Ep. #901 - Digital Marketing In 2022 and Beyond

00:00.00

Matt Watson

And we’re back for another episode of Startup Hustle. This is your host today, Matt Watson, and our guest today is Miles Basset from Wildman Web Solutions. We’re gonna be talking today about digital marketing, and excited to talk all about that. Before we get started today, I do want to remind everybody that today’s episode of Startup Hustle is sponsored by Wix. Yes, our friends over at Wix know a thing or two about turning a scrappy startup team into a global organization that serves millions of people. And they want to share what they’ve learned with Startup Hustle listeners. Their new micro-podcast series is called Ready for Takeoff by Wix. When you tune into Ready for Takeoff by Wix, you get to hear from Wix founders and company leaders. They share super short lessons to help you build better programs and teams faster. Hey, that’s a topic I can get behind. Same kind of topic we talked about here on Startup Hustle. Please subscribe and follow Ready for Takeoff by Wix wherever you listen to podcasts. Miles, welcome to the show. I hear you’re the expert at digital marketing. Am I right?

01:02.00

Miles Basset

Thanks for having me, Matt. I don’t know if I’d say, expert. But I’m living in the trenches all day, every day, so that, hopefully, others don’t have to.

01:14.91

Matt Watson

Well, you are the founder and CEO of Wildman Web Solutions. And I see you’re here in Lawrence, Kansas, representing. Are we gonna hear a lot of rock chalk?

01:25.33

Miles Basset

Um, yes. I am. Yeah.

01:32.45

Miles Basset

Oh, it’s not March right now. So no, that’s it.

01:32.60

Matt Watson

Like stuff during this podcast today. So for those of you who are not familiar, Lawrence, Kansas, is home to the world-famous Kansas Basketball team, which won the world college championship this year.

01:48.50

Miles Basset

Yes, we did. It was very exciting. My office is not merely far enough away from campus. To have that, the whole street fills up with parking, and the whole city blows up there for a little while. So, it’s a fun time to be a Pentium.

01:55.52

Matt Watson

Ah, yeah.

02:04.54

Matt Watson

Yeah, so I guess. What is it like to have a company in, I guess, what we would describe as a college town? I mean, Lawrence is more or less a college town, right?

02:15.30

Miles Basset

Very much. It is a unique space; the population of the city fluctuates depending on what time of year. It is a campus that operates as its own mini-city within our city but then bleeds out into it and affects the market.

02:23.83

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

02:34.35

Miles Basset

We have a very vibrant downtown space because of that. Ah, that is similar to other college towns, I think. I always say it’s a nice side of town. It’s got that vibe of the small town where I can walk around downtown and see people that I know. Um, but it’s not so small that there’s nothing to do, and the University, I think, really helps with that. That balance and making sure that we have a lot of interesting things come through town. From music and events to speakers and, you know, all sorts of interesting things.

02:54.80

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah.

03:10.40

Miles Basset

Only a University draws.

03:10.86

Matt Watson

So Lawrence is about an hour from Kansas City, you would say, so what’s it like to own a business and be in Lawrence like how does that impact what you do as a digital marketing company? Does that make it harder for you too?

03:15.65

Miles Basset

Give or take. Yeah.

03:28.96

Matt Watson

Find and attract clients because you’re in Lawrence, or most of your customers are just way outside of the Kansas City area.

03:34.84

Miles Basset

A mix of all of those things, I guess a bulk of our business is in the Northeast Kansas region though we do work nationally, so we got a bunch of ah, a nice sized book of business in Nashville Atlanta all the way down in Florida. I don’t know why we went southeast. That was an intentional thing, but that’s just how our company has grown. We do work a lot locally. Um, as far as you know, I’m struggling to get business or anything. I don’t think that’s the case if we have a large enough market here. There’s one business going on. Know this, but Lawrence was named one of the top tech growth cities in the country as far as new technology jobs. Ah, so there’s a ton of growth happening here. We’re working with the Lawrence Chamber and our economic development.

04:19.55

Matt Watson

Weird.

04:27.14

Matt Watson

Awesome.

04:30.27

Miles Basset

Efforts here to bring all sorts of really good companies. We put a couple of efforts at the University trying to retain talent by keeping people that came here for college and having them actually stay here and start companies. Ah, but yeah, there’s a whole lot more business here than I think.

04:43.50

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

04:48.90

Miles Basset

People may realize looking from the outside.

04:49.30

Matt Watson

Well, and to some degree, I bet it helps you because you can be the big fish in the small pond right instead of being the small fish in the big pond in Kansas City, wouldn’t you say.

