Oscar Jofre  00:33

All right, here we go. Well, good afternoon. Good afternoon, our colleague Andrew Corn will be joining us shortly. Good afternoon, everyone. And once again, welcome to the KoreConX KoreSummit webinar series. 2021. Yes, 2021. And just to remind everyone, we are now officially five days away. That’s right, five days away from the big. That’s right raise up to 75 million. And today we have two great panelists. We’re going to have a discussion around only RegA, of course, we’re going to be focused like always, we’re not going to divert it, no matter what Andrew Corn tries to do to us, we’re gonna stay focused on talking about RegA, and how to get noticed. So today, we have two great guests. And I’m going to first get them started. But to remind everyone to format, very simple fireside chat, no presentations, these are really more to talk about the the expertise and what they’ve done before so you can get a bit of guidance. So first, let’s start with Dara. We haven’t had you before, on our KoreSummit Series, so it’s great to connect. And please introduce yourself.

Dara Albright  01:41

Sure. Thanks, Oscar. It’s Dara Albright. And I am the president and founder of Dara Albright media. My background is basically a very conventional financial background on Wall Street. And really, I guess you could say cut my teeth in IPO execution on the marketing side. And in the 90s, when this little invention called the Internet, was just starting to emerge and really start to really change the way not only the way that, that we communicate the way we shop, but also the way we invest and get deals done. So it was a really exciting time. And, you know, just been really kind of focused on the space ever since kind of this intersection between technology and regulations, and how it’s been kind of on this whole evolutionary journey of transforming finance, from everything from getting deals done, to getting deals into the hands of retail investors, especially in their retirement portfolios, so that we could see a world once again, where the greatest innovation of the day is, is actually financed by the people. And they have the opportunity to capitalize on that innovation of the day. And hope we get to that point again. And I think that’s what crowdfunding is all about RegA plus is all about the Jobs Act is all about and just thrilled to be here talking about this. So thank you.

Oscar Jofre  03:13

Prefect, Mr. Corn, you look good today.

Andrew Corn  03:16

Thank you. And I am so thrilled to be here with Dara. You know, we go back a long ways. And we didn’t like work together. But we work to kind of almost at sister firms. And, you know, just to hear your insights in perspective, it’s really refreshing. I am not as civilized. I’m so caught up in the day to day of the work of investor acquisition and marketing, and sometimes day to take a deep breath. I’m certainly very focused on investor protection, and bringing the best deals to market. But yeah, reminding everyone, this is all about building a portfolio of what was out of reach to most people and getting them into these private deals. And they can do it where it doesn’t cost a ton of money. They don’t have to invest a lot. The minimums are generally low, when they can diversify and get into a bunch of different deals. And I just think it’s great. For those who have not seen, I think this is my 12th webinar. I’m Andrew Corn. I’m the founder and CEO of E5A. Integrated Marketing, we are a systematic data driven investor acquisition from so all of our efforts, number 12. For you, it may be its own maybe it’s 11. Maybe I’m just hoping it’s not 13 Because that would be really unlucky.

Dara Albright  04:51

I don’t want to be the 13 with you, that’s bad.

Andrew Corn  04:55

But I have been on quite a few which I’ve really enjoyed these gotten to you know, meet with old colleagues. And you know, yesterday I had the honor of being on with Sara Hanks today I have terror, all pride. It’s like how much better could my week get?

Dara Albright  05:12

Well, I you know what I just want to say to Andrew, I feel the same way and honored to be here with you and Oscar as well. And I don’t know if you know this, but one thing that Andrew and I actually have in common is that we and we both worked for the man who actually invented the IPO roadshow. So you know, we have kind of a long history of really understanding deal marketing and IPOs and execution and the whole thing. So this is really exciting to be here with you, and to really kind of talk about how the industry has become, you know, so modernized through technology and the new regs. So it’s exciting time?

Oscar Jofre  05:55

Yes, yes, it really is, obviously, with the increase up to $75 million, it’s going to be a little bit of a clashing between old school and new school, in making sure that they understand the little nuances behind the industry. Because it, it can be, you know, it, I think a lot of people are gonna make some assumptions about what it really is. And today, we’re going to talk about not, dig into a lot of the tactical elements. But we’re definitely going to talk about how a RegA really stands out above everything else, whether it’s from a company perspective, or for the investor perspective, how is that product going to get delivered to them? Because these are the two points, you know, I’m constantly reminded, I got reminded again, just 24 hours ago that once again, that money is there it is there has been there hasn’t gone anywhere, it’s still looking for a place. And obviously, there’s this whole middle, and then there’s a company that would like to get some of that capital, whether it’s some of us, you know, with the opening of the Jobs Act, it’s it’s brought this whole new way of capital raising that others used in different techniques during the IPO era. But I really want to make sure we’re focused on the RegA era of it all. So let’s start first, obviously, with you, Andrew, I mean, you’re well goes without a doubt. I mean, we’re dealing with a hands on. So obviously, let’s start from how does a company get noticed. And obviously, this is just high level of we’re not going into the tactical elements, but you come through enough of them. You’re advising companies in different verticals and stuff like that there are certain verticals that you specialize in. But let’s go through that. And then we’re going to hop into Dara because Dara is bringing a different perspective, which is really from the outside in, right. So you’re in the deep in the trenches and she’s in the outside. This should be an interesting perspective on for people to understand how they can get that exposure, or how do they get noticed, please?

