Building in Public: Jeff Hatten's Edutainment Studio Journey

About the Guest(s):

Jeff Hatten
Jeff Hatten is the founder of the Edutainment Studio, a company dedicated to creating engaging and humorous content that educates and entertains audiences. With a career rooted in sales and video production, Jeff brings a unique blend of humor, creativity, and business acumen to his work. Before founding the Edutainment Studio, he launched a SaaS business and has been consistently involved in creating innovative marketing content tailored to stand out in today's saturated digital environment. Jeff is known for his honest, public approach to building his business and his ability to connect with audiences through insightful and entertaining content.

Episode Summary:

Check out this fun episode of Talking Shizzle... With our host Taylor Wilson who talks with Jeff Hatten about his idea for Edutainment. Jeff is the founder behind the Edutainment Studio. Aimed at merging educational content with entertainment, Jeff's studio stands out by helping brands capture audience attention through innovative and humorous videos. As Jeff shares his journey of building in public, the episode becomes a valuable resource for those curious about the the details of modern-day content creation and business innovation.

Jeff who is also a seasoned sales professional with a knack for humor, unveils his strategy for crafting content that not only educates but also entertains. The discussion covers the challenges of launching a business with transparency, sharing his past experience with a SaaS company as a lesson in adaptability and community engagement. Jeff's unique approach, which he dubs "edutainment," demonstrates the power of blending humor with marketing to rise above the content noise. As Taylor and Jeff explore companies successfully utilizing these strategies, such as Tom Boston and ClickUp, listeners gain insights into effective marketing and the courage it takes to redefine traditional business narratives.

Key Takeaways:

• The Power of Humor in Marketing: Jeff emphasizes using humor to distinguish brand content in the crowded digital landscape.
• Building in Public: Jeff advocates for transparency, documenting his business-building process to foster community engagement and feedback.
• Edutainment Explained: The concept of edutainment combines educational messaging with entertainment, making content more engaging and effective.
• Lessons in Adaptability: Jeff reflects on his past experience with a SaaS startup, highlighting the importance of being flexible and open to change.
• Inspiring Success Stories: The episode highlights successful edutainment examples like Tom Boston's work for Sales Loft and ClickUp's creative content strategies.

Resources:

• Jeff Hatten on LinkedIn: LinkedIn Profile (not mentioned explicitly, but implied as a resource)
• The Edutainment Studio: Linkedin

Listeners are encouraged to dive into this episode to better understand how humor can revolutionize brand messaging in today's saturated market. Stay tuned for more enlightening content from Talking Shizzle!

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Transcript

Hey, hey, hey, all you lovely people out there. I know you've got a lot going on in your day, and you have big dreams for your brand. Are you ready to talk some Chisel and learn some shizzle from entrepreneurs, leaders, change makers, and overall interesting people who like to shake things up? I'm your host, Taylor Wilson, founder of Creative Chisel, and I'm stoked to bring you a fresh episode of Talking Chisel today.

0:00:33

Taylor Wilson

This show is all about helping you think differently so that you could grow your business or your cause. Check us out on the web at creativeshizzle.com now let's get into it and talk some shizzle. Hey. Hey. I am so excited to bring you this episode where I talk to Jeff Hatton. Jeff is a new friend of ours at Creative Shizzle, and he is the founder of a new studio called the Edutainment Studio, where he helps brands build funny content that also educates on what that brand does.

0:01:11

Taylor Wilson

So in this episode, we got into talking about something that he's doing, which is building his company in public, and then we also talked about the value of edutainment and how he goes about bringing edutainment to brands. Enjoy this episode. All right, we're live. Hey, guys. I'm here with Jeff Patton. Jeff is a new friend of ours at Creative Chisel. What's up, Jeff? How are you?

0:01:39

Jeff Hatten

I'm wonderful. Thanks for having me, Taylor.

0:01:42

Taylor Wilson

Yeah, it's good to see you. I'm really excited to talk about the Edutainment Studio and a whole new service offering and company that you really are building live. As you mentioned to me, sort of like before we. We hopped on the recording here. Tell me a little bit about what you're doing. And then I want to get into this whole concept of building a business live. Like, what does that mean? Because I'm hearing more entrepreneurs talk about that right now, but I want to kind of get into what that means. And then I wanted to talk about the Edutainment Studio, what you're doing, and why. Why you think it matters.

