Welcome to the Behind the Bottom Line podcast. I’m Adam Hayes. To my left is my co-host, Bob Payton. Across the table from us is our guest today, Pete Brown with Ash Interactive. Welcome. Thanks for having me, guys. Yes, it is morning. And it’s a Friday. I don’t know when this will be released, but it’s always a good day on a Friday morning. Friday. It’s Friday. All right. I’ll take it. Yeah. So how did you get to, you know, Ash Interactive? You came from somewhere. Yeah, just

 

jammed together. If you’re ever in Michigan, you say ‘party store’, that’s what that means, or you see that on a building. Not so big in Indiana. We have dog food. You go to a party store. It’s not like a party city. You walk home from school, and you go and stop and get a slice or something. The slices at party stores were generally these big, square, puffier slices. Not quite Chicago-style deep dish or anything like that. There’s a famous chain called

 

High School Pizzas, you know, kind of thing. Kind of, but thicker and actually good. Ah, nice. It was kind of rounded up, too. Kind of like Little Caesars? I don’t know about rounded, but it was like cheese all the way to the edge, so there really wasn’t a crust to it. You know what I mean? Like when on a round pizza, you’ve got the ring of crust. There’s none of that in Detroit. This is the part about the United States that fascinates me, right? Never heard any of that, and we’re, you know, how many miles, right? Yeah, yeah. Well, Jet’s Pizza is also kind of

 

out there in the world. Just jump under their skin right now, the same incite the riot, yeah, exactly China and yeah, New York, Chicago, or Detroit, oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah, it goes on and on. So started out there um did my undergrad work at Western Michigan and Kalamazoo since I was in fourth grade knew I wanted to be an elementary teacher so that was the career path that I started going down so bachelor’s and master’s both in education, elementary ed focus and moved to central Indiana about a little over 20 years ago now because of my

 

done with education to the bureaucracy it was no child left behind it was uh you’re now going to get paid based on your kids test scores it was uh we’re in the early stages of sort of like the ravenous like like attack parent you know like my kid is the best and you’re singling out my kid and people checking the homework that I just graded and me having to teach them about American history and why that’s actually not right it was just it was just getting weird because I’m

 

It’s like the only one, If it’s scale anyway, east of the Mississippi. So it’s sort of people have a lot of confusion about why is it here? It’s got a great story. I’m not going to tell it. You should look it up, visit and go to their website. So I did that for about eight years. And really, ever since I’ve been a kid and got our first family computer, our first family over-the-shoulder VHS video camera, I’ve just loved creating with technology. I’ve always had little side projects and side hustles and stuff like that. I’ve always played music. I know we’ve talked about that in the past, Adam. So I’ve kind of always had a side business or a side hustle.

 

Back. I was like, wow, what an awesome blessing to be like, kind of have, create this new job and figure things out and tell us what you’re learning and help the museum grow and all that. So that was really fortuitous. Got way into video editing at a new level there. And also thanks to a good friend I made there, Takeshi Kamisato, who everybody should look up because his story’s awesome too. So that’s another episode for another day. But yeah, got into it there.

 

Right. Well, exactly. Yeah. I learned a lot of, I learned everything I was saying wrong at every like VC pitch was awesome. And so. Did that, traveled around the country to museum conferences and doing all these, you know, speaking events and just workshops and stuff, and sharing what I had learned during my time in the museum and what I was observing in other parts of the country. And eventually was still or continually was still doing website development, shooting videos, photography, real estate stuff, you know, just using the skills I’d acquired to also make money;

 

school hard knocks and just kind of learning from your mistakes. And so by the time I buried that, I was, Ash was sort of already doing really well for itself and just decided to go from the sort of plain middleman, you know, where I can help put a plan together, but I’ve got 14 independent freelancers that I’m bringing in. I really wanted to make that transition to actually creating a business that had a team-with two and a half people. What’s a half person look like? You have to pick if you want to turn the waist up or waist down. Two full-timers and a part-timer. I don’t get Adam’s joke. And just started rolling, you know, and just went all in on the Ash Interactive Services.

 

And again, for the first time, for folks that don’t know, our mission is really to focus on nonprofits and small businesses that are just-we’re just trying to get you up to speed. We are not, we have had moments of inspiration, but really our goal is not to be cutting edge, innovative, future-minded. Video-I need a woman who does branding and I need someone that can do my social media, so you’re sort of still part, part-parsing I don’t know, partying it out? Partying, yeah. I don’t like that. And that was a real frustration that we were hearing from a lot of these smaller businesses and nonprofits where a lot of my team comes from. It was just like, well, who do we call when we need that? And so our goal was to really set up a team that could be that adjunct marketing team for you. So, a lot of our clients might have one marketing person who actually has the word ‘marketing’ in their title, and we fill in all the gaps. But in a lot of cases, it’s a solopreneur.

