Running the Bases with Small Businesses

Holly Starks - Black Hatter and Video Marketer

April 05, 2021 Randy Rohde & Holly Starks Season 1 Episode 25
Running the Bases with Small Businesses
Holly Starks - Black Hatter and Video Marketer
Show Notes Transcript

Running the Bases today with Holly Starks a leader in the Video Marketing Industry and renowned “Black Hatter” in SEO.  Holly is well recognized as both an online and offline marketer and hosts several live events and boot camps throughout the year helping other marketers reach their full potential in Video Marketing and SEO.  Awarded one of the Top SEO Influencers in 2017, she speaks around the world at conferences and digital marketing gatherings.

Holly shares her experience of operating 3.5 Million Youtube videos over 150,000 channels, 1+ Million Twitter accounts, and 65,000 websites - earning her well into the 7 figures.  She also shares how one day - it all came crashing down.

Holly has an incredible story on her entry into the digital marketing world - from food stamps to making over $1 Million in six weeks.  And, she’s never looked back!

Informative, funny (if you think hemorrhoids are funny), and endearing - I think you’ll really enjoy this show.

"I never build anything that I'm not prepared to lose."

Learn more about Holly Starks and current her projects at https://store.hollystarks.com/

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Randy:

I'm Randy Rohde and I'm fascinated with entrepreneurs and small business owners. Plus I love baseball. Every show I sit down with the small business owner and we discussed there running the bases of entrepreneurship. We throw the ball around on strategy management, execution and innovation, plus a little fun baseball tag. Hey, thanks for joining us today. Settle in, grab your Cracker jacks and you know what they say. All right. It's a great day for a ballgame. And, uh, you know, it really is a good day for a ball. It's beautiful outside. We got spring roll in right now. Spring training is underway. It's all just thrilling. Uh it's so it's a, it's a good day for a baseball game. Good day for a podcast. And. You've got running the bases with Randy Rohde and really kind of an interesting day today, um, because we have really kind of an impromptu guest, uh, something that was just kind of scheduled really in the last couple of days., because this guest happened to be in town, uh, traveling from Wisconsin. Is that okay if I say that and, uh, I just said, well, I'm going to try to take advantage of having her in town. So, , this guests, let me see if I could just rattle a few things off is, um, now, I'm going to say you're in the digital marketing space, but I want to. Define this a little bit, maybe through our conversation, but I'll say you're in the digital marketing space, highly regarded and have quite a reputation as well in the marketing space. And you do some really unique, clever way out of the box experiments. Well, we'll do that. We'll air quotes, uh, in that world as well. And, uh, I'm excited to talk with you. I've got Holly Starks. Do you have a business name? Do you have like a Holly Starks?

Holly:

So technically my business name is marketing genius and I spelled genius wrong because I think it's hilarious because I get people who email me all the time and say, you're marketing genius by you spelled it wrong. Um, it was like my first, that was intentional. It was intentional, right? Yeah. So marketing genius is technically the, uh, the business name, but I also run under DBA Holly Starks.

Randy:

Okay. Well, that's all that I've ever seen. It's just Holly Starks and I'm like, maybe that is just the, yeah. Yeah. All right. So here you are. You're in claims, is this your first time to Cleveland market?

Holly:

So I have been to Akron, uh, several times since we have family there. When Brett Farve was inducted into the hall of fame, we went right through Cleveland.

Randy:

Well, of course I was at the game and Packers fan I'm. Sure.

Holly:

Yeah. Yeah. So I went to the induction, so I've been. I I've been here quite a few times, but not actually in Cleveland. It's always been on the outside.

Randy:

Um, I'll give you a little, this is, uh, a, uh, a little tangent here story. I had somebody that I've worked with, uh, several years ago, who, while she was in college, I believe it's Mississippi state. Is that where Brett went? Yeah. Yes. So she went to college and she was Brett's tutor really when they were, when they were in college together and I've thought, wow, that is so cool.

Holly:

It would be like my ultimate dream to meet Bret farm. Yeah. It would be just amazing. Yeah.

Randy:

I won't say anything what she said about Brett. So, so, cause I don't want Brett knocking on my door. All right. So, so here you are, you're in the market was so excited to have you on board. So as I alluded to kind of in the intro, what do you personally call yourself in a professional standpoint? Right? Do you call yourself you're a digital marketer, an SEO, a video marketer. I mean, what do you say? How do you describe, Hey, I'm Holly Starks. I'm

Holly:

I. I kind of have a person who does everything. So I don't label myself as an SEO person cause I don't think I do SEO. I do black hat. So I probably label myself most as a black Hatter. And secondly, as a video marketer, I used to, you know, when I first started, I definitely was just video marketing. So I would label myself as that. But now it's definitely like. I'm known as a black Hatter.

