How to Turn Buyers into Brand Advocates with Adam Ortman, Founder & CEO at Kinetic319
In this episode of Exploring Growth, host Lee Murray sits down with Adam Hartman, Founder & CEO of Kinetic319, to discuss strategies for building emotional connections in B2B marketing. Adam shares insights on the importance of effective onboarding and maintaining open communication with clients. They also emphasizes the value of understanding clients' preferences.
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Sam Ortman
00:00:00
In my world where every dollar is accountable and so is every minute. we typically have to get to work pretty fast, and that's really demonstrating value as quickly as possible. So, I would say, though that, you know, we have the briefing doc, we're getting into communication. Things are signed. I would honestly say set expectations as clearly as possible because you never really want a client, especially in the early days, to think back to their new marketing team that they're very excited about. And they just signed. You never want to. You never want them to think, what the heck are they doing over there? Yeah. You know. Yeah. You know.
Lee Murray
00:00:40
So B2B is all about relationships. And if you aren't solving for how to build new relationships or grow existing ones, then your business is pretty much going to stay stagnant or it's going to start regressing pretty quickly. So today we are going to dive deep on practical ways companies can build emotional connections with their buyers and turned their buyers into brand advocates.
Lee Murray
00:01:02
We're going to do that with Adam Orman, founder and CEO of kinetic 319. Welcome to the show, Adam.
Sam Ortman
00:01:09
Thanks, Lee. Happy to be here. Thanks so much.
Lee Murray
00:01:11
So I always ask my guest to just kind of give us a background on yourself, your company. So we have context to the ideas that you're going to share.
Sam Ortman
00:01:19
Sure. Yeah. My name is Adam Hartman, founder and CEO of kinetic 319. We are an ad agency that primarily focuses on all things planning, strategy, execution of campaigns, analytics, which is incredibly important to us every day, both on the digital side and on the traditional side. We also have SEO capabilities and content writing. So we are very busy in this very dynamic industry that we find ourselves in.
Lee Murray
00:01:43
Yeah, I can imagine. and you're on the B2C and B2B side. Correct?
Sam Ortman
00:01:47
I'm on both. Yeah. And that was something that you and I had discussed, which I'm going to provide some of my insights, more so on the B2B.
Sam Ortman
00:01:55
But a lot of the things that we talk about today, I think could actually be translated into both.
Lee Murray
00:01:59
Agreed. And you know, I always, well, I always say, I'll tell my clients that you get your best ideas from B2C for B2B, you know, look at what B2C is doing, because they're really charged every day with this task of being creative. I mean, it's really in the messaging and the creative to get their eyeballs on the on their product and then get people to convert through their doing this digitally. they have to get creative. They have to know their stuff. They got to know their tools like they are, you know, modern day real marketers, B2B marketers, they tend to be more lazy because they're not called out on metrics every single day. You know, it's more relationship building, but it's still difficult in its own right, you know, and to the nature of our conversation, you know, it's all about building relationships.
Sam Ortman
00:02:48
There is a quote that I have often quoted, Sara Blakely.
Sam Ortman
00:02:52
I don't know if she is the original user of this quote, but I'll quote her anyway. But she's the CEO of Spanx. And she says, you know, businesses don't do work with businesses. Businesses do work with people, right? and that is incredibly important because inherently, at the end of the day, we're talking to people. And I think the the that really fits well into even the title of this session, which we're talking about the emotional appeal and emotional constraints of a relationship in the business world. But at the end of the day, we're just all people, right? We shop the same. We all have. We all have priorities and motivations, and that's really what we want to tap into when we're building healthy and and lasting business relationships.
Lee Murray
00:03:34
Yeah, I couldn't said it better. And often I'll find myself reminding people to say, hey, you're a consumer too. You use that iPhone too. You go to websites too. So it's, you know, we are different creatures with different technology and different environments.
Lee Murray
00:03:52
Like the way we act on Instagram is different than how we act on LinkedIn. you know, there's there's we're kind of complex people. but we're still people. We still buy things. So we can't forget that. It's not these people out there, you know, that are somehow there's a disconnect. There's a there's very much a connect because we're very much like those people. for the most part.
