Synergy Shorts #2: David Fogarty, CEO and Founder of the Oodie and the Davie Group on Leveraging the power of Social Media in scaling a Multi-Million Dollar Business

Get ready to dive headfirst into an electrifying episode of our special segment in #SynergyShorts!

We're rolling out the red carpet for the highlights from our incredible chat with none other than David Fogarty, the brilliant CEO and Founder of The Oodie and The Davie Group.

Imagine sitting down with a business juggernaut who's cracked the code to turning social media into a multi-million dollar megaphone for his ventures – that's exactly what you're about to experience!

Whether you're a hungry entrepreneur, a savvy marketer, or a business aficionado thirsty for next-level insights, this episode is your golden ticket. Prepare to be infused with ideas that will supercharge your impact in the digital arena.

Tune in, get inspired, and transform the way you see and do business in the digital world. You definitely don't want to miss this!


TIMESTAMP:

[00:00:15] - Importance of Continuous Learning in Business

[00:01:01] - Utilizing Diverse Resources for Rapid Growth

[00:01:31] - Incredible Power and Impact of Community

[00:02:04] - Transition to Community-Focused Brand Building

[00:03:09] - CEO Leadership and Overcoming Imposter Syndrome

Where to find DAVID FOGARTY

• LinkedIn
• Instagram
• Youtube
• Twitter

Join the conversation on Synergy IQ on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram (@synergyiq).

Access SynergyIQ Website to get to know more about us. 

Say hello to our host Daniel Franco on LinkedIn.

Transcript

00:00:09:20 - 00:00:19:29
Daniel Franco
In your career and your gross towards the Davie group and growing all these brands, did you consistently learn and educate yourself throughout that time?

00:00:20:01 - 00:00:41:27
David Fogarty
100%. It's the only way you can succeed in business, especially when you're young. You don't have the best and on the job experience. So you need to find people that have done it before. Whether that's YouTube videos, you know, we've talked a lot about rating and it might sound like I'm some bookworm. Truth is, I struggle to read.

00:00:41:28 - 00:01:08:09
David Fogarty
I don't read into books. Yeah, I watch a million YouTube videos and a year, I watch a million YouTube videos and I read a million blog post. I go PubMed and read studies there. So it's not just about books but yeah that then the the resources that I have relied on to grow very, very quickly and that's why I put so much time into my YouTube. You know these people, I'm about the optionality we keep talking about with in my life and a degree of happiness as well.

00:01:08:09 - 00:01:11:01
Daniel Franco
Yeah, hands down podcasts are also one side.

00:01:11:03 - 00:01:18:10
David Fogarty
I've God's actually be on podcast. I would almost put that above YouTube. Yeah in how why.

00:01:18:12 - 00:01:30:28
Daniel Franco
Downloading information from  other people’s  brains and learning from their experiences. What are the benefits from growing these social media accounts and does it help fast track some of the growth that you see in those?

00:01:31:00 - 00:01:52:27
David Fogarty
It's incredibly powerful. You know, Mr. Beast just opened a restaurant and so that was like 10,000 people stormed the mall and he filled out a whole mall. People were camping out for 24 hours. That is the power of these followings. Yeah, he did 100 million in his first year without opening restaurant to start selling like a franchise model, a digital franchise model.

00:01:52:29 - 00:02:19:12
David Fogarty
These communities are so, so powerful. There is the transactional element where you could just build a platform to advertise three, and that's kind of the influencer model. But I think if you can build a community where you really support people, all of the brands, the future direct to consumer e-commerce brands, big ones will have that sense of following and that community behind them, the digital platforms.

00:02:19:12 - 00:02:47:12
David Fogarty
They will get an influencer behind it and they will be the biggest. Kim Kardashian just launched a fund as well. If you think about the value proposition of someone like me who is just in the early stages and I go to one of these venture funds that they have a bunch of investments and strategic advisors where I go to Kim Kardashian and she can just post and just literally annihilate the competition and create or catch all the market share within a weight.

00:02:47:14 - 00:02:54:20
David Fogarty
It's it's a no brainer. So community is in so good and the way to do it is three days as.

