Mentorship and Micro-Targeting: The $1 Formula with Dennis Yu

[00:00:00] Dennis: If you're struggling with direction or trying to make money, or you think that you have to be a superstar, To win in the world of digital, this episode is going to show you what it really takes and how it's about being seen and leveraging other people's power. Imagine the power when you can leverage someone else who's already successful in the thing that you do.
Dennis: And not only are you interviewing them on a podcast, which is not hard to do because they have the expertise, not you, but they can also open doors for you and maybe even be a mentor, watch other people's lives who have been changed and see yourself in their shoes
Dustin: Welcome back to the seven figure leap. I'm really excited today. I have, what I would consider a superstar in the [00:01:00] entrepreneurial space here in Dennis, you, I have been following Dennis for a long time and honestly was admiring his, his, his travel habits and like how he travels in one suitcase and goes all over the world and speaks on all kinds of different cool stages and TV shows and things.
Dustin: and then we got introduced and I'm like, Oh, he's a, real person. And as we got to talking to each other, I realized not only does he have this Incredible knowledge. And he's a world traveler and he's basically a professional speaker, but he just has a super, super heart. And, that's where I want to start today.
Dustin: And of course we'll get tactical as we always do and get some smart strategies from Dennis during our time together too. But Dennis, thanks so much for being on for. our friendship that's, that's emerged here and I'd love to hand the mic to you for a minute and just give a little bit of your own backstory.
Dustin: maybe let us know where your entrepreneurial journey started. And of course we'll, we'll work our way up from there up into the present day.
Dennis: Yeah. Thanks, Dustin. we're in a lot of the same groups spoke in a lot of the same stages. There are a lot of marketing gurus or whatever you want to call it. And I've always been disillusioned [00:02:00] with gurus , and same for the education system. And,I'm, Asian. And I'm good at math.
Dennis: You can challenge that. And I found that even though I could get really good grades and whatnot, that didn't lead to business success. And it wasn't until I had a mentor who was the CEO of American Airlines that showed me it was about relationships and show me it wasn't the guy who worked the hardest or who was the smartest or who was lucky.
Dennis: Or, I mean, there's some luck involved, and it made me kind of, cynical in a way because I thought I've spent like 20 plus years being like a really good student. Like the Asian stereotype is true, right? I was born in Dayton, Ohio. So I also tell people I'm as Chinese as Panda Express.
Dustin: Oh man, this is
Dustin: awesome. All right.
Dennis: So anyway, if it wasn't for a mentor who basically adopted me. I wouldn't have had the opportunity to build the website and American Airlines back in the mid nineties, which then opened the door to Yahoo and opened the door to like all [00:03:00] these other things happened because someone else opened the door, gave them to me, whatever, mentored me and I see so many other people where they are talented, but they just don't have Didn't get that opportunity.
Dennis: And so I found just kind of accidentally some people say in hindsight, like I'm a genius. So we know, but I was just, I accidentally found out that you could use the internet to advertise people. ,like I had a friend who had a problem with Sears. And so I ran dollar day ads targeting executives who worked at Sears in Chicago and got the thing resolved or a buddy wanted to work At Yelp as a product manager, he came to a conference and came up to me afterwards.
Dennis: Oh, I really, I'm unemployed. I'm living in my car. I'm trying to, get a job working at Yelp. I'm a good product manager. I'm like, are you, what proof is there? I Googled him. I can't find anything about you. How, why is Yelp going to hire? They could hire anybody, make a video about that.
Dennis: Talk about what you would do if you were a product manager at Yelp and then dollar a day again, and you can use YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, you can, [00:04:00] You can micro target on the internet. Right. And three months later, he sent me a note saying, Hey, I got it. I got a job at Yelp. Thanks to you. And there's hundreds of these stories.
Dennis: And I feel like these are all surrogate children of mine. it's like the soccer coach or whatever that lives through these other. And these are people young and old that have applied this thing, a combination of mentorship and dollar a day. And That's kind of what has been driving me is what are more ways to create systematized mentorship so that people who are talented can actually be seen podcasting like what you do, like you had this great episode on Digital Marketer with Mark DeGrasse and 65 people have seen it.
Dennis: That's not right. It's not like you're trying to be a super duper influencer, but you haven't been seen if you're putting in all the effort to be podcasting and you, you're a digital marketer and you're talking about success and sales success systems or how to podcast or whatever, like [00:05:00] why not put a coin in the machine, right?
Dennis: Cause it's a pay to play system. Put a dollar in the machine and have it do the work for you. Right.
Dustin: Yeah, I
Dennis: Googled you. Obviously I Googled everyone beforehand. I'm sure, you Google me and everyone's going to Google, everyone Googles each other before they meet. Right. that's what you're supposed, otherwise,that's what you do before you hire someone, before you work with them, before, you Google them.
Dennis: And I saw all this stuff you have done and the people you've worked with, and most of these people are invisible. Yeah,
Dustin: We're going to talk, that's a great teaser. So, as a good marketer, we do, he's opened the loop that we're going to close at the end of the episode. And we're going to talk about this idea of knowledge panels and something that didn't, it's opened my eyes to, of course, I do a lot of stuff, lots of content.
Dustin: I've been involved in a lot of the businesses, different professions, all kinds of stuff, and. That can be cool, but it can also be extremely confusing when someone's trying to, find out who are you and what do you want me to know about you? And the really great thing about this is you actually can influence that in a really [00:06:00] big way through knowledge panels.