Andrew Corn  08:12

Yes. So it’s funny that we need to be on a webinar for me to get to hear Dara’s perspective, which I’m super looking forward to, we basically break the world down into Okay, a company’s decided to do a reg. And that means they are seeking 1000s of shareholders. That’s like one of the prerequisites. And there’s two basic ways to do it, they can do it on their own on their own website, kind of a bring your own investors, or they can do it on one of the portals. And probably the bigger the better. We, of course, don’t really participate much the portals may syndicate our deals, but we don’t really participate in them. And frankly, because they’re scared to death of us. They do not give us any technical access to anything on their web pages. They don’t share data, they they really are very prohibitive and protective of what’s going on, even if we’re empowered by the issuer. So all the ones that I work on, yeah, they may syndicate over to a big portal or two, but they are mostly focused on promoting it themselves to their own investors. So everyone who knows me knows I’m a data not, you know, systematic data driven. So the systematic is really the way we convey the messaging, understanding that investors are on a journey. But let’s you know, to answer your question broadly, it’s all about the data. So we have built we’re up to almost a million now accredited investors. And I say accredited investors because we’re doing RegA plus, which doesn’t require them. And that’s the beauty of it. You can solicit accredited investors but not make them prove it. So it’s a much more Easily onboarding process. And we like to start on wealthier investors and then broaden that out, because they are more likely to understand putting their money into something a illiquid, that’s private that may have a while before it’s starting to pay back. So for us, it’s all about audience. And it’s not just about the investor base that we’ve developed, or that we are expanding to, because we’re working on data every day. It’s also about finding the niche audience, what is the company do? Who are their best investors? And why? Next question, Who are their most likely investors and why? Which may not actually line up? And then if we go mass at scale, who were those most likely to be? So you know, sometimes a product or service customers are not going to be investors? And sometimes they are. So we need to look at all those things and make sure that we are testing, testing, testing these different audiences, to bring them all out. So I might have gotten too far into the weeds there. No, no, I didn’t know the tactics. But it’s the I said this yesterday, if a tree falls in the woods, and no one’s there to hear it, did it make a sound? The answer is we don’t care. Our question is, was the right people there? Were these three audiences there. And if they heard it, it made a sound if they didn’t hear it, then we failed. So it’s really about targeting and understanding who your investor base might be.

Oscar Jofre  11:45

No, it? I don’t I don’t think you got off side, I just will come back to you. Because I want to make sure that you know, people, we’re getting a different client base right now. Right? You know that we’re seeing a different type of company more, more. They, they don’t really raise capital, their traditional way. They didn’t need to do any of these things. So when they hear that I need to do RegA and I hear it on the internet. And I got to do what again, I got to get people to come down. They go oh, so I just buy an email list. Right? We’ve we talked about that. No, I know, it’s so we won’t go into the tactics. But there. One thing that I want to make sure we cover is that the why but I’m going to come back to that. But Dara is? Obviously you have a different perspective, or hopefully I’m not sure maybe it is the same or different. Is that regarding RegA because you are on the outside? You’re talking about it, and you’re an advocate for investors to have access. So one thing is advocacy. But it’s

Andrew Corn  12:50

way deeper than that. Oscar? Yeah.

Dara Albright  12:53

Well, I’ll tell you this, you know, a couple of things. First, what I think Andrew hit the nail on the head when he said a couple of things. First of all, it all comes down to targeting. And when you look at it, when you’re looking at marketing deals in today’s environment, marketing anything in general, you know, what is really what is RegA plus, RegA plus offering, it’s a product that your marketing but it’s a financial product. So now we’re just it’s it’s a different way, there are rules and regulations around it. But just like in the traditional world of marketing, any kind of consumer product. You know, it basically evolved over the years even from radio ads, you know, jingles television ads, banner ads on the internet. And now we are going where you know, exactly where Andrew is, and what he’s talking about. It’s data driven, everything today is becoming more data driven, because we have the technology to make marketing you know, so much better than it’s ever been, we could pinpoint, we could target much better. So, you know, it’s interesting to see how that is done in in the deal process. Of course, there are some, you know, set regulations around it. But you know, where I see it, you know, and it’s kind of interesting. A couple years ago, I put together this chart, it was kind of the evolution of securities marketing and how it really began and evolved through the years starting in the 1960s. And you know, back then if you were going to do a deal on it was first of all deals were a lot smaller, but it was really a bunch of guys sitting around in you know, a conference room and I’m sure it was all guys I probably at that time, but it was a bunch of guys sitting around, you know, the guards, right? We go there had to have been cigars I’m sure. You know, sitting around at a conference table talking about, you know, going through the prospectus and then saying, okay, you know, who are you going to place this with? Who are you going to places the basically the deal was done, there were almost no marketing really involved in it, then as deals sort of change, they got bigger, you know, the institutional market started to grow, mutual funds started to grow, it started to change. And then it became, you know, we’re going to put together an actual marketing kind of structure behind taking deals public. So there was something called the IPO roadshow. And it’s still pretty much is the standard in the traditional way that deals get on, you know, two weeks before you’re actually going to go effective. You know, you go on this dog and pony and you go visit all of these different cities, you know, across the country, sometimes even across the world, and you meet with institutional investors. And you tell your story, you know, you give your your presentation, you know, you do one on one meetings, you have these group lunches, which I’m sure they’re probably cigars at that time, too. And always alcohol, and also rubber chicken, they always had those rubber chicken lunches, we joke around about those on and that was kind of the way things were done, you know, throughout the 80s, you know, much in the 90s, things started to change when the internet started to emerge. And then you had companies coming out and starting to do online roadshows and doing pitch decks online. And then you started to see sort of the, you know, technology become, you know, a part of the this, this the whole marketing, you know, the marketing of these deals. And it was interesting to see how that sort of evolved, and now where we’re going, you know, it really is really what what Andrew was doing. It’s data driven. I mean, the the technology has just become so much more advanced that you’re able to, to now go and, you know, I mean, I think people are still doing roadshows and you know, and shaking hands and meeting people. But I think even after what we’ve experienced in 2020, with COVID, any reservations that I think anyone had that with, oh, no, we have to shake hands before, you know, I invest in your deal. That’s all gone. I mean, COVID really kind of put an end to that. So really, it’s very interesting time now where we are because it really is completely tech driven.

