Can social media alone help my RegCF offering

Speakers

Oscar Jofre

CEO and Co-Founder

KoreConX

Oscar Jofre

CEO and Co-Founder

Oscar is currently one of the Top 10 Global Thought Leaders in Equity Crowdfunding, a Top 5 Fintech Influencer, Top 10 Blockchain and a Top 50 InsureTech. He has published an eBook that has been downloaded in over 20 countries, and been distributed by partners worldwide. Oscar is a featured speaker on Fintech, regulated, equity crowdfunding, compliance, shareholder management, investor relations, and transparency in the USA, Australia, UK, Germany, France, Netherlands, Canada, Singapore, Indonesia and China. He speaks to audiences covering alternative finance, RegTech, insurance, banking, legal, and crowdfunding. Oscar also advises the world’s leading research, accounting, law firms and insurance companies on the impact Fintech, RegTech, LegalTech, InsurTech and OrgTech is having in their business.

Jason Fishman

SVP Digital Strategy

DNA

Jason Fishman

SVP Digital Strategy

Growth Marketing expert with over 10 years of experience leading Marketing Agency, Ad Network, and in-house Brand Marketing Teams. Jason is an expert in digital channels including Search Engines, Social Media Platforms, Programmatic Ad Exchanges, Influencer Networks, Email Automation, Content Marketing, and Partnerships. Jason’s accomplishments in these disciplines include surpassing industry performance benchmarks with both Fortune 500 companies and scaling startups, alike. Over the past 6 years Jason has worked with over 400 brands, many of which in the FinTech vertical and over 175 focused on Investor Acquisition initiatives associated with 9-figures of funding. DNA has developed unique first party investor data that has been instrumental in the success of these campaigns across Regulation A+, CF, and D raises. Jason has been showcased in Panel and Individual presentations at a high volume of Tech and Marketing conferences, along with his “Test. Optimize. Scale.” Podcast. He is also committed to a number of Thought Leadership content projects for 2020, including the Forbes Agency Council. Jason manages a Los Angeles team with experience in all aspects of the user journey.

Samson Williams

CEO

CfPA

Samson Williams

CEO

My super power is helping smart and amazing people be more smart and amazing. Retain me to help you with any of the following: - Making Money - Raising up to $5M via Investment Crowdfunding - The Space Economy - 5th Industrial Revolution - Crisis & Emergency Leadership Feel free to schedule a call with me here: https://www.axesandeggs.com/schedule-a-call Looking forward to doing business with you.

Oscar Jofre  00:24

All right, let’s just give him a minute or two. Here. We are on YouTube Live already. So it’s the show. We had a lot of problems earlier today. And I suspect that people have been emailing us all Sorry, I couldn’t make it. Is it? Is it available somewhere? And thank goodness, we’re recording? Of course we’re recording everything. We’re in a new era now. It’s, it’s not as difficult as it seems. But all right, there you are. It’s the you get your white background. What are you going to put you’re going to put Hawaii this time, or you’re going to put some sort of No, just the background here, playing with

01:06

the more solid color setup. Excited to be on take me an extra second there.

Oscar Jofre  01:11

But yeah, no, it’s there’s a lot of technical difficulties today. But we’ll get started. We’re on YouTube Live. So let me get started here for us. And then. All right. Good afternoon, everybody. And welcome to the course on a webinar series 2021. My name is Oscar Jofre. And once again, we are going to have another great discussion regarding all of this talk about regulation, crowdfunding Regulation A Of course, obviously, we’re all excited about March 15, just around the corner. And you know, our presentation is really not listening to PowerPoint. It’s really listening to those who do this day in and day out. So you can get a sense of how it’s really done. And today, we have two great panelists that are going to have a great discussion for us, and for everybody else. So just a reminder, this is available to you in YouTube channel, of course, as well, on course on that i o all the library of all the webinar series that we have. So looking forward to this one, obviously, we talk a lot about it the crop, but we’re gonna get dive in. But first, let’s do the introduction. So obviously, we get some new guests that we haven’t had be here before. Samson, please introduce yourself.

Samson Williams  02:23

Hey, guys, my name Sansom Williams. Today I’m wearing my crowdfunding professionals Association hat. So the cfpa back in 2012, they helped push through the JOBS Act jumpstart our business startups Act, which enabled crowdfunding to really kick off. So in May of 2016. Title three of the jobs that came into existence, which is called reg CF, it’s not very exotic name, but that’s what it’s called. And that allows for retail investors to invest in early stage startups and businesses. And so I’m going to conclude with this by saying, you should definitely join the crowdfunding professionals Association. It’s a great Association for education awareness about crowdfunding. And if you only take one thing away from this entire seminar, know that customers have more money than VCs, and I say this against you write it down. Customers have more money than VCs, we can even argue that customers have more money than banks, because in theory is based out of their customers money, but we’ll talk about that later.

Oscar Jofre  03:28

That was an interesting introduction of the app part. I think I’m not gonna forget that one. I don’t know. Jason, can you do better than that? I don’t know. It’s up to you. There you go. Sure.

Jason Fishman  03:40

I can’t wait to go sign up for the organization there Samson. Very, very exciting to hear more about what you guys do. And I came up with a Forbes article yesterday called the new premium audience for investor marketing, which is user owners. It’s speaking to the exact same concept there. I was not familiar with the stat of you know, there being more capital from customers themselves really like that can quote you on it, actually. And yeah, of course, and and, you know, not my first KoreConX panel, but just a full overview on me, co founder, CEO of DNA digital media agency out of Los Angeles, California investor and user acquisition marketing agency. We’ve been working on reg D campaigns since 2014. Reg CF campaigns since out of the gate in 2016. RegA plus later that year over 200 to date, time figures capital, here to talk with you about marketing strategy, what we do in terms of building a funnel, driving traffic into that funnel with the social platforms given the topic today, and you know, with Oscar as the host, I’m sure it’s going to be you know, info and entertainment packed for all audiences.

