Unglossy: Decoding Brand in Culture

William "Classic" Thomas: Breaking Through Creative Commodification

• Tom Frank, Mickey Factz, Jeffrey Sledge, Classic • Season 4 • Episode 21

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Have you ever wondered why your favorite artists are struggling despite millions of streams? Creative work isn't always valued as it should be, especially in the digital age. Join us for a hilarious yet enlightening talk with William "Classic" Thomas, a visionary content creator and brand strategist, as he shares unconventional strategies for breaking through the commodification of creativity. We'll even take a detour to discuss "baby bananas" and the quirky side of online sales, ensuring a few laughs along the way.

With insights from fast-paced product development to the intricacies of creative marketing, this episode uncovers the art of balancing passion and profitability. Hear how independent brands can outmaneuver industry giants by leveraging audience feedback and authentic collaboration. Plus, follow a personal tale of transitioning from music to film, driven by the relentless pursuit of passion and perspective, and how this can fuel innovative content creation.

This episode is your guide to connecting with audiences, building genuine narratives, and navigating the complex world of digital content with confidence.

"Unglossy: Decoding Brand in Culture," is produced and distributed by Merrick Creative and hosted by Merrick Chief Creative Officer, Tom Frank, hip hop artist and founder of Pendulum Ink, Mickey Factz, and music industry veteran, Jeffrey Sledge. Tune in to hear this thought-provoking discussion on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you catch your podcasts. Follow us on Instagram @UnglossyPod to join the conversation and support the show at https://unglossypod.buzzsprout.com/

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Speaker 1:

This week on Unglossy.

Speaker 2:

Like. Who the hell said this is less than a fraction of a fraction of a penny Like. How do you break down a penny Like? And the fact that we can get these views? We've valued being seen more than being paid.

Speaker 3:

Yes, that's it right there. We value being seen more than being paid For the past six years. No exaggeration, I will refuse and I have refused to post my Spotify numbers. That is nobody's business.

Speaker 4:

At the end of the year everybody posts their numbers. But they really got checks for like 600 bucks.

Speaker 1:

Yes, From the top. Yeah, I'm Tom Frank.

Speaker 3:

I'm Mickey Fax.

Speaker 4:

And I'm Jeffrey Sledge.

Speaker 1:

Welcome to Unglossy decoding brand and culture. I'm Tom Frank, partner and chief creative officer at Merit Creative. This is Mickey Fax, hip hop artist and founder and CEO of Pendulum Inc. And that is. Jeffrey Sledge, a seasoned music industry veteran who has worked with some of the biggest artists in the business. We're here to explore the moments of vulnerability, pivotal decisions and creative sparks that fuel the relationship between brand and culture. Get ready for a thought-provoking journey into the heart and soul of branding the unscripted, unfiltered and truly unglossy truth.

Speaker 3:

Yo, yo, listen, I got us, I got us. That's mad weird.

Speaker 4:

Something's weird.

Speaker 3:

These are called baby bananas.

Speaker 1:

All right for people who are listening to this right now. Did it cost mad money? Mickey's holding the smallest three bananas I've ever seen. Are these bananas that are sold as small bananas, or did you just happen to pick out the smallest three bananas you could find?

Speaker 3:

These are sold as small bananas. It is a supermarket in Atlanta. It's like an Asian market called like Dae Nam Nu. You ever see that, Jeff? It's like a Korean market and they sell mini bananas. This is called Banana Babies.

Speaker 1:

It tastes just like a banana, I mean if nothing else, for this episode, you're going to learn about baby bananas. I got us started a little late because I sold a couch on Facebook Marketplace. It was a crazy story. Got us a little bit off track A little bit. The deal went through, though.

Speaker 3:

Couches are gone a little bit off track A little bit. The deal went through, though. Couches are gone, so talk to us about you selling your couch really quickly for the people and what you do to prepare for selling to people online.

Speaker 1:

Now, it's not like I do this all the time, but let's be honest. We're all selling things online and if it's a physical thing, that means there has to be an interaction. I don't know these people.

Speaker 1:

They don't know me, so you got to kind of protect yourself. So I have come up with the idea that if I'm not selling it at a third-party destination and they're coming to my house, I like to hide weapons all around the yard just in case something goes south. I've never had to use one before, but I'm prepared and I'm ready to go.

Speaker 3:

My guy is Matami Culkin. He's home alone. B Word home alone, home alone.

Speaker 1:

I like to think of myself maybe as more of a Van Damme or something like that no, no, no, no no. Like a blood sport.

Speaker 3:

No thanks, You're Kevin McAllister. It ain't that All right. So let's talk about our guest that we had today.

Speaker 1:

We had a great guest William Classic Thomas Thomas. I want to say Johnson. Wow, not Johnson. Thomas Thomas Thomas. He's related to this guy, no relation.

Speaker 3:

This time We've had some guests that are related to me, but not this one so you know, for me, I wanted to talk about the algorithm, and I think he had not only an incredible analogy, but he broke it down so well for all of us to hear about it, um, and I think, just from that perspective, I got a lot out of it. What about you guys?

Speaker 4:

yeah, the same. Yeah, he has some issues perspectives on the algorithm and being an entrepreneur in this day and age and being able to find your own way and not relying on big companies to, you know, give you something of a kind of earning your way and having those big companies partner with you to do things, as opposed to kind of like giving you things. It was dope.

Speaker 1:

For me it was like a full circle moment, right, because we've talked so much here about content and doing things a little different and the idea that you have to deliver things consistently and with an action to people, and to me that's everything that we talked about and summarized well, and I'm very excited to get to continue to know Classic, continue to get to work with him, because we've got something special coming up very soon. Oh man, sounds good. Ooh, it's going to be good. With that, let's dive into our conversation with William Classic Thomas. Unglossy is brought to you by Merrick Creative, looking to skyrocket your business's visibility and drive growth. At Merrick Creative, we solve your brand and marketing woes With big ideas, decades of experience and innovative solutions. We'll draw in your target audience and keep them hooked. Remember, creativity is key to success. Partner with Merit Creative and unlock your brand's potential. Learn more at meritcreativecom. And now back to the show.