Randy:

So, and, uh, as I kind of was talking with Holly before we started recording, I said, you know, a majority of our listeners are small business owners, entrepreneurs, and,, you know, they may be running all different kinds of businesses, right? So this is not a digital marketing podcast necessarily. So for those folks, you know, the major,, the majority of the, of the audience. Define what is blackout because we've had a few other digital marketers on it. I don't know that we've ever really discussed black cat, but so in your definition of black hat, what is that? Because that is a term and I'm sure a lot of people have probably heard about the dark world of black hat se.

Holly:

Yeah. So to me, a black Hatter is someone who, for me at least is someone who knows how to manipulate your rankings, knows how to manipulate Google. So. All of my business that I do is all about manipulation and how to get to a top ranking faster. So I guess that's the easiest way, how to say what a black Hatter is. I don't do things like hacking. I don't do injections. Um, I don't generally do negative SEO against someone else's business, a black hat, or just means I cut corners versus like a white hat type of a person will take six months to a year to rank that is not fast enough for me. And. And so I would be considered as a black hat or I think

Randy:

so cut corners. So that's an interesting way. Another way you might say is that, well, I do a little bit of trickery.

Holly:

Yeah. It's total trickery. You know, I, I showed Google what I want them to see and really that may not be what's happening.

Randy:

Yeah. So you have. A bit of a reputation in the industry, right? So if people kind of started looking for a Holly Starks and SEO and , black hat, you know, they throw this stuff into a search, , And you've got a bit of a reputation just in that world. Right. Navigate in with other, , SEO type people. What do you think is a one word description that people would use to describe you and what you do if they have like, Oh Holly, sorry. Like if I started a conversation with some other, , SEO guy and like, Hey, you know, I was talking with Holly Starks the other day and they're like, Holly Starks.

Holly:

Yeah. They're like, usually they're like, Holy crap. You talked to Holly Starks or Holly Starks was at your office. Oh my God, what did she, what did, when did you ask her, you know, to check her pockets? Cause you know, you know, I get a lot of questions like that. Um, I think. I think that there's crowds that you have haters and you have people who love you. So the CR the haters are going to say things like that. I'm a hacker, or that I do a lot of like negative SEO to hurt people business that I don't help the SEO world. And then you're going to have the people who really like you, who follow you, who know that your training classes and courses, and all the stuff that you've put out and talk about is like legit. Because everything I talk about is something that I've tested. So I think. You're going to have both, both levels, I think. And as you grow and as you succeed, you're going to have, you're going to pick up more haters just because people can be jealous. And I, in my opinion, so if I think if people had one word, I think they would probably say something like. That, uh, one word would be hard, but probably something like a massive tester, because that's what my business is really pushed and geared towards testing more than anything.

Randy:

Right. Okay. All right. Well, that's fair people who are not familiar with Holly and a little bit in our world. And so you made. Well, who is this person? So I do have to like give a little stronger background. So Holly really is highly regarded for her training and things that she has. We'll say kind of figured out through a testing process, , trial and error and research and putting together a methodology really to get results. And then she. Puts out, , really some terrific training, uh, around that, that, um, then, uh, obviously she, , garners, uh, subscribers to that training and as a nice tidy little business for, uh, and so she literally probably has thousands of followers, both in, through her training. She's got a great YouTube channel with thousands of followers there and she's. Oh, he's making appearances on a lot of other places. I mean, you speak around the world as well on the subjects.

Holly:

So had 18, not this last year because of the pandemic, but, um, the year before I had 18 conferences that I spoke at, Oh, Oh, in 2019.

Randy:

Yeah. Wow. Yeah. And so in 2017, you were, , awarded one of the top SEO influencers of 2017. So you've been around, you've got, , you do have a reputation, a good reputation, as well as this kind of black Hatter out there. Yeah. So I just wanted to be sure that people kind of like, well, who is this person right now? She's she's has some notoriety in the industry. Definitely. So I want to get into that. A few stories maybe, uh, in regards to some of this crazy stuff that you've done and do one specifically, and then these numbers just absolutely boggle my mind. So a few years ago, and this is probably, I dunno, I'm guessing 17, 18, somewhere around in there., or maybe even more recent, but a few years ago you've had over three and a half. Million right. 3.5 million live stream, YouTube videos ranking on YouTube. So not just out there, which is like a crazy number to begin with, even thinking of producing that stuff. But you're actually a ranking with that and close to 150,000 YouTube channels. Yeah, that you specifically not like client, these are like Holly Starks. This is my YouTube network.

