Why People Come Before Profit | RR376

Hello, everyone, and welcome back to this week's

episode of Relationships Rule. Some people learn business in

boardrooms. My guest today, Jared Harmon, learned it on the

ice, behind a bar, and in a family restaurant at the age of

12. Today, he leads the One Group Agency, a full-service

digital marketing firm in Surrey, B.C. that has held onto

roughly 80% of its original clients for nearly a decade, and

I think that's something to be very proud of. That kind of

loyalty doesn't happen by accident. In this episode, Jared

and I are going to talk about what sport, hospitality, and

deep community roots actually teach you about leading people

and why the agencies, businesses, and leaders who last

who last are almost always the ones who put relationships

first. So, welcome to the show, Jared.

Yeah, thanks for having me. Looking forward to

it. Yeah, my pleasure too. So, I know you and

I remember your family's restaurant, mr. Mike's, right?

When I was a kid, yeah. And you started working in your family's

restaurants when you were 12.

Yeah.

What did that early experience teach you about

people that you can still carry with you that you do still carry

with you today, if anything?

Yeah, I mean it's really interesting when you're

you know 12 years old, and you're. I didn't work for mr.

Mike's. We we had mr. Mike's in the Sirliner brand. We had the

two brands, and I started at the Sirliner and and on Granville

Island, which is like a big kind of you know I don't know what

you call like market tourist spot right in Vancouver. Yeah.

Um. So you know, being pretty young, and I was living in a

suburb of the city, so not a ton of time in you know in the big

city and and coming down and getting to experience all

different kind of walks of lives and walks of life and and you

know different people from different places because of the

tourism part too it wasn't just you know local folks obviously

and yeah you you just you just get a really quick lesson in in

how different people you know act and operate and have

different personalities and you know, and and it's also you know

a good lesson in customer service in terms of just you

know one thing in the restaurant world is you kind of always have

to eat crow a little bit and and you know customers always right

especially back in those days and it was a slightly different

mentality so it was it was a really good intro to you know

the world of you know getting along in professional

circumstances, despite you know whatever those situations may

look like.

Yeah, I know that it's funny that you said that.

Like it's different today, but but common courtesies and

showing that you care in those service-based industries are

still so important; they really are. And if you learn them

young, they stay with you. So I think that's that's really good.

I know also that you know your world. You spent your years

spent years in sports. I think hockey in particular,

broadcasting, operating venues, hockey marketing, junior hockey

marketing. When you look back, what did that world give you

that a traditional business education simply could not?

I think the most interesting and maybe most

valuable thing for me was you know working in junior hockey,

and it's changed a little bit, but not much. You know, it was a

you wear 15 hats, right? Like you know, we, you know, at

different times I was responsible for the volunteers

or the billets or the, you know, obviously the sponsor

relationships, game night activations, all those types of

things. And so, you know, someone who grew up really

loving sports and wanting to be a part of it, it was awesome to

be able to take in so many different facets of like what

goes into a game or event night, you know, and it allowed me to

connect again. It's like similar to the restaurant, like

different types and different parts of the community as well,

right? Like you're not just dealing with the corporate

people; you're dealing, you know, like the volunteer base in

junior hockey is a very different demographic. The

billet base is a very different demographic, you know. And then

it also taught me some really, you know, interesting elements

of just business. Like we, you know, we had a souvenir shop

that we had to run, and you know, so we, you know, we had to

pick out the merchandise and price it, and you know, this so

many different facets. And so, you know, for a while, they're

actually like, I didn't, I almost didn't leave because I

just didn't know what part I wanted to focus on, if that

makes sense. And and you know, I originally got the job to do

play by play, which is really what I wanted to do. But you

know, after spending a few years in it, I realized that there is

way more opportunity and way more interesting, you know, job

potential outside of the play by play, and and and that's where I

ended up in marketing.

So, so tell me. I'm guessing that I don't know.

Did you go to college, university?

