Gratuitous sorcery and incantations from actual Wizards.

Pain is a signal that something is wrong.

Pain whispers, shouts, and screams, “Pay attention. Be careful. Something is wrong.”

Jean Marzollo wrote a children’s poem in 1948 that romanticized Christopher Columbus. It inspired a generation of children during the Captain Kangaroo years. Her proud poem begins,

“In fourteen hundred ninety-two
Columbus sailed the ocean blue”

Bill Bryson wrote an insightful summary of that famous voyage on page 205 of his book, “At Home.”

“Columbus’s real achievement was managing to cross the ocean successfully in both directions. Though an accomplished enough mariner, he was not terribly good at a great deal else, especially geography, the skill that would seem most vital in an explorer. It would be hard to name any figure in history who has achieved more lasting fame with less competence. He spent large parts of eight years bouncing around Caribbean islands and coastal South America convinced that he was in the heart of the Orient and that Japan and China were at the edge of every sunset. He never worked out that Cuba is an island and never once set foot on, or even suspected the existence of, the landmass to the north that everyone thinks he discovered: the United States.”

We learn the meaning of pain as children, but we train ourselves to ignore it as adults.

Why do we do that?

I’m talking to you about the pain of your Google spend.

Is there a chance that you should pay attention – and be careful – because something is wrong?

Twenty years ago, Google inspired and electrified American business owners with their promise of “holding ad budgets accountable” by making advertising results, “identifiable, measurable, and scalable.”

Business owners romanticized Google by shouting,

“Hooray! Advertising will now become just another mathematical equation! Hooray! Hooray! To double my customer count, all I will have to do is double my ad budget!”

I watched a friend of mine raise his monthly Google budget from $20,000/mo. to $70,000/mo because he was convinced that he would get three-and-a-half times as many leads. When it didn’t work, I asked him to look closely at how many clicks he had purchased and compare that number to the total population of his trade area.

Have you done that math?

I watched another friend of mine elevate her Google budget until she was spending $90,000 a month. Her business was no longer profitable. I asked her to look at how many clicks she had purchased and compare that number to the total population of her trade area.

Have you done that math?

Have you ever raised your Google budget and had Google say to you, “We’re sorry, but it is not possible to spend that much money on your LSA. There simply aren’t enough people each day who are searching for what you sell.”

Do the math.

The past two decades have been the Captain Kangaroo years for millions of business owners.

Bill Bryson wrote that Columbus was, “convinced that he was in the heart of the Orient and that Japan and China were at the edge of every sunset.”

How many years have you been believing that your big payday from Google was at the edge of every sunset? Have you been saying,

“All we need to do is tweak our plan a little. As soon as we figure out the Google algorithm, we’re going to be rich.”

A business owner from a major American city recently spent a day with me. He had been spending $100,000 on Google ads each month for the past few years because he was convinced that he could not afford mass media in his city.

His budget could easily have made his name a household word by using television or radio. I know the town well. I have had clients there for many years.

His budget would reach more than 2 million people in his city who spend enough time listening to broadcast radio each week that each one of those 2 million people would hear the ad 3 times each week for 52 weeks for a total of 156 repetitions per year.

Do you sell a big-ticket item that has a long purchase cycle? You cannot win that game unless your name is the one that people think of first – and feel the best about – when they finally need what you sell.

That is when the customer will type your name into Google. It is a cheap click with a high conversion rate because they have already chosen you.

It takes time and patience, but it always works.

Let’s be honest—most recruitment ads couldn’t convince a starving man to eat a sandwich. And it’s no surprise: they’re loaded with buzzwords, clichés, and desperate “competitive salary” nonsense.

If someone tells you otherwise, they’re either trying to sell you ad space or snake oil.

In this episode of Advertising in America, we tear into the sad state of hiring ads and explain why the real problem isn’t the job market—it’s your messaging.

Episode Highlights

• Why no one believes your “fast-paced environment” garbage
• How to write ads that attract the right people without turning off the rest
• What it really means when employees don’t refer their friends (spoiler: it’s you)
• Why every ad is a recruiting ad—and how to use that to your advantage
• How to stop bribing applicants and start building loyalty that lasts

Because let’s face it: great people don’t work for losers. And your best hires aren’t scrolling job boards. They’re already employed—and silently wondering if there’s something better.

🎧 Hit play. hen stop sounding like HR wrote your ad & start building a team that wants in.

📱 Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts

🔥 Then ask yourself: Would you name your company that?

💥 Brought to you by Wizard of Ads® for Essential Services

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Most recruitment ads suck. But to be fair, that’s only because most ads of any kind suck. So, why should recruitment ads be any different?

The challenge of recruitment advertising is the same as the challenge for brand advertising. You can’t just tell me something about your company and expect me to believe it.  You have to demonstrate it,

If you have 100,000 people listening to the radio this week, and you run a recruiting ad, of that 100,000 people, about 20 might be interested in coming to work for you. Which means you better bloody well think hard about what you say to the other 99,980 people because they’re listening too.

I will absolutely pay a signing bonus. I will pay it to the person who referred them in, who's been my loyal employee.

Be awesome. And awesome people will want in.

If you do this correctly, every ad is a recruiting ad.

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Ryan Chute: Recruiting, hiring, staffing up, whatever you call it. Finding great people is one of the hardest and most important parts of running a business, and yet most recruitment ads are so bad that they have trouble convincing a dog to chase a bone. On today's episode of Advertising in America, we're breaking down why recruitment ads suck, and more importantly, how 'em make 'em not suck. Mick, what do you say?

Mick Torbay: Most recruitment ads suck, but to be fair, that's only because most ads of any kind suck. So why should recruitment ads be any different? But I'll give you a few clues as to why yours suck and how to make them better.

First, let's define our terms. When I say a recruiting ad, I mean an ad that everyone sees, not the ones on a recruiting website. That's a whole different kind of suck. We'll get to those later. I mean, a recruiting ad that's on the radio, on TV, or online, that's not in a job search environment, that kind of recruiting ad. The first thing you have to keep in mind when writing a recruiting ad is that most of the people who are exposed to it are not going to come to work for you. Nearly everyone.

If you have a hundred thousand people listening to the radio this week and you run a recruiting ad of that, a hundred thousand people, about 20 might be interested in coming to work for you, which means you better bloody well, think hard about what you're saying to the other 99,980 people because they're listening to and they're learning about you and they're judging you.

My brother Chris has a former client who put a recruiting ad on Facebook and linked it to his personal Facebook page. It was a recruiting ad for a sales position at his company, and it was amazing. Here he is, talking to everyone in his community about what he's looking for in a salesperson.

“We're looking for closers. We want people who could sell ice cream to Alaskans, not afraid to upsell. Performance is everything.” And I'm reading this and I'm thinking, ice cream to what the fuck dude? What he's actually saying is, “I train my sales staff to sell people stuff they don't actually need.”

That's what the expression means. We put making money ahead of helping people, and you're saying that to everyone. For real, this guy did that.

Now, at the Wizard of Ads, when we write an ad campaign for our clients, we always, always create a recruitment problem, and that's because our clients grow and grow quickly. If you don't have a staff shortage now, you will about a year after hiring us, because you'll have more work than your current staff can handle.

So we are looking at how to solve that problem before it's even a problem, because we've seen this movie before, and the way we do it is, we keep in mind that potential hires are watching TV and listening to the radio too. Watching what you say and what you stand for, and when we do it right, every ad is a recruiting ad.

Be the company people want to work for. Reveal something about yourself. Demonstrating that you're a good company to buy from probably means you're a good company to work for. If you can become the leading brand in your category in your community, don't be surprised when others want to join the winning team.

If you do this correctly, every ad is a recruiting ad.

Ryan Chute: So Mick, what you're saying is that every ad is a recruitment ad, even when it's not, as long as it doesn't suck. That's some big picture thinking, I'm in. But now let's zoom in a little. Chris, what's your take?

Chris Torbay: I agree with Mick. I'll deny it if you ever call me on it, but he is right. When you make a company look enticing to a customer, you also make it look enticing to a certain kind of employee. There are tons of people who would love to work for Apple, or Mercedes-Benz USA, or The Walt Disney Company, or Ben & Jerry's, and it's not because they do killer recruitment advertising. They think that brand looks fun, or that brand looks like they get me, and so that's the place they aim for.

The challenge of recruitment advertising is the same as the challenge for brand advertising. You can't just tell me something about your company and expect me to believe it. You have to demonstrate it.

The same as a plumbing company can't just say, “We are the ones you can trust.” You can't just say to people, “This is a really good place to work.” Just because you say it doesn't mean I believe you.

Because when people say things about what they're like. They lie. In recruiting ads, we know what those euphemisms are looking for a self-starter means: “You'll have lousy coaching and supervision, and we are gonna just expect you to figure it out on your own.”

Competitive salary means, “we don't know how much to offer, so we're gonna see how little we can get you for.”

A fast-paced environment means “the workload's too heavy, and management barely has control over how things operate.”

We work hard and we play hard means, “We work hard, then people get plastered at the end of the week on their own dime just so they can put up with it.”

Just like consumer branding messages. Don't tell me. Show me when you see an Apple ad or an Apple product, there is a certain personality of designer or developer who thinks, “that's my aesthetic. I would fit in perfectly on that team.” The key is that I don't see you pulling the strings. The recruitment aspect of that advertising has to be invisible. You don't run an ad for an iPhone and then say, “And if you think like we do, we're also hiring like-minded people to join our team.” If you do that, your ad is trying to do two things, and your ads should do one thing. If you're trying to sell me your products or services and you're also hiring, I literally don't know if you're buying or selling.

If I'm clever enough to figure out on my own that you must be an awesome place to work, now we're talking Cordova. Google is literally beating people back with a stick. When people say literally, they almost always mean figuratively. In this case, there may literally be a stick involved. There are interviews, and written tests, and personality screening, and trips to the campuses, sample assignments, and very few people make it through the gauntlet to get hired, but thousands or maybe tens of thousands of people apply every year because what they know about the brand makes them want to work there.

They never put a help wanted sign in the store window, be awesome and awesome people will want in. Be mediocre, and mediocre people will make a half-hearted effort to beat down your door, or you know, jiggle the handle a little and then probably give up.

If you do post a recruiting ad, tell me a story. Help me draw my own conclusions about what your brand stands for and why that is something I want to be part of. Tell me things that demonstrate, and let me conclude that you are an interesting place to work. That it's an opportunity to learn and grow, that I'm a good personality fit for the team I'm gonna be a part of. But no recruiting ad will make me think that if those things aren't true

Ryan Chute: Now that's a lot to chew on. Recruitment ads aren't just about finding people. They're about finding the right people, and you can only get a great fit when you fill the gaps, too. And as we've heard, that takes more than just throwing out clichés, self-starter and fast-paced environments. Let's dig deeper into what makes a recruitment ad not just functional, but memorable after the break.

Ryan Chute: There's a lot to unpack here on this episode, and where I'd like to start is with something that is very often in our blind spot, and that's around who is the actual competition for our employees, or our potential employees or the applicants that are coming in?

There’s no question that you're up against all of the plumbers who are looking for plumbers in market that you're in, but you're also up against all of the competition out there of jobs that are looking for people who are willing to pay the same amount of money or more to do an easier job. So we start to think about how we stand out in the crowd, and how big this crowd actually is?

Chris Torbay:  Yeah, I mean, not necessarily just an easier job too, but you know, how many people are wondering whether the career they're in is the career for them, and is there something else that I could get involved in?

And you're right, if your target audience is, you are only looking for veterinary nurses, then that's a very, you know, small target to go after. And, wherever you advertise, now, if you advertise in mass media, boy, there's a lot of people that you're not advertising to in order to get the ones that you're trying to reach. But if you present your company or think of the opportunities that you're offering in terms of what kind of person with what kind of skills, what I like in this job, and I can teach them the specifics of it. And you think of it more broadly that way, now you can advertise in a bunch of other places in more mass media.

And you can concentrate on hiring the right kind of person, not the right kind of existing resume. And I think that opens you up, and we've had some clients where we've done advertising, either directly recruitment-based advertising or this double duty advertising that Mick talked about, who deliberately look out of field for their new hires because it's like, I could teach you how to run the J2000 machine. What I want is somebody who's got an awesome work ethic, or who really likes talking to people or these sorts of things. And when you can open it up like that. A, you can advertise bigger, which means you can advertise to a larger target. You've got a much larger potential pool of applicants. Right? And frankly, it says, it says better things about your company too, because you talk about, you talk about beliefs and you talk about the tone of the organization when you're talking to people outside of the specifics of, “I need a guy who knows how to use this wrench.”

