[19] Selling a Web Agency to Focus on Products w/ Brent Weaver (UGurus)
Okay. Let's do this. Hello, bootstrappers. Welcome to Bootstrap Web episode 19. It's the show for business owners like you and me who believe that to get to where we're going, we have to learn by doing.
Brian Casel:I'm Brian Castle. You can follow me on Twitter at cash jam or on my blog cashjam.com. Today, Brent Weaver will be joining me. Brent is a cofounder of yougurus.com. It's a site that helps web professionals level up their business with tons of in-depth courses and free content.
Brian Casel:I first came across Brent when I read an article that he wrote on six revisions. This was in, like, August 2013. And that article was called what it's like to sell your web design company. So this interview kinda dives deep into that story. You know, what what led Brent to sell his web agency after thirteen years of of running it and and building it up, and it was very successful.
Brian Casel:And the process that he took to find a buyer and and making that transition, which is a lot more complicated and complex than it sounds because, you know, not only did he come up with that transition in in his own mind, but he he needed to convince his business partners and his employees to to come along with him in that transition. And you'll hear in the interview how that, you know, the the story behind that and and how difficult that that must have been. You know, we also get into the aftermath of the sale and and and how how Brent and and his team at YouGurus are now exclusively focusing on products rather than doing client services, and how he's kind of rebuilding his company with this renewed energy and focus. You know, the keyword here really, the keyword of this whole month or so here on this blog and and my podcast and everything is definitely focus. A quote from Brent's Six Revisions article that really resonated with me was this.
Brian Casel:He wrote, I realized that focus was at the root of all major successes and that most failures are due to lack thereof. I kinda feel like that right now. I I'm kinda hitting on that same moment of clarity in my business. I I wrote about this in my last blog post, which is called stop starting, start growing. Basically, I'm finding I'm finally coming around to the idea that that I just can't pursue more than one path or really one startup at a time.
Brian Casel:When I lack focus, I feel like I'm just treading water, exerting lots of energy, but not making any progress. That's kind of where my head has been at for the last few months, but I'm kinda pushing through that. And, I mean, as as I wrote in that blog post, I I pulled out of this agency, which was called Stacked. I I had started I'd begun to start that with my friend and and my office mate here, Clint Warren. But I, you know, I kinda pulled out of it because it it distracted me from my primary focus, which is building restaurant engine and sharing everything that I'm learning in that process here on here in my podcast and on the blog.
Brian Casel:By the way, in case you were wondering why I kinda took a four week hiatus from this podcast, well, I had a kid. My wife and I welcomed our daughter, Emma, to the world on March 2. She's our first, and I, you know, I I just couldn't be more excited, happy, and really a little bit unsure of of what the next few years have in store here. You know? Definitely it's definitely a learn by doing experience for sure, this being a dad stuff.
Brian Casel:So I just wanted to kinda share that with you. But, you know, Emma is in the world, and I'm back to work after taking a little bit of a break. And I do plan on revamping not revamping, but but really just firing up this this podcast once again over the next few weeks, starting with today's episode. So so enough chatter, enough about that, on to the main event. Here's my interview with Brent Weaver.
Brian Casel:Enjoy. Alright. So I'm here with Brent Weaver. He's the founder of YouGurus. Brent, welcome to the show.
Brent Weaver:Great to be here. Thanks, Brian.
Brian Casel:Okay. So, you know, Brent has a really interesting story. I actually, kinda first came across him and and his stuff and his work, when I saw an article that he wrote for Six Revisions, which I I think came out, midway through, 2013, and it was all about how he sold his web agency to focus exclusively on his products business, YouGurus. So we're gonna kinda hear all about that and and kind of the lessons learned along the way and and the whole process of of selling a company. I mean, that's something I I really don't know much about.
Brian Casel:So, definitely interested to to dig into it. So, I mean, Brent, for for those who aren't really familiar with you, maybe like a quick introduction of who you are, what what you do at well, what you do today.
Brent Weaver:Sure. Yeah. So I'm currently the CEO of YouGurus. Actually co founder. We've got two other co founders of the company and a team of about eight people right now.
Brent Weaver:My day to day typically revolves around kind of directing our general strategy and vision for the business. Sales and sales for us, our business is highly contributor driven. So we find experts that are doing great things out there in the web pro market and we bring them over to our platform to teach those things. So we find doers, not just teachers, and we basically give them a platform to share their knowledge with others.
Brian Casel:That's awesome. And and, know, actually, on yougurus.com, I was really interested, especially in the last few months and and even going back. I I kinda wish that there was a YouGurus around a couple of years ago when I was really heavily into, like, building up, like, an agency type web client business. What you guys kinda focus on, and correct me if I'm wrong, it's really like the business of running a web design firm. Right?
Brian Casel:Yeah. I like there's so much out there for like web design tutorials and creative stuff, you know, Photoshop and coding, but you guys are really focused on on the business side of things.
Brent Weaver:Yeah. We kinda call it the soft skills of a web practice. So it's it's the sales, marketing, operations, hiring, firing, people, issues, money, pretty much anything that's gonna help you go from, hey, this is like I'm a part time freelancer to this could actually be, you know, a real enterprise for you. So it could be helping you to build a quote unquote agency or it could just be helping somebody take their freelance practice up to the next level. So they stop kind of, you know, turning this from maybe a part time thing, maybe it turns into a a full time type thing where they can support their life around this type of a business.
Brian Casel:Yeah. Definitely. And again, like that that's something that I I I think you guys really carved out a really cool niche there because, again, there's so much out there for, like, freelancers, you know, like, how to kind of quit your job and get your very first client. I mean, this is really more focused on taking it to that next level, you know, hiring employees and and building out a sales process and and that sort of thing, like, really really doing it right.
Brent Weaver:Yeah. We kind of make an assumption that anybody that's on our site or looking at our programs, like, has some basic skills to do this type of work or they have or and they have maybe their first handful of clients. I I have done some blog content around like landing your first client, but really for us it's like that person is getting like a small grip on this being their own business and helping them to to scale that up and turn it into something that can actually thrive versus them suffering through the feast or famine cycle or worse yet, they realize after doing it for a year that they just can't make the money they want and they go back to getting a real job or something like that.
Brian Casel:Right. Right. Well, I mean, you you're definitely kind of an expert in in this area because you previously had company. Can you tell us about that? What like, your kind of previous life before you grew?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. So I started Hot Press in 1989 with actually a classmate of mine when I was back in high school, Steve Thiel. And him and I basically wanted to make a little bit of money on the Internet and we decided the best way to do that was starting a company. And we didn't really think at the time that we were starting this like fourteen year venture, but essentially we we took that business from '99 all the way until 2012. And so, you know, we didn't necessarily start it with the intention of that turning into a company that was bigger than just the two of us, but over time that was the reality that happened.
