How Andy Crestodina Manages His Team After Accidentally Hiring an Internet Troll

Atiba de Souza: Welcome everyone to the Build Your Team Show. I am your host, Atiba. I have with me today Andy Crestodina from orbitmedia.com. Now, they're in the website building industry and that's what they do. But let me just be honest and I hope Andy doesn't mind me saying this right off the gate, but I did a little bit of digging in them and found out a little bit about them and I've seen a ton of website development companies. Never seen one like this. Never seen one like this. So if you're looking for a great website, I know I'm plugging him in the intro. How about that? Right? But if you're looking for a great website, check out Orbit Media. No joke. You won't be disappointed in that. And that's always we're brought to you by Client Attraction Pros, helping thought leaders make video marketing fun, easy and painless.

 Andy, welcome my friend.

Andy Crestodina: Atiba, thanks for having me. It's great topic. I'm excited to be here.

Atiba de Souza: You're welcome. You're welcome. You guys know we do like the pre-show conversation and that type of thing, and in the pre-show conversation sometimes we come up with some interesting topics. And I'm gonna just jump right into this one. I'm gonna go right into the deep end and I told you I was gonna go right into the deep end on this one.

Okay. Because you —

Andy Crestodina: Sounds good.

Atiba de Souza: You told me that at some point in time you hired an internet troll by mistake I'm assuming.

But I got to hear the story.

Andy Crestodina: Okay, so you're ready for it. We're just gonna go straight there.

Atiba de Souza: All go straight in.

Andy Crestodina: This is one of the more interesting kind of HR situations I've been in my life. Senior role, newish team, leadership for the team and must be excellent communicator, capable manager and subject matter expert.

 Someone I knew for a long time. This is a legit player. We can do this. This is a good fit. Kind of a high comp type role. Onboard, right hired. This person's here. Now what happens next? Several weeks go by doing good work. The teams are figuring out how to — it's starting to gel.

And then, this is an SEO. So Atiba, you and I are both SEOs and SEOs are a category where people are sort of defensive about their knowledge. It's a topic where kind of prone for like little fights to break out on social media. So that's exactly what happened. Probably in defense of their own knowledge, this person engaged in a debate that got nasty very quickly.

And so I get a call one day from my old friend, high school friend and college roommate, co-founder. He calls me and says, "Yeah. This is what I'm reading in these social posts online." So during the day, this person was posting from their desk. Our company name is on their accounts like in their bio.

And it was horrific. It was the worst possible behavior you could imagine. It was disgusting. It was embarrassing. It was — no, like indefensible. How could you possibly have typed those words with your own hands? And it went on. It was just this long thread of these people just throwing dirt at each other on social media for no reason. For no reason at all.

So it exposed immediately what you could tell was like an anger management issue, perhaps. It looked like a character issue. In what universe is this acceptable when you read through these things? And if I started quoting it, you'd have to bleep them out. Like it was beyond the pale.

And my partner was like kind of freaked out because he's like, "Dude, this is like your friend, right?" Someone you've known forever. This is someone you respect. I don't know what we should do. I'm like it's obvious, you can really keep the person. It's immediate termination.

It's very clear cut. So he was relieved that I understood the gravity of this. And then the meeting actually it got pretty easy, pretty quick because even though we thought there might be like this big argument. This person was very understanding and like immediately understood like, "Yeah, I get it. That was way too much. So I'll kind of tag out here." So the actual swinging of the acts on that last day was an easy thing because it was very well understood. So, take away. It's not a perfect way to protect yourself but we do not hire people without having someone on our team at least go through their social profiles.

Sorry to say it. It's public. You should expect that as a job candidate that the potential employer will go look through your social profiles just to see if it's anything weird, if the person's crazy, if the person's a bigot, if the person's a jerk, if the person's is aligned with some — their philosophy is not yours. We're a B corp. We're like social justice tree huggers over here. So we have zero tolerance even with clients. Like there's a no a-hole policy here. Anyway, so that was what we learned from it.

 And we will never again hire someone without at least taking a close look at their profiles just to confirm that the person is a cultural fit for the team.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. And that's such a great point that I think — it goes both ways. So number one, I won't hire anyone and — tell me if you feel this way. But I won't hire anyone who I can tell hasn't gone to our social profiles in the first place like you didn't even do your homework.

