What’s Your Digital Real Estate Strategy? | Zondra Evans

David McBee: Hello and welcome to Simpli.fi TV, the web series and podcast for agencies, brands, marketers, and media buyers. I'm David McBee. Our guest today is Zondra Evans, Founder and CEO of Zondra TV Network. Zondra is a distinguished talk show host and executive producer, and the founder of Zeds Corp Zondra TV Network. Zondra is dedicated to helping small businesses thrive through cost-effective branding and exposure strategies embodied in the motto, be heard, be seen, and grow. Renowned as a public speaker and self investment expert, she inspires business leaders worldwide with cutting edge concepts and practical insights. Zondra, welcome to Simpli.fi TV. Zondra Evans: Thank you for having me. I'm so excited to be here today. David McBee: And I'm excited to have you. I always like hosting people who are used to being hosts. They show up looking good with good lighting, good set. You're looking fabulous today. Thank you for that. Zondra Evans: Thank you. David McBee: All right. Well, let's see. We have limited time, so I'm just going to jump into some questions. You founded your very own streaming television network and you host several shows on it. You must feel pretty strongly about streaming TV. Can you tell us why advertisers should care about streaming TV? Zondra Evans: Oh my goodness. It's like this is it. So you have to look at how people are ingesting information today and they're ingesting through streaming. I just did an analogy the other day and I was like listen, the big three. We had the big three when we had cable, CBS, NBC, ABC. We can call it out, but now the big three is really Roku, Amazon Fire, and Apple TV. And those devices, even CBS, NBC, and ABC is on it, and people are advertising on streaming. I mean, streaming TV leveled the playing field so that you can advertise more cost effectively. David McBee: And isn't everyone at this point streaming, don't you think? Zondra Evans: Everyone is streaming and those that are not, I like to read and steep the tea leaves, right? But have you noticed that there's live TV like on Roku now? So let's just talk about live TV. The reason why that live TV is there is to help cable cord cutters to be able to transition and still feel familiar in a space, so I think that was a wise decision. I'm on live TV, but I'm also on demand 24 hours a day, seven days a week. People want to look at TV when they want to. And by the way, you would be just like overwhelmed if you know how many people love advertisements? David McBee: Wait, people love advertisements? Zondra Evans: There are some people that stick around and love ads, and it's not a small percentage. It's a decent percentage. David McBee: I agree with you a hundred percent. I'm a big Jeep person and anytime a Jeep commercial comes on, even though I'm not shopping for a Jeep, I just love seeing that Jeep running through the mountains and stuff. I don't mind those commercials a bit. Zondra Evans: Yeah, exactly. So there's a population that really loves that, and I think this ... With streaming TV, it's really level the playing field that not just large companies can advertise on streaming, but small to mid-size companies, and that's who I focus on and I am building commercials on a daily basis. David McBee: Okay. Let's go down that path for a bit because I know a lot of small/medium business owners feel like the likes of Honda and Kellogg's are oh, they can do commercials all day, but I can't have the budget for it. What do you say to that? Zondra Evans: Well, I'm a marketing and advertisement company, so we have created a way ... Because you got to think about motion graphics. You don't have to hire actors to be in a commercial. That's not really necessary. Motion graphics has just taken such a turn, but we're able to prepare commercials for small business at a small business price and stream it on Amazon, Roku, and Apple just much more effectively. And so we have a development team that actually creates the commercial for small to mid-size businesses. David McBee: All right. What advice do you have for these agency owners who are trying to introduce streaming TV to their clients? Zondra Evans: Yeah, listen, agency owners, you absolutely want to be able to play in all of the digital space. One thing that I talk about is it's cool to be on social platforms, that's digital. It's good to have magazine articles, that's another form of digital, but being on streaming TV is the highest level of digital that you could actually put your clients into. I have particularly worked with agencies to help bridge the gap to get that distribution on TV. You must do it. Now is the time, I'm telling you, and people are watching TV. I mean, when I think about the millions, billions, we're going to use billions of people that are watching streaming TV, but the thing is they want to watch it when they want to watch it. And so that's what makes streaming TV absolutely an area that any agency should be involved in. David McBee: All right, so they're confused though like they used to be able to say, I want to be on