0:02:14

Jeff Hatten

Yeah, I. I started the edutainment studio 38 days ago.

0:02:19

Taylor Wilson

Is that young?

0:02:20

Jeff Hatten

Yeah, it's. It's brand new. It's been an idea that I. Has been in the making for a while that I've been. I've been thinking about. Basically, the problem that I see with content that's being put out by brands is that they're just getting buried by all the stuff that's out there. That all, in my opinion, a lot of it looks the same. It's hard for viewers, like, or people who are scrolling social media to discern, like, you know, oh, this is worth my time. There's value here to do that.

0:02:53

Jeff Hatten

One of the things that I've discovered, like, in my own experimentation is that, hey, if you want people to pay attention, like, people are human. And so the more entertaining you can make content, even if your purpose is to educate them on something that ultimately steers them back to your product or your brand, if you can do that in an entertaining way that doesn't make them feel like, oh, this is a waste of time, or, oh, my goodness, I've got five minutes left on this talking head video.

0:03:30

Jeff Hatten

Like, is it really worth my time in order to sit here and watch that? So essentially, the edutainment studio is setting out to create content that both educates and entertains in a fun and humorous way that helps brands stand out.

0:03:47

Taylor Wilson

And it's all video content. Is that right? Are you doing other types of content as well?

0:03:51

Jeff Hatten

I know video content really well. I would say that's the starting point for every brand. But I haven't planted a flag so firmly in the ground that's saying it's only video. I think there are other ways that edutaining content can be delivered in addition to video, but video is the primary medium.

0:04:11

Taylor Wilson

At this point, I want to get into. We're going to put a pin and I want to talk about what goes into edutaining content. Is there a framework? But first, I want to talk more about this. Okay, you're 38 days in and you are building in public. What does building in public mean to you? What has that looked like? What are you doing when it comes to, like, sharing about the build?

0:04:38

Jeff Hatten

I think a compare contrast to the last business I launched will help to illustrate this. So I, I started a SaaS business will be three years ago in December. So it's been two and a half years approximately. I think that's the timing. I was super excited about it. I kind of built it like quietly and actually even like had stealth mode on my, on my LinkedIn profile for a couple months as I was building it.

0:05:07

Jeff Hatten

And I had people that were signed up and excited about it just through conversations that we'd had or LinkedIn DMs that we'd had. And we launched and I had a few hundred people that had raised their hands that said they wanted to, you know, check it out. And launched and it was exciting. And I posted about it. Hey, you know, we just launched Pauper AI and like, things didn't go great. Like I was expecting, like, you know, this is going to be a rocket ship. Like, I just, the software is really cool.

0:05:37

Jeff Hatten

I think this is going to be a game changer. And what happened was people got into the app, checked it out and then never came back. That right there was an opportunity for me to be a little bit more transparent and public about what was going on and learn from the community, learn from users. And I kind of shied away from the struggles that I was having. I was embarrassed. I didn't know exactly what to do.

0:06:08

Jeff Hatten

And before I knew it, like a year had gone by and I was still hesitant about really kind of telling people like, this is not working. Like I thought it was going to. And I was like, if I just keep promoting it and telling it's awesome, it's great, people are going to eventually start using it. Even if I didn't solve the product market fit issues that I had. Looking back, it was a totally wrong approach.

0:06:35

Jeff Hatten

Like, I think in today's day and age, like people want to be part of your community and want to help with, with what you're doing, want to, want to follow along. Like they, they find like that kind of behind the curtain, peek into what you're doing to be, to be pretty fascinating. And so I'd seen some other creators who'd done this building in public thing where they, you know, one of them that has done an amazing job of it as a, A guy by the name of Vin Matano.

0:07:06

Jeff Hatten

He owns a influencer agency called Creator Buzz. He's done a great job of just, you know, kind of sharing each step of the way like from like how he came up with the name. Like he had a whole day in the life video about that. And so that was spent. That was some inspiration for me. Like I, you know, I think I can, I can do this. But I also selfishly, you know, wanted to put myself out there to hold myself accountable as well as leverage the community and feedback I can get from the community to, to just learn as I go.

