OoM 017： From Passion Project to New Career with Jake Nackos
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Summary
Jake Nackes is the founder and CEO of Arvo, a minimalist watch brand that he started as a side project in 2013 to learn about small business and provide opportunities to give back to his community. Now, Jake and his wife Ashley run Arvo full-time and have stuck to the core values of doing good. He loves the work and the fun challenges of his job, but he s got his values straight as his family is his number 1 priority.
Transcript
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I have never met a man who did not have his next million dollar idea.
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The missing factor then is not what should I do, but how do I do it?
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What seems to be missing in the majority of scenarios I see is the action necessary.
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So my guest today, Jake Nackes with Arvo, tells us how to find your next passion project,
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how to start, and more importantly, how you can finally turn that next business idea into
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Embrace your fears and boldly chart your own path.
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When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time.
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You are not easily deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong.
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At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself a man.
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My name is Ryan Michler, and I'm glad that you're listening in today.
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Whether you're here for the first time or if you've listened to all 17 shows, welcome.
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Now, we've got a great one lined up for you today.
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Jake Nackes, the founder of an extremely successful watch company, is going to share with us how
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we turn our side project into a career reality.
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Now, before we get into that episode, I do want to humbly ask that you leave us a rating
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So, Ted Jitsu left a rating last week, and it said,
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Ryan is an excellent host who is leading on the front line to support men in their journey
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I love the fact that he focuses on skill development as opposed to rah-rah, happy, clappy BS.
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If you've heard any value on our podcast, I would ask that you please leave us a rating
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Now, remember, as always, we've got the show notes up for this show, and they can be found
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Today, I have the pleasure of introducing Jake Nackes with Arvo.
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Arvo is a minimalist watch brand that he started as a side project in 2013 to learn about small
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business and provide opportunities to give back to his community.
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Now, Jake and his wife, Ashley, run Arvo full-time and have stuck to the core values of doing
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He loves the work and, surprisingly, the fun challenges of his Arvo baby, but he's got
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his values straight as his family is his number one priority.
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He's the father of a 15-month-old rascal, Leo, and the real challenge is teaching him
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to grow up with strong values and goals that will help him to be successful throughout life.
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Hey, Jake, there's a lot of guys listening today that are probably thinking a lot of
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what you felt over the past year or two just in the conversations that we've had, and maybe
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they feel a little stuck, and they're really wanting to expand their horizons, or they've
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So I'm really excited to have our conversation today about it.
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So tell me a little bit about what it is you're doing now, and maybe just briefly about
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your background and how you made the transition into what it is you're doing now.
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So I've always had somewhat of a business mindset.
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I was studying business management at Utah State, then transferred to University of Phoenix
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And when I was about to finish, I was really trying to find a little side project that I
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could start with my wife, where we could learn a little bit about small business startups and
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And one thing led to another, and we came across watches.
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And long story short, I found this watch I loved at a pawn shop, and I wore it for a while,
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And when that happened, I couldn't find anything that was similar enough that I liked for a
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And so it just kind of stuck out to my wife and I that let's just try to make something
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similar and just kind of snowballed from there.
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So I know that even just in the past two weeks, you've made a transition, like a full-time
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In fact, it was about two years where I was just doing Arvo on the side.
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And then during the evenings and weekends, I would do Arvo, try to catch up on everything.
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And it just got to the point where I needed to sink or swim.
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And it's not always easy, but I finally took that plunge of scaling down my full-time job
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to a few hours a week and then focusing 100% on Arvo.
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So we're going to get a ton into that and how you did that and why you did that and what
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But the question I have, and we're family, you and I, so we know this, and you know my
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It would be near impossible for me and her to work together.
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I mean, we definitely have, you know, different opinions at times, but our styles over the
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past, you know, five or six years have somewhat melded together.
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So we see eye to eye in a lot, but we try to delegate specific things to one another.
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And if that item is, you know, assigned to her, I let her do it.
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And I just trust that whatever she does will be great and vice versa.
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Ashley also, you know, recently she's been starting a couple of projects of her own.
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And so she's kind of transitioned, you know, out of the day-to-day Arvo stuff.
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And I focus more on Arvo now that I'm, you know, doing this full-time and she's now doing
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So you told me a little bit about why watches and how you came across that.
