#206 - How Great Leaders Scale Through AI, Curiosity & Culture | John Sampogna

0:00 If you're doing something that you love, more often than not, you're gonna get out of the bed with the right intention. And that is what's most important. You're gonna put yourself in a position to have more good days than bad days. And I think that's all you can ask for in life in any aspect of it. Hey you all, welcome back for another fun episode. This is gonna be good. the guest today, John, and I'll pronounce his last name properly, I promise.

0:42 And if I don't, he'll correct me. Um I just I'm so excited to sit down for podcasts and we'll talk for the next forty-five to fifty minutes about people with a good attitude. And the energy that John's had on the first 10 minutes has just been good. Uh I came out of a personal leadership meeting inside one of the companies I run. I'm coming out of it to the podcast, and it just seems like every conversation that I'm on right now. With leaders inside my company, with an event I just held called Worth It, where we had entrepreneurs from around the country come in. It's the attitude of an individual is what matters most. And you can really work with that and build and grow and overcome and problem solve. But when someone just doesn't have a good, inherently positive, good attitude, you just can't do much with it. So I'm pumped today to talk to John Sampogna He's the co founder and CEO of Wondersauce a business acceleration agency.

1:31 Helping brands grow and evolve. Over the past fifteen years, he's led work for companies like Nike, L'Oreal, and Grubhub while scaling Wondersauce into a hundred plus person firm and earning a spot on the Inc. five thousand list. Fog week's acquisition by Project Worldwide, John continues to lead the company at the intersection of creative technology and performance. So John, welcome to the necessary entrepreneur. All right, man. Was that an intro that was proper and acceptable? I think it was perfect. All right, man. I like because perfection's tough to obtain. Um, what do you what's your relationship with performance and perfection? What do you where do where do you land with that?

2:11 I mean, I I don't think it's anywhere near perfection, but I think that you have to constantly be pushing yourself to learn and to evolve as a person, both professionally and and personally. And when things start to get more comfortable and r the routine starts to feel really predictable, I think it's important to to shake things up because you're you're gonna get stale and bored and ultimately lazy. So anything you could do to of to fight Being lazy I think is good. It's good to be lazy in certain aspects of life sometimes, but not not all the time. Through this journey of you starting the company at a young age and then selling it and then maintaining the CEO role and growing, are there moments you could reflect on?

2:55 Like 'cause I think we get to our I mean, you're not quite, you're just going over the 40 hurdle and over the bridge. I've been there for seven years here at 47. But are there moments that you can we start to lose our ego more, I think. That the best ones of us do. And you're more interested in getting it right for for you and your team than you are being right. Can you reflect back over the past twenty say years and reflect on those moments of boredom? Reflect on were there moments of laziness, or did that not exist in you? And if it didn't exist in you when you saw it maybe setting in the companies you're running or the groups you're you're running with? I think like early on in my career it it was never it was never an option.

3:37 I I mean I started working um right before like the financial crisis and I I remember vividly um the day that there were like layoffs at the firm I was working at and I remember just sitting there not really knowing what was going on and seeing people around me just go into a room and leave and It was like a cycle that was going on for like hours. And I remember just being like, This is horrible. And thinking like, I must be next, right? And thankfully I I I was never I I was fine. but I mean, looking back, it was funny. I was I was making probably like thirty thousand dollars. Of course I was pro of course I was fine.

4:18 but I remember I remember looking around and just being like, This is just cold and it was a dose of reality. And I remember um it kind of set my mindset around this idea that you always had to be pushing yourself to be the best person um within your group, within your within your agency or place of work or whatever you're doing, and to ask questions, to question things that you do that disagree with and develop a point of view. And I remember, I mean, from twenty one to twenty five, twenty six, that was like my my vibe with the two companies I worked in. I was constantly I thought of myself as better than I was at the time and I wanted to be put on the most intense things.

4:58 And I think that mindset led me to like the reality that for me to be truly happy, I need to start something myself. Because I was never gonna be happy being restrained and having to follow someone else's playbook. If I have so many complaints and gripe and gripes about like how I would do things differently, at some point just do it differently. Because to your point earlier, you don't wanna be the person just complaining. You wanna be the person who's like leading change in a positive light. So Yeah, I I look back at that all the time and I'm just like, I think those early days kind of set my my mindset. So doesn't that bring us all the way to 2026 with this intersection with AI?

5:40 Right. I had an event last week. first one, it's always wacky when you do something for the first time, and events are hard and to sell tickets. We called it worth it. It was here in Cincinnati. We had some awesome entrepreneurs come around for it. But one of the riffs I had on stage, it was a fireside chat environment. I was interviewing some folks, some were presentations by them, but I had about a three or four minute riff. on you had it at twenty one and at twelve years old I had this moment. I grew up, we grew up financially poor. And I had this moment that I realized I was working for a landscaper pulling weeds and I knew that it was my job to make sure I pulled the root because if I didn't, the customer that that landscaping company worked for was going to have an issue with the customer saying you didn't do the right job.

