How To Get Featured In Forbes, Huffpost & Inc With Jay Jay, CEO of Ace of Spades PR Agency
How To Get Featured In Forbes, Huffpost & Inc With Jay Jay, CEO of Ace of Spades PR Agency
About The Guest
About The Guest
My guest today is Jay Jay, founder and CEO of Ace of Spades agency. He helps businesses and personal brands become known as credible experts in their industry and get press in Forbes, Huffpost, Business Insider and other extremely notable publications.
With an incredible 15 years of experience in a career that has embraced over 30 countries, Jay is a renowned figure in the speaking industry. Over a decade ago, as he was climbing up the ladder, he experimented with social media to grow his audience.
Starting a YouTube channel, Jay Jay organically grew his channel until he leveled to a jaw-dropping 57,000,000 views online, with over 1m additional followers on Instagram and Facebook.
He has taken what he’s learnt through building his own brand and started Ace of Spaces which works with high-level CEO’s, entrepreneurs, companies, and more to help them achieve massive success and notoriety through social media and PR.
Talking Points
04:12 — Magic, showmanship and sales.
09:25 — Jay’s start in social media.
11:32 — What it takes to be successful on social media.
20:34 — The power of personal brand.
26:15 — What makes your personal elevator pitch.
32:52 — How to get into Forbes.
35:54 — How do you get in touch with journalists?
40:58 — How do you maintain a social media presence as a solopreneur?
45:08 — The biggest misconception about PR.
46:41 — Advice for young entrepreneurs & professionals.
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What is the Success Story Podcast?
On this podcast, you’ll find interviews, Q&A, keynote presentations & conversations on sales, marketing, business, startups and entrepreneurship.
The podcast is hosted by entrepreneur, business executive, author, educator & speaker, Scott D. Clary.
Scott will discuss some of the lessons he’s learned over his own career, as well as have candid interviews with execs, celebrities, notable figures and politicians. All who have achieved success through both wins and losses, to learn more about their life, their ideas and insights.
He sits down with leaders and mentors and unpacks their story to help pass those lessons onto others through both experiences and tactical strategy for business professionals, entrepreneurs and everyone in between.
Website: https://www.scottdclary.com
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Read The Transcript (Machine Generated)
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, scott, building, pr agencies, pr, forbes, life insurance, leverage, story, publications, brand, world, payroll, big, listen, magician, business, spoke, agency, understand
SPEAKERS
Scott, Jay Jay
Scott 01:52
Welcome to success story. I’m your host, Scott D. Clary, and Today my guest is JJ, the CEO and founder of ace of spades. He’s helped businesses and personal brands become known as credible experts in their industry. He’s gotten the press in Forbes, Huff Post, Business Insider, and tons of extremely notable publications. He has a whopping 15 years of experience in marketing, brand building social media. He’s also a renowned speaker, and he’s spoken in over 30 countries, starting a YouTube channel. Starting off as a magician, he grew his channel to over 57 million views. With an additional 1 million followers on Instagram and Facebook. He’s taking what he’s learned through building his own brand. He started Ace of Spades you work with high level CEOs, entrepreneurs, companies, to help them achieve massive success and notoriety through social media. And PR JJ, thank you so much for taking a second sitting down. Walk me through your origin story.
Jay Jay 02:56
Yeah, man. Well, I’m standing up today, it’s not sitting because I stand up for success as I call it. Scott’s like, I’m gonna stand off. I say, dude, I’m a speaker. Man. I understand operator and I’m on today. So listen, man, you know, and appreciate you having me appreciate you. You’re giving me a chance to share a couple of things today, Scott with your people. And before we even get into Scott, one thing I’m always big on like, it’s not, it’s not about you today, it’s not about me, it’s about just your guests. And like, if I can just share some moves that have helped me and help some of my clients, like get to the next level with their personal brand, and they can implement it, then that’s success. To me. That’s a win for me today.
Scott 03:33
So and the reason why the reason why I love your story is because it’s so unorthodox. So a lot of agency owners, they come from this is a this is a gross generalization, but let’s you know, I’ve worked enough a job, they come from a career working in PR marketing, they start their own agency, you go to your YouTube channel, you are doing street magic, and you’re doing street magic. So that’s obviously not a common a common, you know, initial out of university job that people go into that eventually dovetails into PR firm. So what’s what’s your origin story? How did you come to where you’re at today?
Jay Jay 04:12
Yeah, I look to 16 years ago, I wanted to do two things, right? stand on stage, and tell the world who I was, what I do and how I do it. I started doing that as a magician. That’s right. In addition, so you’d like card tricks, stealing people’s watches, reading people’s minds, you know, and that took me to the ability to travel to all these countries in share my story right? Now, today 34 countries in 57 million views later. You know, my job now and what I do is but people people is everything for me. How have I been able to connect with people. And throughout that time, the one thing that I really understood was it wasn’t the best magician. It wasn’t the guy with the coolest tricks or the coolest hairstyle or Australian accent. It was the guy who actually was leveraging the media and having the most attention, who was the one that got chosen and constantly got chosen. For gigs and shows, and throughout that time, I had to transition from magician to online YouTube, to speaking TV host. And then now today running a PR agency. But throughout that time, that message in my mind of like, how am I promoting myself today? How am I getting the media today, how many people are seeing me and talking about me was like, constantly, just like on top of my mind.
