058 | Retention, Conversion, and Growth: Borja Cuan’s Ultimate Marketing Formula

Imagine you’re investing heavily in marketing, but you still aren’t seeing the results you’re hoping for. What’s missing in your strategy. Welcome back to the vital wealth strategies podcast. I’m your host, Patrick Lonergan. And today I’m joined by Borja Kwan, the founder of 415 digital, the digital marketing agency, that’s all about delivering real measurable outcomes for businesses.
In this episode, Borja shares his approach to digital marketing, emphasizing the importance of building strong client relationships, obsessing over retention, and continuously involving the client experience. If you’re looking to learn how to create a meaningful marketing impact, drive conversions, and scale your business, this episode is packed with actionable insights.
Let’s dive in. Borja, thanks for joining us today. Um, I appreciate you being here. You are the founder of 415 digital, uh, marketing agency. And I’m really excited to not only just have a discussion about marketing, but really hear your journey as an entrepreneur, um, how you got started in things that have worked and not worked.
And so thank you very much for joining us here today.
Hey, Patrick, thanks for having me. Looking forward to our conversation.
Yeah. And I think this conversation is relevant to our, our audience be because of a couple of reasons. First, um, At the end of the day, we work with entrepreneurs that have a net income over a million dollars.
And when we look at their profit and loss statement, one of the largest expenses on there is marketing. Uh, it’s really hard to, uh, have a successful profitable business without investing in, in that side of the equation. So I’m, I’m looking forward to getting into that and how you, you help your clients, uh, but before we do that, I I’d like to just hear how you got started with 415 digital and, uh, just understand that, that journey.
Before we, uh, before we dig into the marketing piece.
Yeah. So, um, uh, my backstory is I, I graduated from college, uh, in 98 and, uh, immediately after graduating, I ended up working for an internet startup. Based in Boston, I went to school in Boston, uh, uh, interviewed at an internet startup again in 1998, uh, very beginning of the internet, um, and ended up working at that company.
I joined them as, uh, Employee number 29. Um, and ended up, uh, with that company for about eight years. And during that time, uh, I learned a tremendous amount. It was, uh, to date, to, to date, basically my best, my most, I guess it was the most positive professional experience outside of a starting an agency, I would say that was.
immensely impactful for my career. Um,
do you mind if I just ask you a question? Cause if you think about that timeframe, you know, you, you’re, you’re working for an internet company and you started in 1998, we all know what happened in early 2000, the tech bubble sort of burst. And, uh, uh, if you were there for eight years, it means you survived that, that the company survived that, uh, That sort of run up and fall down.
Uh, so can you just walk us through a little bit of that? Like how was that?
Yeah, it was, uh, it was a roller coaster. Um, so, uh, we, uh, went public, uh, not long after I joined the company. Within a year, we went IPO. It was a huge success. I remember that day very well, celebrated by all of us. You know, and, and, and, and, you know, going through that experience, obviously I’d never been through that experience.
It was really cool. And so that was a high for the company, but then as you mentioned, uh, the bubble burst, right? And so then we were going through a very different period, uh, as a company, right? We were, we were not. Immune to kind of the, the, the environment. And as a result, we went through layoffs and that was also something I’d never experienced that, uh, a newbie in the professional world.
Right. So I, I remember just surviving the layoffs, fortunately, but I remember also, Uh, people that I really enjoyed working with and I’d become friends with were affected. And that experience was, man, I remember just being like, what, they, they, they just come in one day and they don’t know they’re, they’re going to be laid off.
And people tell them they’re going to be laid off and, and, and they’re escorted out of the building. It’s, it’s a very, uh, eyeopening experience for someone who’s only 21 out of school with only a year and a half or two of experience in the corporate world. So. We did survive that because we were still a very good business, healthy financially, had a lot of good clients, our service or our solutions were driving outcomes, good outcomes and results for the clients that we work with.
But like most companies, we were, uh, you know, probably a little bit fat and needed to reduce the, reduce the cost. And, and obviously payroll is, is, is probably the biggest cost on the P and L. And so we had to make some modifications to the number of people that worked in, and so they had layoffs.
Yeah, got it.
And, and I think it’s easy to look back in hindsight and go, yeah, these companies were fat and yes, some were overspending, but when you’re projecting growth, you know, up into the right forever, you, you have to stay ahead of that from a hiring perspective. And, uh, cause if you don’t, you just get overrun with business and your teams burn out.
So, uh, totally, totally understand that. Now, can you tell us about how, how did you transition from internet startup, which was, you know, exciting and also probably terrifying just seeing, uh, things go really well and then go, Oh my gosh, this is, uh, am I going to have my job tomorrow? Um, how did you get from there to running your own, your own agency?
Yeah. So after eight years with that company, I decided to leave on my own terms on good terms. Uh, and, uh, and, and, and I really. You know, South that it was the right time for me. Um, I wanted a change in, in, in job, but I also wanted a change in, um, where I was living. So I moved to the West Coast where I’ve been now for, um, I think 16 years.
Um, and I continued in, in the space. I was, uh, part of, uh, another large company and an ad network, which at the time was the third largest ad network in the world. Then I was. Uh, heading up their performance marketing division, working closely with the CEO and founder of that company to help build that business out.