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But I think, and we were talking about this in the pre-interview, we were talking a little
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bit about how, you know, I've never run across anybody who doesn't have an idea in their head,
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but very few men in my experience actually execute on those ideas.
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So when you have this idea, your watch broke and you're thinking, man, I've always wanted
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What was the very first action step that you took to move towards that?
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Because I think sometimes it's just a matter of, okay, we've just got to take the first
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Well, first of all, both my mom and my dad are both entrepreneurs who started their own
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businesses, you know, whether it was, they were forced to, or they, they wanted to have
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more independence, whatever it was, they now both own their company.
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So I think for lack of a better word, it's kind of in my blood that I wanted to do my own
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What really pushed me over the edge was having friends and meeting people who, who own their
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own small businesses and finding out that this is just another normal guy and he's able
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And that kind of gave me the, you know, that little push I needed to just say, let's just
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Because I know that as, and this is order of man, order of man is a side project for
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And so this is something I'm doing on the side as well.
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How do you find the contacts that you need to find in order to make your business run
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and be successful and start this side business?
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First of all, I have a good friend who, who worked for the state and his job was to connect
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basically businesses to other businesses who were trying to grow.
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And so luckily he, you know, has a Rolodex of names that were from, you know, here locally
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in Salt Lake and Utah areas that he was able to introduce me to.
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And then also there's, you know, here in Salt Lake, a couple of different, I guess you could
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call them community gathering places where it's almost like a shared space where you can
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go meet other entrepreneurs who, you know, are in the same position.
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I don't know if you're familiar with it, but it's, it's here in Salt Lake.
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And through this company, I've been able to meet a bunch of different brands and company
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When you started this venture, it sounds like you initially thought, Hey, this is going
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Like it didn't, from where I'm sitting right now and what hearing you say, it didn't sound
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like maybe you wanted to like this to go full bore or to be where it is now.
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Is it different or better or worse than you thought it would be when you started?
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Well, initially, I mean, I, I started it just to learn and figure out, you know, what does
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it take to start a company and go from an idea to actually putting something on somebody's
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These type of watches weren't even our first product that we wanted to do.
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It was, we actually wanted to do like a, an old Casio style calculator watch.
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And, you know, after just researching it, getting quotes, talking to manufacturers, like we just,
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we could not make it happen with the budget we had.
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So we had to do somewhat of a one 80 and, um, change up our style a little bit.
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It's just kind of evolved from there, but it's definitely bigger today than I envisioned
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So when you say, I want to learn, we started it to learn what looking back over, you said
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you've been around for a couple of years, like two years now?
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So what do you feel like have been the biggest learning curves or the biggest lessons in that
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Oh man, I've not only have I learned like skills for business, but I've gained passions
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And I've learned that being in an e-commerce site, like I am, photography is the world.
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I go on their website and it looks like, you know, they took it with an iPhone in a dim lit
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And so one thing I've learned is appearance and how you present your product.
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And as we've been able to put out better photos on our social media, that directly impacts
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our sales, which is funny, but it's completely true.
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So I love that you talk about finding different avenues and different passions, because I think
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sometimes as guys, we tend to believe that we have to get stuck in this career or this
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And then I don't know what it is, but we either become afraid or nervous or whatever it may be
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about trying anything new and we don't give ourselves permission to explore.
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And so that's what I've noticed is I've started Order of Man and some other projects that I've
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And it sounds like that's what you're saying, too, is that that permission that you get,
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you're giving yourself to explore allows you to try things that maybe you wouldn't have
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And, you know, you can't be afraid to get it wrong or fail because I've definitely done
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And you have some embarrassing trials here and there, but you just keep at it and you
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learn and you evolve and fine tune yourself to where you can figure it out.
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I mean, I have tons of tweaks that I like to make.
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So what happens when you have one of those failures or those setbacks for you to be able
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Like, what is it that's driving you or motivating you or how do you push past those failures
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You know, it takes a little bit of stubbornness for sure.
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You know, you want to prove to people that you are doing well and learning to make your
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I think, you know, individually, people have different things to drive them.
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Mine, as you mentioned, in the past two weeks, mine's gone from, you know, wanting to be
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successful to prove to myself I can do it to now wanting to be successful to support my
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Well, it's cool because I imagine you're at home right now, right?
