What you’ll hear in this episode:

• What a “causal factor of purchase” is, and why it is essential to zero-waste marketing
• How Don Donovan combined data and behavioral analysis to revolutionize marketing strategy
• Why passion is essential to an entrepreneur’s success

Don Donovan is an inventor, data junkie, and founder of Baker Street Solutions as well as the author of the trademarked program The Right to Succeed, a marketing approach that guarantees results. His passion for his work is evident from the moment he starts speaking about his work, driving the conversation and enthusiastically sharing his story. Donovan’s journey began at Procter & Gamble in brand, category, and general management after earning an undergraduate degree in mathematics and a graduate degree in decision sciences. He jokes that his 20 years at Procter & Gamble gave him a “PhD in marketing,” which he applied to his own venture when he left the company to found Baker Street in 2002. 

Named after the location of Sherlock Holmes’ office, Baker Street Solutions functions similarly to Sherlock Holmes’ operation, just in the world of marketing instead of crime. When a crime couldn’t be solved by the officials, they would turn to Sherlock, and in the same way companies who can’t identify their target consumer and brand identity hire Baker Street. 

But the similarities don’t end there. Donovan and his team at Baker Street also took an Holmes-esque investigative approach to crafting marketing strategies by looking at causal factors of purchase, or in other words, why people buy (or don’t buy) a product. 

By conducting formal interviews and even going into stores as an anonymous shopper, Donovan and his team would learn straight from the consumers’ mouths why they were drawn to certain products and what their reasoning was behind their purchases. After identifying these causal factors of purchase, Donovan would qualitatively test the findings and ultimately craft marketing content and strategy that reflected these data-backed results. 

Donovan jokes that he was an “overnight success after 35 years,” putting in the hard work behind the scenes until ultimately developing his trademarked The Right to Succeed Technique, which applies data analytics to consumer insights. 

His method centers around a “zero waste marketing and media” model, in which he prioritizes identifying the prime consumer for a product and then determining how to make them aware of your product and how to make your product most accessible to those people. If you’re advertising to people who aren’t interested in or can’t access your product, you’re wasting your money. 

Don employed Google’s API program early on in its development, which is able to access the Google searches of users while retaining their anonymity. The process begins by locating users who were searching for specific products, and then tracking what else they were searching for to further correlate behaviors with each user. Once these correlations are identified, that data would be synthesized into a cohesive representation of a user identity, and the Baker Street team was able to define “behavioral clusters” and target the users that fit the profile of the products they were tasked to market. Donovan gives examples of how he applied this method to great success, increasing some company’s profits by 60% in a matter of months. 

Donovan emphasizes that his process always kept the main goal in mind, which was to sell more product. Whether or not a website gained traffic or didn’t, for example, meant nothing to the Baker Street team if they weren’t seeing results in profits. 

He explains that the behavioral trends and the correlations between them as evidenced by an individual’s search history were so accurate in predicting buying patterns and locating ideal clients that he was able to predict within 5% how successful his marketing plans would be. The data element that backed his insights into consumer behavior is a very powerful tool and Donovan’s strategy was about using data to hit the right person with the right message at the right time. 

As far as founding his own company, Donovan admits that he was nervous at the start of his journey. He had a lot to lose leaving Proctor and Gamble, but he was so passionate about his idea for Baker Street Solutions that he couldn’t do anything but pursue his passion – and it’s clear that passion paid off. 

Donovan is a dynamic storyteller and you won’t want to miss this episode of “Masters and Founders.” Check out the rest of Season 1, and be sure to share it with an entrepreneurial friend!