Scott 05:28
So you you even though you’re building a following, you still saw more leverage from traditional media than just building out an incredible social media following in terms of booking work, doing whatever it is you want it to do. And that’s what prompted you down this rabbit hole of understanding PR understanding how to leverage it understanding how to do it properly, but also from a human perspective and a personal brand perspective.
Jay Jay 05:57
Yeah, yeah. But yeah, people up on the park, they bind you. Right? And, and, you know, like they want they want to get to know the man, the man behind the brand. One of Jeff besos, his highest search terms is like, what does he eat in a day? Why do I care? Right, but because people want to know what the richest man in the world eats? Like, why it’s such a funny thing? Shouldn’t we care about like, what the latest Amazon stock is? No. Right? We want to know what the richest man in the world or what who says he’s the richest man in the world? Like, what is he doing everyday? What’s his day to day? What is he reading? What is he doing? Because we want to understand that because we can relate to people, we can’t relate to a water bottle, you know? Right? So throughout the journey of always being in front of people, Scott, it’s always like, okay, like, how am I connecting with more people? How more people getting to know me, right? And how do I do that through the best way possible? Me, right, my poster brand telling my story, right? And leveraging that on these big media outlets.
Scott 06:55
But you also, I’m assuming when you build out your brand, as a magician, you are extremely aware of people and how they react on how to communicate in certain ways. Because that is literally, I was even watching some of your videos and half of what a magician has a focus on is managing the crowd, right. And that’s what PR is, at a macro level. And I just thought it was a very interesting point. So yeah, so even even the so let’s even talk about like the entrepreneurial step. So you understand there’s a, you know, there’s a need for proper PR, do you feel like you have a you’ve built a strong following? You understand that? Even though you don’t come from a traditional marketing background, per se, you’re able to do this effectively? How do you translate that into Ace of Spades in your agency? What’s the first step of you building that business outlook like?
Jay Jay 07:50
Well, the first step was leveraging what I had was result, right and showcase of like, that. I’ve done it. You know, I did a story on my Instagram today about the reason I show up every day on my stories is not because of my ego or my face, because I want people to see like that I’m always here that I know, they know what I’m doing that, that I’m active that I’m on top of that, right? And if you’re the industry that I’m in, which is my face, selling you promotion, telling the world, right, I want to be a, I want to be able to not just be talking should be showing you what I’m doing and what’s working right now. You know, so one thing I did when I started was like, I need to be able to leverage what I’ve learned last 15 years working with the biggest PR agencies myself, working with a billion dollar company like MTV, working as a magician in working global, like global because I didn’t think of myself as American I think of Australian rights. my accent, I think like the world, right? What do people connect with? What’s working on a global level? And then I’m like, how do I leverage that and incorporate that into the people that I want to work with today? And the crazy thing is that we all need a personal brand today. Like ever more. I remember two years ago when people like add a need social media, remember you have those conversations as not for me. Yeah. And now it’s like, I need it. I need to do something when people are annoyed, you know, shut you down. So
Scott 09:25
you were you’re ahead of the curve, right? Like you were already you’re ahead of the curve like you were building out YouTube, when not everybody has the world not it’s still not everybody has a YouTube account, right? And is focused on creating content all the time, but still you were early on?
Jay Jay 09:41
I was 2009 Yes. 2009 Yeah, when I and the reason I did is a mental Cantonese is would you ever think about using magic to leverage your brand to get more gigs and like of course, that’s what every magician wants to be booked in Vegas, then I actually leverage that and actually created a huge following and attract And I didn’t understand about digital marketing or copywriting or SEO or landing pages at the time. And then I started to teach people something, teaching her magic or showing them the result and then building that following, but leveraging that in and to travel around the world and speak to corporations, and, you know, just just do whatever I want, really.
Scott 10:22
And, and I think it’s important to note that when you introduce yourself as a subspace, and it’s a PR agency, while you’re like, well, there’s, you know, there’s a lot of PR agencies Well, yes, but not a lot of PR agencies have 57 million views. You do not a lot of PR agencies are verified on Instagram with a million followers. So there is a there’s a notable difference in the way that you present yourself, which I’m assuming that’s how all great entrepreneurs who want to monetize their knowledge, do they they pass on what they’ve done for themselves on to businesses? So right, what’s the traditional PR agency? Why is it not hitting the mark? Why are you different? Listen, I’m
Jay Jay 11:07
some people gonna be like, Listen, going, like Dude, probably someone’s listening. This gone. I’m gonna get out of my PR agency after this phone call after listening to you right now, listen, here’s
Scott 11:16
the problem. We that’s what I want. I want I want to shake shit up because he needs Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s gonna say companies don’t know how to market they don’t know how to run PR companies don’t have a million followers on Instagram. But they have budgets Xs, you’re so what’s going on? Like, that’s, that’s what I want to figure out.
