Joe Artime, VP of Marketing at Moe's Southwest Grill, "Welcome to Moooooooooe's"

Daniel: Hello and welcome to another episode of the you should talk to podcast. I am your host as well as your sponsor. Maybe that'll change after today. Uh, you should talk to bears brands and marketers for free with vetted agencies and or freelancers because finding great agencies is a time suck and a pain in the ass.

Super excited today to be joined by Joe Artemi, who is the vice president of marketing at Mo's Southwest grill, who is a part of go to foods. Joe, how are we? 

Joe: Good. Thanks for having me, Daniel. 

Daniel: Yeah, no, we will, uh, we'll dive right in. What is an unpopular opinion or a hot take of sorts you have in the marketing world in general?

You know, I, I think that, um, This is going to be good. I saw you clasped your hands like you're, you're ready for some controversy. So 

Joe: I think about kind of something that, you know, I talked to either other marketers or my team about, and, and one of the things that, you know, I always say is this. I don't know.

Popular health belief that I think has changed a little bit over time that, um, you know, marketing is kind of the lighter side of the business in terms of maybe, um, you know, that it's less math oriented. And one of the things I think I tell a lot of folks on Twitter is, My team and other folks I've worked with, um, you know, don't be afraid of the math as marketers, um, you know, in a way, you know, looking at math.

I mean, that's really just logic. And so the more you can kind of be willing to dive into the business, understand what the business drivers are, And then, um, use that to your advantage and apply it to how, whatever part of the, the marketing team and your tasks are. I think that will help make better decisions for the brand, for the company, and help make you, therefore, a better marketer and more marketable yourself either as you advance your career or within your organization.

So, um, any of the folks, even if they're, you know, just true creatives, understanding kind of the math behind the business is something that I've seen be a huge unlock for folks as they're advancing their career. I love 

Daniel: it. I'm curious then in that same vein of math and science, what's your, uh, what's your take on attribution and how, uh, how obsessive are you about marketing attribution?

Joe: I would say, um, I mean, here, here's kind of, uh, my, my thoughts on attribution at, at the end of the day, we're judged on certain metrics, be that in whatever industry you're in, in the restaurant industry, it's, it's sales and traffic. And so, you know, all the attribution metrics in the world are great. But if our sales and traffic aren't growing, um, you know, if, if we're not growing relative to, you know, our competitors in the space, the industry at large, um, you know, I don't, if I have good attribution metrics, but terrible sales and traffic that that's still a loss for me.

So, um, you know, our, our attribution metrics, it's definitely directional to figure out things like, you know, what creative is performing, um, are we buying media more efficiently? But at the same time, the thing that I want to make sure about is that, you know, whatever we are, whatever type of media that we're buying, that it's driving our top line sales and traffic.

Cause that's, what's going to grow the business. 

Daniel: Yeah. I like 

Joe: it. 

Daniel: I think a lot of people get obsessed with attribution. We talk about it a lot on this podcast, but I think that's a good point that I don't really think I've heard many people talk about is attribution is cool, but make sure it's driving to a, what actually matters for the business.

So absolutely. You've spent the last decade or so of your career in franchise, multi unit food brands like Burger King, Crystal, Perkins, and now at Moe's. Can you tell us a little bit about that journey and in particular, like, what have you seen, um, kind of the evolution of consumer behavior over that time, especially pre COVID versus post COVID?

Joe: Yeah, so like you said, I spent about the last 10 years or so in restaurants. So in that space, you've seen the explosion of digital purchases. So you think about maybe 10 years ago, most every transaction you made in a restaurant was in store, you know, maybe some, you made some reservations if you're going out to eat at a nicer place.

You made some of those online, but most purchases were made on site. And so like seven or eight years ago, you really started to see the advent, not just of like the third party delivery apps, but of restaurants building their own online ordering platform. Uh, then COVID hit and these channels went from, you know, just something that were, you know, nice to have.

And, you know, Hey, they're a little bit ahead of the game, technologically speaking to a must have. And so you saw restaurants literally stand up an entire tech stack overnight when during COVID. And now you're at a place that depending on your brand, anywhere from call it 15 percent of your transactions to over 50 percent at some places.

are taking place online before the guest ever sets foot in your store. If they do it all, if they're a delivery only customer and never come to you, um, but are familiar with your brand only as kind of a, you know, a, an avatar on an app, um, they might not ever experienced the brand in store. So as a marketer, I think that's a blessing and a curse.

