August 31, 2025 • 42 mins
Company: Bytes.co
Guest: Jason Di Vece
Year Started: 2010
Employees: 26-50
What happens when you walk away from security and take the leap into the unknown? In this episode, Jason Di Vece, Co-Founder of Bytes.co, shares how selling everything to move abroad reshaped his mindset and set him on the path to building a 25-person agency serving hundreds of clients.
Key Takeaways
- The risky move that built lasting confidence and shaped Jason’s entrepreneurial journey
- Why hiring mistakes can cost years
- Hard decisions every agency leader must face (and why the hardest ones are usually right)
- How rethinking failure can open the door to innovation and growth
Details for an agency planning workshop event November 10th and 11th 2025.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Russel (00:01):
Welcome to An Agency Story podcast where owners and
experts share the real journey,the early struggles, the
breakthrough moments, andeverything in between.
I'm your host Russel Dubree,former eight figure agency owner
turned business coach, sold myagency and now helps agency
leaders create their idealbusiness.
Every agency has a story, andthis is your front row seat.
(00:23):
This is an agency story.
Welcome to the show todayeveryone.
I have Jason Di Vece withBytes.co with us here today.
Thank you so much, for being onthe show today, Jason.
Jason (00:36):
Thank you for having me Russel.
It's a pleasure.
Russel (00:38):
I'm glad you are here, ready to get started.
If you don't mind, kick us off.
What does Bytes.co do and who doyou do it for?
Jason (00:45):
People ask me that all the time.
What do you do?
What do you do?
What I like to tell people is wesolve problems.
That's what we do.
They look at me like.
Okay.
Yeah, right.
You didn't tell me anything.
We build websites and craftdigital marketing strategies for
organizations, uh, of all shapesand sizes in pretty much any
industry you can think of.
(01:06):
So Bytes.co is really just afull service digital agency.
I like to say that we solveproblems because, um, that's
really why.
I think that's what the value ofan agency brings to a client,
ultimately, is looking at likethings from a higher level,
right?
It's like, I don't just need anew website.
I need something that's going toimpact the bottom line in some
(01:27):
way, shape, or form.
How can you as a solutionsprovider help me do that?
It's about analyzing aparticular business or industry
and crafting a solution that'sright for a particular client.
Russel (01:38):
That's awesome.
We're gonna talk a lot moreabout what you created with
Bytes.co.
Seems like a pretty coolorganization, but let's, let's
take a trip on memory lane realquick and tell us a little bit
about young Jason.
What were his goals, hopes anddreams.
Jason (01:51):
Oh boy.
How far back are we going?
Russel (01:53):
I don't know.
I mean, were you playing with acomputer at two years old or?
Jason (01:56):
I was playing with, uh, Macintosh in fourth grade.
That was what I, I learned on,actually, a Mac.
My dad had his own newspaperbusiness, the Wiscasset Times.
That's where I'm from.
I'm from Wiscasset, Maine.
He transitioned from doing itthe old way with an exacto knife
and glue and paper, you know,laying it out, old school to,
(02:17):
uh, doing it online, doing,doing it with, or not online,
but with a computer rather.
In, uh, 1994.
I started playing around withcomputers.
It was a Power Mac, I think,desktop.
I just thought it was thecoolest thing, you know, to, uh,
to play with the different fontsand, you know, work in an
environment where the paintnever dries, so to speak.
(02:38):
That's really what got meinterested in, uh, working with
computers at a very young age,was, um, really my dad, I guess.
Russel (02:44):
That's like the OG tech transition from old school
newspaper cutting to a digitalformat.
Jason (02:50):
Believe it or not, I was playing around with a program
called, uh, HyperCard and AdobePageMaker, which I think is the
precursor to InDesign, and I wasmessing with those in like
fourth grade, kind of buildingmy own little, like, HyperCard
games, which was like really,really early, like stop
animation program.
It just got me super interestedin, in technology and I really
(03:12):
wanted to do something withcomputers.
Didn't know what, and sounfortunately that kind of, uh,
led me down the wrong path.
Early in my career, I, I wentinto computer science.
My freshman year of college Iwent to UMaine Orono.
I was just talking about thatwith someone earlier today
actually, uh,'cause I kind ofhad a misunderstanding, I guess,
about like where to apply thisinterest.
Russel (03:33):
I don't know where this is leading, but it sounds like a
smart, good path.
But now, now, now I'm curious.
I'm intrigued.
Jason (03:38):
Well, it didn't lead anywhere good.
Basically, like, I realized realfast, like, holy shit.
Realized pretty quickly, this isnot for me.
I don't wanna write code.
In terms of hopes and dreams andthings, I, I, I was a really a
rebel without a cause at thatage.
Things didn't work out atUMaine.
Long story short there.
I took a year off and, um, wasworking as a land surveyor, so
(04:01):
something completely different.
Russel (04:02):
That is completely different.
Jason (04:03):
Yeah, running a transit gun using the, you know, Topcon
device and doing all thisconstruction layout work.
Some advice I would give toyoung people, I guess is if you
don't know, maybe don't rushinto something just because
someone's pushing you to.
I really should have waited to,to go to school.
I just wasn't ready.
Long story short, I went back toschool for graphic design and,
(04:25):
uh, multimedia arts, which isreally going back to the origins
of, you know, using PageMakerand doing layout work.
It's more creative, right?
That's ultimately what, um,where I kind of found like, oh,
this is what I wanna do.
Got my degree, uh, ChamplainCollege here in Burlington,
where I still am today inBurlington, Vermont.
It's where I met my businesspartner who, um, I co-founded
(04:46):
what was then Burlington Bytesin, uh, 20, he started it in
2010.
I came on in 2012.
So, you know, how, How did I getto this point is kind of like, I
didn't really plan for this, tobe honest with you.
I did not wanna start an agency.
When I graduated college, Iwanted to get a job in print
design, believe it or not, and Ijust wasn't good enough.
(05:08):
Turns out, like in 2007, 2008,it wasn't really a big need for,
uh, graphic designers, uh, atleast in this area.
I got a job doing, um, techsupport in the automotive
industry.
I went to work for a big, uh,you know, tech company and hated
it.
Russel (05:25):
I was gonna say that doesn't sound exciting.
Jason (05:27):
No, it was, I, I didn't like it at all, really.
But you know what it did is it,it laid, um, the foundation for
how we were able to start thisbusiness because I actually got
to see like, how you could makemoney building websites as an
example.
'Cause I studied in, in college,building with Dreamweaver and
Macromedia Flash at the time.
(05:49):
I never really was able toconnect the dots, like, how does
this actually, how do I applythis?
In a way to make money.
That probably sounds stupid, butI, I was always thinking of it
as like.
Russel (05:59):
It's the honest question everybody's asking themselves
is, is what do I have that isgoing to get a good return on
investment?
Fair, honest question.
Jason (06:07):
Yeah, it was just art for art's sake.
I just loved the creativity ofit, and I just didn't ever
really think of the businessside.
That was the exposure that I gotwhen I got outta college.
It was like, oh, okay, like thisis how in the real world, the
stuff works.
I hated it, hated the job somuch.
I just worked it long enough topay off my student loans.
Then, uh, I moved abroad toteach English with my now wife,
(06:32):
girlfriend at the time.
While I was over there, Istarted.
Russel (06:35):
Where is over there?
Jason (06:36):
Over there, yeah.
I was in, uh, Korea, actually.
I moved to Korea.
Russel (06:39):
Okay.
That's different.
Jason (06:41):
Yeah, that was different.
I sold all my worldlypossessions at 25 and uh, moved
abroad to South Korea to a placecalled Gwangju in the mountains,
city of about 1.5 millionpeople.
Never heard of it before.
Didn't really know much aboutKorea, to be honest.
But I thought, well, this isprobably better than what I'm
(07:01):
doing now, uh,'cause I reallydid not like what I was doing at
the time.
Russel (07:05):
Okay.
Hold on.
I got, I got questions here.
We gotta dive a little into thisbecause it's like, this is gonna
share a lot about who you are asa person.
Uh, I mean, How much planningwent into this?
Jason (07:13):
Probably three months.
Russel (07:15):
Okay.
And what were you doing in thatthree months?
Was it just selling your worldlypossessions or were you thinking
about what you were gonna doover there?
Or was it just, I got my ticket,now I gotta this, it's more
about the exit than theentrance?
Jason (07:24):
It was more about the exit than the interest, to be
honest.
Russel, I just, I, like I said,I mean tech support in
automotive, uh, with aproprietary site building tool
that was fraught with issues.
I would take sometimes 30 callsa day from car dealers, just
irate.
I couldn't do really solve theirproblems.
(07:44):
That was the most frustratingthing is I was so many layers
removed from the technology.
All I could do was intake theproblem.
Assure the customer like, yeah,no, we're working on it, we're
working on it, and, um, move onto the next thing.
It was this ticket basedfrontline customer support that
really dragged me down.
Russel (08:02):
Oh yeah, I've been there.
I did that for a little bit too.
Not for the automotive, but Iknow exactly what you're saying.
Jason (08:08):
Yeah, right?
So it was like anything I, Icould do to get outta there.
I took a job teaching Englishin, in Korea, and that was the
single biggest like, uh, one ofthe best decisions I have ever
made in my life, was doing that.
Something so different took meway outta my comfort zone.
When I came back, I, mymentality was completely
different.
It was like, I can do anythingthat I want because I did that.
(08:32):
I had never really had thatexperience before in my life.
Russel (08:35):
How long were you over there?
Jason (08:35):
A year.
I was there a year, and while Iwas there, what led me to this
was something called, uh,WordPress.
I was blogging while I was overthere using a tool called
WordPress that I basically just.
Russel (08:48):
A little known tool.
Jason (08:49):
And it was, this is 2009, right?
So at that time, WordPress wasvery, very young.
I just like Googled, you know,oh, that's a blogging tool I
could use.
I started using it.
I was writing a travel blog, uh,called Pack Your Knives and Go.
I think it's actually, it'sstill out there under a
different name, but the site hasbeen, I won't get into that.
Anyway, um, that rekindled myinterest in, you know, working
(09:12):
in, in technology.
It was like, oh yeah, thisstuff's actually interesting.
It's not all like, you know,broken and like, uh, negative.
It really rekindled my interestsin it.
And, um, When I came back, causeour contract was up, I hooked up
with, um, my now businesspartner who I met in college and
(09:33):
he was working at the samecompany I was at, um, before I
left where I was doing the techsupport.
He was working there doing SEOsearch engine optimization.
This was a concept I had neverheard of in, in 2010.
I didn't know what that was.
Actually got a job at the samecompany doing SEO.
I went back in a differentdepartment and just learned up
on my own.
