The First Customer - How To Build a Seven-Figure eCommerce Business with CMO Steve Kilberg

 [00:00:27] Jay: Hi everyone. Welcome to The First Customer podcast. My name is Jay Aigner. Today I am lucky enough to be joined by Steve Kilberg, CMO of SKRP Media and a bunch of other things. Steve, thanks for joining me today, buddy. How are you?

[00:00:38] Steve: Jay, thank you very much for the opportunity to chat with you and your listeners. I'm looking forward to our conversation.

[00:00:43] Jay: Yeah, me too, man. where did you grow up and did that have an impact on you being an entrepreneur?

[00:00:47] Steve: yes, it actually did. I grew up in the Detroit area. My father worked in the automobile industry and he had kind of a traditional role, but he always would say to me, do something on your own, because when you get into the corporate world, you're going to have just, you're going to get stuck and you're going to hate it.

And he'd changed jobs internally because it's a larger company. And initially my first job out of college, I had a job. Which, you know, I was working for somebody, but they had, I had the ability to work out of my home and still I was managing accounts as a rep for them. But because I worked solo, I was in my early 20s at that point, it gave me the taste of doing something on my own because I was managing my own little business and I loved it. And that's what always fueled in the back of my mind and I never left that, that, that conversation which happened many times. My father would try to do something on your own and then just fast forward to years later when I Parents were becoming older and became ill. I made a choice to take care of them because I had job separation and my father brought that up again. It's like I said, it's now or never. And that's what led this me to this conversation today.

[00:01:49] Jay: Beautiful. Have you seen, the documentary American Factory 

[00:01:53] Steve: I have not. That sounds like a, good one though. 

[00:01:55] Jay: about, I know the 1 of the producers, which is why I even know about it, but it's about the 1 of the last, production. Facilities for, I think, for automobiles for maybe forward or somebody in Detroit. and then they sold it to a glass manufacturer that makes auto glass that was bought by an Asian company and they flew in all these.

Chinese folks that, went to run the company, it's all about, like, how they kind of integrated into the society of living in Detroit and running things in an American city. That's different than a Chinese. It's an interesting documentary, to check out, but didn't know if you'd seen it because it's based in Detroit.

 so, tell me a little more about the story. how did you get to SKRP Media? What is it? and kind of what are some of your other ventures along the way?

[00:02:39] Steve: Yeah. Okay. I'll keep this short cause I could ramble on for a while. So when I had that job separation and I made a choice to take parents just because some circumstances happened, uh, I was still single at the time and I had the flexibility where my siblings did not. So I needed to have some type of income.

So because I've got a digital marketing background, and prior to that, I was working in different companies in the internet space. I was kind of touching different parts of the food chain, if you will. So I had some, a couple of early customers in that venue, which were more local businesses. And again, it gave me that taste of, Hey, this is a lot of fun.

I can provide a lot of value to them, help them grow their small business. and and you know, just kind of have that flexibility, which is what I was, which is what I was needed. But then I got, I went back to that taste of being, doing something on my own. So fast forward, then my parents, eventually passed away.

I was struggling with some clients I was getting so that I ventured into the e commerce space, which is cause I had some friends doing that. I said to my, then wife, cause we had met along the way saying, look, give me six months. I'll try this. If I can't make a work, I'll go back and get a job. Well, six months went by.

I didn't quite make it if you will. But I had sales coming in. And enough for the taste. I'm like, wait a second here. So then we ended up growing that business at which we literally started from an idea a conversation dinner to doing seven figures It was growing. We were traveling the world. It was humming along You know, there's always challenges and then we didn't have a great 2000 latter portion 2018 And then we all recall what happened in early 2019 And we ran out of product and we had nothing for months.

And so our business took a colossal blow from COVID because our supplier was closed. So that being said is our, and this is the peaceful tool to hide back to the, your overall theme of the first customer. I've already, I had a customer, I was doing some other consulting, but this is actually a better segue, I think. So we were in Mexico cause we were literally digital nomads and, We were talking about some things and I said we could sell this now it's not gonna be a home run But we'll be able to take it from an idea and sell it and I said, you know if I did this in this We could double this thing and I didn't quite execute on some of those things And then what happened was we were in Mexico.

My wife got a phone call about come and say goodbye to your dad So I was like, oh boy, so flies back. She's there and she calls me and says, okay, he's gonna make it But he needs help and so Are you willing and she knew my answer already because I'd taken care of my parents So I we moved to florida took care of her father and eventually he passed away But by then the business was kind of going now in 2019 then the pandemic happens and you know Our lives changed forever, obviously so our business took a crushing blow, but because we're gonna sell it I was And I didn't and I own that but I learned a tremendous amount So then I got involved with a group and some people and I wanted to learn the sell side of businesses Because I learned all these digital things.

