How SB Mowing Gained 16,000,000 Followers In Under 2 Years

Mike Kyle
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Contractor Growth Network podcast. I’m your host, Mike Kyle, and today I have who I would consider a white whale sitting in the guest chair. He’s somebody that you probably know. You’ve probably seen his content all over YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok. It’s SB mowing. The man, the myth, the legend. He has over 16 million subscribers and followers across social media. Spencer, welcome to the podcast.

Spencer
Hey, thanks for having me. I’m happy to be here.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, if you are. If you are subscribed to our YouTube channel. A few weeks ago, I put out a kind of a deep dive into all of Spencer’s content and how he makes his videos, almost like a psychological standpoint. There’s a lot of really great tips there. And so that is how we actually got connected. And, Spencer, this was all kind of part of the plan, if I may kind of pull you behind the curtain. It was, all right, let’s make this video here, and let’s see if he. If he will, you know, see it, get recognized. So let’s just start there. How did you even come across that video?

Spencer
So, actually, my friend said he saw some. Some video somewhere that said, who is SB mowing? So I just looked up on YouTube, who is SB mowing? And your video came up, and it was just upload, like, a few days ago. And I think that’s what he was talking about. So, yeah, one of my, like, in, you know, real life friends found it and kind of pointed me in the direction of it. And then I watched the whole thing, and I was absolutely blown away by it because I. I felt like you just ripped my skull open and, like, picked all the pieces out of my brain from my entire business and pretty much got them all right.

Mike Kyle
So, yeah, that is. That is awesome. I love, like, that is, like, the serendipity of content. Like, a lot of the conversation we’re gonna be having today is around, you know, content creation, how to do it for your own business. And like that’s what we talk about a lot, where it’s, you never know who is watching, whether it’s your next podcast guest that’s watching or if it’s your next high paying client. You know, everybody is consuming content at all times. So that is a perfect example of the serendipity of it all. But, Spencer, let’s just kind of dive right in. Who are you for those that don’t know what is SB mowing? And just kind of give us your background a little bit.

Spencer
Yeah. So I’m Spencer. I live in Wichita, Kansas, born and raised here. And, you know, I’ve been, I started my lawn care business. I think it’s about twelve years ago now. I was in 6th grade, and I started with my friend. You know, we just push our push, our dad’s pushmars down the street and try to do a couple, and then it just started growing from there. And we eventually kind of went our separate ways. And, you know, through high school, I did it, and I got one employee in high school and, you know, eventually got my own truck and trailer. And then I went off to college about two and a half hour drive away from here to K State. And I studied computer science.

Spencer
And on the weekends, you know, to help pay for college, I drive back almost every single weekend during the season. And I had a crew that was helping me, but then I’d also go out and mow just to keep on top of all the lawns. I think we’re doing about 60 weekly accounts and then some bi weekly ones on top of that. So I was pretty busy trying to get it done in, you know, every weekend in college and driving back and forth all the time. And then a few months after I got out of college, you know, I saw some other people on social media. I was addicted to YouTube and TikTok, and I would just watch it all the time. So I saw some other people going out and doing free lawn mowing.

Spencer
And I’ve always wanted to start a social media channel. And I thought about doing, like, I actually tried doing stocks and investing and because I’m super big into that and financial stuff, but I kind of got burned out doing that pretty quick. It was a lot of tough research and hard work, and then I saw some people doing the trend where they go and they mow for free for people. I’m like, hey, I’ll try that. So I did my first video, blew up on TikTok and got like 7 million views. And then my second video I ever put out on YouTube, I think it’s up like 13 million now. So I’m really fortunate that I was able to have success that quickly. And it kind of showed me, you know, what social media can do for you and for your life, for your business.

Spencer
And the funny thing is, once I saw those numbers, I’m like, all right, I don’t have any kids. I’m not married yet. I’m married now, but I wasn’t married at the time. And I just thought, you know, it’s a, let’s take this risk and a month after doing YouTube, I quit my full time job as a programmer. I was making a good salary. I’m like, you know, this is my dream. I’m going to go full time at it. So I just went hard at it, spent, you know, I don’t even know how much time, 60, 80 hours a week, you know, mowing, editing, just trying to build up a platform.

Spencer
So I kind of, my story is, you know, I just kind of went all in at first and, you know, by this point it’s, it’s definitely paid off and I’m glad I did, but I took a huge risk by doing that for sure.

Mike Kyle
Your story is so crazy and you just gave me so many different points that I can jump off of. So my first question is, Spencer, how old are you right now?

Spencer
I am 24.

Mike Kyle
All right, so you’re 24. So twelve years ago you started your lawn mowing business in 6th grade. You know, you just recently took the jump into content. It’s been what, less than two years, give or take.

Spencer
Yeah, it’ll be two years in September.

