The Startup Ideas Podcast
Learn how to win on the internet in 28 min [tiktok shop, trends, building cult brands]
Wed, 18 Sep 2024
Join me as I sit down with Oren John, the internet's creative director who's worked with major brands like Red Bull, Ciroc, Grey Goose, and YRB. Together, we explore the game-changing potential of TikTok Shop and how creators are using the platform to build thriving businesses. Oren shares his expert insights on the role of luxury, craftsmanship, and storytelling in product design, and how these elements can elevate your brand. If you're curious about using TikTok to grow your business, this conversation is packed with valuable takeaways!Timestamps: 00:00 Intro00:55 Startup Idea 1: Collectible Pokemon iPhone Case10:22 TikTok Shop is a game-changer15:10 The power of creator communities18:38 TikTok Shop success formula21:40 Oren’s tech stack and tools24:37 YouTube vs TikTok26:29 Oren's content creation philosophy1) Startup Idea 1: Collectible Pokemon iPhone Case• Combines collectibility and utility• A product’s utility is the best way to standout on the interet• Tap into current trends to leverage the zeitgeist2) TikTok Shop is a game-changer:• Scale through affiliate creators• Brands pay $1,500-$2,500/month retainer• Creators earn 20% commission on sales"Kids aged 20-25 are making 10-25k/month off these commissions" - Oren3) The power of creator communities:• Discord channels like "Your First Dollar"• Brands recruit creators for TikTok Shop• Learn video creation, hooks, and editingPro tip: Brands can find pre-trained creators here 4) TikTok Shop success formula:• Wide demographic reach• Multiple creators across age/race/gender• Leverage Amazon for fulfillmentExample: Goalie (gummy brand) offering Rolex, Lamborghini as affiliate incentives 5) Content creation golden rule:• Provide saveable, shareable value• Entertain (replace Netflix experience)• Or fail"So many people fall in that third bucket because they go say, I'm going to talk about my brand story" - Oren6) TikTok vs Youtube:• TikTok algo allows for hyper-specific targeting• TikTok has wider reach than YouTube for niche products• Youtube is a less direct sales driver• Youtube is great for brand building• Long-form content still valuableHot take: "YouTube as a primary sales driver for most businesses" is outdated7) Oren's content creation philosophy:• 1) Value 2)entertainment 3)brand story• Tell stories, not just facts• Create content people want to bookmark• Focus on your area of expertise"I want your director to drop it in the Slack channel and be like, why aren't we doing this?" - OrenWant more free ideas? I collect the best ideas from the pod and give them to you for free in a database. Most of them cost $0 to start (my fav)Get access: https://www.gregisenberg.com/30startupideas 🎯 To build your own portfolio businesses powered by community you might enjoy my membership.You'll get my full course with all my secrets on building businesses, peer-groups to keep you accountable, business ideas every single month and more!Spots are limited.https://www.communityempire.co/📬 Join my free newsletter to get weekly startup insights for free:https://www.gregisenberg.com/70,000+ people are already subscribed.To improve your rankings your business on Google and using AI for SEO, sign up tohttp://boringmarketing.com/FIND ME ON SOCIALX/Twitter: https://twitter.com/gregisenbergInstagram: https://instagram.com/gregisenberg/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gisenberg/FIND OREN ON SOCIALX/Twitter: https://x.com/orenmeetsworldInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/orenmeetsworld/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/orenj/
I interviewed Oren Meets World. This guy has worked with everyone from Red Bull to Ciroc, you name it, but that's not why he's interesting. He's interesting because he has nailed TikTok and he has nailed how to create content that spreads to millions of people. TikTok shop, I didn't know much about it. He taught me and he's going to teach you. Enjoy this episode.
All right, new character unlocked. Oren, the internet's creative director. Welcome.
Man, I'm excited to be here. Let's rip some ideas.
Okay, I want to run. This is a Startup Ideas podcast, so I'm going to run an idea by you. Anyone can take it. You can take it for all I care. And I want to workshop it and just get into your brain to see how you would take this idea and turn it into a cult brand. You with me? Let's roll. So here's the idea. I have a iPhone case. It's kind of actually kind of falling apart. It's just black.
