Brand and Butter
Always straight-talking (occasionally in-your-face), Brand and Butter is the no-BS branding podcast for modern marketers and business owners. Packed with clear-cut advice on the influence and power of branding - and how pairing associations, consumer behaviour, and design thinking can impact how we see, think, feel, and even taste.
Brand and Butter serves up refreshingly honest and never-dull conversations with some of today’s boldest brand strategists and architects. Sometimes funny, sometimes vulnerable (and often unapologetically blunt), this is the podcast that you wish you’d listened to before launch.
Tara Ladd is the Founder and Brand Strategist at Your One and Only, a brand and design studio here for brands who refuse to settle. Evolving brand identities to stay relevant fusing psychology, strategy, and design.
Brand and Butter
Content Marketing to the New Age Consumer with Kent King
Ever wondered how a child actor who worked alongside Hollywood legends transformed into a multifaceted entrepreneur? Meet Kent King, the Content Chemist, who has an extraordinary journey from the glitzy lights of Hollywood to the beats of DJing and finally to the strategic world of brand development and content marketing. Kent’s unique perspective sheds light on the importance of understanding platforms and the human behaviour behind them. As you follow the conversation, you'll discover the value of diversifying your skill set and continually learning to stay ahead in an ever-evolving market.
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I have a special guest on today, and his name is Kent King, otherwise known as the content chemist, and he's a force in brand development, content marketing and entrepreneurship. From child actor, where he shared the screen with Hollywood icons like Cuba Gooding Jr, halle Berry and Wesley Snipes, and has captivated audiences as a DJ from New Jersey to Tokyo and beyond, getting to work with prestigious brands like Honda. Kent's unparalleled expertise in marketing, entrepreneurial spirit and his mastery of content creation have made him a formidable force. Each encounter with Kent is not just an interaction but a transformative experience. He's not merely an authority, he is a revolution, inspiring a new generation of leaders to reach unprecedented heights. Stick around, it's a good one. You're listening to Brandon Butter, a straight talking occasionally in your face.
Speaker 1:No BS branding podcast for modern marketers and business owners here for those who want to understand the influence and power of branding and how pairing associations, consumer behavior and design thinking can impact what people see, think and feel.
Speaker 1:I'm your host, tara Ladd, the sometimes funny, sometimes vulnerable and often unapologetically blunt founder and creative director of brand and design agency, your one and only. Hey, everyone. I'm here today with someone pretty special. He is someone that I've been following for quite a long time, and I think it takes a lot for me to follow someone or respect and value someone, and I think, as I was watching, and I was just becoming so engrossed in the way that not only he was executing things but what he was saying, and I want you to listen to him, because I feel that he deserves a platform that's way bigger than his own, especially in Australia, for you know where a lot of our people are and I want to swing the mic over to him. Let him introduce himself, because I feel like he'd do a way better job of it anyway. So, kent, take it away.
Speaker 2:Tara, I appreciate you having me here. So my name is Kent King. I call myself the content chemist. I think that, in terms of what's going on today with short form media, it's chemistry. It takes a lot of the right elements in order to mix some things together, to understand some things, to understand platform mechanics and human behavior, and so I have dubbed myself the content chemist.
Speaker 2:My background is originally in media right Since the age of five I've been in television shows and commercials and you know big budget things. I am a walking living meme and GIF, and so I've got a really good understanding of just media. I pivoted that in college to DJing and took that all around the world. I've never been to Australia, but I definitely can't wait to come and I was able to really build a career with that. The problem with DJing and here's the thing right that really taught me the element of personal branding right and just building that one-person business while still building a promotions based company, and so that was fun. But the problem with DJing is you're always kind of slave to the venue, right, Like if the nightclub closes down, then you've got nowhere to play, and so I saw that as a consistent issue in a lot of the areas that I was at, and so I started doing branding for restaurants, nightclubs, bars, because they were going to shut down and open back up and it felt kind of right for me to just say, hey, I can help you do this and do that and do this, and then I'll end up being the DJ to get back in there. And so that career was amazing, pivoted. That turned it into.
Speaker 2:I owned a content creation facility in my hometown called Loft 9, New Jersey. Loft 9 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Loft 9 was the name of the actual business. Ran that for seven years, loved it, Ran it through the pandemic, we survived. But I realized that I had a platform that I had built and I had more of a responsibility to help other people get to the next level. I love being an entrepreneur, but I'm a creative at heart, and so now what I do is I preach and teach people how to create, build personal brands and use these platforms to scale their businesses.
