Building Communities with Anthony Burke

Accelerate your agency's profitable growth with tools, tips and value added interviews with your host agency owner and coach, Rob DaCosta. Welcome everybody, to today's episode of the Agency Accelerator podcast. I am really excited to have with me today my latest guest, Anthony Burke. And Anthony Burke runs a business called Brits in Dubai. And back in 2014, Anthony created a Facebook group to help Brits settling into Dubai, a place to get advice, support and network. And since then, the group has grown into the number one British expat group with over half a million posts just in the last six months and about 25,000 members. So I thought it'd be really great to have Anthony on the podcast today to share his experience of growing a community like that and then also how to start monetizing that community. So, Anthony, welcome to the podcast. And is there anything else you want to add to my introduction about where you are and what you do?

You've captured it quite well there. Rob. Hi. How are you? Are you well?

I'm really good, thank you. Yep, good. The sun has been shining, so that always helps, doesn't it?

Always helps, absolutely, yeah. Just to kind of elaborate on the group, as you rightly said, this was purely. When I. I'll go back a couple of steps, if I may. Yeah, I was in the UK and I owned coffee shops, had three coffee shops and myself and my now wife, who was my girlfriend at the time, getting a little bit stalled. We wanted a new challenge, wanted to do something completely different. And she had this idea of going to Dubai and I went. Why? You know, in my mind, no culture, no history, no anything like that. Basically didn't know anything about it. So the idea was to go over for a week, see if we enjoyed it and if so, you know, kind of look at options thereafter. So we went for a week. I didn't come back basically. And Gemma did. She did some finalizing, she went off and she joined me probably about six, six weeks to two months later. And I was. I was basically working in a publication called Construction. There's been a few construction magazines because obviously Dubai is just building and building and building. It was a good place to be. And I'd actually done some work on that previously, probably about 20 years ago. And I knew the owner, so I decided to jump in with him, said I'd be there for a year and just see what I wanted to do. And it was social media, which was very, very lacking in Dubai at that particular time. They hadn't really caught on. It's usually about 10 years behind, I would say, you know, the Western world, it's caught up massively now, as you can imagine. But at that time in 2000, I think it was 14. So I thought, this is my market, this is what I'm going to go after. Let's see if I can develop that. So I built a company called Stepping Social, which I still own today. Now, when I first moved to Dubai, everybody says use Google, but it just wasn't the tools for really specific questions. Where can you live? Where's the best place to kind of meet like minded people and all this kind of stuff. So I thought a Facebook group before they were popular to be fair, would be a good thing to do. So I invited a few friends. People can ask questions, just give them some guidance and whatnot. So it starts with a handful of friends, they have friends obviously. And it started blooming and blossoming before you know it, you know, it had a few thousand, a few thousand went to 10,000, 10,000 is now up to 25,000. And it just keeps escalating. You know, it's people recommend the group just because of how readily the information is there, because it's very active and people are genuinely very, very good at giving advice. So it's worked out quite well. So it's basically, if you move to Dubai, that is a group to join, it's going to give you all the information that you need. So, you know, I'm quite proud of that.

Yeah, it's interesting. Sorry to interrupt you. It's interesting that I was doing a bit of research prior to our interview today and so I was looking at other kind of groups like that and any other groups have way, way, way, way lower in terms of the numbers. So your group has obviously become the number one kind of place for expats to go and learn and network and ask questions and so on.

Right. It's, I mean there's about three or four. I would say that I've saw what I've done and tried to mirror that to a degree. Not quite as successful, but they usually disgruntled members from the group that I've tried set up their own thing and that's fine. You know, if there's a market for it, there's enough people then all well and good, but our idea is to make sure it was all inclusive. As in, you know, there's no such thing as a silly question. There was no such thing as trolling or anything like that. And we heavily monitor it. And what I would say is because it is a niche group we were very, very keen not to be elitist or anything like that, but we wanted to say, right, if you are a Brit and you are living and working in Dubai, then this is a group for you. You know, we get many other nationalities wanting to join, but chances are they were wanting to join to basically sell their goods, their services and whatnot. So we're very, very strict and we have one person that looks after basically admitting people. And so we do background checks on literally everybody that comes through just on the Facebook, you know. So we want to know if, originally from the uk, they are living and working in Dubai and they're not just going to come to the group to sell, because if it becomes just a sales fest, then it will absolutely kill your group, that is for sure. So the way we've done it is, you know, we've been quite creative and we've been very strong in the management of who actually gets to partner with us within the group. So we'll probably talk about how we monetize that, you know, throughout this.