Mike Kyle
Okay. So the reason why I wanted to spotlight that is just because like one, me and you, like, we are of the age where it’s like social media and you know, becoming like a youtuber or like being an online creator like that is in the back of our mind at some point has always been a goal. Right. That’s why I am quite in this seat right now. It’s why you’re crushing it. And so for you, what it’s almost like kind of going into like the business side of things because this is the question that I had where it’s the business model.

Mike Kyle
So you had paying clients when you were growing your business and you were paying through school, did you now make a transition where it’s like, all right, I’m only going to go for this free route and the business is now the content or do you also still have paying clients to date?

Spencer
So the first, so I started, let’s see, two September’s ago, I kept my clients and I had another crew that would go and mow those throughout the week. And so I got to the point where I was only focusing on dealing with the clients on the back end, on the phone, scheduling stuff up. And then I would actually go work and do the videos and stuff that it just got a little bit too much. The content started taking off and I kind of wanted to just not even worry about my lawn care business anymore. So I actually just this year, just a couple months ago, I turned it over to my brother. He bought all my equipment off of me for the business, the trailer, the truck.

Spencer
And so I’ve got my own separate truck, and I’ve got a ramp rack and stuff and my own separate equipment that I used for the content. So he bought all the business stuff off of me, and I gave him the clients. So he’s running the business now, and because he’s in college, that’s a good side job for him. And this year is the first time I’m actually 100% focused on content, which is really nice.

Mike Kyle
And the decision behind that was just, like, your attention was just too split up, and obviously you saw the content performing as well as it did. And it’s like, all right, I I’m kind of like, this crossroads. I probably can’t do both. I just need to pick one.

Spencer
Yeah, I probably could have done both, but I couldn’t put all the effort that I absolutely wanted to into the content and, you know, the content. At that point, I was making more money off the content than the lawn mowing business. So I just wanted to kind of, you know, take that leap and be like, hey, like, this is it. Like, this is my career, so I’m going to do it.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, that’s awesome. In terms of employees, you just kind of said a few times, you know, you had at least several crews before, one, two, or maybe even three.

Spencer
What.

Mike Kyle
What did that look like in terms of you had one crew that was really just running, like, the client side, and then you had your crew that was maybe helping you out for the content, or, like, how did you even get to that point where you realize, oh, I’m going to need to hire a crew or two?

Spencer
Yeah. So I hired the crew when I went to college just because I didn’t have, like, I wasn’t home, so I didn’t have enough time myself to go out and mow. So I got my brother and two other guys, and they would go out three days a week, and then I would come back on the weekends and maybe do some clients lawns. But it’s only me on the content side of it. I don’t have anyone recording. My wife helps me edit now, but starting out, it was just me going up and knocking on doors, going up and, you know, spending all day doing the lawns. And then they would have, they would be out doing the client side of it.

Spencer
So when I got home at night, you know, I’d be sending out invoices, charging clients, talking clients, but during the day, yeah, it was just me out and about in the field.

Mike Kyle
Gotcha. And I think that’s a really good segue to talk. Kind of move into our last section here. The content. The big. The big boy here that we’re just gonna be spending some time focusing on. Walk me through this. Okay. That feeling when your first tech talk pops. Right. I’ve had TikToks and just content that’s done well. I know other people that have just kind of gotten into their content and then their first few pieces kind of take off for you. When you saw that your first TikTok did 7 million views, what was going through your mind?

Spencer
It’s kind of hard to comprehend how many, like, 7 million people is. And so, like, what I would do. I mean, obviously, right when it goes, like, I’m refreshing my phone every, like, two minutes, like. Like, just seeing the number go up, like, constantly. I’m doing that for the first few days. And then I remember specifically going to a college football game at K State, and I was sitting in the stadium. I’m like, dang, take this stadium and fill it a hundred times over. And that. And that’s how many people saw my video. I’m like, that’s like. Like, it’s. It’s. It’s so hard to compromise. Like, comprehend that amount. And that’s just one video. So it’s like. It’s just unreal how. How much reach you can get on social media.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. And sticking to that point, you know, at the top of the podcast, I said, you have 16 million followers across social media. Like, just hearing that out loud, because I’ll be honest, when I. You know, when I made that video of you, it was like, I went through your YouTube, I went through your TikTok, and I like, all right. You know, this dude’s got a pretty big follower base. I think you’re between the two. It was around, like, 6 million. And then I saw on Facebook you had five, and then I saw on Instagram you had another three, and I was like, oh, my goodness. The SD mowing world is twice, three times as large as I originally thought it was. So hearing 16 million followers, like, what is, like, describe what that is.

Mike Kyle
Like, actually, like, the speed at which that happened, because, you know, and I know, you know, we. You know, you said you love YouTube, right? You were just a content junkie, and you love kind of creating. So you know how hard it is for people to really break through a space. I mean, forget the glass ceiling. You broke through the glass door, right?

Spencer
Yeah.

Mike Kyle
In this. So walk me through that. Just that 16 million number and kind of like, what that means.