Russel (09:52):
Just went right back to the grinder, man.
Jason (09:55):
I went right back into it, you know, I thought, eh,
this'll be better.
It'll be better, right?
Well, it wasn't better.
The only difference was that Ihad landed myself in just your
textbook cushy desk job.
I went from tech frontline techsupport, which was manic, all
over the place, multitaskinglike you can't even believe too.
(10:15):
Very regimented, orderly,process driven search engine
optimization in the automotiveindustry.
Very different.
I got bored pretty quick.
It was like not what I expected.
I started to, to freelance doingit because I was able to find I
had enough of the fundamentalsof SEO.
I had enough drive to go lookfor work, right?
(10:36):
More work.
'cause I, I was making okaymoney, but, you know, I knew I
could make more.
and While I was doing thisfreelancing, I, I was able to
find a few accounts that paidlike triple the hourly rate what
I was getting at my day job.
My confidence was starting tobuild and then I, My now
business partner, he left soonafter I started my second tour
at this tech company and hestarted, uh, an operation called
(10:58):
Burlington Bytes, which wasbuilding websites with WordPress
that were optimized for search,and he was doing it for local
businesses here in Burlington,Vermont.
This was kind of an eye-openerfor me because I didn't really,
I always looked at WordPress as,oh, it's just a blogging tool.
He was building websites withit.
I had never seen anybody dothat.
Like full websites, you know,that weren't just blogs and he
(11:21):
was applying the same conceptsthat we were learning at this
tech company, which wasbasically like, look, it's not a
website, it's a lead generationtool.
It's driving interest for peoplelooking to buy cars.
Russel (11:33):
What's funny, I'm just hearing you talk about this.
When you're saying it seems soduh in 2025, right?
But I think just for the, forthe younger folks at home, like
this was, this was not the wayof thinking.
In the late 2000s it was, right,I remember right, we were still
in the period of trying toconvince some businesses that
they needed a website.
We were still trying to competeand fight with Yellow Pages and
(11:54):
just the stuff they were doing.
Things that might sound like,duh, this was not the case in,
in the late 2000s.
Jason (11:59):
Good context.
We did a lot of that.
To fast forward just a littlebit, I ended up leaving and
partnering with, um, Pete, mybusiness partner, and he had
maybe, I don't know, 10 clients,15 clients or so, all local
businesses, word of mouth,people he knew.
We started really the company,Burlington Bytes.
It was Burlington Bytes before,but it was just him essentially
(12:21):
freelancing, building websites.
Now it was him and I together.
Russel (12:24):
Now it's official.
Jason (12:25):
We partnered and we moved into my garage in the old north
end of Burlington here.
What you just said is like youhitting the nail right on the
head.
We spent a lot of time educatingclients and really we were
backfilling an industry that waspeople that had like version one
of a website, right?
They got one put up in the,maybe the late 90s, early 2000s
(12:46):
and that was it.
It was like, they didn't reallysee it.
Russel (12:48):
But still had the counter at the bottom and, uh,
the click counter?
Jason (12:53):
Oh yeah, I mean, all kinds of stuff.
Flat HTML, nothing, I mean,mobile wasn't even something you
talked about really.
Those conversations were juststarting to happen, uh, and
people still had mobile sitesthat were, you know, that were
like clunky.
Russel (13:08):
I'm curious, I mean, 'cause because you said when you
came back from Korea, you were,you, you had this, I don't know,
enlightenment or I can'tremember exactly how you
described it.
When you think about the kind ofgoing to the world of
entrepreneurship, was it morethe dissatisfaction of the, of
what you were living in terms ofyour job?
Or was it this enlightenment, Ican do anything from, from your
(13:30):
Korea experience?
Jason (13:30):
I would say it was really both.
For sure, a combination of both.
I had a lot more confidenceafter living abroad and just a
fuck it type of mentality, I'mjust gonna go for it that I
really didn't have before.
The other side of it was reallyboredom.
I'm a creative type of personand I, I don't tend to sit
still.
Anyone that knows me will tellyou that.
That's what I was doing.
I was literally sitting at adesk all day long, doing,
(13:53):
following the same process forthe same types of clients in the
same industry.
I just knew even after a monthor two of being there, I think I
only lasted like 10 months, thatsecond tour, I was like, this
isn't for me.
I'm not gonna last here.
That was the push I think waslike, just realizing I can do
this on my own, even if itdoesn't work out, at least I
(14:14):
won't be doing what I'm doingnow.
And that was the what really ledme to Korea as well.
It was same idea of like, I'm, Iknow I'm never gonna be happy
doing this, so I guess I'm justchasing, you know, selfishly
chasing my own sort of desirefor, uh, for happiness.
Russel (14:28):
I don't think there's anything I, I think we all
should be, uh, you know, chasinghappiness.
I talk to so many owners andjust say, look, if this is not
the direct, the car is notheaded in the direction of
happiness, let's take a stepback and really rethink if we're
on the right road, or, or that,that's the first place.
Because there's no point indoing this whole thing and
working this hard to not behappy.
So I don't think of it asselfish at all.
(14:50):
I really hope this, thisconversation today just inspires
someone to go do something kindof bold like that, a little,
little abroad moment.
Uh, What's that movie?
Uh, Eat, Pray, Love, I thinkwith, um, oh, what's her name?
I, I haven't actually seen thismovie.
My wife talks about all thetime, the, what's her name?
Julie Roberts.
Yes.
Um, But that kind of just go onthis little exploration journey.
Clearly it, it, it, you seemslike you would be a fan and
(15:12):
advocate of that.
Jason (15:13):
A hundred percent.
I'm a big advocate of justpushing yourself to do something
you're uncomfortable doing, andunlearning everything that
you've learned.
Russel (15:22):
All right, so you got this thing up and running and,
you know.
I imagine just like a lot offolks, it's exciting, it's fun,
it's energizing, um,everything's kind of new and or
whatever.
When was the first moment likeyour, oh shit moment?
Does anything stand out?
There's gotta be one I imagine.
Jason (15:37):
Wow.
To what degree, I remember, youknow, this is a, a lot of oh
shit moments.
There was one I remember that,uh, I'll never forget.
It was our first big job, it wase-commerce.
It was on Magento one, 1.7, Ithink.
Russel (15:51):
Oh man, I haven't heard Magento get drops, name dropped
in a while.
Jason (15:55):
Yeah, I know it's a dirty word.
Russel (15:57):
Back to your, your Magento story.
Jason (15:59):
So, but yeah, right, it's, It's an e-commerce site.
It's Magento 1.7.
Uh, we had never worked with itbefore, so there's, oh shit
moment number one.
What the hell are we doingworking with Magento?
To be honest, I can't evenrecall why we went down that
road, but it was the first timeI had used, um, really something
other than WordPress or thisother proprietary system that at
(16:21):
this tech company I had beenusing.
This was like my, another CMSthat I was dabbling in and we
were building this at, it was anexpensive site at the time.
We were charging'em, I forgetthe exact amount.
Probably six or seven timeslarger than anything we had ever
dealt with previously.
This is like still in ourinfancy.
It's still just me and mybusiness partner.
Okay.
(16:41):
We imported all the, not evenimported, we manually added all
these products to Magento bypaying interns like, I don't
know, 10 bucks an hour orsomething to sit at a computer
all day.
There were four of'em and theyhad to key in all these
different products for a clientthat sold really niche, like
(17:02):
medical supplies, super specificto like a particular field.
Electron microscopy, I believeis what the field was.
I don't even know what the,that, that is exactly.
Yeah.
Gnarly product catalog, they keyit all in.
Anyway, one day I show up.
I'm in the backend on theproduct grid.
I hit the select all buttonbecause there was some stuff I
wanted to delete and, um, I hitdelete and it actually deleted
(17:26):
7,500 products.
It didn't select all on thepage.
It selected all products.
It was a bug in the sy, in thesystem or it was me not
understanding the UI, and I waslike, I just deleted like four
months worth of work.
Ouch.
There was no way to recover it.
At least, so I thought.
We were able to recover it.
We did have backups at theserver level of the site, and we
(17:48):
restored it to like a weekprior.
We only lost like a week's worthof work.
But, uh, that was my first one,which was, I'll never forget the
panic of like, oh my God, Ican't believe I am that stupid.
You know?
Russel (18:02):
I'm not a developer, but I, I've, I've heard all the
developers that ever worked forus, especially back then when we
were actually doing Magentoprojects, um, loath its name and
everything about it.
Jason (18:13):
That was a, a bad one for sure.
You could pick, pick the poisonfor the rest of, yeah.
Russel (18:17):
And here you survived.
Was that a big enough, you know,oh crap moment to, you know,
take your learning lesson here,or any big ahas?
Jason (18:25):
It is an interesting question.
The business today, there's 25people that work here.
We have like over 400 clientsall across the United States,
and we started as just like in agarage in Burlington, Vermont,
technically a basement inBurlington, Vermont with just
local businesses.
There's a real difference,right?
When you get up the, into largerorganizations, big nonprofits,
private companies, corporations,you tend to deal with more
(18:47):
sophisticated buyers withsophisticated needs.
There's been a lot of learningthat has happened along, along
the way as we've just slowlyworked our way into larger
businesses and, and differenttypes of clients.
I would say the first, like,probably four or five years of
this, of this journey, I don'teven really count as like a
business.
(19:07):
That was just like a lot of likefumbling through, saying yes to
everything, figuring it out asyou go, fake it till you make
it, as they say.
There was a lot of that.
Russel (19:17):
Basically learning everything you don't wanna do in
the future or how not to doeverything before you can write
the book on how to do it.
Jason (19:24):
A hundred percent.
When we actually started hiringpeople, like we hired people we
knew, we hired like our friendsthat we had relationships with
and that wasn't really a greatidea.
It didn't work out.
We tended to just, or we didn'thave a hiring process and we
didn't really, HR, I mean, likewhere's the paper shredder in
(19:45):
the corner?
We had no concept of how to likemanage people or an organization
or a, or a business for thatmatter.
In those early days, the firstfour or five years, we were
doubling every year in terms ofrevenue and client load and head
count really.
By 2015 we had moved into abasement, um, outta my garage.
Russel (20:04):
Move from a garage to a basement.
That's a pretty big upgradethere.
Jason (20:07):
That's right.
An upgrade.
We went from 500 square feet tolike 1200, I think.
When the landlord was, wasshowing us the spaces, it was in
a nice building, uh, at the topof Church Street here in
Burlington.
We were like, yeah, I don'tknow.
Do you have anything likecheaper?
Because they were all expensiveplaces, is right downtown.
She said, well, we have thebasement, but no one's been
(20:28):
interested in that for years.
