The Agency Hour
The Agency Hour is for digital agency owners like you who want to start, grow and scale their businesses. It’s like hanging out with friends while getting a masterclass in how to tackle the most significant obstacles you’re facing as an entrepreneur.
The Agency Hour
Global Connections: Damon Simms on Bridging Business Between New Zealand and Southeast Asia
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
You can say that recessions are blood bust and all the rest of it, but um, you know, recessions also generally make people rich. And um businesses still need to sell their products. That that that doesn't change because if you uh as a business, if you suddenly no longer have that need, then you very quickly cease to exist.
SPEAKER_00Welcome to the Agency Hour podcast, where we help web design and digital agency owners create abundance for themselves, their teams, and their communities. This week we have a slight departure in the type of guests that we normally have on the agency hour. This week we're joined by Damon Sims from across the Dutch in New Zealand, as they say. Damon is the co-founder of ASEANs. Not to be confused with ASEAN, which is the Association of Southeast Asian nations. This is the uh ASEANs with a Z on the end. Uh, what these guys do is build relationships between New Zealand companies wanting to export product into Southeast Asian markets. They do that by building connections between institutes, business, uh, entrepreneurs, and helping New Zealand businesses navigate all the compliance of getting their products into those markets. Uh, in this episode, Damon shares why he quit the workforce and why he quit employment, the reasons behind him quitting employment, which honestly were very similar to mine. We have that connection there. And also we dive into the process of building those connections between what it takes to build connections between New Zealand companies and Southeast Asian companies, which products are ripe for importing and exporting, and the cultural differences between marketing in New Zealand and marketing in Southeast Asia. Now, the reason Damon is on the podcast is because I found him on LinkedIn. I read what he I did cult outreach on LinkedIn and I read what he does. And the week prior, I had had a conversation with someone in one of our coaching programs who are a New Zealand marketing agency who are focused on helping New Zealand companies get themselves ready to export into foreign markets. And so I thought this would be an interesting, slightly different conversation, but an interesting conversation nonetheless. And what I want you to think about while listening to this episode is if you're a marketing agency, what else do your clients need that you don't provide? And how can you get your clients connected with people in your network that can also help them? Because I believe your job is to become the most helpful person in your client's network. Um, that's how you reduce churn and keep clients happy over the long term. And so that's why I wanted Damon to come in and share his experiences to give us a little bit of insight into some of the other providers that your clients might need in the future. I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as I did. I'm Troy Dean. Stay with us. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the Agency Hour podcast, Damon Sims from Usy Arns. Hey Damon, how are you, my friend? I'm good, Troy. How are you? I'm very well, thank you. Now, I I will let people know this is a you're a slightly different guest than those that we usually have on the agency hour. And I do want to tell the story about how we connected. But before I do that, just give people the the the family barbecue version of who you are and what you do.
SPEAKER_01I came up through high-end hotel management uh and then moved into um business development in IT. Um, worked across Australia and New Zealand. Uh in 2012 or 2013, I decided that having a job was no longer something I was interested in. Uh, and I wanted to I wanted to create uh uh an opportunity for myself at a couple of requirements. Number one, it had to be lucrative. Number two, it had to be location independent, and number three, I wasn't interested in answering to anyone but myself. Um so that that took me out to the Philippines.
SPEAKER_00They're pretty good criteria. I think they're the same criteria that I have, actually.
SPEAKER_01Exactly. Um so that took me uh out to the Philippines where I formed a marketing agency. Um I was there for six years, uh providing outsourced marketing solutions to mainly clients in Australia and a couple in New Zealand. Wow, in this in 2012. Uh yeah, I got there no, by the time I got to the Philippines, it was about 2015.
SPEAKER_00Right, okay. So still pretty, pretty early on and ahead of the curve in terms of because that's a that's a not to hijack your story, but that's a big thing now, is like a lot of our clients, particularly agencies, have staff in the Philippines, but we're talking 2023. This is something that's happened really over the sort of the last six or seven years, and COVID really accelerated that. So you're a bit of an early adopter in that respect. So sorry, go on. I I I I digress.
SPEAKER_01No, that's okay. Um and uh I ran that for six years, had a great time, loved the Philippines, loved the people. Um on a side note, I also had a three-bedroom house and a couple of vacation apartments by the beach. Um so I sort of sat there by the beach uh directing traffic and I really enjoyed that that lifestyle.
unknownWow.
