Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Foreign.
[00:00:11] Speaker B: Welcome to the Victory Show.
[00:00:14] Speaker A: Hey victors. Welcome to this episode of the Victory Show. If this is your first time joining us, I'm Travis Cody, bestselling author of 16 books and the creator of bestseller By Design. I've had the privilege of helping hundreds of business consultants, founders and entrepreneurs write and publish their own best selling books. Through that journey, I've discovered a really fascinating pattern. Most businesses struggle to break past the seven figure mark and those that do struggle to scale. So on this show we sit down with some of the world's most successful founders, CEOs, leaders and business owners to uncover strategies that they use to scale way past that mark so you can do the same. So get ready for some deep insights and actionable takeaways that you can implement in your life and business. Starting now. Today's guest is one of Latin America's rising voices in telecom, digital marketing and startup growth. Ryan Alvarez is the CEO of Nuevitel. Am I saying that right? Nuweitel.
[00:01:06] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: Nuevatel PCs de Bolivia where he's driving transformation at the national level. Scaling operations, modernizing the strategy and positioning VIVA as a customer obsessed telecom leader in the region. He's also a lifelong entrepreneur turned executive. He launched and scaled Iwolf enterprises into a 78 million per year revenue machine, building a full stack advertising, sales and logistics operation from scratch. He's led product innovation, brand creation, digital first campaigns across Latin America earning industry recognition from while also launching sub brands like Yeli Ipico and Somos. Hopefully I'm saying those right as well. Sorry, my Spanish is rusty.
Ryan's journey bridges startup grit and enterprise execution. From SaaS partnerships Belizea to his current work in leading Viva's corporate strategy, sales and technology, his focus remains the same, building agile, high impact organizations that thrive in competitive markets. Ryan, thank you so much for being here.
[00:02:10] Speaker B: Thank you so much. Great intro. I appreciate it so much.
[00:02:14] Speaker A: Well, you got a strong background. First off, the fact that we're having this conversation in your Bolivia right now is I just want to talk about your experience a little bit as being not just an international business leader and business owner, but the fact that you're doing a lot of work in Latin America on this show and during this project, the book, we've had four or five conversations with people that are really starting to push the work into the Latin America and the markets that are coming out of that, from my perspective, seemed pretty exciting. But you're there so let's chat about that a little bit and then I would love to kind of dive in A little bit with your work with Iwolf, and then we'll get to the work you're doing today.
[00:02:57] Speaker B: Sure.
For me, Latin America is kind of like, I kind of feel like I have a crystal ball. Like I know where the, I know where the, where the region's going because it's going to be following, you know, US and Europe type of, you know, layout and structures. So for me, it's, it's kind of, I feel like I have an advantage especially building businesses in other areas and especially in Europe and in the US and it kind of gives me, I feel, a competitive advantage because I know the direction which we're going into. You know, a lot of, there's a lot of people connected to the Internet here in Latin America, but the use of it is dramatically less. And it's really about getting that use up and things like that. And that's really what's going to drive entrepreneurial growth across the region. So that's why I feel, you know, probably what you're saying is a lot of entrepreneurs are coming is because when half the market is, is not really using the Internet the way that most of the world uses the Internet, and they start figuring it out and start using it like that, you know, you're taking a huge market and then potentially doubling it is, is a huge growth potential. And there's not a lot of regions that are primed and ready to go in that aspect. So Latin America is for sure the, the emerging market. That's, that's going to be the highest growth I feel in, in, in the world. So I, I enjoy, I enjoy it very much.
[00:04:24] Speaker A: So did, did you just sort of stumble upon that by accident or were you doing businesses and started seeing the patterns and went, okay, we need to pick.
[00:04:33] Speaker B: I mean, so Viva Nuevitel is the, the corporate name.
Viva is the trademark name that we, of the cell phone company here in Bolivia stumbled on it. So like you said, like I started, I, I've been a marketer my whole life. I've never run a cell phone company. I've always been tied to cell phone because my family's been building infrastructure and things like that. So I've always been in the industry, but never as an operator. So about seven years ago, we had this idea as a, when I, when I was running the marketing firm Iwolf with my brother and my father, we were like, we were realizing that cell phone companies have enormous amounts of data. And back then I, we knew very instantly because as a marketer, data is everything. You know, you utilizing data to get better conversion rates on your sales have our higher roi.