Yeah, yeah, sure. What I'm interested to ask you, and this is kind of from a personal reason, because I've been really unsuccessful all, if I'm honest, about growing my own Facebook group, which I've tried on and off over the years, and kind of put it, parked it, really. So how did you start from scratch? And I know you said, like, you invited a few friends and colleagues, but how did it kind of build momentum from that point onwards? Because I guess at the size you're at now, it's sort of easy to organically grow it because so many people are seeing it and sharing it. But when you've just got 10 or 20 or 100 members, how do you get from that point to the next sort of next level?

Well, I think it's been crazily active within the group, you know, not just leaving it up to other members. Start by building conversations and getting people actually talking. Once they get talking, you know, other people kind of join and that helps with the algorithm. Also say to Facebook, you know what, lots of conversations are going on here. And then they start, you know, you've been to be seen in kind of search engines and whatnot, because if you put in Britain, Dubai, where I think we're at the top, when comes to it, it comes to anything, or British expats in the bike, you know, we're quite heavily up there and people just join the group with that, you know, based on the amount of conversations. But I would say you've got to Lead it, you've got to drive it, you've got to have some conversation there that people are going to kind of enjoy doing. And with us and because it's nation, because it is the Brits group, you know, we started doing events, we get get togethers. So we go to a venue, you know, meet like minded people. We've even done singles nights strangely enough because a lot of people just moved to Dubai, they're on their own. It's a big wide world if you like. They tend to be on the younger end. So biggest if you like demographic is probably 21 to 35. So you know, these people are kind of fresh out of uni and whatnot and they're just trying their feet elsewhere and it's, you know, it's a great way to do it. I would thought so. Having these get togethers has really helped. Obviously they start talking, we're going to this event, join this group and then we'd say, you know, invite your friends. So then they would get other people in to join the group. We'd do webinars, we'd do seminars. Some people at Fragment take tax seminars. A couple of years back Dubai was completely tax free. And a little while ago they decided that they're going to start introducing some sort of tax. It's very small but people needed to know. So we started doing seminars and webinars based around that and that just got very, very popular. So again it just drive people and without necessarily wanting to sell because I think if it's overly salesy in a group it's a big fat turn off. So it's all about giving massive, massive value. And that's what we did in initial stages and we continue to do today.

Yeah, it's interesting because you know the thing that I always tell my audience is that when you are creating outbound communications, whether it be through a Facebook group or your email marketing or social media or videos or whatever, you need to get this balance of 80% providing value and only 20% selling because you've got to build that like and trust with people before they're ever going to buy from you. So you're, you're sort of singing off the same hinge sheet as me of really focusing on providing value. So how. Let's, let's talk about. I know that most agency owners and probably most business owners are super short on time. So they might be thinking about building a community. But how much time do you have to invest? Like in those early days and now if you make a comparison, how much time were you spending actually monitoring the group, answering questions and marketing the group.