You have all this data on your longtime guests, how they interact with your brand, but it also means you have to talk to them in a way that's more sophisticated than in times past. But also more, more complex, you know, I guess back in the day you're able to just buy two or three channels load up on as many, um, you know, as much impressions as you could potentially get on those.

And now you really have to understand, you know, kind of, uh, channel strategy if you need, you know, figuring out kind of that right balance between spreading yourself too thin versus, um, you know, going all in on a channel or two. And, uh, so, you know, all that data can kind of be both, there's, there's upsides and downsides to it.

But that's the big thing that I've seen over the last 10 years and especially in the restaurant space. You know, we're not exactly direct to consumer as of yet, but the, the explosion of those type of transactions has definitely changed, uh, marketing in that space over the last decade. 

Daniel: Do you think you, I'm curious, uh, do you think you can win, and maybe you have the data on this directly, can you win a customer who's never experienced you in store to try their, for the very first time, uh, through third party delivery and stuff like that?

Like at a, at enough of a click to focus on it? 

Joe: I, I actually think so. I, I think that, um, if you look at those third party delivery apps, there are some folks that are absolutely just, they're third party delivery customers. And, and the way that they view some of these brands on here is just through their portal where they are ordering their food from anywhere from 1 to upwards of 10 plus times a week.

And so, to them, that's part of your brand. That's part of your restaurant experience. You know, those or any of the other brands, you know, they, they understand kind of is the food I'm going to be get served in, um, you know, in, in packaging that kind of keeps my meal warm and, and enjoyable to eat. Um, is it going to get here on time?

It is, um, you know, I, I know that it's, we have to make Our stores have a good experience for the dasher or whoever's coming to pick up the food so that they can get in a timely fashion, making sure it's packaged properly and so we can get to our guests quickly. Sometimes that's offering them promotions if they know that they can always get a good promotion from coming to our location or another location.

So it's not necessarily that they're not experiencing your brand. They might now be aware of your brand because of these apps. They might now be able to interact with your brand on social or whatever. But it just so happens that the way that they consume food is through these third party apps. In which case, it makes sense to just make sure that your experience on those apps is good.

Because if you're not on those, you're losing that customer. So, um, you know, they might not be coming into the stores. They might not be seeing all the nice artwork that you've got in there. But they do experience your brand. It's just, you know, from their couch rather than in the store. 

Daniel: Does that make you nervous about having, I mean, I, I didn't ever think of it until you just said that of like splitting the experience with somebody else, essentially, you know, if you have a great experience and a dasher comes and gets it, for example, and then, you know, the, the, the food slides around in the backseat or something like that, for a bad example, like, does that, does that keep you up at night?

Joe: It, it does. Um, but also that's kind of the case for everybody else on those apps. And so, um, it's, You know, you don't want to say it's a level playing field because you never want to lose that control that that's happening. But at the same time, you need to take all of the steps that you potentially can, either through kind of working within those apps to put out a good, you know, a channel strategy slash marketing program and also making sure the in store experience so that when it's delivered, you can do as much as you can to make sure that, um, you know, as it gets to the guests, it's in the best possible scenario and you've mitigated all the risk that comes from somebody else handling your food for a couple of minutes.

Daniel: It makes total sense. Control what you can control in, uh, in this world and, uh, every other area. 

Joe: Yeah, 

Daniel: yeah, yeah. Uh, the biggest, uh, thing I hear lately, uh, most of the year, but more so now, I think since it's towards end of year and people trying to figure out planning for next year is that marketers are being asked to do more with less.

Budgets are getting cut. People need to be more efficient. All that sort of stuff. What's your best piece of advice to other marketing leaders out there on how to get through the rest of this year and thrive coming into 2025? 

Joe: Yeah, Daniel, you know, it's, um, sometimes in marketing people, you can get a little bit myopic and be like, you know, in marketing, we're constantly getting screwed.

You look at people in other industries, it's kind of the same thing. There's a lot of folks being asked to do more with less. You think about industries have been completely turned up in it and disrupted. over the last, you know, call it decade plus. And then even just the, you know, the cycles that tech has been going through over the last like five years, the, uh, the ups and the downs there.

So, you know, I know a lot of different folks in different industries that are, that are being asked to do the same thing. So, um, as to the advice with marketers, and it's kind of the same thing that I was speaking to earlier, you know, understand the business drivers, understand what grows your business and the ways that you can impact that.

