Ryan McKenzie is doing what he can to help save the planet. His super-effective laundry detergent strips are keeping millions of plastic laundry jugs out of landfills each year. He also wants to save your brand from bad video advertising.
I invited Ryan on the show again because his approach to video advertising is just awesome. Here at OMG Commerce, we have the privilege of running all of his Google and YouTube ads so we’ve seen firsthand their rocket ship growth. They were Canada’s 2nd fastest growing start-up and have grown from 7 employees to 200 in record time. In this episode, we break down Ryan’s 7-step framework behind his video ads that are fueling $100k/day in ad spend. Here’s a look at what we cover:
- What is a powerful pattern interrupt and how to use one.
- Why having a villain in your ads is a good thing. Hint: Your villain probably isn’t a person.
- How many and how to most effectively use Calls to Action.
- Biggest surprises on what works and what doesn’t.
- How to use logic and emotion.
Ryan McKenzie
Mentioned in this episode:
Episode Transcript:
Brett:
Well, hello and welcome to another edition of the E-commerce Evolution podcast. I am absolutely thrilled to be discussing this topic we're about to unpack for you and thrilled about my guest who's coming on the show. Guest is a personal friend of mine. We hang out for a while or hang out a number of times over recent years, maybe not so much with the pandemic but pre-pandemic we did and we hang out online a decent amount.
Brett:
And so today, we're talking about YouTube creatives and really video ads specifically. So video ads across platforms and the guy I'm bringing on the show today, he and his company are just creating some fantastic content. We have the benefit of running this content on YouTube and GN and it's just brilliant.
Brett:
This episode is brought to you by E-commerce Influence. If you enjoy my podcast, you've got to check out E-commerce Influence hosted by my friend, Austin Brawner. Austin interviews world-class e-commerce operators like Native Deodorant founder, Moiz Ali, MVMT Watches CEO, Jake Kassan, and Pura Vida Bracelets founder, Griffin Thall. He deep dives into what's working right now to scale your business and he offers a refreshing break from the crushing culture plaguing our industry. The E-commerce Influence podcast will not only change your perspective on changing your business but change your perspective on what's possible for your life. I've known Austin for years. He's the real deal and he's someone you need to listen to if you're serious about growing your business. Check out the E-commerce Influence podcast for free wherever you get your podcasts. And now, back to the show.
Brett:
My guest today is Mr. Ryan McKenzie. Ryan's an awesome guy. He is also the co-founder and CMO of Tru Earth, a laundry detergent strip company, and so you'll get to hear all about Tru Earth in a minute. They are just absolutely blowing up in Canada, the US, and beyond. And they've created some amazing video ads. We're going to unpack those and want to dig in a little bit to what Ryan's philosophies are and what the anatomy of a great, winning video ad is. So lots of fun stuff to unpack there. But with that, Ryan, welcome to the show, man. How you doing? And thanks for coming on.
Ryan:
I'm great, man. Thanks for having me, Brett. This is actually the second episode that we've recorded I think.
Brett:
This is the second episode. That's right.
Ryan:
Yeah. This is the second.
Brett:
Man, it's been a little while. Yeah. So we were just reminiscing about when we met and I think we've got it nailed down. It was at Blue Ribbon Denver, which was one of Ezra Firestone's mastermind. I just got off stage. I think we were in route to the bathroom and we struck up a conversation and the rest is history and so it's been a fun ride for sure. And man, you guys have just absolutely exploded because that was just maybe two years ago, three years ago. I'm terrible with dates by the way. So I have no idea.
Ryan:
Yeah. I think it was three years ago this summer. Yeah. Because Nashville was the January event. So yeah. It's been about. It was before Tru Earth because I did ... Tru Earth didn't exist.
Brett:
Right. It was even pre-Tru Earth, which blows my mind even more because you guys are setting growth records and killing it and just doing amazing things. So really, really fun. Before we dive into your philosophy, your formulas for winning video ads, tell everybody what is Tru Earth, why is it so unique, why are you so excited about it, and why is it blowing up?
Ryan:
Yeah. It's been pretty crazy but, yeah, Tru Earth is, as you can see if you're watching on video, it's this little tiny laundry detergent strip that replaces liquid laundry detergent, powder laundry detergent, or even pods. And what's crazy about it is this strip weighs 1.7 grams where a regular load of laundry weighs anywhere between 30 and 45 grams, which is like an ounce to an ounce and a half ...
