Calvin Holston - Smeeple - Part 1

Bringing the experts right to you! Join Mark and Lorraine as they interview Calvin Holston, the founder and CEO of Smeeple, an app designed to connect people to real authentic experts across a variety of subjects, from sports to HVAC to homesteaders. Learn how Calvin came from nuclear engineer to entrepreneur, the origins and meaning behind the name “Smeeple,” and how it works to curate and cultivate the best of the best.

Spend 30ish with Mark, Lorraine, and Calvin as they talk all things marketing, advertising, entrepreneurship, and of course … positioning!

Transcript

Mark Vandegrift
Welcome to the Brand Shorthand Podcast. I'm your host, Mark Vandegrift, and with me today is the Aficionado of Advertising, Lorraine Kessler. Lorraine, how goes it?

Lorraine Kessler
It goes well, Mark. I have a new puppy, which you saw, and I had to run out because she was chewing everything at my feet, including me. And my husband is going to have to learn how to deal with her when I do podcasts, which is not going to be easy.

Mark Vandegrift
Yes, absolutely. You can't have- it's either you show the puppy on screen or the puppy has to be off-screen because we can't have the barking. And tell us again what it is, what's it called?

Lorraine Kessler
It's a Catahoula Leopard Dog, which I never heard of, and they were apparently bred by Native Americans in Louisiana, as a hunting dog, and from a Mastiff, but they don't look like a Mastiff. There's other breeds mixed in. They, at full size, will probably be built more like a Dalmatian, which he has a Merle coat, like a super Merle coat. You can post a photo and post production. I'll send you a photo.

Mark Vandegrift
The bluest eyes that you ever did see, like they glow blue.

Lorraine Kessler
They look like yours, Mark.

Mark Vandegrift
Is that why you got it? You miss me that much?

Lorraine Kessler
I miss you that much.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, good. I think-

Lorraine Kessler
And when you do that with your eyes, like you're very intense. That's what people say. What is that thing they say, like, why are you reacting that way?

Mark Vandegrift
Yeah. It's my laser eyes. Well, our listeners will also notice we have a guest on our podcast today, and he is the founder and CEO of Smeeple. And for those that have not heard of Smeeple, go to smeeple.com and/or download the app either on your Android device or your iPhone and- a  fabulous app that we will hear all about today. And little known fact in the world, but Calvin Holston is a former nuclear plant engineer. So hello, Calvin. Welcome to the Brain Shorthand Podcast.

Calvin Holston
Absolute honor to be here. Thank you for having me on.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, real quick, give us a little background of yourself and like, just tell the audience a little bit about this whole nuclear engineer thing.

Calvin Holston
I would love to. So, it started in 1983 when my parents... No, all right. So we'll skip the first 20-some years. So I ended up graduating. I went to Grove City College, graduated in 2005. And I said, wanted to be a marketing- yep, the Grove City, fantastic, fantastic school. And I graduated with marketing management and also communication, double majored there. And I did that for all about two years until my business mentor said, "You really are a fool if you don't follow in your dad's steps and go to the nuclear industry." So I traded a suit and tie, a field that I absolutely loved to go into literally be the dumbest guy on site at a nuclear power plant. And the worst part was everyone knew how I got in because it was my dad that opened up the door. So they're like, "Man, we don't like your dad and we really don't like you now." So that was a very, very humbling experience going in from doing very well in one industry to literally being the one that no one wanted to be around. And I was just not- unfortunately, I was not a high performer that first day walking in.

Mark Vandegrift
That's funny. Well, so you had this idea for this company and... give us a little background on what happened that resulted in what we know today as Smeeple.

Calvin Holston
Yeah, absolutely. So it's interesting and it's real testament to, I tell everyone, "if you're willing to work hard, you can achieve anything." And I really mean that you have to have a little bit of smarts, but if you have the hard work, you can achieve whatever you want to be able to achieve. So I ended up staying in the nuke industry and fell in love with it. So after a couple of years, I went into my nuke engineering degree and I got my masters and really made it a fantastic career and married and four kids and the white picket fence. And I was loving life. You know, I was in charge of, we have two reactors on site and it's a pressurized water reactors. I'm happy to teach that to anyone, but I don't think that's the focus of this podcast. We'll do another one about pressurized water reactors, but absolutely fell in love with it. And I thought, "Hey, you know, I came in with one thought of where my career was going to go, but I just want to stay in operations and keep running nuclear power plants because I just fell in love with the environment."