SPEAKER_01Um after that I uh headed up up to Hong Kong for a while, which is actually where I grew up. Uh so I grew up in Hong Kong in the 80s, which was a pretty wild sort of an experience. And uh we um uh got up to Hong Kong and started working on a few other projects. Um, my time in the Philippines had come to an end, and then eventually uh COVID reared its head. And um I left Hong Kong on uh the 15th of February 2020. Wow. Um it was an eerie experience. The airport was completely empty um because they've also just had the riots that that had six months of uh of riots and protests going on. Um again, a a wild time to be there. Um and uh flew to Sydney on an almost empty plane and then connected over to Wellington. I thought I'd be here for a couple of months, and uh well, I mean, the rest is history, we will know what happened after that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's right. Because it I I was in the States in Feb 2020 and I was sitting on a plane, I was flying from LA to uh Phoenix to speak at an event, and I was sitting on a plane next to two people who were wearing masks, and I was like, what's going on? And they they were teachers, they were teaching English as a second language in China. They'd both just got out of China and come back to the States, and they were both saying the reason they got out is because if they didn't get out now, they'd be stuck there and they didn't know for how long. And I'm like, what the hell is going on with this COVID thing? What is COVID? I came back to Australia, we moved house on the on Friday, the 13th of March, 2020, and literally three days later, and we moved out of an apartment into a house with a big backyard, and three days later we went into lockdown and we were pregnant at the time. We had one kid and pregnant with another. We dodged, and it was a complete fluke that we moved into a house two days before three days before lockdown. We dodged a massive bullet. And I remember coming back from the States going, I think this COVID thing's gonna really take off. I think there's a this is because it like we were pretty lucky in Australia, it happened here later. So I imagine Feb 2020, it would have been in full swing in Hong Kong.
SPEAKER_01The thing that encouraged me to make the decision to leave was that they were starting to lock down specific apartment buildings in Mongk, which was the district I was living in. And those lockdowns were quite brutal. You know, you you you you you you were literally trapped in your flat. Um and I was living in a tiny studio flat in an old industrial building, and I just thought I I don't want to spend a week locked in here, let alone um any longer than that. So I I I made the call.
SPEAKER_00What's the business? You you leave the Philippines, uh, you leave the marketing agency. What are you doing in Hong Kong at this point?
SPEAKER_01Uh I was working actually uh in marketing, but I was working with a corporate intelligence agency. Um so you know, uh risk mitig risk mitigations, due diligence and stuff like that. Um and I was also operationally involved with that. So that that was a lot of fun. Okay, got it. What do you do now?
SPEAKER_00What is what is RCANs?
SPEAKER_01What do you do? Uh well the uh sticker on the tin says that we build uh strong bilateral relationships between Southeast Asian companies and New Zealand companies. Um what that actually means is a completely different thing for every project and every client. It's it's it's about um understanding uh the story behind the product or the business that we're working with, um, translating that both uh linguistically and culturally into new markets. Yep. Um and so I mean I I I I I I say I'm basically a storyteller. You know, compensations are my currency. And um that's that's the that that's that's what I do. I I talk to people all day, and um as a part of that I help them grow their businesses.
SPEAKER_00And so the mechanics of that, the reason that you and I connected is um I reached out, I think, on LinkedIn, and uh we I kind of saw what you do. We have a client that I've been working with who's an agency based in New Zealand, and what they do is from a digital marketing point of view and an online presence point of view, for want of a better, less generic term, um, they kind of help companies, New Zealand companies who want to export and expand into other markets, either you know, Australia or Southeast Asia. Um, so you know, for example, wine companies or food companies or manufacturers, uh, they help them kind of get their digital landscape ready to make that uh make that leap. Um, and I actually connected them with a bunch of contacts I have here in Australia through Oz Trade. And then when I found you, I'm like, oh hang on. This is kind of feels like this would be a good um combination for them to have contact with you. And then you and I connected and I thought, you know what, this is this is an interesting conversation on the podcast because I think some I think what happens with marketing agencies is you can kind of get lost in the marketing bubble, right? So you can kind of think, well, what we do is the most important stuff for clients, but you don't you forget that your clients, marketing agencies, your clients have other suppliers and other consultants and other relationships with other companies that you should be aware of. And so what I wanted to sort of unpack today was if I'm a marketing agency and I'm helping a New Zealand company get ready to start exporting, I believe my belief is that your job, whether you're a marketing agency or whether you're doing what you're you're doing, is your job really is to become the most helpful person in your client's world, right? So that doesn't mean you have to do everything for them. It's a I think it's a combination of this is what we do with in terms of our services, but I can also get you connected with people who do all this other stuff that you're going to need. And that's why you're here. That's kind of why I wanted to have this conversation. So just walk me through the process. If I'm a New Zealand winemaker and I do have a friend of mine in in Perth, Simon Bowen, who actually helped Margaret, he helped the Margaret River wine region who were suffering big time, largely because New Zealand winemakers were exporting so much beautiful wine into Australia that it's it squeezed our margins. And so Simon helped the Margaret River wine region export into China, came up with a great strategy, worked really well. What is the process? If I'm a New Zealand company and I've got a product and I want to start exporting into uh into Southeast Asia, what are some of the things I need to think about and what do you guys typically help clients with?
