[00:00:27] Jay: Hi, everyone. Welcome to The First Customer podcast today. My guest is Brian Childress. I'm going to, I was going to stumble over, but I'm just going to say it. Founder and fractional CTO. There we go. I got it. It's on my laps. Brian, thanks for joining me, buddy. How are you?
[00:00:42] Brian: Jay. Thanks for having me. I'm really glad to be here.
[00:00:45] Jay: a fellow Richmond guy. Is that where you grew up? Did you grow up in Virginia?
[00:00:49] Brian: I did, man. Born and raised, moved away after high school, and then my wife and I came back a couple years ago. So,
[00:00:57] Jay: did you have any entrepreneurs? Anybody that kind of led you to being one later in life when you were growing up?
[00:01:02] Brian: my grandfather, I'm realizing now how much he and my story is very much alike. Kind of when we went out on our own, how we worked, On the side as long as well as having a full time job, for a period of time, like our stories are very similar, which is pretty cool.
[00:01:20] Jay: What did he do? What was his business?
[00:01:22] Brian: He was a custom home builder, so he focused, he built, you know, beautiful masonry homes, and that was his thing.
So he had a number of, you know, really nice houses that he built. He, established a few subdivisions and. You know, he was just a hardworking guy, man, six days a week and took Sundays off kind of thing. So,
[00:01:42] Jay: Yeah, they don't make them like that anymore. My grandfather was the same way. He built a lot of stuff, in Mechanicsville, Virginia. construction, business guy, same kind of deal. went out and did it on his own, so. Some of this stuff is definitely in the DNA, I think, for sure. So, I see you're a mentor for tech stars.
You worked at Calendly, you worked at Capital One, you like did all these different things. what kind of led you to eventually founding Summit Labs and like you said, stepping out on your own, doing your own thing.
[00:02:09] Brian: so I originally founded Summit Labs 10 or more years ago. and I did it because, you know, I was learning and growing as a software engineer, and I was finding that I wasn't getting the same level of challenge or excitement. From a lot of the work that I was doing day in and day out. So I kind of founded the company as a way to, you know, try and like dip my toe into freelancing.
just start to, to figure out some different areas that I might want to work, different industries. And so it was my way of exploring with, whilst I still had a W2 job.
[00:02:48] Jay: And what, what made you go out and start exploring, like we said, you were kind of not learning anything anymore. But, like, was there, you know, any sort of personal kind of push towards it? Was it a career thing? Like, was it just 1 day? You're like, I'm going to open an LLC and today's the day I'm going to do that.
[00:03:06] Brian: kind of the latter, man. I, you know, it was one of those, I had a great idea late at night and decided to register the name and pay the 300 bucks. but really, I think for me, I've, and this is something that I've kind of learned about myself over the last decade or so, is I really, I have a strong desire to challenge myself and to constantly be learning and I wasn't finding that level of challenge in my day to day work.
And so I went and found ways to do it on my own and summit labs just happened to be a way to do it. You know, I have some big kind of. Life goals. And, you know, it turns out that the freedom that owning my own business, a lot of what that provides is going to allow me to kind of continue to pursue and achieve those goals.
So it just, it seemed like the right fit. you know, I'm just kind of crazy enough to think it'll work. So.
[00:03:59] Jay: I think it was 11 years ago or something. You've had it for a while now, I think. Right. So tell me kind of the snapshot from where it started to what it is today. Right.
[00:04:10] Brian: so in the early days, I was, you know, I've always, let me back up. So in graduate school, I kind of went into technology. I'm, I was never the kid that grew up programming at eight years old and writing computer games and that sort of thing. It just wasn't me. so I didn't get into technology until much later.
and really in graduate school is when I found my real passion for technology and software development. And so that kind of continued to push me forward. I got into the working world, wasn't feeling that challenge after the first couple of years. So I started my company. and I was just looking for anything.
And at that time, like, I was finding. you know, website jobs off craigslist for 300 and, you know, I don't remember exactly what my first client was or it was kind of a blurry area, in time, but I remember creating a website for like a wedding venue and an insurance company and, like a marketing company and it was just kind of all across the board and it was just, how can I create websites Because that's what I knew, you know, kind of how to do.