Andy Crestodina: Good point. Valid. Absolutely.

Atiba de Souza: Right? And we do also have someone on staff and she calls herself the stalker. Every new person, she stalk them and figures out who they are before we bring 'em on board. So I'm completely with you.

Andy Crestodina: It's too risky not to. Hiring is expensive. It's a risk. It's time consuming. Mistakes will cost you a lot. That was very expensive mistake what happened that day. But so what can you do to mitigate the risk? You can look closely and it's not time consuming. This company that will do this for you.

This is like the free quick version of the background test. I like that you've got the person's like ethical stalker. But why would you? You're gonna get a lot of information in an interview, but that person knows you're being interviewed. Just go through. Just scan through. And to see if this person looks like someone that your team would align with because social media is public social interaction and there's gonna be a lot of public social interaction once they're on board.

I'm glad to hear Atiba that you've already discovered this little HR trick and why wouldn't we all just take a quick look. It's not a privacy concern. There's nothing creepy about it. No, it's normal. 

Atiba de Souza: No. It's a public Facebook, public Instagram, public LinkedIn page, public YouTube, or even TikTok, right? 

Andy Crestodina: Yep.

Atiba de Souza: Absolutely.

Andy Crestodina: Civility. Let's look for evidence of civility, at least.

Atiba de Souza: Yes and maturity too. Let's not forget that one 'cause as we lose that one too.

Andy Crestodina: Not to say that there's like a purity test here for some political belief. We have a wide range. There's diversity of political views in this company, and I know it, and I respect that. That's not at all what I'm talking about. But maturity for sure. Emotional intelligence. That's really what you're trying to hire for in every case, right?

It's high EQ.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. Yes. And that's a really great point again and I'll come back to that near the end. The high EQ. I do want tell people and talk a little bit about why I said that I love what your company does and how you guys did build websites and some of the philosophy behind it.

 But getting back to the point where we were just now and talking about hiring for fit, right? And so we're on that path of talking about trying to figure out; is this person looking for or looking at going to fit in here? Are there any other tests, if you will, standards, considerations that you make when you're trying to figure out if this person fits?

Andy Crestodina: I think one of the mistakes that we all have to avoid in that moment is expanding your idea of the personality types that might fit. My concern is not just that we'll hire someone that's not a fit, but that we are too discerning and that we are disqualifying people who might be great.

Let's say the role is open because there's an individual who's over capacity. "Ah, we need more. We need another John. We need another Jane. Let's hire that. Let's clone this person." Not the right psychology. Not the right approach, because then you're looking for someone who's exactly likes someone that you have.

You're not looking for a fit, you're looking for a clone , that's not gonna work. So my team is like, "Well, this person's very talented, excellent communicator, right? High EQ, good experience, evidence of success in multiple roles. But they haven't done this exactly." Fine, that's fine.

We're not looking for someone who's done exactly the job. That would be weird because nobody's quite like. I thought we're a differentiated business here. We don't have the exact same processes everyone else. So I wanna hire someone that's a fit. To your point that's a fit, but not a clone. I think that there's a lot of advice about how to hire someone who's how to be discerning enough and to disqualify people who are not a fit.

Make sure that we're considering diversity, the slate's diverse and that we're being inclusive and that we're not just trying to find someone who's like exactly like this perfect profile. Same with clients too, right? We disqualify clients who aren't a fit, but you have to really think broadly about that because there's all kinds of different people who work well together.

So you want someone who's sincere, kind, clear communicator, good decision maker. Someone who's — has just good work ethic, exactly how they do the job is not necessarily what you're trying to find in the candidate. They're gonna go through onboarding, they're gonna go through training, they're gonna learn your way of doing things later.

But expand the slate a little bit and I think you'll find some real gems.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. And that's great. And I hope you guys hear this, and we've talked about this before in the channel. When you're expanding just like this guy Andy says there, notice he didn't expand the slate in terms of what their technical knowledge is or what they're good at or what their job history is.

He expanded the slate in terms of their personality.