SPEAKER_01Depending on which market you're going into, you might have to obtain local registration for your product. Um in food products, depending again, whether it's Vietnam or Cambodia or places like that, they've all got slightly different rules. Um you're going to need someone to clear the product through there. You're going to need someone up there to go on sales calls and take samples out for you and actually get the product introduced. So we set up those relationships. So we're we're we're sort of a step before the marketing comes in almost. We open the market for them, we we use our extensive network all throughout Asia to um enable businesses in New Zealand to have trusted contacts on the ground up there to navigate regulatory stuff, to navigate um getting collateral translated into local languages. Um in an example in Cambodia, we've got a really, really great local marketing agency that does amazing work and we absolutely love them. And and they uh will help prepare the marketing side of things. But what we do first is we establish the relationships with the suppliers here and then get them over those hurdles because it's it's actually like like you know, there's little things like we've got an FTA with Vietnam, but honey is a prohibited export, you know, and and it's it's it's all sorts of there's all sorts of nuances to it that you don't really think about and and that you're not going to be able to deal with unless you know what you're doing in Asia.
SPEAKER_00And my and I look, I've spent a little bit of time in Southeast Asia, not a lot, but I've spent a little bit of time in Thailand and Indonesia, main Thailand more so. And I would say that Thailand is probably, in my experience and through hearsay, Thailand is probably one of the more well-regulated uh economies there that kind of looks and feels a little bit similar to what we might experience here in Australia and New Zealand. I would argue that Indonesia is is is you know, for for want of a better word, feels a little bit like the Wild West. It's kind of feels a little bit more chaotic. I imagine that that each of those parts of Southeast Asia would have its own level of regulation and it and it's it that wouldn't be as e especially English is is you know, if English is your first language and you are used to very well documented, very well systemized uh government departments, right? That going into somewhere like Cambodia Oh yeah, it's it it's a whole whole new ball game. Right. Yeah so how so how did how did your I mean okay so you spent a bit of time there, but how did this op how did you say and then you're back in New Zealand, we go into COVID, you know, we spend most of our life living in our lounge rooms uh for a couple of years. How did this opportunity rear its head? Like when did you go, hang on a second, I'm I have some value here that I can add by forming these relationships. How did that come about?
SPEAKER_01What what happened was um uh the the guy who I formed the company with, David Pearson, um he was chased back here in a very similar way to the way that I was. What's interesting about that, we actually met when we were both living in VNT An in Lao about five years ago. And we ended up back in New Zealand about an hour away from each other. Um and both of us were sort of displaced from our uh our traveling days um and trying to get used to the the new normal as they called it. Um and we just started having conversations about you know what what can we do to keep to remain involved in Asia and what opportunities exist here and and what value can we bring to New Zealand businesses, but also to Asian businesses that are interested in New Zealand. Um so we had a we we just had a series of conversations, and I mean the business was probably had its uh genesis maybe four years ago. We we officially incorporated a couple of years ago. Um and yeah, that's so so so he and I both found ourselves uh displaced, and effectively uh I mean I'd been gone for he'd been gone for 13 years, I'd been gone for longer than that. Um effectively in a foreign country, even though we're both New Zealand citizens, um it was just a whole new, you know, I'd I'd never seen a self-checkout before, for example, you know, and and and because they don't they don't exist up there, you know. Um and uh so so we we we we we figured that we could add some value to some new New Zealand businesses, so we started identifying some targets and um reaching out to them, and the reception's been fantastic.