Brent Weaver:And we basically took it from, hey, we're doing some random projects here and there for people to where we ended up exiting it, which was about 14 employees and, know, a pretty thriving business. We had, you know, hundreds of clients, I think like 350 plus type websites that we were under management at some level for or had built, you know, and that excludes some projects that we built where we we build out large scale infrastructures of like 1,500 websites in a single project. So we did all sorts of stuff over the years, built custom software for solar companies. We built tons of websites for niches like restaurants, manufacturing, educational consultants, schools. You know, so we kind of we had a very broad experience over that time and we tried a lot of different things and the net result was that we were able to grow a pretty healthy business that ended in us being able to sell the business at the end of that life.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. And so that sale happened was that 2012?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. 10/01/2012 was the our our last day being owners.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. So you're actually running that business for, what, like, like thirteen years then?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. Yeah. So myself and Steve Phil, my business partner, we're running that and he's he's now in this venture with me and and our lead developer is kind of our our third leg of the stool. He's kind of become our CTO for this new venture.
Brian Casel:Very cool. So was Hot Press kind of was it mostly focused locally? You're based in Colorado, is that right?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. So our clients were definitely there was a lot of concentration of clients in Denver, but we worked with people all over the country and all over the the world for that matter. Mhmm. You know, we did a lot of work for, you know, companies in Australia, The UK, had some clients, you know, in Hawaii, you know, all over The US. So we really had I'd say probably 40 to 50% of our customers were in Colorado.
Brent Weaver:The rest were all over the map.
Brian Casel:Cool. And then it was it was kind of a mix of projects and retainer contracts?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. So I mean, most of our our clients would start with some kind of upfront project. So it'd be, you know, a website built. Right? So we'd we'd build their website or we'd build a custom application or something for them and then it would kind of go into maintenance mode.
Brent Weaver:That could include some kind of ongoing hosting and, you know, platform type of fee or, you know, service and support. So help desk retainers, marketing retainers was really I'd say towards the end of the business, we started really expanding out into being more of a full service marketing company where websites was just a means for us to help our customers get more clients. And so then that's kind of where we started bringing in these managed marketing type retainers where we're doing a lot more search marketing, email marketing, pay per click, pretty much anything that involved driving traffic that we thought was a good strategy for our clients. We would basically bring that service to reality for that customer.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. And then kind of making that shift or or really adding that focus of of the of the marketing, recurring revenue retainers. I mean, by doing that, you're you're really adding value to the business, like resell value. Right? I mean, did that kind of factor into focusing on that, or or was that just kind of good timing as you led up to the sale?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. Well, in like 2007, we made a conscious decision to start building recurring revenue as part of our primary one of our primary business growth strategies. So we we had about in in 2007, we had about 3% of our revenue was coming from recurring. We had like a couple of servers and when we built websites, we basically host them ourselves. But but typically that was like, you know, it could be $20 a month, $30 a month, $50 a month or something like that.
Brent Weaver:And for the amount of work we were doing, doing our own hosting business at the prices that we were setting was like razor thin margins. We we really weren't making that much money. And that's why it only accounted for 3% of our overall gross revenue. And so we basically sat down and said, look, we don't have any peace of mind in our business. There there's we have no idea what the next project is, how much it's gonna be, and we were going through this, you know, kind of turmoil where, you know, sometimes we would have enough money to pay everybody and take home a little bit of ourselves, and sometimes it would be three months before I had like any sort of like real paycheck.
Brent Weaver:Like I would I'd take like a check from the company just like pay my rent or something like that or pay like pay down my credit card bill or something like that. And so there was like no fluid, you know, revenue just like coming in. And so we kind of sat down and said, what what would a business look like if we did have a lot more recurring revenue? Like, what would it take to get our business from 3% recurring revenue to let's say 25% or 50% or I think at the time we were like a 100%, right? We just wanted to like make all of it recurring and and that never became a reality, but what did end up happening is, you know, our overall revenue growth on a gross level was doubling or tripling over a period of a few years and our the recurring percentage of that went from 3% up to about, I think, 25 to 30% of our revenue when we got acquired was through recurring revenue and through retainers.
Brent Weaver:And that definitely teed up the opportunity to sell the business. Basically, we had this asset of recurring subscriptions through hosting and content management service fees, through help desk and support, through labor retainers, through marketing retainers. We had this body of business that was just kind of coming in and we had systems and processes to you know, basically realize that revenue and deliver service to our customers. And so that basically became the foundation for what ended up being acquired.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. So yeah. I mean, it it it just really goes to show how much more value is built into the business when, you know, a buyer can come into it and look at it and say so let's say that let's say a buyer is comparing two different businesses, both both have a annual revenue of of of a million dollars. I mean, if one if one if one business is million dollars made up of at least 50% recurring versus the other which is million dollars in all projects, you know, the buyer there there's no guarantee that those projects are gonna continue whereas when they look at the one with the recurring, it's okay. I know that on day one, we can guarantee this kind of income coming into it.
Brent Weaver:Well, and yeah. And it it actually is is even crazier or maybe worse than that. Like, the the typical service business consists of like a person. Right? Like, people are doing business with that person.
Brent Weaver:And so a lot of small web shops maybe have, you know, two partners or maybe there's three or four people or maybe there's five people, but then there's still that kind of that rainmaker, that leader of the business. Most often that person is like the founder or the CEO. The person that's going to sell the business's service is the best. That's usually the person that started the business. The problem with service companies is that a lot of the business's value, like, revolves around that individual.
Brent Weaver:It revolves around that person continuing to sell projects for the business, and then it revolves around that person basically maintaining that relationship and building those projects out. If that person leaves the business, you have to have somebody that's going to take that person's place that has equal amount of relationships and opportunities to bring into the business. Like, they have to have that talent to sell. And so, you know, now there are some companies out there that have maybe a sales team or something like that, but a lot of these two or three person shops, it's very, very difficult to position them to sell when they don't have that book of business that they can prove, hey, look, if I walk away, this revenue is still gonna flow. And and we were we weren't able to put a huge amount of value on our project revenue.
Brent Weaver:Like, we were able to put some on there, but, you know, I've talked to a lot of different agencies that have acquired several companies, and we actually acquired two other companies while we were in operation. And we were able to, like, run them through the ringer because they had really low recurring revenue billable. So we were able to buy their brand for next to nothing because they maybe only had 50 customers and each one of them was on a recurring deal of 50 to $100 per month, which they thought they were gonna sell their business for like high 6 figures or something. And we were like, actually, you're gonna be lucky to get like mid 5 figures for this because there's just not that much asset here. And so in order to position yourself to be able to sell, you've got to have some kind of asset.
Brent Weaver:You've to have the account list. You've got to have some IP or processes in place. You've got to have or or you have to have a a really high value team that's going to stick on through the acquisition. But for us, we didn't want to we wanted our team to come with us to the next venture or at least some of our team. And so, you know, we were able to position the asset side of our business in a way that was very attractive and, you know, move towards a sale.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. Very cool. And we'll get into that in in a minute about how you made that trans that transition with your team. So before you even reached the point of, I I think, like, thinking about selling or or seeking a buyer. Right?