Oscar Jofre  04:59

Well, that is Drive family in though isn’t it? It has to be part entertainment somebody, somebody who is it mark Roderick or a few the lawyers have said that part of crowdfunding and raising capital has to be entertaining Yeah, to entertain the crowd. And it’s important that you don’t lose focus of, you know, the overall objectives. I know everybody swings one way or the other. So today, we obviously are subject, you know, social media has been the cornerstone to what everybody feels that it’s the key element, the key feature to drive the traffic to drive the awareness and all that, but we’re now learning that social media alone isn’t going to do it. And, Jason, I’m coming to you because you been? I have to give you credit. I mean, you’re constantly putting statistics out there to help the industry understand it, as well, the the investor base that where is it coming from? How do they fit into that whole package? But so let’s break it down to why we’re seeing it’s beyond social media. So let’s talk about that part. When we say social media, what are we talking about specifically that people just do in social media that and then we’ll go into the other elements? Sure.

Jason Fishman  06:13

So social media is a very important element. When you look at site traffic online, top sites, social is going to be, you know, at the top of those lists every time. So how do we use these social platforms for a raise? How do we use these social platforms as part of a digital strategy are important questions to be asking out out of the gate. Now you have organic, and you have paid, you have posts, all different types of content that can be distributed, and shared and look to get third party reposting from it. You know, so paid. So advertising, I’m a big advertising fan as it’s very scalable. If I’m running, let’s say 70 $500 worth of ads and seeing a new investor come on board. And it’s a $750,000 average investment value, that’s a 10x return on adspend. You look at that at a 10,000 $50,000 budget and the type of capital it’s producing, you know, 50k, could produce 500k, and so on and so forth. Also, as that’s happening on the paid side, more organics occurring, if the campaigns running on a portal, the portals audiences seeing that, and you can see more organic conversions coming in simultaneously, maybe that 500k then turns into 1,000,750k, with those audiences that are on looking. So social is a very, very important piece of the puzzle. Whenever we’re working on strategy, we like to map out the target audiences and really define where do they go online? Where are these individuals in terms of their day to day digital usage, and in doing so may identify lists of other sites, other apps that we should also have a presence on, be it organic, or, or paid, and exploring where we want to test out first, optimize towards working best, and really scale the key drivers from there.

Oscar Jofre  08:15

And that’s great, that gives everybody a good overview how social media has been used. And you know, it’s like anything else? People think it’s the whole that’s it’s the Holy Grail. But obviously, there’s more to that, Samson. I mean, I, I’ve been watching you, obviously, you’re an advocate of crowdfunding. This is, you know, the the Kickstarter model where everybody got started from thought that it was just one way, equity brings a different dimension to it, I believe, from the way the investor relates to, but there’s some similarities, but I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on the obviously social media is one side, the other elements that a company may need to consider along with that social media element to drive that traffic down there. So

Samson Williams  09:05

yeah, Jason, he hit upon him at the onset, when he was saying, I tell people, why do you use a product that you’re not the owner of? This basically what it comes down to, particularly when it comes to consumables, whether it’s pins or some type of drink? There was a crowdfunding campaign for a company called dope coffee, real doped coffee. So they only raised $107,000. Sorry, they only raised $83,000. But they had another like $30,000 worth of sales in the same time, because not only are you raising money, you’re also generating revenue. And this is some we have some of those interesting conversations with startups and business owners were explained like, this is what revenue means. This is what income This is what capital is, this is what profit is. And so this is where, where when Jason was talking about why The future of capital markets, and particularly startup funding is consumers will own will have equity stakes in the good products and services that they use this super crucial, because that changes the game. Because that gives, why change the game even more so than social media to give investors, this gentleman named woody muse, he came up with this term investors, and an investor is in it a customer who’s an investor. And so when someone is an investment, it gives them pride or ownership. And so if you walk into my house, and you’re bringing in some Starbucks, we’re gonna fight because I’m not I don’t own a new Starbucks here. I’m not an early stage investor in Starbucks. So we only drink coffee in my house. So we’re gonna have to fight in that doesn’t matter what good product or service it is. And this is where when I started off, saying, customers have more money than the scenes, slightly a big adventure capital, because the internet and social media is changing how humans can connect. And so we saw this a really good example was what happened with GameStop and Citadel capital, budget, retail investors, online chatting, and they’re like, Hey, we could actually do this. And I’m going to go on a little bit of a tangent, I’ll explain to you, it’s only gonna be 30 days long. In 2008, when all those kids who were part of Occupy Wall Street, they were 20 years old, 1820 years old, they went out and they protest, they were occupying squares and whatnot, they grew up, because in 2008, this thing, the supercomputer was used for Twitter and Instagram, it was in its infancy, you have to remember that the app store the Apple Store, was maybe a year, two years old, a 2000 year, Apple Store came online in 2006 2007. So the social media infrastructure was in was in its infancy in 2008. Fast forward 12 years, those same kids have grown up. They’re like, hey, we’ve gone through two financial crises in our lifetime, what have a greater control of what we’re what we’re investing in. And this is where you have a sub Reddit group with 2 million people who, because they’re now connected to the technology, that is social media, they can go out and move a market, they can go out and have the regulator’s pay attention to short selling as a as a thing. And this is where social media has really come into its own its own element, because it’s the infrastructure that has been built out. It’s the user awareness and people, they just know how to get on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook is even a post about MySpace coming back. And so this is where if you’re a business owner, you’re thinking, hey, how am I going to engage my community? Well, you need to engage them where they’re at. So you need to identify what platform are most of my user that there is a sub Reddit group for public subs, if you’re in Florida, you probably been to Publix. It’s amazing. So the rest of the world, there’s 32,000, people who talked about the best public subs, and the varieties and combinations. When you have these affinity groups. Social media just allows you to tap into those groups, so that you can be part of that community, engage them. And then when you engage them through a regulation crowdfunding, now it’s your opportunity as a business owner, as a startup, as an entrepreneur, to tell your story. And I like to say that every dollar tells a story. And if you tell your story, well, dollars will come listen to yours. So this is where you take social media, you combine it with your story, where every dollar is going to tell a story, you’re gonna inspire other doctors to listen to yours, and you push it out. And so part of it is you do need to use social media. The other part is you just need to tell a good story. And of course, we’re investors, part of that good story is, what’s the ROI? How are we going to make money off of this

Oscar Jofre  13:56

interesting twist when the brought up the stock one? Because we certainly don’t want to be providing the illusion that equity crowdfunding, I understand the analogy regarding the crowd. It we don’t want to step into that one right now, because the regulators are monitoring that in a very different room as a reason. Yeah.