Mick Torbay: When we speak to our clients, we're creating a recruiting ad, by this I mean a recruiting ad that is specifically targeting people and is very, very specific about that. One of the questions we ask our clients is, “Are you looking for an experienced person who already has this job, or are you looking for people just in general, and you're gonna train them to do the thing you want to do?”

It seems like a little thing, but it's actually a massively huge thing, and that's because if you're looking for somebody with experience. Kind of by definition, you're talking to somebody who already has a job, they already, which means they're kind of working for your competitor now. And you're now asking them to leave their job and come and work for you.

Well, you can't get them to do that by simply saying, “We are hiring.” Let's say you're an HVAC company and you're hiring HVAC techs. Simply saying, “We are an HVAC company and we're hiring HVAC techs,” is not enough to make someone say, “I'm gonna quit my job and start to come.” To you, that's the recruitment equivalent of here's who we are and here's what we sell.

Doesn't move the needle. So you have to be really, really specific in your messaging because you have to be talking to either a disgruntled worker, or you have to somehow entice them away from their existing job, and that's not an easy thing. That's actually kind of a big deal. So you have to really be giving them something that's gonna tremendously change them.

Ryan Chute: And this is really no different than my theory of the brand is your culture, and your culture is your brand. Because ultimately, people are gonna say, “Oh, I wanna work for that company,” and then you've got your share of the unicorns. And if you don't have that, what you're doing is exactly that. You're answering questions that no one's asking, or you're saying, “Hey, I need a customer to buy my air conditioning stuff, and you're a customer, and I sell air conditioners, so why not come buy my stuff,” right? Then buy my stuff in this case, I'll pay you some sort of exchange to be here and try not to be too much of a pull.

Chris Torbay: But again, the question comes like, consumer advertising, the question comes down to, okay, I got a job. Or as you said, two other people are also saying they're hiring. So why you?

Ryan Chute: Think of that candidate as a consumer, is the consumer of your job, right? And your job is going to be represented by your brand. And ultimately, the brand is a combination of what your people feel is true to your business. And they're the ones who are going to give the buying experience, and the buying experience and employee experience make up the brand. So this self-referential full circle makes it so important for people to realize that if you want the best, if you want to accelerate growth, if you wanna find unicorns, you gotta do that with the best brand because unicorns don't work for losers.

Mick Torbay: You have to give them something worth leaving their job for and breaking in a new boss. People don't like to break in a new boss, it's no fun. So you can't think that you're gonna accomplish that just by simply saying, “Oh, I'm hiring. And, uh, what are you paying? Uh, pretty much the same as everybody else.

Chris Torbay: A competitive salary.

Mick Torbay: Yeah, sure. Let me guess. Is it basically what I'm making out?

Ryan Chute: So the trick here is in a lot of the ads that you've written, where every recruitment ad is an ad, and every ad is a recruitment ad, that we can put that on mass media and ultimately the mass is hearing it and 99% aren't going to be employees of yours, but the people who are hearing it are saying, “I would want an employee like that in my house.”

Mick Torbay: Absolutely, if you're running a recruiting ad that regular consumers are gonna hear, you have to understand, mathematically, 99% of the people listening are not, are not coming to work for you. They're just listening to how you recruit. So, you have to bearing the consumer's reaction to your recruiting ad in mind as much or more than the candidate, even though that's what you're trying to do, because they're listening and if you say, for example, “I'm looking for a, a, a salesperson who's going to jam a sale down their throat that they don't want,” you're turning people off and that's most of the people listening.

Chris Torbay: That is most of what you're at is accomplishing, as opposed to the one small thing that you originated into.

Ryan Chute: And when done elegantly, as you have for a number of our clients, what we see is that you're not just speaking to John, who's getting a little bit as sick of Jerry, right? The boss.

Mick Torbay: Well, you have to think in the mindset of your recruit, of your candidate, and you raise a really interesting point. People don't leave companies, they don't quit companies. Nobody says, “I don't like IBM, I'm quitting.”

What they say is, “I don't like Jerry, my boss. I'm sick of Jerry and his shit. Fuck Jerry. Fuck IBM, I’m leaving.”

Chris Trobay: He's keeping me from turning into what I see for myself.

Mick Torbay: That's it. Now they leave IBM, but they didn't quit IBM, they quit Jerry. So you need to, if you want a person who has a job now, you have to somehow convince them that the things they don't like about their job now are not going to haunt them when they come to you, because they're not gonna bother switching from that company to your company, i there's any possibility that the thing, that they don't like about their current job, they're not gonna like with you.

Ryan Chute: Well, and two things come from that. One is that not only is John mad at Jerry, but John's wife is sick of John talking about Jerry. And John's wife is listening to this ad, and brother, and mother, and sister, and next door neighbor, and everyone else that John's complaining about. And then one day Jerry's gonna just go one step too far, and the writing's already on the wall for your brand. You become the know, like, trust, brand of choice.

Mick Tobay: Are you on the short list for when they finally get sick and tired of Jerry?

Ryan Chute: So this leads us to the next component of this, which is intrusive versus passive media channels. If I'm on a passive media channel, like Indeed, I'm sitting there, and I'm going, we exist, you may find us in the 8,000 different job ads that are for that particular category or keyword. And you may find us, you may not. And if you do, you may get past the front-line sentence, the headline, and get into actually read our copy.

One. That copy has to be frigging awesome, right? Stop talking about your business. Start talking about the person that John wants to be and stand for, and represent and feel good about, so that you get them.

Now, the problem with passive is that you're also gonna get all of the people that Jerry fired because they didn't even come close to cutting the mustard. And now you're getting the classic word in this home service space is retreads. I'm not a big fan of that, but there are an awful lot of people who have the Dunning-Kruger Effect, where they deeply believe that their value is disproportionate to their actual skill set. And that has them thinking that they deserve an awful lot more than what they actually deserve, because frankly, very rarely, it's because of their fault.

Chris Torbay: But again, that's on you to weed those people out. That's another one of these sorts of educate-the-consumer things that we cover in that episode too, which is, it's not the advertising's job to get people who are actually duds to think,  they're probably onto me as a dud, so I'm not gonna bother. And to just get the guys who are actually really sharp to apply.

Ryan Chute: Well, and we will get the targeting through copy, but we can also do that through those mass media  channels. Now, the intrusive media goes out to the greater population.

Mick Torbay: Well, which is why so often, we discuss with our clients the potential angle of not looking for an experienced worker and say, can you take someone with no experience, train them your way, not have to unlearn them a bunch of bad habits that they've gotten into so that the only way they do things is your way.

Is it harder? Yes. Does it take longer? Yes, it does. But you avoid the challenge that you get when you're specifically targeting experienced people, you have two possible situations, either one, you've got a person who does this for a living and has no job, which makes us ask the question, why?

Or you have a disgruntled employee, and now your job is to make that person gruntled again. And grunting an employee is not an easy task to achieve. So you need to realize that there's a tremendous downside when you say, “Oh, I definitely want an experienced person.” It's like, okay, but there's a huge amount of baggage that comes in.

Ryan Chute: I think it's important to recognize that the curtains need to match the drapes in this situation. We need to make sure that when we actually get them inside, they go, “Oh, this is exactly the way we imagined it being.”

Chris Torbay: Well, and maybe that training is where you do that, right? Again, the advertising's job is to make people go, that sounds like a place I wanna work.

That'll be good people who want to go there, and that'll be questionable. People who wanna go there. If you do, you know what Mick was talking about, where you say, okay, then there's gonna be a training thing where we bring you around to our systems. If those people struggle with that, it's like, “Well, I don't know. The way I've always done it is,” okay, well, you know what, you're starting to learn something about this person. Maybe this is your way of sorting. And, so if you build that in there, that's how you can separate the wheat from the chaff.

Ryan Chute: We do this with our clients' customers, as it is, right? You know, we have customers who are existing customers, they're in a club membership, they're engaged, they're doing the thing, they're interacting in that meaningful way. Then there are the disengaged or the dissenting customers, the ones who are disengaged and not connecting anymore. The quiet quitters, the less motivated people who are showing at lower productivity. And those are showing up traditionally in KPIs. And then there's the dead list or the orphan list, the dead list of customers that you can't get a hold of. They're no longer there. They're disengaged, they're gone. We're talking about really finding those disengaged, but not looking employees are the best possible employees that disengage, not looking, are the ones who don't need a job.

Mick Torbay: But if they, if they're happy at their job, and they like their boss, and everything's groovy. Boy, you've got a challenge in front of you. Good luck getting that.

Chris Torbay: And frankly, it's not even, if it's just they think this is the average and they think it's gonna be no better or worse with you, then people will stick with a sure thing way longer even if they have an inkling that, “I wonder if another place would be nicer, but man, I'm not going to throw this, I'm not gonna throw in the towel on this to sacrifice what I have on, on the off chance,” there's gotta be a an obvious improvement.

Mick Torbay: I think people discount the difficulty with which someone leaves a job. I had a client, no longer my client, I'm happy to say, in the state of Virginia, and they believed, this person truly believed in his heart, that there was no loyalty in his community, and that people would only work for home services companies for 18 months maximum. And that's because nobody stayed at his company for more than 18 months. And he was constantly in a state of recruiting because he had this tremendously enormous attrition problem. And it never occurred to him that the problem might be him, might be internal. Remember, when I said people leave bosses? Well, he was the boss, and it never crossed his mind that people were joining his company, and just over 18 months later, they were like, figuring it out.

I'm gonna go somewhere else. And he just thought, “Well, the grass is always greener. That's the problem in this town. The grass is always greener.”

By the way, this is a military town, like the most loyal, patriotic, loyal people, literally on the planet. And he just thinks they, they just try things and then if the “grass is greener, they try something else.” Well, you know what? Training, breaking in a new boss, getting a new truck, no one wants to do that. A new system, paperwork and all that. Nobody wants to do that.

Chris Torbay: When you started a new place, you're really hoping this is the one. This guy seems like he could be the one. Fingers crossed, honey, I think we found the right one this time.

Mick Torbay: They're really not saying to their wife, “Let's try this out for a year and see if I like it, and if not, I'll try somewhere else.” Nobody likes doing that. If you have a recruitment, if you have an attrition problem, if people are not staying with you look in the freaking mirror. This is on you.

Ryan Chute: And this is a nod to just take a second and realize that's not just candidates, that's customers. Customers don't want to change companies of HVAC or plumbing or insurance or lawyers, or anything else.

Mick Torbay: Or cola or beer.

Chris Torbay: They know where to get their brand.

Ryan Chute: The devil you know is better than the devil you don't. And the reality of it is that there may not be a perfect situation there for them, but it's good enough. And what we're selling is, in those situations, sometimes just something a little bit better than what they have right now. And sometimes that's going to be more effective than trying to sell them on this super aspirational, super transformative, thriving dream because you're not meeting where they're at.

Chris Torbay: And that's why this idea of having you figure it out is more powerful because, you know, to Mick's point and, and, and to your point just then, you have to say that incredible thing, now you have to say something that is so outrageous that I might give up what I have.

Whereas if I watch your consumer ads for long enough that I think, “Man, that company's really got it figured out. I wonder. I wonder if they're hiring. I wonder if it's my idea,” if I'm starting to think I've figured something out, and “they don't seem to be putting any recruitments out, but I wonder if I gave 'em a call like I think I'm the smart one here.”

Then I'm the one who said that they're this much better. “You didn't try to convince me of that with perhaps limited actual evidence, you didn't quote a price that's a third higher than the salary I'm making. You didn't tell me I'm gonna get more days off, like you didn't. If you don't say that stuff, then, then you don't look substantially better.?

If I figure it out, I may come to that conclusion on my own, and then  I'll proceed that way.

Ryan Chute: I think it's incumbent of us to say that it is no longer an option for growing companies to advertise periodically as they need people, and do this constant caterpillar effect of people.

Mick Torbay: If you're growing, growing, you always need new people.

Ryan Chute: And we don't know when those good people are gonna show up. It might be Christmas Day when they finally get a day off, and they're just sitting there going, man, sick of this nonsense. And they're flicking through and they're going, boom. But now, if you knew, you were known, liked, and trusted by that same guy/girl.

Mick Torbay: When you're scrolling through and it's like, who of these people do I feel, oh, I've heard of this company.

Ryan Chute: I feel good about these guys. The, it's recruitment not just for the consumer-centric, but for the candidate-centric as well, and we have to be paying attention to that. My ads are up 365 days a year for recruits on my websites.