I did. Do you the University of British Columbia?

You did. Yes. So did I. Yeah. Yeah. But did you

go there for business? Did you go there for sports? I mean, did

we have sports management here? That kind of.

Yeah, I think they did, but no, I went there for

psychology. But but to be totally honest, like I I went

there because like I went to a private school growing up, so it

was just kind of like the natural, like it was the

everybody next step after grade 12 was to go to university. I

think I think like 40 odd kids from my grad class went to UBC

the following year, so I didn't really go there with any

intention, to be honest. I

get it. I totally get it.

And and you know, I had a great experience. You

know, some of the best years of my life for sure. And psychology

just seemed you know somewhat interesting. I I when I was

younger, I had an interest in maybe getting into sports

psychology or or criminology of some kind. So psychology made

sense, and that's really why I pursued it, but no, no, no, like

no training in broadcast or or

yeah, no, that that's that's cool though. I

it's funny because for me as a female, it was yes, you go to

high school. I was in West Vancouver, and everybody went to

university after high school, and but it was also to find a

husband.

Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah,

I know. Weird. Anyway, didn't work. But so

there's a particular kind of accountability that comes from

live sport. No hiding, no replays. The result is what it

is. Just like yesterday in that soccer game. Yeah. How has that

shaped the way you lead your team at one group,

you know. I I think it did a lot for me in the

sense of like learning that you know panic and reactive thinking

is never beneficial to anybody. You know, I used to. It took me

a few years to get to this point, but I used to kind of

have the mantra when I was at the Langley Event Center, of you

know, like they're they're gonna play the game with or without

us. You know, we had responsibilities, obviously, but

at the end of the day, like if if we missed you know an item on

the checklist or you know the pregame prep thing or whatever,

it didn't mean that the game wasn't gonna happen. Like they

were gonna play. It was you know what we did around that game

that made sense, and so that really allowed me to learn how

to like you know take a breath, calm down, even when things get

tough, and and and you know try to analyze the situation before

I react or respond to it. And then you know in terms of how

that translates now with the team at the agency, it's the

same kind of mentality. Like you know bad things are going to

happen, or you know necessarily bad, but like unexpected things

are going to happen. You can't prevent everything. You can be

the most prepared person in the world, and but and you can't

control every aspect. And so, when those things come up, you

know whether it's something as as big as losing a client, or

whether it's just you know something goes wrong on a client

account, or whatever the case may be. It's really it really

taught me to just like I said take a breath, calm down, you

know, look at what the best route forward is, and then and

then make a decision based on trying to be the most effective.

So I think what really interests me is that, as

I mentioned in the intro, that roughly 80% of your original

clients you've maintained those for nine years, nearly nine

years. Most agencies would consider that remarkable. I

think it's remarkable just from a people perspective because

today everything is a blip, right? It goes by so quickly,

and we're not as loyal as we were. In at least, I'm always

loyal. I'm that kind of person, but I grew up. I don't know.

It's always like I want the label that I'm used to. I want

the people around that I'm used to, and it isn't the same

anymore. So I think though that that is very impressive. And

what would you say is actually behind that? A

lot of bribes. No, I think it's just really

focusing on on the relationships. I mean, I

remember we were doing work for a company in LA that had

locations in LA, but the ownership was in Vancouver. So

they and like long term relationships with the senior

management group and the ownership, and so they they

trusted us to go down there and handle their accounts down

there, and I we there were some challenges that went with that

because we're it was it was I think it was our first client

that was like out of market and you know we just weren't really

set up to execute as efficiently as I would say I would want to

in that environment meaning

because it was in the U.S. not in Vancouver, and

you're yeah. We just

we hadn't like all of our clients at that point

were were local, so we we were used to being able to like drive

to the location to grab content and just do do things that were

pretty straightforward in terms of executing. So now all of a

sudden, you know, there's a lot more planning that had to go

into the travel side of things and and the strategy of like

what we were going to do for them, and all and all those

different elements that go along with going to never mind a

different country, even just going to like a different city

or province or state, right? So, and I remember we we had a

couple challenges early on, and I remember saying to their you

know president of operations, who was a friend too, and just

saying, look, like you know. I don't. I've never once believed

we're like the best at what we do. I think we're up there.