Dustin: And so we're going to use me as a case study of what not to do. And at the end of today's episode, Dennis is going to walk us through what we can do
to basically increase our online visibility and our reputation. but there's a few things you said there that. I don't know that I have the right word.
Dustin: Juxtaposition juxtaposition, maybe as a word or contrast to keep it simpler. you're known for dollar a day ads and you've ran over a billion dollars in ads, right? you're the, I would
Dennis: other people's money, but yeah,
Dustin: you're the, you're the, you're no more Asian than Panda express. Cause you're from Dayton, Ohio.
Dustin: but, but I love the idea that you're obviously extremely intelligent. And you have to give the credit to a key relationship that really opened a door to actually let that make a difference. Right. I would throw the same kind of fun at myself and being of German descent and, being a really hard worker and disciplined and all these things, and yet I hadn't even heard the word entrepreneur until my thirties or or at least I'd never absorbed it and did anything with it.
Dustin: And so it was only through a relationship, a mentor, like to your [00:07:00] point that all this opportunity, all this. I'd say potential energy became like kinetic energy. Right. and actually took action. And so I love that you are inspired by that and that you actually do a lot of real practical things with it.
Dustin: So, yeah, so I'd like to expand on that a little bit more, like getting into like why you do what you do. I mean, you and I have talked enough to know. You're basically a professional speaker who doesn't need to go speak and you have Blitzmetrics, which is an amazing agency and marketing thought leader, but you don't really need to do that.
Dustin: Like you're doing all this because you want to, and you're doing a lot of different things. All out of a desire to serve, at least from what I can tell. So, I don't know where you want to go with that. is
Dennis: answer the question. Yeah, here,
Dustin: answer that question. what, why do you do what you do, Dennis? Dustin: Yeah, there you go.
Dennis: this is something that has value for everybody. I was with my buddy Munawar Abdullah in Dubai. He sold his last company for 300 million, super smart. And we had dinner and I intentionally skipped my [00:08:00] flight. I
had a flight out. I mean, a friend, my friend Rehan, who's one of the biggest names in Pakistan, wealthy family said, you need to meet my friend, Munawar, because he's helped the country of Pakistan create more jobs and he's an entrepreneur and you guys need to meet and create opportunities and okay, yeah, yeah.
Dennis: I'm speaking at this conference in Dubai. Let's have dinner. And I thought. Like a traditional American, we'll have dinner for 90 minutes, maybe two hours. And I'm going to go to the airport and fly back to the U S and this conversation went. So my mind was just, I was just flabbergasted. This guy was sharing his experience and just openly helping me.
Dennis: And I'm thinking, why is this guy? I don't even know him. He's helping me. I'm saying, well, what about, what do you, what would you do about this situation? What do you, what about this deal? And how would you approach this strategy? I mean, if you're sitting in front of someone like that, who's just super, super intelligent.
Dennis: I mean, you can't help, but be like a little selfish and want to ask questions. And so the time came to go, to leave, to go catch my flight. And I decided to [00:09:00] miss it and I wasn't going to say anything. Right. And we were out until 2 AM in the morning. And I said, why? I, as an American, I'm sort of like cynical, like this is too good to be true.
Dustin: Right.
Dennis: Why would you, why would you spend so much time with me? And how do you spend, like you, I feel like with you, I, I have all the time in the world, even though I know you own lots of companies and you're doing all these things and whatever. And he said, And this is the answer to your question. I choose who I spend time with by who I like, and I'll have one meeting per day,
Dustin: Wow.
Dennis: one quality meeting.
Dennis: And then he talked about Jeff Bezos, his buddy who only makes one or two decisions per day. I mean, think about Jeff Bezos and if he only has enough brain power to do one or two decisions per day. One or two meetings per day.
And this guy told me back when he first got started on wall street and whatnot, he was, I should probably not tell you all this cause he's a private person and doesn't want people to know he's wealthy in this whole kind of thing.
Dennis: But he said he used to work so hard and was [00:10:00] doing so many things based on the financial calculations of business and this kind of thing. But ever since he had his mentor tell him. He makes decisions based on who he likes, and then everything just naturally falls into place. All the deals he's had, like he told me about these different deals, I won't name drop or whatever, but these are amazing deals.
Dennis: And he said, yeah, that was because I went on a walk with this guy, or I went to dinner with this other friend, and we met this other person, and it really feels like Illuminati like, where these people all know each other, but I've implemented that. In my life in the last few years and Dustin, it's true, it's true what when I've made decisions not based on money or deals or calculating, like Americans are like meetings, meetings, you know, deals money right now.
Dennis: Like, okay, I get it. I get it. But literally just having one or two meetings per day. This is the my meeting with you today. Dustin is the only meeting I have.
Dustin: Wow. Well, I'm, I'm [00:11:00] honored and I hope the audience is too, and we will talk later how to make sure more than more than 60 people hear this. So
Dennis: it's just like going to a conference. So those of us who, who are pros, not just Oh, attend the conference and take as many pictures as you can with the other speakers. That's what the other people do, right? Oh, try to attend every session, try to check every box, try to hand out as many business cards as possible.
Dennis: No, no, no. You and I know if you make one good connection. At that event, that leads to all sorts of things, all I need is just one, but it's got to be a good one, right? And it has to intersect and it has to make sense and it has, and like this morning I was with Jason Van, Van Blurk who started Human Garage.