Sam Ortman
00:04:15
So as you don't know this, Lee, but my masters is in consumer psychology, so. Okay, you're you're tapping into something that is, something that, that I also love just personally. But also I reinforce and enforce in the kinetic 319 practice of every one of our clients is we're actually baking in theory but also in practice. And so we get to see, our hypotheses come to life and a lot of our strategies, which is, which is really fun.
Lee Murray
00:04:43
Yeah, that totally makes sense. I think a lot of marketers are, you know, on some, you know, part of the scale from formally trained in psychology to a pseudo psychologist that are, you know, secretly, I love writing books and stuff, you know, because this is we we love human behavior.
Lee Murray
00:05:01
We love, you know, why? Why people do what they do, you know, and I think that's so, so fascinating. And so to the nature of that, let's jump into our conversation. I'll frame it out real quick. I think we want to focus in and try to give as much practical wisdom as possible. So as we look at building an emotional connection, turning people into brand advocates, really what we're talking about from a business metric standpoint is reducing churn and increasing retention. And so we want to kind of focus on three different areas. One is what do we do around the onboarding of a new client? Because a lot of marketing is pre-sales pipeline. But when they're in the sales pipeline, there's a lot of connection that has to happen there, obviously, to to build trust and get them over the, the, the line. But as they're coming over the line During that onboarding process, what do we do? Secondly, what do we do as they are a customer? So customer success is, you know, a place where we can sit for a little while.
Lee Murray
00:06:00
and then third, how do we add value long term? So, that's what that's what we want to do. So let's jump in. You take us away.
Sam Ortman
00:06:09
Yeah I love it. And I think that this this session is really good because so many of other agency owners or other businesses in general, they're so focused on that new client. Right? On that new customer getting in. I need more sales, I need new clients, I need more pitches. And oftentimes I wouldn't say necessarily neglected, but their current customers and the longevity of them are not necessarily the focal point. I honestly think that that might be a little nearsighted in in a lot of ways. So these these three points are are spot on. So let's talk about really that onboarding whether you have you know, I've had agencies that you get really creative with the onboarding. There's a briefing, there's a briefing material. Either you're going to their offices and, you know, seeing them in person. Yeah, I don't know, send a muffin basket I don't know.
Sam Ortman
00:07:01
There's a lot of different ways of onboarding. some of the practicality though, that I have seen work really well, at least in my experience. And one question that I really, really like is how do you like to be communicated with? So that is literally in every single one of our briefs. And so we have clients that say, hey, I hate email, text me or I'm on slack all day long and I only communicate via slack. So I think identifying that real foundational piece of communication is only going to set you up for success over any duration of time.
Lee Murray
00:07:36
That is huge. I mean, and music to my ears. You saying that because. Yeah, you know, I think a lot of marketers are kind of back and forth into communications. My, my sort of, training was in communications and, and sales. And so I know that communication is foundational for everything that we do in life and in our building our organizations. But, but for for bringing someone on and, and having success, those fundamental things, like what channel works best for you.
Lee Murray
00:08:09
And we're going to, you know, maybe, maybe we have to make an adjustment to make that work for us internally. Most likely not, you know, but that those simple things are huge because what it does is it's a marker, I think, almost to your brand to trust that you've built up that point. It's a marker to say, okay, look, everything they set up to this point made themselves look really good. Now they're deploying that. Now they're actually coming through all of that.
Sam Ortman
00:08:35
Yeah, communication is incredibly important. And honestly it makes the really good conversations that much easier. But it also makes it really hard conversations that much easier because not every day is going to be sunshine and roses. We all know that all of your listeners know that. but understanding how to communicate and integrate yourself into your client or your customers lives in that way to create a very positive feedback loop in regards to communication. like I said, it's a no brainer for me, and I think that it's really overlooked.
Sam Ortman
00:09:05
Just asking that one question on a briefing document changes the game. Yep.
Lee Murray
00:09:10
Love it. Yeah that's great. So we're talking about onboarding and you know, agreement signed. Now we're you know we're walking through maybe a kickoff meeting and you know some subsequent meetings. Are you a fan of like kind of just getting right to work. Or do you have like kind of a prolonged process of bringing someone into your ecosystem or you're into theirs? I mean, what does that look like.