Oscar Jofre  17:40

Right. But technology alone, I mean, you could have all the data driven element to it. It’s the I think, for any company looking at this, they go okay, a data driven Listen, I got a i, I can drive it all all particulars, is still doesn’t get provide you the the homerun, right. Like I’m not trying to be against it. I do believe data is a key element. I think 2020 The data that we seen is very different than what people were expecting, that’s for sure. And given 2020 with COVID, we’re seeing a very different investor base, once again, that we didn’t we didn’t think would be participating this way. Was that driven because of data driven techniques of investor acquisition? Or is that because of COVID-19? Yes, we’ll never know. Yeah,

Andrew Corn  18:31

you’re hitting on two separate things. So yeah, one of the things like if you look at the composition of my firm, it’s primarily writers and graphic designers. We have our data people, we have our media people, and we have our programming people. But certainly if you are not master storytellers, you are not going to convince anyone of anything. So you can have the wrong message at the right place at the right time, you’re still not going to convert. What the data does is make you much more efficient. And you know, I’m going to go back to the 90s. I owned a deal. I owned a website called deal. info.com was primarily used to announce m&a, mergers and acquisitions. And the press release was there. There was a deal website, sometimes one for unions, if it was like a utility deal, and there’d be one for employees, all these things were produced. But if the positioning and messaging weren’t right, then it was never going to play. That’s how a deal will fall apart is because the messaging wasn’t right. So today, if you’re not presenting, you know, one of the things we do is we say it my firm, we say if you only have 30 seconds, you know you’ve got to be able to explain this really quickly. Okay, now expand. Now your left brain thinker, your right brain thinker, some people like videos Some people like print, some people just want it on the webpage, accommodating all these things are what we refer to as the investor journey from prospect to actually allocating money, or investing, all of those things need to be taken into consideration. And it’s frankly, no easier with technology, it just means we can target better. And we have more ways of telling the same story.

Dara Albright  20:27

Right, and you have to look, I think, to its great point, it’s, you have to be able to tell the story, it’s the messaging, and you have to be able to tell the story in a timely manner to people also today, I mean, you know, we have, you know, people attention spans are not what they used to be, keeps getting lower and lower and lower. And maybe that’s partly due to technology. But, you know, you’re right, part of it is the messaging, getting the right story out there. I also think, you know, issuers today have a really unique opportunity to really, because what what what, you know, technology has impacted marketing, you know, even for decades, and each time technology makes it so that, you know, a product, let’s say manufacturers, producers, or brands could engage with their consumers on a much more meaningful level, that’s what technology has done, you know, at first it was, you know, this little radio jingle, you’re listening to it, then it was television, oh, now I could see the product, then it was, you know, the internet you could search for you could buy other people’s, you know, you know, uh, you know, crap, if you, if you will, and then, you know, it’s, you know, now on on your phone. So what’s really interesting is how each time we’re finding more ways for brands to engage consumers, and what does that mean for issuers of deals? Well, your consumers are your investors, I call them actually invest tumors investors, because they are one investors and consumers technology made it so that they are one. So for brands that are out there raising capital, they have a unique opportunity to go first to the lowest hanging fruit, which are their customers, their customer base. So they you know, that you know, for anyone out there that raising capital now, that is the first thing you should do is go out there and engage your existing customers, and let them know, you know, in accordance of course, with with the regulations and how it’s done, but that is very important. We didn’t really have that opportunity a long time ago. You know, pre internet because now you know, especially you know you did with your customers, but now you didn’t really know who your customers were you didn’t know who was watching. Tell you know, your advertising your commercial, you didn’t know who was listening to the radio jingle now, you know, now you have the ability to really not only know who your actual customers are, but who are the people that are actually interested. And watching. So that’s really unique to that technology has really brought to the table.

Oscar Jofre  23:32

I keep forgetting a minute, because you guys were going at it. But as you’re both speaking I again, I you know, I think we’ve heard this before the storyteller, Dean, the messaging, obviously, we’re hearing the data driven and all that. But, you know, let’s say everybody decimal that in, because companies are I mean, they’re spending hundreds of 1000s of dollars, and they’re not getting the result. So getting recognized or getting seen. Let me ask you a really dumb question. Are we I don’t know if it’s dumb. But is it enough? Is it enough to only target the investor to be seen and heard, to get the what you need in order to raise your capital? I’ll start with you, Andrew. I’m asking that question

