Un-locking Creative Scaling With Statiq
This episode dives deep into creative strategy as the growth lever for DTC brands, highlighting why under-$10M founders should still lead creative, how one ad can truly unlock growth, and why fresh sourcing of ideas (outside Meta’s ad library) is critical. Simon Robert, CEO of Statiq, walks through practical frameworks: for sourcing creative ideas, balancing “on-brand” vs “sales-driving” content, creative testing cadences, and the importance of one winning ad over scaling 100 mediocre ones. He also touches on creative team structures, founder involvement, and the risks of outsourcing strategy too early.
This conversation is especially valuable for media buyers and operators who want to understand:
When creative becomes the bottleneck.
How to build a process for consistent winning ads.
What channels and frameworks to use to source inspiration.
How to balance branding vs performance in creative.
We also dive into these key takeaways:
How often should teams be testing new creatives to find the next winner
The risk of outsourcing creative too early instead of founders leading.
Why this is the best way to structure internal vs external creative teams for scale
Why it's better to find one killer ad rather than running 100 average ones
This episode is Sponsored by Statiq. The ad creative agency used by Hollow Socks, Jones Road, Hearth & Soil and many more. Book a call within the next 7 days to get €500 OFF your first month: https://bit.ly/ScalabilitySchoolStatiq
To connect with Simon Robert from Statiq send him a DM at https://x.com/Simon__Rob
To connect with Andrew Foxwell send an email Andrew@foxwelldigital.com
To connect with Brad Ploch send him a DM.
To connect with Zach Stuck send him a DM
Learn More about the Foxwell Founders Community head here to learn more.
Full Transcript
Un-locking Creative Scaling With Statiq - YouTube
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=463iHFZR2rw
Transcript:
(00:00) Like if you are under eight figures a year, the founder should probably lead all that. Like the founder is probably the best person to know about the creative strategy and it's probably also the biggest lever for the business. If that person can unlock that next stage of growth, it's going to change everything. And it's been talked here.
(00:18) It's been talked everywhere. One ad can change your business and life. A single ad. You can find all those inspos on on Pinterest. And one good way to start and that's what we do but also what the brands who are listening to this can do on their own which is to really get their head out of the inspiration the meta library pretty much and try try and seek new ways to seek content and and actually Pinterest is a very good one and that's how you know we were able to provide very creative stuff for holo and
(00:49) some other brands as well. It's pretty st even the top ones. I think this is where some brands need to be a little bit more loose with the like onbrand which is the top ad that you have for us is not even our socks. It's an AI generated version of our compression socks. And it looks close.
(01:05) It looks like really close. It's not exactly it, but the actual background that it produced behind it and just like the aesthetic of it and just the way to, you know, show the product looks great. Obviously, is like eye-catching that it has like a great testimonial on on that ad.
(01:22) There are a few others that have like crazy backgrounds, right? They're like desert backgrounds, insane pattern backgrounds, like there's a lot of creativity behind these and these aren't these are definitely not templates like like you said that you would just go to Atria or Foreplay or whatever um and just rip from somebody else. These are like net new concepts and I think that's why they're working.
(01:40) So, I mean, I think I just have to give you kudos for that is like you're bringing new things to the table that aren't just another another ad with just like four value props with arrows that every single brand runs, right? [Music] And now, let's take a listen to the Scalability School podcast. Welcome to the Scalability School podcast.
(02:07) special guest today, Simon from Static, recording live from France, all over the world. Not in Wisconsin, ironically. Although he did come to Wisconsin, which was pretty cool to see Europeans in Wisconsin since your ancestors came. Yeah. Did you ever do when you were growing up, did you ever dream of traveling to Wisconsin? To actually, actually, I kind of did. So, you know, on on on Tik Tok, you have a whole trend of uh America's nature kind of thing. And I was seeing these Tik Toks of Wisconsin and the state of Washington as well. Wyoming, too.
(02:33) Like a bunch of animals. Uh, and and actually, yeah, I was I was kind of I kind of wanted to go there to Chicago as well, which I did. So, was very cool. Yeah, Appleton's beautiful this time of year. It's great place. I don't I don't know for this one, guys. I cannot It's just local humor. Uh, where we we make fun of where we're from.
(02:59) If you don't know Static, Static is an incredible company that, you know, really started. And Simon talked just briefly about the company, but it really started doing uh just static ads and now it's grown. I mean, you're one of the biggest players in the game. It's grown significantly and you're getting into video as well. Yeah.
(03:15) You know, I mean, you guys have such a dialedin process and you've taken on some of the biggest brands in DTOC. So, uh why don't you tell people a little bit about Static and what you guys do? Yeah. So, the story is I used to be a media buyer. Uh I was buying met ads mostly for ecom brands and at the time I thought uh video ads were amazing but they they took forever to make and I was like okay what's what's the quickest way to get your message out there and um I actually started to design a bunch of static adas myself for my ad spend and they worked pretty well and so I called
(03:40) my buddy Jules and and I told him you know I think we have an opportunity here to like create an entire company based on them. we could deliver that at scale, do a great job, hopefully, you know, work with the the right people and uh and go from there.
