Lauren:

Welcome to the perpetual traffic podcast.

Lauren:

I am your host for today.

Lauren:

It is Lauren E.

Lauren:

Petrillo, founder of Mognus Media as Ralph, our co host is letting me

Lauren:

connect with our very special guests.

Lauren:

very talented agency owner himself, Eddie Malouf.

Lauren:

And I'm so excited to connect with Eddie, who is here today to talk about

Lauren:

everything that he has seen working in 2024 and some predictions of what

Lauren:

we think is going to help our clients and future brands in the year ahead.

Lauren:

So yeah.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Eddie:

you.

Eddie:

Thank you, Lauren.

Eddie:

Happy to be here.

Eddie:

Super excited for our talk today.

Eddie:

It's already gotten a little exciting behind the scenes that people are

Eddie:

never going to hear, hopefully.

Eddie:

so I'm excited to continue the fun conversations.

Eddie:

successful.

Eddie:

60 million

Lauren:

For those that aren't privileged enough to be in the pre

Lauren:

recording time, you got to miss how we broke down the success of Cardi B's

Lauren:

OnlyFans account and why and where.

Lauren:

Yeah, very successful, whether it's top of funnel, middle funnel.

Eddie:

They might not know that

Lauren:

Yeah.

Lauren:

130, 000 a day successful.

Eddie:

crazy.

Lauren:

so Eddie, for those that, do not know you, whatever reason

Lauren:

that's silly, silly, silly them.

Lauren:

Can you tell us about yourself and bad marketing?

Eddie:

yeah.

Eddie:

So I'm the, founder and CEO of bad marketing.

Eddie:

we're a digital agency specializing in three verticals.

Eddie:

So we have one vertical for local businesses, one for e commerce businesses

Eddie:

and one for info products and courses.

Eddie:

We have about 200 employees total.

Eddie:

We've done this in about four years, a little bit more four

Eddie:

years and four months now.

Eddie:

And, pretty cool.

Eddie:

We got to learn a lot of marketing lessons.

Eddie:

I mean, I've been running ads myself for about 10 years, but as an agency

Eddie:

owner would like actual staff on payroll of some sort, we've been

Eddie:

doing it for a little bit over four.

Eddie:

So it's been a, exciting and stressful journey.

Eddie:

You can see all the gray hair on the side of my head that comes from this business.

Lauren:

Well, for those not watching on YouTube, he says you could see

Lauren:

his gray hair, but he's rocking a hat that's hiding most of the gray

Eddie:

see it on the side, right?

Eddie:

Like it's like that side gray, the beard gray, you know, you

Eddie:

gotta give me some gray credit.

Eddie:

I mean, it's cool if you can't see it even better for me,

Lauren:

No, I can't.

Lauren:

I can't.

Lauren:

So that's like 10 years.

Lauren:

You've been doing this.

Lauren:

I was like, I think you're like three, four years younger than me.

Lauren:

So I was like, how old were you when you started?

Eddie:

I was young.

Eddie:

I couldn't even drink when I started.

Lauren:

So there you

Eddie:

I'm 30.

Lauren:

30, 200 employees and, continuing to grow bad

Lauren:

marketing, which for those that.

Lauren:

Are hearing correctly bat b a d.

Lauren:

His company is called bad Marketing like you got to explain

Lauren:

that a little bit before we jump into the actual content of the

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

I mean, it's kind of like the liquid death play, right?

Eddie:

It's like the anti hero.

Eddie:

, and so long story short, basically we had another name that was like

Eddie:

super boring and we had it for years.

Eddie:

That was because like the original partners I had and

Eddie:

they were no longer partners.

Eddie:

So the name didn't make sense anymore.

Eddie:

And so, we basically got a lawsuit over our name cause someone else

Eddie:

was using the same name and it was just like this giant thing.

Eddie:

And I was like, this is stupid.

Eddie:

So let's just pick another name and then we're like, what's like the crate?

Eddie:

Like we can pick whatever we want.

Eddie:

We have case studies.

Eddie:

We have staff we make money already.

Eddie:

Like we don't need to like do something that pleases people.

Eddie:

So like if we really wanted to be ourselves, who would we be?

Eddie:

And we all decided, you know, the way we act is like super bold, disruptive,

Eddie:

like the anti of everything else.

Eddie:

And that's kind of how we've always done things in one.

Eddie:

And so someone sarcastically said, why don't we just go with bad marketing?

Eddie:

And they all laughed.

Eddie:

And I was like, that's a great idea and went to buy all the domains, the handles

Eddie:

and everything over the next few months.

Eddie:

And we ran with it.

Eddie:

And it's been awesome, honestly, like it's been one of the best decisions

Eddie:

we've ever made in the company.

Lauren:

To go it's been so good since you went bad

Eddie:

So good since we've gone bad.

Eddie:

And our motto is actually we make good brands go bad.

Lauren:

That's good.

Lauren:

Or is that bad?

Eddie:

Depends if it's capitalized or not.

Eddie:

Even internally, capital bad is like one thing.

Eddie:

Fully lowercase bad is bad bad.

Eddie:

Like, not good bad.

Lauren:

Gotcha.

Lauren:

Gotcha.

Lauren:

Cool.

Lauren:

so with that, I mean you've been in the space for 10 years.

Lauren:

You have a team for four years.

Lauren:

what I was really excited to talk about with you, agency owner

Lauren:

to agency owner, like a lot of people listening to this podcast.

Lauren:

We're close to Black Friday, end of year.

Lauren:

most people are already in their Black Friday holiday promotions, but what

Lauren:

they're not ready for necessarily are The things to come in 2025.

Lauren:

So I thought it'd be really cool just to hear from you.

Lauren:

Like, what are some of the things that you're looking for and gearing

Lauren:

up for in 2025 for your clients?

Lauren:

Like, what is there any?