I'm always making sure that we're available and looking for, and paying attention to the opportunity for unicorns. So if you're not on the hunt for the unicorn for the people and a unicorn's not about a superstar, the unicorn's about the person who is the absolute best fit for you, be it that they are congruent with your value structure, but equally as much that they fill a gap that you currently have lacking.

Mick Torbay: Right. Well, and, and here's a little bit of practical advice. I talked about a former client of mine who was clueless as to what the problem was with the attrition problem at his company. And of course, by definition, that means sometimes the boss just doesn't know what the problem is. But I'm gonna give you a little shortcut to find out if you are that guy. The best recruitment strategy that you have at your company is your employees. Are they bringing people to your company to work? Are they bringing their friends? Are they bringing their buddies? Are they bringing colleagues, it doesn't matter what business you're in.

Chris Torbay: Are they reaching out to those guys, saying, “Hey, you should come as well. You should come as well?”

Mick Torbay: Yeah. If they're doing that, that means you are bringing something to the table, and they're willing to put themselves out. If you hire a person and he brings nobody, that's not his problem. That's your problem.

Never ask your employee, “Why are you not recommending your brother, who also does this for a living, to come here?” He would've recommended to his brother who does the same thing if he thought if he was happy with the decision he's made, he just doesn't want to bring his brother into the shit show that he found himself in. So that's a good way of knowing if your employees are constantly bringing their friends, you're doing it right. If it never happens, look in the mirror. This problem is yours. You can fix it. But the first step is to acknowledge that you have a problem. You might wanna talk to Ryan about that, he can help you with it.

Ryan Chute: Well, one of the things that I commonly see are these recruitment bonuses of, you know, $5,000, $10,000, $20,000 to get recruited into the business. That sends such a terrible message to absolutely everyone, that I'm astounded that it's still employed today, that the type of person you attract,

Mick Torbay: You have to bribe people to come and work for you.

Ryan Chute: When we talk about transactional and relational customers, transactional and relational customers are made up of the same thing that soil and green crackers are made out of, frigging people, right? Let's all agree that the same thing is true with our candidates. If they're coming in transactionally, they're leaving just as transactionally. You've got them as long as you have not paid them their last check or bonus,

Chris Torbay:  The other nice parallel to how we treat loyal customers versus new customers, right? When you give these fantastic signing bonuses to new customers. And it's like, “I've been a customer of yours for five years, and you're giving that guy a better rate because he's new,” right? “How about me? The guy who stuck with you?”

And so if you offer a signing bonus, it's like, dude, I've been an employee here for three years. I'm your best guy, right? And, and whatever, and you're ignoring me, right? To take a chance on a new guy.

Mick Torbay: If the signing bonus gets big enough, I will switch to the other company for 18 months just to take the money. But I'm not the guy you want.

Ryan Chute: Well, and look, I will absolutely pay a signing bonus. I will pay it to the person who referred them in, who's been my loyal employee. I’m not paying it to the guy who's coming in. I'll pay him when he refers somebody in and they stick. So the signing bonus is valid. You've just paid the wrong person.

Chris Torbay: That's a really good point. Having it reinforced the relationship that's most important to you, which is keeping good people.

Ryan Chute: This is the difference between dopamine and oxytocin, right? If I say, I'll give you $20,000 if you do a thing; dopamine,  But if I say, look, I'm gonna pay you a hundred dollars for the next, every paycheck for the next two years, for every person that you've brought in and sticks around for that period of time. And if you bring in 10 people, that's a thousand people. A thousand bucks a month, week. Or a pay. And that's a big deal.

Because now I'm getting them to squirt oxytocin into their brain, and that's the bonding chemical, the loyalty chemical, the five-star review chemical. The Indeed job posting Glassdoor thing, where they're rating your business and saying, "Now these were pretty standup individuals. You know that all the things that you're looking for to do the thing that you're trying to achieve here, which is to connect and bond and create long-term, profitable, successful, abundant relationships."

It all starts from inside, and how you deliver that, just has to be oriented in the same way that maintains a relational edge, a thriving edge, and not a surviving edge. Which is, which is what the opposite does.

So very interesting conversation, guys. There are a few interesting stats out there.

According to LinkedIn, 75% of job seekers consider a company's brand before applying.

Chris Torbay: 75%. Wow. What do I know about that? Yeah, they seem like a guy, right? Yeah.

Ryan Chute: Or simple as that. I don't know them. Right. Do I really want to, like, if I don't know them, if I never heard of this company, if I haven't heard, would my customers have heard of them?

Companies that showcase their value in their product advertising see up to a 20% increase in applicants, right? People want to work for Google, and people want to work.

Chris Torbay: They wanna work for the people who make iPhones, well, and iPhones are cool. They must be cool.

Mick Torbay: And don't forget that the decision maker is more than just the person who's getting the job. They have families. They do. And so, if you say to your wife, I'm thinking about taking the job over at Google, she's like. “Oh, you're gonna get a job at Google. That's pretty fricking cool.”

If you say, “I'm thinking about taking a job over at Ryan's computer company,” that she'd be like, “You know, you're doing pretty well at the place you're at now.”

Ryan Chute: Recruitment ads with storytelling elements are 2.5 times more likely to attract top candidates than traditional job descriptions; stories work. And don't talk about the job. No one cares about that, like if you're talking to an HVAC technician about an HVAC technician's job, what are you doing right? The job description is.

Ryan Chute: Here's who we are, here's what we sell.

Mick Torbay: That's it. Right? No one cares. You talk in your job ad about the type of person you want in that role, which is congruent with the role, right? Fit happens at the leadership level, at the culture level, at the team level, right? And at the actual physical job level. They already know the job. The real question is, do they fit in the other three spots? That's 75% of the frigging point, right?

No different than your branding considered or considered the brand 75%. That means 75% of them are discounting you as an option if they don't know your brand. Right. So these are struggles of smaller companies, but it's never too early to start putting out an auditory message, a story, a narrative, a truth about what you stand for and what you stand against in this universe.

From day one, it'll make a difference as to who you'll get to drive that intention forward. And, grow your company. And Google gets over 2 million job applications per year. Despite rarely running direct recruitment ads.

One of the things that Roy did brilliantly with the Morris Jenkins campaign was that he wrote an ad that you can find on YouTube about recruiting women in the trades. Because there is a huge disparity in those roles. And that had massively successful results, not only for the aesthetic of Morris Jenkins, who comes across, and feels very, very, compassionate towards families, let alone, 50% of our population is more than capable of performing extraordinarily high-quality duties in the home with the training that they were able to provide.

Mick Torbay: But also, he leaned into that. Dewey Jen has leaned into that. He didn't just simply say, “We want to have, we think there should be more women in the trades.” He backed that up by putting a daycare in his building. So, everybody who had children could just drop their children off at the daycare located at work. And then you wonder why a bunch of women were like, “That would make my life a lot easier.I could just go and work there.” And if something's wrong with my kid, I'm technically there. You think that doesn't affect people's decision-making.

Ryan Chute: It has a massive impact on decision making, and ultimately, it's about being culture-oriented in that nature because your culture, ultimately, when it boils down to it, is your brand. So we're really trying to create an environment where it does make all that sense in the world for me to do the thing.

Mick Torbay: Well, and let's define the terms we've been saying. Company culture. We've said it a couple of times, but what is company culture? It is simply everything that is not salary and job description, right?

If your salary is the same as your competitors are paying, and your job description is the same as your competitors expect, then the only reason why you like this job better than that one is company culture.

Ryan Chute: Right.

Mick Torbay: It's all that stuff.

Ryan Chute: And who drives company culture, but the leaders who do it now; leaders don't control the culture. The culture controls the culture. There's a whole conversation just in culture alone.

Mick Torbay: This is a whole other episode.

Ryan Chute: And it does get really fascinating as to what it is that we can do to be the brand of choice. And, it all ties back to its really hard to advertise that when you're not that. So one of the things to work on is to actually not be a crappy player.

Mick Torbay:  Don't say impossible to advertise, but if you want to know if you've got a good one, well, if your employees are bringing their brother-in-law to come and work for it. You got something going on.

Ryan Chute: There's something there. Folks, we've seen what works and what doesn't, but how do you put this into practice? After this quick message, we'll wrap it up with, uh, actionable takeaways for crafting recruitment ads that actually deliver.

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Ryan Chute: Bottom line, great recruitment ads don't feel like recruitment ads. They tell a story. They reflect your brand's values. They speak to the kind of person who will thrive in your culture. And when done well, they don't just bring you employees, they bring you the right employees. Remember, recruitment isn't about filling seats. It's about building a team that will grow your business. Now go write some ads that just don't suck. Until next time, you've been listening to Advertising in America.

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Thank you for joining us on Advertising in America. We hope you enjoyed the show and captured a nugget of marketing magic. Wanna hear more? Subscribe, leave a review and share this podcast with your friends. Do you have questions or topics you want us to cover?

Join us on our socials @advertisinginamerica. Wanna spend your marketing budget better? Visit us at wizardofads.services to book your free strategy session with Wizard Ryan Chute today. Until next time, keep your ads enchanting and your audience captivated.

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Let’s get something straight, kid—there’s no such thing as a perfect media channel.

If someone tells you otherwise, they’re either trying to sell you ad space or snake oil.

In this episode of Advertising in America, Mick, Chris, and Ryan fire up the mics to answer the golden question:

‍“Where should I spend my ad budget?”

The answer? Not where you think.

We slice through the fog of fear-based media selling, laugh at the myth of zero-waste targeting, and torch the idea that any medium is magic all on its own. TV, radio, digital, billboards—they all work if you do it right. And they all fail if you don’t.

Episode Highlights:

• Why 97% “wastage” might actually be the best investment you’ll ever make
• The difference between clever media placement and a killer message
• Why frequency beats reach every time
• How to build long-term brand love instead of chasing clickbait conversion
• And how to make your budget hit like Coca-Cola, even if you're not Coca-Cola

🎧 Hit play. Then stop chasing tactics—and start building a brand worth remembering.

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Today, we'll cut through the noise and figure out where to spend your cheddar. In the 50s, radio was huge. TV made it less so by the 70s, the stronghold that radio had left was really just in cars as people drove to and from work. You could see that in the ratings.

When I worked on the Porsche business in Canada, we used to run glorious full-page magazine print ads, and the Report on Business Magazine. The one read faithfully by bankers and lawyers, and corporate executives. Running those ads, in that exclusive high-end magazine, it was still 97% wastage. Only 3% of that readership was technically our target audience.

Online versus offline, as we spoke about in earlier episodes, we talk about is social media is something where we look at it as only sales activation? Or do we look at it as branding? Well, it's both.

You can only get so far with clever media choices. You can fish in better waters, but you still need a good lure.

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Ryan Chute: Where, oh, where should your ad dollars go? Choosing the wrong media channel means throwing money away. While the right choice could turn your brand into a household name. Today, we'll cut through the noise and figure out where to spend your cheddar. First to cut the cheese, Mick Torbay.

Mick Torbay: Which media work today and which don't? This is a question that we get asked a lot, and over the years, it won't surprise you. The answers have changed. For example, in the olden times, just about every grown-up read one daily newspaper regularly. My old man would read every page, and he wasn't that unusual. So, a big quarter-page ad in the local paper would get you a strong percentage of consumers in your market.

This is not to say there's no value in newspaper advertising today. It's not the same, and you'd be a fool to pretend that it is. There are simply more places to get news today, and although the New York Times has a digital version, that's the one I read, but there are not as many ads, and instead of the ads sitting on one page as you read the article on the other, now the ads are in the middle and you can easily scroll past them.

It's different. That's all I'm saying. I don't have any clients running long-term newspaper campaigns right now, which brings us to radio in the 50s. Radio is huge. TV made it less so by the 70s. The stronghold that radio had left was really just in cars as people drove to and from work. You could see that in the ratings, big listenership during breakfast and afternoon drive, and that ratings curve hasn't really changed much since the seventies.

Now that's gonna surprise some people because we have a lot more options for our drive to work entertainment than we used to, but you have to remember. There were options back in the 70s, too. Eight track tapes let you choose your own music cassette tapes, let you make your own mix tapes, and then CD players in the car gave us sound that was just as good as the radio iPods and phones gave us bigger playlists, but the numbers show that each of these new options simply replaced the previous ones.

Tons of people are still listening to the radio today, and I have plenty of clients on the radio right now. And remember, I'm paid on results. If radio didn't work, I would find something that does, which brings us to TV.

