and if any look a bit shall they skinny boy that's cute oh yeah there's no rhymes like I'm a skinny boy alright guys so we were sad here with Johnson Courtney hello CEO and co-founder of AJ smart some a little bit so a Jane smart is a digital product studio and innovation studio here in Berlin we work with the biggest companies in the world so every brand every kind of big tech company you could think of we work with them so can be bigger organizations like the UN or it can be training companies like slack
Airbnb all of this kind of stuff and yeah we design products and run big workshops for companies and do stuff like that so basically he's being really honest but just huge huge company it works with the best of the best multi-million euro business out here in Germany now one thing that I kind of wanted to run by you guys and we don't want to get Jonathan on camera is to talk about like and although you guys are thinking that like these big companies big these big companies and these big businesses are kind of like a
very far out thing to attain or reach or bring on board as your own clients and I know a lot of you guys are worried about like maybe your age or your experience this thing I'm just thinking about like you as an 18 year old saying this to them is funny exactly exactly an hour it's show they're like alright so um first of all this run through I guess the first question which is you have a team of 20 employees yeah balm at some office why would you then hire my marketing agency to run your
Facebook ads for you I mean big huge part of it is just that you they kind of you're kind of learning about this all the time you are focusing on marketing that's your thing that's what you're doing 24 hours a day I don't know if you sleep with maybe 12 hours a day we are not a marketing agency we're a design studio most of our like people here are working on products were working on client services we do have people working in marketing but it's they're doing you know the biggest thing is they're doing the
day-to-day tasks for a Jane smart and we just don't really want to bring a whole team of people like you in how is it that means we have today also a health insurance for that and I also don't know how to run it right I don't if I was to build a marketing team that could do what you and your people can do at a Jane smart first of all it would take me a year to figure out how the [ __ ] even to figure that out in the first place and so it would
be a year of maybe getting nothing done and then maybe I would hire the wrong people acquire them and then it would be like I think it would take me like three years to get to the point where I would have people like what you can do doing what you do for us right now I think it's just like it's a time-saving right I think like I can get the you know we started off with YouTube and Instagram growth now we're doing like kind of import product stuff and I can get it done now or
I can try to build this [ __ ] out myself which I don't know how to do even though I could do it and wait a year I don't want to wait here so that's really big key right there's a lot of agency owners involving spire aspiring agency owners are like yeah but why would like I'm charging than the same price that they could hire two or 180 full-time employees and why the hell would they like give me this fee it's because like yeah they could hire one a full-time employer too some of you guys
I know you guys are chargers some of you guys are charging hopefully I figure I'm up retainers you could hire full team exact same reason his he said he doesn't want to deal with like the hiring and firing he doesn't want to deal with insurance bringing them on onboarding them he doesn't want to deal with like just making the wrong decisions well I mean also okay let me just just lay it out at night if I hire the team to do what you're doing for us like the whole behind-the-scenes Facebook's Balaton like Google stuff and
all that kind of [ __ ] then I it's also then my responsibility I have to tell them what to do and I think that I it's like almost like plug in and play I can just kind of leave it to you and your command your team and just kind of sit back and let that happen without it's disrupting my company force without having to think about if you're the right culture fit and all that kind of crap I mean that's why people hire us as well right we charge way more than it would cost
them to hire a team but like initially but actually it would take them two years to hire a team that's even close to what we have here so yeah it doesn't it makes total sense that agency other companies hire people even though they could hire them themselves for cheaper yeah so the point is like most of most pretty much every small business you go to they will they would rather outsource something like this so that's that settle but like now you must be wondering and asking yourself like but how do I get in contact with
a huge business of multi seven-figure businesses pay for your businesses whatever it may be entry to get people are matter offering their consulting services or marketing services all the time or web services or this everyday so okay so how does someone like how does how do you become that one in a hundred that like slips through the crack and actually gets to you and get your attention and a little bit about the backstory about how we kind of came know of each other I actually had a automated funnel yeah he came through my phone oh
