Expert of the Month - Bibi Raven - BibiBuzz
VIDEO: 50:53 mins
AUTHOR: Robert Craven and Bibi Raven
In this GYDA talks, Robert talks to Bibi Raven. Bibi the Link Builder is the crazy founder over at Bibibuzz - where her wild gang of outreach Jedi create powerful backlinks for her awesome clientele. She's infamously known for doling out world-saving link building advice, creative link training and endless, utterly pointless dad jokes.
Robert and Bibi discuss:
How is running a team in the Philippines?
Being a personality online
Transactions vs Relationships
Filter off rather than volume up
Vulnerability and Listening
Guarantee deliverables and not results
Manage expectations
Success and Failure
Is Link-building dead?
Biggest growth pain is Operations
Scale issues lead to doing more training and consulting?
Post-COVID plans
How to get more clients - send them to the service page, client qualify with questionnaire leads to the filter.
Put up prices x2
Self-fulfilling process - better/richer clients that know better/richer clients get attracted
Transcription:
Robert Craven 00:50
Hello, and welcome to the GYDA talks. And today, we've got a really special guest. We've got Bibi from the Netherlands and Hello,Bibi. How are you?
Bibi Raven 01:01
I'm good. I got a little bit of a headache. But I think it's my new context or something. I think I need reading glasses.
Robert Craven 01:08
Yeah, I mean, you can get reading glasses. So without further ado, our audience Bibi is agency leaders agency founders. So for those people who don't know Bibi, who haven't come across you on Facebook - what do you know in for? What do you know, Bibi?
Bibi Raven 01:35
Um, well, I have a lot of nicknames. But one is describing my business. The best is maybe the link builder. I build links for a lot of clients. Yeah, so that's what I'm known for just building links 24/7.
Robert Craven 01:50
So your business is if I recall, it's you're in the Netherlands?
Bibi Raven 01:55
Yeah.
Robert Craven 01:55
The Netherlands country of choice. And it's not just a honeymoon thing. If I could move somewhere, it would be in the Netherlands, you've got so many things right that the UK hasn't got right. You got a business partner in Florida. And you've got a dev team in the Philippines. Is that a rough set up?
Bibi Raven 02:14
Yeah, it's not a dev team but an outreach team, basically. So they do my outreach.
Robert Craven 02:22
Just to give a sense of how big the agency is, how many people work in the agency?
Bibi Raven 02:27
We've got 18 right now. And I think we're growing every month with a couple more, because we get a lot of clients.
Robert Craven 02:36
So we'll see. What's the backstory to that? Because one could argue only 18 people, you know, why aren't you 36 or 72 or 144?
Bibi Raven 02:50
Well, it's, I never had a plan for my business. So it wasn't like, I want to grow to a team of this big or Yeah, hi, I started as my own self doing all the work. And I grew with the clients that I've gotten. So I still don't have a plan. But because we're such a lean company, we have a really good profit margin. And so we're doing pretty well. And I also want to keep a good lifestyle. So I think if we would grow too fast, and hire 100 people, it would basically be suicide for me.
Robert Craven 03:31
I'd be interested about the Philippines becauseI know a few agencies that have that kind of model either. Sometimes it's Bangalore, sometimes it's the Philippines, there must be a downside. The upside is, hey, it's literally a couple of $100 a month. So yeah, that's clearly the upside. There must be a downside and having a team that you're trying to run that comes from a different country with a different culture. And that you're not personally connected with .What's the downside of it?
Bibi Raven 04:14
For me, personally, there is no downside because I'm used to the online life. So I'm able to make really deep connections with people online. I met my partner online, for instance. And there are several ways to compensate that you know, to build your team together. But I would say if you're not used to working remotely with people, or being a personality online as much as you are offline, it will be a problem for you. So you have to invest in building an online connection with people.
Robert Craven 04:55
Yeah, you use that phrase being a personality online and when I think about you, Bibi. It's Bibi time. So was that a kind of a deliberate thing or is it just your effervescent personality?
Bibi Raven 05:18
So I used to be social media marketer. So I'm already really good in creating a network online and building connections and engaging with people. And when I started link building, at some point, I realised that this was my strength in link building, not just lengthening itself, but also dealing with clients and dealing with the employees. So having that personality, it was already in there. But then I realised, oh, this is my strength. I don't have to be all corporate and business, I can follow these traditional paths. But I can just carve my own thing, based on my personal.