Yes, TV is suffering from cable cutters. Fewer people watch TV compared to the old days. But don't confuse fewer people with nobody. That's dangerous. Nielsen knows exactly how many people are still watching regular old television. So the only question is how many are there? And how much does it cost to reach them three times a week? Remember, we don't need to reach everybody. We need to reach half of everybody because they will tell the other half, and you can easily reach half of them with TV.

Digital, well, of course, digital works really well too, but only if the consumer is ready to make a purchase and has no preferred brand. Which leads to a search. With digital, everything begins with a search. And for me, if you're waiting for the customer to make a search, that means you're already too late. I wanna win the hearts and minds of the consumer before they search for your product or service.

McDonald's doesn't need an online campaign 'cause they're already on the short list when we want a fast burger. We don't need to search “burgers near me” to know what a Big Mac is. That's what I want my client to be. The one that's thought of first and liked the best before a search is even considered. I wanna skip the search like McDonald's does, and you can't skip the search with digital.

All of these media work well when you buy them properly, and you have a compelling message.

Ryan Chute: Mo money, mo problems. The more you wanna grow your company, the more people who need to know not only that you exist. But you are the best choice. Chris, what do you think?

Chris Torbay: Listen, all media channels are a blunt instrument. A bunch of people you want to reach mixed in with a bunch of people you don't.

Media companies that try to position themselves as otherwise are creating false hope. There is no holy grail for your brand. When I worked on the Porsche business in Canada, we used to run glorious full-page magazine print ads in the Report on Business magazine. The one read faithfully by bankers and lawyers, and corporate executives, and running those ads in that exclusive high-end magazine was still 97% wastage. Only 3% of that readership was technically our target, except it wasn't. Because the other thing we know about Porsche buyers is that they've wanted one their whole lives.

They just had to get successful enough to finally buy themselves one. But they probably had a poster of one in their bedroom as a teenager, and they weren't a rich banker back then. So, however we've reached them all those years, the media contributed too. I've mentioned before that Coca-Cola used to say, “If it moves, sponsor it and if it doesn't, paint it red”.

That meant they wanted to be everywhere, and they advertise everywhere too, on TV, radio, cinema, pre-roll ads, transit, billboards, you name it. Because their target is everyone. Thirsty people.

And the truth is, your target might be closer to everyone than you think. If you run a jewelry store, your target is everyone who likes to look pretty, as well as everyone in love with someone who likes to look pretty. That's quite a lot of the world. If you sell heating, cooling, plumbing, or electrical services, your target is homeowners or people who want to be basically adults, 18+.

This search for the right medium is what leads to media being created for no other reason. Cigar Aficionado Magazine doesn't exist for all the Tobacconists hoping to read interesting articles. It exists for the high-end whiskey retailers who want someplace to put their ads because, hey, if people can afford fine cigars can also afford fine whiskey. It's perfect for our target.

Dogs Today and Modern Dog are magazines that only exist because advertisers will pay to advertise in a magazine read entirely by dog owners, but that search for zero wastage isn't nearly the best way to reach dog owners in America. Mass media is, even with all the non-target, non-dog people, who are also watching, dog owners are everywhere, and everyone.

Don't advertise your engagement rings in Engagement Ring Quarterly because that's where all the people who are interested in engagement rings are. They're in the world. Advertise in the world, you'd do better to concern yourself less with finding the right medium and more with finding the right message.

What makes you a better source of engagement rings than the other jewelry store? Why will my dog prefer your dog food to the stuff we feed her? Now, why should I spend a hundred bucks or a thousand bucks on this single malt and not that one? Sure. Don't put up a poster for Rolexes at the unemployment office. Don't advertise Viagra on Dora the Explorer. Fish where the fish are, but you can only get so far with clever media choices. You can fish in better waters, but you still need a good lure.

Ryan Chute: Condoms, Chris on Dora the Explorer, possibly a good idea. Let's discuss some fun places to advertise when we get back from this commercial break.

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Ryan Chute: So let's break this down into key considerations, mass versus targeted media, online versus offline channels, and the external tug of war between sales activation and brand building.

Mick Torbay: Well, one of the things that I like to do is I like to meet the client, the business owner, where they're at, and one of the things that we're very often asked very often, early in our relationship with new clients is “what media work and which don't.”

So we phrased our question that way, and that's certainly how I phrased my initial rant. But there's an inherent error in the question itself because it kind of suggests that some do and some don't. And that kind of thinking can lead you down a very, very terrible path of deciding that. That there are some that do work and there are some that do not work. They all work when done well. They all fail when done badly.

Ryan Chute: Right, right. Absolutely.

Chris Torbay: Well, and it's not to keep coming back and making the boogeyman out of digital, but it's also a question that's getting asked more and more because digital in various contexts will offer you a kind of targeting that is very, very specific.

And as we've talked about in other programs, often that targeting comes later in the search funnel, right? So if somebody's air conditioner broke today and they Google “air conditioner repair near me,” boy, digital will search for people who are targeting, who look like they're going to make a purchase today. Whereas mass media, we'll create a brand that people like the best and are and are most predisposed to think of when a year from now something goes wrong and they say, “Hey honey, who should we call? Well, there's those people whose ads we like.”

And so again, there's a thing that happens because digital does offer some sort of targeting, or because you can run a banner ad on the goldfish website, boy, you can really talk to goldfish owners specifically whereas if you advertise on, you know, Abbott Elementary, you're gonna get the amount of tropical fish owners that exist in the world.

So it's one of these things where people now have kind of unrealistic expectations of how targeted they should be able to be, because there are a couple of opportunities to be very targeted. But that doesn't mean that that's the best choice or sort of strategy.

Ryan Chute: Well, and it comes down to what I understand it to be, two things, right? Targeting is ideal for a couple of reasons. One, to get your message out to the people who are looking to buy your thing right now. And two, to target an area where you may not have the budget available to target.

The mass, right? And you just can't afford to do it equally as much. If you live in a great big city and you run a $3 million home service company,  you're not gonna want to target the whole city in the first place because you're gonna spend more time behind a windshield, then you're gonna be in customers' houses.

So it does come back to the operational strategy that the business has available to them at the time with their budgets, resources, and capacities. But it's also a question of what are we actually targeting here?

There's this idea that we're trying to get targeted results out of mass media. We're trying to get a sales activation message out of mass media, and that's not practical. Online versus offline, as we spoke about in earlier episodes, we talk about podcasts, is that online or offline? Is social media something where we look at it as only sales activation? Or do we also look at it as branding?

Well, it's, it's both. It's not an online or offline situation of lead generation versus brand building. It's both. In those situations, and where you leverage the media channel comes into, how does the media channel get consumed? What's the temperament around that channel? What's the intent around that channel?

Mick Torbay: Well, we also tend to imagine that certain people use certain media and don't use others. And that again is an, there's an inherent error there. Well, does, does our target consumer watch TV or listen to the radio or go online? Well, the answer is yes. And, every time they come up with a new medium, it's easy, and it's almost always a very targeted one. And, the way that they sell it to you is they say, well, this is how many people are using this new medium?

For example, I remember when in a ways the traffic map system gets you to work when it first started selling ads where they would do is they knew where you were going and if there was a Dunking Donuts on the way to your, to your target destination, they could say, “Hey, do you wanna stop and get a donut?”

Okay, great idea. And then they would sell that by saying, “This is how many people are using this product, and therefore, if you want to reach them, this is how much it costs.” And if you choose not to use my medium, you won't get them. It's like, “Well, you know what they're doing in their car, apart from using Waze, they're listening to the freaking radio.”

Like we think that every time someone invents a new medium, we add more people. No, we don't. There's the same amount of people as there's always been. It's just every three weeks we figure out new ways of advertising to them. But that doesn't mean that if you don't choose this medium, they are 'ungettable', they're absolutely.

Chris Torbay:  They're listening to the radio on the road. They're watching the billboards go by on the road. They got signs on the road.

Mick Torbay: All the stuff that's been there is still there

Chis Torbay: And they watched the TV ad last night and thought, you know, “I think I might get my coffee there instead tomorrow. Why not?’

Mick Torbay: Absolutely. All of those things.

Ryan Chute: And that's seduction is really perpetrated in marketing class and marketing schools at universities because they're orienting their strategies around the Fortune 500, the Fortune 100, where budgets are seemingly endless, and you have this, this access to the omnichannel presence.

Small businesses, three to $5 million have a budget, they have payroll to meet this month, twice at least. And ultimately, it's gonna boil down to where do I spend my money? And, the answer to that is, wherever you spend your money, don't spread it around so thin that you're talking to very, very few people very infrequently or a whole bunch of people too.

Chris Torbay: Yeah, that's an interesting point. If you're Coca-Cola, you can. You can be a dominant media purchaser in every medium, right? You can buy tons of TV, tons of radio, tons of outdoor, tons of everything. But if you're a smaller player, then pick a medium, help pick a couple of stations within a medium and be a big player on that station so that the people on that station see you as a, you know, and this is why we come back to region. It's about reach and it's also about frequency and reach as many people as you can, but only at a frequency that it becomes valuable, right? You know, three times a week, something like that, where if you are a listener to that station, this is one of the regular advertisers that you hear, and then they become in whatever amount of the population that is. You've got them for sure, though.

Ryan Chute: That's the secret sauce of the Wizard of Ads. And it's on page, I believe 122 of the Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads. You are going to have incredibly more potency reaching the same people with a hundred percent of the message, rather than a hundred percent of the people, at 10% of the message.

Chris Torbay: A little sprinkle here. And this is, Mick tells this story a lot, so I'll say, I'm gonna steal it from you, which is a lot of times when people say that a medium doesn't work. It's because they did a half-ass job of it. They say, “Oh yeah, we tried radio, but it didn't work.”

Well, as it turns out, the radio station then offered them a special price for a 13-week flight. They did one ad that they wrote themselves, and the DJ read it over a piece of stock music, and they ran it for 13 weeks. And guess what? It didn't do anything. Well, of course not, you know, and, and they probably gave them leftover media space on the overnights. And so it didn't even get that much of a, but now they think they tried radio, quote unquote, and it didn't work.

And I'm sure the same thing happened with, you know, a community magazine and a something else, and a something else. And so they've written off all these things because they didn't do a good job of it. They didn't own that medium. They didn't, they didn't have a good message in that medium, but they didn't do it the right way.

And now they've written it off unfairly.

Ryan Chute: And, frankly, that is the fault in my deepest of opinions, that's the fault of the media sellers who are

Chris Torbay: Sometimes…

Ryan Chute: Who are almost always the ones trying to convince you of your marketing strategy, when they're not actually giving you is one ounce of strategy, but a tactic that may or may not work.

There's nothing more frustrating to me than seeing a whole bunch of outdoor signage for a company that doesn't have a supporting auditory reinforcement mass media campaign, because you're literally wasting money on these billboards and these park benches and bus stickers that don't actually drive any evocative emotion.

Mick Torbay: Well, and there's no particular medium that has a monopoly on that. I mean, any advertising medium has to get sold. And so, therefore, you have to bear in mind that there are sales techniques that people use, and like any major decision that anybody makes, it's based on one of two things: hope or fear.

And so you can, you can sell with hope, and you can sell on fear. And the fear that they do is if, here's how many people are availing themselves of my advertising medium. If you don't buy it, therefore you're not getting them.

Bullshit. That's not how it works. And everybody does this.

The radio stations will do this. The radio station will say, “Well, this is how many list, how many listeners you won't get if you don't advertise on my station.” That's not true. Are you a classic rock station? Well, let me guess. Is there another classic rock station in town? Well, people switch back and forth between your station and the other one.

I don't care who you are. Yeah, that's the way. That's the way.

Chris Torbay: And when the game's on, they're on the sports station.

Mick Torbay: They're on the sports station. So you can get everybody somehow. So there's that, that fear, and we, we know people buy based on emotion. So they sell based on emotion, and they will say whatever they can to get you to buy their thing, even though that might not be the best thing for you. Which is why we are media agnostic. We don't care what medium you're on. We want you to make more money, and we choose whatever medium we can to accomplish that.

Ryan Chute: And it's about spending those limited dollar resources, more potently.

We'd much more rather have a concentrated effort going to the same people. That is going to get you further down the road faster, and then be able to build off of that backyard base that you're building from, regardless of the channel. Whether it's social media, whether it's radio, or whether it's television is inconsequential.

What matters most is that the message is right and the frequency is right for the amount of budget you have, is the only thing that's gonna change. Your budget is how many more people you wanna reach. So that function is the measuring stick that we need to look at, not the other way around. We hope to reach so many people on billboards. There's a hundred thousand people driving by a day. Well, who cares? Most of them aren't even looking at your thing. And if you're selling a home service, they don't need your thing right now when they're driving by that. Why in the world would that resonate with them in any other way than to be a of color up on a board somewhere that's completely invisible otherwise.

