Controlling The World's Social Media, Building a 400 Million Person Network and Overcoming Addiction - Dominic McGregor - #005

**Chris Williamson** (0:00)
So I'm writing, saying that you guys have got access to about 400 million people, is that right?

**Dominic McGregor** (0:04)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.

**Chris Williamson** (0:05)
The total combined reach of 400 million people.

**Dominic McGregor** (0:09)
Yeah, yeah. Across the world.

**Chris Williamson** (0:10)
Which is?

**Dominic McGregor** (0:11)
We have followers in like Taiwan.

**Chris Williamson** (0:13)
Fucking stupid. Like, who's got 400 million of anything?

**Dominic McGregor** (0:17)
I know.

**Chris Williamson** (0:17)
Like, it's just crazy.

**Dominic McGregor** (0:19)
When you put it into a graphic, it's like, ridiculous.

**Chris Williamson** (0:35)
So Dominic McGregor, welcome to Modern Wisdom. How are you?

**Dominic McGregor** (0:38)
Good, thank you. How are you? Good drive.

**Chris Williamson** (0:40)
Yeah, good drive down from Newcastle, Manchester in the rain, which is typical British weather. So it's crazy to come into this office, which is several thousand square feet and looks like a labyrinth with sleeping pods and a bar and a fully functioning kitchen with a chef in and all the rest of it. And this is where memes are made that run around the UK, right?

**Dominic McGregor** (1:06)
It's the meme factory. I didn't like that title.

**Chris Williamson** (1:10)
I saw when that article was on The Guardian.

**Dominic McGregor** (1:13)
It was The Guardian, yeah. It just called us the meme factory, which we are. We make a lot of content here, but a little bit about us. So we started in the room next door with a white table, which is like the same one that we're on here.
The only thing is, there was four of them, one for every single person, and we were sat. And I think these are very similar to the white tables we had. We got them as a little bit of a memory. And we were working in the room, starting Social Chain, which is a marketing agency. And it took us, you know, three or four months to really find out that we were actually onto something. And what was different between us and any other marketing agency is we own big communities. So we own big social media pages from Student Problems, Sparth, Love Food, Beef Motivation. And we went and worked with brands on them communities.

**Chris Williamson** (2:07)
So I'm writing saying that you guys have got access to about 400 million people, is that right?

**Dominic McGregor** (2:12)
Yeah, yeah.

**Chris Williamson** (2:13)
The total combined reach across Facebook is 400 million people.

**Dominic McGregor** (2:16)
Yeah, yeah. Across the world.

**Chris Williamson** (2:18)
Which is?

**Dominic McGregor** (2:19)
We have followers in like Taiwan.

**Chris Williamson** (2:21)
Fucking stupid. Like who's got 400 million of anything?

**Dominic McGregor** (2:25)
I know.

**Chris Williamson** (2:25)
Like it's just crazy.

**Dominic McGregor** (2:27)
When you put it into a graphic, it's like ridiculous.

**Chris Williamson** (2:29)
That's terrifying. But so I found out about you guys about two years ago from one of my best mates who actually worked for you. And what he explained to me about Social Chain at the time felt absolutely groundbreaking that you guys have access to the network, you understand the platform, and then you do the creative.

**Dominic McGregor** (2:49)
Yep.

**Chris Williamson** (2:50)
And for me, I was like, how has no one come up with this before? Because influencers have been around for what, like five, ten years, or five years behind the really prevalent thing?

**Dominic McGregor** (3:00)
Yeah. I think the reason we fell upon it is that we had influence, I guess, but our influences wasn't our faces. So we had to fight.

**Chris Williamson** (3:10)
What was the first page that you started off with?

**Dominic McGregor** (3:12)
Student problems.

**Chris Williamson** (3:12)
Was it really?

**Dominic McGregor** (3:13)
Yeah.

**Chris Williamson** (3:13)
Who started that?

**Dominic McGregor** (3:14)
Me.

**Chris Williamson** (3:15)
You started student problems?

**Dominic McGregor** (3:17)
No way. I was at university in Edinburgh and I went out one night. I don't know. Honestly, it was a really heavy night. It was a couple of days. Actually, do you know what? I think it's exactly five years ago today.

**Chris Williamson** (3:30)
No way.

**Dominic McGregor** (3:31)
I think, I'll double check. I think it was the 7th of February.

**Chris Williamson** (3:33)
That's fantastic.

**Dominic McGregor** (3:34)
So I think it is. Went out and woke up the next day and had no toilet paper in my toilet. The shop was down the bottom of the street. I could have walked and got it. So instead of going and getting it, I decided to start a Twitter page and tweet about my life.

**Chris Williamson** (3:54)
You didn't have any toilet paper.