March 18, 2025 • 33 mins
Hamza Alsamraee shares his entrepreneurial journey, detailing his transition into the marketing agency world and the recognition of short-form content's potential. He discusses strategies for acquiring initial clients and principles for creating compelling ads, reflecting on early successes. Hamza offers insights on making the first $10-20k and navigating business and personal challenges while balancing life's demands and finding joy in work. He emphasizes the importance of team dynamics, balancing freedom with accountability, and avoiding marketing misconceptions and trends. The episode concludes with Hamza's advice for young entrepreneurs and best practices for life.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Hamza, you're sitting here as a junior incollege making hundreds of thousands of dollars
a month.
What the heck do
you do?
I run a marketing agency called Newform.
What does your agency do?
We do content.
So we do paid marketing, for consumer software.
The one sentence is we scale world classcompanies, with short form content.
(00:20):
I really wanna understand your blueprint to howyou got to where you are today.
But I think to do that, it's it's also reallyimportant to understand your journey.
How did you get into the world ofentrepreneurship and why?
I wanted to get into a good school.
So I had this, you know, bright idea to write amath book.
I was like, that that sounds impressive.
Right?
That'll get me into college.
(00:41):
And, you know, I started writing in.
I kinda realized in the middle of it thatnobody write you know, buys math books.
So nobody's gonna read this thing.
So I didn't I didn't wanna just do it justagainst the college.
I actually wanted people to read it.
So I was like, okay.
Well, where can I market this thing?
I was like, I'm spending a lot of time onInstagram.
Maybe I do that.
(01:01):
So I made a math page on Instagram, verycreatively named daily math.
I scribbled down a problem from the book on apiece of paper, and I posted it on Instagram.
Got two likes that first day, and I was hooked.
I was like, okay.
Two people liked the problem.
So the next day, I did the same thing.
I made it a little bit nicer.
(01:22):
My handwriting was always terrible.
So I, like, really took my time writing out theproblem.
And then the third day, I had this bright idea.
I was like, okay.
What if I, like, type it up on a computer?
It'll look even nicer.
And then the fourth day, I, like, made a coverpage for the, you know, like, before the
problem.
And the fifth day, I was like, maybe throw insome color.
Right?
And, like, it was just this constant iterationon content.
(01:45):
I kept doing it, I think, for, like, a hundreddays.
I, like, literally did nothing but try to makethe best content in this very niche, integral
community and eventually published my firstbook.
You know, it was a number one bestseller inthis category.
I mean, math is not very competitive, but, youknow, it it got a good number of sales.
You grew that Instagram page, like you werementioning, to 200,000 followers.
(02:08):
But your book that you also launched Mhmm.
That did a million dollars in sales.
I think both of them combined.
Right?
A little less.
Like, I'll be honest.
A little but, like, you know, it did sellhundreds of thousands in sales.
And for a math book, I was like, oh, like, if Ican do content and sell math books, I can
probably sell other things.
So, you know, that was kind of the big unlock.
(02:31):
What was
the moment that you decided to go out andactually just start your own agency, and become
an entrepreneur?
When I was at Faiz, I was basically leading allof growth.
Right?
So I was a content creator, behind all thecontent.
I made maybe a thousand ads there, tested abunch of stuff.
And I was also the editor.
I was the campaign manager.
(02:52):
The yeah.
I was, like, a full 10 person marketing team inone.
And I realized I was like, okay.
Like, I saw two things, happen.
Like, one is subscription apps and kind of thethe new age of consumers coming.
Right?
And, you know, we were kind of ahead of that.
I mean, like, we weren't that ahead, but, like,we saw, like, okay.
(03:12):
You can actually build a profitable business.
Maybe it's not like a huge platform likeSnapchat or, you know, TikTok or Facebook.
But, like, this new age of consumers, like, youcan niche down, be very utility driven, build a
profitable subscription or something like thatbusiness.
And we saw a lot more of those apps coming.
Right?
So it's like, okay.
Well, there's more and more of those appspopping around.
(03:33):
And the second thing that I realized was shortform content is going to be the future of
marketing.
So most people were still spending on staticads, and most people still are.
And but video, like, converts a lot better,conveys your messages a lot better, and builds
more of that trust between user and and brand.
And I was like, okay.
Well, there's hundreds of billions of dollarsspent on this stuff, you know, on marketing
(03:55):
every year, and very little of it is spent onshort form.
So how can we position ourselves to be in themiddle of these two big kind of two big
tailwinds?
And, like, you know, I'll be honest.
I I wish I had the clarity I had.
Like, couple years ago, I had to learn a lot,you know, coming up to to this and, like,
realize that, okay.
Like, these are the two things that really willbecome the future.
(04:17):
But I was always like, okay.
Well, yeah, I at this point, there's this thingis growing.
I mean, FaZe, I think, peaked at, like, number10 in the App Store, on, like, social networks
charts.
It was, like, above be real.
At one point, I was like, okay.
Let me you know, a lot of friends startedhitting me up for consulting.
And then I, like, did a consulting gig here,consulting gig there, and then I was like,
(04:38):
okay.
Well, a lot of people need this.
Right?
Like, not many people know how to do this.
And to this day, like, honestly, even hiringfor folks, like, is hard because, you know,
obviously, there's more folks doing this than acouple years ago.
But compared to the whole kind of marketingniche, it's still kind of an up and coming
thing, just like consumer apps and heavy focuson short form content.
(05:01):
The intersection, we haven't found.
And I you know, like, I think we're one of thekind of leading agencies in that.
So not many agencies focus on both consumerapps and short form, and that's what we want it
to be.
When you first started your agency, what werethose initial steps and process to get your
first clients?
So I I would scroll on TikTok, and every adthat I saw, I'd send it to myself.
(05:24):
I'd send out, like, to my iCloud email, andI'll be I was, like, usually on the toilet.
Like and I it's just like that was, like, mytoilet activity.
I was, like, sending this to myself.
And then when I'm back on my laptop, I'd go in,find the company, find the founder slash
director of marketing, and DM them on LinkedIn.
I did this maybe, like, 400 times before I got,like, our first client.
(05:49):
And it was it was brutal.
I hired a couple of my senior friends.
It it never, like, really worked out, but,like, they were also helping me.
And I was like, hey.
I'll pay you, like, $50, you know, to do this,to send these DMs.
And it was just, like, an absolute grind.
And then same thing with the second, same thingwith the third.
And, like, at a certain point, I was like,okay.
We can get a system rolling for this, and, herewe are.
(06:12):
I presume your sales process looks a lotdifferent now.
Yeah.
What does it look like today?
So a couple of things.
Like, we still do, like, cold email, coldLinkedIn DMs.
Right?
I still think those work.
We do a lot more of our internal content.
So whether it's through by Twitter, myLinkedIn, we have a newsletter, which I think
probably at this point, like, 6,000subscribers, that, you know, we publish our
(06:36):
thought pieces on, and we throw dinners.
That's another big thing.
And, like, word-of-mouth has started to becomea real thing, like referrals.
I would say about third of our business at thispoint.
So yeah.
Like and we run ads as well.
So, you know, we're a marketing agency.
We run ads.
When you actually go on to a Zoom call andyou're now there to pitch whoever it is on the
(06:59):
other line to try to convince them to work withyou Uh-huh.
What are you saying in that thirty minuteconversation to convince the person on the
other end to actually not only trust you, butalso trust you with their money and give you
$510,000 upfront?
Frank I mean, we don't think of it that way.
I'll be honest.
Like, for me, it's always been like maybe thissounds a bit cocky.
(07:20):
For our ICP, we think we're the best solutionpossible.
Right?
So it's just like determining, are you our ICP?
Right?
Like, are you in that zone, whether it's, like,from a scale perspective?
Right?
Like, I'll tell you.
I'll be honest.
Like, someone like McDonald's probably wouldn'tbe a great client for us because we're like,
okay.
We're working on direct response.
(07:41):
McDonald's has a lot more brand campaigns.
Like, if you're within our ICP
ICP, for people who don't know, is idealcustomer profile.
