Journey to $100 Million: Entrepreneurship & Digital Marketing

Erik recently found himself needing to send out quite a bit of information to members of an organization he's a part of. He tried to think of the best way to do this. He could have sent one very long email, but he decided against that because he didn't want to bombard the readers with all that information at once. He then thought about sending a series of emails, but similarly, he didn't think they would want to be reading a lot of material on a daily basis.

H decided instead to record short videos, about 1 to 2 minutes long, containing all the information they need. He then decided to add those videos to a drip campaign, which will send daily short emails, with the link to that day’s video. That will turn into a daily email with a short video, over the course of about 10 days. Those chunks of information via short videos is a lot more manageable than a bunch of information at once.

Erik uses videos to get out information to the team regularly, and it's well received. Think of how you can incorporate video into your processes. It makes things a lot easier.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

There should be very very few exceptions to policies. If you take the time to create a policy it's because you saw the need to create it and therefore it should be followed 99% of the time. If a policy is only being followed sometimes it becomes a guideline, not a policy. If a policy is being questioned time and time again, by your team or your clients, then it's worth re-evaluating to see if it's valid. If it’s not, then it may need to change. But once again, if you have a policy in place it needs to be followed most of the time.

Erik recently had a discussion with the sales team about a particular policy for a particular client. In this instance it actually made a lot of sense to Erik to make an exception to the policy. That's not always the case, but this particular time it just made sense.

Think of the policies you have in place, if they are still valid, or if you need to make a change. Remember, policies should be the rule, not the exception.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

Erik was recently asked on Twitter by TechnoTim, what the status was of writing his first book. If you've listened to the podcast earlier in the year you may have heard Erik talking about writing and publishing his first book. It was one of his New Year's resolutions for 2020.

Erik started by writing between 1,000 to 3,000 words every morning in December of 2019. His plan was to write the first draft in a month, take about a week off, and then start editing after that. What ended up happening was he wrote the first draft, he put it aside for about 3 ½ months, and then he started editing it. He clearly needed more than a week off from it, and the quarantine from COVID was just the kickstart he needed to start editing.

At this point he is done editing, he has interviewed professional book editors, and he hired someone to edit his book. He estimates his book will be completely edited by the end of 2020. After that he will have someone create the book cover, he will format it for use on Amazon, and he will create an Amazon account for his book. It's going to be an e-book on Amazon, instead of a traditional paperback or hardcover.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

Referrals are a great way to get new business. We are always very thankful when someone refers us to someone else. It’s typically easier to close a deal when it starts with a referral and it’s often a good fit. It’s also a great way to start a new working relationship because there's already a small sense of trust.

It's not only nice to get referrals, it's great to refer others. We have a long list of clients who are experts in their industries and that's why we are also their clients. We love referring our customers to others, but not just our customers, other businesses too. It's always nice to be able to help someone by pointing them in the right direction. That's why Kevin is working on a spreadsheet of vendors he can refer to others. Because, what's better than knowing who you can refer someone to? Having an organized list of those businesses readily available to make the referral. Both parties will be grateful and that could lead to good things for you down the road too. Besides, it's the right thing to do.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

What would you do if you found out one of your competitors was advertising using your brand on Google?

We recently ran into this very issue. We did a search for our company name, Array Digital, and were very surprised to find our picture next to one of our competitor’s ads. This stirred up some conversation within our company about what we should do. Do we address it? Do we go to them and ask them what's going on?

Erik decided to take to LinkedIn to pose the question: What would you do if you found your competitor advertising over your brand on Google? He then called out the company by name. A couple of people congratulated him because they said it meant they see Array Digital as competition. Either way, Erik is not too pleased. He thinks we should defend the brand at all costs and make sure we are the ones that show up when we search our name.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

We are a pretty small company with a pretty simple org chart. We're growing, but as a team of 14 we're still pretty small and the way the company is structured is straightforward. At the top we have Erik and Kevin. Erik is the CEO and oversees all of operations. Kevin is the CMO and oversees the sales department. Below that we have Glen, who’s our Sales Manager, Jamal, who oversees the web design team, and Jake, who oversees SEO, social media and advertising. Each of them have a team who work under them in each of those services.

