065: High School Side Hustle Turned Thriving Tik Tok Agency with Noah Frydberg

Danny Gavin Host

00:05

Today, our guest is Noah Frydberg, who started his company when he was only in high school. His 12-member company has worked with over 30 clients. Together, they’ve helped generate over $100 million in revenue and 500 million views for their clients in under two years. When Noah’s not working at Maverick, he’s studying at UT Austin, where he’s pursuing a degree in economics. His expected graduation date is in 2027. He’s passionate about philosophy, Judaism and business, and today we’re going to talk about, of course, mentorship, as well as social media, e-commerce and TikTok. How are you doing, noah?

Noah Frydberg Guest

01:09

Doing good. Thank you for having me.

Danny Gavin Host

01:11

Pleasure. It is really cool to have you here. Obviously, we’ve been friends for a while and to actually have you on the podcast is pretty cool.

Noah Frydberg Guest

01:17

Yeah, it’s awesome. I mean, I remember the first time we were talking about business a couple of years ago and I knew you had an agency. I was trying to market my own companies and to be here now is pretty cool.

Danny Gavin Host

01:27

It is really cool. So let’s start with where you are right now. I think the big question everyone had is like an interesting intro, Danny. If Noah’s making millions of dollars for companies, what the heck is he doing at university? So tell us about your experience? I know you just finished your freshman year. Tell us about university and how you kind of balance the two.

Noah Frydberg Guest

01:47

So in high school. I guess the story really starts there, where I was starting to try to build out this company, trying to also just be like a good person in life and trying to study and be academic. That’s kind of the way that I got to the point where I am now, where I’m both in school and having a business and I’ve kind of definitely struggled to balance the two. But I’ve started to put the business first in a lot of ways because I’ve started to see it as actually having a lot more potential long-term. But I definitely love being in school, I love studying history and economics and philosophy and all these different things. So definitely the balance has shifted as priorities have changed and the business has become a lot more central with providing for a team and a long roster of clients. But it’s been nice to do both, where I can always kind of take a break from one and go to the other. So that’s the kind of benefit of having two full-time jobs.

Danny Gavin Host

02:35

And how’s it living in Austin compared to Houston?

Noah Frydberg Guest

02:37

Well, the weather is slightly better. Other than that, it’s a great place to be an entrepreneur. I found Houston so suburban, so spread out, and I love that Austin is. If I’m downtown, I’m meeting people you know running on the river or going out and everyone around me turns out to you know, also be in business, also to be in e-commerce, so they really got clients from, like, the local Austin community, which has been super cool and so definitely not trying. I’m definitely not a networker, but I would say just making friends with people and finding out that you have things in common is super cool.

Danny Gavin Host

03:11

So in a sense you are networking, it’s just maybe not in a formal setting.

Noah Frydberg Guest

03:13

Yeah, yeah, I guess I like to look at it in the way of if we’re like in a run club together or something that’s a lot of our guests obviously have been a couple of years outside of college or never been to college.

Danny Gavin Host

03:28

So a question I’d like to ask people is like what did you learn inside the classroom this past year? Were there any things that you took from maybe college itself and it doesn’t necessarily have to be in the classroom but like, were there things that you could take from there that actually you’d apply to your business?

Noah Frydberg Guest

03:41

Something that I’ve always felt about myself I’m sure a lot of other people feel this too is I’ve always felt like or not always, but sometimes I felt very much like an imposter, like somebody on the outside looking in, and in college that’s been exacerbated. I’ve definitely felt that a lot. Being Jewish, being in school, especially at this time with everything going on in the world, I’ve definitely felt like I’m watching people, observing how other kids my age act. I went to a small Jewish private high school, so everyone is pretty cookie cutter one way, and now, being in a 50,000 person public school, it’s a completely different experience and it’s starting to really look at kids and I’ve been thinking about how people are in our generation and for business, that’s given me incredible insights, especially as a marketer.

04:25

As a social media marketer, I’m looking at the kind of products that we’re working with. I’m looking at brands that are coming into our program in a totally different light and I’m thinking are these the products that kids now might use and can they use them in the future? This has made me extremely, extremely bullish on the future of TikTok and on the future of social media, because I’m realizing these kids are growing up and that’s part of their life. It’s been part of their life since they were my age. If you’re my age, you’ve been on a phone since you were like 10, 8. Um, I know nowadays kids are learning how to scroll on tik tok when they’re two, which is terrible. But, um, I’m starting to realize the future of e-commerce is so intertwined with social and that’s just been a really interesting thing to realize. Just being in a lecture taking notes on my laptop and seeing everybody in front of me shopping, I get to be looking at TikTok Smart people too. So it kind of goes to show the potential there.

