Hey, I’m Alex! I always enjoy reading about different people in the space from different walks of life and how things are going for them. Unlike most of the other communities I am
a member of, this one includes members from all different lines of work while still coming across as relevant.
Find me on my website and Twitter
I am quite good at getting people and what makes them tick. This is something I’ve developed over the years in sales calls, client relationships, and with people we’ve hired, and so on. And, as such, it helped improve decision-making surrounding all of those areas (i.e., Is this a client that has the right intentions? What makes this employee want to wake up and do great work every day? ).
Lots of things have had an effect (some smaller and some more significant) on the trajectory of my life and work. I’d say the biggest in the early stages, of course, were my upbringing and then just growing passionate about seeing and decomposing how companies grow (and then, in turn, doing that over and over for more companies).
From an early age, though, I took an interest in software and working with tech, which eventually led me in my academic career to studying Computer Science in the first place. That interest in software and business, in general, evolved to the element I knew I was actually the right person for because I saw that starting a software company on my own wouldn’t make sense while I was able to enjoy working directly with and partner with software companies.
Along the way, our team and I have had the pleasure of working alongside some incredibly talented people at the companies we’ve worked with. And I mean we have the benefit of tracking performance and executing on marketing for more than just one or a handful of companies which is invaluable to our ability to iterate and apply strategies to deliver excellent work across the board.
Traveling. In all fairness, this was a bit easier pre-COVID. That being said, I’ve still traveled a fair bit these past years, whether that’s flying on short notice for a weekend to visit some friends or family in another country or taking a few weeks away to work in a different environment. The change of pace is helpful in making sure the business is operating the way it should with and without me.
The first one that comes to mind is a couple of years ago when we were growing, and I failed to properly vet a new client that we took on. The client didn’t align with our core values and was operating their business in a way that meant it was very difficult to motivate myself and my team to be interested to continue working for them.
We’re much pickier now, and our process hasn’t since allowed for another of those to slip through. This experience made us realize that it’s important to complement the work that our clients are already doing and act as part of their team instead of just delivering work for some project or campaign that we have no attachment or interest in.
In the end, it wasn’t a huge mistake and mostly led to having to have a difficult conversation so that we could all get back to doing work that we truly enjoy and are passionate about doing every single day.
It’s really amazing to me to see the variance in what it is that drives each of them. Some people are driven by simple things like being able to provide for their family, while in other cultures, it’s far more nuanced, which, as we’ve grown, has been an interesting journey to navigate.
Money really isn’t everything. As in, don’t get me wrong – in almost every way, money drives what we (and I) do every single day; I’m not going to try to pretend that it doesn’t. We wouldn’t get paid if we wouldn’t be helping our clients get money. Part of what I love about running my own business is that I get to do work that while I get to help businesses make lots of money, we – in the process – also make what would have previously been an unimaginable amount of money as well.
But the right money and the right ways. The moment you can be, be picky. Always raise your standards. Similarly, protect what matters to you. Family and friends’ health followed by you and your health always comes first. We should all be all the more aware of thanks to the past two years.
Thanks for sharing your story with us.
Hey Andrei, great meeting you as well! That’s an excellent question, while I wouldn’t say there’s a specific service that clients feel they need that they really don’t – I will say that we’ve definitely had our fair share of clients who bring us onboard for their SEO & marketing efforts but ended up preferring to manage our team as opposed to letting us prioritize what we knew was the optimal path to results for them (that we’d be able to demonstrate as well and as a result make them happier). Which isn’t their fault, as we do function as an extension of our clients’ teams but in the cases where the point of contact isn’t necessarily the best at letting us focus on what gets them results (i.e. anything from not dictating content type that shouldn’t be prioritized, etc.) it can take some time and more importantly very transparent communication to bring them up to speed / get their buy-in on the work that we’re doing as well. 🙂
I’m a fan of humane communication, where transparency and authenticity stay at the forefront of marketing efforts. What’s your take on being straightforward and honest when running marketing actions for your clients? Results no matter what (I’m exaggerating) or a midway path to get the desired outcomes?
Hey Oana! I’m certainly hoping for the same for the rest of the community. With regards to humane (perhaps more in our case, upfront) communication, we are too, and I think it’s definitely a challenge when working with businesses you don’t own & as a result, where decisions may not always be your own. All in all, it’s something we pre-qualify with clients to ensure that our visions align in terms of being straightforward, honest and transparent through everything. And that we operate very much with the mentality and approach that our client’s businesses are more important than our own since they’re what make ScaleMath. And, as such/as a result, them being aware of that then letting us own the roles/responsibilities that they brought us in for in the first place entirely. Of course, being results-driven where achievable without the sacrifice of those core values – yes, the approach is very much “whatever necessary” but not without limitation so yes, definitely a midway path – which from time to time can be a delicate balance. 🙂
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