Speaker 1: (00:00)
I didn't start my own company to be in surrounded by people who don't wanna make a positive impact on where we are and don't care about, you know, yes, it's business, but like there's a, there's a way to get there, right? It could be Rocky or it could be smooth. And I'm willing to put in all the work to make it smooth.
Speaker 2: (00:17)
When you create the momentum and people are raising their hands saying, I wanna be you. I wanna be involved with you. I wanna help you. You have to give them a path, giving people, access multiple access points to who you are, gives them a reason to be your champion.
Speaker 3: (00:45)
So here we are with LBE page S so for everyone out there listening L here is the founder of the marketing agency, hunter marketing. Um, and I'm particularly excited for this because she brings, um, an outside of the music industry take into this world. We're all, we're all involved in here. So L so glad to have you here. How's it going?
Speaker 1: (01:08)
Cam. Everything is great. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 3: (01:12)
So L to start this off, I'd love, you know, just in general to hear you talk about some of the things you admire most about just in general, your favorite brands from a marketing perspective.
Speaker 1: (01:24)
Sure. Um, I, I, a long time ago, um, in, when I was an undergrad before the frappuccino worked for Starbucks and Starbucks was a relatively new company when I was an undergrad. And, um, I got to, I had the benefit and opportunity to watch this now, you know, global brand kind of fall into themselves. And, um, it just happened to be that, you know, I started taking marketing classes and kind of trying to figure out what I wanted to do when I grew up. And I loved watching Starbucks in particular brand evolve. And to this day, that was back in 1995. The brand hasn't changed a whole lot to be honest with you. But from there, just the idea of the ways in which people are fanatical about brands really, um, really excites me really, um, triggers me to want to learn more about, like, what are the things that cult like brands do to make people want to like follow them, brag about them, be a part of that culture.
Speaker 1: (02:27)
Um, you know, from Starbucks to Harley Davidson, to Gibson guitars, like what are the things that those brands do that make people want to be seen as part of that, that, that people who buy those products, the people who wear those clothes or drive those cars or use those instruments. And so it's hard to like pinpoint brands, like, cuz there's a lot of really good stuff when you dig into them from logos to taglines, brand colors, um, missions. So I don't know, know that I have a particular brand. I, I personally a wee back a wee bit ago, uh, not so much lately, but um, have always loved the Kate spade brand probably because of the bright, bright colors and um, and, and quirky style compared to the more sophisticated coaches of the world. But, um, I, I'm a brand fanatic. I love paying attention to the ways in which brands evolve and, and always including healthcare.
Speaker 3: (03:25)
I love that. What would you say are some like commonalities you've seen from brands that just cultivate that, that fanatic loyal customer base?
Speaker 1: (03:36)
Um, I think a lot of the brands I just mentioned to you, they go all in Starbucks, hasn't changed their logo, Harley Davidson hasn't changed their logo. BMW hasn't changed their logo. Gibson hasn't changed their logo. Like they go all in and they own that equity. And then everything that they do moving forward is to support that brand. They take care of that brand. That brand can be crazy like on, you know, Starbucks let's stay with Starbucks, like, you know, during like the holidays they'll do Christmas cups, but the logo is intact. They'll have fun with their brand. They'll branch out and maybe do merch they'll bra they'll branch out and do other things. But the integrity of that brand, that logo and it, and if they decide to evolve and grow, it's a huge, it's a huge undertaking. And, um, to, to remain authentic to those fanatical users, you know what I mean, to those people who are cult followers, like you have to follow through that brand promise and you can't like go flip 180 on them and expect that they're gonna follow. So, um, I think holding integrity to your commitment of like, who, what do you do
Speaker 3: (04:38)
Talking more specifically from the lens of someone who is maybe like a painter or, or even a, an artist, a DJ, a wedding band, like what kind of general marketing advice might you give this person? If they were like, you know, they had really earned your respect and you really wanted to give them the tricks up your sleeve.
Speaker 1: (04:58)
Sure. Um, I'm gonna make the assumption that some of these wedding bands don't have big media marketing, advertising budgets. Correct. And so some, some things that I would suggest, especially if you, if you know that you did a good job is ask for those reviews, like establish yourself, like get some PA get, get some social media pages. If you have a website even better, uh, YouTube channels and ask those customers to give you reviews, to build up that, that kind of SEO opportunity of like being recognizable or, or found. And then, you know, I think, and you can tell me, cuz I'm a lot older than you are, but you know, when I go to do something, yeah. I ask my friends and I trust my friends and I look at their experiences, but I read reviews. And when you think about it, reviews are total strangers.