 

Teenagers to the snake pit one year because there’s a guy performing that we were like fans of and he; these electronic artists are usually just known for playing like in the middle of the desert from like 2 a.m. m to like sunrise and i’m like there’s no way i can get my kids to a show and this guy ended up headlining at the snake pit one year and so i was like well we’re gonna have a nice conversation about what you’re about to experience right uh because i feel drunk oh yeah because i’ve been a live music junkie again growing up in detroit live music scene is yeah i mean killer it’s killer uh you can see shows seven nights a week at 10 different venues if you wanted and uh and my kids hadn’t really gotten into that yet

 

how would you summarize that 12? I mean, describe the journey, right? This is a lot of owners, you know, they start and they don’t kind of know what’s ahead. So where it’s like, you know, to, to have owners described that have been there. What should they expect? Number one, I think they need to have a really strong support system. And that’s not the business, direct to business, cut to business answer. But I think that a lot of folks that I talk to now that may be where I was 10 or 12 years ago. The first conversation I have is, what does your wife think about that? What does your husband think about that? Have you looked at your numbers? Can you make no money and/ or lose money for the next five years? And still, will your kids be able to play soccer and eat? Because I think it’s so romanticized right now. Social media makes it seem so obvious. You just start a business. Screw your boss. Make all the money and keep it for yourself. And it’s not how it is.

 

Supportive people that are going to help understand that this is a journey and it’s very rarely just that rocket ship ride that you see on social media. So, that’s really fundamental. And I think there’s so many different angles you can do when you get into a business, right? I mean, I’ve talked about this before. The road that I took, and probably you took and I know you took, I mean, we’re choosing the hardest thing possible, right? I mean, I think a lot of us need to acknowledge the fact that if you’re starting something from nothing, then you are choosing to start at zero and start working your way up. And that doesn’t have to be the way that it always is. I think there’s a lot of people that overlook the concept of buying another business out of the gate, trying to figure out, oh, I’m not going to spend 10 years like hoofing it and hustling and scraping.

 

Of buried into or buying into support systems. None of those three always work out, by the way. That’s for sure. There’s no promise for any of that. But I think that step two would be sort of finding, do your homework. If you really just like the grind and the hustle and the willy-nilly sort of experimenting with it and you have that support system, that’s a great way to learn and it can be a good way to get going. And also sort of have that romantic story down the road where like, oh, I just hustled and worked hard.

 

of doing every single gig that got any anybody who’s waving a dollar in my general direction boy i was going to do whatever i needed to go get that dollar right it got me some great experiences and some horrible experiences and but it really quick quickly helped me know where i didn’t want to work you know i don’t want to be in that space anymore but you do what you need to do to make the money sometimes when you’re going um and i think it’s learning that as quickly as you can start sharing the workload with people

 

So I would also say the soonest you can start snatching up mentors and like-minded people and people who, you know, are doing the stuff you want, where you want to be in two years or five years or 10 years, like surround yourself with those people. Cause I found most people are generally kind, willing to give you some time, happy to share their story and can network and advice and things like that. So choosing your mentors and the people you spend time with wisely, I think is also important. Good feedback. Yeah. Good feedback. So what are you seeing right now, kind of the state of the industry? yeah well it’s it’s really interesting i think my perspective is a little different um just because again we’re not trying to be insanely innovative and insanely creating new product and new services right we’re trying to help people leverage what’s already established and what’s proven for their business so i mean obviously earlier bob mentioned ai that is obviously the the key word right and it has been and it’s existed forever you put it on anything and the value just increases

 

feed versus my feed versus Bob’s feed there’s elements of AI and all of that right yes and so it’s it’s not as just trying to help debunk myths sure and say just be aware of this don’t you know learn about it listen to the podcast read the book watch the person on the you know on YouTube talking about it and and know a little bit have a finger finger on the pulse maybe but it doesn’t necessarily going to overwhelm your life or change it that drastically you know today do you see do you see your clients

 

a good chunk of our clients yeah or i don’t like it so therefore i don’t want to put energy into it or money into it well it’s like great don’t use it personally but but your audience is there thank you and every other business in the space is developing it so even though you don’t like it let’s talk about it um the other half i think there’s A certain amount of well, maybe I don’t need to work with anybody else anymore because now there’s a platform that does it right. We’ve all

 

And I don’t need to pay these humans over here to do it. And then they figure out, well, it still needs a human to run it. It still needs a strategy behind it. And so we work with a lot of folks that have given those things a shot and they don’t understand it and they’re not seeing a return. And no one explained it to them. They signed up for a free account, trial online, and then let, frankly, probably AI, chatbots or whatever, sell them a bundle, you know, sell them a package on whatever they thought magically.