So data being everything. There's no other company on the planet that has as much data as cell phone companies. But cell phone companies do nothing with it. I mean, especially seven, 10 years ago, I mean, nothing.
So we had this idea of kind of converting a cell phone company still obviously offering the cell phone services, but making them into not a social media but an advertising company utilizing that data, utilizing the channels in which they have to become an advertising company because the advertising revenues are substantially higher than telecom based revenues.
And so we developed the system but none of the operators in the regions, you know, they, they liked it, they wanted to do something like that, but they just, they weren't really willing to take the risk.
So we decided to buy a cell phone company and to do it. So that's what we did three years ago. We, we, we saw like we were looking for a company that was struggling. Viva Bolivia at the time was struggling because that's, you know, provides a better business case realistically of what we were trying to do as well as there's not a lot of competition, there's only two other competitors here in the country with regards to it. The barity entry is very high, the population's small, so there's not going to be like other companies that want to come in to, you know, cause disruption.
So we just went for it and then now we've, we've put put together our protocol of converting the company into an advertising company.
We offer free data services and we monetize via advertising. So, you know, mission accomplished at the end of the day.
[00:07:14] Speaker A: So what you're saying is you're the Ryan Reynolds of Bolivia, bought your own cell phone company and now you're growing it, but in a much more profitable way.
[00:07:22] Speaker B: It sounds like with a totally different, I mean he has a, he uses marketing to sell.
I'm using marketing to actually create revenue. So I, we Viva, we offer unlimited daily browsing via our super app. And so it's free, it's free to browse the Internet, you can go on social media for free. You can do all of that for free. And I, I collect my revenues via advertising. And in comparison, just that for numbers sake. In Bolivia, the average, most of our customers are prepaid.
So what that means is, I mean they're, they're, they're buying before and activating cards and the average revenue per customer is roughly around $4 per average.
But here in Bolivia, the average revenue that, you know, the advertising companies make pretty Much utilizing our network is about 40 to $50.
[00:08:21] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:08:21] Speaker B: So like why am I going to fight competitors for four when I could just, okay, here's the four I'm going to. So we're, we're, I'm fighting for the 4050 and we're not there yet obviously but it's, it's growing and the scaling aspect is definitely getting there. But I have that potential versus you know, my ceiling and just the telco services is for so that's really what the opportunity is and what we're trying to do.
[00:08:50] Speaker A: So have people in the telecom industry been like sitting up and looking at what you're doing, going like what I
[00:08:59] Speaker B: do A lot of, they invite me to a lot of speaking things we were talking about earlier because of, it's just the shock. Like this industry is very, I call it dinosaur. It's prehistoric. People have been doing the same thing for 20 years and just the sheer, you know, just the, the, the go for it mentality kind of aspect that we did is it shocks a lot of people.
We also launched a, the first ever mobile based crypto token and it's built into the platform as well. So we have our own Viva token as well and Web3 interface. So we just, we're really about pushing the envelope and doing that. So as a combination of all of that. Yeah, they're shocked.
But it also helps us because I mean my real benefit, I mean I want to grow Viva and our brand here in Bolivia. We also have an operation in Mexico as well.
But I am, my real vision, long term vision is to sell the platform that I've created to other operators so they can do the same thing. And then I have like a rev share type of thing with them. So my real scalability is partnering with telcos. I mean realistically I want to create a better, stronger telecommunication industry because a better telecommunication industry is proven to help countries grow faster, help other entrepreneurs sell their products more. All of those things happen when more people are connected to the Internet and using the Internet to do certain things. And if you don't charge anything to use the Internet it makes the use a lot.
You know, you're breaking a lot of the barriers of entry for a lot of people. So sure.
