In this week's episode I interview my friend, Sean Ogle, Founder of Breaking Eighty. What started as a website in the Summer of 2012 has become one of the very best resources on the internet for unbiased golf product reviews. Where you can find reviews of everything from rangefinders, to launch monitors, to shoes, bags, and more. In the past couple of years Sean has parlayed this into his fast growing YouTube channel in 2022, which I am a huge fan.
In this week's episode I interview my friend, Sean Ogle, Founder of Breaking Eighty. What started as a website in the Summer of 2012 has become one of the very best resources on the internet for unbiased golf product reviews. Where you can find reviews of everything from rangefinders, to launch monitors, to shoes, bags, and more. In the past couple of years Sean has parlayed this into his fast growing YouTube channel in 2022, which I am a huge fan.
Today we play golf.
Speaker 2:Let me show you how we do it in the pros.
Speaker 3:Welcome to Behind the Golf Brand podcast. I never missed with the Seven Iron , a conversation with some of the most interesting innovators and entrepreneurs behind the biggest names in golf. My
Speaker 4:Friends were the golf clubs . I lived on the golf course, I lived on the driving range
Speaker 3:From Pro Talk . You should learn something from each and every single round you play in to fun , from on and off the green. Why would
Speaker 5:You play golf if you don't play it for money?
Speaker 3:Just let me put the ball in a hole. This is Behind the Golf Brand podcast with Paul Libert .
Speaker 6:What's up guys? Welcome to the Behind the Golf Brand podcast. This week I have my good friend Sean Ogle from Breaking 80. You guys have had to have fallen on his website at some point in your golfing life. If you haven't, you don't use Google . And he's been really taken off on YouTube. But the funny thing is he's met this for a long time, which is really cool. So I'm really excited to have him on the show. Welcome to the show,
Speaker 7:Dude. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.
Speaker 6:<laugh> . How's that for a , for an intro? That was pretty nice . There
Speaker 7:You go. Nailed it. Made me feel so important.
Speaker 6:You are important . So where are you located?
Speaker 7:I am located in Portland, Oregon, which you wouldn't know cause it actually looks kind of sunny out here right now. But , uh, <laugh> it has not been that way for the last six months.
Speaker 6:It's beautiful. I always thought, I always thought you were on the East coast. I don't know why I thought this because like in your videos you always have those trees in your background and I was like, it looks like he's in a forest. Is that like a green screen or? I've
Speaker 7:Got a lot of green screen comes now. I live in like a freaking tree house . <laugh>.
Speaker 6:Really?
Speaker 7:Pretty much. Yeah, we're kind of right up, you know, right above the trees. We're on the like lowest level. Our house is like three stories and so we're in the lowest level right now, which is my office.
Speaker 6:Oh, that's really cool. So are you a professional golfer?
Speaker 7:I am not. You could say I'm a professional golfer in the sense that I make my living by mostly playing golf. But no, I'm like a 10 11 handicap right now.
Speaker 6:<laugh> . That's good. Almost 16. So I'm on a good day. Not this weekend. I was like a freaking 19 or 20, but um ,
Speaker 7:You've all been there. Yeah,
Speaker 6:It was rough. Um, so how'd you get into golf?
Speaker 7:So I grew up my entire childhood. I played competitive tennis, so that was like my, like all the way through high school, like three, four or five times a week. That's what I was doing. And , uh, for my high school graduation, my uncle gave me my first set of golf clubs. And so I was like, all right , this is cool. Or my first real set, I had like a cheap set that I kind of hit around with and was like, oh , this is kind of fun. Like I got super burnt out playing tennis. So when I was in college, especially like my junior and senior year, you could go out and it was nine bucks for nine holes at the local course. Uh, I went to Oregon State, so it was in Corvallis place called Tristan Tree . Nice. 17 bucks for for 18. And I only had classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays and I didn't start until noon those days. So I go out like first thing in the morning, play 18 holes and just kind of fell in love with it.
Speaker 6:That's crazy. So like did you didn't really play with like your dad growing up or like your uncle or anybody? No,
Speaker 7:I played with my uncle a little bit cuz he was the one that was kind of getting into it and then started playing with my dad a little bit more in college. My uncle kind of started it and then both my parents kind of took it over and now I'm, they kind of have dwindled out a little bit and I'm the one that's stuck with it and kept playing.
Speaker 6:That's cool. All right . So did you grow up in Oregon then? Always?
Speaker 7:Yeah, I grew up in Eugene
Speaker 6:<laugh> and then, okay, so you grew up in Oregon. You went to , what did you major in, in in a college?
Speaker 7:Uh, finance. So finance business with finance kind of option. <laugh> .