Brett:
The laundry detergent itself, like liquid detergent.
Ryan:
Yeah. So it's super tiny. It's premeasured. You don't have to measure anything. You just take it, throw it in your laundry.
Brett:
It's smaller than the size of an index card for those who are just listening and not watching.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
It's a piece of paper basically. In comparison to the iPhone, it's considerably smaller than Ryan's iPhone 12.
Ryan:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then on top of that, it comes in ..
Brett:
As thin as paper.
Ryan:
Thin as paper. It comes in a cardboard sleeve, which is compostable, which helps keep plastic laundry jugs out of landfills since very small percentage of them are recyclable. So it's been really fun. We're getting to grow a business that's positively impacting the world and helping make sure that my kids and your kids get to have a healthy planet.
Brett:
Yeah. I love it. And what's so interesting is that it's become more trendy to talk about environmental causes and to have a smaller footprint and to be more responsible as a company and there's certainly some companies that have nice marketing messages but you get the sense that ... okay. I don't doubt that you believe you're making an impact but are you really? But with your product, it's so unmistakable. This is making a massive, massive impact because laundry jugs are a real problem and, again, if this small strip of paper replaces laundry detergent, it is a measurable, meaningful impact.
Brett:
And here's the other thing. My wife is used to this now because I've been in the advertising business forever. So I'm always like, "Hey. We're going to try a new vacuum. We're going to try a new this crazy thing." Because I met a client and this ... we're going to try this out. She's used to it. So when I said, "Hey. We're going to do laundry strips," she wasn't totally shocked but she was like, "What? What is a laundry strip?" And we have eight kids and I know you know this, Ryan. We have like a massive washing machine. This is like industrial size. We put this washing machine to the test. Multiple loads a day, everyday, and I would say my wife was skeptical at first.
Brett:
She was like, "Hey. I know this guy is good but it's been fantastic." She loves it. It works very, very well and, if it works for us, it'll work for anybody. And so great, great product.
Ryan:
Appreciate that. That's a great testimonial. We should be recording this. Oh wait. We are.
Brett:
I'll send this over to you. We .. I mentioned that. I got to record a testimonial for you. I will do that. I'm committing to that on air. I will record a testimonial for Tru Earth. So awesome company. Awesome background. You guys are based in ... I don't know if anyone can tell. You've got an awesome accent. Tell me where you're based though and then you said some Canadian growth records or something like this.
Ryan:
Yeah. I'm in Vancouver, British Columbia. So you see. Well, actually we're in Port Moody, which is like 25 minutes from Vancouver, but we are on the water, which is pretty sweet. But yeah, we were the second fastest growing company. Sorry, sorry. Second fastest growing start up in Canada last year and just to give you some context, when we won that award, we had nine staff and now we have like 229. So I think we got a pretty good chance this year.
Brett:
I think you're keeping that pace up to say the least.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
You guys are just ..
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
So that's just awesome, man. Well, like I said, we have the privilege of running your YouTube and Google ads and stuff and you guys are just cranking out just some fantastic video content that's killing it on Facebook as well. And so I want to unpack ... let's unpack your anatomy. I think it's a seven step framework for a winning video ad and then, we'll get into some details about some specific campaigns and stuff too. But can you unpack that for us? Let's start with ...
Ryan:
For sure.
Brett:
Step one of that creative framework.
Ryan:
Cool. So there's seven steps and I'll give like a brief overview of what happens in each step and that should probably give a little bit of insight. So the first and very most important step is the patten interrupt. That's basically, you need ... we're in this attention economy and it's not that people don't have an attention span. It's just that they're very selective about what they give their attention span to. And I know this because we produce four minute videos and absolutely every person that I show my videos to says, "You know what? This is going to convert way better if it's shorter. It's going to do way better if it's short."
Brett:
Yeah.
Ryan:
Our attention rate is absolutely insane when people watch these videos and the longer they watch, the more likely they are to purchase. And it all starts off with hooking their attention. So it could be ...
Brett:
And what's interesting and just a little side note to throw in here, that's been true on YouTube for a while. And we've found this minute and a half to three and a half to four minute videos on YouTube and crushing it. And so some people accept that pretty readily but almost everybody is pushing for shorter videos on Facebook and you guys are finding these long form videos are crushing it on Facebook too.