Samson Williams  14:21

That is, if the behavior of short sellers is illegal or wrong, or shouldn’t be frowned upon, then the behavior of short seller the ability to engage in short selling needs to be regulated. The crowdfunding industry is already a heavily regulated industry. I’m in a love affair every week with FINRA, the CFPB or someone from the SEC. If we’re going to regulate short selling, that’s awesome. We need to regulate it regardless of the income status of individuals engaging in that behavior. Because when Wall Street does it no one cares when the retail firms do it. Now Yeah, everyone

Oscar Jofre  14:58

understood I mean, Um, yeah, I did this was not meant to be a public company component because just want to keep it in context for the audience that we are talking about privately held companies and not public companies. What happened in that scenario, I, I’m not going to speak of it because it is in a very different vibe, I understand they use a social media component to impact their, their, their strategy. for private companies do not fear this is not something that was happened to your own stock element I ask is uncomfortable and Jason is great. Well, it’s an uncomfortable subject, because I’m, I’m a black and white individual, I made the decision in Cork annex, and those who are part of it is that public company belongs over there. And let that’s a different arena. I’m not here to regulate it nor condone it. I do understand the components that are happening. The privates, we have a way of doing something very different. What Jason does is phenomenal, the work that we’re helping private companies, that’s what we believe in, we believe in that we should need to start separating the two subject matters because as soon as they get convoluted, they will be those who will take advantage of it in the wrong way. And we put an end to those we, the industry selves regulate, which is fantastic, right? So we go out and we go out of our way to find those who are going to maliciously hurt the ecosystem. The reason we have the start engines of the world, the wayfinders. And the republic’s and the 68 others that have now emerged, and keeping people like Jason very busy is because we’re doing it right. And so that’s why I keep that discussion over there. Because I believe my personal belief what happens over there is let that be there. I like the analogy though, I, I respect that I do agree with you, the power of the crowd is a phenomenal thing that’s happening today. I agree with that. 100%. And, and the one good thing, I don’t know if you agree with this statement, but the one good thing I like about here is the prot The crowd is doing in a positive nature, they tend to why they’re gathering is to, to follow a company that they believe in knowing that the stake of their investment is going directly into the company. So this money is going directly into funnel that growth, hire people and become the company they wish to become that that’s like To me, that’s, you know, I left the public world because that didn’t exist anymore. Here. It’s it’s real, whether it’s $50 a company person, investor, 100, I’d love to hear your comments on that. Jason.

Jason Fishman  17:46

Yeah, absolutely. compliant. You know, it’s so important to follow the rules. And for so many reasons, the power of the crowd. Yes. And that is certainly why I smile about this. But I’ll tell you, I saw this happen with digital assets and in the cryptocurrency world, and there was all types of groups that were you know, talking very positively about alternative coins, and, you know, not all of those projects worked out. And it ended up working backwards for the industry for several years where it was almost a bad word to say cryptocurrency, we’re obviously seeing some of the the blue chips, I think bitcoins over 52k today, you know, and positive things around that. But that’s one of the things I love about regulation, crowdfunding is actually following these rules, and the expansions are occurring March 15, everything’s growing. So you know, the same way asked for you said, Hey, whatever’s happening over there, I say, and I’m kind of able to hide behind the wall on the marketing side of you know, make sure everything’s compliant, make sure everything goes by legal that that’s not what I’m licensed in. That’s not my area of expertise. But I really love the the topic of the power of the crowd. You know, I saw some businesses early on were 3000, investors of $300, each would raise 1.0 7 million for a local brewery or some type of small business and the power behind that and a future patrons, let alone current customers is very impactful. And I’m looking at these, you know, $75 million potential RegA pluses, and you know, maybe a $375 million business, maybe, you know, a billion dollar organization that’s selling a percentage of shares and what it could look like to bring in much larger consumer basis through different funnels and consisting of social media. And another thing I wanted to point out was, you know, we’re talking about channels, and it’s really a game of chess versus a game of checkers. It’s not so much Hey, I’m going to put this one channel out there and the audience is going to convert, you know, for the audience’s at home. Picture seven touchpoints picture 17 what is the perspective investor, be it retail or accredited? Going to see first, what are they going to see? Second, what is the sales cycles at three weeks? Is it three months? I wouldn’t anticipate for it to be a day in first touchpoint that that will happen at times. But, you know, project conservatively and really define what that model looks like from the organic channels from the paid channels, both seven or more touch points. How does the messaging change up? What are the visuals look like? Are there different types of influencers or publishers or anything to provide social proof and or endorsement, I think are all very, very important pieces of the puzzle.

Oscar Jofre  20:34

Yeah, and there’s something you said, and I’m going to come back to you on this one, Samson, because you touched on it as well. And I think it’s important. So you know, social media is the the vehicle that allows us to liberate, let’s be clear that that’s what that is, is delivery, delivery mechanism. It’s like, you know, when, when people wonder why, you know, to get a pill or something FDA approved, is because once they create the the vaccine of something, now you need a delivery mechanism, it’s not always a needle could be a pill that needs to get there. And that’s what social media is, it’s got all these different channels to it, their delivery, but you know, that social media element needs drivers to it. And you said it, and there are some, you know, where customers have more money than VCs. But that’s not the point that I’m going to, I’m going to the fact that customers play a strong role alongside to that. You know, I’d be interested to hear your comments on that Trounson. Because I’m a strong believer that for the very first time, that’s what you can do is offer your customers an opportunity. And there, they become that first inner crowd that just drives everything even further to make those channels even more powerful. You’re on mute, but he’s on mute this time.