And I ended up being there for six years. Uh, so two companies, 14 years. Not common, uh, then not common now. Um, and, and, and then from there, I ended up, uh, leaving again on good terms, uh, but wanted to try something new and did some consulting on the side for about two years, uh, in digital marketing. I did some affiliate marketing and then I ended up, um, sort of not doing that.
And instead working in house for a. Company, uh, in the job, uh, career resume space based in San Francisco as part of their in house growth team, managing or overseeing a budget of about, uh, 120 million an ad spending year. And I was part of that team. Um, and it is there that I ended up meeting my current business partner.
We overlapped there for two years. Um, I left the company. He stayed on shortly after I left, he had approached me. I was actually on an airplane waiting to take off. And he had said, Hey, what do you think of this idea? I’m starting an agency, you know, and I said, honestly, I don’t know. Let me think about it.
I wasn’t really convinced at that moment that that is what I wanted to do next. So I thought about it for about three, four weeks, actually. It wasn’t a couple of days. And, uh, and basically I thought more about it. I said. Let’s do it. So I called them back and I said, let’s, uh, but go for it. Um, we both believed having a lot of exposure, uh, being both on the buying and selling side, that they were a lot of great agencies out there.
And we had worked with many of them. They were vendors of ours. And honestly, the sales process was much better than the actual delivery of service. And so we were always underwhelmed with the level of service we got. Um, and felt that, uh, we could do a really good job in servicing clients and driving performance.
And so it was kind of a combination of just. Timing and, and, and sure connecting with, with, with the right person.
I love it. I love it. So you’d obviously been in the space for a while. Did you have a Rolodex of potential clients that you’re like, Hey, we can, let’s go connect with these, these folks and see if we can, uh, turn them into, to paying customers.
Absolutely. That was part of the thinking process out of the gates was, Hey. Uh, you know, we’re, we’re about to launch a business. Who can we call upon to, uh, talk about becoming our first customers. Right. And, and, and frankly, we are now seven and a half years old and we have built our business solely on network and referrals.
So, and this is why I always tell young people. How important it is to network, uh, as early as you can, no different than putting into retirement, make the investment of time to network, you know, call one coffee a week with someone new, uh, don’t wait until you need something to call. Someone, right, just keep the channels of communication open.
And so, yes, we absolutely started calling people in our network, um, that we had worked with before that we knew were in positions to hire an agency. And we ended up getting a lot of deals, uh, and generating pipeline by that.
I love it. And, and I think one of the things you just hit on is an undervalued asset.
Uh, the value of your network is it’s incredible and you don’t really have to. You don’t have to show up to those meetings with a ton of value. People generally like helping people is the thing that I found. If I’m thinking back to when I was a young entrepreneur and if you show up curious, like, Hey, I just want to learn more about what you’re doing, what’s worked, what hasn’t worked, do you have any feedback, here’s the path I’m on.
People generally are happy to share, especially if you’re buying the coffee, lunch, dinner, what have you. So, um, and, and I can’t tell you like how many millions of dollars our network has made us just because. We find an opportunity and we’re like, Hey, I know somebody that this will fit well with and, uh, we can make those connections and, and go.
So thank you for, for bringing that, uh, that up. So a question I have is like, how has your clientele changed from when you first started to, uh, what your clientele looks like now? Are they the same, uh, general, we’ll call it avatar that you’re working with, or has there been some evolution there?
Yeah. So our business is a seven and a half years old.
We’re on track to manage about 230 million in ad spend in 2024, uh, which represents a pretty significant increase from, from 2023. Um, the, the profile of our clients, I would say has, has not changed dramatically, but the criteria, uh, that we have, uh, the requirements we have house. Right. So I think when you’re, uh, uh, an entrepreneur and you’re just starting out, um, you’re just focused on customer acquisition.
We just wanted that first client. We didn’t care if they paid us, how much they paid us. We just wanted to get them in the door so we could prove to them our worth and prove to them that we could drive value. So we were not really concerned with terms and costs and all of that. You were very flexible.
Our hope was that we could create rating fans out of them and that, that client would end up becoming a referral partner of ours, right? So I don’t think the profile has changed. Um, we do have a more, I would say we’re after, uh, bigger clients in terms of monthly ad spend. Whereas before that requirement was not as important because we just wanted to start working with companies.
Now we do have some bigger requirements in terms of what the minimum ad spend is, what our pricing is, it’s gone up from what it was, now we have minimums and things like that.
Yeah, I love it. So one of the things you, you mentioned, uh, just a few minutes ago was you were seeing how the, the product was sold and then how it was delivered, right?
And there was this disconnect in, in those two pieces. Can you talk a little bit about client experience and how you, it sounds like you, you leaned hard into that in relationship to, we’re going to deliver the value that we promise on the sales side.
Yeah. So something I didn’t mention is I, uh, originally, uh, wanted to pursue a profession in hospitality.
Uh, before getting into the internet, I was actually, uh, working summer jobs in hotels. And, uh, I, I studied abroad in Madrid, Spain, and I ended up doing a pretty. Intensive internship at the Ritz. It’s now the Mandarin Oriental, but it was at the time the Ritz, a very prestigious hotel in downtown Madrid. Um, and I had aspirations to become a general manager of a five star property.
Um, and, uh, after a successful internship, I graduated from college and I just changed my mind. I said, wow, to become a GM. You have to be really old. There are no 30 year old GMs. It’s very uncommon. You got to put in the time. So I kind of became dissuaded based on that, which I don’t know if that was. Uh, smart or not, but, um, the reason I bring that up is I, at a very early age, understood customer service.