Ryan:
Totally. Yeah. They're everywhere and everybody, everybody tells me, "You need to try making a shorter cut," and, you know what? We make a shorter cut every single time and, every single time, the shorter cut loses.
Brett:
Yeah, yeah.
Ryan:
I mean I'm sure there's content ... there's times when potentially that will work but it all starts out with a pattern interrupt and that could be throwing a bucket of water in somebody's face. Our first big video like this, we threw water in Thalia's face and she had like makeup running down her face. It was awesome. The second video, we had a couple ... we had Trey blowing laundry with his 52 inch chest and this last one that we put out, it's just really fast cuts with Trey, again, with a big afro wig and wearing a big, blue velour suit. And you know ...
Brett:
He's like a 70s game show host, right, in this one?
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
Yeah.
Ryan:
Yeah. Big microphone and it's just basically what do you have to do to pull people in. And it doesn't necessarily have to be related to whatever it is you're doing or selling. It just needs to make people stop what they're doing and give you their attention.
Brett:
Yeah. Which is so important and it's often overlooked, right? But unless you have someone's attention, you cannot sell them or show them anything else. And I love the phrase pattern interrupt. That's a phrase that maybe some people are familiar with but it's something unusual, out of the ordinary that doesn't follow the normal script or the normal pattern we have in mind. So someone just talking head on the camera, that's not a pattern interrupt. That's something we expect to see from an ad.
Brett:
Now, maybe someone that's a talking head can say something that's so outlandish or so unique or so on point that it does jolt you out of your slumber or does cause you to pay attention but, using a pattern interrupt like you've talked about where you're combining something visual with something spoken ... and it doesn't even have to directly tie into ... I mean you guys always tie the message back to the benefit of the product and it's beautiful. But throwing a bucket of water in someone's face, a 1970s game show host, right, with a massive wig, a dude with a big barrel chest blowing laundry like he's the wind, that's all very unique stuff.
Brett:
So you're getting their attention. So pattern interrupt, step number one. Most important. Also, can be pretty challenging. Any specific stories and any time that hasn't worked or any surprises or anything you can share on the pattern interrupt that they thought was maybe going to go well but didn't or maybe they thought wasn't going to go well but did?
Ryan:
Yeah. Yeah. So we did a video. It's still running. It's not ... it wasn't a total bust but we did a video with a great big Sasquatch and he looked like ... I thought the Sasquatch was really cool. We spent a lot of money getting that prosthetic head made but it kind of looked like he had one foot in the grave. He was a bit rotten looking.
Brett:
It was a diseased Sasquatch. He'd seen better days. Yeah. Yeah. He was on the downhill slide.
Ryan:
He definitely didn't get his vaccine. But he ... and you know what? The other challenging part about that video and I can't necessarily say that it was because he was ugly but it was a new product we hadn't tested before and so the video actually does really well to warm audiences. It just ... outside of the ones that can't stand him. But we did get a lot of feedback that people hated the Sasquatch and never want to see him again.
Ryan:
And it was funny. We were getting 10 paragraph long emails talking about how they love us but they don't like the Sasquatch and here's an alternative that we think would be really cool. It was funny.
Brett:
We dislike this so much we're willing to write a new ad for you because Sasquatch is haunting our dreams and so please get him out of my feed. Anyway ...
Ryan:
There was a scene too where he was eating beans off the table or the counter and we were talking about how there's E. coli on counters and it's like eating poop. People didn't like that so much either. They were fairly disgusted by that. Yeah. We heard quite a few people didn't like that scene.. people were literally having nightmares.
Brett:
That's awesome. That is amazing. Yeah. Hiding your children from the YouTube screen or the Facebook screen when this comes on. But it is working to warm audiences and so not a total bust and, like you said, not really sure if it was the product or the video, probably a combination of both a little bit. But what's cool is, one, you were willing to run this. You were willing to do something a little bit edgy and then you're also willing to test it and you also found a spot for it to work. And you continue to get some leverage out of that. So that's an awesome example. Love that. Any other surprises on the pattern interrupt stage or step?
Ryan:
Yeah. I mean from the pattern interrupt stage, that one's really the only one that I've ever had that didn't perform. I was anticipating it to be the best one we'd ever done because I thought it was great. But 90 percent of the time, when I think something's amazing, I'm usually wrong. But everything from just having ... we had another YouTube video that you guys ran and it was really basic, really, really basic. I recorded it all. I used a lot of b roll film and I started with just like a stop sign, a stop sign that pops on your screen and I said, "Stop!"