Andrew Corn  24:21

isn’t No, no, no, because so a lot of it is about scale. So, you know, we start off with these three groups that I described. And let’s say it comes out to be a million and a half people. That’s nothing. That’s absolutely nothing. So what that can do is allow us to develop data that we can do attribution analysis on. And with that attribution, we’ll find out demographic information, behavioral information, and frankly, what websites they visit how much time they spend on Facebook, do they go to Twitter? There is enormous information that we can From these people, and then from that, we need to scale that out to 10s of millions of people. But before you scale, if you don’t have the right information, you’re going to be throwing away an awful lot of money. So let’s start with a million dollar ad budget is really small, not for RegA, but it is in general. So a consumer products company may spend $2 million to figure out what a firm like mine needs to figure out with less than $100,000. So necessity is the mother of invention, and you get really good at it fast, or you’re going to fail. So, you know, it’s interesting that there are agencies five times the size of mine that have tried to enter RegA, you know, they have writers, we have writers, they have designers, we have designers, they have programmers, we have programmers, doesn’t mean they can do my job. You know, we sell or we market financial products for a living, you know, before there was this, we were marketing ETFs and mutual funds. And we still do, there are five different ETF issuers all with multiple products who are clients of ours. So someone will say what’s going on with that? It’s like, oh, we have ETFs, taking in on a bad day, half a million on a good day, 2 million. Can you replicate that and RegA plus? No, it’s not possible, because it’s not something liquid that I can trade on each trade that I already have an account with, or fidelity or Robin Hood or whoever else, and just go bam, bam, bam, and I own it. It’s a different animal. But there are behaviors and data that we glean from that that is super duper helpful in selling these private deals. But remember, what a RegA plus 99% of the time is illiquid until there’s a secondary market? Which is a webinar for another day.

Oscar Jofre  27:03

Yeah, it that’s fair. I saw. Okay, maybe I’ll ask it another way. And this one’s to you there. I mean, 233 million Americans, right. So we now know, the total investors to date is less than 1.5 million combining reg CF and RegA. Right 1.5, I mean, of 233 qualified million Americans, which they will have a Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn and Instagram account, and they’ll have an email address. Even if we discount 10% that want to go off the grid, which, you know, there’s always that you still left with, you know, 200 million plus, to target. What What are we missing in all of this? That gets the the other 198 point 5 million Americans to participate? What are we missing?

28:02

So you know, you bring up a couple of interesting points. First of all, social media is a great tool, obviously, you know, not going to say go out and market your deal on a Reddit chat group, although that probably that probably a get you into legal trouble. But no, seriously, I think what is interesting now is that you want to look for more unique ways of engaging your investor your investumer, I’m gonna I’m gonna combine them because they really have become one. So if you look at it in that way, you do want to reach out to your customer base and your potential customers. So what’s a good way to do that? I’ll give you a little bit of a example. When I first started doing crowdfunding events back in like 2011 2012. What we used to do is we used to have and this was before even the passage of the jobs act before reg CF way, way before reg CF was implemented, but we had rewards based crowdfunding that was starting to gain traction. So what we would do is, we have a success, a company, a CEO that was very successful has done a successful rewards based crowdfunding campaign raised a lot of money meet everyone from like, Pebble to CEO Pebble Watch to you know, just whatever it was, we used to do these events in cities all across the country. So I would look on Kickstarter or Indiegogo and I would see okay, you know, what, what companies have really done well, and were able to raise money and I just wanted them to tell their story. And they would come and they would tell their story. And what was interesting, I remember one was like a little gadget on your phone that enabled you to take really the perfect selfie. It was like a tripod that attached to your phone. And I thought You know, they were not having any traction whatsoever and getting the, you know, money raised on their campaign. And then all of a sudden they woke up one day and they were like six times oversubscribed. And it was because it was like a blogger from literally the other side of the world, saw the campaign and wrote about it. So one of the things that I think that and I would suggest is a great thing for CEOs to do is to, you know, you want to you want to look at it, you want to engage potential consumers as well as investors, you want to look at them as the same. So in order to do that, when you’re talking about, you want to talk a lot about your product, because it’s your product, that that, you know, and this will help you to, you’ll be selling your product at the same time that you’re, you know, quote unquote, selling your deal. But what and I know, it’s, you know, SEO, especially when you’re raising money, you don’t have a lot of time, free time to sit and do a lot of research, you know, I mean, your time is really fill running the business and yet raising capital to it. I mean, there just aren’t enough hours in a day. But I would suggest before anyone does embark on a reg CF or a RegA plus, go out there and just, you know, look at and make an Excel spreadsheet, go on to you know, just do Google searches for, you know, any, anything, any kind of anything that’s related to your industry and do Google searches and see who’s writing about that, that industry, that type of product, know, who are the bloggers in that space, and start to create, like an Excel spreadsheet of just all the people that are focused on that area, and it works the same thing for deals to, you know, who’s covering, you know, RegA plus offerings, you know, from the investment side. So you want to start to kind of get to know, even you know, who those bloggers are, who those writers are, because that I think, is also helpful. That’s just a little little tip there. But that could go a long way in helping you engage not only investors, but consumers too, and really increasing your brand awareness.