If you’ve ever worked at a hotel like that, it’s very, uh, embedded into the DNA of people, right? Serving customers, right? And, and so, I think, uh, as it relates to four 15 and client experience, what I would say is we are obsessive over retention. It’s very hard as you know, to acquire a customer, right? And so once you acquire a customer, you really want to do everything you can to retain them.
And so when it comes to customer experience, uh, customer service, and when I say customer service, I think of it. A bit more broadly. So customer service could be Patrick sends me an email. I get back to Patrick in a, in a, in a, in a very short period of time. That’s just basic. Like to me, if you’re not doing that, then, then you shouldn’t be in business.
What customer service is in our industry is really providing strategic value to the clients we work with. So yes, we should be very responsive to their requests. If they call us, we should call them back promptly. If they email us, we should email them back promptly. If we can’t get back to them, we should at least acknowledge receipt of that email and say, Patrick, this was a great question.
It requires thought. Giddy until tomorrow, but I’ve received your email. So there’s that, but then it’s really providing strategic guidance and direction to clients and helping them solve their problems. And, and we are very sort of disciplined in our approach. And we, we write things down, we have trainings, we go through, uh, practice sessions.
You know, we have a formula that we’ve come up with that is, is not proprietary by any means. But that has served us well when it comes to customers, uh, service and, and it’s, and, and, and honestly, the data speaks for itself because our retention rates are in, you know, the 30, 30, 34, 35 month range, which in our industry is actually very good, uh, because, you know, You know, a lot of agency people, they just turn and burn clients, right?
And that’s not our model because we don’t have a pipeline of 50 clients or prospects any given time.
Yeah. I love that. There’s a few things that they come to mind. So Ritz Carlton, uh, you know, I think about the. It’s ladies and gentlemen, serving ladies and gentlemen. And, uh, I love that. And I, I never, I think they pioneered the, my pleasure, you know, when you say thank you, they’re, they, they respond with my pleasure and it was the first time I believed it right when I was at a Ritz because oftentimes, you know, this has been ripped off and you’ll go to a restaurant and somebody will be like, yeah, my pleasure, you know, and it’s like, I don’t feel like it was your pleasure to serve me where at the Ritz, they, they truly, I truly felt like they were.
Like happy to be there and serve me. And I, I think they, they foster that culture. Um, but I love how you’ve taken it from like this maybe surface level thing and built it into like, no, we’re going to, we’re going to take it a different level and we’re going to serve you in a way that we’re going to deliver the product in a way that’s remarkable, right?
Uh, you, you talked about referrals and when I say remarkable, I literally mean remarkable in the context of like, people are talking to their friends about, Hey, Go work with 415 digital because they’re amazing. You know, not only did they, you know, sell me that this idea would work, they executed on it and here’s all the things they did.
So I think it’s, it’s worth a congratulations to just acknowledge that. You know, you’re, you’re able to keep your clients for, for a long period of time and, uh, help them scale and grow their business. That’s, that’s great. I don’t know if there’s any more comments on that, but, uh, I, I, I think, you know, uh, taking care of people is a, uh, underutilized thing in the world we live in today.
So
agree. And I appreciate the, uh, the, the, the, the sentiments. I think, uh, I like to say what we do is very easy to describe, but very difficult to execute. So I can talk to people and say, this is what we do. And, and they’re like, Oh, that seems pretty straightforward. Uh, but there’s so much, so many technicalities and complexities to actually delivering that service.
And we, as you said, right, we’re in a business where we are an expense on the P& L, right? So that just means, unfortunately, we get scrutinized with, you know, we are under a microscope. And there’s so much competition, right? And we’re not the only agency that does a good job. There are many agencies, unfortunately, that are not good.
But also there are agencies that are very good. And so not unlike other businesses, uh, other categories, I mean, you know, a lot of people are in competitive environment, but this is a very competitive environment. And what I like to tell my team is, um, as it relates to managing their clients is we should always assume that someone is coming in and trying to win our client’s business.
And what that means is they may get access to peek under the hood. and look at what we’re doing to see if what we’re doing is as good as we said it would. Oftentimes our clients are not necessarily qualified to determine that, but another agency that has a technical proficiency could come in and do an audit and say, you know what, Borja and 415 are not doing a lot of things that they should be doing to build this business, right?
And so I say, please guys. Cross your T’s, dot your I’s, keep the house really neat and tidy. Make sure that we’re not doing things that, you know, badly, whether it’s the little things or the big things, you know, attention to detail is really important because we should just assume that someone is looking at our work.
Maybe not our, our direct contact, the VP of marketing, the CMO, the marketing manager. But someone from the outside might be taking a peek. So if they do, are you okay with what they’re seeing?
Yeah, I love that. And, and we’ve actually thought about this from our point of view is like a pre mortem. Okay. If we go through each one of our clients and they were to fire us, why would they fire us?
Right. And, and let’s, let’s try to be proactive. Let’s find that thing and go, all right. Because it gets exactly to the point of what you’re talking about. It almost forces you to do an internal audit and go, all right. If, if I’m picking apart the deliverable that we’re providing to our client, what’s, what’s the problem with it?