Danny Gavin Host

05:19

Yeah, I can relate to that tremendously. I mean we have similar backgrounds in the sense. I went to Jewish schools and I think when I got my MBA at the University of Houston being like an extremely diverse school that helped me broaden my mind just of the different people out there and I think that made me a stronger marketer. I never kind of put the two together, but now that you say about your experience, like, ooh, that helped marketing as well, Because really marketing is really about understanding the audience, really connecting with that persona, and just understanding the rainbow of personas that are out there can just make you a better marketer. So that’s really cool. So, Noah, how would you define a mentor?

Noah Frydberg Guest

05:57

I think mentors are super important. Coming from a Chabad background, obviously you have the idea of a mashrabiya, where you should acquire for yourself a mashrabiya. You should be finding somebody who can mentor you and can help you grow, and I found that to be extremely applicable. Like most people on the show I’m sure many people have a lot of mentors. I’ve tried to find myself mentors for different aspects of life.

06:16

I’ve definitely not tried to be cookie cutter in any way, and so I’ve often thought about having specific mentors for different things and looking up to different role models and people for different things. So it’s been extremely helpful to learn from you, Danny, about marketing, about building an agency. Countless times that I’ve hit you up, I’ve noticed a lot of people online are trying to sell mentorships or courses or different things like that, and I think it bastardized the whole idea of a mentor. And I kind of think it bastardized the whole idea of a mentor and in my personal experience, it’s been really valuable to kind of find people that know or have achieved the thing that I want, and just getting the advice from them has been better than any of these other kinds of workarounds or quick fixes that people kind of try to sell you, so I’m very much supportive of the idea of getting mentors.

Danny Gavin Host

07:04

So let’s talk about your most influential mentor. I know you’ve mentioned your dad in the past, but would love to know why your dad has been so influential.

Noah Frydberg Guest

07:10

I’d say my dad is my most influential mentor. So during COVID, when I came back home from school out of town, I was here for, you know, like a normal high school student on Zoom, just clicking away, waiting for the day to end, pretty much every day, and I could hear my dad in the same room taking calls, doing sales calls, managing his team, and I started to get a grasp for how to communicate effectively, how to do sales, which is a really hard process, the process of cold calling and calling people, trying to get them to finally say yes. You know, it’s a numbers game and that really inspired me personally to try to build a business and it was over a year and a half before I actually had a real service-based business and an actual offer to sell. But I would credit my success in sales and, you know, in selling like six, close to seven figures over the phone. I would credit all of that to my dad and that learning.

08:09

I was recently working with a very successful athlete, former NBA player turned social media influencer and really impressive guy.

08:20

Anybody who a guy like this talks to is instantly impressed by their background, by his insane height, all these cool things about him and we were trying to put together a brand deal for a company, for a large fitness company, and they basically said we’ve talked to this guy in the past and we didn’t like the way he talked to us and the CEO personally said no, and this was really talked to us. And the CEO personally said no, and this was really confusing to me. I was kind of surprised. I was like, wow, I don’t know what he did and I realized in his communication with them it was nothing short, it was childish, it was just really bad, and so I’ve been very grateful. People usually tell me that I come off as older and I would definitely credit that to my greatest mentor, which would be my dad. I’ve basically learned how to get a business education, like in real life, for the past few years, so I’m very grateful for that.

Danny Gavin Host

09:13

Yeah, it’s so cool. One of the blessings of COVID.

Noah Frydberg Guest

09:16

Yeah, definitely yeah, definitely a blessing for me.

Danny Gavin Host

09:19

You’ve also mentioned that the internet and the evolution of social media have also shaped you kind of like a mentor.

Noah Frydberg Guest

09:25

I find that a lot of the things that we see online are crazy now for sure. But I think that for people that are young, that kind of grew up with it especially, you start to see the world through the lens of social. You start to see products through the lens of the people that push them. You start to see current events through the lens of people that share them and talk about it online.

09:48

And I’ve kind of felt for me that the idea of even having a business was inspired by the internet and I don’t know how I would have a business without it. I mean, I guess most of the successful entrepreneurs that weren’t on the internet also had businesses. So it’s not that it’s impossible, but for me I don’t know how I would have had the inspiration or the idea, or definitely not the opportunity of TikTok now without the internet. So I do think that availability of opportunity and ease of access to anybody has been an incredible opportunity for me. I’ve gotten brand deals just by sending out DMs to entrepreneurs and now that they’re also on TikTok too, they’re able to actually interact with the products and things that I do and actually kind of see how effective it can be for their brand. So to me the internet has been like the greatest opportunity to be an entrepreneur.

Danny Gavin Host

10:37

So let’s talk about how you mentor others. So obviously you have your teammates, you’ve got the businesses that you work with, so how do you mentor your team?

