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00:00:01
From Insurance Broker to 5 Billion Views (His Family Changed Everything)
28 Plays15 days ago
In this episode, Ken Freire sits down with Rob Clark, founder of That Tall Family, to unpack how he turned a simple proof-of-concept into billions of views and a thriving business. Rob shares the real mechanics behind viral short-form content, why “cracking the algorithm” is the wrong goal, and how volume, speed, and storytelling drive growth. They also explore how AI is reshaping content creation, why physical experiences are making a comeback, and how building a business around your family can create both impact and freedom.
Resources Mentioned
• Stop Being The Best Kept Secret Book -https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GSF8DR1J• LinkedIn (Rob Clark) - https://www.linkedin.com/in/robclark/• Instagram (That Tall Family) - https://www.instagram.com/thattallfamily/
Timestamps
• (00:00) Introduction to Rob Clark and That Tall Family’s massive reach
• (02:00) The origin story: from insurance broker to social media pioneer
• (06:00) Why timing + short-form storytelling led to explosive growth
• (08:00) The real skill of short-form: hooks, speed, and attention
• (11:00) Quantity vs. quality: why volume is the path to winning content
• (14:30) Balancing entertainment and education for business growth
• (18:00) Using AI to accelerate content, books, and business systems
• (23:00) Turning attention into sales: organic growth and distribution
• (26:00) Building a family-centered business and lifestyle freedom
• (31:00) What’s next: books, coaching, and the future of content
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Rob Clark and That Tall Family
00:00:01
Ken Freire
Welcome to another episode of Solo Scaled. i am your host, Ken Freire. And today, i am with Rob Clark, with the founder of That Tall Family. he has had 8 billion, that's with a B, views on social media and over 4 million followers. If you guys have been on any form of short term short reels, TikToks, anything like that, you have probably seen one of his videos. Rob, thank you for being on the show, man.
00:00:30
Rob Clark
Thanks, Ken. I'm excited to be here.
Transition from Influencer to Social Media Consultant
00:00:32
Ken Freire
Yeah. Well, Rob, I'm excited because you and I have been hitting it off on on LinkedIn and we're actually neighbors now. We're pretty close to each other. So we're going to be hanging out here soon. But I'm excited because you kind of just started this thing way back when and it just blew up. So before we go into your story and how it started, just tell everybody what you do right now.
00:00:55
Rob Clark
Yeah, so right now we're kind of in a transition period where most people right now would see us as influencers, meaning that we make videos, they get lots of views and companies will reach out to us to do videos.
00:01:09
Rob Clark
And so it could be anything from Capital One to Nickelodeon to General Mills or even the Abraham Lincoln Museum, which was one of our favorites. And we'll do a video for them and they pay us for those videos.
00:01:18
Ken Freire
and That's awesome.
00:01:23
Rob Clark
And so but now we're kind of in a transition, which I'm sure we'll get into in the story. Like the goal all along was to work with companies and individual brands to build their own social media. That was the goal all along.
00:01:36
Rob Clark
That tall family was simply a little bit of, hey, I needed a proof of concept. And so there's this knowledge that I had. And then yet, and this, and and I fully understand why people would want to see it.
00:01:50
Rob Clark
And I would also push people anytime you're going to hire someone to do something, make sure they could do the thing. And so that tall family was simply, okay, listen, we're going to do the thing and we're going to show people we know we're talking about. And it actually,
00:02:04
Rob Clark
took off a little bit faster and bigger than what we even planned. And so it kind of
The Role of Social Media in Business Success
00:02:09
Rob Clark
derailed our plans for a little bit because we were on that influencer grind, but it it was good.
00:02:13
Ken Freire
Thank
00:02:13
Rob Clark
And so now it's led us to the point now where I would say if a company or a personal brand, anybody trying to get attention in the world, they need to use social media.
00:02:25
Rob Clark
And I guess when I say they need to, that may be a little strong. I would say it'd be silly not to use social media.
00:02:32
Ken Freire
Yeah, and and social media, and we'll definitely get into this, is one of those things that people know they they should do to grow their business, but it feels like it's so hard to crack the algorithm. and And we'll talk about that here in a second, but let's start with your story a little bit more.
00:02:42
Rob Clark
Yes.
00:02:46
Ken Freire
I want to i want to do a deep dive. You had this idea of proof of concept. You're like, hey, I want to do this proof of concept. I'm going to start. Out of all things you could have, you were like, let's start with that tall family, and you kind of brought your whole family into the mix. What?
00:03:01
Ken Freire
How did it all transpire?