How do we fix it? How do we show up and add more value? And, uh, I think that’s fantastic. And I think it’s something that, unfortunately we’ve, we’ve learned slowly, you know, we, we don’t have a bunch of clients, you know, uh, disengage with this, but what we, we find is like, that’s the thing that causes us to slow down and really.
Like assess our client experience and go, okay, I’m We see there’s a gap here and we appreciate people that are just straightforward and go, Hey, I’m, I’m frustrated by this thing. And we’re like, Oh, this is really good. And it’s caused us to evolve our client experience over time. How about you? Have you seen your, your experience sort of changes, um, time goes on.
And I’m, I’m guessing that it changes for a number of reasons, you know, the technology and the opportunities from a marketing platform perspective change. And then also, uh, you just learn things from, from clients and, uh, you, you evolve from there.
Yeah, I would say yes. I think the core services remain unchanged.
Uh, we’ve expanded services, but what I would say is to, to your point earlier in our business, the two most important things that we have to deliver to our clients are number one results and number two relationship. Relationship is important because if, if I have a good relationship with you and I make a mistake.
You will likely give me a second chance. If I have no relationship with you and I make a mistake or I don’t perform, you’re probably going to cut me. So we always say relationship is important because this journey is, uh, full of ups and downs. We’re not going to always perform. So you got to have a good relationship to work through those times.
But if you don’t have a relationship and you don’t deliver, I don’t think people are going to give you that second chance. And so I think we have not batted a thousand. We have lost clients. We’ve lost clients that we did not want to lose. And, and the reason we lost those clients, and it’s not that there’s a long list, but over seven and a half years, we’ve absolutely had that happen to us.
You know, we’ve made mistakes. And the problem is, is trust is so hard to earn that once you lose trust in this business, it’s very difficult, if not impossible to regain. So. If we make a mistake, as I tell my team, if we don’t manage budgets appropriately, you know, we’re, our, our jobs are very important and very serious because we’re managing people’s money.
These are not individual’s money, but they’re the business that they worked for. It’s their money. And they’re, you know, we have clients spending millions of dollars a month in ad advertising. And so if there’s a budget mismanagement issue. And they’ve been trusting us all this time, but then they find this issue, they may start questioning everything else.
If you’re not doing this well, then should I be worrying about this? Right? And sometimes we’ve had instances Where clients have found a mistake that we made and then it kind of becomes a bigger issue and it escalates and they say, well, now I wonder about everything else. And it’s almost at that point, you can tell them you made a mistake and acknowledge it, but some people just don’t give you a second chance.
Unfortunately, that’s just the reality
of business. Yeah. Yeah. There’s, there’s so much truth in that. And, and I think, uh, it reminds me of a book, uh, unreasonable hospitality again, it’s sort of in the hospitality, it’s restaurant business, but one of the, the key premises in that book was like just seeing people acknowledging where they’re at and then making like, if they’re, they’re celebrating something or are looking for something to, to, to deliver on that.
Uh, and, and I think again, it goes back to your comment around, you know, when people like you, they, they give you a second chance. And. You also just did something that I think is, is valuable that not a lot of entrepreneurs, business owners are willing to do, but I think it’s super valuable. You’re, you’re able to approach the situation with humility and go, Hey, we’ve screwed up, we’ve lost clients that we didn’t want to lose.
And that’s hard. And I think if you can show up to situations with clients, when things don’t go well, you can, If there’s still some remaining trust, you can flip that over the other direction and go, Hey, we screwed this up. We’re going to fix it. We’re going to make it right. Here’s the action plan. And then you follow through on that.
It can actually strengthen and galvanize that relationship to where it is almost unbreakable when you, you’ve like, you know, had a minor mistake and we’re able to fix it versus, uh, never having that mistake in the first place. So, uh, I just appreciate all of those. Those pieces that, uh, I just want to highlight for our listeners, cause there’s, there’s a lot of value in that.
Yeah. I think it’s so important when you have a business to acknowledge wrongdoing, right. You know, I think building relationships with anybody personally or professionally, we’re all going to make mistakes, right. And I think what matters most is when you make a mistake, how do you manage through that?
Right. And for me, and what I always tell my team is. We have to be honest, right? And we have to explain what happened, but most importantly, let’s explain what happened and what we will do going forward to prevent it from happening again, so that they know that we’re acknowledging it, but, but also we’ve been thoughtful to think of how to ensure.
That there are, are, are, are processes in place to avoid it from happening again. Right? And so, I think like, in any relationship, and, and you know, we’re unfortunately in a tough business where clients will fire you, even if you, we’ve had clients where we’ve driven record sales, I kid you not, and they tell us to our face, We love you.
You guys bring a lot of value. And then they just let go. They let us go. And we’re like scratching our heads. And I’m like, I just went on a date with this girl. We had a five course meal. We had a bottle of wine. We went for a walk in the park afterwards. We said we’d like to see each other again. And then she never calls me back.
Right. It’s like they, they just do it. We’re in that business where unfortunately it’s, it’s unfair, but it is what it is. So I think. Yeah. You know, it, that’s all to say that, you know, no matter what we’re going to make mistakes, we’re not going to be perfect. Our goal is to be as close to perfect as possible, but when we do make a mistake, we need to acknowledge it, even if it means we may lose that client.
And I think what I’ve done is I’ve, I’ve respected people’s decisions. I’ve written to founders or CEOs and I’ve said, listen, I understand. Uh, you have concerns. If I were sitting in your seat, I too would have concerns. And all I can tell you is I feel confident that we won’t do this again, but you deciding to leave us is very reasonable.