We were like, oh, let's go takea look.
We go down into the basement andit was open concept in a
historic building, so it hadhigh ceilings and red stone
walls for the foundation and afloor that was like epoxied,
right?
We just walked around and wewere like, it's perfect, we'll
take it.
She was like, really?
You actually want this?
(20:48):
We were like, yeah, really?
We like this.
It's like a Bat Cave.
Let's take it.
Russel (20:51):
This sounds so a developer's dream right here.
Jason (20:54):
It was perfect.
There were four of us at thetime when we moved into that
space, and from there we grewto, uh, 15 people.
That was, uh, several oh shitmoments when we were down there.
Russel (21:07):
That's not an insignificant jump, um, for an
agency.
Especially going for, you know,kind of that freelancer with a
few helpers to just a reallyfull-fledged team.
What do you think you were doingthat was allowing you to be that
successful?
Jason (21:19):
Work ethic, definitely.
We were grinding, we wereworking all the time.
We were, um, taking on.
Russel (21:26):
What were you working on?
Unless you're saying this workin terms of just shelling out
for hours and cranking out sitesor something.
Jason (21:32):
Oh no.
At that time when we moved intothe basement, um, we were
primarily building websites.
We were doing mostly websitesand every website that we build,
we host and we support.
There's a revenue stream that,that, that comes with that,
right?
Or a recurring revenue stream.
That's been core to the businessmodel since day one, is we need
some sort of monthlysubscription revenue.
(21:55):
That's the lesson that we tookfrom automotive, right?
The parts department, theservice department, that's what
keeps the lights on at a cardealership.
Russel (22:01):
So there was, there is some benefit other than actually
starting your business fromyour, your automotive tech
support career.
Jason (22:07):
Absolutely.
That was the framework that weused.
The core concept of how to likecreate a business that's
sustainable came from myexperience, uh, in, in corporate
tech.
My business partner had the samething.
A lot of building websites.
We were starting to get intodigital marketing at that time
'cause we had SEO backgroundsand we knew paid search and we
(22:28):
were dipping our toes in that,uh, to the point where we had a
person on staff where that wastheir job, but they didn't have
a full plate of work doing that.
He was also helping us buildwebsites and we all wore
different hats at that point.
I would help with, managing paidsearch at times.
That's what I mean.
We were working all the time.
We were constantly trying to getin new work and, Pete, he did
(22:49):
all the sales and was reallygood at it.
I mean, He was a really goodcloser and could get people in
the door quick.
That had a lot to do with kindof the rapid pace of, of growth
because we were like, well, weneed, if we're gonna do this
job, we need to hire.
Alright, let's do that and thenjust, ramp up from there.
We would basically run in thered.
We would run really hot, neverreally hiring ahead, and then
(23:12):
frankly just kind of hire toolate.
There were a lot of problemsthat came with that, as you
might imagine, uh, hiring underduress.
But, um, a big pivot for us wasour first, we, our first
developer we ever had was thisreally young, kind of
inexperienced, uh, he was rightoutta school, you know, and, and
he did the best that he could,and I think we put him in some
really unfortunate situations.
(23:33):
He left.
Russel (23:34):
That's wont to happen a lot in in small, small agency
environment.
Jason (23:38):
Coding into a corner kind of thing.
The day he left, the day hesaid, I don't wanna do this
anymore, this other guy walkedin, a guy named Brian, and it
was as though it was an act ofGod or something.
He walked into the basement andhe said, hey, I'm a developer
looking for a job.
Russel (23:51):
Literally the day the other guy left?
Jason (23:53):
It was like the day or the next day.
It was like the stars hadaligned and this guy had
experience.
He was from an agency and he wasa lot like Pete.
He was really motivated by thework and it was, he was just
genuinely passionate aboutbuilding things and he was
smart, and what he brought tothe table was a new way of
thinking about buildingwebsites,'Cause he could write
(24:15):
code, he was an engineer, hecould solve complicated
problems.
We could actually respond tothings like RFPs.
We could chase these jobs thatwe couldn't even think about
before,'cause we just didn'thave the technical abilities.
That was a big leapfrog momentbecause we could charge more
money and we could chasedifferent types of work, and
that's what we did.
We, uh, were able to land, um,some really large accounts.
(24:38):
We had another developer joinnot long after who was also,
similar situation.
He just walked in.
He had a startup that had failedand was just looking to align
himself with people that had thesame sort of philosophy as him.
With those two together, we hada real, like foundation of an
engineering team, you know, andthat allowed us to just leapfrog
(25:00):
beyond where we were because wewere really never gonna get
into, um, the organizations thatwe have now as clients if we
didn't make that investment in,like, we, we need developers, we
need people who are like trainedand skilled, and experienced in
this.
Russel (25:13):
How intentional was just that thought process in, in
terms of wanting to just say,hey, we want bigger, more
sophisticated clients, um, youknow, bigger budgets, et cetera.
When you think back in thatmoment, was that, was that the
goal and the intention and youwere going about this
strategically or you're justdoing a lot of work and figuring
things out as you go?
Jason (25:30):
From my perspective, it was just figuring it out as we
go.
It was like the path of leastresistance.
It was wherever the water kindof flows.
That's how I really remember it.
Now, my business partner, he mayhave a very different take on
it, um, cause at the time I wasdoing a lot of work.
I was account management, I wassome technical support.
I was project managing.
(25:50):
I was doing some sales even.
I was wearing a lot of hats.
We didn't have any titles.
It was a flat org and this iswhen the team was probably, uh,
12 people, 10, 10, 12 peoplearound that time.
What we ended up doing in 2015,this was a big moment in my
professional development was,uh, Pete said, look, the
(26:10):
business is growing way toofast.
You and I don't know how tomanage it.
Clearly, cause we didn't.
I didn't go to business school.
I didn't really like, intend forthis to be a thing that was
really taking off.
I just wanted to kind of becreative as a freelancer and,
and make more money doing that.
He said, look, we need to hire aCEO.
We need somebody that can like,do exactly what you just said,
Russel, is like, they need tosteer the ship.
(26:32):
They need to build a strategicplan.
They need to manage the budget,like,'cause this is getting too
big for us.
Which I resisted at first.
I didn't really agree with that.
I thought we could, we couldmanage this.
Russel (26:44):
You don't hear that, to be quite honest.
I mean, yes.
I, I think that problem of, youknow, you've got a lot of folks
like yourself that are justreally great at the work and
really want to be invested in,in the, the engineering of
things, but, you know, maybejust don't have the desire to,
you know, strategically steerthe ship or something like that.
I really don't very often hear,you know, especially at a size
like that, where someone's like,we wanna sit someone over the
(27:06):
top of us, essentially, uh, to,to steer us.
That's a pretty unique thought.
I'm sitting here thinking like,there's just no way this is
actually gonna go good either.
But I'm always surprised everynow and then.
Jason (27:16):
Yeah, well it failed, so, uh, There were some good things
that came of it, uh, but overallthat was a failure and cost us a
lot of money, a lot of time, alot of headache.
It set the business back, uh, afew years at least.
I think the, the real flaw therewas, you know, a philosophical
(27:37):
misalignment, I would say.
This person did some goodthings.
One of the things that they didvery early was he made a
comment, he was like, the waythings work here is like you
just throw a pile of work in themiddle of the room and everyone
just sort of picks away at it,and they just sort of decide
what they wanna do, and then youdo it.
He's like, and that's fine, butthat's not gonna scale.
You need to have an organ.
You need an organization chart,first of all, which we didn't
(27:59):
have.
And you need titles, which wedidn't have.
You need a chain of command, ahierarchy.
He implemented a verytraditional corporate, you know,
pyramid, uh, manager,subordinate, um, director, you
know, C-level, that kind ofthing.
That framework still existstoday.
It's different than what it wasthen, but it, it's, it's still a
(28:19):
thing.
We have titles, you know, wehave managers, directors, et
cetera, et cetera.
And, um, so That was one reallylasting impact.
Another was the rebranding.
That was something that hepushed forward and he said,
look, like Burlington Bytesdoesn't make sense.
It had kind of a weird like, youknow, dude's in a basement like
tech bro kind of vibe.
Russel (28:39):
I just keep thinking Burlington Coat Factory.
Don't ask me why that comes tomind.
Jason (28:42):
There you go.
But people would say like, theythought we were like a food
company, you know, like.
Russel (28:47):
Oh yeah, I can see that too.
Jason (28:48):
He was like, we need to ditch that whole thing.
He led the effort to rebrand, toBytes.Co.
Those two things were, wereneeded, were necessary.
But in his three year tenure, wealmo, we, we turned, basically
turned over the entire company.
People left and people came in,then people left that we brought
in.
We had a real hard time, um,getting the right people in the
(29:12):
door and employee retention wasa real issue.
Just as a leadership team, wedid not really jive.
In the beginning, things wereokay, but, um, it just, there
was no cohesion and it was,again, one of those things that
you could see the writing on thewall of just like, I just don't
see how this is gonna end well.
I just don't see how this isgonna work out.
(29:32):
And it, it ultimately didn't.
Russel (29:34):
I have my guesses, but I, I want to hear it straight
from you.
I mean, like more specific, likewhy, why?
Clearly sounds like you justreally went through a tumultuous
period through this.
Did you let go and put too muchin his hands too fast and, and
it just, you're just completelythrowing the baby out with the
bathwater?
Obviously you said she had somegood initiatives, but with other
things that were maybe workingwell of just someone that didn't
(29:55):
come up in the business andunderstand it?
Give us a little more detail onthat.
Jason (29:58):
We were a tech company and we hired somebody to run it
that really had no background intech.
I think that was the biggestmistake is like, this is just a
misalignment of, just experienceand skill and, you know, I, the
business background and thefinance background, very
relevant.
But, um, there was a realdisconnect from like the work
(30:19):
that we did, and I think alittle too traditional maybe in
terms of their style of how theywanted to manage people.
Created a lot of friction.
I think that was the issue.
I would call it, I guess, acultural misalignment.
I mean, Culture wins every time.
I say that based on experiencethat I've had here.
In that situation, that wassomebody that was hired for the
(30:40):
job.
It was for like the technicalneed, which was, you know,
business planning and financeand, uh, people management.
We thought that they really hadthe skills to do that.
And, and I, I think that thisperson did.
I don't wanna, you know, very,very smart, very capable
individual, but just culturallynot a fit.
Russel (31:00):
I want to bring this home too,'cause I've, I mean,
I've got some experience withthis as well.
I really am just come to theconclusion of how unique of a
business an agency is that itdoesn't fit, you know, even,
even within the construct oftext agency itself is a unique
business.
