 Welcome back to Entrepreneurship Tuesday, online in the morning, special thanks to Alex for that informative interview. As we move on swiftly, we have Eric Smith, who's the CEO and founder of Smith's Ages Limited, and under Smith's Ages, we have the Globe Magazine, which is a digital magazine or an online magazine, and is here to share the story with us about digital content, creation development, and everything about it. So before we talk to him, be sure to interact with us on our social media handles at Y-54 channel on Twitter, Y-54 underscore channel on Instagram, and Y-54 on Facebook. Hashtag is one in the morning. Hashtag is Entrepreneurship Tuesday. And our SMS line is 201-54. Start with Y-254, and you'll reach us directly. Karibusana, Mr. Eric. Thank you very much for having me back. All right, your camera is number four right there. If I missed anything in your credentials, you can go ahead and say it. Thank you very much. I'm Mr. Eric Smith from Smith Ages Limited. I'm the director and founder. And I'm glad that you're here. Had me today. All right. So, this journey, when did it start? It started way back in campus since I was in my second year. All right, what was your... What's your background at Y-54? I have a degree in BA, Fine Arts. Fine Arts? Yeah, majoring in interior design. Oh, you majored in interior design. Yeah. All right, so you're a very visual person. Yeah, I'm very visual and very creative. All right. So, back in campus, you're studying interior design. And then you think about digital media. Yeah. All right, so did you want to connect the two interior design and digital media, or you just wanted two parallel things? Pretty much, I actually studied out as a photographer. Yeah. So, I studied out as a photographer. I went on that way, and then after that, I got interested in graphics. So, I really wanted to connect the two. So, that's how it all started. All right, because when it comes to interior design, you have to design using software. Yeah. And it's not so far from graphic design. Yeah. The software for interior design. Yeah. All right, so photography also helps with interior design, because that's how you market your work. Pretty much. After you've done something, you have to take photographs of it. Exactly. All right, so there's photography, there's interior design, and then there's graphic design. Yeah. And then all this birthed the Glow magazine. Yeah. All right. All this, the photography is what actually started the magazine. Uh-huh. Yeah. Then the graphics is what started the digital company. Okay, so there are like two in one. Yeah. All right. So, how big is the company's over? So, we are a limited company with a team of five, and we have a lot of partners in it. Uh-huh. Yeah. How many partners over? We have like five partners. All right. What was the initial investment? We started out small, still in campus with like 50K, but way before that, before they like the initial 50K, that's when you now come together and say, let's put some 50K together. Before that, I started out with 3000 Bob. 3000 Bob, yeah. What did you spend the 3000 Bob on? I spent the 3000 Bob on a friend of mine who helped me make my first website. All right, so 3000 sharing was spent on the website. Yeah. All right, did you have plans to cash the website? Yeah. Uh-huh. The website was to actually help me show my clients that I'm serious. All right, so which clients are you talking about? The interior design clients? Yeah, both interior design and graphic clients. All right, so like what buttons did you have at the top? I had like a photography, I had graphics and I had interior design. So you had photography, graphics and interior design? Yeah. All right, is the website still alive? Yeah, but it's now way different. It's improved, but it's the same website you said that you improved. Yeah, it's the same website, but way different. Way different now. All right, because you've learned over time. Yeah, I've learned over time. All right, I'd like to get into the digital, media aspect of things. Yeah. And how you, why did you get the courage to start a magazine, man? Like, it takes a lot. Yeah, it takes a lot. And it hasn't been easy, but you know, you just have to take a lot of risks and just go get into it, fail and come back up. So I started when I was in my second year. We did a teaser with a friend of mine who's the co-founder. Her name is Jed. She's doing her masters in USAO. I called her and then we just started. We actually did our first teaser overnight. It was a 10 page teaser and then we just, it was a free digital issue. So we just shared it all over WhatsApp and social media. And guys were so excited about it. So we came back, we had a meeting and we said, yo Jed, let's do this. So we went out, did a lot of research, came up with a lot of cool stories and we made