Holly:

Yeah. I had, I think I probably had one of the largest known out there. I don't, you know, like, I don't believe in hiding if, if you want to find me I'm out there. And, , yeah. So along with a 3.5 million live or million videos, they were all live stream. Plus the 150,000 YouTube channels. I had probably, well over a million Twitter accounts to go with that same with, with, um, bloggers and with, um, tumbler, if I don't remember, I just said ment mentioned to or not, but, um, and I had 65,000 and websites too. So I was like, and that was in 2017. And, um, they were up for a couple years. It wasn't like I didn't get, I mean, when, when you, your black hat, you. Always get caught. Uh, you're always running, it's a cat and mouse game. Definitely. And so at some point you will get caught. And I got, you know, I definitely got caught in 2017 at the end of it, but they were up for three, four years.

Randy:

Incredible. So, you know, probably the first question that may come to mind is like, why. What was the end result or what was your objective, I guess maybe in doing, especially, let's just focus on these videos as an example. So on YouTube and your, your activity and your just massive production on YouTube. So what was your kind of end goal? What were you thinking? And, and, you know, I dunno would share whatever you can, I guess maybe what some of the results were. W w um,

Holly:

so. We did lead generation. So lead generation is where like a business is going to call for someone to, , come and pick up a tree or like snow removal or plumbing. Right. So they would call, , the YouTube video that was ranking. And th and a number they would call would go to like home advisor. And so I was paid based on that call. So like snow removal may have been $14. Christmas lights hang may have been $30. Plumbing is like $50. So that kind of was like the start of it. And once I knew I could get calls through video because YouTube is like the second largest, um, you know, browser. So I just sort of, it came, became like an addiction. I think that I was like, Can I build it in this city? Can I build it in this study? So it was really like, it was a fun experiment to do, um, to see if I could rank for all the same. It was all the same video., so we targeted 180,000, um, cities. I bought the U S census and the U S census had 180,000 cities. So I met, I did one video and, , there was 180,000 cities. And then I would go to the next video and go to the next video and then go to the next video.

Randy:

So was it the same video and you just tweaked it a little bit. I mean, obviously you had to have a different number I'm guessing or no.

Holly:

Yeah. Yeah. So you just spun it, like there's softwares out there that you can get for spinning a video. So it would just spin it and change like a millisecond. So it wasn't a duplicate, right? Yeah. And then I had a software that was running 24 hours a day on my servers and it would just, it would just like live stream to YouTube. So my like hands-on was. Was really just making the first initial video. Yeah.

Randy:

Because the three and a half million is, sounds like so daunting. Right? Like climbing Everest or something. Yeah.

Holly:

Yeah. But it really it's, it sounds like. Daunting, but when you have the structure of the, um, of all the VPs is you just set up one and then you can like mirror it.

Randy:

Right. Right. And I think, I don't know we were on some channel discussion or something together last week or a couple of weeks ago. And I remember you saying something like, listen, I'm all about automation. My business is based on automation. And if I don't, if I don't do it, you know, if I can't automate it, I don't do it.

Holly:

Yeah. I mean, my a hundred percent of my business is automation. So if I can build it, basically anything a human can do a software program can do in most circumstances. So as long as I can automate it, then we'll go, we'll go heavy in it. If I can, even if it is going to make me money, I won't do it just because I can't automate it. And I have like an addiction personality. So I have a problem stopping and like pulling myself back on it.

Randy:

So a part of me is like, so if you had all of these millions of videos out there and the objective was that people were finding them calling and booking and you were making. 10 to $50, probably maybe more per call or booked. I'm like, wow. Even if you're like doing like a 1% a day or something on that, and you must've been just chatting. Rolling.

Holly:

Yeah. It was like beautiful. It was rolling. And then, you know, like, Then one day I was on my flight home and they, they fly in everything. They, they took every single YouTube video down all of my channels down all my, I mean, like destroyed my websites. Everything was gone one day.

Randy:

That's a bad day.

Holly:

It was terrible. I never build anything that I'm not prepared to lose. So everything that my, but you probably don't fully expect to lose it. No, I, I kind of do though. Yeah. I think because I'm not shy about what I do. I don't hold back. I tell you what I'm doing. You can find me quite easily. So I I'm pretty much prepared to lose, to lose it. You know what I mean? I, I think as a black hat or you have to be, you can't like, you can't have blinders on.

Randy:

I love the, you know, you guys, black hatters. I w as soon as they even start thinking about that, like I have this visual imagery of it's the 1840s, and you're out there in the wild West and, you know, there's good black hatters that are like, , they're, they're thought of being black hat, but they're really out there doing good for the common guy,? And then, and then there's the real put you as the good black header. Cause that's. Just how I think of you so good or the common man. So it was good. And then all of a sudden it wasn't so good. So how did you bounce out of that? Right. So, so many of our listeners,, and especially coming through COVID, I mean, this has been. So challenging in so many ways, but, and especially for small business owners, , getting hit with something completely out of the blue, , , Hey, , business going well. And then all of a sudden, the next day, Hey, we're shut down. The state is shutting us down. I mean, that's a gut punch similar to probably what you had. So how did you, , how did you react?