6:21 And ever since that day, since I was twelve years old, I realized like it's my when I get paid to do a job, I need to finish the job. I need to do it all the way. But that's actually scaled to a different level and we'll talk about this. I want to hear your perspective with AI. But then because I established that mindset, because I arrived at that place on what my job was, I inherently by default just ended up being one of the twenty percent. And one of the twenty percent was to your point, when all those people were being let go, for some reason you were there. Yeah, it was a part of thirty thousand dollars, but I bet there were some people there that made about what you made that got let go that day too. And so what I told people, I said, in the world of AI, if you want, don't worry about it, worry about the level of employee or the whether the level of leader you are.

7:06 Because if you are elite inside your job, inside your career, against the people that you're doing the same job with or against, if you stand out and you're more valuable to the entity, whatever the entity is, if they do for some reason let you go, other people are going to know about you and you will always have a career. Yeah, I agree. So we're gonna go ahead. Yeah, I I think that's well said and and it's spot on. I mean, you know, depending on how big of an impact you believe AI will have on the world, it's going to have I mean it's going to have an incredible impact. And uh, you know, you read about you read about like the far exaggerated, maybe not even exaggerated, but you read about like how it could take over everything and there'll be like government assisted living and all this stuff of like no one's gonna do anything.

7:59 that if we put that aside for a second and just talk about like near term implementation and what it's going to do across industries and sectors. I look at it like a tool. It's a guitar, it's a golf club, it's a computer, it's whatever you want it to be, but like a golf club is different in my hand, the same club than it is in like Rory McElroy's hand, than it is in someone who'd never picked it up before. and the same thing could be said about AI. So while it will democratize a lot of things and make um aspects of the workplace commoditized and approachable for the so anyone at any level can do it, I think the work that people get paid for, the intellectual property, the knowledge, the ideas that you as an individual bring to the table, you could use AI as a tool to it enable that and empower that and make it even better than than before.

8:54 So I think of it as a tool to make what makes you unique and special, accelerated and stronger. Now, do I think part of what I'm saying is like wishful thinking? Maybe. But I just can't imagine um there being no level of original thought, uniqueness, and new things that will mat like that that stuff has to matter. It will always matter. So You know, I I like I like to look at it as something that like you have to adapt, you have to use. Um, but ultimately it's a tool and there's no such thing as a level play playing ground if that makes sense. I think it still comes down to skill.

9:35 I think let me try to say it in one sentence. I believe AI is gonna eliminate mediocrity. I think so too, yeah. Which is which is good. It's and here's why it's good, I guess. If someone only feels empowered to be mediocre in their job, they should be doing something else anyway. Yeah. And I I also think that with any large change in industry that is technology led, whether it was like the advent of the computer or the internet or social media or anything we've been going on this journey for the last thirty plus years, uh, it takes time for things to actually shake out.

10:23 And people will have time to adapt and reinvent themselves. And I mean, the way I see it is it's already been two plus years that a lot of these tools have been at a broad enough adoption where you should be pretty comfortable using them at this point. So I think that there's equal parts risk and opportunity that everyone can take advantage of right now. And if you are stuck in a rut and bored with what you're doing, or you feel like you've plateaued and you're not passionate, it's an amazing time to actually reinvent. So I think it's two sides. How are you asking the partners or employees at Wondersauce that you lead? How are you asking them to interact and engage with AI?

11:05 the it's it's it's mandated. I mean you have to use it in in all aspects of what we do. I mean, if there there are there are there are efficiency angles where you could write code faster, you could write copy faster, you could um develop creative vision faster. There are a lot of things that like if you put talent behind it and you know how to use it correctly, you can accelerate valuable output. So there's like an acceleration angle that like It's also ubiquitous AI at this point. It's in everything we use. It's not like you have to like go to the AI machine now to do something. It's in it's in everything. Whether you're using, you know, um a Claude or an open AI or or Gemini or anything like that, but it's it's also in like Adobe and Runway and Figma and GitHub and every tool we use, Slack.

11:58 I mean, it's everywhere. So it's it's one of those things where um from an efficiency standpoint. you need to adapt it because you you just have to. And then from like a visioning standpoint, where I like to say like push creative output that um like get to the valuable stuff faster. Like I mean, I'll tell you like now, like like my my workflow for writing decks and like a compelling narrative. Like when I have to present something to someone, get approval on something, get buy in on an investment, I used to write a deck outline. And would do it myself. And I always had like the ideas.