And then the issue happened. And that was when my wife said, can you install a bathroom faucet for me? And that was about two years ago. And I said, "Of course I can, I'm a nuke engineer. I can do anything like that." So I went to YouTube, typed it in and I said, how do you install a faucet? Watched it, she ordered it from Amazon. I installed it, went fine. And about an hour later I checked and there was a single drop of water underneath of the faucet. So, you know, in the cabinet area. And I thought, "I got this, I'll figure it out." At that time it wasn't worth calling a plumber for $250. Eight hours later of troubleshooting, of trying to figure out what was wrong, I should have called that plumber, right? And that would have been the silliest mistake, but no matter what, when I went to Google and YouTube and I was just watching videos and reading articles, I did not see a solution.

Or even, you know, it's a pretty common story for me to share, but one of the less common ones is about two weeks later, my son is just a fantastic individual, but he's tiny. His little arms are about, you know, looks like a twig. And he said, "Dad, I shot a bow and arrow at sports camp. Can I get one? Because I want to show you how good I shoot." And I was like, "Yeah, let's see this, guy!" So we got him a bow and arrow. We go into the backyard. He pulls it back and launches it. And it only goes two feet. It's like, boom, hits the ground. And I'm like, "Boy, step aside. Let dad show you how to shoot a bow and arrow." Now, to be truthful, I've seen Robin Hood. I've watched Lord of the Rings. But I have never shot a bow and arrow. But I'm thinking, "I got this." And I pull it back, and I'm going to show my son how to shoot it, and only goes two feet also to the ground. I'm like, okay, maybe not. And we watch YouTube and I'm looking at it and truthfully, I'm like, I don't see what I'm doing wrong here, right? I don't see, I'm standing the way, I'm pulling it back and launching it. So we ended up driving about an hour to the Mennonites. There's an archery store up there, and within a couple of seconds, they fixed exactly what was wrong with us, and now we shoot the bow and arrow fine.

So I thought to myself with the craziness of COVID, the good thing that came out of it is video conferencing, right? 5, 10 years ago, which was abnormal to jump onto a Teams or Google video conference or a video session, it'd be hard to look at each other face to face. Now it's, why would you drive an hour if you can just jump onto Teams or Google, right? Save the resources, save the time. It's fine being on a video conference. And I thought, if it's so accepted now, why isn't there a platform to connect to any type of expert, right? I didn't need the plumber at my house. I just needed the plumber's advice for just a couple of minutes, because it was a silly mistake. And I didn't need an archery coach to come to my house, just a couple of minutes of their time to say, hey, what are we doing wrong as we continue forward with it? And I thought, "It doesn't exist. Why not make it? I'm used to working 13 hours at the new plant. This will be easy." And then the rest is history from there.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, give us a quick overview of exactly what Smeeple is then, because I think that painted a good picture of it as to where the idea came from. Now, what's going on that the app works so well?

Calvin Holston
Yeah, I'd love to share that one. So really my idea was just a free-market platform for any type of true expertise to be on it. So, literally if you go onto it now, we're blessed to have over 600 experts and athletes on it now. So we have division one and pro and even Olympic athletes that are on it that want to be mentors to the younger generation all the way to probably one of the top HVAC technicians in social media world- I think he has over 200,000 followers- is on it to be able to share with his followers and also new consumers coming on where consumers can book, pay and video conference all within the app. So you don't have to worry about sending a Zoom link, a Teams link. It's just literally within three button clicks, you can have an appointment ready to go. And it's just like FaceTime, the video conferencing built in.