Holly:

Um, it was hard. Yeah. I mean, I had the financial stability. That if I didn't want to go back to work for a year, I probably wouldn't have not had to. And to be honest, it, I think I probably took three months off because I was like, I'm going to go back to work at Menard's or something like that. Um, because I didn't feel like I wanted to rebuild it again. I kind of just lost all of the. The empty do at once you lose everything. Yeah.

Randy:

And I think probably a normal response, a little bit of like, uh, probably like going through. Yeah. It was probably like going through the, uh, the stages of grief a little bit either. Right. Your parents are like, yeah. And the sad and the down and angry and,. Holly: Yeah, I think, , so that and then around March or April of the following year, I was like, okay. I either I'll have to go back to work or I need to learn how to rank on YouTube again, without, without doing the mass video production. So like I had to let all my servers go. I mean, it was like a very messy business-wise situation because I, you know, we talked about that earlier with all the, all the servers that I had, but,, I think it was just like I had, I was just going back into my wheelhouse of testing. I'm a tester. So I went, you know, I had 25 different tests up and I ranked it one to number 25, whatever ranked the quickest was a way that we were going to rank going forward, but it wasn't, it like, I was sad about it and I was upset that I lost all that income, but I think I felt like a big weight was off me because, , I was kind of becoming that person who I wasn't doing, what I love doing. And what I love doing at the time was doing, doing YouTube ranking. In different, different ways and doing testing in different ways. And at that time, when I lost everything, I was doing mass pages. I was doing a bunch of stuff with social media and I was not like focusing on what I like to doing. I was focusing on what the people told me that I should try to do, I guess. Interesting. So at some point then you, uh, I don't know, you've kind of processed and then you like am getting back in the game, right? Putting the chips back on the table.

Holly:

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I just went back to the old grind and doing a tester. I don't like, I don't like to fail and there's many tests that do fail. I I've, there was something I, it was like for, let's say example, as e-cigarettes like, the highest I can get with e-cigarettes is number five. I can't get any higher, so that's not a failure to me. I see that as like, okay, that person who is beating me, I'm learning something from them. So it kind of goes back to. I don't mind about I don't, I lost everything and it was a failure, but I also am learning right at the same time.

Randy:

There's a great quote., I know I'm going to butcher it by Thomas Edison. I have it posted somewhere, um, in my office, but it's, it's something to the effect that you have to rethink your approach to failure and that you have to believe that every failure. When you try to do something that every failure really is just a step closer to success, right. Something along that lines. But I love that. I'm like, yes, something that I try to teach my kids, don't be afraid to fail. There's nothing wrong with feelings, what you do after that and how you take that. But, you know, don't be afraid to fail. You got it.

Holly:

Yeah. I mean, it makes me cranky if I can't rank quickly, um, Don't get me wrong. Like I get really cranked about that, but at the same time I'm learning something. So I'm like, okay, well just toss that up. Yeah. I love it.

Randy:

That's great. So what are some of the other oversized actions maybe, or experiments that you've done in the digital world? And I don't want you to tell any secrets obviously than one, but do you have some other kind of great stories around the similar to the video stories?

Holly:

The other one is the cell phone.

Randy:

Yeah. Well, and so there we go. So I was waiting to see if you wanted to broach them. So I'm getting, so what brings you into our market then?

, Holly:

so the reason why I'm, uh, in Cleveland area is that I have an experiment that we, we started actually, it was a year ago this week because when I started the experiments,, Randy: so this is kicked COVID off, right? Like, let's do something,

Holly:

you know, it's like, it was like right before., they shut everything down. So it was like the beginning of March is when I started buying the cell phones., so basically the experiment is taking several cell phones, um, to a business. So let's say that you are at McDonald's or something, and you put in a search of digital marketing Cleveland, and you do this in 10 phones, and then you do the driving or you click on the driving directions, you drive to the business. And then based on that, Um, Google sees it as traffic and it ranks that, that GMB to number one or to that website to number one. So that's kind of what the phone test experiment is and it works. It was crazy good. Yeah. Like I have, I have 700, um, iPhone. Um, phones. They're like, uh, they're SES they're five, six is because they're cheaper. I'm going to for 20, $30 and then the Androids are like, you can go buy an Android for$25, a brand new one, you know?

Randy:

So you drive around with all of these phones in your back seat and the front seat.

Holly:

Yeah. So I had to, like, it was a fun experiment because like, you can't just set. Uh, 50 phones into a box, the overheat plus they're old. So you got to figure out how you do air flow. So we had like first we tried old CD cases, but then when I turned all the, so we go flying, so then I had to stop because they were turned, they get turned off. Right. Or they overheated. So we ended up finding something on Amazon. It was like a CD case that was wooden and it worked, but the weight, it was so heavy. So if I picked up the case, it would bus on the bottom. So we ended up. Having to build one. Um, but it was, yeah. I take three cases with me, so I always have a backup. Um, and then generally I'll take a hundred phones. Not very many people need 700 phones. Like that would be, that would take me like probably seven hours just to put the searches in.