Sam Ortman
00:09:38
In my world, where every dollar is accountable and so is every minute? we typically have to get to work pretty fast, and that's really demonstrating value as quickly as possible. So, I would say, though, that, you know, we have the briefing doc, we're getting into communication. Things are signed, I would honestly say set expectations as clearly as possible because you never really want a client, especially in the early days, to think back to their new marketing team that they're very excited about and they just signed.
Sam Ortman
00:10:09
You never want to. You never want them to think, what the heck are they doing over there? Yeah. You know. Yeah. You know, so having that very clear, you know, what is your first two weeks. First four weeks for six weeks look like. Right. that's going to be really important because, you know, your listeners in the audience here might be in a variety of different industries or offerings and services. So that person might not actually see tangible value until six, eight, you know, three weeks, excuse me, three months down the road. So you're wanting to make sure that you're communicating very clearly what's going on, because not all the time will your client or your customer know what's going on behind the scenes. But we all know that your overhead and your resources are very much so working away.
Lee Murray
00:10:53
Yeah, I think about this in terms of leading the client. So yes, you you can't expect them to just know what you know. even down to the point of communication.
Lee Murray
00:11:04
Yeah. And I think taking the taking the intentional steps of communicating that is, is crucial on the front end. Expectations are, are are huge. because it sets the tone for what they expect for them. again, marking that you've done this before and, you know, you're just you're taking them through this, this very, you know, kind of thought over process. I think that's that's key.
Sam Ortman
00:11:30
Yeah. we use internally asana. We're obsessed with asana. So this is not a plug by. It's on a they're not they're not telling me to to call them out, but basically any type of onboarding that we have, we have a template. So any any time a new client is signed, we literally launched that template, tweak it a little bit to get tailored to their business or their specific tech stack or whatever it is. And, it takes out the legwork in those first days where you're trying to get your team synced up and kicked off internally, it takes all the guessing game out.
Sam Ortman
00:12:03
You just hit one little button and assigns to everybody and assigns all the the due dates for the next three weeks, which the communication has already been to the client on that. So definitely use that technology to help that onboarding. That's not necessarily helpful in the client's eye, but it's helpful in your organization and your ability to organize internally so that things are very smooth with the client. Nothing is ever forgotten. And that's my biggest thing, is when, you know, over the I've been doing this for over 20 years, so there's always something like, oh, we forgot about that and just add it to the template and you never have to remember it again. Yeah.
Lee Murray
00:12:37
So so nice. I think what they see is a smooth process. Exactly. Ease. Right. So that, again, first impression is what you're going for. A lot of, like, duck feet walking, working under the water kind of thing. And they, they see the smooth, process. I think looking back, is a big point, you know, whether you're into the work and they're saying, well, we had this great kind of sales pitch, but then what happened? If that first impression is huge and it's almost like, oh, wow, where have they been all my life? I'm so glad I made this decision.
Lee Murray
00:13:10
Yes, because they are now a strategic part of our team. And then then that continues on. you know, you've got it. You're you're really starting to put the pieces together for a good client experience and a good solid, you know, long term client.
Sam Ortman
00:13:24
Yeah. You always want to avoid that buyer's remorse feeling. Right. So you want to continue on. And how you continue that excitement is learning how to communicate set expectations effectively and make sure your house is in order. Yeah. And totally. Yeah.
Lee Murray
00:13:41
Yeah, I love it. So what else do you have for us on the onboarding side?
Sam Ortman
00:13:48
From there it can go a million different ways, right? So depending on what services you're providing, depending on, the team that you're executing internally, I would just say that, you know, having that expectation of following that roadmap is going to be your biggest, your first line of defense, honestly, but also your biggest successor. and then you just get into your emotions, right? You get into, you know, putting your plans together or whatever that may be, and ensuring that that client understands really the value and the effort that you're putting in.
Sam Ortman
00:14:23
I literally just had a meeting with a client this week about this lie on a deck that we were presenting. We were presenting to them some analysis that we were talking about because we were having some issues getting some of their. It was this was for an app install client which could actually go be to be or B2C. the the revenue. Their dev team wasn't able to make the revenue connect in the way that we really needed it to. So on the deck, it basically was talking about us brainstorming ways to find proxies or workarounds. Yeah. And I, I wanted to pause and I did pause in that meeting and just said, you know, I want to give you a client a little more context around this single line in the deck, which equated to literal hours of us sitting down, brainstorming, digging through data, looking at options. So I also think having a narrative and truly telling the story about the work and the effort that the client doesn't see, but they should know about. And again, that goes into especially those early days where there is a lot of stuff happening in the background and onboarding scenario, communicating that effort and that value to them, because otherwise they don't know.