god damn it he came through my photo and then converted convert didn't convert at that time yeah converting like six months later yeah so that's actually how we managed to get to know each other but how would someone like for example do you get holes often no never never get cold calls with you know I've never done I've never done a call yeah I get I get cold emails all the time but they're always really [ __ ] it's always my something where I'm just like my it's not like it doesn't read it I guess
the the biggest thing is that the well the biggest thing is no one does their homework people contact me and they say hey I want to do this for you and I want to do that for you but it's like they clearly didn't look at our Instagram or they clearly didn't look at our YouTube or they didn't they didn't do anything they just said hey I'd love to work with you your company seems cool and I can see the big coffee to pay so back to a million people so one of the things that really
really pisses me off is that people don't do their homework at all I think one of the reasons I really was you know I've kind of blown away by your sales pitch I don't know if you teach this in your course but actually I'm curious to look at your course about how much of the stuff was like you know after after the sales pitch he asked me he's like do you boo me you're really good at selling give any background in sales and I'm like no I I was just winging it Yeah right all like
perfectly yeah I can buy second yeah I could tell I mean I could tell that it was too good like it converted me immediately and I was you you did a couple of things in the video that were like you you pointed out loads of things that I started doing in my sales calls you could do this yourself you could but it will take you six months you want it now or you could do this yourself or but in the six months your competitors will come in and so I think you definitely kind of framed
it for me well but I think like that even back like the very first funnel that I went through was you going through my website I'm like yeah that was great I mean that was immediate immediately for me I was like [ __ ] this is something this is someone who's kind of interesting and actually gets what we're doing well it was this set it was this actual sales video you did when it was like the thing where I was like [ __ ] you know I mean that that sale I mean I don't know
how much you spent to capture me as a client maybe like I think on that entire funnel I spent a hundred pounds and I killed it so okay so you don't get cold calls all right but basically like the thing that makes someone stand out for you and so you know the thing that like will help someone get through the door giving your time each other when they do their homework yeah Sean Sean is also a consultant an external consultant here to help like this this was a this was a case where my mind was
just completely blown as well and like I got a that Danny was like my big guy what a guy working at a gents market was like oh I've been talking to Sean maybe we could really do something together and another thing like I think people forget is that people like me are so busy that we forget things the whole time like we forget things all the time we never even like it's like even if the best offer ever we forget it and we need to be reminded and Danny was like oh should definitely check this
thing out and Danny opened up his laptop and it was a video of Sean at a bar like outside the bar having a beer and he'd like really done his homework like really serious [ __ ] homework was done and I like the thing is I was really interesting also with your video I stopped the video halfway through I didn't watch the whole thing I was like done yeah I'm like I'm 100% convinced like when I went to London to meet you it was it was we went we were supposed to do a workshop yeah
and I was also like I don't need the workshop and I don't want the workshop I actually want you to just do 30 minutes come to me you okay yeah yeah exactly like we weren't we met him in London and it was like 30 minutes into it I was like can you just come to me or can do this for us instead and like you're doing I mean that the interesting thing about this video is like why would an agency founder like me bring in another person from another agency like you even though technically I
could learn all the stuff and do it it's like I just don't have those you know skills I'd I would it would take me two years to get to the point where I could even run a workshop like that even though I could do it it's just better to bring in external consultants to do it to get it done better and faster yeah so the point is like you know it's I think they could hire the employees they could on board them and train them and stuff like that but they just they just don't want
to deal with it they want to keep things fast and also maybe I maybe I'm being over maybe I'm overestimating I probably couldn't like it would probably take [ __ ] you know okay you can't hire people like you you can't other people like people who don't want to people yeah there's also people who want to be kind of doing their own thing and learn from loads of different companies and bring that extra also just like when you learn see there's a very high income producing skill so it's like when you learn a banker producing
skill you know what you're worth yeah so it's very hard to keep those people tied down to drum and that's what I let the video with it you watch if you remember that's so so there's one concept that we train out in sales which is about how you focus on what someone wants after they buy your product or service right because nobody wakes up in the morning says you know what I'm really living here I really need a new kind of funnel system really inbound leads and nobody wants that thing they want what that thing