Dennis: With Gary and I've known these guys for quite a while and I'm taking time to go fly down to Central America to go hang out with them because I believe in what they're doing and it's just fun and like this whole like dichotomy [00:12:00] of you. Can only have your cake or eat it too, or it's either your
health or your business, or if you want to make money, you have to sacrifice your sleep.
Dennis: And you're like, who, who was this like a Gary Vaynerchuk hustle kind of thing that people like, I don't know, people who struggle think like somehow you have to, if you're not bleeding, then somehow you're not working hard enough, like where does this nonsense come from,
Dustin: I, I definitely share the sentiment. And, The American cynic in me and also just thinking about people in different parts of their journey and maybe people who are really in the grind. I want to ask you to reflect a little bit. , where I'm in my seat, I totally agree with you.
Dustin: And obviously you said it. So you agree in this stage of your career and your life, you can be much more choosy and you can really lean into that intuition of Who do I like? Who gives me energy? What do I feel like leaning into? And then that's what I'm gonna lean into.
Dennis: but you can do it now. You don't have to be super successful. A lot of people are like, oh, I can't do that yet.
Dustin: You also work with a lot of young people who are 22 and grinding and just getting started. is that same? Does that same advice apply to someone in the early [00:13:00] stages of entrepreneurship as it does? Maybe once you've been quote unquote successful.
Dennis: Dustin applies even more because they have more compound interest. The relationships have more time to compound. There's more time ahead of them. There's more opportunity. Last week I was in Minnesota with my buddy, Jack Wendt. Jack Wendt, I want to say is 19 and he, As a hustler, super smart, not many teenagers are going to be like this guy.
Dennis: So it's because people say, Oh, it's easy. You pick these guys that are superstars. So no wonder, like no matter what they do, they're going to succeed. Cause they're just these people. Yeah, that's true. That's true. They're very talented. I'm, I'm not going to deny that.
Dennis: Jack went, got his start because he reached out to Caleb Williams, who Was a friend of his dad who's a pastor and they had, I think, I don't know. They both went to like Israel together and did some church mission thing. But Caleb
started with me when he was 21 or something. And what is he now? Like almost 30 [00:14:00] and the mentoring.
Dennis: So when Caleb started with me, he was a nobody, but he then I said, you're. You need to make one minute videos, interview other people, tell your story. You, got paid by Tyson to cut, cut up chickens. You got a dollar per chicken that you processed on the Tyson chicken farm. And you learned about financial services.
Dennis: You were the youngest vice president ever at a bank to run an investment division. Because he had a knack and then , I said, Oh, so and so through so and so, Oh, you're because everyone is, has a friend who knows these other people who can make an introduction to you, like whether it's on LinkedIn or like that, like everyone's no more than a degree or two away because if they don't know that person, they have a friend who certainly knows those other people.
Dennis: And you might not know that that friend knows those people, but he, he had friends who knew these other people. He interviewed them on his podcast. I said, get your YouTube going up. Let's. Put the videos out there. Let's dollar day it. And he is now the number one name in [00:15:00] financial services at the national association of insurance and financial advisors, which is the big conference, the biggest and oldest organization of financial advisors, like people who sell insurance and things like that.
Dennis: He's their keynote speaker, like all this kind of stuff and started his own conference even. And it's all the top names in financial services speaking at his conference and all because of the principles that we're teaching here, where he started as a nobody. Cause the biggest thing I hear Dustin is, Oh, I'm a nobody.
Dennis: Or I, you easy for you to say, because you're at the point where you've already done all these things and all these people and you travel all over and I'm in Arkansas or I'm in Pakistan or wherever I don't have like nonsense. This guy,
Caleb, did it and then he became so abundant and did so well that he's literally giving away everything he knows and he's helping all his competitors and then this Jack Wendt guy comes in.
Dennis: So it's like this, it's like the young adults I've helped have done so well. They're spawning other young adults who are then going through our training and whatnot. And then [00:16:00] this guy, Jack, I was with him in Minnesota and it's a roundabout way of telling you this, but he said, yeah, well, My, my dad owns a, a chain of fitness places in Utah.
Dennis: can we use dollar day for that? I'm like, yeah, absolutely. And I have a friend of mine who's in Seattle, John, who started a coffee. There's tons of
coffee, coffee places in Seattle, right? I mean, good luck trying to compete as, where Starbucks is
Dustin: Right.
Dennis: where the mothership is there, like you're in the neighborhood of the mothership, but this guy, he employs people, other young adults who have, who have had trauma or, or, various situations and have given them jobs in his coffee shop.
Dennis: I'm sure his coffee is great and whatever, but people go to that guy's coffee shop because of the, supporting people who. Who have gone through certain things. And so I said, okay, well, why don't you tell that story? Why don't collect one minute videos, boost it out there for a dollar day, telling the stories people will.
Dennis: And so we recorded those things yesterday. Or not yesterday, [00:17:00] last week and then yesterday we were processing them because we have, software and there's tons of AI software to do all sorts of things. Right? And so I just, I love seeing this avalanche of people paying it forward, especially young adults.
Dennis: And then I'll have a friend who's 67 and he'll say, yeah, but I'm, I'm not a young adult. I'm like, you're, if you're, it's, there's no age limit. If your mind is able to learn the AI tools and get on. Yeah. Whatever the latest,if you're, I know people who are 20 and they're, they have like arthritis of the mind.
