From Valet to COO: Brooks Ellis on Servant Leadership and Growing Evolution Parking

Anthony Codispoti (00:00)
Welcome to another edition of the inspired stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we could learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. As you listen today, let one idea shape what you do next. My name is Anthony Cotaspodi and today’s guest is Brooks Ellis, chief operating officer at evolution parking and guest services, a Tampa based hospitality company that delivers valet.

front door and bell services for hotels across the country. Evolution was founded in 2019 with a simple mission, elevate the first and last impression of every property through genuine guest care, smart technology, and engaged team members. In only five years, the firm has expanded to more than 100 locations, earned glowing case studies at flagship hotels like the St. Regis and Rich Carlton.

and has recently earned industry attention for its hospitality-focused model, including press coverage of its industry-first partnership with Forbes Travel Guide. Brooks brings more than 25 years of experience in parking and hotel operations. Before joining Evolution, he held executive leadership posts with Zip-Buy and Town Park, overseeing teams in all 50 states.

He was recognized by the National Parking Association as a 40 under 40 honoree and holds the Certified Parking Professional Credential. Now, before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, Adback Benefits Agency. Listen, if you run a business, you’re likely stuck in the cycle of rising insurance premiums. You’re paying more, but your team is getting less. And many people can’t afford coverage at all. We do things differently.

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Gains like that can change how a business is valued. Results vary, but the consultation is free. See if you qualify today at addbackbenefits.com. All right, back to our guest today, the COO of Evolution Marketing and Guest Services, Brooks Ellis. Thank you for making the time to share your story today.

Brooks (02:36)
Absolutely. Thanks for having me on, Anthony.

Anthony Codispoti (02:39)
So Brooks, the parking guy, you’ve been in the parking industry for years with a variety of companies and responsibilities along the way. How did you first get your start?

Brooks (02:49)
I mean, like most kids growing up, know, I dreamed about being in valet parking. You know, I kind of fell into it. And I think that that’s really the story you hear a lot around our industry. ⁓ You know, we get to work side by side with hospitality. So that was very familiar to me. Right. And being a part of working with hotels and all the fun environment that that brings about were very attractive. But

Anthony Codispoti (02:55)
you

Brooks (03:19)
I actually lost a job. The restaurant that I worked for closed down overnight because the owner and his partner had a nasty breakup and a friend of mine worked at a valet company, invited me to come over and check it out. I figured I’d do that until I got a real job and here I am.

Anthony Codispoti (03:37)
And so how many different parking companies have you worked at?

Brooks (03:41)
I’ve only worked at four ⁓ and I worked with Town Park for a little over 20 years. That’s really ⁓ where I grew my career from the ground up, starting as a valet ⁓ and then two other very short stints with other parking companies and then some parking technology ⁓ groups that I worked with as well.

Anthony Codispoti (04:03)
So, Town Park, you started as a valet parker. ⁓ You rose up through the ranks, VP of Operations, VP of Innovation. Relate a story from your time there, maybe a particular challenge that you ran into, difficult to go through, but helped to shape the way that you approached work and life going forward.

Brooks (04:29)
Yeah, so obviously at Town Park that was, you know, early career all the way through early executive career. ⁓ And I got to be a part of an organization that was led by a founder that was really focused on employee development. ⁓ Internal growth and development was paramount for us. And ⁓ I benefited from it, but I got to work alongside leaders that really thrived on ⁓

how they inspired and motivated others to learn and grow in the industry. ⁓ And as an organization, we were really focused on delivering a premium product, not just, in hotels, they say heads and beds, right? Or the idea of getting more properties around the country. Our growth aspirations were tied to however we could grow and still be able to deliver this ⁓ exceptional product. So.

Early on in my career, getting a good grounding and understanding, number one, growing your employees and developing from within is a critical piece of your culture that allows you to be able to ⁓ create messages and let them proliferate throughout the organization, make sure people understand why what they do is important, ⁓ and ⁓ be able to spend the time with them to build relationships because that’s what we do with our clients.

⁓ So in order for a client to trust us enough to deliver services at their site, ⁓ we have to show that we can earn that trust and we can deliver on what we say. So that was really big. But I would say ⁓ I grew pretty quickly. And the first job that I got where I was really scared ⁓ was a hotel that a bunch of other leaders had failed at and not had success over multiple years. ⁓ And I got a call one day from my boss saying, hey, we want you to go run this mega resort.

and drop everything that you’re doing ⁓ and head over there and start doing it. ⁓ So great opportunity for me, right? But also scared the hell out of me. And ⁓ it was a great launching point for my career though. Helped me to not only learn how to do what I did strategically versus just running out and doing it and having to understand that I can’t do it all and that I really multiply my efforts through.

⁓ enabling other people.

Anthony Codispoti (06:49)
So what was it that made this so scary? Why were so many other people failing at this problem?

Brooks (06:55)
It was, ⁓ it was about 70 employees, ⁓ you know, and at the time I had one other account manager job. And at that job, I had 20 employees. So was a much bigger responsibility. It was a 1400 room hotel. ⁓ So we’d routinely have 300 vehicles on board and at peak, sometimes we’d have a thousand. And it’s just the complexity there. And it was a massive self-parking operation too. So.

⁓ They had just shy of 500,000 square feet of meeting space. ⁓ So you can imagine the events that they would have there. It’s kind of like running a convention center, ⁓ but then also having to park the cars as well.

Anthony Codispoti (07:39)
So what was it that you were able to do differently to make this successful?

Brooks (07:44)
Yeah, you know, it was really, it all kind of came down to one event where ⁓ I started to feel things unraveling, where it was getting too difficult. I was getting frazzled. I was a little bit more reactive than I’ve wanted to be for my employees or with my employees. And our HR manager at the time, young lady named Amy Hines pulled me aside and said, you know, look, look at, you know, all you’ve accomplished up to this point, you can do this. ⁓ But right now.

you’re spending all your time trying to do it for everybody else instead of letting them do what you hired them to do. ⁓ And ⁓ she pointed out a great example. There was one cashier that I would pull up. It’s kind of like the story of Sisyphus. And they tell the story, Chris McChesney does in some of the 40X training ⁓ about, I would pull into work every day and I would pull up to this cashier booth where this cashier would work. And she was fantastic, but

Every day I’d pull up, the cones would be a little askewed. ⁓ There might be some paper on the ground or something, and it’s six o’clock in the morning. So she’s just getting there too and starting to tidy up. But I’d jump out of my car, I’d fix all the cones, I’d pick up the garbage, I’d say good morning, and then I’d drive on my way. ⁓ And Amy helped me to recognize that what I was really doing was causing that employee to feel like ⁓ they didn’t understand what they were responsible for.

And they weren’t trusted to do it anyways, because I was just going to come around and fix it. ⁓ And so that was a pivotal moment for me to be able to step back and try to understand how to lead ⁓ by trusting my people, making sure they knew what they were accountable for and responsible for and what good looked like. But then stepping back and letting them actually do it. And when you run an operation with 70 or 170, whatever it is, ⁓ individuals, there’s a break point where

you’re completely ineffective when you lead in a way that you try to micromanage and run everything.

Anthony Codispoti (09:43)
And in your mind, in the moment, you think that you’re being helpful, right? Here’s something that needs to be done. I know how to do it. I see it. And so you step in to try to do that. And so great that the HR director, you know, came and gave you that fresh perspective of, hey, here’s the signal that’s actually being received by that other person. And, you know, tip of the hat to you for being receptive to that.

Brooks (09:46)
Right, of course.

Yeah, that was pivotal for me for, and I think about it all the time to this day, because there’s many times that I, know, the same tendencies creep up. And I felt it when I joined Evolution. You know, we were a very young company. ⁓ When I first joined, they’d only been around for a couple of years and really hadn’t hit their stride yet. And then we started to scale really quickly. And I felt the weight of all of that growth and expectation and, you know, maintaining relationships with all of our clients and

Anthony Codispoti (10:09)
Yeah.

Brooks (10:32)
making sure that we’re delivering at every location everywhere. And we had other people that were paid to do that. And so, you know, that same lesson creeped into the back of my head. And, you know, those moments of clarity come when you’re most vulnerable, right? When it feels like everything is coming down on you and it feels insurmountable, ⁓ that’s when you’re kind of forced to take that moment to think about how you got there.

and what’s worked in the past and go back to what works.

Anthony Codispoti (11:05)
So how did the opportunity to join Evolution Parking come about?

Brooks (11:10)
Yeah, so I had worked with Town Park for a really long time. ⁓ The organization started to kind of shift into a little bit different direction ⁓ after some, know, ⁓ P.E. involvement and change in leadership and stuff like that ⁓ at the executive level. So I really wanted to branch out and see what else was out there. I had worked for one organization for 20 some years ⁓ and I got a great offer to go join another company. ⁓ I lasted there two weeks. ⁓

It, you know, I spent over 20 years with one employer doing one thing the way that I knew was the right way to do it. ⁓ And I felt like when I, when I left that, I left that to go recreate the magic that I felt, you know, early on in my career and, and to be able to deliver this superior product that I felt like was alluding me there with just the size and scope of the operations ⁓ with that employer. So I joined this other company.

It was a very different, very different approach to things. And I knew right away it wasn’t right. And so I stepped back. It just so happened to fall right after a big announcement about some strange disease from overseas that was coming into America. And all of a sudden everything shut down. So unanticipated, but I was fortunate. A gentleman that ran a company called ZipBuy out of Australia, Anthony called me.

and asked me to join the organization to come on board. And it was really ⁓ a ⁓ great moment for me because it was COVID and it was a ⁓ hands-free ⁓ parking technology where you didn’t have to touch anything. So was great timing for their product. Not great time for me to leave a job that I was at for a long time and really did well with, but it turned out to be a great thing and made a lot of friends there. And ⁓ they’re very, very successful today.

Anthony Codispoti (13:07)
What is their tech?