Speaker 6:So that's pretty far from like where you're at now,
Speaker 7:<laugh>? It's, it's, yeah, you could say that. I don't know that there was a single thing aside from like social skills. I'm not sure there was a single piece of the college curriculum that has been directly applicable to my life . Even when I got a job outta school in finance, the stuff I learned wasn't really that relevant. <laugh> ,
Speaker 6:That's what I feel like, I feel like we are that generation where we are , you know, go to college, get a good job, blah, blah, blah . And then it's like almost everybody know doesn't use what they got in college. Like nobody. Yeah . And then, you know, oh, then if you get an advanced degree, whatever that is, and then they got more money and it's like, I don't know , like a lot of the entrepreneurs I talk to and work with, it's like they don't, no one, they don't do, they don't do what they do now. Like they just , it just kind of was like a stepping stone into what they do now. I guess. That makes sense.
Speaker 7:Yeah, and I, I mean, I was a little bit of an anomaly. Like I graduated in July of oh seven, went into finance. So by February of oh nine, you know, the market had collapsed . My bosses were unhappy, our clients were unhappy. I was unhappy and was like, okay, this isn't what I thought it was. I was so excited. Like I had like nice office with a view and suit and tie. I was like very excited for this. And I realized, but
Speaker 6:You were sold on, right? Like this is what I was, it
Speaker 7:Sold on it and then you realized the suit and tie, okay, maybe not all it's cracked up to be. And so I ended up taking all my vacation time for the year, February of oh nine and went down to Rio for carnival with my best friend. So we spent two weeks down there, we danced in the carnival play , we went hang gliding over Rio. It was like the most epic trip ever .
Speaker 6:Oh my God . Like really lived life.
Speaker 7:Yeah. The day I got back I got a 20% pay cut. So that's when I was like, okay, we need to figure something else out here. Like , I should be able to do that whenever I want and I'm not making nearly enough money to make this worth it , worth it. So two months later is when I started my first blog kind of documenting my quarter life crisis. And I still, you know, right on that blog today and October of that year, left my job, moved to Thailand. Haven't looked back since.
Speaker 6:So you started the blog, was it a , was it like on a website or was it like a blog? It , what was that blog or ? No,
Speaker 7:I started it as sean ogle.com. My name, there's a guy, his name's Chris Gibo . So he had written, he had a blog called The Art of Non-Conformity. He had this goal of going to every country in the world by the time he was 35. And so I was like following this, you know, quest. He was blogging twice a week. I was like, man, this is so cool. I wanna be able to do this. I wanna travel all over. Like he is like, he was getting really close to this goal and he ended up moving to Portland. And so I sent him an email and was like, Hey, any chance I could buy you a cup of coffee? He agreed to it and he was the ones like, yeah, you should like, you should start a blog and like document , but
Speaker 6:You should do this. Like you do this .
Speaker 7:So I did it and then like a month, two later I went back, I said, all right, I did everything you said I should do now what should I do? He's like, well you should maybe try this. And you know, six months later I quit my job and basically been blogging full-time ever since.
Speaker 6:So how did you do that? Like, did you have to like start saving up? Cuz you're coming up with your plan right? To like really do it . Yeah. So I mean like how , like , I don't know , like how does that work? Like you just start selling stuff or what?
Speaker 7:No, so my buddy that I went to Rio with three weeks after we got back, he quit his job and moved to Hawaii and he is like, look, I'm just looking to like pay the bills while I'm here, like break even. And then in January that following year, he is gonna start a world trip. So I used to talk to him on my lunch break every day or like two, three times a week. And
Speaker 6:You were miserable.
Speaker 7:I was miserable. He's like living the life. He was working as a concierge at a hotel where they're like, yeah, they're like sending me to do all the stuff that all the guests need to do because I need to be able to talk about it. So he is like, yeah, we're, we're doing a, a helicopter , uh, sunset, you know, tour. We've got a dolphin booze cruise coming up , uh, next week. So he's living the life. And I'm like, okay, like clock's ticking. Like if he's traveling the world starting next January, I'm not gonna be able to like forgive myself if I'm still in this job that I'm gonna have .
Speaker 6:This is it. This is your chance. This is
Speaker 7:It. So I had this brilliant idea where my boss at one point, you know, we're struggling. They were still a new business. They had basically they were at a big like brokerage and decided to open their own ria , you know, registered investment advisor firm. So I started in
Speaker 6:2009 . <laugh> ? Yeah.
Speaker 7:Or 2007 .