Host: Dan Dillard

Guest: Don Donovan

Transcript:

this is a founding media podcast if welcome to another episode of masters and founders this week we’re sitting down with branding and marketing master don Donovan don is an inventor data junkie and author of the right to succeed in marking approach guarantee to the liver with twenty years of client experience at Procter and gamble in brand category and general management in fifteen years of marketing consulting is founder and CEO of Baker Street solutions don is bigger streets discovery don’s vision for how to consumer behavior is translated into predictive modeling is the basis for his extra ordinary career I’ll let him tell you more about how he maneuvers throughout his career good morning this is damned little Masterson founders I’m so excited to  bring a special guest on this morning don Donovan with Baker Street thank you so much for being with us thank you have a nice round number cited here I’m really excited about the story I’ve been working with on a few projects over the last month or so we’re just excited to hear the story of where don started as well as the interesting stuff that he’s doing behind the scenes so let’s get right into this don’t tell us tell us your history where did you start yes a little bit about myself again don Donovan essentially my real name I go to the airport people looking like driver’s license a single your real name yes the don Donovan show so I started beaker street in two thousand and two and it’s called big speakers two two one B. Baker Street is the address of Sherlock Holmes  and I was working for Procter gamble at the time so and we’re providing them for twenty years you know you may not notice for PNG is the inventor of the brand management system okay and you always sort of the bottom the only promotion with it so we started as a brain cyst on him in the early eighties after twenty years at the very end I want my title was vice president of marketing innovation and I was sent out to San Francisco so here I am in San Francisco nineteen ninety nine in the middle of the dot com boom well then and I went out there to help run a company called reflect dot com it was custom beauty and we had invented PNG these decision tree analysis we women would go online and they would answer a series of questions and after getting into those questions we would create a formula cart the actual chemistry mmhm right for the customers beauty products in skin care hair care body washes color cosmetics and perfumes one and 

my name’s on to this pass yes so we were working on that business and that was right in two thousand as you probably remember had a lot of things happening in one of those about dot com bust moves dot com companies that might have been from the summit should be good going to succeed in the beginning part of the victim of all the things that happened during dot coms you know we’ve we’ve survived a long time because we had really great talented people I would meet you know about half the people were sent from the mothership can help would be if you get this message and the other half running from the outside so it was a great combination of individuals and we did survive but the DMV and you took it all back inside the took all of our parents and then there’s the very successful especially the color cosmetics mix all kinds of things that went globally on the P. and G. brands so those are the most exciting part of my life but I was kind of chilly was there twenty years of P. and G. I skipped over in about five seconds but I’m not going to bore you I’m gonna tell you what happened when I sort of big one time before we jump into Baker Street  your background education was like what what what what made me who I am so undergraduate degrees in the mathematical sciences okay and then a graduate degree in decision sciences and a combination of that and working in if you went to Procter gamble you know that’s where you get your PhD in marketing right they’re not really graduate degree but that’s what it feels like you know one of us I heard you appointed so that at all okay so that’s a great story Deanna hopefully not bore the audience with this too much in nineteen ninety six I was appointed research bell the Procter gamble company the only person for marketing to ever win that award and to get that word you have to do something for the company right so we invented the methodology was called the fine fragrance methodology to create perfumes that would beat the competition so they would actually sell more

so in nineteen ninety six we sold a hundred million dollars more in one year while in the research fellow human words Virginia ward and I love peer Jeter come with any extra money right in doing this right now but I mean I love walk across that stage and got my appointment it’s it’s still frame that’s the one thing I have in my office I don’t have anything else from BMG there but it says on October seventeenth nineteen ninety six on dominoes appointed research all the Procter gamble company well as you know the name of the show’s Masterson founders look what what I consider masters anyone spent over ten thousand hours or more in the craft of the law sounds like you’ve spent that he plus doing research in mathematics and formulas and gathering data the underlying  secret sauce of help people purchase things yeah that’s exactly right we look at what the recall the causal factors of purchase right why people buy and why they don’t he all began back in two thousand to the end when I got my very first assignment outside the company side of the jeep I sold one of my friends on my cable bill it was a guy Clorox we won’t mention any names okay but I was asked how would they sell more valley ranch dress wait that was using Clorox yeah it was one of the most important food branch that the Clorox corporation makes interesting the other day all kinds divisions within the middle creek all kinds of great products in the  the western musical the BG west hello so but I went to this project only I said how would you solve this if you had to start all over he said I don this company and there’s no there’s nobody there would you the CEO and you’re struggling to sell Morgan valley ranch dressing what would you do and what I did was I only did the graphic interviews at the moment of truth where people use products and where they buy so we did interviews in stores where people are looking at the grocery store shelves and decide we’re celebrating by in in the house we’re actually eating salads and salad dressing and other things and we video that in one of the videos was a woman in Oklahoma with five children all under the ages of twelve and she took out the standard if you reckon some for you and some for you and some for you in some for you and some for you and that’s for your vegetables so he had all these raw vegetables M. window

