David Saxby’s Secrets to Turning Creative Ideas into Business Wins | RR280

Janice Porter: 00:00:02

Music. Hello everyone, and welcome to this

Janice Porter: 00:00:05

week's episode of relationships rule. My guest this week is

Janice Porter: 00:00:09

David Saxby, a fellow Canuck. I love it, and he's got a

Janice Porter: 00:00:13

beautiful background on be which you can't see, but a beautiful

Janice Porter: 00:00:17

background behind him of the the Rockies. I'm thinking because

Janice Porter: 00:00:21

David lives in Calgary, Alberta, so it's very pretty to see that

Janice Porter: 00:00:25

scenery. Welcome to the show, David.

David Saxby: 00:00:28

Good to see you. Janice, thank you for the

David Saxby: 00:00:30

opportunity.

Janice Porter: 00:00:31

Absolutely So. David calls himself an

Janice Porter: 00:00:34

unconventional thinker for unconventional times. I kind of

Janice Porter: 00:00:39

like that. Can you explain that?

David Saxby: 00:00:42

Oh, I think that's been kind of my nature my entire

David Saxby: 00:00:46

life, is that I'm usually contrary to what the mainstream

David Saxby: 00:00:51

is. Even in business, I've done things that people in the same

David Saxby: 00:00:56

industry didn't do or weren't doing, and I think it's just

David Saxby: 00:01:01

part of the creative mind is to be able to think beyond the

David Saxby: 00:01:07

standard sort of thought process of most people. Well,

Janice Porter: 00:01:11

I interviewed a gentleman on my podcast a couple

Janice Porter: 00:01:14

of years ago named Bill Troy, and he I just re aired that

Janice Porter: 00:01:20

episode last month as one of my encore episodes, and he calls

Janice Porter: 00:01:25

himself a contrarian, yes,

David Saxby: 00:01:27

very similar. Yeah, where the idea came from? Okay,

Janice Porter: 00:01:31

okay, so, so, always thinking outside the box,

Janice Porter: 00:01:36

perhaps, right, okay, so as a creative person, okay, so you've

Janice Porter: 00:01:43

actually kind of been in both worlds. I mean, I see that you

Janice Porter: 00:01:47

you and from our conversations previous that you are in the

Janice Porter: 00:01:50

digital world very much. So a lot of your business is done

Janice Porter: 00:01:54

through digital platforms and so on. You've authored three books.

Janice Porter: 00:01:57

That's the creative side you, but you and your newest book is

Janice Porter: 00:02:03

coming out next spring, I think, called Ignite innovative

Janice Porter: 00:02:06

thinking. Is that correct? Yes, still on track to come out next

Janice Porter: 00:02:10

spring?

David Saxby: 00:02:11

Yes, exactly. And it's that came from the concept

David Saxby: 00:02:15

that I always sort of took creativity for granted, ooh,

David Saxby: 00:02:20

because I grew up being a creative kid, and I was always

David Saxby: 00:02:25

involved in art and music and all those sorts of things. So I

David Saxby: 00:02:29

took it for granted. When I got into the ad industry, I started

David Saxby: 00:02:32

to think, what happens if it stops what happens if one day I

David Saxby: 00:02:38

just walk in the advertising agency? I got no ideas. I can't

David Saxby: 00:02:42

figure anything out. And so I started to really study

David Saxby: 00:02:45

creativity, the brain, how we think up ideas, how we can

David Saxby: 00:02:49

execute ideas, and that sort of thing. And it, it helped me with

David Saxby: 00:02:54

my business, because I started out in the creative side of the

David Saxby: 00:02:57

advertising industry, and then I Yeah. Mad Men, exactly, yeah.

David Saxby: 00:03:04

That's, that's more like a reality show for me. It's, I

David Saxby: 00:03:08

watch it, they go, Oh my God, yes. That's the

Janice Porter: 00:03:11

world was like, yeah. It was brilliant, though,

Janice Porter: 00:03:13

that show, it was, it is,

David Saxby: 00:03:15

yeah. And you know, what's interesting is a lot of

David Saxby: 00:03:17

the ads that they put together on that show as part of the

David Saxby: 00:03:20

program were actual ad campaigns. And

Janice Porter: 00:03:24

I think I read, I know we're going aside here, but

Janice Porter: 00:03:27

I love it, because Wasn't it a woman who was the actual I read

Janice Porter: 00:03:34

somewhere, maybe in Vanity Fair, that this woman who was that a

Janice Porter: 00:03:38

big wig in the ad industry, which, by the way, was unheard

Janice Porter: 00:03:41

of really right back in season, whatever. But she was

Janice Porter: 00:03:45

responsible for a lot of those big ads. I'm thinking in my

Janice Porter: 00:03:49

head, Alka Seltzer. I don't know why, but that might have been

Janice Porter: 00:03:52

one of them, plot, plot, because, yeah, there were some

Janice Porter: 00:03:56

others. And I think they, they, they the the base of Mad Men,

Janice Porter: 00:04:02

had some of those things in it. And, and the character, the

Janice Porter: 00:04:05

woman, character that Elizabeth Moss played, was based on this

Janice Porter: 00:04:09

woman. Yes, it was actually, I don't remember her name, but

David Saxby: 00:04:13

do you she was? No, I don't remember her name

David Saxby: 00:04:15

either. You

Janice Porter: 00:04:16

know what I'm talking about. Then Absolutely.

Janice Porter: 00:04:18

Ah, okay, okay. I'm sorry I sidetracked, but that, yeah, so

Janice Porter: 00:04:21

So you so in your study of the industry and of creativity, you

Janice Porter: 00:04:26

probably came across all of this. And so you said that it

Janice Porter: 00:04:30

helps you with your business. But did it? Did your did it help

Janice Porter: 00:04:34

you stay on track creatively and not, you know, thinking like

Janice Porter: 00:04:40

feeling more confident that you weren't going to lose that.