Jay Jay 11:32
Well, and I appreciate you mentioned what you said before about, like, I came to the market with what I least I can show everything in one go. Like, I can’t lie about 10 years of videos, right? You just can’t like, you can see my unless I had some kind of face changing up, you can see that. That’s only now. That’s exactly. So you can see that I’ve been in the game. I’ve put the runs on the board, right. And there’s nothing even better for me when someone says to me, you know what I was on the fence of working with you, then I did a Google search of you one night. And it completely changed. Because I saw I’m like, that really means a lot. That means that people are googling you, and wanting to know if they can trust you, right? Because that’s one of the biggest things that we could talk about that later. But the to question, here’s the problem with PR agencies, this is sort of like the taxi to the Uber model kind of thing like this is what’s been happening for ever. And I’m going to come in as the Uber strike the new thing, PR agencies, you’re paying to hope. You pay money, and they pitch you. And there’s no guarantee. Most of them were going to pitch you and you know what, we’ll get some impressions from men. That’s like me and you going, you know what, I’m going to take us to Disneyland, it’s going to be it’s going to be $10,000 We good? Are we going? Not sure? Maybe? Maybe Why am I paying for maybes I want to pay to know that we’re going to get there on the ride. And I feel like PR agencies the model that’s been it’s like, we’re just going to pitch you and hopefully one bites. The one thing that I want to do differently was tap into all my contacts from when I was working with them. Or when I had them part of my team on bigger levels when I was a TV presenter, right? I was like, how do I guarantee this? Because that’s a strong word. And we want guarantees. Now people aren’t people a title like maybes. So I came in with two strategies. And one result that I’ve done it for myself, and my son just so everyone’s listening, I focus more so on personal brands, companies, I do help, but I like personal brands. reason why is because personal brands, it’s them. It’s their story, you’re speaking to their heart and their soul. corporations, you got to go through the ladder of decision makers. We can’t say this, this will be bad. Scott, I can send you home and shoot this video. You know, you’re like, Cool, let’s shoot it. Great. No, I don’t have to go through a committee. Maybe committee of your fears. But that’s a different credit committee, right. So I wanted, I wanted to come to people and say, listen, what you’ve been doing for the last so long, guess what, I’m going to strap all of that. And now I can guarantee placement food. They’re like, well, how is that possible? I paid a PR agency 50 grand, and they haven’t Well, guess what, there’s a new guy coming again, there’s a new wave. And I’m going to guarantee placement because of the relationships. So now what we can do is we can focus on the best thing, its messaging and articulating you, we can really pinpoint you then we can go to the big boys like Forbes, Good Morning America, you know, any big podcast and say, Look, we’ve got something powerful then then you will slip in perfectly. And and I feel like most PR agencies not all but most PR agencies are like holding on to this lost hope that people still don’t know. There’s another way. It’s sort of like the same thing of a taxi model. Remember when taxi Uber came in and taxis are like we will never lose. We’re too big and then and I feel like the way I’m doing it is I’m coming in with more guarantee and I hit different angles Scott I hit not everybody’s meant to get involved. Man, maybe you have to go more of a podcast angle, maybe you’re better just to articulate your social media messaging, and you’ll hit, you’ll hit the goal there. So isn’t just one way and and it’s also we guarantee it.
Scott 15:15
And also, you mentioned one thing that I thought was interesting. So I’ve worked with PR agencies, I have worked with companies that over the PR agencies, and it’s the process that you just described, which has always been my biggest issue with PR, it’s like, you’re gonna you’re gonna pay a retainer. And if we get a placement we do, but you know, don’t expect anything for six months. And by then you’re like 30 to 50k in the hole already. And, and that’s very cool. And these are the periodicities that are working with some of the largest exactly people in the world.
Jay Jay 18:10
Um, can I can I? Can I spit some Can I reveal something? I’m not gonna say names. Guess who they sometimes call on the five month in me. They’re like, Jay, we need a win. What do you got for me, and I’m telling you this straight because they know the industry is checked. Like, they know that there’s, someone’s going to get in a different way. And sometimes I’m a bit of a lifesaver for some of these marketing and PR agencies when they know they need to guarantee when because what’s currently doing just isn’t there. And they know that they can buy that new Ferrari if that retaining us income. You know, jokes aside, but that’s the truth, man.
Scott 18:50
Yeah, I know I I’ve seen it before. And there’s no guarantee and it just seems like a lazy. It’s just, you know, I just thinking through all the companies that I’ve seen pitch and the and the and the fact that they have no social presence, and they have no PR themselves and they have no website yet they’re saying that they’re going to figure all this stuff out for you, which is it’s an interesting concept doesn’t really work in a lot of businesses, but for some reason seems to be an industry that has sort of escaped.
Jay Jay 19:16
And it’s irrational, maybe for the new entrepreneurs maybe for the new wave of of the way and I’m not another customer psychology like buy I don’t understand how the customer psychology and buys but for me, I want to see result. And I want more of a hope. payment schedule I want like I’m doing this, I want this right and I want to and I want to feel like I’m working with the right person. And I think you and I know now Scott, it isn’t just one agency anymore isn’t just one restaurant you can choose from. It isn’t just one place you can work from my word choice. Now. Let me let me hold my money. Let me let me see before I jump in to the deeper
Scott 19:54
Yes, exactly. And keep and the thing is another thing is that people will pay people pay a lot you If the if you can deliver excellent if you can deliver the best possible product, people will pay. But now they have that option. And you mentioned something else. You’re selective about who you work with. And and I want to dive into why you work with personal brands, because that’s a whole other con concept that people really haven’t bought into yet. The personal brand, the celebrity CEO that so let’s talk about that. Let’s talk about personal brand. Why is it important? Why should an entrepreneur starting a company care about PR for themselves versus their business? and walk me through that and what you’ve experienced? Okay, cool.