So, an example, I guess, would be, you know, don't feel siloed in your specific area, be that creative, social, CRM, et cetera, because, you know, keeping with that less is more theme, theme, there's a good chance you're going to be asked to do something, you know, outside of your function that, that will deliver results.

So, make sure you can speak to that, make sure you've got kind of a, a willingness to learn and, and, you know, that, that kind of makes you more valuable as an employee as we're all being asked to do a little bit, um, more with less. 

Daniel: I like it. Um, most folks in your role that I speak to, uh, are getting hit up 7, 000 times a day, uh, across all platforms, uh, social, cell phone, email, the whole shebang.

Uh, is that the case for you? 

Joe: It is, but, you know, I, I don't mind it. Everyone's got, everyone's got a job to do, man. Um, so I don't hate 

Daniel: it. I'm curious. Yeah, I don't, I think it's a good way to think of it that you don't hate it and that everybody does have a job. I'm curious, what's your advice to folks who do, you know, every agency on the planet hypothetically wants to work with?

Quote unquote cool brands. And I know food and restaurant brands are, um, you know, highly visible and everybody has, you know, uh, usually a story, you know, some sort of nostalgia. But I'm curious if, if you're not in market, uh, for say an agency or vendor, are you open to taking calls with agencies and vendors?

Is there anything somebody can do or so? 

Joe: Yeah, absolutely. So I, you know, I keep shooting a shot, you know, it's tough. I admire the sales folks out there. And, um, you know, I, my, my theory on it is it takes, you know, two seconds to either delete an email, respond back, Hey, not interested right now. Thank you. Or, or just say, Hey, I can't call back at this time.

Feel free to email me. So I, I don't mind it as, as some massive interruption. Um, as for agencies, what I like to see honestly is, is the work, you know, um, bring the receipts. What are, what are some groundbreaking work you've done for clients? Whether that's building a website with an amazing interface, um, some creative, compelling creative that you've done, or just innovation and planning and buying that helped grow the business.

I love hearing those success stories, um, and it makes that email or phone call easier to respond to, even if just to say, Hey, I really enjoyed this work. Keep it up. Let's stay in touch. You know, um, I think some of the agencies that I've, you know, eventually worked with We're ones that, you know, put themselves out there initially, even when we're not necessarily looking, saying, hey, hey, look at this stuff we've done.

At least that makes a name for yourself and you remember, hey, they're the ones who did that really cool campaign for X, Y, and Z. Um, you know, Hey, I know somebody that's looking for somebody, you should reach out to them, which I guess your whole business is based off of. Um, but that's, that's kind of the, that's, that's the plan, you know, exactly.

And, and, you know, but just show the work. If you're just going to put like three email, three lines in email, we work with X, Y, and Z. I want to actually know kind of what you did for them. Um, cause everyone's, you know, every single agency RFP or the pitch deck has that slide of every brand they've worked for under the sun.

There's a lot of the same brands on there for every single agency. Yeah. So, you know, actually showing the work is, is kind of the, this level up that I really want to see. 

Daniel: Yeah, those, uh, I always say that those logo grids, uh, need a little bit of context for, uh, for many agencies. What was a 

Joe: project versus somebody who you actually had on retainer?

Yeah, that would be helpful. 

Daniel: Yeah, I'm with you. Uh, I've seen a big shift in the agency side, especially since COVID. Uh, bigger or named brands, brands that have name recognition moving towards smaller specialized agencies, um, typically independent that are good at say, or specialize in one or two things.

Have you seen that? And what's your kind of opinion of full service versus smaller specialized? 

Joe: Yeah, I've, I've seen both. Um, you know, the best agencies, I like to think of them as just kind of an extent extension of your team that, that, you know, has to work together. So just like there might be sub departments within marketing that need to work together to meet deadlines and push the business forward.

So, if the agencies are an extension of your team, and I believe the best ones are and view themselves that way, um, they should work together to hold each other accountable without having quote unquote the client be, be kind of the middle man that you're kind of going back and forth on. Hey, we delivered our piece.

We're waiting for so and so to do this. They should be feel comfortable enough to, to work together. So as long as you've got the right partners in place for that, I think it makes a lot of sense to, to allow people to kind of work on their, their, their area of subject matter expertise. Um, and, and, you know, make sure they're holding each other accountable just like members of our, our marketing team would.