Dennis: They're like 80,
Dustin: Too old to start. Yeah.
Dennis: And I just turned 50 and I consider myself a young adult. I have the energy. I'm learning new things. I still got it. Right.
Dustin: Same
Dennis: So there's no, this thing I'm telling you about, about the connections and dollar day and making one minute videos is something. Anyone like Jack Hughes. I think he's 18.
Dennis: He's the son of Jeff Hughes, who founded Sterling Lawyers, one of the largest family law firms out there, meaning like divorce and child [00:18:00]
custody, like one of the biggest ones, like all the other family law firms want to be like this guy because he's so successful and has a big firm. And his son, who's 18, decided he wants to help parents lock down their kids phones because, all the privacy settings, because kids know how to get around.
Dennis: Even with the apps, they know they know how
Dustin: a dad of three teenagers. Yes. I
Dennis: I didn't even know like you could like you could hack the wi fi On your iPhone in the setup, in the setup, there's a way to get to the internet. I didn't know about, like, really? Yeah. Oh yeah. You can do this and you can do that. And you can, even though if they set timers and screen time things like, here's how you get around it.
Dennis: And I said, that's incredible. Why don't you make some one minute videos? And he did. And why don't we take all those one minute videos and including podcasts where he's interviewing teachers and interviewing other parents that are clients. Cause you know, all the, it's like Girl Scout cookies.
Dennis: They like, Oh, the parents will buy his 99 program or whatever. Cause that's, it's a set up program, right? He'll set up your phone and lock it down. And now your kids can't get around the thing. Right. But that is so [00:19:00] hilarious. And then let's turn it into a book. So let's, let's take all those, , YouTube, Zoom, Zencaster, cell phone style videos, put it all into the AI.
Dennis: And at the A, I turn it into a book, put it on Amazon, which we will in the next week or two dollar a day it, then he's a bestseller and then he's seen because dollar a day, which I'm famous for is let's make sure you're seen by the right people, even if you're not a big deal, my buddy, Danny Lee brand, he, he's, he was a nobody a year ago and I told him you should start interviewing other people on your podcast.
Dennis: We said, I don't know anybody, I don't, and I'm not a big deal. Like you are, you're a big deal, and it's easy for you to say, no, what do you want to do magic one time? What do you want? I want to do SEO in the world of pest control. I want to use my dad as a home service business owner. And this is one that I can, cause there's not many people in the world of pest control and SEO.
Dennis: I don't want to win SEO overall. I would choose a niche, right? Okay. So who are the, who are the top people in SEO? [00:20:00] Well, there's Darren Shaw and there's Greg Gifford and there's Joy, Hawkins, he started naming all
the top people and I said, okay, Greg Sterling. There's me, right? Yeah, but I'm a nobody.
Dennis: They wouldn't interview me. I'm like, watch, I send an email. To Darren. And I said, Hey, you really should have this kid, , you should be on his podcast and in every single person he has asked, as far as I can tell, has said yes to his podcast, the who's who an SEO and a pest control from a kid who's nobody, and now he's turning it into a book.
Dustin: Let's expand on that real quick. And then I want to go back to kind of pre amplification. And I think it also makes sense once I unpack it. So with this specific example, it's a pest control. Just extrapolate this a little bit. Why would this quote unquote kid, like what's the benefit of him interviewing the other experts in his niche on his own podcast?
Dustin: What are you going to do with that? And then I want to go way back to [00:21:00] kind of. that to talk more about networking and building relationships before you get into this amplification game, but please expand on that part.
Dennis: So the world of digital marketing services, which we all live in is this gigantic trillion dollar, we'll see plenty of room in this thing here. So why would he interview people that are potentially competitors and if he's making videos, shouldn't he be making videos that promote him? Instead of promoting how awesome these other people are, shouldn't he be beating his own chest?
Dennis: Shouldn't he be posting all this stuff on his website and, running stuff to his properties to collect his email address. And so what we teach is completely opposite counterintuitive at first, but later makes sense because if this guy's a nobody and, and he interviews Darren Shaw. Who publishes the yearly, search, local search ranking factors and that whole thing.
Dennis: Well, that video of him and Darren Shaw side by side on YouTube, [00:22:00] targeting fans of Darren Shaw, put onto Twitter where he's been spending a lot of time. So Darren Shaw's on Twitter. Right posting all kinds of stuff and linked in as well and then tagging Darren Shaw and saying, Darren, what do you think about the changes to LSA?
Dennis: What do you think about Google doing this or whatever the latest updates are with GMB, which is called GBP now, right? And and so then he's targeting White Spark, which is Darren's company. So all these people who follow White Spark, they Liebrand is. They sure as heck know who Darren
Shaw is. So when we dollar a day that on Twitter and we target Darren Shaw and white spark, we get a 20 to 30 percent click through rate, link click rate.
Dennis: Dustin, what's a good CTR in an ad? Typically.
Dustin: 2%.
Dennis: Yeah. If you can get one or 2%, you're doing pretty well, but we're saying our standard of our threshold is at least 10%. How the heck are we getting 10%? Because if I interview so and so on my podcast, so [00:23:00] Danny interviews, Greg Gifford, who's a big deal in SEO. And then we target Greg Gifford, all the fans of Greg Gifford on Twitter, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, because we can micro target Greg on multiple channels. Then it's basically like he is giving us his custom audiences. It's almost like a ghost endorsement, if you will. It is kind of like,
Dustin: it really
Dennis: like I was on Danny's podcast and we were talking about some of the changes that, because Google's always making changes. So there's always something to talk about. And then.