Yeah.
Like, if if you're in our zone, in our strikezone, we'll present our model.
We're like, hey.
Here's how we work.
Here's a little bit about us.
Here's what we've done.
And then the other call is like, what do youthink?
Right?
Like, I mean and if we sense obviouslyobviously, if we wanna build win that business,
(08:04):
we're like, okay.
Like, maybe you sense a little bit hesitation.
Like, what sounded, like, crazy about what wesaid just said?
And we can drill down, figure out a bettermodel.
But we've, like, thought long and deep abouthow to, you know, optimize our model.
We're very, like, heavy on performance.
Like, a lot of the deals that we're doing rightnow have a pretty big performance aspect.
So we think it's a no brainer for a lot ofbrands that come in or talking to us.
(08:29):
And, frankly, that first call is just, like,learning more about them and then telling them
about what we do.
And, you know, I don't wanna sell something tosomeone who doesn't need it.
Right?
For us, it's just like, can we find more of thepeople that need it?
We had something similar when we started theagency as we would try to just our key thing is
we would just try to sell and not try to help.
(08:51):
So we would even do that with people who wedon't think it would be the greatest value to.
That ended up backfiring, and now we don't dothat anymore.
But It's
it's a challenge.
Right?
Like, you see the results, like, three, sixmonths down the road when you're like, well,
kinda saw this, right, like, on the wall likebefore.
I really wanna understand your blueprint to howyou got to where you are today.
(09:11):
You've done this multiple times.
So you did it with your book doing hundreds ofthousands of sales.
You did it with your Instagram page, gettingthat to 200,000 followers.
You worked at a startup called Faze, which weactually had, Tyler Maloney back on the pot a
long
time ago.
And you got that to a million, in run rate inless than three months.
And then today, you have an agency, and you'vedone billions in views for your clients.
(09:35):
I presume there's some sort of system orpattern that you've recognized across all of
those places.
What are some of the things that you look for,when creating ads that actually convert and
then just creating content that that works?
Three things that we found to be universalalmost.
The first thing, pun intended maybe, is thefirst person.
(09:58):
You wanna talk in the
first person and not in the second person.
A lot of ads, like old school ads, like, well,do you suffer with this problem?
It's like, that's that's bullshit.
Like, get to the point.
I suffer with this problem.
Be vulnerable.
Right?
And that actually creates a deeper bond withbetween the viewer and the creator.
(10:18):
So our most common hook and the one that's,like, worked the best is, like, I hate x thing.
Right?
And, like, it does a lot better than I don'tlike.
It kind of ties back into our thesis of contentbeing the targeting.
Right?
If content is the targeting, then you wantwhoever creator it is to be that target.
So a lot of times, like, for with fintechs, wework with some fintechs targeting like SMBs.
(10:44):
Instead of being like, are you a small businessowner that's struggling with bookkeeping?
Right?
It's like it just seems disingenuous.
Have some be like, well, I'm a small businessowner.
I struggled with bookkeeping.
Here's what I did.
Right?
Just having that more organic feel to yourcontent has always done better for us.
Number two, a lot of content is bland in itslanguage.
(11:06):
Like, you need to think about your script, andyou need to make sure every word in that script
is replaced with something stronger.
The reason I hate does better than I don't likeis because well, first of all, I don't like is
is longer.
I know it's only maybe one second longer, butyou wanna be, you know, brief.
At the same time, you want stronger words.
Right?
So instead of, like, this app helps you withyour fitness routine, this app will help you
(11:30):
with, like, will achieve will get you in shapein three months.
Right?
Like, what is the actual outcome that you wantthe user to expect?
Obviously, don't like don't overpromise.
Right?
Like, there's always there's always a balancehere, but you wanna use a stronger language.
The third thing that is almost universal is,frankly, like, b roll and cuts.
(11:51):
If you're just talking to the camera for thirtyseconds straight, nobody's watching that.
Like, unless you're saying some crazy stuff,which you're probably not in an ad.
Right?
So the most consistent way we found to makewinners have a lot of b roll and follow the
golden rule.
And the golden rule for us has always been acut every three seconds.
(12:12):
That sounds like a lot, but it actually isn'tonce you actually look at a video.
If anything, you're like, you're too busywatching the video to think about how many cuts
there are.
Now maybe, you know, an older audience, maybeyou wanna ramp it down a little bit less.
But, frankly, even for older audiences, wefound that this ratio works really well.
So b roll, whether it's, like, app, your actualproduct, like, actual b roll.
(12:35):
Like, for example, when we say, like, I hateor, like, I get frustrated, we have someone,
like, ripping their hair out
or something.
Right?
So just, like, how do you visually tell a storyis actually just as important as what you say.
Your point on content being bland is actually areally good one because it's one of the things
that I've noticed.
When I first started the show, what we would dois we would post on LinkedIn and be like, hey.
(12:56):
We just interviewed this guest.
Go listen to it.
Always had very little engagement.
Then all of a sudden, we start turning thoseinto stories.
But the really interesting part is we made surethat every single story that we post invokes an
extreme emotion in whoever's gonna read it.
So whether that's be really happy, really sad,really excited, whatever it is, we notice if we
can get the listener, the reader, whoever'sactually consuming the content to feel some
(13:20):
sort of really strong emotion towards the endof it, it will generally perform pretty well.
And that's some of the things I've noticed evenwhile being in college is the most shared, for
example, Instagram reels are ones that, in thiscase, make people laugh a lot.
So that's one of the things that I've noticedabout great content as well.
How old were you when you made your firsthundred thousand dollar month?
(13:41):
What?
20?
20 one?
Something like that?
How did it feel to be making a hundred k amonth at 20?
Good.
Like, I but, like, it was it was more fun to ata certain point, I think, like, once your your
needs are taken care of, right, like, once youreach, like, a certain point, which I think,
like, honestly, even in a big city, you'reprobably, like, chilling with $20.20 k a month.
(14:03):
Right?
At a certain point, it's like the incremental10,000, like, feels a lot less exciting than
the incremental, like, results that you canproduce.
Right?
So it's like the game now is, like, less about,you know, hey.
Can I scale, like, to this next revenue level?
It's like, almost like, hey.
(14:24):
We have obviously, goals are tied to revenue,but you we're moving past that into, like, how
can we do x or y result, whether it's, like,producing a certain number of pieces of
content, a certain percentage of like, acertain spend level.
Like, we're trying to get, you know, more thana hundred million dollars, like, spent on our
ads, like, this year or something like that.
That's more of, like, the goals that we'restriving for.
(14:47):
But, yeah, I mean, I fucking I mean, it feltgood.
It's like
If somebody is listening to this right now andthey're trying to figure out, like, okay.
How do I make my first ten, twenty thousanddollars a month?
What would you advise them to do?
I've actually heard this from one of ourclients.
Yeah.
He has this thing.
It's like, there there are easier ways to makemoney.
Like, there's definitely harder and easier waysto make money.
(15:09):
Right?
Like, you can go in and find success in abusiness and, like, you know, maybe it's it's
some businesses are easier than others.
But all I say is, like, I would suck as, likeif I were to start, like, an SEO shop, I'd suck
at that.
I don't know anything of SEO.
So there's a lot of ways to make money.
(15:29):
There's, like, there's trillions of dollars inthe economy.
Like, what?
You're gonna capture point 001% of that?
Like, the when you frame it like that, it waslike, okay.
Well, you you probably can.
Just figure out what
you're good at and, like, deliver on yourpromise.
And, honestly, like, yeah, you can you can makeit work.
Given what you've accomplished today, what doyou think that you figured out about sales that
(15:52):
most people probably haven't?
I'll say, like, the biggest thing is, like,sales is not like a battle.
Like, you're not, like, going like, it's notlike a performance.
Right?
I always thought of sales.
Like, I I used to think of sales like aperformance.
I was, like, nervous for calls.
Right?
Because I need to perform.
Right?
Like, when we'd had big calls, like, you know,early on, I still remember, like, we had, like,
(16:16):
the CEO of Playboy help on a call.