Robert Craven 05:59
So it's interesting, because most agents are really good at transactions, you know, you ask them to get links for you ask them to get clicks for coffee cups, or TV monitors, or whatever it is, they could they can do that, because it's transactional, it's their relationship with their machine. My experience is that most agencies aren't so great at the relationship stuff, they're not so because they don't get when you're trying to work with the client. It's not a transaction, it's a relationship, a client is handling their business to you. And therefore that they value that. So is it just always been that you've been a horrible phrase, a people person? Or have you just kind of turned the volume up? Because it's created a little bit of a brand around your personality?
Bibi Raven 06:49
Yeah, that's a really good question. I think I didn't turn the volume, your volume up, I accepted myself the way I am. And I turned the filter off. So I was thinking that I had to be in some kind of box, you know? And I said, No, no, I can just be Bibi. So I just was Bibi everywhere in any situation, whether it was big clients or at a conference or, you know, online.
Robert Craven 07:16
What are the kind of examples of things where people say to you Oh, Bibi, that's a bit unfiltered. What are the sort of things you've done for people?
Bibi Raven 07:27
Well, I wrote a guest post for pitch box. It's a tool I use, and it was the only guest post on my blog that got a parental warning. Because it had so many swear words in it. Yeah, so that's part of it. That's a good example.
Robert Craven 07:47
Don't people say a thing for me, don't people want that? Because, for me, most of digital agency world, despite being young minded, and cool, and hip is actually incredibly bland. Every website is identical. It's like we work with you, our team, our ping pong table, you know, look at us in T-shirts, because I was having drinks on the roof. But they're all the same the all like me to sites with kind of me to stuff. And it's actually age as a buyer is actually Bayesian LeMans there's no, there's very little character, there's very little, very few people actually stand for something apart from running a digital agent is a cool thing to do so. So when there is a personality, you know, whether that's I mean, the example would be David Gilroy, conscious who always wears orange always has an opinion only works with lawyers, but working with lawyers and, and only wearing shocking oranges, like, oh, there's David Gilroy, there's a photo hungry lawyers all in black. David was orange t-shirt. It's a sense of standing out in a world of grey. And I think, ironically, agencies will think they're pretty cool. They all become great, because they all kind of do the same stuff.
Bibi Raven 09:21
And they also all have a ping pong table like Google or Bing, Google was a ping pong table, and then at some point, it gets all done. I think apart from standing out through your personality, it also has to do with vulnerability. So when people know that you're always 100% you they trust you more because they know you're not you know selling bullshit to them. Or when you fuck up for instance, you're gonna be honest about it, because you're there in it as a person...
Robert Craven 09:53
...who loves vulnerability, I mean, I show the Brene Brown or ask people to look at the Brene Brown, TED talk on vulnerabilities 20 minutes on someone who's kind of really, really square, scientific, realising that, by being vulnerable, people can help you and you can help yourself. But if you're not vulnerable, then it kind of holds back. And I think that's really interesting that you almost use that as a ...
Bibi Raven 10:31
...signal, right? It's a trust in on to me. And also it opens up listening, because when you're not vulnerable, and you're just broadcasting your own, we're gonna solve this for you, you're gonna get 1000 leads. But if you open up with, Hey, I don't know, let's talk, you know, and then you're actually going to listen, that way you find golden nuggets that you wouldn't have otherwise, if you're just, you know, pasting that sticker on every client's about that you know best.
Robert Craven 11:01
Without pulling or pulling away from buy from me buy from me buy from me buy from you.com. And also, I guess, what you're doing is you're only going to be attractive to certain types of clients. Your clients that want the money back guarantee, they'll go, oh, yeah, she can't even tell us what she's gonna get for our money. So you know what, we'll go over to this site over here, which has guaranteed results, guaranteed $5, a click or whatever it is. So what you're doing is you're creating your own little ecosphere of people who lean in to the baby way of doing stuff, which means that the people you wouldn't want to work with in any case, goes somewhere else. And therefore, you're working on your terms, Is that fair to say?