(04:00) And so we did and and then eventually now we're probably shipping like 3 to 4,000 study per month. And so uh we're thinking about the next step and we do video services recently. Yeah, that's awesome, dude. Well, you know, people come to the scalability school podcast, the tens of listeners that we have to really get into the the tactics and the deep understanding of like what's working, right? So, um, so let's just kick it off right away, which is, you know, you're you're obviously building and creating a ton of ads. I think one thing you guys have done incredibly well is build this formula
(04:25) that to a degree that that seems to work. You have a really good understanding of what converts. What are the what are the formats right now? Carousel, you know, UGC, statics, and what's being overlooked? What are the what's working in that realm right now that people can apply right right away? Yeah.
(04:44) So like so static ads first of all static ads they probably work they probably work better in certain settings right so like for example offer brand offer brands like you know AG1 is probably the the OG of these offer type brands where you subscribe and save and you get 20% off well if you can somehow format your brand to be an offer brand based and I think a lot of them can actually you can reap with the statics because you you're going to be able to drive a lot of traffic um at top with video and then you can close all that traffic at bottom of funnel with study ads. We work with a lot of these offer
(05:16) brands and they work well with that. Also, one thing that's overlooked right now probably would be design variations. Okay. I think a lot of brands are still testing for copy tweaks and I think it's fine testing them at a point like if you know your messaging already, you're probably better off going for design variations. Okay.
(05:41) So, that's probably one thing that's overlooked and um also you talked about concepts, right? I think I think one thing that brands you know not do wrong but could improve is they think of this process backwards in some ways. So like they open an ad library, they try and see what the concept you know a great concept they see one and they think okay how can I fit my brand into this concept inspiration whereas it should probably be thought the other way around which is what kind of message do I want to deliver to the world right and then okay what's the right concept that fit that you know so it's not really about are comparative ads working or is a product benefit oriented ad better it's really
(06:18) about the process It's about okay, what's my brand? What's the message that I want to deliver? And then what's the right concept for that? So like, yeah, AI concepts are working really well right now. If if like if you have a weight loss brand, you should probably kind of try and find some concepts where you're showing an overweight person versus an in shape person, right? That's working really well right now.
(06:40) It's a very aggressive direct response message, but that's working for sure. And if it fits your brand messaging, you should probably use that. So yeah, more than concepts itself, it's more about actually getting the process right. And it start with your brand, not the other way around, which which is what I see usually with uh maybe, you know, seven figure brands.
(06:58) Eight, nine figure brands, they kind of get this right. Yeah. what we've we've talked maybe a couple times on this podcast and I know Zach has been on other shows where like you've kind of like described the static framework that you use where you you come up with maybe some different ranges of people that you're trying to talk to or you kind of pillar messaging and you use static to kind of prove out those concepts.
(07:23) Simon, I'm curious like what is the average client coming to you asking for? like are they they kind of know it seems like you're working with like big brands for the most part. So like they come to you with like pretty defined like hey we know this works. We're trying to just do more of this. So are you taking kind of the core message and helping deliver on just like a wider range of variations within that core message or like what is the average client asking you for? Yeah.
(07:45) So like big brands I mean big brands like eight to nine figure brands which most of our clients they usually work in cycles. Okay. So what they do is let's say a cycle is six weeks. Okay, six weeks. Okay, they're going to use static ads to try and find a new audience, a new funnel, a new offer. So, like they're going to make dozens of variations testing a pink color background with a woman oriented message.
(08:14) And then they're going to try uh a blue background with a menoriented message and they're going to try two funnels out of them. Like, and and the good thing with static is they're super cheap. I mean, they're cheaper to make than videos. they get cheaper clicks and they're easy to re iterate on. So you can actually start there and once you got some soft and you know some soft metrics hitting and and then also CPAs that are in line with your target and it start scaling you can then pile up new ad formats on top of that.
(08:37) So like you have this kind of cycle where brands use us a lot for these and then you have the other cycle which is I don't know we have the fourth of July ads offering coming and like we need we need hundreds of ads for that and um and when that happens it's really about scaling like a lot of assets eventually they're not going to make some copy tweaks on them because like it's a fourth of July offer you don't really need that I mean to have so many to copy tweaks you just need to take the evergreen stuff that's you can probably add an American flag
(09:09) and you know spin that across your entire SKU set. So like yeah I think to answer the question I feel like they work in cycles cycles of iterations to find new audiences and cycles of optimizing for volume pushing out a lot of content out there.
(09:26) Yeah that's really interesting and there's a follow-up question which is maybe for you but Zach maybe maybe for you as well. You mentioned they're using static. I think this was actually like so the average person that's listening to this is seven to eight figure range and what you said that I think is really applicable to them is they can use statics to find and unlock new concepts in messaging and that's like sounds like half of what you're doing is just like trying to unlock that that new thing.
(09:50) Do you have insight into like how they're identifying like what the concepts should be in the messaging? like what is the what is that creative strategy and research process that's kind of like going into determining who should we even try to message to next? And I have thoughts on this too and Zach, I'm sure you do too, but I'm curious if like you have insight into that process. Yeah.
(10:06) So like again, you got to start with your product. So let's say you're a you're a coffee substitute brand, right? That's what you sell. You probably have a product that based on its ingredients that can solve a bunch of issues, right? And some issues are more appealing to a certain demographic, some others to another demographic.