Speaker 1:And so that's pretty much my intro in a nutshell these platforms to scale their businesses, and so that's pretty much my intro in a nutshell. I love that because you basically just touched on probably three or four things that we could dive right into right there, and I think one of those was the well one. It's the multifaceted approach to understanding experience, isn't it? Because I think that someone thinks that they need to just be really good at one thing, whereas I believe and something that I was told at such a young age, in my early 20s thankful to whoever that was I feel like it was someone that was teaching me something in brand that expand horizontally, not vertically, and to this day, that has resonated so deeply with, and I think, at the time you know we're going back now it was like, you know, digital wasn't really even a thing. Think, at the time you know we're going back now it was like, you know, digital wasn't really even a thing and we were like the evolution of beginning to get into, you know, social media and web 2.0. It was pre. That era was print, and so I started in print and then we moved into you know that evolution period but yeah, it was like so that's kind of when web design started to take off. Beyond that, you know, boxy old school DOS mode type type vibes, 8-bit, and you know, really started to kind of eventuate and I was, like you know, I could be a print designer and I could be a web designer and then started to learn about the evolution of digital. And then obviously web 2.0 came out and then it was understanding the complexities of social and I think it's never for anyone, it should never be just get really good at one thing you can, I agree with that, you should always have some kind of area you specify in. But it's also understanding the mechanics of different areas to be able to add that skillset into the thing that you know really well. And you've just put that in a nutshell you realize the importance of personal brand and business brand promotion. It's like no, when you're doing so well, it's literally like the whole package you've managed to do right there. So, no, I think that that's really great.
Speaker 1:But one thing I want to touch on, and I think it's a really important conversation to have at the moment, is the rise of personal brand and I think everyone thinks it's come from nowhere, but really it's just kind of the evolvement, isn't it? From the way that brand has just naturally progressed. It started with, you know, branding on the back of a cow. Like you know, you just had a logo because the bigger brands knew what they were doing but they had the budget and the time and the energy to be able to invest in that. But then, as we've come along and you know, we've seen you know, ucg or user-generated content sorry We've seen just smaller brands being able to really disrupt and come through and again use that creativity, as you said, to create a real dent in, I guess, the diversification of where people spend their money and what they choose to spend their money on.
Speaker 1:And we're seeing that obviously the next progression of that is connection and people power. And so we're going beyond the why of the business, which is where it then moved into. It's the people wanted to know who you are, what you do, why you do it. And now we're moving into that next iteration of but let me know why I should buy from you in terms of your values and alignments and beliefs. And then we kind of move into personal brand, because people want to know who's running the company. Should I buy from them? Are they ethically sustainable?
Speaker 1:You know, do they have a diversity and inclusivity policy, like all of these things are so much, I guess. Well, they're driven by how people think, act and feel, and I think it's only become really, I guess, predominant off the back of COVID, when everyone was able to consume, consume, consume COVID, when everyone was able to consume, consume, consume. And then we saw this huge shift in behavior of, you know, emotion, political, social, environmental, and we've seen it become what it is today.
Speaker 1:So, after my long-winded kind of explanation. I kind of needed to back it all there. That's what I wanted to kind of ask you, I guess is what you think people should be doing, your tips and advice. And also I did a reel coming just completely ADHD off topic there for one second. I did a reel yesterday on the Instagram audio stand, have you?
Speaker 2:heard that yet?
Speaker 1:Yes, I saw that, and you were one of the creators I instantly thought of, because I'm like he's doing that and I thought that was very clever, so I just wanted to add that in before I forgot. But yeah, coming back to you, what do you think the I guess it's that connection piece, isn't it? And the involvement and how you've managed to build your presence by understanding people and just connection.
Speaker 2:So you gave me a lot there, right?
Speaker 1:And sorry about that. No, no, no, I have. I have ADHD as well. So my mind I got that no, no, no, it's great because I have ADHD as well.
Speaker 2:So my mind compartmentalizes, so I'll go back and dig from what I have to.
Speaker 1:And if I've got to circle back?