Dennis: Someone reached out to me last week. He runs a pretty big pest control company. And he said, Hey, I've been burned by the last three agencies. I paid them all this money and you seem legit. And I would, I just want to work with you. I'm like, who are you? What, how do you find, give me some context. You, you just, you reached out to me via email.
Dennis: You want to sign up for our stuff? Who are you? What, what is going on here? And he said, I saw a podcast episode of [00:24:00] you and Danny. And you were with. Thomas Ballantyne, who runs the marketing for Bulwark pest control, which is a big player. And this guy started 14 years ago and grew this thing to into many States.
Dennis: And we talked about all this kind of stuff. And he said, I, I know, because Thomas trusts you, I can trust you too. Cause these people have no idea about SEO or PPC or doing their website, or they're like, you know what, if this other industry. Like these other people that we call those lighthouses, the ones who are trusted in that industry, then I want to work with you, but you
Dustin: That's awesome. And , we focus a lot of dentistry on podcast guesting and all the different benefits of that, lead generation and SEO benefits and all
that. But I think one of the key ones besides relationship building, which is why I want to come back to you and talk about, For a few minutes is this idea of borrowed credibility, right?
Dustin: So just to throw out an example, you already said I was on digital marketers podcast. So, I actually became friends with [00:25:00] Mark DeGrasse as a result. And now it's Mark's went on to do new things. I've had him on this podcast. And so that relationship has had its own capital. But the fact that I was on that podcast gave me a ton of credibility and very directly led to me speaking on stage at trafficking conversion summit this year.
Dustin: About building a marketing fly, both podcast guesting. So to your point, like I was a quote unquote, nobody in the digital marketing space, yeah, I was doing some cool work, but very much under the radar. But that being on that show and then having that. That not only that relationship, but the, the credibility that comes from that is like people associate Dustin with Mark Mark's, the president of digital marketer at the time, maybe Dustin should be asked about what he can contribute to our conference.
Dustin: And yeah, so I'm a living example of doing this over and over and over again. And I, I consider a lot of this sort of. I put in a category of amplification. So you got something really good. You've got a great relationship, great opportunity. How can more and more, more people know about it before that? I could hear, I can kind of [00:26:00] like hear the question of my audience.
Dustin: Hey, great. If I know Dennis, or if I've got a mentor or I've got this amazing podcast opportunity, and I, get the goods. I can go amplify it with dollar a day. What about the part before that? Right? And so you work with a lot of young, up and coming marketing people and, really smart people.
Dustin: What's your advice to sort of build the building blocks of the relationships in the first place? Like, how do you grow a network? How do I find a mentor before I have? The clay to go build, you know, amplification and dollar a day and all that stuff. So more like even before that, like, how do I build some, what's a good strategy for building my network and my, kind of core relationships in a new space.
Dennis: have to decide what you want. Otherwise there's no basis for mentorship. Otherwise, like why would you ask them to be on your show or whatever it is? there has to be some reason legitimately authentically to connect. So my buddy Harrison Govertz, he started working with me when he was 14. He's 30 now.
Dennis: [00:27:00] 29 and he's one of the biggest names in affiliate marketing has a platform and he's like basically the competitor to call rail, like they're the leader in paid calls. Anyway, he wanted to be the affiliate marketer. And so we
went around to all these different conferences and. Spoke about how we were running Facebook ads together and we'd log in and show Facebook ads on the screen.
Dennis: And because of that, all these other people that wanted to run Facebook ads wanted to connect with us. But remember he was a nobody and I was well known in the world of Facebook ads. I, he and I were doing it together when the whole thing started, but it was very easy because, Anyone who needed help with Facebook ads or who is knowledgeable in Facebook ads, we had a clear connection.
Dennis: So I had, I said Hey, Alex Schultz, who basically was the CMO of Facebook at the time, I said, we should do something together. I'd love to interview you. And so we did that. And then he [00:28:00] said, you know what? We should hold a mini conference. We should invite. a special blitz day we should invite your clients because we had some of the top clients.
Dennis: So I invited Quiznos and WWE and all these others. And I shouldn't mention that because then people will say, well, yeah, you had that asset. So they wouldn't like my Facebook, they have a whole conference just for me. Cause I only had, I don't know anybody, but, but the point was I was able. To arrange this because I was building reputation and I don't have to, you don't have to be world class.
Dennis: Like I was demonstrating, like I was very serious back then about Facebook ads and Harrison was serious about Facebook ads. And we've just openly published what we were doing and this worked and this didn't work. And here's I found a hack in the system where I could raise my bid to a hundred dollars and the system would give me all the traffic and then I would change it down to a penny and then it would actually charge me a penny and give me a credit.
Dennis: And so I would just keep, I created a script that would do that. And. like all sorts of like tricks that we found that we're working that anybody can [00:29:00] use on any platform. Anytime you've learned something, you can go to the experts in that field and have them on your podcast. It doesn't matter what it is, but the answer to your question is, if you want to create content with an expert in that area, you need to show that you're a disciple of that craft.