Noah Frydberg Guest

10:45

It’s not easy for me at all and I’m still learning how to do that. A big struggle for me mentoring a team is that most of the people on my team are older than me and I don’t necessarily get the vibe that they want me to mentor them. As much as they want to do whatever they agree to do and get paid and go on their way, and so that’s fine. So much as they want to do whatever they agree to do and get paid and go on their way, and so that’s fine. So I try to kind of support them with their goals in terms of growing their own agencies or growing their own businesses or just being successful in what they’re doing, and I’ve really found I’ve had a couple people that have specifically reached out to me looking for actual help with growing their businesses and in those cases I’ve really tried to be the person that I wish I had and that’s kind of the way that I feel motivated to help.

11:28

So with a friend I had from high school, he was trying to build his own business online and he reached out to me a year ago and he’s literally starting from zero the kind of guy who’s watched one YouTube video about being an entrepreneur and is interested and he’s fine if I say this, He’ll probably listen. But I told him dude, you need a skill. If you don’t have a skill, you’re going to be in an endless game of marketing something that no one wants. And so he’s like well, what do I do? I suggested video editing because I knew that was something I needed at the time and there would be other people, and I kind of coached him along the path of actually growing his own agency and he recently reached out to me. He’s like I hit my first $10,000 in a month because of you and that was really cool for me to see that I had an actual impact on somebody. So it feels very good, but also that’s kind of exciting to think about. I think that’s kind of cool.

Danny Gavin Host

12:22

Yeah, and I love the fact that you are so passionate about not just helping grow your business, but also help the contractors that you let’s say the contractors that you work with your friends Um, that’s awesome. Um, I think it’s really important to pay back right. So you got your, you know, you got your advice, you have the people that help you out and you’re like paying that forward, which I think is really important, and I’m glad that you are passionate about it.

Noah Frydberg Guest

12:43

I mean, I think it definitely worked for me, and so there’s a lot of people that help me, and so I want to be grateful for all of that and pay it forward. And also I think that nowadays there’s so much disinformation of what people think they should be doing, what they think being an entrepreneur is, and that’s just so inaccurate. Most of the time, you’re alone in a dark room staring at a laptop at least in my case to actually grow a company, and so I think it’s really important for people to get effective advice, and it’s definitely better to get it from somebody that you know than from some esoteric YouTube guy, so I’m always happy to do that if the need arises.

Danny Gavin Host

13:19

What are some other examples of things that people think is entrepreneurship but really it’s not?

Noah Frydberg Guest

13:24

I think the biggest problem is they think it’s an overnight success and they think if they try something it’ll just go viral, and then their store will go viral or their product or whatever, and then they’re just going to be a millionaire. And I can say for me, it’s been a couple of years and I haven’t reached that status yet, so it’s definitely not working. Maybe I’m not that good at it, but it does seem to be a little bit more complex than that and I don’t think anything’s a right success. So I’d say, if you’re able to do something consistently for a period of years without giving up, you’ll eventually basically either outwork the competition or they’ll all give up and you’ll pretty much be at the top. And so I would definitely recommend consistency above all else, which is not something that we prioritize in our short-term, dopamine-focused society.

Danny Gavin Host

14:08

So you’re considered Gen Z and we often hear a lot of things about millennials and Gen Z in the workplace. Much of it is not very flattering. How have you been received as a young professional in the workforce?

Noah Frydberg Guest

14:17

I would say I haven’t had too much of an issue with that for myself. Just because when brands bring me in, they’re typically looking for the Gen Z. My selling point has often been my age. If you don’t like that I’m young, or you don’t like that I’m Gen Z you’re not going to be interested in having me in the room. For the brands that have actually brought us on to help them grow on TikTok, they’re very much literate of what Gen Z does online and how. Not only have we lived our lives on it but are very much passionate about anything relating to it. So they like that, I think, when they bring me on.

14:56

Although I wouldn’t say I’m the typical Gen Z-er. I would say I’m probably way too capitalistic and interested in business in general to be considered a normal Gen Z-er, but I think it’s awesome to be able to use it to my advantage. I got on a sales call one time with a really talented, successful entrepreneur in his late 30s. He was digging into me. I was so surprised by this because that never happened. He was calling me names and telling me how stupid and young I am and I don’t know anything. Maybe I’ll con some people into buying my program, but not him, because he knows better and I’m a filthy salesman.

15:28

I was curious because I didn’t have the intention to do anything other than see if I could help him through TikTok, and I think that people oftentimes are scared of the youth because of the change they’ll bring and definitely because of the potential for the younger people to actually compete. I think that my generation is super smart. They know a lot. They are very difficult to work with in certain cases and I would say even that’s my experience, so I understand where everyone else is coming from, but I think you have to learn how to speak their language. Kind of like the Babaji Rebbe said, you speak to people in their own language. So if you can kind of learn to speak in terms of what other people prioritize, then it’ll be very effective in the long term.