Lauren:

Area that you're doubling down in for either info products, e commerce

Lauren:

or your local business clients.

Eddie:

I think we're doubling down on a lot of affiliate promotions as a whole.

Eddie:

So like, you can look at it.

Eddie:

Per platform, if we're talking like info products, it's probably

Eddie:

more like shared JV lists, cross promoting from list to list.

Eddie:

if we're talking about like e commerce, it'd be like affiliate

Eddie:

marketing on things like tiktok shop or amazon through influencers.

Eddie:

those are definitely things that we're doubling down on in every category.

Eddie:

We're You know, on the info side, creating a lot of JV partnerships between

Eddie:

people in the same spaces that sell non competing products, it's just kind of

Eddie:

free money for everyone across the board.

Eddie:

They've already spent the money for those leads.

Eddie:

And then on tick tock, we're doubling down and basically bring on our e

Eddie:

commerce clients on tick tock shop, just on profit share agreements and, building

Eddie:

basically a giant network of affiliates and creators that can sell their products.

Eddie:

And, we know that Lauren is really good at pet products, for example,

Eddie:

whenever pet products come our way, we, source them to Lauren.

Eddie:

And then she promotes them and that becomes like kind of her niche and

Eddie:

category for clients like ours.

Eddie:

so definitely something I'm doubling down on as a company.

Eddie:

And I think the reason was of this whole year, I think there

Eddie:

was just a lot of lack of trust.

Eddie:

It was hard to get people to check out, in e commerce.

Eddie:

It's harder to get people and info to show up to a sales call

Eddie:

because there's a lack of trust.

Eddie:

On and on and on in every industry, right?

Eddie:

And someone used the term, I forgot what it was, but like trust

Eddie:

inflation or something like that.

Eddie:

Basically, just like, it's harder to earn someone's trust now than

Eddie:

it was a year or two years.

Eddie:

I mean, heck, when I started running ads 8, 9, 10 years ago, like I

Eddie:

just run anything and anyone would buy anything and submit a lead

Eddie:

for like pennies on the dollar.

Eddie:

today it's much different, right?

Eddie:

You got a, Earn the trust a little bit more.

Eddie:

And so I think affiliate marketing is the fastest way to earn that trust because

Eddie:

you're going through someone else.

Eddie:

I think there was a period where like influencers were less trusted because

Eddie:

everyone knew that they were making money.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Lauren:

Hashtag ad and how that

Eddie:

exactly

Lauren:

everything with Instagram.

Eddie:

everything.

Eddie:

Right.

Eddie:

And now people are like, Oh my gosh, like this guy's just doing it for money.

Eddie:

And so like conversions went down.

Eddie:

And then now because of things like Tik TOK shop, it's actually the opposite.

Eddie:

It's like, I'm proud that I'm making money from this.

Eddie:

And it's okay that I'm public about it.

Eddie:

And the people that I'm talking, that know I'm talking about this product,

Eddie:

no, I'm making money off this product and I'm actually just building

Eddie:

trust with them because I'm actually only selling them good products.

Eddie:

And so now the trust has kind of shifted to like, Oh, if I've bought something

Eddie:

from this creator, it's a good product.

Eddie:

I trust him.

Eddie:

And so now it's actually the opposite.

Eddie:

Whereas instead of having less trust, there's actually so much more trust

Eddie:

because they've established that over time from selling other good products.

Eddie:

so it's a very interesting time we live in, This has been a rollercoaster

Eddie:

of trust on the influencer space.

Eddie:

And I think we're gonna have a pretty good opportunity of the next few years in it.

Lauren:

I think it's interesting where it's like you talk about, when we

Lauren:

think about influencers and like two years ago, especially for Gen Z buyers.

Lauren:

They grew up with influencers, bought what influencers said, and

Lauren:

then a lot of influencers selling supplements, unsafe, untested

Lauren:

products, tanked their reputation.

Lauren:

Obviously what happened with the Jenner Kardashians and some of the stuff that

Lauren:

they've promoted, Fyre Festival being like one of the most obvious cases, that trust

Lauren:

in celebrity influencers really tanked.

Lauren:

But what you're talking about is a lot more creators, content creators,

Lauren:

where this is their full time business.

Lauren:

And I think what is really powerful in a lot of that is, You don't

Lauren:

necessarily have to be an influencer to be influential because I bet you there

Lauren:

are a lot of micro and nano influencers, maybe even some content creators with

Lauren:

100, 000 followers that are super loyal and they're super dedicated because

Lauren:

they're talking about stuff in the equestrian space, for example, and when

Lauren:

you're A content creator at the top of your game for that specific field.

Lauren:

And you have a product that you actually put your name and brand

Lauren:

behind, not just your face.

Lauren:

I think that makes sense as a way for a lot more people to double down on that.

Lauren:

Trust inflation.

Lauren:

If that's the term that makes a lot of sense, of course, as well.

Lauren:

you're talking about the e commerce side.

Lauren:

I'd love for you to go even deeper on the, Info side, because I bet a lot of people

Lauren:

are in the space right now where people aren't showing up to these phone calls.

Lauren:

They're not attending the webinars or watching them all the way through.

Lauren:

They're consuming content and it's just this like content overload.

Lauren:

And it's just, why aren't you following through?

Lauren:

Didn't you love what I had to say?

Lauren:

Oh

Eddie:

Yeah, I mean, it's, as of the time that we're filming this, like

Eddie:

these are kind of the lowest show rates I've seen in a while across most

Eddie:

call funnel or, you know, high ticket or info product brands as a whole.

Eddie:

I think we just kind of have to go further of.

Eddie:

It's either at the beginning of the funnel or in the middle of the funnel.

Eddie:

We have to drag it out a bit, meaning like, how many touch points are we giving

Eddie:

the consumer before they become a lead?

Eddie:

Or how many touch points are we giving the consumer between the

Eddie:

time that become a lead and the time that they show up for a call?