SPEAKER_00So I want to unpack that a little bit too, because there's something in in this marketing agencies are typically very bad at doing their own marketing and they pretty much live off referrals and word of mouth and a professional network. What was the strategy for reaching out to new? Well, first of all, what was the strategy for identifying? I mean, I have this conversation every day. I've got agencies in Messenger right now. I could I won't, but I could show you a conversation going, uh, you know, we just need clients. I'm like, great, who's your ideal client? How can I refer someone to you? Oh, anyone with a pulse and and a credit card? I'm like, no, hang on a second. If I'm gonna refer someone to you, I need to know what you do and who you do it for. And a lot of people just haven't thought through that exercise, right? So, how did you identify who the companies are that are most likely wanting to export and where you could add value and have the most success?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so it was really a case of looking um the at what is being exported into China, first off, because that's our biggest export market. Um, and it's a simp quite a similar market to parts of Southeast Asia as far as uh what what products people want. We started there and then we sort of arrived at uh at the moment, it's beef, honey, and wine. Um and we started looking at some of the lesser served markets in Southeast Asia and saying, right, okay, you're already exporting here. You we know you're an exporter, we know you can produce it. Can we open a new market for you? And and the mechanics of the outreach were very simple. I just, I just exactly the same way you connected with Metro. LinkedIn. Yeah. It's it's it it's a monster. It's it's an absolute beast. And it's um when whenever I find myself needing to talk to someone, I'm I I find it really effective just to just to reach out and ask the question.
SPEAKER_00And it's interesting because in the space that I'm in, everyone I you know, every group, every Facebook group I'm in or Slack channel I'm in, everyone bags LinkedIn as being a spam playground, right? I have I love LinkedIn. I actually think LinkedIn is great. If the I think there's two uh factors. One, you've got to know who you want to talk to. And I want to talk to anyone who's and the reason that you and I connected is not because you're a marketing agency, but just because I think you're doing something interesting that is supplemental to what marketing agencies do. And also, I just had a conversation recently with the New Zealand Marketing Agency about this very topic. So I'm like, well, that's super interesting. Maybe I could just get you guys connected. Then when you and I connect and had a quick Zoom call, I'm like, you know what, let's just get on the podcast. Because we were halfway through a conversation. I'm like, we should be recording this because I know my audience would find it valuable. Let's get on the podcast, which is I think one of the good things about having a podcast. So you've got to know who you want to talk to. But second of all, you have to know what you want them to do next, right? And so with you, it was I want to get you on the podcast. So that made sense for me to reach out to you. Uh, with a marketing agency, I just want to get on a call with them and see where they're stuck and if we can help them. So I think a lot of the reason that um people uh have a bad experience on LinkedIn is because a lot of service providers will just have a scattergun approach and will just blast everyone, and then your inbox kind of gets full of junk, right? Um I wanna how did you f how did you identify beef, wine, and honey? It's not like I mean, I don't think can I go to Google and say, hey, tell me what products are currently being exported from New Zealand into China but aren't being exported into Vietnam? Well, no, I I mean that that um or was it Chat GPT that gave you that answer?
SPEAKER_01No, no, no. Um that that that process is is trial and error like anything. You know, you you you you you you you you work you know just just just keep talking to people and eventually you'll find a you you'll find the right fit. Um and and and that's why I sort of say my my life is all about having conversations with people. Um to as far as what's not being exported into Vietnam and Cambodia, etc., I've both myself and my business partner have got quite a bit of local knowledge in markets like that. Um that helps. We've also got an organization here called NZTE, New Zealand Trade and Enterprise, which is our Oz Trade. Um so connecting with them and talking to the people who are in country about what products they'd like to support to get into the into the country. Um so it's it's liaising with government here, it's liaising with distributors there, and it's it it the secret source is is just between David and I, we've got you know nearly three decades of experience operating in the region, so we we we've got a fairly good idea of what's going to work.
SPEAKER_00How do you get attention of someone like NZTE? I've imagined they're quite busy and they probably have a lot of you know incoming spam that they're trying to arbitrage and triage. So how do you how do you get on a call with them? Like how do you how do you how do you get past the gatekeeper?