Clorox people saw this they don’t want we are because right after the initial video where a woman said you know you know he reaches the second catch while Vassar what corporations wants to build something they don’t understand what the build until the audience to listen sometimes I don’t really agree with that if you don’t hold enough designation have lots of great copywriters might tell them can you just use the consumer’s language you can just find a way to say this in the way consumers actually talk because the benefits actually are what those people are buying the product for we also do what we call anonymous shop we go into the grocery stores we stand there we say you know an option at the time was an old man now with  but I was a young man and work even better I was the end of the aisle and I want to you know my wife sent me out here to you know get a Saunders describes the people over I got a chance three one shot which I think you would believe how helpful people well people said well gosh I love this woman and this was like a wall wires that you’re getting in the water listen you can they go listen you got to have a safe one right but you can also have a very adventurous one the results  go for like the ginger sesame one that’s your adventurous when and then get a really safe one and she goes and then the woman standing out you’ll always get a blue cheese and what is that she was met with cheese fancy so I want to change the audience saw you now own Baker Street you started with connection gamble and math and the the studies and all extra but then he started Baker Street and the story about the server comes with sure so I just love corridor of stories and you know when he ever gets asked you know how we did this person come from in this individual just gotten off the train and said the person just got off from me and the person who they wanted to go back and write legal school board

subdivision right then they would name the observation you see the ticket stubs sticking out of their pocket or they have a certain kind of clothes on or maybe it’ll turn on their shoes or something yeah the home sold it and then they would he would say he would say that many would explain how to do that and one of the pre poll we say well now you tell me your number your press release and India and that’s actually my story my story is when we’re when we’re doing all this work and we’re talking to consumers were doing it’s hard work you know we don’t do seventy five one on ones all over the country and forcible to proof in the store here in people’s houses it’s a lot of worship them synthesizable but in the end we we tell the client the answer and the girl was super bursting but we knew all that well yeah but you were doing anything with it yeah your vision your messaging like this unify we identify the causal factors of purchase what people buy and don’t pike and then we quantitatively test those ideas we make a whole bunch of conceptual ideas we test them and find out which one has the highest interest most purchase intention then when we make those ads we we sell more right does that sound simple but that’s really the story of Sherlock Holmes story homes as the the home office loses the naval treaty or install it mmhm Sherlock Holmes is asked to come in which company are canceled well right now and that’s who we are so what I wanna know and you’ve talked about your growth in your your record your last couple years you companies just blowing off he does a little bit about one how fast is coming and then we are wondering too the three wives yeah that’s a that’s a great question listen who said that the report and we match it but it’s the absolute truth I’m an overnight success after thirty five years hello this fabric I’ve been working a long time to build this thing up but in the last six quarters we’re growing at more than twenty five percent a quarter the business is simply taken off the list because we have it would you would call the secret sauce the secret sauce is the idea of why people buying dope quantitative groups data analytics applied to sell more product right we tell clients were only here to help you sell more units long the loss I came in and told you I can get you more top line revenue in the first thing I said is raise your price as well I didn’t really help your business right I have to help your business by increasing uniform velocity and proving that we can do it so I know there’s several pieces to someone I want to get to them one of the things though sounds like you’ve been able to after thirty five years connect the dots really clean the slate cleanly and seamlessly up to where you’re at now there’s a part of the super shoppers and the reason from what what I’ve learned is you’re helping companies tell their story better by talking to clients and so but that’s that’s one thing that’s cold no graphics