Ryan:
And it's been viewed like 12 million times and it can ... yeah.
Brett:
Super low budget but it just worked and I think you got to test this stuff and you got to be willing to go there. One of the examples that I talk about some, one of our mutual friends, Peter from Groove Life, and I'm actually wearing a Groove wedding ring right now.
Ryan:
Nice.
Brett:
.. launch on YouTube and then one of their first I call it a manifesto video that they created was really great and there was a version of it that actually had a Trump joke in it, right? It was someone that does a Donald Trump voice, a brilliant rendition, and it wasn't like pro or anti-Trump. It was just a ... Donald Trump says, "There's two things I love: Russia and Groove Rings." It was just fun right. But we had people saying, "What are you doing? Get the Trump joke out of there." Whatever. Some that were pro or con.
Brett:
Some that love Trump saying, "You're offending me," and vice versa. But we tested that ad multiple ways without the Trump joke. The Trump joke ... that version always won. .. sometimes yeah. And then I remember also, Brant Garvin from ... used to be from Purple Mattress. Actually he's at Groove now too. Just now making that connection in my head. We talked about this print ad they ran that everybody hated and it was just, "Shh. This is science." That was the headline. And they were like ... he said everybody on the marketing team hated it but I don't remember why they tested it and it was one of their best performing ... that was a display ad.
Brett:
But anyway, just goes to show sometimes pattern interrupt you think is going to work won't and something you think is going to be a bomb actually is a winner. So fantastic. All right. Good stuff. That's step one. Step one: pattern interrupt. What about step two?
Ryan:
So step two is the problem. So ... I'm just writing down that, "Shh. This is science thing," because that's brilliant.
Brett:
Dude, you got to test that. Isn't that funny?
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
It does really make you think, "What do you mean? What is it?" Shh.
Ryan:
The problem is what your product solves. So for us a bunch of different problems that we solve ... this could even be the villain if you're looking at it from a story brand perspective. But we want to talk about ... and if you're a copywriter, you're taking the problem and you're agitating it a little bit. So in our scenario we talk about how there's a billion laundry jugs a year that end up in landfills and ... sorry. A billion laundry jugs a year that are purchased and 70 percent of those end up in landfills because they can't be recycled. And over a time that ends up being a hell of a lot of laundry detergent jugs that are filling up oceans and ... you basically dig into the pain a little. You want people to get emotional about the problem and you want to really get them thinking about how this could affect them essentially.
Brett:
Yeah. I love that. So it's one of those things where people are much more motivated to get out of pain than to prevent pain that may be out there or may be perceived as distant or in the future. Whatever. But if you could show that something is a pain right now, agitate that problem, and you guys do that very well with some of the visualizations you do with dropping this mountain of laundry jugs and just talking about that process and so you're stirring up that pain. You could also go with the ease, ease of use of, "Hey. Just a little strip. Set it in there. You don't have to worry about laundry detergent or pouring it or spilling it or little packets or whatever." So yeah. Agitate that problem a little bit so that people want that solution or stir up the villain. Get the villain. Make the villain seem nasty so we want to attack it.
Ryan:
Yeah. And I also follow ... not necessarily with these videos but just as a whole with all of our copywriting or any sort of sales. We approach it from ... you always approach the child first. So the child's the person that gets emotional about the benefits and gets excited about things and gets, "Oo we're going to get a lollipop!" Because a kid doesn't care about they're going to get a cavity right?
Brett:
Yeah.
Ryan:
And then you approach it as the parent who basically does basic kitchen table logic on, "Okay. If I eat this lollipop am I going to get a cavity? Well, I guess I could brush my teeth afterwards." So you want to check all the boxes for why they could use this and ... sorry, the adult, not parent. And then parent. Parent's like, "We've eaten lollipops before. We've gotten cavities. What's different about this?" Risk reversal and all that stuff. But so I always try to take people through that process. I don't like to let them be logical until they've been emotional. So the problem .. emotion.
Brett:
Love that. There's been several studies done in like the fundraising, not for profit sector and advertising as well where, if you can trigger the emotional side of someone's brain first, there's much less resistance to anything financial. So you trigger someone's emotions. You tell a story about an individual a charity's going to help as an example, people are more likely to give. You start dipping into facts and stats and stuff too soon or get too logical too soon, people ... the logical side of your brain is telling you not to spend, right? Or not to invest money.