Randy:

Not only, that's what I kind of like, wow. That's a lot of maintenance because not only do you have where you've got to go do the search and do all of that on the phone physically, because I don't know how in the world you would automate that. Yeah. You can't automate that, but then you've got to charge all of these phones. Right. Yeah. So like, even that alone is a little mind-boggling.

Holly:

I had to buy a charging dock station. I bought the one that had 60 and I fried that like 12 hours broken. So then I, I had to, um, and actually the power at my house. I blew the power. Oh, whatever. I don't know, whatever the hall. Um, yeah, the fire department came because I had flames coming out of our electricity. Um, but so now I, I carry a 30. A 30 charger with me and it hasn't set off. I think it might've set off a fire alarm in Dallas, a couple of, um, last year sometime, but like, I can't safely charge 30 on a lightning cord and you kinda it's a trickle charge. So it probably does like seven to eight at a time.

Randy:

Yeah. Wow. Yes, you are a tester. That is, that is a great story. And, and it's great that it works and it's successful and you have people that pay you to do it, right?

Holly:

So, yes. Yeah. It's not that hard of a, of a sell because you can, , you can show it visually. Instant rankings within like six or seven hours, we can show him a nice thing.

Randy:

Yeah. So you can show demonstrate almost immediately then the, yeah. So we recorded a show with Kyle roof who is also very big in our industry. He won an SEO contest ranking for a page for a term called rhinoplasty. Plano Plano, Texas. You're probably familiar with this story as well. So you recently as well performed in a similar contest. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that? How did that turn out?

Holly:

So, um, the contest that I did was with Craig Campbell and he is. You said you had 30 days. I think it was to rank for loss or it was C it was digital marketing, Las Vegas. And I live in Wisconsin, so I was like, wow. Um, I mean, I am, I am pretty busy, but if somebody challenges me, then I definitely want to try to jump in and win it, you know, and, and mean super competitive. And I have a lot of power behind me. I was like, okay. So, um, what I ended up doing was. Flying to Las Vegas and you can't fly a hundred phones on, you can't even take their a hundred phones.

Randy:

Your, your approach was I'm going to utilize my phones and my phone strategy in order to drive this contest.

Holly:

Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. So the a hundred phones. Got ups over to Las Vegas because you can't take them through TSA. Um, and then I arrived a week later and basically I just drove those hundred phones every day, like for seven hours all over Las Vegas for digital marketing, Las Vegas. And I only actually worked on the contest. I think it was like 12 days in six of those 12 days I was driving. So. The week after I came back, I did a little bit of CTR, like, um, clicking on the website and stuff like that with the cell phones. And I ended up being number five. I was nowhere and I ended up being number five within 12 days.

Randy:

Did you win the contest?

Holly:

Um, I technically did not win the contest because I used a property that was not new. Like, I, it, you had to register the property, um, on the first. And I happened to have that, that, I mean, there was nothing on it. So I did,

Randy:

you had the property beforehand, but it was just raw. It was just a,. Holly: But, but besides that, like, I if you went through, like, I was like, Craig, dude, I actually totally should have won this because I have like 50 properties in the top hundred listings. So I was like, all these 50 properties are in your, are in your, like your realm of your contest rules, but I am number five at the same time. So I, you know, did he give you the prize?

Holly:

The prize was not a prize. It was just bragging rights. Yeah, well, I wanted the bragging rights.

Randy:

I'm sure that you, a ton of notoriety in traffic just on the crazy, you know, activity that you did on it. So, and just when you're describing that, and you're like, wow. When somebody threw down the gauntlet, you know, I got it. So it just went back to my imagery, right? Like the 1840s, black hat, , dude out there I'm like somebody challenging me. Yeah. I'll see you out in the dusty street.

Holly:

Yeah. I mean, I love it when people challenge me because it brings something out of me where I'm like, I'm going to win. I don't care what I have to do, you know?

Randy:

Terrific. So a similar question that I asked Kyle, and I think I'd probably would be a miss if I didn't hit you up with this. Where do you think SEO now you were approached. SEO is very different, but where do you think it's heading now in today's world? Down the road? What do you think about it?

Holly:

I mean, I think SEO as itself. I think you need to focus on what you're doing. We focus on doing podcasts, focus on press releases, focus on CTR and engagement of the YouTube videos and the podcasting and the press releases because Google and YouTube are primarily ranked, , because of their AI, you have to manipulate their AI. And the only way to manipulate the AI is to do engagements. So I think going forward is definitely doing manipulation with. With any kind of engagement that you can do, at least that's, that's pretty much where my focuses on going forward.

