Matthew Faraci | “Make Good Popular” with the Public Relations Expert and the Founder of Inspire Buzz PR

Audio Transcription

Speaker 1:
Today. We are joined by Matthew for reaching the founder of the inspire buzz public relations PR firm. And on today’s show he shares why people want to align with brands that aligned with them, what public relations actually is, how effective public relations can actually help to grow your business. While he believes that public relations is a lot like surfing, how public relations can help improve your brand and why his business was created to make good popular. Ladies and gentlemen, if you’ve ever wanted to know about public relations and its potential impact on your businesses, bottom line that this is the show for you.

Speaker 2:
Yes, yes

Speaker 4:
nation. On today’s show in a world where most people will do anything for the almighty dollar, today’s guests makes me want to holler because he is what I would, what I would describe as the real definition of a baller. Today’s guest, Matthew Farace. He actually wants to make good popular Matthew Farace. Welcome onto the thrive time show. How in the heck are you doing my friend?

Matthew Faraci:
Um, well now I’m fantastic cause I’m here. So how could I complain?

Speaker 4:
Can you explain to listeners, because many of our listeners are going to go to inspire.buzz.com right now it’s actually just inspire.buzz.

Matthew Faraci:
It’s in startup buzz. It’s actually a new kind of a extension.buzz. Believe it or not, it’s an extension.

Speaker 4:
And when you go to inspire.buzz, if you’re, if you’re going there right now, you’re going to see a website that is a laser show of a, how would you describe this? How would you describe what we’re looking at here?

Matthew Faraci:
I, I, I describe it clay as if Monty Python went into the web design business. That is fair. That is a fair assessment. How does that sound? Um, you know, look, when I, when I designed it and usually you know, you don’t, you don’t actually, people say, Oh, check out my website. But these days you don’t really check out websites except to get basic information. Although I should say your website is awesome by the way, love the big Epic picture when you get on there. But most, most websites, you know, you’re just going there to look for info, not to have an experience. And I just thought, you know what, look, I’m going to make it as wacky and crazy as possible. I’m going to push the designer to the limits and if people don’t like it then they’re not the right people for me to work with.

Matthew Faraci:
And if they like it then they are. So it’s like a, you know, it, it, it sorts itself out. Does that make sense? Does that make sense to me? It makes a lot of sense. Cause I think in a lot of ways you and I are very similar, uh, at the core. Yes. Um, yeah and I think we’re on the same frequency. So you, yeah, you are an innovator in the world of public relations and you’re the founder of inspire buzz. It’s a marketing and media strategy agency that exists to make good popular. Could you break down what that means and also explain what public relations even is. Yeah. Okay. That, that’s great. Um, so first of all, I, I really mean that we live in a society today that unfortunately all too often, especially our media and social media culture, all too often advocates vice over virtue, right?

Matthew Faraci:
And so I started to think, um, well what really started me was, was many years ago I heard a guy give a talk and he talked about how politics was downstream from culture. And at the time I was in politics, we’ll get into that. And when he said that, that thought arrested me because I thought, well, how are we ever going to pick sir, fix our politics if our culture is broken? And so at that moment I just decided I wanted to be part of the solution. And so that’s, that’s kinda what got me started, got me started on this crazy trade. So we literally work with brands, technology, entertainment projects, other people who are [inaudible] sounds trite almost, but they are doing good things and they are trying to make the world a better place. Uh, because that’s my passion and you can’t be passionate about money.

Matthew Faraci:
You have to be passionate about what you do and then the money comes in behind it, right? The money comes in to support it. Um, your second question, clay, was, I’m trying to remember your second fight. I’m trying to do two part questions. I’m a horrible, horrible host, you know, as a horrible host. One of the things you do as a horrible host as you want to paint your guests into a corner by asking them multiple part questions. And I apologize, I just was thinking IX just kind of out loud. A lot of people don’t know what PR means. They don’t know what the P stands for it. They don’t know what the R stands for. They don’t know what public relations is all about. What does public relations do? What do you do? Well, so I use the term PR only because that’s what people use.

Matthew Faraci:
But I personally hate it. I prefer the term, you know, relationship marketing. I’ve been throwing out some other terms there, but this is, this is one thing, but traditionally what it means is it was birthed at a time, think the word social media before there was social media, there was just media. So if you wanted to get your message out to the world, the media was your only way to do it. Now you have multiple, we’re on one right now. Right? Um, but I’ll give you a very specific example. If you think of somebody like Denzel Washington who is incredibly well known, but he’s very much a creature of sort of that other era of using the media to get out his message. Um, right these days, like you need to do both. So in his case, he’s very strong in the former and probably not as strong on the social media game. Right? And then you have influencers and creators, a lot of them whom I know they’re really strong on their social game, but they still need the credibility of being covered by the media, if you will. The traditional, we could call it the traditional media, but again, these terms that they get all messy because the traditional media is not really traditional, but that’s a whole other conversation. But you use this stuff to get your message out to the world. Um, and that’s, I think that’s probably the best way to describe it.

Speaker 4:
Can we, um, I wanna I want to take a, I want to go off off-roading here with you just for a second. Some ah, I love it. Let’s go. You, um, you, you’ve worked with some big clients and I know you’re not gonna see their name drop in in brag, unless I kind of prompt you to do it. And I brought two guests on the show here. Uh, Cory Minter is the founder of Trinity employment. It’s a as a staffing company for professionals, you know, medical like hospitals. If you need a professional, that’s who you’re going to go to. Trinity employment. And then we have Josh with living water, irrigation. These are both Christian business owners. Um, and I want to ask you a couple of questions and I know they have questions for you as well, but what are some of the big clients that you’ve worked with? Maybe the names that some of our listeners would know?

Matthew Faraci:
Well, I’ll give you, I’ll give you my, uh, my favorite example. I’ve worked with, uh, a streaming company called [inaudible] called VI out of Utah called vid angel. And, um, vid angel came up with a fantastic idea, which, which had actually had several iterations before them. In other words, other companies had tried, and I can tell you the whole story, but basically what they allow you to do, what they allow parents to do is to take, uh, content, say, uh, say game of Thrones. I’ll give you an extreme example and you can go through and actually filter the various things that you don’t want your kids to see. That the better example are pieces of content where, excuse me, clay, where there’s certain content where, and I’m trying to think of a good, Oh, I know the Martian was a great example with Matt Damon. It’s one of those movies where I almost would let my kids watch it, but, uh, it’s just a couple of things, some language, some nudity, some other where it just, I couldn’t let them watch it.