SPEAKER_01Um uh David did a lot of that work. Um he's he's he's a very good networker. And um the the thing about organizations like NZTE uh and also Education New Zealand, which is another one that we work with, um they exist to support the industry, right? So if you're if you're coming to them and you're saying, look, we've got a supplier, we've got a product, we've got a market, help us. They're really helpful. That's that's that that that that's their purpose. Um so yeah, and and it's just about not being afraid to ask the question. You know? Um and and also most of these guys, they're really accessible. Uh, you know, uh again, uh you can connect with with government people by cold outreach on LinkedIn. You just have to make sure that that 300 characters or whatever you've got to to catch them has has a hook that's going to interest them.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Uh Australia has Oz Trade, which is a the version. And again, they're very um very willing. They're not great at picking up the phone, I must say, but they're very willing to uh help. We they've been a great support to us over the last four or five years. They have a couple of grant schemes that we've benefited from. One is the export distribution marketing grant. So if you're an Australian company making an Australian product and you export it, which we are, we have a a a suite of products that we uh they're digital products and services that we export to an American market predominantly. They will offset some of your marketing costs to promote that product internationally. They also have an RD grant, a research and development, which actually it's not a grant, it's a tax offset. So essentially you can claim I don't know what the amount is, but you can claim up to a certain amount per year, which comes off the tax that the company has to pay. If that is, if you are genuinely doing research and development on and trying to develop a new product to export into foreign markets. So they're uh and during COVID, one of the things that the Australian government did was they accelerated those grants and those tax offsets and they paid them upfront in advance. They it was it was a way of it was a channel for helping businesses uh who otherwise may have been struggling to keep their staff employed and and keep paying the bills was just to accelerate. So they've been an incredible support to us over the last few years. Um and again, they are all about wanting to support companies like yours and mine who are doing things to export Australian products internationally. What are what are what are so beef, wine, and honey, what are some of the things that um just walk me through some of the some of the cultural changes that you need to make when you're marketing, you know, a New Zealand product to a Southeast Asian market.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Well, I mean, I I think you mentioned you spent time in Thailand and Indonesia. I think you would have recognized that the collateral that's used in those markets that appeals to the people in those markets is very different from what would appeal to a New Zealand or an Australian. Yep. Um and that's why we use local agencies because they're the experts at that. Um and the one thing about brand New Zealand, it's got a really good reputation. Um in many Asian markets, like China, for instance. A lot of people don't necessarily trust locally produced products, but we New Zealand has a reputation of high quality, high standards. Um so it's about telling that story, but it's about telling it in a way that that is going to appeal to the eyeballs of a Southeast Asian, and that's a completely different uh situation to what you'd be doing if you were doing the same same thing here. Um so a lot of the marketing that that is done here doesn't really translate. Um so it's yeah, we we start from scratch, really.
SPEAKER_00Um and in terms of like the the not not just the aesthetic of the product, but like the positioning of it and because you know, like in our world, it's all about, you know, do you position it as a premium product? Uh what are the benefits, not so much the features, uh, how do we do, you know, um, if you're dealing with, you know, high-ticket services, it might be price anchoring or value proposition. So it's not just the aesthetic and the design of the collateral, but is is the positioning of it and the way that it's communicated. How is that different?
SPEAKER_01It's well, it's I mean, New Zealand products are always positioned as premium products. Um, they come at a far higher cost uh than um locally produced stuff. And um, you know, that but they don't really compete on the shelf with local products. Um they're they're sitting there next to maybe in the case of beef in Cambodia, you might have it next to American beef and Australian beef. Um but it but but there's no the the there are no local competitors that come close. So so it's all always a premium positioning.
SPEAKER_00And is it does that mean that the market the the the target market is smaller but the uh margins are higher?
SPEAKER_01Yep, yep. So so I mean uh the uh the like I'll use Cambodia as an example. Uh it's I think forecasting 7% growth this year. Uh it's the fastest growing economy in Southeast Asia. It's got um a middle class that's just booming, and they're really interested. And and and there's so so as as they've got more and more money available to them, they're starting to explore a lot of these other products. Um so I mean that's that's just one example, but that you know it's it's rapidly growing. And uh yet exports from New Zealand, um, they're they're they're lagging a bit behind. The the Aussies are in there, of course, um, and the Americans are in there. Um and uh that the opportunity in that in that burgeoning middle class is really where we where we fit in. So it might be a smaller market if you're looking at the entire population, but it's a very wealthy and highly motivated market.