Eddie:

and how easy is that process versus making it more difficult?

Eddie:

So The value is there for them showing up the call because how much they've

Eddie:

already invested prior to the call.

Eddie:

and something that we're conscious of is like, yeah, like people

Eddie:

aren't going to watch everything.

Eddie:

And so, we always like have layers.

Eddie:

So like, let's just take a webinar at the top webinar, you know, let's call it two

Eddie:

hours, for example, sake to our webinar.

Eddie:

I mean, not everyone's going to watch that, right?

Eddie:

Let's just say 30 percent of people are going to watch that.

Eddie:

Another 20 percent from replays.

Eddie:

Okay, so we call it 50%.

Eddie:

There's another 50 percent that will just never watch that, because

Eddie:

they realize how long it is.

Eddie:

But what if I just sent that 50 percent a 16 minute VSL of the same content

Eddie:

that was in the webinar condensed?

Eddie:

Would they watch it?

Eddie:

Well, let's just say another 50 percent would go watch that out of that 50.

Eddie:

Now I have 25 percent remaining that haven't watched anything.

Eddie:

I probably can't get 50 percent of those people to do anything, but if

Eddie:

I can get 20 percent of those people, which is another 5 percent of the

Eddie:

original total, To read something.

Eddie:

Hey, how about I give it to them instead of a video format?

Eddie:

How about I turn the VSL into like a really good sales page and how many of

Eddie:

these people that didn't attend, didn't want to read any of this, or watch

Eddie:

any of this because they don't want to sit there and watch would gladly spend

Eddie:

a few minutes scrolling on a toilet seat to understand everything that

Eddie:

they originally were interested in for.

Eddie:

I have friends who sit on the toilet for 20 minutes, and they're

Eddie:

just reading the whole time.

Eddie:

You know what I mean?

Eddie:

So,

Lauren:

Now, are these friends with kids?

Lauren:

Because there's also like privacy where you're like, it's 20 minutes of silence.

Lauren:

So they're locking that door and be like, I'm in the bathroom.

Eddie:

no, those are like 45 minute bathroom breaks for those friends.

Eddie:

That's another category of it.

Eddie:

But yeah, I mean, that's basically what we're doing.

Eddie:

We're basically like trying to find different mediums for people to consume

Eddie:

the same information and starting with the one with the, you know, the most

Eddie:

time with the consumer between us and them and then slowly dwindling it down.

Eddie:

Essentially, it's probably different opportunities to consume the same info.

Lauren:

So if that's you're finding that in 2024, you've been distilling

Lauren:

the information that people are missing because they've already opted in, they've

Lauren:

shown interest in wanting to consume it.

Lauren:

But we're busy human beings, we're forgetful human beings.

Lauren:

And we've got a lot of things competing for attention.

Lauren:

So you in 2024, what you have found working has been distilling that

Lauren:

information down to shorter form of content and to diverse forms

Lauren:

of content for them to consume.

Lauren:

How are you going to take that further in 2025?

Lauren:

Does that apply for just in time webinars, like live webinars,

Lauren:

everything and everything in between?

Eddie:

Yeah, I mean, I've already done that.

Eddie:

it's for we do that for everything at this point.

Eddie:

Obviously, we're not going to do it like day one because we don't know

Eddie:

if that webinar is going to convert.

Eddie:

And when we turn into the VSL or sales page doesn't make sense.

Eddie:

But like once a webinar is running, those are ways that we basically re optimize it.

Eddie:

And so I mean, going into 2025, It's not like this is something

Eddie:

that everyone is doing yet.

Eddie:

I mean, I know a lot of people selling info products, and I

Eddie:

don't think any of them are doing something like this just yet.

Eddie:

And if they are, they're definitely not taking it to a tech sales page.

Eddie:

So I think there's just still so much opportunity to still take the same

Eddie:

exact path we've been taking just with more people and rolling it across

Eddie:

the board versus just being kind of something that we tested this year.

Lauren:

what about for local businesses?

Lauren:

What have you seen help local businesses in 2024 that you're

Lauren:

going to then double down in for

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

Yeah, great question.

Eddie:

I think content creation is something that local businesses struggle at for ads.

Eddie:

And so I'll give you an example.

Eddie:

Let's just take, I don't know, local chiropractor.

Eddie:

So, like, four years ago, I could run a square image on Canva saying 29 back

Eddie:

adjustment, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Eddie:

And then I get flooded with leads and they come in.

Eddie:

I can do the same thing now.

Eddie:

Leads will be more expensive.

Eddie:

Less of them will actually respond and show up.

Eddie:

Kind of all the metrics of trust are dwindled, or I could invest

Eddie:

time into one time, just scripting some really creative concepts and

Eddie:

videos for the local businesses.

Eddie:

They film them on their phone.

Eddie:

I edit them to be an engaging, educational and funny type video.

Eddie:

, and I run those as ads and let's just say I say I pay the same price as the person

Eddie:

who's running an image ad to get a lead.

Eddie:

but my leads are better.

Eddie:

They're more educated, and they show up more and purchase more, much

Eddie:

more compared to the ones and just square image with the promotion.

Eddie:

So we're doubling down on that.

Eddie:

We have, on the local business that we've never had video editors.

Eddie:

We just have graphic designers and stuff like that.

Eddie:

Cause it's like local businesses.

Eddie:

now we're building an entire video editing team around local businesses and doing it

Eddie:

for those businesses as like a service.

Eddie:

They film it on their phones.

Eddie:

They send it to us.

Eddie:

We do it again.

Eddie:

I'm not going to post organically.

Eddie:

but I will do it just to have better ads because our while be significantly

Eddie:

better and then as a local business, we're advising them on posting

Eddie:

organically because there is so much money to be made from just posting

Eddie:

organically as a local business.