Sam Ortman
00:15:34
And they don't know what they don't know.
Lee Murray
00:15:36
100%, I think being transparent about things is helpful because they don't know what to ask for. They don't know what really what you're doing. Correct. Which is why they hired you. but, you know, in addition, I would add that the first 30 days really, but the first 60 to 90 days, is the best time to get some huge wins. And if you can get some huge wins on the board, even one. Honestly, that is to me, if you were to say, okay, what does it look like to really have a solid onboarding process and a solid sales pipeline process? Those two combined, the sale is really made after you make that big win on the board after you've signed, because I think for work with a lot of CEOs, I think for CEOs, they're in it to make the decision. They make the decision, and then they move on to the next project. What helps them to really move on to that next project and put out the new fire, or whatever it is they're doing, is to see that it's working.
Lee Murray
00:16:43
And if they have that one big win from you, it's proven that they made a good decision. The money's well invested now. They can move on, and then they sometimes won't even look at it again for a long time, depending on what it is. And they'll give it to their team because they know that you can be trusted. But if there's no wins for a little while, even if the expectations set that it's going to be a long time, it's almost like that over, you know, deliver under promise type of thing where, yeah, if it's three months expectation four months, but you can in the first 20 days turn around something that they were delighted. Oh I didn't really even think that we'd have this this quickly. But you knew.
Sam Ortman
00:17:23
That delight is a big part of that surprising delay. And it also makes usually your direct point of contact on the client side look really good.
Lee Murray
00:17:32
100%. Yep. Yeah.
Sam Ortman
00:17:34
I think at the end of the day, that's really what we're all doing.
Lee Murray
00:17:36
That's a real.
Sam Ortman
00:17:37
Sale. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Lee Murray
00:17:40
Getting over the signature and getting that first win. That's your real first. That's the actual sale. Now you've bought yourself some time with that organization to to really get embedded and really start start working okay. So now let's move to that next stage. You're working with a client and it's been over, let's say at least 90 days. We'll say for most most B2B is is longer term relationship. So over six months we're looking at looking into that full year. how do you approach client work to keep it alive? Yeah.
Sam Ortman
00:18:15
There's three, three real main points that I wanted to bring up in this area that I've seen a lot of success in. and the first one is really about me and my role and as the, as a CEO, you cannot be in the day to day of every meeting of every client. You can't at least the agencies of my size. So what I will say though, is stay present, even if that is one meeting every two weeks, or just sit in on a meeting and once a month, whatever that is.
Sam Ortman
00:18:45
so many owners and CEOs and agencies, they sign the client and then they go crickets for the rest of the time. And the only time that that person is seen again is when there's a problem. And that's never really a good relationship for that person to, to take part. And so I would say have leadership be present, you know, sit in on meetings, and don't go black screen. Right. If you're on virtual meetings, don't don't just sit in the background on black screen, engage with the client. have a general understanding of their of their business. What is the performance that they're seeing? What are their goals so that you can engage? so be present is is something that I would I would definitely recommend.
Lee Murray
00:19:27
I like that that's like, what is it worth for your time to be part of a meeting once a month, once every two weeks on various clients? What's that worth? It's probably worth whatever upsell you're going to be looking at. It's probably worth that percentage increase at the time of the renewal.
Lee Murray
00:19:45
It's probably worth all of that.
Sam Ortman
00:19:47
All of your clients want to be treated as if they are your only client. So always remember that, and and, you know, treat them accordingly to the best of your ability and be present. Absolutely. Yeah. the second one is survey your clients, survey them, survey that we do it every six months. We do it in the spring. We do it in the fall. And why this is really important is because we ask them a single question, which I've done this at other agencies as well, which is how, you know, would you recommend us to a friend or colleague one through ten? It's actually one through nine because I force them to choose a side. There's some psychology surveying for you. so would you would you recommend us? And that allows us to have a very quick and easy way to say, okay, how was what's the temperature on this client? that also gives you the opportunity to say, hey, do you have a you have five more minutes.