00:03:03
Rob Clark
Yeah. So to really understand the the story, we have to go back 20 years. So YouTube first comes out at the time I'm an insurance broker in Canada. And so I grew up in Illinois, met a girl at college who happened to be from Canada. I got married to that girl and then she dragged me back to Canada for about 20 years. And so now we're back here in the States and we love it here.
00:03:26
Rob Clark
But At the time, I'm an insurance broker and learning business and loving it, learning marketing, learning everything about how to get more clients. But part of the problem was, is that if we wanted to go on billboards, it costs at the place that we're at, it'd be $3,000 month.
00:03:44
Rob Clark
And it took about eight weeks to go from start to finish. If we wanted to be on the radio to really get any sort of traction, we're looking at a $10,000 package. And again, it's it's a timeframe issue where it would probably take us a month before we can be on the radio.
00:04:00
Rob Clark
And so even if we wanted to do something as small as newspapers, still, it was too expensive for the amount of exposure we'd get. So as as I'm working this job, YouTube comes out and I'm interested in it for whatever reason, probably like most of us were like, this is why would people want to watch videos of people?
00:04:20
Rob Clark
like Like at the time, it just seemed weird. And then I decided to make a video about the insurance broker. about the brokerage. And so I made a funny 15 second video, which, you know, it's funny that we broke out on TikTok because that video was very much like a TikTok.
00:04:37
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:04:38
Rob Clark
And I posted a video and the next day it had 2000 views. And so 20 years ago on that very first video, I was hooked because now of a sudden here's a platform where i can put out content immediately as quick as I want. It's free and I can reach unlimited amount of people.
00:04:55
Rob Clark
And so it it all really started there. And then from there, no matter what I did, whatever social media platform was kind of the new thing we dug into. So a few years after that, well, a few years is like 10 years later, I quit that job and i actually took a job as a pastor in a church outside of Vancouver, British Columbia.
00:05:13
Rob Clark
And we used Instagram, which was a relatively new platform at the time to reach people. And a lot of people came to our church because they first heard about us on Instagram.
00:05:25
Rob Clark
And so now all these years later, the cat's out of the bag. We all know that social media can reach the world. So almost five years ago, when we decided to move from Michigan down to Atlanta and I didn't have a job lined up, I knew without a doubt that the way I was going to get recognized and get noticed and eventually get offered a job was going to be through social media.
00:05:44
Ken Freire
you
00:05:46
Rob Clark
So the goal was is I said, hey, Richelle, who's my wife? Let's sell our house. We're going to move to Atlanta and let's start a brand around our family. We'll get some views. We'll get some attention. And from that, you'll make some connections. I'll eventually get a job, whether it's marketing, sales, whatever it may be.
00:06:03
Rob Clark
And I knew that it would work. I just didn't think it would work as fast and grow as big as it did.
00:06:09
Ken Freire
Yeah.
Content Strategy: Quantity vs. Quality
00:06:10
Ken Freire
What do you think caused the speed of it to grow so fast?
00:06:17
Rob Clark
Well, without a doubt, part of its timing, one of its timing, and at the time, TikTok was fairly new. And so, of course, at that point, it was it was huge, meaning that everybody was on it.
00:06:29
Rob Clark
But what happens when a platform first comes out, everyone consumes. Not a lot of people are creating. So we were early in the creation process. That was one. And secondly, remember, I made a video and I should share that video to the world again, because if you watch the video, it's very much a TikTok. It's it's short and it's telling a story within 15 seconds. It had music over the back.
00:06:54
Rob Clark
And so it very much felt like a TikTok before that was really even a thing.
00:06:56
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:06:58
Rob Clark
And so part of it was is the style that I like to create. And so I knew, and and I tried actually long form. Everyone that has done videos, they've always tried long form because if you can break through on YouTube as long form creators, at one point there was a lot of money in that.
00:07:15
Rob Clark
And it took a lot of time for us. I would film a video and I would edit for an hour, sometimes two hours a night, and we get a thousand or 2000 views. But my style that I just happen to be good at is more of that short form. And so when that became kind of the flavor of the day, there's a bit of it is like that was what I was good at. i was able to tell a short story in 15 seconds.
00:07:39
Rob Clark
So I think those two things, the timing and the skill set of knowing what people want to watch in 15 second increments.
00:07:47
Ken Freire
So walk us through for those who are listening. they There are people who are coaches, consultants, expert-led business owners who are like, I know I should get into this. I wanna grow.
00:07:59
Ken Freire
They're stuck. They don't wanna necessarily do ads. They don't wanna necessarily do a lot of things. They know short form is a great option. And you mentioned you have the skillset for it.
00:08:09
Ken Freire
What is that skillset? If you were to break it down and teach someone how to do it, what would they need to do?
00:08:15
Rob Clark
Yeah, so a shameless plug. If you want to get the playbook, it's only $5 on Amazon.