It's very hard to bring intraditional business paradigms
where you know things arewidgets and you just do more
(31:22):
widgets in the structuredapproach just does not work in
the chaos that is an agency.
Jason (31:27):
Boy, are you right about that.
Russel (31:28):
Just even to run an organization that's gotta be so
on its feet, you gotta beconstantly learning.
Whatever was true yesterdayisn't true tomorrow.
Just that strategic mindset andinnovation and the, the, the
foundations of justunderstanding what the actual
technical work we're doing, uh,I feel like is just absolutely
required.
I've seen other people kind offlail when they're put in that
(31:48):
role, when they're putting morekind of traditional, structured
environments and come into anagency.
They're very smart, intelligent,capable people that have been
successful.
They fall flat on their facebecause of all that chaos.
I say all this just to bring ithome just for folks at home
that, that there's not a, it'snot a plug and play thing you
can ever do to put someone incharge of an agency, even though
(32:08):
I know so many owners want thatworld so they can do the things
that I'm sure you're wanting todo or wanted to do, I guess you
could say.
But it sounds like you learned alot from that, if nothing else.
You paid another hefty tuitionto the school of hard knocks.
Jason (32:19):
I would say so.
That cost a lot of money and alot of time.
Be careful, right?
If there's the advice, it's likehiring under duress is one of
the worst things that you cando.
Russel (32:29):
Anything out of fear and absolute fight or flight
mentality probably is nevergonna be a good long-term
decision.
Jason (32:35):
It really, really isn't.
That was one that, that hurt,but we got through it.
Russel (32:39):
Here you are.
You have so many parts of yourstory that I, I'd love to go
down, but, uh, we do have tokind of wrap up here.
You have a very successfulagency at this point.
I guess maybe think back to justone, one more nugget, uh, you
can share with the folks at homeon what you think was an
important, if someone ask youthe, the key to your journey,
what would you ultimately sharewith that?
Jason (32:58):
I would have a very cliche answer, I think, which
is, uh, don't be afraid to failbecause you're going to fail.
I think that's something thatyou have to recognize, right?
You will fail at some point anddon't be afraid of that.
Just don't be afraid of failurebecause you ultimately learn
from it.
It's like anything, right?
Like investing, right?
(33:18):
Things go up, things go down,right?
It's never always just up.
You have, uh, high points andlow points, and I don't know
that we talk enough internallyhere about that.
I won't digress on that point,but anyway, that's, that's what
I'm saying.
The second piece I would say iscelebrate the wins.
Look at the wins.
Dissect the wins, right?
Yeah, you wanna look at why youfailed, but you also really need
(33:40):
to look at like why you won.
What did you do that wassuccessful that you can
replicate?
I think those are two reallyimportant things that have been
certainly key to our successhere.
Especially in the early days ofjust not being afraid to, to
push and to do something wehaven't done before, and we
still do that here today.
It's just a lot more measured,obviously.
(34:01):
That whole move fast and breakthings.
I really don't like that becausewhat isn't really talked about
is somebody ultimately has todeal with what's broken.
Russel (34:11):
There's a janitor.
There has to be a janitor.
Jason (34:13):
Yes, there's a janitor.
That used to be me.
I was the janitor.
Still am, I guess.
Russel (34:18):
I wanna, if you don't mind, piggyback on it'cause I,
because I, I get a sense aboutyou and, and you know, we do
hear that so much in businesses,you know, fail forward and, and,
and, you know, learn from thosemistakes.
But I get the sense that you'rea person and we can go back to
this Korea moment or this, uh,living abroad.
Not being afraid to fail, butwhat do you actually learn and
do from that failure?
Some folks might get burnt andso they become more cautious and
(34:40):
stuff.
I get the sense from you thetype of no, we got burned by
that so we are going tomassively overhaul or, or
change, um, take as you weresaying, take some of the good,
but then everything that waseven not working at all, just
throw it away.
Don't even just try to improveit.
Take the two or three goodthings and run with those and
you've, you've gotta do someoverhauling and, and pretty,
(35:02):
pretty hefty work and innovationto make these leaps within your
business.
Jason (35:06):
Editing, right?
Knowing how to edit and where toedit is, is important.
I mean, there's definitely, Ifit's not working, it's not
working.
I look at this like I've, I, youknow, had, I've had a lot of
people come and go through by,through Bytes, Burlington Bytes
and Bytes.co over the years.
Sometimes you just have to makethose hard decisions and make'em
quick and not kid yourself aboutlike, oh, well, maybe this'll
change or that'll change.
(35:27):
If you're growing a businessthat's relying on hiring people,
you need to be really quick tomake the decisions, recognizing,
okay, it's not working out withthis person.
We need to take the extra step,which in our case tends to be,
uh, you know, moving on withthat relationship.
I say that just'cause I, I,nowadays I think a lot about
like organizational managementand personnel management and
performance management, thatkind of thing.
(35:48):
That's a lot of what I do now.
I still make these mistakeswhere like, I have people in the
wrong role and ultimately theydon't work out right, you think
about what that costs thebusiness, like I'm still
learning that piece as I go.
I think that for me these daysnow, I guess, um, there's a lot
more sort of reflection on what,how can I do this differently
(36:08):
next time?
What were the signs that Iignored?
What did I miss?
Trying to delegate that down tomy management team has been sort
of my thing.
It's not just like, um, meanymore, but how can I instill
that in other people?
What lesson am I saying, Iguess, for, uh, someone growing
a business is, you know, don'tbe afraid to make those hard
decisions either.
Sometimes it's better foreverybody and you just have to
(36:30):
be honest about that situationand really say that of like,
look, this is not working out.
You're not in the right role.
It's not a fit.
Gotta go or gotta take a nextstep.
Russel (36:39):
I'm inspired by that thought because I, you know, I
think, I think we're just sowired as humans probably to ask
what's the easiest thing we cando to try to improve something.
But I don't know.
I'm kind of thinking we need toask ourselves what's the hardest
thing that we need to do toimprove something?
More often than not, I imagine,I imagine that's the thing that
needs to be done.
Once you're down that path, youcan maybe try to find easier
ways to do the hard thing.
(36:59):
We gotta ask ourselves, what'sthe hard thing to do here?
'Cause that's probably the rightthing.
Jason (37:03):
It's a good point.
The hard thing is probably theright thing.
Russel (37:06):
That's so true.
As much as we don't want that tobe true, I, I, I think, I think
that is the lesson that Icontinue to learn in, in
business as well.
Wonderful conversation so far.
I'm, I'm excited for your answerto this because I know it's
gonna be amazing.
Are entrepreneurs born or arethey made?
Jason (37:20):
Are entrepreneurs born or made?
Russel (37:23):
Yep.
Pressure's on.
Jason (37:24):
What is an entrepreneur?
What does that word mean, Iguess to, is what I would throw
back at you in the five minuteswe have left.
Russel (37:30):
Oh, you're actually gonna ask me that?
Jason (37:33):
What is an entrepreneur?
That word gets thrown around.
Serial entrepreneur or they'rean entrepreneur.
What's that mean?
Do they own their own business?
I know a lot of business ownersthat I wouldn't describe as an
entrepreneur, asentrepreneurial.
Russel (37:45):
Very fair.
Maybe that's just a big, uh,maybe when I would think about
that and, and you've got me onthe spot here, really.
Um, I mean, I agree with you.
It's not just a, being abusiness owner, but I think
going back to what we weresaying earlier, just this so
unique, that an agency businessis, you have no choice but to be
an entrepreneur in an agencybusiness.
Maybe that's to say it's, it'ssomeone that innovates and
(38:07):
creates something.
Not for a W2.
I don't know.
I'm gonna think more deeplyabout this, but that's my off
the cuff answer.
Jason (38:13):
I would say that, uh, ,I'll using your definition and,
and it lines mainly with my own,you said something there that's
important, innovation and drive,work ethic, uh, creativity, and,
um, you know, critical thinking.
I think that is all wrapped intothe entrepreneurial mindset, and
for me, that is not somethingthat's born.
(38:35):
I think that, that's made overtime.
Truthfully, when, it took a lotof years here at Bytes, before I
would identify asentrepreneurial, I didn't really
think of myself in that way.
I thought of myself as, I'm aworker, I'm just a hard worker.
I think I would equate it to,entrepreneurship is like, if
it's, if you think of it as agame, I think it's a lot like
chess, right?
(38:56):
This is chess, not checkers, toquote Denzel from, uh, Training
Day there.
Because you have to think somany different moves ahead,
right?
How is this move gonna impactthe next move?
What is this gonna cost me if Iget it wrong?
Russel (39:08):
You can't just be a piece taker.
Jason (39:10):
You can't just be a piece taker.
I think that, uh, that comeswith time.
That's a skill that has to bedeveloped.
I don't think that peoplepossess that just as some innate
thing.
That's my answer there.
Russel (39:21):
I love it.
That's a very well thought out,uh, almost science driven or,
uh, made answer.
That's a good, good notch in themade bedpost there.
Awesome.
If people wanna know more aboutBytes.co, where can they go?
Jason (39:34):
They can go to our website.
You just said it.
B Y T E S.co.
Bytes.Co, that's our agencywebsite.
You could find me on LinkedIn,uh, Jason Di Vece, D-I-V-E-C-E.
Haven't been very activerecently, but uh, I tend to post
there.
That's where you can learn moreabout, um, what we do and what
I'm up to.
Russel (39:52):
Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day
to share your courageousjourneys, your failures, your
successes and everything thatallowed you to get to the place
you are today.
Really appreciate you taking thetime to share that with us.
Jason (40:06):
This was a lot of fun, Russel.
This was great.
I can't think of a better way tospend my Friday morning, so
thank you very much for havingme on your podcast.
Russel (40:15):
Thank you for listening to An Agency Story podcast where
every story helps you write yourown, subscribe, share, and join
us again for more real stories,lessons learned, and
breakthroughs ahead.
What's next?
You'll want to visit anagencystory.com/podcast and
follow us on Instagram at@anagencystory for the latest
updates.
Jason (40:37):
We hired somebody, uh, to do this support role.
It was their first day.
This was in the basement days.
I forget what hire number thiswas, but remember, we really
didn't vet people or have aprocess or anything.
Anyway, this person's first day,they come in and I'm training
them how to use the ticketingsystem.
It's 10 o'clock in the morningand this person says to me like,
is there beer in that fridgeover there?
(40:57):
I said, yeah.
They walk over to the fridge andthey grab a beer, open it, come
back down and sit at the desk.
I was just like, I didn't knowwhat to say.
I'm like, what the fuck?
Pete who was there, he was justlike, are you drinking a beer
right now?
They were like, yeah, it helpsclear my sinuses.
Russel (41:12):
Can we get a doctor's note for that?