our first issue. You made your first issue. So when you're getting into the business, into the magazine world or the magazine business, you, what are some of the requirements? One, I know you need to cover niche, you need a niche, you need the topics that you're going to be talking about. Exactly. That people are going to be looking for in the magazine. What are some of the other stuff that you need to set up a magazine, even a web magazine? Okay, so first you need content. Because if you don't have content then, you don't have the magazine. So with the content comes content creators. So you need very awesome writers, you need very cool photographers, you need very cool graphic designers. You need a whole team to come up with a very awesome magazine. People are going to understand your vision and who are going to do it with utmost best. So content and content creators, that's all you need. And you need the visuals to pop as well. Exactly. Because that's what attracts people to the magazine. All right, so there's always a contentious issue when it comes to the world of magazines. And the people who make magazines have always been accused of using sex to sell. Always. The cover is always a beautiful woman and she's always have dressed if not naked. Pretty much. What do you have to say about it? I think that's not a good way to go, especially like, for example, as our target audience is the youth between the ages of 18 to around 30. So I think that the best way to go about it is to see how do I actually get my message out there without having being a valga on my images or being a nudist or something. Being too obvious. Yeah. So you need to be extra creative on your covers or your images. So creativity beats. Yeah. Definitely. Stereotype. Definitely. Any time. Any time. You believe that. I believe that. All right, all right. On to the next question now. And this one is about building the brand. Yeah. Yes, because when I go to a magazine stand, I'm going to pick the ones that I've seen since time immemorial because I trust. Pretty much. All right, how do you beat that? How do you be that guy that I'm going to pick when I go to a magazine stand when I open my browser and I click to your icon? Yeah. So first of all, you'll need to be a very experienced creative like I am. First. First. Secondly, you need to understand the brand identity. Basically, brand identity is what people identify you as. Like, for example, like SafariCon, people know it's green and red and has a curve on the logo. Something like that. Then you need to be highly appealing. For example, if you look at some of our covers, I don't know if you guys are going to show this. Yes, we're going to have some on screen. Yeah. If you see some of our covers, they're very interesting. They're unique. They're not normal. If you look at it, you're going to be like, oh, wow, what's this? I want to look inside. Something like that. You need to be very, very appealing. You need to capture the attention from the top. In the first three seconds, somebody sees that magazine. You just want, I want to buy this. I want to see the pictures. Even if they're not interested in reading, I just want to see the pictures. All right. You get. So sometimes you appreciate the people that come to you and say, your magazine looks so cool. Exactly. You take no offense since they didn't read the content that is inside. No, I'm going to be curious. Okay, did you go through it? Did you read? Or did you just look at it? Do you have questions for sure? Yeah. All right. We have your Instagram right here, the GlomagKE. Yeah. You can find them on Instagram at GlomagKE. Yeah. And yes, we can sample a cover maybe. Yeah. Check us up. Uh-huh. Yeah. Oh, let's find the... That one over there. The blue one. No, this one. Yeah, this is the blue one. The blue one. This one. The one with the flowers. Yeah. All right, let's see the one with the flowers right there. Post with the flowers. Right up there. The one on top of this one. But that is a promo for an issue that is coming. It's already out. This is already out. Yeah. But this was a promo for it. Yeah. This is not a cover. Yeah. Let's see the cover of the magazine. Yeah, that one. All right. Who's the star of the show here? This is Maggie Wambogo. She's the former Miss UON. Former Miss UON? Yeah. All right. Yeah. You can see how the cover is. It's not like any other cover. It has a very cool background. It pops. Exactly. And the background matches with what she's wearing. She's wearing. All right, so this takes a long creative process. Yeah, it's a long creative process. You need a makeup artist. You need a stylist. You need a very awesome photographer. And all of these guys have to understand the end concept that you want to achieve. They need to work like a car assembly. Exactly. Exactly. So from this step