Eddie:

And even when you run ads, the thing is, like, if you really look at the ads path,

Eddie:

A lot of people, what they're doing is, they actually go to an ad on Instagram.

Eddie:

They don't actually click the button on the ad.

Eddie:

They go and click the profile of the person that is running the ad.

Eddie:

And then the profile essentially becomes your landing page slash like business

Eddie:

card, whatever, however you want to take that essentially, that's what it becomes.

Eddie:

so, I heavily advise them all and give them advice on how to build their social

Eddie:

media organically for that reason for me.

Eddie:

But, really what I'm doing is I'm just investing more heavily into content.

Eddie:

I look at what everyone's not doing and that's what I try to do.

Eddie:

So like everyone is trying to replace people with AI.

Eddie:

Conversational bots.

Eddie:

Cool.

Eddie:

I could do that.

Eddie:

I'm just another person.

Eddie:

It's not a special edge.

Eddie:

Everyone's trying to do automations on go high level.

Eddie:

Great.

Eddie:

Not a special edge.

Eddie:

Everyone's trying to white label ICO.

Eddie:

Great.

Eddie:

Not a special edge.

Eddie:

How many people are actually like doing really sick ads for local businesses at

Eddie:

a low cost and running them at scale?

Eddie:

None.

Eddie:

Like, I mean, obviously not none, but like it's like single percentage digits.

Eddie:

and that's what stand out.

Eddie:

So that's what we're focused on.

Eddie:

And the difference is night and day between someone who has a really

Eddie:

good video and someone just has like an average ad like everyone else.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Lauren:

So a lot of local businesses, when you're saying there aren't a lot of people

Lauren:

that will do it because local businesses tend to have really small budgets.

Lauren:

And they have a smaller market.

Lauren:

They can only attract the drive in market if they have one single

Lauren:

location for brick and mortar.

Lauren:

What I have seen, at least, a lot of local businesses will hire their best

Lauren:

friend's niece or their neighbor's nephew.

Lauren:

Someone that is just like a younger kid that can film their videos, but

Lauren:

they don't have the conversion mindset for a lot of that storytelling, which

Lauren:

I think you're saying is Is enriching their performance against what is easy,

Lauren:

a canvas, static image ad or something that doesn't showcase personality.

Lauren:

And authenticity and who they are as a local business.

Lauren:

And you're bringing in additional team members cost effective means

Lauren:

because you have such a large production that you can pass those

Lauren:

cost savings onto a local business.

Lauren:

So it's like they're being treated as if they're an enterprise

Lauren:

client, even as a local business.

Eddie:

Exactly.

Eddie:

And in today's world, things are more expensive online.

Eddie:

It's harder to advertise.

Eddie:

It's harder to get to the consumer.

Eddie:

They have way more.

Eddie:

So not only.

Eddie:

Is it more expensive?

Eddie:

But they have way more options.

Eddie:

maybe they used to look at 100 posts a day.

Eddie:

Maybe now they're looking at 1000 posts a day.

Eddie:

And so like the amount of the percentage of their total viewership that you

Eddie:

possibly could have is going down.

Eddie:

It's becoming more expensive to do so.

Eddie:

Everything's just becoming more difficult.

Eddie:

And so like you gotta out edge someone in some category.

Eddie:

and to me, the easiest one that I see is just like better ads content wise.

Lauren:

Better ads content wise, but you said earlier that you don't put those

Lauren:

videos that you make for local business.

Lauren:

You don't recommend that they put them in their organic feed.

Eddie:

No, no.

Eddie:

I just don't manage their organic feed.

Eddie:

So like, you know, I'm not making the videos for the

Eddie:

purpose of their organic feed.

Eddie:

I'm making them just to become a sale.

Lauren:

Makes sense.

Lauren:

Makes sense.

Lauren:

So then, with coming out of black Friday and moving into the holiday

Lauren:

season, is there anything, that you find that you're super invested in?

Lauren:

Like, I know everyone's focused on black Friday right now.

Lauren:

And then the free commerce, at least ship before Christmas.

Lauren:

But what is, that next focus?

Lauren:

For your clients.

Lauren:

And we can go vertical by vertical, like for e commerce.

Lauren:

what is that pivot immediately after they can't shift or they

Lauren:

can't in time for Christmas,

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

I mean, the shipping time for Christmas one is kind of a weird one because at

Eddie:

this point, most of the brands we work with are prepared to like get everything

Eddie:

up to like the 22nd, 23rd there on time.

Eddie:

What we used to do though, cause we would yeah.

Eddie:

I mean, someone will come up with a new product.

Eddie:

We'd sell out way too fast and then we'd have like, you know, a 20 day period

Eddie:

where they definitely couldn't get it.

Eddie:

we would give them like the ability to buy it, to pre purchase

Eddie:

it essentially, and like have their name on a top specifically.

Eddie:

and then we just give them like some sort of bonus, to kind of compensate for it,

Eddie:

but make it still a good enough offer for them to be worth buying, upfront.

Eddie:

But as soon as black Friday, cyber Monday ends, honestly, like we're

Eddie:

pretty focused, um, unless it's like a.

Eddie:

gifting type brand.

Eddie:

we're, we're pretty focused on like you want.

Eddie:

So I'll give you an example.

Eddie:

we're really heavy into supplements.

Eddie:

supplements like don't necessarily smash it in December.

Eddie:

but like as soon as December 26 comes around supplements, start killing it.

Eddie:

Like

Lauren:

new year, new you.

Eddie:

Yeah, new year, new you like people now don't think like, Oh, I'm

Eddie:

saving up to buy gifts for Christmas or whatever the thought process is like

Eddie:

vacation mode slowly kind of goes away.

Eddie:

January 1st.

Eddie:

There's like another uptake because vacation mode like really goes away.

Eddie:

there's like, I don't know why, but like half of the world thinks like

Eddie:

between Christmas and New Year's like there's not a week and it's just

Eddie:

like, you know what I'm talking about?