00:08:18
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:08:23
Rob Clark
I call it 4 billion views. Rob Clark, you can go. And it literally is step-by-step what we did from scratch and how we got those 4 billion views on social media. And so you could definitely do that, but I'll give it to you right now as well. And so some of the things that you got to understand is just the speed at what things happen.
00:08:42
Rob Clark
And so a lot of people, when they do a video, they start thinking about what is it like in real life? It's like, hey, I'm Rob Clark and I'm a part of that tall family. Well, if you do that on video, people scroll right by it. And so a lot of times we see in companies, the first three seconds is either their logo flashing up, who they are, or they're telling us what's going to happen in the video.
00:09:04
Rob Clark
Now, in the world of communication, if you're giving a speech, like, yeah, there's certain things. It's like, you got to tell people what you're gonna talk about and then you got to introduce you. And so all those things, but in short form media, you realize like they say three seconds, but we all know it's one second.
00:09:18
Rob Clark
You got one second to grab somebody's attention. And so that's called the hook. And so you got to hook people right away. So people don't care about you because they don't know you.
00:09:28
Rob Clark
So you got to instantly Like within one second, figure out a way to say, okay, this video is worth your time.
00:09:36
Ken Freire
you
00:09:36
Rob Clark
And that's the first thing with short form video is like, you just got to speed everything up. So that first image, the first text on the screen, the caption, the music, all of it really matters more than what people would imagine because you only got a second.
00:09:52
Ken Freire
Yeah. So for those who, again, and I love that you, you brought up the book. I was like, oh man, I need to go get the book. Uh, I'm going to buy it
Creating Engaging and Educational Content
00:09:59
Ken Freire
as soon as we get off the call. you for them, you're going to give us like a high overview of stuff, but this is where going into the book, you're given the play by plays. I'm assuming examples of what works, what doesn't work.
00:10:11
Rob Clark
Yes.
00:10:11
Ken Freire
have you found anything that people assume is a good hook, but actually isn't like, are there trends for that?
00:10:18
Rob Clark
So, yeah, this is something i talk about all the time. And and I say quantity over quality. And so we hear all the time that quality matters more than quantity.
00:10:24
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:10:27
Rob Clark
And so, but here's what I say with social media is like, I think both are right. But this is what I mean by quantity leads to quality. So quantity has to come first because on social media, there is there,
00:10:41
Rob Clark
There is no tricking the algorithm. There's no cracking the algorithm because it's always changing. And so what I tell people is like, don't actually think about the algorithm. It really doesn't matter.
00:10:52
Rob Clark
Think about content that people want to watch. And then the immediate thing that I follow up with that is you don't know what people want to watch. And therefore, you have to put out a lot of content.
00:11:03
Rob Clark
And by doing that, you're going to figure out what people want to watch. So, for example. Early on when we started that tall family, another reason why I think we are so successful is that when we decided to create content, we said three videos every single day.
00:11:17
Ken Freire
you
00:11:19
Rob Clark
It doesn't matter if they're good, they're bad, it doesn't matter. We're putting out three videos every single day because I knew what was gonna happen is when we started doing that, eventually we're going to figure out what people wanna watch.
00:11:32
Rob Clark
And so as we're doing that time after time, after time, after time, there's one time there's a video that we did and it was just because we had to put out a video because we made that commitment to ourselves.
00:11:43
Rob Clark
So we're leaving for lunch. We haven't done a video yet that day. So we have three more to do. So i said, before we get in the car, tell you what, let's get in the front yard. And I set up the iPhone on a Costco folding table. So not fancy equipment. We're standing outside.
00:11:59
Rob Clark
The house we were living Atlanta was not nice. Like our neighbor got stabbed. It was not a nice area. That's another story. But so there's like weeds in the yard. And so we simply just try to give my oldest son, who's seven foot one, a high five.
00:12:13
Rob Clark
And so and then we do that.
00:12:13
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:12:15
Rob Clark
That takes like 15 seconds. We're driving in the car. I'm editing as we're driving. Put some music on it. Put some captions on it and speed some parts up. and and i And I watched it, I was like, this isn't this isn't that great. i was like, but it doesn't matter. We got to post it.
00:12:31
Rob Clark
We got to put three videos out today. So I posted it. Long story short, right now on YouTube, it's our most, so actually another video just passed it, but it's our second most popular video at 225 million views.
00:12:43
Rob Clark
And so I tell that story because I didn't think it was that great, but I don't get to decide, right?
00:12:43
Ken Freire
That's awesome.
00:12:44
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:12:49
Rob Clark
And that's the beauty of social media. And when I talk to companies, here's what companies often do that is just throwing money down the drain is that they'll hire a company and they say, we need to get a million impressions, 5 million impressions.