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I think we can take a lesson from that is that, man, you're able to pursue this dream
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or this passion or try something new and take some risks and then you look at yourself and
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think, oh, man, I could be at home and I could jump on this interview and I can spend an hour
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doing this and then I can do, you know, my other duties, but then I can also balance that
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and have time for what's important, which in your case, just because we know each other,
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Yeah, it is amazing and to be honest, if you could see my office right now, right next
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to me is a desk set up for Ashley, my wife, and it's fun because we, like our date nights
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are working on our projects and it sounds weird, but we enjoy doing that together and
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bouncing ideas and, yeah, Leo runs around while we do it, but it's fun.
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So I don't want to put you on the spot too much here because I don't even know if I prepped
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you for this question, but you talk about setbacks and failures.
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Is there one that sticks out in your mind as being like, hey, at the time we thought
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either this was the end of the world or at least the end of the business, are there some
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failures or setbacks that really ring true or you can remember very vividly?
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Yeah, the biggest one that I can think of, that's been with our actual product.
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Our very first order of 500 watches, we didn't get the best materials in the wash just because
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of budget and so we wanted to, you know, basically get an MVP out to our customers to see if we
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even had, you know, a business that could happen.
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And once we started shipping them out to people, we were finding that either the batteries were
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dying or the second hands just would stop ticking for like extended amounts of time and throw
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And so I had to probably resend 200 watches of those 500 to customers who had issues with
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And while that was happening, I thought, man, we're not going to recover from this.
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Our first watches and nearly half of them have issues with them.
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I mean, I thought that it wasn't going to go much past that when that happened.
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Well, you sound like you handled it with integrity.
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And that's what I'm always impressed with is like when business can realize, hey, we made a
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Obviously, they were mad that their watches weren't working, but how you handled it?
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There was a handful of people that weren't necessarily happy about it and others that
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And so as quickly as we could, you know, I ordered a new batch of watches, upgraded the
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movements and a lot of different parts of the watch.
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And I think that helped to show them that, you know, I realize we're new.
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I'm sorry about your watch, but here's a new one.
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And for the most part, people were completely fine with that.
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And it didn't seem like there was a lasting, lasting problem as long as you were willing
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I mean, the worst thing you can do is go silent with the customer.
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You know, they just want some sort of feedback.
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And if you're honest with them, it's, it's usually fine.
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So that's one of the things that I know you guys are really, really good at.
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Like I look at your social media followings and how accessible, like some of the parties
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that you guys throw, just some of the things that you guys are doing, I think from my perspective
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are very unique in how you've grown your audience and your brand.
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Talk to me a little bit about your marketing strategy and how, how that's been received.
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So our, our motto or slogan, what, what you will is do good, be good.
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And the reason we chose that is because we wanted to, to go to market as a company who
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was like socially aware, who cares about, you know, helping others and changing someone's
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life for the better, even if it's, you know, with some small beanie or gesture, whatever
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And so we've, we've done as much as we can to participate in charity events or host parties
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And we do as much as we can to just show people that, you know, we might be a company, but we're
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also just, you know, people who are trying to connect with our community and have fun at
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I mean, we have, you know, good feedback on our, our social media posts and, you know,
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a lot of activity, whereas some companies who, who might sell more, they just don't have
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that same FaceTime that we get with our, our customers.
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And that's what I've liked is how receptive and available that you've been and how easily
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So let's, let's jump back to the fact that I think even just in the past couple of weeks,
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you've come to this point now where you feel like, Hey, I'm, I'm, I'm willing to leave
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That's providing a steady income and, you know, frankly, providing your way of life and
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supporting your family to now I'm going to step out of that into some uncertainty and
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Like, was there a point where you said, okay, now I'm having enough income coming in
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or like, what was the event that led to you making that move?
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You know, it was kind of a culmination of things.
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I think not that I wasn't happy at my last job.
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I still like that industry and then whatnot, but I think it came down to how much fun I
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was having doing Arvo and, and meeting new people and getting involved with other brands
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It made me realize that I'm the type of person who does like to be out and about and, you
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And what I was currently doing in that role, I wasn't able to do that, which I think after
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a while, it just, it made me realize that, you know, I could either keep doing what I'm
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doing and someday I might wonder what would have happened if I did Arvo or I could just
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jump into it now, see what I can make of it and sink or swim.
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But I got to that point where I could no longer have one foot in each, if that makes
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Obviously there's a lot of excitement and a lot of optimism about what the future holds.
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What are some of the fears that you have moving forward?