Jason (41:13):
I just did not know what to say.
I can't imagine ever doing thatat like a job.
Needless to say, she, thisperson did not last very long.
Russel (41:22):
Speaking of entrepreneurship, there's
nothing entrepreneurship to, toget you closer to the realm of,
I think I might've seen it all.
Jason (41:29):
The boldness of that was really, I'll never forget that
one.
Welcome to An Agency Story podcast where owners and
experts share the real journey,the early struggles, the
breakthrough moments, andeverything in between.
I'm your host Russel Dubree,former eight figure agency owner
turned business coach, sold myagency and now helps agency
leaders create their idealbusiness.
Every agency has a story, andthis is your front row seat.
(00:23):
This is an agency story.
Welcome to the show todayeveryone.
I have Jason Di Vece withBytes.co with us here today.
Thank you so much, for being onthe show today, Jason.
Jason (00:36):
Thank you for having me Russel.
It's a pleasure.
Russel (00:38):
I'm glad you are here, ready to get started.
If you don't mind, kick us off.
What does Bytes.co do and who doyou do it for?
Jason (00:45):
People ask me that all the time.
What do you do?
What do you do?
What I like to tell people is wesolve problems.
That's what we do.
They look at me like.
Okay.
Yeah, right.
You didn't tell me anything.
We build websites and craftdigital marketing strategies for
organizations, uh, of all shapesand sizes in pretty much any
industry you can think of.
(01:06):
So Bytes.co is really just afull service digital agency.
I like to say that we solveproblems because, um, that's
really why.
I think that's what the value ofan agency brings to a client,
ultimately, is looking at likethings from a higher level,
right?
It's like, I don't just need anew website.
I need something that's going toimpact the bottom line in some
(01:27):
way, shape, or form.
How can you as a solutionsprovider help me do that?
It's about analyzing aparticular business or industry
and crafting a solution that'sright for a particular client.
Russel (01:38):
That's awesome.
We're gonna talk a lot moreabout what you created with
Bytes.co.
Seems like a pretty coolorganization, but let's, let's
take a trip on memory lane realquick and tell us a little bit
about young Jason.
What were his goals, hopes anddreams.
Jason (01:51):
Oh boy.
How far back are we going?
Russel (01:53):
I don't know.
I mean, were you playing with acomputer at two years old or?
Jason (01:56):
I was playing with, uh, Macintosh in fourth grade.
That was what I, I learned on,actually, a Mac.
My dad had his own newspaperbusiness, the Wiscasset Times.
That's where I'm from.
I'm from Wiscasset, Maine.
He transitioned from doing itthe old way with an exacto knife
and glue and paper, you know,laying it out, old school to,
(02:17):
uh, doing it online, doing,doing it with, or not online,
but with a computer rather.
In, uh, 1994.
I started playing around withcomputers.
It was a Power Mac, I think,desktop.
I just thought it was thecoolest thing, you know, to, uh,
to play with the different fontsand, you know, work in an
environment where the paintnever dries, so to speak.
(02:38):
That's really what got meinterested in, uh, working with
computers at a very young age,was, um, really my dad, I guess.
Russel (02:44):
That's like the OG tech transition from old school
newspaper cutting to a digitalformat.
Jason (02:50):
Believe it or not, I was playing around with a program
called, uh, HyperCard and AdobePageMaker, which I think is the
precursor to InDesign, and I wasmessing with those in like
fourth grade, kind of buildingmy own little, like, HyperCard
games, which was like really,really early, like stop
animation program.
It just got me super interestedin, in technology and I really
(03:12):
wanted to do something withcomputers.
Didn't know what, and sounfortunately that kind of, uh,
led me down the wrong path.
Early in my career, I, I wentinto computer science.
My freshman year of college Iwent to UMaine Orono.
I was just talking about thatwith someone earlier today
actually, uh,'cause I kind ofhad a misunderstanding, I guess,
about like where to apply thisinterest.
Russel (03:33):
I don't know where this is leading, but it sounds like a
smart, good path.
But now, now, now I'm curious.
I'm intrigued.
Jason (03:38):
Well, it didn't lead anywhere good.
Basically, like, I realized realfast, like, holy shit.
Realized pretty quickly, this isnot for me.
I don't wanna write code.
In terms of hopes and dreams andthings, I, I, I was a really a
rebel without a cause at thatage.
Things didn't work out atUMaine.
Long story short there.
I took a year off and, um, wasworking as a land surveyor, so
(04:01):
something completely different.
Russel (04:02):
That is completely different.
Jason (04:03):
Yeah, running a transit gun using the, you know, Topcon
device and doing all thisconstruction layout work.
Some advice I would give toyoung people, I guess is if you
don't know, maybe don't rushinto something just because
someone's pushing you to.
I really should have waited to,to go to school.
I just wasn't ready.
Long story short, I went back toschool for graphic design and,
(04:25):
uh, multimedia arts, which isreally going back to the origins
of, you know, using PageMakerand doing layout work.
It's more creative, right?
That's ultimately what, um,where I kind of found like, oh,
this is what I wanna do.
Got my degree, uh, ChamplainCollege here in Burlington,
where I still am today inBurlington, Vermont.
It's where I met my businesspartner who, um, I co-founded
(04:46):
what was then Burlington Bytesin, uh, 20, he started it in
2010.
I came on in 2012.
So, you know, how, How did I getto this point is kind of like, I
didn't really plan for this, tobe honest with you.
I did not wanna start an agency.
When I graduated college, Iwanted to get a job in print
design, believe it or not, and Ijust wasn't good enough.
(05:08):
Turns out, like in 2007, 2008,it wasn't really a big need for,
uh, graphic designers, uh, atleast in this area.
I got a job doing, um, techsupport in the automotive
industry.
I went to work for a big, uh,you know, tech company and hated
it.
Russel (05:25):
I was gonna say that doesn't sound exciting.
Jason (05:27):
No, it was, I, I didn't like it at all, really.
But you know what it did is it,it laid, um, the foundation for
how we were able to start thisbusiness because I actually got
to see like, how you could makemoney building websites as an
example.
'Cause I studied in, in college,building with Dreamweaver and
Macromedia Flash at the time.
(05:49):
I never really was able toconnect the dots, like, how does
this actually, how do I applythis?
In a way to make money.
That probably sounds stupid, butI, I was always thinking of it
as like.
Russel (05:59):
It's the honest question everybody's asking themselves
is, is what do I have that isgoing to get a good return on
investment?
Fair, honest question.
Jason (06:07):
Yeah, it was just art for art's sake.
I just loved the creativity ofit, and I just didn't ever
really think of the businessside.
That was the exposure that I gotwhen I got outta college.
It was like, oh, okay, like thisis how in the real world, the
stuff works.
I hated it, hated the job somuch.
I just worked it long enough topay off my student loans.
Then, uh, I moved abroad toteach English with my now wife,
(06:32):
girlfriend at the time.
While I was over there, Istarted.
Russel (06:35):
Where is over there?
Jason (06:36):
Over there, yeah.
I was in, uh, Korea, actually.
I moved to Korea.
Russel (06:39):
Okay.
That's different.
Jason (06:41):
Yeah, that was different.
I sold all my worldlypossessions at 25 and uh, moved
abroad to South Korea to a placecalled Gwangju in the mountains,
city of about 1.5 millionpeople.
Never heard of it before.
Didn't really know much aboutKorea, to be honest.
But I thought, well, this isprobably better than what I'm
(07:01):
doing now, uh,'cause I reallydid not like what I was doing at
the time.
Russel (07:05):
Okay.
Hold on.
I got, I got questions here.
We gotta dive a little into thisbecause it's like, this is gonna
share a lot about who you are asa person.
Uh, I mean, How much planningwent into this?
Jason (07:13):
Probably three months.
Russel (07:15):
Okay.
And what were you doing in thatthree months?
Was it just selling your worldlypossessions or were you thinking
about what you were gonna doover there?
Or was it just, I got my ticket,now I gotta this, it's more
about the exit than theentrance?
Jason (07:24):
It was more about the exit than the interest, to be
honest.
Russel, I just, I, like I said,I mean tech support in
automotive, uh, with aproprietary site building tool
that was fraught with issues.
I would take sometimes 30 callsa day from car dealers, just
irate.
I couldn't do really solve theirproblems.
(07:44):
That was the most frustratingthing is I was so many layers
removed from the technology.
All I could do was intake theproblem.
Assure the customer like, yeah,no, we're working on it, we're
working on it, and, um, move onto the next thing.
It was this ticket basedfrontline customer support that
really dragged me down.
Russel (08:02):
Oh yeah, I've been there.
I did that for a little bit too.
Not for the automotive, but Iknow exactly what you're saying.
Jason (08:08):
Yeah, right?
So it was like anything I, Icould do to get outta there.
I took a job teaching Englishin, in Korea, and that was the
single biggest like, uh, one ofthe best decisions I have ever
made in my life, was doing that.
Something so different took meway outta my comfort zone.
When I came back, I, mymentality was completely
different.
It was like, I can do anythingthat I want because I did that.
(08:32):
I had never really had thatexperience before in my life.
Russel (08:35):
How long were you over there?
Jason (08:35):
A year.
I was there a year, and while Iwas there, what led me to this
was something called, uh,WordPress.
I was blogging while I was overthere using a tool called
WordPress that I basically just.
Russel (08:48):
A little known tool.
Jason (08:49):
And it was, this is 2009, right?
So at that time, WordPress wasvery, very young.
I just like Googled, you know,oh, that's a blogging tool I
could use.
I started using it.
I was writing a travel blog, uh,called Pack Your Knives and Go.
I think it's actually, it'sstill out there under a
different name, but the site hasbeen, I won't get into that.
Anyway, um, that rekindled myinterest in, you know, working
(09:12):
in, in technology.
It was like, oh yeah, thisstuff's actually interesting.
It's not all like, you know,broken and like, uh, negative.
It really rekindled my interestsin it.
And, um, When I came back, causeour contract was up, I hooked up
with, um, my now businesspartner who I met in college and
(09:33):
he was working at the samecompany I was at, um, before I
left where I was doing the techsupport.
He was working there doing SEOsearch engine optimization.
This was a concept I had neverheard of in, in 2010.
I didn't know what that was.
Actually got a job at the samecompany doing SEO.
I went back in a differentdepartment and just learned up
on my own.
Russel (09:52):
Just went right back to the grinder, man.
Jason (09:55):
I went right back into it, you know, I thought, eh,
this'll be better.
It'll be better, right?
Well, it wasn't better.
The only difference was that Ihad landed myself in just your
textbook cushy desk job.
I went from tech frontline techsupport, which was manic, all
over the place, multitaskinglike you can't even believe too.