00:13:04
Rob Clark
That company creates an ad. They don't care what it looks like. It probably looks like every other ad they created. And then they put money behind it. And then that company says, look, we got you in front of a million people. We got you in front of 5 million people.
00:13:16
Rob Clark
No, they they got that the video in front, but no one watched it. If you actually look at the analytics, nobody watched it.
00:13:20
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:13:22
Rob Clark
Nobody cared. So what I'm telling people to do is do quantity. You got to put out a lot of content and then you could find out what people want to engage with. So that video at 225 million views, I know that I could take that and turn it into an ad and I could put money behind it.
00:13:39
Rob Clark
And that video is going to reach a lot of people because I already know people want to watch that kind of content. And so you
The Impact of AI on Content Creation
00:13:46
Rob Clark
don't learn that, though, unless you constantly put out content. So early on, put out a lot of content. You're going to find something that people love that you didn't expect.
00:13:56
Rob Clark
And then if you want, you can continue to do that type of content or you could put money behind that content and turn it into an ad. So it's just a way to use the content yeah that you make to get your brand out there in a very smart way.
00:14:09
Rob Clark
Now we have never put money behind our content at 4 billion views. Actually 5 billion views now. we We don't put money behind our content because I want to know how can organic content reach people.
00:14:20
Rob Clark
And then if you do want to put money behind it, then it's smart money because you know what people are going to watch.
00:14:20
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:14:25
Ken Freire
Yeah. How do you find the balance between, creating all that content and also like having your, your niche or like your values of like, Hey, this is what I'm about.
00:14:36
Ken Freire
And I'm trying to get more people to, to consume my stuff, whether you might have a long form piece of content, And maybe to be more specific, like there's some people who will say, create all the content for entertainment sake.
00:14:50
Ken Freire
But when you're talking for a business, you're also like you're trying to drive sales at some point. So where's that balance there?
00:14:56
Rob Clark
So I would say the people that are best at it can do both. Meaning you can go deep on education and you're gonna get some people for sure. You could go deep into entertainment. You'll get a lot more people.
00:15:10
Rob Clark
The people that win on the internet are the people that do both. And so there is a skill to that, of course. There is an art to that. And so that's the goal. But I would tell people, if you're simply going for educational, but there's not a level of entertainment, you're you're not going to win.
00:15:27
Rob Clark
it's just It's just the truth. And so if your video is boring, chances are nobody's going to watch it, no matter if it's the greatest content in the world. And so we could say, well, we don't like that, but it's a reality.
00:15:40
Rob Clark
At the end of the day, if someone is a bestselling author, it doesn't mean that it's the best book. It means that they're the best at selling that book.
00:15:46
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:15:48
Rob Clark
That's the reality. And so we can say we like it or not. There's some book out there right now that's the best book that's ever been written outside of the Bible. And yet nobody knows about it because they didn't know how to sell it. They didn't know how to market it.
00:15:59
Rob Clark
And so that's just the world that we live in. So I would say you got to figure out some way that, and i I do talk about this in the book, you got to pick some categories. It's like, are you going to entertain?
00:16:11
Rob Clark
Some people choose the shock value. You know, there's a little bit, it's like always be angry. There's a reason why news is always trying to get people angry and, you know, get people riled up because there is an emotion where we're when we're fearful, we'll consume more that content as well.
00:16:20
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:16:27
Rob Clark
So there are different ways that you can do it. But I would say you whatever you do in your business, you have to find a way that you make it enjoyable. Now, for example, I worked with a constitutional judge.
00:16:40
Rob Clark
And so as you can imagine, not that exciting. You know, even
00:16:44
Ken Freire
yeah
00:16:45
Rob Clark
And I think he's 70, a great man, but he wanted to get his content out there. And we had some of his videos go for hundreds of thousands of views because there are certain things that you can do. It's like right away, how do you talk about something that's trending that is popular in culture right now?
00:17:00
Rob Clark
Okay, let's grab that. Let's add the subtitles. Let's do quick jump cuts. Let's do some background music that builds the suspense a little bit. So even if it's something as boring as constitutional law, there are things that you can do to spice it up a little bit to make it easier to consume.
00:17:17
Ken Freire
Yeah. So for those who are thinking, man, I want to get into this. I want to get into maybe the edutainment, right? I think that's the category that that people call it.
00:17:28
Ken Freire
is Does your book have that playbook on how to how to find that skill set? Because you talked about it earlier. You were like, it's a skill set to learn how to do it. You could do another shameless plug. It might be a different book or you might need to write a new book.
00:17:39
Rob Clark
Yeah.