Brooks (13:09)
It’s Bluetooth. it’s ⁓ essentially you download their app on your phone and ⁓ you ⁓ connect a credit card to it. And then wherever their technology lies, when you drive up, whether your phone’s in the trunk or in your pocket, it’ll open the gate for you, start a session, ⁓ which is, you today that’s not necessarily that unique. There’s a lot of technology that can do that. ⁓ But ⁓ one of their clients was Harvard ⁓ University.

and the campus there, they really trusted our product and our team to deliver solutions for them. So we got to expand from just the parking gates to the doors of the building. So we did access credentialing essentially for them. ⁓ And then into the building, you would basically walk into the foyer and the elevator for your floor would trigger, open up, and you would just step in. You didn’t have to touch anything. And they were able to control access. So ⁓ it was a really cool product at the time.

and a great experience.

Anthony Codispoti (14:08)
Did

I have to have the app on my phone open or my phone on?

Brooks (14:12)
Nope,

you could have your phone in the dark screen mode, like I said, in your trunk, in your back pocket or your bag. didn’t matter. It’s pretty cool. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (14:18)
Interesting. Okay, and

so how did that then lead to Evolution Parking?

Brooks (14:22)
Yeah, so ⁓ the one thing that I couldn’t find at Zip-I that I had grown up with was a large team. mean, we had, we’re a small group. There was a group of developers overseas ⁓ and a small group here, stateside ⁓ that we worked with. And I just had that itch that I needed to, I needed to have more people to, you know, to work alongside. But I’ll tell you what, we had an engineer named, ⁓

Callie, why am I not coming up with his name correctly? ⁓ Callie Cridge, and we had Shirley. Shirley was an engineer at the time, but I talked to you little bit about growth and development and how important that was to me. So right when I got there, the first thing I said was, Shirley is gonna run this company. She’s gonna be the one that does the job I’m doing someday. I gotta figure out how to get her ready for it.

And so that was my goal and my mission. That’s what I woke up every day thinking, how can I do better in this way? And today she’s run the company and I, it just sounded like I took credit for it. I couldn’t because it’s all her doing and she does a hell of a lot better job than I did of it. but, you know, I, found my exit at that point when I realized she can do it they don’t need me.

Anthony Codispoti (15:42)
So I’m hearing a recurring theme here, Brooks, you know, during your time at Town Park, sounds like they were really invested in helping employees understand that there was a path to, to grow, to grow within the company. And they really helped you do that. You you went from, you know, ground floor all the way up to a couple of different VP positions. And then, sorry, the name of the zip buy is that the

Brooks (15:57)
Absolutely.

Mm-hmm.

That’s right.

Anthony Codispoti (16:11)
Yep, zip by. ⁓ You took that same philosophy that had been ingrained in you and you help somebody else, probably multiple people, but just one that you called out do the same thing. ⁓ I’m going to guess that that probably has carried through into evolution today and how you approach what you do with your employees. Let’s hear more about that.

Brooks (16:29)
absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely. mean, we know it’s a competitive advantage for us because and sustainable competitive advantage because ⁓ talent is tough to find, right? ⁓ And in our industry, there’s a lot of turnover. It’s typically positive turnover. We get new sites. We have to bring new people in ⁓ and constantly retrain and retrain. ⁓ So if we can get the people that we bring in to stay.

and we can pour into them over time, then they get more of an opportunity not only to really understand our way of doing things, which we do try to uniquely position ourselves in the industry, but also just to get comfortable with it. ⁓ Because what I learned early on, on the first hotel that I had the opportunity to lead ⁓ the valet team at was ⁓ if I really drill into the team about the standards and I force us to follow a script until it’s

until you can do it in your sleep, then you get to let somebody let their personality shine because they understand the script, they understand the patterning, they’re not gonna miss a beat. ⁓ And they recognize that at some point there’s a switch that flips and that’s the hospitality people look for because our associate is confident, they know their stuff, ⁓ they know the area, they present themselves as a friend to the guest that they’ve never met before, right? To help guide them on this journey.

⁓ Oftentimes, whether it’s business or leisure, it’s new. You’re experiencing something you haven’t before. You’re at a new place. You don’t know the area. There’s all these voids that we can fill for them. ⁓ And I recognize that when we drill in on the standards and structure enough that you really get it, then you can be your genuine true self. And that’s when we really deliver this service excellence. So… ⁓

When we think about growing and developing leaders internally, it’s selfish because I know once they get the confidence to know that they know it and know how to do it, then they can turn on the charm and they can turn on their personality and they can be their genuine self and guests feel that ⁓ instantly. That’s a difference in, ⁓ you you think about the typical hotel interaction, you pull up, it’s very transactional, you get issued a ticket, you walk inside, they check your… ⁓

driver’s license, they get your credit card, you get on your way. Those moments where somebody distracts your attention by catching you off guard ⁓ with something that you didn’t anticipate, you feel it immediately and it triggers you because it’s unusual. That’s what we seek to do. And it’s really hard to do in a transient work environment where people come and go. So we need people to stick around, learn and then get comfortable and then start to love it.

Anthony Codispoti (19:14)
What’s an example of a way that you catch a guest off guard with something positive?

Brooks (19:21)
Yeah, so we used to, ⁓ one of the leaders that had a strong ⁓ influence on my growth and development called them chin lifters. And so, because if you think about you’re walking into a hotel, you got your head down, you’re dragging your bag, you’re like, you know, I hope everybody leaves me alone so I can just get to my room and get on with my visit here. So we would aim to get them to stop and lift their chin and look at us. So we would say things like, hey, that’s an awesome tie. And it would be, you would have to be genuine about it because otherwise that comes off

you know, pretty poor. ⁓ But we would find one thing about that person that we were like, wow, you know, I do like this and I want to tell them about it. So it was, hey, you know, and I find myself doing it today. I was at doctor’s office and the nurse came in and I was like, man, I love those glasses. Those look great. And it’s not, it’s genuine. I mean it, ⁓ but it’s uncomfortable at first if you don’t, you know, because we’re taught a lot of times in service ⁓ professions to keep it professional.

you know, stick to the script, this sort of thing. And talking about, you know, complimenting somebody personally can be a little uncomfortable sometimes for people, believe it or not. So we used to train on it. ⁓ Now you have to be careful about some of the things that you comment on, of course. ⁓ But ⁓ it does. It makes a huge difference. If you can get a guest to disarm for just a moment and smile and recognize that you’re genuinely there to try to help them enjoy themselves, then that creates a different experience at the hotel.

Anthony Codispoti (20:48)
So talking about evolution parking, what is a possible path of growth for somebody who comes in as a valet?

Brooks (20:56)
Yeah, we see it all the time. we have ⁓ valleys come in within a few weeks or months, depending on what career experience they’ve had coming into that moment. They’ll move into a supervisor role. ⁓ And that still has them working right on the front line every day, but gives them an opportunity to kind of lead the experience. ⁓ We’ve got a lot of standardization in how we do run our shifts every day, right? There’s a huddle where the team talks about what’s important for the day.

⁓ There’s assignments that each individual has throughout the shift to make sure that things get taken care of and that supervisor directs those activities. ⁓ So you get a good chance to understand can they motivate and lead their team to get things done or do they do like I did and try to do it all themselves and ⁓ you know we can teach them through that too. But then they can move up from there to an assistant manager to a manager. ⁓ We’ve got area managers that might lead a you know a handful of locations and directors ⁓ that might lead a bigger

portfolio and with each of those roles you get expanding responsibility for client relationship, for financials, for some HR responsibilities, hiring, interviewing, all of that stuff. It’s really, I tell people this all the time when we bring them in and we start talking about development that my goal is to better prepare them for their future regardless of where that is. If that’s with us, that’s great, I hope it is, ⁓ but I’m gonna pour into them and I’m not gonna be able to take any of it back.

⁓ So what they get from us is, you know, career growth and development, whether it’s with us or with somebody else. And I think that disarms people a little bit ⁓ because a lot of employers say, hey, we want to grow and develop you from within. But there’s a lack of trust that maybe that growth and development is structured around trying to save some money, that it’s cheaper to grow and develop talent inside than it is to go outside the company and buy it. Or, ⁓ you know, that you’re

growing and developing somebody because you can’t hire people from the outside because your reputation is poor. But ⁓ we seek to earn trust and then use that trust between both parties to be able to help our team grow and advance our career.

Anthony Codispoti (23:03)
So going back to Zipby, you were getting your successor ready for that handoff. ⁓ How did the opportunity to actually join Evolution come about and what did they bring you in specifically to do at that time?

Brooks (23:18)
Yeah, I don’t think they knew. ⁓ I think, you know, I got a call from the ⁓ founder of the organization, ⁓ really successful guy that I knew a lot about. He had ⁓ started and sold two other businesses prior. ⁓ So one was a healthcare organization that he sold to a big public firm called ABM. ⁓ And I think they had…

like over a hundred hospitals across the country that he had grown from the ground up and sold off. ⁓ And then the next business that he ran, it was called Pinnacle Automotive. ⁓ He had actually sold to the founder of Town Park, Jerry South. So Jerry and I had spoken a little bit about it. And then Michael called me. I came in for the interview and ⁓ I think I caught them both a little off guard because I was there with their current COO and ⁓ Michael being interviewed.

And they asked me, know, what’s your, you know, three year, five year plan if you were to join the organization? And I said, look, no offense to the gentleman, you know, that was the current COO, but I said, I think you’ll find in a few months that my experience, the way that I lead, ⁓ you’ll want me to be in your shoes. So hopefully there’s an opportunity for you to move up.

Um, because, you know, my goal to come here is to, create, recreate the magic that I felt as an employee. And, and I, you know, when I was in my early growth stage with, with town park took a lot of pride in the product that we delivered. had, you know, the best performing market in the country and service and claims and financials. I, and I told them, look, that’s what I’m going to bring here. We’re going to, you know, today it’s 20 locations, but when it’s 150 and we can do the same thing with the same.

⁓ high touch environment with our clients and a boutique feel to this product. ⁓ You know, that’s unique. So again, I don’t know how it struck the gentleman across the table, but they hired me anyways. Yeah. Yeah, so.

Anthony Codispoti (25:21)
This is a bold statement. I’m going to have your job very soon. Well, obviously,

they liked what they heard. They brought you on board. What was one of the biggest projects that you undertook when you first joined?

