Jake Dempsey of Project Broadcast On How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital Marketing, PPC, & Email to Dramatically Increase Sales
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
I don’t care what anyone tells you, this is a component to any great marketing. Innovate and crush your customer’s expectations by being outright ferocious on delivering value for them. It creates great marketing material for you to then go out and tell your story. If you’re marketing someone else’s products, make sure to tell their story of how they’re crushing it on behalf of their customers.
Marketing a product or service today is easier than ever before in history. Using platforms like Facebook ads or Google ads, a company can market their product directly to people who perfectly fit the ideal client demographic, at a very low cost. Digital Marketing tools, Pay per Click ads, and email marketing can help a company dramatically increase sales. At the same time, many companies that just start exploring with digital marketing tools often see disappointing results.
In this interview series called “How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital Marketing, PPC, & Email to Dramatically Increase Sales”, we are talking to marketers, advertisers, brand consultants, & digital marketing gurus who can share practical ideas from their experience about how to effectively leverage the power of digital marketing, PPC, & email.
As a part of this series, I had the pleasure of interviewing Jake Dempsey, Co-founder and CEO of Project Broadcast.
Jake Dempsey is the co-founder and CEO of Project Broadcast. He has 20+ total years of software development experience, including a decade of experience working directly in the network marketing and direct sales industry. Dempsey’s primary mission is to develop and deploy bundled products and tools that help network marketing and direct sales professionals successfully scale their entrepreneurial business ventures. Prior to co-founding Project Broadcast, he served as the CEO of StarterStep LLC, a leading web and mobile app development company leveraging leading-edge technologies for clientele in multiple industries. Dempsey brings a lead engineer focus to software development in the network marketing and direct sales marketplace, with a clear understanding of how to apply agile methodologies and the technological advancements that move the needle among entrepreneurial-focused professionals.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?
Well, that’s quite a long story! I often joke with friends and family that my life is probably best suited for a TV mini-series! I’m a nerd with a less than humble upbringing that dreamed of being a surgeon. Luckily, along the way I found technology and changed the trajectory of my life forever. After decades of building software for big brands, myself and my co-founder Brian Knorr decided to solve a problem in the digital marketing space and launched Project Broadcast. It was born out of the need for our spouses to have a more meaningful and scalable way to communicate to their customers. At the time we didn’t see any tools or platforms that we felt satisfied their needs or industry at a price point that could scale to large, distributed sales forces. After one year of heads down development by our entire team, Project Broadcast was launched. We now support over 30k entrepreneurs that want to leverage the power of text marketing for their business.
Can you share a story about the funniest marketing mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lessons or ‘takeaways’ you learned from that?
Don’t trust your gut — trust the data! Instead of a single mistake I’ll share with you a whole strategy that creates a multitude of mistakes! Early in our growth phase we relied purely on instincts. Now, I’ll be the first to say that I believe all great businesses probably have great instincts. It’s a prerequisite for problem solving in my opinion. I remember in our early years we would build a feature or try a marketing tactic, and in the end, the conversation would be “how do we feel” about what we had done. Well, newsflash, it doesn’t matter how we feel about the approach. Later, through continued development of ourselves as entrepreneurs and business owners, we began asking more thoughtful questions. We started thinking more about what outcome we wanted to produce. With a desired outcome we would develop strategies and plays to put them to the test. But before putting a strategy in play, we would ask a simple question: “How will we measure if this is successful?” I know that may sound simple, but you would be surprised how little that question is asked. Asking yourself how you will measure the success, measuring it, then reflecting on the outcome, helps to eliminate defining success/failure purely off of the feeling the test provided. We still leverage instincts heavily as they are foundational in understanding the problem you are solving for and maintaining the ability to react quickly — so now we just make sure to layer data into that discussion. Will all your plays succeed? Heck no! But using data helps you to understand what works, and doesn’t work, objectively. And with that data, you can make better decisions on what to stop doing and what to lean into more!
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?