Their character. That's what you're looking for when we're talking about fit. That's what we're looking for. Right? And if you're just going out saying, well — like Andy said earlier, if they did the job, they're hired. That doesn't mean they're great. 

Andy Crestodina: You could find someone that checks every box on your job. I was a recruiter. And you get a job order. And then you're finding candidates. And the worst recruiters are matching acronyms, right? "Oh, this person's got asp, this job has asp.

They're a fit." That's not a plan for success. But hiring managers still sometimes do that, right? It's like here's our job order. It's got this number of years with these tools and these types of projects. That person checked those six boxes. But then when you get into the conversation, you're quickly like, "Oh, wait. Wow. I'm not sure. Like this person is different than the soft skills, the culture, the communication, the style, who this person, what they feel like on the call." The first call might not be what you think. It's a mistake to simply look for someone that meets the hard qualifications.

All those soft qualifications are really where — this person is going to succeed or fail in the context of your culture on the team with the clients. Another way to say this is; yes you want actual, but you're really looking for most of the actual, leaving room for a little bit of the potential. You're hiring people partly for their potential.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. Potential is one of those things that — let me just ask the question in this way then: How do you discern potential and not just potential, but someone's ability to achieve their potential?

Andy Crestodina: Well, we're gonna make a choice about hiring, and then we're gonna do a hundred things on the side of management. Let's not confuse the way in which we will foster them in this stage of their career through management with the moment of decision on a offer letter. So to achieve the potential, I mean, you could hire the perfect candidate. Crappy onboarding process, bad training, lack of support, they're gonna fail . So wasted all your time. So just as important as the decision to hire this candidate and the negotiation and the offer, set out the benefits is what you do next, right? What is the proper rate at which you include them on billable work?

What is the structure? Where do they go for which questions? Are they assigned to someone? Who's gonna work with them on their first deliverables? Bringing them in. So the potential is actually achieved through management, training on onboarding and close collaboration.

You need to — of course, qualify them based on their technical skills, based on their soft skills, culture fit, all those things. So you're making a huge choice on the day that you make the offer, but what happens next for that person to succeed in that role is what everyone is really working together on.

That's almost what a company is, right? It's not really much of an overstatement to say. That's what a company is. It's combining these people in a way they are all motivated and successful in executing on the project for the client which requires everything. Communication, culture, quality. And when it works well, these people will walk through walls for each other to give outcome for the client.

Their loyalty to each other will be extreme. Friday, I took a selfie from 16 of us were in one place in post Covid. That's a big group. And you should see the love in these pictures, right? Just from like the place on the street where we went out after work.

They care about each other. The support levels are extreme. Why? Because they're invested in the other members of their team, right? They're gonna make sure each other succeed.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. That's awesome. That's awesome. My wife back in the early 2000's used to do premarital counsel. And she always used say to couples, "You're spending all of this time preparing for one day, but then you have the rest of your lives and that's what you really need to be preparing for."

And I'm hearing you tell that just now, and I'm thinking, "Yes, that's hiring." It's like we spend all of this time trying to find that one candidate, then we find him, and then we like let our hair down and then forget. No, no, no, no. This is when the work actually starts. Right?

Andy Crestodina: That's beginning.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. Yeah.

Andy Crestodina: I think that most companies, and ours is one of 'em. I would include us. Most companies would benefit from sharper focus on their onboarding process.

Most companies would benefit by more checkups to confirm that people are communicating well and everyone's motivated in the week two, week four, week eight.

Week 12.

Atiba de Souza: Week 12. Yep.

Andy Crestodina: I mean it's the talent crunch especially, is it Atiba? Do you feel this? Digital has a major shortage of skilled professionals?

Atiba de Souza: Oh yeah.

Andy Crestodina: It does not even close to enough.

Atiba de Souza: Well —

Andy Crestodina: SEOs or analytics people are people who understand how video gets promoted, Right?

For your example, for what you do, not enough of us. When you find one and onboard them, you got a lot of love, right? Invest. Your job is to invest in that new relationship like you would for anything.

