Episode from the Unscripted Small Business Podcast

Host: Jeremy Rivera — SEO Arcade Founder & Freelance SEO Consultant

Guest: Dave Gulas — President & Co-Founder of EZDC 3PL

Sponsored by: Cookeville Sunroom Company

Dave Gulas is the president and co-founder of EZDC 3PL, providing warehousing, fulfillment, and transportation services for manufacturers and e-commerce brands. With 20 years in medical/pharmaceutical sales and over three years in logistics, Dave brings a customer-first approach to the 3PL industry.

Dave also hosts the Beyond Fulfillment Podcast, featuring real stories from entrepreneurs — available on the EZDC Blog and all major podcast platforms.

In this conversation, Dave shares how he and his partner identified a gap in the 3PL market — legacy providers weren't delivering the customer service that growing e-commerce brands needed. Three years later, EZDC has built a reputation for responsiveness and genuine care.

Key Topics Covered:

• Why e-commerce brands reach a "graduation point" where outsourcing fulfillment makes sense
• The importance of warehouse management systems (WMS) and automated integrations
• Common mistakes when scaling a business — saying yes to the wrong customers
• Bootstrap vs. funded startups: which succeed more often?
• The unglamorous reality of entrepreneurship
• Why personal branding matters more than ever in 2026

• EZDC 3PL Homepage
• About EZDC
• Packaging and Kitting Services
• Retail Logistics and Warehousing Services
• The Kentucky Advantage: Why a Central Hub is Key for Nationwide 3PL
• EZDC Blog & Beyond Fulfillment Podcast

• Dave Gulas on LinkedIn

From SEO Arcade:

• SEO Forecasting 101: Methods, Metrics, Tools, and Challenges
• The Revenue-First SEO Strategy That's Actually Working
• Opportunity Sizing in SEO
• How a Podcast Generates Links, Content, Audience, Citations & Authority
• White Label Podcast Service

From Jeremy Rivera SEO:

• SEO Basics for Small Business
• Simple, Effective Link Building

Guest: Bill Kasko, Founder & CEO of Frontline Source Group
Host: Jeremy Rivera
Podcast: Unscripted Small Business

In this episode, Bill Kasko shares how he built a successful recruiting and staffing agency by doing the exact opposite of industry standards. From inverting the traditional sales model to being the first company to publish pricing online, Bill's "Costanza Theory" has disrupted an entire industry for over two decades.

We dive deep into the evolution of customer service technology, the fragmentation of the search landscape, and how AI is creating both opportunities and challenges for businesses. Bill also shares his insights on the current job market and why honest communication wins more business than overselling.

• How inverting the traditional sales-to-recruiter ratio created competitive advantage
• Why being the only company with a pricing page became their #1 traffic driver
• The importance of customer convenience over business convenience

• Early adoption of online chat 21 years ago
• The rise and fall of chatbot effectiveness
• 24/7 scheduling and weekend service calls
• Why AI agents still aren't quite ready

• Why presence across multiple platforms is now essential
• How TikTok became the #2 search engine for young users
• The challenge of getting indexed across different search engines
• Reddit dominating 60% of search queries

• The rise of fake candidates using AI tools

Guest: Tianna Mamalick, SMB Marketing School

Tianna Mamalick brings 12 years of SEO expertise focused exclusively on small businesses. In this conversation, she reveals why working with SMBs is more rewarding than enterprise clients, how to honestly manage expectations while delivering real results, and why she went back to human-written content after testing AI extensively. If you're a small business owner wondering what actually works in SEO right now, this episode cuts through the hype with practical, proven strategies.

Running a small business means every marketing dollar counts. Tianna specializes in helping businesses with limited budgets compete effectively by focusing on what drives actual revenue—not just traffic or rankings. She shares her formula for pairing SEO and paid ads that works specifically for service-based businesses, and explains why your service pages matter more than blog posts right now.

The Small Business Advantage Unlike enterprise clients where a 20% conversion increase gets a polite "that's nice," small business owners email about life-changing results: hiring their first employee, taking their first vacation, or investing in business growth. For Tianna, this feedback makes the work meaningful.

Honest Expectations Setting

• Three-month minimum commitment required
• Clients must have budget they can afford to lose completely
• Not every market works the same (example: Pilates in Las Vegas vs. other cities)
• Regular check-ins at three months to evaluate if the strategy is working

The SEO + Ads Formula While ads don't directly boost SEO, they strategically help prime new pages through engagement. When expanding to multiple locations, running targeted ads on new service pages helps get Google Business Profiles moving faster and improves location-specific performance.

What's Actually Working in Content

• Service pages are the priority: Every service needs its own detailed page
• Blog posts are secondary: Focus on key blog content, not volume
• Collaboration posts: Feature complementary businesses (example: makeup company writing about top lotions that pair well with their products)
• Opinion-based content: Take hard stands on your values and approach

The AI Content Experiment Tianna's agency tested AI-generated content extensively—and none of those articles ranked well. They've gone 100% back to human-written content, using AI only for creating outlines based on top-ranking competitors. The reality: people want authentic mistakes and real human voice.