Eddie:

It's just like, they're like retired for seven days.

Eddie:

New Year's, like, basically start New Year's Eve starts on, like, the 26th.

Lauren:

Well, that's my birthday is New Year's Eve and I start

Lauren:

celebrating on the 26th.

Lauren:

So let's be real.

Lauren:

I have a female, my mom saved the best for last the real.

Lauren:

Truth story was though that she demanded I got out by midnight

Lauren:

because she wanted the tax incentive.

Eddie:

so funny.

Eddie:

That's crazy.

Lauren:

Subscribe to New Year's Eve starts December 26 because

Eddie:

Why wouldn't you?

Eddie:

It's your birthday.

Eddie:

I mean, for me, it probably started December 1st.

Eddie:

If that the case, you know, uh,

Lauren:

my mom's birthday is December 2nd.

Lauren:

So I have to give her her Her time to shine, but I'll,

Lauren:

I'll evaluate December 3rd.

Eddie:

December 3rd.

Eddie:

I mean, even even the 10th, I give her a week.

Eddie:

You know what I mean?

Eddie:

She's done a lot.

Lauren:

Should I did come out of her body.

Lauren:

So thanks mom.

Eddie:

but yeah, we're focused, we're focused on January and even like

Eddie:

from an agency perspective, right?

Eddie:

If you're an agency owner, I already have landing pages, ads, everything

Eddie:

built for January from now to get more clients and all of them are around like

Eddie:

the obvious angles, which is like, did you miss your black Friday targets?

Eddie:

Did you miss your Q4 targets?

Eddie:

That's a very strong time of transition for e commerce brands

Eddie:

like they decide if they did or did not hit their annual goals.

Eddie:

And like usually the first person that they're blaming is the marketing agency.

Eddie:

So always, right?

Eddie:

It's like, why didn't you fix my entire company?

Eddie:

Well, because I'm only in charge of two facebook ads, and not the

Eddie:

other 900 things that you have.

Lauren:

Right.

Lauren:

But it's a make or break it season for a lot of e commerce brands.

Lauren:

Cause they could be getting as much as 50 percent of their entire annual

Lauren:

revenue in a matter of two weeks.

Eddie:

exactly.

Eddie:

Right.

Eddie:

So it is make or break.

Eddie:

so basically a lot are breaking is really the point.

Eddie:

as an agency in January, you definitely want to focus on that angle.

Eddie:

I started in December.

Eddie:

Like, as soon as Black Friday ends, I literally turn on the ads and it's

Eddie:

like, did you miss your targets for Q4?

Eddie:

Did you miss your targets for Black Friday?

Eddie:

Cyber Monday?

Eddie:

make you one better than Q4.

Eddie:

And it's like my entire angle.

Eddie:

And That's how I mean, that's how we built our agency, right?

Eddie:

I find the angles that make sense based on the time of the year

Eddie:

and everything that's happening.

Eddie:

And then I write it.

Eddie:

So like even this year, like there was like the whole election, like

Eddie:

I ran an entire angle with a trump actor got make marketing bad again.

Eddie:

and just like rode the wave of, trump almost getting shot

Eddie:

and everything else in between.

Eddie:

Right?

Eddie:

And so, Same for Q1.

Eddie:

I am, I'll ride the wave of all the people in Q4 that are complaining that Black

Eddie:

Friday wasn't as good as it was what we thought it was going to be this year.

Eddie:

There's too much competition, blah, blah, blah.

Eddie:

so as an agency, that's what I'll be focused on.

Eddie:

and then as an e com brand, again, some of these guys like naturally thrive

Eddie:

in Q1 more than they do in Q4, to be

Lauren:

Yeah.

Lauren:

The health and wellness space is just, it is your black Friday.

Lauren:

For until what, February 16th, when people give up on their new year's resolutions.

Eddie:

think that's called January 2nd.

Lauren:

Okay.

Lauren:

Oh, look, I'm going to celebrate my birthday for at least a week.

Lauren:

I'm going to hold my new year's resolutions for at least a month.

Lauren:

That's how this works for

Eddie:

Okay, that's good.

Lauren:

But yeah, no.

Lauren:

So, I mean, for, for sure, there's a lot more brands as even in the info

Lauren:

space, because everyone's in a place of reevaluating where they are, how was their

Lauren:

year reflecting on what they want 2025.

Lauren:

So even for those.

Lauren:

Info clients, I'm sure is there.

Lauren:

It put in the self help personal growth business space.

Lauren:

If they have something that can either be a biz op or an opportunity for you

Lauren:

to improve yourself as who you are, you can have a bang on January and find

Lauren:

that you're slower, come August, come September when kids are back to school

Lauren:

and you're prepping for the holidays.

Eddie:

Yeah, that's so accurate.

Eddie:

I mean, January, January is like across the board.

Eddie:

January competes with November for us in every space because of that reason.

Eddie:

And info, it definitely beats it.

Eddie:

Like, we know January is usually like our best month.

Eddie:

and we treat it accordingly.

Eddie:

Like we double budgets in January compared to, March, for

Eddie:

example, just because new me.

Eddie:

New initiatives, new life goals, everything like that.

Eddie:

Right.

Eddie:

And a lot of honestly, a lot of the info products that we work on are

Eddie:

either biz op, like money making based or health and wellness space.

Eddie:

And both of them are like January.

Eddie:

They're just like a different level of motivation and higher

Eddie:

buyer intent as a whole.

Eddie:

So I

Lauren:

So then what is something that you saw either clients come to

Lauren:

you with or prospects are talking to you about that you're like, I.

Lauren:

Stop that right now.

Lauren:

We are not doing that moving forward.

Lauren:

That was such a gimmick.

Lauren:

Go away.

Lauren:

You watched a Tik TOK video where this thing works.