Samson Williams  21:53

Yeah, I’m picking on the VCs, because VCs have always crowdfunded. The general partners crowd fund from the LPS is much smaller crowd. And so when I say customers have more money than VCs, I’m always encouraging VCs to expand their customer base. And so with equity crowdfunding, already, right now, it’s the approximately 70% of the investors into the $214 million that was raised in 2020. That came from accredited investors, they came from venture shops, so they’re already part of the crowdfunding ecosystem. Customers, the average investment for crowdfunding deals are 2020 was 650 bucks, actually $653. But why that’s important is this goes back to how many eyeballs need to see this deal to convert, this goes to your customer acquisition costs or your investor acquisition costs. And that’s super important you there’s a general consistence until the human has heard something seven times they haven’t heard once. And so you do need to not only be on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, but also your social network. And so this is sort of what does the future of capital markets look like? Part of it is crowdfunding campaigns and crowd crowdfunding platforms will help you with your friends and family to organize that round in the tour and 50 to half million dollar raise, particularly given the new regulations that kick off March 15. Reg CF goes from 1 million to 5 million, RegA plus goes from 50 million to 75 million, that’s going to be phenomenal, because you’re going to be able to take more of your customers, more of your audience more of your community members, and offer them the opportunity to be investors. And this is where we call triangle financing. So this is sales, this is marketing, this is crowdfunding, you’re already spending money on sales and marketing, you just got to regardless what good product you are, this, I’m sorry, this other side of the triangle is branding. So you have sales and marketing and branding, you’re spending money on sales and marketing to increase your brand. Because when you have a great brand, it lowers your customer acquisition costs, this bottom part of the triangle, those are your investors. Remember, investors or customers are also investors, you’re spending money on sales and marketing to improve your brand. These investors, you’re going to recruit them to your cap table, he’s customer, you’re recruiting your customers to your cap table, because then something crazy happens, where we haven’t quite figured out what the number is. But maybe Jason knows, what’s the lifetime value of an investor versus a customer versus a VC. And then things get really weird because if your customer is also in Bessemer, they’re not only buying your good product or service, they’re recruiting two people, five people, 10 people, and this really changes the lifetime value of that person who only invest 250 bucks into your deal, because then as an investor they only invest or rather the average investment was 650 bucks. As an investor they only put in 650 bucks, but they’re still generous. Any revenue from them, and they’re bringing in more people pay somebody Think about that.

Jason Fishman  25:05

Yeah, I think it would really reflect the ARV the average order value. As you know, each customer could vary. We’ve worked with some b2b clients who get their ATVs in the 1000s. And they’re become an ambassador referral partner after they’ve participated as a strategic investor in the round. So I think the metrics are going to change up. Also the frequency of purchases, if it’s the type of product that’s bought once a year, once a week, once a month, all of that’s going to come into effect as well, definitely want to emphasize the social sharing element that you put in there, sharing with two people sharing with five people sharing with X amount more, that is really a massive marketing value that you get from these campaigns, not just the visibility, but as you’re bringing on investors. I try not to overstate this, but it’s valid, you’re bringing on these ambassadors, like the terms you’re using here as well to incorporate those more into into our conversations. But you know, regardless of how you frame it, if I invest into a deal on one of these portals today, I’m not going to keep it to myself, you know, this isn’t the type of you know, fits into a portion of my portfolio, that I would likely want to share it with some friends and family, maybe golfing, you know, later in the week, Hey, did you take a look at this, and I get those type of tips from from my brother, from referral partners and clients that I’m close with. And that’s what really happens, whether it’s on the retail or credit investor level here and the way you’re stating it with both for investment conversions and the customer conversions. And being an ambassador for both being able to build a formula, I don’t have one exactly built. And to tell you the truth, we tweak it a little bit and each of our strategies for the initial investment value. In many cases, we’re seeing a second investment and then the social sharing. So then calculating how much that conversions actually worth. And being able to use that as a metric to ramp up the ads ramp up the marketing be able to get to milestones quicker, we have not actually taken into account, the customer purchase values, be it b2b or b2c. So maybe I could follow up with you. And that’s really interesting.

Samson Williams  27:29

Because part of it, we danced around it, but we just forgotten to say word of mouth. And a word of mouth referral is it’s worth his weight in gold, literally. Because if someone refers you when you have greater confidence, because oh, Oscar referred me or Jason referred me, particularly a whoever makes this mouse These are great. my nieces is a great mouse. So if I say this is the best mouse on the world, that’s a that’s a word of mouth for protein causes mouse company or your company. And when you’re paying for pay per click or pay per view, you definitely want those word of mouth referrals. Because crowdfunding is really the it is the slow process of converting social networking into social capital. And then there’s all the business metrics that you benefit where I love your good product or service. I love it so much. I’m going to invest in your business. And then when I’m playing golf, or you know, having a beer, I’m telling everyone Oh, yeah, I just put $1,000 into Jason’s coffee Coffee Company, because it’s the best coffee in the world.

Oscar Jofre  28:34

So, you know, I’ve been listening, it’s good, I actually got to listen. Just joking. No, no, it’s, uh, this discussion is interesting. Maybe, maybe, you know, from a few years ago, you know, we got ao V, we got all these terminology and got the triangle going. You know, I as you were talking, I go, okay, where’s my book? So I wrote the book, equity crowdfunding 11 years ago 30 million copies were downloaded. And I wrote in free language, I give it away for free. And I wrote a chapter in there that became a huge critique over the years because when we first got all this started, the nobody believed the crowd would come that was one you know how you say building they will come. A lot of people even though were touting Twitter and Facebook and most years nobody really understood the power of it. And obviously now we got stats, Jason’s producing that and we’re digging deeper and deeper into it. But there is a fundamental that you know, as you get into the triangle making investigation to customers and all that there is a for me, it comes down to you know, when you get a statistically like this, it My only fear sometimes is that somebody got Okay, so basically I just make every customer to an investor. I follow the follow the channel, they they’ve lost a component of the passion of the love that you need to have for this. And so there was a chapter I wrote was called customer So investors equals customers equals ambassadors. That was seven or eight years ago. And I was challenged on it at the time, because the VC and the panel said to me Who in their right mind, whatever, one 5000 shareholders, and the response that they provided, was, well, interesting enough, you wouldn’t invest in my company unless they brought you 5000 customers. So it is interesting. So the question then becomes, it’s really interesting, the the, the, the dialogue that the company needs to have with this individual, the only component that they need to be reminded as well that you treat them like a customers. I mean, I got examples of clients of taking what I wrote, companies like brewdog breweries look at them, they call them punks, you know, we call them gladiators at a KoreConX, we don’t, we don’t call them shareholders, whether they’re our gladiators are part of our journey to to empower what we’re doing. But what’s interesting about this, I do have somebody on my team, who is a compliance person to remind me, Oscar, is still a shareholder, see, you need that. I just need to I need you to understand I want everybody hear this because it’s important. And so it is ruled by every company that we have we made sure we listen, you put the right people out there, you put a Jason Fishman Samson to drive that met, but don’t forget, you still have a fiduciary duty. Do not forget that there is a customer Your duty is not to lose their business. With investors, let’s go what it is your fiduciary duty to them, and the SEC and everybody else that, but but I do agree with you guys. 100%. And so, you know, the social media only works. Because the the fear that I have sometimes when people read this, okay, it’s a numbers game. I remember when I first tell people Oh, great, I’m going to go to a company that can bring me followers. And, obviously, that’s not going to work, right? Because they’re not they haven’t bought into the brand they haven’t bought in. So can we talk a little bit about that part first? Because obviously, that that goes into the work you got to do, right, Jason? I mean, if the company is it doesn’t have a following, and they say they only got 100 here, 100 there before they can do anything. You got to build that brand up with the crowd, right? If it doesn’t make sense, buying it, the old days, just buy it and put it there. And they will come. I don’t think that’s there anymore. I just want to put that. There’s a reason I’m doing that. Because it’s coming up lately, please. Yeah,

