Robert Craven interviews Chris Simmance
VIDEO: 53:19mins
AUTHOR: Robert Craven and Chris Simmance
In this episode of GYDA Talks Robert talks to Chris Simmance. Chris founded and grew Otpus Digital an SEO and search agency. Chris is now focusing on his new business Torque Partnership which assembles agile teams to accelerate digital transformation and provide skilled teams or individual consultants to companies.
This video was recorded prior to the COVIS-19 outbreak.
Robert and Chris discuss:
Who are Optus and Chris Simmance?
Growing Optus
Getting new clients and prospecting
ROI from events and speaking
Is there a secret formula to creating a successful agency?
Expert help and outside support – what worked for Chris
Getting out of your own way
The Manchester Story
Regrouping and figuring out where to take the business
How to be a great leader and resilience
Being an agency leader and the pressure that brings
Hiring the right people, niches,
Intelligent machine learning, data and Google – the death of search agencies
What’s next for Chris? Futurism.
Advice for agency owners
Transcription:
Robert Craven 00:30
Hello, and welcome to the Gyda initiative, podcast talks and today I'm absolutely delighted that my guest is Chris Simmance, from Optus. Hello, Chris. Hello. Hi, Chris. So tell us about yourself. Tell us who Chris Simmance is and, and tell us a bit about your backstory.
Chris Simmance 00:53
Okay, so I'm an accidental digital agency owner. I got into SEO, when I realised that it was a thing that taught me to get a good job at an agency and realised that I quite like doing things my own way and set up consultancy for myself and very quickly decided that actually quite like getting to do things my own way with other people helping me do it. And then Optus was born. And six years later, there were eight people in London and Manchester. And we focus on SEO and paid search primarily.
Robert Craven 01:33
Cool. And I've got tons of questions for you, I guess. Some people might say, eight people after a couple of years, that's not great progress. Because we hear these wonderful stories of they grew to 50 people in fire, recruit 100 people and they sold and they're richer than their wildest dreams. Is it eight people after how many years ago 680 people after six years, is that? Was that intended? Or is that a disappointment? Or is I mean, what's the what's the story behind?
Chris Simmance 02:09
Yeah, I think one of the key things, I think that quite a lot of people feel because every digital agency sees other agency owners and other agency staff shouting about themselves on LinkedIn and Twitter and going to events and everything's brilliant, and everyone is amazing. And we're the biggest and the best. And then you feel like you have to be the big fish, you have to have 5200 people to be the good agency. I realised a year or two ago, as I was trying, I was thinking I needed to be one of these big guys and how am I going to get funding? Do I have someone come in and start growing different areas of the business? Do we offer 1000s of services? And it was through your help and Jana Schatz really that that finally sort of drummed into my head that actually being the right size, and doing the best you can for eight people is just as good and effective as four people or 50 people. And it really does depend on what kind of business you want to be. So for us, I don't like the phrase. But I'd like to think of us as a boutique kind of agency. We're excellent at what we do. And we don't go outside of the boundaries of what we're excellent at. And that means eight people.
Robert Craven 03:27
What are your excellent.
Chris Simmance 03:29
SEO and paid search. So SEO primarily because I love the technical side of SEO, I love fixing problems and solving issues that are often otherwise hard to hard to solve unless you know what you're looking for. And from that kind of passion. I've picked up people along the way and hired the right people who are great at the content side, the on page and the off page side of stuff. And it's developed into a originally it was just me fixing technical problems as a technical SEO freelancer or consultant. And that's why I sort of built into an agency when I realised that, you know, SEO is the sum of all its parts, you can make a website as fast and as efficiently as possible. But you've got to have the content to back it up. And that wasn't one of my skills.
Robert Craven 04:17
Right. So that brings me straight on to the first question I've got down here, which is really about reaching, reaching clients. What is the message? What's the message that you try and get out there to clients with clients? You're talking to a home crowd at the moment? Yeah, clearly, clients aren't up to speed. So what's the message to your clients and how do you get that message out there?