Atiba de Souza: Absolutely. And I completely agree with you. Not only are they becoming harder to find, but they're becoming more expensive and you're getting the less qualified ones becoming more expensive too, and you're just like this used to go so much better before, right? But yes, you've gotta put that love in once you find that right person and train them because you want to keep 'em. You want the relationship to be good. Now, at the same time, you don't wanna keep 'em just for the sake of keeping them, but you want the good relationship, right? 

Andy Crestodina: There's a number that no one ever looks at, but I'm very proud of. If you look up our company in LinkedIn and go to like the insights page and click on like people or something, or team. The average tenure here is like six and a half years.

Atiba de Souza: Wow.

Andy Crestodina: I am so proud of that number because we have people who've been here for like 10 and 15.

There's someone here who's been here for 17 years. If there's a metric that shows that your culture is healthy and that you're on the right track. Of course the number gets pushed down if you're growing fast. There's a lot of factors in that number. But average tenure, that's a number that none of our prospects ever look up. But it has a lot to do with our success on clients and haven't figured out a way to use that yet in our marketing.

This is the first time I've ever mentioned it, but —

Atiba de Souza: Well, that's the start. That's the start, right? First time mentioned it, that's the start. 

That is awesome. Now, you did mention something, a little bit earlier and I wanna circle back to that. And you talked about the size of the company. So you've got people who have been there 17 years, average six and a half years.

You guys have 50 people on staff now at as of last count? A good friend of mine, Jeff. On several weeks ago and he taught about how he manages his team. Not his team's a lot bigger, but he's in the virtual assistant marketing. He's got 175. He's a little bit bigger. Right? But yeah, I dunno how he sleeps.

 Great guy though. But how do you manage a team of 50?

Andy Crestodina: I have the benefit of being a pretty weak manager myself. And that's helped me because once I recognized that weakness, I've found ways to make up for it by getting support and getting help.

We got to the point where we were at — I think just under two and a half million a year, and I was doing sort of all the sales and marketing myself, and it was exhausting.

 This is like 15 years ago. I realized that we needed like a business person and my partner realized it too. And so, we found Todd and Todd's a professional change management expert. He's an executive. He understands for the legal side, enough for the accounting side and finance.

He restructured the company so that there's CEO, directors, and under those people, those people are the managers of these separate teams. There's accountability, there is reporting on things like utilization and capacity, and we know, tracking, accounts receivable and the health of the business.

We were just looking at cash. That's all we knew. We didn't know anything. I'm not a business guy. I'm a marketer. I'm a teacher. I'm a content marketer. I love to teach and I publish. Very effective in my role at marketing, but bad at the management side. Not an executive. Weak business, basic business. Businesses at separate skill.

So that's how we do it. We have a CEO. The CEO has directors of each team. There's a plan B for all the roles. And those people are in charge of managing and motivating and tracking the rest of the teams. So you need software to do it.

We use teamwork. You need accurate time tracking which is a cultural thing. Very difficult to get everyone to track their time. You need to report on the right things so that you know the health of the business. You've gotta watch your pipeline. There's a million little things. But it is done through professional managers and all that fit within an org structure that is designed to be flexible.

It's designed to scale. I've just basically came to terms with my own weaknesses and filled them by delegation and taking off hats.

Atiba de Souza: You said about five different points in there that we could spend an hour on each. Not going through today.

Andy Crestodina: Great topics. This is good. 

Atiba de Souza: The one that I want to really, really touch on is you recognize your own weaknesses and you've got help. And as business owners, we oftentimes wanna put the S on our chest and say, "I'm Superman, I'm Wonder Woman and I can do it all.

And I've gotta do it all 'cause this is my business and I don't have any flaws." And I forget who it was. I just heard this yesterday. I heard someone say, "Starting in business and owning your own business is the best way to learn your flaws because business will surface all of your flaws quickly." So how did you get to that place?

I mean, then you said 15, 12, 15 years.

Andy Crestodina: I love that line and I think sort of any partnership I could say the thing about marriage. Anytime that you're having high stakes communication with other people, you're gonna quickly learn like what your gaps are and how you really sound and all the little areas in which you're ineffective and you're gonna see 'em laid out black and white.

I've kind of developed a theory that people that have lower pain threshold are more effective and happier because the higher your pain threshold — you know, our culture is a little bit like, "Oh, I'm gonna tough it out. You're like, I can do this." And a bit of a martyr mentality and I sort of had that.