(10:24) So like let's say your brand can solve energy energy issues, anxiety stuff. You cannot mention it directly that way, but then you know anxiety stuff um energy stuff, gut related issues and you're like okay who's most who's more likely to experience that to experience that issue. And it's let's let's do some basic thinking, right? probably on meta if if you target gut issues you should probably target women because you know they are more problem aware than men on that particular issue most likely okay if if you're targeting I don't know energy or yeah energy levels you're
(11:01) probably better off trying to target men for some reasons because overall you may have more people that are ready to purchase for that issue okay and so once you once you start layering those ideas then you can start testing like you can be okay what's the messaging so like you can you can just draft a bunch of headlines on energy on gut etc you try and and make them fit to your audience once you have those headlines like okay how can I represent my product best and then you put it in a situation where you
(11:31) can start briefing static ads so it start with the your product itself and what it solves then you can draw a bunch of conclusions on which demographics can relate to that Then you draft some headlines. The headline step is actually very important. And once you have those, you can think about concepting.
(11:51) And then you you launch to production, you launch on meta, you look at the data, and you start all over again. Yeah, that makes a ton of sense. I I promise this will be my my last followup and I'll let somebody else speak. It's interesting that you kind of position the way that you did and I wrote down each of those those steps. But like what you said, you started with is you have to think about what product problems your product actually actually solves.
(12:09) We we recorded an episode yesterday. I don't know when these will come out in sequence where we talked about one of Zach's recent tweets where he kind of ranted and one of the first thing that he said was like your product actually has to solve problems because if it doesn't then it makes it really hard to actually speak about what you uniquely do. And so I think that that's a really interesting starting point.
(12:26) But the other point that I wanted to make is like the way that this might show up in your ad account is you've been trying things for several months in a row and either rorowaz is constant decreasing or spend is decreasing but you're kind of like flat and you're stuck.
(12:43) And so what what the solution is to that is, you know, in a in a creative sense potentially is going back and doing this process that you suggested, which is listing out all the problems that you solve that maybe you're not currently speaking to and then coming up with a plan to build statics around that that messaging.
(12:56) So is for anybody like that's struggling with maybe plateauing in the ad account, it's like this is one of those things that you should be doing is just like following the exact process that you laid out. Yeah, 100%. And like if if nothing if nothing is working, you should probably think of a bigger swing to make, right? like you can actually change the entire website if you have to.
(13:14) Once you have the the formula of your product I mean I say formula because we have a lot of health and wellness brands but like once you have your product you can you can market it in in very different ways. Even for example let's take holo right? Uh you guys sell socks you can market it for winter activities through the winter and then probably summer activities through the summer and it's it's two probably two very different demographics. I mean, I don't know how how different they are, but like, you know, what I mean, you can make bigger swing. You can change the landing page.
(13:38) You can and eventually if nothing is working, you probably have a a product that sucks, you know? I don't know. But like, if really nothing is working, you you it's should probably think of redoing it entirely. But yeah, you can do a lot of things before shutting everything down. Of course. Of course. Yeah.
(13:58) I mean, I think going through the the process you you talked about is huge. I think that's what one of the things that makes you really unique in in the space that you um have walked so many brands through this successfully and growing and you're being put against other people in the marketplace in terms of ad creators.
(14:16) Um and you seem to have a good sense of uh you know the visual cues that signal DR intent to meta which I think is a big part of it. What are some of those that you've and you can even talk about the ones you've integrated for for Hollow, right? Cuz obviously it's success. Yeah. Static has been working in in Hollow's account which Zach will speak to. Yeah.
(14:35) So like the way I'd say we stand out and also the way you can stand out is to be very creative with your stuff. So like if you do like everybody else, you go into foreplay or whichever you know I library tool you're using and you try and fit your brand into an existing concept and that's all you do, you're probably going to struggle. You kind of need to get your head out of those um inspiration library from time to time.
(14:55) Look at organic things like go to Pinterest, try and find very creative ideas um and and try and think differently. I think I think that's where it starts to kind of have to kind of provide meta with a with a different concept than what's everyone doing.
(15:14) But like for example, let's say again, let's take the the coffee substitute brand because it's a great example, easy to understand. You go to Pinterest and you write mushroom, right? You just do this. You're going to have so much creativity in front of you to try and take inspiration from. Like you can do illustration stuff very different than what what the competition is doing.
(15:33) No one is doing illustrations on beta right now. You can also I don't know place your product in a forest and having um you know weird mushrooms growing around it etc. like you can find all those inspos on on Pinterest and one good way to start and that's what we do but also what the brands who are listening to this can do on their own which is to really get their head out of the inspiration the meta library pretty much and try try and seek new ways to see content and and actually Pinterest is a very good one and that's how you know we were able to provide very creative stuff
(16:05) for Holo and some other brands as well it really start there what what are you looking for in Pinterest like literally just unique visuals that you don't see in ad accounts otherwise. It's like you're going there because you know that people on Pinterest are not staring at ad accounts all day trying to recreate an app like everybody else.
(16:23) So like you're looking for a unique visual in that, right? Is that what you're looking for? Exactly. You're you're looking for something unique and it it's not because it's it's on Pinterest that it's not going to work. What what you want is a great visual that that that delivers your message across. Then you you can performance it, right? So, like you you can add you can add a direct response headline if you want.
(16:42) You can add a bunch of product benefits. You can slap your offer into it. Like it's not because it's on Pinterest that it's not going to work. You just have to reunite both worlds, right? And like it's the same. It's actually the same for videos.
