How Guy “Franchised” His SEO Agency

Daryl Rosser: Hey man, thank you for joining me on the show today, it’s very awesome to have you here.

Guy Sheetrit: Thank you so much, you too. I appreciate that.

Daryl Rosser: So, for anyone that doesn’t know who you are already, do you want to introduce yourself? Like who you are, what is it you do, just basic things like that.

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah, my name is Guy Sheetrit. I’m the CEO at Over The Top SEO. We’re a worldwide SEO franchise with 25 office locations around the world. Growing, we got 15 more lined up for this year. I have been a hacker most of my life, most of my young life.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: And then at one point a few years ago I decided to take my hacking skills into the SEO world and shaped my own version of how to do SEO and how to do business in general. Now I have over 100 employees and I’m known in our industry for some of the things I’ve done for Victoria Secret and Coca-Cola and China Mobile. I was recently picked by Inc. magazine as one of the top 10 SEOs in the world and that’s about it.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome man.

Guy Sheetrit: I write for a Search Engine Journal, Search Engine Watch, SEMRush and a few other publications. Yeah, that’s the basic stuff.

Daryl Rosser: I don’t know where to start with that, it’s a lot. Okay, so what interested me then is like today you’re a world known SEO, you’ve got an epic agency, you got over 100 people working for you, like 25 offices I think you just said, right?

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah.

Daryl Rosser: How did this come about? Were you just some super smart business guy and just said, I’m gonna go into SEO and build up this epic business? How did that happen?

Guy Sheetrit: Bro, I couldn’t buy you a freaking beer four years ago. Four years ago I could not afford to literally go buy a meal, a good meal in a restaurant. I started my way on Fiverr.

Daryl Rosser: Nice.

Guy Sheetrit: I had my five dollar SEO reports made there. I created my own little software and I’ve done SEO and I’ve done a lot of online work way before that.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: In the software industry, less outside, less to people, no one knew me, no one heard about me before I hit the market with banks and with big clients. A lot of luck man, a lot of luck. I am super thankful for the luck I’ve been given and I’ve utilized my skills in the right place at the right time and I’ve met some very important people and it gave me the leverage of utilizing my very first big break and that’s when I started realizing that this business can be expanded to levels much beyond just SEO and online stuff. I got seven e-commerce brands.

Daryl Rosser: Nice.

Guy Sheetrit: Generating over three or four hundred thousand dollars a month on its own now. And I’ve been nursing that for a long time. We’ve been concentrating on our own rankings for a very long time in the beginning. I was very successful on it. I’m ranking for SEO experts worldwide, professional SEO. If you type SEO Seattle, SEO Huston, SEO Manhattan, SEO, like tons of cities, we’re in the top three always organically, maps, ads, everything and I’ve always been keen on total domination. Meaning, if I’m competing for something I want to take all the spots that are available.

Daryl Rosser: Nice, yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: So if it’s the maps, if it’s the organic part, if it’s social media, everywhere. I want to be everywhere. Everywhere you see, you’re gonna see ODT and you’re gonna have no chance eventually but to end up with me or one of my sub-brands. A lot of luck in the beginning and then it’s just, it’s a roller coaster, you know?

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome man. You mentioned luck at the beginning, what were the big moments that just change everything? How do you go from Fiverr to 100 employees, that’s a huge difference. There must be some pivotal moments in that.

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah, yeah, you know what, the crazy thing here is that I’ve always had a soft spot for local SEO.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: And I decided to take local into nationwide, so one of my very first clients was a simple locksmith based in Seattle.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: And I turned him into a monster franchise in less than a year and a half with tons of locations and I got 50 percent income out of the entire business. I put the online efforts and you give me a percentage. We saw that model was working pretty well, so Over The Top now ones 50 percent of I can tell you 10s and 10s of very successful businesses.

Guy Sheetrit: So, it was one big break that I’ve done, some sort of an exit when I sold the software to Bank of America, gave me money to actually breathe and actually do things with.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And then everything else is just smart investments and taking high and calculated risks and its gradual because every business you are successful in, it brings you another chunk that allows you to get 10 more, not one more. So, we always grew by multiples, you know, everything got multiplied, like doubled and tripled and quadrupled with the amount of businesses we got percentages in, we already know what to do in the local space so nothing is really hard for us to rank for or be successful at and the combination was really good.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. How did you get that first revenue share, that locksmith client, that must have been a huge deal at the time?