Brian Casel:I mean, you you had already begun to explore starting a products business. Is is that right?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. So, I mean, we essentially we kind of accidentally created like some products because we were just we we had some ideas and we threw some spaghetti at the wall and and a couple of those pieces of ideas kind of stuck. And, you know, that was probably I mean, that was definitely the beginning of the end of our service company. We we didn't really know it at the time, but we started kind of dabbling in product development and, you know, it turned out that we just kind of liked it better than what we had built through our service company. Not to say that, you know, like I love working with clients.
Brent Weaver:I love people that bring in unique ideas and unique businesses. I love learning about their businesses. I love bringing those, you know, helping to elevate those businesses to to grow and to do some some really cool things. But that being said, you know, I started the business when I was like 17. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life and it took me like a decade and and then some of working within one type of business before I realized like, hey, like there's there's this other thing that actually seems like something that that I wanna pursue.
Brent Weaver:And so that journey started back in 2010, and we launched our first kind of paid non service based product in 2011.
Brian Casel:And And that is is that BCGurus?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. Bcgurus.com, you know, launched as a blog in 2010. It's it's focused on the the business catalyst technology through Adobe. You know, we're still highly still very involved within that community. And so, you know, we built a lot of our sites on Business Catalyst and, you know, that kind of became our primary technology we were building on.
Brent Weaver:You know, we built a lot of our own custom software. We still managed a lot of sites on LightCMS and some other content management systems like WordPress or I think we even have like some dot net nuke sites from like way back when. So we had like this very broad range of experience, but BC was like the place that we just started kind of dabbling in our spare time and talking about that technology. Gotcha. And I've seen I've seen a lot of other service companies do that.
Brent Weaver:Right? Like people that have an agency, but then they talk about WordPress in their spare time or they talk about Joomla or Drupal in their spare time and they get kind of known for their technical prowess. And that for us turn went from, you know, kind of this hobby to, hey, there's actually like real revenue coming in over here. Like, maybe we should start paying attention to that and and could that be something that could get even bigger than where it's at today.
Brian Casel:Sure. And so so what BC Gurus was or or is so BC Gurus is still around right now?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. I mean, we've that community, since we sold our agency, has probably tripled in size.
Brian Casel:Very cool. And so that is it's basically a a a set of info products and a community around learning business catalyst. Is that right?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. We have something like 700 tutorials or something like that for BC that cover the technology and the business around that technology. We've got a community forum and we also build templates that are kind of turnkey website templates for people that are building on BC. And we recently just launched an app store for Adobe for Business Catalyst as well. So so we continue to have like a fantastic relationship with Adobe and and that's still, you know, a chunk a a big chunk of our business.
Brent Weaver:And then ugurus.com was, you know, us scaling outside of the BC market and starting to see what other know, if we could take some of the very similar concepts of what we brought to the BC community and roll that out to a much larger market.
Brian Casel:Very cool. So, you know, I I'm really interested in that kind of short period there between like 2011 and 2012 before you sold, but, you know, now you're beginning to kinda focus on BC Gurus, you know, building out this this product, which I guess back then was kind of early on. But you had a team of of what, thirteen, fourteen employees, handling a lot of client work. What was that balance like?
Brent Weaver:It's it's it's like, you know, being on like a seesaw. Right? Like, depending on which thing you want to to be more successful, like, the other thing becomes less successful. And I've I've seen this and talked to tons of agency owners in my interview series that you could see on ugurus.com where we go and we talk to different agency owners every weekend. This product service paradigm is like, it's a tough nut to crack.
Brent Weaver:Not to say that there aren't companies out there that aren't doing it really well. Like, there's a couple that I could mention off the top of my head that I know are doing it really well. Like, Quick Left up in Boulder is doing a really great job on that. You know, there there's a couple of other companies that are are doing pretty cool work there. So it is possible, but I found it to be very conflicting where one day we were working with customers and clients and we were helping them create websites and and tools for their businesses, and then the next day we would like have to shift gears, change our entire vernacular, change our entire processes and try to work on products for a very very different target market.
Brent Weaver:So one market, were working with small business owners and the other market, we were working with web professionals. Now granted, web professionals are small business owners, but I think everybody listening to this can probably understand there's a big difference between working with a small business owner helping them to, you know, build their website and online business strategy, and then the next day you're working on like your own internal stuff. And so that, like, teeter totter for me became kind of unbearable. Like, I just I didn't like what it was doing to our culture. It created like an us versus them mentality within the business.
Brent Weaver:There was people that, you know, either they were working on both things and they really liked working on one over the other. And so one was kind of a drag and the other one was kind of, like exciting. And and that was different for different people because there's people that were in that business that didn't stay on and stick with us over into through the transition.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I mean, I I can't even imagine, like, like having a team I mean, I I've definitely gone through this a couple of times now. It's like trying to transition out of client work and and bringing in product work and and then the product overtakes my time, but then I have to kinda go back into client work a little bit. I mean, that's when it's just me and maybe a few few subcontractors. But in your case, you have a a whole team of full time employees who who are walking that balance with you.
Brent Weaver:And and it was tough too because there was also a little bit of sentiment at the top It started with myself and my business partner where we were kind of choosing our own favorite. And it's very difficult to when when you start kind of at the top of the organization enjoying one type of work over the other type of work because that that permeates through the entire culture. Right? Like, you set the standard for for what you your company wants to do and what you wanna work on. And when you enjoy doing x over y, everybody else or, you know, people will kinda get permission to do that.
Brent Weaver:Right? And so for us, that's kinda it's just what it's what happened. And we we kinda looked at the two businesses and said, you know, which one of these could we envision scaling to $10,000,000 or $50,000,000 or a $100,000,000 or beyond that? And it was the product side of it. And and I really realized that, you know, at the core, I'm entrepreneur that wants to pursue scalable ideas, especially around the areas of knowledge and learning and education.
Brent Weaver:I wanna see some paradigms disrupted within my lifetime, whether I'm involved directly or whether I'm just participating. You know, that's something that came to fruition for me, and I looked at what I had in terms of my company, and I said, well, this side of the business is gonna let me achieve that dream and this side of the business isn't. So, you know, you need to make some tough choices and and change what we have, you know, what we're working on.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I mean, was there a period there? Because I'm I'm kinda going through this right now, you know, in in the last four to six weeks where I feel like I'm finally coming around to to the idea that, look, you have to focus on one thing at a time. You you know, pursuing two different paths at the same time is really just not an option. Like, I I feel like for a while there, I was I was fooling myself into thinking that I can, on one side, you know, build up a a large company, like a client agency type web shop, and then on the other side, build up a a large products business.