Jay Jay 20:34
Let me ask you a question. Name. What do you think of why does Gordon Ramsay and Jamie Oliver make so much money as a chef, but the guy at the local steakhouse, awesome. Guy is making 80 grand a year when Gordon and Jamie are making 80 million a year while…
Scott 20:53
Certainly it’s them.
Jay Jay 20:54
It’s them. They are the celebrity brand factor. It’s they’ve been put a lot of marketing a lot of promotion into and they’re built up now. Are they the best chef? No. Are they a great chef? Absolutely. Are they the best looking guys? No, Gordon Ramsay is definitely got a face for the kitchen. You know, he even says that. Are they? Are they the Best Spoken? No. It’s because they figured out and or team is figured out Hey, how do we market this person? How do we take Gordon how do we take Jamie Oliver right? and amplify their message amplify them as the celebrity or the leading expert in their space. And guess what? They get all the choices. Gordon Ramsay has restaurants around the world, right? Because he’s got faith, he’s, he’s the guy he’s gonna influence. And I think if people can understand, it’s okay, to get some celebrity aspects to your brand without having to be the JJ or the Gordon Ramsay, you don’t have to go to that level, right? But you can do it in your own space to at least be seen with more star power so that you get chosen over the next coach over the next podcaster over the next guy selling real estate. Dude, I’m in Miami. There’s you know, many realtors are in everyone’s real estate.
Scott 22:09
Unlimited. Unlimited realtors. Everybody in the population in Miami is a real estate agent.
Jay Jay 22:16
But the points of why are these people getting chosen and not? And I think everybody listening one because one thing I had to do was be okay with, you got to take your ego out of it. And realize it’s not the best. It’s not the best website, the product, man. It’s sometimes it’s the person that’s constantly seeking advice promoting, you know?
Scott 22:32
Yeah. And it’s the human component.
Jay Jay 22:35
Right? Absolutely. Yeah, they connect. Yeah. Well, you know, the big thing that I do with the people I work with is, listen, we can get their attention. Right? But how do we make them? How do we keep their attention? And how do we make them keep coming back? It’s like, we don’t want to give you the new plastic surgery look on your face with no personality? Because you ain’t picking up anyone at the bar. Right? You look good. Yeah. That was the salt was your personality. So back to your question. Yeah, it’s really important that personal branding is people are really like, gravitating towards people who can they can connect with. And they want to know more than you’re a great, good looking person with a great product. What does he do on his personal life? Is he married? You have kids? How can I connect with this guy? Oh, he has a heart. Now I want to invest with you. No, I like him. And he’s and I know I can go on about this for ages Scott. But anyone listening? Ask yourself this, when you make a decision on something you’ve bought in the past, maybe an online course. So first you work with ask them what ask yourself, why did you make the decision and adventure you didn’t go? Well, it was a really cool product. You probably like I like the post that he said while he’s a family man. I’m a family man, you know, or he went to you know, he went to the Maldives. And I you know, it could be something small. But it personal brand has a really great way to connect with people. And that’s what we want to be a part of, we want to be we want to be connected.
Scott 23:58
And just to take it a step further, if you are classically sales trained, you will know that people buy with emotion and justify with logic, right? And how do you buy with that? How do you buy How do you build that emotion that with trust? That’s where the the face and the person and the founder and we’re talking about real estate and we’re talking about people that sell a variety of services online, but even you know, you look at Elan Musk, you look at you know, Richard Branson, you look at Gary Vaynerchuk you look at the people that are enormous business names, but they’re, you know, you look at their followings, even you know, you can say, well, Tesla is recognizable. But Elon Musk is the person people listen to if Elon didn’t exist, you think people would care? You think, do you think Tesla’s stock price would be so volatile? If they just followed the Tesla Twitter account and Ilan never said anything? No. Because it’s it’s a it’s a person that you’re now aligned with.
Jay Jay 24:53
Yeah. Yeah. But But I think Scott is well suited to bring it back, though, for people to understand is and this comes up a lot with new clients. They go Well, I’m not I don’t want to be Richard, I don’t want to be a one. I don’t want to. And I get it. I listen, I totally understand. But what you need to do is be okay, of understanding how you make decisions. So make it relatable to the person go, Oh, I made that because of this great, how do we use that same technique, same principles and incorporate that into you as a coach,
Scott 25:23
You and as a real estate, so smaller level, smaller level.
Jay Jay 25:26
So bring us to this go up, go up a couple of notches, man, get the press get get some authority about you get some more testimonials, social, like third party validation, maybe get a Forbes right. Like if you had to make a decision for a house, Scott. And there were two religions on the table. One guy was in Forbes and one guy was both look the same. Both cool both like well put together. You probably choose him, you’re more likely to choose to listen to the guy in Forbes. Because our Forbes is Forbes He must be someone says credibility. He has credibility. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Scott 25:59
So what’s this? So let’s let’s talk about the strategy to get that story told, right? When you’re when you’re building so I guess it would start from your story as an individual, because that’s what’s going to drive everything right. That’s going to drive the socials and drive the beer. What’s what is that story?