Speaker 1: (05:45)
And I've learned in my career that when people have really extraordinary experiences, they write reviews. Um, and if someone asks them to write a review, they'll write a review, but more people are inclined to write, write all the bad stuff. Right. And like the pizza was too hot or the, you know, the bed was too lumpy, you know, or they just had a bad like waiter, you know, whatever. But, um, getting those reviews, I think is one really easy thing to do and post and share a lot of content. Like if you're an artist, um, you know, showing your expertise in, you know, having, having a page, having social media pages where you're sharing your own art, but maybe even sharing other people who are inspiring you and tagging those groups so that you're getting visibility through other people's, let's call it algorithms like other people's audiences to maybe get that like one off person who might kind of glance your way and go, huh, that's really clever.
Speaker 1: (06:40)
Or that's really beautiful. Or man, I like their style. Um, so I think a couple things are one, uh, figure out, you can change, you can evolve, but figure out who you are, like who, who are you attracting? What, what, who, what are you trying to do with your business? Are you trying to grow? Are you trying to sell, are you trying to perform, are you trying to build equity, like figure out who you are, what are you trying to accomplish? And then from there that will help kind of creative path of like tactics that, um, might help support that business better. But my first thing would be the easy thing. The free thing is ask people to review you, leave reviews on Google, leave reviews on YouTube, leave reviews on social media and then share those. Um, so easy, first thing that I would do,
Speaker 3: (07:23)
That's great advice. What kind of intangible qualities you think make a great leader?
Speaker 1: (07:29)
Um, I think a great leader is one who is, um, always thinking about how to support their team. Um, I am a servant leader and I, I, uh, for me it brings me joy to help people be successful. And that includes my clients. And so really understanding what their key marketing challenges are or, um, business goals are. So if you need to sell more pizza, if you need to get more butts in seat with public transportation, if you're looking to sell more autos, like really kind of understanding where you've been and where you wanna go to really be think creatively about that. So as a leader with my clients and with my employees, I never want to be in a room where someone feels like they have to say yes, I, it would destroy me to hear that I had surrounded myself with people who felt uncomfortable telling me how they really felt about anything.
Speaker 1: (08:25)
Um, and that they felt that there was any kind of hierarchy where they had to just say yes, uh, because I'm a learner and I'm a work in progress. And I am only going to get better and stronger by listening to other people's opinions. And sometimes they might be game changers and sometimes we might not agree, but at least I've considered and thought about different perspectives. You know, you cam are in your mid twenties, like your experiences are so different than mine. It would be such a disservice not to take the time to listen to how you're experiencing different things. So, um, I think being a great listener, I think being a great supporter, um, wanting to help people be successful and caring, caring, genuinely about the people that you work with, uh, both externally and internally. Um, I've had clients at hunter that, um, I worked really hard to get to work with only to find out that our, our values didn't line up. And I didn't start my own company to be in surrounded by people who don't wanna make a positive impact on where we are and don't care about, you know, yes, it's business, but like there's a, there's a way to get there, right? It could be Rocky or it could be smooth and I'm willing to put in all the work to make it smooth
Speaker 3: (09:38)
Mm-hmm. Mm. So as a marketer, you're constantly making things and we kind of develop how ways of doing things, habits, consistencies. I'm curious with you, like how you go about seeing things from a different perspective, keeping yourself creative when you're kind of maybe going through the motions.
Speaker 1: (10:01)
Number one, surrounding myself with a lot of different kinds of creative people, constantly paying attention to different trends. Like I, I would be very disappointed. Um, if someone was looking at a lots of different verticals of campaigns that hunter own and knew they were hunters, like that would be a bummer because I'm not trying Hunter's brand is not trying to come through in our client's work. You know what I mean? Um, and there are some agencies that, you know, I see TV spots and I'm like, oh, I know exactly who did that because they have a style and there's nothing wrong with that. But at hunter, for me, um, really thinking about how to creatively, uh, approach pro every project, knowing audiences, understanding data, um, it's critical with what we do. It's how we stand out. It's how we stand out from the crowd too, of, you know, really being intentional about what we do.
Speaker 1: (10:58)
And I have a lot of different kinds of people that work on my team, not just traditional designers. I have artists, uh, I have, uh, dancers, I have sculptors, I have painters. I have musicians. I have all different kinds of, of creative people who, who find joy in maybe writing, but also do X or find joy in designing a digital ad, but also are, you know, a beautiful sculptor. So, um, I think the, an long answer to your question, the short answer to your question is I, I surround myself with creative people and I'm constantly really looking at things to make sure that like they're solving the challenge, right. Not for us because I, not, everyone is a white 45 year old female. And so I might not be targeting myself, but does it work? Did it, does it work? Does it hit the right audience? Is it gonna be received? Am I using the right media? Is, am I using the right tone?