So I knew it well enough. But really what I was learning was what does it take to go out and find somebody that needs something that I can do? And what does it mean to receive money for something that I just created? And so there was a lot of learnings in those early years.
[00:05:30] Jay: What did you learn about going out and getting customers? I mean, what did you apply now that you learned then?
[00:05:36] Brian: that, you know, there's a lot of skills and knowledge that I have that a lot of other people don't have. And I think that was something that because I, you know, the more we study and we get deeper into our industries and our careers, we just, we feel like everyone knows the things that we know, like, we're not an expert.
We don't feel like we are able to, you know, really differentiate. And for me, I found out really quickly that wasn't the case. There's not a lot of people that can do what I do. And there's certainly even fewer people that can do it at the level that I can do it. And that's not trying to be egotistical.
That's just what I've come to learn is that there's a lot of people that value the skills and the knowledge that I bring. And I'm just able to, to bring it to them and a way that, you know, is easy to understand and, you know, very collaborative. And it turns out that we're able to, you know, work on some great projects together.
[00:06:34] Jay: So what is that now? What is your product now? You know, there was websites early on. What is it today?
[00:06:40] Brian: So I focus on, custom software development. And so where I tend to really focus Jay is, businesses like, more established kind of startups or small businesses, medium sized businesses that have custom, B2B software. And I come in and help them to. Design and build that software a little bit better.
So I'll work with the team to be more efficient to provide better quality, more secure, better performance. so I, I like to focus a lot in those areas.I really help the teams to work better so that they can then provide a better product to their end customer.
[00:07:19] Jay: I run a quality assurance services agency, so we probably should talk after this episode.
[00:07:24] Brian: Let's do it. Let's do it.
[00:07:26] Jay: Sounds like we have a lot of, similar goals and similar, you know, client, personas. how mature are you with your, you know, client acquisition and your lead generation and your all these other things? Like, is it word of mouth?
Is it, do you have some targeting you do? Like, what are you doing to acquire new customers today?
[00:07:45] Brian: I do a lot around content marketing. So, maybe 18 months ago or so I really got active on linked in started to really put out a lot of valuable content there. And that's allowed me to grow my network. I've had a lot of inbound leads and opportunities come from that work. I've done some outbound outreach as well.
You know, I look in part of a number of different networks and so clients or, you know, potential projects that may fit. I kind of keep a pulse on that as well.and then, you know, podcasts just like yours has been a great way to, get my name out into the world as well. Cause there's just, you know, there's so much going on that there, it's hard to kind of get your name in front of the right person.
So I think for me, I've really had to kind of niche down into the customer profile that I'm going after and then figure out ways to get in front of them. Cause. You know, they're not going to be hanging out in the same places that, you know, us tech nerds are hanging out. Right. So I need to figure out where they are and go to them.
[00:08:54] Jay: You hear about content marketing all the time and it's almost like, it's almost like the term market research, right? Like people hear it and their brain immediately just like shuts off from overload, like panic mode, right? There's just like so much to do to like have a strategy and to be consistent and to find the right content for the right target audience.
Like, how are you, how have you changed that since, I mean, I'm assuming at some point you're like, I'm going to do content marketing. I'm going to aim it at these people. I'm going to sit down and start. Producing some content for them. How has that changed over 18 months? Like, how have you gotten better at it as you've gone along?
[00:09:30] Brian: There's a few kind of frameworks or ideas that have really helped me in that. And so, like, a lot of what I do is out on LinkedIn. So I try and post at least once a day, sometimes more than that. And a few things that really helped me is this kind of idea that no one is ever going to read everything you've ever written, so don't worry about repeating yourself and changing, you know, maybe slightly tweaking the message, but continually repeating that same message so that folks can identify you and your face and the message that you're putting out there.
When they see it, so just kind of repeatedly, you know, getting out in front of people, another kind of framework or idea that really helped me was, think about, you know, for instance, like on social media. Think about the content that you put out there as if it were a billboard on the side of the highway and the person that's seeing it is going 90 miles an hour and so they're just catching a brief glimpse and the goal of it for me is that I want them to see kind of my name, my title, my picture, and then maybe catch a brief glimpse of what that message is as they're continuing to, you know, scroll through social media, And so those have been really helpful.
just kind of ways to think about it. you know, there's the other things that I've changed about how do I write, you know, most people kind of, not necessarily read, but they. Kind of understand information at, like, an elementary level, like, I don't third grade, maybe. And so just writing in very simple terms, writing about the things that my end customer is going to find valuable, not necessarily the very techie things that I find interesting.