Obviously, I think we're really good at what we do. But I said

what I can do and say with confidence is that we will

always do our best for you. And and and I still you know use

that kind of mentality and approach when trying to pitch

new clients. Is you know like the reality of it is, there's a

lot of really good, you know, firms out there. There's a lot

of really good freelancers out there. There's a lot of really

talented people, and like as talented as I know our team is,

like, you know, you're talking, you know, slivers that separate,

you know, in a lot of those different categories, and so,

but you know, the ability to, you know, answer the phone on

the weekend when something is needed, or you know, you know,

have I don't say not have boundaries, but like you know,

have reasonable boundaries that also appreciate and respect the

fact of what our clients are trying to accomplish has gone a

long way. And I think I might have told you this when we first

talked. Like one of the things when I was working for the

hockey team and I was you know selling rank boards and whatnot

and ads to sponsors was like, you know, that type of sales.

Like, it's really hard to, you know, prove ROI for your

clients. And I got to the point where I was like, I think these

people are only renewing their their advertising packages

because they're they just don't want to. You know, I was 2324,

at the time. They don't want to put me in a bad spot because I

had built a relationship and a report them. And I think there's

a lot that can be said to that, you know. And I think, you know,

I was fortunate to my my dad was in sales, so like, you know, I

watched him with his relationships. My grandfather

was in PR and sales, you know, and and same kind of things. I

was able to learn from that generation and and see how much

those friendships and relationships and that mutual

respect that they had with their clients and their customers

meant for them in terms of that long-term development and

success.

Yeah, it's in the blood for sure, definitely. My

next question sort of speaks to this a little bit, but a lot of

agencies talk about being relationship-focused, but the

behavior doesn't always match the language. So you talked

about you know already being genuinely available and

responsive as much as possible, of course. And I assume teach

your your team at the agency to be the same, even on a Friday

night when they're about to leave the office and the phone

rings, kind of thing. But Is it well? This this is a sideline

question. The team that you have at at the the one group have

they been with you a long time? Are they as as bought? Have they

bought into the same thing that comes naturally to you because

that's where it gets difficult. I think.

Yeah, and and to be fair, like one thing I

learned too, being you know having the opportunity to be in

you know leadership or pseudo leader pseudo pseudo leadership

roles from an early age, like you know like I I I was you know

one of there's two of us that ran the Langley Event Center

when I got that job when I was like 27, so I was pretty young,

and but you learn that like you can't expect everybody to have

the same mentality or philosophy as as you do, and so and and so

in saying that, like you've got to create some boundaries that

are acceptable, and I mean the reality of it is like not to

sound like an old guy, but like the younger generation doesn't

necessarily have those same, you know, same ideas. So, but what I

I think what I've focused more on is helping the team

understand, you know, what it's like on the other side of the

equation for our clients. And like in some cases, we have you

know, you know, people who are no different than me, like small

business owners who, you know, they're putting food on the

table for their families with whatever businesses they have,

and so even though it might not seem like a big deal to us, you

know, on Friday night when a social media post doesn't go out

for that client, it's like that's their lifeline, like

that's their livelihood. So it does matter, and so I think it's

just really about trying to help the team understand what it's

like to be in that situation, I mean, the other thing too is, is

like, it's it's understandable if the team looks at me and say,

well, yeah, like it's your business, like you're going to

answer the phone on a Friday night, like I get that, and and

I appreciate that, and I don't necessarily as much as in like

an ideal world to be like, yeah, I want them all to care and love

the business as much as I do, but that's not reality, right?