Way more in initial stages, I'll be honest, it was a lot of hours and it's not a nine to five thing. People asking questions at all sorts of time. And I think if you're really active and you do give these people the good advice as much as you possibly can in the initial stages, then that's a good thing. Eventually you get your own champions within the group and people with a skill set. So somebody's asking about tax kind of questions. There's somebody there that's going to help them instantly. If somebody's looking for property in the marina, for argument's sake, somebody's going to tell them where's a good place, what are good towers, Please avoid this tower and whatnot. So you start eventually just getting your own champions, but yet in the initial stages, it is a lot of work, but it just evens out now. I'd say we're 25,000. I don't post nearly as much as conversational because it's all done there for me. Lots of people are asking the right question. So it's a case of building it up. But yeah, I think it's fairly niche as well. I think that's key to make sure you're looking at a niche market rather than a generic one, because there's so many other groups I've seen in dubai and they're huge, 70, 80, 100,000 members. And I joined a couple just to see how well they were doing and there's just no interaction. There's basically people going on there just trying to sell anything and everything. And like I said, it's a big turn off. People just do not want to go in there to be sold to on a regular basis. So it's how you monetize that and how you kind of manage it. I think that's. That's the key.

Yeah, I think that's perhaps where I could have done better with my group because I was just targeting agency owners, but I could have probably niched it down a bit more. So I think that's a really good piece of advice for me and anybody else that's thinking of creating a community is to be as niche as you can, invest lots of time up front and then make sure you're adding value to the members and getting them to engage. So what would you. So, I mean, one of the reasons why our listeners might be thinking about creating a group is because they think that's a way of building an audience that they can ultimately monetize. So this is a silly question for someone who's built an audience of 25,000, but just talk us a bit through the value of building that community and you know, in terms of how it supported you earning revenue and doing business development.

Okay, well, again, I put some background in. I was in Dubai for seven years and then we moved back to the uk. So everything I'm doing right now is in the uk. We came back to have our first child. We haven't managed to get that to Dubai, such as life, you know, Covid came around and it's kind of kaibosh a lot of things we've not managed to be out there, but it's irrelevant now. You know, it's a digital world that we live in.

Yeah. And I'm going to touch. Sorry to interrupt you again. I want to touch upon that whole digital nomad thing at the end, so we'll definitely come back to that because, you know, you and I both have got a interest there. So.

Yeah, I think that the point I was probably alluding to is I've kind of lost my train of thought now.

Yeah, sorry, that's my fault for interrupting you. We were talking about monetizing and the value of building that community and how you can use it as a business development platform.