So, really, just kind of putting that message out there and presenting as myself as the expert. I found to be really helpful.
[00:11:17] Jay: And are you going, is the content that you're putting out there, is that driving towards specific pain points for those personas that you've identified?
[00:11:28] Brian: It is. Yeah, I'm targeting those exact pain points. I'm really trying to use a lot of the tools and tactics and ideas that I've brought to previous projects to kind of just present. This is how I solved this particular problem that particular client had, but I know many other clients, or potential clients could have.
[00:11:49] Jay: Where did you find your frameworks and like stuff to, you know, what were you reading, what did you kind of bone up on to get better at the content marketing thing, or was it just kind of, you know, slapdash research as you went along?
[00:12:00] Brian: I've been trying to grab it from everywhere that I can. So, other folks is frameworks. there's a lot of popular voices out there on LinkedIn and similar platforms. really for me, the great unlock was I hired a professional coach almost 2 years ago. and I mean, I spent serious money because I got, I was really.
I really wanted to make this work and I really wanted to kind of take myself to the next level. And for me, the thing that I needed at that time was actually a professional coach. And from that, I've hired additional coaches and I've joined a couple different masterminds. And that has been really helpful because I'm now able to talk with other folks that are doing similar type of work and trying to steal their frameworks.
so just kind of, I guess, long answer is I got around the right people and really listened to what's working for them and then just tried it for myself.
[00:12:56] Jay: What was the biggest thing that you got from your first round of hiring a professional coach? Because that seems like it would probably be the most impactful. One would be the first one. What was the biggest lesson you got out of that?
[00:13:07] Brian: Really, in working with him, it helped me to get out of my own way. Right. I, you know, I think a lot of us kind of have this idea or this, you know, we suffer from kind of imposter syndrome or a lack of confidence that we know what we're talking about. And so in hiring him, we really spent a lot of time kind of working through that.
And it helped me to understand the expertise and the knowledge that I've garnered over the last, you know, 15 years of being a professional out there. And the fact that I've during most of that time, I've worked full time and freelanced really kind of multiplied the amount of experience and exposure I've had to different projects and technologies and industries and so forth.
so working with him just kind of helped me to understand that a lot better.
[00:13:58] Jay: what kind of outbound do you do?
[00:14:01] Brian: I do a lot of, or I've tried various types of cold outreach, you know, so I'll, compile lists based on my ideal personas and then reach out to folks. I've done some, you know, tried to offer different tools and techniques. you know, I've got a pretty well defined playbook that I use and I'll take pieces out of that and then send it to folks.
So I'm really trying to, you know, get into their ecosystem. So if there's an ideal client, I'll try and hang out near where they, they are. If they're putting content out on LinkedIn, I'll try and jump into the comment thread and add some value there. and so some of those have been, have worked out well, but I think most of what I've done has been more kind of putting content out there.
And then I've, you know, largely been lucky with inbound from that.
[00:14:52] Jay: Yeah, I mean, I think you're shortchanging yourself calling it lucky I don't think anybody would say consistently posting every single day and then getting results from that as luck But I mean, I will also say I think luck is a Under appreciated, piece of running a successful business, right? I mean, timing and luck is, got to be on your side. very interesting. and what percentage? So you said most of your business comes from inbound. how do you, so you're trying to help people with, Yeah. You know, better code, better quality, scaling up, like all that sort of stuff. What, how do you get that information about a company if it's not public, right?
Like, how are you digging a little bit deeper? If you have a list of, you know, companies that are five to 50 people, and you know, that's kind of your target and they're doing 5 million a year. And, you know, that's kind of your target, but like, how do you really go, okay, this is when I should spend some time on, right.
is it social media? Is it stuff they put out? Is it just like, is it Reddit? Threads about this company, like what is it that you can use to kind of dig in a little bit and to better qualify candidate so that you can go to that conference, you know, maybe it's an insurance company and you would never go to an insurance conference ever in your life, except if you knew that this one client was a really great perspective lead.