Speaker 3: (11:51)
How do you ultimately decide when, uh, a creative project is finished? Like, do you ever feel in conflict with perfectionism?
Speaker 1: (11:58)
Um, I love going back and looking at things that we've done. I love, um, I take a lot of pride in getting to the end of projects. Um, I encourage my team to make lots of mistakes cause I make a lot of mistakes and some of the best things I've learned have been through that. Right. And when you're, when you're in it and you're, and you're growing and you're hitting your mark and, and you're hitting your client's goals, it can all feel very successful. But then in retrospect, as you look back and you think about the shadow of the campaign and the ways in which it did or didn't work or, or could have worked better, I love digging back through that. I don't think I have a perf I'm not a perfectionist, I'm a little bit O C D I've learned as a leader that I have a couple triggers.
Speaker 1: (12:42)
And one of those triggers, one of those big triggers is when things feel outta control, I don't do my best work when things feel outta control and that's different than being like in a fire drill and things are due. But when things feel kind of out of control that we're not in sync like with instruments, right? Like if you're playing music and someone's off a little bit, or someone's a little faster, like it just doesn't work. Right. And for me, that's when I feel the most out of control is like, I don't do my best work when things feel chaotic.
Speaker 3: (13:10)
Hmm. When looking at people you might wanna bring on your team and, you know, may maybe giving someone advice on evaluating a new band member, like what kind of intangible qualities do you think make for a great teammate?
Speaker 1: (13:24)
You know what, I just, uh, I'm onboarding two new hunters right now. And I was sitting at the table with them yesterday. And one of the things that I said to them was I hired you because you are hunters. Don't lose that. Stay hungry, stay excited, stay curious, like stay hunters. Um, and so I, as, as you know, from hearing me talk about hunter, like, I am very picky about the people that join our team. Um, on the outside, hunter can look like a really fun sorority like agency or one of our brand colors is pink. Um, I, one of our core values is to have fun. Um, and those things are, are part of hunter. But inside hunter, we work really hard. And similarly to those, those instruments or those band members, like you need to find people who can get into your groove, right?
Speaker 1: (14:17)
You need to find people who speak your language, who operate at your pace, even if they're like wickedly different from you. I have, uh, a lot of younger people on my team. I have people who have different religious backgrounds, different sexual preferences, uh, different accents, uh, are vegan, our vegetarian, our meat eater. Like I have a whole spectrum of really different people. I have introverts, which obvi I, and, but, but there's something about, you know, there are certain characteristics that I am, I'm getting better at as I get older. And then do this more often that like, I just can tell when we like hit it and I know we're gonna get into the groove with each other and we can work together because we have, we share common goals and we share common values. And that's really important. It's very difficult to get into the groove with someone when you have a major conflict and that could be political, it could be personal, it could be work habits. It could be commitment. It's really hard to get into the groove with someone, if you, if you don't jive with them, you know what I mean? Like if they just are not, if, if it's just not, if they're not your kind of people, you know what I mean? And on paper, they might look great, but when you meet them, it's like, you know what,
Speaker 3: (15:26)
Totally,
Speaker 1: (15:27)
It's not gonna work. And so it's worth the effort. The juice is worth the squeeze to work a little bit harder in the interim of finding that right match. Um, versus bringing in people who aren't, you know, aren't gonna work or you hope are gonna work, or you think you can train them to make them work. You can't, you, people are changeable 100%. We change all the time, right? Like when people say like, well, he he's never gonna change. Well, he could, if he wanted to, right. You, you can change. Right. Um, but
Speaker 3: (15:57)
You have to want to,
Speaker 1: (15:58)
You have to wanna change. And, and I'm learning that as a leader too, that, you know, it's important to make sure that they don't just work with me, but that they work with each other. Because the culture that I have is so important. And I, I don't wanna say it's fragile, but one, one difficult hunter could flip it all upside down and we have too much on the line.
Speaker 3: (16:21)
So, you know, creating your own agency, I'm curious, in what ways running honey hunter marketing has caused you to grow?