[00:10:41] Speaker A: It's just so interesting to me that you, you know, you come up with this idea of like here's a antiquated industry, they're not using their data, we want to try, you're pitching it, nobody wants to do it. So then your solution was like, all right, well we'll just buy a cell phone company or cellular company and then we'll implement it so people can do it. And now that's your use case. And then like you said, now that you've proven the case, it's now you start selling that technology to others. Is boy in a country I've never
[00:11:10] Speaker B: been until I came, you know.
[00:11:13] Speaker A: And how did you choose Bolivia? Did you like throw a dart or did you just use data to determine?
[00:11:18] Speaker B: No, we, we, we had, we had a lot of different companies on, on the radar.
I mean my, my father immigrated from Cuba to the US in the 60s so you know, having Latin descent helped us. We wanted to stay in the Latin American region for those, you know, the same things I was talking about earlier that we see that growth in the Latin American region.
And, and what also helps us as a because it's a family owned business. My father's very much involved. My brother is the head of the technical department. He's the AI genius behind the super app and my other brother is the genius behind the crypto. So it's a very family business.
So that's cool that that actually helps a lot as well in Latin America because most industries, most businesses here are family run enterprises for, for many, many years. So that, that definitely helped but it was just, I mean opportunity. I mean we had friends in the infrastructure game that told us like hey, this company would be a good target.
As well as the, the brand name Viva here in Bolivia. It's a very, very strong brand name. It just the, the old owner stopped investing into the company about 10 years ago. They were trying to sell it for a long time. So it's kind of, I mean it was, it's not the same as what it was before, but it's still very strong. To where you know, if you go to anyone in Bolivia and say hey, do you know who Viva is? They would, everyone would know who the company it's, the recognition is very high. Maybe not as good as a reputation because of but we' changing that now so that, that definitely was in, was a factor into it as well.
[00:12:59] Speaker A: Wow, that's so fascinating. All right, so let's talk a little bit about Iwolf Enterprises because you took something from scratch to a 78 million dollar run rate.
[00:13:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:08] Speaker A: So let's, I would love to talk from a. So a lot of what I, the conversations I have is really about the leadership and the, and, and, and the growing the teams that can facilitate that growth.
[00:13:20] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:13:21] Speaker A: So let's, you know. You want to walk me through the first few years of Iwolf and what did it look like revenue wise and team wise as you kind of went along.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: So with, with Iwolf it was my brother and myself with two other, my cousin who was one of the. There was four partners, main partners.
What ended up happening? We had a project in Hong Kong that I was working with my father and we sold it and it was a, it was, we were doing a, an online based selling mechanism. And then my father decided to get into Latin America and start building towers again. And I'm like, I don't want to do that.
[00:14:04] Speaker A: So my brother jump Hong Kong to Latin America.
[00:14:07] Speaker B: We've always done it, but it's just, it's just something we didn't want to go back into doing immediately. So I would say the biggest, the biggest risk I ever did was putting a business plan together with my brother and telling my dad I didn't want to work for the family business anymore. Like that was a, a really big step for us.
And so we put it together and we started with skincare. So realistically it was something that we kind of bought a product off the shelf for dudes selling skin care.
[00:14:37] Speaker A: And so you're straight up ecom right out of the first.
[00:14:42] Speaker B: We had a lot of good contacts. So you know, we, we started selling again. We, we base the all off data. So my, like my brother back then, you know, we, we did a lot of data research of certain targets and what we found was we targeted heavily towards tattoo, people with tattoos because especially men and people with tattoos, they use more skin care on average than really anyone else because they obviously want to make their tattoos look good. Yep, that was kind of our little niche in the beginning. And it went fast. I mean we started in October and by six months we went from a couple sales a day to a couple thousand sales a day like that. I mean it was just, it was very, very fast. And then we just started adding products. So we went from skin care then to other, you know, nutraceutical supplements.
We were cbd. We were one of the largest CBD players in the game, especially in the beginning.
Then it, then it just started.
We started, you know, like we had, we built up the team to about 20 people and then from there we started working our way backwards. So it's like, okay, I'm getting products off the shelf now I'm gonna start making my own products. And then from making my own products or designing my own products with manufacturer, then we became a manufacturer and we started manufacturing and then we even, you Know, went to Argentina and had our own, like we were growing the actual product there, shipping it states and making products, and then circled back and became, you know, got a call center and you know, so kind of scaled backwards.