Spencer
Yeah, it’s. It’s just crazy thinking about that. Like, how many people specifically click that follow button, you know, on each platform? And the weird thing is, a lot of the platforms don’t mix. Like, the people that watch YouTube, they don’t go watch videos on Facebook and, like, follow pages on Facebook. Like, they’re completely different audiences. So, like, it’s really weird that 16 million people, that’s. I think that’s more than the entire state that I live in. You know, follow my. My channel, and I actually just put together the amount of views that I have throughout all my channels. It’s like 1.7 billion, which is absolutely crazy. Like, oh, my gosh. It’s just. It’s just weird to think about, like, even still, it’s. It’s. It’s hard to comprehend. And, like, it. It doesn’t seem like it because, you know, I just.

Spencer
I’m just a normal dude. I just don’t know. I like to go out to eat every now and again and mow some lawns and, you know, I got millions of people watching. Billions of people or billions of views. So, yeah, it’s. It’s nuts.

Mike Kyle
So I don’t want to, like, dive into, like, the business side of things, like, too much because I don’t want, obviously, you to share more than you want to. But is it crazy for you because, you know, running a lawn care business or any kind of, you know, contracting business, you know, as our clients do, like, you can be successful, like, very, like, financially successful. Like, it. The money’s there. What’s crazy is when you build up a following of 16 million people and your YouTube’s taken off and everything else is kind of booming, is it crazy to think that the upside of that is higher than what it would be if you, like, just kept running your business and growing it to, you know, your area in your community even further?

Spencer
Yeah, it’s crazy. And not only that, like, I always tell people, like, I’ve got the coolest business model, so, like, I get to help people out. They can’t afford it and that really need it. I get to make money myself doing that, so I get to help them out for free so they don’t have to pay anything, and I get to make money myself doing it, and I don’t have to. Like, I mean, eventually I might hire employees, but right now, I’m just like, it’s just my wife and I running this the show. So, you know, I get to be an entrepreneur. I get to do what I love, so I get to go out and help people and then I get to go home and edit the videos. I don’t love editing, but I like it.

Spencer
I like making a good video, but editing is a lot of work sometimes.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, I know that all too well. All too well. On that note of doing it for free and being able to help people in your community, where did that come from? Because I said this in the video and as I was editing it, I didn’t feel great about how it came off, but I was like, oh, you know, like, one of the things that we love about, like, Spencer’s video is the concept of free because it is so foreign in american culture. Like, what do you mean you’re doing this for free. You’re spending your time, money, equipment, energy on these homes and on, you know, members of your community, and you’re not getting anything really back in return for it. So where did that concept come from?

Mike Kyle
I know you said, like, you watch some other people, but was it just like, inherent to you? Like, yeah, I want to do, like, good for my community.

Spencer
Yeah, it was really cool. I mean, there’s two channels I can think of that we’re doing it before me and that’s lawn care juggernaut and top notch lawn care. I’m good friends with both of them and actually top notch lawn care is in my area and I got hooked on their content and it’s, you know, seeing that, I think it’s kind of like addicting or something. Like watching that concept of that’s super abstract. But then they’re helping people and, you know, there’s a lot of haters in the comments, like, oh, you aren’t doing this for free. You’re making money. It’s like, yeah, I’m making money from it, but Google’s paying me and Facebook’s paying me.

Spencer
It’s, you know, like I’m doing it for free for the homeowner and they’re getting probably a $2,000 service that they can’t afford and the city’s probably going to come cut it and put a lien on their house. So I’m able to help people out by doing it that way and I’m able to beautify our neighborhoods, you know, because here in Woodshot, there’s some neighborhoods that every other lawn is just crazy. And so it’s kind of cool. Yeah. Just being able to help people out and do it as a business. Like, it’s so cool.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. And, I mean, it’s awesome, too, because I saw that you also got recognized by the city of Wichita. Right. For doing this work and kind of being like that outstanding member of your community. So that was awesome to see as well, even, like, the city is recognizing the work that you’re doing.

Spencer
Yeah, it was. It was really cool. And, like, a lot of people know me around here, and I can’t really. I don’t go out with my t shirt anymore. I’m not recognized without my t shirt. So, like, I just go out with a normal shirt and feel like a normal person. And then, you know, if I’m working and I go to a gas station or go grab dinner afterwards, like, it’s. It’s weird that people know me. They’re like, hey, I watch your videos all the time. Like, love it. It was actually cool because I was a potential sponsor came, and it’s an equipment sponsor, and he was going around to some dealers around the area talking to them, and he has to meet up with me.

Spencer
So he took me to dinner, and I had, like, two or three people come up to me during that, and I’m like, yeah, this is, like, the best way to show off to a sponsor. Like. Like, just random people recognizing me.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. You just recently, one of your videos that you posted, I think maybe it might have been, like, a month or two ago, you know, you were just doing a lawn, and you had two people drive by past you, like, stop and pull over and ask to take a picture with you.