Bibi Raven 11:58
Yeah, absolutely. So I don't guarantee results. I do guarantee deliverables. So people get a certain amount of links in there for a certain type of quality. But I'm not promising that they will increase your rankings or increase your traffic because I can't promise that, you know, it's dependent on so many things. So I think you're really hitting the hammer on the nail there. But what I do have, so I have a service page that's on my company sites. And it explains my whole process, and actually exactly what I'm going to deliver. And what I do promise and what I don't promise. So every time I get a lead, I send them to the service page, and then they drop off, or they don't, and they come back to me. And that saves so much time and negotiation and heartache. And you also manage the expectations really well that way. And it feels throughout clients that are the right fit. So yeah, that really helps.
Robert Craven 12:58
So what then happens when COVID comes along?
Bibi Raven 13:00
I die, you know? Yeah, it's funny. So when caught when a lockdown happens, I was in panic mode, because I was like, Oh, my God, the good times are over, you know, I was growing my company. And I actually didn't lose any clients. I had one client that it was in hospitality, and they moved back the budget spent with 30%. And it wasn't great, but I love them so much that, you know, I was happy that they stayed on and we just continued. But the first two weeks, even though things weren't bad for me, I just got into panic mode. And I was working as if, you know, everything was going to shit. So I was working so many hours and trying to keep everybody happy. And making sure that I was getting new clients. And then after two weeks, I just kind of broke down I was suddenly I started crying. I cried for like 15 minutes. And then I realised I'm in panic mode, but there's no need to be in panic mode. You know, I could just relax because I'm actually getting more business than before COVID. I'm not 100% sure why. I think a lot of people went online. And they stopped spending on ads. And they were looking for other ways to grow their business. Yeah, I'm not 100% sure why that is. But for me everything's been going really well.
Robert Craven 14:27
That's really interesting. So I've got a sense that I mean, we've asked I think 160 - 170 agencies where they are between thriving, surviving, struggling, dying, the clear 10% that are dying and die and there's a clear kind of 15% at the top. You've never had it so good. They don't tend to be the larger ones. The interesting piece for me is the ones who claim to be struggling because I think they think not all that don't get me wrong. This is where I'm gonna put my big Wellington boots on. I think that a lot of agencies that are struggling think they're struggling. And what I mean by that is that they've, a lot of them haven't been through a recession before. So this is more than ever my third recession. And I know, it's three years. I know, it's tough, and it's long. And I know that budgets aren't the same. And I know that you just get on with it often, because it's just not the happy days that it was before. So I think a lot of people aren't familiar with that. And also, I don't think anyone realised quite how good they had it, you know, you chuck up a landing page, wait an hour, you get a lead, you phone them up, you get a piece of work, and then you say, well, that's difficult. So the world isn't like that. So I think it is tough. I think people are very confused. But I think people are really nervous. So that the guys and gals who are doing really, really well are really embarrassed about it. Online gaming, it's really bad. Our biggest bicycle manufacturer, it's really bad. I just think it's, for lots of people, that panic mode you talk about is kind of just become the norm, partly because it's everywhere. And part of my worry is they then think that their clients are in the same state that they are. So they go, rather than going to clients. And so the way out of this is to let me help you navigate the way forward. Let me show you how you can do this. They're thinking they're going to clients and saying, you're finding it tough as well. I thought you I guess you kind of want to cut. I thought you'd want to cut budgets. Yeah, well, okay. Well, if that's what you want to do, we'll come back in three months. I think some agencies have talked themselves into survival mode. And I know, I'm upsetting people. But I just think that I mean, some are really struggling, let's not be under any illusions. But some just have just persuaded themselves that they're in a difficult place right now. So do you think running an agency pre COVID and post COVID is any different? Is it just more of the same?