Oscar Jofre  32:27

Okay, I’m gonna have to find a way to push you both to the other side, to the dark side of the forest. Because we’re in it’s great, I mean, you’re right, you do all those wonderful things, right? You do all these things. And I speak to CEOs as well. I mean, to their view, a Oscar I’m, I retain that company, do social media, I retain that company, do webinars every day, I want to do advertising. I did this one for that I got a great video, I’m reaching the market. And so the question I’m asking is, I mean, he zero another influence here. And yes, you can go hire an influencer. I’ve met some companies now. But those are backfired, and RegA. And if you hire the wrong one, but easier another part to this, that also we’re not, we’re in a different stage where we were three years ago with RegA where this was enough, this was enough. I don’t think it’s enough anymore. I think there’s another piece to this in order. Because if it was enough, the numbers should be a lot higher than 1.5. That means we have we that means there’s a whole market out there of investors, maybe they saw it, so or maybe they need to see it somewhere else. Or maybe they it needs to be brought to them. So what else can be seen done by a company to make sure that they get that awareness to their offering? Because I too, I’m the same way. Now, with everybody else. I don’t want to mislead anybody thinking that social media alone is gonna get you or the video alone or the webinar or the newsletter this or not. I don’t think that’s enough anymore. Those channels,

Dara Albright  34:11

You’re right. Its a combination of all that you’re right.

Oscar Jofre  34:13

But, but even if you do them all, I believe there’s still a few more things I’m trying to push you guys ever before. I said,

Dara Albright  34:21

Well, I think one other thing too, because you’re talking about distribution. And I think distribution channels are changing. And I think we also now, you know, but we’re seeing I think more of the renaissance of the retail investor. I started writing about this, you know, a couple years ago, but now I think we’re really really starting to see it. I think retail is rising, they’re awakening. They’re looking for opportunities. You know, the issue that I think we had with RegA plus, is that, you know, once these offerings went public, it’s free. You know, it’s one thing to go out there and raise the capital and the Offering, you know, and then it’s another thing, you can’t just then say, Alright, my marketing initiatives have stopped, you have to, you have to constantly be out there. And we call this you know, back in the day it was investor relations, you know, after you went public, the very first thing you would do is you would hire an investor relations firm that would, you know, help you through then your journey of then being a public company. So one of the, you know, one of the things is, because it all comes down to the F in the aftermarket, you need these deals to be, you know, to really start to be quality, you know, quality deals that are making people money in the aftermarket, there needs to be excitement and enthusiasm in the aftermarket. And I think in the beginning, we didn’t have that, I think, you know, it was difficult, I think it’s getting a little bit better. Now, I actually think this whole you know, this whole Reddit GameStop, you know, craziness that’s happening with retail investors on Wall Street has actually opened people’s eyes to some of the shenanigans that happen with short selling of RegA plus offerings, that were making it difficult for them to thrive in the aftermarket. So I think, I think we’re gonna see a lot of changes with respect to that. And I think you are going to see like this, you know, there’s some deals, Chicken Soup for the Soul, great, you know, great example, they went public during a RegA offering about four years ago now. And, you know, they, they, it’s a great company, great fundamentals, but once they got public, they were just destroyed by abusive shorters. Now, the company has, you know, gone past that, and, and now, it’s almost I think it’s quadrupled what their offering price was. So now we’re getting some, you know, we’re getting some success, RegA success stories under our belt. And I think once you see that, too, I think that opens the eyes of investors to say, okay, you know what, I like the product, I like the company. Now, I also I’d like the investment opportunity.

Oscar Jofre  37:18

That would make me very sad. If that was the it, I’m actually sad to hear him say that, as an intrapreneur. That is my sad is, I think, in my personal opinion, I think public companies will destroy RegA, did it at the they did it in the beginning. And if they come back again, they will destroy it, they will destroy it. Because the fundamental that is sold during the RegA doesn’t carry through when you’re a public company. When you’re a public company, the shareholders sit in this bucket, you hire an investor relations person that’s motivated to drive the stock up to get their options. When you’re a privately held company, you’re building the company, I look at BrewDog. I love the way they engage with their shareholders. I love what Legion M is doing. Where their shareholders I they engage with them, they’re part of their journey, there will be a time when the company’s ready for that exit to go public. But it’s but if you take it too soon, those are the issues. But the other issue is the people you’ve you sold them on the journey of the intrapreneurship what you were building what you are harnessing and what you are going to make a difference. As soon as you became a public company. Here’s our quarterly reports. Here’s our quarterly reports and start like what so what happened to this company like aid? They? So that’s one part for me. I think it’ll be the suicide. I come from the public market. I see what public companies do. They take the money, they don’t care about the retail investor. They’re chasing their biggest investor because that’s what changes the board of directors. That’s how they get paid, the retail investor is going to get burned. And what’s happening right now Reddit isn’t isn’t a reflection of all the investors in RegA in fact that those investors weren’t even being read it they don’t even know what blog read it is. So I’m an advocate for investors. I really am. And for intrapreneurship every day I remind myself I have what I’m looking at jobs act, what does it mean? What was it for? And you know, I’m glad I got David weild to remind me constantly, we want to open up a public markets we do we want to do it right. We want good companies go public, they’re ready to go. They got the financial, they got the revenue model going, none of this pump and dump. And then what’s even worse when a public company wants to use RegA. But I mean, how does it say you’re sitting at 10 cents a share? And what are you going to offer this investor that’s going to offer them any liquidity? I think the real I think there’s a there’s a balance here. I just I don’t I but I personally do not feel that going public is the way if that’s the case, we’re looking at 2000 and all over again. The only difference is that this time we took their kiddie money knowingly, and we took it, we wrote it, and we put them away. And individually as a voice, they have nothing to say.