12:39 I had I I'm I'm I've just been like, it's always been something I've been naturally good at. I could develop ideas fast. And I would used to I used to give it to a team to validate. And they would come back and it would be like a kind of a back and forth ping pong battle. And then we would get a deck after a week and a half and then I'd go present it. I mean, now I could be on the treadmill. I'm I'm talking to Gemini or OpenAI on my phone, and I'm literally brainstorming. where I want to take my narrative. And then at the end of my of my of my run, I say, summarize everything we just talked about. I take it when I'm done, I throw it into like a deep research report in Gemini where I say, pick this apart. And I want any factual inaccuracies identified.

13:23 And I want you to really z zero in on the interesting nuggets that I'm kind of talking about. And I'll have my my literal like thought track. I'll have deep research to validate it. I'll take all of that. I'll throw it into something and say, now spit out the outline for me. And it it's literally like here's ten, ten slides. I say the headlines only. And then I'll look at that when I have a clear space and I'll rewrite them myself in the way I want to actually present them. And I'll throw it into my my like John bot that I have that that I use to write stuff. Like that workflow on my best days, I can do that in under an hour. It doesn't require anyone's help. So when I bring that idea to my head of strategy or my head of technology or a group of creatives, I'm giving them a coherent thought.

14:12 Um, beginning to end with ideas that are factually accurate. And I'm like, what do you think about this? Let's push it. That is me taking something I've always done and leveling up my ability. It's still my ideas, still my narrative, but I'm using this tool to make it all faster and better. So I don't see any I think that's amazing. Yeah, it's where the mediocrity is gone. Yeah. It's gone. It if you interact with it properly, it will level you up in all the deficiencies that we all have and it will make it elite every time. And so I think what you said in the beginning about you just can't imagine a time where unique and new thought doesn't matter.

14:53 It so like we're gonna so are we all gonna settle and say like as of this moment there will be nothing new. We're all gonna just gonna live off the same the same information that we've had up until this point in history, and it'll just be slop on top of slop, slop, slop until it's just slop talking to slop and iterating like like no, of course not. There's Unless AI becomes It's own thinker. What you could. That's the debate, right? That that is the debate. I still think though that no matter what happens, there's no there's nothing that can happen for it to turn off human thought.

15:36 Um and also like just like thinking about what I do in terms of just marketing. Marketing, advertising, whatever, it is no matter what, it is trends based. And you know, as connected as everyone is, um, on their phones, now like a big trend is like you go to a concert and you lock your phone in one of these lockers. You Wanna go to sleep at night, you want to manage your phone use, there's apps, there's tools now to limit app distraction from your your your mental health. Um the second people get so pumped on digital art, I promise you there's going to be something that comes out that's completely handwritten and that will be trendy.

16:17 So it's like it it's always going to be this this balance. And I think the idea is like analog isn't right, machine isn't right. What's right is somewhere in the middle, and you need to be versed in both, and you can't be over leveraged on one side. Terminator two thousand twenty nine, right? Um what's your leadership style? Direct. direct and um you know I I'm I'm not gonna like mince words and I want people to succeed in our structure.

16:59 We've got an amazing retention rate and what I'm most proud of in terms of what we built is our ability to grow people from within and they go on to do amazing things either within our walls or elsewhere. So I'm not saying I'm I'm far from perfect. you know, I lot it's taken a lot of reflection over the last fifteen years to dial back my um sometimes abrasive behavior or um I'm too quick to react on something and maybe I shut down a really good idea because I didn't like the first 30 seconds of someone's kind of talk track and I'm like, nope, don't like it. So I've reflected a lot personally that like you can be direct, but You also need to be an incredible listener.

17:44 And that's something that I've really, really kind of tried to focus on now. Um, it'd be interesting to ask this question to some of my people. Um, but it's something that I've I've really tried is to is to listen and let people go with things more autonomously. But it's always been direct. I don't want something to linger. If I see it, it's a problem. So it sounds like you forced yourself to have a relationship with self awareness at a top level. You have to. I mean, I was never trained in this. I you know, w one one minute you're you're you're twenty six and you're talking to your buddy at a bar about starting a company and then three years later you're managing eighty people.

18:25 I mean, there's no there's no MBA for that. There's no training. You just have to figure it out, right? Um I w you know, there's there's you're you're you're forcing yourself to learn operations, uh, the legal side of the business, you know, um the financial side of the business and Of course, all the interpersonal people stuff from HR. So you have no choice but to reflect on on your s your your style. You you don't know anything, so you have to you have to reflect. What's your best form of learning that you do? Honestly, I I I I always say this to people and it's like the weirdest answer, but I I take inspiration from random things.

19:05 I I never was into like business books or um I never looked up to like leaders. I I looked up to like specific traits of people that I really liked. But I could like I I think of my people that I consider mentors and I I think like I liked aspects of what they did. But in totality, I'd be like, nah, I don't really No, I'm not really interested in learn learning from you on that thing. Just just that. So I I got inspired by looking around and seeing something, and I'm like, that's really interesting. I've never seen that before. And it could be like could be like a uh a deli doing something random. It could be like the weirdest stuff.