04:59.64

Miles Basset

Possibly and that’s why I said it’s a little bit of all of those things because we do work nationally, and there’s no reason for, I mean, it’s a digital company. There’s no reason for us to work with the business down the street versus someone in Alaska. Um.

05:02.78

Matt Watson

Yeah. Um, yeah, yeah.

05:16.37

Miles Basset

So I mean, there is not a natural limitation there. We can work everywhere. But if we really put our effort here locally, we can establish ourselves as the authority in the space, and I think that we’ve effectively done that in the last couple of years, um, if you go to. Anyone here in town. They probably know me or know the company or at least someone on my team, like I said. We do have a little bit of that small-town feel here, and that is nice. Yeah yeah, well, I mean, I have the opportunity to.

05:41.28

Matt Watson

Of course, I was like yeah, I know that wild man. Ah.

05:50.62

Miles Basset

To keep a personal relationship with our clients with the people that we work with, that’s something that, um, I think bigger companies and bigger markets might struggle with. I think that we would probably struggle with that if we were, say, in Kansas City, um, and keeping that personal connection, I know all of our clients on a first-name basis.

05:57.29

Matt Watson

Sure.

06:06.61

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah.

06:09.12

Miles Basset

I ran into them downtown. Our marketing director keeps running into people out on the golf course. Oh yeah, so I mean that’s that personal connection is something that I don’t think could be attainable in a larger market and is an advantage that we have here in Lawrence.

06:25.21

Matt Watson

Yeah, well, I think it’s interesting for those listening, you know, think about, um, you know, working in a smaller city outside of a bigger metro area. I wouldn’t really call Lawrence a suburb of Kansas City. It really is kind of its own city an hour away.

06:38.55

Miles Basset

It might be 1 of these days, but no, not yet. We’re our own thing.

06:42.88

Matt Watson

Yeah, well, you know, so today I want to talk all about digital marketing, and I guess let’s start simple if I asked you what digital marketing is. How would you answer that question: what is digital marketing in 2022?

07:00.62

Miles Basset

That is a good question. It’s kind of an umbrella term and intentionally vague because there is a whole lot that goes into it. I think you first have to start with marketing. I think too many people probably conflate something like sales with marketing, and that’s really not. Not the same thing sales you’re going out, and you are, you know trying to get money or trying to get that conversion trying to get the yes marketing you’re more trying to tell a story to get information out there I think a marketing director does a good job of describing this and saying that sales are talking to None person marketing is talking to everyone.

07:36.94

Matt Watson

There you go. I like that.

07:38.87

Miles Basset

Talking to a lot of people. Um, and so digital marketing is really just using modern technology. Whatever that happens to be as it is changing every 2 seconds um to be more effective marketers, but it is a tool. It’s an end means to an end, and that end is marketing. So. Um, even though I am a technologist, I’m on the software side of things, and I like to think about things in that way. I have to remind myself sometimes that, you know, I am basically a marketer here, and we’re using that technology as a tool to reach more people to tell a story. Um, and to tell that story to the right person in the right way at the right time for our clients.

08:21.77

Matt Watson

So it seems to me it seems as the go-to thing for digital marketing stays is TikTok. Have you done much with Tiktok?

08:32.81

Miles Basset

Yeah, we have a Tiktok. I’m not personally on it too much. That’s not my social media of choice, but we do have one on there. We do work with clients and advise them on doing social media Management. It is The. We’ve been talking about it a long time as king of the new players in town. But it’s really not anymore. It’s an established player at this point. Um, and so I think that having a strategy on there is um.

08:53.60

Matt Watson

Um, yeah, right.

09:06.58

Miles Basset

It’s a nice easy win. Is ah 1 of the benefits of working with the new player in town, if you will, or the smaller markets. There is that it’s easier to get organic reach whereas something like Facebook if you post just something on your page. No one’s going to see it. Um.

09:20.33

Matt Watson

Yeah.

09:23.53

Miles Basset

There’s no, and there’s almost no chance that a large portion of your audience is really going to see it, whereas on Tiktok or 1 of the newer platforms. Um, you can get a whole lot more with a whole lot less.

09:33.38

Matt Watson

Well, we talk about what digital marketing is in 2022 kind of start a conversation here, and yeah, absolutely as Tiktok came out of nowhere right and completely upended social media, and from my perspective anyway, as somebody who used to use Facebook a lot like ah. Somebody said, one day, Facebook is where you go to learn to hate the people you love. It’s like all your friends and family, and you end up with a bunch of political fights and [other things] with them. But TikTok is where you go to learn to love the people you will never meet, right? Like it’s just so much more entertaining.

10:08.96

Miles Basset

Um, that’s an interesting summary.

