Journey To $100 Million

At Array Digital, we have clients in 29 different industries which means we do have nice diversity among our clients but it also brings challenges. But if you take the HVAC industry, for example, they all need the same things and their websites need the same features. You can certainly customize their websites but, on the backend, there is similarity among them which simplifies the process tremendously. We can predict what every single customer needs and get really good at doing that. When you have a company that doesn’t niche and one that does, you really see the benefits of niching. — 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 Dig

At the beginning of 2020, we decided we were going to double the revenue of our company in 2020. We started off strong, then a few things happened (COVID), and we’re going to miss that goal. We’ve had a pretty strong financial year but we missed our goal. It’s good that we didn’t give up on our goal even if it was a stretch goal but a goal doesn’t mean anything unless you put it in action. We needed to be very clear about where this revenue was going to come from early on in the year. It’s not enough to just hope that more clients will come through. It takes serious action like hiring new salespeople, putting aside money for advertising, etc. Erik is putting this plan into effect now for next year and you should think about actionable ways to attack your goals for next year. Without a plan first, you won’t get the results. — 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

Erik recently realized that the Array Digital office is kind of cobbled together. And what better time to redecorate than during COVID when no one is at the office? We’ve expanded the lounge, created a wall to improve the desk layout, we’re going to paint, put down some area rugs, just give the place a general spruce up. The office became the way it is because when Kevin and Erik first merged, they rented a Uhaul, took it to Kevin’s old office to load up all of his furniture, then to Erik’s old office to do the same, then brought it all to our current location. Then they got busy with work and never really evaluated whether the furniture made sense or not so that is exactly what they are doing now. — 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 marke

Very early on after starting his own business, Erik started networking with local business owners and influencers. The problem with starting a new business is that a lot of new owners will not let their network know that they’ve started a new business. They keep it to themselves and it’s a mistake. You need to get out there and network both with people you know and people you don’t know. There are many different networking events you can go to, some more generic in nature and others that are more specific to a particular niche. For us at Array Digital, Erik has concluded that it only makes sense to network with niche groups. We have niched down recently and we want to be targeting business owners in those 3 segments. — 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-win

For the last 2 years, Erik got serious about New Year’s resolutions. In 2019, he decided he was going to run 1,000 miles in a year. He set his mind to that goal, determined how he was going to make it happen, and held himself publicly accountable by reporting on social media and within the company. Because of all that structure, he nailed it and got it done by Halloween, 2 months before the end of the year. New Year’s resolutions are so often a thing that people say with a smirk, don’t make it measurable, and don’t do the steps needed to meet them. For any resolution, you need to have a plan, execute it, and hold yourself accountable. Erik’s New Year’s resolutions for 2020 are as follows: Kick ass at a Half Iron Man Publish a book Collect $2 million in revenue Get to a monthly recurring revenue of $4 million Listen to the episode to learn how Erik has fared on his New Year’s resolutions this year. — Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digi

Way back in the archives around 1998, Erik was a civil engineer working as a construction project manager. He came up with an idea for a website that would join homeowners who need work done on their house with contractors who wanted to do the work. Think Angie’s List. But he didn’t know how to program so he had to teach himself. He used Microsoft FrontPage which would create a website. But he got stuck on the registration page so he ended up hiring a freelancer to help him create this site. Erik obsessed over this website for a year and a half, spending nights and weekends learning everything he could on software development. He launched it in ‘99 annnndddd...nothing happened. — 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 & entrepreneu

A couple of years ago, when Erik started listening to GaryVee, he came out with a concept called the “Content Reuse Framework.” It was an 81-page slide deck showing exactly how he repurposes content. Erik downloaded it and studied it pretty closely to understand how GaryVee was putting out all this content every day. GaryVee has been saying for years that no one - including himself - puts out enough content. That is why we now film our podcast recording sessions and it can be formatted in different ways for different platforms. Video is key to repurposing content so we try to do everything through video now. — 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 Founde

Erik had already created a website called measuredmile.com that was a concept similar to Angie’s List and was supposed to connect homeowners who need work done with contractors. It was a brilliant failure because he didn’t market it. One year after Thanksgiving, he and his family went out to an arts & crafts fair and he saw a booth that was marketing their URL while very few others were. This was the early days of the Internet but hardly anyone was displaying a URL. Erik had the idea to create a marketplace where vendors could post their wares and people could buy them. He built it out and it worked! But, once again, he didn’t promote and market his products enough. He neglected the system and fewer and fewer vendors chose to upload their products there. Lesson learned: Don't just build it; market it. — 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, an

Back when Erik was in high school, his dad retired from the air force and opened a VCR shop. He ended up having 2 video stores and during the summers, nights, and weekends, Erik would work there until college. One of the biggest lessons he learned was to be truthful with customers. For example, people would come up to him and ask, “Is this video any good?” They want his opinion. In that moment, he had a choice to make: 1) If he says he recommends it whether or not he’s seen or likes it, they are likely to rent the movie; or 2) If he tells them the truth that it’s a terrible movie, he may lose a sale. He started off saying yes to everything but quickly changed his approach and gave his honest opinion. What he realized was that it didn’t have to be a yes or no situation. He could frame it to redirect the conversation to help them find something even better. — Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array Digital, he is also the host of the Journey t

If you’re an employee, if you can gain access to your leadership’s vision and strategy, then you could potentially give yourself a leg up for opportunities with that company. It allows you to align yourself with that future and fit that with where your company wants to go. If you are an employer, do you have an outlet where you’re discussing your vision and your path? If not, you are not allowing your employees to have that leg up. You could start with a monthly internal meeting or putting it into social media posts. Think of ways to get that message out to your employees. — 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 i