Matthew Faraci:
So vid angel created the technology to allow you to remove and filter the things that you as a parent objective. Um, so again, they fit that sort of rubric of they’re making the world a better place by making more content, family friendly, right? So they’re a wonderful example of the kind of client that we love to work with. And then what kinds of work would you do for that kind of client? I mean, to get to more exposure, what would you do? Well, okay, so, so the whole, every single client that I work with, and this is one of the things, clay that is very important I think for your two guests, uh, to understand, uh, I was trained in, in political strategy. So that’s where I, where I came out of. And that’s not that dissimilar from the training that I had over the years from some incredible mentors to what people learn in the military.

Matthew Faraci:
And the idea is that you really, and so if you don’t come from this, um, this background, it’s very hard to see PR this way. Even even I’ve found people that have business training, business training doesn’t train you for this. So I’ve often met people in a business setting who are PR people for companies and they’ve never had this training. And so for them, they go, wow, this is amazing. But the idea is to create a strategy. So you look at where am I right now? Uh, what, where is the narrative right now in, in the, in the public space? Um, where is it, where is it going? Where do, where do I want it to go and how do I get there? Right? So these are some, these are some very key questions. And then you write, you create a very, very comprehensive strategy to do that.

Matthew Faraci:
And then you discipline yourself over and over and over and over again every day to work towards that. I usually do this in 90 day increments because I believe that you can’t, you can’t really think beyond 90 days effectively. So any, any, uh, person that’s listening that would be like, uh, you know, from a political background, they would just say, Oh yeah, this stuff’s obvious because if you look candidates, right, you’ve even heard this term used on Fox news and CNN and other places, candidates are, um, are always taught. You hear this term about them being on message, right? It’s very important for them to be on message. Uh, so they’re, they’re familiar with this discipline and that’s what you see in the political space is that really, really successful candidates are extremely disciplined. And so it’s, it’s operating on strategy and it’s having the patience to see that strategy through. So a lot of people, they want to be famous and the next minutes, and that’s the problem with 15 minutes of fame is that’s all you get. And then you go away. Our goal is to create longterm to, to create longterm what I call ubiquity. So that you are the GoTo person on, you know, you mentioned one client, uh, does irrigation, right? So right off the bat I would say, okay, my goal for you is we want you to own that conversation completely. And that’s the, that’s the goal. Does that make sense?

Speaker 4:
It makes a lot. It makes a lot of sense. I want to go a little deeper as well if you’ll let me. Um, and I, I, because I want to talk about a Mitt Romney. I want to stay on brand. I want to, I want to talk about Matt Romney. I love Mitt Romney. Um, I love, uh, people who have strong values and if Mitt Romney was looking for a job, I would hire Mitt Romney because I love hiring Mormons. I love hiring Mormons. Uh, I’ve never had a Mormon ever call in late to work ever. Not one minute late ever, ever. And I’ve had dozens of them worked for me. Never had a sick day either. A, they don’t drink caffeine does a general rule. If they’re practicing, uh, they don’t have a lot of extra marital issues going on. It’s just great. It’s a great thing. Can you tell us about working with a Mitt Romney’s political campaign? And if you can’t, I get it. But we’re maybe just tell us about some of the political work you’ve done.

Matthew Faraci:
Well, I just wanted to say I sh I also share your, um, your opinion of people in the LDS community. I think that they get, they get a bad rap sometimes. Um, and they’re excellent people. I mean, I think, I think that’s the word I would use is, is that common thread of excellence, honesty, integrity, one of the few times where you can actually have a handshake deal and people will do what they say they will do. And so I, I, I feel the same way you did. Um, my, my role was not strictly, um, I actually, I would like to tell you, I would like to tell your listeners a story about Mitt Romney that speaks to his character, um, if you would. Uh, so one day I’m at work, I was working at a place called, uh, the U S council on competitiveness, which, uh, which is a wonderful organization that’s still around.

Matthew Faraci:
And they, they, their goal is to keep the U S competitive versus other countries in the world from a business standpoint. In fact, clay, I think a future interview for you. And, um, I, I saw the, uh, the, I saw the, the phone ring and it said Ann Romney and I, I don’t know why I just didn’t connect. I picked up the phone and I hear, hi Matt, it’s Mitt Romney. And I thought it was all, I thought it was a plank. Right. So I, I just, I don’t know if he caught me in the wrong part of the day. So I said, hello governor, how are you? Just in the off chance that it was him and it actually was. So, yeah. So, so anyway, um, he was looking for some research, um, that we had done on some international competitiveness issues and I spent a day or two going through this research with him.

Matthew Faraci:
This was for his book that he was writing? No. And, um, you know, that was kind of, it, uh, got him the piece of data he needed and I saw him a little bit later and he was extremely thankful and gracious and everything you would expect Mitt Romney to be. And then, you know, that’s the end of that. That’s, that’s all I thought. So I get a call from the New York times and a couple of months later, cause this, I believe when he called, he was, he was running for president, but he wasn’t the candidate. Right. He was, it was still during the primaries. Yeah. And I get a call from the New York times and they want to know what it’s like to work with Mitt Romney. And I said, well what exactly are you referring to and how did you get my name? And they said, well, he credited you in his book.

Matthew Faraci:
And I said, wait, what? So I went, I went, I looked in the back of the book, um, cause he hadn’t sent yet, sent me a copy. And just for helping him for two days, he’d written, he’d credited me in the back of his book. And what that speaks to is the character of Mitt Romney. The fact that he cared enough, you know, with somebody that he just worked for two days on his book to make a little note in the back and say, Hey, Hey, I want to acknowledge this person. To me that spoke volumes to his character.