Randy:

Right. Good words. Good, good thoughts. Advice for SEO. And I think, yeah, well, and Kyle's approach with SEO. I loved, he had some kind of a, is like, you know, when it gets down to it, it's just a, an algorithm. It's just a math problem. And the more that you feed the math problem, it's gonna you'll have. Yeah.

Holly:

I mean like, so if you have two plumbers, right. And the plumber who's number one gets 50 more people a month that visits their website and the plumber two gets only 10 people, right? According to AI, who's going to win. It's the number one, right?

Randy:

Cause it's one of the factors in the equation.

Holly:

Yeah. Even if it's a small business that only just, just open, if they have enough engagement on that website, you're still going to raise.

Randy:

All right. So Holly, do you like baseball?

Holly:

I like football more, but let's, let's go for it.

Randy:

All right. Well, it's, it's this time here in the show. we begin to, so this is my chance. So I have my research team. They go through, they go. Trying to find a nice question that would be relative to your industry., so they came up kind of maybe close. I don't know. I think I told them like, well, listen to, Holly's a rockstar in SEO. And so we really have to have a great question. And so they came up with like, okay, here's a rock. Star MLB fan experience question. All right. So if you watch baseball, you know, the foul balls occur in baseball, right? So just as a little factoid for you on average, they're about 72,900 foul balls each MLB season. Wow. So just a number, big number out there. So here's the question for you? Are you ready for the pitch? She's really nervous. I'm looking at him like, Oh, all right. So here's the question. What are the odds of catching a foul ball at an MLB game?

Holly:

So it would be pretty high. Like you have to, I have to give you a percentage. I don't know. Just, yeah.

Randy:

Throw something now, like one in one.

Holly:

Okay. So I've been to a few games and I, I was at the Indian angels game. I'm rocking out with some people and I sat on the third, the third baseline, and I had like six of them come at my head. Um, so I'm gonna say, like, I think it's like a 65% chance.

Randy:

All right. Well, actually you kind of touched on something, so it really does factor where you set. Right? Uh, so if you're just random, anywhere, you know, your odds are like one in a hundred, maybe over 30. Thousand games or something like that, or if there's 30,000 people in attendance there with 30,000 or 30 balls hit during the game. But if you sit in one of the lower seats and more specifically like their baseline third base or first base line, yes. You're going to. Improve your ads pretty dramatically. And if you, so if you sit in those lower seats, , and you're able to cover kind of with your reach, now, I might be able to read it. It's all more than you, my wingspan, but yeah, your ads kind of go up pretty dramatically, like one in six.

Holly:

That's pretty good.

Randy:

Yes. Yeah. Can I pass the test? Sure, sure. This is for the third baseline, right? Yes. Yes. So see that wasn't so bad. It wasn't so on baseball questions, I actually have a whole page just on foul balls. I'm like, okay, well that's good enough, but nice job though. Nice job coming in. All right. Let's get back to it. So you and all of the crazy stuff that you do have you tried some of this stuff out on affiliate marketing sites.

Holly:

The engagements we do on everything. So on the affiliate marketing, like CBD oil, ClickBank products, a lot of my affiliate stuff is embarrassing niches. Um, because when you have an embarrassing niche, like I wouldn't talk to my friend. Okay. I'm just going to give an example. Like I have him. Okay. I mean, I really don't. Wow. There we go. That's the first time we've had that share on the show. Okay. But you know what I mean? I would be talking to my friend and be like, dude, I got him rides. I would go and look it up because it would be embarrassing. Right. I always give that example. I don't think I've ever admitted that to even my closest friends, but I mean, it's an affiliate product, right? I mean, so like you can do tail, you can do, , Toenail fungus. Right? Like I could list off some pretty embarrassing niches that I'm in and the traffic is crazy and it, it converts at a really high level because you're embarrassed to talk about it. Right. So the affiliate stuff that I do is very, it's all embarrassing type stuff. I mean, CBD is not embarrassing, but you can, you can make it right. If you have the right keywords, I guess.

Randy:

That's great. I love it. And that's a great approach. I think, do it on the embarrassing topics because you know, people are going to go online and search for stuff. You're not going to pick up and like, Hey Brian, I, you know, what do you think?

Holly:

Like, you're not, you're just not going to talk to your friends. Funky stuff.

Randy:

Yeah. So because so many of our listeners are small businesses, small business owners. There we go. What can a small business owner learn from your approach to business and industry?