Mick Torbay: Now, this is not to say that there's no way of being strategic in your media buys because, for example, there's an interesting niche that television has that can't be accomplished with radio, as an example, and I'm talking about specifically cable TV.

When you buy radio, you're buying, we're broadcasting to a very wide area based on how far the signal goes from their transmitter, and everybody who hears your ad will hear your ad if they're within the zone of how far that transmission goes.

With cable TV, now television's generally more expensive than radio, which is why we like radio so much, because it generally costs less money to reach people more often. But there's this one little trick with TV where, let's say you're in Atlanta and you sell roofing, but for whatever reason, you only serve half of the city. Because you're just not big enough to serve the other half. Radio can actually hurt you there because you're advertising to half the people who are listening to you, you can't serve them because you just don't have enough trucks.

Chris Torbay: If they call, you gotta turn 'em down.

Mick Torbay: Exactly. And, so that's not just wastage, it's not just a matter of you're, you're talking to people who are not potentially your customer. You're actually potentially pissing them off when they want you.

They like you. They think of you first. They want to hire you, but you can't serve them. So now you're actually gonna annoy people. You're paying money to piss off half the city you don't want to be in a position where that's happening, but what you can do with cable TV, you can literally bring your message by zip code.

You can say, this is where we operate, and this is where our commercial will run.

You can't do that with billboards because people drive around the whole city. You can't do that with radio because people can pick up your signal everywhere else. That's one example. There’s a few of these, and I'm not a media buyer, but people who are really good with media will help you navigate that world. But there, there are a few examples where you can be strategic about your media buy. My example with a business that serves half the city, radio is the worst thing you could possibly do for that reason.

Chris Torbay: Yeah. And you can target within that too, which is, you can buy ESPN on cable, or you can buy HGTV or something on cable. And so you're talking to people who are interested in homes, or you're talking to people who are interested in sports. And if that aligns with your sort of customer base, then you can target that way. But, but also remember, and people sort of get excited about that. “Oh, well, if a lot of our customers are also sports fans, you know, that's why we put the beer ads on the sports things because a lot of people who watch sports also like beer.” Well, a lot of people who run in investment brokerages also drink beer.

Mick Torbay: And they get thirsty as well.

Chris Torbay: And some of them also like football. So, you know, these things are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but you could also reach that person with your beer ad in something that's aimed at bankers.

It's interesting, and so just because I think sometimes there is that fear of wastage, right? That I'm advertising to all these people who aren't my target consumer. And so isn't that wastage? And it's like, well, it is, but if it's getting you, who is your target consumer as well? Then it's the cost of doing business. It’s a thing that you do.

The one that I learned this years ago and it, and it still gets me, is, I dunno if you've ever seen a TV ad, and sometimes you see like 60-second TV ads for General Electric or Siemens or Bombardier, and it's like there's a 60-second commercial on a like a major thing, and I've learned about those, which is those ads are aimed at like 200 stockbrokers in America, you know? Which is to get you to think about General Electric as an investment. And the best way to reach those 200 stockbrokers or bond traders or whatever it is, is mass media. 99.99% wastage. But you'll get those 200 people. So take your lumps, you'll get the people you're after.

And that's why I say on some of these other things, if you're selling dog food, put it on Abbott Elementary, half the people are cat owners and are tuning you out. But you have an incredible volume of dog owners who are also watching. And that's a valid investment as compared to getting 99% accuracy on a very small run dog magazine that nobody reads. But the people who do are all dog owners.

Ryan Chute: So we're talking about emotional environment, or the intention of the environment, of what the person's disposition is, who is going to be looking at that. They're also dog owners, but they're also kind of like, they're looking intentionally more so, you're going to get a higher weighted value.

Chris Torbay: But again, and we've talked about this, you know, what's more important is your message. I think if I were running an ad for a dog food, I would run a different ad in the dog magazine than I would run on the Super Bowl. And, it's almost what you were saying between brand and activation, right?

Which is somebody who's, who sees your ad in a dog magazine. Maybe you make that a more informational ad. Maybe you talk about things that you wouldn't talk about. Whereas in a broad scope, medium, you tailor the message to what the medium is. And when you get the people who are keeners about it, and they're in a certain space because of how engaged they are, then there's probably a specific message for that person as well. And it's the combination of those two things that makes it more effective, not just this is a better medium, quote unquote.

Ryan Chute: So as we talk about having the past talked about, targeting is one of the ways that you can target without targeting where you can speak to as many people, there's never been a time that we've ever seen somebody who's the wrong person reached with our message bankrupt a company like it just, that's not how it works because mass media is such fractional amounts of money per listener. It's not even a fraction of a penny. So well, it is a fraction of a penny. It's very, very tiny. So why does that matter? It matters because we can reach these people, we can connect with them, and if they're not the desired recipient, the targeting in the message will actually be received and carried forward and shared, as you said, with the other half of the population

Chris Torbay: Or it's brand building, and next year you're gonna get them. Yes. They're not at the bottom of the funnel. They're not looking to purchase a water heater today. Or a new iPhone today. But you talk to them all year. Then, when it comes around and they are ready now you have reached them. Now that investment pays off. That was not wasted money. It was back then because they didn't convert. If that month you needed sales, if that day you needed the phone to ring. Okay, that's “wastage.” But a brand-building perspective, it’s not.

Ryan Chute: It’s compound interest. It's compounding because you're building the business of many years from now. And that's really where we shift into this kind of concept of the long-term brand building and the short-term, and what devices, what media channels are best used for that? TV and radio Billboard, all obviously the best for brand building because it's repetitive, it's echoic. It's going to show up over and over and over again. It's also auditory level. It's going to have a higher impact. We also have social media campaigns, but on a broad reach, impression-based campaign, not a click campaign. That's the only affordable way of doing it. Also, targetable.

These are the things that we're testing right now with the help of Ryan Deiss at Digital Marketer, who's teaching us and testing these theories out on how do we leverage social media in a way, like mass media.

Mick Torbay: But we need to remember that anytime we're talking about media, one media choice versus another, as a business owner, if you're talking about which media should I choose, bear in mind the discussion you're having is, “Where do I want to say it?”

Anytime you're talking about budget, how much money you're gonna spend, what the question you're asking or answering is “How loudly or how often am I going to say it?”

It's how many. It's how many, it's how often, and where? How are we gonna say it? How often, how loudly are we gonna say it?  Have we forgotten what we're gonna say?  It's the message, it matters which media we use. But say it out loud with me. We're talking about how I'm gonna say it.

But are you sure you know what you're going to say? Because what you're gonna say matters more than how you're gonna say it, where you're gonna say it, to whom you're gonna say it, and how often and how loudly you're gonna say it.

Ryan Chute: So, think about this from the Simon Sinek Golden Circle standpoint. The how we're gonna say it is, is the whatever media channel we choose; the what we're gonna say is the actual communication message.

Mick Torbay: Why you matter.

Ryan Chute: And the well, and the why, is going to inform what we say. So the why is we're gonna do this because we're gonna grow our company to this, and we're this, and we're this. The why is what sells, and it's gonna sell more effectively when we get our why. So Simon Sinek, back again to the Golden Circle, get your why, right? Start with the why. The why will inform your what, which is the message, and the what will inform which channels we can do it most cost-effectively on.

So this is, this is all very much the same information that you've seen, just perceiving it from different areas. And that matters because we're really trying to maximize the output of your marketing dollars, because they are limited, that you don't have an endless infinite budget, and frankly, you don't have so much money that you can apply to just pay-per-click campaigns and short-term immediate results that you go out of business trying to chase the almighty lead at $200, $300, $400, $500 per lead for these high level keywords.

What you can do is bring that down so dramatically much and shift more of your message to brand building, to actually giving a reason to know, like, and trust you before they get to Google.

Mick Torbay: And get you on the short list before they're Googling your category, right?

Ryan Chute: Because if you're not on the short list, you're on the long list, and you're no different than anyone else, there's literally nobody else that would stand out any better than you, except for the ones that have worked on their brand.

Right, and we're not talking about truck wraps and logos here. We're talking about auditory storytelling words. If there's no narrative, if there is no editorial, then there is no context to the pretty pictures that you're seeing wrapped on trucks or sitting on billboards. Yeah.

Mick Torbay: And you're not answering the question, why you?

Ryan Chute: The what is a billboard is a channel, a truck wrap is a channel.  A website is a channel. All of these things are the how you do it, but none of them are answering the question of why. And, certainly, none of them are saying what you do beyond what anyone else would say fundamentally.

Chris Torbay: The Differentiator.

Mick Torbay: And don't put more effort into, how am I gonna say it, than, what am I gonna say?

Ryan Chute: And, and frankly, why you're gonna say it? Because until we know why, we're gonna say it. We don't know what we're gonna say until we don't know what your values are. Your mission is your core values, your beliefs, the things you stand for, the things you stand against, and what you're trying to achieve.

Are you trying to be a multinational company? You're trying to be the best guy in town? Are you just trying to run a happy $5 million operation? All of those are okay. Those are all success. It's about doing it at the best possible level to get the best possible results for what you define as success.

So the strategy really depends on the brand's goals and the competitive landscape. We'll tie a bow on what this means for your business after this message.

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Ryan Chute: At the end of the day, where you spend your advertising dollars is less about finding a magical medium and more about understanding your message, your audience, and your goals. It's not about precision so much as presence, and not about targeting perfection, but ensuring that your reach and repetition is embedded your brand, in the minds of the audience.

Video and radio dominate for embedding long-term emotional connections when the right frequency is achieved. Intent-based search and sales activation offers are great for short-term goals, but no medium will do the work for you if your message isn't compelling.

The best advertising strategies blend media channels, measure impact over time, not just leads and adapt as the landscape changes, the key? Think like Coca-Cola, be where your people are while targeting helps. Storytelling and emotion trump clever placement every time.

So, where should your ad budget go? Everywhere your customers live, think and relax. Fish where the fish hang out and use a better lure.

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Thank you for joining us on Advertising in America. We hope you enjoyed the show and captured a nugget of marketing magic. Wanna hear more? Subscribe, leave a review and share this podcast with your friends. Do you have questions or topics you want us to cover?

Join us on our socials @advertisinginamerica. Wanna spend your marketing budget better? Visit us at wizardofads.services to book your free strategy session with Wizard Ryan Chute today. Until next time, keep your ads enchanting and your audience captivated.

If Google Maps is the new Yellow Pages, then ranking high is the new storefront visibility.

And in the essential home services game—plumbing, HVAC, electrical—ranking in that Google 3-Pack is ideal when you haven’t been building your brand in the minds of your prospects. It's the modern-day Main Street for the masses of undecided shoppers, and it’d be great to hold the best digital real estate if you aren’t a destination. 

So, how do you get there?

Let’s toss aside the confusing SEO jargon and talk like real business owners who want predictable results, not magic tricks. Here's how to dominate your local map rankings in a way that’s strategic, sustainable, and totally service-driven.

1. Your Google Business Profile Is Your Digital Storefront—Clean It Up

First, stop calling it a “Google My Business” listing. It’s now your Google Business Profile (GBP). But names aside, this profile is your first impression, your social proof, and your conversion machine rolled into one.

Checklist for a Rockstar Profile:

• ✅ Business Name (no keyword stuffing—Google hates it)
  
• ✅ Address (NAP must match everywhere—more on that in a sec)
  
• ✅ Phone Number (click-to-call enabled)
  
• ✅ Website link (direct to a service-specific landing page)
  
• ✅ Categories (primary = your main gig, secondary = your side hustles)
  
• ✅ Hours (accurate and updated, including holidays)
  
• ✅ Services and Description (use keywords like a human, not a robot)
  
• ✅ Photos and Videos (real jobs, happy techs, and branded trucks)
  

SEO Tip: Add local service keywords into your description naturally. Google sees it. Customers feel it. Win-win.

2. Local Citations Are the Web’s Version of Street Cred

You remember citations from school, right? Now apply them to business. Local citations are listings of your Name, Address, and Phone number (NAP) on directories like Yelp, Angi, BBB, and Chamber of Commerce sites.

Here’s the secret: **they must match—**exactly.

• “123 Main Street” ≠ “123 Main St.”
• “Acme Plumbing LLC” ≠ “Acme Plumbing Co.”
  

Inconsistencies kill trust. And in Google's eyes, trust = rank. Use tools like BrightLocal or Whitespark to clean it up, or assign your ops manager one good afternoon to fix it all manually.