Guy Sheetrit: Fiverr.

Daryl Rosser: Oh really, okay wow.

Guy Sheetrit: My partner, he messaged me on Fiverr, I think it was like in August 2014, just right before I even registered Over The Top SEO.com. He told me, hey I need help, and I’m a locksmith and I need help and can you review my website and tell me what to do and how to fix it and stuff like that. We got on the phone and we spoke and we became very close to each other, and I go look it’s gonna cost you at least seven to $8000 and for me, it was like, how area people paying these amounts? And the funny thing is it made sense to the person. I didn’t know the industry, but the locksmith industry is phenomenal for if you wanna make money and you wanna make it fairly quick. Locksmith is all emergency niches. So, we decided after that, that we’re gonna go in hard core on all the niches. We represent tons of plumbers, electricians, locksmiths, tow truckers, pediatricians, chiropractors, law firm, everything local we just went over it big time.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. I presume obviously because of what you did you’re actually very awesome SEO yourself as well at the time. You weren’t like a beginner at that time?

Guy Sheetrit: No, actually SEO was since 2006.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: But it’s, you can’t really call it SEO back then because it was not search engine optimization, it was search engine manipulation pretty much.

Daryl Rosser: Yep.

Guy Sheetrit: It was everything but SEO, the one we know today. SEO has been evolving into outer space category nowadays. Everyone thinks they know what’s right, everyone thinks they know what needed to be done. Back then it was super simple. Everyone knew what needs to be done. You need a software, like GSA and you just bombing a site with back links. Contactual links, fuck that, excuse my language, key word stuffing F that, I mean all these things today that can get you penalized no one even thought of that stuff back then. So, once you knew something’s working back then, it worked. That’s it.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: So, I’ll be doing a lot of my own things. I had OTT web for design and stuff like that, development back in those days. SEO future since 2004, I’m the first one who knew the SEO future is going to be called for, it’s gonna be a big thing. So I had SEO future in Arizona back in 2004, got shit ton of people to join SEO future, but back then I had much more interesting things than SEO, so life just took me in a whole different path until the point that I had my big break and we opened Over The Top SEO.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. How long have you been, would you class yourself as say like an entrepreneur or like a business guy or something?

Guy Sheetrit: About four years.

Daryl Rosser: Okay. That’s awesome.

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah, around four years I’ve been doing major concentration on this specifically since 2014 where everything is pretty much Over The Top SEO and I started developing everything beneath Over The Top SEO like sub-brands and different type of management classes and key people and industry leaders and so, yeah.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. With regards to when it started out, you were doing a lot of it yourself obviously ’cause it was just you the guy on Fiverr, like freelancing, how have you managed to maintain the quality of your work when you build up 100 people? I’m assuming you’re not sitting there all day building links yourself or anything anymore?

Guy Sheetrit: So, no one in this planet is where he’s at just alone. I mean the cases are super rare where you can say I did it alone. No one else did it with me, I had no help from anyone else. I sat in my house and I built this amazing software, I didn’t show it to anyone and then I went directly to the right person who gave me millions of dollars for it. No stories, or very little, so. Just like I’m not different than anyone else. I have super awesome powerful key people that are my everything. They are essentially Over The Top SEO. My wife, she’s our CFO, she the co-owner Over The Top SEO, without her nothing would have even began of happening. Then I’ve got my key people, which is Greg Lukas, he’s our Senior Partner. He heads our Seattle office. We got Clint Butler, he’s our head of SEO. I’ve got my right hand Paul Hudson. Those guys are phenomenal in ways that I can’t even describe. Super powerful, very knowledgeable, each one is own field so no one crosses pass of another person.

Daryl Rosser: Sure.

Guy Sheetrit: And I’ve just recruited them over time, you know. I always hire people, i always gave work to everyone in the community, most of the people know me, you can always approach me and I’m gonna give you a job whether it’s content, whether it’s links, whether it’s optimization, development, anything. So we started just like that and you ask about quality. I made sure that no matter what we will always maintain the quality. As long as I could do the quality aspect of it and my guys would have done the rest of what they need to do, we work to keep the quality.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And as you grow, I teach my guys how to handle clients and how to handle everything and to the point where their doing it just like me. So, basically quality was always top dominator in every decision we made. We passed a lot of clients and we just passed them along to our competitors. There’s no competitors in our field, so it’s an open field, it’s enough for everyone. Always said that.