Brian Casel:And, you know, you had this quote in in your six revisions article, which which we'll link up in the show notes. You you said, I realized that focus was at the root of all major successes and and that most failures are due to lack thereof. And, I mean, that that really resonates with me. And then I hear I hear others kinda talking about that too. Like, I heard a couple weeks ago, Andrew Warner on Mixergy is saying, you know, of all the entrepreneurs that he talks to, so many of them come back to him and say, the way at the moment that things really took off for me were were when I minimized distractions and focused on one thing.
Brent Weaver:And and, you know, hearing you say that, I mean, we even suffer with the focus problem or shiny object syndrome within the business that we have now. The one thing I would say though is we're always looking for ways to create a single common denominator in terms of our language and our market and our approach to the work that we're doing. So while we have like a couple of different product lines, they all have kind of this like similar theme with them and the process in which those products get executed is very similar. All of our product lines have to do with content, free content, premium content, contributor driven content. So contributors are pretty much the core.
Brent Weaver:We kind of call them our gurus, right? So our gurus are the core of all of our products. And so when we're evaluating new product ideas, we're always thinking about that same type of core concept, like how do we find gurus? How do we create an environment where they're given the ability to thrive and to do the best work they're able to do? And, you know, and so I find that even even with focus, like, it's still hard to keep yourself in check on that.
Brent Weaver:And and we've already, you know, over the last year and a half with this business, we've we've definitely fallen down a couple times. We've lost focus on what we think is important. And so you have to kind of continue to recheck yourself. But the one thing I can say is that our from a culture perspective, everybody is very in tune with the business, the products, and our our general mission as a business. And that was definitely not true when we were focused on two completely different types of business.
Brent Weaver:You know, I've I've even been talking to the the founder of Effective UI, is like a 150 person agency here in Denver. And Anthony, he he talked about this a lot. I mean, they've got a 150 people, and he was like, we don't touch product because product would be taking away from our core mission with our clients. And so for me, I'd say, you know, I don't touch service because service takes away the core mission that I'm trying to deliver to my customers. And so, you know, you just have to be true to that.
Brent Weaver:You have to create that core focus and for most people that might be choosing between service or product, or maybe there's that small group of people that's able to build product and service. The one thing I'd say though is that you'd have to have some kind of common thread between the two of those things. So maybe you'd be building products for your clients or for like your clients in mass. Right? And but for you to have like two completely different target markets and two completely different ways of executing your your day to day activities, like that's where I think focus or lack of focus can definitely kind of hold you back.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I mean, that's a great point. It's it's not only focus on on what you're doing and and your activities and the processes and things and, you know, which product or service to focus on, but really focusing on a market, you know. In your case, back when you were balancing Hot Press and BC Gurus, I mean, Hot Press is kinda focused on small businesses, BC Gurus is is kind of more focused on people like yourselves, like web professionals. So really two completely separate markets there.
Brent Weaver:And and in that, something kind of that encouraged us in a in a big way was the type of impact that we were having on people's lives. Like, you know, I I love building websites, but what I realized that I was building these websites for other people to grow their business, you know, and they would always like hold us back. Like, we'd always have to convince them that they needed to do x y and z in order to like make themselves successful. Like, we'd be like, hey, this is how you should be doing lead gen, Here's how we can create a really awesome funnel. And then they'd be like, well, how much is that going to cost?
Brent Weaver:And we'd be like, well, that'll be this project will be let's just throw it out to like $10. Right? And then they'd say like, oh, we can't spend that much. How much what could you do for $2? Right?
Brent Weaver:And so then our ideas would shrink down and they would become this Frankenstein of our original concepts. And on the so that was like one side of our business, it was always a fight. And then on the other side of our business, we were building these products exactly like we wanted them to be, and the feedback that we were getting from our customers was like like we would get these like six page letters that were like these people confessing to us like of how our the information we gave them was like fundamentally changing their life and how they've met so many people through our community and how their whole business would, you know, totally be different if we never were, you know, a part of their life. And and that was hard to ignore. Like it was hard to ignore all of this fantastic feedback that we were getting from our customers.
Brent Weaver:Like, it just felt like what we were doing on one side was like really right and true to what we were supposed to be doing, and then on the other side, it was kinda like, hey, we're just making some money.
Brian Casel:Yeah. I mean, that that is an awesome way of looking at it, you know. You know, to to think of your customers really for any kind of info product out there, you know, in your case, you your customers for YouGurus are they are hungry for for that product. They're hungry for that knowledge and to better themselves and and kinda move themselves up up a level in their business, you know. Whereas, yeah, I mean, you look at a typical web design client and and they kinda see it as more of a chore.
Brian Casel:Right? They just get their get get their website half done. Right? That's that's usually typically the case. So, you know, I I don't wanna really get sidetracked because I still wanna kinda focus on on the process of selling the company.
Brian Casel:And I guess that's kinda like what comes next in in your story here. Right? So so you've been kinda balancing the two products and services. How do you get into that? How do you get started in that in that transition of of actually seeking out a buyer?
Brian Casel:Really, like, what
Brent Weaver:was the first step there? So the first step was getting married. And I'll I'll explain that a little bit. Okay. So I I took ten days off in the 2012 to go on my honeymoon.
Brent Weaver:And and it was the first time that I had checked out of my business completely for for ten days. And I I kind of and I kinda made a promise to my wife, like, like, I'm not gonna work. I'm gonna and everybody knows I'm on my honeymoon, and we went to Saint Lucia. Actually, ten days. We went to Saint Lucia for fourteen days.
Brent Weaver:So it was it was two weeks of being completely checked out. And I did quite a lot of soul searching within this this ten days or fifteen I guess the first ten days was kind of like I I had a lot of uncertainty about what I wanted to do for the next ten years of my life. Like, was kinda like I felt very much at war with myself in terms of like what's the next step for the company, what's the next step for me personally. And right around that ten day spot of being totally checked out for ten days, I had like just a major breakthrough, know, call it a download, a moment of clarity, whatever. And it it turned into kind of like feverishly creating this like master plan.
Brent Weaver:I actually kinda stayed up like all night one night and just like cranked it out. And basically, it was it created a vision for how I was gonna get to like that next level in my life and, know, it essentially it was creating YouGurus as a business. Right? So creating it not just as like this little product within the company, but making that product basically, that idea, the entire company. And it included like a base plan basically for us to get there.
Brent Weaver:We needed to kind of blow up the bridge to this other thing. Right? We needed to stop relying on this other business to make ends meet and we basically needed to go all in in this other direction. Otherwise, we could kind of continue just to kind of doing half measures instead of full measures. Like we needed to do a full measure.
Brent Weaver:We needed to get into this new venture. Otherwise, we'd always kind of have that deadweight holding us back and doing what we really thought we were meant to do. And and I mean, that might sound negative towards our agency business, but like that's just where my head was at and that's kind of the decision that I had made at that time. And then when I came back from my honeymoon, essentially had this plan and I sat down with my business partner and I said, here's what we're gonna do. And I'm not gonna say that that was an easy conversation.