Brooks (25:36)
Yeah, well, it was actually a few years into joining. We are pretty structured and disciplined about doing one thing with excellence. We work with hotels across the country to deliver those front door services. And I had worked in parking technology, and I’m watching a lot of these other parking tech, know, parking, valet parking companies that are installing parking technology and continuing to grow their

their portfolio, but also ⁓ creating more stability and revenues. So we went out on a limb, ⁓ tried to figure out from the ground up how to develop a different type of technology product ⁓ out there for self parking that would serve our clients, ⁓ not a commercial garage, not a healthcare facility, but a hotel that has unique needs. And, ⁓ and it’s really hard to do that ⁓ because one of the things that we knew

was your guest is arriving and a lot of times you have very little information about ⁓ why they’re there, ⁓ what rate they might have been quoted online or any of that personal information about that individual. But in a hotel setting, that’s very important. If I pull up to a parking lot and I scan the sign to pay for my parking and the rate that shows up is different from the rate that I was quoted online, that’s a problem. It creates distrust from the moment I walk in. ⁓ So we aim to make our product

you know, unique and differentiated. We launched it ⁓ almost a year ago, ⁓ last April, one of our partners took a leap of faith and trusted us. And today we’ve got 80 locations around the country ⁓ that we’re doing it and partners that are, you know, trying to give us their portfolio ⁓ because of the revenue increase and really just a product that speaks to their customer.

Anthony Codispoti (27:26)
Tell us more about what the product is, how it works, why it’s so attractive to these locations.

Brooks (27:31)
Well, it’s called Revpass and, ⁓ you know, again, hotel theme, revenue per available space ⁓ is what we call it in the parking industry. But Revpass is really ⁓ from the ground up created to be able to handle a hotel guest needs separate from, ⁓ you know, a commercial garage, but also to provide the asset owner with data, right? Data is king. If you know what people are driving, how long they stay for, where they park.

to understand the guest journey, right? You can be a lot more intentional about the product that you’re delivering to those guests. You know, I think about a parking lot, massive parking lot, lots of different entry ways, but if you know all of your guests go on one side of it, you can really curate the experience to follow the customer as they walk into the hotel versus trying to have that same impact of the whole footprint of the property.

being able to charge different rates, different times of the day, different times of the year, ⁓ having variable pricing, I think is something that you’re seeing in all facets of ⁓ commerce today, right? So it’s another thing we can do.

Anthony Codispoti (28:41)
So walk me through the guest experience. This is like an app experience. I drive into the hotel and what’s taking place.

Brooks (28:49)
So you pull into the parking lot, there’ll usually be a sign in front of the spot or a few spots away with a QR code. You click on that QR code with your camera and it’s a web app, so no app needed. ⁓ You register. One of the unique things, it doesn’t charge you immediately. What it does is it opens your session and it lets you know you’re going to go ahead and check in ⁓ at the front desk, proceed to the front desk. The front desk can then, when you check in, let you know, hey, you’ve actually got a discount on your parking.

type this code in and we’ll get you taken care of or they can actually do it for you. ⁓ It allows them, know, one of the big things that we found that was unique with hotels is they have tax exempt groups. A lot of times government groups or nonprofits that stay there and parkings, a weird ⁓ little challenge for them, unless it’s run through their system. Our RevPass is outside of their system. So they can actually still handle their tax exempt guests. They just…

flick a little switch on the customer session, and then they’re not charged tax. ⁓ So it’s little things like that that I think might not seem like such a big deal, but to that end user who shows up, that’s a frustration that they didn’t plan to deal with and that kind of derails their experience right from the start. ⁓ And you think about a hotel, whether it’s valet or that self-parking experience, that’s the first opportunity they have to interact ⁓ with their product, right?

that first impression is going to set the tone for the rest of their stay. So if we can get that right, keep them happy, keep it flexible, then ⁓ they’ll focus on some of more exciting parts of the hotel than the parking.

Anthony Codispoti (30:26)
So what were hotels using prior to this?

Brooks (30:30)
So all over the place, there’s some hotels that have what we call the honor system. And essentially you walk up to the front desk and they say, did you park a car with us? And you tell them whether or not you did. ⁓ Our experience tells us that about 70 % of people are honest or forgetful or whatever it might be. ⁓ But there’s a lot of opportunity there. ⁓ We call another option honor system plus. And that’s basically you hand them a tag.

or something that creates this idea that somebody’s looking or somebody’s paying attention. So I should follow the rules here. And you get a little bit better compliance there, but still nowhere near 90 % even. ⁓ so ⁓ this product, basically, some hotels also have parking gates, right? Parking gates can be frustrating. When it’s just you pulling up and it works like it’s supposed to, that’s great. ⁓ But when you leave at the end of a big event or, you know, at the end of a busy night there at the hotel,

Anthony Codispoti (31:04)
.

Brooks (31:29)
and you get stuck in a line. That can be really frustrating. So these systems allow these hotels, even very, very large hotels that would traditionally have parking gates all over the place ⁓ to do away with the gates completely. ⁓ There’s automated enforcement in the event that the hotel wants to do that. So if somebody chooses not to pay, they can send warnings, they can send a ticket to them, whatever they want to do with that. But in hotels, typically they really just want to let

They want to let the guests know what they’re supposed to do and trust that they’re going to do the right thing. We’re not slapping boots on cars or towing cars away. ⁓ We want to make sure customers know how to use the system, that it’s easy enough for them to use it so that they’ll do it, ⁓ and then encourage them that we are paying attention ⁓ and they should do it. We also install ⁓ LPR cameras in a lot of locations. Those are license plate reading cameras.

⁓ And that provides so much information to the hotel. ⁓ It’s not really about the license plate. We use that kind of as a ticket. So that’s how we identify the individual customer. Right. Yeah. Like an ID number. ⁓ But it gives the hotel information about what types of vehicles, what sizes, how many EVs, ⁓ electric vehicles pull into the lot. So when they think about how much investment should I put ahead for our capital expenditures in the next year to put in charging, ⁓ they have credible data.

Anthony Codispoti (32:32)
Like an ID number.

Brooks (32:54)
to make that decision versus industry reports that might have nothing to do with their specific market.

Anthony Codispoti (33:01)
You were talking, Brooks, about how some of the older technologies, older approaches, maybe had like a 70 % compliance rate. With your technology, what do you see that compliance rate?

Brooks (33:12)
It’s in the 90s. So it really all depends on how the client chooses to enforce it because, you know, believe it or not, there are plenty of clients that would tell you we’re okay with not collecting 100 % as long as we don’t really disrupt ⁓ our guests’ experience. So our goal is to provide them the guardrails to be able to collect up to 100%. ⁓ When you put the signs out there,

and you have presence at the location, ⁓ whether that’s people walking around, ⁓ warning tickets that might be placed on other vehicles, compliances over 95%. We found when we install the system, it’s right around 98%. It’ll trickle off if you don’t pay attention to it because guests are very savvy these days and they will research online and people are very happy to put notes about how to save some money when you park at a hotel. ⁓

It varies wildly, but our goal is to make sure that the hotel has the tools and the information. So when those LPR cameras are up there, they know precisely how much of that revenue they’re collecting. Today, in those honor systems, they definitely think they’re collecting over 90%. And then we show them the data to say that it’s closer to 70, and they’re shocked. ⁓ But when you have cameras up and they track every vehicle that comes and goes, you can’t hide from that data.

you know, causes them to just get a little bit more disciplined about it. You’d be surprised. They know every candy bar that might show up missing from, you know, from the gift shop, but have no clue how many cars are coming and going because it’s outside the building. So.

Anthony Codispoti (34:41)
Yeah, interesting.

Yeah, I live in a busy urban area here in Columbus, Ohio. ⁓ So certainly, you know, see the hotels around here that have parking services. Also see them at a lot of restaurants. Why have you guys decided to focus exclusively on hotels? Is there just not the margin in the restaurant business?

Brooks (35:13)
No, is. We believe strongly that you can perform at a much higher level when you seek to be excellent at one thing versus diversifying your impact over multiple verticals or whatever that might be. There’s lots of companies that do a very good job at doing all different verticals. Our goal is to be exceptional, not just pretty good like everybody else. So the product can work anywhere.

⁓ Our sales team is a very small sales team. It’s a team of two today, actually. We’ve just hired another sales leader. ⁓ But our goal isn’t to try to sell to the whole world. Our goal is to sell to partners that think about the business the way we do, that it should be elegant, it should be focused on the guest experience, ⁓ and things should ⁓ work the way they’re supposed to, not compromise in order to make it work everywhere.

Anthony Codispoti (36:09)
So you guys are obviously helping out with all things related to parking, but it doesn’t stop there. What else are you guys helping to do with these hotels?

Brooks (36:20)
Well, like I said early on, it’s that first impression when you walk in the door. It creates an emotion for that customer that they carry throughout their stay. And quite frankly, even when something goes wrong in the hotel, we can fix it before they leave a lot of times. And that means a lot, right? If you leave and you’re still upset or you still feel like you were unheard, ⁓ you carry that with you and there’s a bit of resentment or definitely displeasure.

⁓ that hangs around for a while, right? And we know, whether it’s from the research with Marriott or all these different brands, you return guests are so much more profitable than going out and seeking new guests. So our hotel clients want their guests to keep coming back. ⁓ So all of the training and ⁓ auditing that we do is all structured around how do we provide this environment where people arrive, it’s friendly, it’s safe.

⁓ and they feel like they can trust the individuals. I always think back, and we used to train with this video clip actually from Ferris Bueller’s day off when they drove his sports car. It was a little cabriolet. I don’t remember if it was what brand it was, but it’s a very nice car that they’re very nervous about and they pull up to this greasy looking valet that was as slimy as can be and they hand him the keys and he goes off joy riding in the car, right? And people believe

that there’s an element, and there is, I know there is, I see it on YouTube from time to time. There’s an element of that that does exist in our ⁓ industry. So we have to work really hard to earn people’s trust ⁓ in a momentary interaction. So everything from whether or not my name tag is straight and my shirt is pressed and the way that I stand, ⁓ all of that sends a message to the customer ⁓ that we know and understand and we think about forensically how we.

how we position ourselves, how, when we smile, when we talk, ⁓ know, distance matters and all of that stuff that, know, again, when I said we try to do one thing with excellence, that’s why we’re not, you know, out there trying to have a healthcare ⁓ component to our business or commercial or whatever. It’s so hard to do one thing ⁓ exceptionally well that we know we can’t do it. So we’re not gonna try. We wanna focus on this one thing.