Speaker 4:
Now I want to get into the, to the weeds, the details. Let’s work off the assumption. And I said, can I tell you a true story that you and very few other people know? Are you, are you prepared? Breaking news? Um, recently I signed a agreement to be represented by Foundry media. And if you’re in front of a computer, you can look them up a Foundry media and they represent a Elon Musk’s book that he did with Ashley Vance. Um, the subtle art of not giving an F, uh, Chris Kyle American sniper, Stanley’s new stuff. And uh, they’re having, they’re representing me on a book project that is called the mastermind manuscripts. So think like Napoleon Hill thinking grow rich 2020, where we have the world’s top, uh, branding expert, you know, teach teaching branding. Let’s say Michael Levine, the world’s top restaurant tour, a tour, uh, Wolfgang puck teaching about how to run a restaurant, the world’s top leadership expert, John Maxwell teaching leadership. So I’ve got all these people in a book. Now this is a true story. They’re all in the book. Uh, I’ve got, uh, releases from a mall, so it’s all going to be coming out here soon. If I were to hire you to help me do public relations, what does that look like? Like what does it cost? What are the steps to talk to me about this? Because I like what you do.

Matthew Faraci:
So one of the things that I’m going to use some boring words and I’m going to try to, I’m thinking of that famous scene from Robin hood men in tights where, uh, where, where the sheriff, the sheriff of rotting ham tells King Richard, uh, you know, the bad news in a good way. Uh, and he laughs and he says, Robin’s trying to kill you. I’m going to use some very boring words and trying to make them sound exciting. So one what? You’re right. So one thing that’s very important is process. And I think anybody that’s talking to an agency, they should ask about process. Why? Because the question is this, you can have all the great ideas all day long. And let me tell you, we have some great, uh, incredible creative ideas that we’ve had, not because of us, but because the thing called divine Providence exists.

Matthew Faraci:
And uh, and uh, you know, that’s what we believe but, but there’s the idea and then there’s the execution. Okay. So at a very basic level, what I would do is we would do a very deep dive into your book and to you and to everything and just figure out, make sure that we know everything that there is to know. That’s number one. Then number two, we’d come to you with a strategic recommendation. We’d say based on your book, based on what we see in the marketplace. And let me, let me pause on the marketplace thing for a second. Good PR is like surfing and this and this is like all you got to remember, you’re looking out there at the waves and you’re trying to see which wave you can get on and ride ride home. Okay? So, uh, sometimes you are the wave and that’s when you really know that you have become successful, right?

Matthew Faraci:
Is when you are the story that’s, that’s down the line. When you become so big, you mentioned Elon Musk, right? If Elon Musk eat a Snickers bar, now that’s a story. But Elon Musk had to claw his way up there to become the story. So what you’re looking for is you’re looking for other stories that, that, that, so for example, one meta-narrative that’s taking place right now, as you know, in the corporate culture, wall street journal led off the year with this story was the lack of trust, right? Facebook, bowling, Volkswagen, we could go on forever. The polling research shows that people have less trust in corporate America and frankly in other institutions. And they almost ever then they almost ever had. So you look at that and you’d say, well, is that a place where leadership could come into the conversation where you talk about you, you talked about how can you use proper leadership to restore trust.

Matthew Faraci:
So the, I’m just shooting as an example. Well, what you’re trying to do is say, clay, you fit into this larger narrative. We think you fit into this larger narrative. And so, um, and so we’re going to let, we’re gonna go for that angle. And this is, this is kind of our thrust. Okay. So then you, you come up with a strategy, you guys approve it, it’s collaborative. And then the final phase is we go and we go out. And one of the things that happens when you’re testing, let’s say a pitch, which, you know, you’re, you’re, you’re, it’s almost like sales in six, except instead of selling a product, you’re selling a person in a story is then you go out there and you find out how is the media reacting to what you’re saying? Um, I’ve gotten to the point after doing this for so long that typically are, my instincts are usually almost mostly correct and, but still I have to tweak and pivot and go, okay, maybe that wasn’t quite right. Maybe we to adjust this, this [inaudible]

Speaker 4:
who are you pitching to? Who do you pitch to? Are you pitch to journalists, reporters? Are you, is it fast pitch, slow pitch? How are you pitching it?

Matthew Faraci:
Okay, so again, this is why in my, in my little booklet that you can download on our website, I talk about, um, the, the new way to succeed is the old way to succeed is that the idea is we look at PR as anybody with an audience. So this could be an established reporter, like the wall street journal. Um, this could be a mom influencer who has a really big audience around, around, uh, you know, homeschooling or some other topic that she’s very important with. And what we’re, what we really work hard to do at Gary V talks about this a lot. Um, but I, so believe in this is to provide value. So it’s not just, Hey, look at me, we’re cool. Cover our story. It’s to really, uh, build relationships with people. Uh, get to know what their priorities are, understand what value looks like to them, and provide and provide value.

Matthew Faraci:
So just as an example, um, I have a number of folks that I work with that I call with no agenda. It’s just to say, how are you doing? Um, what’s going on? Why? Because I want to know them. I want to know their kids. I want to know what they’re really about as people because I happen to like people. Um, and it’s, it’s a, it’s a people kind of a, of an industry. And so it, it takes that innate sense of knowing and understanding and really celebrating and appreciating people. And when you do that, you can figure out where the value comes from on both ends and, and come up with something that works. And I say that clay, because in the modern environment where you have, again, everything from the wall street journal that somebody with a big Instagram channel, you have to really understand how to be nimble to understand these different audit, these different influencers, if you will call them influencer channels and how to collaborate with them.

Speaker 4:
I 100% agree. And for anybody out there who’s not, uh, experienced a public relations or worked with that, I want to give you some Google searches you can do to, to prove that I have messed with this and I know what I’m talking about or that. Um, so if you would Google search everybody, um, Google search, uh, clay Clark, that’s my name. C L a Y C L a R K and the phrase Tulsa world. That’s our local major newspaper or clay Clark Kanbar, K a N B a R Maurice Kanbar is the inventor of, of sky vodka. Who bought one third of downtown Tulsa. Who, who hired me to help him market his [inaudible] least, uh, real estate has unleashed commercial real estate. When you Google search that or you can Google search Tulsa. Man buys eight billboards to profess love for his wife. Tulsa man buys eight billboards there. You can see the story. Another guest we have on today’s show, Josh, with living water irrigation and Josh luck.