SPEAKER_00Right. And it's you know, this, I mean, we've seen this happen in India and China, where the middle class has risen up and they have money and they want this lifestyle that they've seen for so long and they want access to these premium products. Um, what what what else I imagine the, and I don't know, uh I I actually this is I don't know if you handle this, but uh I imagine that supply chain into those countries is a logistical nightmare. Do you is that something you help your clients navigate?
SPEAKER_01All of the people that we work with are experienced exporters, so um they're that they're they're good with getting a product on a plane and getting it to an airport or onto a boat. Um where the supply chain becomes a nightmare is that you have no idea what sort of facilities your local agents and distributors have. And when you're dealing with products such as beef and honey, obviously there's there there's spoilage. If if honey's above 20 odd degrees for an extended period of time, it crystallizes and it's worthless. Um that's where our relationships with people on the ground who we know have the capabilities to do that really come into play.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_00I mean, there was a big story in Australia a few years ago about live export, the live export industry of exporting cattle into Indonesia and the way that those cattle were treated when they arrived in Indonesia. There was a massive backlash, and that I am ignorant in terms of how where that story is now, but I do remember it was national news for a week. There were strikes, there was talk about banning live cattle export uh from Australia, and there was a whole industry that was going to fall over if that happened, and uh it was a it was it was big news. Um I also want to talk about you mentioned education New Zealand, and I remember we spoke about this when we first connected. What so this is interesting because you're well you tell us, yeah. I mean you're exporting education, but you're importing international students, right? Correct.
SPEAKER_01Yep. So um we have now run three large events in Cambodia. Uh we're working with a total of seven uh New Zealand high schools. Um we've actually just uh formed a joint venture with a company in Cambodia to provide a complete agency service. So onboarding the students, visas, all the rest of it. Um and yeah, so so we're we're recruiting international students from Cambodia and hoping to add Lao to that this year as well. Oh, next year.
SPEAKER_00Wow. And these are there's secondary students or university students?
SPEAKER_01Secondary students. We're we uh actually we're getting a lot of interest in universities. So we're working on uh expanding into universities in the new year. Uh it's it's it's it's a huge market. And um, yeah, we it actually it was it was it was our first major deal was was was getting the education thing started after we incorporated.
SPEAKER_00Because international students into Australia is big business. Um how do you uh and I'm you know I mean disrespectfully, but how do you compete with that? How do you kind of go, well, hey, here's the value proposition, here's why you should come to New Zealand?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and I think uh that's that's a really, really, really good question because it's something that we uh it's it's it's probably a big USP uh for the schools. Uh our agency arrangement only works for New Zealand educators. If they uh go into a market like Cambodia and attend like a fair, they're gonna find themselves standing next to Australian institutions, American institutions, and and institutions from all over the world. And you know, the the the New Zealand education system is every bit as good as any of the international competitors, but it gets lost in the in the noise. So what what we do is we make sure that the events are New Zealand only and um all of our marketing and all of our support is focused on on driving New Zealand. Um and that that that's really how we separate that.
SPEAKER_00Right. So um, you know, selling in a vacuum, so to speak, where you're not up against the competition, that's smart. Um and uh what what are New Zealand, what are international students coming to New Zealand to study?
SPEAKER_01Oh, uh anything. Um it's it's the the the schools here, different schools specialise in different things, obviously. But um, yeah, they they that some of them will come out here and complete their entire high school education here. Um and you know, I mean, yeah, the the the there isn't a a particular area that people fall into, much like the Australian market.