Our goal is to become a $100M a year advertising agency, specializing in medical, law, and the home service industries. As we grow Kevin envisions our org chart changing to possibly having a team for each of those services, under each industry. That would mean that every industry would have a team that knows the ins and outs of that industry, and how to best serve it. As the company grows even more, we might even have teams for sub-sects of each of those industries. There may be some change at the top of the org chart, but Kevin really sees most of the change happening at the lower levels.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

We recently updated our mission statement to align with our new goals. Initially our mission statement was to dominate digital marketing in Hampton Roads. That served us well the last couple of years, but we feel we have outgrown it. Our new mission statement is to dominate digital marketing for our clients in the medical, law, and home service industries. That’s what we do the best in, and that's where our focus has moved to.

A mission statement should align with the goals you want to achieve in the next two to five years. It should be achievable, measurable, and change as your goals change. Unlike a vision statement, which is really a long-term vision for the next 10 years, a mission statement is a shorter term goal. If you haven't created your mission statement, or if it no longer aligns with your goals, think about creating a new one. Make it meaningful to you.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

When you're first starting out in business it's common to take on all kinds of work. If someone requests your services it's very tempting to not turn work away even if it's something that you don't do or you're not interested in doing. You'll figure out a way to get it done because you're trying to grow, you need money to pay the bills, and something seems better than nothing.

Erik did this a lot in his early years. He agreed to work on projects that he was not interested in or he frankly didn't know too much about, because he needed the work and he needed the exposure. As he continued to grow though, he became more selective in the type of work he would take on, and chose to only do work that he specialized in.

Erik sees entrepreneurialism as a path. Some are ahead of you on the path and some are behind. If someone requests services that you can't fulfill or don't want to, you have a choice. You can politely turn them down or you can refer to them to someone who may be behind you on the entrepreneurial path. You'll be helping out the person who is requesting the work and the person who ends up taking it on. And, it doesn’t hurt to put out those positive vibes into the universe for yourself either.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

We have a fairly rigorous hiring process at Array Digital. It breaks down into the following six steps:

1. Figure out what we need

We have to figure out what we need so we know who we need to hire. We then create the job ad and post it on Indeed, our website, and our social networks.

2. Screenings

After we get applications, we send out some screening questions. Depending on the answers to those questions we will then set up a 15-minute technical phone screen between the applicant and the Hiring Manager. This is to gauge the applicant’s technical ability to fulfill the job.

3. Hiring Manager interview

If the applicant passes that screening they move onto the 60 minute interview with the Hiring Manager. This is what you would consider your typical interview. If they pass this interview they go onto the final interview.

4. Founders interview

This is a 30 minute interview with the company Founders, Erik and Kevin. This is to go over our core values and make sure the applicant fits in with them. This last interview determines if we will make them an offer.

5. Hiring Manager offer call

At this point the Hiring Manager will call the top applicant and make them a verbal offer. If it is accepted we move onto the last step.

6. Due diligence

At this point we run background and reference checks, send the official employment offer, and onboarding begins.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!

Millennials make up a big part of the workforce and they’re a force to be reckoned with. Here at Array Digital we have several Millennials on the team. Jake Maines, our Creative Director, is one of them. He’s been with us over three years and he’s an integral part of the company.

We submitted Jake as a “Millenial on the Move” to our local business magazine, CoVA Biz. That stands for Coastal Virginia Business. We were thrilled to learn Jake was selected as one of the magazine’s winners. He has a nice half-page spread in the magazine with his picture, title, and accomplishments.

We’re all really proud of Jake. We hope you’ll help us congratulate him if you follow us or him on social media.

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Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

—

Kevin Daisey is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was just 23, and is the Founder & CMO of Array Digital. Kevin is also the co-host of the Journey to $100 Million Flash Briefing and daily podcast, and the co-organizer of the Marketers Anonymous monthly meetups.

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For more information on the show, and to check out past episodes, go to journeyto100million.com!