3. Get Reviews. Then Get More. Then Respond to All of Them.

Google wants to know: Do people like you?

The answer lies in your reviews—not just the star count, but:

• The volume (more than your competitors)
• The velocity (coming in steadily, not in suspicious batches)
• The variety (mentioning different services and keywords)
• Your responses (fast, friendly, human—not corporate spam)
  

Pro Tip:

Ask for reviews strategically, right after a successful job. Train your techs to plant the seed, and follow up with a branded SMS or email. Make it easy. Make it personal. Make it matter.

And when they leave one? Always respond. Even to the grumpy ones. Especially to the grumpy ones. Because how you handle critique is public proof of your company culture.

4. Proximity, Prominence, and Relevance: The Big Three

Google’s local algorithm is built on three core principles:

Proximity:

How close is the searcher to your address? You can’t hack geography, but you can:

• Open service-area pages on your website for nearby cities.
• Use “Service area” fields in your GBP smartly.
• List your actual address if you have multiple physical locations.
  

Relevance:

Are you what the searcher is looking for? Your categories, service pages, and reviews help tell that story.

Prominence:

Are you well-known, trusted, and active online? Google rewards companies that act like leaders—posting regularly, earning links, and engaging with customers.

5. Post Like a Pro (and Stay Consistent)

Your Google Business Profile has a “Posts” section. Use it. This isn’t social media fluff—it’s Google’s own content platform.

What to post?

• Seasonal service reminders (“Schedule your furnace tune-up before November frost!”)
• Special offers (“$49 drain cleaning special this week!”)
• Job highlights (“Just completed a 5-ton rooftop HVAC install in Cedar Park.”)
• Educational bits (“3 signs your water heater is failing.”)
  
  

Post weekly. Add photos. Use keywords. And don’t forget CTAs like “Call now” or “Book online.”

6. Build Local Links Like a Neighborhood Hero

Google loves links, especially ones that prove you're the hometown favorite. Think:

• Sponsoring local youth teams
• Donating to community events
• Being featured in local blogs or newspapers
• Joining associations (and getting that sweet backlink)
  
  

Don’t just market to your community—be part of it. That’s real-world PR that fuels online visibility.

7. Website Optimization Still Matters (Yes, Even for Maps)

Even if your leads come from Maps, your website still counts. Google looks at it to determine:

• Service relevance (Are you an HVAC company or just pretending?)
• User experience (Fast, mobile-friendly, clear CTAs)
• Consistency (Does it match your GBP and citations?)
  
  

Your home page and service pages should scream local intent. That means:

• Geo-targeted headlines (“Trusted Pest Control in Franklin, TN”)
• Customer testimonials with city names
• Embedded maps, FAQs, and trust symbols (like Google Guaranteed badges)
  

You Want the Google 3-Pack? Act Like a Local Legend

Ranking higher in Google Maps in 2025 isn’t about tricks. It’s about truth. Relevance. Authenticity. And consistency.

Here’s your next 3 moves:

1. Audit and update your Google Business Profile today.
   
2. Build a review-getting system that’s baked into your customer journey.
   
3. Stay active: post, link, respond, repeat.
   

Remember—visibility isn’t given. It’s earned. And in the home services world, where trust is currency and speed is king, showing up first isn’t just helpful.

It’s everything.

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Want a Free Google Business Profile Guide or help with turning your service area pages into ranking magnets? 

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Bonus Tip: Update Your FAQs and Q&As—It’s Visibility Gold

Want to show up more in both traditional Google searches and the emerging wave of generative AI search results? Beef up your FAQs and Q&A sections.

These aren’t just filler content—they’re findability fuel.

Why it matters:

• Google’s algorithms love direct answers to real questions.
• Generative search tools are pulling structured FAQ content into featured snippets.
• It builds trust and clarity with potential customers.
  

What to do:

• Review your current FAQ and Q&A content across your site and Google Business Profile.
• Add robust, service-specific questions—aim for at least 5–7 per service area.
• Use customer language, not internal jargon.
• Include common objections and clear, helpful answers.
  
  

Need inspiration? Check out how Fix it Frankie structures their FAQs—it's a masterclass in how to speak clearly, build trust, and rank smart.

Bottom line: Think of every FAQ as a mini-conversation starter with both your customers and the algorithms.

Lately, I’ve been getting overwhelming feedback on my latest manuscript, I Think I Swallowed An Elephant (Kindle pre order is available). But the comments that stick with me most aren’t about what I wrote.

They’re about what I didn’t.

It’s what I chose to bury.

Like an iceberg, the real weight of a story lives below the surface. The part you don’t spell out. The part the reader feels in their gut before their brain catches up.

And here’s what’s wild…

Different readers walk away with different truths. One sees a journey of self-forgiveness. Another sees a blueprint for transformation. A third sees a mirror. Same words. Different stories.

Not because I told them everything. But because I trusted them to bring something of their own.

Back in 1961, a young copywriter named Shirley Polykoff rewired an entire industry with just five words.

“Does she… or doesn’t she?”

It was about hair color. But it wasn’t really about hair color. It was about autonomy. Privacy. Power.

Those five words didn’t shout. They winked. They whispered a possibility and let the reader answer it for themselves.

The best writing does that. It respects the audience enough to leave space. It knows that persuasion isn’t about pressure. It’s about resonance.

And that’s the mistake so many make today.

They write like they’re afraid of silence. They fill every gap. Explain every point. Spell out what the reader should think, feel, believe.

But the truth is, people don’t want a conclusion handed to them.

They want to arrive there on their own.

The right words don’t close the story. They open it.

So here’s my challenge to you: Say less. Trust more. Create space for your audience to step inside your message and find themselves there.

That’s where change happens. That’s where connection lives.

And yes… she absolutely did.

What's in a Name? More Than You Think, Kid.

Sure, you can succeed with a mediocre name. Orville Redenbacher did. But why fight uphill when a great name can grease the tracks?

In this episode of Advertising in America, your favourite trio of sharp-tongued strategists—Ryan, Mick, and Chris—take a no-holds-barred stroll through the world of business naming. We’re talking real names, fake names, dumb names, genius names—and the difference between a brand that sings and one that stinks.

Episode Highlights:

• Why most "strategic" names are really just pretty garbage
• The subtle art of saying something without trying too hard to say everything
• What kind of name boxes you in… and what kind sets you free
• And the danger of letting your committee—or your ego—pick the winner

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If your ads sound like Charlie Brown’s teacher, it’s time to grab a seat, take some notes, and learn how to say something that sticks.

🎧 Hit play. Then stop teaching, start enticing, and for the love of Madison Avenue—talk to the heart, not the hard drive.

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On today's episode of Advertising in America, we ask What's in a name? Does your business name matter, or will any old handle do the trick? 

We all know some examples. Jiffy Lube, In-N-Out Burger, Dollar Tree, Thrifty Car Rental. Great names, right? Careful. If you do that, you aren't done. You have to lean into that. Federal Express wanted to convey that they could take a package from anywhere in the country to anywhere else in America and do it very quickly. Genius DoorDash, dropping food off at your house, even has alliteration going for it. It worked. People still think that you can succeed without a good name.

Orville Redenbacher proved that, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it to try to find a name that adds to the value of your brand.

Ryan Chute: On today's episode of Advertising in America, we ask what's in a name? Does your business name matter, or will any old handle do the trick? Let's go to DJ McMaster, T and C.

Mick Torbay: Okay, so I'm part of a Facebook group called Dad's Married to Doctors. We're all fathers. Our wives are all physicians. It's a remarkably diverse group, but one thing we have in common, there are no fuck offs in this group because doctors don't marry fuck offs.

There are a lot of entrepreneurial types in the DMDs, and every year or so, one of them will say, “I'm starting a whatever business, and I need a name. Post your best suggestions. Go.”

Now, the last time this happened, one of the guys asked me, “Why don't you ever respond to these? You do this sort of thing, don't you?” And I replied, “Yes, yes, I do. And that's why I don't respond.” Because there's more to a naming assignment than just brainstorming and picking your fave. Picking a business name this way is like asking your buddies to help design your building. This is no place for amateurs. Think of what a simple name did. For some iconic brands, Federal Express wanted to convey that they could take a package from anywhere in the country to anywhere else in America, and do it very quickly. Genius, DoorDash dropping food off at your house, even has alliteration going for it. Haagen-Dazs is an ice cream company from New Jersey. They wanted people to think they were. I don't know, Scandinavian, it worked. People still think that Ticketmaster, PayPal, OpenTable, Netflix, the name delivers so much.

Now, for every example I give, I'm sure you can name just as many that have no inherent value. Google, Ford, eBay, all successful companies, despite a name that brings frankly nothing to the table, but I'd argue most of those are holdovers from when people simply named the company after themselves, like Boeing, or were so freaking good at what they did that it didn't matter what it was called, like Apple.

So yeah, you can succeed without a good name. Orville Redden Baer proved that, but that doesn't mean it's not worth it to try to find a name that adds to the value of your brand. Just with the people at this table. We turned Allied Garage Door of Southwest Florida into Mo Better Garage. The Canadian Jewelry Group became the National Diamond Store, and a new in-ear headphone was named Sound Curves. You can almost picture how beautiful they are, can't you? 

Did having a strategic name help these companies? Well, I think so. Bottom line, a strategic name for your business or brand is a possible asset, and if you're a startup or for whatever reason, you need to change your identity. I think you should go to some trouble to get one and do it properly. Don't ask your friends on Instagram, and just because people have succeeded without having one, doesn't mean you shouldn't bother to try. 

Ryan Chute: How hard is it to make a bad name work? Am I right? Chris, what are your thoughts in the power of a name? 

Chris Torbay: Lots of companies think choosing a name is an opportunity to tick a strategy box and move on. They have five or six things they'd like to say about their company, usually completely unremarkable. Table stakes, things like fast, cheap, friendly, convenient, and if the name says one of them, “Hey, job done. Customers totally believe that. And now we can move on to talk about all those other things now.”

And that can be true, but it can also be a curse. We all know some examples. Jiffy Lube, In-N-Out Burger, Dollar Tree, Thrifty Car Rental. Great names, right? Careful if you do that, you aren't done. You have to lean into that. You can't just move on to other things, you'd like people to know about your brand because you need to own this one first.

Everyone else says their brand is fast or cheap, too, but you're the one who named yourself that, so you have to go all in, and it will be harder, in fact, to move on to a quality message. For example, if your name boasts that everything you sell is a dollar. If your name is Jiffy Lube, you need to organize your business so that you are always Jiffier than any of your competitors. And since they all say that, they can knock out a quick oil change too, now you have to double say it because you named yourself that. Is it strategic? Sure. Is it a boat anchor? Sure could be because how many companies have tried that and then found themselves with a strategy that unfortunately evolved.

7-Eleven was a great name for a convenience store back when the average store was only open during traditional business hours. When every convenience store is open 24 hours, seven to eleven doesn't say much. This is where we end up with names like Kitchen Stuff Plus or Board Games & More. You wanted to be strategic, but then you found yourself trapped.

McDonald's hamburgers rarely uses their full name, and Kentucky Fried Chicken found themselves not wanting to be tied just to Kentucky. Good lord, please don't equate us with fried, and we'd like to sell you much more than chicken. So now they’re KFCA, great name, is like a great logo. It doesn't do the job for you.

But when you create the brand, it contributes to the story, or it has the capacity to wear that story proudly. And even an awkward name can do that. One of the most successful home services brands in America is Goettl, G-O-E-T-T-L. It'll keep you cool, but it's hard to spell. Combine that with a story of a young man who had to push through challenges to build the successful business he has today, and the whole thing works just fine.

Bigly wiggly. There's a supermarket I haven't forgotten about since Morgan Freeman's character in Driving Miss Daisy shouted, “I'm gonna drive you to the Piggly Wiggly”. Is it a great name? No. Yes, no. Yes. 

The name you choose is just part of the story. It can be a boat anchor if you get it wrong, but it is rarely a rocket ship to success on its own.

Ryan Chute: Do you remember when KFC tried so hard to be kitchen-fresh chicken for a weird minute? In the early 2000s?  

Chris Torbay: I don’t. They tried to do it, get rid of Kentucky and get rid of it, keeping chicken, and then they decided they probably wanted to sell fries.

Ryan Chute: Before we start naming names. Here's a shameless plug for our services.

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So this is normally when Ryan throws to himself, kind of a commercial within a show about commercials, and that's fine. We could let him do that. But really, what you want to hear is me yelling at you. That's the reason you tune into the show. Sure. The conversations are fun and the insights are thought-provoking, but what you really want is cursing, and that's where I come in.