Speaker 1:

All right, fellas, on this week's episode of Unglossy Podcast, we're thrilled to welcome William Classic Thomas. We're going to get to the bottom of the classic between the William and the Thomas. He's an innovative content creator, storyteller and brand strategist with a knack for turning ideas into memorable experiences. Classic has collaborated with major brands like WeFunder we shout out to our friend Johnny, who was on the show recently and Factory Lab produced viral campaigns for rising artists in the music industry and helped start up craft compelling narratives that resonate with our audience. From his work shaping culture through campaigns for community focused initiatives, to his ability to create buzzworthy moments for globally recognized names, classic brings a very unique perspective to the table. Let's dive into his creative process, some of his memorable projects and the future for the for his future for the uh branding, because I think it's kind of interesting. Hello classic.

Speaker 2:

Classic how goes it?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, all right. So we need to start right there, because I have been meaning to ask you this question when does what's the backstory behind Classic?

Speaker 2:

All right. So initially I did music and I, but just in general I was very shy and so I always had these ideas no-transcript. It'd be like, well, what would classic do and create that story and then just go perform that? It's like just leave it all out there. So after a while I didn't have to ask that anymore and it just became like embodying this concept of classic. And so now it's funny.

Speaker 2:

For a while it was classic reinvention. It was like the idea of taking old things and modernizing them. A lot of my ideas come from just things I love from the 90s, 2000s, and kind of rope it into today's day and age, like how we were talking about earlier. There's a lot of stuff that was like really early and so you can still replay it, and out earlier there's a lot of stuff that was like really early and so you can still replay it, and it's new to the current audience but familiar to the older audience, and so that's how you end up getting more of the market share, um, and so that's where classic came from. That's where I've been sticking with it for a while.

Speaker 2:

I love going into corporate settings and they're like what's your name and it's like classic, it just makes the whole room feel uncomfortable. But it's perfect, because now it's like well, let's open this up. Everything doesn't need to be so stodgy, stuffy, uh, how do we get to the people anyway? We're just constantly thinking inside of the box, and so for me that's like the ultimate icebreaker now used to be icebreaker for me. That was an icebreaker for everyone else there you go.

Speaker 1:

Well, you're on with two music guys. We got to hear a little bit about your journey in music before we go any further.

Speaker 2:

Oh man, Pink for me was like a festival in Canada. It was like one of those things with like the crazy lineups I was like but like small name, you got the big names and the small names at the bottom. It's one of those I was working with. I think the only real like claim to fame was Pop Wanzel. He did Usual and it was actually cool like sitting in the studio listening to references for like Nicki Minaj songs and things like that.

Speaker 2:

But music started to feel a little too limited for me and I got into film because it felt more three dimensional, Like I can still do the music and kind of use it as a means for shaping these narrative and these visuals, which would then help people appreciate the music even more. So that was always my thing. Like eventually I am going to make my way back into music. That was always my thing. Like eventually I am going to make my way back into music, but from like a directorial, uh brand strategy perspective, like understanding the story behind the music, understanding the story behind you.

Speaker 2:

Now, how do we create that in a way where people can enjoy it and we're kind of putting the medicine in the applesauce by time they get to the end of it. They feel like they know you better, they feel like they understand where you're trying to take this better, and so now you can easily weed out who is supposed to be there versus who isn't supposed to be there, because I'm resonating on such a level that now I'm just your people, Uh, cause I feel like whenever we put anything out like our audience is an extension of us and but you won't really properly find them until you can tell that story correctly. And so that was the music journey that led into the film side of things, and now we're kind of back to music, even with the most recent project with Vanellie Chopper.

Speaker 4:

So how did you link up with Chopper?

Speaker 2:

Through Factory Lab. So Factory Lab again. I'm constantly finding these correlations between art, tech, culture. And so there was a venture firm called Slauson Co. They're on the West Coast. They invested in Factory Lab and I happened to be talking to one of the folks there and I was like hey, yeah. I was like hey, what you guys got going on, I would love to talk about something. And they were like, hey, factory Lab just dropped these duck boots with NLE Choppa. Cool thing Factory Lab just dropped these duck boots with NLE chopper. Cool thing about Factory Lab is it's ran by Omar Bailey. Omar Bailey was the head of the Yeezy Innovation Lab.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

Yes. So he built that foam runner and so, doing that for years, got that division to a billion dollars. He had a lot of people in his ear that were like, hey, man, you should probably start your own shop. And so that's what Factory lab is. It's mini manufacturing and 3d prototyping, and so it allows them to actually take on anybody and get them to market a lot quicker than a larger situation, because we can do it within these small batches, and so they've done it.

Speaker 2:

For jayalen ramsey, the cleat that he's playing in is a factory lab shoe, uh, and ellie chopper was the first sort of more mainstream musical take on things, I would say. And so I just started talking about the duck boots and then they reached out and sent me duck boots and then I shot a commercial for the duck boots and then they were like, hey, we're going to ComplexCon, do you want to go? And which means I ended up having to do the whole campaign for the duck boots and NLE Chop and them. So it turned into like a really cool cross collaboration where it helped amplify Factory Lab even more, because now they had this visual that really spoke to what they were doing and mixing in LA, which gave him reasons to push it even more as well.

Speaker 2:

I think one of those videos ended up hitting like 440,000 views. This is big for me. I usually don't get like a lot of looks, but it speaks to the hacking of things and, like I'm a real big fan of saying great things about people in a high quality way that kind of makes them obligated to want to share it. It's like damn, I got to show this to folks. Like he said some really cool things about me I probably couldn't even say about myself, and this might be like the first one that like went, went and so now we're having conversations about like well, what does it mean to kind of do this a little bit more?

Speaker 4:

Like how do we apply this to Jalen ramsey? How do we, you know, apply this to other folks that we have coming down the pipeline? You got some other artists and stuff that you that you uh that they're designing uh shoes for um, I'm not sure who else is like, because this was my my first run with them.

Speaker 2:

I know DDG was there and DDG was working with NLE and he was like that whole conversation was like you know, how do we do this for us now and I think that's the cool factor of it, where we don't have to deal with bureaucracy I can talk to you right now. This is what I was thinking about shoot-wise. Do you want to do this? Blah blah blah.

Speaker 4:

We just figure out the business and get it to market in like three to six months.