Chris Simmance 04:41
In terms of prospecting for clients or in terms of,, so in terms of prospecting for clients, it's, I'd say that we're no different to quite a lot of the agencies in the guided group in many senses. Quite a lot of agencies pride themselves on we get all our business from referrals and they everyone kind of says that sort of thing. The reality is that if you run a retainer type business, then you're naturally going to get referrals in any way, because it's an incentive for people to stay longer if they're not locked in, but they're in a retainer model. So a client will work with you for quite a long time, over time, their head off or leave to go somewhere else and ask you to come in and talk to their team in the new place, and sort of grow a little bit of a network. And, for me, I think the key thing outside of getting referrals has been developing a bit of a thought leadership sort of ilk. I don't like to say I'm an expert, because there's always something new to learn, there's always something that someone is better than new at. But I, I do, I do spend a lot of time travelling and speaking to different agencies, different agency owners, different people who work at agencies, doing training courses, and things like Brighton, SEO and stuff like that. Where that in invariably helps you prospect people, because clients just keep seeing you around or prospects keep seeing you pop up at different events and, and then when they when you do meet them at a networking event somewhere, they somehow know who you are, because you've spoken here, you've spoken there, you've been at this thing you've done Robert Craven as well famous podcast and things like that. So, you know.
Robert Craven 06:27
So can you I mean, you're a bit of a numbers guy. So can you actually, I'm not asking for the specific number, but can you actually see an ROI from it. So it sounds like what you've done is you've sat down and you said, Okay, I want to create a name for myself, I actually want to find the stages, find the platform. Now there's, there's loads of people in the digital agency world who are out there on the platforms, you can go to inorbit, you can go to your ungagged, you can go to Brighton, SEO, and there they are the same, probably 20 People 25 People with roughly the same slide deck they had last year. And you and I both have been on their platform. I wonder if everyone on those platforms is actually growing their agency for their celebrity or whether it's just just a vanity thing? I mean, can you can you see an ROI your public.
Chris Simmance 07:28
And if I did some analysis, I'd be able to put a pound on for every pound spent. But there is definitely a positive ROI. And I think that distinction is that I look at this, the speaking and the events, attendance in two different things, you've got the industry stuff, which is where you'll stand up in front of your peers and explain or talk or share things that add value to their businesses. And ultimately, really, what you're doing is you're sharing in the community, that's really good for promotion and for awareness. And, you know, if you want to put something in your pitch deck, you can say I spoke at these industry events, it's on the big stage, etc. But then there's the other side, which is the non industry events, and you kind of say, you know, speak to the National Association of dentists about local SEO. And that's the one which often either you have to pay to play or you get invited to be there. And either way you decide whether or not if I pay x pounds or whatever to speak, what are the chances of getting some leads in do these people have the value that they can bring, and often the case that you'll either take the gig, and you'll almost certainly always come away with some business. And sometimes even in an ideal world, they'll pay you to pretend and you get clients from it, which is great. But the two types of, of, of presence building being the industry and the non industry, they both go hand in hand quite well. And you can then assess the value of a presentation in an industry event and adjust it to speak to people who don't understand the industry at all. Again, they both provide a good ROI.
Robert Craven 09:13
Okay, so the bit that I'd still like to drill down to is kind of the differentiator which is why should people buy from Optus? You know, when they can live in a competition with cheaper, faster, friendlier, ruder, smarter and brighter, more open? I mean, it's just, Yeah.
Chris Simmance 09:37
I'd like to say that every agency has its own USP and everyone's got almost every single agency that seems to have a big word wall with their values and their stuff like that. And they've got their office dog and they've got their beanbag and they've got their Chief morale officer kind of thing. They've got a big office with glass windows for their meeting rooms and that's stuff. And there's always this weekend more all that sort of stuff. I think when it comes to talking to prospective clients, I think the key thing that does make a difference. And the reason I know this is because having been in hundreds of pitches and hundreds of meetings with clients, prospects, past clients, etc, they've all said, you get us, you know who we are, and because you listen, but also, you don't give any BS at this, as if something needs to be done, it needs to be done. And Google doesn't give a damn about you, or your business or any of those things. So doing the things that we're advising you to do, because you're paying us to advise you correctly, isn't a choice, per se. And we've got to help you get around to doing that. And often building that right relationship is something that lots of agencies don't do, they come in the door, they've been sold this fancy thing. A good third of the fees they pay is just on some non fee earning admin person who, who does a good job probably, but isn't really integral to the client's success, and a lot of faff is around things. So we kind of cut as much fluff out as possible. And we'll have really short reports with what are the three things that you really want to know? And what are the key three measures of success? We'll record everything else, but we only talk about the things that need to be talked about. And there's, I think there's a level of trust, you can earn quite quickly by just being you and being honest.
Robert Craven 11:40
And does that. Sometimes, I might be answering the question, Does that explain how you're able to compete against the big boys?