Dennis: Like you, you want to do stuff with WordPress. Okay. Who are the top people in WordPress? You better show that at least you tried to make some WordPress websites or you've tried to do the thing. Cause if you haven't at least tried to do the thing. Even if that guy says, Oh yeah, , I'll be on your podcast.
Dennis: You have no basis of conversation. You have nothing to talk about. Right. Then it's just going to be really awkward. And you could ask chat GPT. Oh, come up with 10 questions. I can ask Dustin. That's going to be weak. Okay. Cause the vibe of the conversation, like your conversation, like we're, people can tell it's not that I checked the box.
Dennis: Oh, I have Dustin Reichman on my podcast. No, people are going to listen and see. Was that a thoughtful conversation? It.[00:30:00]
Dustin: Right.
Dennis: And that vibe, I think, matters more even than who it's with.
Dustin: Yeah, I'd agree. And so the, someone's sitting here, whether they're at a point in their career and they're wanting to be known for something new, or maybe the early under, I wanted to just be known for something. I guess the first key part of the strategy is getting clear on what you want.
Dustin: and once you know what you want to be known for, then it's looking out to see who can I align with and maybe who's the one group we have separation from some of these folks and what can I do on my own to take action, to learn, try. Create, and then once you get that kind of initial key relationship, then it becomes that process of amplification where you take maybe even one key interview, one key conference, one key,collaboration, I guess is the word I'm looking for.
Dustin: And then you can do all the one minute videos dollar a day. You can do a lot of stuff to amplify that and make it appear way bigger than maybe it's. It is in the sense of amount of effort it took to create in the first place that I kind of like tie [00:31:00] that together in a bow of sort of the process of how we create our name online.
Dennis: Have a thing you want to make money on or expertise tied to. Interview someone else, co created content, collaboration, whatever you want to call it. Dollar a day it. Amplifying it. So, you can put it out there on multiple channels. Danny Lee Brandt, who's one of my disciples, I told you. He, he says, Which I agree, put it on Twitter, put it on LinkedIn, put on it.
Dennis: But just, you don't have to make it different. Just paste it there. And like, why not? Right. You're not trying to be a YouTuber, not trying to be an influencer, and that will build the right audience. You're not trying to get to a
million followers. You're just trying to grow. Your agency with the right clients or grow your sass or grow whatever you're trying to grow.
Dennis: You're not trying to reach the entire planet.
Dustin: Find the right people at the right message at the right time. love that. And so.this is not an evergreen thing to say, but I'll say it. so Dennis is going to be featured in our upcoming summit, the profit summit, and we're going to dial in for podcasting specifically, how to use this dollar a day strategy to [00:32:00] really amplify your influence and your impact and your income.
Dustin: so if you're like, like this little teaser that we just did kind of laying out some of these stories and some of the background behind this strategy, we're going to be very tactical with our podcasts, or with our pod profits summit, Presentation that we're going to do on this. but for
Dennis: Let me give you one teaser for that.
Dustin: yeah, go ahead.
Dustin: These tease them a little bit
Dennis: the pod profits conference. So if you are a podcast host and. You've got your list of all these people that you're trying to get onto your show. The thing that I see hosts missing is at the end of the podcast, before you hit stop, because most people are like, Oh, tell us, how can we find you?
Dennis: Oh, you can find me on Instagram. And it's, Oh, thank you so much for being on the podcast guys. Tune in next time for, and they ended right. Instead of that, before you do that, you say, Dustin, what is the one reason people need to watch our episode? Well, in [00:33:00] our episode, we talked about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Dennis: And so at the, after you've already had, you can do all the preparation on thinking about what you're going to talk about and what the questions are, but only at the end, you often go in different directions, which is normal. So at the end of that, You, you say, you basically are making promos, saying, Hey guys, catch Dustin and I, where we talk about this, this, and that, right? And he's Hey, my mind was blown, I just spent an hour with Dustin, where he told me
how he did this and this, and this is why you need to listen to our episode. And then you get him to say it, or her to say it. So the promo at the end, after you've already recorded, while it's still fresh in your mind, you have the energy in two minutes, you're basically recording a trailer because most people who are really pros, they say, Oh, we're just going to get into it.
Dennis: I'm going to record my intro later. Right. Or worse. They record the intro at the beginning. Hey guys. And they read the bio today. I'm with so and so and they've done this, this, and that, and come on, right? That ruins the vibe. The vibe is the most important part, right? [00:34:00] So when everything's good, you could say, you guys, you do not want to miss what we just talked about.
Dennis: And then Dustin says, Hey, yeah, this is really good. You need to check it out. Yeah, you need to, cause this is so good. This is so good. Right. So you go back and forth, little one liners zingers at the end, two minutes at the very end. If you found that to be valuable, because that's, that's what you do in boosting.
Dennis: That's what you put in the bumper. That's what you do. if you have a movie, you have to have a movie trailer, right? Hollywood movies, they make movie trailers without the movie trailer. People watch the movie, even if Tom Cruise is in it or whatever. So that one, that's an example of one tip.
Dennis: I'm going to share a whole bunch of other tips for hosts.
Dustin: love it. Yeah. So be at the pod profit summit with Dennis. it's going to be one of dozens of amazing guests that are just gonna be very practical and strategic. I love that. And I can just. I know how good it would be because I can imagine myself and the very few times people put me in this spot as a guest, because the thing that you were going to respond with is the thing that's truly.