Speaker 6:Oh, it was like literally so
Speaker 7:Right. Like everything was good when we started and then like a year later everything's gone to hell. Oh yeah . So that plan didn't work out the way they'd hoped. So he was like, that sucks, you know, if you can think of any creative ways to save the company money, I'd love to hear about it. And so I'm like, all right, I can come up with some creative ways to do this . So I put together a whole remote work proposal. I was like, if you let me work remotely for three months on a trial basis, I'll take a 50% pay cut. You won't have to pay for my parking. Uh, I'll open this up to a new client base. I'm gonna make you guys more like the company more secure as we figure out how to do this so that you can travel more. And we had like two or three meetings about it over the course of like six weeks. And I'm like, yeah, they're gonna go for this and I'm gonna move to Hawaii and go hang out and work my job and hang out with my buddy Ryan. And uh, he calls me into his office one day, he's like, Hey Sean , um, you know, let's chat about your your proposal. Um, so he calls me in, he is like, we decided not to accept your proposal, but we will accept this as your resignation <laugh>. Really?
Speaker 6:What a jerk. And
Speaker 7:I was like,
Speaker 6:Dude,
Speaker 7:You told me to come up with a creative way to save the company money. I just came up with a win-win creative solution. And so we went back and forth and you know, I had the opportunity to kind of save, you know, my job and in the end I was like,
Speaker 6:Yeah , for not even less money probably now too. Yeah . They're like , oh well if he's were to take 50% less then
Speaker 7:E Exactly. And so at that point I was like, you know what, screw this. I'm out, I'm out. Yeah , I'm out . And you know, I went home. That was, you know, October of 20 October of 2009, I like went home, cried like that night my girlfriend, now wife, we went to go see a movie and I woke up the next morning, went to the gym at 8:00 AM and was like, huh, Wednesday, you know, Jim at 8:00 AM like, I never could have done that. Alright , let's start blogging and see what we can turn this thing into. So, so yeah, so ended up creating a course called Location Rebel Academy about a year, year and a half later. And so that was how I really started kind of making money through the site, was kind of teaching people how to build small
Speaker 6:Online businesses, how to
Speaker 7:Transition, how to freelance write , how to make that transition. Could you
Speaker 6:Imagine if you were doing this like 10 years later, like 2019? Cause like you could have done a YouTube on that in like two seconds and there probably wouldn't have been a blog. It would've been you traveling the world doing cool. Well
Speaker 7:It's wild cuz like, you know, it's old school that was like what people used to do.
Speaker 6:That was what people did. Yeah.
Speaker 7:People check YouTube and check Instagram and check TikTok. Like , whoa ,
Speaker 6:Whatever . That's exactly, yeah,
Speaker 7:They're like waiting for like, I remember with Chris's blog like every Monday and every Thursday I'd be hitting refresh on his blog every Monday morning, be like, dude, gimme my fix. I need like my travel fix something to inspire me to go like, make these changes. Look for life . Yeah. So yeah, so it's been interesting to see the evolution, but I kind of think what's old is new again, you know , everybody was like all about social and obviously still are, but you know, when was the last time you Googled something and a TikTok showed up or an Instagram post or Facebook shows. So it's like if people are actually looking for helpful information , um, blogs are still the the best place to do it. YouTube is a little bit of a different story, but if you can do those two things in tandem, then you've got something really special. That's the
Speaker 6:Hard part. I think that's
Speaker 7:The partly easier said than done.
Speaker 6:Then you guys moved to Thailand, so then you got all this set up . Were you like, were you like freelancing? What were you doing? Like how'd you make
Speaker 7:Yeah, so this dude hit me up and he's like, Hey Sean , like just saw I've been following your blog for a while at this point. The blog was like six months old. He's like , I think what you're doing is awesome. Um, I've got this opportunity. I'm looking to bring an American dude out to Asia. I'll pay you your basic living expenses. You work for me part-time and I'll teach you internet marketing, seo. So you work for me 20 hours a week the rest of the time. You do whatever you want. So I told my girlfriend, it wasn't even really a conversation, it was like , uh, I am doing this. Like, if I don't make myself happy first and figure this out, I'm never gonna be able to make you happy. So I've gotta like take this opportunity. So beginning of January, I uh, flew to Bangkok, met this random dude from the airport, random dude from the internet at the airport at 1:00 AM <laugh> . And it was the best thing I ever could have done for my business and everything that I was doing.
Speaker 6:So was he doing like SEO and all that back then? Like
Speaker 7:Thousand 10 ? Yeah , he had , he had three websites. He had a valet podium website. So like, you know, you go to a fancy restaurant and they've got the like podium for the, the car valet where they put the keys and everything. So he manufactured valet podiums, one of the biggest valet podium manufacturers , uh, industrial key boxes and modern cat furniture. And so that's how I learned how to do online marketing, was through my blog and then doing SEO for Cat Furniture website and a valet podium website. And it's funny because I still like, at least a few times a year I'll go to a restaurant and there'll be one of their valet podiums sitting there. And I was like, that podium got me my start on the internet. <laugh>. That's
Speaker 6:Crazy.
Speaker 7:So ,
Speaker 6:Um, there's tons of SEOs in , uh, in Thailand, like Chang Mai , that's where they're all at. I know that.