And that's how we grew that, that business that quickly. And then that's how we got into this business is because within we were like, okay, how can I be my own social media? How can I make more advertising coming? Because my biggest expense was, was Facebook and, and Google at the time. So how can I take that expense? Because we kind of took every expense out and made it internal and, and that's where this idea came from that we now are running here in Viva. But you know, that's just kind of, that's, that's how we grew up. We just, we just had the revenues, had the products, and then we just kind of started acquiring or building those. Whatever our biggest cost item was. Okay, how do I make that a profit center instead of a cost item? And we kind of started going backwards. There's. And then we started bringing on other products and brands. Like we were doing timeshares with Wyndham and we were one of like the largest online timeshare sellers at the time. Which is, which was very.
[00:17:26] Speaker A: It was just all your marketing in house. Marketing had their own thing where they were just helping Wyndham with the timeshares.
[00:17:32] Speaker B: Exactly. I mean, at the end of the day, we were a marketing engine. Like give us a product and we would sell it. Tell us where in the world and we would sell it. Because, because we didn't look at, you know, it wasn't trends or things. Like we, it was all data. For us, everything was based on data. What worked, what didn't work. We would do millions of variations, color variation, placement variations, and then, okay, that works great. Boom, run it. And then you run like, you know, other variations. Because something only works for a certain amount of time. And then we just, you know, it's. You're just constantly updating, turning, burning, switching.
You know, we would have super really put together sites and like, man, that doesn't look good. And then. Or not turning the.
[00:18:20] Speaker A: Looks great, but it's not converting investment.
[00:18:22] Speaker B: Exactly. And then sometimes like you put together a janky site, you have great people and they're like, no, I don't. This looks horrible. And like, just try it. Like, we don't know. You know, like, let's. When you don't worry about your, your image or something like that, and you worry about conversions, you. You're. It kind of Frees you to try different things and not to be afraid of failure. I would say that's probably a big thing, especially here that I'm trying to do in Viva is not being a failure is actually completely beneficial. That's where you learn the most if you're. I mean, first of all, no one's successful on everything, everything they do. But the failure aspect is where we would learn and go, okay, that didn't work. Let's put this here, try this. And then that's what really got us to the areas where the conversions were just cranking.
[00:19:12] Speaker A: Isn't that very interesting though? Like the, I guess we'll call it the Western sort of philosophy of like, I'm going to try hard and if I fail, that, that's just learning. But I don't know what is in Latin America, but I have friends that are in Asia and Japan and like, you know, you fail at something there and it's like they're going to jump out a window.
[00:19:32] Speaker B: Yeah, Latin America is very similar to that.
[00:19:35] Speaker A: That's so interesting.
[00:19:37] Speaker B: It's like it's, I would say it's there. It's more of an embarrassment here. Like, I mean, I would say Asia too. It's like the embarrassment. Like, oh my goodness, like, this didn't work. Or, you know, are they gonna fire me? Like, I don't know, it's like very authoritative aspects to it and then that's where that fear kind of comes in.
[00:19:56] Speaker A: So what an advantage for you then as a team. If you come in and you don't. You're not stimmied by that.
So, yeah, that's.
[00:20:03] Speaker B: It's actually encouraged. Like, I mean, we're, we're the first ever telco to do what we're doing. We're the first ever telco to launch the token in a web3 environment. We're the first ever. So that's why I tell the team, like, when you're the first, there's no path, there's no predetermined.
We, you know, success for us is what we determine success to be and we're in full control of that. So, like, and at the end of the day, like, there's, there's, there's no fear aspect to, I mean, the company, especially for us, because we, well, that's one of the elements too. The company was about to go bankrupt and when we bought it, you know, we've turned it around and obviously kept it going.
Like, so what's the fear? It was, it was going to be dead anyway. So let's try something new. We know it's. We know it's crazy because no one else wanted to try it. So forget it. Let's go. Like, so that's, you know, it's still a process, but it's definitely, you know, over the past three years, it's been better for sure. Wow. Because now we have, we have about 1200 employees here. So now it's something very much different than what I've, you know, what was
[00:21:08] Speaker A: it when you guys bought it?