Chris Simmance 11:51
I think so. Yeah. And, and I, when we go into A into A. So famously, famously, for me, and then Noctus, we went into a pitch a year ago with a really big health care company. And we, I knew who some of the other agencies going in where they were really big, you know, 100, plus employees, big award winning staff, etc. And they obviously have nice fluffy decks and all that sort of stuff. And, I went in with no presentation at all, and three tabs open on my desktop browser, put it up on the screen, and did some numbers. Do you agree that even if you don't think these numbers are 100% accurate, that they're at least as equally inaccurate for this client, and this competitor in this competitor? What number means this to you, and then we did some maths in front of them. And that one, won the client, because everyone else came in and said, you know, we've worked with these people, we've done these things, we care more, and we've got a dog in the office and the beanbag the, the differences, I looked at it and realised that actually, they, they, it's the pain they had is no one really knows how to make them more money and more business. The game that there was to be had with someone actually just doing the thing they needed doing, and trusting they could get it done. And I just didn't need to bullshit them really.
Robert Craven 13:28
But I worked with a significant service provider recently with the sales directors. And we got the sales directors doing doing pitches, elevator pitches, and I was so appalled at how inept, they were at talking about their business to a potential client, because they just went off on a tangent, as you say about the dog and beanbags and ping pong table and the award. As a client, I don't really care about that. As a client, what do I want? And it's not even that I don't even want SEO. What I want is more customers. You know, if you're able to help me get more customers, you're, you're my friend. And so it's almost like these large agencies had forgotten why I'm not gonna start. But they almost forgot about why they existed and why they're why they're in front of clients.
Chris Simmance 14:32
What you do for me is the thing they want to know. Yeah. Yeah,
Robert Craven 14:40
They don't want to know what you do. They don't know what you do. They know what you do for them. Yeah, they're able to do that. So is there a yes, six years in the game? You've been up to being down. You've been left, you've been right. Is there some kind of secret formula of success or magic? formulas and silver bullet is something that you use now you now realise is the way to make an agent's more successful than someone just setting up shop and waiting for emails to come in.
Chris Simmance 15:13
I think, if you look at your, you know, the FICO side of things, the finance, marketing, etc, avoids finance, marketing operations. And there are, there's almost like three different secret sources in a sense, the finance side of things is knowing the numbers. If you don't know your numbers in order to operate or sell, then then the rest falls down. And once you know that, hallelujah, praise me know your numbers and know what the next goal is, you know, there's no point in setting up an agency with 100,000 pounds in the bank and go, Well, we've got 100,000 pounds, we can work out the numbers later, you just set up an agency with zero pounds in the bank and build because you've got, the more you've got to lose, the more you're likely to, to work for it. On the marketing side of things, I think that it's knowing your audience knows your people, who are you selling? What to do? What is it that motivates them to buy, as opposed to, you know, what, if you're looking at CMO, head of digital level type people, they've worked with a lot of agencies in the past, so what is it that that that they're frustrated with that you can do differently or explore communicate better, and sticking to that as a message, you know, from the first communication all the way through to the entire lifecycle is, you know, sticking to knowing that you're different because you're not doing whatever it is that that's, that's, that's frustrated them in the past, and also knowing the goals. And then, you know, on an operational point of view, again, knowing the numbers is a different kind of point. The clients have things they need to achieve, and you've got the leading goals on the way up to that achievement. So they want 1000 more sales a month or something like that, well, you know, that the the KPIs or whatever they might be, and knowing those for every client quite intimately and referring back to them in the right communication. It's sticking to the same message across all the board, I think is quite important. And we've learned that the hard way by trying to adjust things a bit one way or another way, thinking oh, well, we can we can do more here or do more there, and then accidentally muddying things and sometimes we've lost clients where they've said, we just didn't know what was going on anymore, because this person was talking to us about this and this and this. And, and then we've got other clients who've really, really enjoyed having one point of contact, and then that all gets disseminated and the reports are really simple. All they need to do is copy and paste and stick it in their PowerPoint for their boss and things like that. So keep it clear, and keep it simple, stupid.
Robert Craven 18:07
So you alluded to consulting and coaching. And, you know, the disclaimer here is we have worked together. But I'd like to get a handle on your point of view of that outside help and that outside support. I don't know about the work that we've done with you, but but generally so there's masterminding there's coaching, the there's consulting and clearly they're not everyone's cup of tea and clearly there's there's a window of opportunity when one's right we really interesting to hear to hear your your views on on how external support helps and when it works and what doesn't work and what you found useful.