10:13.10

Matt Watson

And Facebook is just full of politics and bullshit, is what it seems like most of the time, and like I don’t use it anymore.

10:19.39

Miles Basset

I don’t think that it’s going anywhere as a marketer. I think that Facebook is still the most powerful advertising tool ever created by man. Um, and you know, maybe that’ll change at some point, but as of right now, the big players are still Google and Facebook.

10:23.10

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah, yes.

10:37.35

Miles Basset

Now there are these new players in town. As I said, there are some advantages to working with these different platforms. Um, one is you’re going to. You’re going to get your content in front of a very different audience by doing that. Um, you’re going to be able to put out a very different type of content. I think one of the most interesting things that Tiktok did on the landscape was, um, shift how other social media platforms. Ah allowed people to generate content. You’ll notice after Tiktok comes out. Instagram started doing these reels YouTube is doing their shorts. Um, Facebook has its own version of that. Everyone saw the appetite that was there Tiktok really revealed.

11:13.38

Matt Watson

Yep.

11:22.32

Miles Basset

An underserved portion of the marketplace, and they all start modified and, ah, you know, made their own version of Tiktok. Um, anyway, I say that to say that. Yeah, there are different types of content. There are different audiences on all of these different platforms, and so if you contextualize it properly and put the.

11:27.94

Matt Watson

But

11:41.14

Miles Basset

If the right piece of content is out on the right platform in the right way, then you’re going to be able to reach and hire other segments of your potential client base that you couldn’t get to otherwise.

11:50.34

Matt Watson

Well, and I think I think the key there is depending on the type of business that you have, the social media platform that you would use could be dramatically different, right? Like if you’re doing b to b Linkedin might be the place.

12:01.70

Miles Basset

Um, yeah.

12:06.22

Matt Watson

The place to be. But if you’re doing something like a consumer awareness campaign, maybe TikTok is a great place to be um.

12:12.17

Miles Basset

That’s one of the number one questions that I get. I think we should put that in our faqs on our site or something. Um, but you know people are asking me some version of hey, I have a business I know I should be using social media. There are too many options out there. What should I do, what platform should I do, um, what kind of content should I be putting out there. How often should I post all that kind of stuff which really comes down to logistics, and um, you’re right? It really does depend on the business, the industry, and the person.

12:27.70

Matt Watson

Yeah.

12:46.87

Miles Basset

Um, I always say you know where you’re comfortable. Ah, if you have a social platform that you use Personally, you’re more likely to create good content that makes sense in that context because you understand that platform, and you already know what’s going on there. You have a feel for it rather than just going into it.

12:48.17

Matt Watson

Mark.

13:05.58

Miles Basset

Completely unknown territory. So if you are familiar with Facebook and you’ve never seen Tiktok before, and then you go out and try to make professional content for your business on Tiktok, chances are it’s not going to be very high-quality stuff, and you’re not going to see as much success as if you were too.

13:06.80

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

13:25.33

Miles Basset

You know, stay in the game that you already know even if it’s not the perfect tool for you or if you think, um, you know it’s not reaching the right audience or if you think there might be some advantages on another platform if you’re really hesitating. You don’t know where to start with what you know.

13:41.27

Matt Watson

Yeah, what? What works, you know, it’s like yeah, figure out what works, and you just keep you keep growing it and growing it. I currently work at a company called home local services, and we do digital marketing for home services companies. So like HVAC and plumbing and stuff like that and ah. You know, for our customers. It’s like ninety-something percent is like Google Adwords like people go to Google and search like I need a plumber, right? Like you don’t, you don’t find a plumber on Tiktok unless they’re making cool videos, but it’s like some random plumber that’s not in your city either. It’s like, you know.

14:05.88

Miles Basset

Um, right? Yeah, and that’s one of the reasons to yeah yeah, but I mean, as you said earlier, it’s important to understand the industry, I mean, if you think about the customer journey for someone who’s looking for a plumber.

14:17.86

Matt Watson

Not to me, you’re gonna hire. Yeah.

14:25.25

Matt Watson

Um, yeah, yes.

14:25.46

Miles Basset

It’s because something’s blown up in their house, and they’re water shooting out of the ceiling. They want to search and go to that. So whoever is there at the top they’re getting the business chances anyway. Um.

14:34.49

Matt Watson

Yep, totally different from industry to industry. So if I said to you the term full-service digital marketing, what does that mean to you?