00:02:54:20 - 00:03:11:23
Daniel Franco
A CEO, a managing director of a business, what can I do? Because I don't want to be the person that just stands in front of the camera. Hey, guys, like, you know, I do do that every now and again. It's just more the imposter syndrome kicks in. Why would anyone want to listen to what I have to say?

00:03:11:24 - 00:03:31:21
David Fogarty
A few things that impact this festival is it works for us. See, we're tapped to allocate as a one time allocators. As a CEO, it might not be the best time. Is there someone we can hire to do that? To to leverage that? And then there's the other point, which is maybe it's just insecurities coming out that maybe that is the best use of your time, but you're making excuses.

00:03:31:24 - 00:03:49:23
David Fogarty
We've talked about happiness. There's no point if you are successful and have optionality to put yourself through an unhappy thing to create money. That's against what we're trying to do in our lives, which can create freedom. And you are going to tie yourself to that role because once you are that you are irreplaceable. A lot of things to consider.

00:03:49:23 - 00:04:09:26
David Fogarty
No situation is going to be exactly the same. I don't regret doing it for myself. Obviously it's incredibly rewarding, but I don't recommend every single CEO to try to capture their audience. Grow ticked up. And also on that brand, if you're a serious brand, you're dancing around on Tik Tok. It's going to discredit the way we do in the Oodie, 

00:04:09:27 - 00:04:36:26
David Fogarty
which is quite quick, not many people had done this book, but it wasn't intentional as we had a very, very talented person in customer service that had already granitic top following and she just became the face. She handles the entire account, she creates all the content, she's on the platform 24/7 and we can measure the return on investment by a post-purchase survey so you understand how much this platform actually brings in incredibly created for us.

00:04:36:26 - 00:04:53:24
David Fogarty
But for a small business you need to justify it and then sometimes also roll sharing abilities because we're talking about creating content. You know, there's plenty of places that you need content created that can get a return on investment and you can just share that resource to at least explore something like TikTok.

00:04:53:27 - 00:05:04:20
Daniel Franco
In the corporate world building Instagram. I mean, LinkedIn in the corporate world is one that's probably more prevalent. Is there a different approach for LinkedIn or something that you've explored?

00:05:04:21 - 00:05:27:17
David Fogarty
Sure. LinkedIn, Twitter is very underrated. Yeah, I agree with that. Yeah, they manage to get around it, but I don't think it would be very hard to get 100,000 Twitter followers quickly and get millions of impressions was that it's just it's just a great platform if just to create the community strong the ability to grow is strong. There's not many ads that really disrupt the platform.

00:05:27:19 - 00:05:54:16
David Fogarty
One like and it goes so far it's just like LinkedIn as well. So LinkedIn just people like that, have been on Twitter for ages that are now sharing that Twitter content onto LinkedIn as is going viral, is they really do give a lot of impressions quite cheaply. So I think you've identified the two opportunities that I see there as well to to grow those platforms and it's text based content as well, which is much, much easier to integrate, you know, copy.

00:05:54:17 - 00:06:02:17
David Fogarty
We've really struggled to find a great copywriter that can replicate my tone of voice and understand the subject matter as deeply as Well

00:06:02:17 - 00:06:08:04
Daniel Franco
So your advice would be for everyone to try to grow that If you're looking to grow and scale your business.

00:06:08:09 - 00:06:30:17
David Fogarty
It depends on what business. It depends what returns you're going to get, depends how easily you can track those returns. And also it also depends on what your long term objectives is. In these days, things are non-linear. If it if it goes crazy, you it all 100 x your business in three years. So it's about understanding your return on investment timeline as well.

00:06:30:19 - 00:06:42:00
Daniel Franco
Yeah. So for any startup or entrepreneurs, would your advice be to get onto the social media platforms and just promote the shit out of it? Right? Or would it be.

00:06:42:02 - 00:06:43:00
David Fogarty
At least test it.

00:06:43:00 - 00:06:43:19
Daniel Franco
At least this.

00:06:43:19 - 00:06:44:08
David Fogarty
At least.

00:06:44:11 - 00:06:45:08
Daniel Franco
Be silly, not.