But one of the things I thought about and interacting with the few experts that came on board in the beginning is really this product is for you, right? As much as I love Smeeple and I think it's fantastic- I would love everyone to wear a Smeeple on their chest walking down the street- In reality, we're a tech platform to really help pass knowledge, mentorship, experience on. It's all about the experts. So when we were developing the platform, I came up with the concept and the idea, but then I ended up talking to experts saying, "What do I need to build for you to be successful at this?" And, you know, for example, we have Katie Krejci, one of the best homesetters out there who's huge in the social media world. And I said, "What's important to you for you to be able to share your knowledge effectively?" And she said, "Well, actually, I need to be able to share a questionnaire beforehand at times, and then also follow up with some type of documentation if I want to look a little bit more into recipes or different types of seeds and so forth." And I said, "Okay, well, that's what's going to make you successful and help you share knowledge. Let's build that."

So really, really beneficial involving the experts as soon as possible with the build. So now the platform is, right, as I shared, people can book, pay, and video conference with the expert, they can share data before and after, still remaining private, both on sides. had one individual just sign up. He's got about a million and a half followers and he does Subarus. He fixes Subarus and he called me up and I was like, "Man, you're the cool guy. I'm not a cool guy. You you're calling me and talking to me." I was like, "You have a million and half followers." And Lorraine, I don't know if you saw my social, I don't want to brag. I think I have about 200 followers. So a little bit of a difference in the 1.5 million. But he goes, "Calvin, the only thing I don't like about this is that I didn't come up with the idea." He said, "You build a platform for me to be able to answer questions." And he goes, "I spend about two hours of my day answering questions, but you're allowing me to stay private, right? I still want to be 'Mr.Subaru1387' or -67," you know, whatever his handle is. He goes, "I get to remain private, but also share knowledge to so many people out there." So really cool platform and happy to answer any more questions on that.

Lorraine Kessler
That is super.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, I'm a testimony to your homesteader, not Katie, but another one. And I have now fermented beets, peppers, onions, garlics, and several other vegetables.

Calvin Holston
That's fantastic.

Mark Vandegrift
I am on the road to better gut health.

Calvin Holston
Right, that's fantastic.

Mark Vandegrift
And I'm not kidding. My wife looked at me like I was nutso. She's like, "Honey, we pickle and can and everything." And I said, "This fermentation thing's supposed to be really healthy. So I'm going to give it a try," but I needed a kind of a kickstart. I booked someone on Smeeple and today I am a successful fermenter.

Calvin Holston
And truly that's what's encouraging to me, right? So we want it to be a huge financial success and everyone that's part of it wins and the experts in regards to it's a free-market platform. So they put their rates and their availability in, we don't control any of that. The consumer doesn't get any fees from us where... I don't know if you've had that experience of when you do the checkout and the very end it's like, "Nope, we slid a $1.99 on top of that." I said, actually not to that stuff where it really is what you see is exactly what you get. And it's just so encouraging because the point of that is it makes it challenging for a business, for, how little of the take that we have on it makes it challenging for growth. But because we're here to actually spread knowledge, you sharing that story is exactly what we're here for. So that's fantastic.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, and those fees are funny because we have an Air-BnB business and we've actually had prospective bookers that will call or message us and go, what are these fees at the end? They put 14% on the fee after you book it. So you have the rate, which you see, and you have the cleaning fee, which you see, but then Air-BnB adds 14% on it. So talk about a surprise. It's a lot more than $1.99.

Calvin Holston
And really that actually- we did a lot of diving into what different platforms do. And it was actually, I talked to an individual that's a tutor on a different site and I was saying, "Hey, should we take some of the transaction from the experts? Should we charge the consumer. How do we really do this?" And he actually gave a really good advice. He said, "If you don't charge the consumer anything, there's no reason for them to get off of your app, right?" And go somewhere else where, he said, for example, "I'm a tutor where the consumer loses about 20% and I lose about 20%. So on our first call, we end up just saying, hey, do want to go on FaceTime? You can Venmo me, et cetera." And they just move right off the platform. And I thought, "Yeah, okay, great idea." I'm not going to charge the consumer anything. I don't like it personally. It's actually going to help my business in that way and help us grow. So we just try to make it as advantageous as possible to keep everything on Smeeple.

Lorraine Kessler
So where is the revenue for Smeeple coming from? How is that?