So, I think helping them understand like where those

limits and boundaries are, and and I do think you know the

policy that we have is that you know if if a client contacts you

at you know whatever time and it's an emergency, then you know

we need to at least make sure someone responds to them,

whether that's person who got the email or the phone call, or

whether that's them passing it off to the team, and if they're

not going to be available, you know, we actually ask our staff

to put it. Even if it's like a Tuesday night at 530, they know

that they're you know they're going out that night, and they

they won't be able to respond, putting an out of office

response on just so that that client knows. Okay, like I can't

get a hold of Jared, but I can get a hold of Matt, and so I

think it's more about that. Like I I don't want. Create this

expectation where the team has to answer the phone or the

email, no matter what. Yeah, but there's certain things that do

justify it, and like those people are trusting us with

their brands and you know spending their money with us,

and there's a certain responsibility that comes with

that.

Definitely. So I know that you still maintain a

lot of community involvement. You probably know a lot of

people. I know we talked about it. We know a lot of people in

common. And do you think that community involvement makes you

a better business leader, or is it more that it keeps you

grounded as a person, or are they the same thing for you, or

do you need one to to counterbalance the hard work in

the other? You know what I mean.

I think I think they're probably one and the

same in a lot of ways. Like I I've I've always believed you

know never you know you never burn a bridge right and and you

know and and try to be humble is the right word when it comes to

I mean that you're inevitably going to have like disagreements

and you know different philosophies in some people but

the same time it just just because you don't agree. There's

things that can be learned, you know, in in those situations,

and and perspectives that could be learned, and and those, you

know, if you're doing your job as like a leader, to go back to

the question, I think it's valuable to always try to

understand those parts of of the equation. That being said, I

think you know, I do think, you know, kind of cliche, but like

the always learning piece is important too. So when you are

able to surround yourself with other people in the community,

there's opportunities to learn that way. But I, you know, I

also think it's important to try to be involved and give back and

like have a presence and and you know not just I don't say take

because like we're you know we're providing services, but

like it's you know it shouldn't always be transactional, right?

And so right, and I'm coming to that, so that's good. Yeah. So,

do

you think though that like for me when I started

out on my own, I didn't know anything about business. I'd

been a teacher, so I mean, what did I know? I didn't even know

how to do a resume to go out on you know get another job, but

one thing that I knew early on was that it was for me was all

about people, and and the more people that I built

relationships with in the business community and networked

with and and got to know and and who got to know me, that helped.

That helped me grow as a person, but also grow in the in the

business community. Oh, you should talk to Janice. She can

help you with that. Do you feel that that's part of what what

you have built as well? Because like, does your business come

from referral a lot?

Yeah, we like almost all of our growth has

been entirely organic. You know, it's just you know, like great

example. Like this morning, I I had a call with a person who

owns a PR firm, and they they reached out like so. Despite

working in similar worlds for a long time, had never we had

never met. We got connected about a year ago, and just we we

needed some PR help with something and so you know and

just you know just being like a normal human being about the

relationship and just being like you know like you know you know

how's your kids like that kind of stuff and and just you know

now we get thought of for when they have an opportunity to like

co bid on something or or whatever the case may be so yeah

I think I think you know it's like anything. Like there's

always going to be more value in in you know the warm lead as

opposed to the cold lead. And so when there's when there's pre

established trust, even if it's indirect, like I think that just

makes people feel better about where they spend their money, or

they you know maybe more importantly than the money is

trust their brand, right? If they don't, you know, you know,

if a friend of a friend has said, "Hey, like, you know, one

group is trustworthy; they're going to work hard for you.

Whatever the whatever the positive feedback is, it just

it's just an easier call to make than like you know, cold calling

for agencies and looking for for quotes, right? And so, I think

that that can go a long way. And I I think it's important always

as a business as a business owner in person, like trying to

like you know keep you know keep that considerate. I think one of

the things that I'm probably most proud about with the team

that we've built is, despite you know generational differences

and all that kind of stuff, like we have like it's a it's it is a

group of like like minded people. Like you know I'm I'm

really comfortable and confident in saying that like it's a it's

they're all really good people and you know, and that you know,

in a small company like ours, should be easy to say, but I

think sometimes it's taken for granted.