Anthony Codispoti (38:41)
You’ve established domain

expertise in this one vertical, you know all of the peculiarities of the hotel industry. Why dilute that is sort of the philosophy. Yeah.

Brooks (38:51)
Right.

And we love it. That’s another thing that shines through, right? Like, I’m sure you can hear it from me, but I think if you talk to any of our leaders across the country and a lot of our employees, we want to hire people. We say it all the time. If we can just find people that care, with genuine care, it makes all the difference in the world. It’s not a hard job to teach. ⁓ There’s uniqueness to it. But if you care, even if you make a mistake, you can overcome that, you know? ⁓ And… ⁓

My wife and I had an experience a couple days ago. went out to dinner and ⁓ the gentleman that was working there handed out some food to a customer and forgot to put one item in there. And we listened to him toil over it for about 10 minutes after they left. He went to go chase after them and he couldn’t catch them. And he was remarking as we sat there eating our food about how she was so excited because they had this vegan sandwich and she was going to get to eat it. And now she’s, she’s left without food and he had no way to get in contact with her.

⁓ And I was so impressed. I’m sitting there like listening to every word that’s coming out of his mouth. Like, man, I wish everybody thought like that because you have a job that’s important and it doesn’t matter if it’s serving food, parking cars or operating on somebody’s heart. ⁓ Somebody’s placed trust in you to do it well. And you have the opportunity to care and deliver that way or to just transactionally, you know, do whatever you do. And I think that matters so much. ⁓

and ⁓ hopefully inspires our employees to think like that too.

Anthony Codispoti (40:22)
I love everything that you’re saying about, you know, the types of people that you’re looking for, the way that you invest in them, that you want to show them there’s a path of growth there. It strikes me that this has to be particularly challenging in your type of business, because your folks are spread out all over the country, right? I think we talked about over 100 different locations. And so I’d be curious to understand better Brooks, how you approach

all of this sort of, you know, recruiting, hiring, retention, like establishing that culture across such a, you know, diverse geography. How do you approach this?

Brooks (41:04)
Yeah, there’s actually been a lot of dialogue internally with our team and ⁓ externally through some recent LinkedIn chats that I’ve been a part of too about culture, right? Culture is, think, so misunderstood. ⁓ You can’t, in my opinion, you can’t frame a culture and deliver on it because that’s what you want to do. It’s what you actually do. ⁓ And people feel it and they see it and it’s how you lead and what you critique and what you manage or what you ⁓

you know, ⁓ what when you inspect what you expect, if you don’t do that, and you say something’s really important, but you don’t go back to look and see if anybody’s doing it, then it’s clearly not important, right? And we talk about that all the time when we talk about culture internally, is the culture of our organization is what we do as leaders, and that’s everybody. ⁓ So, you know, ⁓ when we go recruiting,

⁓ I think we do just what everybody else does. We put out a compelling message about what we aim to do for our customers, where we work, because we work at some fun places that people look to. ⁓ But the thing I think that’s different for me with our recruiting process is we do it all internally. We don’t trust any piece of that to a third party. So ⁓ whether it’s scrubbing ⁓ resumes to look for the right type of person,

That may sound tedious and AI does it, you know, fine. And I’m sure there’s, there’s going to be a time that we can use AI a little bit more as, as we get better at it ourselves. But being able to look at a piece of paper and look at somebody’s experience and how they position themselves to us tells us so much about what they’re going to be like when they show up. And if we bring one person in that is counter to our culture, ⁓ it disrupts everything. It makes that manager’s job a little bit harder because now they’re.

They’re fighting to change somebody instead of teaching, training, and developing them to understand our ways of doing things. It creates distrust amongst the other employees because they can see it and they can feel it. So we have to get that part right. There’s nothing more important to our organization than our people. So we have to do it all in-house. it’s hard. We have 1,500 employees today. And with 60 % turnover, we’re

we’re constantly interviewing ⁓ all over the country. ⁓ Thankfully though, we don’t hire a lot of ⁓ managers from outside the company anymore. So we talked about our development programs and we’ve had a lot of success there and people like to stick around. ⁓ So that piece, that is so much more difficult because ⁓ the further you get along in your career, the better you are at telling a story, not necessarily, you know, the

the truth, but a story of what you know the employer wants to hear. And it’s hard to read between those lines. And ⁓ quite honestly, it’s just so complex, the job that a manager does for us and leading our people, ⁓ delivering on a product for the customer, communicating and being a part of that customer’s business, right? We’re another department head for the hotel. We’re not a third party. have to know their guest journey inside and out. So we have to be a part of their internal meetings, their resume meetings.

⁓ We’re the face of their business when a customer comes in and decides whether or not to book a big wedding there. ⁓ So we’re so ingrained in that operation that not only are we hiring for ourselves, we have to hire specific to the need at that location and the decorum of that location every single time. So it’s a big challenge.

Anthony Codispoti (44:47)
Brooks, how would you describe your style of leadership?

Brooks (44:53)
I guess servant leadership is a big piece of it. Hopefully you can hear some of that. But it’s also, I like to have fun. Whether it’s inside of work, outside of work, I joke a lot. And I think that’s important because we spend a lot of time at work. In the hospitality business, it’s 24-7, 365. We take phone calls on Christmas Eve and Christmas and

⁓ The families that work for us have to leave their families a lot of times at times that they don’t want to, you know, to make sure that we’re delivering for every one of our guests everywhere 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, right? ⁓ So that’s important. And I try to make sure everybody understands that. When we talk about leadership, we talk about the inverted pyramid, where my role as COO is to support every individual in our company. And so I’ve got a lot of work to do.

because I have to be there for everybody all the time ⁓ and still be able to do my job too. So if I don’t empower them and I don’t help them to learn on their own, then that means I’m making more work for myself. And each leader ⁓ up the chain ⁓ has responsibility for everybody under their charge. ⁓ So for us, leadership is more about relationship than it is about getting the job done because we’re going to make mistakes. We’re moving two and a half ton vehicles through guest thoroughfares with

people and kids running around that are on vacation and not cognizant of the fact that they’re in a driving lane, you know, on a ⁓ roadway for the most part, you know, running around like no care in the world. And we have to protect them. We have to protect the brand of the hotel with how we approach everything that we do with customers. So there’s a lot about our business that’s really serious. And I try to make sure that we can still have a lot of fun while we’re doing that stuff so that it doesn’t overwhelm.

Anthony Codispoti (46:48)
What’s the future of evolution parking? What are some growth opportunities that are coming?

Brooks (46:54)
Yeah, I think the thing that we’ve really done a great job of is aligning ourselves with our partners and thinking about their businesses like, you know, an asset manager versus a vendor. You know, lot of companies, Valley companies especially, think about what they do as selling labor to the hotel. We think about creating outcomes for that hotel, whether that’s, you know, increasing their guest survey index, increasing their revenues.

helping them to plan better around things to create more efficiencies within the operation, whatever that might be. I think our, well, it’s evidenced by who our clients are. We have multiple national relationships where ⁓ hotel brands give us every Valley opportunity that they have or every self-parking opportunity that they have because they trust us. And it’s not that we don’t make mistakes because we do, but when we make mistakes, we make it right.

And we sit on it until we figure out, you know, how it got wrong to begin with and fix it. So I think that’s the one thing that I told you, we have two salespeople now. We have one all the way up until a couple months ago, a month ago. Yeah. Well, he’s brilliant. ⁓ And he is, and he’s, you know, he’s, you know, done very, very well.

Anthony Codispoti (48:06)
which is incredible growth with just one salesperson.

helps.

Brooks (48:19)
to understand our customers’ needs and to not only be able to deliver the product on day one, ⁓ but he stays by their side throughout the journey. And that makes it really, really hard. ⁓ Like you said, we have over 100 clients now. So being there for everybody all the time gets harder and harder. So we did bring on some more help. ⁓ We’ll look to grow some more. But our growth is really all about relationships. If we do what we say we’re going to do and we deliver on it, ⁓ then we want you to go tell your friends. ⁓

about what we did or if you have other opportunities, we want you to give us an opportunity at it. So ⁓ we’ve seen a lot of success there and we don’t aspire to be, you know, again, multivertical, ⁓ thousand property business. ⁓ We want to be, we’d love to be at 300 hotels, you know, and we’ll get there. We’ll be at 200 before we get to the end of this year, which is really, really exciting and scary at the same time. ⁓

we’re gonna do it through ⁓ making sure that we understand we don’t leave anybody behind in that path to growth.

Anthony Codispoti (49:26)
Is there some internal tech that you guys are layering in to be able to support that kind of rapid growth?

Brooks (49:34)
all kinds of it, right? ⁓ I spend a lot of time trying to learn about ⁓ different software that’s out there that our competitors use. One of the really cool things about the parking industry is ⁓ all of the senior executives, for all of the companies around the country, they’re all people that I know and that I’ve worked with over the years. So I can have ⁓ a conversation with our competitor about what they’re doing that’s working and what’s not. ⁓

it’s real easy for them to tell me. It’s not really easy for me to do it, right? So I get to learn from my peers ⁓ and that’s great. It offers an awesome sounding board. But I’m spending a lot of time trying to understand how AI enables us to do more ⁓ in a way that doesn’t take us away from the customer. I know there’s a lot of apprehension in the world right now about what jobs is AI gonna take away? And there’s an element of what we do that could absolutely be done

⁓ you know, through automation. ⁓ But the reason why people hire Evolution ⁓ is because we provide this exceptional guest experience and connection with their guests on the way in and on the way out, so that first impression and last impression stick. ⁓ And they align that with that brand, not with Evolution, but with, you know, the Ritz-Carlton or the Marriott or whatever that brand is that we’re representing. ⁓ I don’t think that’s going to go away.