Calvin Holston
Right, right. So I won the lottery actually, so I don't have to worry about that. No, right? So we do have to pay our bills, right? And we partner with Stripe, which is the largest online payment platform out there. They're a dream, they handle so much of us up. They take a 3% cut. So we overall take 10% of whatever the transaction is. 3% goes to Stripe, Smeeple gets 7%. And the reason I can openly share that is because it's on our website. There's no games, there's no gimmicks. When an expert's signing up, we say, "Hey, essentially if you want to make $50, charge $55. That 7% pays our overhead and the streaming costs and so forth." So very transparent with that.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, because you've curated the expertise. So that's the value for the consumer. Otherwise, you could be spending all day on Google and YouTube doing what you did for your job.

Calvin Holston
Absolutely. We're so encouraged by this where, you know, I challenged- there's a couple of people that said, "Hey, I'm already found, have my own platform, or people find me on a different thing and they're on Google, type in 'I want a fitness expert'." And I say, "Well, when you go to Google and type 'fitness expert', you're to have thousands and thousands of pages and try to say, well, who's the one that's actually legit, who's not legit." And when that's one of the things that really defines something I'm proud of her really showcases what Smeeple offers is that you have to be one of the top experts, right? We only have an 18% acceptance rate with experts. We've had a lot of people apply and about 18% actually make it through where we say, and my common line is that Sally from Nebraska comes onto our platform. She's getting a true expert in the field that she has.

And even how we constructed the profiles where- you know, homesteading, obviously very huge, but homesteading in a big picture can be fermentation. It can be chickens, it can be lambs, right? And no one is an actual expert in all of those fields. So we've allowed the profiles to be built where the individual expert can say what their specialty is in and also how they can help. Right? So even if it's within chickens, what specifically can they help with so that the consumer goes on and can be very specific? "I have an issue with- my chicken has some type of skin condition right now." And I know exactly the expert to talk to.

Lorraine Kessler
That's awesome. I might need that for our puppy. I'm going to need a lot of behavioral training for this dog.

Calvin Holston
Right, Well, I think Lorraine, it's not even worth it. You can just send the puppy to us and my wife will take care of it. Then we'll come back in a couple of years. about that?

Mark Vandegrift
I don't think your kids would let the puppy go. It is the most cute thing you have ever seen.

Lorraine Kessler
No, they won't.

Calvin Holston
my goodness. Yeah. I can, I will fall in love too quick. My aunt tried to say we should look into fostering animals. I'm like, "There's no chance because I'll never give them back, right?" He'll just be one after another, after another.

Lorraine Kessler
I know, that's funny. So the name, Smeeple. Where did that come from? It's a fun-

Calvin Holston
Yeah, great. I'm not sure. No, there is a point to the Smeeple name. So in the nuke industry, engineering world, and even some of the government, "subject matter expert", or "SME" is a very common term. And so I thought to myself, "Well, we're bringing specific subject matter experts in a lot of different fields together with people." And that's how we came up with it. And there are a lot of great variations out there that we never thought like, I've heard a lot of people say, "Hey, it's smart people, SM and people together. It's smart people and people together." Yep, that actually works as well too. So it was kind of encouraging where my co-founder is a senior VP of a global ad agency up in New York City. And when we first were coming up with this, thinking of names, I called him up and I said, "Josh, what do you think about the name Smeeple?" And he goes, "I don't like it, but I don't dislike it." He goes, "Let me think about it for a couple of days." And he ended up talking to a bunch of his people up there and he called back and he goes, "It's rememberable. It makes sense. Let's do it."

And then I made the mistake of saying, "Okay, let's try to buy the domain." Let's just say some guy out there got a thousand dollars of my money. When I said, "Hey, I would like to buy the name 'Smeeple.com'." And I'm thinking he's probably thinking in his head, "What? Why? Like, is, why are you- okay, sure, a thousand dollars." And then I told my wife what I had done. Let me just tell you what I should have prefficed, or you know, prepared my wife a little bit more. She goes, you spent how much on a domain called 'Smeeple'? And I was like, "Well, honey, it's probably gonna get a lot worse in the spending." But, right? It was a good lesson learned in the beginning of being more forthright with your wife before you make a big purchase like that.