14:44.45

Miles Basset

Well, um, it is a little bit of a buzzword used in our industry, and if you look on our website, I do write about this? Um, where I think that we have, we say that we are a full-service digital agency, and I think that we fulfill that. Promise, um, I think a lot of people just throw that around because they do a couple of things. You know they have a few services, but our mission from day one has been to accumulate technologies and tools and services and wisdom. So that we can offer a holistic solution to small businesses who are just trying to figure this stuff out. There are way too many options out there, from website builders to social media to Seo and Adwords and advertising on all these different social media platforms I think a lot of people get. Lost or confused, and they just don’t know where that first step is going to be, so that’s what I mean when I say full service is that we can take a customer from all the way from a to z anything that they need online when it comes to marketing their business digitally ah that that is what we provide. So if you have nothing, we can work with you to do market research at the very beginning if you’re just in the idea stage of your company. Um, we’ve worked with a couple of companies that are just starting. Ah. You know, just ah, starting a brand new company or they’re opening up a new branch or something and helping them to do market research to figure out exactly where their building should be or if they haven’t figured out their visual brand yet we have designers, and we can do ah a full logo and a brand document for you. Do you know? Maybe you just come to us and say look. I’ve got this name floating around in my head, and that’s it. Can you help me to build a business out of this? Then we can help them advise them and get them set up online. Um, all the way to an established business that just needs a full revamp. We saw a lot of that in the last couple of years covid hit and. Um, you know these businesses that have never needed to be online all of a sudden had to be online tomorrow and intelligently leveraging their online presence, or they’re going to be close and so um, working with them to work with what they had um to work intelligently. Many of them are working on reduced resources. Let’s say and get something out there that really works for them.

17:11.62

Matt Watson

Well, and it feels like as time goes along, all of the stuff just gets more and more complicated. It doesn’t really get any easier. Does it?

17:20.91

Miles Basset

Yes, and no, because all the tools are getting better. Of course, the technology out there is getting better. Um, websites are getting cooler and easier to do. There’s all the advent of all these no-code and low-code software that is making even ah. You know, higher-tier software developments are more accessible and easier. Um, so on the one hand, I think it’s getting easier just because the tools are getting better. The technology is getting better, but on the other hand, there just keeps being more options. There are more and more social media platforms out there. There are more and more website builders out there.

17:52.58

Matt Watson

Yeah.

17:59.53

Miles Basset

Um, it can be difficult to even get started.

17:59.77

Matt Watson

Is it? It’s like how do I build my website and then how do I make it work on mobile and tablets, and yeah, yep.

18:07.10

Miles Basset

And if you search that on Google, you’re going to get 100000000 different answers, and a lot of them are right? They’re just different directions to take.

18:16.88

Matt Watson

And you have all the social media stuff to deal with and of course advertising on Google and retargeting and SEO and content marketing and influencer marketing like all this stuff like there’s one thing, and it seems like there’s just something new every year.

18:29.35

Miles Basset

And that’s why I said ah at the beginning of this. Um, you know I said that I live in the trenches here because that is part of the Gig. My team and I are out there trying out the new platforms before they’re big, trying out the tools before they hit the public market sometimes. Um, and really trying to stay on that cutting edge of what’s happening so that by the time. Um, you know it comes around to Mainstream. We can tell clients we can advise our clients. Hey, this is the play for you? Maybe don’t put as much energy over here.

19:00.17

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

19:04.16

Miles Basset

I know you see that new shiny thing coming up, but it’s not going to be worth it. It’s going to be gone in six months. Here’s something that’s going to be more advantageous. Um, and we can figure out what tools work, kind of go through that trial and error process so that our clients don’t have to. They’re small business owners. They need to focus on what they do best.

19:17.53

Matt Watson

Well, and that’s, and that’s the key value that you provide, or you know, or a full-service digital marketing company provides, right? If you know what works and what doesn’t work. You’ve seen it. You’ve seen it work before, and you’ve seen you know you’ve learned from the mistakes, right? So just like our company.

19:23.30

Miles Basset

Yeah, whether that’s.

19:37.43

Matt Watson

Focuses on home services. We don’t do anything else. We only do home services, but somebody comes to us from that industry. Do we know exactly what to do? We know with a playbook. We know all the industry trends, right? Could we tell them exactly what to do? Um, but we don’t know anything about anything else, right? Like we just focus on that and buy that expertise.

19:49.70

Miles Basset

The better.

19:55.35

Matt Watson

It is extremely valuable.

19:56.14

Miles Basset

Yeah, I was talking with a professional connection a few days ago who is working in the financial space doing bookkeeping, payroll taxes, that kind of thing, and she was just saying, ah, you know how do you stay on top of all this. How do you know? What to do and all this is it seems way too complicated. I can’t. I feel like I’m drowning every time I look into this for my business, and I was like yeah, but I don’t know how taxes work. I can’t keep on top of the US tax code. I don’t know how anyone possibly does that? Um, even something as simple as managing payroll for a small company like mine is. Incredibly challenging, and yet you stay on top of it. So it’s really just a matter of specialization, and ah, you know, she works on that so that I don’t have to know how that works. Mike Howton works on all that, so I don’t have to know how all that works, and I can stick with working with this technology and in the digital marketing space. So I know how that works and.