Speaker 2:we'll get to where we're trying to get to. I love this In terms of right, because we're talking about personal brand and you know there was something that you said about you know, not necessarily, I think it was expand horizontally and not vertically. And I want to add that I think it depends on what you're trying to do right For me and what it is that I'm trying to do with building a personal brand. It benefits me largely to remember all of my experiences that I've had, because the two most valuable things are going to be experience and empathy. Right, you can't Google an experience, you can't AI an experience. You have to actually live that. And so the more that you live, the more stories you have to tell, the more points of connections that you have to talk to people about, right, like, had I ever been to Australia, it would have been great for me to say I did this thing, have you ever been there? Right, the more experience I have. And then, secondly, is the empathy right. It's the desire to understand people and what they are experiencing. Right. So the more that you experience, the easier it is for you to be able to say you know what. I can resonate with that in this way, and what I was saying before the cameras cut on was I was excited about this conversation because I'm so used to speaking from a very empathetic standpoint, in the sense that I want to make sure that I'm never communicating anything too high level, right, I'm never communicating anything to anyone with the assumption that they know something, and so having this conversation kind of gives me that freedom of expansion to be able to say this is literally just a conversation about this topic.
Speaker 2:We will exchange opinions, viewpoints, we will go back, and that for me, is like it's fun, right, like it's something that I enjoy, because it's not me creating for my personal brand, in a sense of saying, hey, I want to make sure that this thing resonates like this. I have to touch these creative points, I have to do. I really just have the freedom to let my ADHD brain run, and so I hope that I'm actually answering the question, but I think that those are the two most important and valid things that we can express in our creatives today is that empathy to connect with people and the experiences that we've had, and that doing, remembering all of those things is exactly what you spoke about, about going horizontal, because I have to remember every single moment of everything that I've learned in all of my experiences and then bring it back to communicate that effectively to people, and so couldn't agree more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think it's also. It also adds depth to what you're talking about too Like.
Speaker 1:So, for instance and you know I'm assuming you'd be very similar is that I love to just study random shit, so you know, I've studied nutritional medicine and I've studied sports medicine and I've also done, you know, behavior and neuroscience for the brain and design and there's all these different things, but somehow, one way or another, they've all managed to overlap at one stage or another. I've done had a liver transplant in 2020. He's great, by the way, if anyone's thinking, oh my God, but yeah, he's, he had a transplant. So you know, when I entered that phase, like understanding nutritional medicine helped me to understand what was going on in his body, and so that's what I mean about like you know, we are our own individuals and you watch someone else and their success and their trajectory. It's not ever going to be the same as someone else's and you know, even experience. What I don't like at the moment and I'm going to dig a little bit here is I really hate that someone sells something and says that it's made their. You know, this is how they grew and they did this and it's like I think we need to be very cautious, that we need to be a little bit ethical and again bring it back to empathy in saying that there is a lot that contribute to success and it's not just about following a specific.
Speaker 1:I did X, y, z to get there. Sometimes it's the people you meet, the conversations that you have, and then the visibility that you receive, and you cannot, and I mean, while we can say, hey, I put myself at the event that I went to where I met XYZ, at the same time you didn't know that that person was going to be there. So that is also a contribution of luck and timing, and I think we also need to be really aware that. You know, we've seen influencers that have blown up off the back of COVID because everyone consumed so much information and people look to them as like the guiding light to growing an audience, and it's like, well, hey, everyone just happened to be inside.
Speaker 1:What you did then now no longer works, and I think what I'm seeing is the struggle and the evolution of what's happening in. It's like identity development, essentially because we've had to completely change and people don't know how to deal with that. And then, on top of that, we've seen the rise of, you know, an economic crisis and you know the reduction of spend and people having to be very creative, disruptive. And you know the reduction of spend and people having to be very creative, disruptive, and you know, savvy in how they connect with their audience. And so, without being, I guess, mean, but it also just like it distinguishes those that know their shit versus those that don't, and also those that actually just have something good versus those that don't, if that makes sense. So what are your, what's your opinion on that?
Speaker 2:I think that you're spot on in the sense that it was a different time, right. And so, when people were growing and becoming super megastars during COVID and just previous years period, let's just you know what actually. Let's take COVID out and again, right, the two things that I study are going to be, you know, human behavior, right, people, and then platform mechanics. And so, yeah, prior to a few updates ago, right, the algorithm for TikTok had a session in it where, if you consistently created, right, a certain number of videos in a certain timeframe, you qualify for what was called a heat session, where it was like, if you did, like, 47 videos within 30 days I'm not sure if those are the exact numbers, but if you did that 47 videos within 30 days I'm not sure if those are the exact numbers, but if you did that and you met those requirements, one of your videos was guaranteed to see more distribution than the average. Right, and so that no longer exists. Their algorithm is completely different now. They've given you creator insights and all of this stuff, and so to see someone who's had success in that period, you have to take it in the context of. Things have changed. Are they still able to create what it was that they had then.