Lorraine Kessler
Well, I guess it depends who handles the money in the household.

Calvin Holston
Yes, yeah, I'm very blessed with my wife, and she just knows it's there and she can spend it.

Lorraine Kessler
So I think I like the name even more when you explained it as 'subject matter expert' meaning people. Actually that really helps me like the name. So I hope you have that on your website. I didn't want to say but that would be good.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, you mentioned a kind of an obstacle there with having to buy a domain for a thousand dollars and having a little pushback from your spouse. What would you say are some of the major obstacles that you've found so far in establishing a business, whether they're financial, technical, something else?

Calvin Holston
Yeah, all of the above actually. I went from running, you know, truly, a nuclear power plant, holding the highest license in the nuclear fleet and, you know, thinking that I understood what hard work was and challenges and so forth. And what a brand new experience full of lots of different challenges where I went in- for example, I don't have any tech background. I know how to open up email and get to my social media and other than that, right? I've never coded anything. I didn't know anything in that world. So it was when we said, "Hey, let's start building out this platform. What do we really need to need to be able to do that?" Right. And really it was just, "Hey, I'm really good within this swim lane, Josh, you're really good within this swim lane. We need to be able to find the right people to come in to help guide us into the development of the app or even into finances." I still remember I got a book very ignorantly. It was like, 'How to Approach VCs'. And I'm thinking, "Well, of course, when you start a company, you immediately go to a VC and they just hand you a check for $10 million and they're to love your idea." And it was just, yeah, looking back, I'm like, "You are so naive on how it actually works and so forth."

A lot of challenges coming our way with building out the platform, but I loved it where my son who's nine years old and currently playing football met with a wide receiver, or meeting, I should say, with a wide receiver at Yale. And my son gets discouraged every now and then, and he's always playing against older kids. And he asked the wide receiver, and I would have paid probably my entire worth for him to be encouraged in this way, where he asked the wide receiver, he said, "Have you ever been discouraged?" And I was literally just walking by the room hearing that, and the wide receiver looked at him and said, "You know what? I am discouraged. I was discouraged all the time because I had a brother that was four years older who would, you know, beat me to the car every time that we raced. He beat me in every single video game and every sport and so forth." And he said, "But I had to realize it's never ever a loss. It's a learning opportunity." And he goes, "And I had to take those learning opportunities and grow quickly from them." And I could just see the transformation of my son's face as he's watching a little boy that's discouraged, truly discouraged constantly saying I can learn from this and- I kid you not, going back onto the football field the next week, now one of the fastest kids on the team to truly just show how much mental is behind kids and athletes playing.

And the reason I bring that up now is we've had a lot of lessons learned when you look at this and- you know, I saw Mark Zuckerberg speech- not a huge fan of him, like maybe we shouldn't say that, they'll block is on Meta- but you know, saying he's like, "I don't know how to build this," right? He was sharing, sharing at one of his conferences. "I don't know what I'm doing here," right? "I can't do this, and we had to figure it out on the way." And really it's been the same way. It's the challenges come in and we have to say, "Okay, well, if this is the next challenge, how are we going to do it?" Right. And we heard early in the beginning, two-sided marketplaces is one of the hardest things to build because- I'm jealous of those that say, I got a new hat. Right. This hat is awesome because all you have to do is buy the hat and the hat can't talk back to you. Right. Like the hat has no feelings coming out of it and you buy the hat. Now you have the challenge of selling that hat. Two-sided marketplaces are way harder. I have to find both the expert, convince them to be on and convince them of the vision, and also then go find the consumer, convince them of the vision, that we're trustworthy.