Sam Ortman
00:20:43
And so in that five more minutes, we have an expanded survey that we send to our clients. That is, you know, how is your reporting? How is your client success manager, how is the performance that you're seeing. So it allows us to dig a little bit further in if they if they choose to do so. that is incredibly important because it fuels so many things. We open it, we open up the comments so they can leave us comments and things of that nature, which those comments allow us to either do construction on ourselves or allows us to either even do new sales and prospecting techniques. Right. Maybe something that you've never even thought of that was really kind of mundane in your eyes. Clients love it. And you're like, okay, let's add that to our sales pitch or whatever, or cold outreach, whatever it is. So that's really, really important. The other thing is, is that we tie I tie all of my leads, their growth goals and all of their reviews and those types of things to these metrics that they're associated through on their client side.
Sam Ortman
00:21:42
So that not only gives your team internally a sense of accountability, but it also allows us to have for them to really own the client, right? They own the relationship there. And obviously, whether it's a client success manager, account executive, whatever you call it these days, that, that POC that you have internally that's having those common communications with your clients is really, really important. So surveying is amazing. And in that I'll give you another one. We were just talking about what types of, Topics for content would you like to see more of? That actually fuels a lot of our blog work and our social work, so it's really, really important.
Lee Murray
00:22:30
I couldn't agree more. And here are my thoughts. I think that.
Sam Ortman
00:22:35
Tell me your thoughts.
Lee Murray
00:22:35
Lee, if we were we were surveying this audience that were listening to this right now and saying, yes, raise your hand if you are actually surveying your audience, your customers and getting feedback. I would say 89.9% of them are not doing this at all, and maybe probably another 10% are only doing it informally.
Lee Murray
00:22:57
And so it kind of it's kind of an activity that is gets an afterthought. Everyone knows they should be doing it, but the way you laid it out there is like, there's so many layers to the gold that comes back to you from doing this simple action.
Sam Ortman
00:23:14
But what I probably ways that I didn't even mention, oh, we should use that information.
Lee Murray
00:23:18
There are. And I think what happens is people, if they start doing it, it will naturally, organically show them the next step because it will reveal so much. Asking people, I mean, it's just like a personal relationship going back to being human. If if we're friends and I feel like something's off, if I come to you and say, hey, I feel like something's off, maybe I'm just making this up. You know, you you dispel a lot of rumors. You dispel a lot of, like, dissension that could happen. Years of not talking all this stuff by just asking a simple question. And then they may say, oh, no, everything's fine.
Lee Murray
00:23:50
And then great. You move on with your life and things are good. But here's the here's the nugget I think I found in what you said was the very beginning, is that you scheduled it. That right there is like, okay, well, we need we know we need to do this. Okay. Well, let's first get a simple, you know.
Sam Ortman
00:24:06
May in November.
Lee Murray
00:24:07
Make it.
Sam Ortman
00:24:08
Simple 15th, November 15th. That's when.
Lee Murray
00:24:10
This comes.
Sam Ortman
00:24:10
Around. I will.
Lee Murray
00:24:11
Do it. The accountability you said two times a year. I mean, it doesn't get much simpler than that. And if you schedule it, then you have to look at it in your calendar and you have to reconcile. Okay, are we actually going to do this? Yes, we're going to do it. And then you get so much from it that you're excited the next time it comes around.
Sam Ortman
00:24:29
Yes, 1,000%. Yes. And honestly, it's not it's not a daunting task. So if you're using a, you know, Microsoft Office tools like we're in the Microsoft Enterprise suite there you use forms, which is a free tool.
Sam Ortman
00:24:41
You literally just create a quick survey form and you send the link to your clients and they fill it out. I will say the follow up is a little annoying, right? You're trying to get people to fill this out and show its value. Yeah, that's some strategies that you can work with with your internal teams to emphasize the importance of it. Yeah. but it's easy. It's if we're talking about juice versus squeeze here. Yeah.
Lee Murray
00:25:04
Tons of juice.
Sam Ortman
00:25:06
So much juice.
Sam Ortman
00:25:07
Yeah. So much juice. Yeah. And the client feels heard. And I think that that's another huge aspect of this is that we're giving them the space and the opportunity for their voices to be heard. Yes. and I even say, you know, it goes directly to the CEO, it goes directly to me. So their teams don't necessarily see exactly what it is. Yeah. so I read every single one and I respond to every single one. And I think that's, that's also really important.