Speaker 1: (16:28)
Oh my gosh. Well, um, it took me 15 years to get, to become a mom. And I have helped a lot of blue chip brands and other agencies do some really great marketing. I never found like the perfect match. Um, and I liked a lot of my jobs, including, I would say I had one of my dream jobs. I just didn't work with great people. So when I found out that I was having a little girl, I remember very clearly thinking if I'm not gonna be with her all the time, then I, I wanna be doing something that I love and that she'll be proud of me for doing and, and taking the time that we could be together, away from her because I'm doing something else. And so I became a mom and started hunter at the exact same time. So Hunter's about to be three years old.
Speaker 1: (17:13)
And my daughter's two and a half. So they've run right alongside of each other, both my babies, we will say. So I have, I have become such a different person over the last three years. Being a mom has taught me to be patient that lesson of being patient in the ways in which it has impacted hunter. I'm so grateful for, um, cuz I thought I've always, I'm a people pleaser and I love, I love making people happy. It brings me joy, right? To make people happy and to feel fulfilled and to spoil them rotten. Like I love that that's Madison in the background. Um, but patience was something that being a mom taught me to do multitasking in a big, big way and being able to prioritize things, uh, being a mom and starting hunter helped me with. But um, as I get more in the groove of being, I hate to say the B word as I get into the groove of being the boss, being the CEO, being the leader.
Speaker 1: (18:13)
Um, I see myself evolving away from being kind of that emotional supporter in more into a leader coach role where we, yeah, we learn from hard things, but it's a business, right. And if we're in the groove and we respect each other and we kind of, we lean into each other and trust, then it's gonna be good. But if we don't it's business, right. And the health of the business sometimes is really difficult for me. And always historically has been difficult for me to separate that emotional part versus the professional part. But I have learned just like taking care of my child, I have to take care of hunter. And sometimes that means making difficult decisions that my heart struggles with, but is the right thing for my business and in your business that could include like saying, Hey, this guy's not working out or like in the band or, um, you know, the, the style that I've been trying to get into is just, it's just not inspiring me. Like it, it's hard, right. To make pivots and change and, and evolve, but what's really happening is that you're getting better at what you do and you're getting stronger and your commitment to being successful.
Speaker 3: (19:22)
I love that. I love that last part. Nice. So then looking in the mirror, how else would you say, you know, growth? What, what else would you say growth and improvement looks like for you now?
Speaker 1: (19:37)
Um, so, uh, I marketing is very, a little bit different than what some of your listeners are gonna say, but, you know, I am getting stronger at delegating things that like are either like, uh, someone else would do just as good a job and I could have that time back. Um, I'm learning to really lean into the things that I'm actually really good at. And, and that really do bring me joy, um, and, and hiring other people to do the work that I like so that I have more time to do what I love. Um, and that's hard cuz it means I'm delegating and I'm training and I'm teaching and I'm, and I'm kind of like, you know, putting some things out to other people to be responsible for. And of course I'm always up here cuz at the end of the day, it, it is me to, it is me.
Speaker 1: (20:25)
That is responsible. So if something goes wrong, but it's me, not anybody else. Um, but um, I, I love, I love that I'm in a place where I can start prioritizing and focusing back again on my own professional desires and making sure that like I still love my job and that Hunter's healthy is, has been a priority like in a big way for the last three years of like make hunter healthy, get, make her be sustainable, take care. I have all these people. I'm responsible for take care of all these people, but, and she's gonna be okay. I figured it out. Like I know I know what we're doing. And so now it's time to go back to like, what do I love to do? I wanna fall back in love with my job? Not that I don't love my job. In fact, I'm I, if you ever hear me cam say I'm having like a bad day, remind me.
Speaker 1: (21:13)
Like, but all your dreams came true. So wow. Right. But um, I'm excited to be back in a place where I'm falling in love with my job and I'm thinking about work. I love to do. And really kind of thinking strategically about like, who do I wanna work with? What kind of brands do I wanna work with? What kind of, what kind of more work do I wanna produce? Um, where do I wanna do it? Is it just gonna be Columbus or maybe is there another place that the hunters should land to get to kind of do this work with other people versus just the lucky people in central Ohio?
Speaker 3: (21:47)
I love it. I love it. Elle. One thing I'm getting from you is like you're. So at the cause of of everything, like I feel like you do not allow, um, situations to dictate the way you'd like them to be, but you're very much shaping things in the way, in the way you see it. And, and I love the advice you shared Elle. Thank you so much for coming on here. Hunter marketing El,
Speaker 1: (22:09)
I hope someone got something interesting. And um, if anybody ever did wanna reach out for some advice, uh, would be my pleasure to, to answer any questions for anybody too.
Speaker 3: (22:19)
Mm we'll have, we'll have a link in the description here. Thank you so much for coming on here.