Speaker 2:

That's like unheard of, when you think about like a large, it turns that quick. I didn't know that. Yeah, like there's just like, like they can move as fast as they want because they're going to sit down. The folks are designing you 3d print it. How do we feel about it? Let's press up a thousand, like the timelines are a lot quicker. And so when you're dealing with an adidas or something, I think omar was saying like you're talking about like 18 months, yeah, maybe more, yeah, six, because a lot of people want to make sure that, like everybody knows that I did it and yada, yada versus like no, let's get straight to it.

Speaker 2:

Let's go straight to the audience. Let's let's let the audience be the a b test, versus us trying to decide what's going to work on the inside because you don't really know. You can't plan for something you never experienced. You got to throw it out there like like apple, like that whole concept of you know how do you know people want?

Speaker 2:

a home computer. Well, how do you know? They don't. They never had it before, and so it creates those opportunities. Without the every accuracy to like. Just go straight to testing, seeing what works, refining until you finally get something that the people really want, because they've literally been dictating it to you.

Speaker 1:

So, mickey, if you need a shoe brand, the Mickey Facts shoe, I'm already thinking about it right now. Facts shoot, I'm already thinking about it right now.

Speaker 3:

We tried with Supra back in 2008, 2009,. And they glossed us over and went over to Wayne and then, once they went to Wayne, it kind of tanked, of course.

Speaker 4:

I mean, I know we're getting kind of off track, but my theory is always like when you try to launch something with big artists, you catch an L because the artist is doing it for the check. They're not into it. They'll just maybe do a couple of photo shoots and then bounce off. What you do with somebody who's into it, like even Chopper Chopper's still, he's known, he's definitely known, but he's growing, he's still got a lot of ways to grow to be a big artist. So he's not like that would be into it, or even DDG it would be into it now because they, you know they can, they can grow with it, as opposed to like just another check on the pile of the other 20 checks. You know what I mean.

Speaker 1:

Yep, yep, that's true, it's a classic. Tell us a little bit about how you got started in content creation, right? I mean, I understand the music side, I understand the switch to film, but now what you're doing a lot of, and I'm very interested in from a brand perspective and even from a music perspective, is how did you really first start doing this, like, what were some of your first milestones that you conquered?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I had when we were doing the music stuff. I had this one homie that would always hear me complain about movies and and he presented me with like the biggest dub moment in my life where he was like, why don't you just make them? And I was like, yeah, I guess, I guess why not? And so we brought a camera and it was just started focusing on trying to create what we liked. Same same way with music, where you watch a film, and it was like, all right, how do we get that shot? How do we get this, that and the third, and so that turned into.

Speaker 2:

Well, now we got to pay for it. We got to, you know, like you got to pay for your hobby, and if you 100% nine to five, it's kind of really hard to transition and find that space for creativity. And so we just started selling commercials. So like local businesses, like hey, man, I'll come through, we'll do like a short film, we'll do a web series or something along those lines. And then so I'm from philly, so to me I like to study advertisement and I feel like rocky is the greatest long form advertisement of all time.

Speaker 1:

I would agree.

Speaker 2:

I feel like, for since the 70s it has driven more than a billion dollars in Philadelphia through hospitality, travel, tourism, all those different things, because people come here just to run up the steps, take pictures in front of the staff. We got an actual Joe Frazier's gym is a furniture store, like we don't even care about the real hero.

Speaker 1:

This guy didn't even this guy didn't even exist and he has a massive trophy that I have been to numerous times to take my picture in front of.

Speaker 2:

Rocky one. He don't even want to fight Like it's a, this is a, but what it? What it showed was it sold the idea of Philly grit, philly toughness, and so people wanted to experience that. And so my takeaway was yo, if you can create a character that people can learn to love, then by default you'll learn to love the things that they're into. And so those are the branding opportunities.

Speaker 2:

And so we really focused on because I did a lot of theater work and like sketch and all those different things, and so I was I would be the only person inside the theater. That was actually like roping in some fake brand just to see how people reacted to it. And so we got our first solid opportunity with a vintage store in Philly where I was like, hey, tell me every week what you want people to focus on. And I'm going to shoot an episode where I play the store owner and my homie is like that one customer that never leaves, and the funniness of it is us trying to figure out how to sell the item, but all we're doing is putting the item in your face for like three to five minutes through all these different scenarios, and it was like inspired by Atlanta. So if you think about like that slow sort of pace Atlanta feel, with the quirky jokes and whatnot, and then I watch, people start to come to the store because of the show. And then somebody came in with a screenshot of an episode and was like yo, do you have this sweater in the back? And I was like that's interesting. Like he saw something else in the shot screenshot of the show, roll all the way to the store and then wanted to see if we had it. I was like yo, I think we got something here. And then next thing, you know, like people started they wanted to be in the show because the store was a part of a apartment complex. So, like people that lived in the complex, they would cameo somebody, let us shoot in their apartment. It was like because he looked like Action Bronson. So we was like yo, we're going to do a whole episode, we're going to score with nothing but Action Bronson music just because you look like him. He was like I'm with it. And it just kept growing and growing to the point where I was like yo, people are coming to this part of the city that they normally wouldn't because of this silly show. So let's see how big. We can go with concepts like this. And so I ended up joining an ad agency in Austin for a bit during the pandemic, and that didn't work out.

Speaker 2:

But then the big next milestone was a friend of mine started a tech company called Charger Health. She got like one hundred thousand in seed money and so I don't know anything about any of this stuff. And she's like, hey, can you? I've always liked your work Can you do our curriculum? Because on one side, we feel like it'll make the techs want to pay attention more, but on the flip side, we think more people will want to be a part of this conversation, because now they feel like it's actually for them versus like oh no offense old white guys talking about things in like a really boring way, and so it only feels like it's for a certain group of people. And that was sort of like my light bulb moment of well, how many things can I do this for?

Speaker 2:

And then you start to learn that, like man, there's a lot of money flowing in tech. Not only that, there's a lot of people getting this money that don't know how to talk about what they do on a on a like a mainstream, like digestible, uh and entertaining level, and so this ends up becoming like a beachhead for me. Slowly but surely, somebody comes around for we funder. They're like hey, I'm not, I don't want to tell you what to do, but you should probably talk about we funder. And so I talked about them and, maybe like four videos in, somebody gave one to the vice president and he dropped it into the company slack and the ceo was like we should hire that guy.