Matthew Faraci:
That was Josh. I just, I would just like to get off the show right now because he’s making us all look bad. Okay. So how am I supposed to go back to my wife and respond to the man that bought that bought eight billboards?

Speaker 6:
So I guess you saw the summary then Matthew,

Matthew Faraci:
how do you compete with that? How does somebody compete with that? It’s you’re embarrassing us.

Speaker 6:
Well, I, I think it turned out really well for me and, and hopefully it encouraged it, hopefully encourage the message of positivity, uh, for others out there as well. I think it was a, it was a great idea that clay came up with, we were able to execute and it obviously did a great PR thing,

Speaker 4:
but you have been, you were featured on the Kelly Clarkson show. Oh, that’s, that’s a, that’s a mega point. Yup. You were featured on good morning, American morning, American mega point. You were featured on Washington post, people magazine, people magazine, uh, I D channel channel eight, Chile, Tulsa, Fox and Fox 23 Tulsa, the thrive time show, the thrive time show. This just did the most humble show in America. So you bet you’ve had some success with that yesterday. Now you’re familiar with PR? Yes, sir. And then Cory Minter, if you Google search, Cory mentor, M I N T E R Corey, C O R Y Minter M. I. N T E R. a. Cory Minter, Tulsa. Um, what you’re going to find is that Corey has been featured on what channel eight. Uh, you’ve been in Fox, I believe 23. Uh, where all have you been featured? I write for the Tulsa world on occasion. So I, I, so you, you almost are familiar with this conversation, so I’m gonna start with you, Josh. Yes. What question would you have for Matthew? And then I’m gonna let Corey ask a question there.

Speaker 6:
Hey, Matthew, thank you so much for taking the time with us. Uh, first of all, I love your message and make good popular. I absolutely love that. Uh, I guess, uh, for me personally, or to be kind of selfish here. So you mentioned earlier about kind of, uh, controlling the conversation as far as irrigation is concerned, or for our other listeners out there, what’s something on a local, actionable level that we could do to control that conversation?

Matthew Faraci:
Well, tell me which conversation you’re talking about. Can you give me an example?

Speaker 4:
It is a, um, he has Tulsa. It’s, it’s called living water irrigation. Okay. Yep. They do a sprinkler systems. And I think what you’re saying is you might want to be the gut GoTo guy. Sure. And in a conversation related to sprinkler systems, am I correct? Absolutely. Is that, is that, is that where I’m in our market? Yes sir. Okay. Does that make sense, Matthew?

Matthew Faraci:
Yes. So there’s two routes. You can go the conventional route, which I find boring, so I’m just going to say boring and play. You should play some sound effect like, okay, but what I’m always asking is what, what can you do to have an authentic, heartfelt conversation with people about what you do? And the other thing I would say is, um, becoming, uh, an expert or an authority, uh, on a particular topic and that topic, like in the case of irrigation, right? Um, or you said sprinkler systems, I’m sorry. And the topic okay. Is connected to ultimately what you do. So let’s say for example, that there’s a national story about water shortages and this, you know, remember here in California, that was a thing sometime ago. So again, I’m just riffing here. Okay. So often, often we need to be more thoughtful about this, but just to shoot from the, from the hip here, I’d say, okay, so, so why don’t we slowly position you as an expert because of your irrigation or your sprinkler.

Matthew Faraci:
Sorry, keep going here. Again, because of the sprinkler expertise, you understand these different topics about water more than other people do. Just like because of Ryan’s expertise, uh, growing up in a family where he had to have professional security, he instinctively understood these security issues, right? Then we get you into news stories that are about these other topics. Like, let’s say the drought that’s taking place and then people see you. So, so let me give you a real tangible example of this that happened to me, which is somebody, you guys are familiar with the company. Warby Parker. Okay. Okay. So a friend of mine told me, Oh, you should check them out. Another friend of mine told me, Oh, you should check them out. I went to their store on sunset Boulevard. I walked in, I didn’t do anything. Then I read an article in Forbes and they talked about how Warby Parker was basically transforming the eyeglass industry.

Matthew Faraci:
They were kind of like the Apple computer of the eyeglass industry. And they talked about all these innovative things that they were doing in the vision space, which I’m, I’m very interested in. And so even though I knew that a really great PR person had placed that story, I was like, yeah. I was like, that’s so cool. And I ordered some glasses just because I was, I was inspired by the fact that they’re more than just an eyeglass company. They’re an innovative and they’re telling that story. Right. And so that’s what you want to do is you want to find a way to take what looks like a boring topic and make it interesting and, and share it with people, your personal passions that they’ll connect with.

Speaker 4:
So let me ask you this here. Um, if I, and, and I know Cory Minter has some questions for you, so I’m gonna go to Corey in just a second with Trinity employment.com. Uh, but my, my question for you would be this, and I know our listeners are asking, what does it cost? What, what cause I, here’s the deal I’ve hired, I’m just throwing it out there. Uh, Matthew, you just throw it back. I’ll throw it out. You throw it back. I hired a PR firm back in the day and they were good. They were good. Oh, they’re expensive, right? They expensive. Good. What’s the, you know, and so it was early. I was probably 20 years old and I hired a company and I got a few good wins. I got featured in the Tulsa world, paid about eight grand for that somehow to shape the narrative.