Lauren:

It's not going to work anymore.

Lauren:

Like what is the thing that you have seen a lot of brands ask you about

Lauren:

or that current or past clients were doing that you're like, Nope, this is

Lauren:

not going to continue moving forward.

Eddie:

Yeah, I think it's really just media buying hacks.

Eddie:

I'll put it in like a whole category.

Eddie:

So like, they'll hear someone who's supposedly spends a lot of money on ads

Eddie:

somewhere say like, Oh, if you like.

Eddie:

Click this button and run this ad this way specifically and blah, blah, blah.

Eddie:

Then, you're going to absolutely blow it out the water and that's all you

Eddie:

really need to change this whole account.

Eddie:

honestly, I'll tell you like my most successful accounts that spend the most

Eddie:

money with the most return on ad spend.

Eddie:

Have the simplest media buying structures with the best ads and copy and angles

Eddie:

and funnels and so many people look at the ads as if they're like the thing that

Eddie:

runs the whole business when it's really just like The area where they transact.

Eddie:

So like the landing page, let's call it for, you know, marketing sake, like the

Eddie:

landing page is much more important than the traffic and the content on the traffic

Eddie:

is much more important than the buttons that are being pressed in the traffic.

Eddie:

And so, like, even internally, like when we go to solve an account

Eddie:

that maybe is underperforming.

Eddie:

My media bars will be like, Oh, I'm going to do a cost cap structure

Eddie:

and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Eddie:

And I'm like, okay, cool.

Eddie:

How about you just duplicate that?

Eddie:

You do that for you and duplicate it for me and change this headline to

Eddie:

this and add this at the beginning of this video ad and tell me who

Eddie:

wins and I'll crush the results.

Eddie:

because I think we're in a world where like, Facebook and Google

Eddie:

algorithms, TikTok algorithms, like they're getting really good.

Eddie:

AI is getting integrated into them, whether we are told that or not.

Eddie:

and they're just going to continually improve to find the right buyer

Eddie:

pool based on previous data.

Eddie:

And it's our job just to have The highest level copy messaging, creative,

Eddie:

whatever it is, because that is going to be the highest leverage thing compared

Eddie:

to like trying to really refine more technical button clicking side of things.

Eddie:

I just don't think that's going to be as high of a leverage activity as

Eddie:

it has been, for the last 10 years.

Eddie:

So I think I think that's probably my biggest thing that I like, like, even now,

Eddie:

a client saw a video he said make this change i'm like we just got a 12x return

Eddie:

last week Why would I change anything?

Eddie:

Oh this video from this guy said that i'm like that guy learns from me like

Eddie:

yeah, there's a lot of opinions out there of things but I just think

Eddie:

we're moving in a direction where those assets are going to be more valuable

Eddie:

than the technology necessarily.

Lauren:

Interesting.

Lauren:

So the assets will be more valuable than the technology.

Lauren:

I hear you when, you said, talk about earlier about like the trust inflation

Lauren:

and then you just have this when a client is like, this is what I've seen.

Lauren:

This is what I want.

Lauren:

It's like an affiliate or an influencer.

Lauren:

And their space, because a lot of clients are intermediate marketers.

Lauren:

Like they know enough about it.

Lauren:

And if you're listening to this podcast and you own a brand yourself, like,

Lauren:

you know enough about marketing, so you can hold your agency and your marketing

Lauren:

teams accountable to the results you're looking for, but it can be like

Lauren:

those hacks and those viral videos where this works really well for me.

Lauren:

For me, I get so annoyed because I'm like, there's not an entire picture here.

Lauren:

How much money did they spend?

Lauren:

How much profit did they have?

Lauren:

This blew up in one category, but look at the window you're looking at.

Lauren:

That says 2020.

Lauren:

That was a pandemic year.

Lauren:

Those numbers are not the same.

Lauren:

We need to back this up.

Lauren:

Like I feel granted, we're coming off of the election and it's just been a

Lauren:

fact checking kind of space anyways.

Lauren:

But a lot of those hacks that come forward or come from conversations, I'm

Lauren:

like, yes, we can absolutely test it.

Lauren:

Always be testing.

Lauren:

Don't get me wrong.

Lauren:

wrong, but let's have fair and realistic expectations because what one person

Lauren:

said may not necessarily be true because a thousand and a half other factors

Lauren:

that can go into it, but it sure made them popular for that instant real.

Eddie:

That's for sure.

Eddie:

I'll tell you the political reels right now are very popular.

Eddie:

I am, I am not shy to say I am taking advantage of.

Eddie:

The viewership.

Eddie:

I never talk politics, but I'm like, it's working right now.

Eddie:

So I'll talk about him for a little bit

Lauren:

Well, I think that's a really important part for a lot

Lauren:

of people listening for 2025.

Lauren:

At least I can say that what we have found working in 2024 that we want

Lauren:

to continue and caring is how do we disrupt an existing conversation

Lauren:

by inserting a brand or a story.

Lauren:

And so you've been doing that really well.

Lauren:

With politics and where you're intersecting a trending conversation and

Lauren:

leveraging it in a way that fits your brand, whether you're a Trump fan or not,

Lauren:

that's not the point you're leveraging, his slogan and applying it to marketing

Lauren:

so that you can interrupt the feet of what people are already consuming.

Lauren:

So I think that's really important.

Lauren:

I mean, you're talking about like doubling down on content,

Lauren:

creating quality content with AI.

Lauren:

There are so many tools that enable you to make content.

Lauren:

So quickly and so cost effectively, but what I've at least seen in 2024 that I

Lauren:

don't want to continue in 2025 is the devaluation of quality because when you're

Lauren:

using AI, you're using lots of tools, you're creating more a lower quality

Lauren:

and you're just, you're doing a spray and pray and playing a volume game and

Lauren:

forgive me on this Eddie, but this is how I assume men date on Tinder apps.