Speaker 2:

And then, like two weeks later, I was at the company first six figure, first time getting equity in a company, and I'm like all right, art to equity man. Like ideas are currency. You just have to apply your creativity to something tangible so you can properly understand the return on investment. And if you can explain that ROI, it makes sense for somebody else to be like all right, here's a check. And so since then it makes sense for somebody else to be like all right, here's a check. And so since then it's just been how many times can we create opportunities like this?

Speaker 2:

So, even with the factory lab making that happen, spending 400 bucks on a commercial turns into hey, we're going to pay you for two days. Hey, we're going to cover your trip, we're going to cover your flight, we're going to cover the hotel. Hey, we're going to give you money to shoot more content. And now we're having conversations about like well, what does it mean to kind of do this whole time for you? That's at this point I feel like I have a really good handle on targeting something that has like really good bones that I can amplify and then have that flip into like a, you know, like a thousand X. I think that I did the math on factory lab. It might be like an 800 X return If you think about everything that we've pulled in since then to shoot that $400 video and the one before that for free. So that's like the goal right now. How high can we go? Can I get a Zuckerberg one day? Why not? Like it's just a matter of is six degrees of separation.

Speaker 2:

You talk about the right person that knows the right person that knows him. It works its way over. That's the game right now. That's why I'm even interested with Factory Lab, because Omar is so connected, working with Yeezy, making Adidas a billion dollars, being inside a complex town and him just pointing at folks like that's the president of complex. Yeah, those are, those are head CEOs over at Adidas. Yo, that's such and such, that's such and such. They all know him, but he doesn't have a vehicle that can talk about them in a way where it almost Trojan horse makes them have to, like, throw that to their audience Now, which then amplifies this even more. And so that's what I'm constantly working on and seeing like, how, who can I get next? That gets us the next thing.

Speaker 4:

So you consider yourself an advertising agency?

Speaker 3:

I would say that A combination of advertising and journalism. Wow, advertising and journalism. So my question to you is how difficult is it for you to take an artist and get them into a space that he needs to be or she right, she needs to be uh, to kind of have a foundation for them to kind of live off of their art?

Speaker 2:

I think. I think you have to be okay with compromise. So it's a little bit difficult at times, not saying you have to lose all integrity, but you have to find the balance between what it is that you want and what it is that the people that have the money want, and there's always going to be lack of common ground, but there's always going to be some common ground and you don't have to do it with everybody. You just have to have the patience to find those people that understand you enough that will allow you to do your thing enough, and it doesn't hurt you or hurt them, hurt their bottom line, and so I think, unfortunately, a lot of folks catch a little plow and then they turn that into a privilege and that privilege then turns into an ego and then that ego actually stops their blessings.

Speaker 2:

I don't think it's hard for anybody, because everybody has an audience and larger companies are constantly looking for people that have audiences, like if you already done the work, we don't mind investing in you. It's like a larger company buying a smaller company. Why will we build a whole division to do that when you're already doing it at a high scale? We'll just give you the money and say, put our name on it too. Same thing with artistry. And if you're not taking that time out to become to be brand friendly, like I found out that like the NLE situation was great for him because a lot of people looked at his situation and was like I don't know, do we want to associate with that? You're judging him because of the music and because of the audience and what they look like, and so on and so forth, and so you don't know if that's a good bet or not. But then here comes Factory Lab like yo, we'll do it with you. That created a pilot that showed that he was like super brandable and now it's turning into even more opportunities.

Speaker 2:

So I would say on the artist side, it's like properly understanding your story and being okay with finding common ground, that comfortable medium, because there's tons of opportunities out there, and don't stay local. Like like, go outside, bro, like the real opportunity might be on the other side of the world. Be okay with being uncomfortable, because on the other side you're only uncomfortable because you don't know what's over there and it's turning into a fear and that fear is creating a paralysis. But everything you want is on the other side of fear and the moment you like, take that leap. Okay, we're finding common ground.

Speaker 2:

It's it's kind of off to the races, because I'm an artist man. I was like the most stuck-up artist you could find like, no, I'm not doing that, it's not cool. No, I'm not doing that because, yada yada, I was broke for a really long time because of that. But once I was able to find that way where I can be myself and give you what you need, things got a hell of a lot easier. You started to become like very brand safe. More importantly, you become a value add, because if you can help somebody make money and save money, you'll always have a job, Wouldn't you?

Speaker 1:

say, the best ever. Example of what you just said is Snoop Dogg. Oh yeah, I mean talk about a guy who has, I would say, probably, initially, probably made some compromises. Has, I would say, probably, initially, probably made some compromises, but that has paid off beyond belief. I mean, he is everywhere today and he is, I mean it's kind of a remarkable to me to think about this guy like how he is world renowned right now, but if we remember where he came from, the same people that love him today would have never listened to him 20 years ago.

Speaker 2:

Some and if some people could argue that between he, he could be one of the most famous artists like I, I feel like I'll put him like neck and neck with like a kanye as far as like globally renowned most famous hip-hop artists, just because of integration and and.

Speaker 1:

Not because of music, but because of everything he's done beyond music, including the Olympics.

Speaker 2:

I think they said he got like a half a mil a day or something like that for the Olympics. We just want your feed, don't do nothing else, just turn the camera on and stay us. That's crazy, but it's because he's created something that people want to be a part of. And now and now he's reached the point, he probably wasn't really compromised. Because you want to get into the door, you do a couple of things, a couple of favors that you may not be that crazy about, but it don't hurt you People remember those things. And then later on down the line you have such a brand cache that now you get to dictate the terms, you get to build your own world and teach people how to live in it. Like that's what Snoop is doing right now more than anybody I can think of, and he's having fun doing it.

Speaker 1:

He just sold like a smokeless grill or something like that, but to me it all comes back to putting him next to the person that he never would have been next to Martha Stewart. The two of them made no sense whatsoever together, except for everything that Martha Stewart went through and having to happen to just be sitting next to him at the Justin Bieber roast. It was a Justin Bieber wrote. The two of them happened to sit next to each other and the relationship began, it took them to a whole new stratosphere.