We had, like, the CMO of Intuit.
Right?
And we didn't we ultimately didn't convertthose clients, but I was, like, thinking of it
as, like, a performance.
And sales honestly is more like just likediscovery.
Right?
Especially that first call.
It's just how can you figure out what thatother person wants on the other side of the
(16:39):
call, working with them to get what they want.
Honestly, like, the biggest thing we track onour sales is what percentage of the time do we
talk.
It needs to be under 50.
There's no way.
Like, it's over like, even if ideal ratio is,like, 60% of the time, 70% of the time, the
client is talking, and you're just absorbingthat.
You're like a sponge absorbing that, and you'retaking very careful, like, jabs at, like, what
(17:02):
you're about to say, always say less than isnecessary.
Why is that?
Well, couple of things.
One, you wanna learn more.
You only have thirty minutes, and you wanna getas much of the call as possible.
Second, you don't wanna say something thatisn't what they would like to to get.
Right?
Like, we've had this thing where, like, wewould go down this path, pursue a solution or a
(17:27):
model that is totally would not work for theirbusiness and only to find that out later.
And I was like, oh, well, you were reallylooking for to solve this problem, not this
other problem.
Now we have to redo the whole sales discoveryprocess.
I was like, figure out what is the thing Like,what is their problem?
Do you think realistically, can you help them?
And if you can, like, tell them about thesolution.
(17:49):
But you need to articulate that.
Like, that problem discovery process is, like,the most crucial.
If someone's listening to this right now andthey're feeling stuck, maybe it's business wise
and they hit that like you said, most agencieswill generally get to 50 k and starts
plateauing.
Maybe it's personal wise.
Maybe they're going on a few dates andnothing's happening on that front, or maybe
(18:12):
it's they're trying to get a job and they'redoing a few job interviews and nothing's
happening.
How do you think people can get unstuck?
I think about that a lot.
Right?
Like, kinda making the like, this is one thingthat's, like, a big theme in our agency.
A lot of things seem, like, almost impossible.
And, frankly, sometimes all it takes is, like Imean, this was the case with, like, when I
(18:35):
first started the agency.
It felt impossible to get a single client.
Right?
Like, it was, like, 400 messages later.
Great.
We found one.
And it was terrible.
They didn't pay us on time, and I think theymissed an invoice, and we had to, like, yeah,
it was terrible.
Right?
It's just, like, this is very chewy, but justdo it.
(18:58):
Like, whatever you feel like you know, there'scertain things that I think, like, yeah, like,
if something is consistently not working, yougotta zoom out a little bit, reconsider.
But if it's just like this little thing thatyou're just not able to squeeze, you just gotta
squeeze harder, and figure out a way to get itthrough.
(19:19):
And sometimes those can be very creative waysof getting it through.
Like, we have done crazy things.
Like, we've sent bottles of champagne tooffices and, like, put notes down.
We would, like, handwrite notes sometimes.
Like, we would do the craziest things to get tothat.
So, like, think outside the box and just say,like, if I had, like I think the best question
(19:39):
to ask yourself is, like, if I had 10 times theagency that I would that I have right now, what
would I do?
Think about that.
That's a really smart way to think about it.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I mean, that's, I guess, what happens a lot,and, you know, Peter Thiel and a whole bunch of
other folks talk about it is doing theunscalable things.
(20:00):
And this isn't a new concept, but when you areable to send that bottle of champagne, send the
handwritten note, it's something that mostpeople aren't willing to do.
And this is a a similar theme to what we spokeabout with Alexa Von Tobel.
So she sold her company, LearnVest for$375,000,000, has a fund now called Inspired
Capital.
I asked her, why did you particularly win?
(20:21):
And she was just like, yeah.
I never follow the same path as everybody else.
I always try to carve my own path.
And even if that means it's a little bit harderor a little bit more difficult, it's probably
worth it in the end.
We were on a phone call actually a couple weeksago, and
Yeah.
I almost dropped out of college.
I was on the verge of doing it.
And you actually convinced me not to.
Probably, you didn't you probably didn't evenrealize it.
(20:44):
But I was talking with you, learned how muchmoney you're making, and you're still in
school.
And I thought I had to leave college to get tothat next level.
Apparently, that's not the case, so I must bedoing something wrong.
What have you figured out?
Because you're in school.
You run a business with, like, fifteen, twentypeople, and you also play rugby.
How do you manage all your time?
(21:04):
I I'm answering that question every day.
But I'll say, like, one thing is a distractionfrom another.
You know, when I get too stressed on thebusiness, I work on school and vice versa.
Rugby, which led to this little thing, youknow, is, like, another way I'm just I
completely forget about everything else.
I'm just, like, focused.
(21:24):
And I think it's, frankly, it doesn't feel likework to me.
Like, I I guess may maybe that's, like, theultimate answer is, like, what I do feels like
play and less like work.
And every day is like a new thing, a newadventure.
And, obviously, like, some days I hate.
Like, let's be on like, every everybody hasdays that, like, they absolutely hate weeks.
(21:47):
They they're too stressed.
But I look forward Like, the thing that I kindaoptimize my life around is, like, do I look
forward to the next day and waking up the nextday?
And I think that's, like, kind of a deep thing,but, like, do you like, genuinely, like, are
you excited to for that new next problem?
And if if you're not, you gotta kind ofreorient.
(22:08):
Right?
Like, are you really doing the thing that youwanna be doing right now?
You know, I I like to think about the long termvision eventually.
Like, the day to day can suck.
Right?
The day to day might not be the most fun.
But think about why you're doing the day today.
And I think about, like, you know, why am I ifI'm I'm at school, I'm doing this for a
specific reason.
(22:28):
And it's not for a degree or anything, but it'slike, I know that, like, the moments and the
memories that school will bring will be thingsI will remember for a lifetime.
I would regret leaving.
Right?
Optimizing for that short term.
Maybe I maybe the business can do slightlybetter in the short term.
Yeah.
And that's where I think the over obsessionaround money can actually be quite dangerous.
(22:51):
I was listening to an interview with AlexHermozzi, a couple weeks ago, and he was
sitting down with Steven Bartlett, the host ofthe Diary of a CEO.
And Alex is sitting here making hundreds ofthousands of dollars in his condo that he was
able to buy from working in private equity.
And he said, I just didn't wanna wake up thenext day.
Like, he didn't feel like waking up the nextday.
(23:13):
And even though he had all this money, dideverything that his parents wanted to, he still
wasn't happy.
And that's where I think the conversationreally needs to shift where it also should be a
lot most of your focus should be on beingexcited to do what you love every single day.
And if you can find that and make money doingit, then you're in for a really cool ride.
When you've been building out your agency, whatdo you think are some of the things that most
(23:36):
people get wrong when trying to build and andscale an agency and also a team?
The the biggest thing, and I was just talking,about this actually, like, couple days ago, is,
like, letting people fail safely.
Like, aligning on on long term vision, showingthem like, hey.
Here's what this could be, and then allowingthat team to fail safely.
(23:59):
And that's not like there there's always abalance, especially in an early stage company
of, like, the founder is always gonna beinvolved.
Right?
And, like, they're probably involved in, youknow, more processes and operations than they'd
like to be, and I'll speak for myself.
I am.
Right?
And there's you know, a lot of times, if youare kind of micromanaging every little piece of
(24:23):
operation, you don't allow people to fail.
And that's actually the most important thingis, like, allowing people to fail.
Sometimes I will know.
Like, for example, like, let's say we have adeadline on, like, you know, a piece of
content.
I will know that, like, we're not gonna hit it,and I will know that we should have, like,
explained that to the client and, like, giventhem an update, but I'll let it happen.
(24:49):
And, like, obviously, you know, if I need tostep in, I'll step in.
Like, I'll ping the person and be like, yo.
By the way, like, you forgot about this.
But just, like, allowing that natural piece of,like, well, now they wake up the next day.
It's like, oh, well, I should have, like,updated the client.
Or maybe the client themselves are, like,checking in on it.