Brent Weaver:I think there was definitely some friction and there was definitely, you know, a lot of egos on both sides of the table that were involved in that conversation. And it took us a while to, like, work through that. Like, there was definitely, you know, a little bit of a transition period where, you know, it was kinda like, well, you know, what will this look like? How is this gonna affect us? Is this really the right thing to do?
Brent Weaver:But the one thing I would say is I had I kinda had the momentum. Like, I kind of came back from this, you know, break from my business and I brought with it like a very keen sense of determination and it really took a lot of focus over probably a three to four month period of time to essentially exit Hot Press Web and start YouGurus. We actually got a round of angel investment from five different investors that I have known for for years. And so there was like a huge amount of things that got done in a very short period of time, but we were very determined to make it happen and make the transition into the new business.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. Okay. So before we kinda fast forward into YouGurus, so, I mean, you you come back from your honeymoon, you you have this kinda hard conversation or series of conversations, you know, talking about the new direction for the business. I I mean, I know that your mindset is kinda full speed ahead on this. Right?
Brian Casel:But were your current products showing enough promise where it was, like, almost like an obvious choice? Or or do you think it was more risky to make a big change in direction there?
Brent Weaver:It it was yeah. So definitely, like, revenue from our existing products could not sustain the structure that we had, you know, that I had basically outlined, that we had I had built for the transition. And so that was the the reason for getting some outside investment. Obviously, with the the part of the plan was to exit hot press in a financially positive way. And so there was you know, that kind of created some of the runway as well as our our angel investment created the rest of the runway.
Brent Weaver:So we were able to essentially create kind of this plan to say, hey, look, if we do all of this stuff and then with existing revenue, if it just stayed constant, if we weren't able to drive any new streams of revenue into the business, we'd have about like six to ten months of runway in order to, you know, make that transition. And so, you know, it was there was definitely a lot at stake, but, you know, we definitely were not a self sufficient business like on day one of YouGurus. Without a doubt, that couldn't have happened unless we dumped a heap of money in ourselves as well as some other people's money.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. And so when during this process did you present the new direction or the idea or the plan to your team, to your employees?
Brent Weaver:So yeah. So after my partner and I kind of worked through some stuff, then basically I met with each person on the team one on one and basically walked them through the plan and kind of got their temperature for where they thought that they were you know, where they thought they could fit in that plan. Like, had some ideas about where they could fit, but then it was kind of up to them. And, you know, that didn't work for everybody. Some people were like, you know, like one of our our team members, Carol, like, she she took that opportunity to say, hey, I've actually I was about ready to tell you guys I'm going to South America.
Brent Weaver:I've got a one way ticket. I'm gonna hang out with my friend and like discover who I am, blah blah blah. And so like it was it created this like opportunity for some other people to like go do that next thing in their life as well. But we definitely created some opportunity for people to stay over and then some people just just weren't a good fit for the new venture.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. Yeah. Mean, I can see how that can be kinda scary for for somebody who's been working at a well established web agency, you know, or in the industry for thirteen years and and basically, their their job or their company is now transforming into a startup. Right? Yeah.
Brent Weaver:And and we had to you know, and I had certain levers and pulleys that I used to make that transition, like to make sure that the people that decided to stick on board, you know, had some kind of incentive to weather that storm because, you know, it could be a big problem. Right? Like, you don't wanna first of all, if you're trying to sell one asset, right, like, your employees and your team could determine the value of that asset in a very short period of time. You know, they could basically, you know, spike the ball or if you will and just take the whole thing down. So you have to approach that very carefully with any type of exit to a business and you have to really think about that strategically.
Brent Weaver:You can't just make some announcement to everybody like, we're gonna sell the business and expect them to proceed just business as usual. You have to be very careful about that.
Brian Casel:Sure. Sure. So, okay, so tying up loose ends and sealing up this deal. Mean, okay. Know, first of all, I mean, how did you find how how did you go about finding a buyer and kind of letting the right people know that, hey, my comp I'm looking to sell my company.
Brian Casel:How how does that happen?
Brent Weaver:So, you know, one thing I learned early on, people are always looking for opportunities to buy profitable businesses. Right? So like, if you have a profitable business, like, just put a feeler out there and say, I'm looking to exit this business. Right? Maybe you're putting a feeler out there to some trusted advisers.
Brent Weaver:Maybe you're putting a feeler out there to some direct competitors, some partners you've worked with for a long time. Maybe you've got a partner in the business that maybe would find this company to be attractive to lead full time for themselves. Just putting that feeler out there, like all of a sudden doors start opening up. And so that's kind of that's what we did. We basically know, I actually took the same vision deck that I had run my business partner through, you know, some version of it and I run my team through a different version of it, and I'd created a deck for some advisors that I was looking to potentially have as investors.
Brent Weaver:And so when I started doing that with my advisors, you know, they basically started saying, oh, well, I know this person, this person. And then the person that ended up acquiring the company was actually, you know, one of my close advisers. We've been doing work together for years. And he actually introduced me to somebody else to sell the business to. And then when I started going through the process with that other person, he was like, well, you know, this information looks really interesting.
Brent Weaver:Like, I actually might be interested myself as well. And so we were able to find, you know, essentially two qualified buyers within, you know, a couple months. But there was definitely a period where it was like hot and cold with both of them, and then it was like hot with both of them, and then we were able to actually create a transaction out of that scenario.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. Very cool. And so how does the I guess, you know, how how does the negotiation work? Do you throw a number out there? Do they throw a number at you?
Brian Casel:Like, who
Brent Weaver:Well, and and and I had kind of a you know, we wanted to move on to the next thing. So we basically came up with a number that we were we would be happy with. You know, we weren't trying to like, this was not our retirement fund. We weren't trying to get an unreasonable amount of money for the business. We we were we basically talked to some advisors and said, hey, what what a business is like this, what could they go for?
Brent Weaver:We looked at that. We looked at what we had done in the past with other agency businesses that we had acquired and we thought about how we could potentially position the business to get what we thought was a reasonable amount for the company. And, you know, we basically presented that to both of the buyers, and then there was there was some negotiation and some little bit competition between that.
Brian Casel:Gotcha. Gotcha. And so and then, I mean, you know, this is a a web agency, so there are so many, like, projects and clients that that must have kinda, like, carried through the transition. Like, how how do you kinda tie up those loose ends, you know, existing projects? And and then also, you know, what was the reaction from your from your clients as as they're starting to learn that, you know, their agency that they've been working with is now gonna be under new ownership?
Brian Casel:Like, how how did that all kinda
Brent Weaver:So yeah. So we had definitely a transition plan. So I mean and we we put a lot of work in that and since we had bought a couple of other companies, we actually had experience. We had kind of a bunch of lessons learned like what not to do because we had screwed it up before with other people. And so we very carefully planned our messaging around it.
Brent Weaver:We basically we we took on a partner, so to speak, and we basically, you know, transitioned the business to be spearheaded by that partner because we were focusing on a product side of our business. And the guy that bought the business, he actually is is one of our investors for YouGurus as well. So so that was like that whole message actually came out decently well. People for the most part were like, okay. Cool.