But when you finally do hit that tipping point where you can't sustain it. I was doing sales all day and writing proposals all night. How many 60 hour weeks do I wanna work in a row? I was the first one here and the last one gone every day for years. Just burning it down. Just exhausted.

So one way to do it is to just wait until you hit burnout. A better way to do it is to lower your pain threshold and change sooner.

The less tolerance you have for crap, the more likely you are to adapt sooner, and it's gonna be good for your business. So take an honest stock of yourself and don't wait until you hit rock bottom.

It was a bad time. It was a dark time for me a tough time for the company to have gone through that like maxing out of trying to do too much. To do all the sales and all the marketing and a bunch of management and all the client service work. Millions of dollars in business and I'm in a critical role.

I'm way too many things. Just adapt sooner is my best tip. Be honest. Define your role. Do an org chart for what your company will look like in two or three years. Make sure that your role is not growing that whole time. Your role should be shrinking. You should be getting more focused.

The biggest winners are the teams of specialists. What do you wanna specialize in? Do that. Don't do the other stuff. That's gonna make an enormous difference. Those are the businesses that scale.

Atiba de Souza: Yes. That is brilliant. That is brilliant. And it reminds me of something that Alex Hormozi says in his book, a $100M Offers. I dunno if you've read that one. He says this cuz he's talking about that exact same point that we're talking about right now where failure is imminent.

And the thing about it is if you're flying a plane and the engine goes out at altitude, you know failure is imminent, right? And you may try to do a whole bunch of stuff all the way down until you crash. And it's the same thing in life and in business. But sometimes we just ignore the fact that the engine went out.

Right? And Alex said in the book, it struck me. I was working out when I heard this months and months ago. And I go back and I listen to it all the time cause it struck me. He says, "If you're at that place where you say, I only need one more. Failure is imminent." I only need one more employee.

I only need one more client. I only need one more week. Because it's never true. It's never, ever, ever true.

Andy Crestodina: No, I've told myself similar things. It's like, "Oh, this is a painful plateau. If we could just be a little bit bigger than we'd have more of a backup for each of these separate roles." And you sort of never stop seeing it that way. It's a vision question.

What are we gonna be? What is the size and shape of this organization? Right? What fits within my goals? Financial goals, lifestyle goals, time, family. You can get to the point where you're not asking for one more. Some of the happiest people I know are just kinda like "This is what I do. I love it. I do it well. This is what my team does. They love it, they do it well." And those are some of the better — some of the businesses that I admire. Look a lot like that.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. Yeah, me too. So man, this is good. This is good. But I want to circle us all the way back around as we, we get close to our ending here. And there is a statement on your website. Okay. And it says, "Web design is a test of empathy." Web design — I want y'all to hear what this statement. Go to it, orbitmedia.com.

You'll see it. Web design is a test of empathy and then he has a video explaining that. And I want you to take a minute and listen. Okay? Because my question for you now as we circle back around to high EQ.

When I read that statement, I realized your organization had to have high EQ and you must be building a culture of really high EQ when you are creating a website, which is an expression of someone else and you sit —

Andy Crestodina: Else's.

Atiba de Souza: — in the middle.

Right? So tell us a little bit about that and Orbit Media.

Andy Crestodina: Well, there's a true story in the life of every visitor to every webpage. Start there. There are people on your website now. What brought them there? What are their information needs? What are their hopes, their fears? Really, why wouldn't someone fill out this contact forum and hire you? If you don't know that, if you don't know why someone doesn't buy, if you don't know the biggest anxieties that they might have, right? It's like video. I'm just gonna make it up. I don't wanna be that exposed. I don't want my face on stuff. Gotta address that. Sounds expensive. I don't know. A big investment. I'm worried it's gonna be like a blank check.

When does it end? You gotta address that. I wanna be like these famous Instagrammers.

Atiba de Souza: Gotta address that.

Andy Crestodina: We're with this client to figure out. Yeah. So in the end, you build a page and that page is sort of emulating a conversation with you.