Speaker 4:
Um, but I got Boeing, I booked Boeing airlines for their holiday party from that deal. Wow. I booked ’em quick trip, uh, convenience stores. I got a Warren Caterpillar, so I probably brought in $4,000, probably spent $8,000. And then that led to other events and that kind of thing. And then I hired another firm and I was 25 and they were expensive and they were really expensive. They were very expensive know. So it’s like a restaurant, but you don’t ask the price kind of thing. But they were like that where you mentioned the price, if you’ll have to ask Mr. Clay with sold. And every time I would ask, I would get this like, well, it’s different because we’re shaping them. They’re doing, we’re working. And they didn’t talk like that, but I felt they were talking like that and I got nothing. I got nothing. I’m not going to get a single hit, not a win. Nothing. It was bad. So the third time around, I hired myself and I went out there and did certain things and it worked. So, um, I, but I also see tremendous value in hiring a good firm. How much do you charge? Well, clay, you’re,

Matthew Faraci:
first of all, you’re a rare breed because I, I most often tell people, dear God, don’t do your own PR. And part of that is just because there is a, but you’re, you, uh, so you’re in a clay is in a different category. Uh, mostly because there are these unspoken rules in this business, uh, about like you can’t pitch yourself, but somebody else can pitch you kind of a kind of a thing. Um, I would just, I’d give some very specific advice to, to, I want to be super specific about this for people, number one. Number one, um, just like a lawyer, like we, we actually, uh, operate on a model much like a Deloitte where we’re very transparent with our clients about this is what you gave us and this is exactly what we did with our time. And these are the results. Um, these are the people we talked to. Uh, so that if we’re not successful, you see how hard we worked. Although thank God we’re always successful. Um, and if we are successful, you see how hard we worked. But we believe in transparency. Like here’s, so we talked to, here’s how we pitched. Um, here’s the results. And we’re always showing measurable. Like, here’s exactly what we did. Because transparency is what you should expect from an agency. Why? Because why not? Right? So if they tell you, Hey, we’re working on it, we’ll get it.

Speaker 4:
Hey, wait real quick. I have rude, rude, rude host here. No PR firms. I mean, there’s very, very few PR firms, almost no PR firms do what you just said. They do not show who they’re pitching to. They talk in circles. So that’s, I’ll give you why I give you one. You have one mega point so far. Continue. Yeah. So I think that’s important. Now, the other thing is

Matthew Faraci:
you don’t want, I have a personal bias against the big guys because they’re big, dumb. It’s slow. Okay. So they’re very, you know, uh, some I worked in D C and some of the big firms in DC will charge you like tons of money just to create a press release or just to do very little things. Now, if you’re a big fortune 500 company and which is a lot of their clients, you probably don’t care about the, about those kinds of budgets. But if you’re an entrepreneur or a startup, you care very much about those kinds of budgets, right? So I always tell people, you’re better off to work with a boutique firm that has a specific niche and that’s what they do. So like we said, we’re going to, we’re going to specialize in, in this very specific vertical that we’re in. And when other people come along and say, Hey, you guys are good.

Matthew Faraci:
I’m like, let me refer you out to somebody else that does that, because that’s not what I want to do. But that’s not my focus. And that’s not where I want us to be. And helping the brands make good popular, right? You’re, you, you focus on clean a right of center, morally solid constitutional kind of biblical based companies, am I correct? Yeah. I mean, we, we want, we want people that are, that are going out there and trying to, um, like we work with, uh, you know, uh, you, you spoke to them the other day, uh, clay out Harmon brothers, right? Yep. What do they do? They do all these super-popular ads, but the thing that nobody notices is they’re all clean and family friendly. So we’re like, Hey, you guys are awesome because you are, again, you are, uh, you’re adding, you’re making the culture better, not worse.

Matthew Faraci:
Right? Right. So anyway, the point is, is that you want, um, you want people that have a specific vertical that is your vertical and they’re specialized in your vertical. So that’s, that’s also super, super important. And then the other thing, and this is the final thing, is look, if some firm is not willing to agree to some goals and metrics and measurables, you know, when I send a proposal to somebody on the first page, we say, this is what this is about. And these are the specific goals that we have. Do you agree with these goals? Because if you don’t agree with these goals, we need to change them and once we come up to a place where we agree with this goal, these goals, I want you to hold us accountable and ask me in 90 days did we deliver on the things that we told you we would do?

Matthew Faraci:
And so what I’m trying to educate everybody here is just these are the things you need to look for when working with an agency and that should give you, those are the signs. If they, if they look at any of those things that I just shot you and they, and they sort of veer away from them, that’s your warning sign to say, okay, this isn’t the firm that I’m going to work. What kind of money, ballpark are we talking about? $7 $70,000 while I’m sorry. Thank you. You left out. My last point though though, I don’t like TA though. I hate talking specifics with finances. Here’s what I would say to people. First of all, if somebody is too inexpensive, you probably don’t want to work with them. So for example, if somebody says, you know, for five grand, I’m gonna make you famous. I’m sorry, I’m just, I don’t believe that.

Matthew Faraci:
Um, but they’ll get rich. Tell us if somebody tells you 25 grand a month or I walk, I’m like, okay, look dude. Again, depending on what you’re doing, that could be possible. But like you really gotta be doing some world changing work to be a gut to, to be at that level, right? So people, but you don’t, you certainly don’t want to hire somebody that says we’re the cheapest or we’re the most economical because that’s a red flag for me. Right? Like that’s not going to work. And then again, a lot of the big firms, they, they charge a lot for what a boutique firm would charge much less to do. And in the boutique firm, you know, you have actual like people that really get in there and they specialize in their niche doing that kind of work. And so obviously that’s us. But I mean I’ve always had that bias with come on clay cross different verticals. I’m always wanting to, whether it’s a lawyer or whatever, I’ve always wanted to be able to pick up the phone and talk to the principal if I want. You know, I’ve never liked the bait and switch where I think I’m hiring clay and then I get, you know, Clay’s college intern and that’s the person really doing all my work and that has happened to me on two different PR firms.

Speaker 4:
Occasions where I, you hire somebody and you get stuck to the underling with the underling. And actually dr Zellner and I actually flew all the way out to Chicago to do an interview with a huge publication and the Lackey for the big PR firm. After we got there said, oops, it looks like it wasn’t confirmed. Do you guys want to have lunch while you’re here? And I was, I was, I was so pissed. So I took my anger, I turned my bitterness, I turned it into betterness and I bought my wife a very expensive salad. I almost killed us all while driving doctors. He took the wheel. So can I drive please? Cause I’m a terrible driver downtown Chicago. And that happened. True story

Matthew Faraci:
play. I want to ask one more thing too that hasn’t come up in this conversation that should have you ever been in a situation where you had, for lack of a better word, kind of a crisis PR situation?