Chris Simmance 18:54
Yeah. So on all fronts, I think you have to be in the right place either personally or professionally to be able to do it. Otherwise you're just ticking a box and throwing money at someone you know, back in the second year I set up Optus, I was an arrogant bugger. Some people say I am now but I was even more so. And and the and I wasn't in a bit I was in a position where I'd sit there and I'd nod and I inflate a number here and there to look bigger and better and actually get no value from these sorts of things and it just didn't didn't do any do me any good. So if you're in the right frame of mind to realise that there is something to learn and do better than then any one of coaching masterminding or or or coaching masterminding and the other one consulting will be better for you. And the value that I've got personally in the last couple of years from masterminding is that no matter what kind of level you're at in terms of size of an agency, everyone almost has the exact same problems. They're just on a different scale. And, you know, I've seen agency owners with 100 Odd staff who, in terms of the number of headaches they have, not just from staff, but in terms of the scale side of things. And then the ultimate net profit at the end of the bid at the end of the day, is actually comparatively lower than the person agency. You know, I know, from a numbers point of view that we're doing very, very well in terms of EBIT and net profit, primarily, because we're doing one thing really well and we've got a lot less headaches. We've got the normal headaches, but a lower scale, and masterminding, has helped me realise that I can help big agency owners because I've had experience in solving a problem on a smaller scale, that they can then escalate up to their size and vice versa. And when you realise that there's enough websites, enough businesses and enough people out there, that you aren't directly competing with every other agency owner, and you can help each other and you are ready to listen, then, you know, mastermind groups are absolutely fantastic. If they're, you know, if they're chaired properly, they're brilliant. Usually, I come out feeling pretty bruised. But it's like the gym, you always come out feeling a little bit bruised, and a couple of hours later, you feel fully sort of pumped up and ready to roll. With, with with coaching, I think it's an entirely different ball game because it occurred to me yesterday, in fact, actually that the, from a coaching point of view it most agency owners and heads off don't are in that position because they don't like to be they like to be the boss, they don't like to be told what to do. And it's very easy to misconstrue a coach giving, making you accountable for something as you are being accountable to them. But when you realise that, actually, you're only accountable to yourself, and they're just facilitating the thing that you know that you need to do. It's an awful lot easier. You know, I've sat in, in coaching sessions with my arms, folded my head down, and just kind of grumpy muttering everything that's been said to me, and youngish will will will agree that I'm almost entirely by about mid afternoon about ready to walk out the door and throw my laptop out a window. And then 10 minutes after the session, I realised actually, it's is the right thing, because I've actually not been told what to do, I've kind of talked myself into by coaching, the right way of doing it for the for our agencyю
Robert Craven 22:45
That requires a real level of vulnerability to admit that you're wrong, and everything you do. Most of your time is I'm the owner, I'm your boss, I'm the keynote speaker. You spend most of your time in control or being the one who knows the answer to everything. Yeah, I think it's, I mean, for all of us. Don't talk too much myself as much as listening. It's just that Okay, so maybe I am wrong. And maybe there's, maybe there's a better way of doing stuff than the way that I've done it actually. Maybe I'm not quite as great as I, as I said, Oh, yeah. And that's, that's a really tough thing. With all the machismo and stuff, it's a really tough thing to, to, to expose that vulnerability to someone because that exposure implies weakness. You're saying, I'm weak and I'm frail.
Chris Simmance 23:51
Yeah. i One of the biggest changes in Optus was me realising to get out my own way, for certain things that I know that I wasn't as good at. And I'm, I'm good at talking to people and working with people and things like that. But from a management point of view, it's not my forte. And, and that was very hard to come and realise, but when I did, things changed very quickly.
Robert Craven 24:24
Me, to get out of my own way. I just love that.
Chris Simmance 24:30
Every time I did something, I was like, this is the best idea ever. And it's not work. Someone else must be to blame. And then I realised afterwards, someone else can't always be to blame. It has to be something else. It can't be nice.
Robert Craven 24:45
There's a common factor and it's always me.
Chris Simmance 24:48
Yeah. And getting the right people that you can trust and then empower and those people care and really do love what they do, then you can get out of your own way and know that you know that Vicki has got all of the finance stuff locked up, then has got all the all of the PPC and team stuff locked up. And all I need to do is be reported to and I know what's going on without having to pick a pick there and make everyone pissed off.