Daryl Rosser: Absolutely.

Guy Sheetrit: If I represent today, you’re probably gonna represent him at one point or you represented him at one point if you’re one of the dominating SEO or in digital marketing agencies, it’s passed through the companies at one point. Reasons vary a lot. A lot of people try to buy their rankings over night and when they don’t get it over night they just go to the next one in line. We don’t do that. We have a service agreement with our clients. It’s nothing committing, but its more for us if you don’t give us at least three month minimum to show you progression, we’re not gonna pick you. Unless you’re super cool with that, even if you don’t see anything for three months, my judgment day is three months and one day and I always try to make sure that all of my clients they understand that because just the optimization process alone, and no matter which sites or CMS you’re using or CRM, it doesn’t matter where you’re from, what you do, the sites, they’re always vary, they always differ.

Daryl Rosser: Sure.

Guy Sheetrit: The categories affect the rankings and the results and the niches that you’re in and the cities that you’re in and the counties that you’re in and the country that you’re in. Everything so dramatically can change from one to another that we have to have that minimum time to show our skills and I always try to make sure of that. I think that’s a great reason for why our retention rate is so high. Not many leave us.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome.

Guy Sheetrit: Those that do, they were either impatient or we cut the cord because they changed the site without letting us know, because they bought links, because they’ve done things. Another thing we put in our contract is, we are the owners of your site effective immediately upon signing the agreement with us. And it’s for you, not for us.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: So, that’s for quality.

Daryl Rosser: So if you take on a client, like you own their site from the minute they become a client?

Guy Sheetrit: We don’t really own it, own it.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: I’m doing it, even if you are the owner, you have no permission touching the website.

Daryl Rosser: That makes more sense.

Guy Sheetrit: Without our permission, without letting us know. And if we tell you no and you still do it or if you do it on your own, and we find out later, we just cut you out immediately. Doesn’t matter if you pay us $10,000 a month or $200,000 a month and we have clients that pay us more than that even. So, they all know. Hey listen, these guys are no joke. We’re the last spot. After you got fucked by the other companies, after you got screwed around, after you got played, after you got pitching all your money and time on bullshit things, you came to Over The Top, this is the end game. Now you play by our rules, you want to be successful. If not, just take your things and go on. It’s that simple.

Daryl Rosser: That obviously helps then with getting good clients and setting the right expectations so they’re cool to deal with. Does that also help with acquiring the clients? Because, we’re the shit, we’re good at what we do and if you want to work with us this is how it works.

Guy Sheetrit: You know, it’s funny Daryl, you just gave pitch of Over The Top. We are so good at what we do, we don’t have to do anything in our sales calls. First of all, we don’t do any outbound calls. Everything is inbound. Whether it’s from the website, whether its from other sources, whether it’s from ranking sites, whether it’s from organic maps, whatever it is, wherever you found us and you call us, we have the easiest sale in the planet. Hey, open Google, type SEO experts, type professional SEO, type SEO Seattle, type this, type that, type Google maps marketing, type domain authority checker, type like, we’re gonna give you all the top hardest key words in the history and you’re just gonna find us yourself. It’s one of our biggest featured items in the website is the ranking video, you can just click play and we dare you to go ahead open Google yourself, anywhere in the planet and just type those keywords. Look, who do you see in the top. You see us, this, this and that. All right then there’s nothing to talk about.

Guy Sheetrit: If we can beat everyone in our own industry, no one can beat us. So that’s just part of the sale. We’ve already done the rankings part, we already have the big ass clients, we already have a very successful business and thousands of business that got their successful ness because of us, that’s enough proof to seal a client in a second. You don’t have to sell it.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. What do you personally work on today? Where is your day to day life like?

Guy Sheetrit: I wake up at 12.

Daryl Rosser: Nice.

Guy Sheetrit: In the afternoon, not because I want to, because I have a new kid.

Daryl Rosser: Fair enough.

Guy Sheetrit: My first kid, so I’m taking the night shifts, I’m actually with him all night long until like five, six in the morning.

Daryl Rosser: Wow.