(10:15):
Very regimented, orderly,process driven search engine
optimization in the automotiveindustry.
Very different.
I got bored pretty quick.
It was like not what I expected.
I started to, to freelance doingit because I was able to find I
had enough of the fundamentalsof SEO.
I had enough drive to go lookfor work, right?
(10:36):
More work.
'cause I, I was making okaymoney, but, you know, I knew I
could make more.
and While I was doing thisfreelancing, I, I was able to
find a few accounts that paidlike triple the hourly rate what
I was getting at my day job.
My confidence was starting tobuild and then I, My now
business partner, he left soonafter I started my second tour
at this tech company and hestarted, uh, an operation called
(10:58):
Burlington Bytes, which wasbuilding websites with WordPress
that were optimized for search,and he was doing it for local
businesses here in Burlington,Vermont.
This was kind of an eye-openerfor me because I didn't really,
I always looked at WordPress as,oh, it's just a blogging tool.
He was building websites withit.
I had never seen anybody dothat.
Like full websites, you know,that weren't just blogs and he
(11:21):
was applying the same conceptsthat we were learning at this
tech company, which wasbasically like, look, it's not a
website, it's a lead generationtool.
It's driving interest for peoplelooking to buy cars.
Russel (11:33):
What's funny, I'm just hearing you talk about this.
When you're saying it seems soduh in 2025, right?
But I think just for the, forthe younger folks at home, like
this was, this was not the wayof thinking.
In the late 2000s it was, right,I remember right, we were still
in the period of trying toconvince some businesses that
they needed a website.
We were still trying to competeand fight with Yellow Pages and
(11:54):
just the stuff they were doing.
Things that might sound like,duh, this was not the case in,
in the late 2000s.
Jason (11:59):
Good context.
We did a lot of that.
To fast forward just a littlebit, I ended up leaving and
partnering with, um, Pete, mybusiness partner, and he had
maybe, I don't know, 10 clients,15 clients or so, all local
businesses, word of mouth,people he knew.
We started really the company,Burlington Bytes.
It was Burlington Bytes before,but it was just him essentially
(12:21):
freelancing, building websites.
Now it was him and I together.
Russel (12:24):
Now it's official.
Jason (12:25):
We partnered and we moved into my garage in the old north
end of Burlington here.
What you just said is like youhitting the nail right on the
head.
We spent a lot of time educatingclients and really we were
backfilling an industry that waspeople that had like version one
of a website, right?
They got one put up in the,maybe the late 90s, early 2000s
(12:46):
and that was it.
It was like, they didn't reallysee it.
Russel (12:48):
But still had the counter at the bottom and, uh,
the click counter?
Jason (12:53):
Oh yeah, I mean, all kinds of stuff.
Flat HTML, nothing, I mean,mobile wasn't even something you
talked about really.
Those conversations were juststarting to happen, uh, and
people still had mobile sitesthat were, you know, that were
like clunky.
Russel (13:08):
I'm curious, I mean, 'cause because you said when you
came back from Korea, you were,you, you had this, I don't know,
enlightenment or I can'tremember exactly how you
described it.
When you think about the kind ofgoing to the world of
entrepreneurship, was it morethe dissatisfaction of the, of
what you were living in terms ofyour job?
Or was it this enlightenment, Ican do anything from, from your
(13:30):
Korea experience?
Jason (13:30):
I would say it was really both.
For sure, a combination of both.
I had a lot more confidenceafter living abroad and just a
fuck it type of mentality, I'mjust gonna go for it that I
really didn't have before.
The other side of it was reallyboredom.
I'm a creative type of personand I, I don't tend to sit
still.
Anyone that knows me will tellyou that.
That's what I was doing.
I was literally sitting at adesk all day long, doing,
(13:53):
following the same process forthe same types of clients in the
same industry.
I just knew even after a monthor two of being there, I think I
only lasted like 10 months, thatsecond tour, I was like, this
isn't for me.
I'm not gonna last here.
That was the push I think waslike, just realizing I can do
this on my own, even if itdoesn't work out, at least I
(14:14):
won't be doing what I'm doingnow.
And that was the what really ledme to Korea as well.
It was same idea of like, I'm, Iknow I'm never gonna be happy
doing this, so I guess I'm justchasing, you know, selfishly
chasing my own sort of desirefor, uh, for happiness.
Russel (14:28):
I don't think there's anything I, I think we all
should be, uh, you know, chasinghappiness.
I talk to so many owners andjust say, look, if this is not
the direct, the car is notheaded in the direction of
happiness, let's take a stepback and really rethink if we're
on the right road, or, or that,that's the first place.
Because there's no point indoing this whole thing and
working this hard to not behappy.
So I don't think of it asselfish at all.
(14:50):
I really hope this, thisconversation today just inspires
someone to go do something kindof bold like that, a little,
little abroad moment.
Uh, What's that movie?
Uh, Eat, Pray, Love, I thinkwith, um, oh, what's her name?
I, I haven't actually seen thismovie.
My wife talks about all thetime, the, what's her name?
Julie Roberts.
Yes.
Um, But that kind of just go onthis little exploration journey.
Clearly it, it, it, you seemslike you would be a fan and
(15:12):
advocate of that.
Jason (15:13):
A hundred percent.
I'm a big advocate of justpushing yourself to do something
you're uncomfortable doing, andunlearning everything that
you've learned.
Russel (15:22):
All right, so you got this thing up and running and,
you know.
I imagine just like a lot offolks, it's exciting, it's fun,
it's energizing, um,everything's kind of new and or
whatever.
When was the first moment likeyour, oh shit moment?
Does anything stand out?
There's gotta be one I imagine.
Jason (15:37):
Wow.
To what degree, I remember, youknow, this is a, a lot of oh
shit moments.
There was one I remember that,uh, I'll never forget.
It was our first big job, it wase-commerce.
It was on Magento one, 1.7, Ithink.
Russel (15:51):
Oh man, I haven't heard Magento get drops, name dropped
in a while.
Jason (15:55):
Yeah, I know it's a dirty word.
Russel (15:57):
Back to your, your Magento story.
Jason (15:59):
So, but yeah, right, it's, It's an e-commerce site.
It's Magento 1.7.
Uh, we had never worked with itbefore, so there's, oh shit
moment number one.
What the hell are we doingworking with Magento?
To be honest, I can't evenrecall why we went down that
road, but it was the first timeI had used, um, really something
other than WordPress or thisother proprietary system that at
(16:21):
this tech company I had beenusing.
This was like my, another CMSthat I was dabbling in and we
were building this at, it was anexpensive site at the time.
We were charging'em, I forgetthe exact amount.
Probably six or seven timeslarger than anything we had ever
dealt with previously.
This is like still in ourinfancy.
It's still just me and mybusiness partner.
Okay.
(16:41):
We imported all the, not evenimported, we manually added all
these products to Magento bypaying interns like, I don't
know, 10 bucks an hour orsomething to sit at a computer
all day.
There were four of'em and theyhad to key in all these
different products for a clientthat sold really niche, like
(17:02):
medical supplies, super specificto like a particular field.
Electron microscopy, I believeis what the field was.
I don't even know what the,that, that is exactly.
Yeah.
Gnarly product catalog, they keyit all in.
Anyway, one day I show up.
I'm in the backend on theproduct grid.
I hit the select all buttonbecause there was some stuff I
wanted to delete and, um, I hitdelete and it actually deleted
(17:26):
7,500 products.
It didn't select all on thepage.
It selected all products.
It was a bug in the sy, in thesystem or it was me not
understanding the UI, and I waslike, I just deleted like four
months worth of work.
Ouch.
There was no way to recover it.
At least, so I thought.
We were able to recover it.
We did have backups at theserver level of the site, and we
(17:48):
restored it to like a weekprior.
We only lost like a week's worthof work.
But, uh, that was my first one,which was, I'll never forget the
panic of like, oh my God, Ican't believe I am that stupid.
You know?
Russel (18:02):
I'm not a developer, but I, I've, I've heard all the
developers that ever worked forus, especially back then when we
were actually doing Magentoprojects, um, loath its name and
everything about it.
Jason (18:13):
That was a, a bad one for sure.
You could pick, pick the poisonfor the rest of, yeah.
Russel (18:17):
And here you survived.
Was that a big enough, you know,oh crap moment to, you know,
take your learning lesson here,or any big ahas?
Jason (18:25):
It is an interesting question.
The business today, there's 25people that work here.
We have like over 400 clientsall across the United States,
and we started as just like in agarage in Burlington, Vermont,
technically a basement inBurlington, Vermont with just
local businesses.
There's a real difference,right?
When you get up the, into largerorganizations, big nonprofits,
private companies, corporations,you tend to deal with more
(18:47):
sophisticated buyers withsophisticated needs.
There's been a lot of learningthat has happened along, along
the way as we've just slowlyworked our way into larger
businesses and, and differenttypes of clients.
I would say the first, like,probably four or five years of
this, of this journey, I don'teven really count as like a
business.
(19:07):
That was just like a lot of likefumbling through, saying yes to
everything, figuring it out asyou go, fake it till you make
it, as they say.
There was a lot of that.
Russel (19:17):
Basically learning everything you don't wanna do in
the future or how not to doeverything before you can write
the book on how to do it.
Jason (19:24):
A hundred percent.
When we actually started hiringpeople, like we hired people we
knew, we hired like our friendsthat we had relationships with
and that wasn't really a greatidea.
It didn't work out.
We tended to just, or we didn'thave a hiring process and we
didn't really, HR, I mean, likewhere's the paper shredder in
(19:45):
the corner?
We had no concept of how to likemanage people or an organization
or a, or a business for thatmatter.
In those early days, the firstfour or five years, we were
doubling every year in terms ofrevenue and client load and head
count really.
By 2015 we had moved into abasement, um, outta my garage.
Russel (20:04):
Move from a garage to a basement.
That's a pretty big upgradethere.
Jason (20:07):
That's right.
An upgrade.
We went from 500 square feet tolike 1200, I think.
When the landlord was, wasshowing us the spaces, it was in
a nice building, uh, at the topof Church Street here in
Burlington.
We were like, yeah, I don'tknow.
Do you have anything likecheaper?
Because they were all expensiveplaces, is right downtown.
She said, well, we have thebasement, but no one's been
(20:28):
interested in that for years.
We were like, oh, let's go takea look.
We go down into the basement andit was open concept in a
historic building, so it hadhigh ceilings and red stone
walls for the foundation and afloor that was like epoxied,
right?
We just walked around and wewere like, it's perfect, we'll
take it.
She was like, really?
You actually want this?
(20:48):
We were like, yeah, really?
We like this.
It's like a Bat Cave.