(16:58) I'm not sure if we want to switch to videos right now, but I do have a great example for it. Simon, I mean, I think we should get into the work you guys have been doing for Hollow and just kind of like talk about that a little bit more because we can actually share some numbers and talk about what's going on and all that good stuff. Um, for what it's worth, hired static. I think it's been like 30 days at this point.
(17:16) Does that sound about right? Maybe a little bit more. But we have definitely found some winning ads, which is awesome. I mean, we have one ad that alone has spent like nine grand, another one that spent six grand, another one at four. So, I mean, these are individual ads, not like all of the ads.
(17:33) So, we're talking, you know, multiple tens of thousands of dollars in spend from from statics work, which is incredible and an incredible like ROI, especially based on your fee structure and kind of how that's been going. The metric that we look at um also just to like share is like a northbeam one day click. Anything above a one for us is like a win. That usually backs into we've done a lot of analysis to say that this is like a two plus NC ros if we can get a one north beam one day clicks. I'm looking at a ton of ads that you guys have made for us. To your point about like inspo um
(17:58) and just new ideas, a lot of them are AI based like you said. Even the top ones, I think this is where some brands need to be a little bit more loose with the like onbrand which is the top ad that you have for us is not even our socks. It's an AI generated version of our compression socks.
(18:16) And it looks close. It looks like really close. It's not exactly it, but the actual background that it produced behind it and just like the aesthetic of it and just the way to, you know, show the product looks great obviously is like eye-catching and then it has like a great testimonial on on that ad.
(18:34) There are a few others that have like crazy backgrounds, right? They're like desert backgrounds, insane pattern backgrounds, like there's a lot of creativity behind these. And these aren't these are definitely not templates like like you said that you would just go to Atria or Foreplay or whatever um and just rip from somebody else. These are like net new concepts and I think that's why they're working.
(18:52) So I mean I think I just have to give you kudos for that is like you're bringing new things to the table that aren't just another another ad with just like four value props with arrows that every single brand runs right that everyone tries to copy. I mean you have to comment that you know the French are known for innovation in design. Simon you're kind of on brand with this.
(19:08) I also assume that you've only had pastries today just like being French as well. Close to it. Yeah. Yeah. Um, the one thing I did want to ask you about that I thought was interesting is like, so there's some language that you guys have used in the ads that you've made for us that are just brand new ideas, right? So, we've talked a lot about like getting inspo on the visual.
(19:31) I'd love to understand how you're getting inspo on like the copy that you're using in like the headlines and stuff like that. So, tell us more about how you think about the copy. Yeah, to be fully honest, I'm not sure if we're going to be able to run that, but you'll let me know. You guys run you guys write the copy for us. Uh, are you aware of that? Sure. I didn't know that. No. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, I'm not going to try and my way into this.
(19:50) I mean, it's actually not part of our offering and we don't we don't write copy for for many reasons, but I also feel like um copy actually should belong to the brand. A few a few months ago when we started, we try and do copy services as well. And I think that's that's a relevant world. The truth is our copy was us. Copy is actually very difficult to write.
(20:11) And like if you're trying to externalize your entire messaging to any agency, it's probably not going to work because copy services are I mean great copy services should and are very pricey. Um and in some extent you breathe your brand 24/7 and we believe that brands should own that.
(20:31) And so that's why we actually separated both and we own creative direction. So like we put out great new ideas and you guys match us with the the appropriate copy for that. Right. That makes that makes a lot of sense. Yeah. I mean, I think the one thing that I was even mostly trying to get at was then just like the creativity that comes with the copy, right? So, like we have some language here, it's like torturing your feet is just a big headline. I've never seen an ad that we run with that.
(20:53) But then like the visual that you guys came up with that was AI generated that ties into torturing your feet is just super punchy, right? It's not a photo that we would just get. It's not a photo we would get from a customer. Like I think that's where the the special sauce or statics comes in, right? Because like Yeah. Okay.
(21:11) if we are writing the copy which is news to me I did not know that that you guys have full creative freedom though to just like let it rip with that concept right so I think that's exactly how are you so another question I have then based on that so for brands that are uh what are the brands that you feel like get the most like spend out of your ads like what are what are they allowing you to do what are they doing what are you doing uniquely for them that are the ones that are getting the most volume of spend versus some that you're like, we we tried our best, but it just didn't
(21:39) didn't work out. This episode is brought to you by the Foxwell Founders membership that Andrew and his wife Gracie run. It has been absolutely pivotal for not just the Homestead team, but the Easy Street Brands team. We've had I don't even know how many members are currently in there that are a part of our ecosystem.
(21:57) But when it comes to anything from learning ads to understanding what's going on to building an agency to knowing retention, it's been absolutely useful for our team when they get stuck or they need help to just go there and resource all the other experts. So definitely would recommend it for anybody that's looking to, you know, take it a step deeper, try to get a little bit more knowledge on on growth marketing and all the world DTOC is.
(22:16) Yeah, I think one of the most incredible things about it is you can just like open up the Slack group every single day. You can pin your favorite channels for the topics you care most about and like every day there's going to be somebody who just like because they want to contribute something valuable to the group. You can go learn something every single day and it's going to be extremely useful.
(22:34) There's there's some ballers in there. You just get like the benefit of learning from that like for the for the cost like you couldn't pay them that for their time but through the membership like you get access to some some incredible people and tons of resources. The Yeah. I mean I think the biggest resource to me too is like the events that you know Foxwell Founders does.
