All Your Eggs in Someone Else's Basket

Business Brain, episode 572 for Casual Friday, August 9, the annual Perseid meteor shower peak night of 2024. Greetings, folks, and welcome to Business Brain, the show where we take an idea or three, we crunch them, we dissect them, we use them to help tune our business brains so that we can each learn how better to beat the system and lead that charmed life that we all want to lead. Here in Durham, New Hampshire, I'm Dave Hamilton.

And out here in Lafayette, California, I'm Shannon Jean. And how you doing, man?

I'm good. I was telling you before we started recording that I went to see that band, Train. I wound up. I wound up getting to know the drummer in Train because, well, I got to know him and then interviewed him on gig gab and got to know him more and. And he invited Lisa and I out to a show the other night. I. It was my first time seeing Train. I. It will not be my last. They are a fantastic band live. And, yeah, when I know you've seen them, Pat Monahan, their. Their singer, he has his own version of what I think Sammy Hagar has where he makes you feel like even if you know he's going to do it, you still believe it, that this is the best night of the tour. You're the best audience that they've ever played for. This is the best that the band has ever played. There's something special and you're getting to experience it. And I've seen. I've now seen Pat Monahan once. I'm guessing he does this all the time. Maybe. Maybe the other night was the magic night.

He's good.

Yeah, I could. I could tell. But I've seen Sammy countless times and I actually just saw him a week and a half ago and he did the same thing. And I laughed when he started doing it because I've seen him do it many times before and yet I still believed it.

It works, right? Yeah. We're gonna see him, I don't know, next week or the week after, but out here at our local amphitheater, I just love the guy. And, yeah, it's a skill that they must learn over time, the lead singers, and to be able to make you special. And when we start talking about that, I was thinking, you know, how do you make a similar skill is making your customer feel that way, Right?

Well, it. Is it a different skill? I think it's the same thing. I'm. Yeah, I guess I'm Sammy's customer, I'm sure. Yeah.

Yeah. And so how that, you know, making your customer feel like they're the most important, you're handling them the absolute best you ever can. You know what? Just a hack that if you can pull it off and personalize what you're doing or, you know, yes, you have to give great service. Yes, you have to. But there's, there's ways to address everyone that you interact with at your business that they're going to feel special. And man, if you can pull that off, it's just, it's keys to the kingdom.

Well, I think part of it is that in the moment, you have to believe it. And so there has to be something about it that is special to you.

And you as the deliverer.

You as the deliverer.

Right.

I mean, I certainly treat my customers this way. Right. Each of them is special to me. And when I'm interacting with them in that moment, they are my most important customer. This is simply true. I'm not thinking about somebody else. I'm, I'm here, focused on you. And therefore it's really easy for me to convey to them both explicitly, but also implicitly with body language and focus and all of those things that you're. I'm here like I'm present. And I think that's a big part of it is that being present, paying attention.

Yep. And I think you can even do it via email because, yes, you know, you're interacting so much online and answering questions, email. But we talk a lot about using templated responses, whether it's a text expander type app or help scout service that you're running all your customer service through. One of the things I see over and over is I love the templates. I love that. But you still can personalize it because when your customer writes into you, they always something that they're going to mention, like this, this, this. So it's paying ATT to the personal things. So you can even add or add a personal comment or an emoji to the template. So when they get it back, it's like you feel, hey, Shannon. Hey, you know, I'm so sorry. On Thursday, this, that, whatever. And then boom, there's the, there's the template stuff. But you have personalized it in such a way that like even on, on in social media, what I find is people are in such a hurry. Replying using their name in the reply is huge because I think it causes them to kind of stop. Like in dms, it's like back and forth, back and forth, back here. But if you start saying, hey, Dave, it Just connects you emotionally. Much more that you're like, oh, this person is recognizing me.

Paying attention to me. Yes.

Paying attention. Yeah. Value, right. They're giving value and that kind of stuff. So those guys do a great job because they're doing it to thousands of people at a time. Maybe they have an ideal customer profile too, where they're just singing to one person that they've developed over their career. Yeah, but you can do it too, I think. No, I think it's definitely.

I think we all have it in us. I think some of us have. Some of us are just innately better at it. Some of us have spent time to develop it, and some of us can spend time to develop it. Yeah. You know, and.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

Yeah.

It, it's, it's, it's worth slowing down to do it. I had, I'll give you an example of how not to do it. I've had a warranty issue with a little refrigerator in my house, and people have kind of been dilly dallying around. They have to come back out again. And instead of calling or emailing and asking us which dates work, they just sent a text and says the text will be there on August 14th between 9 and 5. It's like, well, that doesn't work for us. Right. And it. You can automate it as much as you want, but it's like, hey, here's a few open spots. I mean, it's so easy to do with your calendar.

Even if they can't. Even if they want to take. Do exactly what they're doing. Right. Like offering you one time instead of saying the tech will be there, then ask, yes, we have August 14th booked for you.

Would this work?

Would that work? That's it. Because it's going to elicit the same response. You're either going to say great or no.

Yes. Yeah. And at this point I'm like, why would they. You know, I forwarded to my wife. It's like, well, they're scheduling me without even talking to me. Yeah. You know, it just, it's, it's, it's not disrespectful.

It's presumptive.

It's presumptive and it's a lost opportunity to connect with, you know, so slow down or be smarter as you, as you're operating. You know, that's the thing. And how you're addressing everybody and, you know, personalize it, man. Make them feel important and special and valued.

That's it. Yeah. Yes. Just think about pay. Focus on them. You know, we Talk about spotlighting versus. I can't remember the term that we use. The multitasking. Right.