Danny Gavin Host

16:12

And what would you say are some of those things that Gen Z prioritizes over, let’s say, the millennials or people who are older.

Noah Frydberg Guest

16:17

Well, I think they care a lot more about causes and they care more about ideas even than money or other things. So, as an example, when I’m working with influencers and when I’m reaching out to influencers the older influencers they care more about what is the brand, what is the product, if they like it, if they’re interested oh, skincare, okay, cool. But if I’m talking to a younger entrepreneur first, I don’t like working with younger influencers, younger creators. A lot of the time they have gone viral to celebrity status really quickly and they’re not interested in anything other than if this is a B corporation, is this sustainable? And then they’re really. Maybe this is a good thing. Maybe I’m just seeing it the wrong way, but they’re very much interested in the authenticity of their posts and their relationship with their audience, and so that’s kind of interesting. That’s probably a good thing. In many ways, where they are a lot more honest, they are not that money hungry, but I do think that is going to lead to some particular issues in the future, although I guess we have yet to see.

Danny Gavin Host

17:17

So let’s pivot into your area of expertise, which is TikTok and e-commerce, two topics which you often mention together. So why did you choose TikTok as the platform to scale businesses?

Noah Frydberg Guest

17:28

the platform to scale businesses. I found I came onto the scene at a time when TikTok was a massive opportunity for companies. That was mainly something that they had never really thought about or discovered. You know, 2017, let’s say, I was in middle school. I think, yeah, I was in middle school and that was the only audience on TikTok, it was kids. It was kids in the US and it was kind of a joke. I didn’t even use it. I don’t think I really ever used it. And then I get to build my own businesses online come 2020, 2021.

17:57

And I’m realizing TikTok is this incredible opportunity. No longer is it the age of. Is it the place for 12 year olds to hang out? It’s not a playground anymore. There are adults posting every day. There are influencers that are being featured on the New York Times and Fox News every other day. They’re being featured. They are TikTok and brands are starting to come on and make serious money. They’re starting to make seven, eight figures there and it’s starting to be something where it wasn’t just a joke anymore. It was becoming serious and the biggest thing about it is no more ad spend, no more paid ads. From a technical marketing perspective that’s a massive deal. You could get impressions at a fraction of the cost that you would be paying meta for them or facebook at the time for them. So from a marketing perspective, it was a phenomenal opportunity.

18:44

The only struggle is how do you do that? How do you go viral? You know, how do you find that? How do you go viral? How do you find that process? And the typical solution was just to hire some influencer in Los Angeles to make content for you. But a lot of brands weren’t really on board with that. They don’t really know how it’s confusing those influencers. No one liked it, no one still likes them. They were getting arrested during COVID for house parties, so it wasn’t the cool thing to do to hire these people.

19:12

And I found another solution where I was building my own brands and these brands were going viral and I wasn’t getting sales. And this was a really weird time for me. I’d been in business two years already. I had made a bunch of money on eBay and Facebook as a kid, and then I lost it all building my own brands. I lost it all on product and on marketing, but they were starting to go viral and I started to realize if I’m just good at marketing.

19:32

I think I heard a quote from Gary Vee to only focus on your strengths and not worry about your weaknesses. So I said I’ll do that, I’ll just focus on my strengths. And I started to sell marketing services on TikTok and post other products as if they were my own. And that’s when we started to see really wild results and brands getting millions of views and trying to actually find the benefits of the platform where we were able to build a system to replicate that at scale. And that’s kind of been the coast or the wave we’ve coasted on since, giving that opportunity to brands, which is otherwise very hard for them to do with Facebook and things like that, where they get pretty upset having to pay those fees.

Danny Gavin Host

20:11

You just mentioned going viral on TikTok. What does that mean for the uninitiated people who aren’t on TikTok? Why is that so important and what is that?

Noah Frydberg Guest

20:17

I would say the baseline definition of going viral nowadays is going to be to reach viewers beyond the amount that you normally reach. So, for example, if you have 1,000 customers for your brand, if you get a post that gets more than 1,000 customers or more than your average post does, I would call that viral at a low level. But at a higher level, tiktok gives the opportunity for a brand to literally get millions of impressions on a video. On a video, we’ve had brands get 5, 10, 15 million views on a video and that can be tens of thousands of dollars in sales generated in just a couple hours, and so it can really be life-changing for a brand on the long term to build a strategy around TikTok where they’re able to do that systematically and consistently. So that’s been a really cool opportunity and a really cool thing that we’ve been able to build.

Danny Gavin Host

21:09

And why can you do that on TikTok and not, let’s say, on Instagram?