So I, I'm, I'm all for that trend. Um, and I've also had the, the full service agencies that I, I think work well. Um, also, so, you know, whatever works right for the client, um, obviously, and for the agencies themselves, I should say. 

Daniel: Yeah. I'm curious if you have a tip for kind of that agency harmony you discuss, cause I find truthfully like the biggest thing I hear from both brands or from agencies on every slide deck is, Oh, we act as an extension of your team.

And every marketer says, yeah, we want an agency that's an extension of our team. But I feel so few get to that spot where it's actually that it's more like a talking point. Do you have, you know, any sort of tactics or advice on how to achieve that? 

Joe: Yeah, you know, I think this is kind of, you know, basic slash mundane.

Um, but, you know, inviting them to meetings is something that's super simple. And I'll try to think about this from the agency point of view. Um, You know, so you, you have your agency partners. They, they work throughout their career. They've seen, they've been in multiple different industries, uh, you know, they understand a little bit about a lot of different industries, which is, which is great.

And that, that, that knowledge ends up being valuable, um, for them to bring kind of outside expertise. Um, but also they've never, they can never truly like be embedded in the way that you know your team members are where they're kind of thinking about this one business over and over again. So a lot of times when you have people that are on your account and maybe they're the only account that their agency folk is working on, I like inviting those people to just, you know, internal meetings that we've got about, about the business, where we kind of go over the results, what's working, what isn't.

From what I can tell, that helps them understand what the actual business is, what we're, what the goals we're working to, so that they're thinking about it from the point of view of one of the folks sitting on the team rather than just the agency. So as they go back to their creative team or, you know, their, their agent, their, you know, account supervisor, that sort of thing.

They have the ability to say, Hey, these are the things the client is really focused on versus just here's what's in our scope. Here's what we're delivering. So that's kind of a very simple and what seems like an obvious thing, but I think a lot of people fail to do it because, you know, they think like, Hey, we're not trying to load up meetings for somebody that doesn't technically report to us.

Well, if they're a member of your team, they should be in those meetings, um, and they should know kind of what, what the important stuff is to you versus just what a list of deliverables are. And the thing that I've seen actually be the outcome of that. You know, we all get sent articles, um, you know, in any industry you're in, your agency will send you an article and it'll be like, Hey, check out what, you know, this brand did.

And you're like, yeah, I saw that, you know, five days ago when it first came out because I'm overly on top of all this stuff. And over time, what you end up seeing is as that person becomes more embedded in your team, what your goals are, what your industry is, what you're looking at, they end up sending those articles to you the day those come out versus something that they saw, you know, on, on social five days later.

So that's kind of the way that you see it's working as kind of there becomes that better timing between kind of what, what they're looking at versus what we're looking at. 

Daniel: Yeah, I would like every piece of advice that I give to agencies. I generally start with this is going to be super boring and like non groundbreaking and mundane stuff.

But yeah, like the simple stuff like you said, not a lot of folks do. And I feel like some agencies who I would lump in the, you know, overarching category of not the type of agency I would want to work with. They see those often as a time suck is like, Oh, they're inviting us to another meeting, you know, like, and we have to waste time and resources and stuff like that versus doing the work.

Or can we bill for this meeting? That sort of thing. So I get it that some are presumably like that and unnecessary, but to your point, yeah, like the more you can invite somebody into those, they also just feel like better about the relationship, I would say as well, 

Joe: they become more invested. And I mean, no one wants another meet held the people on the marketing team who have to go to these meetings.

Don't want another, we don't want to be in that meeting, but you know, it does help. 

Daniel: Yeah. Don't upload it. Yeah. Can you think of a really great agency experience you've had in the past at some point in your career and what made it so great? 

Joe: Yeah. My first job out of school was actually at an agency. So, uh, that, that was a great experience for me because it made me learn.

You don't get this. 

Daniel: I never get this side of working at an agency. Oh yeah. 

Joe: I made me learn. I wanted to go to the brand, the brand side. Um, Hey, 

Daniel: that's a positive outcome. 

Joe: No, but if seriously, um, you know, when I, when I was at that agency, like I got to see the best of client service, you know, I got to see, And I, you know, just simple things like when to, I remember, you know, one of my older bosses, he was like, you know, speak up more in meetings.