produces they want the afters yeah they want the conversions they want the increase revenue they want the two-speed samarkand right and when I first met these guys and the video that I made for them was you want a higher premium for what you charge and guess what you deserve that because your product is normal but the way you're talking about your product of the minute doesn't get you that higher premium and that's what you're really interested in isn't it mr. cool I agree me I'd like to change so he doesn't give a [ __ ]
about actually what what's the thing that you're selling she don't know he really can't be after she wants to - I didn't even know what the thing you were selling was because I stopped the video and it's not about that so if you can connect your products into the after version of interesting the ultimate benefit and the incredibly show up with okay and here's the thing that's going to help you get you piqued your interest get them on the phone doing the creative way through video outside a bar on a beer because I knew that
that's the kind of song that would resonate now that's another thing actually the tone you were saying like do people contact us people contact us like every 20 minutes I get a message on Instagram on whatever no one does their homework they don't even think about the fact that we're like the attitudes of our agency has no that's something you guys have seemed like Pierce Brosnan like that but you know I like posters and everywhere they walk around in slippers it's very like chill it's a chill vibe it's also like the cheeky by the way
crack open a beer that's true about time it is actually beer o'clock Jesus Christ oh and yeah there was a [ __ ] yeah focus on those afters doing your homework given insights in a way that that person you can hear it understand there and go oh they're just like me how you see I'm gonna beer and I'd like that cool [ __ ] I was like that a certain time yeah hello mister cool I mean you know I thought some ideas it's how you can improve you read me you just may want to use
this Joker yeah but it's my Tolkien in a tone that of course them is gonna resonate how about things that they're interested in and then showing up where the credible ideas to how to do it yeah there's a lot of actually what's interesting and I don't know the answer to this there's a lot of people I meet to our consultants who wanted to work for AJ and smart and I meet them and I'm super excited about it but something happens and I forget them you know what I mean it's like it's almost like it doesn't
feel essential whereas what the two of you guys did is made it feel like essential because also like there was like the understanding of the actual problem and the connecting you know I think that's a it's a cool it's definitely I mean it's something also I need to get better up with clients as well sometimes I treat them like you know they're just coming in and I'm like dealing with them but I don't sometimes really personally deal with them but yeah doing the homework is also such a big thing like I mean [ __ ]
lazy those people are lazy and front sick and if you just invest even half an hour like I was doing how we got time great story abroad so so I was doing a scheme for Lotus star tops in Manchester in the UK so basically we were helping these startups really big business from brands like Kellogg's and Barclays inject your Land Rover so I'm training these guys on how do you sell to big big brains and I said look first mistake that your sales people make is they don't do that homework they've got a standard sales
pitch yeah I'm a rocker but I mean just talk about the product during dinner that's a nonsense first weights is what we were doing particularly a person and I think honestly I tell people in my program I think it's a clean disrespect yeah yeah and respect reducer and the reason well there's an another reason but one of the reasons is that people think that it takes a long time like how am I gonna you know I've got the sales targets of means and I mean isn't very high off and I said look there's something called
a 10-minute deep dive all right what you can do is let's say I was helping these thoughts or sell let's take Alex okay so Kellogg's big food producer I think like most people know Phelps is Brandon so we had the CIO of Kellogg's coming into this event that we will hold them and three of these thoughts are really wanted to by Kellogg's as a client and I'm like okay in 10 minutes let's get some intel on on Kellogg's that they'll be surprised about if you know them don't guards Kellogg's website because that's a fiercely much
people will do right you can go into that public website there but there's nothing really everybody's off they don't either it's what they're it's what they want me to see and it's not really about their business it's about the products right look that's the website go to Google News now Kelly because that's what what the people in the industry and analysts and everybody else is saying hey this is what's going on with college of business and the second thing News download Kellogg's last quarterly statements every big man has to put our quarterly statements and that
say hey both these the kind of things that go on a business and put a timer on your phone and just scan those two things for 10 minutes you'll be amazed at the amount of Intel comes out yeah in 10 minutes so we've got a workshop the buspar stops where they did it they did a terminal D typing branch that they were selling to these guys go oh my gosh that Kellogg's have got this internal efficiency project in Europe where they're trying to kind of drive our costs and how the new materials and we've got