Jason Fishman  32:32

absolutely. And it actually reminds me of conversations I had back in 2015, pre reg CF, about you know, and in rooms with with VCs different types of investment banks, different types of groups that we’re looking towards equity crowdfunding, Oscar, I imagine you could remember those waiting periods as well, too, you know, before each of the regulations went into effect. But they basically consisted of whiteboards that said, Hey, we’re gonna have a site, we’re gonna email some investors, you know, 10% capital costs a month later, the rounds closed. And I’m sitting there scratching my head saying, it’s not really how digital marketing works. So I would be very surprised if that is what occurred. And I should note, I have seen that type of thing happen for you and far between. But I have seen reg CF is closed out in a week with very little marketing, reg DS and similar types of fashions. Obviously, there’s a different variable, because the accredited investor can come on at such a large level. But comparatively, but, you know, it’s actually going to go back to something Samson said earlier, where you need all of these audiences to get a small amount of engagement, a small amount of conversions, a small amount of traffic, I used to build out these algorithms. But just to give you an idea, if we’re using real round numbers, 1000 investors $1,000, each producing roughly 1.0 7 million rough numbers and you know, you can multiply that times five for a $5 million, reg CF. To get 1000 investors, you likely need 50,000 visitors quality traffic, not just something you’re you’re buying and hate could be a bot, we don’t know quality traffic and the right people probably need 50,000 of those prospects on that page to get 1000 investments. That’s a 2% conversion rate, not to throw too many numbers out there or anything like that. But that’s what Google defines as an average conversion rate about 2.35%. To get 50,000 people to a website is tough. And then definitely look at the quality traffic there. It’s actually a big tear separating business level. This is around that 50,000 person level in a month, even stretched out over a few months. You still get the idea. It’s 50,000 people. It may require a million, several million, 5 million impressions different audiences to see it to produce 50,000 visitors to produce the 1000 investors. Now, that is somewhat conservative in many regards, that’s not taking into account higher quality traffic, such as referrals, such as peer to peer marketing that is much warmer by the time it gets there. But I like painting that picture because it shows the funnel. And it shows you need a whole lot of people to produce a strong amount of traffic to produce what could be looked at as a large pool of investors, but is really tiny. It’s the tip of the iceberg when you look at all of the awareness that occurred. And that’s what I really encourage brands to map out in their strategy and rollout in their campaigns versus Hey, just build it. And I love I use that analogy. Because I’ve said that before I’ve said if you build it, they will come does not you know refer to equity crowdfunding, you really have to mark it, you really have to push it out there, I can give you a whole list of benefits that you get beyond just the capital from doing so. But that is the right lens, that’s the right perspective to look at these campaigns with.

Oscar Jofre  36:11

Yeah, it that’s a good summary and something I’m going to come to you. But I just want to make sure everybody’s very clear on this. So it, if you buy that list and you buy those things, you’re going to flesh it out really quickly that this all that is is just a bogus number. And the reason I say this, because we’re gonna see a brand new audience coming in into regulation CF, because it’s been increased to 5 million, we’re gonna see a brand new audience to re a because it’s been 275. And what does that a more established business? It’s saying, Hey, you know, I’m just kidding, I don’t have a lot of social media. Just buy it, I hear you can buy a list for 50,000 people just get it on. And that’ll make it go. And I want to put that puppy to rest because you’re not going to believe this. It’s a question now that comes up frequently. I don’t know what social media company you’re working, but it’s not the one we’re gonna recommend for you. I mean, Samson, you. You’re an advocate of social media and all that. But I’d love to hear your comments on this because I don’t think you can bite customers that way. If we could, we’d all be billionaires by now. But please.

Samson Williams  37:18

Yeah, we I often tell everyone’s a billionaire in Excel. So particularly dealing with startups there are they’re all billionaires in Excel. Like guys, I’m not arguing with you over maplelea today. But I want to just bring to bear that you can’t fake authenticity. And so that’s part of what because there’s no magic formula for going viral. Rather, if if there’s a magic formula for going viral, it’s you consistently put out messaging on a routine basis across multiple platforms for decades. And in your in the thing that goes viral, there is a specific call to action to go do x. Because if you just have something that 10 million people see, but there’s no call to action to buy, invest our click on your website or follow within it, nothing comes of it. So you got to keep in mind, you can’t fake authenticity, we smell it humans, like they’re full of crap. Not gonna work. And so because you can’t fake authenticity, there’s no easy way of Oh, you have this giant blister that you paid someone for qualified leads. This time you’re going to your biggest hurdle is a caller Who the f are you. And that Stranger Danger, someone doesn’t know you, they’re not going to talk to you engage with you much less by giving you their money as an investor, you got to get over that, Who the f are you hurdle as the biggest thing. Because once you develop that rapport, this is where word of mouth come in. If Jason or Oscar, your friend tells you, hey, you should go to so and so or check out so and so. Now we no longer have Stranger Danger, your conversion rate goes up exponentially if you don’t if you’re not worried about stranger danger. So just keep that in mind. On a practical terms, who ever create your content should not be in charge of managing your campaign? I just want to say that out loud. Often you have a creative who creates the content. And they’re the same person who manages your social media campaign. That should not be the case. It never works out well. In my experience. He should have two people that handle those things individually. But I do want to go back to from the cfpa perspective, the crowdfunding professionals perspective, were an advocacy group or based in DC we harass the SEC and FINRA, for on behalf of not only issuers, business owners, startups founders are called issuers to the issuing chairs, but also for investors in just the general public. And part of that we’re focused on March 15. We got the reg CF rules go to 5 million, the red eight plus rules go to 75. Those are the two big hanging fruits, but also as part of the changes. Oscar you brought this up where if you have five 1000 people on your cap table, many, many VCs have to go, No, that’s too much, you can’t do it. Well, one of the changes that’s happening on March 15, it’s called an SPV, which is a special purpose vehicle. I know it’s not related to social media. But because of this SPV, you’re gonna have to be able to have 510 20 30,000 people as one line item on your cap table, when they do it. SPB there’s gonna be a big deal. So just keep