Ryan:
Totally.
Brett:
So love that. Stir up the emotion first, use logic then to affirm and backup and support those emotions you stirred up.
Ryan:
Yeah. And even like check the boxes on confirmation bias, right? Like when you believe in something, you're doing research. Smarter people are generally more susceptible to bias than less intelligent people because they're able to go and do research that confirms whatever it is they want to confirm. It's easy to go search Google and find some evidence that the world's flat.
Brett:
Right. Whatever it is. Pick a belief, even a crazy belief, search for it, you'll find all kinds of articles to support that.
Ryan:
Yeah. Exactly. Sorry. I'm tangenting here now. Sorry.
Brett:
Yeah. This is good man. So, we've got pattern interrupt. We got problem or villain. What's next?
Ryan:
The next is the solution. So this is where we're going to introduce our product as the tool or the guide to, basically, defeat the villain or solve the problem. And so in our case, after we show the bottles fall from the sky and that they take however long to decompose and that jug is never going to be recycled and turned into a bicycle, we're going to demonstrate ... we're going to show the product and introduce it as a solution and why you'd want to use this versus the problematic version.
Brett:
Love it. And so we got show the solution. And now that they've been interrupted, they're paying attention. The villain has been made clear and ugly in their mind. Now, let's talk about the solution and, "Hey. This product is the guide. It's going to help us get ... it's going to help you get where you want to go and it's going to help solve this problem." Okay. Love it.
Brett:
So any tips on making the solution believable? Making it something that really resonates or really sticks with somebody?
Ryan:
Yeah. I mean at this point too it's not really about being logical still. You still want ... at this point, we're still introducing the product as an emotional solution to the problem. We're not necessarily spitting out a bunch of facts to try and convince them at this point. We're still saying, "Hey. This is going to fix your problem." And some basic product demos and stuff like that are probably enough to, with smiling, happy people after they use your product, is enough to get them considering because not everybody needs to go through all three of those phases in order to make a purchase. Lots of people will make snap decisions based on emotional purchases.
Ryan:
I bought this ball here. I like to play the guitar a little bit but I suck but I was ... this is a silicone ball and I turned it on once but it was buggy but it's this music machine and you can make like many things with it. And I thought, "That would be really cool. I could make bass lines and stuff like this and I could probably mix it with the terrible guitar that I play." But I did not go through any sort of logical phase. I was sitting on the floor with my kids in the basement, watching TV, and I saw this ad and I'm like, "Oo. I want that." And I just bought it.
Brett:
Right. Right.
Ryan:
It was like a hundred bucks. It was a stupid purchase. I've never used it because it's buggy but at the time I was like, "I've never seen that before. It's really cool. I think I could play with that while I'm at work on calls or something like that." And I bought it and kind of regret it but..
Brett:
But people do that, Ryan. But you rarely do that if almost never if you're tapping into the logical side of the brain only, right?
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
The logical side of the brain doesn't cause you to make impulse purchases but the emotional side does. And so you can take advantage of that as a marketer, right? So we have the solution and, again, you have more on the emotion side, happy, smiley. We're the solution to your problem. Then, what comes after that?
Ryan:
So the next one is a call to action and I see a lot of people actually do this wrong. They'll say like, "Try Tru Earth today," and there's not really that much effort put on it. I would specifically tell the person that's watching the video to click the link below or click the link on this video to try Tru Earth today. And the reason being is, especially older demographic, are you still watching ads on TV. If it's on YouTube or whatever, they probably just think, "Oh, I could check this out in the grocery store." Unless you're specifically asking someone to do something, I would anticipate that they're probably not going to act unless they're very aware of what they're watching.
Ryan:
And stuff like laundry detergent isn't something you normally buy on the internet.
Brett:
Yep. Exactly.
Ryan:
So ..
Brett:
Most people have never purchased laundry detergent on the internet. Maybe they do from Amazon but ... yeah.
Ryan:
Yeah. But ... yeah. So it's very important that you specifically tell the user the action that you want them to do, if you want them to purchase from you online.
Brett:
Nice.
Ryan:
Try Tru Earth today. Click the link below. Just be very specific.