Robert Craven 25:23
So that's interesting, but that's a very grown up way of running. So we've had this conversation before in the pub, I just want you to run through what I call the Manchester story. And what the lessons were just, you didn't tell me the story of Manchester. It's more about your, your entry into the Manchester digital agency world, I suppose. Just run us through a very quick, I think a fascinating story. I'd love to know what the lessons
Chris Simmance 25:57
Yeah. So I suppose the story is less about Manchester and how I accidentally moved my agency to Manchester. Effectively, I set up another business called under two, it's a web development business focused on fast websites with my business partner who is based in Manchester. And as part of that I was going up there an awful lot more. And at the same time Optus was going through a rough spell with, well, actually all ends of the spectrum, you know, my decision making got us into some trouble. And I got and I realised that things needed to change. So in changing those things, we hired a few people in London, one person was from Yorkshire at the time, but she lived in London, and one person we hired up in Manchester because I thought, you know, since I'm up here a lot, it makes sense to have a bit of a long term presence. And the girl who was from Yorkshire, but lived in London, and unfortunately had a house fire and said, Look, you know, one day, I've got to move back up to up north, because I really love it there. And I'm not happy as I will be in London kind of priming to leave the business. And I said, Well, here's a laptop, we trust you to go to the office in Manchester, if you like. And without realising it, I kind of realised a bit later that it doesn't really matter where you are. We do what we've got within the team, everyone's got slack or a variation of that. And we've got this role where you can work wherever you like, as long as within two days of the week, you're in the office for meetings and whatnot. And, everyone, you know, liked that idea. But then I have all these messages on Slack and things like that. How do you do? What can I have link here, link there documents sharing and all this sort of stuff. So we decided that you can't ask a question, or give an answer in a sentence or less, then you have to have a zoom call. So have you got five minutes for a zoom call, I need to ask you something, then you put it in the calendar and have a recall. And it meant that you can kind of see the whites of someone's eyes. So from a remote point of view, everyone was working where they liked. Now, the only people in London and myself and thinking because everyone's up in Manchester, and then I had a digital is outstanding. And because he's so good at what he does, obviously he wants to work with people around him who are nearby. So from a hiring point of view, Manchester is where we're going. And not to say people in London are bad or anything like that at all because well I'm excellent. I'm in London. But there is a really good digital talent up in up in the north and there's some big agencies there that hoover up good stuff. And some of them get a bit disillusioned anyway. But otherwise, we're you know, we're looking for really good bloody bloody good people in Manchester. And there's a lot of them to be found.
Robert Craven 29:22
So, so many stories. I mean, was it just all plain sailing or?
Chris Simmance 29:28
No, no, no. The development business took a lot of my focus one way which then left me without much focus on Optus that then made problems with Optus harder problems with that with under two harder. So that decision was that we'd kind of decouple the two businesses and run them as two separate entities. Then, I think 80 hour weeks and about three trips up to Manchester a week and things like that. We're beginning to kill me. So, no, it wasn't plain sailing. But I think that rather than have a car crash, we had a controlled landing, as Yeah. So we decided where to park
Robert Craven 30:21
Bordering on you?,
Chris Simmance 30:23
Yes, exactly. I decided where to fall rather than just fall. And I think that doing that we slowed ourselves down on both fronts. We regrouped on the finance, the marketing, the operations, the people and the culture, we got advice from you and from youngish on, on where to focus and attention and things like that. And I think getting the headspace was really important. So the Manchester accidental move to the agency was through, not focusing enough on the right things. And lots of different things happened. But when we pulled everything back, we realised that actually this, there's a lot of good opportunities here that we otherwise would have missed. Because we were focused and blinkered the whole way through.
Robert Craven 31:13
So it's, every cloud has a silver lining, if you chase two rabbits, you catch neither the other lessons to be learned from that.
Chris Simmance 31:24
And if you're stressed, you make bad decisions, and it's best to make no decisions and stop and think. So, think before you do stuff.
Robert Craven 31:42
That's really interesting. What is quite interesting now I've been going for six years is, how does, how does the whole keep on going thing, work that for 48 weeks of the year, it's more than just one. It's more than just coffee. That every day you come in your chair for the Christmas everyone expects to see for your staff for your peers, your clients, your competitors for networking, I mean, it's a real personal reset just every morning you get resilience and so on.