yeah we call it the right to succeed and if your audience would like to hear how I thought of that idea it’s another interesting story sure in nineteen ninety two I was transferred to London in the office was in agony was the old offices of Richardson Vicks and our CEO and his team flying here to every place in the country from Cincinnati and so this time it came to London and they review all the businesses in that location so all the beauty care businesses have to do a review and then they give you about thirty five minutes and we had just purchased a company called your cost cosmetics and we had two fragrances a lower abuse out of range and if you go box records and they were about to launch something called the Nazi which is just Venice in a tally okay the Mets and they had set up the room it was the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen in this competition the bottles the backgrounds of posters even down to the minute details of what would be on the counter when you went into a department store in our CEO’s name Edwin arts and arts he was known as the prince of darkness in pulled her into a leisure suite six book called soap opera and he he looked at them set out go ahead Sir resenting and they did and he stopped them less than two minutes into the presentation about minutes and he said wait a minute you’re telling me how beautiful this looks for why is it going to work what right do you have to succeed M. they were dumbfounded listen I didn’t have to say that at first was here I am just a young transfer guy and he’s got to the acquisition people they have to answer the question and the president he very bravely taps the side of his nose and he says it’s my house

yeah this is the right succeed miners I can choose a perfume for women will love wow and it also says but it’s my money it was the end of the meeting because your Intel you prove to me with data that you’re going to sell more product we’re not launching this product so they go around the room he said well then don Donovan usually transferred over here from PNG wasn’t your brand manager on zest bar soaps and he’ll fall that writer yeah he said don’t come data who’s the David this is he looks at me because I want to be that I was going to work and I want you to build the entire plan I’m sure tell me how the category is going to be solved by punching him and I did do that day so all right and then when I left P. and G. I said I’m gonna call this technique the right to succeed hello one of the things why this fascinates me so much is a lot of start ups listen to the shows are building their companies and one of the things that real time is one of the biggest areas of failure is marketing branding they they you’ve got the most people have a genius idea create a product and they don’t know how to read a message to the prospect of clients and so learning that you’ve got the the science behind it intrigues me because I’ve ever met company after company media company and we do commercial carrier marketing branding it raining the real estate was  got like others always pretty things that will develop for you in the gut tells us there’s a lot about what you do it’s and I’ve heard you say this turned zero waste marketing yep he talked to me about that I would actually say that what we’re talking about really is the big problem worse people said fifty percent of my advertising is waste correct yep and so I would make a small change called zero waste media okay because what you have to do is there’s two things you have to do if you’re doing a start up business listen to tell yourself there’s two things I got to remember and they’re not very hard to remember I don’t have distribution

I have no get away to get my product to the customer right the second is awareness you have to have distribution and awareness now there’s much more to it right because windows has to be among the right people it has to be the prime prospect the person who actually want to buy the product so we have to think about who that might be right we have to prove that this person would have a higher propensity to buy them this other person so here’s your second two words to remember probability and magnitude is the probability that the greatest among this set of people to buy my product it is the magnitude of my unit volume sales highest among that group so the probability and magnitude I wouldn’t approach any business without this type of discipline I would say I’ve got to have the system so the problem is she’s always existed is how do you get awareness along this prime prospect audience and the tool being so blunt I mean think about a blunt tool if you have something very specific you want cell let’s pretend we were back in the early eighties and this was a bottled water bottled water we used to joke never gonna buy bottled water correct but that audience at the time was quite small because people were just getting the water out of their chapter had to figure out what we can reduce the assault awareness and distribution now still when you advertise any product if you then you don’t make it water you make it vodka instead there’s only so many vodka drinkers right but I don’t know if you provide the other people there are great but good but there’s only so many calls from people don’t like they never even tried you have to find vodka drinkers otherwise when you advertise on television you were never turns into a whole bunch of people who don’t get bought every dollar of that media is reached yes and every dollar will reveal to the same kind of money is wasted if you put up a Billboard everybody runs by no because only some of the world drink book shop and purchase of coal yeah that’s too much of a shotgun approach will be governed in Indiana not show what it is is we said how would you fix that we fix it but actually getting a program that looks at Google’s API  and there are two billion searches a day we are not are you in search terms we are literally looking at the API and all the searches that every person at every device has done for the day and then we look at bliss is use the bucket example anybody who tied fought during the vodka brand and then we look at every other search that that same device that’s a person also did and I would build a correlation