Guy Sheetrit: Then I go to sleep and wake up like 11, 12. I have my morning meetings with my staff. Then I have about three or four hours that I dedicate to personal projects, which is my core insider Over The Top SEO. I handle probably 80 percent of our clients heads, so once a day or twice a day I’ll have a call with one of our clients that needed or wanted to talk to us. I try to always remember where I started and I try to always be involved in everything. It’s really hard when you get.

Daryl Rosser: I bet.

Guy Sheetrit: Like there’s always hundreds, you can’t fit them all in a day. That’s why I work like 16 hours a day. But, I like it. I love working hard. I love putting in the hours and I love talking to our clients. I rarely do sales calls anymore. Even though I frickin love it. It’s really something I really love. I do music in my free time.

Daryl Rosser: Nice.

Guy Sheetrit: I write and sing. I got a good buddy of mine that is my guitar player. I try to enjoy time with my wife and my kid. I work on expanding Over The Top arms into different areas, countries, worlds.

Daryl Rosser: What is the big goal today?

Guy Sheetrit: The goal today, I just want to be the biggest SEO franchise in the planet. I want to have over 1000 locations all across the world. I want to have a local representative in each and every town. So, wherever you are, anywhere you are, it’s like what’s your favorite drink? It could be Coke or Pepsi or whatever, but it’s a set template. Anywhere in the planet, they’re always same beverages that you like, or McDonalds or whatever. So I’m taking the McDonalds concept and putting it into SEO and to our businesses that we get involved in.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome.

Guy Sheetrit: That’s my endless goal, which is probably gonna go on forever now.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah. Do you ever worry that, for example, Google could change the set ups and it’s gonna be all apps, stuff like that, and the way SEO works is gonna completely change?

Guy Sheetrit: Look, SEO is, I’m just gonna go by recent news. You guys saw the news with Google taking the authority of knowing it all to themselves and they start showing the clock on the page and time zones, did you see that?

Daryl Rosser: Yeah. Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: Time Google gives you the answer there’s no more search results.

Daryl Rosser: Make sense.

Guy Sheetrit: Google is a monopoly, always has been. They have always dominated everyone. Me, you, him, her, anywhere. They have been a huge monopoly. Google is either gonna fall down in the next 20 years, completely fall apart or someone else is gonna take over their spot, or they’re gonna own us all. There is only those three options.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: If Google is gonna continue in their path right now, either people are gonna be very emphatic on Google said it, then it’s okay instead of relying on things, Google is not an authority, it’s a directory. That’s all it is.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: It’s a directory and they make billions of dollars showcasing things that searchees are looking for. Once you realize that this is what they are, a lot of the questions on the future are very easy to answer because you minimize it to specific things that can happen, that’s it. So if Google took time for example and they feature it right now and all of a sudden its not just time, and you see another thing and another thing and another thing, you know where this is going. So if Google is gonna show who is what and where and why, then we’re gonna have to figure out how to fit in, in that, for us, for our clients, for everyone else. That’s one scenario.

Daryl Rosser: Yep.

Guy Sheetrit: The second scenario, which is another one that is very likely to happen too is that Google is gonna stop there, the vibe on the web and the fuss, which hasn’t happened by the way so much, only a few things on Twitter, on search engine round table, been featuring talking to Danny Sullivan finding out what happened. It was really, or the gravity of what they’ve done. The balls they have. If they didn’t cause that much of a storm, all hell should have broke lose once that happened, but it didn’t. So Google knows now, hey the SEO community, they’re a bunch of pussys. That’s all they’ve done, okay then screw it. So, that’s one option. If that’s gonna happen, we’re in deep shit.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And if deep shit, we’re gonna have to swim in that shit and find our way up to breathe. There is no other way. We’ve been doing the same exact crap over and over and over the past few years with all the updates that they’ve done in their algorithm. And all it is, is Google. That’s the answer because no one ever knew what’s gonna happen next. No one ever knew what effects are gonna happen in real time. So, that’s one scenario which we’re all gonna have to learn how to live with just like any other scenario.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: Okay, imagine it’s not happening. Let’s say that Google, okay, we don’t want to decide for you the answers. We’re gonna keep featuring the answers like we’ve been doing. We’re gonna keep staying a directory. A big ass directory, but we’re gonna stay one. Then another thing could happen is that Google is all of a sudden gonna decide to drop everything that related to what we know as SEO and then what are you gonna do. So they’re not featuring it, all of a sudden, nothing that you know works, what are you gonna do? Again, the answer is stay the same.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: You can never deal with the unknown until it comes. You can always think of possibilities, you’re asking me what’s gonna happen if they’re gonna do it and the answer is very simple, we’re doing everything that is also off of the SEO field that we’re not only reliant on Google, so there are many, many aspects of lead capturing channels and the e-commerce field that are very open to other things besides Google. So, we tried to become super crazy experts in any field, any platform, we try to make ourselves aware and known for every possible scenario out there, but we never take into consideration the possibility that Google was gonna do this and that, so we’re gonna do this, no fuck that. Right now it’s working, why the fuck would I mess with it.