Oscar Jofre  40:27

that in mind. You know what I need to correct you on that note? Sorry, I need to correct you’re correct. But I want to make sure the entrepreneur understands. This is not a traditional SPV. What it is, it’s an SPV vehicle that the company still manages, you still have the responsibility to the 30,000. What they did was clean up the cap table on there, but it still the fiduciary duty lives there. And we’re all working in as an industry, I don’t mean to cut you off. But as an industry lawyers at the funding portals, because they haven’t given guidance. Because an SPV normally has a nominee model to it. I don’t want to get too deep into it. But nominee models, someone who speaks for all the 30,000 holders or and all that the SEC did not provide guidance on that. Typically on an SPV, there’s a lead investor, there is no lead investor here. It’s the company who created so there’s a little bit of ambiguity, but you’re right, once we flush that out, just like we did in 2015, when we didn’t know how we were going to put 1000s of shareholders now we do we put them in saves, we put them in crowd saves promissory notes and stuff like that we now know away. So we don’t go over rule 12 G to put companies at risk. So but I I’m regardless of the instrument, regardless of all that, I think the the bottom line that came from both of you, over and over, we beat that dog over in it, you have to because you know, guys, for the next two, three years, it’s still an educational purpose, we’re still there, we only touched 238 358,000 new investors, when you look at the market opportunities during 33 million Americans. And based on our statistics, three and a half percent of the investors were not Americans. So that means we’re even reaching outside of the United States coming in, which tells us that, you know, we’re reaching a much larger audience, and therefore, we’re just scratching it. But to Jason and Samson’s point, you know, when you go through this, it is more than just social media, you got to think about your strategy, whether you’re b2b or b2c, to bring the crowd in. Because if you don’t do that, and if you just buy your way in, you’re not going to get the results. That that’s been really my message. I don’t know if you agree with that, Jason to that’s what I’ve been telling companies. Look, you’re better off waiting a few months hire a company to work with you. Because they don’t even you know what I find interesting. Every company’s got partners, customers, friends, associates, advisors, and a few shareholders already, but it never dawns on them, to go to them first, to get them the first. You know, you go how many people you got? got about 130. But it’s not a lot. 130 times tan? Yeah, it’s starting to look pretty good. Because how did you do that? Well, each of them are getting, so they so it’s interesting. Do you know why that is? Because people still think shareholders sit here. And customers sit there. And I sit here. And that’s how the public world works. And as soon as we do that, we’re going to have the same chaotic problems they do. When you started it. You said the word. investor, investor, investor, that’s your coin turn their investment. Sherwood, nice job with one. Yeah, just stealing no problem in Bessemer. So you were combining the two. So now they’re together, which is I’ve always believed that as soon as you do that, you change the mentality. But because we’ve been trained on the public market, that’s the visibility of ready. Everybody has people put them in stance. So. So I do agree with the fact that social media only works with the right messaging component. And so let’s talk a little bit about that for a moment. So it’s more than social media, the social media is just the vehicle. So what part are you playing in this one, Jason, when you’re guiding companies guiding them? When they don’t have that voice? They don’t know. Are you? Are you starting at that point? Or are you waiting for them to have more established? I’m curious from your side? Sure.

Jason Fishman  44:48

So in terms of the voice speaking to the messaging, yes, that that should be in place, there should be consistency. This should feel like an organization that’s going to continue growing. Already valued at these different levels as displayed in their forums. So their messaging their voice their Yes. In terms of their existing audience. We see the force.

Oscar Jofre  45:14

I think Jason cut out. All right. All right. Sounds good, man. Get in there.

Samson Williams  45:20

Yeah. Well, he’ll he’ll come back. Because

Oscar Jofre  45:23

I mean, you’re you’re with the CFPA, which I am, you know, I’m supporting, meaning. I believe that the industry needs a voice. We had it before. I’ll come back to you, Jason. There’s a there is something going on in California right now, as you know, you’re one of the states that they want to put a hack to. At least that’s what I saw. But the, you know, the cfpa are you providing a, you know, I know you’re an advocacy for the industry, but are you providing kind of learning tools for companies? Look, look at this subject matter. We could talk for hours, you know that right? Because there’s so many people go off social media, I got a Twitter handle, I got all that. But you’re listening to Jason key. You need to have a message, you need to be consistent. You need to be able to reach that audience. are you providing an overview for companies on that?

Samson Williams  46:12

Yes. So if you visit, this is a shameless plug for the SFPA. You visit cfpa dot org, particularly in our video library, we not only have longer segments, but we have shorter or concise segments that talk about this after and what I’m going to do is, when I started talking about the spvs, you brought up some excellent details. And I love it, because it’s great to having people like yourself. We’re like, Oh, you said word. Let me explain for the larger audience what this means. And so the cfpa we’re continuing rolling out new educational when we do advocacy for updating the read the 1933 Securities Exchange Act. Number one, as well as the JOBS Act Two, we’re rolling out new webinars that focus on some of the minutiae from the perspective of investors from the perspective of platform or nose or portal owners. And then from inspect the perspective of issuers of people who are looking to use reg CF. There are some ambiguities like some of the new rules that happened on March 15, for demo day and testing the water. Much like the SPV, the SEC doesn’t always get bright line rules like we’d like. So we’re we have a legislative committee who are continuing to write Hey, can you provide us some clarity, because we don’t want the platform operators in trouble. We don’t want issuers to get in trouble, particularly in the use of social media. There’s much that you can’t use puffery, you can’t exaggerate, you have to state facts. And so this is where’s the use of social media and compliance and regulatory compliance to the SEC gets very nuanced from time to time. So we provide those tools and resources so that people can understand what is crowdfunding? How could we potentially use it? And then check out the 60 plus FINRA approved platforms, so they can pick whichever platform works best for them?