Right, yeah. Like I said, we moved up to the UK and I was going to be doing photography. That's what I was getting to then. I had a full diary, full look, because I was going to be doing wedding photography because that kind of my past as well. I had a social media company in Dubai when we did a lot of hotels, restaurants, I used to do photography from that. So it was a skill set I was using and I thought, I can easily get back into the UK and develop that now. That collapsed, you know, the no weddings was going. So I had a year's full of weddings gone instantly. And so then I start thinking, right, how am I going to get myself out of this? You know, this message that were potentially in savings starting to dwindle and I thought, I'm spending so much time on this group, myself, my wife, we have somebody else working in it. We've got about five admins now in the group spending a lot of time and I'm talking initially 12, 14 hours shared between us on a daily basis. Nowhere near as much as that now. But the fact is we needed 2 get something from this rather than just being these nice people outside this group and I didn't want to inundate it. So we started working with partnerships. Now, what I mean by that is I wanted to work with one specialist that works in any one particular area. So for argument's sake, property developer sells and rents houses. I wanted that, I wanted one specialist, I wanted him to be our champion. And everybody had talked about properties, where to live, they can give some good solid advice and, you know, that's worked out well. We work with some the again, it's a specialist that does used cars, expat motors and they do 60% of their business through our group. So it's huge. And that's because they give the value add. You know, they talk to people, they explain, you know, about how they can get financed, how they can sell cars, all the registrations, because it's much different to what it is in the uk. So it's value add. And that's what we always say to people, look, you are champions. I want you to start speaking to our group, really explain what is you can do for them and how you can make their life a little bit easier. So I've gone down this route. So we have one IFS specialists, one ifx. Basically, people, I want some money back to the uk. How's the best way to do it? The most cost effective way, because doing it through the banks is insanely expensive. So using an IFX broker, they can send money to and fro. So that's helped out, that's helped out our members massively because I've got now somebody that I go to and they're accountable because they're in the group. So, you know, we know that these people are going to give good, solid advice and really, really help out. So I would say, you know, me working with just a specialist in any particular area has worked massively. Baggage, people sending baggage home. We've got one specialist that do that. Now how we've actually done that is rather than just leaving it to chance and putting on an advert, because if you've been in the group, you'll see there's a post, it's going to drop down, drop down, drop down. So we used like the featured posts, but we do multiple posts about that. We do video interviews very similar to what we're doing, you know, asking the business who they are, where they've come from and it's more conversational, you know, how they started in Dubai, where they came from, what their background is and, you know, and it's a personal level. That's what I tried to get through, you know, for our champions, so to speak. And I do Call them champions because they're, you know, the other people, they are the best at what they do. And I'm like, I'm heavily focused on looking for those right people and we don't just let anybody do it. So, like I said, systematically start looking. Right, what do, what do our members need? Where do they need the help on a regular basis? I mean, hotels and restaurants, there's 10,000 of them in Dubai, so we can look at loads of different venues for that. But when it comes to specialist advice, I always say, go unique, go with one person and, you know, let's see how they can help the members. So that's how we've done that. And I basically look at people and say, I want to work with you for a year. This is how much it's going to cost and this is what we're going to do for you. So that's probably the next thing that we do, not just a case of posting on the group. And as I know you're a massive fan of builder list as far as email list. Yes, absolutely crucial. Massively crucial. So what we do is we build a landing page for any particular business, anybody wants to talk about any particular products or service. I want them to speak to them directly, but we collect the data. So it's initially right, okay, XY is asking for, you know, property in the Marina. Can you help them out? So then we'll then steer them. Obviously we've got the data and we can then talk to them about properties further down the line and do some added work for, for the clients. And we also use something, the keyword. Keywords is fantastic in the group. So if anybody's saying I want to, again, I'm just going to use property for now. But anybody who wants to move to the marina or to downtown or to wherever in the city, as soon as that's mentioned, I get a ping and then I put a link straight through. You need to be speaking to such and such and such. Here's a link to some more information. So it can be a brief synopsis on who they are and whatnot, so they know who they're speaking to. Do some data collection. It could be the phone number. Well, it's usually an email and a name and now and again we get a phone number for like mortgages. People want to speak to them, you know, fairly, fairly quickly. So we collect this information. So that's ours. And my list is building all the time. I mean, you don't have to give me your email address when you join the Group. But people are very willing to give you the email address because it's something that they want. And we don't spam them, you know, that's ever so important. We only send them information that's pertinent to what their original query was. And it's building up that you've got far more of an open rate if you do that as well.

Yeah, there's so much in there that I just want to pick apart a bit. So it sort of reinforces the 8020 rule that 80% add value. But then there is a way of selling as well. It's interesting that I have a client that has been really successful at building a Facebook community, and it's growing and it's very niche. I won't say who it is because I don't. They're listening. I don't want to know who I'm talking about. And then one day they're a marketing agency, and then one day someone in that community, because I'm part of it as well, said, can anyone recommend a marketing agency that can help us do this thing? Which my client could. And then someone else went on and said, oh, yeah, go talk to this company, which wasn't my client. So here's my client running a community with someone asking for their services and someone else recommending someone else. And that is because they were just focused completely on adding value and never letting people know who they are and what they can do. And that's good example of only, like, focusing 100% on adding value, but never the 20% on selling. So you've got that balance right. I really like the point that you made about it's about being human and it's about being real and authentic and all that stuff. And I also think one of the great things about community, which, again, you alluded to, which I think is so important for listeners, if you have a community in whatever way it is, whether that be an email list or. Or Facebook group or something else, and you listen to what your community needs, then you make sure you produce products and services that you know that they want, as opposed to thinking you know what's best for them. And you're going to create something that nobody ever buys because they don't actually need it. So I think it's really smart for you to listen to your audience and then bring in partners that can solve some of the problems and challenges that they have. And of course, you know, the building, the listing, as you said, I'm a big fan of that. And the listeners will know that, because I talk about it all the time. But a really good example is like, I think building a community online, like this is a brilliant strategy, but it's also smart to try and get those people to come into your email list. Because, you know, I always. Now, Donald Trump gave me the best example. You know, he had 20 million Twitter followers and overnight he lost, lost them. And of course that's very extreme, but these social media platforms can change their T's and C's and that can have a big impact on you. A good example of that is that a few years ago it was very easy to export your LinkedIn connections and get their email addresses and then LinkedIn changed their terms and conditions so you could no longer get their email addresses. So encouraging people to move into your list in whatever way is a smart, a smart thing to do. Yeah, from an agency. So if you think about your social media agency, if you were thinking about creating a community to support the growth of your social media agency or to win more clients, which is obviously what a lot of the listeners would think about, what advice would you give those people.