Speaker 7:Yeah, it used to be in 2010, it was Bangkok and then everybody like, you know ,
Speaker 6:It's like , oh really ? I , it's been know
Speaker 7:Everybody went down to Bali in like 2011, 2012. Oh yeah, yeah . Then to Chiang Mai , then into like Ho Chi Min City and you know, all those are hotspots now. It's like everybody's a additional nomad. So all those places have tons and tons of people doing self
Speaker 6:Time , all
Speaker 7:Of it . It was kind of a , a relatively unique thing.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I have a bunch of friends that live in Chiang Mai and like, and they also live in Fuca part of the year too. Yeah,
Speaker 7:I mean, yeah, it's one to
Speaker 6:Be those places.
Speaker 7:I lived there for almost a year and never even made it up to Chiang Mai . Every time someone wanted to come visit, they wanted to go down to the islands. So it's like, all right , once a month we'll go down to the islands and hang out for a week or two. And
Speaker 6:It's like so cheap to live there, huh? Like it's super cheap.
Speaker 7:Yeah, I had a $200 a month apartment, but I mean, it didn't have a kitchen. It was one room. It was a total, you know, hole <laugh> .
Speaker 6:That's all right . You live life.
Speaker 7:It was like, at the time, like, you know, when I left my job, I only had 10 grand in the bank. So I was like, all right, I can live here cheaply. I can have an adventure. I've got world-class hai Thai food for, you know, a buck of pop outside a dollar , yeah. Dollar beers. Like, it was great. So I think I was like 25 at the time, 26, something like that. So, so it was ,
Speaker 6:How long were you, how long were you in Thailand then?
Speaker 7:About a year. A little less than a year. And
Speaker 6:Then what'd you do? You started moving all over the place? No ,
Speaker 7:So basically like my girlfriend at the time, she's like, Hey, like we had broken up for part of the time while I was there. She came out for the last month that I was there, and at the end she's like, all right , like, you can stay here if you want, but we're breaking up for good, or if you wanna continue this, then you need to come back to Portland. And so I went back to Portland and now we're married and have a kid and <laugh>. So I still still travel a lot and I still traveled quite a bit in those early days, but it was no more like seven, eight months stints. It's like, all right , go for, I did two months, two months in Bali the next year. And then after that it was a lot of like two week trips, three week trips, things like that.
Speaker 6:So you still have location rebel , right? Yep . And your core , do you still have your course or no?
Speaker 7:Yeah, we've had over 5,000 members go through it over the last 10 years, 11 years. Holy crap, dude . Um, so, so yeah, most of what we do now is teach people how to build freelance writing businesses. I think freelance writing's the easiest way to make money on the internet. So if you're someone you don't like your job , uh, you're not happy with where you're at, you're trying to figure out how you can make a little bit of money on your own, I think freelance writing's the best way to do it. And so that's , and
Speaker 6:You're a decent writer and you speak English, like Exactly. And they can like,
Speaker 7:And even if you're not that great of a writer, there's lower level , you know, types of work out there that you can find opportunities with. But especially if you've got like a high school degree, you know, that level of writing, then there's a lot of opportunities out there
Speaker 6:I feel like on , not blog, I'm not saying blog, but like on websites, I think there's like different levels of, of copyright, you know, so like, it's like an everyday person talking, or is it like, you know, more analytical I guess? Totally.
Speaker 7:And you get into like, you know, the difference between like an SEO focused informational article that's 750 words and it's like, okay, like most people can Google, you know, spend 20 or 30 minutes of learning what they need to learn and write that article. And then you've got like high-end copywriting, persuasion sales pages trying to make sales. Yeah . Which obviously you have to have a certain expertise to do that. And so, and then there's kind of everywhere in between technical writing , uh, con like regular blog content writing , um, you know, writing scripts for YouTube or social media, and obviously AI's kind of changing all of this or evolving at all, but there's still lots of different opportunities out there. Yeah,
Speaker 6:I totally agree. That's crazy. 5,000 people through course, so you get traffic from that annual of the course. That's brilliant. So then when did you start breaking 80?