Daryl Rosser: Exactly.

Guy Sheetrit: Only or if they’re going to change it. No, when it’s gonna change we’re gonna deal with it. We’re strong enough, we’re not doing anything so off road, so no matter what Google’s gonna do the outcome is never gonna be that dramatically the opposite of what they have updated themselves. We never had one single person or company or small or big business on my watch that got penalized. Not for the stupidest, smallest, never. So, I don’t see how I can prepare for something that no one knows what to prepare for or if to prepare for. So I hope that answers your question.

Daryl Rosser: It’s a good answer. I agree completely. Let’s talk about the franchise part of your business because you mentioned that you have, it’s kind of running a franchise model right?

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah, like I said, franchise.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: There is a twist to it. The twist in the franchise is because we’re not giving you the rights to buy our name. We hire you, we nurture you, we train you and then unleash you in your area. Let’s say you’re in, where you at right now Daryl?

Daryl Rosser: I’m in Vietnam actually.

Guy Sheetrit: Good, all right. Vietnam is a great place, I love Vietnam. So, Vietnam you’ve got, let’s say that you’re coming to Over The Top, like guy listen, I want to join your company. Okay, look the end goal for you in our company is for you to own in OTT business on your own.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: That’s the end goal. So, there’s always room for growth. You can take over the entire Vietnam area, I mean not just a city, entire, we don’t limit you to the areas unless we already have an occupational office there, but if you’re growing just like many of our employees do, they’re taking more and more cities. For example, Houston area, Katy, Missouri City, all those cities surrounding.

Daryl Rosser: Don’t ask me, I can’t help there.

Guy Sheetrit: They’ve got all kinds of cities like for example in Seattle you’ve got Bellevue, Ranchin, Redmond, Maple Valley all these cities. For example, you want to open an OTT franchise location you can open that one, you can open 10 more, we open it for you. We do everything for you, all you gotta do is bring local clients in. That’s all you gotta do. So, that model has been worked out tremendously beautiful for us because not only that you’re gonna get paid like a salary, you’re in charge of your own growth.

Guy Sheetrit: Now remember the beginning of our conversation, this is not happening by chance because we’ve made sure that it’s gonna be super freakin easy for you to bring clients in. So we’re gonna give you brochures, we’re gonna give you the videos, we’re gonna give you the presentations, we’re gonna give you the rankings, we’re gonna give you the power, we’re gonna give you everything. And all you gotta do is bring the damn clients in. It’s an easy sale. There is no sale here. So that’s why it’s been so successful. We have over 1000 clients right now and it’s growing rapidly. You can, I can tell you right now that we’re screening our clients to that point. So we’re not taking any clients less than $1,000 a month, for example, on a local niche. If you’re an e-commerce store and you’re national we’re not gonna take anything less than $5000 a month.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: If you’re a franchise we don’t even talk to you below $15,000 a month. So, and that depends. Each location you’re gonna pay more depending how many locations you got. So, again the future in OTT and what we offer is so easy to make your dreams come true, you know, with your dream salary and doing big things and owning a business and standing on your own two feet. All under the OTT umbrella. So that’s the franchising model.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. What assets specifically do they get versus just doing it themselves? Like, I talk to the people that are watching this, a lot of people going out there trying to build their own agencies and doing consulting and stuff like that. What assets do you give your people that helps them succeed so much better than everyone else going out there and doing it on their own?