Brent Weaver:Like, who who do I send requests to when I have a problem? And and once they got that that question answered, you know, it was it was pretty much fine. Now, the one thing I would say is we were able to find a very very good match for our business. The company that that we sold the business to did the same types of projects that we did with the same types of customers in the same geographical region. And and so there was there wasn't like this issue with them not knowing how to do what our clients needed them to do.
Brent Weaver:And so we did spend a lot of time on that transition plan. We made sure that all of the clients got communication, that they knew who to contact. Most of the stuff because of the systems that we had set up actually stayed very much the same. Right? And then what the company did was actually they carried over our name for probably a period of six months or so before they actually migrated the name, you know, on the invoices and all the support stuff up to Creation Chamber and they dissolved Hot Press Web.
Brent Weaver:So they kept the the name for quite some time just for those customers and then eventually they merged everything up and they created a separate series of press releases about that.
Brian Casel:Okay. So so the deal is sealed, you know, done deal. Now now you guys are, you know, officially YouGurus. Hot Presses is, in the rearview mirror, so to speak. So, you know, what tell me about, like, the immediate aftermath of the sale.
Brian Casel:Like, did you guys kinda get to work? You you and your team, like, did you guys kinda get right to work right away? Or was there, like, a period of ramping up? Like like, how did how did that work?
Brent Weaver:So nobody missed a paycheck. Now, Hot Press basically was sold October 1. YouGuru's first start date was November 1. So there's on paper, there's a thirty day transition period. But in reality, we were basically just paid everybody out of our my partnership with my my business partner, which was kind of separate from Hot Press, why we basically had this little month long transition period.
Brent Weaver:But essentially, you know, one day people were working on Hot Press stuff and then the next day it was like, we're we're now on this other thing. That being said, the the terms in the agreement did have kind of this carry along type of thing where, you know, we were basically responsible for, you know, a punch list worth of things. Right? We had to send specific communications out. We had to be available for, like, phone calls.
Brent Weaver:We need to be available for a certain level of, you know, carryover support for like ninety days, you know, just as needed. But but basically, the new entity, they would just pay us like a contract fee as needed to facilitate that kind of support work. And in terms of open projects, we had to because we knew the transition was coming, we did spend a lot of time trying to wrap up loose ends. That being said, there was probably a few projects that were left open. And what we ended up doing was finishing out those projects, but there came a point in time where I said, you know what, this stuff is distracting us.
Brent Weaver:And so probably after about those projects that weren't wrapped up probably within about sixty to ninety days, anything at that point, we basically kind of refunded a certain amount of this the acquisition deal back to our buyer to basically have them just take those projects over and and take them through completion.
Brian Casel:Interesting. Because again, it gives you that that freedom to to really focus on on the products company, and that was the whole point of of doing
Brent Weaver:all this. Yeah. And and there's, you know, like, yeah, it would have saved us a little bit of money, but like the opportunity cost of lack of focus is like you're doing one thing and not the other. Right? So if you're sitting here like tying up a loose end with like this client that, you know, yeah, it might save you a little bit of money because like I'm not gonna have to like reimburse like Phil at Creation Chamber or whatever.
Brent Weaver:Like there comes a point in time where I'm going, well, I've got my really talented team member working on that and they're not working on like our next big thing that's gonna be much bigger value. Right? So, you know, you have to kind of make a decision that, you know, it's not just all about like the money and the revenue and the you know, it's not just about the the dollars and cents that you have to just say, look, I'm willing to just go ahead and pay to to clean this up and to get out of my hair and just, like, move on to the next thing.
Brian Casel:Right. Right. So was there
Brent Weaver:a
Brian Casel:point where where you felt kind of where you kinda came to the realization that, like, you you definitely made the right decision. This is kind of all paying off or maybe not quite to the point where, okay, every you know, profits are through the roof or anything like that, but just like where you really felt right that, okay, looking back on this whole thing, it's it's it was definitely the right decision.
Brent Weaver:So it took us probably October, maybe September to kind of hit that, like, breakeven moment, right, where we're not, like, bleeding just like cash anymore. And so, like, that kind of moment was like, hey, you know, we actually are kind of like afloat still. You know, there was like this sentiment that when we first did the transition that we needed like some runway and that if we were, you know, we we were aiming to last like so many months and then, you know, we'd maybe have to relook at some new funding sources. But the reality was we were able to basically self fund ourselves into like staying afloat and then so that kind of happened last fall. We started hitting into some profitability, which has been really fun.
Brent Weaver:And now it's like, okay, now we're kind of getting our groove. So how do we like really start to, you know, paddle the same direction and really achieve that thing that we set out to do? Because for a while there, it was like we kind of had that scrappy startup mentality. Like, we just need to like find enough revenue to keep ourselves afloat with our products that are in line with our vision and then, you know, we'll figure out kind of the big stuff later. Right?
Brent Weaver:And so we kind of have have passed through that milestone. Like we now kind of are seeing we're having a little bit more revenue to start testing with some new ideas and some bigger ideas. We're building out a whole new office. We're currently about to sign a lease on a whole new space. It's custom built for the YouGurus business model.
Brent Weaver:We're launching several different new programs. We've kind of built out our own platform, content management system, ecommerce, information product delivery platform, and some of that investment is now starting to kind of catch up with us to where we can start doing some really really cool things with our communities. So like I I would say over the last four months, I've started to get that realization that hey, we made we made the right decision.
Brian Casel:Nice. Yeah. You know, it's funny what it from like outsiders looking in or like what it's like to kind of be an entrepreneur and build a products business or really any kind of business, it's like, you think about that day where where where you've hit that, you know, the big success. But, I mean, really, that that day of success, I mean, me, I can definitely relate to that as well. It's just like when you come to the realization, like, hey, I'm not I'm not struggling anymore.
Brian Casel:Like like, the big success is just realizing that, like, hey, I'm actually paying my bills, you know, without you know, of course, that's really just the jumping off point of of growing and and coming into your own, but it it's an interesting milestone to hit.
Brent Weaver:Yeah. I mean, there was like something kind of silly, but like we were talking to our new, you know, potential landlord and, you know, they were like, oh, and by the way, you guys are gonna get some building signage. You know, I was like, oh, that's cool. Like, it's like the little thing. Right?
Brent Weaver:And like, I told our team that and they were like, oh my god, that's so awesome. Like, I could finally, like, tell people, like, where I work and we could drive by and, like, we could, like, see it. You know? Like, it is like this little thing that I wasn't even really thinking about would be like a big deal, but deep in my heart I'm like, man, that's gonna be cool. When that thing, we light it up or whatever, when we just see it for the first time, that's gonna be a really cool feeling.
Brent Weaver:And we could have as a startup, we had some money early on. We could have probably done some of that stuff, but it's nice to have this year and a half where we were really bootstrapping it and now the pressure is coming off a little bit and we're starting to see you know, some success and we're starting to be able to use that investment now or that new money to kind of create a second round of investment in ourselves.