Let's take it.
Russel (20:51):
This sounds so a developer's dream right here.
Jason (20:54):
It was perfect.
There were four of us at thetime when we moved into that
space, and from there we grewto, uh, 15 people.
That was, uh, several oh shitmoments when we were down there.
Russel (21:07):
That's not an insignificant jump, um, for an
agency.
Especially going for, you know,kind of that freelancer with a
few helpers to just a reallyfull-fledged team.
What do you think you were doingthat was allowing you to be that
successful?
Jason (21:19):
Work ethic, definitely.
We were grinding, we wereworking all the time.
We were, um, taking on.
Russel (21:26):
What were you working on?
Unless you're saying this workin terms of just shelling out
for hours and cranking out sitesor something.
Jason (21:32):
Oh no.
At that time when we moved intothe basement, um, we were
primarily building websites.
We were doing mostly websitesand every website that we build,
we host and we support.
There's a revenue stream that,that, that comes with that,
right?
Or a recurring revenue stream.
That's been core to the businessmodel since day one, is we need
some sort of monthlysubscription revenue.
(21:55):
That's the lesson that we tookfrom automotive, right?
The parts department, theservice department, that's what
keeps the lights on at a cardealership.
Russel (22:01):
So there was, there is some benefit other than actually
starting your business fromyour, your automotive tech
support career.
Jason (22:07):
Absolutely.
That was the framework that weused.
The core concept of how to likecreate a business that's
sustainable came from myexperience, uh, in, in corporate
tech.
My business partner had the samething.
A lot of building websites.
We were starting to get intodigital marketing at that time
'cause we had SEO backgroundsand we knew paid search and we
(22:28):
were dipping our toes in that,uh, to the point where we had a
person on staff where that wastheir job, but they didn't have
a full plate of work doing that.
He was also helping us buildwebsites and we all wore
different hats at that point.
I would help with, managing paidsearch at times.
That's what I mean.
We were working all the time.
We were constantly trying to getin new work and, Pete, he did
(22:49):
all the sales and was reallygood at it.
I mean, He was a really goodcloser and could get people in
the door quick.
That had a lot to do with kindof the rapid pace of, of growth
because we were like, well, weneed, if we're gonna do this
job, we need to hire.
Alright, let's do that and thenjust, ramp up from there.
We would basically run in thered.
We would run really hot, neverreally hiring ahead, and then
(23:12):
frankly just kind of hire toolate.
There were a lot of problemsthat came with that, as you
might imagine, uh, hiring underduress.
But, um, a big pivot for us wasour first, we, our first
developer we ever had was thisreally young, kind of
inexperienced, uh, he was rightoutta school, you know, and, and
he did the best that he could,and I think we put him in some
really unfortunate situations.
(23:33):
He left.
Russel (23:34):
That's wont to happen a lot in in small, small agency
environment.
Jason (23:38):
Coding into a corner kind of thing.
The day he left, the day hesaid, I don't wanna do this
anymore, this other guy walkedin, a guy named Brian, and it
was as though it was an act ofGod or something.
He walked into the basement andhe said, hey, I'm a developer
looking for a job.
Russel (23:51):
Literally the day the other guy left?
Jason (23:53):
It was like the day or the next day.
It was like the stars hadaligned and this guy had
experience.
He was from an agency and he wasa lot like Pete.
He was really motivated by thework and it was, he was just
genuinely passionate aboutbuilding things and he was
smart, and what he brought tothe table was a new way of
thinking about buildingwebsites,'Cause he could write
(24:15):
code, he was an engineer, hecould solve complicated
problems.
We could actually respond tothings like RFPs.
We could chase these jobs thatwe couldn't even think about
before,'cause we just didn'thave the technical abilities.
That was a big leapfrog momentbecause we could charge more
money and we could chasedifferent types of work, and
that's what we did.
We, uh, were able to land, um,some really large accounts.
(24:38):
We had another developer joinnot long after who was also,
similar situation.
He just walked in.
He had a startup that had failedand was just looking to align
himself with people that had thesame sort of philosophy as him.
With those two together, we hada real, like foundation of an
engineering team, you know, andthat allowed us to just leapfrog
(25:00):
beyond where we were because wewere really never gonna get
into, um, the organizations thatwe have now as clients if we
didn't make that investment in,like, we, we need developers, we
need people who are like trainedand skilled, and experienced in
this.
Russel (25:13):
How intentional was just that thought process in, in
terms of wanting to just say,hey, we want bigger, more
sophisticated clients, um, youknow, bigger budgets, et cetera.
When you think back in thatmoment, was that, was that the
goal and the intention and youwere going about this
strategically or you're justdoing a lot of work and figuring
things out as you go?
Jason (25:30):
From my perspective, it was just figuring it out as we
go.
It was like the path of leastresistance.
It was wherever the water kindof flows.
That's how I really remember it.
Now, my business partner, he mayhave a very different take on
it, um, cause at the time I wasdoing a lot of work.
I was account management, I wassome technical support.
I was project managing.
(25:50):
I was doing some sales even.
I was wearing a lot of hats.
We didn't have any titles.
It was a flat org and this iswhen the team was probably, uh,
12 people, 10, 10, 12 peoplearound that time.
What we ended up doing in 2015,this was a big moment in my
professional development was,uh, Pete said, look, the
(26:10):
business is growing way toofast.
You and I don't know how tomanage it.
Clearly, cause we didn't.
I didn't go to business school.
I didn't really like, intend forthis to be a thing that was
really taking off.
I just wanted to kind of becreative as a freelancer and,
and make more money doing that.
He said, look, we need to hire aCEO.
We need somebody that can like,do exactly what you just said,
Russel, is like, they need tosteer the ship.
(26:32):
They need to build a strategicplan.
They need to manage the budget,like,'cause this is getting too
big for us.
Which I resisted at first.
I didn't really agree with that.
I thought we could, we couldmanage this.
Russel (26:44):
You don't hear that, to be quite honest.
I mean, yes.
I, I think that problem of, youknow, you've got a lot of folks
like yourself that are justreally great at the work and
really want to be invested in,in the, the engineering of
things, but, you know, maybejust don't have the desire to,
you know, strategically steerthe ship or something like that.
I really don't very often hear,you know, especially at a size
like that, where someone's like,we wanna sit someone over the
(27:06):
top of us, essentially, uh, to,to steer us.
That's a pretty unique thought.
I'm sitting here thinking like,there's just no way this is
actually gonna go good either.
But I'm always surprised everynow and then.
Jason (27:16):
Yeah, well it failed, so, uh, There were some good things
that came of it, uh, but overallthat was a failure and cost us a
lot of money, a lot of time, alot of headache.
It set the business back, uh, afew years at least.
I think the, the real flaw therewas, you know, a philosophical
(27:37):
misalignment, I would say.
This person did some goodthings.
One of the things that they didvery early was he made a
comment, he was like, the waythings work here is like you
just throw a pile of work in themiddle of the room and everyone
just sort of picks away at it,and they just sort of decide
what they wanna do, and then youdo it.
He's like, and that's fine, butthat's not gonna scale.
You need to have an organ.
You need an organization chart,first of all, which we didn't
(27:59):
have.
And you need titles, which wedidn't have.
You need a chain of command, ahierarchy.
He implemented a verytraditional corporate, you know,
pyramid, uh, manager,subordinate, um, director, you
know, C-level, that kind ofthing.
That framework still existstoday.
It's different than what it wasthen, but it, it's, it's still a
(28:19):
thing.
We have titles, you know, wehave managers, directors, et
cetera, et cetera.
And, um, so That was one reallylasting impact.
Another was the rebranding.
That was something that hepushed forward and he said,
look, like Burlington Bytesdoesn't make sense.
It had kind of a weird like, youknow, dude's in a basement like
tech bro kind of vibe.
Russel (28:39):
I just keep thinking Burlington Coat Factory.
Don't ask me why that comes tomind.
Jason (28:42):
There you go.
But people would say like, theythought we were like a food
company, you know, like.
Russel (28:47):
Oh yeah, I can see that too.
Jason (28:48):
He was like, we need to ditch that whole thing.
He led the effort to rebrand, toBytes.Co.
Those two things were, wereneeded, were necessary.
But in his three year tenure, wealmo, we, we turned, basically
turned over the entire company.
People left and people came in,then people left that we brought
in.
We had a real hard time, um,getting the right people in the
(29:12):
door and employee retention wasa real issue.
Just as a leadership team, wedid not really jive.
In the beginning, things wereokay, but, um, it just, there
was no cohesion and it was,again, one of those things that
you could see the writing on thewall of just like, I just don't
see how this is gonna end well.
I just don't see how this isgonna work out.
(29:32):
And it, it ultimately didn't.
Russel (29:34):
I have my guesses, but I, I want to hear it straight
from you.
I mean, like more specific, likewhy, why?
Clearly sounds like you justreally went through a tumultuous
period through this.
Did you let go and put too muchin his hands too fast and, and
it just, you're just completelythrowing the baby out with the
bathwater?
Obviously you said she had somegood initiatives, but with other
things that were maybe workingwell of just someone that didn't
(29:55):
come up in the business andunderstand it?
Give us a little more detail onthat.
Jason (29:58):
We were a tech company and we hired somebody to run it
that really had no background intech.
I think that was the biggestmistake is like, this is just a
misalignment of, just experienceand skill and, you know, I, the
business background and thefinance background, very
relevant.
But, um, there was a realdisconnect from like the work
(30:19):
that we did, and I think alittle too traditional maybe in
terms of their style of how theywanted to manage people.
Created a lot of friction.
I think that was the issue.
I would call it, I guess, acultural misalignment.
I mean, Culture wins every time.
I say that based on experiencethat I've had here.
In that situation, that wassomebody that was hired for the
(30:40):
job.
It was for like the technicalneed, which was, you know,
business planning and financeand, uh, people management.
We thought that they really hadthe skills to do that.
And, and I, I think that thisperson did.
I don't wanna, you know, very,very smart, very capable
individual, but just culturallynot a fit.
Russel (31:00):
I want to bring this home too,'cause I've, I mean,
I've got some experience withthis as well.
I really am just come to theconclusion of how unique of a
business an agency is that itdoesn't fit, you know, even,
even within the construct oftext agency itself is a unique
business.
It's very hard to bring intraditional business paradigms
where you know things arewidgets and you just do more
(31:22):
widgets in the structuredapproach just does not work in
the chaos that is an agency.
Jason (31:27):
Boy, are you right about that.
Russel (31:28):
Just even to run an organization that's gotta be so
on its feet, you gotta beconstantly learning.
Whatever was true yesterdayisn't true tomorrow.