We just actually had a young lady- a young lady, I'm sure she would like that- a young mom with a child send me a message saying she's gotten a lot of requests about similar things like us, but they were all scammy and she goes, "I looked into you and you all look fantastic", right? And it's convincing the consumer, no, these are legit experts. You can now talk to someone that played in the NFL for four years. He's a UCLA linebacker coach for $12. Right? I mean, I personally don't play football like my kids do. And if my kids go, "Yes, I'm potentially interested, but I want to play division one at UCLA." Well, guess what? You can talk to the linebacker coach for $12 as a mentor now. Right? Or we're even going over to, you know, one of- I'm very passionate about the niches that we were serving where we have two female wrestlers on the app. We have one female wrestler who's the national champion, another female wrestler that's a two-time gold medal Pan-Olympic champion. And it's just incredible experience where in Pennsylvania, they just sanctioned female wrestling as a sport for high school. Well, guess what? I'm sure there are a lot of young ladies out there that go, "I would love a mentor, it's a male-dominated sport." Now I have two mentors that are in it. The Pan-Olympic champion is $15 for a half hour. It's like, I would pay four times that amount if my daughter said she was interested in wrestling in a male-dominated sport. I got the best in the North America, right, to be able to help out my daughter and so forth.

So a lot of challenges have come with building it, but also we have to remind ourselves all the successes that we've had with it, which is the encouragement of moving forward or hearing the stories of, you know, the fermentation, Mark. Truly, that means a lot to me saying that you actually were able to learn from this and it was a great experience or, you know, there's a lady that just booked- her son's a 10 years old on a travel baseball team- and booked a gentleman that just got drafted. And her immediate response was, "This was so fantastic, booking again", right? Like, that's great. I brought a baseball player at University of Florida with a 10 year old boy that's on the travel team. I don't even know what state they live in. And it was so encouraging that the mom saying, "I'll spend another $40 on this", right? And continue booking them. It's just, I can get through any challenge as long as I know that we're being successful in that way.

Lorraine Kessler
How cool. I am just- my head's spinning. So I have grandkids who would so benefit from so much of this. Myself too, because I'm always- Mark knows this- I'm the fix-it at the house. So I do the plumbing and the toilets and the gardening and all. But yeah, my kids in sports, sometimes they just need that encouragement or someone who knows more. That would be wonderful.

Calvin Holston
And that's- Lorraine, it's interesting to say that about the sports side. I took it from a- I want to shoot a three point better. We have one of the best NBA shooting instructors that are on the app now. And I thought it was going to be pure form that people are going to be talking about. Well, we have an NFL individual. He just retired. Fantastic individual, and he's actually coming on board to work with Smeeple because he's so excited because he says, "Well, people don't realize the division one level, and then going to pro", he says "It's 10% athleticism and strength, 90% mental." He says that's the true difference between the two where, he said, "You have now built a platform where we can share the mental side of the sport because that's what's really going to take kids to the next level." I was just so encouraging to me. I was like, "Hey, good. Yeah, I'm glad. I'm glad that's how we're to be able to do it. Right. And then let's get it out there to encourage the kids."

But in reality, it's true. When I look back, I was at best the D3 basketball player, right? It just, and I grew up. I was the poorest rich kid you could ever meet. And there was, you know, we never use the air conditioning, we never use the heat, but- there was always food on the table and that's why I say that way- roof over our heads. You know, my neighbors knew we weren't home during the summertime because that's when the windows were shut, right? Other than that, the windows were open. My dad was like, "We're not spending money on air conditioning." Dad, don't watch this. But there was no chance in the world that I could go to AAU for basketball or, you know, go to special camps because that was just not in the budget for us to be able to do. And now it's like, we built a platform where you can talk to D1 basketball players or even that shooting coach for $10, $15. I mean, I was mowing lawn since middle school. I could have paid for that and gotten specific instruction to help me where, you know- I'm sure people will laugh in the background on this one- but you know, I was decent athlete, right? You know, six, five, skinny as anything, but I could jump like none other. And, and I had the build for it, but mental and the training and the preparation was not there. So that's why, you know, I did decent at the end of my high school career, good enough to go to college with, you know, the perspective of playing basketball, but could have been something different had I had that opportunity that most don't. That's one of the biggest drivers for us is that we say that we're bringing now coaching, mentoring, expertise, knowledge, especially to people that might not financially normally have the ability to have it or geographically not be able to have it.