a warning we've got we've got a brilliant efficiency kind of innovation process I'm like well isn't it so much better for you to turn off and start talking about you know that efficiency process yeah in a way that that buyer is going to resonate rather than kind of just sort of them in a vanilla hey we're this company and we have this yeah yeah it does piss me off email me and they're like oh yeah I had a look at your website and blob I'm like what the [ __ ] I'd like people a mail
me about stuff and I'm like I literally have like 20 videos online explaining something that could have helped you hear that you know you just don't do the egg and anyway the homework yeah that's a really good one the deep dive I got to steal that yeah and I mean I like you know I also use I talked about this example a lot like you know where when I was looking for my accountant there I go to like all these huge accounting firms and like they'll all start off and they ask me that like so
what do you do and I'm like online marketing I'm like oh cool so were your numbers like what blah blah these are leprous digits like accounting firms and then I go to the last one right and at the last by the last one I'm kind of jaded I'm like okay whatever look these old people yeah I've had enough [ __ ] books like whatever I've got the last one to make so that what are you I'm not full online marketing oh cool you do affiliate marketing I'm like yeah some I do a bit of a
feeling like oh cool what offers new moment and I'm Steeve no idea I didn't even like oh okay so you know what we'll do is we'll get your strike processor will get your pay no this is how we segment the different countries they spoke my language that was the most important thing they spoke my language and I mean I don't know whether you guys saw it last week or you're gonna see it in a week from now but you saw the student interview with Stephen Stephen Tran who did fifty two thousand dollars in monthly recurring
retainers in 40 days and one of the big key takeaways from that interview or when the big key takeaways from the success he had he spoke their language and that's probably like the defender guys deal and I think if you don't have a say if you don't it's just like I think it's a plaintiff disrespectful yeah yeah well think about what's going on psychologically right if you're speaking the language that somebody uses day-to-day inside their organization subliminally they're just going this person is just like those yeah it should be in our organization shouldn't they not
yeah as a salesperson though you want to be working with them as a bar right so show up talking like all of their colleagues already tell absolutely they're just putting you into that mob because I mean okay so you're a part of your economy now and it's just by talking about like keep going back to the code example that efficiency project is called project K project in the networking as soon as that event whether the starters for pitching as soon as the networking starts one of those thoughts of planners goes off the CIO of Kellogg's
and they go hey I'm laughing this told me I'm interested just project K I've read a little bit online what nobody else we're not normally bother nobody bother to do that home right yeah but instant they've got a connection now they've got a meeting and now the discussion apply that that's the big difference makes a little bit of research to just get those those language books help people go oh wow you get my world is calling with your authority yeah I'm showing empathy for you know me and my business you get me right that's not
a proper conversation because you're not just a sales dude trying to flog me a product that's bananas yeah so I mean obviously like it's actually really cool they're like you've no sorry this video I always see you know cuz you doing very well with your consulting business metric metric Jonathan happen to come through a photo of mine stayed up that was also another really important but that sale happens six months later and right so for six months like we stayed up to date etc etc so he happen to come through a formal what are your
you know in terms of getting the really big clients right what are your recommendations in terms of actually getting in front of them in the first place getting that meeting that's all yeah it's always the hardest one so yeah of course you need to vlog your network so any personal connections and I mean LinkedIn is an amazing tool right so they're saying it's getting a bit dated I still think it's super valuable if you've got anyone that knows anyone in that organization just like it might take you three or four loops to get to the
actual person in the little conversation with but getting warm intros along the chain to the buyer is worth so much it's worth so much so learning at web to death that it is burning there's loads of creative ways to get attention reads fog bits of ways so there's a story from a Brandon you could have no innocence innocence rings yeah so they'll always tell the story about how you know they didn't like that did not huge advertising budget when they started or what they did is they knew they wanted to get one buy from Sainsbury's
so they did a little bit of research and found out which area of London its kind of product by I lived in and they just bought billboards in that area of woman that I was it right because they just wants the conversation with that bike and it just remember musty when after this this one buyer and I was looking at big bill the Sainsbury's and that so so creative targeted ways to get someone's attention in a way that John was saying about where you don't you research you know what's importance then when you show up