we call that a behavioral cluster it’s an intent based media program now we are looking at the past year right but after we look at one day that we look back two years and will find how that develops because there’s very few people F. dissident Tito’s vodka really famous down here in Austin the whole world  the world every day other people’s books and doing the job for sure I mean this is exhausting right but one time they have no distribution no words were but if you tried to launch Tito’s in someplace where there’s really very little weirdness you’re gonna need a media program to talk to people who drink vodka right so if you want to make sure that that goes to the right person you do this Google API that can create what’s called a behavioral cluster and we’re going down we’re looking at the past but now we we make it we send it only to people who in days to post once so if today’s T. and yesterday it’s T. minus one tomorrow’s T. plus one yes so time plus one or ten plus twenty the anytime in the future any doctor anyone who does any action that we have developed into our behavior cluster they get an ad for a lot and only those people and explain to me the difference between that I know a lot of media people talk about Google adwords you know the Democrat and this sounds like a completely different than what nine members of Congress are doing up there it is completely different if you if you talk about people talk about this your SEM or any kind of lookalike audiences any of that that’s not what we’re doing we are literally looking at the intentions that people right and we know that because the typed these words into the Google API in our computer program looks at it and says look at those actions again what other actions do they do yeah so what we we we marry them up we create a correlation and then afterwards we we them it’s called audience first right what we’re looking at is and it’s only going to go to that person right here audience first she takes an action and type something in the behavioral closer doesn’t even have to be vodka because of the magnitude of probability I see you see we know she’s a water drinker because she dared reaction so we nobody drinkers do gotten so soon as she does that audience first we sent it out to them I am I know that nobody right now is doing this and what other people going to catch up to me yes are the people going to think of this yes in order to try to build it yes what am I afraid I mean I’m I’m doing this interview because I’m afraid someone’s going to come out and do this better than me but you can’t you have to use intellectual honesty and say other people can do this maybe even better but you know what we’re first we’re growing fast there and we’re proving to our clients we will sell more product three zero waste zero waste along that end back to the thirty five years experience

I also am familiar with this people in the eyes of some something everybody can get the relationship if you’ve you’ve got special with Google to be able to access this you know we probably should reveal too much about that but yes stamp that’s right all that worked with me before and we’ve worked together for years have the relationships in our relationships can it there I just wanted to point out this is something that it’s not anybody can just go and do some some business thirty five years of hard overnight success that you’ve been able to at the end of the day business is relationships and assemblies professorships so you’re you’re you’re doing the study suggesting analytics algorithms to go do the searches and then find the unique message to to  help clients understand clients and companies understand what they’ve got and the Seoul incredibly important for him to succeed as I mentioned you know one of these I find all the time because people just don’t spend enough time in that compartment we just kind of feel like bill they will come and that’s not the case all the time you get the uniforms it’ll happen but that’s not the case on top do you have any stories you can omit examples of you you’re comfortable sharing them of some successes that it’ll be okay I think I think I should tell you one story for sure and you tell me what do you think that’s the best one perhaps the story of Aston Martin and what’s that matter to people who buy highland vehicle I loved it because I’ve heard this story before love your kids on the story share what you found out how you can imagine holding let’s begin with some background again if I don’t think like I think or if you don’t have the training I have I’m not sure you would do it but maybe you worked so again using intellectual honesty there’s lots of people smart the truth is that because I did this for thirty five years of  I’m with those a lot you know the old guy the Bible into nine or sixty nine years it would be in marketing yeah I’ve seen everything together so Aston Martin every year in the United States there are more than fifteen million cars new cars used cars new cars sold on dealer lots fifteen million well there’s a whole bunch more wrestled you know to car companies like hertz right but retail I’m talking retail so more than fifteen million the number of hardline cars cars that cost two hundred thousand dollars plus it’s only fifteen thousand oh well it’s a tiny copper right and so if you are going to be Aston Martin and compete in that category with definitely Lamborghini the highest level of vehicles that can be purchased right Charlie