Jay Jay 26:15
I call it What’s your book, we play this game. I play games with my clients all the time. When they come if you ever come to my office, Scott, and we do this game, we print out a big photo of your face when you come in the office. Because it used to be an entertainer, right? So I’m very annoyed when I coach and teach. So if anyone if you ever worked with me, anyone want to take a big photo of your face, like print it and put it on the wall? You come in, you’re going to see it like Okay, great. Who is this guy? First thing we need to do is break down like who you are what you do, but what’s your book? Right. So why if I was the owner, if I was hurt, bruh you played? I’ll ask you to Scott, if I was Oprah from Ellen. And I’m like, No, actually, let me change it up for you. If I was Richard Branson, and I said, Listen, Scott 30 seconds. I’ve got a checkbook ready to write. But you got to woo me. You got to pitch me you got to what’s your what’s yourself? That’s going to be your hook. What’s the hook? That’s
Scott 27:11
a good one. What’s your what’s your personal elevator pitch?
Jay Jay 27:14
Yeah, exactly. But a lot of people don’t understand that. They’re not just a business coach. They’re not just a relative, like, what is the point of difference that makes you different phone, the media wants to choose you over everybody else. And this is where you know, my expertise comes in. But like, that’s one thing that’s really important. You have to think of like, Well, okay, you know, that you’re amazing. Your clients know that you’re amazing, but the world doesn’t. And they just think you’re another coach. They just think you’re another guy, not a girl. So the first thing we try and do is like, really quickly, how do we find that food for you? Right? Like, how do we like, what why would folks choose you? What are they going to do? What what’s your move here? You know, and take some time. So the first thing would be like figuring out that unique point of difference, just something so that if there are 10 business coaches in front for Forbes choose, they’re immediately going like that without without even knowing your credentials. Like that. That pitch. Oh, that’s interesting. So to me when I was a magician, I’m not. I thought I was cool enough being a magician. No. Yeah, I’m The Man from down under steals watches from around the world. That’s like one little trick, right? Well, the 57 million dude man steals, you know, when I was doing stuff more, but when like steals your heart and steals your watch. Okay, I’ll click on that. So yeah, yeah, coming up with the hook is is a good starting move for people just like okay, what do I how can I be a bit different here
Scott 28:47
as the problem right now for us? And then, as you as you build out that hook Can you give me an example of can you give me an A? So can you give me an example of why Forbes would run a story based on a on a hook? Is that what they look for first? Is that the main thing that drives their first decision? Like what’s the what’s the content? what’s the what’s the meat because everybody you know, a real estate agent does so many things. They sell homes, what they show homes they list on? They sell homes, they all do the same thing, right? So what’s the what do you what do you actually what’s the content rather.
Jay Jay 32:53
Right, right. So okay, so now we don’t just want to be impressed with a story. We want to be led with education and shows that wow, this person really knows. So Forbes, especially Remember, the publication is business. Forbes isn’t a TED, it isn’t like the fifth 17 minutes of like your unique spin on the world. Forbes is like your business to education. So to get into Forbes, they are looking for a unique spin on how maybe you sell homes. Right? And it could be something simple. How Jillian Garcia, right closes every deal in Miami by the one postcard she sends out. Okay, and here are three tips on how you can engage with your people more. That’s like an example. Right? Yeah, I know. It’s a lot for people to take on right now. But like every new media outlet, they’re always looking for an angle, but they’re looking for something that they continue to think about what do they want Scott, they want attention. They struggle with the same thing we need. So the way to wait to give everyone some news is like, what do you do? What what why? What makes you a little bit different, right? And then how do you also put that out to the market and you do that through your personal brand? Like you through social media as well because
Scott 34:12
that’s free and then all these all these efforts, they start to compound. But even if you’re just getting into the game, obviously you know you can you can you can leverage a PR agency but let’s assume even a PR agency isn’t where you’re at right now. It’s maybe expensive and you’re just trying to do things right.
Jay Jay 34:30
I tell people listen, you don’t need me. Right?
Scott 34:33
I saw how do you build those relationships? How to How the hell do I I don’t know Forbes? What am I gonna do you know go to their contact us like, right? That’s not something that’s doable for many. Okay,
Jay Jay 34:41
he’s a he’s a great move, right? I don’t say I’m all that moves. Right. I want you to go in the places where you every single day usually there could be a coffee shop, maybe a lunch place. Maybe Anyway, you interact with someone else that has no emotional value and you take your phone out and ask them hey, Scott, I want you to be honest with me. What’s up, man? They do blah, blah. What looking at my work? What does it look like I do? And ask them this question. And if it’s not super clear, that’s your first problem. If your messaging is unclear, what do you think the will is knowing about you? And I used to do that all the time when I ran around the world I was traveling on Hey, what do I look like I do. And when there was when there wasn’t a clear point of like, Oh, you do this, they don’t have to say you exactly do this, but you look like this this, then I have to fix it. And as you know, Scott in sales, have confused miners and sold mine. Right. It’s the same thing with life. If they’re looking at you and my wife, I think he that’s a problem. And the way to fix that is get really pinpoint clear on like, exactly what you do. And exactly how you do it and who you help. And that will help you. And that’s free doesn’t cost you anything.
Scott 35:54
Then, after after you figure that piece out the last piece of the of the press, the press, I guess distribution would be actually reaching out to the journalists. I’ll give you a reading. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I love these movies. By the way, these are very good. So this is all great. This is all very tactical stuff. Because I think that people just they look at PR is like, I don’t even know where to start. And what I want to help people do with this conversation, is get their first piece and even any publication so that they can get their name out there, close more deals, build a business, build a brand, and then sort of take take that and run with it.