Speaker 7:So I started breaking 80 in the summer of 2012. And basically it was kind of like, you know what, I've kind of figured out this blogging thing, let's apply it to something that I'm really passionate about. And so at the time, I was golfing a lot and I went out and I played , uh, there's a course in Central Oregon called Pronghorn, which was got two courses, but one of 'em was Top 100 Public Still Is. And I played that course and it was the first like really nice golf course I played and was like, oh man, this is cool. I wanna play more courses like this. And so I started breaking 80 in part because there weren't really many good golf sites out at the time, like nobody was doing what they're doing on YouTube or Instagram or any of that stuff. Um, and also I was like, all right, well now I wanna go play more of these courses. Let's make a goal. Let's go play the top 100 public courses in the country and I'll document the whole thing and the, you know, website will be the outlet for that. And so I started doing it and the more I traveled and the more courses I played, I was kinda like, well, if I'm like, you know, going to the middle of nowhere in Michigan to go play these, you know, public courses, I'd really like to see the, the top 100, like the best of the best, the ones that include a lot of private courses. So I started then making the goal of the top 100, not just the top 100 public . Then I took a trip to Scotland and at one point I had played more of the top 100 in the world than I had in the us . Well , I was like, cool, well let's expand this. We'll play the top 100 courses in the world. And so now it's just kind of, it's evolved to the point where I just like playing cool golf courses with cool people and you know, I'm still kind of tracking the list I'm at, like, I think I mentioned I'm at 52 out of a hundred , uh, on the top 100 World list. Um, but I don't write about that side of things as much. There's lots of other people that are doing it now. Um, so it's just kind of a , a fun little side project. And I'll occasionally share some of the course reviews and photos and everything, but it's not necessarily the primary focus of the site, how it was early on.
Speaker 6:When did you start pivoting off of just the courses? I
Speaker 7:Was always doing some product stuff mixed in there , but yeah , it was probably like 20 16, 20 17, 20 17, 20 18, where I started realizing that the product reviews got a lot more traffic than the course reviews did. And so I was like, all right , well let's , let's try a few more of these and see what happens. And so then it just kind of snowballed from there.
Speaker 6:At the same time though, you're still running Location Rebel and you had a YouTube channel for that, right? So when did you start the YouTube channel for Location Rebel?
Speaker 7:So I technically started it in like 2011 and I'd like do it for a little bit and then stop, then do it for a little bit and stop. But it was like 2018 is when I really kind of restarted it and stayed consistent with it all the way through. Um, so I would say 2018 is when I really got serious about it.
Speaker 6:That's for Location Rebel though, right?
Speaker 7:For location Rebel, yeah. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> .
Speaker 6:So then you started focusing more on the golf. Yep . And then when did you s really start like honing in on YouTube for breaking 80?
Speaker 7:Yeah, so I started, I , I don't know if that was when I officially started it, but I really got, yeah, the YouTube channel going March of last year. So March of 2022. Um , you can see
Speaker 6:That. I mean, dude, you've gotten like 10,000 new followers in like a year, which is awesome. Yeah ,
Speaker 7:Well basically what happened was the blog was doing really well and I was like, look, I've done over 300 YouTube videos for Breaking 80 or for Location Rebel . So it's like I kind of got the YouTube drill down at least a little bit. And the reason I didn't wanna get into it with golf is like the amount of time and effort. It's like , man, I'm gonna have to go to the course, I'm gonna have to set up the camera. All of a sudden you have to start thinking about like lighting and audio and being compelling and all the product
Speaker 6:Shots and slowing people down and blah, blah, blah . Slowing people down. Oh, I know. It's
Speaker 7:Sucks so much that goes into that. Yeah, it's a lot. And so I was like, you know what, I don't wanna do that, but maybe there's an opportunity to, you know, review the products. All the products I've already reviewed, I'm going out to the course, I'm using them, I'm, you know, testing them out. I'm doing the written reviews ,
Speaker 6:Everything about it.
Speaker 7:Yeah. So what if I just did the exact same setup that I'm doing for Location Rebel , like in my home office , um, and just talk about the products and you know, I'll throw in some B-roll or whatever, but it goes from like a whole production of having to think about all the video quality and everything. Let's just, you know, talk about it and see what happens. And I think what my thought is, what happened is so many of the people that are doing product reviews on the courses , you end up with like a lot of like dead time where they're fumbling around, they're hitting shots, a lot of them , some of them might be more compelling because there's a lot of visuals. Some people are funnier than me, so there's more entertainment value. But with my product reviews, it's like, it's pretty much like, cool, I'm gonna sit here, I'm gonna tell you all the pros and cons very quickly. Like, you know, pretty well edited what you need to know, what you need to know quickly. And I think that that's what a lot of people are looking for. So it ended up, you know, doing better than I expected it to.
Speaker 6:It's really, like I said , I'm a fan. I saw your break in 80 site like three or four years ago. I remember seeing it. Yeah . And I was like, and I remember reading your bio a long time. I'm like , oh , it's really cool. Like, I just remember reading that . I , I just remember, I don't know why. Cause when I was getting ready for today's show, I was like, I've been reading this before, but you're right. Like, oh , I think it's what's so interesting about YouTube is that like everyone does it differently. There's no right or wrong way of doing it. It's just how you do it or how you figure out how to do it, I guess is a better way of saying it. Like Totally.