SPEAKER_00Uh good segue and and just a moment here to talk about our uh partner here at the podcast, E2M Solutions. When I first started out in I don't know, 2008, uh I had a team working with me in India doing some web development and SEO. What I realized is sure, there were some economic benefits of having staff in an emerging economy uh where the the cost of labor was cheaper than hiring Australian staff. So yes, there were some economic benefits. But what I didn't know at the time and what I learned is that the talent pool is also just way bigger. So I've had a team over the years in India, in the Philippines, I've hired freelancers in Sri Lanka, in Bangladesh, in Pakistan, in Vietnam, in Indonesia, and not only are there economic benefits, but there is just a much bigger talent pool than little old Australia here, right? And I would argue that even if you're in the States or the UK, that the talent pool of people who specialize in the type of tasks that you might need help with, web development, SEO, marketing tasks, the talent pool is really big in those emerging economies because they've seen an opportunity to skill up and serve Australian, Canadian, New Zealand, UK, American companies. The problem is that when you start doing this, there's a whole bunch of infrastructure, training, stable internet, good, you know, stable electricity, reliable internet, all that kind of stuff that you need to factor in. Processes, SOPs, people turning up on time, all that kind of stuff. So one of the things that you might want to consider is just instead of building your own team, is just working with a company like E2M Solutions, who have 180 staff in a in a their own head office in India, and they uh you you literally it's a plug-and-play system. You plug into their system. They have a project manager that work with you in your tool of choice. So if you're in Basecamp 3 or ClickUp 3 or Asana or whatever you're using, they'll communicate with you in your Slack channels, in your project management tool to make sure that they get the job done. And typically what they are really good at their sweet spot is uh web development, WordPress web development, and SEO and content completely white labeled, so you can just manage the relationship with your client and leverage the systems, the process, the culture, and the team that Manish and the guys at E2M have already built so that you can increase the capacity of what you can do for your clients and you can just get on with serving your clients knowing that you've got uh E2M in your back pocket helping deliver all the stuff. So uh big plug for them, big shout out, love the work that they're doing, and we'll continue to work with them in the future. Uh check them out at e2msolutions.com slash agency dash mavericks. I think the link is. We'll pop that link in the in the show notes here. And I think if you follow that link, you get a discount off your first month so you can take them for a spin. All right, back to the show. What are you most excited about 2024? I mean, we're we're we're we're kind of teetering on the edge of a global recession. I see that inflation rates have come down in the states over the last 60 days. In Australia, they're starting to turn. You know, the RBA just put interest rates up again here in Australia. Are we going to see more interest rate rises next year? We're not sure. People are a lot of people are saying 2024 is going to be a bloodbath and it's going to be worse than 2023. Who knows? Uh, what are you most excited about for 2024 in your particular business?
SPEAKER_01Oh, I I I think we've got uh a number of new products that are gonna be going into market um early in the new year. Uh, we're really excited about that. Um and you know, you can say that recessions are bloodbaths and all the rest of it, but um, you know, recessions also generally make people rich. And um businesses still need to sell their products. That that that doesn't change because if you as a business, if you suddenly no longer have that need, then you very quickly cease to exist. Um so I I'm not I I'm not overly concerned about all the doom and gloom. I try and I I try and ignore most of it. You know, we the the the the planet has been through these cycles before, and I'm sure it'll happen again. Um and it's about just putting your head down and carrying on.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, totally. I agree 100%. Uh it's just interesting. I, you know, and I think it's a mindset. I mean, you need to be aware of what's happening, but I think it's a mindset thing that you can and it's funny because the episode of the podcast we just shot this morning was with a psychologist and she talked about the fact that what fires together wires together, right? So what you focus on is what you attract, what you think about is what you manifest. Um I and and and again, in the in the in the heat of battle, when you're getting shot at, you can go, you can run away and retreat and put your head under the covers, or you can dodge the bullets and just keep moving forward, which I think is uh is the mindset that you should adopt. Um I mean problems are gonna happen, you know, it's it's how you respond to them that that that defines you.
SPEAKER_01And I I think that's uh a a core value of mine that you know you grace under fire, keep calm and carry on, and try not to catastrophise. Be mindful, be present. Um and and you know, the that thing that's going through your mind that is the absolute worst possible outcome 99.9% of the time is not gonna happen. Right?
SPEAKER_00I was talking to my I was talking, I was on I had a phone call with my brother last night about this, and I said, you know, he he taught me something years ago. He said, when you're trying to go to sleep at night, or you wake up in the middle of the night, or you wake up first thing in the morning, any of those moments, don't pay any attention to what's going on, the voices in your head, right? The thoughts in your head, because they are just there to sabotage you and bring you. And he said, What it's your subconscious, all the file, the filing cabinet's open, it's got all the paperwork out, and it's trying to sort it all out and it's trying to problem solve. So just don't pay any attention to it because if you listen to that, you just pull your head over the covers, right? Get out of bed, have a shower, make your coffee, walk out of the sun in the in the cold light of day, then think about the problems that you've got, and you'll be far better equipped to solve them. Um, good advice, I think, for anyone. Um, so I'm gonna ask one question, and I need to ask this because I'm thinking specifically of this New Zealand marketing agency. If they if I'm a marketing agency, I'm dealing with a client, they're wanting to export. Uh, I I spoke about this at an event uh a couple of years ago. I think the agency, the marketing agency of the future is a combination of done for you services and information around other things that we don't do, but we can get you connected with. I call them playbooks. So if they're a marketing agency dealing with a company who wants to start exporting, and all of a sudden the marketing agency is like, well, we don't know how to do that. Like, what are what are the sort of the first couple of things that that that an exporter should be thinking about when they're kind of getting ready to package themselves up to go after an international market that aren't marketing related?