Chris Simmance 32:27
You've seen me first thing in the morning with a coffee Rob I've still got a smile somewhere. But I think that way back before I started Optus or even knew what SEO was. I got ill. I was in hospital for quite a long time. I've got Crohn's disease, so I had like a metre and a half my bowels taken away. And it affected me throughout all of school and things like that. So I learned a lot about being resilient to things because there's, if you live with chronic fatigue or a chronic illness, and all the time you're knackered you're not going to get very far if you let it let it keep you. So all the time that is if you see it as an opportunity to not let it defeat you. And then over time become resilient to other things. So when things don't go your way, rather than getting upset and being irrational or on naturally, everyone immediately is irrational. And then the rational mind takes over. But I always look at things from as pragmatic a point of view as I can. So when I feel rubbish, or have had a bad day, or previously and I've still got to then talk to the same person, the next morning that I've had a bad afternoon or a bad day with it's an opportunity to turn that into a positive. That makes me happy and makes me smile. And the reason I do this and the reason I've been doing it for six years, as you know, you speak to a lot of agency owners and a lot of people who work in agencies, it's a stressful environment, a stressful industry as with quite a lot of others, and resilience is key to dealing with stress and, and fatigue. And if you're resilient, you tend to stop and check yourself before you do it.
Robert Craven 34:18
Sorry, I sort of say the obvious but what is what is resilient? And how do you know first of all, how do you know if you're surviving or you're thriving? And what would you say the word resilience but what is what is just it's just resilience being tough.
Chris Simmance 34:36
I think resilient, and I think recognising that you aren't bulletproof is the first point. If you know that you're fallible and you aren't bulletproof, then you're able to take things on the chin better when things don't go right. There's you can't you don't have to. You're not then blaming it on something else immediately, you are able to identify that. That isn't it, there is a reason for all of the things that either you've chosen to do or have happened around you. And because you know that it could be you, or something is out of your control, then it's easier to handle from an emotional point of view. Because you can say, Okay, I can't fix this right now, I'm not going to worry until I can fix it or I can.
Robert Craven 35:37
If only, if only, you know that, all of us. So all of us wake up at five o'clock in the morning, we wake up, we go for a pee or whatever it is. And then it's like, Oh, my God, today, I've got to have a chat with that member of staff, I got to talk to that client, I want to make sure this is working, I also need to do that proposal that needs finishing. And that's it. You know, being asleep, being asleep is over. If only, you know, if you have the secret to tell me how to go. Good morning, there's things I need to do. But I don't need to worry about it until I get into the office. So I can just go back to sleep isn't that part of our DNA is
Chris Simmance 36:16
I don't know. I don't know. Because see, for me when I've got something I don't want to have to deal with. But I know I have to. Then I'll for example, if it's a if it's an email, which I know I've got to send, and it's not going to be received well, or something like that, or it's a call I don't want to have to have and book but I know I'm going to have to get into it, then rather than worry about it all weekend, and then send the email on Monday, I'll write and send the email on on the Friday, but I'll press Send Later, and it will send at 9am on Monday morning. So in my irrational brain, it's sent and dealt with and in my rational brain, it's just sitting there waiting to go the that on, on all phones you can have Do Not Disturb between certain times, or even have them off. I tend, if I wake up in the night, having an irrational dream about something work related or you know, being on stage. And typically, I take a little walk around the flat, look out the window, look and see what there is to see. And by the time I've done that, then I've kind of passed out of my head a bit. And then I just count to 100. And I'm asleep again.
Robert Craven 37:36
What I saw this morning was that your job is to be the best person you'd like. Your job is to be the best person that your dog thinks you really are.
Chris Simmance 37:53
I think I am, yeah.