00:06:45:11 - 00:07:01:17
David Fogarty
Be silly. You'd be silly not say there's really no is so many social media platforms that I'd be surprised in any business model that you couldn't get one of them to work. You know, even a painting like a service provider for painting commercial houses. Tiktok's got this.

00:07:01:19 - 00:07:04:25
Daniel Franco
There's something so calming about the process.

00:07:04:27 - 00:07:09:21
David Fogarty
If you're a service based consulting business, LinkedIn, then Twitter's probably going to work for you.

00:07:09:23 - 00:07:29:09
Daniel Franco
How do you overcome? A You know, I talked about this before where, you know, the the idea of speaking publicly or people think listening to what we have to say and actually meaning something to them, how do you do or manage the imposter syndrome that goes those videos?

00:07:29:09 - 00:07:50:12
David Fogarty
I think the imposter syndrome is all around growth. If you're not if you don't have imposter syndrome, chances are you're probably not. It like pushing yourself hard enough or putting yourself in a situation have very deep imposter syndrome. I don't know when it will go away, if you will ever go away, but it's just something that yeah, I'm I'm working on.

00:07:50:13 - 00:07:58:06
David Fogarty
I think I'm just trying to become more happy and complacent with how I see myself rather than how other people see myself.

00:07:58:12 - 00:08:08:10
Daniel Franco
What was one lesson through that chaos period that will hold the dive group and the business in good stead from now into this?

00:08:08:12 - 00:08:28:14
David Fogarty
I think really just understanding what your business is, what is your strategy, Is it sustainable, is it antifragile, those kind of things you have to live one one. I was changed in way with a business that is not stable. Granted, I don't even think Facebook understood that platform science for Apple, so it would be hard for me to predict that.

00:08:28:14 - 00:08:32:02
David Fogarty
But it's just a lesson in. Yeah, diversification.

00:08:32:04 - 00:08:47:15
Daniel Franco
Stability. Yeah. I really liked your point earlier about instead of trying to spread too seen in horizontal they think vertically it's definitely goes to the point of really missing out right on your product. The more you try to do that, the more chance that there is.

00:08:47:15 - 00:09:08:00
David Fogarty
Yeah, well capital allocation, where is the best use of my financial capital? And I was being told by all these private equity firms and they say's that you need to be more diversified. I took that as well. GRATS But trace is better off being spent diversifying and supporting duty, which we now do. So it's full to great.

00:09:08:04 - 00:09:25:27
Daniel Franco
Thank you so much for your time today. Wrap it up there. It's been an amazing chat. Learning a little bit more about what's going on inside your head today. And then, you know, I think we can jump on YouTube and learn about how to grow in scale and all the success you've had there. But it's been really enjoyable learning.

00:09:25:29 - 00:09:44:19
Daniel Franco
You know, there is a human behind these brands who is actually learning and trying to grow himself and the business as as it grows in scale. So, you know, kudos for everything you've done and kudos for everything you're going to do. I'm very, very excited about where you're going and where the business is going as well.

00:09:44:20 - 00:09:49:02
David Fogarty
And I appreciate it. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, I think you have me worthy. It's great.

00:09:49:05 - 00:09:54:16
Daniel Franco
Beautiful. Thank you, everyone. That's it for now. We'll catch you next on Peaceful Listening.

00:09:54:16 - 00:09:58:11
Daniel Franco
To the podcast. You can check out the show notes if there was anything of interest to.

00:09:58:11 - 00:09:59:28
Daniel Franco
You and find out more about.

00:09:59:28 - 00:10:01:25
Daniel Franco
Us at Synergy IQ dot.

00:10:01:25 - 00:10:03:08
Daniel Franco
Com. So do you.

00:10:03:10 - 00:10:05:12
Daniel Franco
I am going to ask, though, if you did like the.

00:10:05:12 - 00:10:11:22
Daniel Franco
Podcast, you would absolutely mean the world to me if you can subscribe, write and review. And if you didn't like it.

00:10:11:25 - 00:10:16:22
Daniel Franco
That's alright too. There's no need to do anything. Thank you, guys. All the best.