 

The rest of us, quote, unquote, are in the for-profit space. Economy, interest rates, blah, blah, blah. But in a not-for-profit space, what do you see their challenges currently in the next couple of years? I would say that the biggest challenge that I see as someone who’s come out of teaching and someone who’s come out of nonprofits and arts and social service spaces is just the differences helping them come over a mentality of ‘we can’t do it’ and ‘we don’t have money.’ We’re just need to be thankful with what we’re handed as a nonprofit. And so that is, is a challenge that I’m very comfortable helping. Very comfortable arguing about it. I’m very comfortable talking in a board meeting, going, ‘Hey guys, every single board member here needs to get their wallet out because we need five grand for this.’ And here’s why we need it. Here’s what’s going to happen. And here’s why we need to do it. And everybody here should be contributing.

 

on earth to keep up with anybody with all the free platforms we have access to the technology we all have access to you are at a much closer playing field to coke and pepsi and tesla than you were 20 yeah correct we’re 20 years ago and at a number that’s not you know crazy yeah it’s getting more expensive yeah well relatively comparison and the education is free on youtube you know even thinking about you know what was on youtube but i was you know deciding to be

 

So, yeah, that’s it. I think a lot of what we’re doing is trying to overcome mindsets, help empower and help demonstrate. Like, again, we’ve got a great network of people in foreign and nonprofit spaces. And there’s been a number of occasions where, you know, a client needs money to accomplish a goal in the marketing space. They don’t have the money. It’s not in the budget. We can write it in for next year. But by that time, everything will change, by the way.

 

We have very few established nonprofits where money is a whole lot of an issue. You know, once you actually start talking about it, I feel like, yeah, that’s. Based on what the services we’re providing and the questions we’re asking, we don’t see a whole lot of problems with that. Now, does that mean that they’re not pausing their capital campaign to go build a new gym or a new building? I don’t really know that information because I’m not in that space. Right. But it seems like at a functional, just sort of like operating cost standpoint, we haven’t had any pushback or any real, you know, any. Drop-ins or drop-ins. Drop-ins. Yeah. Yeah. Nobody’s like, we can’t afford you anymore.

 

bonus. It should be the icing on the cake. In a lot of ways, it’s the first level of that multi-tiered cake, or it should be. It’s foundational to the organization. If the audience can’t understand the story and the value that the organization provides to its constituents, then there’s zero chance of success. At least sustainable success. It might be a flash in the pan. Anybody can pull one quick thing off and get their 10 minutes of news coverage and press release on.

 

Like that, right? Yeah, I mean there there are some aspects of marketing that do, and I think that that you know that’s kind of a been an industry challenge you know. If we’re just open and honest about it is people diving at those squirrels right, and saying ‘I need instant ROI’ well You can’t get instant ROI except for in some rare cases without building foundational elements that really connect you to a story that connects that story to your constituents and your audience, and demonstrates value. And then you give a good experience of your product and service, and have this full-service, full-circle, holistic approach to your business. That is sustainable, not one campaign that you throw against the wall and hope it sticks because you saw some influencer on TikTok.

 

Yeah, that is not a strategy! I’m gonna hire an influencer for the next two days-good, my entire year budget and it unfortunately people then you know do a couple of those things and then they convince themselves that marketing doesn’t work, and it’s not that marketing doesn’t work, it’s that you approach it the wrong way and committed a random act of marketing. I like that, I like that, totally true! It’s like you When we say, ‘Well, what have you done with your ad spend on some Meta ads for Instagram and Facebook?’ Well, we boosted a post last year, and we didn’t even make any money off of it. You click boost, and you donate. That is not a marketing strategy. That, ladies and gentlemen, is called a Hail Mary. I call it a donation to Mark Zuckerberg. Did you want to buy Mark lunch that day? Well, then, yeah, boost that for $20. Great. It’s going to be gone like that, and it’s going to get you nothing.