00:17:39
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:17:40
Rob Clark
Yeah. Well, there is a new book coming out. And so maybe next month, maybe two months from now, I don't know when it is, but that will have all the playbooks of how to do that. But at the end of the day, the the thing that most people don't want to hear is that it's going to take time. It gets back to that idea of quantity over quality.
00:17:59
Rob Clark
Now, there there is a way. So one, if you don't want to invest that time, then you need to hire somebody that has already done that. And that's true of anything, right? We could, as human beings, we're capable of learning a lot of things.
00:18:12
Rob Clark
And so, but if you don't want to spend the time learning that, then you've got to invest in somebody.
00:18:15
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:18:17
Rob Clark
And so obviously that's something that I do, but there's there's lots of people out there that do that as well. But now that you kind of brought it up, there is one kind of thing that, uh,
00:18:27
Rob Clark
One of the things that I don't understand, but I do as human beings, that we understand how powerful social media is. We know that the next president in United States will not win if they're not effective on social media.
00:18:43
Rob Clark
We know the biggest Fortune 500 brands in the world will not do well if they're not successful on social media. And yet many of us in our own businesses will simply throw social media to the youngest person in the company.
00:18:59
Rob Clark
It's like you have TikTok. Why don't you run our social media? I work with universities and you see this all the time.
00:19:04
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:19:04
Rob Clark
Let's have students run the social media just because they're young. They must know how to do it. And so all that to say is like this, we got to treat it like another skill set. And there are people out there myself, but there's lots of people that are very good at helping you figure out how to break through on social media for your category.
00:19:23
Ken Freire
Yeah, and it's so imperative, I think, in this age of AI, especially for for CEOs, entrepreneurs to start growing their personal brand, right?
00:19:33
Ken Freire
And like having someone like you, Rob, on their side, like, hey, actually do this, tweak this.
00:19:33
Rob Clark
Yes.
00:19:37
Ken Freire
You're not talking about it correctly here. How are you using AI
Family Integration into Business
00:19:43
Ken Freire
in your business or in your edits? Like, for example, are you still doing a lot of the manual edits when you create videos or are you using AI?
00:19:50
Ken Freire
Curious how's that working out?
00:19:50
Rob Clark
Yeah, so so so right now in the world of social media, there are some AI tools, but they're just not there yet. Now, they're going to get there at some point, but the the beauty of social media is that it's always changing, and that's also the curse.
00:19:58
Ken Freire
Yeah. Yeah.
00:20:07
Rob Clark
is is always changing, meaning that once you figure it out, it could change tomorrow. And we see that all the time. If we look at our numbers, things go up and down and there's times where we're through the roof and there's other times where we're flat.
00:20:20
Rob Clark
And it's just because the algorithm is always changing and people's expectations change as well. So for AI right now, I think you'll get to a place where we already see some videos that are not real people.
00:20:26
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:20:34
Rob Clark
And especially in the kind of the education component of it is like, I think we're going to see more and more of that. I don't think the AI is is great as entertaining yet, but it's going to get there for sure.
00:20:47
Rob Clark
And so I would say for any creator is how are you using AI? And I think as maybe Gary Vaynerchuk, it doesn't matter, i'm go to steal this quote, this idea that AI is not going to take your job, but someone that does use AI will take your job.
00:21:02
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:21:02
Rob Clark
And so it's this idea that we got to see it as a tool. So I'm not afraid that it's going to replace you know content creators. And if it does, then there's going to be a skill set on top of that.
00:21:13
Rob Clark
And so I probably spend two, maybe three hours a day doing new things with AI. And so one of the things as an agency, we're we're using AI to help us build websites.
00:21:25
Rob Clark
We're using AI to help us build apps One of the things that I've done with a couple clients was that even though I do love digital, there's also a little bit of physical.
00:21:29
Ken Freire
Thank
00:21:35
Rob Clark
And so i have a couple books. And so now I'm also helping others create books. And so I got some friends, Shane and Justin, they live up in Canada and they're friends from Canada.
00:21:46
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:21:46
Rob Clark
And they're there one's a basketball coach, who one's a hockey coach. And so, but they have a podcast, they've had over 70 guests. And so through AI, I helped them build. So we took those podcasts and stripped all the data, stripped all the transcripts, and then AI helped us to format a book.
00:22:04
Rob Clark
And so it gave us a rough outline. They went and they did the editing and they they made sure was in their voice. But in that process through AI, we were able to put a book together in less than 30 days.
00:22:15
Ken Freire
yeah
00:22:15
Rob Clark
And it became, that up in Canada, was the number one bestseller inside a Christian leadership.
00:22:20
Ken Freire
That's awesome, man.
00:22:21
Rob Clark
Yeah.