So we need to figure out how to leverage ⁓ the data that we have ⁓ so that we can better understand customer journeys and how people move and when they’re going to be able to anticipate what they need before they need it. That’s so big for us ⁓ is anticipatory service. And I know there’s data there that can help us, but we also think a lot about protection. ⁓ And it means a lot of different things to us, but

One of the things it means is when we operate a two and a half ton vehicle, ⁓ we have to understand that we have to keep the customer safe that are out there on the front drive. We want to keep their valuables safe, whether that’s locking their car or scratching it on the way to the parking lot. ⁓ And so we spend a lot of time talking about protection. When you think about ⁓ those cameras, you think about ⁓

dash cams and stuff like that. There’s a lot of technology out there that we can use to enable us to better train our associates. If I could see the driving path of every associate everywhere across the country, every time they park a car, and I can have something trigger to say, hey, this looks a little unsafe, let’s take a look at it. Imagine the experience there because now it’s not about me ⁓ being upset because somebody caused a claim. This is me proactively coming to somebody and saying, hey, we noticed when you were driving, when you reverse that you were throwing your arm up.

over the back of the chair and looking back, that puts you in a position where you can only see one direction and it limits your field of view and potentially puts the vehicle, other people, your coworkers at risk. And we want to train you how to do it differently. That experience to us is where we want to be able to try to leverage ⁓ technology. Absolutely. Yeah. Yep.

Anthony Codispoti (52:41)
It’s training opportunity. know,

growth has been a big theme of our conversation today, right? We’re talking about the rapid growth of evolution. We’re talking about the growth that you were allowed at your first stop in the parking industry, the mindset that you have brought to evolution and being able to help others grow. And now we’re going to shift the conversation towards more personal growth for you because

Growth comes from overcoming big challenges, Brooks. And I would like to explore a big challenge that you’ve overcome in your life and how you got through that and what you learned.

Brooks (53:23)
Yeah, I I would say we talked about it a little bit, but I would say it was that same lesson that I’d learned over and over again. was stepping into this role and then seeing the growth that we’ve seen ⁓ at the rate that we saw it and trying to remember that it’s not my job to do everything ⁓ for everybody, but to enable them and empower them to be able to do it. ⁓ I’m a…

I’m a quick learner, but I can also stray from the lessons that I’ve learned pretty quickly, I guess I’ve learned over the years as well. ⁓ But for us, that’s really it. That’s it for me. It’s been all about trying to reframe my role every time we hit a new benchmark of growth and a new… ⁓

you know, kind of a new model for what we’re doing when it goes from 20 hotels to 50, from 50 to 75 and to 100, and then a new product that we’re delivering and trying to perfect. It’s one of the GMs that I used to work with years ago. He’s now an area leader for Marriott. Ron Mackinac told me the business is kind of like changing the tires on a NASCAR, but you don’t get to pull into a pit stop.

And he’s right. I mean, everything just constantly keeps moving and it doesn’t slow down. We don’t get days off. So our improvement, our continuous improvement model has to work with a live environment at all times. So, I mean, I read all the books I can read. ⁓ I was on a webinar just before ⁓ our time ⁓ learning about how to better leverage HubSpot for our sales team to do some automations and stuff to get them

out in the field versus sitting behind a computer. ⁓ And so that model of constantly trying to learn, constantly trying to get better, constantly trying to reframe where we’re at today for our customers and what we provide and what they need for us tomorrow around the corner to make sure we’re prepared for that, that’s, I think, always going to be a challenge ⁓ for me and for us. ⁓ Because like I said, our aspirations and goals are to keep growing as long as we can keep providing.

this service to our customers.

Anthony Codispoti (55:45)
And so what’s been helpful to you in leveling up? Because you touch on something key here, Brooks, you know, the person who is good at managing a company at 25 locations, you know, that’s a different set of skills when you get to 50, 75, 100 now, you know, an additional tech product on top of that. Not everybody can make that transition as the company grows and the company oftentimes outgrows its leaders. So what has helped you kind of keep pace?

Brooks (56:16)
Yeah, I’ve had one advantage in that I’ve been down this road before. ⁓ When I started at Town Park, we had 30 some locations. And when I left, we were around 750. ⁓ So I got to see a lot of that happen. And we had some really great leaders that I learned from that they weren’t perfect either, right? They made mistakes. So I feel like I ⁓ have the confidence to know I’m allowed to mess up every now and again. ⁓ But the important thing for me

that I learned from some of my mentors was have a plan. Your plan is where you start from. Mike Tyson says, everybody’s got a great plan until they get punched in the face, right? But that’s a great moment because in that moment you reframe, ⁓ my plan doesn’t make sense anymore. Now I’ve got to change. How can I change? What’s broken? And when you have that discipline of reframing your plan every month,

It’s my rhythm. So every month sitting down, framing up a plan, deciding what I’m ⁓ trying to accomplish every year, having a big plan that I want to make sure I can break up into bite-sized chunks throughout the year allows me to be able to measure my performance and see my own ⁓ opportunities. ⁓ So, you know, being self-aware, especially in leading a people-driven organization, ⁓ you know, our product is people and it’s lots of people spread out all over the country. ⁓ You have to be

You have to be able to reflect on what you’re doing well. You have to be able to understand what you did yesterday and what you plan to do tomorrow and whether or not that’s on your strategic path to move the company forward. And you have to be able to reflect on how you feel about what you did, honestly. And I feel like we have great people that work with us that give honest feedback because there is a trust that we all have with each other that I can get critiqued from somebody that works for me and not

be defensive about it. So, and I welcome it. You know, I ask for it that, look, if we walk into a room and we walk out in agreement, but you don’t actually agree, you were just afraid to speak up, then, you know, we both are going to look silly because we’re going to fail. And, you know, and then nobody wins. So let’s hash it out while we’re in the room together, ⁓ you know, and then figure it out, even if it means you have to be disruptive and disagree and ⁓ it feels uncomfortable.

If you’re doing it to make sure that we make the best decision, then you’re gonna make us better. And I need that. That’s what I ask for from my senior leaders.

Anthony Codispoti (58:53)
What’s your superpower, Brooks?

Brooks (58:56)
I think it’s clarity. ⁓ You know, it’s being able to take the chaos of, you know, any environment and be able to boil it down to what are the most important things? What do we need to focus on today? And then, you know, once we get that down, what are we going to focus on tomorrow? So being able to see around the corner and what we’re seeking to achieve is a big picture, but being able to break it down into bite-sized chunks that are ⁓ measurable, repeatable, and ⁓

and teachable so that people understand what it is that they need to do today to reach that big lofty goal, that BHAG that’s in the future for us.

Anthony Codispoti (59:35)
What’s your favorite thing to do outside of work?

Brooks (59:40)
I’m all over the place. You know, I talked about, you know, being able to control chaos, but my personal life is I love to just stay busy and stay active. I, um, a big CrossFitter. I love fishing. Um, so I like to be outdoors. It doesn’t matter if it’s fishing or, um, hiking or just, you know, whatever activities outdoors. I’ve got three, I was about to say little girls, but, uh, they’re 24, 21 and 17 now. Um, so.

but they’re all still local and we spend a lot of time together. So my wife and the girls is ⁓ everything I do. ⁓ so we, you know, we’re at the parks, we live in Orlando. ⁓ So we spend a fair amount of time outdoors and that’s where I love to be. Thankful to be in Florida.

Anthony Codispoti (1:00:25)
Yeah. Just one more question for you today, Brooks. But before I ask it, I want to do three quick things for the audience. First of all, to get in touch with Brooks and evolution, I’ve got a great website. It’s evolution pgs.com evolution pgs.com. And we’ll have that link in the show notes. But if you’re listening, you want to type it in right now, you’re not the video evolution pgs.com. And if you’re enjoying the show today, please take a moment to subscribe wherever you’re listening.

it sends a signal that helps others to discover our podcast. So thank you for taking a quick moment to do that right now. And as a reminder, you can get more hospitality and parking employees access to therapists, doctors, and prescription meds that as paradoxical as it seems, actually increases your company’s net profits. Real gains that can change how a business is valued and it works well in high turnover environments too. So reach out to us at addbackbenefits.com.

So last question for you, Brooks, a year from now, what is one very specific thing that you hope to be celebrated?

Brooks (1:01:29)
So we’ve got a big goal right now as an organization to eliminate claims from our business. think ⁓ everybody in the industry, maybe not everybody, that’s a broad statement. A lot of people in the industry look at claims, vehicle damage, as a cost of doing business. And I think that’s kind of absurd, right? Like if you thought about, hey, I bought this car, at some point I’m going to crash it into something. ⁓ You know what mean? That’s ridiculous. ⁓ So.

⁓ We spend a lot of time trying to help our team frame that idea because it is hard to imagine. They’ve seen, if they’ve worked in parking for a long time, they’ve never seen an operation that they didn’t have a claim. ⁓ And ⁓ so we’re doing a lot to teach and train around ⁓ the theme of protection. Again, we’re protecting our guests. ⁓

stuff, right, their vehicle or what they might have in their vehicle, but also the people that are out there by driving safely, our client’s reputation by, you know, not damaging somebody’s vehicle and creating a bad experience and all of this stuff. ⁓ And it’s right in line with what we do well, you know, around training and developing our team. ⁓ But it’s with a more important mission that, you know, we’re going to try to eliminate something from the business that has ⁓ traditionally been a large part of it.

⁓ And we’re not going to accept anything less than this goal of getting to zero claims. So it’s aspirational. It’s a BHAG. It’s a big Harry Audacious goal that we’re going to tackle and accomplish. So a year from now, that’s where we’ll be.

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:03)
So you had mentioned before when we were talking about, you know, some of the tech things you’re like, you know, if we had dash cams, wouldn’t that be great? And obviously, you can’t put a dash cam in a you know, a car that’s not yours, but are you kind of tilt your head like, okay, so correct me here.

Brooks (1:03:15)
Maybe.

Well, I don’t know. mean, that’s, ⁓ you know, never say never, right? Because if you would have told me five years ago that I’d be typing into a machine on my computer that tells me everything about everything and answers every question you could ever have, I would have said you’re crazy. ⁓ But here we are, right? And so that’s exactly, you know, one of the products that I’m trying to figure out. Is there a way to do that in a meaningful way where ⁓ even if it’s not

perfect, it gives us a little bit more insight that we can learn a little bit more and be more targeted with what we teach. Leave no stone unturned. So that’s one product we’re looking at. Could be. Yeah, it could be. There’s all these weird things that you have to worry about, Especially when you’re dealing with guests all the time. look, we see famous people just like we see normal people all the time. And a lot of, you know,

Anthony Codispoti (1:03:55)
Would they be body cams for each of your ballets?