Speaker 2:

That's an uncomfortable position to be in for somebody normally, but it's an important position to be in because I have this term, the beautiful unknown right. Like I know, I have a minimum. I know what I'm not going to do. I know as far as like value wise, but as far as like the most I'll accept, I don't know. And so I don't put a price on it because I want to be surprised. I just want to position myself for that blessing and make sure that I can take full advantage of it when it comes, because you never know what's going to present itself. So by him walking into that situation, he just walked in with the utmost faith that this is going to be good. Did he know how good? Probably not he. Probably. There's no way in the world he could imagine that everything he has now was going to come from that relationship, and so he was just open to whatever it was that was going to come and walk into it, and that's the kind of faith that you need as an artist when walking into these opportunities. You don't have to understand what this means. Factory Lab.

Speaker 2:

I was super excited about that because I can't guess the order of effects on it. I don't know how far it goes, and that to me is extremely exciting because it can go to the moon. But even if it don't, it can go to the stars close enough, like there's there's still like a a ton of upside on that, and so you have to think like an investor in that, in that sense, and like you know, if I do this, what's the cause and effect? And then what's the series of cause and effects that happen on the, on the on the backside of that, and if everything kind of skews positive and there's like just consistent gain, go for it. But people won't allow themselves to see past the current moment and like what the perception is of this moment, and so I'm not going to do it, because people might look at me a certain way and then they kill this and the third off and it's like, well, you, you're cutting yourself at the knees, you're stopping the train before it even starts.

Speaker 1:

And this was the reason that we met a couple of weeks ago or maybe a month ago, I don't know what it was now that I was immediately attracted to what you were saying, Because even the podcast we do today, right Unglossy is about brand and culture. It doesn't make any sense the way it was launched, in that it was originally launched as part of Merit Creative. Merit Creative should not normally have a rapper, a music guy and a brand guy doing a podcast for a company that traditionally did real estate. But it's my belief and I believe your belief too, but I'd love to hear more about it is that brands got to think differently. It almost is full circle for us. It brings us back to our conversation we had with Mags Miller a while ago in that the future of brand to me is.

Speaker 1:

It's about storytelling and it's about entertainment, and it's about not overly selling something but selling the benefits of it, selling the value of it and selling the lifestyle of it, and I think that's ultimately what you're trying to portray in the work that you're doing. That it's not about just here's a shoe, buy this shoe.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, it's about creating a lifestyle. Like if you were to take a snapshot of the room you're in right now, like look at all the opportunities. It's a microphone, it's a shirt you're wearing, there's earbuds, there's books, there's signs, there's HVAC. Like, all of this is an opportunity to kind of tell a story and combine those two, those different things, to the best of your abilities. And so if you're not going outside and looking at things that you're not familiar with, then how can you find correlations? And I'm pretty sure it makes you the same thing with battle rap. Like, if you're not introducing yourself to like a ton of information, how can you find cross lines? Where now I can you know, I was thinking about coming into this like, like, what's my favorite battle rap line? And I think, as of recently I don't remember how he completely worded it, but I think his murder move saying to A-Verd, this vegan must have made a mistake. And I was like this is beautiful because he figured out a series of words that sound like two things at one time, that mean literally two different things this vegan that made a mistake, battling me, and this vegan that made him, made him a steak and I was like that's freaking beautiful man.

Speaker 2:

But if you aren't, if you aren't opening yourself up to as much as possible, how do you even find the opportunity to meld things together like that? And so the same thing with brands. Every, every audience represents a culture and a series of variables that is unique to them. And if you aren't understanding them, how are you actually telling a story that resonates with them? And if you aren't understanding them, how are you actually telling a story that resonates with them? Like the story for the older grandma from Panama isn't the same as the young Jewish kid from the Bronx that just happens to be. You know, mixing in whatever they're mixed in. But you can find common threads and now put them in the same room and now we're watching the thing and we pull something else. That's very specific to me. But now I've also learned something about you. And if your storytelling isn't doing that, then you're actually isolating yourself and you're kind of like stuck in one group and there's no growth.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, I mean, I think that even going back to that line right, like he was able to create a pathway for your mind to hear one thing and translate it as something else, right, we call that like a double entendre or potentially a minimal right, because mistake made him a stake right. The m is also into a stake right, um, but also, you know, just kind of finding these different pathways for brands to go into a way where it's probably unconventional and something that they probably you hear it or you see it one way, but in the flip side it can go another way and we'll be right back. What's what's up? Y'all?

Speaker 3:

It's Mickey Fax, ceo of Pendulum Inc. The first ever online hip-hop academy. We're leveling up and introducing the new Pendulum with three free celebrity classes on December 17th, 18th and 19th. To kick things off, we got Flawless, the fire runner-up from Rhythm and Flow, the OG Sauce Money and Disaster, one of the coldest battle rappers in the game. Ready to school? You Don't sleep. Head to PendulumInccom right now to sign up and explore our online classes on lyricism, mental health and the culture of hip-hop. This ain't just a school, it's a way of life. Long live lyricism.

Speaker 1:

And now back to the show.

Speaker 3:

So I want to ask you something else right in terms of algorithm. Right, why does the algorithm limit so much from? You know, when I think about I don't know when you know, jeff and Tom joined Instagram, but I remember joining Instagram in 2012. Joined Instagram, but I remember joining Instagram in 2012. And I remember having a thousand, maybe 2000 followers and receiving the same amount of likes and visibility in 2012 that I'm seeing now. Like, if I have a 2000 followers, I was getting three, four hundred likes and the analytics were high. Now, on Instagram, now I have seventy six thousand followers and I'm still getting 200 to 400 likes and potentially shorter viewed videos. Is the algorithm? Is it is? Do you have to say specific wording for the algorithm? Is it that? Do we have to boost? Do we have to pay for traction? Is it a time thing, like how do you break the algorithm?

Speaker 2:

So as a two-parter there there's what is the algorithm and like what is it doing? And then how do you break it? And I think what the algorithm is is like truly like population control for the sake of monetization, Like if we can make everybody like the reason why it isn't hitting is because you aren't doing trendy things. There are, there are, there's always going to be like a sort of like a top 10, top 100 things that are like just going viral left and right because and they're going viral not because of one person is doing it, because millions of people are doing it, and so if it doesn't fall into that, then it's not deemed as valuable and so we're not going to boost it. And so if you do want to boost your originality, you got to pay for it.