00:22:21
Ken Freire
My business partner and I, we did something really similar. were like, hey, in 30 days, can we publish all of our content or like on a podcast? We do a lot of podcasting and see if we created a book.
00:22:32
Ken Freire
And the book's right there on the show. It took us a month and a half because of all the sicknesses that went through my house.
00:22:34
Rob Clark
Yeah.
00:22:37
Ken Freire
But man, we we we recorded it. We edited it with with AI. We talk about AI being like our ghostwriter.
00:22:43
Rob Clark
Yep. Yep.
00:22:44
Ken Freire
And man, we were, we were pumped. I was like, Oh, look, I'm a published author now. And it's our voice. It's not like we had ai write it for us. It was like, it was writing with us. It took all of our content and created it. So that's the power. I love that you guys are doing that with your friends and and help them there. I'm curious for you, how did you get them to the number one bestseller in the Christian leadership space?
00:23:07
Rob Clark
So this again gets down to attention and that's what we got to understand at the end of the day, we need to get attention. And sometimes it's not necessarily just posting something on Instagram.
00:23:18
Ken Freire
yeah
00:23:18
Rob Clark
And so for them, it started as the momentum was literally hand to hand combat. And so when I say hand to hand, it's like, all right, get out your phone. And the idea was that you need to text every single person that you know,
00:23:31
Rob Clark
that you think would find value in this book. And so it started there. And then from there, the social media amplified it. So friends that love the book shared about it on social media, shared about it on Instagram, on Facebook, on LinkedIn. And there's a lot of traction there. So social media, by simply talking about it there and then having other people talk about it there, it was able to move pretty quickly.
00:23:56
Ken Freire
That's awesome. Rob, you know, we could talk a lot about your business and all the ways you're helping people grow. I do have a this is a sidebar of a conversation before we wrap up our our call here. But I'm curious, you brought your family into the the whole mix, right? And there are some people that they're getting to the stage of like, man, I want to bring my family, but I don't know if I should into the business.
00:24:19
Ken Freire
How has growing your your influencer and your business been like with your family in tow.
00:24:27
Rob Clark
No, for for me, it's it's been everything. i grew up and, you know, it's one of those things like a lot of people grew up in a broken home, fairly poor growing up. And so and I know a lot of people had it much worse than I did, but didn't have a really close family growing up.
00:24:42
Rob Clark
And so for me, when I was getting married, when I decided to marry my wife, Rachelle, we talked about the number one goal was to have a family. For for me, that's one of the things I wanted more than anything. And so and again, I'm not trying to throw stones at anyone. This has just been my goal is to be around my family as much as possible.
00:25:04
Rob Clark
and And now as my kids get older, I have a 21 year old son son, he just got married. And so he he thankfully lives like 20 minutes away, but obviously not under my roof anymore. So we don't even see each other every single day like we used to. And so I look at this thing where we work together as such a blessing. This this idea that, you know, I did insurance for like 10 years, actually it was 11 years.
00:25:26
Rob Clark
And but I would leave in the morning at seven. You know, I get home at 530 when the kids were babies. I'd see them for like an hour a day, sometimes not even that. And so for this last season of life, to be able to create social media with the family and to spend time with the family, it was such a huge blessing.
00:25:44
Rob Clark
And so that's one of the things where for us, this idea of creating content, it really allowed us a lifestyle that has been a huge blessing that we are able to, for me, to be able to have the family close together for such a long time is is a huge blessing.
00:26:00
Rob Clark
And so this is the same thing with ai
00:26:00
Ken Freire
Thanks.
00:26:04
Rob Clark
I would say to people is like, okay, if and and there are some people, and again, I'm not trying to say you're a bad parent if you if you go work in an office all day, because like, I get the reality of that.
00:26:14
Rob Clark
But as these tools come out, maybe there is if your goal is to not spend as much time at the office, there's probably ways that AI can help you. There's probably ways that social media can help you scale what you're trying to accomplish much faster and much bigger, and maybe allow you to do those those things, the goals that you have in life. So All that to say is without a doubt, doing this with the family was the reason, the primary reason why I wanted to do it.
Balancing Work and Family Life
00:26:54
Ken Freire
It's a big blur at some point.
00:26:56
Rob Clark
Yeah.
00:26:57
Ken Freire
But just the reality of i don't want to leave at seven in the morning, get back at six and just be like, I only have two or three hours with my kids before they go to bed.
00:27:08
Ken Freire
And as a Christian, as as a believer, I was like, who's discipling my kids? Who's called to disciple them and be the main one? And I was like, well, I am the father. I'm the the leader of this household. And if I'm not around enough to do that,
00:27:23
Ken Freire
Like it's going really hard. Not to say that if you are working that job, there's not ways to do it. I know there is. There's pros and cons. But I was just like similar mentality. I want to be around as much as possible to train up my children.