Janice Porter: 00:04:44

Yeah,

David Saxby: 00:04:45

and for me, it was like creativity when I was

David Saxby: 00:04:50

growing up came pretty naturally, but I realized that

David Saxby: 00:04:55

there are ways of prompting creativity. There's ways of

David Saxby: 00:04:59

being able to. Feed creativity. And then as I got into business,

David Saxby: 00:05:03

I started out on the creative side, like I mentioned, then I

David Saxby: 00:05:06

moved into an ad agency, so you had to have both the creative

David Saxby: 00:05:11

side, or the right brain thinking, along with the logical

David Saxby: 00:05:15

linear side, which was being able to plan campaigns and

David Saxby: 00:05:18

organize and all of that sort of thing. And then at that point, I

David Saxby: 00:05:22

realized that there was a lot of creativity in the business of

David Saxby: 00:05:27

advertising, but the challenge became, if it wasn't tied to

David Saxby: 00:05:33

strategy, then it was just a great idea, but had no traction.

Janice Porter: 00:05:40

Example, well,

David Saxby: 00:05:43

yeah, I'm just trying to think of one. The

David Saxby: 00:05:46

challenge, being, in a lot of cases, is, is that businesses

David Saxby: 00:05:50

came up with ideas that didn't gain traction. Actually, a good

David Saxby: 00:05:53

example, I don't know if you're familiar with Quiznos. They were

David Saxby: 00:05:58

a sandwich maker, yes, and they came up with an idea based on

David Saxby: 00:06:02

the fact that they observed subway, right? And subway didn't

David Saxby: 00:06:09

have ovens. So quiznus came along and said, Well, if we cook

David Saxby: 00:06:13

the sandwiches, if we toast the sandwiches, people buy it

David Saxby: 00:06:17

because they like warm meals, right? Great, creative idea,

David Saxby: 00:06:21

right?

Janice Porter: 00:06:22

Wasn't it? Wasn't it a Canadian company?

David Saxby: 00:06:25

I don't recall. I think it is an American company

David Saxby: 00:06:29

franchised in Canada, okay, but what was interesting about that

David Saxby: 00:06:33

is they found a loophole that gave them a bit of traction in

David Saxby: 00:06:37

the industry. The challenge with it is they hadn't thought the

David Saxby: 00:06:41

strategy out very well, because all subway had to do was supply

David Saxby: 00:06:44

all their franchisees with an oven, and kuznos was toast, no.

David Saxby: 00:06:53

And, and so in that circumstance, then they realized

David Saxby: 00:06:58

that, oh, they're not getting the traction they expected in

David Saxby: 00:07:01

the marketplace, subway was still the number one franchise.

David Saxby: 00:07:04

So then they came along with these really wacky ad campaigns

David Saxby: 00:07:08

with his ugly looking character with a hat on. Oh, it. It was

David Saxby: 00:07:16

actually very like looking at the characters going, Oh my God,

David Saxby: 00:07:19

that's ugly, yeah. So, yeah. So anybody thinking about getting a

David Saxby: 00:07:24

sandwich, all they could think of is this character, yeah. And,

David Saxby: 00:07:31

and from there, they lost a lot of traction in the market. So

David Saxby: 00:07:36

creative idea, you know, they found a loophole they could, you

David Saxby: 00:07:39

know, saturate the market for what they were trying to do. But

David Saxby: 00:07:44

they couldn't carry it out any further. And then they started

David Saxby: 00:07:47

doing really crazy ad campaigns that, you know, were, were not

David Saxby: 00:07:52

well thought up. Let's

Janice Porter: 00:07:53

put it that way, right? And so it didn't. So they

Janice Porter: 00:07:55

died, basically, yeah, yeah.

David Saxby: 00:07:58

Well, and one of the franchise when one of the

David Saxby: 00:08:01

franchisers who owned several stores actually got so

David Saxby: 00:08:05

frustrated with Quiznos and everything going on that he

David Saxby: 00:08:10

committed suicide. Oh, dear, yeah, so I mean sad story, and,

David Saxby: 00:08:14

you know, again, an example of creativity, but not being

David Saxby: 00:08:18

carried through thinking strategy. They weren't thinking,

David Saxby: 00:08:23

Okay, interesting anyway, so a little bit of a Segway, but

Janice Porter: 00:08:27

that's interesting. So do you feel that

Janice Porter: 00:08:32

the work that you do in your company spark communications

Janice Porter: 00:08:37

allows you to create, to be still the creative?

David Saxby: 00:08:42

Yeah, i i My focus is still coming up with

David Saxby: 00:08:48

innovative ideas, and that's another thing. I talk more about

David Saxby: 00:08:51

innovation than I do about creativity, because creativity

David Saxby: 00:08:54

is a component of innovation, but innovation is creative plus

David Saxby: 00:09:00

execution, okay for implementation.

Janice Porter: 00:09:03

So tell, tell my audience a little bit about

Janice Porter: 00:09:07

Spark communications, because I have here in my notes that you

Janice Porter: 00:09:11

help businesses create a strategic advantage over your

Janice Porter: 00:09:16

their competitors by developing in innovative marketing

Janice Porter: 00:09:20

strategies which, which is basically what you just said,

Janice Porter: 00:09:23

and you have that that added advantage of having that

Janice Porter: 00:09:31

creative background, I think, when you're talking to business

Janice Porter: 00:09:34

owners about their marketing that a lot of marketers don't

Janice Porter: 00:09:37

have, if that makes sense, because they're not All ad

Janice Porter: 00:09:41

people. They're not all people who've created those kinds of

Janice Porter: 00:09:43

things. So tell me what your secret sauce is with with Spark

Janice Porter: 00:09:48

communications with your clients.