20:35.64

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah.

20:44.60

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

20:53.67

Miles Basset

You don’t have to mess with it.

20:54.76

Matt Watson

Yep well, I bet you have some experience with Wix, and I want to say again. Thank you to them for being our sponsor today. Um, our friends over Wix. The website and business-building platform know a thing or two about turning a scrappy startup team into a global organization serving millions of people. And they want to share what they’ve learned with you in a new micro-podcast series called Ready for Takeoff by Wix. Where the company’s founders and leaders share super short lessons designed to help you build better products and teams faster. Subscribe and follow Ready for Takeoff by Wix right now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you’re listening to us today. I’m gonna guess you’ve probably used Wix. I’d love to hear some of your favorite tools. So you know, if you’re an entrepreneur or a small business owner or whatever and you’re trying to wrestle with all this marketing stuff. What are some of your favorite tools besides Wix, of course?

21:51.37

Miles Basset

Yeah, yeah, I mean, I have worked with Wix along with other website builders out there. Um, I’m not sure if I’m going to have a good answer for you there. I don’t like favorites. But, um, I will always say that there is a right tool for the job. Sometimes Wix is the right tool for the job. Sometimes a different technology might be out there. You know, if someone’s trying to do some more advanced processing it really needs a web application, then we’re going to be doing a very different tech stack. Um, if they have some technical experience, then maybe we’re working within their tech stack, or maybe we’re.

22:10.49

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah.

22:19.20

Matt Watson

Yeah.

22:28.54

Miles Basset

Ah, maybe they have no idea what’s going on. They don’t want to touch it at all. Um, and so we’re just going to go with whatever my favorite technology of the day happens to be, um, I Do think that. Um, there are a couple of tools out there that are very useful for small businesses that are underappreciated. I want to throw those out there. Um. One is a listening tool when I tell people about this. It’s often. The one time that they’ve ever heard about it. Um, I don’t know why it’s not more common than a listing builder or a listing distributor. Um, I think the key to all small businesses is that they should have something like this put in place. Um, the idea is that you have your business listing information, that is, your name, address, phone number, website the basic information about your business that allows you to be found online. You put it into this tool, and it pumps it out everywhere because there are 0 different business directories and apps.

23:23.30

Matt Watson

Oh yeah.

23:25.76

Miles Basset

And map services and search engines and review sites, and I mean just think of all the different places that you have these different business listings. Um, and if you can automate putting those things out there in one or two different locations. Um, and make sure that they are up-to-date and accurate. That is probably the biggest bang for your buck outside of just, you know, putting something online, getting a Facebook page, getting a website, or something that a small business can do.

23:54.34

Matt Watson

And so, what was the name of that site?

23:57.18

Miles Basset

Oh, there are several different options for it. Probably the big name in the game is next. Um, there is another tool out there that we have that is developed by a little company called Wild Man Web solutions that I’m a little bit biased towards, and that’s just our listing build ah listing builder suite.

24:09.63

Matt Watson

Okay.

24:14.88

Miles Basset

So we’ve got a couple of different software options out there depending on the price points you’re looking for that help to get that information out distributed to all the different directories and everywhere that houses this kind of information.

24:27.30

Matt Watson

So what? What led you to build that.

24:31.50

Miles Basset

Well, our mission is to be a full-service digital agency for small businesses. Um, we have a pile of different tools and services. Some of them are, you know, existing tools that we recommend to people. Or we have a reseller agreement with our licensing agreement or something like that. Um, but sometimes there just isn’t something on the market. That’s really marketable or that I think fully solves the problem at hand, and at that point, we developed something internally.

24:58.20

Matt Watson

M.

25:06.37

Miles Basset

So um, when we are talking with our clients, we have a big tool chest that we can use depending on what they need. We will advise a different prescription for them. But um, we’ve got some tools that are developed internally and maintained by Wildman Web Solutions. That we’ve partnered with or licensed with because, you know, sometimes you don’t need to reinvent the wheel. There’s great stuff out there, and they’ll give us a commission if we sell some, and then we’ve got some things that we just partnered with because of their value ads, for example. Ah, we have a constant contact agreement. This is an email marketing software. None of the better ones out there, and definitely, it’s the one that we use internally and None I like using, and we offer that through our platform, meaning that we have full integration with them, and we can use some of that data in some of our other tools. But we’re not actually making any money on it or anything. It’s just a nice additional value that we can pass on to our clients.