ABC or CBS, or I want to be on the news, or I want to be on baseball. And now with the environment of streaming being all over the place, how do we help businesses understand that we've got them, we've got them, and we can take care of them? Zondra Evans: Yeah, you know I'm going to put a plug in for y'all. I can't help myself because I'm a ... So first of all, geotargeting and geomarketing, you have to know that you've got to play in there if you're an agency. But when I actually got introduced to Simpli.fi, I was like, this is it. This is it for me. Because one of the things as an agency is that I want visibility on multiple streaming platforms, so when I knew that I could actually create a commercial for my client and stream it through your agency, I mean, your company, I was like this is perfect. And in fact, the first one that I ran, I think I got 45,000 impressions, which is unheard of in 30 days. And by the way, it was on Pluto and Samsung and I mean, it was just this list of TVs that it was on. And so I was like this is it. I love it. Every agency should be trying to get your stuff on Simpli.fi, and if not on Simpli.fi, come see Zondra TV. David McBee: Oh yeah, I know there's a professional in the room when they're starting to make just slight little gentle plugs like that, so thank you very much. All right. Do you have any specific examples of some of your strategies or initiatives that helped your clients achieve their goals? Zondra Evans: Oh yeah, we have a lot of them, but since we're talking about commercials, I'm going to stay in that lane right now. We create 30-second commercials and yeah, we do stream them on all networks, including Hulu and everything else. But I think what really works though is being able to also have a social media campaign in support of that commercial advertiser, advertisement, to allow them to be able to go in front of their peers and potentially clients for themselves and just say, "My business is being featured in a commercial on Zondra TV." So I do that. That's one of the things that we do because I don't think it's one thing, one element. It's being in every lane to truly change your trajectory and see an improvement in your global reach. David McBee: I like that and I think omnichannel approaches are all the rage. Everybody's trying to get their message across as many channels as possible, and I don't mean TV channels, but digital channels, advertising. Yeah. Zondra Evans: Everywhere. I mean, you need it everywhere. You need to start turning your videos into blogs. You need to do that. My message to the world is you have to have a digital real estate strategy, and if you don't have that, you're slowly going out of business. I'm just being honest. So you got to have digital real estate. I look at it like the game Monopoly. You're trying to buy all the hotels and get everything. Well, that's what you're doing now. You're trying to be in every lane possible to strengthen your digital footprint and make sure that you've got a good landscape digitally where people can find you on who we call the source of truth, which is Google. So, yeah. David McBee: I love that, digital real estate. That's great. But what do you say to the advertiser who says, "Yeah, Zondra, I can't afford Park Place and Broadway. I just can only get these railroads." Zondra Evans: Even if it's small budget, it's still room for you to be able to do something. In fact, and I'm going to throw this out. You could be on Simpli.fi for only like $500 to run a campaign. Imagine that. Come on now. Where can you do that? I'm talking to agencies now. Where are you going to be able to do that? Get on board. I'm telling you, you got to get some geotargeting and geomarketing going for yourself. David McBee: Oh, I love you so much. Before we go, I'm going to ask you what I like to ask all my guests is do you have a special book or a podcast that you feel has been instrumental in your success? Zondra Evans: I'm going to tell you the book that ... And it's a recent book, but I've read all of his books. So T. D. Jakes just released a book called Disruptive Thinking, and I'm going to tell you, that book, it's like it was a refresher to everything that I have read in the past that he's created. I'm a disruptor. And I ... In fact, here was an article written on me through Median or one of those magazines that I was a disruptive entrepreneur, female entrepreneur, and I am. I believe that you have to disrupt the status quo if you really want to win at this game, and so Disruptive Thinking. David McBee: I love that one. Great. And what is the best way for people to find you, Zondra? Zondra Evans: Just go to beonztv.com. That's B-E-O-N-Z-T-V.com. David McBee: Zondra, thank you so much for being my guest today on Simpli.fi TV. Zondra Evans: Thank you. David McBee: And thank you guys for watching. Simpli.fi TV is sponsored by Simpli.fi, helping you to maximize relevance and multiply results with our industry leading, media buying, and workflow solutions. For more information, visit Simply.fi. Thanks for joining us today. I'm David McBee. Be awesome and we'll see you next time.