Spencer
Yeah. So the. The cool thing about that is we actually traveled to Texas and Florida this winter so that we can get content while it was snowy here in Kansas. And, wow, I’ve never been recognized while working before. And so we drove down to Texas, and literally the first lawn that I do, two people came up and they recognized me. Want to get pictures and everything, like, while I was working. So, yeah, that was really cool.

Mike Kyle
Another great segue into the content strategy that. What you just said, I want to stick on that. Okay. You. You live in Kansas. It gets cold. I’m also from the midwest, so I understand that. What was it in you to decide to, like, drive to Texas, to Florida, like, with your gear? I would imagine, because you need it in order to do these projects, to actually, like, keep the content going, because one of the things I was going to ask you was, do you do, like, do you record several. Several lawns a week? Are you doing one a week? Like, what’s your general workflow?

Spencer
Like, I so right now I’m trying to do multiple weeks so I can save up so that we don’t have to travel as much this winter. But, you know, this last winter was the first time I was, you know, full time doing this. So I’m like, I told my wife, I’m like, all right, I’m taking this seriously. Like, I’m not missing a single weekly upload this winter. Like, we’re gonna go figure it out. So we traveled to, first we traveled to Tampa, Florida, because I have a friend there, and we thought it’d be cool to visit him and then go, Bo. So we stayed there for two weeks and did something like ten jobs or something, and then, so that got us out about two and a half months.

Spencer
And then we also went to Corpus Christi, Texas, and Waco, Texas, to get us the rest of the way through the winter. So we’ll go travel for, like, two weeks and just get as much as we can. And then I really wanted to do that because none of the other long guys are uploading in the winter. So it, like, it just sets me way far apart and gives me, you know, that head start and gets my momentum going on all the platforms just way early. And it just continues my momentum because I never stop. So it’s continuing it from the last fall, and I think that’s a really big reason why. This last spring was, like, really big for me, and I gained a ton of followers and views just this year so far.

Mike Kyle
And what’s your general week to week workflow like? So just kind of now really diving into the content side of things. I have my own workflow. I have different ideas that I’ve recommended to some of our clients for workflows, like, best fit their schedule. What does yours look like?

Spencer
So right now it’s kind of crazy because we just moved, so it’s not normal, but normally I’m trying to do at least two lawns a week so that I’m getting, you know, I’m taking care of, you know, one week and then I’m getting ahead. So I’m trying to do at least two a week. My wife and I will usually go out Sunday, Monday, something like that, and we’ll drive around for literally, like 8 hours or something like that. Like up and down every street, like over and over every street. And we’ll write down all the addresses that we think would make a good transformation and that just really need it. And then that next day or later that evening, we’ll go back and we’ll knock on doors and stuff and see if I can get some scheduled up for that week.

Spencer
And so say I get some scheduled up for Tuesday and Thursday. I try to take a break between every day because it’s really exhausting because some of these clamps take me, you know, for a video, like, I don’t know, 8 hours, 10 hours, and crazy hot days. And so I go down, I’ll go out on a Tuesday, you know, I’ll film it, do the whole cleanup, and then when I get home, I’ll transfer it. So my wife has an external drive, so I transfer all the footage over to her external drive, and that next day, she’s editing that video. So she actually, I’ve sat down with her and kind of taught her my exact editing style and every single little thing that I do.

Spencer
So she helps me edit the long form video, so she’ll edit the long form videos that day, and I’ll get home and I’ll review it, you know, make changes and stuff, add my voiceovers, and then I’ll cut it up and do it for every other platform. She just does the main one for Facebook and YouTube. And then same thing for Thursday. I’ll go out and I’ll mo, I get home, transfer the footage over, she does it the next day, and then turns it over to me. And then I do all the uploading and stuff and making sure all the schedules out. I actually just put together this massive calendar. It’s not really a calendar, but it’s kind of like a content calendar where it just has like, the address, every single platform which date it’s supposed to go out on. Every platform.

Spencer
And, you know, with every single video, I think we’re posting like eight or nine different cuts or just different places. So it’s kind of hard to keep track of. So I just kind of mark it off. Every, everyone that gets uploaded and everyone that’s ready to go, so that’s kind of the workflow. And then the winter, we do the same thing. We just get an Airbnb, and I’m out working all day, and I get there, I get back, turn the footage over, she’s editing it while I’m out working the next day. So it’s, we found a good flow and something that works really well for us.

Mike Kyle
It sounds like each video generally takes around three days. So you have like the initial, like, filming of the video. Then the next day your wife’s editing, and that third day is you’re then taking everything, cutting it up, and even scheduling it. That sound about, right?

Spencer
Yeah, yeah, about three days.

Mike Kyle
What was your workflow like before you went SB mowing content full time? So when you are trying to manage clients and actually run, like, the admin stuff of SB mowing and juggle the content side of things, because that’s the boat that a lot of our clients are in. They are in that in between middle ground. And what I have found is that if they are not prioritizing social media and content, it won’t get done because something else always comes up and then that takes priority instead.