Where we talk about, you know, female sports, my daughter, we're in Southern Maryland. So my daughter is probably destined to play lacrosse or softball, but her true interest is dance and gymnastics right now. Well, no offense, I don't really know the area that well for dance, but I have not been impressed with the gymnastics program in this area. Well, right now she's meeting with the University of Florida dancer and absolutely loving it. And now they do routines together and every week that they're meeting and she does it at her house. And it's like, what an amazing opportunity this is.

Lorraine Kessler
Yeah, that is wonderful, wonderful.

Mark Vandegrift
Well, you mentioned the 18% that you accept, which unless my math is wrong is 82 % that you turn down. So probably a lot of mundane, boring stories, but give us an interesting story or two about people you've had to turn down on your platform. Don't name names, just give us a story as long as it doesn't identify anyone.

Calvin Holston
Do you want a good one or do you want the best story? Which one do you want?

Mark Vandegrift
Yes, we'll take the best and the good.

Calvin Holston
Oh my goodness, I hope he doesn't watch this. The worst case. I'm not sure if I mentioned this or not, but Smeeple, we've been so blessed with, investors got involved in the beginning, right? A lot of expense went into building amazing technology. It is just amazing what we're able to build. That was through the help of people who came in and originally invested in the family and friends round. Well, very thankful for them.

So one of my investors actually signed up to be on the platform as an expert and I had to turn him down. It was so bad. I was like, let me call him and explain why. And his heart was right. And I just said, "Hey, I appreciate you so much wanting to be part of this, but there's, you're not an actual expert. Like, you're not a top expert, right? You might know stuff about this one." And he was gracious. He was like, "Okay, I see your point." Yeah, that was one of the most nerve-wracking calls that I've ever had to make was turning down someone that had just put a good chunk of money into my own company and say, "Hey, but you're not good enough to be an expert on my app."

Mark Vandegrift
"Can I my money back now?"

Lorraine Kessler
And so he didn't say "I canceled the check."

Calvin Holston
No, no, I made sure to cash it before I called him. No, but really, that was encouraging to him where, truly, some of my investors provided amazing feedback. So talking about what type of expertise we can have on this, one of my investors challenge and it led to an amazing actual feature of our platform that not many people know about where he said, "Okay, if social media is going to be one of the ways that you can vet someone. What do you do when someone has a massive social presence, but is not a true expert?" And the example of that one is the Liver King. I really don't know his background, but if you don't know the story about the Liver King, he has millions of followers and his big- I mean, he is a caveman looking jacked beast, right? Like, I mean, he is just so big of muscles and he eats raw meat in front of everyone. And he's, he's developed quite the crowd. Not my style, but I'm also very careful to judge against anyone just because we're learning so much through the years and so forth of what's actually good and what's not good.

His style is definitely more entertainment and "look at me" and my investor challenged me and said, "I don't think he's a true nutritionist. So if you're basing it strictly off of his social media following, people love that he eats raw meat. Would you allow him as an expert?" And I thought to myself, "Well, the study's not out, it's wrong, not wrong and so forth. And people truly believe in that system. You're right." I told the investor, I said, "I need to create a way to have people that are public, but then also still give the ability for people to be private within their own network on our app." So people can actually sign up- if you're a top expert with validation behind it and we can prove that you're a top expert, that's who you're going to see. That's the 600 people. But we also created a private version where it would in your own network. Maybe you don't want new clients. You just want to be able to serve your clients with a little bit more privacy and a little bit more convenience. You can send out and you get the same software capability. You just can't be found. So when we developed that- so the Liver king could potentially use our software with his own network, and until he proves that he's actual nutritionist, then we wouldn't have him on the app. And lo and behold, two months after that conversation, a whole scandal came out saying that he was on steroids. He wasn't actually, you know, getting that muscular because of the meat that he was eating and so forth.

