Jake Johnson & Robin Heppell: The Funeral Results Marketing Partnership

Jake and Rob look back at the events over the past two years that brought them to become partners in Funeral Results Marketing and where they are today. For more information about Funeral Results Marketing, check out our Funeral Home Website section, Cremation Arrangement section or Digital Marketing Services section on our website or contact Rob at [e-mail] or at 1-800-810-3595. See the complete transcript here: Rob Heppell: Welcome to the Funeral X Podcast. I am Robin Heppell and I'm joined with my Funeral Results Marketing partner, Jake Johnson. Hey, Jake, are you there? Jake Johnson: Hey, Rob, nice to be here. Rob Heppell: Yes, excellent. Now, for everyone listening, for a little bit of a background, Jake and I have been partners for just over a year with Funeral Results Marketing where we meet on a regular basis. And we have some great discussions about funeral service and what led us to this point. And we thought that others may want to listen, too, on some of our discussions and so we're going to provide this on somewhat of a regular basis. And hopefully, if you're listening that you get some insight out of it and where we are, and where we're going.                 So Jake, I think a great first topic, let's talk about you and I and how we got here today. Not since the beginning, not over a decade ago, but maybe in the last year and a half how we got the conversation started to working together, what are your thoughts? Jake Johnson: Well, you and I, Rob, have been known each other and talked for quite some time. I think dad initially ran into you when he was having audio/visual issues at a presentation back in the day. And he said, "You got to meet this guy," and you and I spoke. And you then helped us with our website and online presence. That was the big reveal for me, like, "Who is this guy?" We claimed to be the premier consulting firm back then as we were growing and you were ranking higher than us. I'm like, "Well this guy has got it figured out."                 So, I've always seen you, Rob, as that, I always say OG, but the guy that really saw what the future would look like with websites and online marketing. And that's proven true with the platform that you build on. It's still here and others have, quite frankly, attempted to switch to because of how long and how robust the system is. So yes, that was the beginning of it as I can recall. Rob Heppell: Yes, that's great. And I think maybe in a future episode we'll dive in deeper to that part because there's some good parts in there. But I think what I remember, and this would have been, ironically, at the time of the beginning of the pandemic. So the spring of 2020 and nothing to do with the pandemic itself but just, I think, that the timing's align. I was approached, there was some consolidation going on in the funeral service technology website space. And I had received some phone calls and interest in that and if I wanted to participate in it. And some of it sounded interesting, some of it, I didn't really latch on to what they were trying to offer or where they might be going.                 And what I like to do, I always like to listen. I learned that from one of our clients, was always listen, always hear someone out. But then also, too, maybe talk it over with someone else just to make sure I'm not missing anything. So I remember I picked up the phone and called you Jake and let you know what was going on. And what were your thoughts at that time of what you had heard about what was happening, and where was your mindset going regarding websites and marketing from that point? Jake Johnson: Yes, for me, I've been interested in technology in this space as far as back in 1996 when I started. I've always been into it. And so, as it's advanced and those opportunities just to continue to grow and grow within our space, being behind with a lot of the different things that you se...