I grew a business from an idea to seven figures I know how all this stuff works It's still making mistakes But I still made that work and it's I've learned that much more since then that being said as I linked up with a colleague of mine and now we are I'm doing M& A advising slash investment banking for digital businesses which are sub 10 million that are looking to grow and or sell. So I'm actually helping businesses grow to get to a spot where they're ready to sell and or sell. In conjunction, I'm trying to regrow our brand back up but that's another, I'm not going to go into that story. But that has been a fascinating experience. I've been doing this for the last year and a half now Just getting in the trenches of these businesses to try to take them Finding buyers for those businesses and we have clients all over the world, which is a lot of fun as well And so a little bit of a longer answer there But I think it gives context to what i'm doing and how I got to where i'm at today and i'm having the time of my life right now because Seeing these business owners giving them their life changing moment where Whether they make a million dollars or they make a couple hundred thousand dollars, it's still a life changing number because we just sold a business last month from a gentleman who's from Eastern Europe and the average salary in that country is 20, 000 us and we sold his business for multiple six figures. That's a life changing event for that individual. I get that wire transaction. So those are the fun times when you actually get to that spot and the wires get sent out and he gets his money and you just see that look on his face and you're like, wow.

[00:06:47] Jay: so who, and in your, what is your role for that company? is it an advisor, just a kind of a consulting kind of role?

[00:06:53] Steve: Yes, it's in that role. It's an M& A advisor. I mean, there's a couple different names I could say in digital investment banker, but it's we're just calling ourselves an M& A advisor because we're helping Digital businesses that are doing less than 10 million dollars a year in revenue and they've made a decision that owner to sell their business And it's really an asset the other day if you have a business that's less than 10 million.

These are asset sales These are asset businesses because even though it's your website, it could be e commerce. It could be SAS It could be an app for your phone. It could be a software It doesn't all those things are the relative But they don't have major infrastructure. You typically don't have hundreds of employees. These are smaller businesses. Most businesses that we're working with now have less than 10 employees, but they're still generating profit and revenue and profit. And they've made a decision to sell their assets, sell their business. And so we'll find buyers for those. And again, most of our clients we have now are all over the world, which is, there's just so many things that I've uncovered and learned in the last year and change has just blown my mind. And it's fun to get behind the scenes. Literally, because I see the financials, I see everything that they're doing, and then we present that as a package to a prospective buyer.

[00:08:00] Jay: Have you learned things from those clients to cycle back into your business? 

[00:08:05] Steve: Absolutely. Absolutely. 100%. And this will actually, I think, benefit your listeners in terms of, if you're looking for that first customer, right? You are doing everything, and it starts right up here. It's all a belief. Is it possible? Can I do it? I'm following things that I'm taught and I, that I'm intuitively know and all those things you do, whatever your business is, whether it doesn't matter. And when you get that first sale, I'll never forget this getting that sound on my phone. We had that first e commerce sale. It was literally, it makes your hair on your arm stand up and you're like, Whoa, what is that? And then when it keeps, then it's addicting. You're like, I want that again. And then when you get to the spot where it's happening all night, you wake up and I had five sales while I was sleeping. How about that? That is a fun, fun feeling. And now. So just looking at this from a different perspective, these people have built these assets up and now they just want to exit. They want to have that exit experience, or I call it the life changing experience. And it doesn't have to be a multi million dollar deal.

So many people get thinking, like I talked to friends of mine that are still in the corporate world, they're like, well, you know, I don't have my idea for the next Twitter. I'm like, you're not going to develop the next Twitter. Do not worry about that. It doesn't matter. You can do whatever that is. If you're solving, if your product or service solves a need in the marketplace. And you can demonstrate that you can fulfill on that you can generate a sale that is a business that is a brand and it's Something you can sell as a tangible asset to somebody who will take that asset and do something more with it. And that's a life changing experience. The transformation that I've gone through in doing a corporate job that I hated and loathed in different companies.

And you know, you always change jobs. You're like, okay, this one will be better. And it's like, this is just a different shade of green. It's still all the same, right? So I was like, I'm never going back to that. but anyway, that's kind of where I'm at now. And it's just a lot of fun to be part of that whole process.

[00:09:51] Jay: So who was your first customer?