Speaker 7:And so there's a big part of me that's like, man, I need to do more OnCourse stuff or more, you know, when I'm traveling and playing courses, doing some of the like course vlogs and stuff like that. But kinda what I realized is if I'm like, we just did a trip to Australia and so played seven new courses while I was down there and was like, I'm trying to, you know, play golf. I'm trying to socialize with the people I'm playing with. I'm trying to take photos.
Speaker 6:There's a family's a
Speaker 7:Family , I'm with my family, I'm trying to take photos on the golf course. Doing possible is is just too much. It's like one thing too many , it's ,
Speaker 6:It's almost impossible. I'm not saying it's not fully impossible. Cause I, I mean, a year ago when I started doing YouTube, like full-time, I , I , I mean honestly it's true story. I would hire somebody to come film me. Yeah . Here in the studio I'd get a videographer. Um, they did a good job. Nothing wrong with the videographer, but like if you hire a wedding photographer or a videographer, someone who does not do YouTube, they have no idea what they're doing. Right? Yeah . They like, they can take good video, but they don't know how to edit. They don't know how the angles, they don't any , they don't, they don't know. It's a whole other like, I feel type of art, let's call it. Yeah . And I think like for me then I was like really nervous having to start and be like, well, I'm gonna film myself. And I knew nothing and I just started , you know, I watched those first couple of videos I made. I'm like , oh man, these are terrible .
Speaker 7:Well that's, I know you're doing something right. If you go back and look at those old videos and you're like , man, these suck <laugh>.
Speaker 6:I look at those like ,
Speaker 7:You know , you've gotten better and you've gotten, you've improved. And I hope that a year from now, like I , I think my videos are pretty good right now, but I hope a year from now I look back and I was like, Ooh , that's bad. <laugh> .
Speaker 6:Yeah. It's like now I feel like with my videos, I think my videos are doing a lot . I think my are are way better than they were before. But again, you're right to the point where it's very difficult. And there's only a couple YouTubers that I know that are doing it themselves where were filming yourself. And I'm not saying if they have an editor or not, but just filming yourself is a huge pain in the. Like , it's just a huge pain in the. Especially if you're trying to play because you don't wanna slow down the game. You don't wanna off the other people you're playing with. You wanna be able to get all your talking points while playing. It's just a lot of ,
Speaker 7:So there's so many dynamics that kind of come into play there. And so that's where I kinda made the decision. I was like, if I have to deal with all of that, I'm not going to do it. And if I'm going to start YouTube, it needs to be consistent. It needs to be something I can keep up with.
Speaker 6:Yeah , you can bust it out and blow it out.
Speaker 7:Yeah . So there's a lot I could do better, but the way I'm doing it now at least allows me to get the content help out that is hopefully going to help people. I mean, it's, the whole reason I did it is to get people to the point where it helps them make their buying decisions and maybe be a little bit of entertained on the way's why , um, and you know, stay consistent. But as soon as it's like there's too many barriers to entry, then I'm not gonna do it and it's not gonna be worth it. So I
Speaker 6:Mean , the next barrier to entry really is like, okay, if you go on course, like if you wanna do it the right way, you need someone to follow you with a camera. Exactly . That's what they're looking for . Like, that's it. And like, who am I talking to? Uh , Shawn knows this, but I was at true Link Square's golf tournament this weekend. Right. And there's a bunch of influencers there. And I was talking to somebody, I'm not gonna say who it was , and they said that, and I agreed with them a hundred percent. They go, you can't really ask a golf course, can I film on course, right. You see , to go film it . Because really if you go and ask, usually they're gonna say no or they're gonna say, oh yeah , it's 1500 bucks. But they told me , I'm like, somebody's gonna charge you extra money. It's like, yeah, they want $1,500 . And I was like, are you serious? And every time I've asked the course, they've, they've said no, or they said, oh, I have to go to my marketing manager or some other story. And I was like, we've just gone filmed and it would've been done. And you got
Speaker 7:Get to the second, third hole. They got no idea. You're out there and you're good to go. <laugh> . Oh
Speaker 6:Yeah, seriously. And, and you guys plug the course and see how great it is. Like, so it's almost like you have to be like secretive, you know what I mean? Not secretive, but which I don't know . So I like ,
Speaker 7:And if courses were smart, they would recognize, be like, cool. Like these are the times of, you know, the, the week that we're not super busy. You can come out, you can do everything you need to do. And if you know you wanna help us out, give us a plug, say that's where you're doing it. And everybody wins. <laugh>.
Speaker 6:Like, he was telling me , he went to a , like he's a , he's based out of LA and he said the chorus were telling him, he's like, look , I'll come in first thing in the morning. It's dark. Like before anything happens we'll get out, we'll get out for No. Everyone said no to him . I was like, really? And he works with a really big golf club manufacturer in Carlsbad. I'm not gonna say who it is, but like, they still couldn't like, and I was like, you know what, that's, that's, that's like the third time I've heard this. I think like the people that are in the United States trying to do on-course review, there's only a couple of us really, I think. And I mean, I'm not like a big one. Um, but you have to have that relationship with the chorus or you just gotta go do it and then hopefully the people you're playing with are not gonna be off at you.