Lauren:

It's just a volume.

Lauren:

I'm swiping on everything.

Lauren:

Copy, pasting, copy, pasting, copy, pasting.

Lauren:

and I can't imagine that.

Lauren:

Most of those individuals find love, maybe what they're looking for, they'll

Lauren:

find, 'cause it's a volume game.

Lauren:

But if you're trying to like, build a relationship with the brand and get

Lauren:

customer loyalty, that personalization, that quality is gonna be a stronger play.

Eddie:

Yeah, no 100 percent I mean I agree with you on all aspects of it

Eddie:

I'm interested to see where I does take us though because I mean I can't

Eddie:

afford to be obsessed with it If I was like jobless and didn't have a massive

Eddie:

company to run then I would probably be obsessing with AI and I Going crazy over

Eddie:

it, but, I don't have that blessing.

Eddie:

So, I put myself in like the early adopter phase, but not in the,

Eddie:

like, whatever comes before that.

Eddie:

but

Lauren:

Mm.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Lauren:

The, super fanatics, the ones that are gonna break the systems and

Eddie:

exactly.

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

Like I'm going to learn from someone else.

Eddie:

I'm not going to be the one paving the way by any means on that side.

Eddie:

but I, can already tell like creatives are going to be the thing.

Eddie:

That has the biggest leverage from the marketing side, at least short term.

Eddie:

And a lot of people creatively are going to be out of jobs or going to have to find

Eddie:

ways to use AI to output 10 X, what they currently are in order to keep their jobs.

Lauren:

When you say 10 X, for me, when I agree with you, 100 percent

Lauren:

like AI inserted into the marketplace for marketing has been amazing, but

Lauren:

also hard for a lot of businesses.

Lauren:

I can only speak to what we've done at Marmos Media.

Lauren:

We use AI.

Lauren:

We've been using Jasper for years.

Lauren:

We've been using Surfer SEO.

Lauren:

And by years, I mean, Jasper has been around for like three years.

Lauren:

That's not actually a long time that an AI software has been around, but we have been

Lauren:

using it so that we can produce higher amount While maintaining quality at the

Lauren:

same price that it would have taken us to do before so we've become more efficient

Lauren:

But there's definitely a like the 10x piece where we have found ourselves and

Lauren:

Others that aren't leveraging AI that 10x.

Lauren:

It's just it's a growing delta because we can maintain great for a good price You

Lauren:

And you don't have that same dichotomy and I bet you that's gonna be true too

Lauren:

for creators in that 10x where you can definitely 10x in terms of quantity all

Lauren:

day long, but the 10x in terms of quality when you have that creative conversion

Lauren:

based mindset and you're, if you're an existing good creator and you leverage

Lauren:

AI, you become a great creator, but if you're bad and you leverage AI, you.

Lauren:

Lowercase b,

Eddie:

Just making sure,

Lauren:

yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Lauren:

If you're a lowercase b awful creator and you leverage AI,

Lauren:

you're just amplifying awful

Eddie:

Agreed.

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

And it's,

Lauren:

volume, not quality.

Eddie:

And again, it's like conversational, right?

Eddie:

Like you're feeding it the inputs that are going to require the outputs.

Eddie:

And if you suck, then it's going to just give you stuff that

Eddie:

you like, which usually sucks.

Eddie:

So, I love where it's moving though, towards like us, at least commercially

Eddie:

being able to like read spreadsheets at scale and data at scale and contracts

Eddie:

at scale and all these other things.

Eddie:

I think that's going to be massive.

Eddie:

I think it's definitely going to hurt.

Eddie:

Lawyers who are billing 400 bucks an hour to read a document thousand

Eddie:

bucks an hour to read a document you know, they're kind of all negligent.

Eddie:

Now I can read 100 page document in 16 seconds.

Eddie:

So, I'm really that's what I'm most excited for on the side

Eddie:

because, from a productivity standpoint, I could probably run.

Eddie:

10 times more businesses with the same amount of time just from

Eddie:

being able to process information significantly faster and being

Eddie:

able to make decisions based on it.

Eddie:

So it's really cool.

Eddie:

We'll see a year from now where we're at, but it's growing exponentially though.

Eddie:

Super excited.

Lauren:

Okay, so, in closing thoughts and, final ideas of coming into the end of the

Lauren:

year, your new Black Friday being January.

Lauren:

is there anything right now that you feel is missing from marketing toolkits and

Lauren:

from technology has not yet developed to the way or like, what are those like

Lauren:

crystal ball predictions are like, I just wish this resource was made possible

Lauren:

to make your job and your campaigns that you're running more successful.

Lauren:

Do you have anything?

Eddie:

Yeah.

Eddie:

So there's something that I've been talking about since I was in

Eddie:

university, like back in 2012 ish.

Eddie:

and I'm starting to see it a little bit.

Eddie:

so basically what I, what I was thinking back in those days, I was,

Eddie:

this is exactly the situation I was sitting on my couch in my like dorm,

Eddie:

like, central living room area.

Eddie:

And my roommates were there and like a Domino's ad popped up and we're watching,

Eddie:

like, I think we were watching like Wimbledon or something, some tennis

Eddie:

tournament and, Domino's ad popped up and I was like, How, lame is it I can't

Eddie:

just, like, turn this into a transaction by, like, clicking yes on my remote?

Eddie:

how come it doesn't connect to my phone directly to just open the Domino's app or

Eddie:

website on my phone by me clicking on it?

Eddie:

And then, now this year, Amazon Prime came out with that feature.

Eddie:

when you run ads on Amazon prime, if you're connected to Amazon of some sort,

Eddie:

you can basically click like down on your TV and it'll basically open it on

Eddie:

your phone, to where that product is on Amazon or some sort of Amazon hosted site.

Eddie:

And so I'm really excited to see where that goes, because I think that is what's

Eddie:

missing because now you're turning.