Robert Craven 37:56
That's a tougher engine. Next question is one that actually you put up on Facebook all over the place I've seen. So you got to talk about it. Which is really what is in your mind? What are the big things? We'll talk about the big things a little bit short term? What do you think the big challenges are? For agencies? What do you think the big challenge is, in terms of this, this environment we're in, which is unrecognisable in many ways from the environment we're in certainly six years ago, when you set in half the businesses in half of platforms that people use didn't exist, half the measures didn't exist, half the agencies didn't exist. What do you see as the big pressures on how agencies are going to perform and deliver? Just in those kinds of long term trends? I'm really interested to hear what you think they are. And
Chris Simmance 39:00
two to two things, I suppose that the first thing is, I think that the talent market is going to be a big problem. And people are already feeling that now. Like you say there's how many different tools and platforms and ways of doing things and, and all of these measures and things like that, and not one person can look after all of those things for one client properly anyway, already, unless it's a tiniest of tiny clients and then half of it's meaningless, which is unfortunate. But as things develop, and as technologies develop, and as tools come in and need to change, even as SEO develops or or even PPC, there's going to be a problem with hiring the right people at the rate that things develop, and then it might at that point be a tipping. There might be a tipping point where it's too expensive to keep hiring people as things develop. And then, the industry itself kind of suffocates itself because you can't do it as well as the robot still does it, because it's got all this data. There aren't enough people who are. And I don't mean this in a horrible way, they're not smart enough, because they haven't, there isn't the opportunity to sit there and learn all the time. They're doing 10 hour days, plus working on the weekends is most of the time. And they, no one can really still keep up with everything. So you will end up potentially with really, really niche niche people who are like the Python or the JavaScript guru expert. And you'll end up with a JavaScript agency or something like that, where they only focus on the one tiny aspect of this entire big puzzle. And it's almost like a niche within the niche of the agencies, because the market just can't handle the needs of its capacity. The other thing that worries me more is that I and I realised that this might sound silly being an agency owner, but I'm, I'm relatively confident that unless agencies evolve relatively rapidly, that the the death knell for SEO and PPC is on it's on the verge of being run anyway. Google doesn't, doesn't give you search results, and ads, and all of that for free for no reason. They've had 21 years of gathering all this data, they now know your heart rate through Fitbit, and all that sort of stuff. They know where you've driven, because you've got Google Maps, and Waze. They know who you've called for you to text all of these things, the amount of data is so much now that it's and I'm not talking about AI, because that's no one really understands AI when I'm talking about intelligent, intelligent, machine learning tools. So for the put to the point, that for example, one day rather than searching in Google, it will say, Hey, Chris, how do you fancy this new BMW three series in the colour that you like, you'll be approved for the finance department exchanged this, and there's no searching needed, because it knows who you are, where you go, knows what you'd like to drive, how you'd like to drive, when you like to drive? What makes you feel good when you can? So you know, say on social media, I've got this and that and the other. The, to the point now, where you don't need ads and 10, blue links. It's about what is it that you want and it becomes Google then becomes an answer gateway, or it provides the answer before you've even asked the question in some.
Robert Craven 42:58
Interesting enough. That's what worries me in a different way, in a different way, but actually joining the dots. So what my worry is that the agency becomes superfluous, because Google, whoever it is, will create an app, which will do Google ads for $10 a month. You know, the technology is already there. You're a shoe shop, you're in London, and we've got data on 50,000 shoe shops across the world during the winter. So just leave, just leave, just leave it all to us, we'll do that more, we're able to do SEO. So that kind of makes many agencies redundant. And then if that's not going on, then the channel partner approach, I run an agency, I'm going to sell to the institute's directors, I'm gonna sell to the Chamber of Commerce or whatever it is. That's Google going to one agency, one agency takes 50,000 customers, so that takes that piece out, which is really scary. And then the final piece is, you come out and come out of the cinema. And you voice search, you say: Where's good to eat near here. And Google says the best place to eat here is Nando's. It's the first I left, and most people have whatever it is chicken. You know, so despite all your best intentions of running another, another restaurant nearby, you've been taken out of it. And again, the agency as we know it today doesn't exist because Google has got all that information already. And it's got its preferred restaurants nearby. And, in respect to the way that people actually use and, and interrogate Voice Search. And the fact that there is no money in voice search at the moment for Google. You just have to think about how those models are going to work. And, as I say, those models may not include agencies. We're not agency.
Chris Simmance 45:01
And this is where I think if evolution needs to happen rather than, rather than extinction, the agency of today isn't what anyone will be looking at in the future. It really isn't. You know, in five years time you will have people who still do what we do right now. And they're still going to be the people who do $10 a month for 50, bookmark links or whatever, from 2011. But the, the agency of now, which is evolving our agencies, which look at things from an entity's point of view, looking at Semantic Web and markup so that websites are almost then superfluous because you've made the information so clear that a robot will understand it from a human point of view. And, you know, Dixon's tool inlinks is one of those examples, which is, it's fantastically useful for understanding how our website looks from an entity point of view. And if agencies start thinking along those lines, then that other restaurant next door to Nando's when you search on by voice, you might say what's the best restaurant near me? It will say, the best restaurant near you is this one, it's the pizza place because you like pizza. Yeah. Or it will say, this place has jazz music, and you like jazz music, and it does sells Piri chicken Nando's is also next door if you prefer that. Or it'll also say.