Let’s talk about Brian. Brian Knorr, CTO and co-founder of Project Broadcast, has been a great colleague and friend for more than two decades. In fact, it was Brian who would nudge me to “get a real job” before I ever took my first position in technology. Brian, eight years my senior, told me one day early in my career: “I know that one day I’ll work for you. I just know it.” I’ve never forgotten that, and it inspired me to push every day to be a better teammate and business owner. Twenty two years have passed since Brian and I first met. During that entire time, except for one year we don’t discuss, we’ve worked together at every company. Building software requires talent across a spectrum of skill sets. From people who are talented “at the bare metal” of the project writing code with a deep understanding of technology — to people who have a deep understanding of the customer. Brian and I have been such a great duo because the two of us represent a broad area of that spectrum, while enjoying plenty of overlap in the middle. Project Broadcast would not exist without Brian. There is no debating that fact and his continued leadership as our CTO is invaluable to our continued success.
What do you think makes your company stand out? Can you share a story?
At the heart of our team is a strong desire to scale and automate the success of the small entrepreneur. It is something we discuss frequently as a team. We feel that this only happens when we truly invest in the success of our customers. I remember feeling sad for our customers, because I saw that higher paid entrepreneurs were able to afford “strategists” to help them improve their business. They would pay a strategist to consult them on creating systems for their business, help with marketing strategies, and the understanding of emerging trends. As I thought more and more about our role, as it pertains to our customers, I decided we needed to provide these types of benefits for everyone. As a team, we defined what it meant for our customer to be successful. And with that, we started our Project Broadcast Customer Success Team. Whether good or bad, they have the vaguest job description in the entire company, with a simple mission to “help our customers be successful”. I was lucky to find two of these paid strategists in the marketplace and they joined Project Broadcast full-time, so that all of our customers would have access to their skills and experience. It was one of the best decisions we’ve made as a company. I get so much joy out of knowing we provide the value of in-house strategists — at no cost to our customers — so that everyone can tap into that as a resource. On a daily basis, we receive messages from our customers expressing their gratitude for providing access to our Customer Success team.
You are a successful business leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
I’m actually a believer that, ultimately, it takes only two character traits! I feel strongly that if you have both aptitude and passion you can conquer the world. Archimedes said, “Give me a lever long enough, and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.” I think passion and aptitude function as the lever and fulcrum. Aptitude, generally speaking, is the understanding of the problem domain and solution. You have to know what problem you are solving — and how you’re going to solve it in a specific way. But just knowing the problem and solution will get you nowhere. It’s all about execution. For me, passion is my motivation for getting things done. It’s the hustle that doesn’t sleep. Now, without passion, you could certainly apply your aptitude and begin the journey of solving a problem. However, without a true passion for the domain and solution, you simply won’t finish the job. Real passion is what gets you to work on the days you’d rather just sleep in. My family jokes with me constantly about working too much. I jokingly reply that I’ll retire one day — which gets an immediate response of eye rolls and laughs. They know I love what I do too much to stop. My passion for my mission is so strong that I don’t view the work I do as toil. Because there is a big difference in work and toil. The work we do at Project Broadcast empowers others to crush their business goals — and I’m addicted to empowering their success!
Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?
At Project Broadcast, on a product level, we feel that we should deliver on three primary objectives for our customers. 1.) Deliver the most robust marketing platform at the most affordable price. 2.) Provide deep collaboration zones for entrepreneurs and their team members. 3.) Help customers manage their customers and leads effectively. Currently, I think we knock №1 out of the park. Project Broadcast is by far the most robust and affordable text marketing platform available today. We’re hard at work improving our commitment to №2, with our new spaces feature, and we have tons more work to do there. In 2023, we’ll take a deep dive into fulfilling our commitment on №3. We have some great stuff on the horizon, and even after five years of driving value on behalf of our customers, we’re just getting started!
Ok super. Now let’s jump to the main questions of our interview. As we mentioned in the beginning, sometimes companies that just start exploring with digital marketing tools like PPC campaigns often see disappointing results.
In your opinion, what are a few of the biggest mistakes companies make when they first start out with digital marketing? If you can, please share an example for each.