Speaker 2:

You have to pay to be yourself. You have to pay to be organic. Isn't organic food always a lot more costly as well? There's like this, these, these various correlations between like being real and the sugar coating, uh, industrialized version of things that somehow seems to always be cheaper and always in front of you. And so, just like a food desert on the on the food side, we're on a, an, an, an or and not organic, but more a unique desert over on this side.

Speaker 2:

Every everything looks the same, right, music sounds the same same flow, same beats, same everything. No-transcript, you know where the algorithm doesn't affect you. A newsletter, a text thread, using something like SuperPhone that Ryan Leslie created, like how do you get the people that do care over to something that you can own and can control and now get that messaging to them and now? So instead of I have to pay you, uh, just to be seen, now you guys are paying me to uh, to just to follow, like so you can put like these small numbers on things and like run it up. You look at, like you know, ten10 a month isn't a lot of money. 1,000 people isn't a lot of people, but $10 a month, 1,000 people. Now you've got 10 grand, 120 a year. What can you reinvest that in? That now grows at 1,000 people to 10,000 people. Now we're talking about 100,000 a month, 1.2 a year.

Speaker 2:

People don't have the time and patience going back to the patience on the artist side to play that compound game. Same thing would happen with stocks and stuff like that. Do you have the patience to get one person at a time and run them over here, a palace is a series of bricks. But if you're stacking your bricks and somebody walks past and you only got six, you're like man fucking hand palace. Bro, watch when I'm done. It's like they can't see that. And because they can't see that, you may get, you may like, uh, you may stop, and now I'm just gonna go through the thing that they can see. That's falling into the algorithm. Versus if you took the time out, if you just spent that time being consistent, doing one thing consistently, one person, one person. Give them that, like you said, you have 76,000 people. Well, 76,000 people are paying you $10 a month over on that flip side, via that newsletter, via that, you know, like the well Ryan Leslie did with Superphone is like amazing man, like he, he's crowdsourcing to the folks, cause it's not just like paying him for the music directly through his platform, but it's also like, hey, man, I'm going to be in X city, I'm trying to shoot this video. Anybody got a car dealership. Just send that text out to the people. This many people come back like, yeah, use my car dealership. So now he's just cut the cost on that music video. Hey, we need wardrobe. Now he's just cut the cost on that video he did the same thing.

Speaker 2:

I think I think the first case study was um, he was like hey, I want to do this. Uh, this new year's eve party in a castle in vienna. If I did it, who would come? This many people said they'd come and he was like all right, well, here's the pre-order. If we do this amount, I'm making it happen he hits his number, he takes that money, rents the castle. It's like the, the. The opportunity is there. If you can just stack those advocates because a true follower should actually be a marketing and your sales team Are you incentivizing them accordingly to be able to do that for you, and are they also paying you at the same time? And so pull it off the algorithm, use the algorithm to the best of your abilities to rack those numbers up and then break that percentage down into the amount of people that you can swing over to something owned and then grow that, because then they'll go to run around and be like hey, if you really want Mickey facts, you got to check out his newsletter.

Speaker 1:

But I think that's true. I mean, that's a great point for all brands. So many brands think it's social only, but it's really social is just one trigger to drive somebody to the ultimate place which, as you said, is your own content. You can do all the trendy things to get them there. And then here's where I am, who I am the new stuff, the original stuff.

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so there's a company and not to cut anybody off who may have had a question, there's a company that I'm working with called Tapioca, where you get this card Right. This is the card right here. You get this card right, this is the card right here. And if you're a musician, you tap this card and your music is just like Apple Pay. You tap this card onto your phone and the music uploads into your phone immediately that you can stream it right, and basically you just kind of pay.

Speaker 1:

So I'm paying for that card. You're paying for the card right.

Speaker 3:

Right now they also classic have this. They have this analytic technology that can tell you how much money you should be making by collecting all of the data from all of your sites, from YouTube, facebook, instagram, da-da-da-da-da-da right. So I gave them all of my data. I gave them all of my data and it took them about an hour and they came back to me and they said yearly I should be making $778,000. What If I have a? It's literally saying. It's literally going with what Classic is saying If I have a dedicated, they're not fans.

Speaker 3:

You have to treat them like investors. They are investors in your brand that are dedicated and I would have to constantly put out content, right, but sell directly to them. Do not go to streaming, do not just stay on social media. You know, put out merch, do a show here and then, and these particular fans will pay a premium price as opposed to the streaming price that that I would get there or a feature from here. You know so. When they calculated it and they said that number, I was just like and you know I brung them also to my students there was a student who had 3,000 followers and they were like your number is $12,000. Another guy had 10,000 followers. He were like your number is twelve thousand dollars. Another guy had ten thousand followers. He's like your number is forty thousand and they, they did all of the analytics and broke it all. I want to see what my number is. Yeah, I mean, it's probably high, bro, it's probably I like it.

Speaker 2:

We've got, we've gotten so used to. Man. It's just like government intervention, anything else we're like. We feel as though like we can't do something unless somebody gives it to us, and that's the biggest trick of a lot of these platforms and just anything around the world has kind of played on us, where you can't move until I help you move, whereas though, no, you actually have more than enough. Like I'm a firm believer in if you think you can, you're right. If you think you can't, you're also right. Like whichever you know side, you kind of throw out into the universe. That's the energy that's going to come back, and so it's really hard for people to kind of bet on themselves long term. That's why I like folks. You know you invest in the stock, it drops 10%, you pull the money out, but then it's like bro, you were there for a week.

Speaker 4:

Give it five years, give it ten years. Yeah, it goes up everybody's mind.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, but just be mad at yourself for not betting and thinking long term. So the same thing with the careers. I put out a video. It only got this many views Ah, I'm out. No man, you gotta keep rocking and you gotta.

Speaker 2:

You have to continue putting forth something that makes people feel as though that, like I, really rock with this person because of something tangible. It's not even just the music. That's why it's important to tell your story and where you come from, because that amplifies the music even more. Your upbringing, what you're going through, that amplifies the music even more. Now you're starting.