Andrew Corn  40:11

Now I couldn’t disagree with both of these view more. So there’s a bunch of things going on. First of all, I do agree on this renaissance to the retail investor. And I think the retail investors been taken for a ride, you know, you’ve got a lot of financial advisors who basically are buying model portfolios, and everyone’s in the same stuff. And I think it all started to change when ETFs started to get popular, where you could buy a basket of stocks, you could buy it through your brokerage account, and bam, when you bought it, you weren’t getting a price, at the end of the day that might be manipulated, you was trading like a stock, and it trades like a stock. And I think that’s been really good. But then the robo advisors came in and said, You don’t need to know anything. And by the way, we don’t know anything, either, we’re gonna put you in five ETFs and charge you next to nothing, because we’re not really doing anything for you, other than taking your money. And, you know, I think that there is a little bit of a backlash against the robos. And there’s a place for robos. I mean, I worked on robos, they were called model portfolios for 401 k’s a million years ago. But what’s going on now, I think is really a disservice or we’re Robo only for women. It’s like really, women have different investment investment goals than men. I mean, I happen to understand some of the differences between men and women, not all of them, I will admit to that. But I think everyone wants to retire well, and as saving for college and saving for retirement, etc. But anyway, the whole thing with online brokerage, change this so that bam, we can go in and we can buy something and we can sell it. And you know, I talked about ETFs earlier about this liquidity premium Gee, I can buy it and sell it whatever I want. RegA, you’re making more of a commitment. But first. I know the public company that’s going to be coming to market with a RegA plus offering. But they are trading at 10 cents. And it’s not based on their share price, it’s going to be an offer, backed up by their balance sheet and their New York Stock Exchange listed company. So when the time comes for that, you know, we keep our name out of all the paperwork, but you will know that my firm is marketing that deal. So there are and I think the big change is we’re seeing amazing quality companies coming to market. So now it’s like, oh, you’ve got money at a robo, you’re thinking of maybe buying some stocks as well with a fidelity account or Schwab account. How about a RegA plus? Well, how about buying a RegA plus through Schwab account, that’s an innovation I’m looking for that Oscar deeds to take care of, because you have the technology to make that happen. I don’t. But I think that there’s this disconnect between I’m going to go in and do it, I’m going to get an email confirmation. And then the shares are sitting at a transfer agent like a core contacts and you guys do a great job, and they can do investor relations, but it’s not there with my other stuff. So I think there’s a little bit of a disconnect. But then one other point and all guild my time is we’re just in the second inning here. At best, we may still be in the first inning on this, you know, ETFs have been around for 12 years. And RegA plus in its current forum is only around for two, three years. Like you need to give some time. You know, a lot of what I’m doing is converting people from reg D, you know, people are used to putting their money into private deals into RegA plus, it’s easier for them and they can have lower minimums. That’s a much easier sale than getting to someone who is a consumer and say, You like this company, you like their product, you want to own part of the company, you’re going to give us money and not get product back, you might get a little perk, but then we’re gonna hold your money for a while you’re going to be part of the journey. And some things are really exciting. And that would be something you want to do. You know, we’re going to be marking the deal where it’s going to be in this is what our copy is going to read. We make electricity from sunlight. We’ve got these massive places where we’re doing it. We’ve got contracts with utilities, and the utilities are obligated to buy it for from us at this rate for 20 years by the state You can put your money in, you’re going to get six 7% interest on it. That’s the deal. So you can be part of clean energy, you can get income. And that’s the deal. There is no entrepreneurial ride, but you want your money in the bank had half a percent? Or do you want to be part of this new industry of creating electricity from the sun and earn interest from it? There’s no unicorn, there’s no billion dollar company, I think it’s a great deal. Why? Because they have a contract with a utility. And the utility is obligated by the state, there’s law behind it. Like, it’s not as safe as FDIC insured. But I think it’s a great deal. So each deal has to be looked at for its own merits, who are we going to market that to? Well, not to the best consumer person, this is going to be someone who needs income and wants to save the planet. It’s just different. So each deal, but that deal has a lot of merit, it’s got these two things backing it up. Plus, you know, personally, I love that they’re making electricity from sunlight. So I’m really good. I’m not the perfect prospect for that I’m actually in several solar deals that are never going to be billion dollar corporations. And then there are other RegA pluses where I’m hoping they will be billion dollar corporations. So you know, the merits of it, and how many million people we’ve gotten to has a lot to do with the quality of the deal, what people’s perception of our how they invest in why they invest, and us slowly bringing them on that journey to understand, you can do really well in the private markets, it’s not that hard to do, you are qualified, you can put in so little money, that it’s such a small percentage of your overall investments. And through incredible technology, like KoreConX, you’re going to be able to monitor it. So unfortunately, you won’t have it on the same statement as your online brokerage account. But you’re going to be able to monitor it. And the good companies, like Dara said, are going to do investor relations, and really bring you along the journey.