Like, don't, don't just be a wallflower. That was, you know, important advice that I got really early on in my career. I saw kind of the, the, how they delivered, you know, best in class customer service. Um, and so, you know, I've, while I realized like, Hey, it made me want to be on the brand side because again, that's, I, You know, you were invested in those brands.

I thought we were delivering great customer service, but I actually wanted to, you know, have the email address that said at the actual brand I'm working for versus the agency that I'm pitching on behalf of. So, um, that was an invaluable experience for me. And then the other great experiences I've talked about, I talked about the extension of the team thing.

That's when it ends up being, you know, those great. Um, experiences. And a couple of times I've come into brands that were, you know, call it in the turnaround stage and they're rebuilding the marketing team and you come in and the agency is doing so much. They're doing stuff way out of scope. They're basically, you know, members of the marketing team.

Some of them are actually working in the office. Some of them are on the phone with franchisees on a regular basis, and they're almost kind of holding down the fort until you have to come in and kind of reorganize stuff. So those are the folks that, you know, do that kind of mentality of, Hey, Hey, You know, we are, we're going and, you know, they're part of it is self serving, you know, they're doing it to, you know, stay within the business and make themselves more valuable.

But at the same time, you know, I think back on those and how they really helped with my onboarding and bringing me up to speed. Uh, those are kind of the partners that, you know, you feel like you feel because they have that same level investment that you do. So you can trust them in a way versus somebody you're just trying to pitch and start a new relationship with and keep them over there in a silo.

Okay. Um, and you're the expert versus them. 

Daniel: Yeah. I think it's an interesting point too. Like, I think it's totally fine to have a self serving, um, you know, layer of the relationship, because again, if you do great work and you service your clients, well, you will get more business, you know, that your current clients will refer you to people that they know, or when they go to new jobs, they will bring you along and stuff like that.

So. Uh, I think as a brand, they should actually want an agency that's a little bit self serving. They should want to help and further the brand and stuff like that, but yeah, like, they should, great brands should want to see their agency partners, you know, win new business and stuff like that and be able to hire more and have, you know, more revenue and stuff like that to do cooler stuff for them as well.

So I think that's an interesting point. Can you think of a negative agency, uh, experience that you've had and what made it so poor? 

Joe: Yeah, I mean, there's been some agencies that are bad fits and I don't know. You know how like when you've got, call it, you know, two friends and then they become a couple and sometimes they just don't work for whatever reason and, and they might be great people.

They might get along, but together they're just, they're not a fit. That's, you see that kind of on the agency and the brand side, you know, great people on the brand side, great people on the agency side, but they just don't work together for whatever reason. Um, I've, I've been experienced that sometimes I would say that, you know, I've been on the part where we were probably a little bit more of a difficult client than we needed to be or we should have been.

Um, and I've seen folks where agencies come in with just completely different expectations. And I think a lot of that really needs to be laid up front during the pitching process, um, to understand the expectations on both sides. I know, you know, I'm very appreciative when, you know, going through the pitching process where agencies will be up front and say, like, they're realistic about, hey, I don't think we're the right fit because X, Y, and Z.

And what they're really saying is your expectations are crazy out of whack for what you're trying to pay us. But at the same time, you know, at least they're letting it known, be known up front versus, Hey, we're going to take this billing and then, you know, if we're not going to deliver, well, at least, you know, they already invested us and we can mark this out for seven to nine months of billing.

Um, like that, that's not ideal for anybody. And that's when those breakdowns occur. Um, so I think just being up front on both sides of what the expectations are, kind of, you know, what, what kind of reporting you're going to need. What? Um, you know, the expectations are gonna be in terms of business results, what they're gonna be responsible and what they're ultimately going to be judged on.

So you go back to the attribution. Um, topic, you know, if you're just saying, Oh yeah, this attribution looks great. This is great. This is great. This is great. And the agency thinks, cool, we're just going to like flood them with attribution and show how great our attribution models are. And then, you know, you come to them six months in and you're like, traffic is down.

Um, even though you've been telling me how great your attribution was for the last six months and they're like, okay, well, you know, we, they, they don't necessarily know that that's what they were ultimately going to be judged on. So, um, Um, you know, I, I think being up front about that on the, the front end is go, goes a long way to just making sure that relationship isn't disastrous from the jump.