Speaker 2:Now, right, and that's one of the things that you have to do in order to validate who is actually, you know, the cream of the crop, so to speak. Right, because there is a lot of fluff, there is a lot of desire for people to be able to make money off the back of this, and so I totally understand what that motivator is. But the problem is, then a lot of people lose sight of their morals, their ethics, their own perception of self and their beliefs, and so they'll do anything, or say just about anything, to try to coerce or convince someone to part ways with their dollar. And so we're really in a space now, and especially with the rise of AI, where I do think that it's very important for conversations like this to happen, when there are people who align and who completely understand the overarching game. Right, well, we can look at it from both a macro perspective and a micro perspective and understand nuances or talk history of like.
Speaker 2:You know what it was like in the print days, right, when you were doing print? It was completely different from like just copywriting now, where it's like, if I'm doing copywriting for somebody now, I might have to come up with 30 different headlines because they're split testing websites. Or, as opposed to the print, it was like we've got to just make sure we've got the one and that's it, and so I fuck up, because once it's printed, it's done.
Speaker 2:It's over with, and so I do think that that you know, conversations like this are super important, and here's the caveat, right? It's like, yes, these platforms have given way to, um, scrupulous individuals who are willing to manipulate human beings, but they've also given way to our connection. Right, we would have never been able to connect without the these platforms that we can sit here and, you know, talk shit about, but, like, in all honesty, they're valuable when you use them in the right way oh, I 100 agree, I think, and most of the community that we've built has been all digital, like that has been.
Speaker 1:I guess the best thing um, even from covid, if we're talking about that for a second in the hybrid working space and the working model and providing flexibility and time is that people are able to run a business digitally and have a life, and I think that that's something that is really important. I think, where people I guess in my experience in terms of brand and I guess you would be a really good person for me to throw this around to but I believe I keep seeing these messages saying everyone needs to fix their messaging, everyone needs to fix their messaging, and I'm like, I believe that's absolutely correct, but I think what the real problem is, it's a positioning and an audience problem, because we've seen huge shifts in the way that people, you know, invest, spend, align and value even beliefs. You know you had a conversation with someone five years ago versus now, like so much can change based on how much we've all been through. And then you know, messaging, yes, absolutely is important, but I mean, I think that that's the problem People are tweaking messaging but they haven't actually done the work in the positioning and the audience space and I think that that's.
Speaker 1:I think that that's the problem. People are tweaking messaging but they haven't actually done the work in the positioning and the audience space, and I think that that's. I believe that's where the gap is, and so what I'm really struggling at the moment is trying to get people to figure out that that's what their problem is, and so that's kind of like you try and insert what you were saying before about it's that knowledge gap, isn't it? It's like being able to articulate what it is that you're thinking and putting it into terms where it's easy to understand. And I think that's the biggest thing with messaging and those hooks and being able to kind of reel people in Didn't mean that pun, but it totally worked for me. But do you know what I mean? Like it's kind of like I believe that that's where the real problem is and it's understanding deeper psychographics and deeper connections. And exactly what you said before and I saw something this morning was that you know people ignore brands that ignore people, and I was like oh, that's solid.
Speaker 2:I completely agree that that hits, that resonates, and I think you're right in in terms of the value of positioning or the undervalue of it. I think people are so busy trying to create what it is that they've seen work before that they're not figuring out what's going to work specifically for them. And there is no, there's no USP in a lot of what people are doing anymore. Right and and you know I follow Chris Doe and he something and he got it from a woman I've got to remember her name but it goes, different is better than better, and I feel like everybody is so busy trying to be better than what they see that no one's focused on just being different and realizing that that is a superpower. And realizing that that is a superpower.
Speaker 2:Where you sit in the market, how you are viewed in the market, ultimately determines your value in that market. And it's so funny because I think I was listening to Daniel Priestley this morning, oversubscribed. It's something that I probably read once a year and I have it on audio book as well. I literally just ordered the book again today because I think I gave mine to somebody and I'm like where's?
Speaker 1:my book. I need to highlight stuff.
Speaker 2:I'm going through something right now. Come on, and he was speaking about how you know, essentially in most markets you have four big businesses that corner the market in some way, shape or form their position. They, they sit and hold that position and, like you said, so much has changed now that you don't necessarily have to have the large position of price or right. You know convenience or whatever your small, subtle nuances, the things that make you, you allow you to sit uniquely positioned in the market, and so so many people again, they're so focused on and it's a competitive mindset, it's what we do as human beings and it's, you know, you can go into all of those fallacies, but they're so focused on seeing what has already worked that they are not considering or concerned about creating something that would work for them.