Dara Albright  47:17

I think that’s a great point, I think that there are people that are chasing yield now and you have to look at what what your investors needs are I mean, you know, there there are investors that are seeking growth, or investors that are seeking yield depending on you know, a lot of different aspects, you know, their age, etc. I think what’s interesting, in RegA plus two that’s happening is that we’re seeing it, you know, originally it was implemented and introduced to facilitate capital formation for for small businesses, help them get to the markets, public markets, earlier equity deals, but what we’ve seen was real financial innovators taking RegA plus, and using it to create fixed income products. And, and in doing so, giving their or giving clients an opportunity or investors an opportunity to obtain yield, perfect example, you know, where the financial great company, they, you know, use RegA plus to to create a fixed 5% product. So, you right, it’s not anyone that’s, you know, looking for, you know, these, you know, 1,000,000% returns these to go be billion dollar companies. So, it’s, you know, we’re, but they, you know, all companies, I think any product, like I said, it’s a, you know, financial product that you’re looking to take to consumers, you do need to have a marketing strategy behind you. And, you know, I think, Oscar, you made a really interesting point, when it came to equities, you had mentioned that, you know, these companies by, you know, waiting until they’re actually ready to be a private company, we’re going to get, you know, better quality deals. And, and I, and I think we’re seeing that 100% But I would also I would argue, you know, Intel went public in 1971 at a $58 million valuation, they missed their, you know, first quarter of revenues. And, you know, look, Intel went on to become, you know, one of the greatest companies, you know, in the history of mankind, I mean, you know, as far as a preach, giving back appreciation, and as far as even, you know, transforming all other industries and you know, you know, helping us you know, with computers and by biotech, you know, you name it. So, you know, why is it if we have to ask ourselves, why is it that a company like that could go public in 1971 at a $15 million at a $58 million valuation, but it’s somehow it’s, it’s, you know, they can’t do that. Now, that’s not good. You know, that’s too low too risky. That I don’t get, it’s

Andrew Corn  50:27

we advise companies not to go public unless they’re going to have a market cap large enough to be included in an index tracked by an exchange traded fund, so that the volume trading volume is there. What the world doesn’t need is another 10 cent stock that trades once a month, or even a 10 cent stock that trades a million shares a day because it still doesn’t add up to a lot of money. So you know, from a practical standpoint, running a company, do you want to have all that extra overhead? Or do you want to be a little bit more practical, and I’m not a lawyer, and I’m not an investment banker. So. But I did want to say I wanted to change topics just for one second to address something that Oscar said when he said, Is this enough. And I really have two quick things to say. One is, you can interview 100 CEOs who have done successful RegA plus is they’re not replicatable, there’s no capturing lightning in a bottle, it doesn’t happen. And if you hire most marketing firms, they’re going to show you what they’ve done in the past. We don’t do that. Why? Because what happened in March of last year, when we were taking in a million bucks a day across a couple of deals is not happening in the same way today. You know, COVID, changed everything. market sentiment changes, everything. weather changes, everything. What we show companies is a process. And Dara actually touched on this, it’s an orchestration of these different things is what makes things work. Which is why when people are saying, I’ve got this video company, in this social media company, in this PR company in this company to do our advertising, we want you to participate, I always say thank you, but no, thank you. If there’s no one in charge, and if there’s no accountability, and there’s no clear cut of this, the way all the pieces work together, I don’t want me or my company to be a part of it. So and that’s very different than the way other people view it. But we don’t have to do everything. Because we don’t we don’t do social media. We don’t do PR, but I love to collaborate with them. But it’s done in a structured way so that everyone is overlapping, but not wasting time by doing that. And I really believe it’s about process orchestration. Even going back to the 80s and 90s, when we were working on IPOs, it was all about where was the roadshow going and why. And to who, once you seeing them wide. Now it’s about individuals. But it’s so similar. And there’s a lot that can be lost. And a

Dara Albright  53:09

ton of research was done in the targeting stage to know that you reaching the right people coming out about that, right?

Andrew Corn  53:16

The number of hours we spend on figuring out audience, right is probably more than any individual item that we write. It’s just it’s a huge, huge, huge part of what we do. Data is a key.

Oscar Jofre  53:31

Yep. So let me put it maybe in another different way. I mean, you’re right, there are no two deals, like every CEO will describe their process totally different. So again, data, data driven 233 million, only 1.5 have participated. What is getting in the way of the other ones? Like maybe that’s maybe that’s the better question now to start asking to getting noticed is there’s still a large gap. We’re doing all of this work here. It’s we maybe it is touching it, but they’re not acting on it. What what is happening here? What is their real? Is there another third party involved? Is there. Is there another layer that needs

Andrew Corn  54:14

to jump in on this territory? So society needs to catch up to technology. It’s been that way forever. You know, we had printing presses not everyone knew how to read. I mean, all the way back to they’re so yeah, we’ve got all this technology, we’ve got all this stuff, but that doesn’t mean that your average 35 year old is ready to put money in a private deal. You know, one of the first things we ask issuers is, what am I getting? On the on the investor? What am I getting? I understand your product and your vision. I want to know what I’m getting. I’m going to give you $1,000 of my money. What do I get and if The answer is equity. It’s a crappy answer. How am I going to get my money back is then my follow up. And we need to be able to communicate, not just all about the company. But what this compact is between the issuer and the investor, so that they have a clue. So that people I know people who don’t know they’re accredited, I know people who have never put money in a private deal, who talk about private deals, but they’ve never done it. We need to drag society up to where technology is, which is never going to happen. Technology will always be add. But let’s have this same convert list that three of us get together a year from today, and see what that number is, with the quality of deals coming through. I think that number is going to grow. But it’s not going to grow fast enough to satisfy Oscar, which is a good thing we need to not be satisfied.

Oscar Jofre  55:58

Yeah, I’m just asking the question. Because I mean, it is. I mean, we were seeing the data on the reg CF, we got 3600. Companies,

Andrew Corn  56:08

how many? Are you Web?

Oscar Jofre  56:11

Sorry, how many problems?

Andrew Corn  56:13

Are you with currently?

Oscar Jofre  56:15

Just one.