David Saxby: 00:09:52

Well, I think, as I mentioned to you while ago, we

David Saxby: 00:09:56

have a I have a formula that I kind of follow when it comes. To

David Saxby: 00:10:00

working with clients, so that the first part of the formula is

David Saxby: 00:10:03

strategy first, not tactics. And a lot of businesses make the

David Saxby: 00:10:08

mistake is they go out and they do all these things, and then

David Saxby: 00:10:10

they go, oh, that didn't work, or this worked and that didn't

David Saxby: 00:10:15

work. So if you have the right strategy, the tactics fall into

David Saxby: 00:10:19

place, and then the second part for a second. So

Janice Porter: 00:10:23

I want to make sure I understand it, because I

Janice Porter: 00:10:25

know we're building up the word spark with the things that you

Janice Porter: 00:10:28

do. So the strategy, and I'm just going to pull it a little

Janice Porter: 00:10:33

bit for a second to relationships rule, okay, this,

Janice Porter: 00:10:39

I would think has, have you already got an idea, or are you

Janice Porter: 00:10:44

thinking first, okay, this is the type of business it is, and

Janice Porter: 00:10:48

so with it being, say, an online business or or a brick and

Janice Porter: 00:10:53

mortar business, the strategy will be different as to how we

Janice Porter: 00:10:58

promote this business, or how we market this business, absolutely

Janice Porter: 00:11:02

okay. So strategy first, we haven't come up with the ideas

Janice Porter: 00:11:06

yet for you

David Saxby: 00:11:07

and the strategy, strategy actually comes from me,

David Saxby: 00:11:12

observing the industry, looking at, you know, the trends going

David Saxby: 00:11:16

on in the industry, the competitors that are in the

David Saxby: 00:11:19

industry, and literally looking for gaps, okay, looking at what

David Saxby: 00:11:24

the competitors are doing, and going, Okay, where is the gap?

David Saxby: 00:11:29

Okay? And so when I find the gap, that becomes an opportunity

David Saxby: 00:11:34

to strategically enter the industry. For the business, and

David Saxby: 00:11:38

for a lot of businesses, they're commodities. You know, you look

David Saxby: 00:11:42

at Pizza joints, every corner you look on in the city is a

David Saxby: 00:11:45

pizza joint. So what makes one different from another one?

Janice Porter: 00:11:49

Okay? And so that's where you start. Okay

Janice Porter: 00:11:51

with strategy. Okay, go ahead. So

David Saxby: 00:11:55

then the second part is positioning. And so

David Saxby: 00:11:59

there's an expression that came from the two fellows that first

David Saxby: 00:12:03

came up with the concept of positioning recent trout. And

David Saxby: 00:12:08

what they basically say is that it's not what you do to the

David Saxby: 00:12:12

product or service. It's what you do in the mind of the

David Saxby: 00:12:16

customer, sure, perception. It's the perception, exactly and

David Saxby: 00:12:21

people, most of us, have preconceived notions of almost

David Saxby: 00:12:26

everything in the world. Can I

Janice Porter: 00:12:28

give you one that's on my mind right now,

Janice Porter: 00:12:30

that yeah, Rogers and Shaw joined forces? Yeah, so to

Janice Porter: 00:12:36

speak. Ever since Shaw has become Rogers. I have had the

Janice Porter: 00:12:43

worst time with them. I cannot get through. I have an hour and

Janice Porter: 00:12:49

a half to get on, to wait on the phone, to get a customer service

Janice Porter: 00:12:53

agent to help me with the bill that is wrong that I'm trying to

Janice Porter: 00:12:59

write because I'm being a good consumer, and I can't get

Janice Porter: 00:13:02

through to them, and I'm ready to just tear my hair out. So my

Janice Porter: 00:13:07

perception of this thing is so bad right now?

David Saxby: 00:13:12

Yeah, well, here's an interesting story for letting

David Saxby: 00:13:15

me vent. Here's an interesting story. Is before Shaw cable

David Saxby: 00:13:22

became Shaw cable, they were a little company called capital

David Saxby: 00:13:27

cable. They had eight stations in Western Canada, and I was

David Saxby: 00:13:33

connected with them through a fellow I knew, through a

David Saxby: 00:13:36

volunteer organization, and I became their first kind of

David Saxby: 00:13:41

marketing consultant, yeah. So they were launching their

David Saxby: 00:13:46

company and going public and becoming Shaw cable.

Janice Porter: 00:13:50

Oh, you were with Shaw, that's right, I forgot,

Janice Porter: 00:13:52

yeah. So

David Saxby: 00:13:54

when that happened, the first thing that they were

David Saxby: 00:13:57

going to do is they were going to put together their annual

David Saxby: 00:13:59

report and send it out to potential investors, okay? And

David Saxby: 00:14:04

so I was put in touch with the accountant, and he said, Yeah,

David Saxby: 00:14:06

we're just going to take the financial statement, we'll slap

David Saxby: 00:14:10

a cover on it and stick it in an envelope and mail it out. And I

David Saxby: 00:14:13

said, No, do not do that, right? And so we went through a

David Saxby: 00:14:19

process, and I told them, you know, basically, I said to him,

David Saxby: 00:14:23

what we need to do is we need to tell the story, and we need to

David Saxby: 00:14:27

package the story in the way that's going to get these high

David Saxby: 00:14:30

value investors intrigued and interested in investing in the

David Saxby: 00:14:35

company. Oh, no, we're just going to send out financial

David Saxby: 00:14:38

statements. I got a budget of $2,000 yeah. That include

David Saxby: 00:14:42

Bailey, yeah, yeah. So that started out, and the first thing

David Saxby: 00:14:46

that happened when we we built a proper Annual Report with a nice

David Saxby: 00:14:49

cover on it and background story and so on, is that some of these

David Saxby: 00:14:54

very high end investors, and we're talking, you know,

David Saxby: 00:14:57

millions and millions of dollars very well. A few people wrote a

David Saxby: 00:15:01

note back to Jim Shaw and said, fantastic. This is great.