Bibi Raven 17:45
No, for me, it's the same. It's because I'm a lean agency. So I don't have I work from home. I don't rent an expensive office, I don't spend time on market. I mean, I don't spend money on marketing or ads or anything like that. So I always made sure that whatever costs I was making, it will be covered by one client. Right? So if I ever got into problems, it would be okay, just needing one client. And also, I always think of people first. I think a lot of people are going to get mad at this as well. You know, they want to have the fancy office and they want to feel like they want to fulfil their ego and all that stuff. And then when COVID is they're like, oh my god, we need to fire half of our people. Because we can't afford the office. And I'm just like that, no, you should have not had the office, you should have been able to cover the cost of your employees. And then think about fancy office. But that's, I mean, that's probably a very easy way of saying it, but I feel like we were already COVID resilience or crisis resilient before it hits. Because we never spent money when we didn't have this or you know, we have an accountant she's used Profit First accountant. I don't know if you've heard about it.And so we're not running that system yet. She's looking at our whole company and giving us an assessment, but she said that a lot of the ways we were doing the business finances was already profit first base. So any costs we have there are covered already. Of course, we put the profit aside, but there's such a high profit margin. We never needed to worry.
Robert Craven 19:39
Yeah, so it's a Profit First for those people who don't know if it's a book by Mike McKee. I think that the name is James. And the principle which I pretty much adhere to is rather than going let's look at our revenue. Oh, let's look at our costs. What have we got left at the bottom? Oh, you Just rejigged that equation, which is to say, What's profit We want? Less What revenue do we think you're gonna get? And what are the costs left that we can afford to spend? And the other beautiful thing from Profit First is that each month you have a series of different bank accounts and each month you take money out straight away. So you take money out for your drawing straightaway, you take money out for tax straight away, you take money out for wages straightaway, you take money out. So therefore, you've got the little pots of money. So you don't wait to the end of the year and go, Oh, no profit, how can we bought too many computers, you actually are live managing your budget. So it's a different way of looking at things. And we've always done that not as deep as they do. But we've got pots and money goes out every month, so that when the tax bill, when my dividends when the wage bill comes, the money is there already. And it's and you're playing with the balance, which is your costs rather than that, it's a really good way of looking at a business, I'd be really interested to see how that works for you. So in a way, this is in praise of cockroaches, dare I say, you know, the dinosaurs, the quote was, you know, in the Ice Age, the dinosaurs will die, but the cockroaches will survive because the cockroaches will survive, because they will move in and they were Profit First in the first place. I mean, you know, we all talk to lots of agency folks, and so on and so forth. I mean, do you have some sense of a system or a process that agencies for agencies to be successful? Do you think there are certain things that they should be doing that you sometimes the agencies are not doing?
Bibi Raven 22:15
This is hard, because, like I said, I didn't have a plan when it started. And a lot of things kind of fell in my lap. And then I realised how I could use the strengths that I had to grow my business. But I think for agencies is this an opportunity to completely rethink of what an agency is. And you should let go of all the definitions and what you see around you. Because, you know, you have these agencies where they say like, oh, we made 2 million last year, or 3 million or lalala. And like you said, with corporate first, that's revenue, right. But how much of that is profits. And I will show you my numbers, but just having a big fancy agency doesn't mean you're profitable. So I will definitely go back and think about what you really want to do. And what you really want to get your customer. And if there's pletely different way of getting your customer that because now it was COVID You get to reinvent yourself. So I think that will be really good. And let go of all the success stories and everything that anybody else has seen.
Robert Craven 23:37
We're all running a different race, you know, and one person they want a million pound in the bank for another one, they want something that generates 50,000 pounds a year. For another one, they want to be in the middle of a business which is known for, for another one they want to sell for 10 million. So we're all running different races. And I think there's a lovely interview I did with a guy called Sammy Mansur Torre, who runs house UK in Bath near me, actually. And he said because they were on this real growth spurt. About the size that you are now maybe slightly larger. And he did the sums and he kind of recognised that at about 15 you suddenly start employing non fear learners. And then same thing happen again at 25. If more than if a board room. And yeah, then we could be 60 And then we'd have to employ more we'd have an FTE and then we could be 90. And you could map it all out. And then he did the songs and realise that the sweet spot for his agency, which is a full service marketing agency, was round about, I think about 28-29 people. That was for his model. The point where 99% of the people were fee earners. That was the point where the teams are still small enough and intimate enough that it was a pleasure to work there. That was where The stage where the sales and marketing effort they had could feed everyone with good, interesting work and that they didn't have to take on rubbish work. That was the stage at which he could take Saturday and Sunday off and come in at Monday lunchtime. And it will give him the lifestyle that he wanted, and give his people the lifestyle and security they wanted and give them the quality of work. And obviously, for each of us, that's different as another example of a client I've got who realised that if they saved 100,000 pounds a year, for 10 years, that'd be a million pounds and where they live, they could buy 10 houses one a year, and they could rent them all out, and that the rent from those houses would be, would end up being 200,000 pounds a year. So everyone else is going, they're macho, or sell the business for 5 million blah, blah, blah, and 150 staff. Very, very testosterone driven. And this person kind of realised that actually, just slowly and gently, you know, to end up after 10 years work with a guaranteed income of 200,000 pounds a year, nevermind what you do with the agency, that would be a really cute thing to do. So I think there's loads of ways of dealing with this. And for some of us, we want to get on stage for some of us. We don't want to get on stage for some of us, we want not to say yeah, I've got 50 people or 70 people.