Speaker 2:

Now people are like man, this dude is real and it's real not because of some like street stuff, but it's real because of like vulnerability. People are scared to be vulnerable and and like honorable and and just create something where, yes, somebody is going to make fun of it. So what? That's not your audience. They weren't going to buy anyway. Why are we worried about them? Worry about the people that are like man, I'm going to do that same thing, or I know somebody that's going through that same thing. I can relate to that. I'm actually. Now I'm going to support. Now it isn't even just buying. Now I'm supporting because I know my little bit can be the reason why you keep going and that actually makes me want to talk about it more, but then it's probably going to help me improve.

Speaker 2:

Some want to improve something in my life as well, and that's that that, that reciprocation, that like is missing where, like, everybody thinks everything has to be strictly entertainment. It doesn't. Man like you can find that balance between, um, entertainment and education, like they call it, uh, edutainment. And so, yeah, that's your number. But you know my joe button rant what is the screen? My most deaf rant. Or yassine bay like, like who? Who the hell said this is less than a fraction of a fraction of a penny, like. How do you break down a penny Like they're? And the fact that we can get these views, we've valued being seen more than being paid.

Speaker 3:

Yes, that's it right there. We value being seen more than being paid For the past six years. No exaggeration, I will refuse, and I have refused to post my Spotify numbers.

Speaker 4:

That is nobody's business At the end of the year they post their numbers. But they really got checks for like 600 bucks.

Speaker 3:

Yes, I refuse like, and then my whole timeline spotify spotify spotify spotify on december 1st. For what?

Speaker 1:

for views only because, because everybody else did it.

Speaker 4:

Yeah, that herd mentality yeah, for cloud chasing, because most people don't understand the formula of what those views break down to monetarily. So it looks good. It might look good but in reality, like my producers, I've met some producers and we did a record for this cat and it hit like a million streams a couple months ago or whatever he said the thing. I got a million streams and I was like cool, I was happy. But in reality I was like hey, ain't no bread, it's like 2,000 hours it looks good because I think you would still equate the old with the new.

Speaker 4:

A million streams means a million sales. It's like nah, it means nothing, but again, it looks nice, but in reality what are you running them into?

Speaker 2:

Like, well, like, what's your call to action? What's that other thing Like, whether it's a newsletter or it's a uh on demand t-shirt, where, like you, you know you ain't holding them in story and it's just it's. It's sold for 80. You pocketed you know however much the distributor pocketed that like uh, exclusive content. Like you come over here and pay five dollars and get behind the scene access to inside the studio and little things like that. Like if people could think outside of just that main thing.

Speaker 2:

Like that, million streams doesn't mean anything on its own right when it attaches to something and you start playing the 80-20 rule, like 10% carry over. There's 100,000 people going into something, then 100,000 turns into that $10. Isn't that a million? I'm not agreeing with math $100,000 is a million. Yeah, so look at that on 10% of that stream number. Just because you ran them into something affordable, that 10% is not a large number of people in the grand scheme. So even at that 5% to 10%, look at how much you could have flipped if you ran them into something that you owned on your end.

Speaker 2:

That now allows you to slowly but surely kind of buy that freedom back and start doing things a lot more independently where you can see even more money. So now a thousand streams turns into like even more things, because now you have the big brand side. If you're consistent, again a million streams. I want to give you a check just to do something with us. But that don't stop the other check that you're getting over here, that you own 100% of. It has to be the balance of the two, otherwise you're constantly at the mercy of what somebody else says you're worth.

Speaker 1:

But in essence, this has been the evolution of social media. Right, because social media was all about views. It was all about people feeling good, putting everything they had. And I think, as a society now we're getting smarter, because now content people are realizing what they're doing is of worth. Right, whereas before the platforms were grabbing everything. Right, it was the Facebook, the Instagram, the TikTok, whatever they were making all the money. And it brings you back to like what's the basic facts of advertising? Right, it's consistency and action, and we have to be consistent. Whether you're a musician, a content creator, a podcast or a brand, you can't stop. You got to be consistently putting out content, but when you're doing so, you got to have a reason for it, you got to have an action for it. You got to have a way to get somebody from point A to point B, which is where I think people are starting to rethink how social media is used, rethink how video is used, rethink how content is produced, and I think that's the future, that's the next wave of where we're heading.

Speaker 2:

That's a lot of what I was thinking about. Going into a lot of these companies as I learned more and more about the importance of bottom line and like this is our overhead and we only have this much to spend on this, but we need to make X, y and Z and these are our quarterly goals. It's like, well, how do I take that and rope it into the story? Because that's an action that I need the folks to take. So I can still talk about the brand, but I need to talk about it in a way where it activates various consumers on various levels. If we're talking about a record shop, look how many different conversations you can have. You can talk about running a record shop, you can talk about the history of music, you can talk about the making of vinyl. All these different things actually speak to a whole different audience but also have like a whole nother action on the flip side the idea of going to buy the vinyl. Maybe I wanted to start my own record shop, maybe I want to invest in your record shop, maybe I have an artist and I want to put them in your record shop, and so if you're not taking the time out to understand the different layers of what it is that you're trying to push, then, yeah, you are going to be limited to that one stream, but these are all opportunities to kind of like stack it up Like this the goal is to make your millions, the goal is to make your billions, but but that's not supposed to be one stream, it's supposed to be a series of them and as an artist, you have the ability to manufacture value in any of those spaces. Like you can just come up with an idea right now, shoot it and somebody will pay you for it.

Speaker 2:

Like that's. Like I don't think people really sit and think about. Like how crazy that is. We can come up with an idea right now, go shoot it. Somebody. Probably at some point, if we tap into the right number, we could probably make a million bucks on it. Like that's, that's unfathomable. The currency flip on that, just by attaching it to the right variables and it hitting the right time, right trend, right this, that and the third and the next thing. You know you're out of here Like Hawk to a girl. What does she have to talk about? That one concept went like this Now she got a podcast, she got this, she got that. I think if we take that for granted, we can be a lot more intentional about it and you actually create a lot more purposeful opportunities that work their way towards you.

Speaker 1:

So, as we talk about the evolution of social, the evolution of advertising, how does AI play a role in this? Because that, to me, is the current wave that's happening now, and I still think we're not even close to tapping into what the real value is, in the same way that people really didn't understand social at first.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think with AI. I think AI is a beautiful thing if you view it as such. I look at AI the the recession. There's like one group of people that are scared of recessions and then there's another group of people that are like I'm waiting for a recession, I'm about to be up every, I'm buying everything low, and so ai is sort of like that same thing, where on one side, it's like, oh man, it's gonna take my job, it's like. Or you can view it as it's gonna make you super at your job. Like for every job loss. You can create it as it's going to make you super at your job. Like for every job loss, you can create one with AI.