Brett:
Awesome. Now that was step four, Ryan. So we have pattern interrupt, problem/villain, the solution, call to action. Don't we end with call to action? What are the next couple steps? So I'm real eager to hear step five.
Ryan:
Yeah. So step five is where we're going to introduce logic. So this is objections and credibility. So this is where you want to take all the common objections that people have. So like for us, does it work in high efficiency and regular laundry machines? And demoing these things in use. Does it actually get the stains out of your clothes? Showing these in use, kind of like feature benefit or benefit feature, as well as stuff like social proof. Tru Earth has been purchase by more than 300 customers around the world and over 16,000 people have given it a five star review. It's ...
Brett:
300,000 people, right, have purchased?
Ryan:
Yeah. Yeah. So it's stuff like that. It's social proof. It's objection busting. But you're also using this as an opportunity to demo the product in specific use cases so that people ... "Oh. I never thought that I could possibly use it like that." For this section, obviously, dig through all of your reviews. Dig through, if you have some sort of part or thing in your vending cart where you're asking people why they didn't buy. Go through all your Facebook comments and see what questions people are asking. Put them in a list, bucket them into the most common things, and use this as an opportunity to nail all the big ones because this is where you're going to get that logic addressed.
Ryan:
You're also going to want to include, if you have one, a risk reversal. So this is a critical parent. Why is this different than before? For us, we say we have a 30 day risk-free trial, 30 day love it or return it trial. If you don't love the product, return it and we'll give you your full refund. So we're covering logic. We're covering social proof. And we're covering risk reversal in this segment.
Brett:
I love it and I'm a huge believer in social proof. I love video testimonials. I love highlighting the number of five star reviews and even showing little snippets of those reviews. I think the thing to keep in mind here is that there's a right way and a wrong way to do testimonials, right? So again, if we're thinking maintaining people's attention and using emotion, what are the emotionally charged testimonials that we have? What's something that tells a little bit of a story even if it's in a soundbite. Don't just pick the testimonials that say, "It's a great product. I really like it." Well, okay.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
That doesn't tell me anything. What's moving the narrative forward? What's keeping me engaged? What's making ... maybe overcoming an objection from the customer's point of view? And so all really powerful and I think one of the things I'll highlight about the risk reversal because some people either are hesitant to do it for a variety of reasons or maybe they think, "It's implied. Everybody knows you can return stuff if you don't like it." But something about giving that confidence that, "Hey. It's totally cool with us. If you don't like it, return it. We'll be easy to work with." That provides some assurance and that is in the back of people's mind. So you saying it does make a difference.
Ryan:
Totally. And even in questions like, "Does this actually work?" Half of them, I don't even say, "Yes. It actually works." I just say, "Listen. We're so confident that you're going to love our product that, if you don't like it, we'll just take it back." I don't even need to tell you that our product is good or better than the competitions because, literally, if you don't like it, I'll just take it back. I mean hell, I'll probably just let you take it.
Brett:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And just give you your money back. Yeah, exactly.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
Yep. Which is awesome. Fantastic. So we're introducing logic now, step five. Step six.
Ryan:
Step six. Again this is something that I don't see people do very often but it's a second call to action. Again, very specific. You've now covered the problem, solution. You've got them emotional. You've asked them once. If they didn't click the first time, maybe they needed some logic and some risk reversal. This is where you're going to ask them to do it again.
Ryan:
Again, very specific. Try Tru Earth today. 30 day money back guarantee. Click the link below. You have absolutely nothing to lose. And it sounds simple but it's amazing how many people don't do it.
Brett:
Yeah. And it is one of those things and I've said this for years and years. If you don't ask someone to take action or if you don't tell someone the next step, they won't take it. And one thing I will say that we don't always do and some of our clients don't always do is that second CTA. Always do the first but maybe not the second. And if you even go back to email copy as an example. If you think of really good copywriters, there's multiple places in that email where you can click and take action because sometimes all you need to see is the headline and the first paragraph and you're thinking, "I'm in. Just let me click that link." Other times you just want to keep reading and see what's there and then you start clicking on the second or third link. But the same could apply to a video. That first CTA is going to get some people but other people are going to stick around that need more convincing or they just want to keep watching. So that second CTA may hit them.
Brett:
Awesome. Step seven.