Speaker 1: (22:23)
Have a great night cam.
Speaker 4: (22:29)
Well, if you made it this far, thank you for listening. Just wanna let y'all know. We've got these hand dyed ice dyed, weird music podcast teas, and we're also gonna be making some sweatshirts. So if you'd like one, let us know. We'd love to get you one also wanna give a big shout out to the geniuses over at Thrax C B D sponsoring this show with their amazing products. Got a link in the description. Also big thank you to our sponsor J and J distribution. Ohio's premier C and Delta eight wholesale supplier retailers check out their brands, Kush burst, and three Chi TC edibles, and also wanna give a big thank you to our local print. Shop Franklin and press. If you need any custom merch or custom printing, hit them up. They'll take good carrier. Ya. We got links in the description and yeah, much love y'all. Now back to the show.
Speaker 3: (23:17)
So here we are with Kate Bradley churn. So for everyone out there listening, Kate here has a deep background in marketing in the music industry. Um, but also beyond Kate is also the founder and CEO of lately AI, which is a super interesting marketing tool. Kate. So glad to have you on here. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 2: (23:36)
Good up cam. It's great to see you. hi everybody.
Speaker 3: (23:40)
I would love to talk with you about how you've seen marketing for artists in the music industry evolve over the past 15 plus years. And what kinds of opportunities do you think exist now that didn't necessarily exist for artists in the early two thousands?
Speaker 2: (23:56)
You know, I'm not sure most people would call it opportunities. So I like your positive spin on that. I mean, well, I think that having to be everything all the time is really a tough burden on anyone and especially musicians as well. I mean, a lot of musicians I know are really good at one thing, you know, and, and suddenly they have to do math that sucks. Right. Um, and, and management and the wrangling and all that. The musicians that I worked with in the past, I mean, I would see them being constantly underserved by management by the venue. Um, so there was always that like pain in the of someone that was supposed to be doing their job, not doing it for them. And now, and certainly for the last 30 years, I'd say, it's like, they're still dealing with that. But like even more because the job is now down to them, right?
Speaker 2: (24:54)
So they already probably didn't get enough marketing from the venue or from the a and R guy, right. That already wasn't happening. But then it just like was a colossal, a bit of a disaster. So the opportunity of course is that you can do it by yourself, right. There is the, you have the tools, the, there is the ability, but yet still, I mean, everyone needs to be in army of one. Right. And like the army part, I mean it's and so this one guy I know really well, his name is Seth clear. I love Seth. I don't love his music. He knows that we're friends, but Seth is a superstar because he has the stamina to do all things, right. Everything. So record, write the songs, record the songs, produce the songs, manage the tour, schedule the tour, do all the marketing hustle, hustle, hustle, sell the merch, you know, pack up the merch, pack up the.
Speaker 2: (25:50)
You know, it's just, it's a constant hustle, um, when sorry, everybody in advance. But like when people ask me like, you know, what do you think I should be doing with my music career? I say, get out I do. I mean, it's not unlike being the founder of a startup, right? Everyone requires a team of support, whether it's your husband or your girlfriend or your parents, or your friends, or your bandmates or your manager, you know, you have to get comfortable with asking for help. It's a big one, right? Get, get your com liaison and just ask people mostly say yes. Right. Which is amazing that people wanna help you. People are, you know, pretty forgiving and loving. And you wanna be strategic about who you ask for help. Obviously someone that has more power than you and is willing, you know, you wanna, one of the great strengths that musicians have is, you know, how to make fans, right. A listener is not a fan, a fan is an evangelist and they work for you for free. So you have this huge gimme right in front of you to take advantage of all the time.
Speaker 3: (27:01)
So in, in marketing, like, yeah, I feel like the greatest brands are able to really cultivate that brand and evangelist and, and same with the greatest artists. Like they have those diehard fans. And I'm curious with you from a marketing perspective, what you think are the key sticking points for not just having listeners, but having those evangelist fans,
Speaker 2: (27:25)
You know, I was just, um, I listened to the radio still. I'm one of those people I'm just always sort of curious, like, has it evolved? And radio has not evolved in 50 years, which is shocking to me anyways, they were playing my favorite band is the police. I love a three piece that can make a lot of noise. And I love each one of these band members individually sting, the least, honestly, Andy, the most. Um, but I was, it was, um, every little thing she does is magic, which is kind of the throw away pop song, but actually it's incredibly like complex song, you know? And it's Stuart alone. It's really impressive to listen to. And, and I was, I was listening to it, you know, here goes sting and he is throwing into the chorus EO and he branded this thing. Right.