How do you really define that? They're good for you. A good could be a good potential fit.
[00:16:10] Brian: All of the above as much research as I can do on a particular company, you know, I try and narrow it down as much as I can, but because of the nature of the work that I do, I tend to work across industries. So I'm not necessarily niched in, in insurance or FinTech or any other industry.
so really I look for.
Companies that are building software that may be struggling to deliver good quality software, right? They're behind schedule. they have security concerns or performance concerns and trying to identify some of those. And so that in itself kind of makes it a little bit trickier because I basically, you know, I, I kind of need to talk to those pain points, but in order to find them that I have found that to be a bit trickier.
you know, maybe some things that I've seen is like a developer for a company might be asking a lot of questions and different forums that I'm a part of. I'm a. A member of a lot of different discords and slack communities and that sort of thing, and just kind of keeping an ear to the ground.
Like, if there's developers asking specific questions, like, I bet I can help there. I wonder if I should research a bit more about that particular company, you know, I might, you know, and this has worked for me as well. Like.helping that particular developer out saying, Hey, you know, I think this is what you should try if you want to hop on a phone call real quick, I can help you kind of troubleshoot what's going on.
And then that, you know, brings me into their ecosystem. The developer is, you know, happy because they're able to solve their particular problem. They look great to their boss. Then they may say, Hey, boss, we need to bring this guy in to help with this bigger project or this other challenge that I know we have.
so things like that have helped as well.
[00:17:58] Jay: No, I like that. It's very, you know, organic and I mean, you know, you hit on it without saying it directly, but, once you stop just selling your shit and you are like helping people, it always kind of comes back around. And even if it doesn't, it's still the right way. It's the best way to sell things is like, to offer your help and solutions and that sort of thing.
People go, oh. so it sounds like that's kind of exactly the path you're taking. so you mentioned personal brand a little bit, like very briefly, podcasts and other things and getting your face out there and getting your name out there. is there any difference for you, but like from, you know, Summit Labs and your personal brand, you know, Brian out there, putting his face out there.
Is there any difference in the way that you market those two things? Or right now, is it just trying to get people to know who Brian Childress is?
[00:18:45] Brian: I think it's largely just get to know me, Brian Childress. you know, Summit Labs is largely just, you know, how I run the business, right? Where all my, you know, taxes and all that kind of stuff is handled. But really the person that they're recognizing that they're seeing posts on LinkedIn every day and solving problems is me, is my face.
and so I've really tried to lean into that a bit more. you know, podcasts and speaking at conferences and all of those sorts of things I've really tried to lean into over the last few years.
[00:19:14] Jay: Beautiful. Well, it sounds like you're doing all the right stuff, brother. I got one final question for you. now I'm business related. If you could do anything on earth. Then you knew you couldn't fail. What would it be? Yeah,
[00:19:25] Brian: on earth and I knew I couldn't fail.I have a goal to, you know, I, I really like travel and I wish I could, you know, was traveling more. so I have a goal to climb a mountain on all seven continents. not necessarily the tallest, right. You know, but just. to climb and explore. That's one of my passion areas.
And so that's something I really would love to pursue. and for me, you know, the risks involved there failing could be, could mean death. so, I mean, if I can remove that as a factor, yeah, sign me up today.
[00:20:00] Jay: I like that one. That's a good one. I don't think anybody's ever said climb a mountain on all seven continents. That's a good one. I like that. Alright, Brian, if people want to find you, if they want to get in touch, how do they do that?
[00:20:10] Brian: LinkedIn is the best spot to find me, Jay. Brian dash Childress. I'm on there. I'm trying to post, at least once or twice a day. So I'm pretty active on there. Feel free to reach out, send me a connection requests or a message. I'm happy to chat
[00:20:24] Jay: Alright, cool, brother. Well, I appreciate it. you shared some very Tactical advice, which is fantastic. I think people will get something out of this episode that can, they can maybe go use, which I can't say for every episode, but I can say for this one, it was great. So, Brian, you're fantastic. Have a good rest of your week, brother.
And I'll talk to you soon. All right.
[00:20:41] Brian: you as well. Thanks.
[00:20:42] Jay: Brian. See you, man.