I think one of the biggest mistakes people make is not knowing what problem they’re trying to solve. PPC campaigns should be targeted. But who should they be targeted to? When you define your audience, why did you pick that audience? It’s so critical to be thoughtful about who your potential customers are and where they hang out. We recently revisited this discussion internally. We launched our social media presence a while back (admittedly, we were a little late to the party) and have been driving engagement on our social platforms, as well as doing paid ad spends for well over a year — at times spending upwards of $20k a month. One of our recent discussions focused on our own efforts for our social platforms. We were working hard on Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, and TikTok. As we discussed these efforts, someone brought up a very thoughtful question: “Why are we spending time on LinkedIn? Our customers don’t hang out there.” It really made us sit up and think again about who our customers are and where they hang out. Once you establish those two answers, you can then begin to think about where you should spend ad dollars and how to target your audience more effectively.
If you could break down a very successful digital marketing campaign into a “blueprint”, what would that blueprint look like? Please share some stories or examples of your ideas.
As I said, the first step is to truly discover who you customer is and where they hang out. Once you have those two pieces of information, it’s then possible to identify what problem you can solve for them. Your marketing should be about solving a problem for someone. If your advertising doesn’t show how you solve a problem, then you’re likely not going to convert. I’d also note that before you spend anything you should determine how much a customer is worth to your business — and what you’d be willing to pay to acquire them. Knowing that figure helps you to evaluate whether you’re capturing customers in a sustainable way. For example, let’s say you determine that you’d spend $50 on acquiring a customer and your CAC for a given campaign comes out to $10. Well, if I’d be happy with $50 per acquisition, but I’m actually acquiring customers for $10, then I’m going to go figure out how to crank the dial up to 11 on my spend for that particular campaign. Conversely, if my CAC is coming in above $50, I may reallocate those dollars to a better performer, or decide to terminate that specific campaign.
Let’s talk about Pay Per Click Marketing (PPC) for a bit. In your opinion which PPC platform produces the best results to increase sales?
I think marketing should be a multi-faceted approach. It’s one of the reasons Project Broadcast exists. If your entire marketing approach is wrapped up in PPC, then you likely aren’t engaging with your audience in a meaningful way. Should you have PPC? Probably. We’ve had both great success and great failures on Meta and Google. Hulu recently launched ads, and I’ve not had time to play with their platform, but I’m intrigued by it. Same with TikTok. At Project Broadcast, we exist to empower small entrepreneurs to create conversation. We’re a huge believer in the idea that business flows out of relationships — and not the other way around. If you agree, you must make sure your strategy includes a way to truly engage your potential customer audience on multiple channels. If you really want to increase sales, and do it in a sustainable way, you have to create relationship with your customers.
Can you please share 3 things that you need to know to run a highly successful PPC campaign?
For me, it boils down to finding out who your customers are, where they hang out, and how much you’re willing to spend in acquiring them. If you don’t have a deep understanding of these three factors, you’ll likely fail with an ad spend.
Let’s now talk about email marketing for a bit. In your opinion, what are the 3 things that you need to know to run a highly successful email marketing campaign that increases sales?
Look, I’m going to sound biased here. For the most part, email has about a 20% open rate, a 15% or less read rate, and an even lower response rate. The data changes slightly from year to year, but those are the rough numbers. Conversely, texting has a 98% read rate. And the response rate from texting is also quite high — as I’ve seen stats in the 50% range. So, let’s apply some basic math here. You send 100 emails, 15 of which are read, and even less illicit a response. On the flip side, you send 100 text messages, 98% of which get read, and 50% generate a response. Texting, by far, has higher engagement than email. But what do you do with that data? Well, you use a tool like Project Broadcast, allowing you to engage with your customers in a thoughtful way that creates real relationships and loyalty. My three tips are simple -be personal in your marketing, make sure you understand the problem you’re trying to solve, and get your customer to engage with you. If you create marketing the feels individualized and personal, solves their problem, and makes them want to engage with me, then I’m your customer for life.