Speaker 2: (28:13)
So he made, they already have the brand, the band and he has his extra brand sting. Right. And then EO, right? So he, he piled little, little tasty bites upon tasty bites. Right now we do that. I'm Caly from lately. , you know, it's ridiculous. It makes everybody laugh at lately. We think a lot about humans and software together. And it's how our actual artificial intelligence works. It relies on human intervention to succeed, but it's also how we treat each other. I mean, you know, in case everybody doesn't. So I used to be a rock and roll DJ. My last gig was broadcasting to 20 million listeners a day for XM satellite radio. I know a thing or two about making a fan into an evangelist. Right. And being able to take those, that story, the stories is part of the key thing. Right. And fold it into lately, which we've done.
Speaker 2: (29:13)
Right. So lately is based on what I learned about the neuroscience of music listening in my career and radio. Right. So there's that connection here. And so that's the thing that great artists of all kinds do really super well is they figure out what's my twist in radio. It's totally lawless. But the lawlessness was also beautiful when we made our own rules. Right. I, we programmed our own shows what we were live, what right. And the same with, um, startup land, right. This is lawless. And I love that I'm building the plane as we fly it. So that's the story part we're thinking about, like, you know, it's easier when I'm 48, so it's easier when you're older to look back at your life and, and take that crooked line and straighten it out, you know? Cause you can see, you have the wisdom to see it's a little bit harder when you're in it at the moment.
Speaker 2: (30:15)
I always like to say, um, it's always right in front of you. It's like one of my favorite saints because usually there's something here that I can twist into a metaphor and apply it to what I'm doing now. And I don't have to work that hard. I don't have to discover America again. It's someone has already done that. All I have to do is like, um, amplify what's here and make it my own. You know, that goes with songwriting too. When you make a record, nobody knows who you are and nobody cares. Nobody cares about you and your little picture of, with a guitar on the cover, kill me now, you know, and whatever your earnest lyrics are about your heartache and who the else knows what else. Right? So you have to get me to open the record or, or click on the, on the file.
Speaker 2: (31:02)
And the easiest way to do that is to cover a song. Everyone knows, make it your own. Everyone loves a cover. All, all rock and roll. DJs love a cover. Everyone does because it's so easy. I don't have to do any work. We're lazy as humans. Oh, I know that song. And so then your, your task is to make it interesting. Right? And turn it inside out, put your twist on it. You know, it's so it's an easy, easy give that. I don't know why people don't take more advantage of that. I mentioned to you previously, my husband's a guitar player. Also. He specializes in lap steel. His band, um, was our, had our favorite record of the year when I first got to XM and they're called the Wells since then, uh, beware, he's cut his hair and bought chinos. And now he's in sales and he is very good at this but we have 40 guitars out, out in that building.
Speaker 2: (31:53)
Cuz you know, he's an addict like, like you all tend to be, um, one of the things he doesn't do is so he hides he's hopefully he'll never hear this. He hides the fact that he's a musician from his corporate, you know, thing. Now every once in a while someone figures it out and they're like, oh my God, you're David char like, cuz he's really, he's an amazing guitar player. Eric amble who played for Joan jet, you called him the best guitar player in New York. Cuz he was. And when they figure that out, like this is how you become fan, right? it's that extra little something in there that people can relate to. We were talking about the cover earlier, right? So giving people access multiple access points to who you are behind the story gives them a reason to be your champion. And cuz then, then there, the two things happen.
Speaker 2: (32:45)
Number one. Oh I could be you. Everybody wants to be you when you're on stage, they do right. Make them help, help the story along if you're married, take the ring off just for that show please. I mean, come on, help us out. Right. um, don't tell David but you know what I mean? You wanna, I'm doing this with you now, like giving your audience and you multiple ways to connect with me to relate to me, find me interesting. Right? And this mastering your brand, this part is the easy part. When you do this, all the other content production and you know, that you, you have to, how many times a day I'm gonna post about the show on, on social and whatever it is, all that stuff will come easily. You know, you said you just went to somebody's wedding, right?
Speaker 2: (33:38)
Like I always think of a well oiled band or company startup in my case, like a wedding by which I mean, um, as you get closer and closer to the wedding, it starts to take on a life of its own and perfect strangers come outta nowhere and we're like, I'm gonna do this for you. I'm gonna, I'm gonna design the artwork for your invitations, for you. I'm gonna, um, purchase all the flowers for you or whatever it is, you know? And it often is people you don't know. I mean there's family involved as well, but that, that, um, that wave of excitement and it's because in the wedding's case, everybody wants to be leaving true love when you're a band, everybody wants to be on stage, you know? And the only way to participate in that momentum was to be, be the wave, the wave that lifts you up.