Brooks (1:04:10)
People don’t like cameras, so we’ll have to figure it out. It’s not like it’s easy, but that’s why it’s our big, audacious goal.

Anthony Codispoti (1:04:16)
of it. Brooks Ellis from Evolution Parking and Guest Services. I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. And I really appreciate you being here.

Brooks (1:04:27)
Yeah, it’s great talking with you.

Anthony Codispoti (1:04:28)
Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us. And if one thing stood out, put that into action today.

Intro  

Welcome to another edition of inspired stories where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes, how they’ve overcome adversity, and explore current challenges they’re facing.

Anthony (host):  

Welcome to another edition of the inspired stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes, how they’ve overcome adversity and explore current challenges they’re facing. My name is Anthony Codispoti.. And this episode is brought to you by my company AddBack Benefit Agency, where we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your bottom line. One recent client was able to save over $900 per employee per year by implementing one of our programs. Another client is going to save over $1,200 per employee per year by implementing a different program a patented construct that we offer. Results vary for each company and some organizations may not be eligible to find out if your company qualifies. Contact us today at add back benefits agency.com. Today’s today’s show, our guest is Ryan Whiteside, who is the Digital Marketing Director at two wheels marketing a firm based in Columbus, Ohio that provides SEO, PPC and paid digital advertising. Ryan, I appreciate you making the time to share your story today.

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, great to be here.

Anthony (host):  

So let’s start not quite at the beginning. But I see you went to Ohio University and Athens from graduation. What was that path into digital marketing? How did you first get started in the field? And what did your path kind of look like to get you to be where you are now at two wheels? Yes.

Ryan (guest):  

So I went to college in 2003. And my freshman year I was in like multiple majors, I could not figure out what I wanted to do with my life.

Anthony (host):  

Sounds like a traditional college freshman.

Ryan (guest):  

But in my spare time, I started building websites. So my first start was a poker website. So Parker was like very popular at the time. So I created this website that like reviewed all the poker sites, and I earned a commission affiliate program whenever someone would sign up for these services and made money that way. So like I was my first intro into making money out of wine. So I was like, very addicted to that. And you know, from there, I created multiple websites all throughout college, and made a nice side income from that. But my degree was in computer science. So I learned to program and do all this stuff. And I really did not like it. But by the time I really figured out that I really didn’t like it, I was like it was into my third or fourth year of school. So I was like, I might as well just finish because I’m so close to the end. But once I got out of school, I already knew I did not want to be a programmer and do that my entire life. But I always had that passion of marketing. So that’s kind of where I started to look for jobs was in digital marketing, which, at the time I started my career with, well, the worst times was 2008, you know, economy crashed. There weren’t just a lot of SEO or digital marketing jobs in general, like it was kind of starting to become an up and coming thing. But one company finally took a chance on me and you know, the rest is history.

Anthony (host):  

So who was that company that took a chance on you.

Ryan (guest):  

They’re not even around anymore. It was called Web Marketing. I was employee seven there. And it was it was a wild company to start at. I mean, I remember like, one of our first couple months it was Halloween and like, instead of working for a day we like sat around and drank like it was it was a wild time. I

Anthony (host):  

think we’re we’re understanding a little bit well, maybe why they’re not still around. No,

Ryan (guest):  

actually. That’s not an accurate picture like they are. The two owners were fantastic people some of the best people I’ve ever worked with that they’re still very, very successful today. And actually the company grew from like seven to 30 very quickly. And a couple of years later, we got acquired by a company that was 150 people. So yeah, the company itself was a success. We just just in the early days of a startup it was just like you know a lot of excitement, constant change that type of thing.

Anthony (host):  

I want to go back to the poker website Commission’s because it sounds like that’s where you get your first bite of the digital marketing. Apple in it, and it worked pretty well. Can you give us an idea of what kind of side income you were able to generate from that while you were in college?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, I mean, I was making anywhere between. I mean, it wasn’t like crazy money. But I mean, between 500 and a couple $1,000 a month I was making in college, which I remember, some friends would like, work at, you know, the local fast food place making like $6 an hour. And like, the money I was making was, like, completely passive, like, my website was just sitting there. And I was collecting checks. So like, it was, it was pretty nice. And, you know, paid for some of the college funds. That’s

Anthony (host):  

awesome. Yeah, I think I was making about $4 an hour when I was in college. So that shows a little bit of our age difference there. But, so I know your career, you know, you, you did the computer programming thing in college, you came out, you got into the digital marketing field sounds like you worked at a agencies a variety, different sizes. And then in the last, you know, what was it two or three years ago? You’ve been a part of two wheels marketing, which is this small, scrappy, firm in Columbus, Ohio? How does that compare to the experiences you’ve had at some of the other organizations? What, what do you prefer about it? What’s, what’s worse about it? Maybe?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, so I, you know, looking back on my career, the times I was the most frustrated were the times where I had the least control over things like, especially with the company that was 150. I mean, just so much bureaucracy, like to get anything done required, approvals, overtop of approvals, etc. And, like, those kinds of situations I, I just really struggled with and was frustrating. So yeah, I kind of come to the realization, I’ve always kind of preferred, you know, having more control, and two wheels, you know, it’s very small company. So, you know, the thoughts opinions, I have, like, really matter, and, you know, we kind of run with so simple, I’ve really liked compared to, you know, some of the other companies, you know, on the other side, in, in theory, you know, a bigger company, you may consider that, like a safer job where, you know, like, if you lose some clients, like the company can technically absorb that. But, you know, what I found with two wheels is just like, we have a very stable set of clients. And, you know, we, even though we’re not a big company, we are able to, you know, sustain even if a few clients drop off, so, there’s really, there’s really not a lot of downsides, just with the way to his business structure set up.

Anthony (host):  

Yeah. You know, I hear this from a lot of my entrepreneurial friends who maybe had had some experience in corporate environments. And there is this high degree of frustration of the path to a solution or to success is relatively clear, like, we need to take these steps here, but there’s so much red tape, there’s so much bureaucracy that it becomes paralyzing and frustrating, you feel like you’re beating your head against the wall, you know, spending time on things that don’t really matter.

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, and I mean, that kind of applies to clients as well. I remember one of our clients was this major health organization in Columbus. And, you know, we’ve put together this pitch deck and like, we propose this like, very creative idea. And, you know, the marketing director would pitch it to is like, Oh, my God, this is fantastic. Like, yeah, we should definitely do this. Like it was an absolute no brainer, what we were proposing and like, there’s going to be clear, deliverable successful results. And, you know, she had to pitch it to her boss, then her boss, and then her boss, and then four bosses later, eventually, someone was like, hey, it’s not a good idea. And then we ended up not even doing it, even though it was like, you know, a no brainer thing to do. That’s

Anthony (host):  

so frustrating. And that, that actually makes me wonder what have you found from your experience is sort of your, like, ideal client, like maybe the big corporate structures like that are appealing on the outside because it could be a very valuable contract for you. It could be nice, steady work, but having to jump through all those hoops to get there can be a waste of time is there, like a mid tier to a smaller client that you find is a is typically a better fit. I

Ryan (guest):  

mean, it’s definitely not smaller, the better, you know, more medium sized companies do have additional funds, and they are able to take more chances. So necessarily the size of the business, I guess, like the ideal clients is where you know, the worker do is going to make an impact, like a big impact, like for some clients, like whether they’re small or medium. It’s like, okay, like, what you’re doing now is already pretty good. And yeah, we can come in and do like a little bit of optimizations here and there, but we’re not going to make a drastic change, whereas some businesses, it’s like, okay, yeah, what we can do for you, it’s going to be like, you’ll immediately see it like, it’s, it’s definitely going to make a big impact. And, yeah, I mean, as those tend to be the most rewarding clients where they say, a year from now, like, yeah, we’ve had to hire more people on staff, because of, you know, the work you’ve been doing, or, you know, one of the recent clients like they, they literally doubled their digital marketing revenue from one year to the next. And the only difference was like, we were working with them for that whole year. So you know, things like that, where we know, it can make a big, big impact. Those are, like the clients I really like to work with.

Anthony (host):  

And you can probably get a pretty good sense of the ones that you’ll have the biggest impact on just by going in and kind of looking at what they’re doing now. What, what is the SEO structure on their site look like? What are their PPC campaigns look like? You probably my right, get a pretty good sense pretty quickly, like, Oh, this is somebody we can really move the needle for? Yeah, definitely.

Ryan (guest):  

Mark, you know, founder to wheels, like, he’ll send me the website, and we’ll, we’ll kind of talk about it. And, yeah, I mean, there are some times where it’s like, yeah, we could take this over. And, you know, we’re gonna do a good job, and we’re gonna give it our best efforts. But in reality, like, I don’t know how much of an impact it can make. And I mean, to give a little more specific, like, in digital marketing, some of the clients I struggle working with our businesses were like, the businesses, customers might only be like, 50, or 100. People, like, their target market is like, you know, CEOs of major companies, like, you know, to do digital marketing, and to try to find those 50 or 100 people is a bit challenging, where, like, for those types of businesses, they really just need to find those businesses and call them, email them, send them postcards, send them letters in the mail, like, it’s not necessarily like running a Facebook ad to those 50 or 100. People like that doesn’t work very well. Whereas, you know, like, an easier fit for digital marketing is like, everybody needs us, like, everyone needs blood, like to buy flowers, or everyone needs a dentist or something like that, where there’s like a big market, it’s easier to target those people and and make a bigger impact when you have a wider audience like that.

Anthony (host):  

You want to be able to cast a big net, rather than trying to throw a line in for a single fish. Yeah,

Ryan (guest):  

well, I Yeah. I mean, I mean, you can do, you can do a good job with digital marketing, if it’s not a massive audience. But you know, it’s just really hard to do digital marketing. And we’ve had a few clients where like, like I said, there’s literally only 50 to 500 people in the entire world that would even be a good fit for this business and to do digital marketing on that as can be a bit challenging.