And if you ever change your mind, we’re, we’re here,
right? Yeah. Yeah. No, I, I love so much about that. That is, uh, that’s fantastic. So I can totally sympathize. We, we had a client once that was in the consulting arena and we consider some of the work, we do consulting, you know, we’re, we’re saving our clients, uh, on average $280,000 of income tax.
Okay. And I think this client was on a retainer paying us five grand a month. He was probably there for maybe eight months. So he paid, uh, $40,000 and I, we saved him hundreds of thousands of dollars of income tax. And he disengaged and I was like. And he was the same way. He was, he was awfully thankful, uh, for all the work we did.
Everything seemed to go really well. He made the comment like, yeah, it’s super frustrating when you show up and provide a ton of value to your clients and then they fire you and then like a month later he does the exact same thing. And I’m like, I, I’m sort of at a loss, you know, it’s the best investment he’s made all year.
And, uh, but again, he challenged us all along the way. And he, he was one of those clients that did come back and re engage with us, uh, uh, down the road. But it was, uh, to your point, like. How do we learn from those things? How do we keep the lines of communication open, uh, and, and just let people know that they’re, they’re willing to come back.
So I think all of those things are, are great. Um, I want to move on. What, what, what,
what, what, one thing I would say is just close this, this conversation is the one thing I’ve learned as an entrepreneur, when an employee leads or a client leads, and it’s a surprise because they’re happy. And they’ve told you you’re happy.
I try to spend very little time in understanding the why, but I also realize like some things I’m never going to connect the dots on, right? Like I don’t understand and honestly, it’s all speculation. They you know, and so what I, what I’ve learned to do is actually I’m very transactional. I move on very quickly.
I don’t dwell, I, I, I try to learn if there’s a learning opportunity, but otherwise I’ve moved on. I’ve moved on to find that next client, to hire that next employee, because if you allow those things to sidetrack you, business is going to be a lot of, uh, a lot of, a lot of jabs. You’re just going to get hit all the time.
I think that’s one of the reasons I try to talk people out of starting a business, because It’s just a lot of, uh, things are not going to go your way, no matter what you do. And if you can adapt and move on, you’re going to be in a much better position because If it sidetracks you, you’re just going to be sitting there, uh, in quicksand.
Yeah,
I love
it. I love it. This is great. So I want to wrap up this conversation about client experience. You talked a little bit about, you know, we create processes and, you know, document and make sure that we’re following through doing everything we’re, we’re, we’re saying we’re going to do. And one way my brain could go with that is like, Oh, I get the cookie cutter, you know, uh, outcome.
Now, I can also see, you know, on the other end of that, if we don’t document anything, everything’s custom, you know, we’re doing it new and different for every single client, and that’s also not sustainable as a business owner. So, Can you talk a little bit about how, when I engage with 4. 15 digital, that I get a custom solution inside of the framework of a client experience?
Yeah, I mean, I think, uh, I’m going to say this in a way that’s going to come across as it’s not impressive, but it’s a very direct and honest statement. A lot of what we do is copy and paste. Like there isn’t immense distinction, right, uh, between businesses now, that being said, but so a lot of what we do is standardized in terms of our approach, our methodology, that being said, where there’s a bespoke, uh, solution.
It’s really around your business being different than The next person’s business, right? So like it, it, your problems be different than the other client’s problems. Your goals being different than the other client’s goals, how you measure success and different. So there are definite differences in terms of how we unfold or develop our plan for, for the different clients we work with, right?
B2B companies versus B2C companies within B2B marketing. It’s different, right? The B2C marketing. Um, um, so that’s not to say that we have one solution and we. Apply it across the board to all of our clients. But I would say the approach we take and the discipline and the level of sophistication with the processes, the tools we use, the overall approach is the same, and then where it becomes different is once we dive deeply into the business and understanding our clients goals and objectives, what their challenges are.
Uh, that’s when we start, you know, developing, uh, custom solutions to address those things. Yeah. I love it.
And, and just to use your bespoke for a second, you know, if I have a tailor that’s going to make me a suit, you know, I’m six, four, 200 pounds, um, they’re going to use the exact same tools as the suit for my wife, who’s five, four and 120 pounds and shaped totally different than me.
And so, you know, I think about that in our business too. We, we have a set of tools. And where the magic comes in is how we apply those tools to create unique outcomes for, for everybody, because nobody has the exact same, you know, game plan, even though we’re applying the same set of tools to create the, the planning, you know, for them.
And you’re, you’re doing the exact same thing. You’re, you’re creating with the tools that you have, but you just go, cool, I’m going to take this tool and this tool, and we’re going to combine these together and create this outcome, uh, that’s going to be custom for this person. So. I, I, I do appreciate your, your willingness to say, yeah, well, look, we, we have these set of tools.
We use them exactly the same way every single time. But that combination of the tools applied to that individual business is going to give us different outcomes. So I think that’s a brilliant example. Thank
you. And it’s also, uh, knowing what tools to use, what tools not to use and when to use them. Right.
So again, it goes back to what I said, you know, many minutes ago, which is, you know, What we do is very easy to describe and explain, but very difficult to execute. So that’s when some of those complexities come into play. I love it. This is great.
Okay. So we’ve talked a lot about delivering the product. Can you help me understand 415 digital and the, how you help clients grow their business?