Like, hey.
What happened to this?
I thought we were gonna get yesterday.
Do you think you can actually end up leavingtoo much room to allow people to fail?
(25:11):
Because I've noticed this with our team, whichis a fraction of the size of yours.
But one of, the video editors on our team awhile back, we gave him a lot of leeway.
And if he missed the deadline, we'd be like,okay.
Fine.
This can't happen again, but, you know, do thisin the future.
Maybe it was a problem with the person in thatspecific instance.
But do you think in in some cases, you actuallycan give people too much room to fail?
(25:34):
And if so, how do you know how much room youshould give somebody?
It's person dependent.
You need to, like, think about less so, like,what I want.
And this is kinda crazy shit.
You gotta think about, like, well, how can youget what you want but through the lens of the
other person?
We only hire people that are motivated, thatknow what they're doing.
(25:56):
And if that is true, then that other person canbe a great performer.
It's all about kind of bringing that dog inthem.
And taking a
look at marketing as a whole, what do you thinkis the biggest misconception people have about
marketing today?
So we do performance marketing.
We do performance marketing.
And within performance marketing, a lot ofpeople overestimate how much it takes for
(26:18):
someone to actually, like, make a bet on aproduct and, like, actually try it out.
I've heard of people's like, well, you know, ittakes, like, x number of impressions.
It takes this.
You need this many touch points.
You need to hit them on Google, on TikTok, onMeta, on on a billboard.
I'm like, you're a start up.
Figure out a like, your channel.
(26:39):
Figure out how to scale that channel before youworry about what McDonald's is thinking about
or something like that.
You know, you could be a billion dollar starfor all I care.
You're not an enterprise yet, and you're you'reprobably closer to start up marketing than you
are to, like, enterprise brand marketing.
A lot of people kind of overestimate the valueof these, like, complex marketing strategies.
(27:01):
Go for the simple.
Go for the trackable.
And
if something is not trackable, like, it doesn'tmean that you shouldn't do it, but take it with
a huge grain of salt.
I also heard you say on Corey Levy's show thatyou believe capitalizing on trends is a bad
thing for companies to do.
Why?
Oh, trends are terrible.
(27:22):
Our most sophisticated partners agree with thistoo.
Don't lean into trends.
Go for evergreen content.
And it's because, like, creatives already age.
Like, you're exhausting this creative, and youalso have the compounding effect of, like,
well, your the trend is also aging, and it's,like, gonna become worse and worse over time.
So if you're building your your marketingstrategy around trends, you're kind of destined
(27:47):
to fail.
And then the second thing, the biggest thingis, like, you need to earn trends.
Like, when McDonald's does a TikTok dance, it'sfunny.
When Duolingo, their their owl, does a TikTokdance, it's funny.
Right?
Because you know who that is.
You have an idea of that brand as a person.
But your ran your end startup is not relatableand is not funny because nobody knows who
(28:09):
you are.
What about having 80 to 90 of that content besome of that evergreen content and then 10% of
it be, like, taking shots on taking basicallygambles to see whether it works.
Have you thought about that, or you're justcompletely against trends?
We're big fans of trying stuff out.
But I'll just say, like, even if you do go forthat, you need to make sure that if you show it
(28:29):
to a person who's not familiar with the brand,then they can understand even what it is.
Because if not, you're just like you're settingyourself
up for failure.
What do you think is the most underleveragedopportunity in content right now?
What we're doing right now.
Actually, maybe Podcast?
Fake podcast ads.
Fake podcast ads.
Well, I
guess this is a real podcast.
(28:50):
But, like, we invest a lot into podcast ads.
I think we we have been doing them for a while.
We've only recently started doing them reallywell.
There's so much that goes into this, and I'msure the person behind this, like, can you
know, you can feel good about that.
But, like, there's a lot that goes into this.
And we didn't realize that upfront until weactually started executing because there's such
(29:15):
a big barrier to entry.
It's a lot more expensive.
It costs us, like, you know, three, four timesmore than UGC, but it's worth it.
The other thing I think why it works reallywell, and why we've seen it the clips work
better for podcast clips versus when I wouldjust sit down and film myself for thirty, sixty
seconds is when somebody first sees that on thefeed, they're feel they feel like they're
(29:38):
tapping into a conversation and, like, they'relistening from behind the scenes into
something.
Whereas pretty much all other content out thereis, like, screaming in your face on why you
should listen, whereas the podcasts are alittle bit different.
Yes.
The first three seconds, you gotta capturepeople's attention, etcetera.
But people, when they view it on their feed,they feel like they're actually tapping into a
(30:00):
conversation that's going on behind the scenes.
And I think that's why it makes it feel alittle bit more natural than maybe some of
those other videos might.
I think so too.
There's also a natural flow to it, and it feelsorganic, but at the same time, very high trust.
Right?
Because, like, well, you know, there's always,like, funny comments like, well, you should,
(30:22):
like, raise the price of podcast equipment.
Because, like, you also have a lot of yapperson podcast these days.
Obviously, there's, like, low quality podcasts,you know, high quality podcasts.
Like, and maybe it gets the the value getsdiluted over time, but I think, honestly, it's
here to stay.
If you were to give 20 year olds in theaudience some advice, they're looking to make
(30:44):
money, maybe it'd be a side hustle, a business,whatever it might be.
What piece of advice would you give them?
There's a billion ways to make money.
Find your thing that you have an uniqueadvantage at and, like, just go for it.
And to wrap it up, we have a couple of closingquestions.
What's the best piece of advice you've everreceived?
One thing I'll always remember, it'll pass.
(31:07):
Right?
Whatever it is you're going through, it'llpass.
So there's, like, there's always evolution.
There's always something new.
And that could be a very uplifting thing, maybeif you're stressed or to, you know, like,
depressed, like, a little, like, it'll passtomorrow.
Could also be a bad thing.
It's like, well, if you're having a great time,think about it'll pass.
It's like, you know, it's not the best thing tothink about.
(31:27):
I think, like, in both cases, it reminds you tolive in the
moment and maximize that.
What's one rule you live by that most peopledon't?
It's not that serious.
Life isn't?
Yeah.
Why?
Most people, like, really overestimate thevalue of a single thing in their life
trajectory.
It's almost never that big of a deal.
If you have the will, you can always work outof something.
(31:50):
Maybe there's something doesn't go my way.
Right?
I just think about, like, will this matter infive years?
And I've never had a thing where with where Isaid yes.
I don't remember who told me this, butsomebody, told me that if it's not worth
stressing about in a week or a month, then it'sprobably not even worth stressing about now.
(32:11):
And that's kinda some of the things that Ithat's probably the number one thing that I try
to keep in the back of my head when I'm goingthrough problems or difficulties in my day to
day is if I encounter something that I, in themoment, think, like, this is a really difficult
challenge.
How am I gonna approach this or or solve it?
And or and if I realize, like, oh, wait.
This isn't actually gonna matter in a week fromnow, then I might not even, you know, stress
(32:34):
about it that much.
If I think, yes, it will matter, then I then II probably will.
But I think it's one of the things that I keepin the back of my mind to figure out what are
the things that truly matter and truly worthspending time on versus the ones that don't as
much.
Because there's so many things that are tryingto grab your attention every single day.
I think if you wanna be really successful, youjust gotta pick the two or three or whatever
(32:55):
they are, the the very as few as possible, andjust focus on those and and leave the rest up
to up to life.
Last one.
If I slid you over a phone and you could callyour 20 year old self, would you call or in
this case, 18 year old self?
I was like, what?
Two years ago?
Would you call?
And if so, what would you say?
(33:15):
Nah.
Let him figure it out.
Let him figure it out?
I don't think there's anything I I've learnedor that's, like, fundamentally, like, life
changing over the last couple years.
I mean, like, there's a lot of business stuff.
But I think, yeah, like, it's almost it'salmost ominous, you know, if it's just a phone
call.
Hey.
Tell me everything.
What happened?
You know?
Like, you know, what happened to that girl youwere talking to?
(33:37):
What happened to this?