(22:51) They've been able to do some even in Wisconsin, even in the the boring state of Wisconsin, which is pretty awesome. Getting people together in person and able to have really just like honest conversations of what's going on, what's working for them now, you know, where where they're at in their business and knowing that there's going to be, like Brad said, some real killers in the space in this in this membership that can that can help and are willing to take the time and help. So, that's been a huge part of why a lot of our team have really enjoyed it as well. And the applications are now open if
(23:16) you're looking to join. So, founders. Yeah, foxfounders.com. Go check it out. Go follow. What are the brands that you feel like get the most like spend out of your ads? Like what are what are they allowing you to do? What are they doing? What are you doing uniquely for them that are the ones that are getting the most volume of spend versus some that you're like we we tried our best, but it just didn't didn't work out.
(23:39) I mean, again, the creative stuff like the the ones that are willing to try very creative concepts, creative ideas, not only not only layout, you got you got to think outside of layouts. So, like you got to think outside of, okay, this is an ugly ad, this is a comparative ad. Uh, this is this doesn't really matter. It's really about the the main idea that you're trying to deliver.
(23:58) And if the brand is fine with trying out new ideas, new settings, they're probably going to perform better with us. That's one thing. Then, um, and it's a it's kind of a global branding decision, but you should probably frame your brand as an offer brand even. I mean, probably any brand, any product can become an offer.
(24:18) Actually, that's what I think. And your your statics are going to work better if you can if you can have an offer behind it. If you're just selling a product and it it doesn't really have an offer like it doesn't have to be a bogo or a percentage off or a subscribe and say, but like it has to have this twist where you're like you're more entitled to buy and your statics are going to work better eventually also. Okay. So, two things.
(24:42) You're willing to try creative ideas and you're able to frame your brand into an offer environment. Okay, that's that's probably the the two answers that I have for this. And then your testing metrics, your testing metrics, sorry. So like for example, I think I think the best way to test statics right now and and to find the most performance out of your set of static ads is to brief net new concepts.
(25:02) So like different stuff. Let's say you brief five per week, five net new concepts, very different. And then within each concept, you do variations of targeting different dem demographics. So you'd have one concept, three demographic, so three different design variations. And then you can also have three different headline variation, one per variation.
(25:23) Okay? So you end up with a set that has a lot of different concepts. Each of them has design variations and appropriate copy. And this is how you can really test at scale new audiences, but also find winners, work on evergreen, and you know, keep double rank.
(25:43) And you're putting just to be clear as I answer like how do you suggest people test this? Like I mean a lot of people are coming to you are probably spending a decent amount but are you suggesting that they just throw it all in a new ASC or in the existing or I mean it depends on the buyers I suppose in the accountant situation maybe you're letting them decide that. Definitely depends on the buyer.
(26:00) I'm an guy but like I would run I would run you know I would run my my tests with with on an setup. So like for example you'd have you'd have either either you have all net new concepts no variations competing within each other in a single adset. So like three to five net new concepts competing within within each other. That is if you have a low budget low is different between brands.
(26:23) But like if you spend less than 100k per month on meta you're probably better off working on bigger swings. So like don't spend money and time figuring out variations. just spend money and time on getting those net new concept and make them compete within each other. If you have more money to spend, you can probably dilute that ad spend across multiple ABOS and and try and deep dive a little more.
(26:49) And if you have more money, if you're spending above 100K per month on Meta, you can have one per concept. And that includes all the variations. And then you have a third way which is less preferred to me. But if your account works with an AAC setup, you can actually do that is you can use the big boy the big boy setup having a lot of variations and put it all on an AAC and and you know hope something sticks. Okay, that's the third way.
(27:13) Personally, I prefer testing because I feel like it's it's also a mindset shift. Okay, when I when I test Static SP spends money on ads as well. So I know I know like I test as well. when I spend money on an setup, uh, it's actually a lot of money, right? You're spending a lot of money behind it.
(27:32) And so, if it doesn't work, next time you go into the account, you're going to be more thoughtful about your testing. You're going to you're going to think twice, right? If you put everything into an AAC with a low budget and if you're a small brand and you're starting out spending less than 100k per month, um it may not be so much worth it to do this because if it doesn't work, you're not really going to know what didn't work and it's not going to be a huge loss for you. So you'll be like, that didn't work, right? So that's why I like because it forces me to be
(27:59) good. It's pretty much that. Yeah. I mean I there's so many different ways to think about it, but I generally agree with you. I think it's tough. I mean it's especially if you have a lower budget which I think a lot of people live in especially that are listening to this podcast right so so a followup another question I have um you know you're exposed to a lot of creative strategists and a lot of creative strategy process within different organizations I think that one of the things that every brand is trying to figure out right now is how do we make
(28:25) the process so you talked about like here's how you develop different personas you look you know get inspiration from different places how do you make the process of of doing creative strategy briefing faster and better like because I think there's a big hangup in a lot of that that brands don't h the owners are doing it themselves or they're you know what I mean they're trying to find a CS that they're doing this or the agency is doing it the agencies do varying job like jobs of varying degrees of good jobs of this and so I'm just curious you
(28:53) you're exposed to a lot what are those that are doing it really successfully what are they doing and let's just focus on the ones that aren't the biggest brands in the world because clearly like the ridges and everybody they're going to have like 10 CS people 100% Actually, so maybe controversial, but like if you are under eight figures a year, the founder should probably lead all that.