Like, like specifically, can we get into like, this is the type of marketing we do? Cause you, you hear marketing and it could be. You know, that could be a billboard. It could be direct mail. It could be social media. It could be a combination of all those things. Can you just talk through like the type of work you’re doing to help your clients grow?
Yeah, so, uh, our agency specializes in helping businesses scale through digital advertising. So this is all online, specifically the platforms that we are experts in, uh, are Google ads, which is primarily led by search, but also within the ad stack, there are different Google ad products. Stopping. A video retargeting in addition to Google ads, Microsoft Bing, which is another search engine that still exists.
Many people forget it’s not as, you know, in terms of market share, not as big as Google, but certainly plays a role with a lot of clients that we work with. Then we work with Metta, which includes Instagram, Facebook, Instagram. LinkedIn for B2B companies, primarily, TikTok, Pinterest, and a few other ad platforms.
But of the 220 million that we’ll manage in 2024, I’d say about 78 percent of that is running through Google. So, Google is Is, is mostly where our investments are being made. And that’s, you know, mainly because, uh, that’s where it’s performing. So the data is what informs our decisions in terms of where to deploy the money.
Um, so it’s digital marketing across those platforms. And in addition to that, how we help businesses scale is through creating the right traffic infrastructure. So for us, you know, measurability is important. You can’t manage what you can’t measure. So we spend a lot of time and sort of. Understanding, uh, and building out a more sophisticated tracking infrastructure to support our digital marketing efforts.
And so that’s an important step in the process and really is the foundation. Everything starts with tracking and then we build from there. So it’s tracking, it’s media buying, and then it’s, uh, also design. So a lot of work that we do with our clients who need that service is helping them build out assets that support our marketing campaigns, um, you know, on, on social media, right?
There are a lot of ads that we have to build out. We have to test different ads, uh, both static and motion ads. Um, so it’s, you know, the creative design, uh, piece is important. We also build out landing pages, right. To help with conversion rates. Um, and websites, if, if it needed.
Yeah, no, that’s, that’s great.
So, so many things there that I want to sort of dig into, you know, I, I think of the, uh, I don’t know where I heard this, but there’s sort of three T’s, right? We have to test it, track the results and then tweak it. And, uh, I think about that in relationship to, uh, you might find something that works and then Google can change the algorithm, right?
They’re constantly trying to get the best results to, um, You know, they’re, uh, people on the opposite side of search. Right. And then they also have changed their pricing model since like, Hey, this, this was a super efficient, you know, we were basically printing money, running these ads, cause we could spend a dollar and get three, four or 5 of revenue or profit on the backend.
Right. Like this is beautiful. And then all of a sudden, you know, it costs us 5 to get 5. It’s like, this, this doesn’t work that well. How do you manage the, the ever changing environment? Right. I feel like if you. Try to just keep doing what you’ve always done pretty soon. You’re going to be left behind. Um, and it doesn’t seem like there’s any magic bullet out there that any marketing agencies figured out in regards to like this thing will work a hundred percent of the time, every time.
Can you just walk us through a little bit of that? Cause it seems like it’s a mystery to me and a lot of the business owners that we were working with.
Yeah, it’s, uh, as you said, uh, rightfully so it’s, it’s ever changing, right? The, the, you know, Google, VEDA, they’re always, you know, there’s always new things coming out, changes that they’re making, right?
I think the game, uh, and you know, as someone who’s been in this space for 24 years, whatever it is, um, it’s just gotten harder, more competitive, new, uh, uh, competitors have entered the marketplace, right? New platforms, right? Um, so for us, uh, you know, because of our, um, you know, because of the size of the business we have in terms of how much media is under management, we have very close relationships with, uh, Google, with Metta, with TikTok, with, you know, some of these, uh, platforms.
And, and through that, we get access to a lot of, uh, training, uh, we get a lot of access to betas, things that they’re sort of testing that that hadn’t been released publicly yet. Um, and we’re constantly making that a job requirement for the team is just to make sure that you’re sort of, uh, uh, aware of everything that’s, that’s, that’s new, right, that we want to bring to the attention of our clients that might be useful.
For their business. Now, keep in mind, uh, unfortunately, and people know this and certainly don’t want to sound negative, but oftentimes Google’s objectives don’t align with the client’s objectives. Meaning they have an agenda. They want to drive more ad revenue. They want to push their product tweet. And in many instances, that is not necessarily what’s in the best interest of the client, right?
So pushing a specific product or a client to use. And we’ve tested and we’ve said, no, we’ve tested this. It doesn’t work, isn’t sensible, right? So there, you know, it’s also really knowing and that’s why it’s such a skill set, right? What we do is a very clear skill set in understanding how to utilize these platforms to help clients grow.
It’s not something you can just learn in a month. I mean, all of this is public and anybody can become an expert, right? This isn’t like we have access to things that you don’t have access. But there’s, there’s levels to the game, right? There, there are people, and we see this where candidates that apply to our company for positions, uh, and we go through this, the, the hard skills test.
And we’re all, you know, not always, but oftentimes they have a position of, of, you know, a certain position at a company and they don’t know some of the basics. So I think the point there is there are levels to the game and some, uh, you know, in terms of media buying and understanding these platforms, you know, That, um, requires so much training and, and, and education.
Like you can’t just learn it overnight. You have to really, um, go through the, the, the, the experience of certifications and things like that.