Bibi Raven 26:36
Can I ask you a question? So it's all about finding your why right? And then building your business on top of it. How do you advise people? How do they find their work? I never worked from a plan where I am, I'm happy, you know, but how do you get to that? How do you find it?
Robert Craven 26:55
Well, I'm on, This is where people start throwing bricks, I'm not a great fan of Simon Sinek. And finding your why. And I'll tell you, I'll explain why I'll explain the reason. I think the original thing, you know, some 20-30 years ago, and you wrote it, which was a personal development thing, which is understand your purpose, and then you've done it, everything else makes sense. I totally go with that. I got no problem with that. And then marketing grabbed ahold of it and said, Oh, look at Apple, they understand why they said that they can do Patagonia, and I totally get that. But if I look around me right now, okay, I have a book, I have a phone, I have a buro, I have glasses, I have a cup. Okay, none of those things did I buy Because of their why. So every single one of those, I just thought I want one of those. And I bought it. So it's transactional. Now, new paragraph, independent businesses, what makes them special is how and why they do stuff. And therefore, it's really interesting that I can choose which Cafe, which independent cafe I go to the one that I liked the vibe and I like the music. I like the art. I can choose which independent Shoemaker I go to, I can choose which accountant I go to, and so on and so forth. So it becomes more relevant how they do stuff. But my problem is I learned I know several agencies, sort of at 100 people who didn't know what their purpose was. And they were sent off by consultants to get to figure out what it was. And essentially, their purpose was, were a couple of people running a really great agency were great people doing great work with great people enjoying and everyone's making some money. We're making money, our clients are making money, our staff, and that's cool, but it wasn't saving the planet or anything. So I think that Simon Sinek has been repurposed, and abused in a way to be something more than it was meant to be. So yeah, lots of people don't really have a route map, you know, yeah, most people get to 40. And they still haven't quite got a route map. Some people have that's fantastic. I feel like you know, I'd love to have faith.
Bibi Raven 29:29
Because it's like, the Y becomes this Holy Grail, and you're working towards this holy grail. And in the meantime, you're not enjoying what you're doing right now. Right? So it's Yeah.
Robert Craven 29:40
So I think you do have a purpose, but it probably is not clearly articulated. And my argument would be why do people work with you? They work with you because they remember who you are. They like the way you talk. They like the results. You seem to get that people as Seth Godin So people buy from people like, they bought you. And that's what's going on. But my worry is that there's been too much emphasis on your why. So that's what marketing, big marketing agencies sold the idea of the why. And now you know, people don't this answers the question, people aren't buying your why they're buying your how they're buying how you do, they're buying the BB we're doing stuff, they're buying the engagement, and they're buying the relationship. So I think why, it's not wrong, do your independent business helps to have a community and common goals and common understanding, we know that everyone has to be on the same page. But I don't think, you know, I've had great people work for me who don't share my values, you know, awesome Excel spreadsheets and numbers and organising and sorting out long run, it didn't necessarily work because I kind of didn't see eye to eye on fundamental things. But I can't just employ people like me.
Bibi Raven 31:10
No, that's why the orange lawyer agency worked really well, because he's orange. And He's nothing like his clients.
Robert Craven 31:19
Funnily enough, just 10 minutes ago, in the middle of this call, he phoned.
Bibi Raven 31:23
Wow, that's crazy.