19:49 It could be a billboard outside and the placement of the billboard along with the copy, and I'm staring at it for a while and I'm like, And I try to like work myself backwards as to like, why did the person who decided to do that or put it there, why did they do it? And I'm I try to kind of like work backwards. And I kind of like save all this stuff in my mind and I end up like applying stuff that I learned from maybe like hospitality to like automotive. And it's a it's it's a I can't really connect the lot the line, but it's a dotted line in my brain. So I I I just learn from observing in the real world and seeing how people interact with things. I think like if you're in advertising and marketing, it's about understanding human behavior and why people like and dislike stuff.

20:34 So it's why people love they love their this deodorant, don't like that deodorant when it could be made in the same factory. So you're probably a guy who was always swaying upstream and didn't fit in a lot of places, right? Yeah, ironically I I feel like I always got a w got along well with a with a bunch of different groups of people. Right. Yeah, you weren't in a certain quick, right? You can hang with anybody, but you were probably misunderstood if you really got deep in any of those places. Definitely. I'm still I'm s I'm a I'm a I'm a weird guy. But that means that that's true entrepreneurship, right? To to to have this way to think, to be really in you to have intuition at the next level, to understand to search out new ideas and being willing to like strike out on your own and say, I'm gonna go down this path because I believe it's right, even though everyone around me is telling me it's wrong, I'm gonna do this.

21:28 Does that sound familiar? It does. And I I I always love looking at like consensus thinking. Um, it could be it could be in any aspect of of life. And when everyone is like really negative on something, I I'm like really trying to find a positive on it. Where I'm like, maybe some smart people were negative on this, and then the rest are just like jumping on. So it's probably not as bad. as everyone's making it out to be. And if you actually figure out something decent within this thing everyone's piling on, there's probably an opportunity because no one else is focusing on it.

22:11 So I think like it's a it's a really good kind of like hack for anything. Whereas like if every single person in your town I keep using like food as a if if every single person in your town is jumping on like the um farm to table you know, organic or vegan thing or whatever, then like there's an opportunity somewhere. It's a bad example, but like There's an opportunity to fill a void that's not that. Exactly. Or and and to figure out a way to like turn whatever people are saying is negative into something that is just a different version of that that's actually positive and compliments the stuff people do like, but it's approaching it from a different angle.

22:57 Um, what are the characteristics that you love in the people that work with you um in the company that you run? What do you love? What are some of the most that you're like, man, you see it and you're like, that's somebody I can do something with? curiosity. Always like wanting to learn and and sort of like not afraid to just jump into something. Um, especially now, right, with AI. Like, there's no courses to take that we would take at least, um, on on on what's going to make you viable. The only thing that that's going to make you viable is figuring it out yourself. So I need people that don't look at that as work.

23:37 That they're like on the weekends and at night they're geeking out on this stuff because they think it's fun. And I don't care if they're do if they're using it to make like funny images of their friends or if they're using it to like organize their their personal finances. Um, but they're using it and they're figuring out how to like work with agents and all this other stuff. So like for me, curiosity was always really big. And I used to I remember this back in the day, like I used to read, you know, every single day I would read like the New York Times. I have my RSS feed back when RSS feeds were a thing. And I would read like, I would at least scan like hundreds of articles every single day. And I never looked at that as work.

24:18 I just liked to know stuff. And I just think you need that today more than ever, because um you you need to be ahead of the person next to you with something. Do you need to know how to process all this information that's coming at us too? We have more coming at us now about every subject and people trying to influence our brain to believe what they believe, their perspective, buy their product. Do you need to have these skills more now than ever? And if you're curious and you're solving through those things in earlier years in your life, maybe that's an ability that you have to process information as well. Yeah.

24:59 It's funny and you have to be careful too with like what you're consuming and how accurate it is and how factual it is. Um, but for me, like zooming out and identifying key themes, and even if you are getting served something within like the algorithm that you're like, Why am I getting served all this stuff? And it's like zoom out for a minute. And I always say, like, look at look at like slow news, look at like The slowest stuff you can find. Like stuff that maybe has to live in print in a magazine from a respected place. And like just zoom out for a minute and like Take a look at what they're covering topic-wise and get a feel for what's going on when people actually have like a deadline and things have to like stop.

25:46 And I'm not saying that's like that's like fact that's the the the Bible or anything, but I do think it's important to like focus on some slow stuff once in a while. And that like you you're not always focused on like fast, fast, now, now, refresh, refresh, refresh. Cause then you get yourself into this like, you know, death scroll rot state, which is also like really unhealthy. So I think it's just balance. It's like a little bit of podcasts, a little bit of Instagram and TikTok, a little bit of traditional news, a little bit of linear TV, you know, live sports, whatever you're into, but like curate your media mix in a thoughtful way and um try not to get over over leveraged on any one source.