Noah Frydberg Guest

21:13

This can be done on Instagram. We actually purpose a lot of our content to Instagram, to YouTube shorts, even to like Pinterest. I think even LinkedIn does short form video nowadays, so this is content that we can use elsewhere. But really what I found is this kind of style does better on TikTok than anywhere else, and what’s unique about TikTok part of the reason why people want to ban it is its algorithm is just different. I was talking to a client about this earlier today. Tiktok’s algorithm gives it the ability to put a video in front of your face that you are uniquely interested in as a viewer better than any other platform. It’s a lot more addictive, and so we’ve been able to take advantage of that to help brands grow rapidly and find their audiences on TikTok, which is much easier to do now on TikTok as a younger platform, than it is on Instagram, as a platform that’s more established and is less likely to reward video consistency or effort with actual views.

Danny Gavin Host

22:08

So you may have touched upon this a little bit, but why have you focused on an organic content marketing strategy when so many others are fixated on paid I’ve kind of felt like that was my unique opportunity as a marketer.

Noah Frydberg Guest

22:20

Like probably it’s going to bite me in the butt because I’m not going to get as many credit card points for buying all that spend. But the thing is, at the end of the day I found a really unique opportunity with TikTok and I would definitely recommend brands to get on there if they’re looking to get more sales, but also because that’s kind of been my strength. Like I mentioned this before, that was what was working for me before, and so I just thought if I don’t change anything, if I just keep doing the exact same thing every single day and I just focus on what works, then I’m going to have a quicker ride to the top than if I keep trying to implement new things and figure things out. But yeah, I mean that’s pretty much been it. Just building momentum on TikTok organically, without paid ads, has been a great way for us to help brands grow, and they’re free to run paid ads if they’d like and do what they’d like.

Danny Gavin Host

23:07

So do you ever incorporate ads in TikTok, or do you leave that up to the brand?

Noah Frydberg Guest

23:12

I don’t do it at all. We have a sister agency that runs paid ads for brands, or they can do it themselves or however they like, but we focus solely on organic and for me it’s been like there’s this saying there’s riches in the niches, and so for me I’ve been trying to be hyper-focused and specialize on TikTok organically, and that’s been like the thing. I think our selling point is that we do one thing really well, not a lot of things, okay, and so that’s kind of been my approach to building an agency.

Danny Gavin Host

23:39

I know this might be getting in the weeds a bit, but let’s say you have a TikTok video. There are some ads that are being run through that right. Are you able to tell the difference between the organic reach and the paid reach, or does it kind of get mixed up?

Noah Frydberg Guest

23:51

I can tell the difference. If I look at it, I can typically tell the difference. I mean, the biggest thing you’re going to see is the engagement rates. Like a lot of the time a brand will run paid advertising on a video because they’re looking to get the video more views. Again, as you said, this gets into the weeds.

24:04

But the thing is, if the video does really well organically and it’s just getting a lot of views, there’s going to be a lot more people who actually like the video. They’ll actually know that. So if a brand is going to run paid ads on TikTok, I would say put that video on organic first, let’s see how it actually does, let’s see how much people actually like it and then run spark ads or run paid ads on and see what happens. But you want to know that the video does well and for sure. I mean a big reason brands come to us is they’re running their paid ads content or their UDC content on TikTok and it doesn’t do well because the algorithm is a lot different than Meta or Instagram or whatever, and so for us, building out content that’s unique to TikTok I think has actually helped a lot of brands with paid advertising as well for them to use it there.

Danny Gavin Host

24:43

Do you think it’s the opposite as well, meaning videos that work well on TikTok, then taking them on Meta, do they also perform well? I know it doesn’t work the opposite way, but would you say this way of good content on TikTok, moving it over to Meta, does that usually work well?

Noah Frydberg Guest

24:58

The reverse. It may be true I don’t know, since I don’t do a lot of paid ads but the thing is, I would say the big unique thing about TikTok is we’re looking to make content that’s truly entertaining and engaging. We’re actually not looking to make advertisements, we’re looking to build a fan base for a brand, and so that’s a much more long-term approach. And to me, I see in my experience understanding paid ads, you’re really looking to kind of make a pitch in like a short, interesting video, and so the style definitely is a little bit different in that way too.

Danny Gavin Host

25:30

Can you talk briefly about it?

Noah Frydberg Guest

25:30

how the element of controversy helps brands scale on TikTok. Okay, yeah, so I’m super, super supportive of controversy on TikTok, and I know that there are brands that are looking to shy away from that, and so we’ll have brands that aren’t interested in doing something along these lines. But what I’m talking about with controversy is splitting the audience can oftentimes be good, and the reason is you’re able to actually find the viewers that are interested in your product, and by using controversy, you’re simply looking to get people to disagree. Maybe people are disagreeing along the lines of the argument that you’re making, for example, if it’s a supplement and you’re making a claim about its potential uses, or simply you’re making a statement or anything along those lines.