Speaker 2:And you will definitely start to see again the cream rise to the top, simply because and my mentor said this to me the other day he said you know, light travels faster than sound, and so a lot of people look really intelligent until you hear them speak. And that's what's really going on with content right now. There's a lot of people who've got the pictures, they've rented the cars, they've rented the watches and all of these things look really successful until you actually get to the root of understanding what it is that they do, and then they always tend to crumble right there. So I completely agree Positioning is important and finding your USP is crucial.
Speaker 1:I was funny you brought that up. I was literally going to bring USP up. I think that I believe that just most people don't understand brand strategy and I mean I say this and I've got to try and rework it somehow, but I'm like it's not your product, your brand isn't a product, your brand is. It's literally the memory, it's the association, it's the connection that you have with people and if you haven't cemented that like you, look at all these people changing categories. You know, I don't know, you know who gives a crap toilet paper in Australia? No, I don't. Oh, you would love them. Go, go and follow them. Basically, they've changed the toilet paper category in Australia. They're really ballsy, really bright, they're very sustainable, they use like bamboo um, you know to, it's really, they're really cool.
Speaker 2:They give like my girlfriend probably knows them. She's, she's the one who's saving the world. So yeah, well she probably does.
Speaker 1:They're like real and obviously during covid they blew up as well.
Speaker 1:Um, because the whole toilet paper thing, which was that's a whole, whole other conversation but um yeah, it was like like scarcity on a product that actually was not scarce, which was, yeah, but it was like that that I find that their change, because the reason that they did it was that they were able to step into a space where everyone was pretty boring and they became this humorous personality driven. Like the whole launch of the brand was the founder sitting on a toilet for 50 hours to try and raise money to invest in his brand and it was live streamed back at Cirque. You know what I mean. So it was like these younger, more creative, like watching what's been done is great and I actually believe in. I think it's Art of Persuasion that I was listening to. I don't I can't read these days, I'm listening to everything on the go but he was saying that if it existed 10 years ago and it's still around, chances are it's probably going to be around in 10 years time anyway.
Speaker 1:We always see these trends come in and we think, oh, no, it's going to do this and this and this, and AI is doing exactly that. Right, people are like, oh, it's going to take over the world. People are going to robots are going to replace humans. I'm like and you thought that about Facebook, and you thought that about Y2K and we thought this about. So everything is going to be so far fetched to the right and it's always going to come back down to the middle, because people, at the same time as technology, also change, adapt and evolve. It's called neuroplasticity. It's our brain doing the natural thing. It is always done. It's like there was a person recently, um, that diet or was dying, froze their body, um, and wanted to be brought back in 70 years time or something ridiculous, and I was like but you would be so out of touch with the world yeah all of your family would be gone.
Speaker 1:like why would you, why would you want to do that? And and I was like that's the same type of thing, like we have evolved so much as humans that we but we're in it, right as we, but we're in it, right as we change, we're in it. So it seems you can be persuaded by all these things. But I guess it's the same thing with where we're going at the moment. And I think why people are scarce at the moment is because they're in that scarcity, because people aren't spending as much. Look, let's face it, five years was easy. Five years ago was easier. People were, you were able to do things. People were just spending willy nilly. You could get away with doing something and stuffing it up and going again. And now people are really risk averse with what they're spending their money on. So you have to be fucking good at what you do to get them to release their money.
Speaker 1:And I think what you said there, like I think experience will always trump trend, but it's kind of like the trend will start and then people will then come back to the people that have always. They're kind of like, oh, that didn't work, Maybe I do need to do it. It's the same thing with, like, weight loss and why the weight loss industry exists because people want instant gratification versus the long tried, true, tested, really normal way of losing weight or, you know, getting strong and healthy, and I think it's just that human behaviour element, isn't it? It's like, once you understand, you've just got to stay to the path. Don't be persuaded by what others are doing.
Speaker 1:You know, keep that message, because what happens and I think this is the same thing with Taylor Swift, right, we've seen this happen with her is that she's said the same thing for years and years, and years, and years and years, and society has finally caught up with her message and gone oh, she's been telling us this shit for 10 years and I think that's what has you know? It's, it's been consistency. It's not all of a sudden. She's talking about X, y, z. It's been, she's been talking about this all this time and it's only that now society has caught up. It's like the tipping point, the classic tipping point thing. Yeah so.