Like, I think it would be a bad idea.
Alright.
Well, I think that's a great way to thanks,Hamza, for taking the time to join the show.
I appreciate it.
Thank you.
We'll have
a link to new form in the episode descriptiondown below for anyone interested in checking it
out.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Hamza, you're sitting here as a junior incollege making hundreds of thousands of dollars
a month.
What the heck do
you do?
I run a marketing agency called Newform.
What does your agency do?
We do content.
So we do paid marketing, for consumer software.
The one sentence is we scale world classcompanies, with short form content.
(00:20):
I really wanna understand your blueprint to howyou got to where you are today.
But I think to do that, it's it's also reallyimportant to understand your journey.
How did you get into the world ofentrepreneurship and why?
I wanted to get into a good school.
So I had this, you know, bright idea to write amath book.
I was like, that that sounds impressive.
Right?
That'll get me into college.
(00:41):
And, you know, I started writing in.
I kinda realized in the middle of it thatnobody write you know, buys math books.
So nobody's gonna read this thing.
So I didn't I didn't wanna just do it justagainst the college.
I actually wanted people to read it.
So I was like, okay.
Well, where can I market this thing?
I was like, I'm spending a lot of time onInstagram.
Maybe I do that.
(01:01):
So I made a math page on Instagram, verycreatively named daily math.
I scribbled down a problem from the book on apiece of paper, and I posted it on Instagram.
Got two likes that first day, and I was hooked.
I was like, okay.
Two people liked the problem.
So the next day, I did the same thing.
I made it a little bit nicer.
(01:22):
My handwriting was always terrible.
So I, like, really took my time writing out theproblem.
And then the third day, I had this bright idea.
I was like, okay.
What if I, like, type it up on a computer?
It'll look even nicer.
And then the fourth day, I, like, made a coverpage for the, you know, like, before the
problem.
And the fifth day, I was like, maybe throw insome color.
Right?
And, like, it was just this constant iterationon content.
(01:45):
I kept doing it, I think, for, like, a hundreddays.
I, like, literally did nothing but try to makethe best content in this very niche, integral
community and eventually published my firstbook.
You know, it was a number one bestseller inthis category.
I mean, math is not very competitive, but, youknow, it it got a good number of sales.
You grew that Instagram page, like you werementioning, to 200,000 followers.
(02:08):
But your book that you also launched Mhmm.
That did a million dollars in sales.
I think both of them combined.
Right?
A little less.
Like, I'll be honest.
A little but, like, you know, it did sellhundreds of thousands in sales.
And for a math book, I was like, oh, like, if Ican do content and sell math books, I can
probably sell other things.
So, you know, that was kind of the big unlock.
(02:31):
What was
the moment that you decided to go out andactually just start your own agency, and become
an entrepreneur?
When I was at Faiz, I was basically leading allof growth.
Right?
So I was a content creator, behind all thecontent.
I made maybe a thousand ads there, tested abunch of stuff.
And I was also the editor.
I was the campaign manager.
(02:52):
The yeah.
I was, like, a full 10 person marketing team inone.
And I realized I was like, okay.
Like, I saw two things, happen.
Like, one is subscription apps and kind of thethe new age of consumers coming.
Right?
And, you know, we were kind of ahead of that.
I mean, like, we weren't that ahead, but, like,we saw, like, okay.
(03:12):
You can actually build a profitable business.
Maybe it's not like a huge platform likeSnapchat or, you know, TikTok or Facebook.
But, like, this new age of consumers, like, youcan niche down, be very utility driven, build a
profitable subscription or something like thatbusiness.
And we saw a lot more of those apps coming.
Right?
So it's like, okay.
Well, there's more and more of those appspopping around.
(03:33):
And the second thing that I realized was shortform content is going to be the future of
marketing.
So most people were still spending on staticads, and most people still are.
And but video, like, converts a lot better,conveys your messages a lot better, and builds
more of that trust between user and and brand.
And I was like, okay.
Well, there's hundreds of billions of dollarsspent on this stuff, you know, on marketing
(03:55):
every year, and very little of it is spent onshort form.
So how can we position ourselves to be in themiddle of these two big kind of two big
tailwinds?
And, like, you know, I'll be honest.
I I wish I had the clarity I had.
Like, couple years ago, I had to learn a lot,you know, coming up to to this and, like,
realize that, okay.
Like, these are the two things that really willbecome the future.
(04:17):
But I was always like, okay.
Well, yeah, I at this point, there's this thingis growing.
I mean, FaZe, I think, peaked at, like, number10 in the App Store, on, like, social networks
charts.
It was, like, above be real.
At one point, I was like, okay.
Let me you know, a lot of friends startedhitting me up for consulting.
And then I, like, did a consulting gig here,consulting gig there, and then I was like,
(04:38):
okay.
Well, a lot of people need this.
Right?
Like, not many people know how to do this.
And to this day, like, honestly, even hiringfor folks, like, is hard because, you know,
obviously, there's more folks doing this than acouple years ago.
But compared to the whole kind of marketingniche, it's still kind of an up and coming
thing, just like consumer apps and heavy focuson short form content.
(05:01):
The intersection, we haven't found.
And I you know, like, I think we're one of thekind of leading agencies in that.
So not many agencies focus on both consumerapps and short form, and that's what we want it
to be.
When you first started your agency, what werethose initial steps and process to get your
first clients?
So I I would scroll on TikTok, and every adthat I saw, I'd send it to myself.
(05:24):
I'd send out, like, to my iCloud email, andI'll be I was, like, usually on the toilet.
Like and I it's just like that was, like, mytoilet activity.
I was, like, sending this to myself.
And then when I'm back on my laptop, I'd go in,find the company, find the founder slash
director of marketing, and DM them on LinkedIn.
I did this maybe, like, 400 times before I got,like, our first client.
(05:49):
And it was it was brutal.
I hired a couple of my senior friends.
It it never, like, really worked out, but,like, they were also helping me.
And I was like, hey.
I'll pay you, like, $50, you know, to do this,to send these DMs.
And it was just, like, an absolute grind.
And then same thing with the second, same thingwith the third.
And, like, at a certain point, I was like,okay.
We can get a system rolling for this, and, herewe are.
(06:12):
I presume your sales process looks a lotdifferent now.
Yeah.
What does it look like today?
So a couple of things.
Like, we still do, like, cold email, coldLinkedIn DMs.
Right?
I still think those work.
We do a lot more of our internal content.
So whether it's through by Twitter, myLinkedIn, we have a newsletter, which I think
probably at this point, like, 6,000subscribers, that, you know, we publish our
(06:36):
thought pieces on, and we throw dinners.
That's another big thing.
And, like, word-of-mouth has started to becomea real thing, like referrals.
I would say about third of our business at thispoint.
So yeah.
Like and we run ads as well.
So, you know, we're a marketing agency.
We run ads.
When you actually go on to a Zoom call andyou're now there to pitch whoever it is on the
(06:59):
other line to try to convince them to work withyou Uh-huh.
What are you saying in that thirty minuteconversation to convince the person on the
other end to actually not only trust you, butalso trust you with their money and give you
$510,000 upfront?
Frank I mean, we don't think of it that way.
I'll be honest.
Like, for me, it's always been like maybe thissounds a bit cocky.
(07:20):
For our ICP, we think we're the best solutionpossible.
Right?
So it's just like determining, are you our ICP?
Right?
Like, are you in that zone, whether it's, like,from a scale perspective?
Right?
Like, I'll tell you.
I'll be honest.
Like, someone like McDonald's probably wouldn'tbe a great client for us because we're like,
okay.
We're working on direct response.
(07:41):
McDonald's has a lot more brand campaigns.
Like, if you're within our ICP
ICP, for people who don't know, is idealcustomer profile.
Yeah.
Like, if if you're in our zone, in our strikezone, we'll present our model.
We're like, hey.
Here's how we work.
Here's a little bit about us.
Here's what we've done.
And then the other call is like, what do youthink?
Right?
Like, I mean and if we sense obviouslyobviously, if we wanna build win that business,
(08:04):
we're like, okay.