Speaker 4:
A lot of my clients have had crisis PR situations. Um, I have not, um, personally, um, but I think it’s because people who don’t share my worldviews get off of my podcast cause I say such motivational things like if you don’t share my worldview, get off my podcast. Um, and so I think I don’t have a whole lot of that because I, I, I quote Bible verses on the show and that kind of thing. But I could see where if I were like a Fox news personality, I would have a crisis PR situation almost every day.

Matthew Faraci:
Yeah. So I asked because that’s just, it’s another thing that people need to think about. Um, again, coming from having done 35 political campaigns in my life, you, you gain both skills, both the outbound, getting the message out and managing the incoming [inaudible]. How do we deal with, how do we deal with this situation? But it’s something else to think about because as your profile raises, so did the haters and so true, you know, you see this, you see this in social media. So the more famous you become, there’s a, there’s a positive, but there’s nobody that becomes ubiquitous in their vertical and nobody is a hater. In fact, I often tell clients you don’t matter until you have some painters. True, right? Because until some people just say, I hate clay and I hate Clay’s podcast, they’re not happy. You’re not having an impact. And so it’s, it’s, it’s something else to be thinking about in the back of your head.

Matthew Faraci:
Cause it’s very important because just hoping you don’t run into an incident or illegal thing is it, that’s not a plan. You have to plan for that with your PR agency and say, are you guys prepared? Like what are you guys going to do? If we run into a problem, are you prepared to handle that? Some of them may say, that’s not what we do. We would prefer we would refer you to our crisis partners. So-and-so. That’s an honest answer. But it’s a question that every business owner and organization needs to ask because as you guys know, there’s these crazy things that happened in the media and people get all, uh, ginned up. And uh, you know, we had a, a client of ours that got involved in a very, uh, um, of a celebrity had a, you guys probably remember this, I won’t get into huge details, but had taken a picture of the president that was, it was inappropriate.

Matthew Faraci:
Um, and we advise them right away like, you need a, I remember calling the CEO and saying he had just gotten off a plane and I said, you need to get out there right now and make a very strong statement that says that this is not, this is not the civil discourse that you can don’t as a company. And to his great credit, he was very strong, very decisive, came out and said, this is not us. This is not our values. That’s not what we stand for. Regardless of political party, regardless of background, there’s a certain level of respect that we require as a company. And they, to their great credit, people on the left and right came out and said, wow, you know, you guys are great because you did the right thing. And the reason I credit that CEO is because he was willing to act decisively. I’ve worked with other people who weren’t. And then they start getting hammered because the media is rightly asking, where are you on this? How come you’re not responding? Isn’t this a problem? Don’t you object to this? Or, or if you don’t object to this, tell us why not. Um, and in our modern culture, that can happen within a number of hours. And uh, so it’s something people just need to think about.

Speaker 4:
Cory Minter, founder of Trinity, employment.com Trinity, Trinity employment specialists, but the website is Trinity employment.com. Sir. What question would you, would you have or questions would you have for Matthew? Hi Matthew. I have a quick question because there are so many different platforms and channels that you can put a lot of effort and energy into when it comes to PR.

Speaker 7:
And I have a question for the average small business person. So eh, when you’re out looking at small businesses, is, is there, uh, is there, are there certain things that you look at and you’re like, you know, I think it’s really important that they would put efforts in this particular area, in this particular area, and it would be the most important use of their time. What are some ideas that you might have from some of our small business guys out here?

Matthew Faraci:
Yeah. Um, one of the things for small business folks is, you know, there’s that and I don’t know who the heck said it, so forgive me, but there’s that great brand statement about all great brands have two things, right? Proof of, uh, the claim of distinction and proof of performance, right? I was taught that by a friend of mine who is a brand expert. And, and uh, so think about Nike, just do it right? And so for a small business, start thinking about your brand and, and this is something we get into too, because again, traditional PR is just telling your story. I work backwards. It’s why we call it relationship marketing. And I look at what is your story? How do you tell your story? Are you telling it the right way? Could we tweak this? Could we change that? Because we really need to see, do you have the pieces in place?

Matthew Faraci:
There’s a lot of people that contact us every day and say, Hey, we’d love you to work with us. And I’ll look at their stuff and go, look, you’re not ready. You know, some basic stuff. You don’t have a nice tight bio on your website. You don’t have a place for the media to contact you. Um, it’s not very clear on all your social channels. Your branding is confusing. You know, we go through a tuneup to say, do you have a coherent story across all platforms? That T that makes it very easy when the media does come calling to see who you are, what you do and what you’re about. And so that’s number one. And then as a small business, do you have a person on your team that can deliver the message effectively? And this is really big. Okay. Right? Um, when you’re fighting in the beginning to get attention, which is what it is, it’s a Klein scrapping fight, right?

Matthew Faraci:
When you’re trying to clay, you know what I’m talking about? Like you’ve got to hustle, hustle, hustle for every opportunity. Yup. Right? Clay. And by the way, that I’m still there. I’m still there. I tell I opera and I love, I love it. Scrappy. Honeybadger and it’s back to you, sir. Yeah. So, so when you’re doing that hustle, okay, whoever your spokesperson is, they have to be willing to do that hustle. Um, they have to be willing to do those, you know, annoying radio interviews at 5:45 AM drive time. They have to be, in other words, you know, they have to be willing to hustle and do the work to get in there. And it’s inconvenient. And I remember asking a YouTuber friend of mine, I said, so tell me about like when you work, what’s the hours of a YouTuber? And he looks at me like I’m crazy.

Matthew Faraci:
And he says, YouTube is not a job. It’s a lifestyle, right? I’m always shooting videos, which is unfortunately why some YouTubers actually burned out. But when you are trying to build your media profile, you guys would not believe some of the places I have done interviews, you know, in bathrooms, in the backs of cars walking around a parking lot in a F, you know, because if somebody, when I was working on different things or when I’ve had clients working on different things, you know, when I tell them, Hey, so and so called, uh, wall street journal called and they want to write a story on you, I tell him, you step out of that meeting, you stop what you’re doing and you make this the priority because, and I realize when you’re running a business, you have to have other priorities. Okay. So I’ve always got to argue, stop everything and spend all your time on PR.