Well, I think that's very special, and I think

it takes a lot of work to to build that, and it come and and

I think that people always look to the top to see you know how

that has been right because you're the face of it for sure.

So let's talk about digital marketing. You work in digital

marketing, which can feel like a very transactional space:

impressions, clicks, conversions. You know that ROI

thing is it working? It's really nebulous in some cases. I think

to. Or is that the wrong word? But you know, it's really it it

can be difficult to pinpoint what got the ROI or or not. So

how and for me, like you know, I work in LinkedIn. I don't deal

in the content side very much because I'm about building

relationships with people, and yes, I have to have a presence,

so I have to put up some content. But things have changed

a lot in the LinkedIn front recently as well. But I want to

ask you though, how do you keep the human side of the work

visible when everything is being measured. Like, how do you? I

don't know. It's like, do clients know what they're asking

for? You know, do they know what makes they're relying on you? I

think more than anybody to your company when they come to you to

say, well, you know, I haven't had any success with my content

marketing. I need your help. What can you do for me? Like,

where it's to me, it's very like I said, nebulous, esoteric. It's

like you don't know.

Yeah, I think you know. For us, we always try to

you know. Sorry, to answer your question, do clients. Some

clients do, some clients don't. Some clients come to us and they

have like a pretty clear picture and vision of what they want and

how they want to get there. And you know, a lot of times those

clients are are the easy ones in the sense that like it's you

know like for us like executing a plan is probably the easiest

thing. Like when somebody comes to us with like, hey, this is

you know A to Z here, what we want to do. Okay, cool. We just

go do it. Like that's well,

yeah. But hang on a second. If it's sometimes when

people say they know what they want, it isn't necessarily what

they need. So

yeah, and and we do. I always push the team and

say, hey, like it's okay to push back. Like if if a client's

proposing a strategy that we like think is just not going to

work, like I think we owe it to them to say like, hey, like, I

get that you want this, but you know, here, here's what I think

you should do and why, and I think the why is crucial. Like,

you know, you have to say like, hey, like, we're the agency, we

know better. Like, it's like, you know, based on experience,

A, B, C, D, E, like, we think you should do this. Yeah. But

and it's like a, it's such a common conversation for us in

the office because you know, especially like the content team

who have very specific creative ideas and things like that. Like

sometimes clients will come to them with their own ideas, and

our like our team are like, "Oh, like that's like, but like you

know, but you know, at the end of the day, that's the client's

money, client's idea. They want to do it, but but because of

that, though, it is why I push to say to the team like, hey,

like you need to, if you if you see if there's a flag here for

whatever reason or or something that you're worried won't work

or whatever the case may be, you need to flag that because if

you're sitting there watching the client go down this path and

you know that it's not going to end well, and then we do it, we

execute it. It's one thing if we tell them that we think we can

go down the other path, and they still choose to go that path.

Well, at least not that we want to say we told you so, but at

least we can say, hey, like we tried to present another idea

for you. You didn't like it, which is fine. So we executed

what you wanted. But so yeah, we we try to have that conversation

with the clients. But that the Sabra, there are a lot of

clients who come to us and just say, hey, like you guys are the

experts in ABCD, so you know what do you think? And and you

know we obviously still collaborate with them, and it's

not like we just you know take their accounts and run with

them. But but you know I think the big variable there are the

businesses that like have dedicated marketing people or

those who don't. Like because you know I I would say most of

the time when you're talking to clients who have marketing

people on the team, like they do have a good understanding and

like a solid base of like who their audience should be and

what they want. The clients who don't have the ability to like

live in their marketing world all the time because they don't

have a you know a dedicated team or whatever, those are the ones

that like usually are more open to like letting us just like you

know run the playbook and like use what we know and and what we

understand for for to to optimize their their efforts.