AI Search Reality Check Less than 10% of traffic comes from ChatGPT for most small businesses. While you should prepare by enriching About pages with certifications and expertise, this isn't the urgent crisis some marketers claim. Most people aren't using ChatGPT for business searches yet—we're still in early adoption.

Mining Your Best Content Stop using SEMrush as your starting point. Instead:

• Record sales calls and note what converts prospects
• Review customer support emails for common questions
• Ask front-line staff to keep notebooks of daily questions
• Use this real language in your content—it converts better than corporate marketing speak

Platform-Agnostic SEO SEO principles work across all platforms, not jus...

Join Jeremy Rivera as he delves into the world of wedding photography with Terrence Irving. Discover how Terrence transitioned from a hobbyist to a professional, balancing his passion with a corporate career, and the unique challenges and joys of capturing life's most cherished moments. Learn about his marketing strategies, the importance of building relationships, and his vision for the future.

Scott Curry shares his incredible 15-year entrepreneurial journey from multiple failed businesses to building a thriving YouTube channel that replaced his six-figure income in just three months. In this powerful conversation, Scott reveals how a personal tragedy inspired his new mission: helping a million people achieve financial freedom so they never have to choose between work and family.

In This Episode, You'll Learn:

• How Scott pivoted from motivational speaking to YouTube success during COVID by teaching investment strategies
• The reality of working 3-4 hours of sleep per night for three months to launch a successful side hustle
• Why YouTube monetization is just the beginning—Scott made $5,000 in month two with only $500 from ad revenue
• The strategic shift from one-time affiliate income to monthly memberships that scaled to $25,000/month
• How to survive YouTube's brutal first 10 videos when the algorithm ignores you completely
• Why providing value to many people beats charging premium prices to a few
• The heartbreaking family story that transformed Scott's business mission forever
• Scott's framework for "failing small" and getting through 100 failures faster to reach success

Key Timestamps:

• [00:01] Introduction and Scott's current success after 15 years of failures
• [02:00] The COVID pivot from motivational speaking to online education
• [04:51] Turning $1,000 into $32,000 in one month—proof of actual results
• [08:13] The truth about YouTube monetization and multiple income streams
• [12:23] Why YouTube is harder than other platforms (and why that's good)
• [15:26] The Faith Roar mission: inspired by a mother's one regret
• [22:20] "You're paid based on the value you provide" finally makes sense
• [25:03] The two books that shaped Scott's journey

Notable Quotes:

"I didn't give up. I had a failure, overcame it, failure, overcame it, and just kept on going."

"It is exceptionally rare to find somebody who can and teaches—and when you find people like that, go subscribe to every single social media platform they're on."

"I've met a lot of people on their deathbeds. I've never met anybody who said they regretted not working more. I've met a lot of people who regretted not spending more time with their family."

"The people that go into business to help others are the ones that are the most successful. Your why for starting a business has to be to help people. It cannot be to make money."

"The only thing that is stopping you from achieving the life you've always wanted is action. So just get started."

Resources Mentioned:

• Faith Roar - Scott's new company dedicated to helping people achieve financial freedom: faithroar.com
• We Profit Day and Night Trading Success Journal - Scott's 230-page journal with only 30 pages of information and 200 pages of action steps
• The Bible - Particularly Psalms, Proverbs, and the Gospels for strength and perseverance

Connect with Scott Curry:

• Website: faithroar.com
• Learn about investment education and trading strategies
• Discover how to start a YouTube channel and online business
• Access resources for achieving financial freedom

About the Unscripted Small Business Podcast:

Hosted by Zanetta Chunique Empower, Unscripted Small Business brings you authentic conversations with entrepreneurs who share the real stories...

In this episode, Jeremy Rivera sits down with Justin Stehr, OT, a Certified Hand Therapist at Vanderbilt Health and Clinical Consultant for MetaFlex®. Justin shares his journey from business operations to working at Vanderbilt, and discusses innovative approaches to hand therapy, the mental health connection to chronic pain, and unexpected clinical applications of compression gloves.

Episode Highlights:

• The power of movement and understanding hand biomechanics
• Why we all have overly strong flexors (and what to do about it)
• How MetaFlex® gloves work differently from traditional bracing
• Unexpected applications: Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, stroke recovery, and more
• The sleep-mental health-pain connection you're probably overlooking
• A remarkable Vanderbilt limb salvage case study
• Upcoming research presentations at ACRM and beyond

Justin Stehr, OT, CHT is a Certified Hand Therapist at Vanderbilt Health in Nashville, Tennessee, where he was recently named 2024 Acute Occupational Therapist of the Year. He holds a master's degree in occupational therapy with specialized focus on upper extremity rehabilitation, stroke recovery, and hand therapy.