To have a Facebook to support.

Their like, for me, if I was growing a group to support my business and I wanted to turn, find a way of actually turning some of those members eventually into my customers, which is a bit different to what you're doing. Have you got. I know I'm putting you on the spot here. Have you got any advice for anybody that's thinking about embarking on that journey?

Well, I would say not necessarily. I'm a massive fan of like, say that the community groups rather than. I mean, niche is great, but you know, it's quite difficult to target these people to get into a certain group because we're all busy kind of professionals, aren't we? Spending a lot of time in groups can be a bit counterproductive, productive. So it's having that fine balance. Most people are just basically looking to get clients, aren't they? It is a toughie because like I say, everything I've done, I've not gone down that route. I've always stuck to the community group because I do think there's a ton of volume, ton of business within that. So I'm maybe not the right person to maybe give advice about likes of the niche group to support an agency.

Yeah. You've not thought about doing that for your social media business then?

No, I mean, what I thought about doing is doing more community groups. What I've done now, looking down, either it be regional or, you know, whether it be down the expat route again in different parts of the world because, you know, they have proved very, very useful. One, you get the numbers and two, you know, you can get the people. I suppose now I've just thought about it. I could in reality, if at the time they've had the manpower, these people are coming to me now I know my clients, I could potentially outreach them and do their social media and you know, the PR and maybe build a business out of that. I haven't touched that, but I could quite easily do that. So, you know, building up a community group where people have come in and they've, you know, fragments say, I get this a lot, they join a ton of groups and all I've done is that they've put a post on there and you know, it's advertised, it's either been taken down, they've been asking to move away or it's just not at the same kind of impact. And that's down to, again, down to the age 20 thing. So if you could potentially build up these quality niche groups as far as community groups, not method niche groups, should I say there is business that you can get through there? Because people just don't understand the power of social media. You know, whether or not they be selling adverts, they're doing pr, doing marketing, they're coming to you and chances are if they want to advertise in the group, it's just because. Because they haven't really got much of a clue outside of the group. So there is a market there. I haven't touched it because I have another partner who basically does web creation and social media presence. So anybody comes to me for that, I offset that to them. I'm quite busy doing what I do that I don't necessarily need to do the other side, but I would do I build up the community groups because you're going to get people that want to advertise and if they're doing that, chances are they don't really know what they're doing. So, you know, you can be their guiding light, I would say.

Well, that's the thing I guess is like any, any way you can build your tribe, whether it be through these community groups or email lists or anything else, gives you an audience that you can demonstrate your credibility to, to build that know like and trust. So eventually you, you know, you're there when they're going help, I, I get this but I haven't got time to do it myself. I need some help. And you're like, hello, I'M here.

Yep. That's how to approach that.

Yeah. And I think I've seen some really successful business groups, community, you can call them communities, they're saying same thing really, where they've built their tribe using a Facebook group and then they've been able to really market to that when they're focused on that 20% of selling. And of course those people already know like and trust you, so they're much more likely to buy. So you touched on this.