to this step to this step. And the first step is dependent on the last step. On the last step. And the last step is dependent on the first step. On the first step. Yeah. All right. Do you end up sometimes having two covers and you have to pick one? Yeah, pretty much. Like this one. We had two awesome covers and we had to choose between two. Yeah. It's a boardroom kind of situation. Exactly. Guys want this. Guys want this. And you need a tiebreaker. All right. So in the long run you get to pick. So this is how you get to stand out. You need to pop. Exactly. You need to pop. You need to pop. And you need to catch people. All right. Yeah. Caching. How do you cache it? We sell digitally. We sell digitally. We have an online shop. It's shop.glomag.co.ke. And we have different modes of payment. So shop.glomag.co.ke is different from the Glomag Magazine website. Yeah. But you can still go to Glomag.co.ke. And get a link there. Yeah. Slash shop. All right. Yeah. So the shop, what do you sell at the shop, apart from the magazine? We just sell magazines. You just sell magazines strictly. Yeah, strictly. It's a limited market. Yeah. All right. So on the people buy digital copies. Exactly. That is the one way that you guys cache it. Yeah. What is another way that you guys cache it from the magazine? Advertisement. Advertisement. Yeah. We have full spread, half spread, and quarter spread. Full spread, half spread, and quarter spread. Yeah. We sound like we are talking about bread. So maybe you can explain full spread. So people don't assume we are talking about it. So full spread is basically a full page advert. Half is a half page advert and quarter advert. It's self-explanatory. Yeah, it's just that basic. So adverts and actual sales. Yeah. All right. How are the sales so far? Do canyons have this culture of reading and buy magazines? For sure, canyons don't read. Canyons don't read. You read as much. Yeah, according to my research. But we've just had to see the best way on how to actually make people buy the magazine, especially the youth. We had to actually review our pricing so that guys, because you see our target market are not necessarily people who are working. It's mostly people who are in campuses. Or people who are grinding. Exactly. So we had to put a pricing that's very accommodating. Yeah, and satisfactory to that guy. And it's not going to be, oh, that's too much. So we set a very comfortable pricing, which is 200. And we have another issue which sells at 250. It has more informative, educative information. The exclusive issue. Exactly. And then the normal issue. Yeah. So you can just decide between the two. The other thing we found out is that guys don't want, guys might buy a hard copy, but then they won't treat it as much. Because nowadays, nobody wants to go carrying something. You just want to carry things. Yeah. So we found it easier to just make the issue available on gadgets. So as long as you have it on your computer, on your phone, or on your tablet, that's the easiest way to go. Because anybody, whether you're driving, whether you're on a train or something, you can just trade it. OK, OK. So there's this guy called Ryan Leslie. He's an independent artist now. And he was complaining how it was sent a label. And they first sold a number of records. The second time, they sold less. And he was wondering why did the label just market to the people who bought the first time directly and sell it to them directly. And then go out on a wild goose chase. All right, do you guys have like a system where you monitor your customers? And what is the importance of that? Yes, we actually have a community. We have an exclusive page where guys actually come and join the community. So once you join the community, you join the community. Is the right word for that? Yeah. So once you join the community, you join by subscribing via email. And we obviously do weekly newsletters. And that's how we actually get in touch with the customers on a weekly basis. Right. Yeah, so that way we keep our guys updated with news, information and stuff from the magazine. All right, and do you get to take the opinion in as well? Yes, we also do have a review platform as well where guys send us emails on things to improve, things they need to read about and such stuff. All right. Somebody who has seen it all from campus till this date, what is the importance of research in a startup? Research is kind of like a binoculars. You want to go over there, but you can't see it. So what you do, you do research. And research is pretty much like a real-time binoculars whereby you can see clear, but once you use your binoculars, you're going to see more clear. So research enables you to plant strategically and it enables your plant to become more solid and it's highly calculated in short. All right, so your moves