Ready to go to the next level? These are the skills that make exceptional marketers stand out.
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We work with medium businesses all the way to large corporations. We have some small businesses, but you know, typically most of our revenue does come from large corporations. What I mean that, I love it because a little guy can get results. You can go use tools, and learn a lot on your own, and do SEO without having a big money investment, if you’re willing to put in the time and energy yourself. A lot of other marketing forms don’t exist, or they exist but they don’t provide those kind of results without money. Some of the other marketing channels out there you have to put in money to get results.
Quick wins sometimes exist. When you say “quick wins”, a lot of people just get lucky. But here’s a great example. So everyone in the SEO industry is familiar with ChatGPT. It’s a project from OpenAI. OpenAI was founded in 2015. ChatGPT did not just come out this month or last month, or the last year. They’ve been working on the whole vision, whole product since 2015. It’s not a overnight success. Sam Altman isn’t an overnight success before this, Y Combinator. He did a lot of other things before that. Did a lot of angel investing. He’s been an entrepreneur for ages. The point I’m getting at is, everything worthwhile just takes time. Yes, sometimes people get lucky and things just blow up overnight, but it’s extremely rare. That’s like pulling a needle in a haystack.
My day-to-day is a lot of phone calls, meetings, some content creation, answering emails, strategy stuff, working on client accounts. Typical, normal day spending time with kids. Watching some TV like news. I watch BBC quite a bit. We’re between seven and 800 employees. We’re US, Canada, UK, Brazil, Australia, India, Singapore, Germany. We’re about to have Portugal and Spain. When I’m saying these regions, we actually have a managing director, someone leading up a specific region. But we have people in many different regions on top of that as well. But my guess is we’ll probably have, be in over 20 countries with leaders in each of those countries by the end of 2023.
Family fits in great. I’m at home, I work from home. And I see my kids often throughout the whole day, and I play with ’em, and I read to them, and all that kind of good stuff. So yeah, I try to be there as a parent. All the major events and everything like that. And you know, try to support my kids in whatever they decide to do in life and whatever makes ’em happy.
I create content. We try to educate and help through that, but I’m actually not that involved in much. My wife is. So I try to focus on building a business. My wife focuses on philanthropy and tries to help through that. So she spends her full-time raising kids and helping out a lot of different organizations.
I don’t really look at it as like a feeling. I look at it as more like a, there’s a lot of things that are wrong, and as humans if we have the ability to help others out, you should. Right? I don’t look at it as a feeling. What makes me feel better isn’t the helping other people out. It’s actually seeing things improve. There’s so many kids out there that people are like, “oh, they don’t live in good areas. “They’re not going to succeed”. Well, if you gave them the tools and the education, why can’t they? They’re hungry. Who says they’re not smart? Who says they can’t accomplish amazing things? Who says they can’t build multi-billion dollar companies? Who says they can’t cure cancer? And for me it’s more like, it’s sad to see a lot of people in this world not have opportunities, and others help ’em out. And helping ’em, yes. You could say it is a good feeling, but what’s a better feeling for me is seeing change, and then seeing the people that you help out try to help other people as well, and just continue. And hopefully, it’ll make the world a better place. I say more so like, what’s a good feeling is what Elon Musk is doing. What he’s doing is tremendous, right? Trying to make it where people can live on multiple civilizations, not have a single point of failure, being Earth. That’s crazy in a good way. I don’t have the capability to do what he does. It’s not just even money. Sure I don’t have the money he does, but I don’t also have the brain power and intellect.
