In the moments before 3pm Eastern-Time every Friday, hundreds of want-to-be entrepreneurs can be found booting up their laptops or smartphones, awaiting the notification that the weekly “Shark Live Local Marketing Jam Session” has begun.
Around 4 years ago, Nick Ponte and his business partner Tom Gaddis built an empire based around the idea of educating and inspiring people to be their own boss. Ponte founded this company, Offline Sharks, using the same strategies that worked for him when he was starting out in the digital marketing space.
Having no formal education or advertising experience, Ponte was able to drive his digital agency, Nick Ponte Marketing, to six figures in his first year of business. This success story not only served as a testament to his dedication, but catapulted Nick’s career, drawing interest from a large group of people who desire the luxuries that comes with being your own boss.
After teaming up with Gaddis, Ponte further established the vision for Offline Sharks. To educate and give participants vital tools in order to generate $100,000 of revenue in their first year.
The core program is broken up into monetary and customer-generating milestones. A student of Nick Ponte’s starts out as a “Baby Shark”, otherwise described as a newbie to the industry, and from there they have the chance to progress all the way to “Megalodon”, a title which serves as proof of marketing expertise.
Ponte’s goals for Offline Sharks continue to extend beyond simply walking people through a series of modules. The Offline Sharks Facebook Group, for example, boasts an impressive 9,700+ active members. Nick and Tom also host weekly marketing jam sessions within that group which draw in an average crowd of over 200 at the time of streaming, with an even larger number of students re-watching the live shows after air.
Nick Ponte’s focus within his own agency and through his education business may be helping mainly local businesses drive more traffic, leads, and sales to their online assets; but, members of Offline Sharks and Ponte’s various training and education programs come from all over the world.
In Ponte’s most recent private coaching classes, a service that students may enroll in to receive personalized training, he saw participants from countries like England and New Zealand, in addition to the United States.
What lies at the root of Offline Sharks and Nick Ponte’s success? “I wanted to inspire others to achieve their goals, I know if it weren’t for those figures in my own life I would still be working as a mechanic.”
Non advertorial feature
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