I mean, I don't want to get all shit or get off the pot on you, but at the moment, Ryan's doing this whole. “I'll give you 45 minutes of my time to help you narrow down your challenges and find a solution thing”. You think that asshole will give me 45 minutes to shoot the shit, but here's what he does. This maniac will go over everything, your sales process, your offers, your loyalty club, and yes, your marketing, and then you don't have to do a fucking thing.

You can take all that insight and roll if you like what you hear and want a deeper dive, dive away, my friend. Ryan ends up not working with about 90% of the people he meets, but the ones he does end up working with, they start here. So think about that. He's got a whole web thingy where you can book an appointment.

It's at wizardofads.services, stupid address. You want to believe it. And I'd say that to his face. wizardofads.services. And now let's get back to the stuff I really want to curse about. Shit.

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Ryan Chute: As we do start to understand the identity, there is that weird disconnect sometimes that we see. How many times have we gone in behind a naming company, who suggests that they're the guys that should be naming your company, when in fact they're just producing empty cartridges that you're supposed to fill with some cute and clever story?

Nothing strategic. It doesn't make any sense to me. You really do need to understand the mission and the values, the intentions of the owner, the competitive landscape that you're in, your target audience and how that matters. Is it a local play, a regional play? Is it a national play? Where do you go to get to the thing that you're trying to achieve? And I think that's lost a lot of time in naming of companies. 

Chris Torbay: Well, sometimes I think it's the effort of trying too hard. It's funny because I believe in all of those things, and I believe in approaching its strategy. And as Mick says, it's not just blind brainstorming, it's kind of focused brainstorming with the strategy behind it.

But getting to a result. If it looks too much like you have reached a strategic result, then almost by definition, it's not right like it; it kind of emotionally has to be right. But if it's, in a sense, if it's too brilliant, then it gives itself away as trying too hard. And I think this is equally true with names and logos, which is, I love it when logo designers come in and say, “Well, it's a two stripes with a dot above. Now the two stripes represent North America and South America, our two largest treating regions. And the dot represents the intellectual center of the what”. It's like, come on, man, it's two stripes in a dot. And they are brilliant, looking like two stripes in a dot. And it makes me feel good about your company. So, stop being overly strategic about that and let's go with it. 

Nike has a swoosh. Coca-Cola has a wave, like there's lots of less thought-out things, and I think that's true with logos and names. They need to be able to wear the message or the larger story, but it is not their full job.

And if you think of Amazon, so Amazon's a great name and it wears the whole, the wears the entire story. When somebody tells you, “Yes, and see Amazon, Amazon is the world's largest ecosystem. So you see, that's why it's a great strategic name for the thing”. You go, “Oh, that is clever.”

But I didn't need to know that. It's not like it came bottom up from the name. It's that. Once I know that and it works and the name needs to be such that it works. And when somebody says, and you see how the smiley arrow thing actually goes from A to Z? Cool. But again, I didn't have to get that from the thing. It's nice when it comes in later. So it is this weird middle ground where it's not that I expect it to do the work, and that it is so obviously doing the work, because that is showing your underpants. 

Mick Torbay: Well, I also don't believe that it was nearly that strategic when Amazon was just a bookstore, because it was just a bookstore because it wasn't the world's biggest ecosystem. It was never supposed to be the world's biggest ecosystem. It was just an excellent way to buy books. And so I think a lot of the time when something becomes tremendously successful, we can sort of look at it and say, "Oh, well, naturally that succeeded”. It's like it is like, I think what I think what we're doing is we're throwing a dart at a board and then we're drawing a target around it.

Chris Torbay: Yeah. It's like going back through Shakespeare, saying, “You see that this line, see? See what it actually means. Okay..”

Mick Torbay: Yeah. In hindsight, it is the world's biggest ecosystem. Before, it was just a word that everybody knew. It didn't stand for any other brand, and everybody knew how to spell it, which was really important when you're having an online business.

Ryan Chute: Yeah, and it was very important for an online business and making it easy for the person to be able to get from A to Z, pardon the pun. And ultimately. It took an incredible amount of advertising dollars, an incredible amount of energy and effort to make Amazon matter, right? The name itself creates this friction of making it easy with terribly spelled names or clever spelled names, where the I's and Y's have been switched or some other kind of goofy thing where they leave out particular letters or add an extra vowel in all of these things, just create an environment where it makes it that much harder for the customer to get to the thing that you're trying to get. 

Chris Torbay: Yeah. And, I would ask customers, here's a survey question. “How many times have you ever chosen a brand because of their name?”

Right. And I believe in choosing a good name. I've done those assignments and I've changed, but I think when I develop a name, I also develop a name. It's like, what? What capacity does it give me? Not, what does it accomplish? You know, we, because we've done a couple of recent ones and, and we've created a name where I can see the campaign that comes outta that. And I can see how the campaign that comes outta that or works with that allows us to tell this story about this brand that we want to tell. So yes, it comes from, the inspiration does come from the brand, but the name doesn't tell the story. The logo doesn't tell the story. We still tell the story, and you look for, and that's why I think there are so many intrinsically bad names out there that are still very successful. And how many times have we done this with a, with a company that is intrinsically poorly named and you go, “What the heck am I gonna do with its dumb ass name?” And you go, “Well, you know?” Right. And that's the creative challenge. That's the thing that you say a lot, which is, you know, if you want to get a creative guy inspired, put him in a box and get him to find a creative solution out of it. Sometimes a bad name, you think is a bad name until you think of the most interesting, creative way to work with it, and then suddenly it's an asset.

Now you, but, but it, but it's the creative person. It's the communications person who makes it an asset.

Ryan Chute: Well, that leads us into the kind of second point out of five here, where we talk about choosing the naming category and Igor talks about a few different categories of names: evocative names, invented names, descriptive names, experiential names, and functional names.

All of these things serve a different purpose to get to an end result. They're all strategic, some better than others, and some are, are going to come with more creative juice to evoke our intentions as a business and to live in the space that we're trying to live in, be it locally, regionally, nationally or internationally.

So evocative names trigger that emotion. The ideas related to the brand's purpose. You know, it's evocative. Monster.com is an evocative name. It's standing out above all invented names are a little bit trickier, things like Google? 

Mick Torbay: Yeah. Or Kijiji. 

Ryan Chute: Or Kijiji, right.

Mick Torbay: What's a Kijiji? I dunno. 

Ryan Chute: Well, it's a, it's sure someone's gonna say it's something, it's an African something or other. 

Mick Torbay: And I'm sure someone's gonna remind us now that a Google is actually a one with a hundred zeros after it. Fine. Right. But you know what? Nobody knows that. And nobody knows that it's misspelled, and it only doesn't actually apply.

Chris Torbay: And to that end, though, it is so fine. It tells a little bit of the strategic story, but it tells, you know, that, that. You know, infinitely huge. Okay. That contributes to what Google wants to say, which is, “We will give you a million options, or a Google of options”. Right. But that's not nearly the whole story.

Ryan Chute: And that meaning gets lost so often. I remember times when you were talking about your large agency days, and people were, you know, saying the swoosh and the dots all meant some crazy thing. And it's like it got so deep and so metaphorical. You know that? 

Mick Torbay: Or it's to justify an hour-long meeting about the logo.

Chris Torbay: Well, let's justify that some logo companies. You know, gone away for a charge for an entire month, and it's charging a hundred grand for this. And so they come back and it's like an art gallery where they say that, you know, where it's a banana taped against the wall, but they say, well, the tape represents the imprisonment that we all feel intellectually.

And, you know, that blurb, which tries to make the thing more profound than it actually is. Well, can't you just say it's a really cool shape? I think people are really gonna remember it. It's gonna be very distinctive from everybody else. Because that's actually a huge win. You, you had the win. It's the right, it's the bullshit you tried to attach to it that lost me.

Ryan Chute: So, I mean, there is a balance in that subtlety. Descriptive names are like General Motors. They explain what the company does. They're there to just kind of put it out on the table. 

And experiential names like Gogo- related to an experience or a feeling. Gogo is a Wifi for airplanes, so it's. Trip on a Go-Go. I guess you know when you're on the go-go make me up before you, before you, before you connect to Wifi, see what you, I see what you did there.

And functional names, you know, ho hotels.com, you know, directly describe that product or service, it's highly descriptive. We also get lost in that when we see companies that are named quality or absolute, or any of these things, where they're trying to be definitive and holistic, it's nearly impossible. To own that idea and attach it to what you represent? 

Chris Torbay: Well, or you could do it, but as I say, then it's a restriction. If you wanna call you in Canada there was this, this big move for, 2-for-1 pizzas. A company owned calls themselves 2-for-1 Pizza. You pay for one pizza, they give you a second one for free. Cool. But like now, you can't be the most delicious pizza in town because the thing you've named yourself is that you get a free one. And so it is not that's cool. Now, if we also say We're delicious, boy, we're gonna win all of it. 

Mick Torbay: Also, you sure as hell, better be selling two pizzas for the price of where the competitor sells one, because in all those situations where people say, “Oh, we're two for one pizza”. No, you're twice as expensive pizza, and we give you two of them, you know, we're, we're not gonna fall for that.

Ryan Chute: Buy one pizza for full price and get the second one for full price as well. 

Mick Torbay: Well, and also when you're naming things, we have to bear in mind human nature, and human nature is always going to shorten things. This is a mistake that a lot of people make. They think that you can have a long, descriptive, complicated name and think that people are actually gonna say that, we all shorten it.

I mean, Federal Express isn't that long, and we still say shorten it, and we shortened it. Exactly. So bear that in mind. I mean, it's one of the reasons why Allied Garage Door of Southwest Florida. We changed to Mo Better Garage because it's significantly shorter, and now people can at least remember that.

If they shortened Allied Garage doors of Southwest Florida, what they're gonna do is they're gonna short it, shorten it to Allied, and they can't own the idea of Allied.

Chris Torbay: Well, because there's probably an Allied Trucking, there's, there's an Allied Taxi. 

Mick Torbay: There’s probably a hundred Allied. And so they're never gonna own that idea. But what they could own is Mo Better Garage. And they at least have a fighting chance of people remembering their brand compared to another one. 

Ryan Chute: Which would fall into the evocative world. This is we're taking something and going, what are the things that are going to stand you 600 feet above the competition?  It can't be that you're different anymore. It has to be distinct. And that subtle shift is that everyone is different, like everyone else. Like, there is no different-indifferent anymore. We have to shift gears and point in a different direction. But we were also very strategic in Mo Better Garage to not call it Mo Better Garage Doors. Why? Because if they wanna sell any other kind of door, or epoxy flooring, or lifts, or storage, storage cabinet storage. Exactly. They have the freedom to do that now, and in the future, we ought to look at it from a standpoint of, is this going to be a local brand or a national brand? 

So you start to shift these mindsets to what is the game that we're playing, what is the big vision and how we're gonna fit this all in. So you're absolutely right, now, where that goes to the next step is how we can focus in on the emotional components of it. If we don't have an emotional connection, it's way harder for your name to do the lifting that it needs to do. 

Chris Torbay: Well, and again, you can't unfairly give that to the name. Philip Morris, famously,  a decade ago, changed their holding company name to Altria, because it sounds kind of like altruism as opposed to cancer sticks, which is what Philip Morris sold is- is in people's minds, 

Mick Torbay: Allegedly, we don't want to get sued. 

Chris Torbay: And so, they thought, “Well, if we call ourselves Altria, then people will feel better about our company cigarette”. It's like, no, you gotta make people feel something about your company on your own. You cannot expect that a name change is going to do that. And there are a number of examples of corporations that sort of try that. 

The reason people buy Acura is not because the name sort of sounds like accuracy. It's because the product lived up to being a slightly premium version of a Honda. And so people do find the value in paying extra for the Acura line than they pay for the Honda line. But you can't get away with doing it just with an evocative name and thinking, “Well, now we've got that solved”.

Ryan Chute: Yeah. Evocative with that's empty or void of authenticity, we know that when it feels disingenuous that it's pulling the wrong emotional string. And we are looking for that emotional, and we want positive resonance outta that emotional string that pulls, and just any old word ain't gonna do.

And using the generic go-to words that you would see on any good core values list aren't gonna cut it either. 

Mick Torbay: Well, no, in fact, if you pick a word that is generally used in your category,  you never have a problem when it comes to search, which matters. Which is why a company called Best Barbershop is a problem, because you will not be the only answer to that question.