Speaker 7:Yeah , for sure. Which , and I mean more, more power to you. It's one of those things I would love to
Speaker 6:Do more. No, no . I'm not saying the right way of doing it. I'm
Speaker 7:Just like, Hey , no, I think it's, but if you do it the right way, then you're providing that much more information for the viewer. You're giving them more visuals, they're allowing, like allow them to see the product and get kind of real time feedback with how it goes. And if you do that well, I think that's more compelling than what I'm doing. But um, you know, I just know if I were to go out myself, I don't think I'd be able to do it very well.
Speaker 6:Well I don't feel like I'm doing it well and I feel like, I mean, you're not gonna play golf. You're just, you're literally running to take a shot to do the watch, you know, talk about the feature, run to the next thing, set the tripod, you know, cause you're trying to keep pace of play . Like you don't , you could probably score a 50, you know, on a part on a , on a nine hole course or 60 because you don't have time to even think like you're just trying to like, and then you're trying to like , I'll have my iPad and I'll go through it and be like, oh crap, I still have to do that talking point. You know, whatever that is. You know?
Speaker 7:Yeah. The bigger, the bigger your brand gets, the less you play golf, that's for sure.
Speaker 6:Yeah. I mean I just, I like what you're doing. I think it's really smart. What a smart way. I love having people like me on the show. Like I think it's so cool to hear how people do it differently and it's smart cuz you're able to, you'll be able to get it done in a consistent manner. You control all the variables. You know, if I spend two, three hours on this today, I can get this video done and I'm not gonna have to worry about running around and it could look like. Or the sun could be above your head or the audio's messed up cause they're on the lawn or whatever.
Speaker 7:So that's what's worked for me. We'll see, you know , I think we'll,
Speaker 6:We'll you're doing experiment
Speaker 7:With some more stuff and , and branch things out, you know, especially as I've got some travel coming up and you'll potentially do some like travel vlogs and, but I don't know if people are gonna be into that. It's like you said, it's like you've kinda got your narrow niche and so if you go too far beyond that, then sometimes the audience isn't into it or the algorithm isn't into it and you don't get any views and it's not worth all the extra time and effort. So who knows?
Speaker 6:I was talking to somebody and they recommended like, if you're gonna do something outside what you normally do, it's like a two or three to one ratio. Like do two or three of you normally do and then plop it in there and then do three . Like, so like it's
Speaker 7:Like one for me, four for you
Speaker 6:<laugh> . Yeah, exactly. And then or videos
Speaker 7:For your audience. One video that I wanna do <laugh>,
Speaker 6:But wouldn't . Okay . Let but be honest though. Wouldn't you love to be able to just go play 18 at a cool course and vlog it like isn't like that? That's that to me that's like the epitome of what I wanna do. Right? Talk, have fun, enjoy , like have the day, encapsulate that in video. But it's like, there's only so many brands that do a really good job of that. And it's like,
Speaker 7:Well, and with that, for me, I've done a little bit of that and some of those videos have done well, some of them have been really fun, but you have to have the right people in your group. So I'm finding like if you're doing it with other quote unquote influencers or people that do similar things to us , um, then, then it can be really fun. So they're like, all right , what can we do to get content? Um, so I was playing , uh, pebble Beach a few years ago down for a charity event with, you know, three other people , uh, Kyle Mays, cart barn guys, Hannah and Fred who have big Instagram accounts and they're all good golfers. They're all like plus handicaps. And me being like 10 or 11, so with each one of 'em I was like, all right , I get one stroke and I'm gonna do like a one hole match with you at Pebble Beach. And so shot a bunch of videos around that. We went to like the, the fourth hole at a spyglass, you know, big 110 foot long green. It had like a putting challenge. And so those little kind of like microcosms that you can do , I think are a lot of fun. Um, but the reason it worked is because they were all in the exact same mode. I was. We like, cool, I wanna create a , a fun video for my audience. Smart . But if you're playing with just three other people that don't care about YouTube and don't wanna be on camera, then it's really difficult to create that type of content .
Speaker 6:Well that's why like, you know, like Bob does sports does a good job cuz they're all characters, right? Yeah . Like it's funny, like it's entertaining. Good, good. You know, each team is good. Good. They all have their own character, right? Like whoever they're , that the role they play, whatever that role is .
Speaker 7:And that's the , the people that are doing that type of stuff the best are the ones that have in most cases, like a group or at at least a few different people where personalities can play off each other.