So great play, but it really opened up a new opportunity where we just landed our first corporate pilot. And that pilot program is actually with Airgas, and Airgas is putting us in every one of their stores in both Michigan and Ohio. And what's going to happen is they are- if people come into the store to buy specific pieces of equipment that cost a lot of money, they're going to be handed a flyer so they can connect with one of the welding engineers in-house to help them. "Hey, if you have any questions, if you want help setting it up at your home." Well, Airgas, because we don't want the common person to be able to find that because then our guys are expensive, right? We don't want someone calling up that didn't make the purchase. We want to use this as an incentive for people that purchase. And I said, "Done, we got a private profile. No one will be able to find you. It's only the consumers that you can get the QR code. Can they now contact the welding engineers?" And because of that one investor saying something of going, "Hey, let me challenge you a little bit as you build this out", we now have a corporate pilot program going on. And I'm super excited about that's launching literally next week.

Lorraine Kessler
Would you call that a business to business play then, where you could go to other, like people who make splitters and HVAC and those.

Calvin Holston
Absolutely. Yeah. So is that our true main focus today? No. The good news is that that happened to fall upon us. We're super excited about it. We're gonna let the pilot run out and if it is successful, absolutely. We'd be fools not to where we go out and essentially white-label our software and say, "Hey, feel free to use this at a very cost effective price. You know, here's the proof that it works within your consumers and helps drive, you know, the interaction." And the interesting thing about they're looking at it from a does it drive the sale?

I'm really interested to see the numbers in regards to repeat business, where once you form that connection, there's a big difference between, "Hey, it's a salesperson." I bet none of us can remember the teller that we had six months ago at a random store. But if you interact with someone, you form a connection. And one of the coolest things that I saw is our plumber, one of the plumbers on our platform got booked. He's in Florida and an individual from Texas had an issue with his septic. He got booked and he paid his time. The plumber only gave advice, was not able to fix the problem and said, "You most likely have to get a contractor in to be able to do this." And I thought to myself, "Okay, good example of giving some advice, but not really leading to the solution." Both of them- they don't even know each other- both of them emailed me separately and said, "What an amazing experience." The expert side said, "That was a dopamine effect, right? Like I was so excited to share my knowledge with someone that really wanted it." And he went on his social media and talked all about us. And he goes, "Send me a hat, because I want to wear it all the time. Like this was an amazing feeling being able to help people." And then on the consumer side, the consumer reached out and said, "Thank you so much for the opportunity to meet with someone like this. I feel confident now if someone ends up coming over my house, I know exactly what to say. I know that I'm not being swindled. And in fact, I'm going to book them again, because I think I am going to try it myself," because he gave him enough encouragement and knowledge to attempt it. So I do- I'm interested to see that. Once the connection's made, is that going to lead to more sales for businesses?

Lorraine Kessler
Well, you could have helped me greatly because we had a lake house and has a septic and it was short, short cycle. It drove me crazy. My husband, course, doesn't hear it. And I'm like all night, I'm like, this is not right. So I call first our contractor, who's kind of an auto-didactic guy. He's just really, he loves problem solving. So he had a cup and he looked at it and he said, "Well, I'm thinking it might be a leak cause I'm checking all this stuff." So then I had the well guys come and, and he diagnosed it. He says, "I think you need a different type of valve on this, like a balloon valve." But he couldn't fix it. So the plumber had to come out. So a thousand dollars later- but I could have told the Smeeple, identified that these are the valves we need and know to call the plumber and we would have been fine.

Calvin Holston
Yes. And I could not agree more with that one where there's a difference- and I go back to what I said earlier. I know a lot of amazing plumbers and one of my closest friends is an electrician. He still doesn't know everything, right? I'm sure there are certain things that he might know of, but he's not the guy that can immediately see it and go, "This is your exact problem." Well, that plumber that's on Smeeple is a septic guy, right? Like that is his world. He knows it, breathes it. It's just like, everyone's in the industry that they're true expert. They like, almost sense it. They're like, "Oh, I already know problem. I can just feel it in the wind." And I know exactly what your problem is, just because they have all of that experience. So yeah, absolutely.

Mark Vandegrift
Hey listeners, we had such a great interview with Calvin that it went pretty long. So we're going to break this into two episodes. So we'll leave off here today. Join us next week as we conclude our interview with Smeeple founder and CEO, Calvin Holston. And if you haven't liked, shared, subscribed, or told your friends about the Brand Shorthand Podcast, be sure to do so. And until next time, have an amazing day.