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Cause I think, you know, what's interesting is, is my wife was, was asking yesterday about
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somebody that we know and she said, Hey, this guy's like really smart.
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Why is he still working for this other company?
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And my response was, it has nothing to do with intelligence and it has everything to
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It has to do with the fact that, yeah, he's a bright guy, but at the end of the day, a
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lot of guys just don't believe that they have it.
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There's just not enough belief in themselves that they can go out there and they can make
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And I know that as I branched out on my own with my financial planning practice, and even
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as I start this order of man, I know that I still have some doubts and some uncertainties,
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even though I've already made the plunge and made that big leap.
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What are some of those fears that you have now?
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I mean, one of my biggest fears is, you know, there's only so much that any one person can
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And so you get to the point where you have to start, you know, delegating or hiring people
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And I fear that as you do that, you know, it dilutes it a little bit and you lose some
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And also I studied business management and, you know, in other aspects of business, but they
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don't really teach you, you're running this company.
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And so I think right now my biggest challenge is knowing where to go from here.
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Now that I have more time and I can tidy up the details, now how do I scale it?
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And so I'm still at that point where I don't know and I'm trying to find out, you know,
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And it's scary because if you try the wrong route, you know, it could sink you.
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So you talk a lot about the people around you and trying to find those.
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And so it's all about creating your own networks and creating the right people and having the
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Talk to me about the people around you, whether that's family, obviously your wife's in the
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Like, tell me about some of the support people around you that are helping you advance
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So I do have, I mean, you have a couple of mentors and a couple other business owners
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that I'm close with who I can bounce ideas off or ask how to do, you know, certain things.
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I'm also, excuse me, I'm part of a group of, I guess, entrepreneurs or people who are looking
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We meet together once a month and talk about ideas and how to go about that.
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But in speaking with them, you realize, or it brings to mind like all these different
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ideas or aspects that you can incorporate into your business.
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And so, I mean, I have a good network of people who just are nice to talk to and are great
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I think, you know, between that and doing my own research and trial and error is basically
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I want to come back to the trial and error and shorten learning curves.
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But I'm also curious, did you come across or do you currently still come across any naysayers?
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Are there people out there in your immediate network or close to you that express their
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doubt or whatever it may be, maybe just some negative reaction to what you're doing?
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I wouldn't say there's people who are negative, you know, at least to my face.
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I don't know if there's something behind my back.
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But to be honest, I mean, most people are pretty supportive.
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And, you know, if they follow us on social media or if they've never heard of us, they
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think it's, you know, it's cool what we're doing.
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And, you know, what's interesting about that is that, I mean, we've known each other for
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a long time, but I fully believe that you'll be successful with your business.
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And I think there's probably a lot of other people that think that as well.
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But it also makes me wonder if that you just have enough confidence in what you're doing
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that maybe it could even be that you're not even worried about that stuff, right?
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Well, I mean, if I were to sit down and think about it, there's definitely some worries,
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So I just, you know, if I have a task and I want to do something, I just figure out how
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And I try not to think of, you know, what could go wrong because I don't really like those
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I just, you know, if I want to do something, I'll try it, see if it works.
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How do you find the balance between you doing it?
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Because you sound like, and I know based on our conversations, that you and I are both
00:23:00.120
So how do you find the balance between doing it yourself and then knowing, like you said
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earlier, that I've got to come to a point where I'm going to scale this business?
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Are there some things that you've used or some tools or tricks that help you realize,
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here's what I should be doing myself and here's what I should be delegating out to other people?
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So up to this point, aside from, you know, my family and two interns that I have, I also
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And what I've done with them is I've found out or I've identified two areas of the business
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that I can do, but they take a lot of time and they don't allow me to grow the business.
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And so the first one was all my inbound emails from customers or bloggers or whoever it may
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So she answers all the emails and filters them out, either answering them herself as a customer
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service representative, or if it's more of a business inquiry, she'd forward it to me.
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And that alone cut my time dramatically throughout the week.
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And then the second one was I hired a lady to do all of our blogger and influencer relations.
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And what I mean by that is we're a company that we're a little different in marketing to
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where we're not paying for, you know, billboards or TV stuff or online AdWords a whole lot.