Anthony (host):  

What is it that sets you guys apart from your competition? When somebody is coming to you from one of your competitors? Why? Why are they doing that? Why are they more likely to see success with you guys?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, we definitely have a lot of clients that are working with another, another digital marketing company and they’re disgruntled with the work and yeah, I mean, one of our advantages right now is just we’re, we’re very lean, not a lot of overhead. Like, you know, I’ve worked with a lot of digital marketing companies, like I said, and you know, a lot of times you’re your point of contact as an account manager, and that account manager doesn’t know anything about digital marketing and that’s like frustrating where you have to talk to the account manager, the account manager has to kind of try to tell the people are actually doing the work what needs done and there’s like miscommunications and all kinds of problems. And you know, kind of similarly, like, someone might get sold by like a real really great salesperson who, again, doesn’t know anything about digital marketing, but they kind of over pitch services and promises. So you go into, you know, a relationship with like, all these extremely high, like impossible expectations. And then when the people actually doing the work are in there, they’re like, yeah, there’s no way we’re gonna be able to do this. So, you know, the benefit with us is, you know, the people you’re talking to, are really the ones in there doing the dirty work as well. So it’s going to be clear transparents, right out of the gates. And, you know, because we don’t have as much overhead, as you know, some other companies more time is get getting spent doing the work, that’s going to make a difference for you.

Anthony (host):  

Well, in your company, right, they get to come and they talk to the account rep, the sales rep, the the owners, the operators, all on the same conversation, there aren’t those different layers where those conversations sort of get lost? And this guy promised one thing, and it didn’t get passed on to the other guy. So

Ryan (guest):  

exactly. And, and yeah, I mean, between Mark and I, like, we both been in this industry for one two years. And, you know, you’re getting a very senior level person, that that you’re working with, at all times, which you know, another thing with, like, bigger agencies, like, you might be working with a team, and they might be doing a good job, but one of them leaves, and then you’re working with a different person, and that person has to relearn the accounts, and maybe they’re not as senior level as the other person. And you’re like, Oh, I wish I was working with that other person when things are great. And, you know, your account can just get passed around by person to person, and there can be a lot of disconnect there.

Anthony (host):  

No, no, most business leaders that I meet, have at least one, if not multiple stories, where they had to overcome a big challenge at some point in their career, you know, maybe there was a lawsuit or a firing or a big accounting mistake, or, you know, something that that, you know, almost really derailed things, or maybe didn’t derail things for a while. We don’t often get to hear so much about these stories, because people are embarrassed to share. But for me, these are some of my favorite conversations because it inspires other people to be resilient in the face of their own challenges. What can you think of in your past, it’s a, you know, a big challenge that maybe you had to overcome.

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, it’s there was a kind of a lull in the middle of my career was very frustrated. And it just kind of seem like I was doing the same thing, year after year. And that went on for two to three years where I was just like I was, I was managing the same team, we were doing the same stuff. You know, digital marketing is always changing. But like, there wasn’t any major things going on, we were still kind of doing the same process. And that’s where I was starting to get kind of frustrated. And at the time, I was only doing SEO work, which was just one aspect of digital marketing, where there’s multiple aspects. And I always wanted to be multifaceted, where I could do SEO, I could run Google ads, I could run Facebook ads, I could do email marketing, etc. And I think with my career, it was it was hard to transition. Because, you know, it’s hard to start doing work that you have no experience. And whereas, you know, your career role, like you have years and years of experience and and, you know, you have more knowledge there. So, to be able to finally break free and get to an opportunity where I could do multiple aspects. It was it was a real struggle for a couple years. But eventually, I did get through it. And now I’m at a point where my level of learning is so much more rapid than it used to be. Which I feel like there’s like a Steve Jobs quote, or something where he said something along these lines, but if you’re not really learning on a daily basis, and you’re just kind of, in a rut, doing the same things over and over, like, don’t wait so long to make adjustments to where you’re more fulfilled, and you’re learning.

Anthony (host):  

Yeah, I love that. It’s a message I try to communicate to my kids on a regular basis. You know, they, they think that at some point, they’re going to reach, you know, a stage in their life where they’re, they’re sort of they know it all they they’re done learning. And the line I like to give them all the time is if you’re doing it right, you are learning something new every day. And so I want to hear a little bit More about that stagnant period, because, you know, I think a lot of people can probably relate to that, you know, it’s like, you know, it almost feels like Groundhog Day like, you know, you’re getting out of bed, you’re you’re going through the same routine, like, like you want to shake it up, you want to learn you want to grow. And like you pointed out, you were sort of in like a catch 22 Because you wanted to do something new, but how do you get a job and that new thing without having, you know, some experience in it? So how did you sort of navigate that? How did you get from this place of I want to be over here? It’s tough to get over here without having some experience. How did you cross that? Yeah,

Ryan (guest):  

yeah, I mean, not every profession can do this, but with with our industry. I mean, people take sidekicks, it’s just kind of like it, maybe it’s a little more secret at the time, but it’s pretty normal to, I guess, have a full time role, but then understand that you might be doing a little bit of work on the side. And that’s how I was able to make the transition was, you know, my full time job was doing SEO for company. But, you know, 510 hours a week, I was also moonlighting siding with another company. And that’s where I got no opportunities to start running Facebook ads get first firsthand experience. Same thing with Google ads. That way, whenever I was at the point where I wanted to do another role, it’s like, okay, I have, I have done this type of work before, these are the type of results I got. And, you know, that’s kind of kind of the way I was able to transition was to be able to actually get experience, it just wasn’t in a full time role. Got

Anthony (host):  

it, you took a side gig, and you were able to build up a portfolio and some experience that you could then kind of leverage in getting some of those new opportunities. Another interesting thing that you said is that your level of learning is a lot more rapid now than it was before. What do you credit that to?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, I mean, being a small team, like, you know, we have a set of clients. And you know, we’re every day trying to figure out what’s best for the client. And, I mean, whatever that is, like, whatever idea I have, like, oh, maybe we should try this new thing. It’s like, Hey, Mark, we should do this. Yeah, I agree. And then we do it. So it’s like, there’s not a lot of friction from, Hey, I’ve learned this, or I have this idea to let’s try it. Let’s go. Whereas again, like if you’re working at a bigger company, it’s like, okay, I have this idea. Well, that’s not my department. So someone else has to do it. And then maybe they think it’s a good idea. Maybe they don’t, or, yeah, like the account manager doesn’t want to do it, or the client doesn’t want to do it. Like there’s all kinds of possibilities where you don’t go from idea to implementation as quickly. So that’s kind of where the, the learning happens is in the doing and, you know, there’s a lot more action taking in our current setup.

Anthony (host):  

Got it? So we talked a little bit about the sort of the professional challenge of getting stuck for a bit. What about any personal challenges that you had to overcome that you look back on maybe had, you know, a formative influence on who you are today? You know, for some people, it’s, you know, maybe there was a death of a loved one or you stuttered or undiagnosed case of dyslexia or anything like that, that you know, kind of earlier on in your life that you think maybe helped to shape who you are today?

Ryan (guest):  

Ah, yeah, when you when he first asked that, like, as far as, like, things that impacted me was probably getting fired a couple times. Like, you know, that’s not early in life that’s like in my career, but like those things really set me on a much better path where, you know, getting stagnates you know, sit working for the same company for many years getting fired because things that were outside of my control primarily, like they lose a bunch of clients and everything’s kind of tailspins from there. But yeah, when you get fired and you’re really scrapping to find your next opportunity, you you grow thicker skin, you get more, more different experience. Yeah, like having that happen twice in my career, like really shaped me considerably to where I am today. Whereas if, if those things which seemed like horrible at the time, didn’t happen to me, I would not be the person I am today. Like, I just wouldn’t be so yeah. Tell

Anthony (host):  

me a little bit more about that. What’s it feel like in that moment to get fired? And how does that eventually turn around to be this good positive force in your life?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah. Yeah, the time it happened, it was just completely blindsided. Yeah, I’d worked at a company for eight years, like, I never really looked for alternative jobs, just because it’s kind of like a loyalty thing. I guess. Like, I felt like, hey, you know, even though I have all these frustrations with this company, like, I’m loyal to these people, for whatever reason, but then getting fired, just kind of like, wipe, you know, wipe the dust in my eyes and realize, like, hey, there’s greener pastures out there. And like, immediately, like, the next opportunity I got, I was like, oh, yeah, there’s like, so many new and different things here. And I’m meeting a bunch of different co workers. And yeah, like, Why did I spend the last few years like in a position that just wasn’t working for me when I could have went elsewhere? So yeah, it’s,

Anthony (host):  

it kind of forced you to shake up the snowglobe in us, in a way. Exactly. Yeah. That’s great. Any specific books or mentors that have helped to shape your professional career?

Ryan (guest):  

Oh, gosh, I really got the personal development kick my seat around my senior year of college. I even so one of the websites that I started was a personal development website, which went away but I mean, I read hundreds of personal development books. So anything from like time management to goal setting, to you know, investing all these things? So yeah, I definitely went through quite a, a book journey. But I don’t read as much as many books now. I tend to do more courses, podcasts. But um, yeah, I mean, I, like my senior year, like a couple books, I can think of, or like, thinking Grow Rich, for our work week. Summer, like Ryan Tracy’s, like, eat my Eat, eat the frog, or whatever it’s called. Yeah. Richest Man in Babylon. Like, there were a lot of books that really kind of opened my eyes to like, oh, yeah, you can be a better person. And you can, you know, learn to use your time more effectively. And, you know, reach towards, like set and resource goals, like, all these things were like, you know, never really learned at school. And it was like, something that I feel really helped, especially as I was entering, you know, the real world and the workforce.

