Hungry for Success: Interview with Rita Agoulian, Founder of LickYourPhone
I recently went one on one with Rita Agoulian, founder of LickYourPhone, an Australian-based food social media marketing company that has grown to over a million followers on Instagram through viral content. As Rita told me, “LickYourPhone started from a place of passion. Passion is the recipe to success. The night of April 3rd, 2015, I had an intuitive whim, changed my personal Instagram account and started posting creative, unique content encapsulating the energized bonding experience people have with food. LickYourPhone was born. In 2018 I took a leap of faith and plunged into the deep end by quitting my full-time finance role to chase my dreams of becoming a successful business woman. At the time we had a combined hungry audience of 1.7+ million hungry followers across our social media channels and was earning a big fat doughnut. Only through education and failures did I learn how to convert followers into profit and how to scale the business during a global pandemic. Failure is an essential ingredient to reach success.”
Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here? What experiences, failures, setbacks or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?
Rita: Being addicted to success is how I got here, LickYourPhone started as a hobby, I was looking for ways to convert my passion into a career. Eating food unfortunately doesn’t pay my bills, or my mortgage, I had to figure out how to turn my passion for food into a profitable business. Just before I quit my job, in April 2018 LickYourPhone had 1.7 million followers, and we were earning a big fat zero profit from it. Brands would reach out and expect us to invest our time to create content for free, when they learnt they need to pay for our services their response was “we don’t have budget”, and I’d think to myself: You’re a multibillion-dollar company, how do you not have money?” It didn’t make sense.
Education, business courses and mentors taught me how to convert our followers into a profitable business and techniques on how to deal with challenges.
Successful businesses have found a gap in the market. Here’s a problem, here’s the solution. Conversely, we didn’t necessarily find a gap in the market, we simply know how to do social media marketing really well so instead of just applying those skills to our own social media brands we started managing socials for brands within the hospitality industry. Through time we transitioned into a hospitality marketing agency and that’s our business model that helped convert our passion into a career. Turn your skillsets into a profitable business.
The failures? I used to say: death row would’ve been easier than starting a business, especially from ground zero! It was that much of a struggle, especially as a start-up. There is nothing no one can tell you what’s ahead until you actually do it.
I’m a high-risk taker; I quit my successful high paying role in finance to pursue my dreams. In the beginning of LickYourPhone I was living off savings and barely making an income. It can be a very lonely road and you can feel like you’re in a box trying to figure out how to climb out. You don’t even know where to start because there’s so much information online it can become overwhelming.
Also, it takes me a really long time to learn, it might take you five minutes, whereas it might take me a year, so the best lessons came from failures.
Failures are a blessing in disguise, it’s the quickest and most powerful way to overcome battles thrown at you especially when you’re in the deep end. You learn in time the services or products you’re offering is right for the market, do people want to buy what you’re offering; do they need that? That’s ‘product to market fit’
These blessings in disguise shape you for growth and to become better at what you’re doing or selling; they’re imperative to a person’s development and growth, and for business
Adam: How did you come up with your business idea? What advice do you have for others on how to come up with great ideas?
Rita: I’d travelled with friends to the Greek Islands and came back and felt I wanted to continue to explore my own city, Sydney. In 2015, Instagram was booming and loved the idea of a page that would show and recommend places you can experience for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert.
No one had the account name ‘LickYourPhone’ so converted my personal page from Rita Agoulian which had 600 followers at the time to LickYourPhone overnight and started recommending places to eat in Sydney.
I gave birth to LickYourPhone “Food that looked so good, it’ll make you want to LickYourPhone.” On April 3rd, 2015, founded in my bed at my mother's house, the best ideas come to those who dream.
Adam: What are the key steps you have taken to grow your business? What advice do you have for others on how to take their businesses to the next level?
Rita: It was only through mistakes, years of investing in education, asking open ended questions to people and networking that I learned what I know now, which is how to grow a successful business. To take your business to the next level you must be hungry to become successful, hunt for leads and invest 80% of your time in marketing & sales, especially in the beginning.
Education provides the highest return on investment, and I invested heavily in business education on how to grow a successful business. Only through education did I learn how to convert followers into profit and how to scale the business during a global pandemic.
You don’t necessarily need a website to start a business. First key step is to use social media to get your brand or service out there.
Adam: You have enjoyed great success around creating hype and enjoying viral word of mouth referrals through social media strategies. Can you elaborate on the strategies you have been able to successfully execute and share your best tips on how to create viral marketing campaigns?
Rita: We would create FoodPorn video content that would capture the attention of major universal publications, the largest social media publications in the world started to reach out to us for more content. I’d be up at 11pm talking to them, making sure I’m building relationships and capturing what they want so I become a valuable asset and help to them.
A successful marketing strategy is videos: Your job in the first five seconds of a video is get them to watch another five seconds. People can click on it but that doesn’t mean they’re going to engage. On Instagram a person needs to engage with your content for a minimum of three seconds before it’s considered a view.
One of our most viral videos reached 120 million views in one video. It was burgers being drenched in cheese, when it went live the venue sold out of 800 burgers in 4 hours. Believe it or not, burgers & cheese are also one of our marketing strategies.
New strategies are: To increase direct messages and saves on each content posted on social media. Priority is to create word of mouth referrals through DMs. Not as many people are commenting on the actual post; what they’re doing is private messaging it to their friends. They like to have conversations, not in the public eye.