(29:12) Like the founder is probably the best person to know about the creative strategy. And it's probably also the biggest lever for the business. If that person can unlock that next stage of growth, it's going to change everything. And it's been talked here. It's been talked everywhere. One ad can change your business and life. A single ad.
(29:30) So like you're probably better off working on this yourself. Honestly, if you try and hire yourself out of this at this st at this stage, sorry, you're not going to have the money to hire the best probably. Or the best, they won't work with you because maybe they work on a percentage of ad spend.
(29:49) And if you spend less than 100k per month, they may not look at you like like an interesting client. That's the truth, right? So what I think is if you're under eight figures revenue, you should probably figure it out yourself. like as a founder, you built this product, you know why it works, you should probably work on it.
(30:08) Um, a great a great example of that, let's say you want to make a bunch of videos. But by the way, founder le videos are crushing right now. They're doing amazing across accounts. So I saw this guy Zack from Hollow. I saw an ad from them. It was like really it was cool. It was really interesting. So yes, but yes, founder videos are actually super helpful for sure. Yeah.
(30:27) So my answer is you should probably do it yourself and and yeah, start thinking about the the the brand and the message you want to put across. And I actually have a great example for this. I think Andrew, you're into golfing, aren't you? Probably. I'm terrible at I'm not good at it. No. Okay. You're not good at it. No. Um but I mean I'm terrible as well.
(30:44) Yeah. I'm terrible as well. But I've seen golf courses. Let's Let's say you have a golfing brand like you sell gears or whatever. All right. All right. love it. And you're like, you want to try and find a new video concept. The way the way you shouldn't go about it is open open an ad library and try and find a cool concept.
(31:04) That's that's not the way you should probably you should probably think about, okay, where does the conversation happen for my audience, right? Is it on the green? Maybe maybe it's a great idea. You could start with that, but like maybe you can also like find some some better stuff.
(31:23) Like maybe great conversation about golfing happen at the clubhouse restaurant, right? At the restaurant. They're all sitting together after golfing and like they have an hourong conversation about golf. Can I recreate that setting? Can I do it myself? Can can I put a bunch of people talking about golf together in a restaurant, giving them mics, recording that, and have an hour long of raw content about my golfing brand? That's the kind of ideas probably only a founder can find because because if they hire an agency for that, they will never have the the budget for it, but they can probably find a way to be scrappy about it and and deliver themselves, right? So like that that's kind of the way to go.
(31:55) Like don't try and and find the concept to fit to your brand messaging, but like think about your brand when where does the conversation happen and then create concept around that, right? And the more organic it it looks and feels obviously the better it's going to go. Yeah. Yeah.
(32:13) And then you can spin up new you can spin up B-rolls on top of that conversation and like introduce your product and and show it in action and have a bunch of weird video footage going on and like create an action ad and that that could rip or not and then you move to the next thing. So what's your core creative stack that you you guys are using right like Figma, Adobe and where do people lose efficiency in like the hand file handoffs and all this kind of stuff but I think working with a partner. Yeah.
(32:36) So, so, so like I feel so our stack is is mainly Adobe and Figma for like putting things together. Adobe is for product composition. So, like mixing backgrounds and product, making sure it's beautiful and it's well lit and it's well integrated. Um, and Figma is for displaying copy and receiving client feedback. Okay.
(32:54) So, like feedback is for scaling copy and assets and Adobe is for core design production. Um, one one thing about this, you're better off having everything in one place and we use Adobe a lot and especially Adobe Firefly. They're AI generative creative tool built in and it's great and it's it's really good. Same thing for like assets libraries.
(33:14) We use Freep, we use Envado. Freepai is actually amazing. No one is talking about it. Like I feel like in our industry, everyone is chasing the next thing when it comes to tools and whatnot, but like the old players are doing very good at this.
(33:33) And so we try and limit the numbers of the number of of tools we use to make sure we stay efficient. I'm actually messing around a lot. I've been messing around with uh with Jiminy this week and uh it's amazing. You can create some really cool stuff and we do use it for hooks for example for hook generations. It's great but it's very slow and it definitely slows you down.
(33:52) So like you really need to find that balance between speeds and new and like try to find the right balance. Adobe and Figma is is the perfect setup and then you can add some some tools on on the sides. Yeah. The So, let's switch over to talking about video and let's talk about, you know, what what you're seeing. Obviously, you've been getting into this.
(34:09) I mean, the company's name Static, so I don't know what you're going to rename. Yeah. But, uh, but your statics in motion or something, I don't know. Just, you know, brainstorming here. But I think there's I'd be curious about like the systems, the production techniques, the hook frameworks that you utilize to scale spend efficiently and not just look good.
(34:27) Utilizing video, what you guys are doing that's really killing it. Yeah. Can before you answer that, why video? What's I mean, you kind of alluded to it earlier like statics are great for testing and getting some insight, but ultimately it's probably scale, right? So I guess what what led to that before you do that? Sorry, Andrew, cut you off. Yeah.