[00:21:11] Speaker B: It's actually a little bit less. I think we had about 800 before, but now all of the, Everything I'm talking about, we do all in house, so all the developments done in house. So we've, we've hired a lot of developers, a lot of salespeople, and just different types of people and shifting people and retraining people.
So initially we actually, it was about 800. We, we took it down because there was a lot of people that we didn't need. And then we built it back up. Yeah, and then we built it back up.
[00:21:43] Speaker A: Wow. But I mean, just even the, like, the mindset, I could just think of, the people I've had conversations with, you know, I think 150 employees is probably the most they've dealt with. So the fact that you're looking to buy a company that's already at 800.
[00:21:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:21:59] Speaker A: So how do you, how do you
[00:22:01] Speaker B: personally, to be honest with you, I mean, there's, there's, they have a lot of people doing a lot of, you know, things, but AI, I think is. Is converting a lot of that. You know, we've already incorporated that, but what we're doing with AI is just making our team faster, more agile. Like, we're, we're. So it's not like we're using it to, you know, to lower our headcounts and stuff like that. For us, it's purely for scalability and getting, Getting everything done faster.
[00:22:30] Speaker A: Yeah, I love that. So with, with Iwolf, with the four of you started, like, how did you guys divvy up the responsibilities? Because you hear a lot of stories of companies starting with founders, and then especially when you scale and hit success, then there starts to be this clash. But it sounds like even with the, you know, when you started with your brothers, you all had sort of such unique skills. Was that strategic or did that just sort of end up happening more like, I'm good with computers, I'm good with selling, and I'm good with.
[00:23:00] Speaker B: Exactly. No, that's exactly how it happened. I mean, it was just the station of our strengths. So I've always kind of been the organized one. I'm the oldest brother, so I've always, so I was an Iwolf. I was in charge of legal and financial aspects and kind of the organization and the managing partner of that. My brother's always been super technical driven, data related.
So he kind of took that piece over and then made that into the sales engine.
My cousin was a sales machine. I mean, he was closing on the phones at 75% cold calling at the time. He was just an amazing sales machine. And then when we got the call center, he was the one writing the scripts. He was the one like, you know, he had a whole system in place of how to do that. So that's, you know, because a lot of, a lot of, you know, because it was all subscription based stuff too. So a lot of the things we did was subscription, which ties in well to the cell phone stuff that we're doing now. But you know, when the people are calling to cancel, like, so the stopping the call to cancel, upselling, all that kind of stuff he was a master at. So he took that kind of piece on and then we just had the, the fourth guy was more of like the meet and greet. He was always going to the conventions and the shows and finding new products to kind of grow into. So we just kind of just naturally fell. I mean, that's kind of part of our business plan too. But we just knew what our strengths were and then just depended on each other to, to do what we needed to do and, and to go forward. So it was great, great experience.
[00:24:38] Speaker A: Well, normally I like to talk about leadership, but you've, you've, you're so heavily based in marketing. I'd like to shift and talk about that a little bit from, you know, you've worked at a high level. So what do you see as sort of like the top two or three mistakes that most, let's say, you know, small businesses, like 5 to 20 million a year.
What do you see? Is that like sort of the primary mistakes from a marketer that you look at them and going like, oh, you did this, this and this. You could scale, but you're not.
[00:25:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
First is offering the customer too many options.
So from ad to landing page, you never take them to a homepage. You, you want everything done in as few clicks as possible. Realistically, probably three clicks. So click from ad, click from lander, fill out information, buy like that you, you needed three clicks and under, but you don't Want to give ad is
[00:25:36] Speaker A: for one specific product that goes to a page with that. That product.
[00:25:40] Speaker B: Exactly. So specific product ad.