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All our marketing dollars goes into social media and blogger influencers who have a following
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that we can tap into. And we do collaborations with them, you know, setting up giveaways or
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promotions, posts, et cetera. And so I hired a lady to manage all those relations so that I don't have
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to be emailing back and forth. And that also has cut my time dramatically to where I can focus on
00:24:52.640
One of the biggest concerns I have as I bring on employees is, and I've done this in the past,
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where now I've freed up my time. And I know it takes a lot of discipline because sometimes
00:25:02.120
when we free up our time, we don't, we aren't as effective with the time we just freed up as we
00:25:08.920
And so I think that's a trap that we've got to avoid if we're wanting to branch out and be
00:25:13.500
successful, that we've got to really grind and know that if I have a spare minute, I mean,
00:25:17.420
you said yourself for the last two years, you've been working full time and then in mornings and
00:25:22.580
nights, you're doing everything you can with Arvo to get it off the ground. And I think that takes a
00:25:29.880
Let's go back to learning things and learning curves. I want to talk about things that maybe
00:25:36.820
you've identified as ways to shorten the learning curve, because you started this as an experiment
00:25:42.940
based on what you've said and really trying to gain education, to gain some learning. But at the
00:25:49.940
same time, you want to be as efficient as possible. Are there some things that you've learned or done
00:25:55.080
to shorten the time from, I don't know anything about this, to now I'm an expert maybe at this
00:26:02.180
Uh-huh. Well, I think, first of all, it comes from what you're passionate about, and you might not
00:26:08.080
know that in the beginning. So for example, I wanted to try to learn how to do a little bit of
00:26:15.020
everything myself. And so I built my first website. I did my photography photos. I reached out to
00:26:22.560
different bloggers and whatnot, different revenue streams. And I found out what I liked, what I was
00:26:28.060
good at, and what I enjoyed learning and researching on my own. And then I spent my time focusing on
00:26:34.380
those areas. And then the things that I didn't click easily or that I didn't enjoy, I found people who
00:26:42.080
were good at that and almost had them teach me, mentor me a little bit as they were willing.
00:26:48.160
And I guess an example of that would be the coding, the back end of a website. I don't have
00:26:55.180
necessarily the patience to learn all that. And so as opposed to wasting time, I would rather hire
00:27:02.860
out someone to do my website or have them give me some sort of fast track learning on it so I don't
00:27:11.820
Well, you talk a lot about finding the things that you're good at. What do you think are your
00:27:16.080
strengths? What would you say that you bring to the table as far as being strengths and that you
00:27:21.100
I think what I enjoy most, first and foremost, are photography and the marketing. So I really
00:27:29.000
enjoy learning how to shoot products, how to shoot lifestyle images, how to use Photoshop and
00:27:36.600
anything that has to do with the photo media. And I enjoy using those to do fun marketing campaigns.
00:27:45.000
So, I mean, we've done like conceptual photos where, you know, maybe there's something surreal
00:27:52.520
about a photo and then we have our customers or our followers kind of caption that image,
00:27:58.480
something that stands out to them. And so it's a little different, but it's a way that I've taken
00:28:03.360
two of my passions and kind of combine them together to build some momentum and some rapport with our
00:28:09.380
followers. And one of the ones that I've seen that I like is, I think it's you and your family.
00:28:15.740
You're in the, you're in the woods and there's a huge, just oversized watch in the background,
00:28:20.660
I think, an art of a watch in the background. Is that what you're talking about?