David Saxby: 00:15:05

Congratulations on the launch of your company. We look forward to

David Saxby: 00:15:08

next year. And Jim and I had a conversation after that, and

David Saxby: 00:15:14

every year after that, my would meet with the VP, and Jim would

David Saxby: 00:15:18

pop into the meetings. And what are you planning for this year's

David Saxby: 00:15:21

annual report? And so we grew the company literally by telling

David Saxby: 00:15:26

the story of what was going on,

Janice Porter: 00:15:29

so interesting that I would have to

David Saxby: 00:15:32

vote today. That's so and this, this is even more

David Saxby: 00:15:36

interesting is that back when all the specialty channels

David Saxby: 00:15:39

launched, this is the late 80s, early 90s. The specialty

David Saxby: 00:15:44

channels weren't getting enough traction in the market, and

David Saxby: 00:15:46

there was a fear that they were all going to go broke. So the

David Saxby: 00:15:49

CRTC, the regulating body, said to the cable companies, you have

David Saxby: 00:15:55

to take on these companies and sell them to your subscribers.

David Saxby: 00:15:59

So literally, they forced them to take over marketing,

David Saxby: 00:16:03

especially companies. So we did a campaign for Shaw to launch

David Saxby: 00:16:07

this. And basically what we did was what was called a negative

David Saxby: 00:16:11

option campaign. And what that meant is, you got this package.

David Saxby: 00:16:16

We're sending out information about these specialty channels.

David Saxby: 00:16:20

If you're interested in having these specialty channels, you

David Saxby: 00:16:23

don't need to do anything. I

Janice Porter: 00:16:24

hated that negative campaign. You don't

Janice Porter: 00:16:27

want them cancel them. Yeah.

David Saxby: 00:16:30

So anyway that that gained great traction, we had a

David Saxby: 00:16:33

94% subscription rate by default. Rogers came along just

David Saxby: 00:16:43

shortly after that with the same kind of campaign, and miserably

David Saxby: 00:16:47

failed and had to restart their campaign. So

Janice Porter: 00:16:51

what was the difference?

David Saxby: 00:16:53

Just how they approached it, the message and

David Saxby: 00:16:58

literally, how they strategized him. Okay, so we personalized.

David Saxby: 00:17:03

And this is, this is really something was quite unheard of

David Saxby: 00:17:07

at the time. And this is kind of when my my brain, went into the

David Saxby: 00:17:10

innovative mode. Yes, was we personalized every single

David Saxby: 00:17:15

person's letter. And in those days, in the early 80s, that was

David Saxby: 00:17:19

almost impossible. We went to Canada Post and said, Here's

David Saxby: 00:17:22

what we want to do. And they said, we don't think we could do

David Saxby: 00:17:25

it. Mail Merge. Yes, exactly, yeah. And in those days, it was

David Saxby: 00:17:29

done on a mainframe computer, I know. Oh my goodness. So we had

David Saxby: 00:17:33

606 100 and some odd 1000 personalized letters went out.

David Saxby: 00:17:39

Okay,

Janice Porter: 00:17:40

so I'm going to come back to the Shaw Rogers

Janice Porter: 00:17:42

thing later. Yeah, strategy, positioning,

David Saxby: 00:17:47

positioning, yeah. So positioning is, it's, it's

David Saxby: 00:17:50

how we, in the mind of the customer, got them to buy into

David Saxby: 00:17:55

the concept. And the billboard advertising we had, and the

David Saxby: 00:17:58

other promotion we did, we had a picture of a silver platter, you

David Saxby: 00:18:04

know, that they use for catering. And it said, think of

David Saxby: 00:18:09

it as a smorgasbord. In other words, you've got all these

David Saxby: 00:18:12

options. You don't have to eat everything at once.

Janice Porter: 00:18:15

Okay, so perception was part of that

Janice Porter: 00:18:18

positioning we come to attracting attention? I think,

David Saxby: 00:18:22

yeah, so an attracting attention is really

David Saxby: 00:18:25

about, you know, what's your message? What's the media that

David Saxby: 00:18:29

you transfer your message through? And it has to be a

David Saxby: 00:18:34

place where your customers are. So the target market, and the

David Saxby: 00:18:38

concept behind that is that the media will kind of pop up or

David Saxby: 00:18:44

come up as you think of how you're going to communicate with

David Saxby: 00:18:48

your customers, because nowadays we can research where people go

David Saxby: 00:18:53

and find information, whether it's Google or they're going on

David Saxby: 00:18:56

to paid ads or they're on TV or radio or print, or whatever

David Saxby: 00:19:02

channel they're going through. So the the concept being, is

David Saxby: 00:19:04

that once you've done that, then it's a matter of figuring out,

David Saxby: 00:19:08

okay, how can we deliver a message effectively? So there's

David Saxby: 00:19:12

a there's a rule in the billboard industry way back

David Saxby: 00:19:15

when, and that was basically an effective billboard with six to

David Saxby: 00:19:20

eight words and an image, that's all you had to work with. Now

David Saxby: 00:19:24

that's a slide. Yes, exactly, yeah. So the medium changes, but

David Saxby: 00:19:29

the message doesn't, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and then at that

David Saxby: 00:19:33

point, it's a matter of moving to the next stage, which is the

David Saxby: 00:19:36

resources. And what that simply means is that you've got only a

David Saxby: 00:19:41

handful of resources. One is people, the other one was time,

David Saxby: 00:19:46

and the third one is your media selection. So if you have the

David Saxby: 00:19:51

people, you can do the work marketing wise, internally, but

David Saxby: 00:19:54

they need to know what they're doing, and they need to

David Saxby: 00:19:56

understand the whole concept of marketing. Uh. If you have the

David Saxby: 00:20:00

time, you can hire a consultant, or you can hire a marketing firm

David Saxby: 00:20:05

and pay them. But in a lot of cases, people do the opposite.

David Saxby: 00:20:10

They figure, oh, we got lots of people. We have no clue what

David Saxby: 00:20:12

we're doing, but we'll just use enough people to clobber the

David Saxby: 00:20:17

internet with messages,

Janice Porter: 00:20:20

yes, yes, okay, the last one, okay, yeah,

David Saxby: 00:20:27

and that's about keeping the keeping your

David Saxby: 00:20:31

competitive edge. What? What I mean by that is just simply

David Saxby: 00:20:34

continuing to market. So some businesses are all year round.