Robert Craven 31:26
That is really spooky. So your thing about Secrets of Success really is you're kind of discovering it as you go, rather than having a plan?
Bibi Raven 31:42
Yeah, I'm afraid so. But I'm sorry that I don't have a blueprint for success.
Robert Craven 31:48
Let me put the question in a different way. What do you think separates the successes from the failures? What separates the people who are doing okay, at the moment from the ones who are struggling? Because there's lots of people struggling.
Bibi Raven 32:01
Yeah. It's looking at what you've got, and not going by what somebody else tells you that it's the thing of sorry, but it's like SEO, you know, I mean, you can read so many blogs on SEO, and then it doesn't mean that's going to be your success. You have to be consistent and testing. Just throwing shit at the wall and seeing what you know what happens. But I guess for someone who's not like me, so it's not personality based or something like that. You have to find an angle that works for you. And then completely specialise in that angle. Like, I have this friend who's a link builder. And he's an amateur, I don't know if I can say his name, whatever, he's probably gonna hate me, or thank me. But he is an Indian Scotsman. And when he stalks nobody gets understands what he's saying. And it was really hard for him to get clients because there are a lot of SEO agencies from India. So you always got associated with those. And that's, you know, that can be tough. Because, yeah, he doesn't stand out. But then for some reason, I don't know how he did it. But he started to work with a big hip hop artist, and he used it for PR and link building campaigns. And use that. And now when you look at him, he's actually this weirdly cool combination of hip hop, Scottish, Indian, and still nobody gets the faculty saying, but he stands out for good reason. You know, so yeah, he's also a pharmacist, by the way, which is completely bizarre. Yeah, so it can move in very, very weird directions, how to find your angle? And how to find your angle also sounds stupid, like the, you know, focusing on the why to watch.
Robert Craven 34:15
I think you're absolutely right about the standing out. It's like, why should I bother to buy from you and I can buy from the competition? What makes it best? And then what? In a world of beige, you know, it is incredibly dull. So I find it quite fascinating that still so many people kind of go back to marketing one on one. I mean, in a sense that or rather they don't go just marketing a one on one. What they do is they think it's safe to have a website pretty much like everyone else's.
Bibi Raven 34:49
Yeah, but it's clearly not working anymore. You know, you have to look at the results, it's great. It's all textbook stuff, but is it working? No.
Robert Craven 34:58
So what do you think? In the world of Link, Bibi, I mean, we've now been this is must be the 10th year 10th year that link buildings are gonna die. Like, it's also this is the era video. And this is the year that Link building is gonna die and all the builders will be buried.
Bibi Raven 35:17
And they all go to hell.
Robert Craven 35:19
Absolutely, yeah. They all congregate with Gareth oil. Doing their link building thing on their own. I mean, how do you see them? I mean, we're in this world where? Yeah. In my mind, it's like Google was only in town. Now It's not. The world's changing. How do you see the next 12 or 18 months in the link building world sort of developing?
Bibi Raven 35:54
Yeah, so they're, like you say every, every other month now there's this thing that somebody says on Twitter, and then it's like, Oh, my God, I'm making buildings and oh, my gosh, you know? And then somebody else a couple of days later says no, no, we did they bring some nuance in it. And they say, Well, this type of thing billing is kind of dead, you know, but I feel, I don't know if Link building is gonna die at some point. But because the Link building is all around content. And so if it's gonna die, let's say all links become nofollow or whatever. And then they don't mean anything anymore. It's all part of marketing. So it's all part of PR and content and all that stuff. So it will transform into something else. I don't know what, what yet. But I don't think it's a bad thing to focus on link building. Because if it dies, then you still learn a lot about how to get the attention of people. And you can use it for another business. But I don't know if it's gonna die. Not sure. So they always say it. But still clients. I mean, I get more clients never. And they all want links. And yeah, and the traffic goes up.
Robert Craven 37:12
So you just see your businesses. Generally growing, we will still run, what do you imagine your business will look like in a year's time?
Bibi Raven 37:22
Yeah, that's a good one. So we've, I've had some growing pains, and it always comes down to operations. So getting the clients is going well. I can build links, but to scale it, that's we always hit that little growing pain and we need to hire more people. I'm not sure if I'm going to do that endlessly. You know, like, I have 18 people. Now, I don't know if I want to go to 50 or 100. But I do. People do ask me a lot more for training and consultancy. So maybe I can. I've done it a little bit now. But maybe I can add that to the business more.