Sorry, I was just gonna say that there is one thing that I could have possibly added to that a little while back. Again, like I said, pre Covid, I basically put out questions saying to businesses, look, there's a lot of business owners in here. Do you want a network group where we can, you know, read me regular, you know, almost like a BNI just for our members and I had 400 people sign up for that. So, you know, if I was that way inclined, excuse me, if I was that way inclined, that could have been a real nice platform for me to say, right, you know what I mean, I can help you on the X, Y and Z. And in hindsight maybe I should have done that, you know, and that's not to say I can't do it now, but I think building up that group, you're going to get these natural people coming in anyway, you know, and then you can touch that and like I said, then you can say you want to set up your own kind of network, professional network within that, you know, you've got low hanging fruit potentially.

It's not a big leap is it, from having a community to then saying, okay, well now we're creating a networking group and you're going to pay £20amonth or whatever for that. So that's great. Now you touched upon this early earlier that you're now back in the UK and just for listeners, Anthony's sort of achieving the digital nomad status of currently traveling around the UK while his son's still young enough to be able to do it in their, in their motorhome and having lots of adventures but still being able to work. So just tell us a bit about that decision. Obviously Covid had some impact on it, but tell us about that decision and what it's like.

Right, okay. Oh again, me being me, if I have an idea, I kind of go with it. So poor Gemma, she just goes, okay, you know, we're going to have the coffee shops. Okay, we're going to go to, you know, I want to live in a different country. Okay, we Come back. And then we said look, I'm, I'm getting stalled. You know, we've all been locked up for such a long time. I've lived in the UK for, for numerous years obviously I've spent seven years in Dubai when came back and I said I've been literally everywhere in this country and I cannot tell you anything about it. Says wouldn't it be nice to just go from one town to another town and really kind of enjoy it and explore it and just trundle around. So we said right, let's, let's get a motorhome and do a two year trip which is what we're on now. Been doing it since April and so far we've been as far up as Carlisle, all the way down to, down to Cornwall, which you know, is amazing. Unfortunately I got Covid in Cornwall myself and my wife so I isolating in a van with a two year old. Yeah, that threw some challenges and yeah, that was, that was quite difficult. When we eventually could, you know, we weren't contagious, we managed to get back to our base in Cheshire and basically get well. So we came back out again a couple of weeks ago. But the idea was, you know, one just enjoy kind of the digital nomad lifestyle too. I've got a two year old, I'm an older dad, I'm 50 now so I wanted to spend as much time with him which is why I love the digital kind of frame where I don't need to be anywhere. So he's going off and he's having the best time of his life. He's seen so many cool things. You know, we're going to so many nice places. I can work from the van. I mean I set it up, I've got wi fi set up, I've got solar panels so I can just work here. We also build, not built but we've got this pop up area so when it's raining he's got a play area to play outside. Can still work. We bring our car with us as well so Gemma can just go off for the day. I do my work, you know, do whatever I need to do and then you know, we've got family time and it's not just a case of coming home and just watching tv. You know, we've got a new backyard every other night and it's such a nice way to live. It really is. I mean it has its ups and has its down, you know, a chance to go from four bedroom detached house to basically a box, a small box. It's quite difficult. But we're managing it and we're doing well because of it. And that's. It just, just opens up your eyes. You meet so many nice people and you get to see so many beautiful places that you've probably passed through and not giving it a second thought. And to be able to do the exploring, to be able to work, to be able to just live which everybody's dream life to be fair, you know, we're living it so it's quite nice. But I think it's because we thought a few years ago about this digital world and to be fair, if it wasn't for Covid, I probably wouldn't have done this. I'd have set up an office and I just kind of developed and I don't think we would have developed as quick as what we have done because of COVID Everything's gone online. My Zoom meetings, I have three or four of these a day sometimes it's opened it up for me and you know, people so much used to to doing the Zoom sort of thing. So you don't need to do, you don't need to jump in. You can't go to a meeting, you know, two hours away for, you know, for a half hour, 45 minutes and then do another two hours drive. You're much more effective doing the way you do now digitally. But again, doing it in a space I just love and like I have a new backyard every other day is just, it's just a really nice way to live, I think.