0:07:39

Jeff Hatten

So I've been extremely transparent along the way, you know, to the point like I'm posting like how many, how many meetings I've had, how many calls. You know, there was one, you know, situation where I completely effed up on a meet on one of my early meetings, like where I thought it was at 10 o' clock and it was actually at 9:30 and I was like researching the account when she DM'd me. And she's like, I've been waiting for 10 minutes, and I'm like, oh, my gosh.

0:08:07

Jeff Hatten

And I didn't want to tell anybody that I completely made that mistake. I mean, it was human, but I shared it. And then people resonated. We're all human. We all make some mistakes.

0:08:20

Taylor Wilson

Not familiar with Van. I'll have to look him up. But one of the guys who I've seen sort of blow up and he talks a lot about building in public too's Adam Robinson. You know, and one of the things, I saw one of his posts the other day where he talks about even, like, and I've seen him do this a lot, where he's even, like, publicly sharing, like, his revenue and that sort of stuff. Like, what do you share in terms of, like, the struggle and the success and reality? And then, like, what is. Maybe you don't have to share everything with the world all the time. You know, like, there's some things where I'm like, do I really need to share that? But I also firmly, like, adamantly agree with, like, there's a lot of stuff about entrepreneurship and the build and the journey.

0:08:59

Taylor Wilson

Like, yeah, sure, Like, I missed a meeting. I effed up. Like, everyone does that, you know, I don't know. What are your thoughts on that? Like, what's. What's appropriate? What's maybe oversharing?

0:09:09

Jeff Hatten

I have definitely swung my pendulum towards being more uncomfortable sharing stuff than I. Than I ever would in the past. So I think Adam's a great example of somebody who's been very, you know, at least from our perspective, very transparent, like, with sharing revenue. Vin does that as well. Like, you know, we're. We know exactly what each month looks like. And now both of those guys, their numbers are impressive.

0:09:38

Jeff Hatten

So, I mean, Adam's like, oh, yeah, we're like, at 25 million or whatever. It's like, yeah, that's. I mean, I'd want to share that, too. So now, you know, I'm 38 days in. It's easier to admit, like, I have zero revenue at this point than it will be 60 days from now. Hopefully, that's not the case. But at the same time, you know, at that point, maybe there, you know, I need to pivot if. If I really. If 90 days in, if I.

0:10:05

Jeff Hatten

If I don't have paying clients, that seems to speak to, like, maybe they're like, what I think this is, which I think is a really valuable good thing. Maybe it isn't. Maybe the market's trying to tell me something, and I'm. I. My intention is to be fully transparent on that.

0:10:22

Taylor Wilson

Or maybe the product itself isn't even like a product market fit error issue, but maybe it's even like a pricing model or something like that. Like, I've run into other entrepreneurs and I've tested this a lot myself too. Like what works from a. It's like, I think there's a lot of levers to pull on that. You know, sometimes it's product, sometimes it's offering, sometimes it's positioning, sometimes it's pricing. I know from my perspective, I don't think I had a paying client for about four months.

0:10:52

Taylor Wilson

So maybe that makes you feel better. It takes a little while and I've.

0:10:57

Jeff Hatten

This isn't my first business that I've started and I, I recognize that you, you turn on the lights and it doesn't happen overnight. I, I know I've been grounded in reality, like having been on my own for a while now that, to know that. But I do know, like, you know, if I do the right things from a, you know, I've been in sales my entire career, so I know that a huge part of success is actually getting out and having conversations with people, like having activity that leads to conversations.

0:11:27

Jeff Hatten

I feel like I'm on the right track. I really do. And I, I didn't expect to have a client, you know, 30 days in. I know that business decisions take longer.

0:11:36

Taylor Wilson

I think you're onto something. So let's talk about what edutainment really is. Let's talk about what you think works, what, you know, kind of define it for me, and then let's talk about what goes into it. And what you're finding works really well.

0:11:50

Jeff Hatten

I'm a huge believer first and foremost. Where I planted my flag with my LinkedIn content a little over a year ago was really leaning into humor, humorous video content. I did it for a couple reasons. So number one is I always thought I was kind of funny. I always thought I could come up with creative ideas. I have a video production business as well, and I've countless times pitched clients on ideas that are a little silly, a little more humorous, a little less talking head video.