00:28:24.560
Yeah. I love those. Those are so good. Sorry, but I interrupted you, but keep, keep going. So
00:28:31.940
Yeah. So those, you know, creative marketing strategies, I love all that kind of stuff. And
00:28:37.440
I like bouncing new ideas and having, you know, different contests, that kind of stuff I enjoy
00:28:43.720
and kind of building that brand to consumer relationship. I think it's, it's fun. And,
00:28:50.340
you know, things like maybe the website or tracking finances like that stuff, I'm not as passionate
00:28:57.320
about. And so I find people who are, and I try to involve them, whether it's, you know, through trade
00:29:03.600
or, or even just paying them, it's worth it to me because I can focus on what I love and not get
00:29:09.460
bogged down by, by those kinds of things. What are some necessary skills? If there's somebody
00:29:15.220
listening today that says, Oh man, this guy's awesome. Like he's talking about branching out on
00:29:19.640
his own and I've got this idea I've always wanted to do. And now I feel motivated to go start
00:29:24.420
something. What are some skills that you think men have to have right up front or learn very quickly
00:29:30.780
to be successful in any type of endeavor like this? Definitely passion and drive, because there's
00:29:36.520
going to be a lot of times where, you know, you don't want to stay up until 2am or 3am to, to get
00:29:43.880
something done, or you don't want to learn this or learn that. And you definitely need that, that drive
00:29:49.600
motivation and a little bit of stubbornness to, to make that happen. I think you, you know,
00:29:56.120
I think you do need to be creative to an extent. And honesty is something that I've found has been
00:30:02.820
huge for us because we're, I mean, we're a small company. Not everybody realizes that, you know,
00:30:08.900
they might log into our Instagram and see that we have 20,000 followers and think we're bigger than we
00:30:14.640
are. But there's a, you know, a balance between portraying yourself as a small company and then
00:30:21.060
portraying yourself as a large company. And I think honesty comes from the interactions that we
00:30:27.860
have on our website and our social media. I mean, we have people all the time who, who will say,
00:30:34.360
hey, my watch broke right on, you know, the messages in a post and everyone else is seeing that.
00:30:41.020
And sometimes, you know, as, as an owner, you want to erase their comment, try to hide that from
00:30:46.380
everybody and try to fix it, you know, behind the scenes. But what I found that's kind of cool is
00:30:52.480
if you address these issues right on front of your post where people can see that, it almost does
00:30:58.800
more for you than trying to hurry and take it off and, and helping around the back. It shows that you
00:31:03.720
are upfront and, you know, honest to your customers and want to help out. And so honesty is huge.
00:31:09.620
I would say those would be my three pillars are just, you know, drive, motivation, honesty and
00:31:14.940
hard work. I think it's really important that you brought up one of the things you just said was
00:31:20.260
sometimes you don't want to stay up till two or three and work on whatever it is you may be working
00:31:25.060
on. And I think what we do sometimes when we do make this leap into some exciting venture is we have
00:31:32.240
this false notion or this false belief that if it's my quote unquote passion, that everything's just
00:31:37.440
going to be easy and it's all going to fall into place and I'm going to love every minute of it
00:31:42.560
when what you're saying and personally what I've experienced is that, yeah, I do have passion for
00:31:47.820
the things I do, but that doesn't mean that sometimes I don't want to maybe put together the
00:31:53.540
show notes for a podcast episode or whatever it may be. Right. So I think it's important to recognize
00:31:59.140
that, but then also to recognize that you can find people and you said this too, you can find
00:32:05.680
people to help delegate that stuff out because there's certain things in my business that I feel
00:32:09.920
like, man, these are just draining my energy and other things that actually give me energy when I
00:32:15.280
do. And so I'm really glad that you made that distinction. Yeah, it's definitely important because
00:32:19.900
there's a lot of wasted energy, you know, that can go into something where it might have been 10 times
00:32:25.440
easier just to find somebody who can do it for you or, or hire it out. I mean, sometimes it's,
00:32:30.760
it's worth it. You talked a lot about your marketing strategy and the way that you get out in front of
00:32:36.440
people is through social media. Obviously, like you said, 20,000 followers on Instagram. And I know
00:32:41.440
everybody who's following you is very active from what I can see. And then also outreach to bloggers.