Based on what that visitor needs, what that visitor's thinking, what questions do they ask? The best webpages emulate a sales conversation. So when I'm on your page, it feels like I'm talking to Atiba, but it answers all my questions, addresses all my objections, sets realistic expectations, and it gets proof points, right?

You gotta build, you gotta supply evidence. But that's what a good page does. It's not at all what I wanna say, right? I can make webpages. It's very easy.

It's very easy to just make a page that says what I wanna say, but that's not what performs in digital. There's a true story in the life of your visitor.

You are only going to succeed to the extent that you understand that story in their life, and that you construct a visual hierarchy that's designed and a series of messages, that's your positioning that align with what they need in that moment. And when it works well, the visitor's like, "Oh, I got it."

Spoke to me. Made sense. Some of the bit was a bit unexpected, but a lot of it was what I came to see if it's a fit. And yeah, I think I'll have a quick conversation. Let's just reach out. That is where — and the conversion rate is the scorecard on this empathy test, but that's what web design really is and should be, right?

No one goes to a website to hear what you wanna say about yourself. They go to a website mostly to disqualify it as a possible option because they know there's so many options. But in the end, they're gonna decide like, "Can this company, person, service provider, vendor partner, can they help me specifically?"

People don't care that much about brands. People care a whole lot about their own needs. So, stay focused on them and you'll get far, far better results.

Atiba de Souza: That's fantastic. And that's exactly what web design is a test of empathy. And for somebody who's been in this industry, I've had the pleasure, I wrote my first search engine in 1996. So I've been in this industry a long time. A long time. I can tell you I've seen a ton of web design companies.

I've worked with a ton of web design companies. As a matter of fact, for over 10 years, all of our work came through web design companies and helping them. So I've had tons of experience with them, and you're the first that I've ever seen that truly got that. A lot of people say it —

Andy Crestodina: Thanks for that. I appreciate that. And I'm grateful for the encouraging words. We have to keep getting it though every time for every client. So you gotta love this job or don't do it. You're in the wrong business if you don't love the intersection between creative and technical, art and science.

If you don't love service and people, if you don't love learning about a new audience and learning about a new offer, a new product to service, you're in the wrong business. You gotta love people, science and art to do this job well.

Atiba de Souza: Well, and clearly you found — I mean, six and a half years of longevity. You found people who want to be here with you and do this with your clients. And so that, that is wonderful. And guys, if you've watched my episodes, I don't pitch anyone and I'm pitching Andy. And listen, we just met — 

Andy Crestodina: I appreciate.

Atiba de Souza: True talk. We just met.

But in my experience of going through and seeing, I understand where this company's coming from. So if you are in need of a website, talk to Andy.

Andy Crestodina: You're too kind, Atiba. Thank you for that.

Atiba de Souza: You're welcome, my friend. So tell everybody what's the best way to reach out to you and Orbit Media.

Andy Crestodina: Well, you and I met on LinkedIn. I mean, LinkedIn's a great way. I have it set up right now where there's like a follow button, but if you go to more, you can find the connect button. Don't hesitate. Just click the connect button. Would happy to be help anybody however I can, conversation at any topic.

 And then orbitmedia.com is where I publish an article once every two weeks. That's my frequency. It's just once every two weeks. So, you can subscribe there. In the book, I just — sixth edition. I'd never even mention it. The book just came out on Friday. I wrote this book six times. It's the Illustrated Handbook to Content Marketing.

It's like filled with everything I know between two covers. It's on Amazon pre-order or maybe available now.

Atiba de Souza: That's awesome. Awesome. Give me the name of the book one more time.

Andy Crestodina: Content Chemistry.

Atiba de Souza: Content Chemistry. Go to Amazon and find it. Andy, thank you so much for being here, my friend. It's been an absolute pleasure to have you. And we gotta do it again.

Andy Crestodina: Pleasure was mine.

Atiba de Souza: 'Cause we did miss some —

Andy Crestodina: Anytime.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. All right, everybody — 

Andy Crestodina: There's a lot to talk about.

Atiba de Souza: I know. That's all for us for today, but go to Amazon. Get the book. If you need a website, find Andy on LinkedIn or orbitmedia.com.

Read some of his great articles. Great guy for you to connect with. Bye everybody.