Becker Private Equity & Business Podcast
Earned Media, Supporting Friends’ Businesses, & More 5-7-25
Wed, 07 May 2025
In this episode, Scott Becker explores the importance of supporting friends’ businesses by paying fair value, avoiding requests for free services, and understanding the true nature of earned media.
Chapter 1: What is the main focus of this episode on supporting friends' businesses?
This is Scott Becker with the Becker Private Equity and Business Podcast. Today's discussion is earned media and asking for free stuff. So here's the concept. If you're in the media business or if you're any business, you have connections, friends, colleagues, customers, everybody.
Chapter 2: How should you support a friend's business financially?
And here's my one piece of advice for a friend, a colleague, a connection who wants to do business with a friend's company. If your friend owns a restaurant, you go and you pay full price and you over tip the servers as a way of supporting your friend.
You don't go to the restaurant and say to the friend, I want a discount, and then also cheap tip the service staff, the team that's working with you. Rather, you do the opposite. When you show up at your friend's place of business, you either overpay or you don't complain.
Chapter 3: What should you avoid when supporting a friend's business?
If you don't want to spend the money to show up at your friend's place of business but still want to support them, then you say positive things to other people. You encourage people to use that business. You do that kind of thing. So let me tell you what you don't do. You don't. ask for free passes to the meeting.
Chapter 4: What is the concept of earned media in business?
You don't ask for free publicity if the business of the company is providing a media outlet. That's not the concept. Now, of course, earned media. Earned media, I joke, is a phrase I don't know. But the reality is there is earned media, but it goes to people that either spend a lot of money with the company, with the media outlet, or that are so
special and different that the media outlet is honored to have them on. Now, the thing that I would encourage people to do is when you think about that second category, people that are so honored that the media company is so honored to have you on, you should wait for the media outlet to point you to you as that kind of person than think you are that kind of person. So the concept today is
earned media, supporting friends' businesses, and more. And our concept is that if I have a friend who's in business, I either don't do business with them or I pay full price and I don't ask for free stuff. One of my best, best friends owns a landscape business. The last thing I'm ever going to do is ask that friend for a discount on the landscaping
If you want to be supportive, you be supportive. If you don't, don't. But support in other ways. You don't have to be a customer of your friends. By no means am I suggesting that. But don't ask your friends that run businesses for free stuff. If I tell my podcast production team, hey, I want you to do this free this week.
They might feel they're compelled to do it because we do enough business with them, but it would be awfully awful for me to ask that question or ask them to do it. And that's the concept. I hope this resonates with some people. I know I've probably not nailed the topic exactly right, but it resonates with people. If you're going to do business with a friend, support those friends.
If you're going to do business with companies, support those companies. Thank you for listening to the Becker Private Equity and Business Podcast.
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