Spencer
Yeah. So I just didn’t make excuses. That’s something really easy to do, like, oh, I need to go do this or I need to go do that. So when I first started, I was working full time as a programmer and doing mobile development on like, mobile apps and stuff. And so I was working, you know, nine to five. Luckily, I was working from home, so I was working nine to five days a week. And I remember the second video I ever did, the one that just went super viral for me on YouTube. It took me four or five days because just for the filming, because, you know, I worked my nine to five, I’d get off and I’d immediately head there and it was like a 20 minutes, 2030 minutes drive. And so I had like two, 3 hours of daylight left.

Spencer
And so I just get as much as I’d done, and I literally did that Monday to Friday, and it took me that entire week to get that one video. And it sucked. But, like, the entire time, I remember thinking in my head, like, I was like, super hot, sweating up a storm, I was shoveling off this sidewalk, that it was just super labor intensive. And I was just telling myself in my head, hey, this will be worth it. Just keep doing it. Just keep going. Don’t stop. Like, I wanted to go home so bad the entire time. Like, it sucked, but yeah, so I got that done, and then that weekend I spent, I wasn’t very good at editing, so I probably spent 20 hours editing that video.

Spencer
And, yeah, it went super viral for me and it paid off just like I thought it would. So that was my workflow. Before I would, I’d be working my nine to five. And in the evenings, I try to get some time, evenings or weekends to get some time to record, because it’s just, it’s so hard to find time sometimes. But you have to find that time if you want to be successful, because you’re never going to get out of that nine to five grind or whatever. If you’re not working on something that’s going to set you free.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, that’s awesome to say. And that’s something that we have also relayed more and more where it’s especially with content, whether it’s filming for us, it’s even scripting on this side of things, editing, uploading, just learning the platforms, it takes time. Like you, this is something where you need to be able to actually put the work in order to see the results because it is like, it’s such a combination of processes. Editing is its own process. If you’ve never done that before, right. Your first video took you 20 hours to edit, you know, actually filming.

Mike Kyle
There’s a learning curve there where if you don’t have a tripod or if you’re trying to figure out how to establish shots and lighting, especially if you’re filming outdoors, you know, if that sun is beaming down, your shots gonna look all blown out and just kind of a mess. And so there’s so many different, you know, processes and things to learn in every single step of creating content that you have to put in the work and you have to put in the time in order to actually, one, understand what works, what your style is, but then also to actually continue to do it enough to see results.

Spencer
Yeah. And that’s the time thing is a big thing that I’ve noticed somehow the YouTube and the algorithm gods or all the big whatever AI is deciding to push out videos or something, I’ve noticed that for some reason it knows which jobs suck the most and which jobs are the hardest and take me the most time because those jobs are the ones that do so well. Yeah, because like, if I go and, you know, spend five to 10 hours on a video and I upload it’ll do okay. But then almost every single one of my viral videos, I’ve broke my back doing those videos and I spent a whole day or a whole two days just filming it and maybe all and on put 40 hours into one video.

Spencer
So I’ve noticed that the more time you put into it, the more successful the videos are going to be.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. And I can speak to that too, with the video that I did for you. I think it took, that video took me, well, one, as I was watching your content on vacation for seven days and just binging everything, I was internalizing everything, trying to think of what’s working, how does he do it? And then I then had to put my thoughts on paper and write the script for two days. Filming took a day. And then I spent, I think, four straight days just on the edit, just trying to make sure it was perfect and told the story the right way and was very like succinct and things of that nature. And I mean, that video popped off immediately. And that was a video. I’m sure.

Mike Kyle
I’m sure you have this feeling too where when you hit upload, there are some videos where you just know, oh, this might take off.

Spencer
Yeah. Oh, yeah. I just know. And like, honestly, just as a viewer, I could tell you spent a lot of time on that video and it was really well put together, flowed super well. It was a really good video.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, dude, let’s talk about it. Are you, are you cool with that?

Spencer
Yeah, let’s do it.

Mike Kyle
So if you missed the video, I’m gonna give you the high level overview of my analysis of what makes SB mowings videos so great.

Spencer
The first is, yeah, you better take my brain.

Mike Kyle
That’s right. So the first thing, it’s the transformation. And we all love transformations in one way or another, whether it’s somebody mowing the lawn or if we’re watching somebody get a haircut, there is something so satisfying around something going from pure chaos and unorderly to order and in like that restored fashion. So that’s the first thing. The second piece is storytelling. Dude, you do such a good job in that 1st 30 seconds of setting the scene, giving the backstory of the home. I mean, obviously that first shot of you knocking on the neighbor’s door and asking, you know, what’s going on here? Perfect intro to get us invested into the story in that way. The third piece that I loved is just the edit you take, as you just said, right?