Ryan:
Step seven. The final step. So again, this is another thing that I see people do a lot. At the end of a video, if you have your call to action and then the video sits there for like a second, what's going to happen on YouTube is it's going to transition to the video that the person came there to watch. If it's on Facebook, it's just going to either transition to the next video or it's going to have that little loopy watch this video again thing and it's done. So you want to give people time to click. We basically call this the outro. But you can either have some sort of ... your call to action displayed on the screen or what's another fun way to keep them going is put some bloopers at the end for five seconds but with the call to action on the screen so that they have ... you're just giving the person time to click.
Ryan:
If they're on their phone or if they're watching it like on their Apple TV or something, they might need to scramble to get their remote so they can click.
Brett:
I bought a set of outdoor furniture during the pandemic from a YouTube ad I saw on TV for a company called Yardbird. I was so impressed that I'd been shopping for outdoor furniture.
Ryan:
Awesome.
Brett:
But they had a great ad. But it's so true. Now more and more people are seeing YouTube on a smart device or smart TV rather. So if you hook them and all these things are going well, that little extra outro so they can find their phone and start searching. That's brilliant. It's super important.
Ryan:
Yeah. So that's the last thing and there's a lot of other tiny little things that we like to include in there and a lot of this stuff I, personally, learned from going through some of the Harmon brothers courses and then the child, adult, parent stuff I learned from Travis Sago and other random marketers that I've had mentor me over the years. But a lot of people don't mention their brand enough in the video too.
Brett:
Yeah. Agreed. Agreed.
Ryan:
You know you should be..
Brett:
Show it, mention it, have a logo on the packaging. Yeah.
Ryan:
As much as physically possible, you want to say your brand name without it sounding awkward.
Brett:
Because people forget, right? And this is some of the .. I got my start in radio believe it or not. You had to do it. It's kind of perceived as a must in radio. You had to repeat the name five to seven times or whatever. You need to do it on YouTube too. As long as it sounds natural, because otherwise they're going to forget. They're going to forget the name. They'll be impressed by the ad. Something will resonate with them. They're going to forget your name. Yeah. I like that a lot.
Brett:
So maybe a couple things here. We got just about five minutes or so as we'd like to wrap up. But as your ... because you guys went from that first video you talked about, that literally had a stop sign and you're saying, "Stop," and it's a really affordable video to produce to now, you guys are cranking out some high quality, high production value commercials. How are you evaluating those before you run them? Obviously, we never know until we start running them and getting some data and some media dollars behind it. How are you guys evaluating it ahead of time though to understand, "Okay. This is ready to start running and start testing."
Ryan:
Yeah. So I mean, I work with my friend, Joe. I think you might have had him on your show. I can't remember. You did ..
Brett:
I have not yet but I've got to.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
I love what he does. He's fantastic. on the show.
Ryan:
He is. He's fantastic. He's amazing at what he does. But our process is we come up with the big ideas together. He fleshes them out. We review the fleshed out version of it. We have comedians come in, funny it up. Then they film. They edit. We got through it, make sure there's nothing that is super off brand or whatever, review for like typos and stuff like that and then we launch. But it's ... we don't really have a crazy game plan. I have a Facebook launch plan that I've kind of come up with myself where we usually have three different hooks, which obviously makes it more expensive to film.
Ryan:
But we usually have a good idea which hook's going to win before we even start. And yeah. The process really isn't super complicated. Usually, send the new creative to our list once it's done, which I don't think a lot of people do, and that usually generates close to a $100,000 from an email to content, which I mean ... I don't know.
Brett:
Crazy. That's crazy.
Ryan:
I think that's pretty good.
Brett:
Yes. I would call that a win. Yeah. keep doing that.
Ryan:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). And it seeds the content. So I mean it gives it better engagement on the platforms. There's a lot of really good things but I don't really have too crazy of a process. I know you did mention the other video too, the one that was lower budget. And I know a lot of people are concerned about or don't know how to create these longer videos or they think that it does need to be super funny in order to win. It doesn't. The template that I've outlined doesn't have to be in a funny format.
Brett:
It doesn't.
Ryan:
It can be in a super serious. If you got to YouTube/Tru Earth Movement and you go and you find, it's the only video that's got 11 or 12 million views. You'll find ... it's one of our older ones but it starts with like, "Stop," and I literally ... I took this framework that I'd just laid out. I wrote this script and then I ... and I'm not a videographer or anything like that but I went in, took a little bit of crappy b roll with my iPhone, and we edited it together and it did great on Facebook and it did great on YouTube.