0:12:24

Jeff Hatten

I've been turned down more times than I can count, like, ah, no, we just want to play it safe. We want to play it safe. And even though I've always believed that adding an element of humor and entertainment to your content because we're all human is a difference maker. I've been thinking about this idea for a humorous video for a while. I'd been stewing in my head I was running this. I created my own edutainment series that was humorous based. It was a retro style game show called Sales Game where I had four sales type influencers from the LinkedIn community that would join as contestants on the show.

0:13:05

Jeff Hatten

And I was, I played the host. I mean, I came up with the whole concept, like the, the different little games that we would play. And it was freaking hilarious. Like one of the things that people would do is they would, they basically do impersonate Arnold Schwarzenegger or Elmo and they've got to do that while sharing some sales advice. I mean, it was fricking hilarious. So I'm the host and I'm laughing along and I'm like, I'm having these people do this. And I'm thinking to myself, you know, if I was on this show, I would fricking kill this.

0:13:38

Jeff Hatten

I'd be really funny. Like, so part of it was like, I'd built this show and like people loved it, it was really funny. And actually they got some sales advice. So that's the edutainment, education and entertainment aspect of it. But I really hadn't showed anybody other than creating this concept like that I have a, like a sense of humor, I can play a character as well. So like part of it was just, you know, me being jealous by like this own thing that I created. So I had this video idea that I'd been like thinking about and I finally decided to go for it, like, put myself out there, even though I was scared.

0:14:16

Jeff Hatten

Like, I mean, I just, I still viewed LinkedIn as like, like I just got to stay professional, you know, I don't want to. Don't put yourself out there too much. Jeff finally did it, shared the video. And I thought it was great. I thought it was hilarious. And there was one guy that had been a guest on the show who commented on the video. He's like. And he's a comedic hero of mine. I just always thought he was hilarious.

0:14:42

Jeff Hatten

He said in all capitals, oh my gosh, I need more of this. This is amazing. And that was like, like validating to me. Like, oh yeah, I can do this. And so I started doing it and this. And at this point now I'm like, you know what? I could, I could start creating like entertaining humorous content. And I had this software business at the time that I'm trying to get off the ground, I'm trying to drive signups for people. It was a PLG type motion.

0:15:11

Jeff Hatten

And I decided, you know, if I create humorous content, people are going to go to my profile, they're going to see the banner which says, sign up for free for pauper. And. And that proved to be true. Like, people started doing it. And then I know this is a long way of answering your question, like, what is edutainment? Then it kind of dawned on me, like, all right, Jeff, you're posting basically silly cat videos. Like, it's funny, like, it would do great, like, as a Saturday Night Live skit, but it doesn't really have anything to do with anything related to.

0:15:47

Jeff Hatten

To business, like, and. Or who your. Your customers are. So I started like, leaning into. Because a huge. My ICP were salespeople. Like, I wanted sellers to go out and try the product and use this to. In their. Their sales conversations. So I started leaning into what I know a lot about, which is I've been in sales my entire career. I worked for a sales training company. We taught people how to. How to sell more effectively. I.

0:16:17

Jeff Hatten

I started leaning into little teaching moments or awareness moments related to sales, while at the same time, like, leveraging humor. And then I started to get comments from people that are like, oh, my gosh, your videos are always hilarious and you're always, like, teaching us something. Like, unexpectedly as well, that kind of became like, I started to put two and two together and then this word edutainment popped into my head and I didn't make it up, but like, hey, I think there's something there with creating content that is entertaining, but also there's a purpose to it designed to drive people towards your brand.

0:17:02

Taylor Wilson

I love the concept. I agree. I think it's like so many, just like corporate, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and it just gets really stuck, it gets lost, and everyone looks the same. And with like, AI voiceover videos, I want to stick a fork in my eye. I think a lot of people do. So when you're approaching a brand and you're thinking about, okay, like, this is what we do, this is what industry we're in.

0:17:32

Taylor Wilson

You know, this is our target audience. How do you sort of like, go about fine tuning what kind of edutainment will work for your different clients? Because it's going to be all different. And I'm sure some maybe will lean more into humor than others. Are there sort of like, is there sort of like a process that you use to approach it?