Yeah, I love it. The next thing I want to touch on is, cause I think this is a great point too. You could run the best ad campaign on the planet, right? But if their landing page doesn’t convert, right, they, they had this digital asset that is no good.
Um, It’s a problem. And so it sounds like you get involved with helping the client, not just make sure traffic’s coming their direction through ads, but we’re also making sure that their, you know, web properties are, are going to convert to turn it into revenue because if not, then that client’s going to go out and be frustrated by their results.
Is that, is that a fair statement?
100%. Uh, so we are, uh, direct response. All of our clients are direct response oriented, which means they are not interested in, uh, uh, vanity metrics, right? So vanity metrics are how many people viewed my ad, how many people clicked on my ad, uh, that would be unsatisfactory, right?
We never measure performance based on those metrics. Instead, we are looking for a very specific agreed upon. Desired action that that client wants us to, to help them generate, right? So for most of our clients, if you’re in e commerce, it’s sales, right? If you’re in a B2B, it’s a MQL or SQL marketing, qualified lead sales, qualified lead.
We have to drive a conversion. Um, and not only drive a conversion, but we have to look at, you know, the cost to acquire that customer, uh, the cost to acquire that MQL. And then beyond that, we’ll look at other metrics if you’re B2B, right? So we’re not just looking at how many qualified leads we sent. We want to get into Salesforce or HubSpot and see, did those leads close?
Did that salesperson close those leads? If so, what was the value of that contract? Right, if it didn’t close, why didn’t it close? Right, was it the salesperson? Was it the price? Was it the capability set? What was it? Right, if it closed, by the way, We want to learn that too, because we want to maybe incorporate some of those things into our messaging on the front end, right, in our ads.
And then, to your point, you said, yes, I mean, conversion rate is important, so we’re looking at landing pages. We’re making, uh, recommendations, if not executing on those recommendations on how to make that landing page better to get better conversions. And that may include working with the client to come up with the right messaging and the right offer type.
So that they can, uh, increase their probability of getting someone to fill out a form. I love
it. I love it. And, and, and here’s something that I think we need to acknowledge. Um, the, what you’re doing is so much more than marketing. It’s getting into the business in general and understanding everything from the person that’s out there potentially searching for this product all the way through, we’ll call it contract, right?
Somebody signed a paid. And so. That takes more than just understanding how to run some ads. You know, you have to understand the, the business side of the equation, the sales side of the equation, you know, your, your tool belt is beyond just marketing. And I think showing up and providing that value to clients is, is tremendous.
Cause I might think that I have it all dialed up, you know, dialed in my, my. Website’s fine, my salespeople are fine, I just need better marketing. And then you can come in and look at it and go, we’re driving all the traffic. There’s just a problem down the line. And here’s how we’re going to fix that. Or, or at least you can give them feedback that they’re aware now that, you know, maybe not as dialed in as they want.
So. I think good for you for just acknowledging the fact that, um, Hey, for us to do our job successfully, we’ve got to be in deeper than just the, uh, just the marketing driving leads to the, the company. So I think that’s, I think it’s,
yeah, it’s, it’s so important that you’re calling that out because I think it’s a unique selling point.
It’s a unique value proposition. I think when we talk to clients in terms of what makes us different, that would be one of the things that we would call out. And the reason it’s important is because if we don’t care about the full light, like the cycle, the full sale cycle, I always think we’re just going to get fired.
Like if we don’t take the initiative and take complete ownership over understanding what is happening to the traffic that we’re sending, uh, even though other agencies would say, I sent Patrick a lead. Great. I don’t need to know anything else. There’s a lot of people that will do that. That’s not enough for us.
We really. Uh, want to know beyond that lead, what is happening. And I always say, uh, to the team, the more reliant a customer becomes of us, the more we stay curious, the more we ask questions. The more we provide value, uh, it’s just harder for them to break up with us. Right. But if we just keep our role very limited and we don’t allow ourselves to be involved in other conversations that are relevant to the work we’re doing, we’re just going to be very, very much like anybody else.
Yeah. I love that. And that’s honestly how our client experience is also developed. We, we. Started with the tax trick, you know, like, Hey, we will, we will drive your tax bill down. Then we’ve quickly figured out we had to understand and manage your cashflow. And then we also had the investment piece and then there’s the protection, like let’s make sure the insurance and legal structures are in place and our whole goal was to be like, from a value perspective, make it easy for the client to go, yeah, you’re.
You’re amazing. You’re more plugged in than any advisor I’ve ever had. And you’re driving so much value. I couldn’t imagine my life without you. So I’m, I’m happy to hear you say that because it’s, I think, again, it’s come through those client experiences where they haven’t gone the way we wanted to, and we’re like, okay, what do we need to do to make this better?
And the process has evolved over time. And, uh, uh, I just love how you’re, uh, really driving so much value for you, for your clients. Any other comments on that? I’ve got a few other things, uh, that, uh, I want to get to before our time runs out.
No, I think, uh, that’s good for now.
Good, good. So I’m curious, what’s next for 4.
15 digital? Like, where do you go from here? Is the opportunity to continue to grow? Is there new marketing opportunities you want to bring into the mix? Can you talk to us a little bit about what’s next for 4. 15?
Yeah, I mean, there’s so much, uh, opportunity to grow that, uh, you know, we are very focused on building the business.