yeah you’re gonna need a class act Middle East right so first yeah we did that the graphic research we talked to twenty five people who had purchased one of these very expensive cars and we did it at the graphically and get them to talk about the car and with one of those people talk about the car that individual said you know as a member of the Dallas Country Club when I drive it home people to know I’m arriving before it was a well that’s interesting well why did you say that because nothing sounds like an Aston Martin while one single purpose that is an amazing insight that people bought a sports car not just for how beautiful it looks or even how wonderfully it’s made because an Aston Martin’s handmade vehicle it is one of the only ones in the whole world is still here while but the the revised because nothing sounds like an Aston Martin so in in PNG parlance that’s actually the functional benefit right yeah there’s a little bit commotion the book the functional the car itself it does this thing mmhm but there was another benefit that was an emotional benefit and here’s what happened to him people talked about it recently and Aston Martin is unlike any other sports car during those interviews stand he also said I’m on like any other person so really this is the emotional effect so really we combine the idea nothing sounds like an Aston Martin and unlike any other which is actually speaking to the person if you are unlike any other you should be looking at our last another Alexa we ran this capsule we do we learned all this week we should show to the client I thought it was wonderful did you even know the story here Aston Martin regularly they actually turn their cars right thank you to the engine okay so the tune the engine to Tom’s two songs the musical tones and they so back to the stories they didn’t they do something and realize that that was what they were selling I didn’t realize how central wash and the purchase of the vehicle but even doing it they’ve all believe it’s right so once again the special called we come in and say nothing sounds like an Aston Martins has gone we know we do it on purpose brother I

wish I could shake your hand across the table what did you tell everybody here because you know what we discovered that’s a that’s a core causal factor for purchasing the car so is unlike any other so we then made advertising that did this and then we used to Google API we cost adds to only go to highline vehicles the Highlander vehicle purchase before you jump into that tell us about the cluster of what you found these this looks like what else are they doing what what behavior but without revealing too much my secret sauce I’ll just give you a quick snapshot should be expressed in I’m glad you asked me the search obviously for certain kinds of cars right right but then they do things under the auto business that are not necessarily brand specific and one of the things that they do is they look for auto auctions they’re looking to buy the nineteen sixty nine James Bond Aston Martin now we’re not looking at people who going to auto washing should drop by Toyota right right because there’s all kinds water washes will return there will be personally classic cars right so it’s not like so she’s part of the behavioral cluster group person who would do that is a potential person that would take a section of the homepage here’s three fascinating thanks we also have to look good remember we don’t know the individual we we we really don’t know the individual because Google protects people there’s completely everyone should realize you’re completely safe online now you really are B. Google does not reveal anything  I do nothing it’s all anonymized data it’s just information right and again because we’re just doing this behavior based intent based deterministic media we’re just finding out what it is that our court will those things on the record it’s all people who do this you gotta make sure it’s not a seventeen year old boy right right what the seventeen year old boy stop Ferrari recognitions bonded watcher taken interesting you search for it exactly what was the single James Bond movies next thing you know has the market right now so we got to make sure those people were excluded because of the way still just went everywhere except in the United States make ways for for for Aston Martin to be like adwords rate can be a big waste of money because of all these kids that are looking for the slow exactly

right so because behavioural clustering the people do other things that prove one they’re millionaires this is John so people who are millionaires who also get paid big bunches of money at specific times of year like partners in law first doctor successor who get a lot of money end of year bonus they change their behavior with that almost happens they changed their search behavior so if you look at somebody who kind of all year long during the day for googly PI you look at it you know devices they’re not doing anything like this they also do three things they look for the best minimize is devastating yeah and then they look for to very high level you know the exclusive investment advice to companies not not not just the generic ones right now or you’re doing six ninety five trade yourself you know what you’re looking for somebody who’s going to management right right and the next one the people do a lot as they look for travel and they don’t look for travel Expedia to fly you know to my hand and all we’re talking to South America yeah right before they get to go take a cruise on the Danube yeah in first class right yeah and then the last thing we do is this I think this is all the most fascinating is that most purchasers of highland because our main model okay but most of but if you’re going to buy one you are very likely also shopping women short makes sense what makes a lot of sense not minutes you’re here not watching this then you were going to wear and here’s why during the Vietnam I hope you find the story faster yeah laughter yes No we found there are three barriers to buy a car international one any of three barriers first there was you know I don’t have the money right now UCB is not solved and like I said before well this person is a partner in a farming and they get to be checked right right they know they don’t have the money others playing instinctively hit the other part of the hospital right this is like some stances sometimes people feel like this isn’t really the right time I like to buy a sports car because I really should be programmed SUV mmhm I have three kids or something right yeah because as little too selfish for me to do that the best selection of states but the most important one the hardest barrier to overcome is my wife makes sense makes sense because she’s of the book two fifty thousand personal research that’s not really for me don’t bring that home as an anniversary gift regular I mean this is you apply that for you so you know what happens you have to make up to get some thank you for that they go into giving you an example the look for bushel Paris get off the victory the specs of the piece of jewelry that is gonna be dying in a clustered impulse right I mean this this is good news