Robert Craven 46:33
And you're celiac or you're vegan.
Chris Simmance 46:37
So it's, it's that kind of stuff where you're working with the user generated content and reviews and the listings on things like Google Maps and whatnot. That's why That's why they Google introduced like the Google Local Guide stuff because they are allowing you to take photos you think you think you're you're saying this restaurant was lovely and this and the other and you're actually taking photos of things on a menu, giving them the information saying how expensive was saying where it was what you found useful, how busy it was, you know, it can dissect the review and understand the sentiment of it through the entities and and using its you know, its NLP tool, it can then decide this suits this person because of this language and this sentiment dadadada dA. So when you ask the best restaurant nearby, it will say it's not Nando's because or it's Gregg's because you'd really love sausage rolls.
Robert Craven 47:34
For me wandering the streets of Brighton after numerous pints of beer and falling into a great restaurant with the chance and and, and synchronicity and randomness is the thing that makes great events not being something you know, you're going to like because it fits in every
Chris Simmance 48:01
Yeah, I suppose. Things often change without realising it from a social point of view anyway. But equally, if technology changes to how things are developing, you could end up in a situation where you don't have those nights out anymore, because your Fitbit knows how much you've drunk. And if you keep drinking that much, then your health insurance is at risk. And you then don't have those kinds of nights. So past 10 o'clock at night, you're walking nice and quietly into the lovely restaurant, and you're not drinking any caffeine and you're eating tofu biscuits or something,
Robert Craven 48:36
and I'm not allowed to serve you up. The whole state only wants you to drink so much. There was a book, which I'll tell you, right, so what next Christmas? What's next?
Chris Simmance 48:49
Next to me? Well, I've separated the speaking side of things into a separate business entirely. The reason being is, well first of all, I really love standing on the stage and having people applauded. The best way to do it is to get lots and lots of leads for that separately. And those will naturally help Optus and undertow. Anyway, Judging by the last few minutes of conversation, you won't be surprised to hear that the niche is futurism. So, I, I'm spending an awful lot of time reading, researching, understanding and this is why you know, this is a lot more interesting to me now being an agency owner because it's an awful lot easier to to migrate into that. Next within that, I think diff for me, we're really really we've got a very robust three year plan now. We're actually having a chat about it in about half an hour's time with the leadership team. The the planning includes growth as well as churn with with heavily, I'd say someone, someone looked at the look to them the other day and asked if I used to be an engineer, because we've really we've gotten down to like the really nitty gritty, with a lovely, beautiful, lovely, beautiful Gantt chart of what point to hire based on when you get a lead in and things like that. It's brilliant, beautiful. And, the growth plan involves me getting out of the way a little bit more, to allow the leadership team to bring in the right people who do the right things. So get out of the way more, but get the right in the way of the right things.
Robert Craven 50:41
And finally, absolutely, finally, what do you think are your top tips? Or what would you wish you'd done? Done earlier on in your, in your agency owner career? What are your top tips.
Chris Simmance 50:55
And I think that early on, I was really really conservative and worried and had a lot of cash in the bank and not a lot going out. And, and I thought that was how you grew. And it was just about the in the in the bank. When I realised that once you are really hot on your numbers, and you're hot on your message, and you've got the right operational structure, it isn't as much about taking a risk and spending money. It's about knowing what the reward could be and understanding how it works. So knowing the numbers and staying on message is something which I wish I'd known a few years ago. But equally and it's I. I'm pleased that we had the problems that we had. And I'm pleased that the stress that came with it and the and the the financial and operational issues that came with that happened, because it's actually made us enormously more effective and efficient and happier as a team. So forget what you wish you knew, because I wish I didn't know it. But on the other side of things, I'm really enormously pleased that I've had the hard stuff to deal with because it's actually made things much better in the long run.
Robert Craven 52:15
Brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. Chris, thank you so much for being our guest. That's been a really invaluable 45 minutes. Taking so much about away from that about your, your workman like approach to know the finance know the marksman, you know, the operations and also
Chris Simmance 52:35
Been drummed into me.
Robert Craven 52:37
Yeah, but also about vulnerability and, and, and being open and being willing to admit you're wrong and being willing to pick yourself up. And also, I just love the idea that you don't have to be big, that you can run your own race at your own speed and get your own results for your business, you're worth doing. So, Christians, thank you very much for being our guest.