Yeah. So I'm sure lots of listeners will be listening with mvp. But it's completely possible and I think we put a lot of our own roadblocks in our way that keep us in our comfort zone and stop us doing these things. It's completely possible. And as you say, if there's anything positive to be taken out of the coronavirus situation, it's meant a lot of us have had to move online and prove that we can work remotely and also prove that traveling is not a very effective way of running business. Last Friday I had to go to London. It was my first long sort of trip that I've done. And so I was in London for a two hour meeting and it probably took me six hours in total, like drive there, have the meeting and come home. And I mean it was a necessary meeting because I needed to meet this person face to face. But it does remind you that it's just not efficient. In that same time, I could have done three two hour meetings. So if anybody's Listening to this with envy about what Anthony's done, then just remember that it's completely possible. You just have to get out of your own way and make those decisions. Okay, so before we wrap up, I just wanted to ask you the question that I ask all of my guests, which is if you, if you could go back in time and give your younger self a bit of business advice when you're just starting out, what would it be?

I've tried a couple of different things and I'm quite pleased that I have. I'd always say go with your go. If it works, if it works, fantastic. If it doesn't, you know, there's, there's more options and I think the younger me would have maybe had a lot self doubt. I mean, eventually I've done things, but I think I would have done it a lot easier a lot earlier. I would say just go with your gut feeling. If it works, fantastic. If it doesn't, there's always other options. So, you know, and you're, I think you're a long time dead as well. So you kind of got to live your life. So it's the possibilities and the possibilities now are endless. I wish we have the opportunity now. You know me at 50 than what I had when I first started doing my own thing because I've worked in various different industries and my first business was 20 years ago and it's still alive and well today. And sometimes I wish it stayed within that. Yeah, I just think it's nice to have choices and, you know, gut feeling is a massive one. If you think it's a good idea, get the right advice, you know, speak to the right people. Don't just maybe go gung ho with it. But yeah, just Canada.

Good, good bit of advice. And I think I always say to people, you know, back in 92, I started my first business and it was my young, arrogant, naive innocence that probably enabled me to do it because I didn't know anything else. Whereas now I'm old, gray and cynical. So. But I think listening to your guy is such a good bit of advice. I think it's a. Our gut instinct is that flight or fight, fight a thing that keeps us safe. And you know, there's so many scenarios, including that one where we need to listen to our gut. So, Anthony, I really appreciate your time today. If people wanted to get in touch with you or learn more about Brits in Dubai and so on, where would they go?

Oh, that's the thing. Usually to Britain. No, either. I'm assuming most of your Readers are not in Dubai or of any interest in going there, but if they want to reach out to me personally, you know, I'm more than happy to do that. So they can send me an email or they can follow me on Facebook. It's Anthony Burke. The email is infohonyburke.co.uk and I'm happy to field any questions. And I'm even thinking about creating a training package to show people, you know, how to develop a good Facebook strategy and talk about other things more in depth than what we have done today, how you can build it, how you can build that as a business. So I'm in the process of thinking of doing that, you know, if there's enough interest and I'll certainly.

Yeah, we'll include. We'll include the links in the show notes, including the Brits in Dubai, because people might want to just have a look at what you're doing. And, you know, if anyone wants to reach out to Anthony and have a chat with him about building your community, then he's just given you that offer, so please do. But other than that, I want to say a big thank you for giving up your time today. I know you're in. I think you're in the Lake District at the moment, so there's probably lots of beautiful things to see, but you're sitting here with me instead, so.

Well, to be fair, I've got an 11 o' clock and a 12 o' clock meeting, so it's. Yeah, I'm not seeing much of Kendall at all today, but, yeah, I'm in the Lake District. It's beautiful. I. I don't work Fridays, so. Because Friday's a weekend. So Fridays and Saturdays for me is. Is my complete day off, two days off. So, yeah, we're up to Windermere and that kind of thing, but. Brilliant. Rob, absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for having me on today.

You're welcome. Thanks for joining us.