Speaker 1:I think that's how we're kind of evolving. But, yeah, and that's what I love about what it is that you do, is that you manage to frame messages in a way that get people to understand that knowledge gap. And I think that, and what I want to say to people is that not everyone's out to make a million dollars. So the income signaling of you need to earn X, y, z, like at the end of the day, money is a tool. Money isn't the solution that you know, the end product. Money is the tool to get to X, y, z and everyone's going you need to do this so you can get this, and it's like but that's actually not the end point. The end point is whatever the money is buying, right, so it's like, you know, earn $10,000 so that you can have a life where you can sit on the lounge with your kid and not worry about money or whatever.
Speaker 1:It is Like that's. That's the motivation. It's not the money. The money buys the thing that they want, and so people are talking about making money, but it's actually the end product over here that you need to be selling. It's like people stop just one step too early. It's like keep going, but like yeah, so that's. I guess that's. One thing that I think is really great is being able to educate people on their knowledge and their experience, because, at the end of the day, that's the thing that will always win tried, trued. You know, this is how you're learning, this is how you're evolving, because if people are adapting their you know business models to just jump on the next trend, you know it was an Instagram coach and then it was like a reels coach and then it was like a ai coach and that, like you're just always going to be hopping to that next best thing and never find that safety.
Speaker 1:Um, I guess, what is? What is your advice to people that, uh, are in that scarcity mindset of them at the moment that you know maybe needing that extra push or or to kind of break past the hurdle of where they're feeling blocked?
Speaker 2:You know it's funny what you said about not everybody wants to make a million dollars. When the pandemic happened and I first started out on this mission to try to help entrepreneurs, you know, I was taking calls for free right Just for two reasons. Number one, so that I could really understand what people wanted on a one-to-one level. Again, I came from the world of promotions, right, trying to pack out a party, and I did it before the you know, social media days, and so I had to do what was called what we called hand to hand combat. Right, because I did live in the world of, like I was in college when Facebook came out. Right, I was like the first Facebook user group, and so we did have that, and so we knew that digital was important. But when it was time to hand out flyers, we called it hand-to-hand combat, and so I transferred that skill again right, going wide and, taking everything that I've learned, transformed that skill into when I was doing content, and whenever I would have calls with people and that was the thing too it was twofold, because I was learning people, plus I was also recording it, so that it was a, it was content, but whenever I would have these calls with people, I would ask them.
Speaker 2:I would say and I learned to frame the question like this I said, let's say tomorrow, magically you got whatever the number is that would make you ultimately happy, whatever money that is, whatever that number is, you got that instantly in your bank account. You did all the things. You bought the cars, you bought the houses, you hit every country, you took every vacation and now you're back home. What is it that you're going to do every single day for the rest of your life? What is that thing when money does not matter anymore? And that was another moment for me to have empathy, because I had to realize how many people have never thought that far ahead or never been asked that question or never framed it that way, and so they've always just been chasing money because they never knew what actually exists at the end of the road to actually provide them that happiness. And whenever people figured it out which sometimes was a long time, sometimes it never happened, but once they figured it out, everyone who has ever had those conversations with me is happier now because they're doing something that they are passionate about or something that in this is what I say is even more dangerous or a step above. They are obsessed with right, and so my suggestion for people is to double down on who you are and not who you think the world wants you to be, and what I mean by that is make sure that what you are doing is contributing into the world in the way in which you want it to be, and something that you want to be remembered for right.
Speaker 2:I don't have kids yet, but I am so ready to be the dad that is like you guys are going to sit down and watch some of my old reels, because I put my heart and soul into these things. Look how I use negativity bias, because I know that you know, ages and ages ago, we didn't even have the ability to see what our grandparents looked like if they didn't have access to certain technologies Prior to that, if they weren't being painted. We have no idea, right. And so right now we have the ability to leave this digital footprint, and so it's really about well, what do you want yours to look like? And then what's the thing that's actually gonna bring you fulfillment? If you find those in any combination and you give yourself the permission to explore them freely, the content becomes easy because you're no longer bound by platform algorithms, you're no longer bound by vanity metrics, you're no longer bound by all of these constraints that don't allow for the most creativity. And so that's really what my message would be to people is like as long as you are doing something that encompasses your obsession or borders on the line of it, or you are chasing in that direction, you have nothing to worry about, because that's ultimately the thing that matters.