It's not that interesting. I will say I used to just have no iPhone case and I would crack it and crack it and crack it. So I've given up, you know, for the people in the comment section who are going to be like, oh, you know, I can't believe he has an iPhone case. Can't believe he's one of those people like I've given up on it. You know, it's so interesting. You feel me on that?
Yeah, I was going to say, I was going to hold up. I was going to take my phone out of its case because I adopted the case purely because it's been absolutely destroyed in the same way. I just got to stop. I got to stop doing it. And so I'm in the same exact boat, brother.
Dude, once you hit like, I don't know, late 20s, early 30s, you're just like, I can't do it anymore.
Yeah, as soon as kids are involved, man, the phone's breaking no matter what.
Exactly. So the idea is, how can you make the case a little more fun? And... Like a lot of us, you know, I'm into collectibles and I was thinking, oh, wouldn't it be cool if you can have a case and in the back of the case, there'd be like a holographic Charizard. So it's basically marrying a collectible with the case.
And you're able to make a premium on it because obviously, let's say you're buying, okay, Charizard is probably a bad example because there's some Charizards that go for like $30,000. But there are like, I don't know, maybe it's a Squirtle or something like that, which you can put in, buy it for $20. It costs you $5 to make the case and you sell it for $75. What do you think?
Definitely intrigued. I do. It is funny. You mentioned up, I have an influencer iPhone case. I don't know, for lack of a better term, I have a, this is from Maximize. I don't know if you've seen his videos, his weapon of mass distraction. So I'm a believer in the vanity iPhone case. Yeah.
And I'm also, the place where I work is we do websites and that includes the road website who did that, the viral, the case that has lipstick colors. Look, I would immediately take that and be looking at, all right, you have the IP angle is a great angle, but I think the utility angle is still the best angle to take for sales. for anything that's going on the internet, right?
Because people are more likely to save and share something with utility than they think is cool because we are so inundated with cool stuff. And that was just my general take of like where we are right now on the Zeitgeist. And so I'd be looking at, okay, what can we take within the Charizard world that like makes this useful, right?
Can we slap, is it, can we make like the back case big enough to put a full pack of cards in or whatever that is? You can like, you can hold your deck or whatever that would be that would tie into what that experience looks like. Or what else are like the youth really, really into that could make for like a funny, potentially viral, viral case to tell the brand story.
One, um, just cause I'm, I have a bunch of, uh, Cologne is really popular right now. And so I've been sent all this influencer cologne that I'm never going to wear. And I have like 20 of them in front of me. But that's a thing, right? Kids right now, young men especially, are building like their perfume bar. It's like a thing that's happening online. So I'd be like, all right, cool.
How can I, like if they want to carry that with them throughout the day, like what's the iPhone case that allows me to hold four of those that has the royalty with, you know, whatever, you know, cologne sommelier they're following on the internet. So yeah, I would basically be attaching utility to that that has virality and storytelling.
I think any of those could then have you have 100 videos that spawn from that. You can repeat those videos whenever like some new exclusivity drops and then you're on your way to to establishing your cult.
So my initial reaction to that is, well, if you're building a luxury product, which this is, do you need to have utility? That was my initial reaction. And then you started talking about the colognes, which, by the way, I had no idea that cologne is like, you know, popular right now.
The youth are in a shocking place right now, but we'll get there.
Exactly. We can unpack that later in the video. So what you're kind of saying is, you know, utility doesn't need to be like your standard utility around just covering the phone, but it could mean like, how do you put utility and marry that to what's happening in the cultural zeitgeist? Is that what you're saying? Exactly.
That's exactly what I'm saying. Because I think your luxury point is actually an interesting one. And I spend, a lot of my background is in like the conversation around luxury and higher end and items that sell for a premium price point. And so like the concept of luxury is really important for people with ideas to understand is there's basically like luxury is inherently rooted in craft.
People buy the Hermes saddle or whatever it is because of the quality level with which has been sustained over a period of time. And then the desire that comes from people wanting to attain the ability to acquire that quality level. So luxury is inherently rooted in craft. And since in iPhone case, I don't know how much craft you can apply to that.
We've already seen the carbon fiber cases and rare Python leather or whatever. It doesn't really change my experience. But then one level down from that, we have what I call designer products, right? Where the design differentiates it. You can charge a premium because the design is so cool or so interesting.