Guy Sheetrit: Money. I give them liquidity, I give them percentages. So, when you have an ongoing increasing escalating salary with options with percentages, with a solid contract, your future is super secure.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: It’s not going anywhere. So we promise that to our guys and we deliver. It’s hard work, but it’s, you know, people that love this field. Look, I’m in love with SEO, I’ve always been in love with SEO. SEO is not really going anywhere. No matter what Google is gonna do. Google is not SEO. It’s just part of what’s now became SEO. SEO has always been the future whether it’s live or on the internet or off the internet. We are one heck of a search engine ourselves. So, it’s not going anywhere. People always want to be better than their competitors. So, they’re always gonna look for the platform to be better. It’s all about being seen. So, if it’s not Google today or tomorrow, it’s something else and we’re there to make sure that we can help you achieve those rankings. You go type Amazon SEO, got like 1600 searches a month, we get about six to eight clients a month just for Amazon stuff, it’s not Google.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: It’s not Google. And on the other hand, you type Google maps marketing 4400 searches a month, super competitive, we get about between 15 to 30 clients a month on just Google map stuff and it’s a huge thing, but it’s entirely completely and utterly based on Google. If Google dies, all the shit dies with it. So, and people are still doing it. So, like I said in the beginning you can’t concentrate what Google is going to do, you concentrate on the now. If it works, it works now. If it worked for me for all these years, it’s gonna keep working unless I’m not gonna be on top it and gonna let things just go sour.

Daryl Rosser: Two guests today, so I was asking about the structure of your team right. So you’ve got the guys going out there, the franchise guys that are bringing in clients and that, then I presume you have an SEO team that are delivering the results?

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: Managed by Clint Butler.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: He’s known in the industry too.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah, I know him I think.

Guy Sheetrit: Okay.

Daryl Rosser: What other sort of departments so to speak or sections of the team?

Guy Sheetrit: We have a department for everything. We never outsource anything that we’ve done.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: I’ve always nurtured the idea of hiring you, then paying you for whatever service I need. So, we don’t outsource anything. If we need something that we don’t already have or are capable of doing, we’re gonna hire you to do it. So we have a department for the development, design, content, SEO, off site, on page. We have a department for literally everything that we need in order to make a successful campaign for almost anything.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome. We’re you any good at this stuff? Was this something you naturally went through, like you’re pretty good at management or did you have like outside consultants so you just managed to meet the right people and they helped you out?

Guy Sheetrit: Daryl, I swear to god man, I didn’t know many things about myself until it unfolded. I really didn’t. Like I told you it’s a combination of many things, but for example, it not our co-founder Annetta, which is also my wife.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: I wouldn’t be here talking to you right now. I wouldn’t be anything. I wouldn’t be nothing. OTT would not even existed.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome, that’s really cool.

Guy Sheetrit: It wouldn’t even have gone to those levels ’cause there’s always someone on the road that’s going to either bring you up a notch or take you down two. And thankfully my lovely wife and my partner, she always made sure that every step we take always is upwards, is going up. Then, my team, my right hand team, these guys man, seriously again, I am super appreciative of my team. Everyone that works at Over The Top, you’ll never hear anyone complains on how poorly they get paid or how poorly they mistreated, or how it’s not fun to work with me, or with anyone in the team. You’re not gonna hear these type of things because we remember, we know where we came from. We came from nowhere to a freakin empire in less than four years and it’s really important to always remember that. Always remember your roots.

Daryl Rosser: For sure.

Guy Sheetrit: Never talk to anyone, never speak like you’re something or you’re someone, there’s always someone better than you. Always. It doesn’t matter who says what, there’s always room for growth. There’s always room for learning. I listen to anyone. Anyone that says anything, I’m gonna listen to them. I’m either gonna justify them or I’m gonna ask more questions, and I’m not gonna tell you, hey fuck that, you’re just, you know, you’re not interesting enough for me to listen to you. No, none of that crap. So, it’s super important to always remember that, that’s what’s gonna keep you on top if you’re gonna remember to level up with everyone. Don’t forget.

Daryl Rosser: For sure, if you could go back to say four years ago and give yourself some advice based on what you know now, what would it be?