Okay, so where do you operate mostly? Are you on

all of the the social media? Do you work in all the social media

platforms, or do your people have different focuses?

Obviously, depending on where the company that you're working

with, where their audience is, or but do you have preferences?

Do what's working these days? Like

depends on the client, right? So like it

depends on the audience you're at, but maybe less of the

client. It depends on the client and the audience they're after,

right? Like there's, you know, in a perfect world, the ability

to, you know, if you're a brand or a product or a service that's

trying to hit multiple different demographics, like being

everywhere is, you know, preferential. But it's only

preferential if you could do all the platforms well, and you

yeah, it's tough to do

that.

Yeah, yes, so. So, like, my first comment is always

like, "There's no there there's no harm done in being on every

platform, right? Like, even if your audience isn't on you know

X or isn't on Facebook, you know, if you're already creating

content for Instagram and TikTok, like it's not going to

like hurt you to also publish those pieces, those assets in

the other channels, but it so it really comes down to like where

you focus the content more so than where you publish it. If

that makes sense,

you mean the topics that you focus on? Is

that what you mean?

No, I mean like like how the copy's written or

how the you know if it's video like how it's optimized. Like is

it you know like the video might be optimized for TikTok but you

still publish it on on X, even just just to get it out there.

But you're not spending time and money, you know, recreating the

content so it's wise for both platforms.

Well, that may work with some of them, but do

you ever work on LinkedIn with LinkedIn?

Yeah, we do. Like we do quite a bit. Depend again,

depend on client. Like if it's B 2b, like that's that's this one.

And I think the the big challenge with LinkedIn is, and

at least what we're what we're seeing is the success of it's

become more about individual content as opposed to business

content. Now that content can be repurposed for the business. The

biggest challenge we have there is like a lot of people don't

want to create the individual content. It's not it's not

comfortable for everybody, right? So

correct.

So that can be hard at times, and the style of

copy and and whatnot that is successful isn't. I don't say

it's not natural, but it's not natural for everybody, right?

And so it's that's where it can be a challenge for to get people

comfortable in that space.

Well, it's it's actually good to hear you say

that because you I I I have heard with other people I've

talked to that you know we'll just put it across all

platforms, including LinkedIn, and LinkedIn is a different

animal and doesn't take that well, right? So it has to be

done differently, and and and that's good to hear. But I do

find it frustrating to hear to think that. You can just put it

out on everything because it's too hard to to to manage, you

know. No,

and when I sorry, when I say that, I mean if

you're putting it on everywhere, like in a ideally you're you are

you know customizing the content for channels, yeah. Like you

don't like like you don't want to just have in a perfect world,

you don't want to have like one caption, one image, and you know

one you know strategy that you just you know pace across each

platform. Some people do that. I don't think it's always going to

hurt necessarily. That's your only option, be it budget or

time. Better than not having you know anything there, but I think

you got to think it through more than that for sure.

So just curious with the clients that you have,

and they they you probably have different levels of of service,

but the full blown clients that they do you do all their social

media content and you do their do you do other is it all

digital that you do like video and and content?

Yeah, we. I mean, we have produced content for

traditional platforms like TV and whatnot. Because I mean,

it's it's funny because like that that world has changed so

much too. There was a time where like you could use the tools

that we use now to create like TV commercials, right? But

that's become a lot easier to do. So we do do some of that at

times. Not a ton, but yeah, we we will do it if needed, or even

audio stuff if necessary.

Okay, so when people trust you and you do the

work for them, are there different levels of of

involvement or engagement from the client? Do they go? Do they

all go and they write their own responses and things like that

to content that's put out there.