Daniel: Yeah. The number one reason I hear from folks in your position of why they're firing or getting rid of their current agency or parting ways in some regard, uh, is, uh, misaligned expectations. We thought this, they thought that, and neither party are right, truthfully. Like there was just a miscommunication at some point that led to misaligned expectation or not speaking enough, truthfully.

Joe: Yeah, I mean, I think one thing that people can do a better job of on both sides is straight up asking like, Hey, why are you leaving your current agency? You know, Hey, why did your last agency leave you? Um, why are you looking what you've got to be up front about that there's, there's almost way too much like footsie and small talk and, and, and just for lack of a better term, ask a kissing on the, the, for those first few agency or RFP meetings.

Um, you know, get down to the business and really understand what the struggles are on both sides so that you can just kind of lay your cards on the table before both sides end up investing more time, resources on, on the pitch. 

Daniel: Yeah, it's honestly, uh, I get a lot of that from the folks in your position.

And I often say like, you should share that with, uh, the agencies and they won't, or they don't want to until I convince them sometimes, or sometimes they won't like they don't, I don't know. It's like a mental block or something like that, that they shouldn't be that forthcoming or something like that.

But I get the like crazy stories of we're firing them for this. I'm like, Oh my God, like that's insane. You should definitely share that with the current agencies so that they don't. Do that as well or like that they don't repeat that and stuff. And most of the times they don't want to, I feel like. 

Joe: Yeah, people, people really want to guard that stuff or they don't want to, you know, air, air, dirty laundry and that sort of thing.

I think there's a way to do that without, and again, it comes back to just, you're not gonna, you're not gonna throw somebody out because you hear one horrible, you know, recommendation. People can hopefully give the context of, you know, here's what we did right, here's what they did right, and here's what each side did wrong, and here's just why it didn't work out.

Um, you know, kind of being adults about it versus just throwing somebody one side or another completely under the bus. 

Daniel: I think that's actually the biggest risk for agencies, like, in this current landscape we're in. I see it all the time on LinkedIn and different communities I'm in. Somebody will ask for an agency recommendation, or they'll ask if anybody has heard of a certain agency.

And there's no context to the ask, right? Nothing about budget or any reason why. And on the negative side, on the times where they'll be like, Hey, has anybody heard of X agency? Somebody will say, Yes, I had a terrible experience with them. Don't work with them. And the personal go, okay. And like that agency was just shamed in front of, you know, hundreds of CMOs and stuff like that with zero context as to what happened on the flip side, people will say, Hey, I need a A creative agency with no context around what it is or budget or timing or anything like that.

And people will list a bunch of ones and I can see some of them. I'll say like, there's no way that that is a fit for that brand or like nobody asks questions and the marketer wastes so much time and energy, like having conversations with agencies that are clearly not a fit and stuff like that. So I think that's a, an interesting point you've brought up several times around like the context around these things matter so, so much.

Joe: Yeah, people, it's almost like the process gets too formalized and people like, all right, this is step one. Now it's step two. And sometimes you just have to, and I've, I've had bosses that actually have been great about this. And that's one of the things that I've really learned is sometimes just pick up the phone and have like ad hoc conversations with these agencies as you're going along.

Because eventually if they become your agency, you're going to be randomly picking up the phone and talking to them and being like, Hey, this is kind of where the business is. This is one thing we're changing. This is one thing we're thinking about. If you have those conversations on the front end versus taking it out of the formalized step by step process, you kind of get a sneak peek of what the actual working relationship is going to be like.

Daniel: Yeah, you're giving away all my secrets that I, uh, tell my agencies to do, uh, for now. I mean, it's like, again, none of these things are, like, groundbreaking things. I, I tell them all the time, like, in between portions of the process, I'm like, Call, just, like, build some more rapport. They're like, about what?

I'm like, if I've gotta, like, explain to you how to have a conversation with somebody you might want to work with, like, This isn't going to go well, but Hey, how's the business going? What have you seen in the last 30 days since We'll come up with a couple questions. We saw this here and we were curious your thoughts on it.

Again, just to show your thinking and stuff like that. But yeah, to your point, like, artificially creating relevant touchpoints is like the name of the game. Especially in an RFP process. Absolutely. What are you most excited about in the marketing space, uh, at the moment? Outside of AI. I hear about it too much.

Okay. 