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– A lot of it just comes down To consistency in doing
something long enough, And what we're doing isn't rocket science. There's a lot of other people
that can do the same thing But they're just not
willing to put in the blood, Sweat and tears. (light music) – So what is it particularly
about SEO that excites you? – It's a great way for
the little guy to get tons Of traffic without having big budgets. (bell chiming) – You mentioned the little guy there. So do you specialize in working with just Big corporate companies, Or is it you help the little guy as well? – We work with medium
businesses all the way To large corporations. We have some small businesses, But you know, Typically most of our revenue Does come from large corporations. What I mean that, I love it because a little
guy can get results. You can go use tools, And learn a lot on your own, And do SEO without having
a big money investment, If you're willing to put in
the time and energy yourself. A lot of other marketing
forms don't exist, Or they exist but they
don't provide those kind Of results without money. Some of the other marketing
channels out there You have to put in money to get results. SEO, organic social, There's only a few channels
where you can really
Do well that really exist For the small guy that
doesn't have any money. – Okay, now obviously
you have got a massive Personal brand yourself, right? What was the thing that you did That really accelerated
your own personal brand? – There wasn't anything. I did not try to build a personal brand. There wasn't one thing that I did. When you do something long enough, And I don't think my
personal brand's that big, There's so many bigger
personal brands than mine. But when you do something for, Call it 20 plus years, And you try to do a decent job at it, Hopefully you build some sort of brand Whether it's personal, Corporate, maybe a bit of both. But nothing, You're not going to become
a overnight success. There's not one thing that
builds a personal brand. It's a lot of little things
that add up over time. From the outside perspective, They don't really see it that way. But that usually is the real case. It's a lot of little things
done for a very long time, And done consistently that
build up a personal brand. – So when you say a long time, If somebody's starting off To build up their corporate brand Or their personal brand, How long is it before you start, When you do consistent things is it, Before you really start to get known?
– Three to five years. That's a conservative estimate. Somewhere in that time range, You'll start getting more well known. Sounds like a long time, But most people are looking
for that one year solution, And it's very rare. – Right, so yeah, I meet a lot of people
look for the quick wins In the industry. Do you think there's any, Do quick wins exist? – Quick wins sometimes exist. When you say "quick wins", A lot of people just get lucky. But here's a great example. So everyone in the SEO industry
is familiar with ChatGPT. It's a project from OpenAI. OpenAI was founded in 2015. ChatGPT did not just come out this month Or last month, Or the last year. They've been working on the whole vision, Whole product since 2015. It's not a overnight success. Sam Altman isn't an overnight success Before this, Y Combinator. He did a lot of other things before that. Did a lot of angel investing. He's been an entrepreneur for ages. The point I'm getting at is, Everything worthwhile just takes time. Yes, sometimes people get lucky And things just blow up overnight,
But it's extremely rare. That's like pulling a
needle in a haystack. – So you said consistency is the key To anything in marketing then, do you? – I think consistency and learning From what's happening. Because there's so many
algorithms and changes. You got to experiment, Learn what's happening, And adapt. – I'm not sure how many
videos you've done. It must be quite a lot because I mean, Social media's just flooded
with all your videos. Do you think that being
consistent in all platforms With all your various videos really helps? – It does. It drives good branding
for corporate, personal. It drives leads. I would always recommend it to people. You know, what we do, There's nothing magic at our agency, NP Digital. We are one Of the fastest running ad
agencies according to Ad Week. And a lot of it just
comes down to consistency, And doing something long enough. And what we're doing isn't rocket science. There's a lot of other people
that can do the same thing But they're just not
willing to put in the blood, Sweat and tears into it. – I mean one of the conversation I have With business owners and individuals is, Well okay, I get the consistency,
But what do I talk about? What do I do videos on? I mean, obviously yourself, You've done thousands of videos. Where do you get your inspiration from? – I get my inspiration from just reading, And also talking to
people and figuring out What pain points and issues they have. Great example of this. You can go on Google, Type in any keywords Within your industry, And you'll also see people also ask. People also ask is what
people are curious about. You can then go And start creating content
around all those topics. It could be video, Could be text based, It's up to you. – Right. So it's realistically just
seeing what people want to know. – Yes. – Brilliant. – That really is all
about content creation. It all comes down to what
do people want to know? If you create that, you'll do well. If you create content Around what people don't care for, Then it wouldn't matter. – So do you have a big team
behind you for creating content? – Not a big team. One video person for all my short form, One video person that I see once a month For all my long form.