Jay Jay 36:26
Yeah, yeah. And let me tell everybody why the power of press is important. It gives you authority and it gives you credibility, and it gives you attention and a third party validation. Right. And we do this a lot with clients. It’s like, once they put a press article on their on their featured press article in a social media or email people go, oh, wow, congratulations. And that elevated value just went off, like the stock price and themself went up. So here’s a great move, how you get it for free doesn’t cost you any money. just takes a little bit of time. Google your city, right and go local publications. Okay. So let’s say local publications, depending on what city you’re in, assuming that if you’re probably in a major one, go to the second page, right? Because you’re going to get the NBC, ABC, all the big ones, the second page of Google, they’re going to have the local ones. What do they need help with? They need attention. They have journalists, they have editors, they’re going to be easy to get ahold of. So this is what you do. Right? It’s really easy. I do this. I’ve been doing this for years. And I still do it today. We go to these people, we find their editors name, right. And usually they’re accessible because what do they need? They need to be the first one to script a story.
Scott 37:28
Yeah, so you go, they want to be accessible.
Jay Jay 37:30
They think they need to if they don’t, they’re in trouble. They don’t get it. They’re not going to see your role next year. Right. So they are going to access via LinkedIn or Instagram. If you can’t get them get the head journalists, the way to find the head journalists. Look at the website, look at who’s writing the most it will say like by this. They’re journalists in their eyes. They’re an artist, they want to be appreciated for the hard work of what they write. So you reach out to them. First thing you want to do this is like old school relationship, what I want reach out to them and say, Hey, Scott, loved the article on this. Be honest, Don’t lie. Love the article on blah, blah, blah. Hey, out of curiosity, how do you go about writing new stories? Hey, out of curiosity, who in your department writes unique stories? Two things is going to happen. One thing like, oh, wow, right? Oh, and by the way, in your signature, right? Do not have please check out my work that don’t be needy, have like just your best link, just like Jay or your signature, but have your best link. Because of course if someone gives you a compliment, right? Like, they’re gonna look at you, right? They’re gonna see your story. minute says, Hey, who runs your stories? Then they will say either or you can forward it to this person. Or, of course, you don’t think they want the credit? Yeah, you can talk to me what’s going on? then build the relationship from there. I do that with all my clients. Because remember, they’re a lower tier publication. They’re gonna probably write about you, they’re probably gonna be like, Oh, this is a good idea. Right? Cool. Look, I don’t have anything else Scott. But maybe a month when we’re doing this. I’m gonna position it here. Or now that you have been talking to you right now. There are big moments throughout the the your Christmas, Thanksgiving, right? Valentine’s Day, beginning of the school season. So if you can think and make their job easier for them and think of like, how could you spend your story? Third thing now you’re giving them gold on a platter. They’re like, Great expert theory. He knows his stuff. He likes my work. They write about you guess what, ladies and gentlemen, now you get a free press article. You get a relationship with it with an editor and you get free SEO. With a back with a right backlinks for free. Now, now you did that with two or three people or you may build a relationship with them. Scott, we have a dating coach that works under like our agency, right? She’s now writing as like the Friday you know, the Friday, best line of the wallum whatever, whatever you have, but she loves it. But I said to her Listen, it does. Doesn’t matter how tall you are, it doesn’t matter about it. Cheers. It’s not on Forbes, I’m like, it’s not your place to have that yet. Let’s get 52 weeks of you on a publication, you’re building it, you’re building your authority, you’re building your writing, you’re building your expertise. And you take that, and you can go to now, maybe not Forbes as of yet, but you’re listening. I mean, running on this one for 52 weeks, right? Like, we’re interested. You’re an ex vet, you know? And that’s,
Scott 40:28
yeah. Now, okay, Jay. So one other one other thing that’s in your ecosystem is social. So now you figured out a solopreneur, how to build and get their first, build a brand, get the first press release? How do you translate all that work into an effective social strategy? And I know that I actually, your agency focuses more on the PR side, but I’m just asking, because I know you’ve done it. So I don’t even know how to do this. for yourself, we used to
Jay Jay 40:57
do it, but it was too tedious. We do it for like, big retainer clients. Because we know that half the problem is time, right? No one wants to sit there all day. If I can give everybody a move. It’s not supposed to be overly complicated. And I know everybody’s like, you got to suppose 17 times a day. Now you don’t you don’t, you just have to hit remember, social is just another channel. It’s another tool for people to connect with you and learn about you. So here are just three moves that work very well. And you guys can implement this content. So education, right? educational driven content. So anything that shows you the expert. So let’s say Scott, you’re a podcaster. Right, and you do multiple other things, but I know he’s a podcaster. You can go Hey, everyone, I’m going to teach you today how to get to start your first podcast, with a microphone from Best Buy’s for $29. That is great content, cuz it’s like, okay, I don’t need all this, like these things that I see in front of you, I can just start go to Best Buy and get a microphone for $29. Even if it’s simple, it just shows you that your you know your stuff. So educational driven content is super important with social testimonials. You don’t need video testimonials just as much. They’re powerful. You could screenshot a text message from a client saying, hey, oh my gosh, thank you so much. Blah, blah, blah, you use that just edit out her name. Put that on your social media. So an email screenshot from an email or video testimonial. And the last one is personal brand. Yeah. So your personal brand further was uploading a piece of content about yourself, and having a caption, or revealing story. Now you don’t need to like share something that’s really, really personal. But it could be the time when Hey, this is the first day when I got married, and how scared you were, I don’t know. Or, you know what, when I lost when i when i when i got screwed over by a business partner, like reveal a little bit so people lean in, and they’re like, Oh, my gosh, this guy’s not like, he’s actually got a story. Or maybe he’s got like, you know, the moment when I stuffed up, you know, my first podcast or the moment when his stuffs a huge guest. Like, yeah, but when you reveal people lean in, right? So if you guys follow that kind of three kind of content strategy of the month, now you can do that with videos, photos. Those are like hitting a lot of the parts that you need to be seen as the expert in your space. And, you know, it’s a good strategy from that.