with some kind of something to my Parliament like that's super important you're the big thing about how to get influencer like I've seen you see any decision make that it's done don't understand the value of like a cold approach with the video yeah the video thing is a [ __ ] chiller and it's and it's only utilized so we had and you would want talking about this so so CEO of brother see you know further that they make printers they make kind of like you know Java so we have them come to be going about
these names Phil Jones you play on the Manchester and he said look as a big brand what I do is I sit down on the MBA from what see many employers in this you know global brands but I was at that front of a camera like this if I'm trying to secure start blocks orality or Laura Ashley which by the way they did last it found channel secured numbers of clients are the only I will sit down and I will talk directly into the camera to the person that I want to talk to because you
know it's just as hard for the big guys to get intros with other big guys yeah as it is it is just the start and so don't be on the delusion season but it was through the video and so I created talk to beer and I'll just say hey listen and you know mister MD of Starbucks I'm Jones I'm the MD of brother UK and we've done some research on you know some challenges of your business and we think that we've got something that could save you that's many million in the next year I'd love
to send my account executive who then kind of drawings among the video to speak to one of your people sometimes are not you directly it's one of your people to just begin an exploratory conversation I appreciate you're a super busy man so this is a short video but I just wanted to kind of say if there's also another thing when you send the short video and this is super easy to you when you send the short video have the video and then also have an mp3 version of it and then also have a transcript when
I sent over the audio the audio feeling oh dude thank God you said over the audience I didn't even watch you I just listened to it and if you would sent it over by like a PDF go through yeah I didn't never would I haven't looked at it yeah so it's just like it doesn't take much time but some of these people you know busy man you're like Jonathan know like straight out like for example if it's even like a 10 minute a ten minute like video directed towards ever fifteen minute thing or a 20
minute thing like might as well just throw in the mp3 link yeah I might as well from the same [ __ ] file yeah exactly and you might as well just like get it transcripted it doesn't cost much then that way you can send it off to maybe like a team member so make that exception highlight something from the video like I haven't done that before yeah but I mean it's cool I haven't done it but it's definitely a nice idea and you know it's just the ask at the end they ask you since I
want to meet with those big it's let's let the minions talk it's a it's a micro commitment it's it's yeah exactly it's a small code it's just saying you know let's begin something and it's appreciating that there's a sales cycle to answer I know but it's been bold enough to get it going and saying you know let's not you play your time but let's get the minions talking and that's something maybe like the cool thing is that I mean for any I don't even know he's gonna be watching this video with the cool are you
watching this video um I've been running this business for six years and about one person per year what's in the effort like out of 300 people contacting me it goes the same for people wanting to work here out of 300 applications one person does the homework so it's not like everyone does this you know what I mean it's like people are always like discouraged because they're like oh yeah you know people once they watch this video people it's like whatever eight billion people in the world maybe 2,000 people or I don't know how many people
will watch this video literally nobody does the actual work yeah everyone is [ __ ] lazy and also there's people blame you know like when people apply for jobs are they James Martin maybe we don't apply to them because we're small companies well in terms of like we don't a giant HR department and then I get a message on Instagram saying uh no one replied to me I'm like yeah I didn't do anything about like why should I reply to you why is that something that like I know and I think that there's been these
people who do stand out and do then get the interview and do actually get the time of day it's rare most people don't bother we had a hundred fifteen applicants for the most recent role that we put out as a business yeah half of them with discounters straight away because we asked specifically front paragraph of the job of the jobs back that we put on these websites please send a cv and the cover letter or video that tells us a little bit about something and half the people didn't even do that they just said this
evening yeah and we're like what the hell and so then there was three people I actually did a little video who are the first people that we interview yeah of courses they are through you make it kinda with them of course but you know we ends up getting reason for this and yeah and so it's that's the thing like it sounds like you know when I used to read these things about getting a job and how to make you know a Jane smart special company it's like [ __ ] I'm gonna have to like I