[00:09:54] Steve: Well, there's a couple ones on the, when I first did my very first consulting, I'll never forget it was a dentist back in Denver, Colorado, and it was like the first real client I had. And it was really cool. Cause I was helping him with his SEO and his local marketing and he had no, they had no idea.

Like if you typed in their website, their brand, like their business name into Google, you couldn't find it. It's like, how is that possible? Well, there's like simple things like, you know, having just a little bit of basic knowledge will help you change some things. And then you show them, Hey, I just type your name into Google.

Like, Oh my God, there's our business, right? So that's always a fun experience too, to see them that, and then do some marketing activities and generate, you know, clients for them on a dental scale. From a dentist's perspective. Then in the e commerce side, I'll never forget there was a woman who I was going through kind of a bought a course and did like a mastermind.

And it was in Las Vegas doing an event and we were kind of getting in the trenches, doing some things. And the guy said, do this, and this. And I'm like, this is never going to work. He's like, just trust me on this thing. Right. So I did. And then that night I got a sale and I literally, it was like doing backflips.

I'm in my hotel room. Like I'm seeing metaphorically, but I was just like, Oh my God, I actually did this. I sold something on the internet now. The local thing was more face to face. On the internet, it was just different. And so since then, having those sales repeating, we got to the point where we sold a million dollars worth of products, which is a very, I don't really, you don't appreciate this until you look around. And it still is a quite a feat, although it's took a big blow with COVID. But again, as I said earlier, is that the fact that I know how all this stuff works. I have full confidence I can do this again once we get some product and there's a whole story around that but once we Solve that issue I'm gonna we're gonna blow this back up and now i'm going to sell it for more than we were initially sell it because i've Learned so much more on the m& a side

[00:11:29] Jay: Beautiful. kind of talking about that journey, a little bit, how, how much more do you appreciate? The journey now, then those milestones, I mean, there are the moments where your hair stands up and there are the moments where you hit, you know, 100, 000 and then you hit 500, 000 and then you hit a million and then you hit 1.

5 and he had 2 million and those are all very nice moments in time,

[00:11:58] Steve: absolutely

[00:11:59] Jay: but the longer I've done this, the more I've realized that's all they are. Is there just moments in time, like, there's no balloons that come down from the ceiling. Like, time doesn't stop. Like, there's no sash that somebody gives you that says, like, you made it and like, you're good to go now.

How have you kind of appreciated just the day to day grind and the journey to get to these next milestones as compared to just chasing these things, you know, and then hitting them and then moving on to the next thing, the journey, the, you know, the journey is in the in between, I think, right. that's the fun part.

how have you come to appreciate kind of that in between part more, as you've gone through some of these successes and failures,

[00:12:36] Steve: I'm really glad you asked that question because that is exactly it. If you don't embrace the journey and don't embrace, I hate to say the word grind because I actually love what I do. It's seven days a week for me. It's not work. It is not work at all. Like I'm, if you call it work, I'm in front of my computer way too much.

And, but I truly enjoy it. And I was talking with a gentleman yesterday, just a new colleague I met. And he said, do you enjoy what you do? I said, you know, there's obviously you're going to have things that you're going to do that you don't want to do that you don't like to do. But that doesn't matter.

If you look at the whole picture and I said, I've had learned more in the last five to seven years than I've ever in my entire life. And I've had more fun because of that process. I've learned to enjoy the process. And because now I am helping these business owners cross the line and we built our business to a spot where we could have sold it.

I chose not to. And then, you know, things changed. But because I know how all that works, it is a process. It doesn't happen overnight, but there is a, you know, and it's not a straight line. I'm not going to, I've learned that lesson too. It is not a linear thing that goes up and to the right. It's sideways, backwards, it goes up and down and all those things, but that's just how this works.

And if you're getting value from that and you know, you can wake up in the morning and still look forward to, you know, to move it forward, then that's just what it is. I mean, granted, there are days when it's just hard. I mean, I'm not going to lie here and say this is just like every day.

I'm running around and, you know, um, happy as can be. But there are days where you're like, oh man, but because you, something's going to happen. It's a little stressful. But at the same time though, the big picture is it is definitely, it is a process you need to embrace.