26:32 Isn't that the truth? So with Wondersauce, I think you it's a what do you really how do you describe the term business acceleration agency? It's a unique term. Yeah. Um, we help brands unlock their next stage of growth. And we do it through two paths. So the pat the first path is around like digital transformation, which is basically working with the brands to rethink and rebuild their own infrastructure. So it could be a website, an app, or a net new idea. Things that like their customers use this brand for.

27:14 So we help a lot with that. We do that for a lot of different types of brands, whether it's e-commerce businesses or you know, a website or an app or whatever, but do a lot of that. And then we do a lot of um revenue acceleration. So basically working with a brand who is here and getting them to here. And that could be from one million dollars in revenue to 10 million, from 10 million to 100 million, et cetera, et cetera. And we basically use a mix of tactics. that drive both earned and paid attention. So we do a lot of creator and influencer content, we do brand content, um, a lot of paid media beyond just like social and search.

27:57 We do a lot of, you know, out of home and TV. Um, but basically we prescribe a mix of different types of marketing to um help brands get to that next stage of of revenue. And we do it in a way that's it's measurable. So we can tell after like thirty, sixty, ninety, one twenty that we're on the right track. So we try and build a level of attribution so our we can make sure our work is is impactful. Do you see a difference between marketing attracting eyeballs to a brand versus conversion of that client?

28:37 Are those different? Um Well, I would say within marketing there's there's a there's there's a few buckets. There's there's like on the performance lower funnel side where you're trying to get this person to do something right now. Um so low like lower funnel tactics would be basically like Instagram ads that get people to subscribe to this podcast. And your immediate action is basically like you're gonna pump some money into meta. And you're gonna set up your targeting and your goal is to get X amount of subscribers by the end of next week.

29:20 That would that to me is lower funnel. They may not know anything about your brand, they may not know you. So you have to go from like get them excited to get them to sign up very fast. So it's it's what's it's it's honestly uh what things like Instagram and TikTok are built for, like immediate marketing type strategies. So there's a lot of that. And that type of marketing really took off during COVID. Um, every brand started basically transacting in this way where they started to use, like, you know, our ROAS, our return on ad spend as this, our cost per acquisition number, our CAC. And they basically built their whole marketing point of view around that.

30:04 And what a lot of brands forgot is that there's a s there's a complementary part to that, which is on the awareness side. Where you're building a brand that has equity and value beyond the immediacy. You're doing things that don't have an immediate payoff. And this is traditional top-of-funnel marketing. It could be things like out of home. It could be stuff like this. Like I would say, like me being on this podcast is awareness, right? I'm not, I'm not selling anything. I'm not um Talking about like why you need this website right now, blah, blah, blah. We're talking about general things within marketing and technology.

30:45 And maybe one day, six months, eight months from now, someone listening will be like, that guy, who is that guy? And they'll look up this episode and they'll say, and they'll maybe they'll email me. And like now, how the the how do you measure that in a neat and clean plan? It's really tough. So like you need to have both. You have to have top of funnel and lower funnel working. So Eventually, if your top of funnel is working, it's going to help organically drive the cost down of the lower funnel stuff because you're going to start getting people knowing your brand and repeat visiting you and visiting you for free because they associate you with a category or a product or something.

31:27 So you have to have both. Some brands are very overleveraged on one side right now. Yeah. Do you think it needs to be an even mix all the time or does that leverage need to change? It has to change based on the type of business and where the business is at. But, you know, I'd say right now, a lot of brands are really, really performance focused. And I understand why, but they're unintentionally like signing up for the fact that they're gonna have to pay for every single customer forever. And the second you cover up their logo, they don't stand for anything because they've never invested in the more lean back story narrative element of their business.

32:09 Because it takes time, it takes patience. And there's not an immediate payoff. There's not this moment where you put twenty dollars into Meta and twenty dollars comes out. This just takes time. Yeah. Is I'm sitting here listening and you talked about one area, one department, one part of what your company does. And then I thought being in the CEO role and how someone grows and how you scale. And I think about the talent part because this place that I'm at, what I find is every time I want to scale my business, no matter what you think it is, it's normally about great people. Yeah. How have you done that?

32:51 We are a people business. So our people are our IP and they are the people interacting with our clients and they're coming up with our ideas and executing on our work. So without our people we are nothing. We are literally nothing. Having the right people is obviously crucial to our success and retaining them is even more important. So for me, it it's a retention. Um it's a retention conversation versus um attracting new people. Uh we always are interviewing and we are always bringing people on, but if we're a hundred people, And every single year thirty people leave.

33:41 It's it's impossible to keep up. You're never gonna find the right thirty people every twelve months to to to fit in. It's gonna be chaos. And um I I remember like like during the pandemic when a lot of people were bouncing through jobs, like we had a we had one year where our retention rate was like t our sorry, turnover rate was like twenty percent. It was all it was really high. So painful to on the recruitment side. So for me, it's all about retention. and that means you have to have a clear and honest dialogue with um your p your people, understand what makes them tick, where they want to go, where they want to grow. And um I'm all about, you know, proactively um having those discussions around title, salary, all that stuff.