don't know go up and do like a crazy stunt like a backflip well I'm on fire or something or wait outside the company and like pee on someone kind of know but you actually don't need to do anything to stand out almost nothing because no one does any everyone's quite lazy and once you realize that you realize the friction that's actually way lower than it looks you can get into any company and really work I mean the I guess the original thing you are asking is like for your students I mean they're already a minority
on this planet you know how many people like a couple of thousand people are doing the course I have no idea a couple of thousand I'm assuming a couple hundred that's even [ __ ] better like a couple hundred people are doing this course that you as a consultant who's making pretty do you know he's 18 yeah yes weird but it's like literally they have no excuse I think anyone doing your course who's not you know actually getting something out of it it's also being lately yeah no they don't fight me general YouTube this is
just a general YouTube so that they maybe don't have your probably yeah okay okay by the guys cool no good by the guys course and then do something with it that's the I don't make good on it you know I mean obviously either we're not perfect right I've done this way I spent two grand enough course couple years ago and I did Jack or with afterwards yeah I must use that as entertainment I just kind of sat there kind of absorbed it and I thought I'll because I've watched the videos and I've done a little
bit actually engage in it I did not actually engage and kind of do the actions off the back of it and I guess that's what we're saying is when you when you take actions off the advice that you can't go shown here alone it's the ones that do that actually execute yeah that are gonna see something happening yeah that sounds like really cheesy small advice oh my gosh it's just it makes it so massive almost different we train we've trained between like thousand people in the last year and there is it's not that then the
thousand people go and become spread facilitators that make money right it's the few people who actually engage and try [ __ ] a lot of people are just like I'm sure your people as well like I'm sure you get a lot of emails like oh yeah I did I did your course or I watched your thing and I didn't get a job and whatever is like did you email any yeah did you do any of this stuff okay yeah I need your phone so you pretty much go out like and none of this was like
plaid like this kind of like all just felt like I was just trying to do my sales emails here and this punker came over so yeah just to summarize I could give them like but I both of you guys are just even one piece of advice egg the thing that like we're bringing them up to the highest ROI but everything in this 30-minute just bleh brain virgin advice and yeah I think it was like use video to your advantage and do your homework those like actually in the order of do your homework so you don't
disrespect the company or emailing and have a video in that email if you're cold contacting them yeah otherwise it's actually insulting to receive these emails like these [ __ ] emails you get from like Poland you know the developers they're like hello mr. Courtney I am coming to Berlin for a day and I would love to meet you and talk about a partnership with a development company why would I ever say yes to this you know it's like I get like I don't know why it is like a billion polish development companies to send these
emails every day but like what like why would I get so I find soultaker and I even have annoyed by it yeah but if you get something where if someone actually puts effort in does the homework this is nice yeah so Hills was do the homework and exploit video yeah and I thought you ready I would say no no I would say to do well on that if you do those two things to do that well make sure you're using language that will resonate with that specific audience right so one of the big things I've
been dominant to these guys for the last 18 months is use empathy and authority play so a lot of people think they need to impress ya in their sales message in yeah I have to show up as the credible big dog right this is all the reasons you should I have all these cool kind yeah I'm puff up with authority right yeah you need to get it up but you need to start with my demonstrate empathy hey mister put mister missus by that I know your world I understand the issues that are children you I
know the things that you're interested in and guess what I can help if you can use that language in your videos to pique interest and get folk on the hook often you don't need to prove you've got the authority because it's like it means just he just gets bored and goes here [ __ ] it they understand me let's go meet Singham I never asked either of you who you worked with no I didn't know I don't want that again here yeah I don't know it's like do you get my well that's what most yeah
kind of busy entrepreneurs and executives me and as does this person understand my well because if not it's not even worth conversation so lead with native language that's gonna present it alright well guys this have been an absolutely incredible interview Sean really appreciate it mm guys yeah hope you enjoyed it's been amazing trip here in Berlin and almost on Instagram [ __ ] it isn't ask J ice cream JK I see like it's like Jase scream Jason white Jay and the wear nice clothes look gave us such a shameless plug yeah so at foam on
the school Leadership Forum underscore the ocean all right home da Studios website perfect 1 billion followers from now on