Just that strategic mindset andinnovation and the, the, the
foundations of justunderstanding what the actual
technical work we're doing, uh,I feel like is just absolutely
required.
I've seen other people kind offlail when they're put in that
(31:48):
role, when they're putting morekind of traditional, structured
environments and come into anagency.
They're very smart, intelligent,capable people that have been
successful.
They fall flat on their facebecause of all that chaos.
I say all this just to bring ithome just for folks at home
that, that there's not a, it'snot a plug and play thing you
can ever do to put someone incharge of an agency, even though
(32:08):
I know so many owners want thatworld so they can do the things
that I'm sure you're wanting todo or wanted to do, I guess you
could say.
But it sounds like you learned alot from that, if nothing else.
You paid another hefty tuitionto the school of hard knocks.
Jason (32:19):
I would say so.
That cost a lot of money and alot of time.
Be careful, right?
If there's the advice, it's likehiring under duress is one of
the worst things that you cando.
Russel (32:29):
Anything out of fear and absolute fight or flight
mentality probably is nevergonna be a good long-term
decision.
Jason (32:35):
It really, really isn't.
That was one that, that hurt,but we got through it.
Russel (32:39):
Here you are.
You have so many parts of yourstory that I, I'd love to go
down, but, uh, we do have tokind of wrap up here.
You have a very successfulagency at this point.
I guess maybe think back to justone, one more nugget, uh, you
can share with the folks at homeon what you think was an
important, if someone ask youthe, the key to your journey,
what would you ultimately sharewith that?
Jason (32:58):
I would have a very cliche answer, I think, which
is, uh, don't be afraid to failbecause you're going to fail.
I think that's something thatyou have to recognize, right?
You will fail at some point anddon't be afraid of that.
Just don't be afraid of failurebecause you ultimately learn
from it.
It's like anything, right?
Like investing, right?
(33:18):
Things go up, things go down,right?
It's never always just up.
You have, uh, high points andlow points, and I don't know
that we talk enough internallyhere about that.
I won't digress on that point,but anyway, that's, that's what
I'm saying.
The second piece I would say iscelebrate the wins.
Look at the wins.
Dissect the wins, right?
Yeah, you wanna look at why youfailed, but you also really need
(33:40):
to look at like why you won.
What did you do that wassuccessful that you can
replicate?
I think those are two reallyimportant things that have been
certainly key to our successhere.
Especially in the early days ofjust not being afraid to, to
push and to do something wehaven't done before, and we
still do that here today.
It's just a lot more measured,obviously.
(34:01):
That whole move fast and breakthings.
I really don't like that becausewhat isn't really talked about
is somebody ultimately has todeal with what's broken.
Russel (34:11):
There's a janitor.
There has to be a janitor.
Jason (34:13):
Yes, there's a janitor.
That used to be me.
I was the janitor.
Still am, I guess.
Russel (34:18):
I wanna, if you don't mind, piggyback on it'cause I,
because I, I get a sense aboutyou and, and you know, we do
hear that so much in businesses,you know, fail forward and, and,
and, you know, learn from thosemistakes.
But I get the sense that you'rea person and we can go back to
this Korea moment or this, uh,living abroad.
Not being afraid to fail, butwhat do you actually learn and
do from that failure?
Some folks might get burnt andso they become more cautious and
(34:40):
stuff.
I get the sense from you thetype of no, we got burned by
that so we are going tomassively overhaul or, or
change, um, take as you weresaying, take some of the good,
but then everything that waseven not working at all, just
throw it away.
Don't even just try to improveit.
Take the two or three goodthings and run with those and
you've, you've gotta do someoverhauling and, and pretty,
(35:02):
pretty hefty work and innovationto make these leaps within your
business.
Jason (35:06):
Editing, right?
Knowing how to edit and where toedit is, is important.
I mean, there's definitely, Ifit's not working, it's not
working.
I look at this like I've, I, youknow, had, I've had a lot of
people come and go through by,through Bytes, Burlington Bytes
and Bytes.co over the years.
Sometimes you just have to makethose hard decisions and make'em
quick and not kid yourself aboutlike, oh, well, maybe this'll
change or that'll change.
(35:27):
If you're growing a businessthat's relying on hiring people,
you need to be really quick tomake the decisions, recognizing,
okay, it's not working out withthis person.
We need to take the extra step,which in our case tends to be,
uh, you know, moving on withthat relationship.
I say that just'cause I, I,nowadays I think a lot about
like organizational managementand personnel management and
performance management, thatkind of thing.
(35:48):
That's a lot of what I do now.
I still make these mistakeswhere like, I have people in the
wrong role and ultimately theydon't work out right, you think
about what that costs thebusiness, like I'm still
learning that piece as I go.
I think that for me these daysnow, I guess, um, there's a lot
more sort of reflection on what,how can I do this differently
(36:08):
next time?
What were the signs that Iignored?
What did I miss?
Trying to delegate that down tomy management team has been sort
of my thing.
It's not just like, um, meanymore, but how can I instill
that in other people?
What lesson am I saying, Iguess, for, uh, someone growing
a business is, you know, don'tbe afraid to make those hard
decisions either.
Sometimes it's better foreverybody and you just have to
(36:30):
be honest about that situationand really say that of like,
look, this is not working out.
You're not in the right role.
It's not a fit.
Gotta go or gotta take a nextstep.
Russel (36:39):
I'm inspired by that thought because I, you know, I
think, I think we're just sowired as humans probably to ask
what's the easiest thing we cando to try to improve something.
But I don't know.
I'm kind of thinking we need toask ourselves what's the hardest
thing that we need to do toimprove something?
More often than not, I imagine,I imagine that's the thing that
needs to be done.
Once you're down that path, youcan maybe try to find easier
ways to do the hard thing.
(36:59):
We gotta ask ourselves, what'sthe hard thing to do here?
'Cause that's probably the rightthing.
Jason (37:03):
It's a good point.
The hard thing is probably theright thing.
Russel (37:06):
That's so true.
As much as we don't want that tobe true, I, I, I think, I think
that is the lesson that Icontinue to learn in, in
business as well.
Wonderful conversation so far.
I'm, I'm excited for your answerto this because I know it's
gonna be amazing.
Are entrepreneurs born or arethey made?
Jason (37:20):
Are entrepreneurs born or made?
Russel (37:23):
Yep.
Pressure's on.
Jason (37:24):
What is an entrepreneur?
What does that word mean, Iguess to, is what I would throw
back at you in the five minuteswe have left.
Russel (37:30):
Oh, you're actually gonna ask me that?
Jason (37:33):
What is an entrepreneur?
That word gets thrown around.
Serial entrepreneur or they'rean entrepreneur.
What's that mean?
Do they own their own business?
I know a lot of business ownersthat I wouldn't describe as an
entrepreneur, asentrepreneurial.
Russel (37:45):
Very fair.
Maybe that's just a big, uh,maybe when I would think about
that and, and you've got me onthe spot here, really.
Um, I mean, I agree with you.
It's not just a, being abusiness owner, but I think
going back to what we weresaying earlier, just this so
unique, that an agency businessis, you have no choice but to be
an entrepreneur in an agencybusiness.
Maybe that's to say it's, it'ssomeone that innovates and
(38:07):
creates something.
Not for a W2.
I don't know.
I'm gonna think more deeplyabout this, but that's my off
the cuff answer.
Jason (38:13):
I would say that, uh, ,I'll using your definition and,
and it lines mainly with my own,you said something there that's
important, innovation and drive,work ethic, uh, creativity, and,
um, you know, critical thinking.
I think that is all wrapped intothe entrepreneurial mindset, and
for me, that is not somethingthat's born.
(38:35):
I think that, that's made overtime.
Truthfully, when, it took a lotof years here at Bytes, before I
would identify asentrepreneurial, I didn't really
think of myself in that way.
I thought of myself as, I'm aworker, I'm just a hard worker.
I think I would equate it to,entrepreneurship is like, if
it's, if you think of it as agame, I think it's a lot like
chess, right?
(38:56):
This is chess, not checkers, toquote Denzel from, uh, Training
Day there.
Because you have to think somany different moves ahead,
right?
How is this move gonna impactthe next move?
What is this gonna cost me if Iget it wrong?
Russel (39:08):
You can't just be a piece taker.
Jason (39:10):
You can't just be a piece taker.
I think that, uh, that comeswith time.
That's a skill that has to bedeveloped.
I don't think that peoplepossess that just as some innate
thing.
That's my answer there.
Russel (39:21):
I love it.
That's a very well thought out,uh, almost science driven or,
uh, made answer.
That's a good, good notch in themade bedpost there.
Awesome.
If people wanna know more aboutBytes.co, where can they go?
Jason (39:34):
They can go to our website.
You just said it.
B Y T E S.co.
Bytes.Co, that's our agencywebsite.
You could find me on LinkedIn,uh, Jason Di Vece, D-I-V-E-C-E.
Haven't been very activerecently, but uh, I tend to post
there.
That's where you can learn moreabout, um, what we do and what
I'm up to.
Russel (39:52):
Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day
to share your courageousjourneys, your failures, your
successes and everything thatallowed you to get to the place
you are today.
Really appreciate you taking thetime to share that with us.
Jason (40:06):
This was a lot of fun, Russel.
This was great.
I can't think of a better way tospend my Friday morning, so
thank you very much for havingme on your podcast.
Russel (40:15):
Thank you for listening to An Agency Story podcast where
every story helps you write yourown, subscribe, share, and join
us again for more real stories,lessons learned, and
breakthroughs ahead.
What's next?
You'll want to visit anagencystory.com/podcast and
follow us on Instagram at@anagencystory for the latest
updates.
Jason (40:37):
We hired somebody, uh, to do this support role.
It was their first day.
This was in the basement days.
I forget what hire number thiswas, but remember, we really
didn't vet people or have aprocess or anything.
Anyway, this person's first day,they come in and I'm training
them how to use the ticketingsystem.
It's 10 o'clock in the morningand this person says to me like,
is there beer in that fridgeover there?
(40:57):
I said, yeah.
They walk over to the fridge andthey grab a beer, open it, come
back down and sit at the desk.
I was just like, I didn't knowwhat to say.
I'm like, what the fuck?
Pete who was there, he was justlike, are you drinking a beer
right now?
They were like, yeah, it helpsclear my sinuses.
Russel (41:12):
Can we get a doctor's note for that?
Jason (41:13):
I just did not know what to say.
I can't imagine ever doing thatat like a job.
Needless to say, she, thisperson did not last very long.
Russel (41:22):
Speaking of entrepreneurship, there's
nothing entrepreneurship to, toget you closer to the realm of,
I think I might've seen it all.
Jason (41:29):
The boldness of that was really, I'll never forget that
one.
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