34:30 If if it if if it makes someone feel better about doing their job, um There's no reason to hide it. Let's just have a conversation. Because if you're hiding it, if you're not being upfront about it, that's when people start to interview and they start to, you know, build build up um resentment or anything like everything like that. So uh I'm all in on on uh retention. Yeah. Um, what do you think your best habits are and strategies and tactics are to reinforce retention at the level that you want? I think it's it's understanding always that employment is a two way street and the employer doesn't have as much control as they think they have.

35:23 Um so Hearing someone out and listening, whether that's about themselves and where they want to go, or a frustration they might have with how something's being run, or even their manager. So giving someone the opportunity to share feedback, but that is all stems from this idea of like trying to create a culture that people actually feel comfortable having those conversations frequently. and I think it's just about. Creating an atmosphere that um put people in the best position to succeed. Um for us it's it was, you know, I remember, you know, the the whole shift from being in the office every day to more hybrid.

36:13 And when there was this push for everyone to go back to office, we we really kind of s relied on our people to dictate what they wanted to do. Um, because the like everything changed. The world changed. And It would not be in our interest to throw in a mandate that we didn't think our people were gonna believe in. So we relied on them to dictate things. And um we were fortunate enough to kind of strike something that works for everyone. So for me it's just about trying to create an atmosphere that puts people more often than not in a position to succeed because, you know, also like we're not perfect, the world's not perfect, you're also gonna still be upset about some things we do and or don't do.

36:59 Hmm. Can you go back to ten years ago when you sold the company and now you're the CEO? You're probably working for or with the people that you sold it to. So it's a tough question to ask about doing things different. But what insight did you have or do you have now that you didn't have 10 years ago? Like if you ever find yourself, because here's the narrative. Of course you're gonna be the CEO of Wondersauce forever. However, if you ever found yourself in another position where you built and scaled a company and you were going to exit, what's the perspective now versus 10 years ago? We were we we I think we did it right.

37:41 I mean we were we were wise beyond our years and we were very upfront with the people that were um considering this deal. We said and we were very consistent, we said, you know, this is a full acquisition and obviously like money is gonna play a part in this conversation, but we are thirty years old, thirty-one years old. We wanna build this thing still. We are We're less interested right now in like everything this has become where we're managing the accounts receivable, our line of credit with the bank. The founders were doing t too many operational things where we were not doing the fun stuff anymore.

38:23 And a big reason for the acquisition was like wanting that to be a thing in the background. And it was important to us that we found a place that would allow us to continue this growth story and have us feel. Um, like we were still controlling our destiny. And the place we um Project who who bought our company, um, it w what what stood out is they owned at the time it was like 13 agencies and all but one still had the original founder operating the business. So like the proof was in the pudding. They know how to retain founders. And um here I am ten years later. So I would say that if I ever was in a position again down the line to sell a business, I would I think it's so crucial to be up front with your buyer.

39:11 If if I'm if my if my narrative was, look, I don't want to do this anymore, but I've built you a world class management team, so I don't matter. Let me show you that I don't matter when you're going through due diligence. It'd be good for them to know that before they buy us and I leave, you know? That that's how bad things happen. So I think it's just crucial whether you want to stick around or exit. To just be up front. And I don't think people think about this stuff often. It's too financially driven, which I understand. That's a big piece of this. But the interpersonal side is so crucial. Because everything can go south if you if you feel like, you know, you're deceiving someone.

39:52 We're talking about communication, right? At a high level all the time. Whether it's comfortable or not. Exactly. Exactly. What belief about marketing did you have? There's gotta be something there that's been almost flipped on its end in a hundred and eighty reversal over time. Is there something that sticks out that you don't have to dig for? Uh just that like anything, um, trends repeat. And when I kind of I alluded to it earlier, when something is swinging too aggressively towards one side, start exploring the other side. It's and I don't care, like I don't care how disruptive a technology is, um, trends repeat.

40:36 You know, like we're living in a world now where like the nineties is like the is like the coolest thing again. Everyone's like all obsessed with the nineties. And like having grown up in the nineties, it was cool. Like I remember it was the best. I was a kid. It was the always awesome. I miss it. But um my I wore my starter Cincinnati Reds jersey to a game last weekend. I have a starter Yankees jacket that like I basically had the same thing when I was a kid. Five years ago, people would have been calling me nerdy to wear it. I put it on work. They're like, man, that thing's cool, man. That's like retro. And I'm like, you've got to be kidding me. Wow. It's funny. Like things things repeat. And um like I remember being in the nineties and everyone was talking about like the seventies.