(34:44) So the thought process behind this was I guess an average client at static probably spends 30% 40% max of their ad spend on static ads right and I love static ads for all the reasons that we stated before super cheap clicks ability to iterate some decent performance etc etc but to achieve true scale you probably need some video formats as well in the matrix right so like for us it was the natural next step into the into the process And we were able to find a nice offer that is very similar to static in which we still have some kind of inputs in footage selection for example but we still give brands the ability to direct the scene right if I
(35:26) may. But like they still brief us in some capacities. For example, if they want to use a certain type of talking head or a roll, they they can still do it and they they can still tell us about it. But like we still have an input on on the B-roll side of things and footage selection, which is I think the great compromise between the brands seek net new raw content. They create a huge library of content. They upload that into their video library.
(35:51) They keep on seeking, you know, new reels. And on our end, we scale the art production. And so you have like kind of a B party setup which works really well. Yeah. I'm thinking about an example literally right now where we've had footage for a client for probably months.
(36:09) Like I know because I actually filmed part of it cuz I happen to have the product and we just added a couple headlines to it and all of a sudden it's ripping and it like months ago did nothing as is. And I feel like a lot of brands like build this insane library and just don't do a great job of like continuing to go through it.
(36:22) which is like one of the core things that we do and sounds like what you guys do is just like how can we repurpose this a million times over. Um I think the trap that you can fall into with doing that though is you just make these like mini iterations that don't aren't actually meaningful and I know I'm like really diverting away from Andrew's original question so I'm sorry.
(36:38) Um, is there when when you think about um like iteration specifically for for video content, are you pushing brands to say, "Cool, you've got all this footage, but like we shouldn't just be changing the headline." Like, we need to be thinking about here's the visual hook that's currently working on this video. And I'm kind of alluding to the framework that we use, which like the average person that's actually watched this, there's only 25% of people that have stopped and watched this in the first 3 seconds. So if we change the visual hook in a very meaningful way that's still relevant for the rest of
(37:03) the video that gives us a whole basically net new ad like how are you how are you coaching people through like what to focus on when iterating on videos if at all. Yeah. Yeah. So so the way the way we're coaching them is brands so they work in cycles as well just like prosthetics actually they should be seeking intentionally new B- rolls all the time.
(37:22) Okay. like it's it's actually you have to brief B- rolls intentionally just just to make sure everyone like if we're on the same page here, a B-roll is a supporting footage. That means it's usually not someone talking, but it's a product in use or something weird happening with your product.
(37:40) Like again, uh if you're in the coffee space, you can just take a white white t-shirt and spill coffee all over it. You can shug a monster energy. You can be very creative with those B- rolls and if you're intentional briefing them, you can create a huge library of them because they're actually very cheap to get from the creators, you can also do them yourself, a lot of them, right? And so you do a bit every month and you already have a lot to work with and you create new angles out of them, right? So like I don't know, I'm taking my coffee and I'm drinking it and I'm making a weird grim face of like because it's bitter and
(38:11) it's not good and and you know and then it gives you the jeters the coffee. So like you check the monster energy and and then you're like traveling, you know, you can you can be very creative with that and it's very cheap to do. Okay. And you have to be intentional with them.
(38:28) So I'm like, "Hey yo guys, please brief new B- rolls every every month. Um and and do this consistently consistently." And then you have the A-roll talking heads which is much harder to get and it's also more expensive. So how do you think about it? You should be again if if if we take the the thought process that I introduced before with you know the golfing example.
(38:51) If you think about your brand and you're like okay where does the conversation happen and you uncover a bunch of settings a bunch of situations. Um then you have to think about okay can I do this myself? Okay yes I can do it myself so I can get some a going on. Um can a creator do it? Yeah okay okay they can do it. So I'm going to hire some creators and then should I hire an agency for that? So, like for example, if you think the conversation happen in the street and you want to have street interviews footage, chances are you cannot really make that happen with a creator, chances are you're not going to
(39:18) go there yourself. Okay? So, probably you're better off hiring an agency for that. Um, so yeah, you should think about a-roll content in cycles. So, probably like every two, three months you get an influence of new A-roll content of talking, people talking, okay? And then every month you get new visuals.
(39:37) And if you do that consistently, every quarter, you're going to have new content to make. And you don't you don't even need to think about what's what's my next angle because it's going to be there anyway. You're going to have so much content. It's going to be there. And the tools out there right now, the video library tools, they allow you to tag automatically the content too.
(39:56) So like you can just open the library, you can hire someone for it or you can do it yourself. But like you can open the library, put some clips clips together, use AI for hooks and keep on spinning new video ads all the time and you're actually making big swings.
(40:16) It's not it's not because it's not because you go only B- rolls and AI voice over that that it cannot work. It can actually work very very well. I've seen I've seen six figures ad spend on AI voice over simple script and a bunch of B- rolls on the back end. So like and and this is life-changing for a brand life-changing and every everybody can can can do this very easily with a bunch of B-roll.
(40:35) So uh so yeah the answer is be consistent and intentional with how you brief B- rolls and then think about the messaging that you want to put across and try and get new raw talking head content every quarter and then you're you'll be good to go. Yeah. I mean I think a big theme of this podcast is really from you is like what you've seen in terms of you know obviously you have visibility into mass ton of accounts and what's working for them. they're telling you you're you're guiding a lot of this process obviously for them in building their ads is a lot
(40:59) of it is utilize the creation of a lot of B-roll and have that and have also the same thing with statics like have more and think outside the box and you can be the one in charge of that you don't necessarily have to do these incredibly polished pieces and which is which is good you know I think another thing you talked about with video is hire agencies to get the specific content street interviews organic style podcast style don't purchase finished ads ads only with agencies or creators. Make sure it includes RAW%
(41:28) close close celebrity author figures into whitelisting deals. Seek tons of hooks and then your video production process video library of A and B- rolls plus script plus AI v uh voice over plus editor and static. The last one is the one I want to ask about which is that piece.