Speaker 6:Yeah. And two, three camera guys, whether they're playing and two , three guys that helps. Yeah . And editors and they , the course wants 'em to be there. Not like your uh ,
Speaker 7:And the sound guy holding up the boom mic
Speaker 6:And the sound guy following 'em . Yeah. All those small things that we found . Don't
Speaker 7:Forget the drone operator, you gotta have a dedicated drone.
Speaker 6:Oh yeah . You got the drone to fly by and the really cool stuff.
Speaker 7:Stop doing this myself. Get more people involved.
Speaker 6:Yeah. I wish that would be cool. I know. Good, good . Was here last night, was it last night? Yeah, last night they were in Arizona doing the thing. So like what's in store for your channel or for you this year coming up,
Speaker 7:Man, so right now I'm just working through, you know, it's, you know, may, I've still got products that I got in March, April that we're trying to kinda get reviews outs that, that time of the year. So a lot of that type of content , um, I still do have a whole bunch of travel stuff that I'm, I'd like to get out. So once we kinda get through the product reviews, got a lot of photos to edit and I wanna share that side of things. Um , have a few trips coming up. So one of the things I haven't mentioned is I have a golf society called the 80 Club. So that is basically a golf society for private club members around the world. Um , so as I was starting my kind of top 100, you know, quest, I was getting a bunch of people who are members at some of these cool clubs around the world that's like, Hey, you know, if you're in New York, I'm a member of such and such club, I'd love to have you out. So at the end of 2016, I was like, you know, this was before a thousand Greens was a thing. There weren't a ton of golf societies out there. I was like, there's gotta be a way to introduce these people to each other. They all need to know each other and turn it into a business for myself. So I started the 80 Club. Um, we're at over 200 members now. Um, and so we do a handful of events every year. So we're going to , uh, Alberta gonna go play, you know , uh, Banff Springs, Jasper, a few other courses over there. No , pretty , uh, we , we have a band trip coming up in November, like 20 guys, so it's gonna be good. So some travel for that. Um, handful of kind of media type things, going to a few different places to few resorts and that type of thing. So mostly just continuing to do what I'm doing. <laugh> more of the same. It's all, all been working pretty well and people seem to enjoy it, so just trying to give them as much of it as I can.
Speaker 6:No, it's really cool. I mean, you're so dev , you're , you're so diverse, man. Like, seriously, like, it's cool because, you know, it's not like you're just, oh, I do product review, you know, it's like, no, I have this whole other thing with like, you know, en course , you know, not vlog style , but like encore checking out the courses, doing reviews of world famous courses. You have the club, which I forgot about. Talk about that. That's how, like how big is that? Does that get each year? Like more people keep on joining or how does that work?
Speaker 7:Yeah, you know, I will say being totally honest, COVID was a challenge. You know, we had eight or nine events that all got canceled. Uh , beginning of 2021 I had a kid <laugh> . So all of a sudden my times changed . Yeah.
Speaker 6:Cut in half.
Speaker 7:Travel wasn't happening. So just now we're starting, I'm starting to kind of get re-energized with it and you know, it was pretty plateaued, pretty stagnant for a while , but now we're starting to get some new people in and it's been exciting to kind of get excited about it again as opposed to, you know, having everything planned. And it's like, oh , you know, COVID gotta cancel that, gotta cancel that, gotta cancel that. So , um, so it's taken a few years to kinda get back to it, but it's been , uh, it's been a lot of fun. The group is, is great. A lot of very well traveled and really interesting people in there
Speaker 6:To hang out with and a bits of fun times too. And you could have played really cool courses.
Speaker 7:Yeah, we did an event last year at , uh, Oak Hill, which, you know, they've got the P G A championship. Um, so we stayed on property there for three nights and played four rounds of golf. And so, so that was really cool to be able to do that type of thing. Super cool Is is really special.
Speaker 6:Where can people find you?
Speaker 7:So youtube.com/breaking 80 , it's always spelt out. E I G H T Y, Instagram at breaking 80 , um, or breaking eighty.com. Um, you know, it's probably the best place to start. You can go get a sense of what we're doing on the site and , uh, if there's a specific type of product you're looking for , uh, there's a good chance we've probably , uh, reviewed it for. Well,
Speaker 6:I really appreciate you being on the show. I , like I said, I've been a fan for a long time. I remember , like, I, I swear to God, I remember finding your articles like back in 17. I definitely do. Um, so it's cool to see how fast you've grown on YouTube too, and that you're, you're doing it your way, which is, it's cool to see that. Cause I feel like YouTube's a , it's , it's so much an algorithm, but then it's like finding the right way that works best for you, but huge , huge supporter of the show. Um , I love what you're doing and uh, you guys need to check out Sean's website and YouTube channel. But I will see you guys in the next episode.
Speaker 3:Thanks for listening to another episode of Behind the Golf Brand podcast. You're gonna beat me the golf stay connected on and off the show by visiting golfers authority.com. Don't forget to like, subscribe and leave a comment.