Oscar Jofre  48:07

Yeah, I think the number 78 now. Yeah, so it’s good. Yeah, it’s growing daily. Except that I know Jason, are you able to get back in we do have a question from one of the attendees here. So we’re going to get to but you know, the the the interesting thing about social media is that when you are using it, I’m going to this in my left leg, I’m giving Jason a plug I’m giving it to those who are in the industry doing it for companies that are looking to doing a reg CF or reg D or RegA. Here’s my only word of thing for you to know. Marketing in marketing is marketing. Investor acquisition is what this industry does. What that means people like Jason fishermen a DNA provide a service understanding the regulatory framework and what that means is that they’ll know that when you want to say all this is a multi billion dollar opportunity, I’m sorry, No, you shouldn’t be doing that it make sure you go get your lawyer where the other market Oh, I like that man that’s punchy. Let’s put it in. So punchy will get you exactly that that sentence will tell you it will get the knock knock sec saying well show me that multi billion dollar opportunity please. We want to see it. And you don’t want to do that because the United States is the only country in the world that actually gives you a very pretty outfit. It’s orange, and it’s pretty, so you may not want to have that. So it is important. I am a big advocate. You know when I entered this I love the professionalism that we’re getting to there is enough resources now for companies to understand you can go to the cfpa.org you can see it there they obviously they should have a you know a directory we have a directory we do it as a company. We believe that it’s information should be available to you. Because we want to you to be have a healthy, you know crowdfunding, we don’t want errors. We want them regulators to increase it from five to 10 and 75 to 150 million. I hope the SEC hurt. I guess we want RegA to 150 Please, please 150 million because that will bring another type of client that we’ve all been dreaming for. So Jason, I didn’t you get your internet back on there?

Jason Fishman  50:18

Yeah hardwired in I don’t know what happened there. But I caught most of them Samson said throughout the process.

Oscar Jofre  50:25

Yeah, he, you know, he came into the rescue for you. So this is a very lengthy discussion we can have for our for hopefully, for Samson, you met somebody. If there’s any company right now that can give you statistics of what they have done. He’s got a he, he evolved the firm’s that I’ve met a lot of them say they have it, they don’t. If you follow Jason on LinkedIn, you’ll see a constant his firm is providing it looks our objective at KoreConX with Koresummit to say education, but this is a publication of data. Data is educational, meaning how many kids do you need how many people you need to get back how many people from the from the initial investment to the second investment to what the symptom is saying that the word of mouth and you know, one person to 10, that it’s just it’s it’s powerful. But you got to have a strategy. And you got to start with companies that actually know what they’re doing can help you with the messaging. We have somebody that’s got a question. I’m gonna bring him in. Aubrey, you have a question?

51:29

Hi, this is a question for Samson. I don’t know if you have heard of Cindy Gallup, she’s, she’s in marketing advertising out of New York, she’s starting a company, she, she’s on my LinkedIn. And every single day, she laments the traditional VC barriers to entry. And so she’s an older woman, she has started this, I think it’s, it’s called make love, not porn. It’s like a, it’s a sexual sex industry sort of product. So she talks about all these barriers. I’m not sure that she’s familiar with crowdfunding. And I don’t say that because of her age group or anything else other than maybe somebody hasn’t. And she’s got something like 44,000 followers. I mean, this is a heavy hitter in the LinkedIn world. And it occurs to me, either This is her stick is not being able to find funding, or she just doesn’t understand the route. Any other non traditional route. So to Samsung, do you think some of this, some of the things like regulatory frameworks and Icos and crowdfunding and, and this, this, this counterculture to the traditional route, it’s just maybe buried or people just don’t know about it or hasn’t gotten it’s not gotten press like it should, I guess,

Samson Williams  52:57

the industry, the reg CF, title, three of the JOBS Act, he turns five years old, on May 15 2021, happy birthday. And so part of it is, and Oscar said this before, it’s awareness and education, you’re not aware of this, then you get become informed and educated about it. So what I would encourage you to do is connect Cindy with me on LinkedIn if you could, and then we’ll send her to the resources that we have on the crowdfunding professional association cfpa. And it’s not just for her, it’s for anyone who’s looking for if you can’t get a bank loan, you don’t have a high network, high network network. And you don’t know any VCs will then that fourth option is crowdfunding equity property investment property. And that’s just a matter. I would actually say

Oscar Jofre  53:43

it should I actually, you know, what, if I would put it forget about just, it could be the first date. There’s nothing wrong with being the first I did the thing with the crowdfunding, sometimes it becomes a stigma because people think it’s the last resort of money. I don’t think that way anymore. That’s what it was in 2012. It’s not, but I do agree with you with the one thing about crowdfunding, it doesn’t exclude you. That’s the better. To me. It includes minorities, you know, Latinos, you know, people black, you know, Chinese, everyone that would the people love your passion to your business. You know, we saw a coffee shop or sorry, a tea shop, led by a woman, a black woman out of New York, Brooklyn raised a million dollars, what was that in 90 days? In a platform? I thought that was powerful. I thought it was powerful. What was really, really cool. It all came from a certain district of which she her restaurant. To your point, Jason, it’s, it’s, it’s really is interesting. And regarding the comment with the lady that you were talking about, I saw her profile on LinkedIn. Do not be surprised because you’re not going to believe this when I’m I’m about to tell you, it’s going to blow your mind. I got a call one day not that long ago from an accountant in Houston, Texas. And I’m getting yelled at because excuse me, you’re giving my client false advice about raising money. I said, I’m sorry, I’m not I don’t do that. I’m, well, he said that he can go out and raise a million dollars from the crowd. That is illegal. I go, No, it’s not. No, it is it. I said, look at the SEC that no, if the SEC, I would have seen it. Yeah. Okay. So I burn him directly. When did this come out? 2012. So, what I’m trying to tell them, Samson nail that we have. So we got to educate so many different people that it’s there. It’s possible for everyone minority and non minorities business to want to dry cleaning shop, you know, flower shop restaurant, there it, you know, Video game providers. It’s not just for startups, it’s not just for, you know, for companies that are doing well, it’s for everyone that was that is sorry, that is what the intent of the JOBS Act is, if any of you have ever heard David Weald, he is the father the JOBS Act. He is as passionate today about it, as he was when he started it over 1012 years ago. And for him, job creation, bringing the ownership back to owners democratization of capital, allowing everyday Americans to invest and look what we’ve achieved. in such a short period of time people go, What are you talking about been 11 years, that’s a short period of time in the capital markets. So

Samson Williams  56:42

it is one thing I want to because as we’re wrapping up, but we’re coming at the top of the hour, we’re talking about social media, you’re when you go to build this online community, congratulations, you build an online community of 510 20,000 people after the race, you need to communicate with them often still send them all your quarterly reports or your reporting that you must be done need to maintain that relationship, don’t put them in the dark, because they might help you with that first raise. And then you’ll go back to them Oscar mentioned grew dogs, I want to say grew, dog says raised somewhere around $96 million in total, through their various races, because they have a small army of 12,000 or so investors that they continually engage. So even after you’re done raising money, you’re down to the business of your business, you got to use your whatever social media platform to stay connected to your community.