0:17:52

Jeff Hatten

Yeah, so I have. And I just kind of tweaked this process a couple. Couple weeks ago. Initially, the way I was pitching this idea was let's engage. Pay me a little money to come up with a few concepts for you that I think will work and then we'll work together to determine which concept we think has the most legs and then we'll fine tune it. Another huge part of that is I have this theory that I know is true that most brands don't have somebody in house who possesses the right skill set to do what I'm proposing we do, like create this funny edutainment series.

0:18:38

Jeff Hatten

Number one, having the person with really a sense of humor that's going to really make people laugh. Both in terms of being able to come up with creative ideas that make people laugh, but also the on camera execution of doing that. Like it's just not everybody has that skill set and it's not something that just can, you can instantly wave a wand and like, oh man, you're instantly, you know, hilarious and you're great on camera. You know, it's just that doesn't necessarily exist.

0:19:08

Jeff Hatten

In addition to, not every brand has the skill set in house to create videos themselves. Like do the video production element. So what I'm providing for brands is a fractional content creator, somebody who possesses the personality, the sense of humor and the video production skill sets to do this for them. So when I share this idea, we know we're going to have somebody who can execute on this for them. And then I will share as part of this arrangement, I'll share with them.

0:19:41

Jeff Hatten

Once we lean into the concept. Three different creators that potentially could do this for you, like work as a fractional creator for you. Each may have a different rate depending on their, their skill set as well as their audience that they have. So the way that I've tweaked that, so as opposed to, to going in and saying hey, pay me first and I'll give you a few ideas is that I'm, I'm now sharing ideas up front with clients. Like it's one of the things that I'm like if I were to give myself self a ranking of like, you know, you're really good at this or this.

0:20:17

Jeff Hatten

Like one of the things I'm, I'm really good at is coming up with concepts that are relatable to a brand and to their audience. Like having been in sales, I look at it from not their perspective but from their audience's perspective. Like buyers, like what do their buyers actually care about? And so I'm giving these ideas away up front in exchange for a conversation. And hopefully the plan is like, now pay me a little bit of money, let's zero in on that concept more. I'LL pair you or give you three creators, fractional creators that I know can pull this off and let's figure out which one is the best fit for you.

0:21:00

Taylor Wilson

How do you find brands that are willing to be funny? I just, I don't know. Like there, there are those out there, but I also feel like and, and B2B particularly, there's so many companies, I don't know, we, we don't want to go there. They like want to be so buttoned up. So how do you either find like the brands that are ready to be funny? Maybe what are some signals and, or maybe how do you persuade an organization that's like, nah, that's not us, we're, we're buttoned up.

0:21:37

Taylor Wilson

How do you pitch them on humor and entertainment? Because I struggle with this, just even pitching people on like doing LinkedIn thought leadership, even even not funny stuff, just like, you know, thought provoking stuff.

0:21:51

Jeff Hatten

So the answer of how do I find the brands that are willing to take those risks? I don't know the answer yet. Like I, I haven't figured that out, but I recognize that that's a, a huge part of it even so much. So like earlier this week or last week maybe late last week, I had a conversation with a, a leader at a brand who was, wanted to do this. Like, hey, I, I can do this. I've got the authority to do this, but I can't commit to, you know, any sort of, you know, long term commitment. Let's just do a video and then see how it goes from there.

0:22:32

Jeff Hatten

And if it goes well, you know, I know I can sell it because my CEO doesn't really believe in marketing. That was my signal. Especially at this stage. Like I, I don't want to bring on a client that doesn't believe in this. At this stage. I don't want to like go through the, all the work that would need to be done in order to try and do this. Especially knowing that posting one single video or even if it were four videos, I know enough about how marketing works that it just doesn't happen overnight.

0:23:08

Jeff Hatten

You know, there are sometimes people, you know, hit, you know, a magic bullet and it just instantly explodes. But oftentimes it's, it's a, it's a slower grind than that and you're building an audience over time. So I, I'm looking for, for brands who, who see the value in it that know that at the highest level, like the ultimate decision maker at that brand is, is bought into this idea and knows that there's it Isn't something that's going to instantly like, you know, just blow up and go viral because, you know, if that's the expectation they have, I'm going to completely fail like that. That won't work.