Scott 43:18
And I guess it’s that that was all incredible. One, one last, I have some rapid fire questions for you out of here sooner. But one last question on why everybody has to be, you know, building a personal brand. What, what is your opinion or insight on the future of personal brand? celebrity CEO, everybody being a media company? Where do you see this going?
Jay Jay 43:43
I believe everyone is going to want to know the guy or the girl behind the brand. They want to know what they’re about. They want to know what they cancel. They want to know what they value. They want to know that you care about them. They don’t want to be trust is the biggest problem in the marketplace. And they want to feel like they can trust you when they trust you. They like you and they buy from you. Period.
Scott 44:06
I love it. All right. rapid fire questions. Rapid Fire let’s roll rapid fall you take you take as long as you want doesn’t matter to me. You can you can go quick and go slow. Doesn’t really matter. With rapid rapid is it’s a good book. Listen, you’re you’re standing up, you’re ready to go. Alright, biggest challenge in your career could have been during your agency, current present day or it could have been before when you’re trying to build out your own brand. What was it? How did you overcome it?
Jay Jay 44:38
Yeah, one of the first thing that came up straight away is realizing you are not the perfect coach agency for everybody. And taking my ego out of it as a man that I think I can close anyone and I’m the best No, they’re not for me. Thank you Next and and just choosing your battles, like go into a situation when you know I’m going to I’m gonna go 100% I want to get to 100% for them. Because I feel it. I just got instinct. So that was the hardest thing, letting go of the old one and working with the best.
Scott 45:08
Good, good advice. biggest misconception about PR that you’ve seen in your time working in the industry,
Jay Jay 45:14
that I am amazing Scott, and people should just know me and write about me. And I’m pretty and I should be verified because I’m someone, dude. No, you sometimes it you organic and organic isn’t the way to make it a lot. You got to pay to play, you got to pay, you want to you want to go to a fine dining restaurant, you don’t get that for free and hope you pay. It’s the same thing with your brand.
Scott 45:43
And what you mean by that is, okay, yes, there’s people that have accomplished a lot of stuff over their career, and people write about them. But if you want to get that press, if you want people to look at you, you’re getting into publications, you’re paying for eyeballs to expedite that process. That’s what that’s us. And people are just entitled, too many people are entitled, and think that they just because they’ve done something interesting that people should give a shit. And that’s not the way the world works. It’s too much too much noise. And I think that’s something that you have to really come to terms with
Jay Jay 46:17
attention is the new currency. You know, we just try and do noise even gonna listen to you. It’s like, do I just have your attention at the moment? You know, so,
Scott 46:25
which is hard enough,
Jay Jay 46:26
it’s just hard enough man, you know, so it’s like, it’s being okay with going, Hey, I’m not buying my way into this. I’m leveraging to advertise. And I’m leveraging this so that I have a chance to be seen.
Scott 46:41
One thing that you would tell your 20 year old self.
Jay Jay 46:46
The one thing that I would tell my 20 year old self is, it’s okay. To let go let go of what you don’t know, you know, in 2020, I lost all my confidence, clarity and conviction because I was a speaker, right? You know, and I was you just, you have to just be okay with it. All right. Now, I just have to pick up and go again, you know, so, there were times when I was 20. thinking, you know, you know it all? I got it. We just assumed a man. I’m just assumed I’m an I’m just a learning Ninja, you know? And a couple others. Yeah.
Scott 47:23
Very good. book or podcast, that you’d recommend people go ahead. Say again? Sorry. Sorry. Last question. Oh, oh, no, no, I was I’ve never heard of go ahead before. That’s it. I said a book or podcast that you’d recommend people go check out on my Go ahead. I’ve never heard that by.
47:44
So you know what, like, I know people probably heard this one. Like, look, I like
Jay Jay 47:48
the 10x rule. I like grant stuff. You know, I’ve read it again recently, you know, I know that we all probably probably believe was the richest man in Babylon all this, I just think you know, with with the way when you read that, it makes you believe that you can do more. And for me, like, it keeps you like thinking bigger. Like instead of like trying to like I want to hit Miami, dude, I want to hit Singapore. You know, it just it opens your eyes. It gives you the belief. I think we all need belief in ourself to mobilise.