Justin also holds certifications in:

• Wound care
• Ergonomics
• Hand therapy (CHT)

He currently serves as Clinical Consultant for MetaFlex®, where he educates healthcare professionals on innovative approaches to hand rehabilitation. Justin has presented research at national conferences including the American Congress of Rehabilitative Medicine (ACRM) and has upcoming presentations with the Canadian Percussion Network on the biomechanics of drumming.

Personal Background: Justin's path to hand therapy includes a unique personal connection—15 years ago, he experienced a severe hand injury requiring reconstruction of tendons, nerves, and arteries, giving him firsthand understanding of the rehabilitation journey.

Quote: "We spend all day long, we grip everything. So we're constantly grabbing and pinching and then when we're ready to let go of that item or task, we just let go, we relax. We never forcefully open."

This creates an imbalance where our flexor muscles become overly strong while...

Host: Jeremy Rivera, Unscripted Small Business
Guest: Conrad Coe, Operations Manager at Exotic Vehicle Wraps

In this episode, Conrad Coe shares his unconventional journey from music education to becoming operations manager at one of the nation's top automotive wrapping shops. We explore how AI tools are transforming small business operations, the value of hands-on experience over formal education, and why showing the heart of your business matters more than polished marketing in today's digital landscape.

On Experience vs. Education:

"I would rather have four years of hands-on practical experience at the thing you're trying to do than a degree saying I'm good at it."

On AI in Small Business:

"We wrap cars with vinyl. That's sticky. So what we've been using AI for has been mostly beneficial for us."

On Marketing Differentiation:

"No one uses dashes. Nobody does except for GPT and AI models... In that way, we are using AI to help us differentiate ourselves from AI."

On Customer Service:

"We're not vinyl installers. This isn't a vinyl wrap shop. This is a client experience shop."

On Problems as Opportunities:

"Problems are bugs and not a feature. Like, you're going to have problems. That problem then therefore becomes a feature if you know you're going to have these problems."

Conrad Coe is the operations manager at Exotic Vehicle Wraps, a premier automotive aesthetic restyling shop in Loudoun County, Virginia. With 20 years of experience in the industry, Conrad's path started in retail management, moved through music education at Berkeley Boston, and evolved through design, print, and installation before landing in shop management. His hands-on approach and mentorship style have helped shape one of the longest-running and most respected shops in the automotive wrapping industry.

Conrad discusses his journey from aspiring music teacher to operations manager, emphasizing how mentorship and practical experience often outweigh formal education in tr...

Host: Jeremy Rivera
Guest: Lynn Colepaugh, Founder of Cyber PR Army
Podcast: Unscripted Small Business

In this episode, Lynn Colepaugh from Cyber PR Army joins us to discuss the evolving landscape of digital marketing for small businesses and creators. We dive into the challenges of treating creative work as a legitimate business, the impact of AI on content authenticity, and the fundamental marketing mistakes that are costing businesses customers every day.

Lynn shares practical, actionable advice on everything from fixing basic website issues to building local trust, and why simply responding to inquiries can be your biggest competitive advantage.

On Treating Creative Work as Business:

"It is convincing creators that they are a small business. And it's a really big hurdle because they are creators at heart—whether they are dancers, whether they're making instruments, whether they are writing music."

On AI vs. Authenticity:

"I'm seeing the pendulum swing away from as much AI generated stuff back to people questioning, 'Is this real, a real image or is this something that was generated separately?' And those that are authentically creating are now standing out even more in a really beautiful way."

On Basic Marketing Fundamentals:

"If some industries are just so kind of barren with communications that all you have to do is reply and be thoughtful and communicate, then holy mack, there are companies missing out completely on getting new customers and nurturing customers and keeping their customers long term."

On Local Trust Building:

"I tell people, if you have roots, show your roots, because that's how people know if something goes wrong, they're going to be able to find you."

On Low-Hanging Fruit:

"So many things are on the very granola first level fixable level that people have issues that are just 100% addressable."

On Timeless Marketing Strategy:

"If you're getting your message out correctly, then you will adapt as tools come and go. To me, it is staying face forward there, making sure you're storytelling and talking about the things that are important."

• Creators Must Embrace Business Fundamentals - The biggest challenge for artists and creators is convincing them they're running a small business. They need to understand budgets, contracts, legal documentation, and how to pay their team. With modern AI tools and digital systems, small businesses can now have a "mini support team" to handle low-level tasks they once struggled with alone.
• Authenticity Stands Out in the AI Content Flood - While AI has made content creation accessible to everyone, it's resulted in a flood of similar, generic content. The pendulum is swinging back toward authentic, raw, human-created content that tells real stories. A simple, unpolished video of genuine human connection can outperform highly-produced AI content because people are now questioning what's real.
• Stop Selling to Yourself - Know Your Actual Customer - Small business owners often make the mistake of trying to sell to themselves rather than understanding their actual customer's motivations. You need to identify who's really buying from you and why, then tailor your message accordingly. Just like you'd speak differently to kindergartners versus PhDs, you need to adapt your content to match your audience's specific needs and pain points....