00:32:46.740
Why do it that way? What, what was your thought process behind we're going to build a brand this way
00:32:51.500
as opposed to traditional media outlets or advertising outlets? I think because maybe it's
00:32:57.960
because here in Utah, we do have, you know, a pretty good blogging network. And I was somewhat
00:33:05.120
familiar with how that worked. That influenced me a little bit. And, you know, when you're a small
00:33:10.400
startup, especially in a very competitive industry, such as watches, where companies have been around
00:33:15.520
for decades, there's got to be something that you do that other people don't. And so what we found is
00:33:21.600
by working with influencers who have thousands of followers who respect what they say and post,
00:33:29.400
we're able to, to build relationships with these influencers, get them to post about our project
00:33:35.140
product, whether it's through paying them or maybe we trade them something. All of a sudden,
00:33:40.040
all their followers are wondering, Oh, cool. That's, that's a nice watch. I want to go check out their
00:33:44.720
stuff. Then they come follow us. And from the beginning, we found that that was the biggest
00:33:50.920
bang for our buck. I mean, I've tried more traditional outlets that I just wasn't as successful
00:33:56.080
on. And I think that in the next few years, you're going to see more and more, you know, people using
00:34:02.340
bloggers and less, you know, using like a celebrity because, you know, if, if, for example, LeBron James
00:34:10.200
is wearing our watch, people aren't going to care and people can't relate to LeBron James. But
00:34:16.160
if, you know, your neighbor who says, Oh, this is a great watch. You should go check them out. It's,
00:34:21.880
you know, it's only 50, 60 bucks. That's going to be a lot more compelling to someone to go buy our
00:34:27.000
stuff than if they see LeBron James wearing it, if that makes sense. Right. Yeah. It's just going to,
00:34:32.400
it's going to connect them better. Yeah. And so people, I mean, people want to connect with,
00:34:37.740
with others. They want to have that relationship and it's the same with products. I mean,
00:34:42.760
they want to be able to relate to it some way. And ours has been through social involvement and
00:34:49.860
influencers. How do you reach out to somebody who I've got to be careful. I don't want to say,
00:34:55.480
I don't want to say they're better because that's not the case, but how do you reach out to somebody
00:34:59.200
who maybe is a little bit further down the track than you or been a little bit more successful up to
00:35:04.020
this point? How do you reach out to that person and make that first and initial contact?
00:35:09.540
You mean if you're wanting to maybe collaborate with them? Exactly.
00:35:13.860
So there's almost an, I don't want to say an unwritten law, but when you're starting out,
00:35:19.260
if you want to be promoted by bigger companies with more followers, more than likely you're going
00:35:25.500
to have to either pay them or know them, you know, outside of work. Because if you're a,
00:35:32.420
if you're a small company and you go to a large company and say, Hey, do you want to trade like
00:35:36.860
a post for a post or product product? More than likely, they're not going to respond to you,
00:35:41.420
not because they don't like your product, but because they're also wanting to get something
00:35:46.620
out of it naturally. And so what happens is, you know, if you have 500 followers, start collaborating
00:35:53.100
with people who have 500 or a thousand followers and then slowly build yourself up that way.
00:35:58.220
And as you grow your base, that margin of difference in your followers kind of starts
00:36:04.340
to expand to where, you know, if you have about 10,000 followers, you know, working with someone
00:36:10.860
with 15,000 followers is probably acceptable. If you kind of stay on that same, that same wavelength,
00:36:18.460
then you can get away with, you know, doing trades, whether it's like I was saying, you know,
00:36:23.600
you post this and I'll post for you. That way we both gain followers. If you're wanting to work
00:36:28.460
with someone who has a lot more, more than likely you're going to have to pay for it. And it can
00:36:32.500
range anywhere from, you know, 20 bucks to 1500 bucks. I'm so glad you said that. What's interesting
00:36:38.980
is I had a guy on, his name is Tanner Guzzi with Masculine Style. And he talked about being better with
00:36:45.860
your style, being more fashionable. And he said, it's all about making gradual changes in your,
00:36:51.040
in your fashion. If you're a five and the next day you try to be a 10, there's going to be a
00:36:55.660
disconnect. But if you're a five and you try to work up to a six or seven and then a seven to an
00:37:01.460
eight and eight to nine. But what I keep hearing over and over again, as I interview successful men
00:37:06.120
is all about the process. And I think we have a tendency to want to rush through things and get
00:37:11.460
to the end goal really quick. And what you're talking about is enjoying the process of building a
00:37:16.660
company, right? Yeah. I mean, you're going to get frustrated if you're not, if you expect to get
00:37:21.640
10,000 followers in a month, then you're probably going to be disappointed because it's as funny as
00:37:28.660
it is, it's very competitive. And when you're an e-commerce company like ourselves, that's what we
00:37:34.080
look for is new followers. And they don't just come like that, you know? Right. You have to earn
00:37:41.400
So I think you're somebody, again, based on our conversation, who is somebody who always has an
00:37:47.640
idea, right? Always looking forward, looking for the next thing, looking for just something new to