Lee Murray
00:25:31
Yeah. Okay.
Lee Murray
00:25:32
So I think about things visually and I'm sure I have this mapped out somewhere in a visual, but I think that marketers are really good at looking at the funnel, and salespeople are really good at trying to close the sale. They have trouble communicating, which is I don't know why it's so dumb. They should all get together and and map that out, but what would make that easier, I think, is if the whole if you look to the whole company and you said, let's look at this as a lifetime value as the client, right? Yeah. And said, what do we need to do to get eyeballs on our company for the very first time, all the way through the touchpoints to it's just a this is a point in time that they will have to churn. There's attrition. They have to. Their business is changing. They got sold. Something happened that wasn't of our. But this is what's going to happen at some point. The life, the total life, birth to death.
Lee Murray
00:26:25
If you map that out visually and say, let's, let's put on this map every touchpoint that we know currently, we're engaging with a potential client and client, and now we want to make it our work to go deep on building relationships all the way through. What you're talking about at this stage is reengaging clients as as clients, you know, post-sale and post kind of initial wins. But it's engagement. Again, we should be engaging all the way through it. It's it's our job to lead the client to success. And I think that points to this sort of last piece of adding long term value. Right? Correct. I mean, I don't want.
Sam Ortman
00:27:09
To lightly I have I have one more for re-engagement.
Lee Murray
00:27:12
Oh. Do you. Okay, well.
Sam Ortman
00:27:13
I promise three and I don't I don't want to be a liar. And that is, that is, really know your client's business well enough to have open conversations with other departments.
Lee Murray
00:27:25
Yes.
Sam Ortman
00:27:26
And this leads to a natural upsell scenario for you as an agency or you as a business and the end client.
Sam Ortman
00:27:34
So I have been in so many conversations where, you know, we're in the marketing world and we don't get to talk to it. We don't really get to talk to, you know, other product departments. You know, those types of things push for those meetings. I will bet that 80% of the time you'll get a meeting, right? Yeah. One of our sales, one of our process in the onboarding. excuse me, one of the steps in the onboarding process is we have their sales team pitch us the sales pitch, because then we get to understand. But then I have now we have some contacts to the sales team.
Lee Murray
00:28:06
That's huge.
Sam Ortman
00:28:07
Wow. And we also have hey, we're going to be putting some pixels on your site. Let me talk to the IT team. Let me talk to the dev team. that also helps us, you know, if we're wanting if we're coming on for media, if we're doing traditional or digital, whatever it may be, how do I get in and have the SEO conversation? Right? That's important to me as an agency that's looking to make this engagement more robust.
Sam Ortman
00:28:28
So don't feel that you're kind of pigeonholed into those conversations. Open up your breath within the company, obviously in a respectful manner. Sure. but I think that that that gets to your linear point, that you're just painting out on that life cycle of a client or that LTV, that middle, middle bit. There's a lot of opportunity there to to have really interesting conversations and engagements with your client, even outside of the scope that you're currently signed for.
Lee Murray
00:28:56
Yeah, that's sort of like this expand and expanding mentality, taking it to a different level. Yeah. And I think what comes from that, my initial reaction is that you find new problems to solve. You find new opportunities that are natural upsells or cross sales, and then you find the people who are the champions to help you sell those things. Because if you're talking to it, you're talking to sales, you're talking to these other departments. They're gonna like, oh yeah, we could totally use that, and they're going to sell it through.
Sam Ortman
00:29:26
And they don't know what they don't know, right? They don't know that you may have that capability or that you have that service. And you know, by bundling it with your other services, you might get a discount. You know, those types of things that you can start adding to. And honestly, this conversation goes to our last point of the session, which is adding long term value where you're able to maybe bolt on some other services that helps the client in new ways that they didn't even think about.
Lee Murray
00:29:49
Yeah, 100%. And it benefits everyone in the room. I mean, you're assuming you're brought in in some form of fashion by leadership VP, even maybe CEO. Yeah. Now you've been given the trust because you've had the wins to the team. You're working really well with the team communicating explicitly expectations, expanding into other teams. You know, other teams where available, where where possible? Yes. you're really becoming a strategic partner. This is what we try to do. I mean, I know a lot of people throw that term around and they don't fulfill it, but that's what it really looks like.