0:23:45

Taylor Wilson

I think that's one of the hardest parts about marketing these days in a lot of ways is so much managing expectations around, you know, the like, viral factor. That's a rare thing to happen. But so many leaders, especially those who don't really get marketing, they're not in the day to day weeds of marketing. Oh, like why isn't this blowing up immediately? We turned on one ad. Shouldn't we have 5,000 new leads yesterday? Well, not always, no.

0:24:16

Taylor Wilson

So I think that that's a big challenge, but I also think that that's where you're onto something because I think you'll be able to start to prove ROI on edutainment pretty easily. Because I do think, especially in this day and age of like so much content, like what we talked about at the beginning, it's going to be the kind of content that works really well, that builds a lot of trust and authority, but it still might be a little bit of a long game, so.

0:24:39

Jeff Hatten

Well, there are brands that are doing it today, you know, that have, that have the internal people already and they're blown up. I mean, it's like, it's awesome, you know, I know it works. There's no doubt about it. Especially if you have the right messenger, like the right on camera personality. And the, the content is, is good, it's entertaining, it's original, it's short because people's attention spans are short.

0:25:07

Jeff Hatten

If you do those things, I know it can work. So it's a matter of just finding, finding those brands who are willing to take the risk. But I'm being, I'm being careful about vetting them out as much as they're vetting me out.

0:25:20

Taylor Wilson

What are some of your favorite brands doing it that you think are like doing it really well?

0:25:25

Jeff Hatten

One guy who is a hero of mine on LinkedIn, you know, have you seen any of Tom Boston's content?

0:25:32

Taylor Wilson

I don't think I have.

0:25:34

Jeff Hatten

He's a Brit. He worked for a SaaS company called Sales Loft. He created edutainment content for Salesloft. That was his job. And he's got, I mean he's 70,000 followers or something. It's just, he's hilarious. His content is very targeted towards the sales audience, which he talks all about sales concepts. He's actually got characters that are unique, characters that are Repeatable. Salesloft came onto so many people's radar because of the content that Tom is putting out now. Tom left Salesloft and went to work with a, a new company that's a sales coaching company and now they still post sales content, but it's all kind of all roads lead back to like what they're, they're doing there.

0:26:34

Jeff Hatten

Perfect example of edutainment content that is lifting a brand up and you know, all of a sudden like it's on people's radar because they saw it and they were edutaned by it.

0:26:47

Taylor Wilson

Yeah, I just found him. Tom Boston. Let's make sales fun now at my sales coach, I'll check, I'll check out his stuff. Who else? Any. You got another one or two?

0:26:57

Jeff Hatten

Yeah, for sure. Another example that is a brand that's done amazing work with edutainment is Clay. Clay is a brand that all of a sudden everybody hears about and knows about. Now their strategy is a little, is different and I'm not going to approach Clay with my service because I already know that they've got a strategy that's working for them. They're leveraging influencers to create edutaining content.

0:27:25

Jeff Hatten

So all their content has a common theme. It's most of their influencer content has a common theme. It's funny, but it also teaches people about Clay. And all of a sudden it's like you can't even get on LinkedIn anymore without knowing who Clay is and what they do because of all of this edutaining content that's being put out there. So there's two different strategies. One is hire in house talent who can do it like Tom Boston.

0:27:57

Jeff Hatten

At the other end of the spectrum is roll out the checkbook for influencer marketing and pay, you know, 10, 12, 20. I'm not sure how many influencers that they're, that they have in their ecosystem, but they're people who already already have an audience for things that, that Clay is interested in. Like that is relatable to Clay. And so those are just two different ends of the spectrum. Like one of those is obviously hiring and finding the right person is costly and expensive.

0:28:32

Jeff Hatten

If you can get Tom, that's awesome. But are you going to, are you going to find the right person and do you have the internal ability to coach this person like on how to create edutaining content if they already haven't already done it for another brand and demonstrated that the other end of the spectrum is this costly influencer strategy. So in the middle is kind of where I'm viewing what the Edutainment studio does where we provide you with a fractional creator to do this for you.

0:29:01

Jeff Hatten

I provide all the oversight needed to make sure that this is, that it's on message. It's. It's on brand for what we're doing. So it's kind of a meet in the middle solution. Another. I'll give you another example of another brand that this one leans way more heavily on the entertainment side than it does bleeding into the Edutainment side, but has been wildly successful. Is ClickUp like if you've seen clickups video content. I think they're averaging 200 million impressions a month on strictly entertaining content.