Yeah, again, depends on the resources they

have for sure. You know, we we we have packages that include us

handling that for them, and packages that don't. And it just

again, it just depends. Like, you know, we're usually try to

be pretty transparent with clients around you know where

we're best served and not best served, and like you know, on

the engagement end, and like responding to like you know

their inboxes or their their comments online, it's totally

doable. Like you know, we'll do a good job, all that kind of

stuff. But if you have someone in the office who understands

the business at a much higher level, that's going to be more

effective than us doing it for you. And so it's yes. So again,

like that conversation usually is a like, hey, like option A is

we do this, and it's you know the responses are a little bit

more generic, or or sometimes we have to message you to find out

the response, whatever. Therefore, they're a little bit

slower, but it's better than not doing anything.

Of course, yeah.

Or if you have someone internally, you know, an

admin person or a marketing person or just somebody who has

the the capacity to do that, you're going to get better

results doing it yourself.

And it must be interesting because I find

digital media so frustrating because it's like throwing mud

at the wall. I mean, you have to. I don't know. LinkedIn

lately, there's been some talk about instead of having a plan,

instead of having a three month content calendar with the

pillars that you use and you rotate, which is what I try to

do, but I don't do a great job on it. But now it's about forget

that, just post something personal, something real,

something that you know isn't planned out. You're sitting

waiting for a doctor's appointment, and you write a

post and you stick it up there, and you know so it's changing

all the time.

Yeah, and I think one of the things we like always

tell people these days is like don't overthink it, you know. So

media's got such a short, you know, like that one post. The

shelf life is nothing, right? So like, you know, I'll assume that

nobody's planning on posting anything offensive or

derogatory. So like, it's like you really have nothing to lose

if you, you know, trying things out. You never know what's going

to stick. We had a client the other day that posted this

really mundane-looking World Cup schedule. It was easy to read,

easy to follow. I wouldn't even say that they're a place that

people are going to go to watch the games. And they had

something like 33,000 people engage with it, which is like

32,000 more than ever is engaged with anything, right? And it

like it's funny. My my buddy who runs the restaurant texted me

and said, "This is on my eyes. This is the social media, man.

Like this is just the weird things that happen for no

apparent reason.

Reason, yeah.

And and and so, you know, I I can't really

answer that. Like I don't know like what it is, but the

simplest way to answer it would be somebody randomly caught on

to it and shared it with their network, and it just kind of

like you know caught fire you know down that path. What

platform was that on?

Instagram.

Yeah. Okay. Interesting. So it

just and like I said, they're just like they're,

you know, I could stare at that post all day and not have any

idea why why it worked the way it did. But you know those

things happen. Like that's that's the world, right?

Yeah, exactly. So as we wind down here, I wanted I

want to get your opinion. If someone is early in their career

and they're watching how you've built your business and your

life, what's the one thing that you would want them to

understand about why relationships are not just a

nice idea? They are an actual Strategy.

Yeah, you just you just never you know like you're

always going to need help and guidance and mentorship in some

way. And I think I think it's naive to think about it any

differently. And I think you know by building a solid network

of people that you can trust and that can trust you, you're just

always in a better position to get the you know the feed

whether it's feedback good or bad or you know help and advice

that you need to to be successful like you know the

amount of times I've you know called a buddy or that you know

that hey like what did you do when you're in this situation

like you know or what do you think about this you know like

it's it's nice to have it's it's not as nice actually. It's

important to have those sounding boards that that aren't directly

connected to like your day to day in terms of how you manage,

you know, your company and and your business. And I think it'll

go a long way. And from a marketing perspective, it's

crucial too because I think one of the and we might have chatted

about this before, but looking at your business and your brand

from a different perspective than your own, one that's not so

emotionally connected to it can help a lot, right? And I think

so. Like again, having that network and that those

relationships, and again, the keyword there is trust, right?

People that you can trust that will be honest and and sincere

with you, and and know that you know you'll do the same for

them.