Mike Kyle
A project may take you 8 hours to film, but of that 8 hours, we see a highlighted 20 minutes version on your long form channel that is sped up, God knows, five x, ten x. I would love to know what the number actually is. And then afterwards we just go into positioning, which matters so much for YouTube, which is probably the reason I would argue that you took off the most. The way that you title videos it. It’s in such like, it’s not in a clickbait over dramatic way, but it is a. Oh my gosh, I can’t believe that this happened. Sort, sort of feeling around the titles for your videos. And then lastly, just the diversity in your content.

Mike Kyle
Where you have your main YouTube channel that posts long forms, you then have a dedicated shorts YouTube channel and then you have your different lengths all across the other platforms as well, so those were my big five reasons, kind of, for the success of your channel. So what did I get right? What did I get wrong? And let’s kind of spend some time talking about this.

Spencer
So you got. You basically got everything right. Storytelling is a huge one. I try to make it to where the viewer feels like they’re part of the video and they’re actually, like, part of this story and want to learn more about what’s going on or it piques their interest. But getting into that, you know, it’s the title and the thumbnail. I try to. There’s a lot of titles out there that I’ve seen that are click baity. I try not to be clickbaity, but I try to make it super enticing. So if you look at a lot of my titles, they’re usually something that the homeowner says, like, or it’s something about the story that makes it interesting. So I try to make it to where somebody reads that title and, like, immediately wants to learn more. And I do my best to do that.

Spencer
But I’ll go into kind of my. My intros is talking to the homeowner or a neighbor, because you never know what someone’s gonna say, and people always want to hear what their reaction is gonna be when I tell them I want to do it for free, because people just don’t do that. So, like, a big thing that I try to do is do all my interactions are super authentic with the homeowners or just with anybody. Nothing in my content is really scripted, except sometimes my voiceovers are scripted. But. So I’ll just set the camera up. You know, whatever happens. I’m going to make the best of it. There’s always going to be a good story. There’s always going to be something. And I’ve noticed that there’s some other creators out there that are in the same space as me.

Spencer
They’re trying to do the same thing as me. But just from being in it for so long, I can tell that they aren’t authentic and they’re faking their interactions. So either they know the person that they’re talking to, or they’re having someone blow up on them in a certain way. But I can tell, like, a lot of those are scripted or they’re just not real just because I’ve been doing it so long. You can just tell by watching it’s not real. But I think so a lot of those guys have actually reached out to me and are like, hey, why am I not having success like, you, what do you do differently? And I just keep telling them over and over again, like, hey, you need to make your content authentic. Like, you need to go get an actual, like, interaction.

Spencer
People aren’t interested in hearing a script. People are interested in, you know, seeing what happens in the real world or, like, seeing the social experiment that I’m doing. That’s a big one of just going up and seeing how a homeowner is going to respond. So you definitely hit just about everything I do to kind of make my content do well, at least that I know that makes my content do well. There’s probably a bunch of other stuff that I’m not. I don’t even know about.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. When we talk about, you know, just that social experiment, that’s a great way to describe it. I’ve never thought of it that way. But that is what you’re doing. You’re kind of capturing and documenting that. One of the questions that somebody told me to ask you was, like, that interaction with the homeowner has there, like, are there, like, one or two, like, door knockings that have, like, really just, like, stood out to you? Or, like, by and large, how would you describe that reaction of, you know, either one, what’s going on with this neighbor’s house? Or if it’s, like, the homeowner that you’re doing, that you’re speaking to? The idea of, I can do this for free.

Spencer
Yeah. So a lot of people think we’ll talk about, like, if they’re the homeowner. Most people think it’s a scam. Just nobody goes and asks that. A lot of people think I’m going to do the work and, like, send them a huge bill afterwards or put a lien on their house. So that’s something that a lot of people don’t see on camera. I cut a lot of that out. I leave some of it in sometimes, but, yeah, people, the interact is just, they’re all so different. I’ve. I’ve knocked on doors where people don’t even open up their door, and they’re just like, they literally just tell me, go away. I’m like, okay, sorry. So I just walk away. But a lot of people don’t see that for mowing since, you know, they could get fined from the city and stuff.

Spencer
A lot of people let me go ahead and do the work, but I’ve noticed when I go pressure washing driveways, if someone drive someone’s driveway is super dirty, they don’t really care as much, and I get turned away a lot more doing pressure washing, but mowing. People need it a lot more. So I basically, if they answer their door, they’re going to let me do it.

Mike Kyle
Gotcha. Yeah, I was actually in the back of my head, I was just thinking about, oh, I wonder if I can sneak in at the pressure washing side of things on this as well because I know you just started that recently, too.

Spencer
Yeah, I’ve been doing that for about a year. So it’s a little bit slower growing, but it’s still getting a decent amount of views and doing pretty well.