Scott 48:18
I agree with that. I agree with that. I think that that’s probably the biggest impediment for people to be successful in their career and their entrepreneurial journey, whatever it may be. Right? It’s having like a little bit of like, faith in yourself. Actually, I’ll tell you what, I’ll tell you start off. I don’t mean right. A lot of stories. But one of the people always ask me, what was the the one liner that you had, like, you know, out of all your guests, what’s the one thing that you’ve heard from somebody? some wisdom that really resonated? And the one thing that I always talk about is when I had Anthony Scaramucci on the show, and he spoke about how if he, if you don’t have the Scaramucci, he’s a hedge fund guy investment. You know, venture capital was Donald Trump’s direct communications with like 11 days, got some notoriety through that. But he said, If I had to redo everything all over again, if I was back in Brooklyn or New York, whatever, you know, just like white, you know, white t shirt, jeans in debt in a shitty apartment, whatever. And I no money to my name, no connections. I would feel confident in myself being able to do it all over again. Right. And that is an exceptional amount of self confidence. But I think that that’s what you actually have to have to do anything phenomenal in your life. I think that that it takes that because as you know, is everybody knows who’s built anything. You do a lot of shit building stuff. It’s a lot a lot negative a lot of a lot of downsides, right? What does it say? Some wins a lot of losses
Jay Jay 49:41
due to the colonel the colonel the Colonel Sanders started rocking in at 62 we got a few Yeah, we are good. Yeah, he didn’t. He didn’t go from zero to chicken. He you know, have you read his story like Dude, he wouldn’t know
Scott 49:54
I actually don’t know his story. I think I think that photo of him looking so tired is like Final I made it up after.
Jay Jay 50:03
Like, you know, he’s just like this. Like he’s just hanging like, yeah, finally, it was chicken that took off. Yeah,
Scott 50:09
I didn’t know. So I’ll have to do that. But I know that he was late in the game and he was old. Yeah, he’s older. Yeah. And he started when he was successful, rather, but 100 you dude, I
Jay Jay 50:17
couldn’t agree with you more. And I know that confidence thing is in a very sometimes a loop thing, because, you know, no one wants to hear it. They want to hear Hey, what’s the next best head to take me to success? Nah, man. It’s like, dude, if you you know, if you if you know that you’ve done it once. Or you can do it again. Like, let’s go. You know, it’s like stops such from here, man.
Scott 50:38
Yeah. What does success mean to you?
Jay Jay 50:42
Doing what you want whenever you want however you want to do it. Yeah, I call winning. I’m winning within a lover. A win with for me. Like, it’s not an external telling me or what it is like, we know that feeling like, yeah. That’s it. That’s that. That’s it. Like, no one’s around. You know, you. You feel that? Yeah. Yeah.
Scott 51:07
And then most importantly, where do people go connect with you? Social website all that?
Jay Jay 51:12
Yeah, yeah. So you know, hit ace of spades. agency.com. How it sounds ace of spades. agency.com, or at JJ live, which is the best one because you see all my all my fun personality on there at JJ live JYJY l i v. e. Send me a DM. If you listen to this, I always like to know, like, who’s listening and who’s staying at the end?
Scott 51:33
So yeah, I like to know that too. I think I think the the metrics usually taper off around the 30 minute mark. But you know, that’s, that’s it’s important. So I want people to reach out and I want people to just consume all your content, because I think that even if you just totally those doff for the last 45 minutes, and you just follow what you’ve been doing on social, right, that’s a good place to just learn from and start. And that’s, that’s my first impression of when when we first connected. So that’s something to be, yeah, yeah. That’s,
Jay Jay 52:05
if I can, if I give when everybody moves, like, you don’t need to pay out, like, just pay me or pay other people just start doing content. I’m a big believer of like, leveraging this bad boy, to start like, like, use it like, it’s free. You can literally put stuff out there. If you don’t like it, delete it. And then that you’d be surprised like, Scott, most people are impressed with you if you show up and do content, because then their mind they’ve said, I can’t do it. What’s the number one biggest fear of public speaking? If you just get up and start speaking people go, Oh, my gosh, I could never do that. You just get brownie points. You know, just because Dude, you know, much probably credibility you’ve got from doing a podcast and committing to the success that has been because it’s incredible.
Scott 52:49
And and now as it is right now, it’s just talking to awesome people for you know, 45 minutes. And then Ryan day, like, how, how easy is that? Like, who doesn’t want to do that? But you do it for you. You look if
Jay Jay 53:03
you had to sweat man, because you know, you had to be cool people drop off. Yeah, yeah. Because people drop off stuff to do the same thing. Do people go? How do you build 57 million views? on like, three videos a week? Eight years straight? Yeah. Oh. I’m like, great. comeback. That’s not. That’s not a that’s not a shortcut. Yeah, yeah. Did you click with Gary Vaynerchuk It was so good. This kid comes up to me. He’s like, Hey, man, I’m really trying to sell my shoes. And he’s like, really telling all the things he’s doing. And Gary looks at him. And he’s like, How long you been doing it for the kids? Like, three months?
Scott 53:37
He’s like, get the ad to him. And I’m like, it’s so true. The job if he did it for 10 years, he’d be successful.
Jay Jay 53:47
After five years, and we can talk, yeah, like three months in and I’m the worst of that, too. Like it’s not working for like, I mean, for phone calls. Okay, make 400 then we’ll talk. Yeah.
Scott 53:58
Yeah. Yeah. All right, man. That was awesome. That’s good. That’s all that’s all I got. I have nothing else that we are doing.