Speaker 2: (34:34)
Right? And so your job as the artist is the leader of the band. All you have to do is let them, it's get out of your own way, right? You're when you create the momentum and people are raising their hands saying, I wanna be you. I wanna be involved with you. I wanna help you. You have to give them a path. This was a great lesson I learned from Isaac oats. Who's one of my investors. And he, he always said, he's like, you don't have to focus. It was in the business case, you know, there's small, medium and large companies. And while you're not supposed to market to all of them, we do because you know, I like to the establishment. Right. them. but Isaac, I remember what he said to me. He's like, you don't have to focus on all of them at once.
Speaker 2: (35:25)
You just have to give each of them a path. Right? It's the same idea, you know? And it's just about equipping people to be the fan or the evangelist or whatever it is that they want to be. You know, maybe they wanna man, the merch table for you and then let them, or maybe they wanna run your, your newsletter for you. You know, let them do it. That's the best quality of a good leader is looking at the team employees where everyone call it around you and figuring out maybe the skill set that you want them to have. Isn't the one they have. So figure out a job they can do with what they're good at. Hmm.
Speaker 3: (36:06)
So Kate lately, AI, what, what is it?
Speaker 2: (36:11)
So lately uses artificial intelligence to first learn any brand voice or individual voice by which we mean the words that get you the highest engagement online, what words make up the social posts that you write that will make people move, you know, into evangelism. And then once we have that writing model for you, which gets built in about 1.8 seconds, we then repurpose any kind of long form content that you have or that you earn. So it could be an interview like this. I'm gonna ask you for the file cam, right? And we run it through the AI and AI reads what we're saying and will transcribe this video. And it's gonna pull out the one liners that you or I say and clip up the video that goes with into dozens of social posts that it, it already knows will get high engagement. And so proof in the pudding there, Gary, Vanerchuck created an entire Twitter channel fueled by lately and nothing else.
Speaker 2: (37:11)
And we got him a 12000% increased engagement. Cause it's AI doesn't around. Right. yeah. Um, yeah, the metaphor though. When we talked about, when we were touching on before, this is how it all works, right? So lately isn't, isn't just designed to automate some annoying tasks it's designed to hit that evangelism, you know, mark for you and, and, and superseded even because what you write online, you don't want it to fall flat. There's a lot of effort that goes into that, you know, and everything has an objective. Every song you record, every show you play, every social media post I write. And I think people forget what the objectives are cam like sometimes they think they just need to do it to do it, just get the record out. well, that's. You know, like what's your end? What's your end game?
Speaker 2: (38:11)
Like how many copies do you wanna sell? Let's think about that. For example. Um, or like in the case of social media, there's only two goals click or share, right? So then you're bringing it down. Like, yes, I want to increase the revenue of the company by 20% month over month. You know, of course, of course I do. But like how do I get there back into it? You know? And so if I know that my aim is to either get you to click or share, what can I write? That's gonna make you do that. What's great about, um, sharing content is it's very ego driven, same way with music, by the way. Right? So when someone comes to you with a new band and you're in love with the band too, and then you share that band with other, other people, you instantly become the tastemaker, right?
Speaker 2: (39:01)
You get the credit for being the cool guy that is talking about this band, you know, and online it's the same way. So if you share something that I wrote you look good, it's all about your ego. Okay. So now if I'm writing or I'm writing my song with that in mind, right. That I'm, I'm empowering you to ride the wave, that's there, you know? Right. Mm. And I'm doing it here. I'm, I'm carefully thinking of things. I mean, I'm thinking of the AI. I know what it's gonna read later when I ask you for the file, we run it through and I'm thinking of Alex, my intern, who's gonna take what the AI gives her and augment it a little bit. And you know, what's gonna make her life easier. One liners is what it is.
Speaker 3: (39:49)
So with the human element of copywriting, um, you mentioned it's very similar to songwriting in the way, you know, you really want it to hit. And, and I'm curious like what consistencies you see between strong copywriting and strong lyric writing and, and really what you think the key principles are to strong copyright.