00:27:37
Ken Freire
And that my dad, he worked three jobs the whole time. I never saw him. You know, so it was like, oh, dad just came in, grabbed a bite to eat and and he was gone. So I wanted to be there for those. So maybe the the maybe a final word encouragement from you for those who feel the struggle right now as they're building their business and they were like, I left my nine to five to start my business, but now I feel like it's 24 seven.
00:28:01
Ken Freire
What has helped you to kind of rein things in so that you can be more family oriented?
00:28:07
Rob Clark
I think sometimes it's just being intentional. And I know that could be a buzzword, but I think if we're really honest with ourselves to be intentional, you know, as we start this new business that we're starting, I am traveling a little bit and I don't travel a ton, but, you know, like next week I'll be gone for a few days.
00:28:26
Rob Clark
And so it's just being intentional, knowing that I'm going to be gone is like leading up to that. And when I get back, how do I structure my time? So I'm not just constantly focused on the business.
00:28:37
Rob Clark
And then there's just the the reality of it as well as like all of us, if we're building something that does take time, so give yourself grace because there's going to be times where you're just not going to be able to do it all. There's going to be times where, I mean, the reality is, is there's going times where you have to be away from the family.
00:28:57
Rob Clark
And so give yourself grace when that happens. But there are other times where you realize there's a lot of time in the day. So for us, it's like, OK, what what does my wife enjoy to do? What do my kids enjoy to do? So when I don't have to work, how can I serve them? OK, so like today,
00:29:14
Rob Clark
there's a lot of work going on, but I'm going to carve out from one to three. I'm going to have coffee with my wife, just my wife. The kids are staying home. I don't care what they want to do. They're staying home. And then later it's like, okay, we're going to do this with the kids. And so, and I think if we're honest, all of us waste a lot of time.
00:29:30
Rob Clark
And so it's just being honest with ourselves.
00:29:30
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:29:32
Rob Clark
Like, okay, you can waste time or you can be intentional about it. And so, but the word of encouragement is to give yourself grace because all of us are trying to figure this out.
00:29:43
Rob Clark
And like you, as a believer, it's like my ultimate goal is to stand in front of Jesus and hear, well done and good and faithful servant, knowing that every single day until that day, i'm going to fall down and and mess up.
00:29:56
Rob Clark
But Jesus gives us grace, so we should give ourselves some too.
Future Plans and Legacy
00:30:01
Ken Freire
Rob, that thank you for that encouragement. Like I said, before we wrap up, I'm asking every expert the same five questions, right? And I want to know what's actually working, what they're even working on for themselves.
00:30:08
Rob Clark
Mm-hmm.
00:30:12
Ken Freire
So question number one for you is what's something in your business you're experimenting with right now?
00:30:18
Rob Clark
Yeah, I think this idea of books, and again, it's funny because I'm all about digital, but there's a little bit of, there is there's always a pendulum swing.
00:30:29
Rob Clark
So I think we're going to get to a place where even my own self, like I listen to a lot of podcasts and audio books, but there is like in my own life, I'm like, I need to pick up physical books more often. So I'm doing that.
00:30:39
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:30:40
Rob Clark
so So I'm trying to write more books. So I have, sorry about that. Shameless plug, Growing Your Influence is my first book. And I would say it's good. Then there's 4 billion views, which is only like 60 pages. And it's very just like, it's very tactical. It'll be super helpful.
00:30:56
Rob Clark
And so it's pretty good. The next book is going to be very, very good as far as from A to Z on how to do social media. But at the same time, I'm currently finishing, which will be out next month. a book for higher education, which I'm co-authoring with the guy. But then I'm also releasing a series of five books and they're going be short, probably like 50 pages each.
00:31:18
Rob Clark
Social media for contractors, social media for car salesmen, social media for hairstylists, social media for podcasters. And so I'm going to dive deep in these on these niches.
00:31:29
Rob Clark
And so that's what I'm experimenting right now is how can I create content in physical form?
00:31:35
Ken Freire
That's awesome. And I was like, wow, that's a lot of books, but I'm sure you and I will have some plenty of time to to chat about that.
00:31:40
Rob Clark
Yeah.
00:31:41
Ken Freire
Question number two, which part of your business feels the most influx or maybe that keeps you up at night?
00:31:48
Rob Clark
Honestly, just getting enough clients to put food on the table.
00:31:52
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:31:53
Rob Clark
And so that's, and I think everyone at the end of the day, that's probably one of the biggest stresses is like, theres there's so many goals, but at the end of the day, if you don't have enough cashflow, that's oxygen. And then the business ceases to exist.
00:32:07
Ken Freire
Yeah. Great. Question number three. What's a goal you're building toward this year that you're really excited about?