Mike Kyle
I I gotcha. I gotcha. What would be your advice to somebody that is a contractor residential, could be outdoors or it could be interior inside the home for them to get started with content.

Spencer
So a big thing that, a big piece of advice that I always tell people is that let me turn that around a little bit. Because a big reason why I got started is because I was, like, super addicted to social media. And, you know, my business mind was like, oh, you know, like, why can’t I do this? Why can’t I go make money on social media or, like, you know, get tons of followers and promote my business? And a big piece of advice is start analyzing what you watch and figure out why it works and just take everything that you watch and try to do that. So, like, if you’re watching a video and be like, oh, I really like this video, that’s super satisfying. Like, why is that satisfying? Why do you like it?

Spencer
Why are you sticking around to actually watch that video? So figure that stuff out and apply that to your own social media pages because, you know, that’s how I got probably my editing style from people that aren’t even in lawn care. I go watch, I’m like, oh, I really like what they’re doing there. Oh, I really like how their captions look. If you can ever guess what channel my captions are similar to, I’ll give you $5. But they’re, yeah, I, a channel that I watch a lot. I like the color of their captions. I liked how they looked on screen. So I kind of started using a style similar to that. And then I’ll pull stuff from, like, other channels that I watch and, like, just, you know, figure out why you like what you like and just do it.

Spencer
It’s not as hard as it sounds like. You just have to do it because a lot of people are like, oh, I don’t know how to get into it. It’s like, dude, you’re an expert at YouTube. You watch YouTube videos every day. You watch TikTok videos every day. You’re on Instagram every day. Like, you’re an expert of that platform, so, like, why not make videos and just do it? A lot of people just think that they can. Like, you just have to dive into it and actually, it’s like a shia labeouf. Just do it.

Mike Kyle
You know, so much more than you ever give yourself credit for. And like, that was like a big part of me making the video on you. It was as I’m watching this, I’m realizing and like, you know, being in content for a decade, I kind of know what to look for, but it was that, it was okay. I’m watching these videos. I’m hooked. What is it about them? And then just analyzing the video, like, just talking out loud to myself as something that you did kind of like came on screen or something that was interesting. I was like, okay, that’s what it is. And that’s how this video kind of came to inception.

Mike Kyle
And like, this now is honestly going to kickstart a whole new series for us now where we just analyze kind of contractors, social medias, or cool things that they’re doing and trying to figure out why it works. Because I just watch YouTube and tech talk and Instagram all the time now, so I know kind of like what to look for and what works and what doesn’t. And when you get to that point now, like, I alluded to this a little bit, you know when a video is going to pop, you know, when you come up with like that, with that super sleek title, you’re like, oh, that’s going to work. Or when the thumbnail works well, you’re like, okay, this feels good during the edit. Okay. I like the way that this goes.

Mike Kyle
And you can kind of tell at this point when something is going to do well compared to when something may be just all right or average.

Spencer
Yeah. So the weird thing about that is, so, as you said, almost every video that has popped or done well, like, I know it’s gonna do well. I know what works. I know when I have really good interactions, I’m like, oh, I can’t wait for people to see this. It’s gonna do so well. Or when I have some edge or sidewalk that’s so overgrown, I’m like, oh, you know, this took me 3 hours. I put down this little 22nd video. Like, it’s gonna be so satisfying. But the weird thing about that is there’s been a few videos where I’m like, oh, this is gonna go super viral right away. Like, it’s gonna go nuts and then it doesn’t, it’s like an average performing video. I’m like, dang, that sucks. That was a really good video.

Spencer
And then I look back at it five, six months later. I’m like, that videos, 3 million views. Like what? Like, it’s like some of them are just slow growers, but they’ll get there eventually and some of them just kind of, it explode immediately. So. And it’s kind of cool once all the videos start working together too. And like, all of them are just getting views and compounding on each other and, you know, I’ve, I saw videos. My first video is still getting a ton of views. My second video is still getting a ton of views. It’s, it’s super cool seeing the old ones grow and then continuing to grow.

Mike Kyle
And that’s the beauty about YouTube specifically. Right. Whether it’s, you know, tick tock, Instagram, Facebook for the most part, generally how those platform works, it’s gonna go up and it’ll take off and then it’ll just drop off the face of the earth kind of. Once it get, once it gets its run, YouTube’s totally different. Where YouTube, it doesn’t matter how long it’s been, there’s always a potential for that video to get views. I mean, if you look at, you know, our top ten in our analytics, you know, six of the last ten were posted two or three years ago and they’re still getting views and they’re still getting that traction.

Mike Kyle
And it is always nice whenever that video that you thought didn’t do well at the time slowly starts climbing up in those rankings, like, you know, a year later, six months later, and it’s like, alright, finally, video that I thought was great is now getting the recognition that I felt like it deserved in the first place.

Spencer
Yeah. And that’s what’s really cool about YouTube too, is that, you know, work that I did a year ago, I could still be getting paid for today. So just slowly over time, it’s super cool. Like, social media is wild.