Oscar Jofre  57:40

Yeah. Sorry,

Jason Fishman  57:42

sorry, just gonna add to that, because I’m seeing it even further down the line, there’s sayings, some of the portals encourage statements such as always be raising, we’re on our fourth round with one of our clients third round with another, both of two reg CF. So one of the reg D, both on RegA pluses. And you know that audiences exactly like what you’re saying there, Samson, part of the warm pool that you’re engaging in the first part of that next round. So as the investigator, I think he said, and being able to continue engage them on, you know, your marketing milestones. But beyond that to the next capital raise, I’m familiar with other groups that have 30,000 investors now and they’re in path to a million investors and want to announce a project and be able to raise it, and even more narrow point of time from there. And this is all just the beginning, I tried to see where things are going to be in five years and 10 years. And it said, so it’s really exciting to be a part of I think every founder should be considering these different paths right now, as Oscar said, it’s no longer Hey, I couldn’t get capital. So I’m going to a crowdfunding route. Instead, hey, I’m pushing off these other options and going to the crowd.

Oscar Jofre  58:56

Go to the crowd. Exactly. This is the option where you get somebody, Andrew corn says it best he goes, it’s gonna be great to have 1000 people who see the same view rather than just one. And then it’s going to dictate terms. See, that’s the way you can look at VC versus the crowd. Another element, I think we’re talking both about the same company Legion M. I can say it because they’re really proud to have them on board. They’re shooting for 1 million shareholders. I mean, 1 million privately held shareholders. Jeff and the team have done a phenomenal job. They’re communicating with that crowd. I mean, constantly, right? And people don’t invest in one time. Oh, yeah. This is the boom, boom, second, third, fourth, they missed one, they get the next round during round seven. And I think now they’re gonna start round eight. So it’s pretty exciting. We got Forbes here who’s got a question for us. There you go. Forbes you’re in. You got to unmute yourself there to speak. Give them a second. There.

1:00:00

Can you hear me? Yes, we can. I interviewed a controller, the property controller was here in Canada. And he was working for a Chinese company who basically was selling land to Chinese investors. And he was responsible for compliance and Investor Relations and reporting. But what was really interesting was is that they were selling the land in one square meters, and they had over 10,000 participants in that particular deal.

Oscar Jofre  1:00:35

So it was, so I’m just kind of curious about Chinese platforms, social media platforms, and whether or not what you’re discussing has an application

1:00:49

to market? And and am I restricted in Canada? Or, you know, under these structures, or can I use these structures? are in Canada’s, or do I need to locate?

Samson Williams  1:01:03

I’ll venture to answer this question that Canada has, I want to say they have 13 different provinces. And each one handles crowdfunding slightly different. And so it really depends on what province you’re at. And I do think that when it comes to the company who selling one square meters, three by threes beat squares, where if the land, I think you would, I would be cautious of that, because it seems like our whole way of avoiding avoiding raigad regulations, it might be legal, in the sense you’re selling a, you know, nine square feet, but I don’t know if it wouldn’t do it passes.

Oscar Jofre  1:01:41

Yeah, Austin have been here, Samson, you probably didn’t notice I’m Canadian. Oh, I let her know, the box that came out. Okay. Everybody knows no. I came out. Okay. So official, February 17 18,000? Because I’m Canadian. Yes. So Forbes, your answer to your question is, start. First. Canadian securities law allows you depending on what province to go to, to create a sub PCO and the United States to use regulation CF, you got to be really careful how you do it, you do need to engage with a US lawyer in order to make sure that the structures correctly but keep this in the back of your mind is that if you do choose to use reg CF, and you’re a Canadian company, which you can and then later on, you decide to do a RegA, you will not be allowed to do a RegA. So like anything else. We’re gonna have a webinar on structuring for foreign companies, foreign countries, where regulation CF was only intended for us based companies. But it doesn’t mean that you cannot purchase off here. But there is a consequence to Canadian companies in particular. Now answering your question regarding Chinese platforms, you have to be careful the securities laws in China prohibit the sale of foreign securities to their nationals without the Securities Commission in China. I do know people use platforms like WeChat and others to do that. How that individual comes to the platform to invest is another question. All these things look at social media brings up a lot of different models. And people say oh, yeah, it’s legal gets online. Not always. So please be careful Sampson’s correct, as well that in Canada, we have 13 different provinces. Therefore, it causes a lot of headache where you can go, one of the leading online crowdfunding platforms there is from founder, Paul, the Paul, Peter Paul can help you there. They can help you depending on what province you can raise up to 250,000 investing in Canada only. But obviously, to use this exemption, it requires a different strategy. You can reach out to us we’ll put you in touch with the lawyers that you need to the good thing is we normally have to wonder who to go to and all that we know the go to people now. They’re there. That’s what’s so much further ahead than we were in 2015. So much further. We have an association. We have trained professionals with our the the investor acquisition, we have the lawyers, we have the auditors, we have the funding portals, all the resources are there for you in order to make it go forward. And as you can hear my little one, he’s saying he’s ready to go as well. So listen, we could talk for hours. Thank you, everyone, for a wonderful afternoon, Samson. You and I are going to teach it again. Jason, as always, thank you for making the time and and for your support for both of you have a wonderful afternoon everyone.

1:04:29

We’ll talk

Join the all-in-one platform empowering private capital markets.

Free forever, KoreConX makes it easy for participants in private capital markets to manage their investment portfolios, raise capital, and meet global compliance standards along every step of the way.

Book a demo
Join the All-In-One Platform empowering private capital markets.

Free forever, KoreConX makes it easy for participants in private capital markets to manage their investment portfolios, raise capital, and meet global compliance standards along every step of the way.

left line right line bottom line