26:09

Really, even if you’re kind of showing something that people don’t like or making a video, maybe it looks really gross, maybe it looks really cool, whatever it is, getting people to say yes or no about that idea is very helpful, and people are always afraid of the no’s, but I would say be afraid of the no’s, but remember each no means a couple of yeses. How many yeses does it mean? Be afraid of the no’s, but remember each no means a couple of yeses. How many yeses does it mean, and so if you’re able to make people actually radicalize along these lines, you’re able to get people to actually like your product a lot more, and the people that are defending you in the comment section are going to be the ones that buy, and so that’s oftentimes very helpful. I think controversy is very helpful, yeah.

Danny Gavin Host

26:45

It’s scary, right. I can imagine being like that brand owner. It’s like, ooh, look how many people we’re going to offend right. But I think your point is you’re doubling down on the people who like it, and then that is like an even more powerful claim that goes against FTA guidelines.

Noah Frydberg Guest

26:58

Of course we’re not going to violate that. But we have a lot of clients. They’re looking to get massive appeal and they’re looking to get reposted on other platforms and have a bunch of people in the comments debating and for them they love that. So it kind of depends on what the brand’s goals are as well, but definitely using some controversy can be very helpful to actually get more sales too.

Danny Gavin Host

27:29

What are some of the best viral hooks you’ve recently seen on TikTok?

Noah Frydberg Guest

27:32

The best viral hooks. Well, a good one that I absolutely love is you want to show a change. So you could say I used to be like I don’t know. This is an example. You could say anything with a change. So you could say I used to be poor and now I’m worth a million dollars. Here’s why you could say with a change. So you could say I used to be poor and now I’m worth a million dollars. Here’s why you could say a year ago, no one knew, no one heard of blank, and now everyone hates it. Or you can do anything along those lines. So showing a change is really good. That’s one or another thing you’ll never guess how this happened. Oh, I love that. Yeah, I mean, there’s a lot of good ones, yeah.

Danny Gavin Host

28:08

How do you identify a good or strong creator? What other criteria do you use to locate one?

Noah Frydberg Guest

28:13

So I talked about this a little bit before. If they’re really young, I’m kind of scared to work with them. I just don’t know how motivated they are and I do like it if they’re at least 25 years old, minimal, minimally, and then with TikTok it gets in the weeds. So I want them to be outside of the United States, preferably not Obviously a little bit better for tax reasons if they are, but preferably within the United States, preferably at least 25. Preferably very ambitious.

28:37

I’m looking for ambition. I want them to tell me they’re looking to grow their own business and really they all are technically trying to grow their own business, but I want to be building a personal relationship with them. I mean, I tell brands this too, because a lot of brands are doing influencer seeding now and sending products to creators and hopefully the creator likes it and makes a post about it. What I recommend is building personal relationships with these creators. So for me, I don’t use Discord or Facebook Messenger or whatever people use to reach out to these people, or email even. I prefer to go directly to iMessage and talk to these people directly. I’m buddies with them because the goal is that I can be buddies with them, I can bring them a lot more opportunities and help them grow. And, of course, yeah, if they have the potential to grow and you can see that they’re ambitious and they have the time and effort that they’re willing to put in and take care of their families, that’s the best thing.

Danny Gavin Host

29:31

So how many creators would you say now you have relationships with Like? Do you know that number?

Noah Frydberg Guest

29:37

I would say I would probably have like 100 that may be around maybe 80 to 100 that I have like a relationship with, and then I have a couple hundred more that I just have like access to like in a spreadsheet, yeah, yeah, and then, yeah, something along those lines probably. That’s very impressive, yeah.

Danny Gavin Host

29:56

So how do you measure a TikTok content campaign success? How much is it dollars and cents? How much is it viewed? How do you present that?

Noah Frydberg Guest

30:05

It definitely depends on the brand. Like, I’ll say, 80% of our clients, they’re looking for month over month, week over week kind of growth. They’re looking to really grow revenue and so with that it can be very simple. With TikTok, we’re typically just able to look at the product in the TikTok shop and see exactly how many sales it’s gotten. It’s a very simple process.

30:26

But at a more macro level, we have, I would say, let’s say, 10 20 of our clients are coming in and they’re not even looking for sales, they’re looking for massive views, they’re looking for fan bases, and so, um, we have one large client who I probably can’t say their name on the call, but they’re in walmart, they just launched in target and for them they were looking to go massively viral. They’re like we want to take over tiktok and I was like, wow, that’s exactly the kind of client I want, because that gives us a lot of freedom to really make content and try to get as many views as possible, which is really our sweet spot. So for them we added 66 million views in three weeks with an influencer page and they launched in Walmart in the fall. They sold out in three or four days, maybe five days across the US and they just went and targeted a couple of weeks ago and for them Tik Tok been an incredible opportunity because, as I said before, you can get these CPMs at such a good price that you’re paying cents per view. So it’s been incredible to see that kind of thing happen.