Matthew Faraci:
But, but just to be reasonable, it is one of those priorities where when, and this is a mistake I think a lot of small business owners make because they have so much on their plate when somebody comes calling, right and wants to do an interview, if you, if you equivocate and you go, wow, I don’t know, maybe next week I’m going on vacation, whatever. If you do that, they’ll just go talk to somebody else and you’ve lost the opportunity. Um, I once worked with a guy who was really, really fighting hard to be the authority on this particular issue. And we got him to the point where he was every time, um, uh, this thing happened, man. He was all the, everybody was calling and, and they were asking him for his opinion. And then he told me, you know, um, I’m, I’m going to go away for a couple months and then we’ll come back.

Matthew Faraci:
And I said, Oh, that’s a mistake. Not because I need you to keep us working with you. I’m just telling you as professional advice. That’s a mistake. Comes back a couple of months later, says, I’m ready to go again. I’m set. I’m sorry. These two other people are now have now replaced you because all these media outlets called and ask for you. I didn’t have you. So they went to somebody else and now they think you vanished. And so all the work that we’ve done to get your profile up to a certain place, we’d have to start, we’d have to start from,

Speaker 4:
I want to say this real quick. I want the listeners to know this. This is interesting. When Matt and I talked, uh, Matthew, you can verify this. You said, how come? I don’t know. You do remember that? Yeah. And uh, this is interesting because my wife and I have achieved all of our financial goals. I am no longer willing to travel ever or to pick up the phone for anything urgent. That’s is like a rules I have. So I am like the reverse PR guy because I lived in that world for a while and I just don’t want to do it anymore, you know, at all. But wait, but wait, claim. But weight is very important. Yeah, you did it to get where you are. I did. That’s what I want to share with everybody. I did it, but I am done with it. But what you just said is 100% correct.

Speaker 4:
I went to Bloomberg to do an interview. I was featured in the New York times and interview about Glenn Beck being parallel to ludicrous. I was in the fast company. I did all that and I was willing to do it, but I, my wife and I very clearly knew where we were going and so on this new book we’re working on, the thing that is interesting is I’m willing to do podcasts because you and I today met. We set a time, we committed to a time. You’re on the show. I’m on the show. We’re on the show together. This is great and I can set a time and I love that about podcasts, but the mainstream media I probably will not make much appearances on because of that. But what you just said is 100%. It is exhausting and that you have to be ready to go.

Speaker 4:
And they’ll say, Josh, when you did the Kelly Clarkson show, they were nice to you. Yes sir. But they wanted to do a call when they wanted to do the call and it didn’t really matter when you had to install the sprinklers. Not at all. It was, it was on their schedule. And you’ve got to have your fact sheet ready to go. And let me tell you one way to lose kill your credibility is to talk off the cuff without a fact sheet in front of you. Seriously. Cause you get kind of nervous. You know, man, you get kinda nervous. And so that’s why having a good PR coach like Matt, um, it’s so important. I would encourage you, if you, if you’re out there and you feel like you, you, you aren’t standing out in a cluttered marketplace, this could be a PR, could be a, um, a big thing for you. And Michael Levine, Maya PR consultant back in the day who’s represented, you know, Michael Jackson’s estate and Prince and Nike, he said that branding is analogous to gift wrapping. He said, brand is just a perception or Elon Musk actually says, brand is just a perception and perception will match reality over time. Sometimes it will be ahead, other times it will be behind. But brand is simply a collective impression that some have about a product. How would you describe branding there, Matthew?

Matthew Faraci:
Uh, look, I, I, I totally agree with that. And um, and I think it’s interesting too because our culture is so perception driven now. Um, I mean, think about this. Facebook is a highlight reel of your life, right? One of the cycles, it’s causing psychological problems, right? Because people look up their feed or Instagram and they’re like, how come Josh’s life is so great? He put 12 billboards up for his wife and my life is terrible, right? People don’t, people don’t put, you know, uh, up on their Instagram feed what a terrible day they had. Right? It’s so, you know. Right. So this just goes to show you that even your, every average person understands instinctively this, this idea of branding. It’s kind of like when you’re, when you’re on a job interview, right? You’re presenting the best version of yourself. Right? Um, but one of the things I think that, that the great brands do is they give you a feeling.

Matthew Faraci:
It’s like, why I love Apple so much, and I know it’s in Vogue to say like Apple, but I, I’ve loved Apple ever since the goodness ever since I was a kid using, using the Apple to see computers because Steve jobs sold me on this vision. And, and, and it even helps you to, you know, you become such a brand fanatic that like, I’m talking to you right now on my AirPods pro. And guess what? I don’t really like that. Uh, I love the sound, but I don’t love the controls. Right? But I’m such a fan of Apple that I’m willing to go [inaudible] I don’t really love this product, but I know you can’t overlook, you know, you can’t buy anything else because you’ve like, you’re breaking the trust you have with this big company. Right? Right. So I think, I think that brands, the best brands really do make that emotional connection with you.

Matthew Faraci:
And I think also in the marketplace today, and this is really important, there’s all kinds of market research on this. And for both of you guys, uh, you know, we call it cause marketing. And I believe in this passionately. People want to align with a brand that aligns with them, right? And so Y Y, you know, if you look at home safe and Cove, why, why is that a good match? Because the people at Cove happened to say, Hey, we think people of faith are good people. And we think that people in the faith community don’t always get the recognition that they deserve for the good things. They do have all different kinds of faiths, you know? And uh, and so what does that do? So people in those different faith communities can say, Hey, those guys like me. You know those guys, I, I could know those guys.

Matthew Faraci:
It’s like they always say, you vote for the president who you’d most want to have a beer with, right? You vote for the candidate who you’d want to sit down with because it’s this idea, and this is why I think this is so important, guys. Relationships, relationships, relationships, relationships, and a culture where relationships can just exist digitally. I think people either want to experience real relationships, which is why live events like yours, clay are so popular. Or if they can’t have as much of that as they want, they want to feel like the brands they’re working with actually get it. So that’s why we say make good popular. Because guess what? If you’re saying, um, we do this, this, and this thing, we go, well you’re not, you know, that’s not a fit for us. So like, so like that’s cool. Look what you’re doing, go do it.