00:37:53.860
try and experience and be. And so what are some of those things for you? Like what types of visions
00:37:59.440
and thoughts do you have about what the future holds, either for your company or other things
00:38:03.320
moving forward? Yeah. I mean, I love brainstorming ideas and I do have quite a few that I'd like to put
00:38:10.300
an emotion at some point. But the biggest one that, um, you know, we've talked about it a little
00:38:16.420
bit is this, um, it's a company where we're going to be helping manage that relationship between brands
00:38:24.740
and influencers. Cause like you were saying, I mean, there, there are plenty of, of people wanting
00:38:30.380
to start up, but they don't know, like they don't know anybody who can help them promote their
00:38:34.660
brand. And for me, it was, I had to go out and go to blogger conferences and do different things
00:38:41.340
to meet these people. But we want to help new startups and, and bigger companies bridge that
00:38:47.420
gap. And that will be through a phone application where it's almost like I'm blanking on the name
00:38:53.000
of that, that app where you can meet people Tinder. Oh, Tinder. Yeah. So it's almost a Tinder style
00:38:59.040
where, you know, you scroll through these different bloggers or brands. And if you see something
00:39:03.640
you like, we help connect them. And so it's, uh, it kind of takes out that, you know, if you don't
00:39:09.800
know somebody, I'm not going to do it. We're going to help them. You have a product. I know someone who
00:39:14.040
could help you rep it. We want to bring them together so we can create like a good collaboration
00:39:18.260
right now. I'm working on that application and hopefully it'll be cool. And it will even help
00:39:23.720
Arvo down the road. And I think that's so valuable. Like you're saying is just connecting with
00:39:28.020
and knowing the right people and being at the right place at the right time. Not that it's all luck,
00:39:32.320
but certainly there's an element of, you know, just, just being there, just being out and being
00:39:37.860
visible and being present and being in front of the right people. Right. Sure. So Jake, I appreciate
00:39:42.700
a ton. You come in on the show. You've shared a ton of valuable information for guys who, who have
00:39:48.240
that idea, who want to take that idea to the next level. If somebody wants to connect with you and learn
00:39:54.080
more about what you're doing with Arvo or even this new app that you're talking about, what is the best
00:39:59.380
way to connect with you? Well, I think initially, um, I mean, I'm more than happy to email back and
00:40:06.200
forth or I, uh, my phone number is in my email signature. So just Jake at Arvo where it was
00:40:13.080
probably the best way to connect and we can go from there. So we'll make sure if, if, if people
00:40:17.460
have questions or want to, want to learn from you or talk with you to reach out to you, I know you're
00:40:21.660
busy. And so obviously, you know, we want to, we want to help as we can. We understand how busy you
00:40:26.900
are. So we again, appreciate it. Is there any last minute bits of advice or words of encouragement for
00:40:32.240
somebody that wants to make that leap into this idea or this passion they have? Yeah. Um, in fact,
00:40:37.520
I, I kind of live by one phrase that I read a few years ago, to be honest, I wish I remember where I
00:40:44.340
heard it, but I, I just don't, but they were talking about starting a business and they said,
00:40:50.220
if you wait till your product or service is perfect, it's too late. And so what they're saying is if,
00:40:56.580
if you're waiting till you have all the details squared away, someone else has already beat you
00:41:00.940
to the punch and you've lost. So if you have an idea, no matter where it is in the process,
00:41:05.960
just start putting stuff together and the details will come. Don't worry about having it perfect
00:41:11.840
before you launch. I mean, like I said, our first batch of watches we had issues with,
00:41:17.240
but that got us on the map and put us in, in the motion to fix it. And, and now we're here.
00:41:22.720
So just, I mean, if you have an idea, pursue it now and don't wait.
00:41:26.860
Awesome. Thanks. Again, what we'll do is we'll make links to all of the resources you talked about
00:41:31.780
and how people can reach out to you. We'll make those available on our show notes at
00:41:35.060
orderman.com. Jake, thanks again for being on the show.
00:41:40.500
There you have it guys. Mr. Jake Nackes with Arvo teaching us and giving us some insights in how to
00:41:45.240
turn that idea into a lucrative career, which he has been able to do. Now, if you're running or
00:41:49.980
working out or driving or hiding under the desk at work, listening to this, and you want to get
00:41:55.020
some of the information about this episode, remember head to orderofman.com slash 017 to
00:42:00.480
get all the information and notes from this show. And so while you're there, also, if you would,
00:42:04.940
please leave a rating review and you can do that again at orderofman.com slash iTunes. Also be sure,
00:42:10.960
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00:42:15.760
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00:42:21.240
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00:42:25.660
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00:42:36.620
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00:42:43.380
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00:42:53.640
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00:42:59.900
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00:43:04.940
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