Even the short form, I see him once a month as well. Short form, I see him for a few hours a month. The long form, I see him for maybe like three, Four hours a month. And two other people
on the tech-based side. So a small team, Four or five if I had to guess. – Right, so it's not a massive team then? – [Neil] Correct. – Just takes it. Do you say your personal time It takes what, Two, three days a month or? – So personal time to create content? Probably. If I had to guess, 24 hours a month max Including podcasting and everything. – All right. Okay, so it's a lot less than
I actually thought actually. – Yeah, and that's a max. There's some months where
it's much less than that. – Yeah, okay. Now obviously in the industry, And I'm talking the
wider marketing industry, If businesses don't have the
budget to employ an agency Or a freelancer, What could the those people do? – Do it themselves. Look, you can bust out your phone And start recording,
And creating content and uploading it. The issue is Is people don't want to put in the time. It has nothing to do with hiring. That's why I said SEO's the one Of the only channels that really work For the small media business. Not because they need to pay my agency, But with SEO and organic social, You can do those without
having to pay anyone money. You can put in the time
yourself in learning. Just people aren't willing to do it. Yeah, you can learn paid advertising too, But you got to spend
money on the paid ads. So it's just like, That's tougher for a small business. But SEO and organic social is very doable For businesses of all sizes. – If somebody had to
choose between going out And writing content pieces, Or doing videos, What would you say would create The biggest impact between both? – People spend more time on
videos than text-based content. At least, I was reading some stats a few days ago But that was the latest stats that I read. I forgot what percentage or time, But it was videos dominated
more than text-based content. So I would tell people
to focus on video first. – Okay, now just to get
to know you as a person. What does your day-to-day look like? – My day-to-day is a lot
of phone calls, meetings, Some content creation,
Answering emails, Strategy stuff, Working on client accounts. Typical, normal day
spending time with kids. Watching some TV like news. I watch BBC quite a bit. – Okay. Now, you rebranded your
agency from Neil Patel to NP. What was the reason behind that? – We originally wanted call it NP Digital. We couldn't get the domain name, And then eventually the person sold it. – Ah. As simple as that. – Yeah, we wanted it from day one. We tried getting it. The guy said "no". When the economy started
going down a little bit They hit us back up saying, "hey, do you still want to buy it? "Same price." And we said yes. – So with NP Digital, How big of an agency is it? – We're between seven and 800 employees. We're US, Canada, UK, Brazil, Australia, India, Singapore, Germany. We're about to have Portugal and Spain. When I'm saying these regions, We actually have a managing director, Someone leading up a specific region. But we have people
In many different regions
on top of that as well. But my guess is we'll probably have, Be in over 20 countries With leaders in each of those
countries by the end of 2023. – So how has your personal brand Directly impacted the
growth of your agency? – It gave us an amazing start
'cause it provided us leads. But believe it or not, Majority of our revenues, 70 ish percent comes
from employee referrals, Client referrals, And just word of mouth. – Right. Okay, so literally- – I think it's actually
like 76% to be exact Comes from those three channels. – Right, now this is
why I love doing videos Like this because perception
was that the majority Of people go to your agency
because of your name. – No, you have to remember
when you are working With large companies, Let's say you want to work With the Fortune 100, They don't care about Neil Patel. They care about who are the
people working on my account And what are their skill sets, And what experiences they have In my industry that's
going to produce results. – So it's all about the team
who work within the agency. – Not just the team who
works with an agency, But the team who is on their account. That's who they care about
more than anything else. – Right, okay. So when you're working
with these big companies,
What sort of requirements
do you have to put in? What sort of pre-sales prep
work do you have to put in In order just to be at the table To pitch to these corporates? – There's not an easy answer for that Because these big corporations
all have unique requirements. What you have to put in
varies based on their needs. A lot of times they send out a RFP, Request for a proposal. They tell you the
requirements and then you Either decide if you want to
put it in the energy or not. You could end up
sometimes spend a hundred, $200,000 to try to get a
deal and you may not win it. – Wow. I was going to say, so you
really need to have a solid base Behind you and financial backing In order to really go after
these bigger contracts To start with. – Correct, yes. Well, or you can just
put in your own time. For me, the reason we have those expenses Is 'cause we have so much staff. So then we're paying for those hours And if we don't close it, We wasted the money. But I think it's always worth it. – Okay. So, you say you're in all
these various countries. How involved are you
personally within the agency? – Very involved. It's what I do full-time. – Right, so is your own focus On building this one, This agency up?