When Erik was in navy contracting, he had a 2-man navy contracting company named Syntactical where they did software development for the navy. Erik came up with the name, reserved the domain, and named their company. He quickly realized that no one knew how to spell the word syntactical which is crucial for a business name. They ended up shutting down the company after 4 years. The lesson learned here was to pick a name for your company that you can communicate easily to people. When you say it, they need to be able to recognize it and be able to spell it in their head. Pick a name that’s VERY simple; the simpler, the better. — 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,

Which is better: productivity or efficiency? Kevin talks about a concept called ‘True Productivity’. Is productivity how many things you do or how efficiently you can do them? Productivity is quantity. For example, how many social posts you can put out a day for multiple clients. It’s checking off a box. Efficiency is quality. For example, you put out all those social posts but you misspelled words, put in the wrong picture, didn’t generate any engagement, etc. That is not being efficient because the quality is low. — 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 B

There is a phrase you’ve probably heard: “The riches are in the niches.” What this means is that if you narrow the focus of your company, you can make more money. It seems counterintuitive because you want to service everyone. But you need to narrow your focus to a particular demographic. Here’s an example: If you break your ankle, are you going to go to your PCP to do an X-ray and put a cast on it? No, you want to go to an orthopedic surgeon. You want a specialist to take care of this. It’s no different here at Array Digital which is why we’ve been rethinking our business. Our clients want an agency that knows their business inside and out; they want us to already know the specific challenges they deal with. — 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 di

Erik and Kevin have started a new mastermind called Array Mentors. They are part of several different masterminds and they don’t intend to replace them with this. But instead, they intend to bring things they’ve learned from other groups but with a different focus. The focus will be on companies under $1 million in revenue and getting them over that mark. It’s for people who are dedicated and are trying to take their business to the next level. If you are a dedicated entrepreneur, freelancer, or business owner, feel free to go to ArrayMentors.com. It’s going to be selective and limited with people who can add something to the group. There will be 2 meetings a month, a slack group, and other experiences as it continues to grow. — 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

How in the heck did we come up with such a lofty goal of $100 million dollars within 10 years? About 3 years ago, a moderator reminded us of how companies overestimate their accomplishments in a year but undermine their possible accomplishments in a decade. We thought it through and talked about having more offices, having more employees, but thought... what is true success? The biggest metric of success that's unfakeable is revenue! We calculated about $40 Million in 10 years, realistically, but why make goals that are easily obtainable? If you set your goals high, you'll work a little harder to get there. Learn why we've stuck with the ridiculous number and how we use it to drive our business in today's episode. — 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-wi

Kevin and Erik opened a second agency from scratch: Rival Digital. It’s so new that the website hasn’t even been established but they’ve hired two employees and started prospecting already. But why did they start another one? Well, Array Digital, their primary agency, has been around for a while developed from work that both Kevin and Erik had done for years before merging to form Array Digital. They’ve gained so much knowledge about what works and what doesn’t work including niching, which we’ve done recently. But, at Array Digital, niching is risky because we’ve got a lot of good things going on. We’re more of a full-service digital marketing agency and we haven’t really niched. Erik and Kevin wanted to niche very narrowly so that’s why they started Rival Digital to be a digital marketing agency for residential HVAC companies and only on that. — 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 Milli

Up until about six months ago we were willing to do digital marketing for just about any established business that needed it. When Covid hit we started to rethink that. We lost our biggest client, who was a retailer. It hurt. That's when we started to look at the different industries that we serve and we noticed some are more recession-proof than others, and we do really well for those industries. The industries we’re talking about are law, medical and home service industries. While some marketing agencies focus on specific niches, we are not there - yet. The pandemic forced us to narrow down the segments we serve, and it’s been really good for us and our clients. — 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 s

Recently Kevin interviewed Stephanie Messas, a lawyer based in New York City but originally from France. She helps French businesses do business in the United States. One way Stephanie saw success during the pandemic was by having everything digitalized. Everything she works on is in the cloud. She prides herself on being a business partner to her clients which means she had to be very good at communicating with them. The modernized law firm format sets her apart from her competitors. — 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

There’s a big debate whether every single client should pay the same amount for the services rendered. In this episode, Erik summarizes the two biggest philosophies out there regarding the two sides of this debate. The first side is: yes, everyone should pay the same amount. If one client finds out they’re paying more than another, they’ll be mad. But what happens if you raise your price for new clients? Do you raise your price for old clients as well? If you do, you’re going to have some issues that you’ll have to deal with. Another option is to change the price for the client based on some factor that you objectively or subjectively set in advance? Many people say you should base your price on the value you deliver to the client which varies based on the client’s situation. — 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

There are two big categories of salespeople: hunters and farmers. The difference between them is how they go about getting prospects and turning them into clients. A hunter is a salesperson that goes out and meets people and very quickly tries to convert them into a prospect. They offer value quickly so they can start to talk business and get them into the pipeline. They’re actively going out, actively getting business, and actively trying to close them. A farmer is pretty much the opposite. A farmer may start a podcast, interact with people on social media, go to events to network, but they don’t press too hard when it comes to converting someone into a prospect. They are more so invested in business development and doing things to bring awareness to your business. It’s a longer process, takes a long time to pick up speed, but it is still a completely valid sales strategy. We’re looking for hunters. — Erik J. Olson is an award-winning digital marketer & entrepreneur. The Founder & CEO of Array