31:26

But yeah, from a CPM basis it’s a lot different than paid ads where you’re looking at a CRM, you’re tracking clicks, cost per click and all that. Tiktok a little bit different because oftentimes, even like I was talking to a friend whose company’s worth around $30 or $40 million and they’re doing a lot on TikTok and he’s saying people go on TikTok or Shopify to look at the product and then they’ll go to Amazon right after to actually buy it. So there’s an indirect correlation between the two of our growth on TikTok is not being tracked, but we’re seeing a connection between when a video goes viral and when Amazon sales spike. So that’s an interesting thing too, but it’s a little bit harder to track because you can’t even target things very well to people, but when the sales come, you kind of are able to deduce.

Danny Gavin Host

32:14

Yeah, a little secret, but as privacy gets stricter, so does Google Ads and all the other ad platforms in the world. It is going to be harder to track the direct correlation. So I think we are moving into more of a. Obviously, we hope that we’ll be harder to track the direct correlation, so I think we are moving into more of a. I mean, obviously, we hope that we’ll be able to hold on to that as much as possible, but I think we will. Eventually. It’s trending in that direction. Where it’s going is that one-to-one attribution is going to be a little bit hard. What are the two biggest mistakes brands make concerning their organic content strategy? On TikTok.

Noah Frydberg Guest

32:46

The first one that I see a lot is they go viral once and then they’re never able to do it again and they just think if they post consistently, like for a period of even like I’ve seen this like for years, they’re paying for, like UGC and these content creators, to make them like paid advertising content, like a really simple, pitchy style. Let me unbox this new beauty care set with me, you, me, something along those lines. And it doesn’t do well because everyone on TikTok has already seen it before. It takes more than a pretty face or a well put together video to actually get results there, and so I definitely stress, using controversy, using new ideas, putting together an overall overarching system for TikTok, as opposed to just trying to make entertaining posts like you think everybody else is making. So that’s one big mistake that brands are making. And the second mistake they’re making is by not being on TikTok, because the opportunity is simply too large for them to not be there, and I would definitely recommend they don’t need to work with me.

33:46

Definitely don’t If you don’t want to. That’s not my priority, but I do think TikTok is an incredible opportunity for you as a brand or as a person If you’re just a person also. I mean, it’s an incredibly incredible opportunity to grow your own company, grow your own brand. If you’re working in a nonprofit, call attention to that, call attention to your sub stack, whatever it is. I mean, people are getting married through TikTok. It’s a great opportunity to meet people. So I would definitely recommend being on there and being literate in kind of the potential it has for you as a creator. Not as a viewer, don’t think that’s helpful, but definitely as a creator. It’s a great opportunity to help yourself grow.

Danny Gavin Host

34:20

So, Noah, is there a feature or features that you’d like to see implemented on TikTok Ooh? It would be great for brands if they could somehow identify demographics better.

Noah Frydberg Guest

34:31

One of the big struggles with TikTok now is we literally have clients in Dubai or Melbourne, Australia, or random places, and they’re not able to use TikTok shops because they’re not based in the United States. And so we’re starting to put together a program. Now I’m working on this actively with some TikTok reps to figure out a way to go around that. But a big struggle now is that TikTok is so core to the United States that there are opportunities limiting brands outside of the United States to grow. So that’s like one thing I would say is just location. I think that they should democratize the location a little bit more probably.

Danny Gavin Host

35:04

Do you have any fear of TikTok being banned in the United States?

Noah Frydberg Guest

35:08

I’ve looked into it a lot and I’ve even had clients ask me that right before they sign, like, hey, noah, it’s going to be banned. I don’t know if we should do this and kind of my answer is you can cancel if you’d like to. You’re of service, I’m not going to lock you in if they get banned. But, based on my last look at what it is, let’s, let’s hold on as long as we can. Let’s take advantage of this opportunity as long as we can, because there’s a lot that can change in a year. There’s a lot for your business to grow in a year, and so it’s an opportunity for now. Um, but I I mean, I don’t know if it’ll even be canceled. So I don’t, I don’t who’s who’s to say if it does get canceled. I’m glad I took that opportunity to grow a company and help a lot of people, and then we’ll go from there with what’s next.

Danny Gavin Host

35:53

Yeah, I love that outlook and I love that positivity and I agree, sometimes you just gotta grab the opportunity as much as possible.

Noah Frydberg Guest

36:00

Yeah, exactly, latch on, do what you can, and then, when time’s up, that’s when God decides, exactly.

Danny Gavin Host

36:07

Can you describe a successful social media marketing campaign that you’ve managed? I would love to just maybe a short case study of one specific brand that you’re really proud of no-transcript hard.