[00:14:12] Jay: what's the common theme for the successful businesses that get to an exit that you've seen? What's kind of the, some of the key things that you've seen from the founders and owners of those companies,

[00:14:24] Steve: That's a great question and I think I didn't realize appreciate how much I was doing this one because again, it's me, right? I'm thinking from my world looking at this the world this way now. I'm looking at things from the outside it is the never give up attitude And it's that mindset of, I'm going to figure this out and however you do it, you know, reading a book, you know, buying a course, getting part of a mastermind, meeting that one person who gives you that one little thing. One of my early mentors in this space, and I think this is relative to that, is like, he made a comment to me or a phrase to me. He said, he's experienced this and now I've experienced this as well. He said, in this world, either digital world or even in life in general, there are very small hinges which can open very big doors. If you just keep going and you believe in the process and where you're going, right? Because there are solutions out there for pretty much everything. If you believe. If you believe in what you're doing, right? And, I'm, that's a foundation for me as well. Because you don't need to do things on the gray or dark side to make this work.

You just don't. And I've seen people try to cut corners because they just don't want to embrace the process. And they're making some very short sighted decisions, but that is. It's their choice. And I think it's foolish because I've just learned, and I'm just one person, there's countless people who have done greater things than me, but that also inspires me too.

[00:15:43] Jay: what's one of your biggest failures when running your business and, kind of the biggest lesson you learned from it.

[00:15:49] Steve: Yeah, and it's something I see now in these businesses that I'm helping sell, right? And they're making the same mistake and I made this and I knew it But I just didn't realize the magnitude of what I had done And so we were building on our, I'll tie this back to our e commerce business, but it's a relative to anything, right? You are, you have to grow a business. You have to do some form of activity either a marketing activity or some type of action To create lead flow to create action to create visibility for your business You're either going to get an email address or a phone number or a customer, right? Those are really it's really think about this.

It's either going to be a lead and or a customer You want to lead to become a customer? So both of those pieces you need to cultivate a relationship and focus on the bigger picture and develop a very deep Relationship with that customer and that prospect and take it to the nth degree and that's the mistake I made is I did I stopped short and I should have kept going Even though I knew quite a bit about our ideal buyer with our e commerce business, I did not stay, consistent and go deep enough with that.

And it hurt us a big, and that hurt us drastically. And what I mean by that is when you have an email list, you need to build a relationship with them because they're, you're a small brand and you're still building a relationship. with that prospective lead and or customer and people will respect that.

Yes, people are not going to unsubscribe or they're going to go with an ideal fit. That's okay. That's just how this works, right? You're on the buying side. If you're going to dinner, any interaction, there's times you appreciate things. There's times like, and I want to move on from this business.

That's okay. Because that business owner, if they're smart about this, they're going to be like, you know what? You're not the right fit. It's time because there's somebody else out there. And the fact that we were in our e commerce business selling A product that was very competitive, and again, I would not, I wouldn't do this again, but I just did this because we're trying to move forward and figure some of this stuff out, but it's in a very competitive field, but the fact that we were making it work, and we did make it work, and we were competing against brands, one of our top competitors in that space runs television ads on primetime TV, and I didn't realize that until one of those, that was one of those moments where I'm sitting down, we were traveling, we're at family, and there was an ad on the TV in the back, and I'm like, wait a minute, that's one of our competitors, and we just saw that they're a manufacturer because we're in a trade show in Asia, and My wife three months earlier had like been standing at a booth and we're like, wait, that's one of our competitors.

They're like, yeah, we build those things for them. So it was one of those moments where I'm like, I'm competing with that brand. But I, the point is I did not go deep enough. So the role I'm doing now in this M& A work, that is the number one mistake these owners are making. And what's weird is they're still profitable.

We're still finding buyers for them, but I will tell them, and this is something a point for your listeners, they leave a lot of money on the table and I'm sad for them because I made that mistake. And they are making that same mistake and you know why they people don't typically cultivate put that extra work and enjoy that process For you know doing the emails doing the social media posts all those things because it's work It's a lot.

It's a work. It takes time. It takes critical thinking It takes actively doing things and listening and always adjusting and if you're not wanting to do that Then you're if you ever go to build an asset and sell it which is what you should be thinking from day one You're going to leave money on the table and you're going to regret that.

And by then it's going to be too late and you can fix it, but you're not going to get the money you want.

[00:18:57] Jay: So a couple more questions based off of that, one based off of that, something that I run into, and I think you're dead on the relationship, the depth of the relationship, uh, Basically dictates whether your sales are successful or not, right? Like, I mean, sometimes you just get stupid lucky

and somebody needs your service and you're there and you, it's a quick sale and you're good to go.

But the question I would ask is, and this probably applies to a lot of your. M and a companies that have this problem, how do you continue to engage with a prospect past that surface level? While still being genuine while not coming off as salesy or not just turn them off as being like, this guy just wants to, you know, buy some crap from him.