26:02.69

Matt Watson

Sure, so have you created it? Um, you mentioned if you’ve created a few different things have you created any of these tools that have kind of really taken off into a life of their own like do you see yourself eventually being turned into a software company.

26:19.96

Miles Basset

No, I don’t, but I do think that there will always be a vertical of SaaS products that are part of our agency. Ultimately I think that we’re not going to be able to move away from the service side of things because we like people too much. We like working with all these different companies.

26:27.45

Matt Watson

Ah.

26:39.75

Miles Basset

Um, there is probably about a number of our company revenue-wise that is just saas products subscription-based software that we have built out. Um, then there’s also internal software that um.

26:46.29

Matt Watson

Very cool.

26:55.94

Miles Basset

You know, they’re not exactly products that we’re selling or anything, but we just use them to manage our customers or to help our customers manage the tools and services that we’re trying to get them set up with, um, one of the complexities that our clients complain about early on was just having to jump around from. They go and log in on Facebook and then log in on Tiktok and then log in out costs of contact and then log in their website, and they’re bouncing all over the place and have 47 tabs open in order to manage their online presence. Um, and so we developed our business app or our admin dashboard.

27:26.50

Matt Watson

Yep.

27:32.49

Miles Basset

Where our clients can go to our website, and they can log into that dashboard there, that has all of the different products and services and tools that they’re using all built into that dashboard, so you don’t have to jump all over the place. We have your social media already connected there. We have your listing tools already connected there. Your None d-party tools that you’re using. Um.

27:38.89

Matt Watson

There you go.

27:52.37

Miles Basset

Your Google Workspace is in there, your website is in there, and there are also a couple of other tools in there like the analytics and reporting that constantly tells you how things are working online. Yeah.

28:01.58

Matt Watson

Very cool. Yeah, I mean that’s all stuff we could use at, um, at my company. You know it’s the same struggle, right? Just collecting all that data and trying to try to get it to clients is there’s so much information is yeah, it’s a struggle.

28:15.80

Miles Basset

Um, everyone’s struggling with the same thing. Yeah.

28:21.46

Matt Watson

So how are you? How do you see the future for Wildman Web Solutions?

28:28.45

Miles Basset

I don’t know, so this might be a good opportunity to go into a little bit of history here. But um, you know, I don’t have an MBA or anything. This is the first company that I’ve started and the only company that I’ve started and everything that I know about business administration. I’ve either just learned by accidentally doing it right or doing it wrong and just learning by error. Um, so I’m kind of figuring it all out as I go with building this business. Um, we’ve been. Growing so crazy fast, I feel like I’ve just been riding the wave and staying just ahead of something, um, staying just ahead of our growth enough to keep us going, keep us growing, and becoming what we ultimately will become. Um. So with that natural progression. We have developed into this full-service agency. There are a couple of different verticals in there. As I said, we’ve got that SaaS vertical in there just subscription-based software that I think that we will hopefully continue to expand and license out, I think maybe the growth. Ah, for that particular part of the business might be blind sending it out to other developers or other agencies, and you know we can be the agency behind the agencies or something along those lines. Um, especially if we’re not in direct competition with those agencies. Um.

29:49.67

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

29:57.19

Miles Basset

Or you know there’s a designer out there that wants to do freelance design, but all of her clients are asking her about more technical services that she can’t provide. We can give her the technology that she needs to be successful there, and she can just license that out for her business. Um. Entirely sure, but that’s been the idea I’ve been kicking around in my head there, and then on the other side, we do have the services where this is just we’re men managing ad campaigns for our clients or building websites for our clients doing search engine optimization campaigns for our clients. And that is just going to be building out the team. I’m always looking for new talent for smart, driven people. Um, and the more of those I can pull on to my team. The more services we can provide and the more of that one on None personal attention that we can provide that I talked about.

30:36.59

Matt Watson

But

30:54.78

Miles Basset

Earlier? Um, yeah, so that’s probably the two versions of growth for our company here, building out this software and building out the team.

30:59.71

Matt Watson

Okay, so ah, yeah, your background is in technology as a software developer, right? So I’m just curious how often clients come to you. You know, in the context of marketing.

31:06.56

Miles Basset

Um, yeah, yes.

31:16.68

Matt Watson

And you guys have to build custom software for them. Does that happen very often?