You know, it's funny because there's also some

people that you feel quite quickly that you can pick up the

phone and call, or God forbid, the answer. But I still have an

intent to do that sometimes. But I felt that with you right away

when we started talking. That I felt like, and I think it's so

cool to have that sense of, you know, I think I want to talk to

you again about such and such, and I I would feel okay doing

that. I wouldn't feel that you were still just a stranger, or

you know, I interviewed you on my podcast, and you know, I I do

though, and that's that's important, and I think that's

that's that's a real feather in your cap, I guess, to use an

old-fashioned term, in the sense that you know you have built

your business on people and on relationships, and you learned

it from a young age, and you're using it in your business today.

And to me, that's the best capital in the world: is people,

is relationships with people, and and as you said, trust. So I

hope that you feel the same way because I feel like I want to

talk to you further. So thanks. Yeah,

no, it's it's great. I mean, it's it's really

cool. I think I mentioned we've been trying to do some you know

PR efforts to grow the brand a bit, and like you know I think

the interesting part for me is like getting to meet all these

different people, and and you know obviously like yourself

and. And it's weird. Like we had the pre-call, and it just now

you know feels like you know the person right away, and I can

just have a conversation with them, which makes it a lot

easier for everybody, and hopefully more enjoyable for

anybody who's listening.

Yeah, I hope so too. For me, it's yeah, it's

better. I can do it on the fly, but it doesn't feel the same to

me. I have to get a little deeper first. So, and so it does

make me actually want to ask you about all those pictures behind

you. Special people, tell me. Yeah,

just so it's funny. I saw it on a podcast

like five or six years ago, and it was it was somebody on there,

and they had a bunch of it was a hip hop artist, and he had a

bunch of hip hop artists that he respected and looked up to, and

said I remember saying to myself, I thought it looked

really cool, and I'm like, if I ever have an office that has

wall behind me, I want to do this. And so I just I just threw

up pictures of you know people that I you know look up to in a

business sense, or you know I've admired you know like athletes

or musicians. Okay,

so let me see if I can guess any of them. But

also, are they caricatures that you had done or paid? Yes. Yeah.

Okay. I'm thinking that's Gary Vaynerchuk behind you.

Correct. Yeah.

Okay. And then over on the left is a hockey

player. I'm thinking, and I'm not real good with them, but

Ember

Lennon.

Oh, is it? Okay. Well, it's old, so it's hard.

Like he's he was young, so I don't. He was young

then. Yeah, he's got a little bit more gray these

days. Yeah, yeah. But that's cool.

Okay, and who's the one next to him,

Dr. Dre?

Okay. Also, you in the youth. Okay, but the one

that I really recognize was okay, and I think is Steve Jobs.

Is that Steve Jobs? And I don't know who the girl, the woman

is. Martin Stewart.

Fantastic, and I can't see the other two. The

other one's The Rock and Jay Z.

Love it. Okay. Yeah. So that says a lot too.

That you know that you when you talk Martha Stewart, when you

talk Gary Vaynerchuk, you kind of know when you talk Trevor

Linden. That's a local hockey hero, but was also an

international hockey hero. So very cool. Thanks for sharing

that. I like that. Great

icebreaker too when people come into the

office.

Absolutely, yes, absolutely. So, thank you for

being here. Thank you for being part of Relationships Rule. And

how can people find you? And I'll put it in the show notes,

of course. The one group, go ahead. Yeah, one one

groupagency.ca is probably the best place, and

then you can grab links to my LinkedIn there, or Instagram, or

or whatever you know, pretty open book. Happy to always have

people reach out, even if looking for a few minutes of

advice or or thoughts. So

that's that's important. That's great. Thank

you so much. Yeah. And just to wrap up, I think that there's a

good reminder here that the best business lessons are rarely

learned in a classroom. They come from showing up for your

team, for your clients, your community, and the people who

trusted you early on, that to me is the throughline in everything

you've built. And I'm grateful that you brought it here today.

To everyone listening, if this episode sparked something for

you, share it with someone who needs to hear it. And if you

want to connect with Jared, the information will be in the show

notes. And until then, remember that the relationships that you

build today are the business you'll have tomorrow. And

remember that to stay connected and be remembered.