Dustin: You're passionate about, you just had this 30, 45 minute conversation. There's [00:35:00] always that nugget. And there's that thing that like, wow, like that, that really impacted me. And so you're catching them in the moment to really regurgitate that without too much thought. And that's, the thing, right?
Dustin: That's the hook that people are really going to be attracted
Dennis: And the second to last question is, so that that's the last thing that you do. But the second, the last thing that you do is you ask, what's the one question that you wish people would ask you, and then go ahead and answer it.
Dustin: I'm going to ask you that now because I want to I want to get into the knowledge, the knowledge panel as a kind of a final takeaway. But Dennis, we literally could have 10 episodes talking about all different aspects of your career and your areas of expertise. What is one thing in the context of the conversation we've had so far today that you wish I would ask you or that you really wish people would key in on more when they have an opportunity To have you in front of an audience, like what should I have asked you?
Dustin: And go ahead and answer it for the benefit of our audience. And then we'll switch over into this kind of practical takeaway with the knowledge panels.
Dennis: What's the biggest mistake in digital marketing.[00:36:00] Dustin: What's the biggest mistake in digital marketing, Dennis?
Dennis: I think it's that people focus on the tactical shortcuts of SEO and whatnot without realizing that your actual experiences captured through social media, driving traffic to dollar a day is what actually creates your Google ability. I don't like to say SEO because that implies you're trying to trick the search engine and me as a search engine engineer, right?
Dennis: I represent the search engines. That's what I did is protect the search results. I'm trying to see who's legit. So. Your reputation, you and I would agree is everything. Everyone listening and watching. We agree our reputation is what drives the whole thing, right? Your reputation is what Google says about you.
Dennis: How do you influence results on Google? Influence social first. There's an underlying layer of social. If you, if you claim all your socials and you have your podcasts and you've interviewed all these other people to kind of. Train Google on who you are and you put it out there in the right way. We built a tool that does a lot of this, like personal brand [00:37:00] websites, integrating schema and all the plugins and that kind of stuff.
Dennis: Then Google understands who you are. So when someone types Dustin Reitman in, they see what you want them to see. And in this case, I did a query before we started. I looked you up in the Google knowledge graph Explorer, and you have a. Confidence score of 24 and you have a knowledge panel, which I will give you the ID on it and you can go in and claim it.
Dennis: And so if you Google me and you see all the colored boxes and whatever, that's a full knowledge panel. That's what should show up. A lot of
people think it's only celebrities that should have that because we're going to follow the recipe, like Betty crackers, chocolate chip cookies, whatever the recipe is.
Dennis: We're going to follow the recipe and you're going to get a knowledge panel, Dustin, and then you're going to tell everyone how you did it. In fact, you're going to tell people go Google me, like, why just, just go Google me and see, and you're like, I'm going to show off to them a little bit. Right. And then they see all this stuff show up and they'll say, how'd you get that?
Dennis: [00:38:00] What did you do? Did you pay someone for that? No, I looked myself up in the knowledge graph tool, which is Google. Google's big database. We created a tool to do that. Unless you're a programmer, you could do it, but you have to be a programmer or use my tool. It's free and then feed Google all the information about who you are and what you've done and what your relationships are and about your company and all all these.
Dennis: You need to feed Google the right information. Now it shows up properly and you have to claim it, which means you have to go through the Google verification process, not instagram verification or the other blue blue checkmark, whatever vanity nonsense. But you have to verify that you are who you say you are.
Dustin: Okay.
Dennis: IDs, that kind of thing, right? Once you're verified, you can then claim that knowledge panel, provided you've triggered it and you have enough information there. And now your SEO is so much more powerful. Now, the things that you do on dollar a day are so much more powerful because the people see you are, they see that, you interviewed so and so on the podcast, then they Google you, ta da, this whole thing shows up.
Dustin: Beautiful. So someone who's done digital marketing for [00:39:00] 15 years, maybe I'm the only one everyone's listening to duh, Dustin, You're such a fool, but I just did not have the awareness of this. If I'm being really transparent, like Dennis and
Dennis: No, they don't know. All these SEO experts, they have no idea. That's like people who are, they claim to be professional car mechanics and they don't know what a transmission is. Really? Yeah. I've been working on cars for 20 years. I'm a pro. Okay, great. let's look at your, let's fix this transmission.
Dennis: I don't know what a transmission is. Okay. What am I supposed to say to that?
Dustin: right? And so I think step one here is awareness, right? Like, Oh, you can influence this and you should. And then, step two, I guess, is, is really taking action to do that. So you've. Kind of painted that picture. there's a verification process. You get to choose what you want to show up and and prioritize, I guess, in your identity and Google's eyes.
Dustin: I guess just give us the step by step. Like, where do we start? We want to let's just
Dennis: Let me, let me
Dustin: use your free tool.
Dennis: Here's where people get this wrong. [00:40:00] Cause they start off with the frame that they think SEO is some technical wizard, black magic thing that someone else does that you just throw it over the fence and the wizard handles it. Right?
Dustin: Yes,
Dennis: No, your reputation, the things that people say about you, your reviews, the podcast, you've been on word of mouth, the people who know you, you're linked in all these things about who you are and what you've actually done.
Dennis: When that is properly reflected into digital. Like the sun reflect, sun has, the moon doesn't give off any light that it's reflected from the sun, right? So when your actual experiences and relationships and work and things you've done get reflected into digital marketing, so it shows up on Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, whatever, which is like the moon or the sun's rays reflecting off the moon to come.