David Saxby: 00:20:38

Some businesses are seasonal, so you need to be able to continue

David Saxby: 00:20:42

being competitive in the market by, you know, adjusting your

David Saxby: 00:20:46

budget, adjusting your messaging, determining when the

David Saxby: 00:20:50

biggest share of your market's available. So online as an

David Saxby: 00:20:53

example. And if you look at LinkedIn, a lot of businesses

David Saxby: 00:20:58

are online in the daytime, right? And, you know, generally,

David Saxby: 00:21:03

Tuesday, Wednesdays are the best dates of the week to put

David Saxby: 00:21:07

messages out on LinkedIn, right? Yeah. So the concept with that

David Saxby: 00:21:13

is that, if you're doing marketing correctly, it's an

David Saxby: 00:21:17

investment, well, incorrectly, it's a cost,

Janice Porter: 00:21:22

Okay, fair enough. I do think, yeah, you're

Janice Porter: 00:21:24

talking about paid ads on LinkedIn, as opposed to posting

Janice Porter: 00:21:27

and things like that, right?

David Saxby: 00:21:29

Oh, no, same, same thing. Okay,

Janice Porter: 00:21:31

I think today, I really do think that there's

Janice Porter: 00:21:36

people online all the time, all around the world, so absolutely,

Janice Porter: 00:21:40

yeah, it really does depend on your audience, and whether it's

Janice Porter: 00:21:44

global or whether it's local, and so forth as well. Because I

Janice Porter: 00:21:48

think we get a bit too hung up on that myself, but maybe bigger

Janice Porter: 00:21:51

companies would have to pay more attention to that. I don't know.

Janice Porter: 00:21:54

Well,

David Saxby: 00:21:55

yeah, and it's also, you know, what's your

David Saxby: 00:21:58

industry doing? You take the construction industry, yeah,

David Saxby: 00:22:02

what are they doing the warm season? They're going 24/7,

David Saxby: 00:22:07

right? They're trying to make as much money and do as much work

David Saxby: 00:22:10

as they can, right? So on the shoulder seasons, when they're

David Saxby: 00:22:13

ramping up particularly, I mean, you look at Alberta in BC they

David Saxby: 00:22:17

can pretty well work all year round. But in Alberta, there's

David Saxby: 00:22:20

times of the year where deal with weather, yeah, so, so

David Saxby: 00:22:26

that's kind of the formula that I I work to when I'm working

David Saxby: 00:22:29

with clients. As I look at that formula and say, Okay, what's

David Saxby: 00:22:33

going on in their industry? You know, what's their market doing?

David Saxby: 00:22:38

Yeah, and then where do we go from here? Where do we find the

David Saxby: 00:22:41

gap? And so

Janice Porter: 00:22:44

do you think there's one or two common

Janice Porter: 00:22:47

mistakes that that people make in like, what you ask people

Janice Porter: 00:22:54

what their biggest problem might be, or their you know, did? Did

Janice Porter: 00:22:57

the same ones come up all the time?

David Saxby: 00:23:00

I would say generally, yeah. I mean, first

David Saxby: 00:23:03

one is they get the wrong target market and or a lot of

David Saxby: 00:23:07

businesses. So you ask them, who's your target market? They

David Saxby: 00:23:09

go, Oh, everybody, yeah. They have no, yeah, if you got lots

David Saxby: 00:23:13

of money, it could be a roof, yeah, yeah. But that's, that is

David Saxby: 00:23:16

big, okay, yeah. So that's, I think, a big one, the second one

David Saxby: 00:23:22

is confusing messages and and I see this all the time. I work a

David Saxby: 00:23:27

lot with professionals, and I see this all the time that they

David Saxby: 00:23:31

talk from a technical perspective, or they talk from

David Saxby: 00:23:35

industry speak, trying to reach their customers. And you know,

David Saxby: 00:23:38

you look at computer technology, when computers became mainstream

David Saxby: 00:23:42

and people were putting one in their house, you'd go to a

David Saxby: 00:23:45

computer store or a computer sales person, they'd start

David Saxby: 00:23:48

talking bits and bytes and RAM and ROM and yeah, all sorts of

David Saxby: 00:23:52

technical terms, the customers going, Well, can I type on it?

David Saxby: 00:23:55

Yeah, exactly. So that, I think the confusing message part is

David Saxby: 00:24:02

the second 1/3, one is they've got a confusing brand. You know,

David Saxby: 00:24:08

a lot of businesses use their own personal name when they

David Saxby: 00:24:10

start up, you know, a name like Smith. Well, good luck with

David Saxby: 00:24:15

marketing that, because there are hundreds of 1000s of Smiths

David Saxby: 00:24:19

around the world, so the brand isn't attractive. It does not

David Saxby: 00:24:24

have the right message. It doesn't match the thinking and

David Saxby: 00:24:27

the mindset, the preconception of what a business should be.

David Saxby: 00:24:33

They're not consistent. They don't have a process or a

David Saxby: 00:24:35

system. So they're not doing it from a strategic point of view,

David Saxby: 00:24:40

they're just throwing things out and seeing what sticks, and then

David Saxby: 00:24:45

even more so with digital media and technology. Now they're

David Saxby: 00:24:49

doing poor lead generation. They're not using like, you

David Saxby: 00:24:54

know, you work on LinkedIn. They're not using the LinkedIn

David Saxby: 00:24:58

system to be able to generate good. Eves are just fishing.

Janice Porter: 00:25:03

Yeah, a lot. Okay, here's a question for you.

Janice Porter: 00:25:08

Many businesses focus on technology and automation in

Janice Porter: 00:25:11

their marketing. How do you balance the use of technology

Janice Porter: 00:25:15

with the need to build meaningful relationships with

Janice Porter: 00:25:18

customers?

David Saxby: 00:25:20

Oh, yeah, that's an interesting one. I think the

David Saxby: 00:25:27

first thought should always be, what's my customer thinking?