Anthony (host):  

It’s something that I wish that schools were able to do a better job of is sort of the making learning fun. And I get like, they’re trying to, you know, you’ve got to have this sort of foundation in place, right? You have to know how to read, you have to know how to write you have to know, math skills. But yeah, for me, it wasn’t until later in life when I got out of college, and I own my own company. And I was in a position where I needed to learn in order to advance my career in my company. And but there was a lot of fun and being able to apply that knowledge where I felt like in school, I was spending a lot of time learning things that were sort of theoretical, and it was like, Maybe I would use this someday, but I don’t know is do you find that as well? Like, is it more exciting and motivating for you to sort of pick and choose the things that you’re interested in that you get to learn more about?

Ryan (guest):  

Yeah, I’m definitely yes. I mean, so many people in life, like, once they get out of school, they, I mean, stop learning. Like, I know, there’s like stats were like, I forget like 50 like at least 50% of people once they graduate never read a book again, or something like that. So it don’t quote me on that, like, look it up on the internet, and how could they even come up with that stat, like, that’s another sidetrack. But I remember that was a stat that I read at one point in time, but yeah, I mean, it’s it. Yeah, I mean, the school systems, I guess, like, you know, a lot of it is like rote memorization, and you’re learning this just to pass the test where, you know, the real world is more about like What can I learn that I can apply? That’s, I mean, that’s something, especially with digital marketing, like you can really go down the rabbit hole of education where you’re reading a million different blog posts and doing all this stuff. But a lot of the learning, like, comes from being in the weeds and like really digging in and doing the stuff that’s, that’s where you get a lot of the learning not not that like blog posts and courses aren’t valuable, but that they contend to be a trap with a lot of people is just like learning, learning, learning, learning, but never actually doing. Yeah, so you kind of have to make sure that balance is in place.

Anthony (host):  

What’s something you wish you could teach the 20 year old version of Ryan.

Ryan (guest):

Yeah, I mean, like a constant. I guess the constant theme is like.

If you’re not learning, and you’re kind of stagnant like. It’s time for change. I’m sure there’s a million things. I tell my tell my twenties like so many things about the golf swing I’d be like, come on, man, like all you have to do is this, it makes it so much easier.

Like a and so many different subjects. But yeah, II mean it for me, like when I’m happiest and most fulfilled is like when I’m on regularly learning. And yeah, they were just kind of points. And micro. You know, as I mentioned before, that things a little bit stagnant.

Anthony (host):  

Yeah, there’s a regular theme that is is coming up here, and it’s one of continuous self improvement and learning, which I think is great. What’s a challenge that you’re currently working through in your business?

Ryan (guest): 

So in with with digital marketing agencies, you can kind of go a couple of them or pass. You can be good for a lot of different industries, or you can go niche and like only work for one type of company, like only dentists or only flower shops, etc. And there’s kind of pros and cons to both. The pros with going super niche is like you can become the best of that industry, and like become very good at servicing that particular type of client and all this types of thing. It makes the sales process easier, because, like, Hey. you know, we already work with 20 other businesses just like you. And we have all kinds of the testimonials and stuff, and it makes that process easy. But the problem with going super niche is. it could be economic factors like, if all of a sudden, people don’t want to use this service anymore, or something to that effect. Like, well, okay, you’ve built your entire portfolio on one industry. So if that industry gets shaken you’re in a lot of trouble, whereas, you know, working with a bunch of different types of industries. You’re more resilient to outside factors. And in a way, you can also learn faster by working in different industries. So you can learn something in one industry that applies to another industry, etc. So I think the question was like, I forgot where he landed on the question, but what’s what’s a challenge that you’re currently so business. So you guys trying to like, yeah, so the challenge with us is, yeah, we are starting to find some vertical that we’re already good at, like we have some verticals where we already have a dozen or so clients.

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and the challenge is, how can we get more of those clients? So specifically, flower shops? We have a lot of different flower shops. And the challenge with that is in the sales process. So in a lot of industries, you might be able to send emails or follow them on Linkedin, or, you know. go in Facebook groups and kind of meet them. But with flash up owners like what we found is they’re they’re kind of old school like they’re not as tech savvy? So the challenge being a digital marketing company is, how can we kind of get in front of these people that aren’t necessarily digital people? And you know something we’re exploring this year is going to conferences, sending them postcards and stuff in the mail. You know, reaching out via phone. So kind of doing offline sales activities, even though, like our wheelhouse is all the things you could do when people are are online.

Anthony (host):  

That’s what’s something fun or interesting that most people don’t know about you, Ryan.

Ryan (guest):

Yeah, every time I do an interview. And I get this question, II say the same thing. So here it goes. fun. Fact about me is, I have 7 published novels. So I’ve written 7 fiction books. There’s like a a couple years before my first son was born, like once my son was born. This kill killed my fiction writing career. But yeah, it was in a span of like, about 2 years, 2 and a half years. I wrote 7 fiction novels, which, yeah, was pretty cool. Pretty fun at the time, were they? Kind of all part of a series? Was there a common theme to them. Yeah, there were. So there were 5, 5 of them. or 4 of them were standalone. And then there was a trilogy. So yeah, that made up the 7. And what’s like is this like, I don’t even know. Comedy was this like murder? Mystery like, what’s more thriller, thriller mystery. All them are kind of in the thriller mystery category, which is kind of like the movies and shows and books that I like to reader. And so were these all like digitally published. Did you do any? Yeah, I mean, they’re on Amazon and Barnes and noble and apple, and I can buy a physical copy of these books. Yeah, I’ve yeah, I’ve got the physical copies in my basement. There’s probably a box of books. And yeah, I’ve every now and then I’ll like hand them out to coworkers and stuff. So yeah, there’s physical copies now. My name is Ryan Whiteside, but I used a pen name, because I’m super cool writer person like that. So if you search like Ryan Ryan Wiley was my pen name. So if you search Ryan Wiley on Amazon. I think I still come up and search results for some of my books. So you still get some sales from that. Yeah, I get like, yeah, few dollars royalties every year, which it’s actually a pain with my accountant, because, like royalties have to be classified as something else. So it causes like a couple extra emails explaining what this income is, because it has to be like. I don’t know. It’s an accounting problem that they have to deal with.

Anthony (host):  

And what’s what’s the most interesting evolution or innovation that’s happening in your industry right now?

Ryan (guest):

Oh, yeah, I mean, like a lot of industries like AI machine learning, you know, makes makes a huge impact in digital marketing. And I mean, even before, like ChatGPT era, like machine learning. And AI, it was still a pretty big part or impact on what we do. I mean, specifically like you take Facebook ads, for example, something 5 years ago that we as digital marketers, it was super important was to like find the right interest audiences. So if your trying to think of an example

like, if you’re into Catholic books, for example, like in Facebook, you used to have all these targeting options. So you would set people that are interested in Catholicism or people that are interested in the Pope, or people that are interested in Richard Roar. Which is this very popular Catholic author like you had to find all these like very niche pockets and and manually type them in. Whereas now, like more and more, Facebook has just like taken away a lot of the targeting options that you can type in because of privacy. And all these reasons, but also confidence in their algorithms where a lot of the time the targeting we set is what we call catch-all, where it’s just like Facebook. Go after everyone between the age of 21 and 65, and find the audience for me. And that’s all done by AI and machine learning. And you know what we find as like Facebook’s algorithms, just really good. Now, at, you know all the information they have already on your customers. So they yeah, you know, with digital marketing, you can add like a pixel, it’s called a pixel on your website. So they’re tracking you. So they know everyone that’s coming to the website. They know if you purchased or not. They also know other websites you’re visiting. So like Facebook and Google, they have like millions of data points on all these people. And because of that, their algorithm is very smart. So once you say, Hey, Facebook, find this audience who’s most likely to purchase these books. They’re very good at doing that, because they have all all those data points on people.

Anthony (host):  

Right? Yeah. So it used to be like you were saying that. You had to be really good at picking out these individual audiences. And but now with the pixel that tracks everybody Facebook and Google’s algorithm is better than choosing those individual audiences which you don’t even have the ability to do as much anymore. You know you might have to spend a little bit more and add spend, I believe, upfront to to be able to help train the pixel and get some of that data into Google and Facebook so that they know the audience that’s converting. But it’s it’s it’s much more effective in the long term.

Ryan (guest):

Yep, yeah. And yeah, I mean, as far as like digital marketing, we just we kind of have to pivot and what we’re doing so, whereas before we were spending all our time like finding those audiences and keywords and stuff where now we have to focus more of our time on other things because of, you know, some of that’s done for us. So you know, for example, you know, that frees us frees us up to spend more time on talking to the client about like what offer they’re doing like, hey? Maybe we should run this promotion during this time, or you know things like that where maybe before, we wouldn’t have had as much time to to be able to do those things.

Anthony (host):  

Got it? Ryan. You mentioned before that a lot of times in digital marketing, you know, you’re you’ve got some side gigs going on any interesting side gigs or projects that you want to give voice to. No, I don’t.

Ryan (guest):

II really don’t do as much side gigging as I used to. Part of that is just. you know my personal life. I’ve got a 8 year old now, and he keeps me pretty busy, whereas you know Pre Pre Evan, my my son’s name Pre Evan, like I used to wake up at 5 and write some fiction books and do some side work until, like 110’clock on a Saturday or Sunday like it was no problem like 5 h of free time to just, you know, do this type of work, whereas now like we wake up the same time he wants to play soccer in the basement, or go outside, or something which which is great. You know, I definitely wouldn’t change it. So yeah, as far as like side work. Yeah, it’s just yeah. II don’t do it quite nearly as much as I used to.

Anthony (host):  

Evan is your side work now.

Ryan (guest):

Exactly. Yup

Anthony (host):  

I wanna be respectful of your time. But let people know, how can they get in touch with you?

Ryan (guest):

Yeah, I’ll don’t have a big following on Instagram or Tiktok, although I did demo Tiktok videos for a little bit. Yeah, I mean, you could look me up on Linkedin Ryan Whiteside. You can connect with me there. Message, me or yeah, I mean, if you wanna learn about digital marketing stuff. Yeah, you can go to 2 wheels marketing. I also have a few courses on you to me. If you actually want to learn how to do this first hand. You can search for my name on you to me and see some of the courses I’ve done.

Anthony (host):  

That’s U-D-E-M-Y.com

Anthony (host):  

Yeah, Ryan, thanks for making the time. We really appreciate being able to hear your story. That’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories Podcast. Thanks for learning with me today.