Dennis: So we see the moon at night, right? When, when that gets organized and reflected properly, then the results on Google will be, What you want, , it's your reputation and [00:41:00] relationships and experience organized in a certain way. That's not some magic secret thing that allows Google. It's very simple to understand who you are.
Dennis: Google is confused. There's so many other Dustin Reitmans out there.
Dustin: In my example, not many, but, here's a, here's a
Dennis: I can show you, right? I've got the thing open right here and
Dustin: probably are a few in Germany. You're, you're right. But in the U S I think there's only one and I think he lives about 15 miles from me and is probably a distant cousin.
Dennis: Well, regardless of how many there are, because a lot of people have like other celebrities or whatever the same name, fine. But there's. That the main object for you has a confidence score of only 24, meaning there's only a few objects. So there's Dustin Reichman is the object and then every podcast, every relationship, everything you've done, the companies, your social, like all the things that are kind of attached to all these attributes and things and other objects are like you and I, when this gets published, that creates a link between the Dustin Reichman object and the Dennis you object, right?[00:42:00]
Dennis: Google's trying to map all these things together. There's so few things there that Google, no offense, Google doesn't know very much about you and I know you've done a ton of stuff in digital marketing. So how can it be that there's a ton of stuff about you and a ton of things that you've done yet when we look up your ID in the knowledge graph, there's only a few things.
Dennis: Why is that? Cause you haven't connected them.
Dustin: yes, exactly. and I guess that's a good demonstration that even with a crazy sort of unique name like mine and someone who has a large digital footprint, like I've done a lot of stuff, between guesting and hosting and conferences and writing and LinkedIn and social media and all that stuff.
Dustin: And I've had numerous different online businesses, even Dustin, who's also I would say, above average connector and relationship builder. has a crappy knowledge panel that I'm going to, improve. And so tell me, Dennis, or tell the audience and speak to me directly since I'm going to go do it.
Dustin: Like what is step one and maybe step two? I know we don't have to get all the [00:43:00] way down
Dennis: one is do a Google search for Blitzmetrics knowledge panel, Dustin: Okay.
Dennis: and that will pull up our tool. You don't have to log in or anything like that. It doesn't ask you for money. You type in your name and then it looks it. It then queries the knowledge graph to look at all the other people and you find the one that's yours.
Dennis: And then our article shows you step by step how to claim it. And then there's like various things along the way where maybe you get rejected or like we deal with all the weird little problems along the way.
Dustin: But step one, go find the Blitzmetrics knowledge panel Dennis: it, right?
Dustin: Yeah.
Dennis: we teach, our answer is just Google it, right? I mean, if we're saying we're going to help people be Google able, everything that we have should be Google able too, right?
Dustin: That's a good, that's a good, that's a good meta, not to blend with Facebook, but that that's a good meta example of, kind of taking your own medicine and doing things the right way. Well, Dennis, this is awesome, man. I really appreciate your time. We're going to continue the conversation, for our summit coming up with a very, [00:44:00] like we talked about practical tactical takeaways for podcasting specific dollar a day strategies.
Dustin: I guess, first of all, tell us , how to find you. And then I got a follow up question that I want to close
Dennis: got to find me on Google. But I'm also a real human, even though we have an AI, Dennis, but I actually answer on LinkedIn and Facebook and what, just Google me. And I actually do reply. It might take me a day or two, but I, it's, there's no AI. I believe in humanity.
Dustin: so do I.
Dennis: I'm easy to find
Dustin: Yeah. So is there a preferred platform or any of the, any of the above?
Dennis: LinkedIn, if it's business, all the other, so whatever your favorite platform is, if you're a young adult and you want to reach out on Instagram, I do check my DMS. I get a ton of them, but I always check them.
Dustin: All right. Well, Dennis, I can speak from firsthand experience, super generous guy, obviously a very intelligent, well connected,entrepreneur, but I, as I opened with this whole episode, just , a heart of gold, a real giver, someone who's really looking to make an impact in the world, and he was extremely generous with his time and talent, and his treasure.
Dustin: And so Dennis, thank you so [00:45:00] much. if someone's, Finding this for the first time. I'm not going to phrase this well, cause I need to take our training from the summit. But Dennis, why, in a minute or less, why should someone go back and listen to this episode of our podcast together?
Dennis: If you're struggling with direction or trying to make money, or you think that you have to be a superstar, To win in the world of digital, this episode is going to show you what it really takes and how it's about being seen and leveraging other people's power. Imagine the power when you can leverage someone else who's already successful in the thing that you do.
Dennis: And not only are you interviewing them on a podcast, which is not hard to do because they have the expertise, not you, but they can also open doors for you and maybe even be a mentor, watch other people's lives who have been changed and see yourself in their shoes.
Dustin: Beautiful. All right. Well, I'm convinced I'm going to go watch this again when it comes out, Dennis. thanks so much for your time. Look forward to continuing the conversation at the summit. and everyone else go Dennis, you, why you go find them on LinkedIn or [00:46:00] your social media platform of choice, reach out, send them a DM if you need some help, and go use blitz.
Dustin: Blitz metrics has amazing tools, obviously for the knowledge graph and many things beyond. So Dennis, thank you, my friend. Look forward to continuing the conversation. you're awesome. And we'll see everyone else back here on our next episode of the seven figure elite podcast. [00:47:00] [00:48:00]