Brett:
It did. It did do great on both. It sure did. And you can totally start there and that's what's beautiful about this framework is that it will work with something that's lower budget and that's a great place to start. And so just love that. Love watching you guys and how you've grown and evolved and how you're continuing to just crush it. And then, one thing I will underscore about what you just said is, if you're going to test different elements of your video, hook is the most important thing to test.
Brett:
I think it's well worth it. You said it's more expensive but it's not that much more expensive once you have the idea. This is the meat of the video, right? The problem, villain part, the solution, the multiple calls to action, the introing logic, all that. But so that can stay the same but then you have maybe three different openings, three different hooks to test and ... because you may find, "Hey. This is the hook that works best with cold traffic, the prospects, people that have never heard of my brand. But this other hook is actually better for warm traffic or for remarketing traffic." And so it's really important to test those different hooks.
Ryan:
And expensive doesn't necessarily mean better.
Brett:
That's true too.
Ryan:
Just to give you an example. Parker ... I think that's how you spell his last name. He's a buddy of mine and Joe's. And he's run a lot of the ads for Lumi and other big Harmon Brothers productions. And they spend 70 grand on one pattern interrupt and I don't know which company it was with but he said that the cheap version absolutely smashed it. So it's more about having variety than it is ...
Brett:
Exactly.
Ryan:
You know you don't need to blow up a car or something crazy.
Brett:
Yeah. Yeah. And what's an interesting thing too about ... just a little side note there on somebody blowing up a car. That's not really a pattern interrupt anymore, right? Now many movie trailers begin with a car being blown up? A lot.
Ryan:
Yeah.
Brett:
Yeah. Yeah. So exactly. Does now have to be high budget. Be creative. Test things. I would say start with these lower budget things first and then graduate your way up as you get more comfortable.
Brett:
Awesome, man. Really, really good stuff. One of the things we underscored before we hit record and who knows when you guys will be listening to this but, as we're recording it, the IOS 14 updates are coming out. So privacy's a big concern. Lots of discussions now about how will tracking be impacted and cookies are going away in 2022 and various things.
Brett:
And one of the things that I believe and I know you agree with it as well is that good creatives will win, right? Right now I think that there's some companies that are benefiting by being too dependent on the algorithm and they've got okay creative and fantastic targeting and the algorithm is saving the day. As some of those things shift, great creatives will win and so this is something that you need to invest in and focus on and work on. So really good stuff man.
Brett:
As we kind of wrap up, anything that you want to point people to? Obviously, they should go check out Tru Earth. So let them know how to do that but any other resources or you want people to connect with you or should they just go buy laundry detergent and help save the planet?
Ryan:
Yeah. You can ... I'm a real person. You can connect with me. I'm on Facebook. You could search for my name. I'm on LinkedIn too. I think I'm Ryan McKenzie on LinkedIn but definitely try Tru Earth if you haven't. You can check it out at www.tru.earth. Tru.Earth. It's funny. I think I've been on so many podcasts and stuff now. I think I probably have more marketer customers than anything else. No. It's great. Even if you don't like laundry ... I still enjoy ripping off a strip and hocking it in and not measuring, not having a mess, and more cupboard space.
Brett:
Absolutely. So it's got the imagine the Curry family stamp of approval, which I think carries some weight.
Ryan:
It's big.
Brett:
It's pretty big. And the other piece is check out Tru Earth, one, so Ryan can remarket to you. You do want to see his ads I promise you. You want to see the Facebook ads. You want to see the YouTube ads. So check those out. I'll link to some of that in the show notes as well but ... man, Ryan, this has been fun. Round two. I appreciate you coming on the show again and it's been super fun, man. And I know you've been super busy what with blowing up Canada and the US and the world and so keep up the good work, man.
Ryan:
Well, man, this is call to action number two. So now we need like an outro.
Brett:
So the outro is this. Appreciate it. So put this stuff to work. In addition to creative winning, I believe video ... this is not a bold statement, right? Video is where the video is today. It's where it's going tomorrow. So you need to master this and don't just master this for Facebook. Manage it or master it for YouTube and other channels as well. And so with that, hey, we'd love to hear from you. Let us know what you think of the show. We'd love that review on iTunes. It helps other people discover the show. And with that, until next time, thank you for listening. See you. That's a wrap.
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