And a good example of that is, I don't know if you've seen those metal cases that are like two pieces, but it's like a little metal, like almost like liquid metal looking thing that goes on top and the bottom. They advertise on Instagram a lot. That's a designer case, right? You're charging a premium for someone's really unique design.
You could say the same thing about like, say this more hype beastie concept where it's like, oh, you get your Charizard or it's a, you know, it's a Travis Scott case or whatever it is could fall in that category. But really where luxury is at its pinnacle is that combination of utility and craft, right?
Where you're able to say like a perfume experience, depending on what O you have, et cetera, can be a luxury experience. And if you marry that with all the utility that comes from it, like the craft and the story of it, you're kind of reaching that pinnacle. And so I think that's what we'd be trying to do here. And now I'm leaning into the idea of the cologne case, right?
Like let's get it so it could have four or six of those testers. Let's launch it with an exclusive with YSL or whoever is going to give us the four tester set that fits right within it. We're going to go MRR because you're going to get four to six sent to you on a quarterly basis. And you can sign up based on your sent profile.
And then you can share the sent profiles with your friends via the app, obviously, which has its other inherently social value. And then you can get your pheromone ratio through the wearable. All right, we're going too far.
Don't tell anyone, but I've got 30 plus startup ideas that could make you millions. And I'm giving them away for free. These aren't just random guesses. They're validated concepts from entrepreneurs who've built $100 million plus businesses. I've compiled them into one simple database. Compiled from hundreds of conversations I've had on my podcast.
But the main thing is most of these ideas don't need a single investor. Some cost nothing to start. I'm pretty much handing you a cheat sheet. The Idea Bank is your startup shortcut. Just click below to get access. Your next cash flowing business is waiting for you. Well, you know what's cool about this idea is When you think of... Okay, what's that brand? It's a men's cologne.
I almost bought it and then I looked at the price and it was like $250 for a cologne. There's one... I think it starts with a C. Do you know what I'm talking about? I'm not sure. What's the... Cree or...
You know, I have only gotten back into cologne because I have it was it came up so often in this. I did this like I do these like reports for like large like retail groups and stuff like that was like on like what's trending. And so I end up doing like these focus groups of Gen Z all the time.
And the perfume thing came up and then I started to say I always used to say no to the influencer seating on perfume. And now I take them all because, yeah, it's a it's a whole thing. So I'm not like super savvy as to what brands are popping right now.
I got it. I got it. I was close. I called it Cree, but it was really Creed. And I just like the first link that came up is it's a 12 Creed, $1,260 for, I don't know, like 12 hours.
It's like the La Mer of Cologne.
Let's go.
Yeah, exactly. So listen, if you're going to, I don't care how wealthy you are. If you're taking one spritz of that Creed, you're hoping that someone's like, wait, is that a, is that a Odo, you know, Aventus? You know, that's, but that's the problem with cologne is there's no easy way to share the status of your cologne.
Yeah, well, it's interesting because you do want to let's go back to marketing from utility. So a friend of mine has a TikTok shop that's smashing it where he sells cologne and he sells a cologne called Her Loss named after the Drake. And it is a pheromone cologne because he's playing on it's 130 bucks or 95 bucks or whatever it is. I guess we're down to 80 on Amazon.
And they're playing into that idea that there is a chemical attraction element to what cologne can do for you. And that is a perfect scenario for the TikTok shop. But I think it's, you know, because people aren't going to notice what that width is and no one's going to recognize the Creed scent.
I think, you know, if you really want to make something in that niche and you don't have the infinite marketing budget, apparently Creed has, then you have to go back to a good old fashioned chemical utility, whether it works or not.
How do you look at a TikTok shop and see how much revenue they are doing?
So basically, you can click into this core store. So basically, you'll see the hard part about this is that all these people have like 50 accounts now. But if you go to the core one that has the store on it and click over into shop, the individual items will have how many units sold on there behind them.
And so your buddy, you know... I don't know if you can say, but like what ballpark is he doing in revenue?