0:29:39

Jeff Hatten

It's relatable to their audience. Like ClickUp is a tool for project management. Yeah, but they've got HR guys as an example doing karaoke singing songs that you know. But changing the words to be like HR related. Like you know, don't, don't use cuss words, you know. But it's in. It's a song, you know, that's, that's actually talking about it. It's hilarious. I mean it's a, it's a perfect example of getting away from this boring corporate stuff that all looks the same and doing something different.

0:30:13

Jeff Hatten

And so that brand has taken a huge risk to do that now they've ended up hiring internal staff like to do that to. To manage it all.

0:30:23

Taylor Wilson

Yeah. Like actors and stuff internally for sure.

0:30:27

Jeff Hatten

They're full on like actors like SNL skit type stuff. Very much so, yeah.

0:30:34

Taylor Wilson

I haven't really watched any of that. I'll have to check it out.

0:30:37

Jeff Hatten

But all corporate related. Like corporate bro. Have you seen his stuff?

0:30:42

Taylor Wilson

That one's rings a bell. Yeah.

0:30:44

Jeff Hatten

He's also with. Goes after a sales audience. His name is Ross Pomerance and it's primarily just humorous stuff related to sales. Like him. He's playing the characters in these things and I mean he blows up like just completely hilarious entertaining stuff that people love to watch. I'm positioning myself to be.

0:31:08

Taylor Wilson

I'm like following all of these. I'm making sure I'm following all of these people as we're talking about them.

0:31:15

Jeff Hatten

I'm positioning myself to be a little more strategic when it comes to the education part though. That's the difference because I, I do believe that for most brands that's where, that's where the sweet spot is. Like not every brand can do what ClickUp is doing with the. And not every brand is going to get the half million dollar budget or whatever. Probably a million dollar budget just to create this content, you know, on an ongoing basis.

0:31:42

Taylor Wilson

Well, I would say for a brand like ClickUp, they're already a massive company. And so if like you're, you're not a ClickUp of the world and you're trying to grow, I can see how like the making sure the, the education part of it and tying back to the services or product or how they're actually helping solve problems. Like that's where the probably like sales ROI actually comes in for most brands.

0:32:07

Jeff Hatten

Yeah, yeah, you look at, I mean think about like super bowl commercials, like Doritos can spend, you know, what is it, $12 million on a 30 second hilarious spot that you know, like oh, Doritos. But you already know Doritos. You're right. So you're right. For brands that are, don't already have that, that capital built up, like they don't already have people that are rabid fans of what they're doing.

0:32:32

Jeff Hatten

Edutainment, in my opinion, is a better way to get there.

0:32:35

Taylor Wilson

Well, hey Jeff, if people want to get in touch, learn more or follow along and watch your funny videos, what's the best way to do that?

0:32:42

Jeff Hatten

LinkedIn for sure. That's where I'm planning my flag, I'm building in public so you can follow along as I do things right and stumble and hopefully have a few wins along the way as well.

0:32:55

Taylor Wilson

I love it. Well, congrats. It's been good to get to know you. So, Jeff Hatton, if you're listening, it's H A T T E N. Go find him on LinkedIn. You do you do like a weekly Friday funny, is that right?

0:33:07

Jeff Hatten

Yeah. So I started, right towards the beginning of this year I started a, a newsletter on LinkedIn called the Funny Five. Basically just shining a light on creators and brands that are creating entertaining slash edutaining content. Most of it I'm looking for is I'm not looking for silly cat videos. I'm looking for videos that are relatable to their brand's ICP and sharing those. So yeah, it's a refreshing newsletter that gives you a little levity as well as some ideas every Friday afternoon.

0:33:42

Taylor Wilson

I love it. I'm subscribed to it, I've been looking at it. So thanks Jeff for coming on. It was good to chat and I hope that this gave you listeners some ideas around your brand and your content and how you could maybe infuse some humor and edutainment into things to stand out in this crazy, busy, noisy world. Until next time go get all that shizzle done.

0:34:07

Jeff Hatten

Love it. Thanks so much, Taylor.