31:19.17

Miles Basset

Ah, yeah, um, a lot of times, we get something. That’s pretty basic, like we just need to build our website for a company. Um, because no matter how good your Facebook ad campaign is, if they click on it and take you to a website from before the internet was invented, then it’s not going to work, so there’s a lot of that where we’re really just developing basic websites or small web applications. Um, but then we do get people that you know to come to us, and they have a really good idea for an app, and so we’re developing a couple of mobile apps, right? Now we’re developing a couple of.

31:48.80

Matt Watson

Um, right.

31:55.23

Miles Basset

Web applications we have one client that originally came to us, you know, wanting some advertising and some social media help really just wanting to hire a social media manager and we got talking about the struggles of their business and really wear their pain points are, and it turned out one of their pain points was really this internal. Management management. Um, and they had this nightmare spreadsheet monster spreadsheet that was managing everything within their business from their um, their products, and their inventory. Fulfillment and distribution. This was a pretty sizable distribution company ah managing everything off of excel, and so we ended up building basically a CRM for them just for internal management. Um, and that’s a.

32:35.59

Matt Watson

Um.

32:47.42

Miles Basset

Ah, a really fun thing that we can do as a full-service digital marketing company that you know if they come to us. They just want a logo, or they just want some social media help. We can talk with them and figure out what the real pain point is and probably serve them better than they even realized by solving a problem. They didn’t know they had.

33:04.51

Matt Watson

Well, and that’s a byproduct of being a full-service company, as you mentioned is you’re working with certain companies and certain types of industries that if you build a website for them.

33:09.73

Miles Basset

Now.

33:17.18

Matt Watson

They might also have like all this dynamic content or catalog or like we need this portal for our customers to log in and do this spring or whatever, and you inevitably kind of get dragged into these other projects that are needed for you know digital presence online. It could be simple.

33:27.11

Miles Basset

Um.

33:34.43

Matt Watson

Login Portal for their customers to do something or whatever.

33:36.11

Miles Basset

Yeah, plus it’s fun. Um, as I said, my background is in software, and I find myself being more of a marketer and more of an administrator now running the company, but sometimes I like to get back to my roots and just build something cool. Um, and so being that full-service agency. Allow me to do all of the above. I can still do some design work. I can do some administrative work. I can go and build a website. I can help someone with their Wix site. And then I can go back and build a really cool piece of software for a client.

34:11.29

Matt Watson

You gotta keep scratching that itch. I know that you like to write code. You know it has busted.

34:15.65

Miles Basset

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, ah, it’s hard to get away from um, and it’s a very specific type of challenge. It’s a type of creativity that really isn’t leveraged anywhere else. I don’t think it hits both hemispheres of the brain.

34:24.90

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

34:32.84

Matt Watson

Yeah, I’ve been a software developer for 20 years, so I get it. I get it. Well, once again, today’s episode of Startup Hustle was sponsored by Wix. Are you an entrepreneur or founder trying to figure out how to successfully navigate the rocket ship that is hypergrowth?

34:35.46

Miles Basset

Check all the boxes for me, you know.

34:52.19

Matt Watson

Do you want to take control over your company’s online presence internally and externally? Well, our friends over at Wix Enterprise can help. Wix Enterprise is a platform that provides businesses with an all-in-one solution for all types of growth and business needs to create hyper-performing websites for your business. All of which are backed by enterprise-grade security as well as expert support to help you manage and scale online. Head over to Wix.com for more information. So, Miles, I have a question for you. You’re an entrepreneur. And it’s a struggle, right? You’re like, well, I don’t, I don’t know what to do, I don’t know if I’m doing it right? I don’t know if I’m doing it wrong. It’s trial by fire. You’re learning as you go, and really, it’s the best way you know way more than the guy who went through his MBA but hasn’t done any real-world work. So. How is that journey, and how do you learn from other people? Do you have mentors or anything like how you do? How do you do this?

35:50.76

Miles Basset

Well, um, that probably has a lot of answers, and ultimately you know I’ll get back to you when I figure it all out. Um, but yeah, as you said, it’s your kind of learning as you go? Um, I think it’s one of the strengths that were given to me by working in technology and being a software developer, so you’ll appreciate it. It doesn’t matter how many languages you know. It doesn’t matter how many technologies or frameworks you know. It’s going to be obsolete by tomorrow. And you have to learn the next thing. So, if you’re ever talking to a professional software developer, who you’re really talking to is a professional learner.

36:21.27

Matt Watson

Yep.

36:24.25

Miles Basset

They’re just picking up new things all the time. Um, and that has really benefited me in the business world because that’s really all I’m doing all day, every day, is asking questions and looking at ways that I can improve our internal systems.