David Saxby: 00:25:34

What's my customer doing? Where does my customer hang out? So

David Saxby: 00:25:38

the relationship part comes from understanding the psychology of

David Saxby: 00:25:44

the customer, understanding that sociology, that's how the group

David Saxby: 00:25:48

thinks the the segment of the market, yeah, and and then

David Saxby: 00:25:52

figuring out the demographics behind that market. And there's

David Saxby: 00:25:57

an interesting book came out called pre suasion. I don't know

David Saxby: 00:26:01

if you've ever read it, but titles cover, yeah, and it's all

David Saxby: 00:26:05

about how we influence and persuade customers to buy. And

David Saxby: 00:26:10

the first book that it's Robert chial, chill, chill Dini, I

David Saxby: 00:26:15

think it is,

Janice Porter: 00:26:16

oh, C, I a, l, yeah. You wrote

David Saxby: 00:26:19

a book before that called influence, but what he

David Saxby: 00:26:22

realized was that when it comes to relationships and working

David Saxby: 00:26:28

with people and trying to give people to buy into a concept or

David Saxby: 00:26:33

a marketing campaign or whatever it is, it all begins with

David Saxby: 00:26:36

preparing the audience's mind to receive the message. So the the

David Saxby: 00:26:44

challenge there is that there's so much clutter going on in our

David Saxby: 00:26:47

heads that, you know, how do we cut through? How do we cut

David Saxby: 00:26:51

through that clutter? So, it's about timing. It's about

David Saxby: 00:26:54

creating associations with pre, pre seed or perceptions. It's

David Saxby: 00:27:00

about framing the concept, the idea, it's about building trust

David Saxby: 00:27:06

and connection.

Janice Porter: 00:27:07

So do you think, though, that that's done better

Janice Porter: 00:27:11

today, online or in person or face, face to face? Well, face

Janice Porter: 00:27:19

to face, like even if it's like this, not just, not necessarily

Janice Porter: 00:27:22

in person, but telephone, I mean, that's it's an old

Janice Porter: 00:27:26

fashioned tool, but I think it's coming back.

David Saxby: 00:27:29

Well, yeah, and there's in the sales process, or

David Saxby: 00:27:32

in in selling, one of the things that's challenging for

David Saxby: 00:27:38

salespeople is if they can't see the person. So on screen, we're

David Saxby: 00:27:44

seeing about this much of us, so if they can't see the person,

David Saxby: 00:27:48

they don't know how to read, how the customers understanding the

David Saxby: 00:27:53

information. And so in language, using language, salespeople can

David Saxby: 00:28:00

break through that lack of visual perception by

David Saxby: 00:28:04

understanding the language of the people and what they're

David Saxby: 00:28:07

saying and the gaps in in the messaging so and a lot of that

David Saxby: 00:28:13

has to do with what's called neuro linguistic program

David Saxby: 00:28:15

program, right? And so most sales people, they just, you

David Saxby: 00:28:20

know, they hear something, they take it for granted, or they

David Saxby: 00:28:23

take it literally. But in some cases, and if you're dealing

David Saxby: 00:28:27

with different personality styles, what people say and what

David Saxby: 00:28:31

people are actually thinking and doing are different perceptions,

David Saxby: 00:28:36

different so in a relationship situation, the context is also a

David Saxby: 00:28:43

factor. Yes, yes, right. So it's and, you know, we even when we

David Saxby: 00:28:49

went from face to face selling to online doing zoom calls,

David Saxby: 00:28:55

again, we don't know. All we could see is this much of a

David Saxby: 00:28:58

person. We don't know what they're doing. They could be

David Saxby: 00:29:00

sitting there in their underwear, and we have no clue,

David Saxby: 00:29:03

but that's okay.

Janice Porter: 00:29:04

Who cares? Yeah, exactly.

Janice Porter: 00:29:06

It's just, it's, how do you how are it's whether you have the

Janice Porter: 00:29:11

ability to relate through the screen. That's exactly it,

Janice Porter: 00:29:16

right? Yeah, and that has never bothered me, but I'm, always I

Janice Porter: 00:29:21

guess I'm of the generation that the first tool that I would ever

Janice Porter: 00:29:27

choose would be to pick up the phone, because that's how I grew

Janice Porter: 00:29:30

up. And I had a funny story my little granddaughter, who's

Janice Porter: 00:29:34

five, she called us the other night on FaceTime, or my my

Janice Porter: 00:29:39

daughter called on FaceTime, and my granddaughter wanted to talk,

Janice Porter: 00:29:43

but when we came and said, Hi, how are you, she had a play

Janice Porter: 00:29:47

phone up to her ear, and she said, Could you call me back?

Janice Porter: 00:29:53

I'm on another call.

David Saxby: 00:29:54

Yeah, that's funny. I

Janice Porter: 00:29:57

was like, what could you call me? Back. I'm on

Janice Porter: 00:30:00

another call, and then I just saw a picture of her. She got

Janice Porter: 00:30:03

herself dressed, and she has her phone in her pocket.

David Saxby: 00:30:07

Hilarious. Wow,

Janice Porter: 00:30:09

yeah, so it Yeah. Anyway, I want to switch gears

Janice Porter: 00:30:13

for a second, because I feel that you are a a master speaker

Janice Porter: 00:30:20

in that you were one of the founding members of your chapter

Janice Porter: 00:30:25

of caps, which is the Canadian version of Canadian Association

Janice Porter: 00:30:30

of Professional speakers. And I am in awe of people who have

Janice Porter: 00:30:37

done a lot of speaking and have been part of that organization,

Janice Porter: 00:30:42

because it takes a lot to do the kind of you know, to get paid

Janice Porter: 00:30:45

for speaking and things like that. But are you still involved

Janice Porter: 00:30:49

with them at all?

David Saxby: 00:30:51

Oh, very much. So yeah, I'm not on a board

David Saxby: 00:30:54

anymore, right? I probably spent about eight years in my my

David Saxby: 00:30:58

career as a board member in some level, okay, and became the

David Saxby: 00:31:02

president. And, yeah, yeah.

Janice Porter: 00:31:04

And so, how would that? How would you say that has

Janice Porter: 00:31:07

been beneficial in your career?