Lee Murray
00:30:23
That's what a strategic partnership looks like, is someone who knows the business as well as their top people, and can communicate value through the lens of what you're doing, you know, for them, I mean, you're not fully in their business. So there is a stopping point somewhere. But I think that stopping point is sort of vague. Yeah.
Sam Ortman
00:30:45
I mean, invite me to the Christmas party, right?
Lee Murray
00:30:49
I know, I mean, I'll show up with good gifts, you know.
Sam Ortman
00:30:52
Absolutely, absolutely I would yeah, that's really important. And honestly, you get to have really, really good conversations. And and I think one of, well, one of our taglines at kinetic is we want to know your business better than any other agency team. And these are some examples. These are some examples that I'm giving and our practical onboarding process or our practical operations that helps us get there. Yeah.
Lee Murray
00:31:17
Love that. That's a huge again, going back to the idea of a brand marker, that's a huge brand marker, because I don't think I don't see any other agencies saying that.
Lee Murray
00:31:28
And to say that you're going to have to have thought through it.
Sam Ortman
00:31:33
I agree. I'm still sneaking through it. I'm still, you know, that's one of those things that it will never be finished. It's kind of like your website, right? Your brand will continue to evolve. You'll continue to change. You'll continue to see what's working, what's not, and continue to pivot. but yeah, it's really, really important. And I think the, the last point that I want to bring up in our, in our three points here on the adding value and going and still being that very close collaborative strategic partner and I. And something that I see in the space is understand what the client really wants or really needs. Because when you're looking at your performance, let's just say you are a marketing agency and you're you're throwing leads at them all day, every day. But are the leads paying the bills? So always wherever you can close the loop in your reporting, because you want to ensure that the efforts that you are doing are actually driving revenue and profitability at the very end of the process.
Sam Ortman
00:32:40
And there are so many groups that honestly, I don't know how some of some groups can get away with just getting impressions and clicks these days on the digital side. Yeah. some of those groups exist, and there's other groups that say, hey, we're just giving you leads and they're I'm giving you leads all day long, and that's my KPI. but at the end of the day, the business is a business and it has bills to pay and it has overhead and it has objectives and goals. So tying your efforts to the client's bottom line will inherently drive long term value for the client.
Lee Murray
00:33:14
Yes. And and other industries it's just looking at impact working.
Sam Ortman
00:33:19
Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. and I love having the, you know, cost of goods sold conversation because then you can actually start to tie your advertising to a true profit number and then get to that LTV number, and then you start optimizing and really looking at your marketing plans very differently than if you were just to look at service level lead generation.
Lee Murray
00:33:40
That is a completely different level for from an agency standpoint. Yeah, I mean, that's that's amazing. yeah.
Sam Ortman
00:33:46
I love.
Lee Murray
00:33:47
It. Awesome. This is I mean, this has been an awesome conversation. Thank you so much for coming on.
Sam Ortman
00:33:52
Hey, thanks for thanks for having me. I, as I love this stuff, I could probably talk another 2 or 3 hours, but I hate the sound of my voice. I hope your audience doesn't hate the sound of my voice so I would save them. I'll save them from that.
Lee Murray
00:34:04
Everybody hates to hear themselves. if we. So if we want to send people your way, where do we send them?
Sam Ortman
00:34:09
Yeah. Feel free to look us up on kinetic. 319 319. Kinetic 319. Com. also check out our socials. So we're on LinkedIn. We're on Facebook and we're on Twitter. We are posting all the time. And so we're actually going through a weekly series called State Kinetic Tips, which are good tips that I mean, we just posted one that was about when you launch a Google campaign, all of your keywords will be broad by default, which is a very hidden setting.
Sam Ortman
00:34:36
So go in there and change that. a lot of tips like that that are not necessarily, you know, really high level. They're actually really needed gritty. So definitely subscribe to our socials. and check us out online. Absolutely.
Lee Murray
00:34:48
That's awesome. Love it. This has been an awesome conversation. I love talking about this kind of stuff.
Sam Ortman
00:34:53
So yeah, thanks for having me, Lee.
Lee Murray
00:34:55
All right.
Sam Ortman
00:34:57
Everybody.