Brian Casel:Yeah. Totally. I mean, you know, I just moved into this office space about six months ago and after, like, six years of working out of a out of a home office, it's it's amazing, you know. It's just a totally, like to see, like, my company name on the door, and then it's just like a generic sign. It means nothing, but it's just like, oh, well.
Brian Casel:So this is actually, like, a real thing now. Cool. So what do I have next here? So you guys are kinda, you know, off and running at this point. Let's let's talk a little bit about your the line of courses on on YouGurus.
Brian Casel:Again, you know, kinda coming full circle here. So the the topics that you guys are covering, you know, really around like business and operations for for web professionals, what are those topics that have really become like the most popular? Like, what what what are people asking, you know, the most questions about? You know, what's really resonating with your audience these days?
Brent Weaver:So and I've actually been asking web pros what their top pains are for a long time through, you know, our various email series. And and the two things that always come back are, I need I need more clients and I need to be able to charge higher prices. And so anything that we've done to date so far around sales or marketing has been really well received. My web design sales kit is probably, you know, still our our top selling product without a doubt. And that being said, you know, we're currently in this transition of going from like us being like the gurus to tying in our community to do that.
Brent Weaver:And that transition, we've kind of accelerated it from what we originally had planned. But like when we first launched BC Gurus, like we were the experts. We took all the information that was in our business and we just kind of started to publish that and share that with other people. And then there came a point in time where I was like, know what? There's some like really smart people out there in this community.
Brent Weaver:I bet we could basically become their platform to share their knowledge. And that's always been the vision for YouGurus from day one. We wanted basically create that platform to share other people's knowledge, so we're now in the process of making that transition where I was being pretty active in our course creation in terms of being like the subject matter expert. And while I'm still gonna be doing some stuff, we're gonna be shifting gears and bringing in some amazing people that are just building multimillion dollar businesses all the way down to the virtual agency owner that's doing $700,000 a year with like zero employees. Right?
Brent Weaver:Like, we're gonna be covering the gamut of some really amazing talented people. We just launched a course called Freelance 46, which is by a friend of mine, JR Harrell. He's an amazing designer. The guy, you know, he went from probably charging like $85 an hour to a 160 plus dollars an hour within like a twelve month period of time. And so Freelance 46 documents his process of how he basically made that happen and how he maximizes his time as a freelancer.
Brent Weaver:Now his process isn't like I wouldn't suggest using it as like an agency that's trying to build like large projects. Like his whole philosophy is you want to get started doing work as fast as possible and start delivering work within a very, very short period time so that you can see if you're a good fit for the type of business you're working with as a freelancer. His process is very different than my process, but it's really cool. We're looking to bring more ideas like that to the table. It's not just about one way of doing things, it's about looking at a series of choices or possibilities that could work for your business depending on what you're trying to achieve.
Brian Casel:Nice. Yeah. And I mean, that's so true that there are so many different ways to kind of achieve the same types of goals in in this business, you know, different different paths, different, you know, just ways of of providing value. So that is awesome. Tell me a little bit about your marketing.
Brian Casel:I mean, I I know you guys do a ton of content. You do kind of a a series of video interviews, which I've been really enjoying, a lot of good stuff there. How do you guys approach that that content? And and is that, like, the primary way of getting getting the word out?
Brent Weaver:So we yeah. I mean, we've done a lot of content marketing just because, like, in a way, marketing is, like, cheaper than paid ads. Right? Because you can, like I I can spend three or four hours writing a blog post and get it published on, you know, SitePoint or DesignMoto or or whatever. And, you know, you get some traffic and some reputation through that.
Brent Weaver:You know, that being said, it is difficult to scale content marketing. Right? Like, I mean, you you can create more free content or higher value free content, but it's it's hard to just like click on the button. And so one of the things that we've actually done recently, we haven't really been able to show some of the the fruits of this labor yet because we literally hired them like earlier this month. But we're taking some of that margin that we now have to play with and we hired kind of a full marketing firm to help us to start to escalate that kind of effort.
Brent Weaver:So we'll still be very content marketing driven. Like I think that will always be a part of our DNA is blogging, guest blogging, you know, podcasting, doing video interviews. Like, that's just something that I I love doing. I love sharing content and sharing ideas. But I think over the next couple of months, you'll probably to see like us following you around the web a lot more and probably some more carefully crafted funnels to sell our products.
Brent Weaver:Because our goal is to get our instructors to share their ideas and then we're trying to maximize maximize the the amount amount of of revenue revenue that that we're we're gonna gonna make for that instructor by getting the most people to buy that product possible. So our business really becomes trying to get the word out about them. We kind of looked at it and said, there's companies that just dedicate themselves to helping other businesses market and scale traffic. And while we had some experience with that, you know, we also have six other hats or 10 other hats in the business that we're trying to run. So we we recently brought in a company to help us out with that.
Brian Casel:Very nice. Yeah. I mean, you know, the nice thing about working in the space that you do, like, you know, your your market being web professionals is that by their very nature, they are on the web. You know, there there are tons of these blogs out there. Some of them are very big.
Brian Casel:So you do have that opportunity to go out there and and guest post as as you've been doing. I mean, I actually I see your name pop up, like, everywhere these days. Like, six revisions, you know, like like, all these different sites. I mean, that that audience, that market, they are on the web. They're they're on all these blogs.
Brian Casel:They're on social media. So that that is definitely a benefit. I mean, like, I you know, for instance, my my company is in the restaurant industry, and we do actually quite a bit of content marketing there as well. But, man, it is it is hard, you know. Like, there there are very few outlets where can actually go reach people online.
Brian Casel:I mean, so much of it is actually just like over the phones.
Brent Weaver:Well, and and you know, that's an interesting thing because we you know, like doing an interview like this, right, I mean, obviously this is for like your web audience. But in terms of like, if I was to like we used to do a lot of work for restaurants. And one of the things that's worked really well for me is is if you wanna get into a target market is to essentially think about ways that you can bring content marketing to them and help to elevate their brand, like just like this interview we're doing right now. Like, we started doing agency owner interviews because I wanted to network with more agency owners. And so while, yes, the exhaust is like this video interview that we published to our website, Like, I'm building a network of agency owners, specifically right now in the Denver, Colorado region, Denver, Boulder.
Brent Weaver:Right? But eventually, we're gonna start taking that kind of tour on the show or that show on tour, you know, in unlike places like Austin, you know, Palo Alto in the Valley, LA. We've got some contacts in New York to where we'll go start expanding our network to those spaces and we're currently working on a product that's it's currently under development, but it's going to be specifically targeted at agency owners and helping to build a community. So we were able to take our content marketing to help us to build credibility and reputation within the market, but then use that as a tool to have meetings with our ideal customers. And so no matter what market you're in, you could use a program like this to interview restaurant owners or to to copy my blog and essentially do, you know, sit down video interviews.