Andrew Corn  56:17

So what how come I can’t get you into a CF or an A? I’m not doing my job, right? Or am I and you’re just not the target for the deals we’ve been marketing?

Dara Albright  56:29

Well, I’ll tell you one thing, I think Oscar touched upon this too, it does come down to distribution. And if you want to reach retail investors, when it comes to it’s one thing reaching consumers to buy your product, it’s another reaching investors to actually invest in your deal. Why are they going to do that? So one is obviously you know, the, the aftermarket issue that that is a struggle right now that that does need some work. The other thing that people need to understand is that retail investors don’t invest typically, with the money that they have sitting around in a checking or savings account, they primarily invest through their retirement dollars. large majority of retail investors are invested in equity markets and bond markets, you know, through their retirement vehicles. So I think once we open up I think the the retail retirement investment channel that will be a floodgate. I think that’s starting to happen. It’s been the I think, the what’s been kind of the struggle, and the challenge has been that a lot of the ways to do that have been built on antiquated systems. But that’s all starting to modernize. Now, and I’m sure Oscar, you know, a lot about this as well. And I think that, you know, once you’re able to integrate those types of technologies with, you know, like your tech platform, I think that we’re going to see a true explosion in reaching retail investors.

Oscar Jofre  58:14

Okay, so, look, it is. The other day, I was looking through all my notes regarding RegA, and REG CF and all that and all we talked about the same thing. It’s about the matching thing and all that and then I’ve been going back, because I look at the stats, right, and I’m going, okay, what are we what are we missing? Right? Like, what, what, what is the next what is the next thing? And you’re probably I think it is distribution? To understand who is influencing that individual? What you didn’t ask me, and you should have asked me is who is my our Ria, right? Because that’s a that is an influencer to my, because I’m busy doing this. I don’t want to be doing that. Right. And so I’ve often wondered, if the majority of the potential investors who say, hey, you know, I found this deal? Yeah, no, no, no, I would, it’s no good for your portfolio. I wonder how many biases are that that’s the part that I’m trying to get. Sometimes it’s, it’s easy to just keep going this way, thinking that. That’s the only way. It’s almost like there’s got to be another root here. That needs to understand what this is. And, look, I’ve seen it firsthand. That’s why I brought I brought this up because I think this is now an eye opener for me, right?

Andrew Corn  59:34

I think with our citizen eye opener for all of us who definitely is worth the price of admission for me, Oscar, how many people so right now we have early adopters that we need to bring mainstream? How are these early adopters paid by or they they didn’t even invest? They paid by credit card? What percentage is credit card? 70? Yeah, so it’s a mindset. If I’m going to put up my retirement account, then I can Spectre hold it for a very long time from buying over the credit card. It’s almost disposable.

Dara Albright  1:00:05

Yeah, it’s a whole different mindset. And we need to

Andrew Corn  1:00:09

convince the rest of society, hey, you can be you are a private equity fund you individually can be a private equity fund, you can invest in these private deals, eclectically, build a portfolio of them. And you can do it with small amounts or larger amounts. How about if there was a way of doing one piece of your 401k or IRA, and you can put 15 deals in that that would be a great structure for someone to come up with in that market. And then they can have people could have a completely different set of ideals about it. 10% of my 401k is going to go into private deals. And

Dara Albright  1:00:49

both make a point to just financial literacy and education. So much more needs to be done. I mean, it’s great that you know, we’re doing this, and hopefully this reaches, you know, those in the retail marketplace, because it’s I can’t even stress the importance of financial literacy and education. It’s not even teach in schools, it should be.

Oscar Jofre  1:01:12

Yeah, we’re on to an amazing journey in bestway, I tried to look at it from all sides, I don’t get comfortable, just with one area. And I think you touched on the right wording distribution channels. And I think that’s going to be the key element to push that needle from where it is now to. Because if there’s going to be a larger audience coming in to take advantage of this regulation, which we believe that is happening, then we need a larger base, it can’t be the same existing base that we all keep going to. Right. So in RegA, there’s one particular channel that I want to get started that wells eventually going to run dry. And so I keep thinking to myself any day now, they’re gonna say, Okay, that’s it. So he, so and nobody does anything to go outside of it. And I feel education is, is a key element making sure. And I know that with working with the ecosystem, we’ve been able to open up to new channels. And that’s where I was really driving you both to so, you know, in a good old fashioned way, but it was great. Having you both. I mean, this was, this was an enjoyable conversation. Because it’s an it this will be an evolving topic. Meaning that today, we say this is the way you’re gonna notice. It’ll be interesting to see a year from today, what we will be saying about how to get noticed in a RegA offering. And will there be distinctions between reg CF and RegA and REG D offerings, when all of this is said and done. So we have a great starting point. I don’t know if we’re in second base first base, but I know we’re just getting started. It’s so thank you both today for a wonderful afternoon. For everyone else listening in. Listen, we are only five days away on the 15th of March if you haven’t registered now, we have state of the Jobs Act that 2021 with the father of the Jobs Act, David weild. And of course, Sarah Hanks, hosted by Vincent millenary, who is the founder and CEO of modern era media FinTech TV. It’s going to be a whole week of webinars talking to companies and REG CF, the funding portals, companies like Andrew who are there to help you to get you started. It’s going to be phenomenal. Thank you everyone. Again, if you want to meet our speakers, you can see their bios, their LinkedIn link their email address@koresummit.io Or you can go to their YouTube channel core connects and you can watch this video again and again and watch us battle it out. So thank you both. We’ll be talking