He's pretty, uh, uh, his, his handle, he's pretty open about it. Like, but they're, they're doing a couple of hundred K a month just in the cologne. Like he's, he's on Instagram talking all about that, you know, full, full, full guru life. So yeah, so I think they're, they're doing really well on that. Well, I think look at the, the alpha there for the ideas podcast is that like,
There's a young demographic online that are discovering these experiences for the first time. Cologne, right? And there's a ton of influencer videos on colognes. If you see these, these guys have these like cologne collections.
So there's all these influencers have like 50 and then they'll pull the bottle out like really close in front of the camera, like a macro shot, some ornate, like a good example, the John Varvatos bottles are great examples, like ornate crazy bottle. And then they'll take the whiff and they'll be like talking about it or whatever.
And there's all these, you know, when we were supposed to cologne, whenever we were growing up, like, I don't know, it's like whatever my dad had or like some stuff I saw on a magazine ad. Right. And this is they're getting exposed to it through these insane people on it, on TikTok. And then they're going, hey, I want to start my own journey. What does that look like? But guess what?
If you watch a video on cologne on Instagram, you're going to get shown more videos about cologne on Instagram. So if you've and then if it's a TikTok shop video. where someone's actually purchasing product recurring from it, Instagram's weighting that super heavily in the cologne algorithm. So basically, as soon as you start down that rabbit hole, you're getting hit with her loss, right?
Or with my boy's product and who's hijacking that consumer journey. Who's saying, yeah, instead of finding out any other way, a native TikTok shop brand is taking advantage of that opportunity inside culture. And that is a really interesting concept to me.
And who else is... Because I'm fascinated, and I think a lot of people are fascinated with TikTok Shop. So how do you build a business on TikTok Shop? And who's doing it well? What... Are you following Goalie at all? No. Tell me about it.
All right. So TikTok shop is a scale game. This is the thing that breaks most CMOs brains right now. Back to our comment about one TikTok account, whatever they started off the account with. TikTok is a game of affiliates, right? So basically other people that create content for your brand and they link your product and they get a percentage of that sale. Most of them are also on retainer.
So for instance, I ran TikTok shop at this brand I was at. I was a CMO. Previously, we had a toy brand. We had five or six creators that were on monthly retainer, 1,500 to 2,500 bucks. This is very typical. Bigger brands will build this up to 50 creators, 100 creators. They are thirsting for creators to be able to do this because it's a lucrative system.
For that 1,500, 2,500 bucks a month, they make, let's say, 15 to 20 videos, sometimes more that are about that. And there's software doing it too, not related to shop, separate combo. And... If those videos go well, people buy product from them on TikTok shop. That creator gets a percentage that goes in their bank account. That's why you see all these kids now.
There's a lot of kids aged 20 to 25 who are in these discords, like the collective and stuff like that. Or I think they just changed their name. It's called Your First Dollar, where they are making 10, 15 grand a month, 25 grand a month off these commissions, flaunting that on the internet, because of course that's what we do now, but like actually making good money.
And like that is a really interesting opportunity because they're doing it off of like affiliate sales. But the thing is, there's no limit to the scale of that currently because TikTok is so wide. And we all look at creators differently, right? When I was first making content, I was at like 100K. I noticed someone was jacking my content. Someone was copying my videos word for word.
And they had like 40,000 followers. I was like, oh man. But I went and looked at the account. They look different than me, different race, general different overall vibe, completely different follower base, almost no overlap to my follower base. And that's like the important concept to understand is that everyone's TikTok algorithm is different. They want to see different people.
They have different interests. They have different niece. And then the TAM of that is like ludicrously wide. So if you look at a TikTok shop brand, you go... If I'm Goalie, who's like a gummy brand, okay, every single person on the earth is my TAM for this, right? And I also sell this on Amazon. So I'm gonna have young creators of every gender, race, overall vibe, content type.
I'm gonna have middle-aged creators, older creators. I wanna cover as many as I can, as long as I can make the math work from an affiliate perspective that they get 20% of the sale, I get the other money off TikTok shop. I have a certain splash over into Amazon and now TikTok and Amazon are becoming one for that fulfillment. Like that is the size of the opportunity.