Brent Weaver:And and we definitely to build some credibility, we we bring a certain kind of show and dance to the occasion. Like, we have this whole light set up and we're doing a professional video interview and and that gets us basically in with anybody that we want to get in with. They're like, oh, yeah. Sure. I'll do that.
Brent Weaver:Like, I'd love to be on your show. And so we we use that as a tool to I don't wanna use the term infiltrate, but basically to grow our network within people that we wanna talk to.
Brian Casel:I, you know, I really like that concept, what you just said there, like, bring content marketing to them or to to industries and to those to to that niche that that hasn't really embraced it the way that most web folks have, you know. I I really like that. And, yeah, you know, I've I've been watching some of those video interviews you've doing and they are, you know, high quality. You guys do kind of like a tour of their office and and that sort of thing. So I can definitely see how that would be attractive to, I mean, you know, any any agency owner for sure.
Brian Casel:So so I guess with this new kind of marketing company, guys are getting into more like paid acquisition and and kind of funnel work and that sort of thing?
Brent Weaver:Yeah. I mean, it'll they do all that stuff. Right? I mean, they have Facebook ads. I mean, we've done that stuff.
Brent Weaver:Like, we currently do like limited runs of pay per clicks for certain terms. Facebook ads, you know, do some retargeting and stuff like that. But that that's their like full time gig is to basically figure out how to, you know, drive traffic and build revenue that somehow levels out and scales, so that we could potentially have, you know, we're spending less than we're making and then we like turn the knob up as loud as it can go. So, you know, we're not quite ready to launch those types of campaigns, but we're in the strategic, like, planning process right now.
Brian Casel:Very cool. Well, Brent, you know, it's been a pleasure talking to you here and hearing your story. It's been really really interesting. I got a lot out of it and I know I know this audience will. So where can folks kinda reach out to you?
Brian Casel:I mean, of course, I I definitely recommend everybody go check out YouGurus if if not for the paid courses, which I can definitely attest. I I I've been through them. They are really really high quality, high value there. But all of your free content, the blog, the interviews, I mean, all of it is is really really good stuff. But, yeah, like, work where can folks kinda, you know, reach out to you.
Brent Weaver:For sure. So, I mean, obviously, yougurus.com, great place to go, great resource. You can follow me on Twitter brentweaver. You can reach out to me over email if you've listened this far in the interview. You know, it's brent yougurus dot com.
Brent Weaver:We're always looking for people to connect with in terms of helping us generate new content and deliver courses or if you just have an idea for a new product, or if you have some questions about our our brand, then definitely feel free to reach out.
Brian Casel:Awesome. Brent, thanks for taking the time.
Brent Weaver:I appreciate it, Brian.
Brian Casel:That was my talk with Brent Weaver. I hope you enjoyed that as much as I did. Here are three key takeaways that I took from that. I mean, there were so many little tidbits of information. I hope you'll go back and and really hear this whole thing.
Brian Casel:But alright. So here were three ones that really stuck out to me. Number one, the mindset of a web agency client versus the mindset of a customer of of an info product, particularly Brent's info products. You know, many web agency clients tend to see hiring an agency as kind of more of a chore than something that they're really excited about. Like, they know that they need a website or they know that their site needs to be redesigned, but they're not all that excited about it.
Brian Casel:I mean, the wet the the agency owner and their team of designers, developers, and and everybody on that team, they kinda present all these exciting ideas to the client. They they pitch, you know, all these different creative ways to leverage their their web presence, to help them build their business. And, you know, so many times we hear the client hear all that and and the client comes back to us saying, okay, so how much is it gonna cost? Oh, $10,000, $20,000? No.
Brian Casel:That's too expensive. I'm not interested. You know, they don't share in that excitement of of the possibilities. They they don't really see that return on investment. They just don't really understand how how these kind of investments can actually return if if they're really embraced and and committed to it in the right way.
Brian Casel:There's just that always that kind of uphill climb to convince clients like, hey, we can do this. You know, these ideas, these techniques are out there if you just embrace them. But, you know, customers of an educational course, on the other hand, they are hungry for that knowledge and they are driven to better themselves and level up their business. That's what makes creating and selling educational content so inspiring and motivating. The customers place such a high value on it.
Brian Casel:Brent talked about in in his in his interview here about how some of his customers would send him, like, six page emails pouring out their feelings and aspirations related to his products. I mean, it's hard not to get excited about running a business that has that type of impact. The second key takeaway here that that that I took here was I I really like this quote from Brent. He said, bring content marketing to your target audience. So not every business has the luxury of selling to an audience of web savvy folks like us who who frequent the blogs and Twitter and podcasts and things.
Brian Casel:Brent's advice to me when I started to bring up how my product focuses on the restaurant industry was he said, bring content marketing to them. You know, in in Brent's case, what he does is he actually publishes interviews with his target customers. So he'll go and interview, like, agency owners, and and by doing that, he's attracting other agency owners because they're interested in hearing interviews with agency owners. And and he has the opportunity to go talk to agency owners because they are his target customers. So, you know, it's really kind of a win win win win win win at three.
Brian Casel:I I don't know. Okay. The third key takeaway here was the careful process of pitching the change in direction to his partners and his employees. So, you know, it it's easy for a solo entrepreneur to shift gears and and try a new direction. But when you've got a business when you've got business partners and employees who and count on the strength and the focus of your business for their paychecks, you know, it definitely requires a a very delicate approach for you as the entrepreneur, as as the founder, as the leader.
Brian Casel:It's a very delicate approach to to pitch a drastic change in direction. I mean, I I really like how Brent approached it. It was very methodic step by step approach here. Basically, step one was he had to lay it all out for himself. He described how he spent most of his vacation, I believe his honeymoon, thinking through this big change in direction.
Brian Casel:He kinda had the the realization that that's what he wanted to do, and then he spent, you know, a couple days there, you know, during his trip just mapping it all out, figuring it out for himself first. Step two was he came home and he presented what he had already organized in his own mind. He he presented it all to his business partners. And really, that that's the process of convincing his business partners to come along with him because they really need to be, you know, invested in in this change in direction as as much as Brent was. He kind of described how difficult of a process that that was, and I I can definitely see how how that was the case.
Brian Casel:Step three was Brent spoke to each of his employees one on one, which was interesting. It it wasn't like he just made an announcement to everyone in in in one big room of of employees. He actually took each one of them out for a meal, and he wanted to kinda get their temperature and determine if they're willing and if they would be the right fit to come along with him in the new direction. And I believe most of them did come along. So that that was great to hear.
Brian Casel:Okay. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If you're looking for more, head on over to castjam.com, and that's where you'll access the entire back catalog for this podcast. I also have a weekly newsletter where I share my lessons that I'm learning by doing, while bootstrapping my business. So enter your email at cast jam dot com, and and let's do this.
Brian Casel:Thanks for tuning in.
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