What are the other digital marketing tools that you are passionate about? If you can, can you share with our readers what they are and how to best leverage them?
One of my favorite digital marketing tools is actually Canva. Again, I’m here for the small entrepreneur and tools like Canva can bring the power of creating beautiful graphics with excellent typography to the fingertips of any business owner. They provide templates for social media posts, so you can get the right image, sized correctly, from a massive library of content to leverage. For the small entrepreneur it’s absolutely a must have.
Here is the main question of our series. Can you please tell us the 5 things you need to create a highly successful career as a digital marketer? Can you please share a story or example for each?
1.Know who your customer is.
If you can’t identify who your customer truly is, why even try? Spend the time. Put in the work. Don’t spend money casting a net so wide that you don’t catch the right fish.
2. Know where your customer hangs out.
This is vitally important. It’s great to know who the customer is, but we then have to make certain we know where they hang out. I don’t want to oversimplify, but if you don’t know where they hang out, you’ll spend dollars trying to capture customers in places they don’t frequent. I mean this both digitally and in a physical sense.
3. Understand what you are willing to spend to capture that customer.
Marketing involves basic economics of spend, in my opinion. In order to be successful, you have to understand what you’re willing to spend to capture a customer. You have to make sure you attribute your efforts, collect data on the effectiveness, and evaluate the spend. Reallocate funds or terminate what doesn’t work.
4. Execute ferociously on your actual product.
I don’t care what anyone tells you, this is a component to any great marketing. Innovate and crush your customer’s expectations by being outright ferocious on delivering value for them. It creates great marketing material for you to then go out and tell your story. If you’re marketing someone else’s products, make sure to tell their story of how they’re crushing it on behalf of their customers.
5. You have to truly care about the success of your customer.
This matters so much! You have to make this part of your story. It can’t just be lip service. If you truly care about the success of the customer, you also create a massive amount of content to then use for marketing. If you truly care about their success, and deliver on that premise, you can follow up by asking them to provide a testimonial quote or social shout out. Every customer is an influencer. Yes, their sphere of influence varies in size, but every last one of them has some level of influence — and you can really stretch your spend further once your customers are doing the marketing for you!
What books, podcasts, videos or other resources do you use to sharpen your marketing skills?
I recently read “Amp It Up” by Frank Slootman and I’m still digesting what I learned from the book. Ultimately, Frank talks about increasing expectations on yourself and the business in order to be more aggressive about growth. You never want to finish the race with fuel in the tank. Leave it all on the playing field. I also continue to learn that, as a leader, if your team sees you working hard, they’ll almost always find a bit more in themselves and push harder too. I’ve also always been a huge fan of Gary Vaynerchuck’s “Thank You Economy.” I think he’s spot on with his observation of business today. You have to get personal. You have to build real relationships with your customers and show them you truly care about their success. Every day at Project Broadcast, we demonstrate how we truly care about our customers. And the most beautiful thing is that they recognize it and refer others to our platform. When your business is nearly 80% referrals, you know your customers love what your providing.
Thank you for all of that. We are nearly done. Here is our final ‘meaty’ question. You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
Wow, a zinger at the end huh!? Right now, so much of my world revolves around Project Broadcast and the business owners we’re empowering. More than 95% of our user base is female. They’re small entrepreneurs (solopreneurs in most cases), oftentimes as a consultant working for a network marketing, direct sales company, or some other version of a small side-hustle. They’re using Project Broadcast to create and scale relationships to grow their business. If I were capable of starting a movement, I’d want to create something that empowers their success even further — by helping to remove many of the outdated and false stigmas associated with their chosen profession. Every day, I see them fight to overcome the former stigmas of their profession in the world. But the reality is different. While there will always be bad actors, the direct selling and network marketing profession as a whole has become much more grounded in providing an equitable outcome for everyone involved.
How can our readers further follow your work?
If you want to follow our journey at Project Broadcast, you can follow us on Instagram, and you can also find me on LinkedIn.
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for the time you spent with this!
Jake Dempsey of Project Broadcast On How to Effectively Leverage The Power of Digital Marketing… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