Robert Craven 38:05
Well, you certainly can if you can. I mean, I had training and a speaking business. I think last year we did, I did 18 transatlantic flights and got paid big bucks for big stages. South Africa, US, Singapore, and so on and so forth. That's evaporated, I mean, a third of all. And we also did training in, I think, 14-15 countries last year, Netherlands, Belgium, Croatia, Poland, you know, the list goes on about where we've done training in San Diego. That's all dried up, you know, and being converted into kind of is and online stuff still happens, but it's not at the price and the fees and impact that it was so that will still exist, it will always exist, but I think it's gonna be tighter for a while. That's the world we're in. But first, there is a sense that if you can get the if you can get, you can have whatever the numbers are, you can have one person giving you 1000 euros a day, or you can get 50 people giving you 200 euros a day. Oh, that's interesting. So it's the same DNA, it's the same product. It's in one version, it's being multiplied out. And I think there are models around that.
Bibi Raven 39:37
Yeah, so maybe that will become acquired. I don't know. I don't think I want to grow like a giant big agency because I think the responsibility will weigh too heavily on me but it has to do with my mental.
Robert Craven 39:53
Yeah, I think you look at some of the people who run 200 person agencies, you just look at the bags under their eyes, you know, yeah, cool, they're driving a really nice car, and they've got really nice holidays, and so on and so forth. But if you've got 200 people, then every single day, every single hour, one of those people is kicking off about something. Every single hour, one of your clients is probably kicking off about something. Every cafe or bar you go to someone is probably saying, Oh, you did some work for me, we weren't very happy with it. Whereas, you know, when you're a 10th of that size, your problems are manageable.
Bibi Raven 40:35
Yeah. And the chain of communication is really short and stuff. So I think if I was gonna grow to 200 people, I definitely need some stoicism, therapy. To deal with that.
Robert Craven 40:54
Nice, nice to use, nice with use of the word already like that. So what's the plan for the next three or six months? Because we're kind of mid COVID. It looks like lockdowns are coming again. The UK just seems to be going back in, Israel has gone back in, Belgium, Spain.
Bibi Raven 41:15
Looks like pressing stuff depressing. Not always sounds depressing. It's realistic too.
Robert Craven 41:22
So what's the plan? Are there any is there a plan B?
Bibi Raven 41:27
Yeah, well, I don't have a plan B, to be honest. But I just want to get the server going through growth spurt. Now we're, I've hired more people, I want to get the operations, you know, at a really smooth level. And I'm not worried about getting more leads and more clients. Maybe that's stupid. I'll just continue whatever I'm doing. And if I, so like I said to you before, I always make sure that we're covering the cost of the employees with one clients. So at some point, that might be two clients. But let's say I lose a lot of clients because of another lockdown or something. It's a moment when I have noticed, I might have only five, then I'll start thinking about okay, maybe we need to have a plan B. But I haven't thought about a plan B so and I put it in my head. And I'd be like, what would I do if I wasn't building things?
Robert Craven 42:26
I just go back one more time into the comment made about clients. Because what is it agencies want? They always want better clients, they always want better people. Sounds like you've got the better people think kind of sorted out, although you're saying we're always aware that operations is DSU. But I just like to talk a bit about the better clans. Because that's like manna from heaven. That's a thing that every agency I talked to wants more beta clients. And you're saying that's not an issue for you. So is there a secret to that ?
Bibi Raven 43:08
Well, I would say raise your prices. So I was in December, I got a lot of leads. And then I thought oh, are you clapping? Thank you. Thank you. And I thought this is too much. I can't handle this right now. So what can I do? And I thought, let's double my prices. Because you know, maybe half of the leads will drop off, but at least it's come through, it will be the same work for weight. It will be the same work for more money. Yeah. So that made sense to me. And of course, it's really scary to double your prices. Yeah, but it worked really well. The clients that got through were actually better clients.
Robert Craven 43:48
So you doubled your prices. Are you saying that?