Sherlock Holmes because you are finding out the the buying patterns and what this person is doing and you’re you’re you’re getting to know the person by what they’re searching because water search Fossum here and soak again that’s how it’s done and now without revealing his wrist to separate things about Aston Martin whatever but we we succeeded in market usually with this idea just keep coming we did a test market sales were up sixty percent well some countries all have two percent while so we did our true Procter gamble test test markets then we did another test again this year and we we didn’t do the sensitivity totally totally different cities with that same result again and so we really need is their name is there some once again isn’t data the key but not just in the big game reading analyzed and synthesized that proves you are going to actually sell more yeah we we were just talking to somebody and  that individual asking how did you and your bestie right unless the to do list and I’m gonna give one hundred percent correct Procter gamble track because the answer is we said how many cars were sold in the test market persons you’re ago from October to December the growth how what is the change and there was a what is the change in the balance of the U. S. in the same three months versus year ago and one was up sixty and the other was only up to and the guy we just know what goes on right yeah your data it’s it’s it’s one of the seniors want I mean you spend all this time to raise happy do all the things you need to build a company and you will you’ll do all the science data you want your marketing your message to be in the same way to produce those results the most accurate way safely results I love it right some some some of my competitors right so I’m not I’m not saying bad things about the people in the digital world and people working there has been a very often going to clients and say you know we spend this money efficiently look the click through rate number is there’s the cost per thousand this accent we we spend it spend less money on a cost per thousand you were spending so we save you money we got more people to your website and all but I. single but to what end okay the thing that matters is did you increase your bone blossom really the only thing that matters we’re gonna talk about media delivery inefficiencies can talk about the only one to me if I will see you on the orders of one company talk to anybody who’s actually started their own company and the money gets spent their own money right right they will tell you I want you to sell more right that show don’t come and give me some idea about what you think you’re doing from an efficiency tips airport or a median delivery standpoint come in and show me you’ve sold more that we have one lasting damage if you’ve heard this before we also do what’s called behavioral economics we build a plan that says if you invest this much money and this cost per thousand with these impressions against a prime prospect you will sell this many units so how can I help you 

behavioral economics but the behavior of what consumers do and the economics of what that impact actually is and we have been within plus or minus five percent before we actually run the ads well we can predict how many units will be sold or something J. harmful this is one of those thank you you can go to the the CEO said you you know so one of the things that I find when CEOs or or founders of companies are doing their business plan business small spines right numbers can get automated up with them you know the best golf shots sure pass but everybody knows those numbers were accurate however if they came into this war with using cells like you can get within five percent accuracy before you to spend a dollar that’s right wow all thanks for calling for a specific think that’s really why the gaffe after thirty five years an overnight success I worked my whole life trying to get all of this knowledge and now plying to other businesses and figuring out before we do something how will it actually work and then having the case histories that show yes I don’t think we’re gonna sell sixty percent more for everybody breast mark we get right right right and we’re selling more for lots of companies in the growth rates or something like between five and nine percent more than they were getting before for the same day well right and so efficient efficient mortgage we’re we’re specific reading the prime prospect within the right person with the right message at the right time five nine percent is big no it’s big if it’s not the same spending level record but right now you’re talking about the incremental revenue and that internal revenue is going to happen after the bottle because a lot of it’s gonna go to profits you for not increasing the marketing and advertising spending we’re going to make money right really we don’t deal with that because it’s up to you you’re running your business and you’re you’re charging your P. and L. we help you do the rest we have to get public revenue growth and that’s where most people actually need to help it’s quite difficult to increase your voice box right everybody knows how hard everyone is in business anyway I love this so you just got caught into what you’re doing back to being a fab so you’re both a master of your craft matic’s your passion publishing detailed energy of how you just dive into your work which also founder of a company house what is that like thank you you’re welcome have a founder of your company is doing this I would tear it was really scary I think if people talk to former Procter gamble people they will tell you we have the golden handcuffs mmhm you know we really wanted to stay have you been in PNG five years remember the famous ten thousand hours exactly the same thanks right I mean my my person told me when I got there you really don’t know how to do anything we’ll see what you’ve done after five years the release of my second day on the job so easily book come back talk to me in five years