Speaker 2:

Ai is going to be the reason why we have a billion dollar company with less than 10 employees. Yep, yep, because all you need is an idea, uh, uh, an understanding of what it is that you're selling, uh, an understanding of your audience, and you just let the agents run you. You and your a hundred person team wasn be able to talk to that many people. Anyway, I came across a video where they were talking about Salesforce was talking about. I can't remember which large-scale fashion house was utilizing them in their call center, but it turned their customer success team into a sales team because generative AI was on the call, like listening to them as they were troubleshooting issues and then able to tell them like hey, pitch them this, they might actually need this. So people are coming in with a problem and leaving purchasing something because of the power of this tool listening on the conversation and offering what you need. And so I feel like if you aren't utilizing ai, you are actually pricing yourself out. You.

Speaker 2:

Ai is the reason why, yo I, I get so many scripts done in a week just because I'm like, hey, this is the brand, this, I give it a full profile. I need, I need something. I need you to explain it to me, cause I may not 100% get it. I need you to explain it to me. I need you to tell me the audience is for, and I need you to do it in a layman's way so that anybody can understand it. And I take that information and I'll all, right now, give me the key selling points. Then I take that information and I write a script and I'm just literally like this is information.

Speaker 4:

Do you let chat GBT write the script?

Speaker 2:

I write the script, I just let it give me bullet points, because it doesn't know how to be like uber creative. It knows how to be organizational. So like, whether you're using chat, gbt, perplexity, claude, it doesn't even matter, let it set you up. So it was like all right, that's the selling point. How do I say the selling point in an interesting way? Let me add a joke. Selling point interesting way? Let me add a joke. And it's literally like that. And next thing, you know, I'm like breezing through. And then on the editing side, it's like I can take the audio, throw it into Adobe Enhancer. Two minutes later she says Chris, like there's a ton of things where it's like, yeah, on one side it's like all right, now I don't have to pay somebody for that. But that person that feels like that they lost their job how about you use that to enhance your job? The engineer that I probably would have sent this money to initially, how about you use this tool? And now you've gone from mixing down two artists this week to 10, 20, 30 artists this week, and now you can actually lower your prices and play the volume game because of how much is running in.

Speaker 2:

There's so many different ways to look at it. I just I view it as an amplification of whatever your dreams are. You just have to find the right tools, figure out the right way to position it for yourself and go out there and earn some money, because there's a billion people in the world, so it is. And, like we just said that number, you only need a hundred thousand to start Like. So why not incorporate a tool that can get you to that quicker?

Speaker 2:

So now, if you can make that million dollars quicker, what can you invest in next? And do the same thing, and do the same thing, and do the same thing. I think, instead of it like making everything disproportionate, I think it is one of those main things that actually give us a fighting chance. Like there's no reason to complain anymore about such and such, won't give me an opportunity, I can't afford this, that and the third to make it happen, no, like there's nothing you shouldn't be able to know, there's nothing you shouldn't be able to do, and at this point, if you ain't got it, it's because you don't want it.

Speaker 1:

That's a great point. I look at it as an accelerator. It's the same way you said that it gets us rolling and at a faster volume. All right, we're running a little bit out of time, but I want to mention this. There's a rumor out there that you and I might be teaming up on a podcast. What that's the rumor, I'm not going to confirm it or deny it. Did you start?

Speaker 4:

this rumor.

Speaker 1:

I didn't start this rumor. This is a widespread rumor, mickey Fax and I think this podcast has everything to do with what we've been just talking about. It's understanding brands and it's using the right tools to come back and tell a great story about a brand, and I'm very excited about this class. What are your thoughts?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'm excited about it too, especially with the folks that we're going to be working with. I've always enjoyed helping people try to figure it out in the beginning. Everybody wants to run to the wells because, of course, you operate with them and that's the reason why you'll blow up, because they're big and you're standing next to them. But I feel like there's even an even bigger return if you can help somebody become that, and so the the difference maker for that is storytelling. Like, if you can't outspend somebody, you just gotta out storytelling. You gotta out weird them, you gotta out, you know, communicate them. You gotta out uh friendly them, like something where it just allows you to uh catch an organic wildfire, and so I I feel like our little tool. Uh, that's what I'm calling the podcast.

Speaker 2:

It isn't just like an entertainment it's not a regular thing, yeah yeah, our little tool will hopefully be the reason why other folks feel as though they can tell their story and and do it confidently, so that way they can get even more folks to buy in.

Speaker 1:

I like it Coming very soon. Folks Coming very soon that's crazy, Are you?

Speaker 3:

ready, mickey, I'm always ready. Man, Y'all need a theme song. What's up, man?

Speaker 1:

We do need a theme song, and, don't know it, maybe that too, but don't think I'm not coming to you first. That works, let's do it All right, fellas. This has been very interesting.

Speaker 4:

Very very.

Speaker 1:

It's a classic. Before we let you go, tell the people everywhere where they can find you.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, everywhere IG, twitter there's Classic LLC, cl, ssc LLC. Linkedin. William Classic Thomas LLC. Linkedin William Classic Thomas. And then I have a website right now tioutsiderbeehivecom is the newsletter that I do, where right now I'm housing all of my content and like dropping insights around. You know, like the process of what I created. Eventually it's going to roll over into a new site that's not on Beehive but, as of right now, that's where you can check me out. Thank you, classic, thank y'all.

Speaker 1:

Eventually it's going to roll over into a new site that's not on Beehive, but, as of right now, that's where you can check me out at. Thank you Classic. Thank y'all. All right, folks, that's our show. Tune in to Unglossy, the coding brand and culture, on Apple Podcasts, spotify or YouTube, and follow us on Instagram at unglossypod to join the conversation. Until next time.

Speaker 4:

I'm Tom Frank. I'm Jeffrey Sledge.

Speaker 1:

Smicky, that was good.

People on this episode

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Jeffrey Sledge

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Mickey Factz

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Tom Frank

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