Joe: Yeah. Me too, man. Um, you know, of course it, I mean, you know, it's funny in these kind of, uh, settings that you're almost, you almost sound ridiculous if you're like, um, yeah, not really excited about AI, you know, not, not, not by, you know, not buying it. Um, yeah. Yeah. Machine learning. Of course. I guess besides that, um, I'm encouraged by some of the course correction you're seeing out there where a lot of brands, including some of the big ones.

Um, are willing to say, you know, not everything is a digital transaction and there's still a prominent place for brand building. Compelling, creative and more kind of grassroots traditional marketing. Now, one thing I will say, um, the parameters around what creative is relevant or what local activations drive interest, um, that's changed.

But that's always going to be the case. You're, you're always going to kind of see marketing, you know, uh, What used to be a 30 to 60, you know, second spot makes zero, makes zero sense. Now for a brand that maybe hasn't even changed that much. It's just the way people consume, uh, different types of content.

But it's encouraging to see that those type of, of tactics still have a place. You know, the, the kind of local activations, grassroots mar uh, grassroots marketing that might have been done by field marketing in the. Um, as well as just, you know, really compelling creative that shows your brand in an interesting and unique way.

Um, it's, it's awesome to see that still have a place out there and not have everything go to this DTC or digital transaction world. That's still really exciting, the machine learning and the targeting that you can do. But, you know, is it as interesting to me as seeing what some of the really compelling creative that other brands are doing out there?

That's, that's way more intriguing and encouraging to see for me. 

Daniel: I like it on the opposite end of the spectrum. What keeps you up at night from a business standpoint? 

Joe: You know, I work in restaurant marketing and there's always more restaurants being built, which is great. Uh, you, you love to see kind of, you know, brands grow, consumers have more choices as to where they want to go out to eat.

But it means that, you know, in order to, you know, the amount of meals and that people are having, you know, uh, isn't, isn't necessarily growing at the same rate. So it means you have to steal share in order to grow your business. Um, and, and that makes, you know, as somebody who's a fairly competitive person, that makes my job exciting to see, you know, when, when sales and traffic come out, um, you know, I, I like to see how we performed, um, the previous, uh, you know, day, the previous week.

And kind of understand, you know, and if we need to adjust plans or continue to do things, see what's working, see what's not. Um, I enjoy seeing that the team's hard work pay off in results. So those are the things I don't necessarily know about keeping up at night. But those are the things that kind of keep us going and allow us to make informed decisions as we do our job.

Daniel: You constantly keeping an eye on folks in your space? Or you try to stay in your lane and do your own thing and not let the noise influence you? 

Joe: You know, I could lie and say I'm not looking at, you know, what other folks do. But, you know, that's, it's interesting to me. It's interesting to me to see, like, kind of what people are doing, people with bigger budgets, people with smaller budgets.

Um, you know, people in the restaurant space, people out, you know, in different industries, I find compelling. Um, you know, I've never worked in B to B for instance. So I'm always super intrigued whenever I meet kind of a B to B marketer and kind of understanding how they're able to, you know, you talk about stuff, you know, trying to put something in layman's terms to get people to understand it.

Um, I'm, I'm really impressed whenever I meet a B to B marketer who's kind of, you know, doing interesting stuff in that space. So I, I always like seeing what else is out there. Um, because I think that's that's how you make yourself a better marketer. That's how you make more informed decisions. Um, and, you know, think kind of outside your silo.

So, yes, while I believe in, you know, staying the course of our plan, making sure that, you know, our plan takes into account everything that we might be facing in terms of headwinds coming down the road. Um, and and making sure that, you know, we stay true to our plan. Always have to be looking at what other folks are doing.

I won't deny that I'm constantly looking at that. We'll finish with some fun ones here. What was your very first job? Um, you know, my, my earliest memory of, of, you know, the labor force, if you want to call it that, you know, my grandparents owned a really small, um, grocery store, like a neighborhood grocery store when I was a kid.

Um, so I remember dusting the shelves at my grandfather's grocery store when I was, you know, super young. And then when I was 15 and able to finally, like, you know, get a payroll job. I, uh, worked as a bagger and basically cart boy at, uh, Kroger. So, like, the, the summer heat outside on the blacktop pavement, like pulling in carts all, all summer.

Um, minimum wage, friggin miserable. Uh, you know, the next summer I got a job at a restaurant and, uh, continued to work at restaurants all throughout high school and college and, and never went back to the, uh, the grocery store life ever again. I was gonna say, um, so 

Daniel: that manual labor life, you're, you've got a cushy gig now, you know?