 

yourself through trial and error before you maybe bring on a, you know, Hayes or Ash say, here’s what I’ve tried. And I’m really struggling with this. I don’t understand it. Well, be real, be humble. Yeah. You know, come from a position of understanding and I’ve tried stuff and I’ve done the best I can, but now that I’ve experimented, here’s what I’m seeing. What do you guys think based on this information versus coming in from a position of like, I hate that I’m here in this marketing company’s office in the first place, because now this guy’s going to ask me for a thousand bucks

 

for us to get them understanding where it went wrong for them and what the right approach is. That’s a great point. And because all these tools are so accessible, anybody can create a website that makes them look pretty good. And everybody’s cousin’s nephew is a web developer or a graphic designer or a photographer. And so they start taking these cheap, the least expensive shots they can get, and then they devalue the whole industry. And that’s tough too.

 

You just don’t know what you don’t know. Sometimes you have to go. That’s correct. Again, learning through failure or learning through the wrong choices. Unfortunately, the only way. Yeah. I mean, we all make mistakes, right? We’re all human beings. And the more authentic and transparent we can be with each other, then we can get to something that’s real and help each other. And if it’s clouded and mystery and BS, then it doesn’t work. Yeah, 100%. Yeah. So what do you see happening with Ash Interactive next couple of years? What do you think? Oh, gosh.

 

Pike Township in Indianapolis, kind of on the northwest side. And that was great. We’ve been in Hendricks County now since 2020 and have just had a great experience there. We still do work in Indy. We’ve got lots of great friends and contacts there that we get to work with. But I really wanted to test out this model where we were trying to provide almost geographically. Almost a community-based. Yeah, being more community-based and setting up those relationships. And we’ve done, the team has just done a really solid job of establishing that.

 

The visionary big picture I’m just thinking: how is this? How can we start popping up pockets? How can this uh either franchise for lack of a better term or can it just be replicated in different communities? Sure, we’ve seen the growth of our clients; we’ve seen the empowerment and like just more pride and energy behind a lot of our clients in the non-profit space and like let’s face it: these are the people that are helping people in your community right? So we want them to grow… you know, internally we say we like helping people that help people; it helps us.

 

Yeah, sure. And so that, to me, is sort of big picture. How do we start looking at that and scale and help more people? But also, how does that make Ash a more valuable company, too, as I look to the future? A future exit someday. Exactly. So is it, you know, my kids aren’t necessarily that hot into it, which is amazing. Because, like, I would have killed it if my dad would have been like, had all the toys we have. I was just like, oh, my God. I was like, my kids, I’m going to have to stop them from playing with video cameras.

 

is Think about where you’re going. The direction you’re going today is great. Think about that. But also think about it. And what if you made a hard right tomorrow? And what if you made a hard left tomorrow? Where would those take you if you just focused on different niches or different new services or only decided to do one service starting tomorrow? How would that change? It just helps you think from so many different angles about where the business could go or where it should go. And I think that helps add clarity to go through that.

 

Path because there wasn’t demand for it right, right all of a sudden we’re getting calls for ‘Hey, my Catholic school, we worked with probably every Catholic school in central Indiana for their fundraiser. Because, man, if we don’t get that $50,000 dollars that our annual gala event raises then we’re in trouble. You know, no matter what the scale of that raise was, we were traveling all around the state, loading up the car with gear, driving three four hours sometimes and setting up multi-camera live streams helping, um, ideate with the people who put this on. Well, every year we normally have a magician. We normally have a band. We normally have a, uh, uh, what do they call the guys that make the cocktails? Uh, mixologist. And so we’re brainstorming. I’m like, great. We can still have a mixologist. We’re going to Zoom them in from our studio. He’s going to have cool recipes and where you’re going to mail everybody or have a drive-through box of stuff. It’s going to have a shot glass and it’s going to have a whatever’s shaker cup. Yeah. I missed that. Yeah.

 

But how many of our friends don’t exist anymore? That’s correct. Because for whatever reason, they weren’t able to. So, you know, I mean, that’s a great trial by fire that a lot of businesses starting today. Hopefully we’ll never have you know so yeah. Fair enough. Pete, how can people find you? Pretty easy to find. If you Google Ash, which is A-S-H Interactive, you’ll find us at Ash Interactive for our socials, Facebook and Instagram. We’re also on TikTok and YouTube. But we’re pretty easy to find. And our team is fun, making cool behind-the-scenes content. We’ve got one coming out today, and I know this will come out at a later date. But we just got some swag. We’re just sort of leaning into it now. Got some quarter zips and hats for the team and that kind of stuff.

 

You I don’t even know if I need to argue, but I think we have the best contemporary art collection, I agree, in Hendricks County at least, uh, just in our building. So, if you’re an art lover and want to see something some stuff that’s a little more unusual stuff right, give yourself a tour. Awesome, that’s awesome! Well thanks for coming on yeah, we’ll be on again sometime in the future, we’ll love it. This has been a lot of fun, thanks.