When you get to that product page you're not offering a bunch of variety. You're me. The variety might be quantity of product or maybe kind of bundles with that product as the main piece. And that's it. Like you, it's keep it simple stupid. Like you do not want to over complicate it. The more variation leads to not purchasing at the end of the day. So you can have, I mean we had 3,000 SKUs we were running but we just have 3,000 web pages with thousands of. I mean you just have to scale it out like that. If you're going to have a lot of SKUs you just have a lot of landing pages and ad variations and things like that. But that's the, I would say number one, I'm, I'm dealing with that in Bolivia a lot today because a lot of our app they could send people to a homepage and the homepage has 5,000 products or all of these different things and like man, we're not selling. It's like you're giving people too many choices. Like they saw your ad a bit of a severe product or a specific sale.
Do not let them deviate from that even on the landing page. You don't want to let them get into the homepage. You let them get into those homepage aspects after they become a customer. Now you open up a catalog now you listen to what their other likes and interests are to add other products and kind of make a nice little bundle for them.
But I would say that's number one. Number two is, is rewards always works. We always had a reward program. If someone was going to call to cancel we would always.
I had like there's lots of rewards partners out there that I've dealt with that there's available for very cheap like 10 cents a user. You can get Walmart gift cards, just something nice to give a spiff to keep them as a customer that you can find for very cheap and, and customers want to be appreciated. They wanted, they want to know that they're taken care of, that you're listening to them. So when they're calling you have a live person and then you throw in some type of reward for thank you for being a long term customer before they try to hang up and, or try to leave your service. But if they're trying to leave your service then obviously you're, you're kind of, you want to kick it into high Gear but it typically always works. I mean I. We had a very high conversion rate with. With offering those things.
So I would say those are the two for sure that don't really into
[00:28:05] Speaker A: focus sales and a rewards program.
[00:28:08] Speaker B: Yeah.
Because there's so many rewards programs off the shelf that you can get in a white label for any product. I mean really any product. They have them there. I mean there's.
[00:28:18] Speaker A: So what's a couple reference you to? Yeah, I'm just curious if you got them on top of your head.
[00:28:24] Speaker B: It was after one, bro. Yeah, I'll have to pull. I can send it to you.
God. Because they changed their name. But they were, they were.
[00:28:35] Speaker A: I've never heard of the concept of a white label rewards program. That's like amazing to me.
[00:28:40] Speaker B: Okay, we can add that.
[00:28:44] Speaker A: We'll put it in. This will be in the show notes a part of the chapter.
[00:28:46] Speaker B: Perfect. Perfect. Because I would love to. To hype those guys. They've. They've always done great for me and it'd be great to get them some. Some love. How.
[00:28:56] Speaker A: So how did you guys. So from my perspective, what you're talking about really with your E Commerce is you were really just kind of going what I would consider old school direct response marketing targeted ad to a targeted. Like did you have long sales pages, VSLs, that sort of stuff or is
[00:29:10] Speaker B: it just all of it?
Again, we would do everything and then when something's working, you write it until it stops working and then you have something else that you've kind of been testing and then you. And you replace. So it's long form. We've done editorials, we've done. We've done everything. I mean again, at the end of the day, the real key to marketing is knowing that you. You just give the customer what they want. You're not assuming you know what the customer wants. So we just. We just always had variation available and gave them what they want.
[00:29:43] Speaker A: So how did you discover that method of marketing? Because a lot of people don't even really know what that is.
[00:29:52] Speaker B: I mean I would say first you we like because my brother is very analytical and he was the one that ran that. So it was just an analytical mind versus an artistic mind. An artistic mind kind of comes into the. They have to have the colors perfect and the placement of things perfect. And with my brother it's like did it sell? No. Okay. What's what. What you know, what gets us to the point to creating a sale. So that's why I was mentioning earlier about the whole, you know, good looking webpage versus not good looking web page. Like sometimes like the, the grimy or the ad even like just shot from a cell phone, quick, even shaky, those would do better because it felt more real to the customer and the customer just seemed to appreciate that more and it worked. So a lot of times when we would do big budget things or you know that sometimes we have company spokespersons, they never converted as much as just being real with the customer.
[00:30:52] Speaker A: You know I, I had a client years ago so I used to do rec response sales copy and I had a client that hired me and I was working with him and, and it's being kind to say that he, he, he comes across as a, as a dumb redneck when you think of that stereotype.