36:25.69

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

36:41.48

Miles Basset

Um, and being completely okay with learning and failing to admit when I don’t know something I just said here on this podcast in front of people. Um, you know i’ I’m everything that I know about running a business I’ve either. Accidentally done right? Or I learned by doing it wrong? Um, and it is a really powerful, really ah crazy way to learn something, but it’s also a really, really rewarding thing that I do wish that I knew when I was just starting off is how important it is to have.

37:00.44

Matt Watson

Yeah, yeah.

37:16.28

Miles Basset

Mentors to surround themselves with people who know what they’re doing who maybe have done this before, um, and just knowing that they are out there, I think I I probably knew that I needed to ask people some questions, but I didn’t think that they existed I didn’t think they were around me I didn’t think that they would talk to me if I asked. Um, and now with the benefit of hindsight, I know that? Um, if I reach out to a member of our local business community. Um, either through the chamber or the side or None of our other professional groups that we have here, chances are they’re happy to sit down and talk with me. Answer some questions and probably would have saved me a whole lot of headaches. Now I’m on the other side of that, and I try to tell people, you know if you are trying to start something, call me. I’m happy to sit down and have a coffee with you and answer questions and tell you what to do and what not to do, and you know.

38:03.11

Matt Watson

Um, yeah.

38:10.92

Miles Basset

Maybe save you some of those headaches and mistakes that I made the time around so that you can go out and make a whole new set of mistakes.

38:16.57

Matt Watson

I think the problem is, and this applies to all people and all types of things. If you just don’t know what you don’t know, right? You don’t. You’ve never done this before. You just don’t know what you don’t know. It’s like. Like being a parent for no time. There’s nothing you don’t know, and you don’t even know that you don’t know them until you go through the journey. Having a mentor is by far one of the most important and viable things as a parent. It’s like I’ve got grandma and grandpa to help out right to learn from, but as a business owner. You also need mentors. Yeah.

38:52.32

Miles Basset

It’s also intimidating. I think that was my problem early. You know I didn’t want to go out and talk with people. Um, I’m also just an introvert, surprise, the software developer doesn’t naturally go out and become a social butterfly. I’ve gotten better at that over the years, but it’s definitely not my. Ah.

39:02.72

Matt Watson

Yep.

39:09.63

Miles Basset

My default setting, if you will um but being okay with rejection um, getting a couple of knows and you know that’s not going to ruin your day just go out and ask people I think that’s um, that’s incredibly valuable for people who are just going out and getting started. You know, figure out who owns that restaurant down the block that you want that you like um or you’re one of your favorite businesses in your town and call them up chances are they will probably talk with you and answer some questions about everything um and don’t be afraid of failure whether that is. Um, in your own Ventures. You’re trying to start something out. You’re going to learn a lot more from failures than you are from your successes. And don’t be afraid of failure when it comes to reaching out to these people or saying something dumb in front of someone who knows what they’re talking about. Um. You need to be asking these people a hand and finding a mentor.

40:03.54

Matt Watson

Yeah, and then the connections that come from it are invisible, right? You never know who you’re going to meet. Maybe, they may not be able to help you directly, but they might know somebody who does, right? You know, it’s just a couple of degrees of separation generally between.

40:10.39

Miles Basset

Absolutely.

40:22.65

Matt Watson

You and other people that could potentially be a customer, mentor, investor, or whatever.

40:25.67

Miles Basset

And it happens all the time now. Of course, I know because I’m running in the circles that are the CEOs in and around this area. But we’re always passing information from one person to the next. If someone is looking for, you know, if they’re trying to hire someone, a lot of people are trying to hire people right now. So.

40:35.31

Matt Watson

Um, yeah, yep.

40:43.88

Miles Basset

I’ve got my eye out for a couple of people that I want to bring to my team. But also, you know, slots that I know need to be filled over at friends’ companies. Um, so yeah, we all talk, and it’s an important network to be involved in.

40:49.37

Matt Watson

Right? Yep, absolutely. Well, I hope you go back and listen to the episodes of Startup Hustle before if you want to learn more. We have so many great podcast episodes about all things entrepreneurship and business.

41:05.50

Miles Basset

Um, but.

41:12.60

Matt Watson

And sounds like Wix has an amazing podcast that they just released. So definitely check out Ready for Takeoff by Wix, another great educational podcast about entrepreneurship and business. Miles, thank you so much for being here today. Um, if somebody wants to learn more about you and your business, how should they reach out?

41:28.67

Miles Basset

Yeah, thank you for having me. The easiest way is just to go to our web website https://wildmanweb.com and learn more about Wildman Web Solutions. Yeah, there we go.

41:39.56

Matt Watson

I’m never gonna forget. You’re the wild man. I like the name. It’s clever, all right. Well, thank you, wild man. Take care.

41:44.67

Miles Basset

Um, thank you.