Speaker 2:And when you frame it like that and you think on a bigger picture, my mentor said he's not a billionaire yet.
Speaker 2:He's worth like 34 million. And I said all right, what's the thing that's going to get you to the next level? He said the difference between a millionaire and a billionaire is two things. He said is the people that the billionaire can call and that will answer. And the second thing is the billionaire is thinking on a longer time horizon. And so I tell people, if you want any type of success regardless if it's money, fame, whatever it is the longer the time horizon you think on, the more freedom you have to actually chase that thing. When you start putting time constraints on it, that's when people start to conform and say, ok, well, I've got to get this now. So I've got to do this and I'm going to sacrifice this and I'm going to go this direction. But when you really think on a long time scale, you're about creating that footprint that's going to last beyond you, and so as long as you're doing that, I don't think that you'll have a problem with creating any content.
Speaker 1:I agree with that. I guess the one thing that I can actually add to that is that what I found difficult with that conversation is I'm very outspoken on and I've had to put like a line between the business brand and the personal brand and where I've found the struggle is figuring out and it took me 18 months to figure it out what I was saying that would join both accounts together where I could talk about what I really wanted to talk about on my personal page. That would still coincide and connect with what I speak to on the business page and it ended up being identity and narrative and by that it was as a brand we have, and you know I'm bleeding heart through and through. So it's like understanding biases and the way that we make decisions and unconscious, you know, awareness of what we're seeing on screen and how our realities are shaped and I was like this is like some big heavy shit to talk about. And so, over on my personal brand I'm talking about, you know, gender bias, racial bias, you know inequities in disability and obviously I wear ADHD, so I talk about that a lot. My kid's autistic, so I speak about, you know, just the differences in cost of motherhood, the motherhood penalty. So I talk about that stuff. That stuff can't. You can't really bring that too much into the business brand. You can, but not to that level. So I find the content on my personal page fucking easy to talk about. That is like you said so easy to talk about. Fucking easy to talk about. That is like you said, so easy to talk about.
Speaker 1:Where I found the problem was talking about what I did in the business. That would represent the umbrella of everyone that fits underneath the brand, because you then become a culture of a group of people. So what you say is a direct correlation of what can happen to the group. So at the end of the day, the whole reason for starting that business was I saw the inequities in agency of location and cost. They used to let people come in. They'd ask you to have two years experience and they got that experience because you know, successful, wealthy parents could support their children to go and work for free for two years to get that experience, while those of us that didn't have that had to work. So we couldn't work for free and then so I hated that. I didn't like the unpaid internships and never would do it.
Speaker 1:I also watched really amazing women leave the industry. Now we're talking 10-ish years ago now, so I think a lot's changed since then. But you know, so amazing women leave, come back after kids, and then they would just be dumped like in the corner, like a part-time role, like you answer the phone now, and I was just like, but they were like so I hated that, um, and I also hated like the egocentric creativity of agent, of big scale agencies, and how there was always one or two people that would end up with the final word and all of these amazing creatives would be like well, what's the point of working here? So it was like a whole bunch of different reasons and obviously now I start to look at neurodiversity in the workplace and how fucked up working in an open plan office was with a whole bunch of people. And now I'm like oh, now I understand why I wouldn't let my boss change the fluorescent light that was over my head and I used to fight him about it.
Speaker 1:It was just like so it's like all of these reasons for starting the business was like I wanted to bring something to because I live in Southwestern Sydney, so it's on the outskirts of the city. So it's like there's always like this locality thing and I was like fuck that, like why should you have to go to the city? Let's create something on the outskirts. And so it was all of these things that were actually the drivers to starting. The business was founded on diversity and inclusivity, and I was like holy shit.
Speaker 1:And then it was, it was just like this do you know what I mean? It was there the whole time, but it wasn't until, like you say, you do the work. You've got to figure out what is it that you would be passionate to talk about over and over again? And it was always and always has been that. And so it's it's. I think that that's the importance of the why right, like it's, everyone goes otherwise, and it's like it's not just because you like to make things clean or healthy or sustainable. It's it's more than that, like why? Yeah, it's like you don't believe in child labor or you want a clean planet for your kids to live in. It's like it's always that extra one step further. But yeah, I guess that was my little add-on. I know that people may.