That's what it, his entire business was him shooting selfie videos and they were awful and it was painful and he was making 3 million a year with a two person enterprise. Right? So I just remember coming out of Hollywood and coming into that my brain is like this is so awful. And yet he was crushing it. And it's interesting you say that because I get asked all the time what's working in the market right now and I'm just like man, my. Again from my perspective and you probably speak to this but it feels like everything's coming into authenticity whether you're a coach. Like I deal with a lot of high ticket people, right? Coaches, consultants and, and that sort of thing. And it's all authenticity. Like if it's too overly polished and too whatever, people are kind of like yeah, exactly.
[00:31:57] Speaker B: They, they, they're kind of like looking for the sucker punch. Like you're going to do something, you know, you're something like that.
[00:32:02] Speaker A: What's the, what's the hook? Right? Where are you going to go?
[00:32:04] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly, exactly. Versus I would. Authenticity, that's a perfect word for it. I would say that's exactly. You know we, I had a client that was like a former NBA player. He had his products, we're helping him sell it and, and he's, he was used to it because I mean as he being and he's used to the commercials for the NBA. All of those things like super high polished and we were shooting ads and I'm like dude, you're, you're wasting so much money. Like let's just grab a phone and walk down the street. That's all you need. Just like, like you're it, it's your company, it's your brand. But. And it works so much better. And it, and it, and that's when I think it really clicked because then they've done a lot of other things as well. So it's been, it's been fun for that aspect, for sure, because it, it just, it creates a connectivity. When you create a connectivity to that customer. That's why I think loyalty works as well. You're creating that connectivity. And that's, that's when people are more comfortable to purchase a product, is they feel. I mean, they'll even spend more money. I mean, Apple, for instance, people are spending tons of money more. I'm on an Apple right now talking to you. I love the product. I'm. I'm connected to the product. I will spend more for the product because I, like, I'm connected to it.
That's just, that's what you need to do. And it's, and it doesn't take money to do that. It's, it's the.
[00:33:25] Speaker A: Maybe two weeks ago, I did a presentation on LinkedIn and I call it the Invisible Expert Crisis.
[00:33:33] Speaker B: And I was.
[00:33:33] Speaker A: And my whole argument was that everybody could. People come to me and I ask them, you know, why? So why do you want to write a book? And 99% of the time it's like, I want more credibility. I want more authority. Right? And it's interesting because I think now visibility is the new credibility.
[00:33:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:33:49] Speaker A: And it's. And, you know, and like, so I'm like, during the thing, I'm pulling up all these creators off of LinkedIn and X and Instagram that are 23, 24, doing 4 or 5 million a year.
Why pull out their phone and they just share a piece of advice for three minutes and turn it off. And I'm like, boy, like people over 40, getting them to turn on the phone and just talk is like, they just won't do it. This is not their thing, you know? And so, and, and the thing is, now you got these kids that are charging way more money and they're going like, I've got three times more experience than this kid. And I'm like, yeah, but that kid's everywhere. So you look at him going like, I like this guy. Like, I've got a sense of his personality. I see him everywhere. Right? So that's, that's interest.
[00:34:32] Speaker B: No, I mean, like, I'm in a podcast booth right now because for that exact reason, like, it's, it's, it's a, it's availability and authenticity. You always need to be available.
You always need to kind of add. It's, it's daily. You have to keep dropping it daily. It's not long, you know, you're doing two, three, four minute spurts maybe you know a 30 minute podcast like Joe Rogan's famous. So you can do three hour stuff. Yeah, a nice little 30, 40 minute hitter with nice clips. That's what works. And, and it's just constant needs to, that's really how AF promote.
[00:35:06] Speaker A: I love it.
So for you and Viva, walk me through like this next, through the end of the decade, what is your vision for the company and where do you, where do you hope that you'll. So we're having this conversation in 2030.
Where's your vision that you think that you'll be with Viva and also your, your, the platform, the advertising platform with Viva.
[00:35:32] Speaker B: We're definitely, or I mean we're, we're going to be investing heavily here so there's going to be a huge uptick in our serviceability to our customers. We're going to, we're going to be going really hard into getting better service for our customers. So it's massive amount of investment that we're working on right now. 300 million plus. Wow. That hopefully should take place sometime next year between the first and second quarter.