41:21 Like the seventies were cool. The nineties were fun, man. The nineties were fun. Before but before the crazy advent of the internet and social media and stuff. It felt free. Doesn't feel quite as free now. No, but I wonder if we were twelve and thirteen it might feel it might feel really free. Maybe too much. Probably. Yeah. Um so you were early on um as social as a growth lever. You saw it. But what what caused you to see it? Not obviously there were other people that did too, but what about your brain and the way you think and the way that you weed and operate? I don't think it's just curiosity, but you saw it as a growth growth growth lever.

42:04 Why was that? What'd you see that others didn't? how we grew up using the internet. I mean, I I was like 12 when we got America Online, and I was, you know, 13 and 14 on Napster with my friends on in ninth grade. And we junior year of college, we got Facebook and met a bunch of people and, you know, like I never thought of it as anything but things that exist in the modern economy. So of course there's going to be a role for brands to live there because brands want to be where the attention is and that's where the attention is.

42:48 So it was really fun back in like the early 2000s advising brands on like their social media strategy. Like that used to be a thing. Like here's your social strategy. Here's where you should be on. Like you should be on Twitter and this and that. Like that was fun. Hmm. The have you ever had a moment where inside running your current company, did you ever hit a growth ceiling? And yet you couldn't figure it out? Okay, you've hit one. What what do you what do you think you have to audit to figure that out? It every it's y you'll see it's everything starts breaking. Um, you know, like your quality of work goes down, uh, people are unhappy, burnout's high, you're as as a leader or a manager, you're you feel like you're just chasing random things.

43:38 It it means your your system is completely broken. Um, like I said, we grew from two people to a hundred people in the first three or four years and we haven't grown since. We got up to like 120, 130, and it was It started getting too big, too sloppy. Um, the sweet spot is like for us eighty to ninety people. That's that's the spot. And um I feel this, I I I say this all the time. We can we can double or tr and triple our revenue with the same exact team. It's just about the type of work we're doing. So scale for me is no longer headcount. It's it's it's about just proper proper revenue financial growth. And if I'm growing headcount.

44:20 It's intentional. It's a very, very intentional thing. And I have a reason for doing it. And I might say, I am gonna add 10 people and they're gonna be focused on this. I have a carve out in my business plan in my brain. And for me to go to like from one hundred to two hundred, I'm not against it. But it would be it would be a very intentional thing. Um, versus, you know, 15 years ago, I you think growth is cool. That that's that's what it that's what I thought. With AI now in the mix in a significant way, what's your what will your next hire be? ah Someone that um someone that understands design and technology and could approach it fairly balanced.

45:08 So um basically someone who has elements of design and user experience architecture and someone who also has a general understanding of code. Um There's like there's hybrid stuff going on right now where I think we're gonna have to like rethink titles in the not so near future and and responsibilities. So I like the idea of more like T-shaped individuals that are like fairly legitimate in two things. Like you don't need to be an expert in eight things, but like give me fairly legitimate in two.

45:50 Um so I I'm looking for that right now. Um whether it's design and tech, whether it's, you know, strategy and creative, whether it's strategy and tech. So it's it's a it's kind of a mixture. Management and something else. So How do you approach competitiveness in your field? Like do do you take your eighty and ninety person firm and do you have a competitive angle or bent or advantage over a twenty five hundred person firm? Or do you even think of that? What's your approach? Yeah, I mean, whenever you're going into a pitch and you understand who you're competing against, I always I always spin our our advantage um in that situation and our disadvantage.

46:35 I love basically going in and saying, Here's why you should work with us and here's where we're not a fit. I have found that talking about your inefficiencies and why you wouldn't select my company um actually helps answer a ton of questions and concerns on the other side of the table. Um and it very rarely backfires. And if it does, you're literally saying, if you want this, don't hire us. And they're like, I want that. So I'm like, that don't hire us. That's that's it wasn't a fit. And I can't I can't It'd be a disaster four months later. Yeah. So I don't want to like try and sugarcoat things or spin a false narrative just to win the business.

47:20 I'm all about making sure we can deliver. When we're in a pitch, like that's that's what I get most excited about. It's like, can we like we we we can crush this, right? And one of my teams like, yeah, like this is right in the sweet spot. I I wanna go in with like the most bravado I can about just how confident we are that like we can deliver this. And the ideas will be there, but more importantly, the execution will be such a layup and you won't have to worry about anything. Is going into a pitch the same as an interview and I'm gonna ask it if that's a quick answer, I'm gonna f ask a follow up question. It is, yeah. How would you interview now being the 41-year-old John?

48:02 Imagine being interviewed for a job. What would what would be your approach? I if I ever had to I mean I I I can't not be myself and I can't speak I have to speak my mind and be honest and if I don't like something I would say it. Um I have very clear boundaries in terms of like what I will and will not do. so What do you mean by that? Very clear, but and what do you what you will and what you won't do? Uh whether it's um like work I don't feel like doing anymore, like whether it's the type of work or um like someone dictating too many rules about how I how I do my work.