, Holly:

so I, I really. You know, like when I've gone around speaking and stuff like that, I really try to folk try to get the people who I've met to try to focus on key words or terms that are not competitive and to try to rank for those first. So everyone wants to rank for plumbing and Cleveland, right. But plumbing in Cleveland. You're going to take a year or how much, I mean, you're going to take so much out of your money and out of your budget to try to rank for, for plumbing in Cleveland. Instead, I'm going to try to rank for like leak repair. I'm going to try to, you know what I mean, I'm going to pick those smaller terms. I'm going to try to get keywords that have three or four words in it and gear my business towards that. So everything that I personally rank for and that my. Isn't this rank forwards is all smaller, low competition, low, high, low fruit. Nothing is something like plumbing, Cleveland, plumbing, Dallas, because I don't want, I want to rank right away. So I think as a small business owner, you have to. You really have to like stop patting yourself on the back for trying to rank for plumbing. You gotta, you gotta rank for the, the buyer keywords obviously, and then the keywords that are not going to be competitive.

Randy:

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's brilliant because that's a strategy that we do our own clients as well, because. Well, I tell the folks that, especially if they really haven't been ranking much for anything, I say, well, listen, we can get start ranking. And it's almost kind of a, like a pyramid effect. If we can start ranking for some of these lower volume, lower competition keywords and get you on the first page and you start driving a little bit of traffic to it, then it begins to kind of build up and then makes it a little bit, yes, makes it a little bit easier to rank for the more difficult words. And eventually we are going to be ranking for Cleveland plumbing.

Holly:

Right, , as a small business owner, I think. Starting off. Totally doing low competition is the best way to go. And naturally, you're going to rank for plumbing if you pick the right keywords. Anyways, is this my take?

Randy:

You shared with us kind of the challenge, I'll say the gut punch from the, uh, taken all of your properties down at that point, you know, uh, back in 17. Any other obstacles that you've faced similarly or not, maybe not to that extreme or whatever, but in your pursuits of your business and have you approached those apps tickles, how did you solve those issues? How did you come to solution?

Holly:

I think like I definitely have everyday problems in my business that I have to deal with, like, especially with servers and VPSs. So the new network that, that we've been building, we're going to use that as an example. So. It, it was, I don't know myself how to build a website. So I had to hire someone to build a website and then I had to hire someone else to create the video so I could watch them build the website. So my, my weaknesses are always going to be my struggle. So my weakness for me is for building websites and for breaking things. I think that's a weakness at the same time as it is a good thing, but it's also a weakness. So if I can get it right the first time. Then I'll write everything down, but I don't usually get it right. The first time I do a lot of backtracking in my business. And so it's definitely something I'm trying to work with. Like I have say I have like 50 sites up and I realized I forgot to activate a plugin. I don't have something that can go and activate that, that particular plugin, if it's custom coded on all my 50 sites. So then I have to log into all 50 sites and that takes me like a half a day to do it. So I guess for me, that would probably be. Stuff that I could try to fix, because it would be as simple as just a button pushing. I mean, in the past, my businesses is it's always surrounded around, around breaking things and not having things the right way anyway. So I'm, I'm kind of like used to that and I can. Get through it a little bit easier, I guess.

Randy:

Sounds like as well, you've identified some of the things. Maybe you're not, maybe I don't want to say not skilled, but, uh, as a weakness, I think was the word that you used and you countered that by essentially building your team to do those things.. Knowing you, you, you know, you think through. I think you're very contemplated and very creative in thinking through like, well, what if we did this and why? And then you kind of map out a planting to kind of, for the experiment, we'll say, and then in order to execute it, you gather people around you to, to make it happen. Um, and I think AI, I think that's an effective leader and, but that's, it's a great approach to solving, you know, a particular challenge, right?

Holly:

Like if I want to know if say a link on a press release is going to help my company, I can go out and set out on my servers, a hundred different links and maybe one of them we press releases and the other a hundred beats something else. I'll be able to say within a few hours, whether or not a press release is going to help me. My business are my other links.

Randy:

Well, Good approach. So here we are. We're at the bottom of the ninth. That means it's toward that. Yeah. The two minute warning in the fourth quarter that got you. All right. So I asked this question really just about. Every guest on our show, which is what advice do you have for rookies in the game? Right. So those folks who are just starting out in business, or maybe they've, they already have their business and they're looking for some guidance, what kind of advice do you have for those folks?

Holly:

Don't be scared of, uh, of failure and. If you don't get it right the first time it's okay. Because none of us did either and to come back and try again and, and change something and maybe it will get it right the second time. And if you don't that's okay. It doesn't mean you're a failure. It just means that you learn something and come back the third time and try it. I think like when I first started off. I don't know. Do you know of a story that I, that I, how I got into this? This is good. Yeah.