David Saxby: 00:31:12

Oh, well, you know, it's interesting. I started out

David Saxby: 00:31:16

having a pure public speaking.

Janice Porter: 00:31:18

I was actually, Oh, you did okay.

David Saxby: 00:31:20

Oh yeah, yeah. When I was growing up, I had two

David Saxby: 00:31:22

thoughts about careers. One was advertising, yeah. The other one

David Saxby: 00:31:26

was being a professional musician. Mm, hmm. So I was

David Saxby: 00:31:30

literally going to music school, and I was I was signing up for

David Saxby: 00:31:34

college to learn about the advertising business in the

David Saxby: 00:31:37

industry, and I had a group of students I was teaching in

David Saxby: 00:31:42

music. We went to a festival like the Kiwanis festival.

Janice Porter: 00:31:47

What did you what instrument did you play?

David Saxby: 00:31:50

Guitar? Okay. Anyway, the night before the the

David Saxby: 00:31:54

competition, the band that I was training to perform the guitar

David Saxby: 00:32:01

player phoned me up and said, we can't go. And I said, Why is

David Saxby: 00:32:04

that our singers lost her voice, his voice, I should say. And I

David Saxby: 00:32:09

said, Oh, well, that's going to be a problem. And they said, You

David Saxby: 00:32:13

have to sing for us. Ah, and I had never sung in front of 650

David Saxby: 00:32:18

people in my life, but they

Janice Porter: 00:32:20

knew that you could sing like that was, that

Janice Porter: 00:32:22

was, no, they didn't. I mean,

David Saxby: 00:32:24

I would sing, but it was just kind of in the

David Saxby: 00:32:26

studio as we were teaching the kids. So the night before I went

David Saxby: 00:32:31

home, memorized the lyrics. We went up to the event. It was up

David Saxby: 00:32:35

in Edmonton. We got up on stage together and started singing. I

David Saxby: 00:32:41

started singing and playing. They they were playing guitar. I

David Saxby: 00:32:44

didn't play guitar for that, the power cut. All that was left was

David Saxby: 00:32:50

my voice and a set of drums that we're doing back in the USSR by

David Saxby: 00:32:55

the Beatles. When I walked off that stage and I said, Screw

David Saxby: 00:32:59

this music business I can't do. It's way too stressful. Oh, my

David Saxby: 00:33:04

goodness, would not get on a stage again. Then I got into

David Saxby: 00:33:08

business, and I went, Okay every night before I have to do a

David Saxby: 00:33:12

major presentation, I was talking to guys that were old

David Saxby: 00:33:14

enough to be my dad or granddad, about parting with millions of

David Saxby: 00:33:18

dollars of ad campaigns and I would be sweating bullets a

David Saxby: 00:33:23

night before I'd show up and as best as I could present, and

David Saxby: 00:33:27

most of the time it went well, but I said, Okay, I can't deal

David Saxby: 00:33:31

with this. I I've got to learn how to do presentations. So I

David Saxby: 00:33:35

joined a group called The JCS Junior Chamber of Commerce. They

David Saxby: 00:33:38

had an eight week program, yeah, and I went through that program

David Saxby: 00:33:43

and learned, you know, what it takes to put together

David Saxby: 00:33:46

professional presentations. And what was interesting is, when I

David Saxby: 00:33:50

first went in, I said, the guy leading the program, I said, I'm

David Saxby: 00:33:53

just sitting at the back here taking notes. And of course,

David Saxby: 00:33:58

who's the first guy he picked on? Yeah. And when we finished

David Saxby: 00:34:02

the program, he said, I want you to lead the next one. And I

David Saxby: 00:34:06

looked at him, I said, No, I got my notes. I'm good. I'm out of

David Saxby: 00:34:08

here. He said, No, I'd like you to leave the next one. I said,

David Saxby: 00:34:11

No, we're not doing it. And he said, How about you and I lead

David Saxby: 00:34:14

it together? So I said, Okay, well, yeah, we can do that. So

David Saxby: 00:34:18

we led the program together. The next year he came back and he

David Saxby: 00:34:21

said, I'd like you to lead the next program. Interesting. And I

David Saxby: 00:34:25

said, we already had that conversation. Yeah, I got my

David Saxby: 00:34:29

notes. I tried it once I'm out of here, I'm good. And he says,

David Saxby: 00:34:32

Well, no, you have to. I mean, I have to. And he said, you're the

David Saxby: 00:34:37

only guy that knows the program I'm leaving the country. And

David Saxby: 00:34:41

that was my introduction to speaking. So I did training for

David Saxby: 00:34:45

volunteers and and through the through the group. And then I

David Saxby: 00:34:50

got people asking me, would you come out and do a presentation

David Saxby: 00:34:53

for our business or not for profit organization? And started

David Saxby: 00:34:58

to do that. And. Then the next thing, one day, I woke up, just

David Saxby: 00:35:02

shortly after I had the marketing the advertising agency

David Saxby: 00:35:06

went, you know, I could probably get some clients if I went out

David Saxby: 00:35:09

and did presentations, right? So started doing that, and, of

David Saxby: 00:35:13

course, attracting clients. And that's how I built the marketing

David Saxby: 00:35:17

firm. Sure,

Janice Porter: 00:35:18

interesting and and, of course, you're, you are

Janice Porter: 00:35:24

a doer, obviously, because once you got involved, then you had

Janice Porter: 00:35:29

to get involved, right? Like, yeah, that was interesting. Um,

Janice Porter: 00:35:34

no, it's fascinating. I, I've dabbled a little bit early on in

Janice Porter: 00:35:39

Toastmasters, and I have experienced a little bit of caps

Janice Porter: 00:35:44

in Vancouver. They have a pretty strong group here, but yeah, and

Janice Porter: 00:35:47

I have spoken on big on bigger stages, but I never had any

Janice Porter: 00:35:51

training. And so I think the piece that's missing for me is

Janice Porter: 00:35:55

how to tell a story properly, and that I know is is so

Janice Porter: 00:35:58

important in speaking on stage. So

David Saxby: 00:36:03

story is a big part of it. And actually, you know,

David Saxby: 00:36:06

flipping back to the whole aspect of marketing and

David Saxby: 00:36:08

advertising is used to be, if you had a catchy slogan and a

David Saxby: 00:36:13

brand, you could get traction in the market. People buy your

David Saxby: 00:36:16

product or service. But now it's more about telling the brand

David Saxby: 00:36:20

story. Yeah, you know Simon cynics, yeah. Why? Why? He's all

David Saxby: 00:36:25

about why are you in business? Why are you doing what you do?