Like, how do you engage with prospects in a way that's meaningful and non annoying and non obtrusive and non, you know, how do you do that?

[00:19:54] Steve: Great question. And here's, this ties back to the really the deeper issue with not building a relationship with your prospect of let's say your email list, right? Just use that as for the sake of this conversation and here and this is the this is really the painful part I knew this about our customer.

I just didn't go deep enough and didn't stay consistent enough in that You know lesson learned for i'm going to give an example for our e commerce business Here's what I knew about our ideal buyer and this is where another core mistake All businesses are making, they're not going deep enough, right?

So, for example, I knew that our buyer was a 48 year old, ideal buyer, a 48 year old female that lived outside of San Antonio, Texas, was married, college educated, worked in the medical field, was a nurse, owned an iPhone, had a child, drove an SUV, therefore, they had a child, they knew they had a baby, stole it because they ran, they wanted to run more, they wanted to exercise more, and they couldn't. When I say that, and I can keep going, but when I say that description of people, those 10, 11 items there, people are blown away. They're like, how did you know all that? Well, I knew all that because I knew it was data that was important for me to grow my brand. Now granted, yes, we sold to males, we sold to females, and we sold to people that were older than 48 and younger, but that was our sweet spot.

That was our ideal customer profile, our avatar, and we knew that deep enough. Go back to answer a question. The reason you want to go deep enough on that ideal customer, Is once you know that about your customer, you can talk to them in a way that's different because they're going to, they're going to receive that marketing activity, that communication responses, and they're going to feel like, hey, this person knows me. So if I know that you have a child and I know that you have, maybe you need, do you need something for that stroller that you want to run with on the weekend? Because I have an accessory, you can go here and buy it. Or I just want to give some, you know, content, valuable information, which ties back to my brand, which ties back to products and services.

Then I can ask them, you know, you bought this product for us, we thank you, we're grateful for that. What else can, what else could we help you with? That's how you develop that relationship and go deeper. Because then I can develop other new products and services or source other products and services and now you're building a deeper relationship.

And how this ties back in the M& A side. The other thing that a lot of business owners don't know is they don't know their numbers, right? They know that they need to know their numbers of their business front to back and back to front and I know that scares so Many people they go I say I ask people it's like I hate math I don't I'm not good at math I'm like, I don't care if you don't like it You better learn to like it because you need to know your numbers Especially if you want to sell your business one day and get the most money and then other people will say I'm not looking at So my business I'm like well you should be thinking that way from day one and here's why If you're not thinking that today, you better change because a life event is going to happen and you have no idea what's going to happen in your life the next three years, or a world event like COVID is going to happen.

You have no idea. So if you put your business in place today, build that infrastructure out, it'll never be done, but if you put all those pieces in place, then if you decide to sell it, you give yourself the greatest chance to get the most money for it versus you're scattered all over the place because then it's, I can tell you right now, a savvy buyer is going to come in and say, I'll buy it. But I'm gonna discount it down because you're not doing this and it's gonna reflect in your financials and like okay I'll buy it for this. You're gonna leave a lot of money on the table I mean we're talking hundreds tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of dollars and any person listen to this Have you said if you did these things I just described you can sell your business for an extra two hundred thousand hours Would you do it? And the answer is most likely. Yeah, I'll do it.

[00:23:16] Jay: Love it. What a way to, what a way to cap it. Steve, if you wanna find you, if they wanna find, SKRP or anything else you're working on,how do they do that?

[00:23:26] Steve: Thanks Jay. They can go to skrpmedia. com Slash J. That's skrpmedia all one word Dot com forward slash J. They can go there. There's a landing page. Just answer a couple of questions and I'll give them a free consultation call. It's 30 minute call and people, every time you have a call like that, I can always spot opportunities of, you know, gaps in their business.

And it's not picking on people cause we don't know. We don't know, but we're so in the trenches. I was the same way. You're so in the trenches. You can't see the forest for the trees and just having a fresh set of eyes. Look at some things always gives perspective and I can guarantee. You will learn something valuable if you take the time to set up a call.

[00:24:08] Jay: Awesome. Well, lots of great stuff in there, Steve. I'll have to have you on again someday and dig into some more of your stuff. I love talking to you. love what you got going on, and I wish you the best of luck, brother. Have a good rest of your week and we'll talk to you soon, Steve. Thank you.

[00:24:19] Steve: Thank you, Jay. Same to you.

[00:24:20] Jay: See you.

Bye. 

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