Or do you have other
entities you focus on? – No, I just focus on the agency. – Right. – All my time. – All your time. And moving forward is, You personally, What's your personal journey
looking like in the future? – The same. I don't really see it changing. Focus all the time on growing the agency And try to become one of the biggest Global ad agencies out there. – What's your why? – Why? – I just love it. I'm having fun. I love it. It's just passionate about marketing. Has nothing to do with
money or anything like that. It's just a goal and I
want to try to achieve it. – Right, so it really is Because you just love
the work you're doing. Yeah? So how important is obviously, family? How does family fit
into everything for you? – Family fits in great. I'm at home, I work from home. And I see my kids often
throughout the whole day, And I play with 'em, And I read to them, And all that kind of good stuff. So yeah, I try to be there as a parent. All the major events and
everything like that.
And you know, Try to support my kids in
whatever they decide to do In life and whatever makes 'em happy. – So when you say that you work from home, Don't you see a need for you To be in the office with the teams? – Oh, we're virtual. – Oh, everything's virtual, is it? – Uh-huh, post-COVID, We moved virtual. – All right. Okay, that I wasn't aware of. – Yeah, we still have offices. Barely anyone goes into 'em. But we're virtual. – Right, and do you find
office-based versus virtual Is a good move? – We like virtual. Both are fine. There's pros and cons to both. There's nothing wrong with either. It depends what a company wants. That's why we have a bit of both, And people can either go Into office or they can work from home. We don't force 'em with
any specific requirement. We let 'em decide. – Okay, now moving onto SEO. Obviously this is the SEO interview. What do you think's
missing in the industry? – I mean, people focus on tactics. Not enough people are focusing enough On user experience and truly
trying to delight them. Not talking about user experience just
From a low time perspective. I'm talking about user
experience from like, How do you just create amazing products, Amazing services, Amazing content and just
try to delight them? Some people do. I wouldn't say it's totally missing, But that's not the main focus. People are like, "ah, let me build more links, "and let me optimize this element in "within my code to try
to gain the system." It's like, well if you put the user first And do what's best for
them in the long run, You should win. You should. I put a asterisk around should. – Yeah, I was going to say, And if you could have the
power to change something Within the industry, What would it be? – I don't know if I would change anything. I don't really see anything wrong with it. Been in it for a long time. People are friendly, it's nice. People are trying to learn more. It's a good industry. – Good. It's the first time I've
heard somebody say that. – Yeah, everyone has their own take. But I love the industry. It's done wonders for me, And wonders for a lot of people. And when I first got into industry
People were really
welcoming with open arms. And I think it's a great community. – Yeah, I was going to say, How obviously you're giving your time up To be on this interview now, Is what other things are you involved in In order to just help people? – I create content. We try to educate and help through that, But I'm actually not
that involved in much. My wife is. So I try to focus on building a business. My wife focuses on philanthropy And tries to help through that. So she spends her full-time raising kids And helping out a lot of
different organizations. – Wonderful. It's a really good feeling when
you can help others in life. – It can be. I don't really look at
it as like a feeling. I look at it as more like a, There's a lot of things that are wrong, And as humans If we have the ability to help others out, You should. Right? I don't look at it as a feeling. What makes me feel better Isn't the helping other people out. It's actually seeing things improve. There's so many kids out there That people are like, "oh, they don't live in good areas. "They're not going to succeed".
Well, if you gave them the tools And the education, why can't they? They're hungry. Who says they're not smart? Who says they can't
accomplish amazing things? Who says they can't build
multi-billion dollar companies? Who says they can't cure cancer? And for me it's more like, It's sad to see a lot
of people in this world Not have opportunities, And others help 'em out. And helping 'em, yes. You could say it is a good feeling, But what's a better feeling
for me is seeing change, And then seeing the
people that you help out Try to help other people as well, And just continue. And hopefully, It'll make the world a better place. I say more so like, What's a good feeling is What Elon Musk is doing. What he's doing is tremendous, right? Trying to make it where people can live On multiple civilizations, Not have a single point
of failure, being Earth. That's crazy in a good way. I don't have the capability
to do what he does. It's not just even money. Sure I don't have the money he does, But I don't also have the
brain power and intellect.