We’re seven and a half years old and other companies that have been in business for three years are, are much bigger than us. Uh, there are companies that have been in business for 20 years that are smaller than us. Um, but we’re not satisfied with where we are. We’re grateful for a lot of the victories along the way, but we are absolutely committed to building out this business.
Um, and that build out comes from, you know, some expansion of services going deeper with some of the services that we offer and building out a team, a bigger team around those services. So like created is a perfect example of that. The demand for design services has increased and we’re not staffed the same way we are to deliver media services.
So we have to build out the, the, the, the, the creative side of the business. We also, you know, want to, you know, build out our team more in Mexico. We opened up a third office in, in, uh, 2024, about six months ago. So now we have six staff members in Mexico. We’re growing that team out quite aggressively. And we’re very excited with that team.
They’re, they’re, they’re, you know, providing a lot of value to the clients. They’re learning a lot. It’s, it’s been a great experience entering that market. And opening up an office, though, for us, it’s really growth mode, you know, you know, getting better at, at what we do, uh, you know, um, and expansion of services, uh, is really where the focus is right now and in the short term, and even, you know, over the next 12 months, it’s really what we’re thinking about.
Fantastic. I love it.
So. If a new client were to come to you, what does that ideal client look like? What is their monthly ad spend? You know, somebody that’s hearing this going, Hey, this is exactly what I need. I need somebody that’s in my business a little deeper than what my, my current agencies, Doing what does that client look like?
Yeah. I mean, I think, um, ideally, and there are exceptions to the rule. We have some clients that, you know, in terms of the client portfolio today, on one end of the spectrum, we have a local business, uh, it’s a gin that has two locations that does 86 million a year in revenue. And then on the other end of the spectrum, we work with a publicly traded life sciences company, and it does 6 billion a year.
And then we have everything in between. So we have companies that are, you know, bootstrapped to raising series, a, B, C, D, you name it. So there’s a lot of variety for us. Ideally we’re working in terms of the prospects that we’re, we’re talking to. They’re, uh, they have an established digital presence and so they’re spending, I would say somewhere in the range of 100, 000 per month in digital marketing.
Uh, they are offering a product or service that is not limited by geography too much, meaning, you know, I had a call with a prospect the other day and they said, Hey, we’re only offering this service in one state. And within that state, it’s not the entire state, it’s actually a few DMAs. So I think for us, it’s typically a client that has broad reach, um, in terms of, you know, customers spending somewhere between 80, 000 and a hundred thousand dollars a month.
And this last one’s really important. And, and, you know, fortunately I’m in a position where we can sort of do this, but a lot of our selection process is also based on the people we’re working with. Um, and, uh, and we get to know these prospects through our, you know, sales process, which is very kind of academic and, and, and, and consultants.
It’s very consultancy driven, but essentially like, I want to make sure that whoever we’re working with is aligned with the vision we have for what their business needs, right. And that’s not to say that they can’t be demanding or have high expectations. It’s that we need to be aligned on the direction that we want to go.
So when we map that out in the sales process, I want their buy in. And if there’s, there’s. There’s, there are pieces of it that they don’t agree with. That’s fine. Let’s talk about it. Let’s make sure that we’re both aligned because if those, those things are going to become a friction point, then their relationship is going to be very difficult, right?
So it’s that, and then also like making sure that people are, have the right resources in place on their side to supplement what we’re going to do. Because we don’t do everything right. And so when we, when we find an engagement that, that goes bad, it’s usually because they are understaffed in the areas that are critical to support our marketing efforts and without those functions in place, It makes our parts not work as well, if that makes
sense.
Absolutely. You know, I, I think about we dial up the marketing and I’ve got one sales guy and now he’s overwhelmed and all of these leads are just going, they’re, they’re expiring, right? They’re sort of like milk. If we don’t get to them right away, they, they, they go bad. And uh, Yeah. You know, that structure just doesn’t work, you know, it’s not a recipe for a great relationship.
So I, I love that. Borja, this has been a wonderful conversation. I’ve learned so much. I love how you’re doing business. I appreciate how you’re driving value to your customers through a, uh, client experience that gives them custom solutions. What is the best way for, for people to connect with, with you and your firm if they’re, they’re interested in, uh, exploring more?
Yeah, no, I, uh, I appreciate you having me, uh, on the podcast. I’ve also enjoyed this conversation very much. And, um, uh, you know, hopefully we can stay in touch. Uh, the best way to get in touch with me is, uh, through email. Uh, my email address is for hub, uh, B O R J a dot C U a N at four 15 digital. com. That’s F O U R one five digital.
com. You can also find us, uh, on LinkedIn, uh, 415digital, and then our website is 415digital. com, and we have a contact us button right on that homepage where you can fill out a form and we’ll be in
touch. If our listeners are anything like me, they’re driving or at the gym or something, so we will make sure all of those, uh, contact resources are in the show notes so they can, uh, click on those when they have a minute and they’re, they’re not driving to, to be able to reach out and connect with you.
This has been wonderful. I appreciate the good work you’re doing in the, the digital ad space. I just, from our experience, it’s a little bit of the wild, wild west out there. Anybody, you know, with a computer can fire up a digital marketing agency. And it’s, um, it’s, it’s great to talk to. You, you’ve been doing it for a long time.
You know what you’re doing. You deliver a lot of value to your clients. So keep up the good work.
Appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thank you.
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