Speaker 2:I think, um, in terms of the why, right, I I have, um, I was. So I have a small cohort of individuals who I'm helping right, understand their content and do sales and do all of these things, and I have instructed them to never ask the question why, if you're not prepared to ask it three or four more times, because the first level why is never going to give you the root right. And so the example that I always use is you know, I'm originally from New Jersey and I moved to Atlanta, and when I was in New Jersey, I was paying like $25 for a haircut. Now I come here, I pay $50 for, just like a shape up, right. And so the question becomes well, why do you cut your hair then? Right, why would you double that for the same service? Just because you're in this new location?
Speaker 2:And the first answer is, well, I want to look presentable, right. But then you ask well, why, why does looking presentable matter to you? And it's like, well, I mean, I could just wear a hat, but I like how my girlfriend reacts to me when I get a new haircut, and the deeper you go, the more you understand what the root cause is of that why. And so, yeah, it's never just the why, it's always but why, right? And you know it's funny, um, that a friend of mine has just had a child and you know I'm like the godfather and I was telling him that I'm jealous because he gets to explore that first level of someone asking why, and how many times they ask it after, like there's no end to that, like you kind of I've got one of those real long go to sleep or something, right Cause it just never ends.
Speaker 2:And I'm like there's so much power in that, there's so much power in that discovery, in that remaining childlike, in that understanding, that curiosity, that desire, right, there's so much power in that. And so that desire, right, there's so much power in that. And so, yeah, I completely agree, it's never just the why. On the first level, you've always got to ask it multiple times and that then will give you a couple of different levels of either a content to talk about, directions to take right Ways to pivot all of that stuff. The deeper the level why you go, the more you have to expand upon.
Speaker 1:I love that. It's literally something I had a conversation with the other day with my masterclass that I was running and I said the moment that I get to the point where someone gets the shits is the moment that I've hit the good bit, because then they get angry with you and it's like, hey, it's not me, it's whatever it is is that you've now found the block. Whatever the block is, that's what's stopping it. And it's the same with a good idea, not even just the why. It's the same with a good idea. If you think that you come up with an idea and you're like that's it.
Speaker 1:And I used to do this in my old agency and they'd hate it, but the end result was always amazing because it's quantity over quality, right, so they're just smashing out all this stuff. Now I do believe that there should be an element of quality over quantity to try and figure out what people need. But then, once you kind of get there, then it's just once. You kind of get to that sweet spot and you would know this it's that, kate, curating it till it gets to the point where you're like that's it, that. And now I'm just going to do this over and over again. Um, but to come back to what you said about the children asking why, a great question to ask back to the child is why do you think? And it makes them start to question their own thinking, and I think that's something that is also really important is that we're always externally looking for the answer from other people, when sometimes the answer is always upstairs in our own heads without a doubt, without a doubt, without a question.
Speaker 2:Um, I'm laughing because I I use that tactic in sales of, uh, reverse engineering the question right. When someone asks me a question, usually I'm asking them one right back right, and that's part of what I teach people in terms of sales and in terms of, like, closing the deal, and so it's funny to me because it's exactly what you do for children and, at the base root of it, a lot of the people who I speak to are children. Anyways, that actually makes sense. That actually would definitely work. So, yeah, definitely agree validation.
Speaker 1:Oh well, I have loved this chat and obviously I could continue to talk to you for the rest of the morning, but I know that you need to go. But likewise, I want everyone to know where they can find you, because I think you're amazing. So why don't you to know where they can find you? Because I think you're amazing, so why don't you tell everyone where?
Speaker 2:they can find you. It is Kent Cultivate on all platforms. That's where. Wherever you can find anyone digitally, that is me, that's where I'm going to be at, that's what I'm going to be under, that's my website and everything. And again I just feel like and I renamed myself Kent Cultivate my original name was DJ Dark Kent because, again, I was a DJ, but I wanted to find a new handle that really spoke to what it was that I was doing, and the idea of cultivating something means to try to get better consecutively over time, and that is honestly the root of what I believe it takes to do. Just about anything is honestly the root of what I believe it takes to do just about anything, but specifically, content creation and social media and growth and developing your personal brand, you have to consistently, like you said, just keep chiseling away at the attempt to continue to get better, and so that's how I landed on a name Kent Cultivate and it's stuck and that's where I'm at and that's how you guys can contact me.
Speaker 1:Well, thanks so much, kent. It's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you. Likewise, thanks everyone. We will chat to you next week. Did you like that episode? I hope so, because if you did, why don't you head over to whatever platform you listen on and rate and review? It's much appreciated and helps others know what we're about. If you want to follow us, you can find us at.