are calculated, but you do your research. All right, when you say you guys did your research, being a company that started from 3,000 shillings to setup a website, to 50,000 shillings to make it a company and all that, what are some of the ways and tricks you guys used to do your research on a budget? Okay, so one of the easiest ways is to just set up a link, set up an online form, put up the questions that you want and set up a prize at the end of it so that people are excited to participate. To answer the question. Exactly. And as long as, but the thing is, don't set too much high pricing, just something convenient so that then people won't give you fake answers. You still want legit answers. Just a small incentive and guys, you're just gonna get a whole lot of data that you're gonna use, yeah. All right. And data is, we're living in a data era, man. Exactly. Data is cash now. Yeah, yeah. All right, what is the future of Glow Magazine? The future of Glow Magazine is pretty huge. We're having discussions with some partners in Ghana and we are hoping to head to Ghana very soon. Adventure in Ghana. All right, so you guys want to be African. Yeah. In Africa Magazine and then take it far wide. Yeah. All right, xenophobia, you guys are not scared. No, I think the best way to tackle these things is just head on and to actually talk about it. And as Glow, we're definitely gonna be writing about it. You're going to be talking about xenophobia. Yeah, pretty much. You're going to attack it head on. Yeah. All right, I'd like to get your opinion now. So do you think Africa has a chance in being an open market like that? Since you guys are heading to Ghana, maybe we'll head to Ghana next, maybe to South Africa. Do we have that chance of being an open market where we can sell our, a Kenyan, a Nairobian or a Kenyan can sell his goods or products or services across the continent? Yeah, we do have a very good chance, especially that now our continent is growing and that the East African community is bringing up very nice policies that are going to allow exporters nice incentives and great freedom. And I think we have a very great chance in improving our businesses if we increase our chances of export. Yeah. And if we increase our target market. Yeah, yeah, pretty much. Bigger the market. The bigger the market. Exactly. All right. So being a business person, I'm pretty sure you know the importance of saving. So we have a question on Facebook and the question is all about the merry-go-round or the charm of, you've heard of them? Yes, I have. Have you been part of one? Yes, I have. All right. So do you think they are, they work? Yes, they do work. Sometimes earlier this year, my company Smith, I just limited, took part in a campaign run by a Britain investment. And this campaign was generally driven to actually the youth. And it was basically about saving. So why would such a big company tell these young guys to actually save? Because they actually see the importance of saving. For example, when I was in campus, I had to actually save up so that I can invest more on the magazine and on the company, right? That's where I'm where I am today because I saved some money and I invested it and it gave me very nice returns, yeah. All right. But when it comes to merry-go-rounds, what do you call this? This says they were, you have... Well, you have guys contribute and then... Contributing and then somebody's given a big chunk of the money. And then next time it's the other person. You think it works that, that kind of situation? I think it works to some extent, to some extent. But my personal opinion will be, why not save the same personally or individually? Because the same amount you contribute is actually the same amount you get. You get in the long run, right? There's no interest. Yeah, there's no interest. There's no particular added value. Just that you get a huge chunk of money at once. All right. So why not just save it? Why not just save it? Yeah, and save it with like a cycle or an insurance company where you're going to get interest. In the long run, yeah. So the money doesn't just sit there? Yeah. So that is your opinion right there? That's my opinion. All right, thank you very much for coming through. Thank you. How can they find you guys online? They can find Glomagazine, Glomake. And they can find me by Eric Smith on Instagram. All right, thank you very much for coming. Thank you very much, Barry. Doing what you're doing. Thank you very much. We appreciate you so much. We have come to the end of the second segment or the second interview of the day. And we had Eric Smith, the CEO and founder of Glomagazine, a digital magazine. You can find them online. And be sure to support Kenyan content as they head to Ghana. My name is Barry Mossers or it's very more on social media. Don't go nowhere.