48:47 I don't want any of that. Um a work life balance, like I'm not just gonna like randomly ping pong the world for no reason unless I have a reason to do it and I wanna do it because I I value like watching my my my daughter grow up. Um So I have boundaries and um I also have like I know what I can deliver. So if if I'm not a fit for someone, then I'm not a fit for someone. But hopefully I don't have to do that anytime soon. Yeah, right when I asked the question, you're like, I can't imagine this. No, it would be terrible. Are you almost unemployable then? Hopeful have this job forever? I would if I yeah, I would just start a bunch of other things.

49:29 I would just I would I have I would I would I would do a bunch of different things to uh to make ends meet. But I think it would be funny to work at like if some I would I mean I'm not saying I'm unemployable, but maybe maybe close. You'd find out. Um, there was there's these shows on TV where they'll place extremely successful people, I forget what it was called, but they'll drop them in a city and say you have like seven days to make a million dollars. And what that is, is that's basically saying, what would you do as a startup tomorrow if you did it again? So let's say this gig ended, the marketing branding agency, the game's over, but you're a serial entrepreneur and you're like, I have to start something else, like you just said.

50:12 What would you do? What what would you do? Well, 'cause there's such a high failure rate in starting businesses. Yeah. uh I'm assuming really quick, you would do a lot of things to make sure that you succeeded in one. So what would that look like? Well, the boring answer is like you can I can consult. Um I would I can I I I think like being able to quickly provide recommendations, ideas, whether it's how to operationalize and fix an actual business and how it runs, or marketing and advertising and strategy services. I think I c I mean I I can consult. That's that's boring. But I I I think more more and more it'd be f I I would want to do like something offline.

50:55 Um So, you know, I talked to my f I my my friends, my wife, we we were talking about doing like a frozen yogurt store, um, just because we thought it would be fun. And it to me, it no matter what happens in the world, people need dessert. So um I I I think like something like that could be very fun. Um so I I don't know. I I I think that like there's just a lot of opportunity, no matter what, in the world to do do stuff to make money as long as you approach it correctly. Um, so who knows? So let's get a final question. Great conversation today, but a final from John, the CEO of Wondersauce, the brilliant guy who joined us with great energy today.

51:41 There's an idea out here if you find the thing that you love, you'll never have to work another day in your life. Okay. I know what I believe about it. I'm going restrain from what I believe about that to ask you your idea and your approach with that idea and combining it what happiness means. And if that's a relevant thing to aspire to or worthwhile. Yeah. 'Cause we spend a lot of time in our life working. So if if you're going to work, you should try and be happy. And you should not chase something because it's you know, it's lucrative if you hate it.

52:28 So I think it's the it's a cliche saying, but it's so true. Do s if if you if you are doing something that you really enjoy, it is not gonna feel as much like work. It's still work. Let's be honest. See, there you go. There there's the new work. Yeah, it'd still work. Like I would rather be golfing. And I'm okay saying that. I would rather be at a Yankee game than pitching business. Is that is that like a crime to say? It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be. And I think the narrative that some of these people who have become billionaires, that I give them, man, I give them all their flowers about the receipts they have and say, you made a big impact in the world and you were influential on something really big.

53:13 But to be so disingenuous to make that statement, where if there was someone sitting there asking you if you ever had days at work where it felt like work. If you ever think about the deepest, darkest days when you were facing elimination and the company was thriving where credit lines weren't there and banks are calling notes, those things happen frequently. Yeah. And it means why my hair was gray when I was twenty nine years old. Like it's work. It's stressful. As I I've had moments of like immense joy and happiness doing this. But I've also had the opposite end of the spectrum of like fear, pain, and ongoing stress.

53:54 That's life. Yeah. So what where do we wrap that as find something you love and you'll never w you wouldn't make that statement then. Then you'll never feel like you're working a day in your life. Like you wouldn't make that statement. I think as a general statement, it's it's okay to say because I think that like every aspect of life has those those polar swings, right? Like you could not work and still have fear, joy, stress, all this stuff, right? So it's not completely tied to work. So the way I see it is just like if you're doing something that you love, more often than not, you're gonna get out of the bed with with the right intention.

54:35 And that is what's most important. You're gonna put yourself in a position to have more good days than bad days. And I think that's all you can ask for in life in any aspect of it. All right. So to wrap this up, here's what we wanna know. We wanna know what John loves. I love interacting with different people and hearing what makes people tick and get excited and mad and all that stuff and I've uh I've made a profession out of it. Never an argument in your entire brain, huh? That's ever happened. Hey man, thanks for joining us all the way from New York City, man. Great conversation. Thanks for highlighting what you do, why you do it, your businesses. I think very valuable today and it's great to great to sit down with you for an hour and get to know you.

55:19 Yeah, same here. Thanks a Mark. Thank you, ma'am.