Bibi Raven 43:51
Yeah, yes. I love you. I think that's just fantastic. I mean, it's my thing. And not enough people do it. They're always like, give you a 10% discount, you know, boom, the margin just evaporates. There's no way you can, you know, it's far better to slow down the flow coming in on price. And otherwise, you're competing with Bangalore, head on with Fiverr. Yes. And so my whole client's qualifying process, which includes the pricing, of course, but also the terms that I put on my service page. And I also send people an 18 questions questionnaire. Yeah. 18 questions. So when a lead comes in, I send it to the service page, and I send them 18 questions. And then from if they don't fill in the questions, or if they fill it in, and I feel like this is not the client for me. They just drop off, right. So the clients that I end up with are way less, let's say 20% upon leads come in. But there are clients that are almost self fulfilling success. So because I qualified them that much, it's usually easier to fulfil for them, which is good for me. Because, you know, they could be happy clients, and it's gonna reflect well in business, they're going to tell their friends, their higher level friends, and then those are going to come in.
Robert Craven 45:25
That's a beautiful, virtuous circle. So you only attract the sorts of people who are attracted to you. And the way you talk, you only work with the ones who can afford the incredibly good value, high prices that you charge. And because of the circles that they move around with, they are able, on the assumption, they're impressed with your work, they will refer more of the similar people in. So you're constantly getting into the right circle, and you're wonderfully filtering out what I call the pond life and the scum, the people who don't want to be working with you during a process. And I absolutely love that. I think that's just great. I just wish more people would do something like that. So I think we've come to the end of our time I do. My final question is, are you were you to be out with some agency owners. At the end of the conference, if you remember those days, when you've been drinking, and having fun, or and you're kind of if you remember that you put your arm around someone and you wag your finger, and they say, What do you think I should do is my agency? And you go, this is my recommendation. This is not that this is you. But you'd be saying, you know, What would you do if you were running an agency like mine? What are your pearls of wisdom? What are your recommendations to people who run agencies?
Bibi Raven 46:59
I'm gonna sound like a grandma, but it's listening. So work on your listening skills, I think a lot of people aren't listening anymore. If you listen to the niche that you're targeting, or the clients that you have, or the leads that are coming in, you're gonna learn so much more than if you just impose your own assumptions and things that you read in a blog post on a client's. So I feel with leads that come in, when I talk to them or through email or whatever, the fact that I really listen, it just makes me stand apart as well.
Robert Craven 47:46
And that therefore assumes you're asking great questions.
Bibi Raven 47:50
Yeah, yeah, the questions are really important. It's, I think, I mean, that's not to be Socrates, or something. But he did point out the importance of asking questions, you know. So he was, so whenever someone comes to me with a pain point or a problem, I just start asking questions, because usually they know the answer themselves better than I do. Right. So yeah, I think Japanese people do it as well. There's Japanese philosophy about that, as well.
Robert Craven 48:28
I think there's a really interesting thing about school dealing, again, with the outer game. So the outer game is what other people say and tell you in responding to what they say. And then the InnoGames, kind of what's going on here. And of course, I would argue that very often we know what we should be doing. You just go to Google, how do you grow an agency, write a business plan, write a marketing plan, understand the environment, be competitive, be different and stand out from the rest. So we kind of know the what, you know, just Google it and find my book, you know, how do I do this, which is the inner game, which is, you know, why am I tolerating this from these people? Why am I tolerate whether it's clients or staff? Yeah, on the one hand, I'm saying, I'm going to do this, that and the other and then when I go into the room, I don't do it. So what's the inner game and the inner turmoil? What's the psychology going on? That's actually stopping me from doing it. So I think you're spot on, you know that really great questions mean that your agency, customer is king and so on and so forth, means that your agency's giving people what they want, and you're actually responding to what they want, as opposed to your preconceived ideas of what's easy for you to deliver. And I think that makes a difference. Bibi, our time is up. Thank you very much. I really enjoyed our slightly rambling but interesting conversation. You've given us a real insight into the agency and what the agency does and how the agency works, a real insight into the Bibi method. I think there's a book there. All the links and so on and so forth to your business or at the end of the show people will contact you. And all it was left for me to say thank you very, very much indeed for being a really great guest. Thank you very much.
Bibi Raven 50:33
Oh, thank you. It was fun.