Randy:

Well, they, you know, the bottom of the nights can go for a long time,

Holly:

so I'll try to make it shorter as much as I can. But, so I was married for eight years and I left my husband to be with my now wife, which is a whole nother story. Right. But I did have any. I didn't work. I didn't have any skills. I didn't go to school. I don't, I didn't nothing. I, I graduated high school and I was really good at computers. And so I left my husband and I realized I have to work. I don't have money and I don't have skills. And I worked for a newspaper. I delivered newspapers for$7 and 50 cents an hour. And I, my check was $120 a week. And my wife's check. Was $8 an hour for 40 hours, or her check was $400 probably a week. And we had four kids. Uh, and two of them in diapers. Um, and I had to kind of learn how to, uh, like survive. And I think that is a lot of why I am the way that I am, because I always learned her survive. Right. So I just learned. Uh, by watching my kids play on YouTube. And I don't think that they had like Twitch and stuff like that. They were just watching YouTube videos. And I was like, how do you, my kids taught me how to make a YouTube video and all about YouTube. And I just sort of like fell into it. And then I made my first course, so I worked, like I made like $7 and 10 cents for probably a year. And we barely got by. We were on welfare, we had food stamps and within six weeks of doing the YouTube and getting clients, I made a million and a half. So I was, went from seven, 10, two hour to a million and a half in six weeks.

Randy:

That is a big jump.

Holly:

That's a huge, and I've never gone backwards. But I think that I had to, like for me, I had to, I had to be at the lowest level. Of of me to, to be willing, to learn how to like succeed. So that's why I say I don't fail at things cause I'm always learning. And I think as a business, you kind of, for me, I have to look at it the same way. I'm never going to be like the bass business with like management wise, but I'm okay with that. Cause I'm always learning. And I don't think that's a bad thing. So I mean, if you're a new business and you get frustrated with maybe not getting as many calls as you want or not getting enough income that month, it may happen the next month, just because you don't do it that month. This is okay.

Randy:

That is so powerful. I mean, that's how I got started in it. That is such a powerful story. Thank you for sharing that. Yeah. Wow. That is incredible.

Holly:

Yeah. I mean, I, I like re you know, I was raised in a very poor family and I've never had money. And so even today I have the same house that we had in 2014. Uh, I, I'm not like, how do you say how spore I'm not car poor. I have everything paid off. And I, I live a comfortable life and I enjoy life. And when I was married and I wasn't, I wasn't enjoying life. Cause I wasn't who I was. Right. Do you know what I mean? So I mean, this is a totally gone, totally different direction, but I think the moral of, of what it is is you have to be happy with yourself before, like I think your business. I don't know how to say it, but if you're not happy with yourself, your business is not going to be in a happy and a happy place.

Randy:

Yeah. I think, um, like do what you love. That's probably as, uh, as succinct as you can get it actually, uh, you've gotta be at a good place for yourself and happy with what you're doing. If you're going to expand the energy to try to drive success. And frankly, I would say you're permanently, aren't going to have the success. Uh, if you are. Right. Unhappy in what it is that you're doing. So, wow. That is really great. I don't know that we've had like that that's a home run. That's a walk off a home run right there for the bottom of the night.

Holly:

That was, I wasn't even, I was a, nobody. I made a splash and took out, um, a couple of big SEO guys just by saying I could rank for him because, you know, it's my competition thing. And so people started trusting me based on that. I just came in on a splash. Like I think you have to make a splash in business, especially as a female in our space, because there are so, you know, our space has what, like 98% men.

Randy:

You know, that's funny. I, when I was, , uh, looking over the questions in the back of my mind, I was like, I wonder if I could ask her a question about women in the SEO role. And I thought, Oh, I don't want to, you know, that, I don't know. It really is though. It is a very male dominant industry. And you know, you are one of a handful, probably a well-known kind of women in the industry.

Holly:

I know of probably. Maybe two or three other women that are very prominent in, in the industry that get that, get the love that they should. And I've had, uh, when I had, did have clients, um, I've had clients turn me down because I was a female and they said a male could do a better, a better job at SEO. And I was like, well, that's a stereotypical, you know, I mean, that's. It's like, okay. I'll just prove to you that I can, that's fine with me. But, um, yeah, this I've been to a lot of masterminds and there's been like the one in Chang, mine that I go to with Matt diggity, there was 50 men and me and I was, I was like, can you get some more women in here? But yeah. I mean, I really get that a lot of times, like I think at most SEO conferences it's like me and probably two other females. Uh, that's, that's pretty much it.

Randy:

Yeah. Well, listen, I absolutely appreciate that you were here today and in the market and it was just fun spending some time with you today. So yeah. Thanks for being on the show, agreeing to like, you know, kind of impromptu, like okay, sure. Let's do it. So anyway, it's been a lot of fun and so, so great to get to know you a little bit Holly, and appreciate it. Thanks for joining us today, everybody. And if you'd like to show, please tell your friends subscribe. And, and as we say, that's the ballgame running the basis with small businesses is brought to you by 38 digital marketer, a digital marketing agency, committed to client growth. With lead generation higher conversions and increased sales connect with us today at 38 digital market.