Mike Kyle
Yeah, absolutely. I wanted kind of go back a page.

Spencer
Yeah.

Mike Kyle
Because you mentioned that your wife is your editor now. And this is the concept that I have become more and more bullish on as our clients are struggling to fit editing and social media kind of into their wheelhouse. I’m like, honestly, your best bet at some point is to just hire somebody, right? Like, there is a reason that I run all of contractor gross networks media as a whole and our CEO doesn’t because this is just what I do, and he doesn’t really want to be doing it. So for you, that step of, hey, I’m going to take editing off my plate and give it to my wife. How has that impacted just, like, your overall, like, sense of, like, overwhelm ness in regards to creating content, how has that worked well for you?

Spencer
Yeah. So I feel like my entire life, from waking up to going to sleep, is not consumed by my content. I can actually kind of, you know, take breaks a little bit every. And it just helps out a lot. But there is one thing. I mean, I’ve never actually hired, you know, someone I don’t know to go edit videos for me. I’ve never done that. But I’m assuming it would be the same thing as, you know, my wife doing it is that when you get an editor, you need to spend a lot of time with them upfront to make sure that the videos are up to your liking. And kind of like, don’t let someone edit a video and make it, like, a crappy edit and just upload it because it’s done.

Spencer
You know, sit down with them, be like, hey, I like this because of this. Do this way, and just kind of review your videos with them. And then, you know, you’ll create the perfect editor for you. Like, when. When you’re high, when you’re hiring an editor, the best way to. The best editor to find is someone that would edit like yourself, like your own brain. So do that research, do that analyzing. Figure out what works in the edits, and then teach that to somebody else, something that they can kind of replicate. But, yeah, it’s. It’s made my life a lot easier. And she helps out a ton, so.

Mike Kyle
Yeah. And that’s awesome that you too, like, gets, like, you know, be partners in the SB milling company and the brand now. Like, that. That’s. That’s awesome.

Spencer
It is so cool. Yeah.

Mike Kyle
Cool. All right, Spencer, let’s wrap it up with this. All right. You’ve created tons of content. Let’s wrap it up with. I have two different thoughts. Let’s go with this. What’s your favorite video that you’ve produced?

Spencer
Oh, man, that’s a tough one. I don’t think I’ve ever been asked that. The ones. So there’s always a ton of videos that people comment on or like, oh, the homeowners aren’t very appreciative. Oh, they don’t care. I do like doing those videos because I know they need the work done. But the videos that I love producing are the ones where you can tell, you know, my work completely changes this person’s life or something like that. A big one that I did recently was there was this lady who was recently separated from her husband, and she was acting as a single mom, and her lawn was getting insanely overgrown. It was a corner lot. Everybody could see it. She got some city warnings already, and I was able to clean it up for her.

Spencer
I was talking to her, and she told me, yeah, you know, I’m just recently separated from my husband, and so I don’t have a mower yet, and I’m trying to take care of kids. So I actually gave her my hustler raptor mower, and she was like that, like, completely, like, changed her life. It, like, made her weak. So it’s really fun producing videos, really fun getting the views, but it’s. It’s a different type of feeling when you’re able to help somebody out or you’re able to, like, really affect somebody’s life in a positive way. So definitely those videos. So ones that stick out specifically for me are that one. There’s one where this lady couldn’t even walk in her backyard, and I got it all mowed down for, and she was super thankful.

Spencer
She barely spoke any English, so her son was translating for me, and I ended up giving them, I think, like, two or $300 just because when I first knocked on the door, she’s like, oh, we don’t have any money to pay, like, at all, because she thought I was trying to sell her a service. So I got to clean it up for, and I got to put a little bit of money in her pocket. So that was really cool. So just. Just things like that are probably my favorite to produce.

Mike Kyle
I think that’s the most wholesome end to a podcast we’ve ever had. So no better way to wrap it up than. On that note, Spencer, go ahead and use your 30 seconds of screen time to plug whatever you want.

Spencer
Yeah. If you guys want to watch my videos and support my work, the best way to do that is just whatever platform you like. Look up sb mowing sb pressure washing as well. Whenever you watch the videos, just leave a like and just watch them all the way through. I try to make them the best I can is entertaining for you. Let’s see what platforms I’m on. YouTube. I have a YouTube shorts channel. I have Instagram TikTok. I have Snapchat now. Actually, I have a Snapchat show that I’ve been working on for the past few months. So yeah, whatever platform you like, just do that. And if you want to reach out and talk, I’ve got an email. Just shoot me an email. I try to get back to as many as I can. So yeah, thanks for having me on. I appreciate it.

Mike Kyle
Awesome. Spencer dude, thank you so much for being on. And if you enjoyed this episode of the podcast, the best way to help this podcast grow is to either one, leave a review or two, share it with a fellow contractor. Thank you all so much for tuning in and we will see you in the next episode.