Eddie:

Television into such a lower friction source of click.

Eddie:

And if we can turn mass media like television, Netflix, streaming

Eddie:

services, et cetera, into like more clicks rather than impressions.

Eddie:

Cause like the click through rate on those ads are so low because

Eddie:

you're not really clicking anything.

Eddie:

You have to like go type in a website, scanning QR code, whatever it is.

Eddie:

Right.

Eddie:

but if I could just like, Next to me and something because

Eddie:

I'm like, that looks sick.

Eddie:

And like even just downshift and they're down, press and like save

Eddie:

it to my phone as a bookmark.

Eddie:

I think techno, I mean, man, from a marketing standpoint that opens

Eddie:

up so many doors, so much more.

Eddie:

Advertising so much more data that we have in those spaces to on those

Eddie:

consumers and their households that now we can like advertise using.

Eddie:

So, that's something that I've gotten a taste of a little bit through

Eddie:

Amazon, but it's only on Amazon.

Eddie:

Like if you watch the ads and they're like Papa John's at, it's never going to have

Eddie:

it because it's not on Amazon, obviously.

Eddie:

but I'm excited for that to become a mass adoption type situation where

Eddie:

it's We can connect our devices via the Wi Fi in the house or wherever

Eddie:

we're at and take a call to action From our phone or from our remote

Eddie:

to our phone from seeing that on TV.

Eddie:

I

Lauren:

I mean, there's no one that's watching TV without their phone in their

Lauren:

hand, and we know that people are like, look, I mean, Amazon has it where you

Lauren:

have x ray and because you're like, Oh, what do I recognize this actor from?

Lauren:

And it's just allowing you to dive deeper into the content you're consuming.

Lauren:

And further into that is you might be watching something like,

Lauren:

I love the jacket she's wearing.

Lauren:

Where do I get that with Google image, like you can scan a picture of anything,

Lauren:

and then it will pull up the Google shopping feed to give you a Something

Lauren:

similar, but it does require extra steps.

Lauren:

It's not a single button click.

Lauren:

and it doesn't give you that frictionless buying experience.

Lauren:

And even further is imagine if that becomes personalized, where you already

Lauren:

have a history of buying books that are referenced in specific TV shows you

Lauren:

like watching, and then you can have like a small pop up want to add this to

Lauren:

your Goodreads list, want to add this to your cart, things of that nature.

Lauren:

So that all you have to do is like with your AirPods, you can shake your head.

Lauren:

Yes.

Lauren:

If that's how you're listening and then it's already taking that transaction step,

Lauren:

but I do, I don't know if you remember this, there was a Super Bowl ad and I

Lauren:

want to say it was Domino's that did it where they had in the ad where it was

Lauren:

like, Hey, insert the name of the apple.

Lauren:

human voice that if I say it right now, she's going to start talking to me.

Lauren:

Hey, uh, order me Domino's pizza.

Eddie:

Yeah

Lauren:

And so they had tried to take it where they could use the

Lauren:

internet of things and different devices from TV to force it.

Lauren:

And it was just like, wait, I didn't order that.

Lauren:

Hold on.

Lauren:

She's listening to the wrong

Eddie:

so funny.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Eddie:

so funny.

Eddie:

I feel like I remember hearing that Uh,

Lauren:

to say it was Domino's, but it was definitely a, maybe it was

Lauren:

a Papa John's or Little Caesars, but there was a pizza brand.

Lauren:

Anyone that's listening to this, if you remember that or find that

Lauren:

exact commercial, like please go to the Telegram group, pretzeltraffic

Lauren:

forward slash pretzeltraffic.

Lauren:

com forward slash Telegram and please send it to me because I was

Lauren:

like, oh my gosh, it was brilliant.

Lauren:

But the lawsuit side of it ended up getting more earned media because.

Lauren:

It was an intrusion to their listening devices, but there was no precedent

Lauren:

or law that said you couldn't do it.

Eddie:

that's crazy.

Lauren:

Yeah.

Eddie:

I can't believe like that wasn't even thought of as a consequence.

Lauren:

Well, look, when there's a will, there's a way.

Lauren:

There's always a way to hack or, leverage emerging technologies, because usually the

Lauren:

people that are designing the technology aren't the evil geniuses of how they can

Lauren:

leverage it for their specific use case.

Lauren:

Well, Eddie, thank you so much for jumping in and helping me like

Lauren:

riff, like agency owner to agency owner, like what you think is going.

Lauren:

Obviously you have such a successful lead bad.

Lauren:

Marketing company, capital B.

Lauren:

but I think a lot of listeners are super lucky to hear your insight

Lauren:

because of the number of accounts and clients you've had the chance to work

Lauren:

with and work on, if anyone that's listening, wants to further connect

Lauren:

with you, where can they best find you?

Eddie:

yeah, so, uh, Instagram, just my first and last name, Eddie Maloof

Eddie:

or YouTube first and last name.

Eddie:

YouTube is more long form, like very in depth, kind of high IQ ish content.

Eddie:

Instagrams, bits and pieces of that other stuff with some nice cars.

Eddie:

Fun stuff.

Eddie:

So, I run all my social stuff on Instagram.

Eddie:

So if you DM me, it's, me answering, not a appointment center or a robot.

Eddie:

So feel free to reach out if you guys have any questions or anything I can help with.

Lauren:

Cool.

Lauren:

That's Malouf.

Lauren:

M a L O U F Eddie.

Lauren:

Thank you so, so much for joining and for all of us that listening.

Lauren:

I hope you got just as much value as I got out to it.

Lauren:

And, Wishing everyone, your clients, your brands, very happy

Lauren:

Q4 and a even more momentous Q1.

Eddie:

Love it.

Eddie:

Same to you, Lauren.

Eddie:

Thanks so much for having me on the show.

Eddie:

Appreciate it.

Lauren:

See ya!