Like, maybe you sense a little bit hesitation.
Like, what sounded, like, crazy about what wesaid just said?
And we can drill down, figure out a bettermodel.
But we've, like, thought long and deep abouthow to, you know, optimize our model.
We're very, like, heavy on performance.
Like, a lot of the deals that we're doing rightnow have a pretty big performance aspect.
So we think it's a no brainer for a lot ofbrands that come in or talking to us.
(08:29):
And, frankly, that first call is just, like,learning more about them and then telling them
about what we do.
And, you know, I don't wanna sell something tosomeone who doesn't need it.
Right?
For us, it's just like, can we find more of thepeople that need it?
We had something similar when we started theagency as we would try to just our key thing is
we would just try to sell and not try to help.
(08:51):
So we would even do that with people who wedon't think it would be the greatest value to.
That ended up backfiring, and now we don't dothat anymore.
But It's
it's a challenge.
Right?
Like, you see the results, like, three, sixmonths down the road when you're like, well,
kinda saw this, right, like, on the wall likebefore.
I really wanna understand your blueprint to howyou got to where you are today.
(09:11):
You've done this multiple times.
So you did it with your book doing hundreds ofthousands of sales.
You did it with your Instagram page, gettingthat to 200,000 followers.
You worked at a startup called Faze, which weactually had, Tyler Maloney back on the pot a
long
time ago.
And you got that to a million, in run rate inless than three months.
And then today, you have an agency, and you'vedone billions in views for your clients.
(09:35):
I presume there's some sort of system orpattern that you've recognized across all of
those places.
What are some of the things that you look for,when creating ads that actually convert and
then just creating content that that works?
Three things that we found to be universalalmost.
The first thing, pun intended maybe, is thefirst person.
(09:58):
You wanna talk in the
first person and not in the second person.
A lot of ads, like old school ads, like, well,do you suffer with this problem?
It's like, that's that's bullshit.
Like, get to the point.
I suffer with this problem.
Be vulnerable.
Right?
And that actually creates a deeper bond withbetween the viewer and the creator.
(10:18):
So our most common hook and the one that's,like, worked the best is, like, I hate x thing.
Right?
And, like, it does a lot better than I don'tlike.
It kind of ties back into our thesis of contentbeing the targeting.
Right?
If content is the targeting, then you wantwhoever creator it is to be that target.
So a lot of times, like, for with fintechs, wework with some fintechs targeting like SMBs.
(10:44):
Instead of being like, are you a small businessowner that's struggling with bookkeeping?
Right?
It's like it just seems disingenuous.
Have some be like, well, I'm a small businessowner.
I struggled with bookkeeping.
Here's what I did.
Right?
Just having that more organic feel to yourcontent has always done better for us.
Number two, a lot of content is bland in itslanguage.
(11:06):
Like, you need to think about your script, andyou need to make sure every word in that script
is replaced with something stronger.
The reason I hate does better than I don't likeis because well, first of all, I don't like is
is longer.
I know it's only maybe one second longer, butyou wanna be, you know, brief.
At the same time, you want stronger words.
Right?
So instead of, like, this app helps you withyour fitness routine, this app will help you
(11:30):
with, like, will achieve will get you in shapein three months.
Right?
Like, what is the actual outcome that you wantthe user to expect?
Obviously, don't like don't overpromise.
Right?
Like, there's always there's always a balancehere, but you wanna use a stronger language.
The third thing that is almost universal is,frankly, like, b roll and cuts.
(11:51):
If you're just talking to the camera for thirtyseconds straight, nobody's watching that.
Like, unless you're saying some crazy stuff,which you're probably not in an ad.
Right?
So the most consistent way we found to makewinners have a lot of b roll and follow the
golden rule.
And the golden rule for us has always been acut every three seconds.
(12:12):
That sounds like a lot, but it actually isn'tonce you actually look at a video.
If anything, you're like, you're too busywatching the video to think about how many cuts
there are.
Now maybe, you know, an older audience, maybeyou wanna ramp it down a little bit less.
But, frankly, even for older audiences, wefound that this ratio works really well.
So b roll, whether it's, like, app, your actualproduct, like, actual b roll.
(12:35):
Like, for example, when we say, like, I hateor, like, I get frustrated, we have someone,
like, ripping their hair out
or something.
Right?
So just, like, how do you visually tell a storyis actually just as important as what you say.
Your point on content being bland is actually areally good one because it's one of the things
that I've noticed.
When I first started the show, what we would dois we would post on LinkedIn and be like, hey.
(12:56):
We just interviewed this guest.
Go listen to it.
Always had very little engagement.
Then all of a sudden, we start turning thoseinto stories.
But the really interesting part is we made surethat every single story that we post invokes an
extreme emotion in whoever's gonna read it.
So whether that's be really happy, really sad,really excited, whatever it is, we notice if we
can get the listener, the reader, whoever'sactually consuming the content to feel some
(13:20):
sort of really strong emotion towards the endof it, it will generally perform pretty well.
And that's some of the things I've noticed evenwhile being in college is the most shared, for
example, Instagram reels are ones that, in thiscase, make people laugh a lot.
So that's one of the things that I've noticedabout great content as well.
How old were you when you made your firsthundred thousand dollar month?
(13:41):
What?
20?
20 one?
Something like that?
How did it feel to be making a hundred k amonth at 20?
Good.
Like, I but, like, it was it was more fun to ata certain point, I think, like, once your your
needs are taken care of, right, like, once youreach, like, a certain point, which I think,
like, honestly, even in a big city, you'reprobably, like, chilling with $20.20 k a month.
(14:03):
Right?
At a certain point, it's like the incremental10,000, like, feels a lot less exciting than
the incremental, like, results that you canproduce.
Right?
So it's like the game now is, like, less about,you know, hey.
Can I scale, like, to this next revenue level?
It's like, almost like, hey.
(14:24):
We have obviously, goals are tied to revenue,but you we're moving past that into, like, how
can we do x or y result, whether it's, like,producing a certain number of pieces of
content, a certain percentage of like, acertain spend level.
Like, we're trying to get, you know, more thana hundred million dollars, like, spent on our
ads, like, this year or something like that.
That's more of, like, the goals that we'restriving for.
(14:47):
But, yeah, I mean, I fucking I mean, it feltgood.
It's like
If somebody is listening to this right now andthey're trying to figure out, like, okay.
How do I make my first ten, twenty thousanddollars a month?
What would you advise them to do?
I've actually heard this from one of ourclients.
Yeah.
He has this thing.
It's like, there there are easier ways to makemoney.
Like, there's definitely harder and easier waysto make money.
(15:09):
Right?
Like, you can go in and find success in abusiness and, like, you know, maybe it's it's
some businesses are easier than others.
But all I say is, like, I would suck as, likeif I were to start, like, an SEO shop, I'd suck
at that.
I don't know anything of SEO.
So there's a lot of ways to make money.
(15:29):
There's, like, there's trillions of dollars inthe economy.
Like, what?
You're gonna capture point 001% of that?
Like, the when you frame it like that, it waslike, okay.
Well, you you probably can.
Just figure out what
you're good at and, like, deliver on yourpromise.
And, honestly, like, yeah, you can you can makeit work.
Given what you've accomplished today, what doyou think that you figured out about sales that
(15:52):
most people probably haven't?
I'll say, like, the biggest thing is, like,sales is not like a battle.
Like, you're not, like, going like, it's notlike a performance.
Right?
I always thought of sales.
Like, I I used to think of sales like aperformance.
I was, like, nervous for calls.
Right?
Because I need to perform.
Right?
Like, when we'd had big calls, like, you know,early on, I still remember, like, we had, like,
(16:16):
the CEO of Playboy help on a call.
We had, like, the CMO of Intuit.
Right?
And we didn't we ultimately didn't convertthose clients, but I was, like, thinking of it
as, like, a performance.
And sales honestly is more like just likediscovery.
Right?
Especially that first call.