And you'll see why I bring up Goalie from the start is their incentive package for affiliates going into Q4 is insane. What I mean by incentive package is basically if you generate enough GMV, like the market value of sales there, it's like Rolex. Lamborghini, a condo in Miami, night at Amangiri. That's the level which we're talking about for these kids. And that's the promoted program they have.
And that's how far these big TikTok shop brands are from where these legacy brands who can't move on there are. And the arbitrage is crazy.
Dude, I actually love you. I... We have to unpack all of that. Cause I feel like there's to you, that's completely, uh, of course this is happening, you know, in my world, I'm like in the software world. So I don't like think about these things. You mentioned something at discord. I think you called it, uh,
Yeah, it's called Your First Dollar. It used to be called The Collective. But that's like where all the kids go and get trained.
And then brands go and recruit in there. Explain exactly what it is.
Yeah, so if I was 19 right now, I worked at Chick-fil-A when I was 19. And I worked at Abercrombie. I got fired from Abercrombie. I worked at Chick-fil-A. Long story. That sucked, right? So if I say I'm online, I'm like, these kids are making money on TikTok shop. How do I do it? So there's a Discord channel where they teach kids how to make videos.
Basically, like how do you use CapCut, TikTok editor? What's a good hook? What's a good whatever? And so kids will go on, they'll pay, I think it's like 15 bucks a week or something like light to go say, all right, cool. Do I want to do this? I want to learn how to make videos. And then brands will post opportunities like, hey, these brands want 20 videos for TikTok shop.
So I recruited off of that when I worked at this toy company. I was like, cool, I need a creator in the UK because regional is big in TikTok too. I need a creator in Germany. I need a creator who does Spanish. We recruited off of there.
pay these kids x amount for the videos they get x amount of the tiktok shop revenue they've already been trained you can see some of the content they're doing or they're brand new and you're giving them a shot for a lesser rate and then brands will come in there kind of with deals and recruiting at the same size so they kind of have a two-tiered system but like that's what kids want to do that they have to go figure out how to do that somewhere so either you take a course but of course is like the wrong framework for anything now right it's like course and community much rather you'd have the discord where people like me are hopping in there like give me a
And so all that kind of happens in one place. And that's one of like 10 discords where this is happening.
Insane that that exists. Because, you know, I did a tweet the other day about, you know, if you were going to create the YC of today in a world where software is commoditized, it's all about distribution. What does the YC for creators look like? And I feel like it's kind of this, right? Yeah.
Yeah, well, also I look at, I mean, honestly, so my last, before I hopped on this podcast, I was giving a talk to YC about content for software. And so a quick note on that is the same thing is happening in software, right? So if you look at... AirBuds, you look at, I think the other one is like, is Humane. Humane is like the mental health one. There's Jenny, there's GG Dating.
GG Dating is a good one. There's Trip BFF. The software that said, hey, content market fit is as important as product market fit, but they're using 50 creators. Like I think AirBuds definitely has 50. You know, GG has four or five accounts, maybe two or three creators. But even like Ladder has like 30 trainers on their fitness app that are creators. So they're applying the same theory.
They just don't have the unit economics that TikTok shop does. TikTok shock is great because there's a get rich dynamic that is material, but you can literally calculate out the way you calculate like meta ads ROAS and like be in the mix of, that's amazing. Software, you have to like look at, it's much more, it's a little more intangible, but that's literally happening.
But also you look at like, to your point about the creator YC, like I run this program called Cut 30. We have 100, 150 people in it every time we do it. It's like every six weeks to teach people how to be content creators. And the hit rate's crazy. Like the group chat of the people, we have a group chat of people that like really pop off going from there.
And it's like 16, 18 people who've become like, hundreds of thousands of followers. And we're not the only one. There's other people that are doing that. But all this is happening in these closet communities. The only people that know about that, I don't go run a million ads about that or talk about it every day. It's just people that have gone down funnel enough to even get promoted to.
Same thing with a collective. They're not splashing that on the front page. A bunch of us aren't tweeting about it, but it happens in the background. And that's where I feel like entrepreneurs and CMOs get left out is because if you can't find a way to be visible into the world that's happening around you and into the trends that are around you, you're literally just getting left behind.
Just to finish up on the TikTok thing, what else do people need to know about building on TikTok, starting a business on TikTok?