Noah Frydberg Guest

36:57

so I said let’s say you guys want views, quick, let’s, let’s do influencers. And so immediately onboarded a couple influencers, sent the product out and one influencer got 66 million views in a couple weeks. We stuck with him, um, and got over 150 million views in a couple of weeks. We stuck with him and got over 150 million views for the brand in the last seven months. So that’s more views than the Super Bowl and that’s for one company that paid significantly less than a Super Bowl ad. Maybe I should have charged them Super Bowl pricing, but now I know Next time you will. So that paved the way for them to get into Target a week and a half ago and go from there. But yeah, again, it’s not a direct result. We didn’t directly add that money to ourselves on the website, but that’s not what they were interested in. They were looking interested in enough views in the United States to sell in stores, and so that’s what they’ve seen.

Danny Gavin Host

37:42

And do they actually credit that success getting into Target with you guys? I think so. So how do you stay current on emerging technologies and the latest developments related to TikTok’s business?

Noah Frydberg Guest

37:52

A big part for me is just being literate on TikTok. I try to spend that time knowing about it so that my clients don’t have to, and kind of knowing what’s next. So talking to a lot of people. I’ve been hopping on Twitter spaces a lot more often recently, talking to a lot of brands, just in general that are on TikTok, and then I work with a lot of TikTok reps, so I want them to update me if things on the platform are changing, if things are going in different directions, because that has a big impact on our business and our clients, and so I want to know those changes as they’re happening, to basically be on top of them and have the power to actually make moves that can not mess things up, especially for a lot of the brands that are on there.

38:31

I mean, for example, we had a client doing half a million dollars in revenue per month from TikTok shops and their product was banned from TikTok after getting 9,000 orders, which is really strange. How does a product that’s got 9,000 orders on a platform get taken down? What mistake has it made that’s profitable to TikTok? It shouldn’t happen, and that’s because TikTok’s algorithm AI essentially customer service support isn’t very good, and so, with things like that, we were actually able to get the product reinstated, and so for me, knowing the right people, as you said, like with mentors, just having the people that I can reach out to to have that fixed, is like the best solution possible, and so yeah, do you ever find yourself getting sucked into because, since you’re dealing with it right like, or do you try to stay away as much as possible, like when, yes, when, when it’s the end of the day, like you’re not looking at it?

39:22

I would be lying if I said I’ve never been sucked into it before, unfortunately. I wish that was the case, but I try to do a pretty good job of staying up. If I’m going to look at TikTok for any reason, just to scroll. If I need to scroll, I’ll wear yellow glasses, blue light blockers and I’ll turn on the race color on my phone and try to make it less interesting to just remember why I’m actually looking at it. Not get too distracted, hopefully. Yeah, it’s crazy how addictive it is.

Danny Gavin Host

39:50

Well, it’s time for our lightning round. I know you’re a big book reader. I’d love to hear some of your top books, so give me the top three, top five that you suggest.

Noah Frydberg Guest

39:59

Yeah, top books. I would suggest how to Win Friends and Influence People. Dale Carnegie, Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. The Elon Musk biography with Walter Isaacson. Make your Bed by unnamed, I don’t remember the name, but Make your Bed.

Danny Gavin Host

40:15

That’s fine, we’ll put the link in the notes, so not a problem.

Noah Frydberg Guest

40:18

Admiral William H McRaven. That’s the name.

Danny Gavin Host

40:20

So no, what’s your next big project?

Noah Frydberg Guest

40:22

Well, I’m looking to really grow this company. That’s my project for now and really my goal with Maverick Creative. My TikTok marketing company wants to have essentially the greatest proprietary system for taking brands viral on TikTok and really be the go-to name in, let’s say, the industry to be the solution there. I really want to be able to take any brand viral. I want to be able to boast that, not for the reason to be boastful, but I really want to have that capacity for this company and that’s my goal. State is, I don’t even want to have to be picky with clients anymore. I want to be able to say, yeah, yeah, you pay online. It’s like adding to cart one TikTok viral, please, and making it that system.

Danny Gavin Host

41:02

That’s cool, and I hope to see you talking at conferences. I think you do really great there as well. Yeah, all in due time. I think you do really great there as well. Totally, yeah, all in due time, awesome. So talk about Maverick. Where can listeners learn more about you and Maverick Creative?

Noah Frydberg Guest

41:13

Yeah, I highly recommend you know. Find me on Twitter. Linkedin, Noah Friedberg, linkedin, maverick e-com on Twitter for more posts and go to maverickcreative.net for all your viral TikTok marketing needs.

Danny Gavin Host

41:27

Love it. Well, Noah, thank you so much for being a guest on the Digital Marketing Mentor and thank you, listeners, for tuning into the Digital Marketing Mentor. We’ll speak with you next time and