It's just how can you figure out what thatother person wants on the other side of the
(16:39):
call, working with them to get what they want.
Honestly, like, the biggest thing we track onour sales is what percentage of the time do we
talk.
It needs to be under 50.
There's no way.
Like, it's over like, even if ideal ratio is,like, 60% of the time, 70% of the time, the
client is talking, and you're just absorbingthat.
You're like a sponge absorbing that, and you'retaking very careful, like, jabs at, like, what
(17:02):
you're about to say, always say less than isnecessary.
Why is that?
Well, couple of things.
One, you wanna learn more.
You only have thirty minutes, and you wanna getas much of the call as possible.
Second, you don't wanna say something thatisn't what they would like to to get.
Right?
Like, we've had this thing where, like, wewould go down this path, pursue a solution or a
(17:27):
model that is totally would not work for theirbusiness and only to find that out later.
And I was like, oh, well, you were reallylooking for to solve this problem, not this
other problem.
Now we have to redo the whole sales discoveryprocess.
I was like, figure out what is the thing Like,what is their problem?
Do you think realistically, can you help them?
And if you can, like, tell them about thesolution.
(17:49):
But you need to articulate that.
Like, that problem discovery process is, like,the most crucial.
If someone's listening to this right now andthey're feeling stuck, maybe it's business wise
and they hit that like you said, most agencieswill generally get to 50 k and starts
plateauing.
Maybe it's personal wise.
Maybe they're going on a few dates andnothing's happening on that front, or maybe
(18:12):
it's they're trying to get a job and they'redoing a few job interviews and nothing's
happening.
How do you think people can get unstuck?
I think about that a lot.
Right?
Like, kinda making the like, this is one thingthat's, like, a big theme in our agency.
A lot of things seem, like, almost impossible.
And, frankly, sometimes all it takes is, like Imean, this was the case with, like, when I
(18:35):
first started the agency.
It felt impossible to get a single client.
Right?
Like, it was, like, 400 messages later.
Great.
We found one.
And it was terrible.
They didn't pay us on time, and I think theymissed an invoice, and we had to, like, yeah,
it was terrible.
Right?
It's just, like, this is very chewy, but justdo it.
(18:58):
Like, whatever you feel like you know, there'scertain things that I think, like, yeah, like,
if something is consistently not working, yougotta zoom out a little bit, reconsider.
But if it's just like this little thing thatyou're just not able to squeeze, you just gotta
squeeze harder, and figure out a way to get itthrough.
(19:19):
And sometimes those can be very creative waysof getting it through.
Like, we have done crazy things.
Like, we've sent bottles of champagne tooffices and, like, put notes down.
We would, like, handwrite notes sometimes.
Like, we would do the craziest things to get tothat.
So, like, think outside the box and just say,like, if I had, like I think the best question
(19:39):
to ask yourself is, like, if I had 10 times theagency that I would that I have right now, what
would I do?
Think about that.
That's a really smart way to think about it.
Interesting.
Yeah.
I mean, that's, I guess, what happens a lot,and, you know, Peter Thiel and a whole bunch of
other folks talk about it is doing theunscalable things.
(20:00):
And this isn't a new concept, but when you areable to send that bottle of champagne, send the
handwritten note, it's something that mostpeople aren't willing to do.
And this is a a similar theme to what we spokeabout with Alexa Von Tobel.
So she sold her company, LearnVest for$375,000,000, has a fund now called Inspired
Capital.
I asked her, why did you particularly win?
(20:21):
And she was just like, yeah.
I never follow the same path as everybody else.
I always try to carve my own path.
And even if that means it's a little bit harderor a little bit more difficult, it's probably
worth it in the end.
We were on a phone call actually a couple weeksago, and
Yeah.
I almost dropped out of college.
I was on the verge of doing it.
And you actually convinced me not to.
Probably, you didn't you probably didn't evenrealize it.
(20:44):
But I was talking with you, learned how muchmoney you're making, and you're still in
school.
And I thought I had to leave college to get tothat next level.
Apparently, that's not the case, so I must bedoing something wrong.
What have you figured out?
Because you're in school.
You run a business with, like, fifteen, twentypeople, and you also play rugby.
How do you manage all your time?
(21:04):
I I'm answering that question every day.
But I'll say, like, one thing is a distractionfrom another.
You know, when I get too stressed on thebusiness, I work on school and vice versa.
Rugby, which led to this little thing, youknow, is, like, another way I'm just I
completely forget about everything else.
I'm just, like, focused.
(21:24):
And I think it's, frankly, it doesn't feel likework to me.
Like, I I guess may maybe that's, like, theultimate answer is, like, what I do feels like
play and less like work.
And every day is like a new thing, a newadventure.
And, obviously, like, some days I hate.
Like, let's be on like, every everybody hasdays that, like, they absolutely hate weeks.
(21:47):
They they're too stressed.
But I look forward Like, the thing that I kindaoptimize my life around is, like, do I look
forward to the next day and waking up the nextday?
And I think that's, like, kind of a deep thing,but, like, do you like, genuinely, like, are
you excited to for that new next problem?
And if if you're not, you gotta kind ofreorient.
(22:08):
Right?
Like, are you really doing the thing that youwanna be doing right now?
You know, I I like to think about the long termvision eventually.
Like, the day to day can suck.
Right?
The day to day might not be the most fun.
But think about why you're doing the day today.
And I think about, like, you know, why am I ifI'm I'm at school, I'm doing this for a
specific reason.
(22:28):
And it's not for a degree or anything, but it'slike, I know that, like, the moments and the
memories that school will bring will be thingsI will remember for a lifetime.
I would regret leaving.
Right?
Optimizing for that short term.
Maybe I maybe the business can do slightlybetter in the short term.
Yeah.
And that's where I think the over obsessionaround money can actually be quite dangerous.
(22:51):
I was listening to an interview with AlexHermozzi, a couple weeks ago, and he was
sitting down with Steven Bartlett, the host ofthe Diary of a CEO.
And Alex is sitting here making hundreds ofthousands of dollars in his condo that he was
able to buy from working in private equity.
And he said, I just didn't wanna wake up thenext day.
Like, he didn't feel like waking up the nextday.
(23:13):
And even though he had all this money, dideverything that his parents wanted to, he still
wasn't happy.
And that's where I think the conversationreally needs to shift where it also should be a
lot most of your focus should be on beingexcited to do what you love every single day.
And if you can find that and make money doingit, then you're in for a really cool ride.
When you've been building out your agency, whatdo you think are some of the things that most
(23:36):
people get wrong when trying to build and andscale an agency and also a team?
The the biggest thing, and I was just talking,about this actually, like, couple days ago, is,
like, letting people fail safely.
Like, aligning on on long term vision, showingthem like, hey.
Here's what this could be, and then allowingthat team to fail safely.
(23:59):
And that's not like there there's always abalance, especially in an early stage company
of, like, the founder is always gonna beinvolved.
Right?
And, like, they're probably involved in, youknow, more processes and operations than they'd
like to be, and I'll speak for myself.
I am.
Right?
And there's you know, a lot of times, if youare kind of micromanaging every little piece of
(24:23):
operation, you don't allow people to fail.
And that's actually the most important thingis, like, allowing people to fail.
Sometimes I will know.
Like, for example, like, let's say we have adeadline on, like, you know, a piece of
content.
I will know that, like, we're not gonna hit it,and I will know that we should have, like,
explained that to the client and, like, giventhem an update, but I'll let it happen.
(24:49):
And, like, obviously, you know, if I need tostep in, I'll step in.
Like, I'll ping the person and be like, yo.
By the way, like, you forgot about this.
But just, like, allowing that natural piece of,like, well, now they wake up the next day.
It's like, oh, well, I should have, like,updated the client.
Or maybe the client themselves are, like,checking in on it.
Like, hey.
What happened to this?
I thought we were gonna get yesterday.
Do you think you can actually end up leavingtoo much room to allow people to fail?
(25:11):
Because I've noticed this with our team, whichis a fraction of the size of yours.
But one of, the video editors on our team awhile back, we gave him a lot of leeway.