It's an operational nightmare. The hardest part about that is dealing with TikTok and your inventory being in there or not. So like I mentioned, I was at a toy brand with this beforehand. We got shut down on TikTok shop so much that we basically stopped. We had a product that was on the edge of compliance. There's a reason for that.
But basically, there's just so many logistics around shipping and customer service and compliance and violations and strikes that's like all automated by TikTok that you have to be... You need to have a uniquely insane and process-driven operational person who is dedicated to that to work through the scale.
But if you are, it is likely worth that on the other end, especially if you have a good Amazon business because the crossover is huge. And if you're walking into a retail conversation, something I like to call out is I worked with this water brand called Chlorophyll Water, where he was really early on TikTok, the founder. Seeded out a ton of product on TikTok when he launched.
We had this whole SEO strategy we put together. But he had, there was something like a billion views on the Chlorophyll Water hashtag when he launched. And he walked that right into retail and was like, look at the demand for my product. But this is not a product that is consumed online. People don't buy cases of water or single water. It's a product that's consumed in retail.
And guess how those retail conversations went, right? Of course, they want to take advantage of that arbitrage, right? We want to be the person that has that availability. That's still the conversation. We talk about TikTok shop. There's the crossover to Amazon and the crossover to natural retail because of how much discovery entertainment happens on that platform today.
Damn, dude. I do feel, and maybe other people listening, the whole supply chain just feels like a black box. I don't even know where to start.
In terms of making a product?
Yeah, in terms of making a product.
So I would go to like, if you know, kind of, if you have a general idea, but you want to go into the belly of the beast, then I would go to Canton Fair. It's twice a year. It's in China. I know that sounds like something that would be a wild thing to do, but it is a literally like, it's like the Mecca for where things are created.
And that includes everything, food, you know, like, you know, jewelry, electronics, like whatever it is, food may say slightly less, but let's say if you wanted to get into the supplements game. There's that, there's a network of other more specific, like you want to do gummies, you want to do stuff made in the US, wherever there's a bunch of like trade shows related to that.
But like Canton Fair is where everything in the world is made. Like all the factories that make everything in the world go to to display their wares. And the Western world is kind of common adopted. And there's enough understanding that you have to deal with people that speak English when you're there.
And that's where people go to find their factories and experience supply chain for the first time. Obviously, if you don't want to go all the way over to China, if you do go there, you're going to get the best rates. You're going to actually see people's operations. You're going to see all the available options. If you don't do that, there's a reason that Alibaba founders are so rich.
Between Alibaba and Pietra, you basically have access to factories of any kind to make anything you want basically anywhere in the world, or you can hunt them down individually. I just feel like to me, like the product creation part is fully antiquated right now.
It's actually so easy to use Alibaba or go talk now through WeChat or with translation or the amount of Chinese people that speak English or to anywhere in the world to make something that really comes down to more of like distribution of ideas being more important than the creation of them.
What sort of software tools do you use to come up with ideas, figure out supply chain, competitive analysis? What's your content creation? What are the things that people probably need to look into?
There's a whole bunch of them. But I would say like, yeah, so like e-commerce, like particles, interesting on e-commerce because you can basically look at any brands like Shopify data over time and store data over time. And so that's a good one to be like, how much do people do promotions? What colors do they sell the most of? How much do they really sell of X units or Y?
Then there's the more traditional ones like Amazon ones, like Helium 10 and things like that. There is a really specific one for TikTok shop. that my brain is short-circuiting on right now, but I'll find that one before the end of it. But I manage my entire life in Notion, in these databases where basically every project has, the supply chain is all tracked in there.
And Notion's great because it's also functional in China. So people can update their statuses and stuff and all like that. But basically every project is tracked in terms of where things are in production and target dates. Content roadmap is populated by where product roadmap ends on a separate doc. But it is interesting.
The creative workflow is the one that's most interesting to talk about because we have CRM, we have ERP, but creative teams, like there's so many briefs and so much content being created now by these teams. And there's really no good way to track it. Everyone's using like these ultra complex, like Notion Slack combos. And there's not like a dedicated creative platform for that.