But realistically what I'm hoping for is free service. I mean realistically where I want to see us being at in five years is being an advertising giant in the country.
Really helping the local businesses sell their quality products to consumers at a high efficiency and giving away free service to do that. That's, that's where my goal is in the next five years as Viva Bolivia and Viva Mexico.
And then industry wise with regards to the platform.
I'd love to see some other type of platforms met up, to tell you the truth, because that just gives a lot validity to what we're doing right now. We're the only ones that really combine everything that we're doing. But really seeing the industry change did not where I'm not the only one being an advertising giant.
Like I said, the opportunity is staring the face in front of these telcos and I would love to be the one to push it forward, but I'd love to be the one that also starts the industry of that pushing it forward and kind of transforming the entire telecommunication industry. So that's definitely the goal in the next, by 2030.
[00:37:10] Speaker A: Wow. So somebody is listening to this or reading this chapter. Maybe they're a teleco going like oh my God, how do we do that? How do they get, how do they get in touch with to you?
[00:37:20] Speaker B: I mean I'm I'm, I'm, I'm very visible. I'm on LinkedIn, I'm on Instagram, on, everywhere, obviously via email. But you know, to do the platform with us, we actually don't charge anything for any operator to, to join the platform. We, we build everything custom, we launch it for them, we help them go to market with it and we rev share. So that's, that's the business model. I just want to help create additional revenues, no risk, and, and share that revenue. So it's, I don't think it's too hard. I mean, email, WhatsApp, I'm always available. Viva Bolivia is very easy to target and find. And you know, like I said, I'm, I'm very visible here in the country, especially on LinkedIn or, or magazine articles, like, especially in Bolivia or something like that. If you know anyone here, you can, you can get a hold of me via two people that maybe two, three degrees of separation in this country.
[00:38:17] Speaker A: Well, it's rare that I get a chat with somebody who's legitimately disrupting not just an industry, but like a global industry. So this is going to be pretty. Again, thanks for taking time out of your day, but I can't wait to
[00:38:29] Speaker B: watch the opportunity to tell my story because that's, you know, like I said, it's something where I think the more people that just hear it and just kind of like put the piece because it's there. It's not like I'm saying anything that's so crazy. Like, oh my God, you're, you know, you're talking about, you know, Mars and the moon and it's not that, it's just kind of putting pieces that I always felt should be put together.
[00:38:53] Speaker A: Okay. It just took marketing with data and put it together.
[00:38:55] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly.
I mean, who, who doesn't have a cell phone in this world? You know what I mean? So you mix those things together and
[00:39:04] Speaker A: it's just the, the thing with me having worked in Hollywood for 20 years is just looking at Hollywood going like, how can Hollywood just keep generating so much bad content when they have so much data?
[00:39:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:16] Speaker A: And he's still just pushing out conkers. I don't understand it. Maybe that'll be it. I'll consult with you. Maybe I'll go do something.
[00:39:25] Speaker B: Yeah, maybe my brother needs to run through some algorithms for them and just, and just put, you know, have the artist make something that they know number wise will work.
[00:39:34] Speaker A: I don't know what's, what's interesting to me is every person we, that comes on the show, when you talk to what's the number one driver in business? Right. Ask the customer what they want and give it to them.
[00:39:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:44] Speaker A: And it's just so funny to me. And then again, I always tie it back to Hollywood. I'm like, they. They do everything in secrecy, and they won't let anybody know what they're doing, and they'll spend hundreds of millions of dollars, and then they'll test it, and then they panic when nobody wants it.
[00:39:57] Speaker B: I say listen. I mean, especially with we have, you know, a huge call center. It's just, you got to get that data and you got to listen, like, actively listen, like, take those points and.
And because they're telling you, all of your customers are telling you, so it's not like you have to do anything. Just open your ears and listen and then go from there.
[00:40:17] Speaker A: That's so, so funny. Well, Ryan, thanks again for the conversation. I really appreciate the time.
[00:40:21] Speaker B: Great. I appreciate it as well. Thank you.