And if he missed the deadline, we'd be like,okay.
Fine.
This can't happen again, but, you know, do thisin the future.
Maybe it was a problem with the person in thatspecific instance.
But do you think in in some cases, you actuallycan give people too much room to fail?
(25:34):
And if so, how do you know how much room youshould give somebody?
It's person dependent.
You need to, like, think about less so, like,what I want.
And this is kinda crazy shit.
You gotta think about, like, well, how can youget what you want but through the lens of the
other person?
We only hire people that are motivated, thatknow what they're doing.
(25:56):
And if that is true, then that other person canbe a great performer.
It's all about kind of bringing that dog inthem.
And taking a
look at marketing as a whole, what do you thinkis the biggest misconception people have about
marketing today?
So we do performance marketing.
We do performance marketing.
And within performance marketing, a lot ofpeople overestimate how much it takes for
(26:18):
someone to actually, like, make a bet on aproduct and, like, actually try it out.
I've heard of people's like, well, you know, ittakes, like, x number of impressions.
It takes this.
You need this many touch points.
You need to hit them on Google, on TikTok, onMeta, on on a billboard.
I'm like, you're a start up.
Figure out a like, your channel.
(26:39):
Figure out how to scale that channel before youworry about what McDonald's is thinking about
or something like that.
You know, you could be a billion dollar starfor all I care.
You're not an enterprise yet, and you're you'reprobably closer to start up marketing than you
are to, like, enterprise brand marketing.
A lot of people kind of overestimate the valueof these, like, complex marketing strategies.
(27:01):
Go for the simple.
Go for the trackable.
And
if something is not trackable, like, it doesn'tmean that you shouldn't do it, but take it with
a huge grain of salt.
I also heard you say on Corey Levy's show thatyou believe capitalizing on trends is a bad
thing for companies to do.
Why?
Oh, trends are terrible.
(27:22):
Our most sophisticated partners agree with thistoo.
Don't lean into trends.
Go for evergreen content.
And it's because, like, creatives already age.
Like, you're exhausting this creative, and youalso have the compounding effect of, like,
well, your the trend is also aging, and it's,like, gonna become worse and worse over time.
So if you're building your your marketingstrategy around trends, you're kind of destined
(27:47):
to fail.
And then the second thing, the biggest thingis, like, you need to earn trends.
Like, when McDonald's does a TikTok dance, it'sfunny.
When Duolingo, their their owl, does a TikTokdance, it's funny.
Right?
Because you know who that is.
You have an idea of that brand as a person.
But your ran your end startup is not relatableand is not funny because nobody knows who
(28:09):
you are.
What about having 80 to 90 of that content besome of that evergreen content and then 10% of
it be, like, taking shots on taking basicallygambles to see whether it works.
Have you thought about that, or you're justcompletely against trends?
We're big fans of trying stuff out.
But I'll just say, like, even if you do go forthat, you need to make sure that if you show it
(28:29):
to a person who's not familiar with the brand,then they can understand even what it is.
Because if not, you're just like you're settingyourself
up for failure.
What do you think is the most underleveragedopportunity in content right now?
What we're doing right now.
Actually, maybe Podcast?
Fake podcast ads.
Fake podcast ads.
Well, I
guess this is a real podcast.
(28:50):
But, like, we invest a lot into podcast ads.
I think we we have been doing them for a while.
We've only recently started doing them reallywell.
There's so much that goes into this, and I'msure the person behind this, like, can you
know, you can feel good about that.
But, like, there's a lot that goes into this.
And we didn't realize that upfront until weactually started executing because there's such
(29:15):
a big barrier to entry.
It's a lot more expensive.
It costs us, like, you know, three, four timesmore than UGC, but it's worth it.
The other thing I think why it works reallywell, and why we've seen it the clips work
better for podcast clips versus when I wouldjust sit down and film myself for thirty, sixty
seconds is when somebody first sees that on thefeed, they're feel they feel like they're
(29:38):
tapping into a conversation and, like, they'relistening from behind the scenes into
something.
Whereas pretty much all other content out thereis, like, screaming in your face on why you
should listen, whereas the podcasts are alittle bit different.
Yes.
The first three seconds, you gotta capturepeople's attention, etcetera.
But people, when they view it on their feed,they feel like they're actually tapping into a
(30:00):
conversation that's going on behind the scenes.
And I think that's why it makes it feel alittle bit more natural than maybe some of
those other videos might.
I think so too.
There's also a natural flow to it, and it feelsorganic, but at the same time, very high trust.
Right?
Because, like, well, you know, there's always,like, funny comments like, well, you should,
(30:22):
like, raise the price of podcast equipment.
Because, like, you also have a lot of yapperson podcast these days.
Obviously, there's, like, low quality podcasts,you know, high quality podcasts.
Like, and maybe it gets the the value getsdiluted over time, but I think, honestly, it's
here to stay.
If you were to give 20 year olds in theaudience some advice, they're looking to make
(30:44):
money, maybe it'd be a side hustle, a business,whatever it might be.
What piece of advice would you give them?
There's a billion ways to make money.
Find your thing that you have an uniqueadvantage at and, like, just go for it.
And to wrap it up, we have a couple of closingquestions.
What's the best piece of advice you've everreceived?
One thing I'll always remember, it'll pass.
(31:07):
Right?
Whatever it is you're going through, it'llpass.
So there's, like, there's always evolution.
There's always something new.
And that could be a very uplifting thing, maybeif you're stressed or to, you know, like,
depressed, like, a little, like, it'll passtomorrow.
Could also be a bad thing.
It's like, well, if you're having a great time,think about it'll pass.
It's like, you know, it's not the best thing tothink about.
(31:27):
I think, like, in both cases, it reminds you tolive in the
moment and maximize that.
What's one rule you live by that most peopledon't?
It's not that serious.
Life isn't?
Yeah.
Why?
Most people, like, really overestimate thevalue of a single thing in their life
trajectory.
It's almost never that big of a deal.
If you have the will, you can always work outof something.
(31:50):
Maybe there's something doesn't go my way.
Right?
I just think about, like, will this matter infive years?
And I've never had a thing where with where Isaid yes.
I don't remember who told me this, butsomebody, told me that if it's not worth
stressing about in a week or a month, then it'sprobably not even worth stressing about now.
(32:11):
And that's kinda some of the things that Ithat's probably the number one thing that I try
to keep in the back of my head when I'm goingthrough problems or difficulties in my day to
day is if I encounter something that I, in themoment, think, like, this is a really difficult
challenge.
How am I gonna approach this or or solve it?
And or and if I realize, like, oh, wait.
This isn't actually gonna matter in a week fromnow, then I might not even, you know, stress
(32:34):
about it that much.
If I think, yes, it will matter, then I then II probably will.
But I think it's one of the things that I keepin the back of my mind to figure out what are
the things that truly matter and truly worthspending time on versus the ones that don't as
much.
Because there's so many things that are tryingto grab your attention every single day.
I think if you wanna be really successful, youjust gotta pick the two or three or whatever
(32:55):
they are, the the very as few as possible, andjust focus on those and and leave the rest up
to up to life.
Last one.
If I slid you over a phone and you could callyour 20 year old self, would you call or in
this case, 18 year old self?
I was like, what?
Two years ago?
Would you call?
And if so, what would you say?
(33:15):
Nah.
Let him figure it out.
Let him figure it out?
I don't think there's anything I I've learnedor that's, like, fundamentally, like, life
changing over the last couple years.
I mean, like, there's a lot of business stuff.
But I think, yeah, like, it's almost it'salmost ominous, you know, if it's just a phone
call.
Hey.
Tell me everything.
What happened?
You know?
Like, you know, what happened to that girl youwere talking to?
(33:37):
What happened to this?
Like, I think it would be a bad idea.
Alright.
Well, I think that's a great way to thanks,Hamza, for taking the time to join the show.
I appreciate it.
Thank you.
We'll have
a link to new form in the episode descriptiondown below for anyone interested in checking it
out.
Thanks.
Thank you.
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