And it's moving so fast that by the time anyone creates it, it's probably going to be iterated away. But anyway, software opportunity for people. All right, so yes, the TikTok app, the name eludes me at the moment, just because my brain is short circuiting, but basically it shows you creators and how much market value they're doing. So how much sales they're actually making.
And then basically also you can go explore products and categories in a similar way, which allows you to then formulate a strategy to go DM creators, do outreach. And that's the gate that everyone has, right? It's finding more people, actually getting them to want to do something with your product and like getting that relationship and following up is definitely the hardest part of that right now.
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Who does that nowadays? So check it out. Highly recommend boringmarketing.com. And so we've talked a lot about TikTok, but YouTube, do you do any sort of... competitive analysis on YouTube or you just don't really touch it?
No, I mean, I still don't think as a platform, I'm excited about the features they're putting in for products. Like I've tagged a bunch of my own products inside my YouTube channel, things like that. Haven't seen like big sales after anything.
I do not think of that as a platform for brands besides very mainstream CPG brands like that, like that compi foods, um, like, like candy brands, a perfect brand for you for YouTube, YouTube shorts. But I think, um, YouTube, when I talk about the algorithms, like TikTok is extremely good at giving you very specific things.
It can zone in on like, like when I was in China, it was showing me content of other Americans, like in China, like the level of which that they are good at being able to do is actually shocking. even though it's like on a VPN. But then with YouTube, it's so mainstream. The content that succeeds has to be like painfully mainstream, on shorts at least.
So if you are a niche product, you have less of a chance of reaching your audience there. But if you have a product with wide appeal and you have a viral format, you have a lot of opportunity for success. But I still don't think of that as a YouTube as a primary sales driver for most businesses.
Wow, that's a hot take, dude.
I appreciate that.
Yeah, that's a really hot take. I mean, first of all, the interesting thing is you don't even mention long form.
Yeah, well, long form is a brand builder for brands to be able to put out there. And obviously, there's influencers that put a bunch of that inside their content to build it. But when you look at a tactical, useful strategy with arbitrage that you can then compare to, you can come at from a numbers perspective, the way you come at advertising.
I look at short form, and especially what's happening on TikTok, way more specifically quantifiable, actionable, scalable, organically, than YouTube is more of a... a slower, more marauding, more brand-focused game. Not that that's a bad thing for brands, but I think the opportunity with organic virality on short form is generational.
And before we leave, I have to ask you, because you're the goat at this, besides format, if you're trying to create a TikTok audience, you're trying to create content that's going to land with people, how do you do it? Yeah.
This is a good one. There's a couple of things like the core macro level. There's three types of content, right? Content that drives value and not just like I have three tips, like value that someone wants to bookmark or share. Like my content works so well because I get shared in Slack channels of companies, small and large, every day, thousands of times.
Cause I make content specifically for that. I want my content to get, I want some, I want your director to drop it in the Slack channel and be like, why aren't we doing this? Or I want a creative person to be like sending it to their creative team, I wanna do this. So value that is safeable and shareable either does that or it entertains, it replaces Netflix and the TV experience. or it fails.
Those are your three options for content, right? And what happens is so many people fall in that third bucket because they go say, I'm going to talk about my brand story, or I'm going to talk about what my product does that's cool, and no one cares. And even if you're an established brand, why a lot of their content isn't good is that they don't care.
But if you take that same lens, I'm going to talk about that, and I'm going to provide saveable, shareable value, or I'm going to entertain in such a way that people are consuming it in replacement of entertainment, that's where you can succeed on short form.
And so if you're an expert, you're trying to build your following or do the kind of thing I've done on there, I'd be laser focused on telling stories about things because people don't care just about facts. They care about facts in context of stories that are also playbooks that enable people to act.
If you're an expert in any field from fitness to branding, to e-commerce, to whatever, you're a cardiologist, that is the format for which you to succeed.
Beautiful. I appreciate it, my man. Where can people get to know the internet's creative director more?
Yeah, I'm at Oren Meets World, O-R-E-N Meets World, on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. YouTube is my favorite personal platform at the moment, even though it may not drive the brand value. So you can come check out the long form on there. I have a newsletter called Hyper that is in my link bios on all there, where we talk specifically about brand strategy and creative direction.
That is a worthwhile read. So appreciate you having me.
Anytime, my man. Come back soon.