(41:49) So they have A and B- roll stuff, the script generally and then you guys are putting it together. But that's really the magic or like how are you how does that process work to make something really great for for folks? Yeah, we're putting it together once we have everything. We pretty much have like we have video editors who are kind of strategist as well.
(42:06) They wouldn't write copy, they wouldn't write the script, but they can understand what performs, how to transition clips properly, and where should clips go, which is which is, you know, the it's it's like basic, but it's how you put together an ad that performs. Okay. So, uh, so yeah, that that's that's pretty much it.
(42:26) It's really about seeking the content, being intentional, and then either you brief it specifically to an editor that you hire in house or you hire someone like us to do the job for you. It's it's pretty much about that. And when it comes to authority figures, you know, you guys have been talking about whitisting already quite a lot, but I feel like authority figures are a different kind of edits. Usually, it's more organic. It looks more organic at least.
(42:51) And you probably need to be less heavy on the editing when it comes to whitelisting. Okay. So, so you'd probably give more freedom to the authority figure that's working for you. You probably give them more freedom because they they know their audience. So, so yes, it's going on paid, but like it's it's a different kind of uh video editing setting.
(43:08) It's a different it's a different thing. One thing I'll say is um I think we should transition into the final episode of or the final segment of the podcast, what we always get into, which is beefs. And we all have different opinions about this. I want to ask Zach a question as it relates to to the working with you guys. You know, Zach, obviously you have your own internal creative teams.
(43:26) Then you have a team like Static coming in and doing stuff. You know, what are the beefs that you have in terms of what others have done and how they produce creative and make it great versus what Static has done and what the difference is there? I think it mostly comes down to just like creativity and net new ideas, right? So, it's just hiring an agency to just repeat the same playbook over and over again. I mean, we've kind of talked about this is just there's no point, right? I mean, you've kind of buried a
(43:52) concept like if we have, you know, we had one concept that would always work. We hired a few creative agencies early on and they would just take that concept and try to like iterate on just that one um and apply it to other things. It just didn't it didn't move the needle, right? So, I think the one thing that Static's done is they take, you know, they take bigger swings on the visual, on the just overall aesthetic of these ads and don't just take templates and and rerun it. So, my beef usually comes down to just
(44:15) like almost laziness and trying to templatize creative, right? I think that that's where some of these, you know, there's like other things out there where you can buy 50 templates and just run those for your brand. It's less about the template as Simon has said like historically I agree with him entirely there and it's more about like the concept and the creativity that goes in that's going to actually get the attention of someone while they're scrolling. That's my that's my perspective on Yeah. I mean, I think Simon, my my beef
(44:38) that I I hear a lot in creative strategy discussions is, well, I wanted to create new stuff and so I went to the ad library to look at what my competitors were doing and you've obviously talked about that and that's not necessarily a bad thing to get a baseline, but it's also like you're you're building off of others ideas and you're not necessarily thinking creatively on your own, which I think has been a big theme of what you guys do, which is really special.
(44:57) Um, and is clearly something that sets you apart. You know, my beef is like be be original. That's that's an important point because like if you think about how people interact with ads, like if I go to Hollow's website right now, my feed and my story placements and my reels for the next seven days are going to be socks competitors.
(45:16) And if your ads look the exact same because you stole from each other, like it's probably not going to do anything, right? Like it's it's really hard to break through when I see the the comparison ad with the exact same visuals side by side. So yeah, that's a point worth uh thinking deeply about. Yeah, 100%. Awesome. Well, Simon, we're so glad to have you, man.
(45:36) Thank you for being here. And uh I do want to say as a, you know, just a transparent nature. Static and Simon as sponsor of this episode. However, we only take sponsors from those places and vendors and people that we work with who drive results across brands that we've seen. I've seen it personally in Foxville Founder members. Simon doing great work and his team doing great work at Static.
(45:55) Obviously, Zach's seeing it with Hollow. Brad is cheap, so he doesn't he doesn't have any money. I've referred No, I've referred people. I've now referred to him. He's actually Yeah, that's true. He's a big He's a big referral guy. Big referral guy. Have to get back to you on that. Yeah. The reality is that Brad is smarter than Zach and I both.
(46:12) So that just I mean we're at the end of the podcast, but that's the that's the truth. So if you we want to be transparent about that, but you know, we stand behind the work that you guys are doing and obviously appreciate the partnership and uh yeah, if you have questions on any of this, you can obviously hit Simon on X is a good place. You can also reach out to Andrew at foxhwelldigital.com.
(46:32) I'm happy to connect you with Simon and and I'm sure there's some sort of special deal for podcast listeners that they'll cook up for you guys. 100%. So, I appreciate it, Simon. And uh thanks for being here, guys. Thank you guys for having me.
(46:49) Hope uh hope you you enjoyed it and you know you had value from it and happy to answer any questions you guys have. [Music] The only way that we grow this podcast is by you sharing it with your friends. Honestly, like reviews kind of don't really mean anything too much anymore. They're really meaningful, but they don't do a lot for the growth of the podcast.
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