00:32:15
Rob Clark
Yeah, one of the things that we're going to also do is I'm launching into coaching and consulting. And so that's something new. We got together. i got a course. It's it's put together. it should be out within the next 60 days.
00:32:28
Rob Clark
And so that's going to, I think, help a lot of people. And so there's a company I'm working with out of Phoenix. And so they're finalizing, they're packaging all that up together. And so, but that's something new.
00:32:39
Rob Clark
But this idea of coaching people how to get more attention, I'm pretty excited about that. When it launches, I think it'll be very helpful for a lot of people.
00:32:49
Ken Freire
Oh, yeah. That's going to be really good. Question number four is where do you see the industry? And you're in several industries here, but where do you see the industry shifting and how are you preparing for it?
00:33:01
Rob Clark
Yeah, I think with all the digital and and AI is speeding everything up. And so i actually had a car dealership yesterday talking to a guy and he's like, I was in the music business. And but now I'm not because AI is going to no one's going to be musicians anymore because I could just hit on my phone.
00:33:18
Rob Clark
There's a song and some of you may know about that. ai A country song that hit top of the charts.
00:33:21
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:33:23
Rob Clark
and And I see it differently. I said, yeah, that's going to happen. But people are going desire physical. So this gets back to the first question is like, i think people are going to get back to physical books.
00:33:34
Rob Clark
And so, yes, I can open up my iTunes account and listen to any song I want. And I don't know if that person's real or not, but people are going to start craving to go and see real life artists.
00:33:45
Rob Clark
They're going to want a real life experience. and And maybe it's not a stadium. So if you're a music artist, maybe it's not a stadium. Maybe it's a house. Like my my daughter's doing music. She does music. So she's having a house concert here.
00:33:57
Rob Clark
So at some point we're going to have like 50 people in our house for a concert. And I think that kind of stuff is going to be an opportunity.
00:34:05
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:34:05
Rob Clark
And so for even content, for example, if you're a content creator, that at some point, AI is going to be able to do exactly what you do when it comes to content. But what it can't do is say, okay, on this day in Nashville, Tennessee, at this coffee shop, we're doing a workshop.
00:34:22
Rob Clark
At this day, at this hour in St. Louis, we're getting together with 50 entrepreneurs. And so it's like these in-person events. So start thinking about what AI can't do.
00:34:32
Rob Clark
And then because everything will lead to that. And so people want access. So with this podcast, for example, probably next year, AI could replicate your face and your tone and your thinking, but it can't replicate meeting you for coffee. it can't replicate 10 friends getting together.
00:34:49
Rob Clark
And so I think the real life experience stuff, we're going to start craving that more than ever.
00:34:55
Ken Freire
100%. I 100% agree with you. Last question. What's the legacy that you want to leave behind?
00:35:01
Rob Clark
Yeah. So I kind of let the cat out of the bag a little bit is that I i want to stand in front of Jesus. And in fact, I don't know if you can see it, but it's like the tattoo that I have on my arm here. It says, well done, good and faithful servant. So my legacy is that one, my wife, my four kids, God willing, all my grandkids and everybody I come in contact, they're standing there with me and hearing the same thing from Jesus to them.
00:35:29
Ken Freire
Amen. Rob, for those who are really excited about what you bring to the table and they're like, man, I could actually use someone like you to help me to either coach me or just do this stuff for them. What's the best way to contact you?
00:35:42
Rob Clark
Yeah, LinkedIn is is really good. Rob Clark, LinkedIn. I think it's LinkedIn backslash Rob Clark. So I was able to snag that.
00:35:49
Ken Freire
Yeah.
00:35:50
Rob Clark
And then Instagram, I see almost every message on Instagram, that tall family on Instagram. I'll see that message as well. But yeah, if you pull up that tall family Instagram,
00:36:02
Rob Clark
YouTube or Google or wherever you go, you're going to find us. And I think on YouTube, even I put my I put my cell phone number just at the top of of the YouTube page, which is fun.
00:36:06
Ken Freire
Thank you.
00:36:13
Rob Clark
So I get a lot of like 12 year old kids calling, hey, is this really the tall family? Send us a photo. And so and it's fun. And we we do we send random videos. But but yeah, if you just search in Rob Clark, LinkedIn, that's probably the best way.
00:36:26
Ken Freire
That's awesome, man. Rob, thank you so much for being on the show. I really appreciate what you're doing and and how you're doing it in a very authentic way and bringing the best of who you are to the table.
00:36:29
Rob Clark
Thank you, Ken.
00:36:37
Rob Clark
Yeah. Thanks so much, Ken. i so appreciate being here.
00:36:41
Ken Freire
Yep.