Speaker 2: (40:14)
Yeah. So Alex Deen, who's a lead singer of my husband's band. That Wells is one of my favorite lyric writers. Um, sometimes because he writes nonsense. So we all know nonsense. It's great lyrics. I mean, most lyrics, if you write them out and read them, it's embarrassing, baby, baby, baby. , you know, and sadly now more than ever, it's all cliche. But one of the things that I like that that Alex will do is sort of poetically play, play on words. Um, and think about, um, think about how they are sounding coming, coming outta your mouth. So, so actually, um, rivers Cuomo does this from Weezer as well. Um, like the automatic P of a word. Um, and I'm not gonna be able to think of it in lyric as the moment, but I'll give you a totally separate example. I was a goalkeeper in college sucker, high school and college MVP. And, um, the, you call yourself not a goalkeeper. You call yourself keeper. And the reason is, is because it comes outta your mouth faster and you need to shout quickly keeper, give me the ball or get outta my way. Right. Keep, you know, so there's these short words, goalkeeper, goalie, all that stuff is harder to say, you know, doesn't sound easy and, um, lyrics are the same way. The, the word radio is one of my favorite words to hear a song, cuz it sounds so good. You know, radio radio, like,
Speaker 3: (41:49)
Like the phonetics,
Speaker 2: (41:51)
The Fantic yeah, you got it. You're right. The phonetics, you know, I think the other thing to think about in, in great lyrics is, you know, it's just like regular writing you when you overwrite it, when you try too hard, everybody can feel it. And the easiest way to, to do that again is to say it out loud or sing it out loud. If it feels awkward, you know, as it comes out, it's hard. Um, so, you know, there's there's words like, like, I mean, I don't know, artificial intelligence hard to say AI, easy to say, you know, um, I'm not really giving you a lot of gold here, but I think that I was just thinking about that song. Stacy's mom and why I love that. It's so great. Stacy's mom has got it going on. Okay. So there's nothing brilliant there, but there is cuz they could have said Stacy's mom is hot.
Speaker 2: (42:52)
Right. They could have said, and it's not going on. It's going on? Stacy's mom has got it going on. Right. So there's a vernacular there, which is cool by which you mean like a casualness, you know, there's that the local flavor of how someone would say something and then it's not, she has it going on. Has got it going on. Stacy's mom. She's got it going out to Stacy's mom has got it going on. It's easy to remember it. Obviously the rhyming, you know, there's just so much there and it's fun to say it's fun to relate to. I mean, men or women, someone had a friend whose mom was the hot one. Alex went to Grinnell for writing after the band had, had started. And then, you know, I know rivers Cuomos actually AF long after the band had like taken a lot more voice lessons and stuff like that. Um, and writing lessons. And so I think that's an interesting thing is you get to a place where you've already used all your tricks, cuz they've been pent up to your point for so long and you gotta figure out how to either learn more or remake yourself and, and um, get help. Right?
Speaker 3: (44:06)
That's a good point. Let's say you're, you know, your cousin, your niece, someone, someone you love and you care about is like, look, I'm going to be an artist. I'm gonna create my own brand. Maybe not necessarily a musician, maybe a painter, even an author. I'm curious what kind of marketing and branding advice you would give them? Just kind of like 1 0 1, the basics dos and don'ts, don't worry about this, but focus on that kind of thing.
Speaker 2: (44:37)
Just do one thing. Well, don't try to do it all, you know, so you don't need to have a newsletter and a presence on Instagram and Twitter and LinkedIn and or whatever, a paid ads or whatever it is. Just pick one, just pick one, do it super well. And then, then you're, then you'll learn, you know, I mean you need to do it yourself first because only you can learn how maybe hard something is and know who to hire or who to ask for help later. That's I think, you know, I was, we were on the microphone live overnights, right? That's what you did. You, you crack the mic every night. And the only way you learn is when you embarrass yourself, it's when you up. Right. It's the best way. Um, and so I think that's pretty important is even though it's something we don't wanna do marketing specifically, most people don't wanna do it. You just gotta get dirty a little bit. So you can have an understanding of why it's so hard and why it's so valuable. The other thing I would just say generally speaking is if you're gonna do that, if you're going to be an artist, do just do everything everyone tells you not to do.
Speaker 3: (45:50)
Do you have a why to that?
Speaker 2: (45:53)
Well, the first is if you're going to be interesting, I think it's required. right. And being interesting is actually more important than being talented in our world. We, we, we applaud that more, you know, and things are better when you break them. I mean, rules are meant to be broken.
Speaker 3: (46:16)
You're awesome. Thank you for joining us lately. AI, Kate Bradley churn. I got one last question for you. Kate. I'd love to ask this at the end of episodes. If there's one lesson, one takeaway something you're all about some, a mantra from your, your story. What might you say that is?
Speaker 2: (46:39)
Don't be nice.
Speaker 3: (46:41)
Mm. I love it. Thank you, Kate.