Guy Sheetrit: I wasn’t that late, but the cryptocurrency man.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: I swear to god bro, you don’t have to believe me, no one has to, but I had so many bit coins invested back in 2012, ’13, ’14, I knew this is going to happen. And one day I let the industry dictate to me it’s time to sell. And I should have invested so much more in bit coins, so much more. I had 1000 bit coins at one point, 1000 of them. And I sold them at like ugly, but hey, I should have known, I knew it, I should have entered that field hard core. Make review sites, make cash out sites, made anything related to the cryptocurrency.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: Because it was written all over the damn wall bro. It was written everywhere, the banks in Greece, the bankings in Europe, the bankings in America, everyone owes money to China, everyone, it’s going south. It’s like there for years and years. All the countries are in debt, are in Qatar and Saudi Arabia has the biggest oil fields in the world, they dictate the market, China just busy every fucking thing pretty much, so they own America, they’re not acknowledging it, they don’t want to admit it, now they probably some of them already do. But I mean look, it was written all over the damn place. So cryptocurrency where you’re your own bank was the future and it was really clear to me for many years and I could have done a lot of stuff with this, but I entered it a bit late.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: I’m still in it right now.

Daryl Rosser: Do you accept cryptocurrency for payment for SEO?

Guy Sheetrit: Oh yeah, definitely.

Daryl Rosser: Cool.

Guy Sheetrit: If you want to pay with bit coins, go right ahead. If you want to pay with lit coins, with bit coin cash, any of it. You can pay with any freakin method you want from credit card to bringing your cash to one of our agencies, to whatever you want, money’s money man. Money’s money.

Daryl Rosser: Fair enough. Do you have any advice for the agency owners that are like maybe the multiple six figures, seven figures a year sort of range. Those guys oftentimes I see get kind of stuck at that level and don’t know how to grow it past that. You have any advice for those people?

Guy Sheetrit: Everyone is relying on clients.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: Stop relying on clients. And whatever it is that you do for yourself, start doing it for your clients. I took this model and I fuckin did it to almost any client that I had besides e-commerce, almost anyone. I speak to my clients from the beginning about the future. I ask them where do you want to be in five years? If you wanna stay where you’re at, I don’t want to represent you, I’m sorry. No, not in a bad way it’s okay to stay, it’s perfectly fine, I just don’t want to represent you personally. Because I don’t see the future in representing you. I don’t see the future growth for you or my company if you don’t allow me to do that. If you go 10 percent from what your clients dreams are and it’s very fulfillable by you. If you’re an SEO expert and you got a team of experts and you want to make something out of someone, or even yourself, do it. It’s not that freakin hard. So you just gotta do the right things and you gotta think always three, four, five year ahead of time.

Daryl Rosser: I like that.

Guy Sheetrit: Yeah, and if you don’t have many clients and you want to do it on your own, open a sub-brand. I mean, you are developing websites anyways. You’re writing content anyways. Your designer designs stuff anyways, your SEO team is doing SEO anyways. So make your own sub-brands or other things. You see something you like, make a fucking website for it. Right the content for it. Do the SEO for it. Start making money from the same field that you’re looking at.

Guy Sheetrit: Affiliate networks are phenomenal. I’ve entered that affiliate world a long time ago and it’s tremendous, it’s beautiful. You don’t do anything and money comes in because it’s already been done, that’s it. You don’t have to do so much work all the time.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And it really depends on the niche that you’re at and the workflow. If your team is already working on ‘X’ amount of projects another one is not gonna crush them. It’s not gonna be the thing that broke them. So, just think outside the box. I know people say it a lot, but I’m really telling you, like it’s, just think how to expand yourself into different horizons even if it’s not logical at the moment. But if you dive deeper into the questions of why not, you’re not gonna find any answers. If you already have the team in place and you already doing the same exact shit, just do it for you instead of someone else. That’s it.

Guy Sheetrit: And charge accordingly, don’t be afraid of charging accordingly. You have to have some type of minimum. If you want to maintain quality, you have to have some type of minimum. And I know that a minimum budget is always smart. I didn’t have the pleasure and privilege of dictating budgets from day one, but I did so very, very soon after. Nowadays we just charge $75 and hour with minimum sets of hours.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And that’s the minimum man, if you don’t want it, it’s fine, I don’t have a problem with it. You don’t have to go with it, but you’ve got to have it. You have to have order. That’s a great way to grow bro.

Daryl Rosser: For sure. I really like that’s some good points. I especially like the focus on don’t just take on crappy clients that are gonna be paying $1000 a month forever, actually focus on clients that want growth and grow with them. I really like that, I think that’s a good wrapping up point.