Matthew Faraci:
But like we even as a PR agency have to feel an emotional connection to what you’re doing. Why? Because when you’re in the middle of a campaign and you’re frustrated, the money isn’t what matters. It’s, I love clay. I love what clay stands for. I love what clay believes in and that’s what motivates me to keep going. Well, we’re going to do now is we have time for three rapid fire questions. I want to ask you about your tiny book that all the listeners can download for free. Josh, you have time for one, one faster. This. It’s, it’s, it’s a quick question. It’s a 32nd answer. It’s like a bonus round. It’s like the bonus fry. You’ve been in McDonald’s, you’ve got that extra fry, you go, I did not expect this bonus fried. This is exciting. There’s one bonus front. Here we go. Let me, let me queue up my bonus. Fry music. Let me get restarted. Here we go. Here again. Let me get that thing. Okay, let me get it all there. Oh, there is perfect volume. I’m ready.

Speaker 8:
Josh, what is your, what is your bonus fry question. So when you’re, you’re saying that, uh, relationships are everything, you know, I believe that in our business. And, and what it is. So how would you, what’s a tangible way to get that personal connection that you would recommend from a PR basis as opposed to Facebook or Instagram or all the social networks? Um, meet with the, meet with the principal of the agency and see if you guys are resonant and compatible and also ask them about their relationships. Hey, where are your relationships? That is everything. Okay. Awesome. Courtney men are hot and fresh. It says, I’ve read a little bit about you and it looks like you have a spiritual side of faith based side to who you are. How do you incorporate that when you’re dealing with business who are not faith-based? What, how do, how are you aligned to those [inaudible]

Matthew Faraci:
taken to the bottom? Well, you know, I, this is why we talk about, um, we talked about value. Like when we’re working with content, we talk about values because values are universal. Okay. Um, and all values are inspired. Okay. By dif, by, you know, like if you look at many different faith traditions, they have a, a commonality and that there are very important virtues and values. Okay. That are, that are part of the fabric of what they are. And so we’ve, we’ve worked with people that, um, may not care about a particular faith tradition or the other. That’s not really the issue. The issue is, are you trying to advocate for virtue over vice? And if you’re pro virtue, we’re pro you.

Speaker 4:
There it is. If you’re a pro virtue or pro you, my final question is, I know you have some free stuff for the listeners and you’ve got a really cool, uh, tiny book. You know, where it’s, it’s, it’s, it’s animated. It’s got facts in there. It’s, it’s fun to flip through. It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s somewhere between a booklet and a book. It’s free. I, I think it’s hilarious. Um, I think it’s jaw-dropping. Um, I call it a tiny book. Clay, I’m going to drip. I need you, I’m going to use that word. Well, my tiny brain processes, well, not a free booklet. It’s beyond a booklet. It’s a B to B. That’s bad branding. It’s beyond a book. Well, this thing is, I mean, but it’s not a book. I mean, it’s a tiny book. So, um, it’s called how and why the new way to succeed is in fact the old way to succeed. What can we find in there if we download it? Where do we get it?

Matthew Faraci:
So if you go to inspire.buzz, first of all, please make sure there’s a movie marquee at the top. Type your name up in the top of the movie marquee. If you don’t do that, you don’t really get the full Monty Python experience. Also click all over the place cause there’s something like 20 hidden items, uh, all over the website that you can try to find. And we did that just to mess with you and intelligence tests, right? But the tiny book, I love book, I’m going to use that clay, you’re awesome. The tiny book just lays out this idea that a lot of these ideas that I’m talking to you guys about and that’s kind of like the real final big thing. If you, if you talk to me, if one of the things I loved about talking to clay for the first time is clay was fun, right?

Matthew Faraci:
And there’s, you know, if you’re not fun is, is again, it’s like a cheap word and people overuse it. But let me go a little deeper. You really need to be enjoying yourself. Okay? So, so if you’re working with an H, a PR agency, you have to have fun with these guys because here’s the thing, they could be really good, but if you don’t enjoy working with them, you have not going to do it long term. You’re just not true. Okay? And so, yeah, so it’s gotta be an experience. And that’s why on our website we tried to create a fun experience because what we’re telling you is this is who we are. If fun is not a priority for you, go to somebody boring cause you’re with us, you’re going to get fun. And for some people honestly, they’re like too many jokes, too much fun.

Matthew Faraci:
That’s not how we roll. We’re all, we’re all straight laced or whatever. And that’s fine for them. It’s just, I can’t help but be myself. I’m old enough to have realized that. And so if you’re, if you want, if this is our personality and so we show you that by saying, if you don’t like that web experience, yeah, you won’t like working with us. If you do, you’re going to have a great time. And clay, I felt like that’s how you and I connected is the lights on. This guy’s fun and from that flows so much.

Speaker 4:
Today’s interview is a blasting blast in a laser show and I appreciate you so much for being on the shot. I feel today show was, was, was a bromantic it was fantastic. And uh, I just, I am, I on, I was honored to have you on the show and thank you so much. Um, and helping me get closer and closer to my quest to reach Mitt Romney. I, I’m just getting closer and closer to the, to the fumes, to the aura, to the essence of Michelin Rodman.

Matthew Faraci:
Send this. I’ll make, we’ll be sure we’ll have to send this over to him to uh, yeah, so that he can say, you know, cause he’s got nothing else to do.

Speaker 4:
I’m ready. I’m ready for the fast pitch fro from IOP to Mitt. Right. Ready? I’m ready to catch Mitt here. He just throws it. Just throw it at me. I’m ready to go. And everybody check out. inspire.buzz. That’s inspired.buzz one more time because, because, because you gotta remember inspire.buzz Matthew, have a great rest of your evening. Thank you for investing your time with the thrive nation.

Matthew Faraci:
Clay, I look forward to your special edition episode of dry bar comedy.

Speaker 4:
Oh, beautiful. Beautiful. You take care goodbye. And now without any further ed. Boom.

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Speaker 9:
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