SPEAKER_01I I think it it's about making sure that your um uh product can actually get into the market, understanding FTAs, understanding regulations, coming to terms with um all sorts of fun stuff like tariffs and customs duties and and and what workarounds, learning about how different FTAs interact with each other so that so that you know exactly what what you're gonna be dealing with. Um and then really understanding local regulations around what products need to be registered. Uh so in in Vietnam, there's a cost where you have to register every SKU with the government, and that comes at a fee of a few hundred US dollars that has to be renewed every three years. Um and and and you know, you you need to know that, you need to be prepared for that, because that that that could come as an unexpected cost, especially if you're sending in, you know, you you want to send 30 different SKUs into market, and suddenly you find yourself uh with a bill for 4,000 US dollars, which you weren't expecting. Um it's about that. That that those are the first steps for me.
SPEAKER_00And um there's a lot to navigate there. So uh, you know, how do people what's the best way for people to get in touch with you and to get some advice from you guys and to and to maybe engage you guys?
SPEAKER_01Yep, they can just go to aseance.net um or feel free to email me, Damon at Asians.net. And also uh I'm I absolutely accept any requests that come through LinkedIn. So feel free to put put a link to my LinkedIn profile and uh and people can connect that way.
SPEAKER_00We will do all of those things. We'll definitely put links in the show notes to the website and your LinkedIn profile so people can reach out. And I will personally send this episode of the podcast to the marketing agency in New Zealand to make that introduction. Um fantastic. I look forward to talking with them. Um and what other but just finally before I let you go, what other products apart from food and wine do you think are ripe for exporting into uh, you know, from Australia or New Zealand, what other products are there apart from food and wine that are good opportunities for export into international markets?
SPEAKER_01We sort of focus on on food and wine because it's it's uh I don't want to say it's it's easier, but it's it's you know that it's continuing and and and there's a big market for it. But um I think there's there's art, there's you know, there's there's there's all sorts of stuff. Um and particularly in New Zealand's case, um there's a lot of really talented uh sculptors, uh jewellery makers, like like uh Greenstone. You would have seen the the sort of Mary style greenstone uh carved stuff. And I I I think there's a market for all of that. Um but I think we started with um food and wine because it's there's that there's a lot of suppliers that are interested in the market, and there's a lot of people in the market that are interested in that. But um, and uh seafood was another one actually that we did some work on last year. Um so so seafood's a big one, but obviously that's food as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. So supply really where there's a lot of demand, there's a lot of supply, but there's this big problem in the middle of navigating the stuff to get the supply into the demand, and that's where you guys fit in.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. And and one big thing that we're finding also is that the Chinese market is softening. So there's a lot of excess supply. Stuff that would have gone to China is now available, uh, where previously all of that supply was fully committed to the Chinese market. So suppliers, so so producers here are actually more interested in diversifying.
SPEAKER_00Awesome. Well, thank you so much for hanging out with us on the Agency Our podcast. I really appreciate your time. I know this is your first podcast, so thank you so much for doing this, and I hope you go on to do many more. Um, I think it's a very interesting topic. And uh, as I said, I think it's something that marketing agencies don't often think about, but they should be across because you know we are an international playground these days. And um, if there are opportunities where marketing agencies can connect their clients with other people and just become really valuable in their network, I think that's a win-win for everyone. Absolutely. All right, well, thank you, Troy. I appreciate it. Pleasure, Damon. Thanks for joining us on the Agency Hour Podcast. We'll keep in touch. Cheers, mate. Hey, thanks for listening to the Agency Hour Podcast and a massive thanks to Damon for joining us on his first ever podcast. I hope he goes on and does more of them. Okay, folks, please don't forget to subscribe and please share this with anyone you think may need to hear it. I'm Troy Dean, and remember, Jupiter is twice as large as all of the other planets combined.