I was afraid to do it everybody appeared you said don Donna still here I mean it’s just an inch from your you were always put them on the website which is always solving these problems you have to meet us here you can go find more interesting things to do what might might evaluations are always top of top of the class but they they just wanted while still there and that’s because it was a free okay it’s scary to go out on your own did you know for sure are you gonna raise money are you going to give up part of the company’s somebody after best in you is it going to be your father in law and that person to lose their money if you fail I mean yeah this is the kind of stuff and stop people from doing it right she discussed people who really brave it just do it because they don’t have much to lose but I have a lot to lose right I was I was still going north the P. G. yeah I think it’s because the idea that made me do it one research you know if any of the person is listening to me  internal person right that’s it if you have the idea and now you can’t do anything else you know you get to do it because the point I just kind of do what I gotta do on my own even if I fail I gotta try this I wanted to be on me I don’t want to be on even even something that could happen to me upon me get a bad boss or by the brand of monsters the film the marketplace or something out of my control I have a good enough idea I’m gonna find you willing to take the responsibility yeah I wanted you know to me didn’t produce results responsibility sure our ability sure do they give me lots of forty minutes right at the beach when you talk of course when you’re talking about the final decision maker present top little tough then I wanna be C. O. P. G. one made a target of one to do that but really what I generally wanted was for I have responsibility accountability I wanted and I thought the idea is good enough I should go do it and I proved to myself that I could do it it’s IBM G. multiple times you know running the businesses starting things up individual my name’s on patents and I said I can do this yeah because I got to the point right it was that or go crazy I had to start started with the passion of the books I read from coming to our homes so when I called big street I have the story I think the gradient don’t don’t you agree I have a great brand yes I love it you know it’s call Baker Street mmhm when I say it’s two to one B. K. street address of Sherlock Holmes everybody gets that yeah right well you’re a problem solver  we you know we could be in trouble you could you could help solve but you mention elementary and I say yes hold regular Menteri and so that’s really to be honest with you that’s really what happened I had to do it now I learned a lot in sixteen years and one of the things I would tell people is and they’ve heard this a million times from from founders they’ve listened they protesting thing I’m about to say which is a fine bunch of other people really counted it and get him to come with you and give them some of the right I mean make sure that you’re not there it’s not your place to make sure their partners and someone with you the newly they believe they really want to do this and they want to do this with you

and that’s what we have we are superb I have super partners will love the story and love what you’re doing I love the passion I love the the the fire in your belly is so strong that you have to do this this this and worst you’re seeing tremendous success so congratulations on that thank you for coming on the show I know we talked about in some of the special because I’m sure that people are listening to this Wilson is my wonders like reach out they would create an online form for them to like you answer some questions in the you can look that up for you so call thank you so much for being with us today are related to the story thanks so much for having me this is a great opportunity for me to sell I really appreciate thank you thank you so much don for sharing with us how making the leap can be scary but just making the jump is the first step you can learn more about don and see some of his work by visiting Baker Street S. F. dot com we put a link in the show notes the masters and founders team includes me damn Dillard producer Mariah gossip and audio engineer Jake Wallace thank you everyone if found in media for your support if you have been enjoying this show I would suggest you check out packing taste it’s another founding media podcast all about the consumer packaged goods industry in Texas we will put a link in the show notes