Another strategy we use is when people follow LickYourPhone they’ll receive a direce message from us saying: “Welcome to LickYourPhone, hope you don’t mind us sliding into your dm’s, we would love to know how you came across us?” We want to continuously build friendships with our community and it’s imperative to do market research, we want to know how people find us: A lot say: “Instagram suggested.”
Memes are also a powerful strategy because they drive a lot of conversation, hashtag your content to a specific community where people can search for you.
User generated content is a powerful tool to grow your brand make sure you utilise Instagram Reels too!
Adam: What are other sales, marketing and social media tips, strategies and tactics of value to fellow marketers and entrepreneurs?
Rita: In the beginning and to this day, we ensure our contact details are freely available so people could reach us for invitations and business opportunities, you must ensure there is the least amount of friction and resistance, you must spoon-feed people information, make it as easy as possible for people to reach you. Ensure all contact details are clearly visible on your Instagram bio.
Influencer marketing is an effective strategy, you invite people of influence to experience your service or brand in exchange for exposure.
A video app we highly recommend is called InShot. You don’t need a fancy camera to create content, get your phone out of your pocket and start filming, combine the most engaging clips into a video and make sure the content is actually worth watching. Ask yourself is this boring to watch? Speak to the heart’s & mind of your consumer.
On social media, videos are imperative however what is more important is the cover photo you select for the video. I spend five minutes scrolling to find that perfect hook shot, the cover photo must be the most intriguing visual to capture attention and stop that thumb from scrolling. Ask yourself, what’s the bait you’re going to use to hook their attention.
The business model that helped us become successful is by creating the done for you social media management services, we transitioned from content creators into a hospitality marketing agency, the first question I asked myself is, do I genuinely want to manage socials for other brands, the answer was yes. It’s important to ask your inner self questions, It’s the most accurate compass to guide you.
Follow your instincts, don’t be afraid not listen to people, make your own rules and chase your dreams. Believe you can and you will. The only person holding you back is you.
Adam: What are your best tips on the topics of branding?
Rita: At all touch points, learn how to stand out. I didn’t know what branding was, I just knew that, for example, if you see an apple icon you’ll connect it an iPhone
The best way for me to describe branding is: when you see an Apple logo, you don’t need to see the word ‘Apple’. You already know what it is. That’s what branding is. People recognize you from a logo.
Adam: In your experience, what are the defining qualities of an effective leader? How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?
Rita: Leaders also like to be led; I have multiple mentors to help. Learn to pass on your knowledge, surround yourself with mentors who are passionate about what they do, it’s not just about the dollar signs.
An effective leader isn’t afraid to share his best secrets to help others become successful, invest your valuable time to help fellow marketers and entrepreneurs on a regular basis, this is how an aspiring leader takes their leadership skills to the next level, they invest time into helping others.
Adam: What are your three best tips applicable to entrepreneurs, executives and civic leaders?
Rita: Tip one, don’t over complicate it. Keep it simple.
I have learning difficulties and a terribly slow learner, it’s important to explain your business in simple English that a three-year-old could understand.
Tip two, be persistent, be consistent, get shit done
Tip three is stop procrastinating, the power is in implementation, so that’s what I mean by get shit done.
You can learn as much as you want, but if you’re not implementing it, you’re still at the same stage as where you started. If I can do it, anyone can.
Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?
Rita: Even if the sky fell down, think of it as a blanket covering you. I had chills when I heard this. The point is: be positive and whenever you have a challenge, think of it as an opportunity to excel.
Your mindset has a lot to do with handing setbacks and challenges. If you’re in a position where you’re being challenged, your mindset determines whether this is an opportunity for growth, or: “Oh this is a problem”.
Adam: Is there anything else you would like to share?
Rita: Create content that’s relevant, that’s going to add value to your social media followers and online customers. Give them free advice, give people value, and that builds trust with your brand or your service.
When you’re giving advice or sharing funny entertainment, you’re showing them a reason to follow your journey, your content needs to be relatable to your ideal customer avatar.
The next step: invest in ads and marketing but make them quirky, stand out. You need to create thumb stopping content. That’s the crucial, most relevant key to grow a business or an online community. Then, depending on your industry, tap into LinkedIn marketing, and Google My Business – it’s such an underutilized, cost effective platform. You can engage thousands of eyeballs by simply posting content on GMB, drive organic traffic to your website, also make sure you ask people to review your business on Google.
Also, recommend email marketing: Grow your data base. If you have over 10,000 followers on Instagram, include a swipe up link to a website in your Instagram stories. Encourage people to sign up to your newsletters.
Don’t be afraid to ask for a better price. I was really embarrassed in the initial stages to ask for a better price, but when you’re starting in business you have minimal income you need to ensure you’re keeping costs down at all times.
Cutting costs as much as possible means more margins, which means you can invest more into marketing
Knowledge is the legacy I want to leave behind. The fact that I’m able to pass on a legacy, which is knowledge - you can’t put a price on how powerful that is. Knowledge isn’t just power, knowledge is profit.
Finally, my last words are the same as my grandmother’s last words: “Happiness is better than medicine, so be happy in what you’re doing.”
Adam Mendler is the CEO of The Veloz Group, where he co-founded and oversees ventures across a wide variety of industries. Adam is also the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one on one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. Adam has written extensively on leadership, management, entrepreneurship, marketing and sales, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities and non-profit organizations.
Follow Adam on Instagram and Twitter at @adammendler and listen and subscribe to Thirty Minute Mentors on your favorite podcasting app.