Chris Torbay: When somebody Google's best barber shop in town. 

Mick Torbay: So you might say, “Oh, that's brilliant because when people want the best barbershop, they're gonna get us?”

It's like, “No, Google knows better than to just only give them one answer.” If you called yourself Kangaroo Barbershop. Then you have a better shot of being the only one when people are putting in your name. 

Ryan Chute: Well, and that's a trap that came from Yellow Pages, where A1 and AAA and all those things were the cheat code for a minute. And then in Google, the cheat code was what the search terms? What are the best search terms for searching for the best barbershop?

That worked for a minute, Google uses natural language processing. It's 2025. We have to be more sophisticated in our approach now because not only are we creating a challenge. Now, but is there an opportunity within that? Sometimes, sometimes there's ways that you can pull on that, but it's very often limiting. It's not going to have the legs and the depth that you're hoping that it's gonna have.

Mick Torbay: You also need to bear in mind that changing the name is almost always, at first, a liability. I mean, changing a name requires changing minds, and we really don't like changing minds in advertising. That sounds counterintuitive because when you're trying to persuade people to make a decision, but we actually don't want to change minds. We wanna find out where the minds are and then attach our brand to what the consumer's already thinking. 

If people are thinking of you as one thing, and then we want them to think of you as another thing, that's really, really fricking hard, right? So when you're thinking about changing your name, bear in mind that you should only do that if you have to.

Ryan Chute: I agree. And I would say if you currently don't represent anything in anyone's mind, if you've never advertised or if you've advertised so little that the only people who would know it's not a household thing, right? 

Mick Torbay: Yeah. Then you're not changing people's things. We're merely starting from scratch. We're starting from scratch. But I can give you an example of a client who needed to do this. It's a client of ours, a plumbing company in Dayton, Ohio, and they were called All Drain. And All Drain is an excellent name for a plumbing company. But the first thing I ask them in our very first meeting is, “Are you ever going to offer more than just plumbing services?”

Because very often in these spaces, they will expand the number of trades underneath their umbrella. They say, “Well, we're thinking about getting into HV in a couple of years, but don't worry about that.” It's like, “Oh no, we're gonna worry about that because we're about to completely change your advertising. And I don't want to completely change your advertising twice. So if you're ever going to get into HVAC, we need to bear that in mind now, change your name to something that can take you through the next 20 years. And change it now so that it'll work.”

So we gave them a new name that had nothing to do, didn't say drains in it. Had a new name, was a strategic name, worked for Dayton, Ohio, was not physically restricted to the one trade that they're in now. So that's a good, that's a good reason to do it. 

Ryan Chute: Neil Patel is in charge of Neil Patel, a SEO marketing agency, a hundred-million-dollar SEO agency, and he said the data is clearly supportive of a brand taking 10 years to build the full momentum that it needs when you start branding. And not the lightweight stuff that a handful of people, including your customers, will see. We're talking about the mass level of branding that happens when the majority of people. Have some sort of impression about you. The better your brand, the more they feel about your brand. Some people have name recognition. We had a client down in, in Florida where they had name recognition. I promise you, they were spending a King's ransom in marketing. We reduced their budget by a third, increased their total impact points or impression points by four times and leveraged the heck outta the name. And that company doubled in size. 

Well, that's a big deal when you start to think about name recognition versus brand recognition. The whole point, which starts with a name, is how do we make people feel something about that name, not just know it. 

Mick Torbay: I would also caution people who are in a situation where they have to change their name or they're considering changing their name, for god's sake, keep the committee outta the room. Because my rants about the committee are legendary. You can find those online, but the risk is with the committee on a naming assignment. Is that they're going to look at any name and say, yes, it ticks these boxes, but what is it saying about these boxes over here? It's not there to tick all the freaking boxes.

Apple ticks no boxes. Yes. So, it's fine. And it's fine. Absolutely fine. But I mean, you know, talking about trigger warnings, I mean, Kitchen Stuff Plus absolutely makes me go bananas, because someone at kitchen stuff said, “Yeah, but we're also selling things for the dining room. So we should call ourselves Kitchen Atuff Plus,” okay, so you just took your the name of your company, you made it slightly more cumbersome, slightly less easy to remember and gave me no new data with which to make a decision.

Yeah, because “plus” doesn't tell me shit. Any tell time you call yourself… 

Chris Torbay: All plus does is tell you that the first two words are sort of wrong. 

Mick Torbay: That's it. If know, if you call yourself more than just signs, I don't know what else you sell except for signs. So don't do that. At least call yourself Dave Signs and then move on from there.

Chris Torbay: And again, that there's a name that has the ability, maybe I can build a story around Dave, maybe. Maybe there's a backstory there. Maybe there's a quality story we could tell about, Dave, you've given me something with Dave. You haven't given me something with Plus. 

Ryan Chute: Yeah. That's it. That's exactly it. And we are right in the weeds of the fourth component that we consider around all these things, which is avoiding too descriptive, or limiting names, and avoiding difficult to spell or pronounce names, clichés or similar to competition names. All of these things are the common pitfalls that seem right because everyone's doing it. But the biggest pitfall is if everyone's doing it, you should probably do something different. 

Chris Torbay: And then that was a real trend in the last sort of decade or so. Partly because all the good URL words got scooped up. And so, you can't call yourself. You know, tires.com, because somebody big and rich owns that one. So you try spelling it with two i's or a y or you know, something like that. I mean, that one's gone in Britain. I'm too sure too. But, and so you get all these things where they drop the second last vowel, and you know, all this kind of stuff. And, I think we're sort of past that, which is first, we used up all the real words. Then we used up all the misspellings of the real words. 

Mick Torbay: Then, you know, we now we're left with Kajiji. 

Chris Torbay: Now we're left with either totally made-up words or words that on first glance, have absolutely nothing to do with our business, or we're making up crazy words like Mondelez.

Ryan Chute: Well, and I think it goes back to the very first point, which is to understand what the intentions are and what we're going to start wrapping that strategy around. And that puts us into this step number five, where we start to set ourselves up for that comprehensive narrative. You know, I think of a name of a business, kind of like the working title of a book. If you haven't read or written the book yet, then what in the world is that title? But yes, a good idea around what might it be, and how many times do people change the name of their. Book once they've actually written it and gone, oh, it's actually not about that. It's about this. 

Chris Torbay: Yeah. And that, to go back to the very beginning, that's why, you know, we believe in doing these naming assignments strategically. I mean, one of my last agency jobs was to work for a branding agency. And we would quite frequently do rebrandings because companies would evolve, and their original brand was tied to something that they really don't do anymore. They really do this new thing. And so we do a strategic look at it and so. It should definitely come from and you should definitely dig into what the business is and what its future is, and let's make sure we know that where that path is headed and pick something that's more appropriate to, anything in the cone of uncertainty that that path could be.

But again, given that, it doesn't have to tell that story. It has to be able to bear that story. It has to be able to be a component of that story. It has to be the bass player in that band. But it does not have to be the driving force.

Ryan Chute: It really comes back to alignment, right? In all of these things, if the bass players out of sync with the rest of the song, it sounds awful. You know, it's no different than a truck rapper or a logo. What should we be doing truck raps and logos for on a business that we don't even know what the right name is, let alone know what the right story is. That's all backwards. Now, have we had to tuck ourselves into working around those creative constraints? Of weak naming choices and weak branding choices that we elevate. Absolutely. 

Chris Torbay: Sometimes you can turn that into a win. You know, you can. And that's what my Piggly Wiggly thing, right? It’s a ridiculously bad name. It's so ridiculously bad that you can run with it. You can lean into it, right? You can, you can make it a thing, and you can suddenly be distinctive, and you know, how strategic can you be with it? Not sure. I mean, I haven't looked into all of their advertising, but it's sometimes something that at first is very disheartening, very discouraging from a creative perspective. And, your first thing is, “Could we change your name so that I can create something that I can work with?”

And when the answer's no, it's almost a better challenge. Okay, so how can I actually make that make sense, because it doesn't. And sometimes the story you have to tell is now, such an interesting story because the consumer didn't see it coming. It certainly made you have to do something other than quality service selection and plenty of free parking because you somehow gotta justify this crazy ass name.

Mick Torbay: But bear in mind that that's, that's nitroglycerin. I mean that in the right hands will save your life; in the wrong hands will blow up in your face. There are so many examples of companies that gave themselves incredibly restricted names, and then they just ignored it. 

I mean, there's a very famous, or not famous, but a very popular store in our city called Just White Shirts. And it just became a very popular men's wear store. And now they obviously don't sell just white shirts. It's like, “Guys, your name is killing you here.” 

Chris Torbay: And they're just looking the other way.

Mick Torbay: They're just ignoring it. They're just pretending it didn't happen. It's like, well, now what you need is a really good copywriter to dig you out of that hole. 

Chris Torbay: Sure. And now, do a tongue-in-cheek campaign about, “just white shirts, sorry, about the name,” you know, or do something. Run with it. 

Ryan Chute: And that's one of the things when handed a creative constraint like this is to sometimes lean into the campaign being about the name. 

Ryan Chute: You know, one of its ways around. 

Chris Torbay: That's what Goettl did. And, to rhyme hard to spell with it acknowledges that it's kind of a hamfisted name, and what are you gonna do? But it makes you people interested. Now you kind of want to, it's what are they? It's weird. 

Mick Torbay: It's like Orville Baer.

Chris Torbay: It is Orville Redden Baer. Brilliant name, you know. 

Mick Torbay: So I do have one piece of advice though for people who are considering changing their name, and they're perhaps bringing in a company to do a naming assignment, and this, and it's gonna sound like I'm being silly or facetious here, but I'm actually being very honest. 

If you've got someone doing a naming assignment, be very wary of placeholders. Do not use a placeholder. 

And so, because everybody uses placeholders, I'm gonna give you the placeholder that you have to use and the name of your company, the placeholder that you need to talk about while you're waiting for it is, stupid, stupid, crappy barbershop. Literally, call it stupid, crappy barbershop while you're waiting for someone to come up with the answer. 

And the reason is because you know that can’t really be it. 

If you start calling it “Ryan's Barbershop” as a placeholder while the people are coming up with the name, then in the month and a half while you're working on your business and doing your build out, and talking with renovation people, you're gonna start to fall in love with Ryan's Barbershop.

Chris Torbay: As bumpy as it might be, it gets less bumpy for you. 

Mick Torbay: That is human nature to just, whatever you pick, you'll just kind of start to like it because you're just gonna say it over and over again. And then you're gonna be fighting with a new great idea that your naming company has come up with. And then the thing that you kind of fell in love with all on your own. So you, there will be a placeholder use, “stupid, crappy, whatever”, so that you do not fall in love with it. 

Chris Torbay: Yes. This is how I got into the actors' union. I demoed so many of my own commercials and then went to a casting session to get somebody else to read them.

And the client had been listening to my demo for a month, and by the time we gave them the new cast, it's like, “I don't know, I kinda like Chris's version.” 

Mick Torbay: Chris is not a real actor. 

Chris Torbay: Yeah. Uh, but I still got the gig. It yes, absolutely happens. 

Ryan Chute: That's fantastic. What does your name say about you?

Could you see it on a national TV ad? Does it represent your intentions, your solution, your purpose, and what you're trying to achieve with the business itself, locally, regionally, or nationally? 

Names are really, really important, and they should be true to you and true to what you're trying to achieve. When we get back. We'll wrap this up with a few ideas on how we can best name your business. 

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‍Remember that saying, only half your marketing is working. You just don't know which half. Let's help you with that. Book it free strategy session with wizard Ryan Chute today at wizardofads.services. Yes, that's a URL wizardofads.services. Now let's get back to the show. 

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Ryan Chute: There are four things we'd like you to take away from today. The first is to embrace boldness. Names like Call Ada and Mo Better Garage succeed because they break the mould of their categories. 

Two, is to prioritize simplicity and clarity. The name should be easy to spell, pronounce, and remember.

Next is to tell a story. A great name is a foundation for a compelling brand narrative. And lastly is to own the lion's share of the mind. Unique names create competitive advantages and avoid legal conflicts. Until next time, this has been Advertising in America. 

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Thank you for joining us on Advertising in America. We hope you enjoyed the show and captured a nugget of marketing magic. Wanna hear more? Subscribe, leave a review and share this podcast with your friends. Do you have questions or topics you want us to cover?

Join us on our socials @advertisinginamerica. Wanna spend your marketing budget better? Visit us at wizardofads.services to book your free strategy session with Wizard Ryan Chute today. Until next time, keep your ads enchanting and your audience captivated.