Joe: Yeah. definitely. Versus, I, I, Hey, that's why I always, anytime you're, you're out in the lot, I always take the cart back inside, man. Um, just for that reason, because I, I remember those, those days out in the, uh, on the parking lot in the middle of the summer. Oof. What would your final meal be? You know, so I recently had a birthday and, um, that's kinda the same question, is like your wife asks you like, Hey, where do you wanna go for, uh, your.

And I just wanted pizza. I wanted, you know, just a, you know, New York style pizza, even the fancy pizzas that, you know, Atlanta's got a great, a lot of great pizza places around town. Um, that's, that's just what I wanted. So if that's what I wanted on my birthday, when I was, I could have had any meal. Um, I assume that's what I would take for my final meal as well.

Okay. Fair enough. 

Daniel: Uh, and who is somebody who inspires you personally, professionally, or both? 

Joe: Um, yeah, so, you know, um, Personally, I, I could say, um, you know, I'm going to say both my parents like, you know, I don't think it's funny. I remember one time doing an icebreaker where they're like, Hey, where do you get kind of your work ethic from or whatnot?

And everyone just went around the table and said, you know, how much they learned about hard work from their dad and whatnot. And I was like, cool. So, you know, you very rarely see people be like, yeah, no. Parents, super lazy, you know, no work ethic whatsoever and here I am. So, you know, I, I, I'm very fortunate to have had, um, two parents that, you know, showed, showed me kind of the value of, of, you know, hard work and, and continuing trying and, you know, really trying to, um, you know, do as much work as possible to sacrifice for your family, but also being there present for your family, which is something I try to, um, model myself in my personal life after.

And then, um, you know, professionally I've been super fortunate even in like, you know, early on in my career, I, you know, I mentioned the agency, which, you know, I quickly learned after a couple of years wasn't for me, you know, like I said, learning from those folks early on, um, the folks at the agency that, you know, best in class customer service, I truly believe that.

And then, um, Um, working at, uh, you know, I worked at the Princeton Review, which is a test prep services company, uh, a field that I have absolutely zero interest in. But at the same time, you know, worked with some, some bosses that really cared about you as, as people, um, and then, you know, you were able to kind of learn again.

It's always fun to learn industries that you're not necessarily interested in. I think that helps you in the long run. And then over my time in restaurant marketing, you know, um, having bosses that are able to, that are willing to take a chance on you. Um, you know, I remember my first. One of my jobs, I had almost no experience doing any sort of media buying.

And I was just had that part of the business thrust upon me. And, um, I It very well could have gone poorly, but I had a boss that was willing to, you know, sit down and he called it, uh, I'd walk in and he'd be given a stack of flowcharts and he'd like fun with flowcharts and we just go through flowcharts and talk about, you know, whether we're the plus up and cut up media.

And so, um, having those, those bosses that are willing to take the time, teach the business to you, um, and kind of bring you along, but also kind of give you the freedom to kind of Uh, learn from your mistakes and, and, you know, kind of take chances on, on the, you know, platforms and or ideas that you have.

Those are the folks that have really inspired me and I've, I've really been fortunate to kind of have that along every step of the way, um, thus far in my career. So yeah, you know, there's too many of those guys to name, but you know, it's been, it's been great to work for them. 

Daniel: That's awesome. That's all I got for you.

What, uh, before we leave, what, uh, any new menu items or anything that people should know about those before we go. 

Joe: Yeah, I don't know exactly when you're when you're launching this, but this Friday 

Daniel: next week or two years from now, something like that. 

Joe: So yeah, on october 4th, we're actually launching chili crisp chicken at most.

Um, it's a, you know, a brand new product. One of our proteins we've had some really successful launches this year with birria. Um, then tequila lime chicken. This is a new upcoming trending flavor. We're really excited to put it in stores and and see what, um See how our guests enjoy it, you know, and, you know, always trying to kind of, you know, push the, you know, push the letter on, on innovation and, and bringing, you know, compelling reasons for folks to come back and enjoy those, you know, we're known for, you know, flavors and our, our atmosphere in stores.

And, um, this is a product I think goes really well with the brand. So I'm excited for people to try it. 

Daniel: Chili crisp chicken. It is love it. Thank you very much for joining. This was awesome. Hey, 

Joe: Daniel, thank you for having me really enjoy the stuff you're doing here, man. Thanks. Take care.