Guy Sheetrit: I’ll give you an example.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: We got a new client, is a budget, it’s autoshipping. Ships cars between countries, you know.

Daryl Rosser: Okay.

Guy Sheetrit: He came to us, he’s spending $20000 on ad words, every month.

Daryl Rosser: Nice.

Guy Sheetrit: No future, just immediate 20K, buy, gone. Bro in less than two months I am taking the 20000 to our company, not to Google. We’re getting the 20K and he’s getting five times more calls than he did from ad words. And there’s an added value. He’s getting advanced in the freakin cities organically in the maps and he’s doing ad words because we’re doing the complete domination process.

Daryl Rosser: I love it.

Guy Sheetrit: And look, the field is like no competition. Fuck, what are you waiting for. So that’s a great example of taking someone, because everyone now, because of the ads that they’re taking so much space, now a lot of people are doing PPC, they don’t want to break their heads over SEO too much, they’re just doing PPC management, they take their percentages cut from it at the end of the month, but that’s just small thinking. That’s just low level thinking. I’m not trying to insult anyone god forbid, I’m thinking you’re paying Google the money there is zero chances of you ever seeing an ROI long term from it. The day you’re gonna stop paying Google, that’s the day you’re gonna be gone like the freaking wind.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: So it’s not like SEO where you’re investing for a year and your stop paying. You’re not gonna be gone like the wind, your fuckin ass is staying unless you do something stupid or not doing anything at all for a long time and let everyone pass you. You’re not going anywhere. It just, look for the small things that are so given to you, that are so ordinary like oh, PPC, you have no choice, yeah you have no choice, but what are you gonna do later? So what now? You need clients now, okay lets allocate ‘X’ amount for PPC and do the rest for SEO. Don’t just do everything PPC. It’s not gonna do anything for you. And by the way, I contradict myself knowingly, some niches are doing only PPC and they’re making millions of dollars, millions of dollars.

Daryl Rosser: Yeah.

Guy Sheetrit: And we do that too. If I see a future in it, like there is nothing set in stone.

Daryl Rosser: There’s that thinking for the future.

Guy Sheetrit: Exactly. If I see the future in freakin PPC for you specifically then I renounce everything I freakin said if that’s what I’m gonna do because that’s where the money’s at.

Daryl Rosser: That’s awesome.

Guy Sheetrit: It just varies a lot depending on the niche, depending on the criteria, depending on the area where you’re at, depending on the clients behavior. You know how many case studies we’ve done on client behavior? It’s retarded. The amount of knowledge you know from a niche to the level of understanding of the people that are looking for that product or a niche is phenomenal. So, I can tell you right now some niches that I am doing these day that I’m spending hundreds of thousands of dollars a month of our clients on PCC alone and it’s worth it. Why? Because there is future in it. I don’t see anything to cut anytime soon. I don’t see any problems arising anytime soon. And if I see it, I’ll see it ahead of time and I’ll start allocating for it. I always try to integrate SEO into the process no matter what. But sometimes it’s just not the answer. So, we just got to make sure we have enough balls to say, hey SEO is not right for you right now, buddy. We need to do only this or that because this is gonna generate you ‘X’ money in ‘X’ amount of time and we know it. So, again there is always the out of the ordinary extension to whatever it is that you’re doing.

Daryl Rosser: I love it man. For sure. Honestly, I think that’s a good point to wrap it up on, we’re at 55 minutes already, an hour which is cool. Where can people find you man if they want to connect?

Guy Sheetrit: Well, basically we’re gonna do Ungagged probably on Vegas at the end of the year and I don’t plan many events because of all of our office locations, but if you want to see us physically you can visit our office, you can see our website in the locations you can see where we have an office if you jump by and say hello. And you can find us online pretty much everywhere. We love to connect. I speak to everyone all the time, I’m a computer person, I’m a Skype person, so I’m always reachable by email chat, you know.

Daryl Rosser: Awesome. Cool man, I really appreciate you joining me today. It’s been great.

Guy Sheetrit: Thank you Daryl, appreciate it too. Me and Leo loved it and we’ll be in touch soon

Daryl Rosser: All right, hope you guys enjoyed the episode, I’ll catch you guys next week.

Daryl Rosser: If you want to learn more about how to scale our SEO business head over to LionZeal.com. That’s Lion Zeal dot com.