David Saxby: 00:36:29

Yeah, why do you sell what you sell? And it's telling the story

David Saxby: 00:36:33

of how that came about, or why your business does what it does.

David Saxby: 00:36:37

Mm, hmm, yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:36:39

yeah. Times have changed, but we also have a lot

Janice Porter: 00:36:42

more competition. There's a lot more information thrown at us

Janice Porter: 00:36:45

daily as well, and all this stuff. So we have to, we have to

Janice Porter: 00:36:48

be, I think, stand out from the crowd, being sincere and being

Janice Porter: 00:36:56

caring. I really think that that, that, to me, is the major

Janice Porter: 00:37:01

difference. I had it. I'm not going to go into it. I'll tell

Janice Porter: 00:37:04

you another time, but I customer service, for me is so vital, and

Janice Porter: 00:37:10

when I come across customer service that isn't they don't

Janice Porter: 00:37:14

care, it drives me insane. We just had a 10 day vacation. We

Janice Porter: 00:37:19

stayed at this really cool boutique hotel in North

Janice Porter: 00:37:23

Hollywood. And yes, it's a really cool hotel. And every

Janice Porter: 00:37:28

person that I came across there that worked at that hotel was so

Janice Porter: 00:37:32

good they'd step out of the way if you were going to the

Janice Porter: 00:37:35

elevator. They wouldn't get on with their big carts with you.

Janice Porter: 00:37:38

They'd always wait. They'd say, how are you? They'd be it was

Janice Porter: 00:37:41

all every single person was. Was that's what you want. You want

Janice Porter: 00:37:45

that feeling absolutely that you're being cared for. Anyway,

Janice Porter: 00:37:49

we talk for hours, and I have to wrap this up, because time is of

Janice Porter: 00:37:53

the essence. Here, fabulous to speak to you today. You have a

Janice Porter: 00:37:59

free ebook. I understand that people can access, and I need to

Janice Porter: 00:38:04

make sure I have the link so I can put it in the show notes.

Janice Porter: 00:38:06

You want to tell us about it?

David Saxby: 00:38:09

Sure? Yeah. The the ebook is really an overview of

David Saxby: 00:38:13

the things that I do marketing wise. It's called spark

David Saxby: 00:38:17

innovative marketing, yeah, and so it's it basically

David Saxby: 00:38:23

encapsulates a lot of the things that need to be done in the

David Saxby: 00:38:27

process of of developing marketing strategy and then

David Saxby: 00:38:30

carrying it through. And I think the big thing, if I was to leave

David Saxby: 00:38:36

people with anything, is that marketing is a process. It's not

David Saxby: 00:38:40

an event. Most people think, Oh, I did, did something. It's done

David Saxby: 00:38:45

like in Yeah, early on. So it is a process. And in that book, I

David Saxby: 00:38:52

talk about some of the different ways that you know you can be

David Saxby: 00:38:56

effective at marketing and advertising and all of the

David Saxby: 00:38:59

different aspects of marketing. And I think the second thing, in

David Saxby: 00:39:02

conjunction with that is that marketing and sales need to work

David Saxby: 00:39:06

together. I don't know how many businesses I go into, the

David Saxby: 00:39:10

marketing departments one end of the hallway, the sales

David Saxby: 00:39:13

departments at the other, and they pass each other in the

David Saxby: 00:39:15

hallway and don't even talk to each other,

Janice Porter: 00:39:17

and some people who think they're both the same.

Janice Porter: 00:39:19

So have another conversation about that. Another day. I'll

Janice Porter: 00:39:22

bring you back, because I think that's very important. Yeah,

Janice Porter: 00:39:25

yeah, they

David Saxby: 00:39:26

cross over the words marketing and sales and

David Saxby: 00:39:28

branding and throw them all into a mix and understand any of

David Saxby: 00:39:32

them.

Janice Porter: 00:39:33

Yeah, exactly so. And you definitely have the

Janice Porter: 00:39:38

background, have the experience, have the wisdom to help people

Janice Porter: 00:39:42

who are in business today. I know that from talking to you, I

Janice Porter: 00:39:45

know that from looking at your work, and I also feel the the

Janice Porter: 00:39:52

caring that you have for what you do, the passion for what you

Janice Porter: 00:39:55

what you do, and and I'm sure you've helped a lot of people

Janice Porter: 00:39:58

along the way. So. That that will speak to that.

David Saxby: 00:40:04

I'm hoping so, yeah, I've, I've made some plans

David Saxby: 00:40:08

fairly rich. Let's put it that way.

Janice Porter: 00:40:11

Yeah, okay, so they can find you at Spark

Janice Porter: 00:40:14

communications.com, on LinkedIn, on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,

Janice Porter: 00:40:21

and your email, if I may, put in the show notes as well, if

Janice Porter: 00:40:24

people are for sure, yeah, okay. And your free ebook is on your

Janice Porter: 00:40:30

website, on a specific yes

David Saxby: 00:40:32

it is, yeah. And I think I sent you the link as

David Saxby: 00:40:35

well in your

Janice Porter: 00:40:36

well, I'll double check with you after for sure.

Janice Porter: 00:40:38

Yeah. Well, thank you, David. Thank you for being here, thank

Janice Porter: 00:40:41

you for sharing and thank you to my audience again for being

Janice Porter: 00:40:45

here. Remember to stay connected and be remembered.

David Saxby: 00:40:50

Thanks. Jess, you're welcome.