Know. Yeah.

So don't, don't do that. Just spotlight. When you're dealing with someone, deal with them.

Yeah. And teach your employees to do it and teach your automations to do it. Think about it.

Right.

It's worth it. So it's worth it. But hey, you know, we had an interesting occurrence last week. Was it last week? Yeah, I think that.

Or maybe right up until an hour ago or something. Yeah.

That our. Our business brain account on X got suspended. And like many social media suspensions, you're kind of vague. I don't know why they don't.

Kind of vague.

They're like, they don't tell you.

I don't even think I. In fact, I know we didn't get a notification that our account was suspended. We.

We did not.

No, we just went and to use it. Sadie was the first one. But yeah, you know, it could have been you or me, it doesn't matter. And we went to you. She went to use it and was like the account suspended. And. And it was like, it's suspended. Click here to find out why. And it listed the X.com like rules. All three of us read the rules. It was like, oh, what did we do wrong?

And none of this.

We couldn't. And so. But they didn't. There was no. Like, you broke rule number 4A.

They never tell you why. It's like, I don't know, they want wiggle room or something. But some lawyer has to. All these companies, if you break their. They just say, oh, you went against our terms and conditions, which are 400 pages long.

Yeah. Good luck. Figure it out, buddy.

So terrible. Yeah. So you brought up a good topic. Yeah. Yeah, go ahead.

Well, okay. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, we did. We. They said. I loved what they said. It's permanently banned. You can file an appeal. It's like, well, which is it?

That's not a permanent. Right. Yeah.

So anyway, we filed the appeal. I sent the note in mainly because I didn't want. If it, if it got shut down, if they summarily rejected it and banned us forever. I didn't want that on Sadie's shoulders. Right. Like, I figured, well, it's not going to make a difference who it comes from. They're going to treat it the same. Might as well just come for me. And then that way, if it, you know, makes sense, I sent the thing out and just said, hey, you know, I read through everything and I don't think we violated a rule, but if we did, please tell us what it was. And then if it's something that's not terribly egregious, maybe we can come back and we'll just know not to do that thing, whatever that thing was again. And the only thing we know is that the account is back on. We. I haven't seen any email come in saying, oh, like here, Dave, you were.

This mistake happened and we apologize.

No, not at all.

That's not happening. It's not going to happen.

But it's really underlines how important it is to not put all your eggs in someone else's basket. I mean, you were saying earlier, you know, don't, I guess in, in Wednesday's episode, you were saying that, you know, you don't want to have just one client that you work for. Right? You know.

Yeah, of course.

Of course not. It's the same thing. It's like if, if you're building your brand and it's on a platform that you don't own, if you don't, if, if the top level domain of wherever you live, if it's x.com or facebook.com or YouTube.com Instagram whatever, instagram.com whatever, if you are building a platform there, it is not your business, it's someone else's business and you need to, it's, it's okay, use that. But very quickly direct people to you so that you have them and you can contact them directly.

Yeah, I had a really great conversation with someone that's really very successful in building these social media brands and companies and everything else. And his comment really kind of set me back and he said social is not the end, it's just the beginning. And it really made me think. I'm like, yeah, man, because I'm building this brand and myself and trying to productize my knowledge and all this stuff on X. And the main goal after I had that conversation with them, like, yeah, I gotta get my newsletter going. Yes, you, from the minute you start building your, your presence for your business or whatever your personal brand on social, it. No matter what platform, your main goal has to be to get your clients off of there and onto something you control. Whether it's a newsletter, your website membership, whatever it is, you need to get them off there and give them an incentive to get off and follow you. And that's what I really missed for a long time was it's not just good enough to have a newsletter. Why should they join? You need to give them something. And especially people Want something, they want this value, you know, so you get a lead magnet. Magnet. And, you know, I give away information. It's like, hey, here's a list of auction companies I've bought from for the last 25 years. 50 companies. It's all yours. And they go through, click through it. And to get the list, they subscribe. And I say, hey, man, you can get the list and subscribe, unsubscribe, of course, it's okay with me.

Right.

And. And that's what we have. So you'll see, you get a hundred new subscribers, and maybe 10 or 15 will unsubscribe after the thing. But your net positive keeps growing up and up and up. So you're in control of those people because your account could get shut off. One of your competitors could file a complaint about, you know, some BS thing, and so you get suspended. You just need to take control of it and not have all your eggs in one basket. To your point, we preach about, you know, not having your whole career in someone else's hands. It's the same don't have your business in someone else's hands that you're building on social media. Don't do it.

Yep. And it, at the very least, diversify yourself so that if you. If you are a social media presence, you're not just on one platform, you're on many. But why not start a podcast where you're doing it at your own domain? Like, sure, we host our stuff. We don't actually host the media files on our servers, but we own the Domain BusinessBrain show. And that's what your podcast podcatcher or podcast player is subscribed to. So if we had to move all our media files, we own the domain that points you to those media files, and so we can move.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Be in control.

Please subscribe to the show. That's my ask number one. And then number two, just because we had a problem with it and it would probably look good to boost up our follower numbers. Please go subscribe to us on X at. At. At Bizbrain show.

Yeah, just follow us. You don't have to subscribe.

Yes, sorry, you're right. Follow. Is that. Yeah, we. We. We live in a world where.

Follow terminology.

You're right, very different. Follow the podcast in your podcast player. Follow us on X. That's. That's correct.

Yeah, that'd be awesome.

Yeah.

But I'd love to hear ways that you've taken control of your brand off of social. If you're. Well, we have this great funnel that we move people into. Share it feedback at BusinessBrain Show. We'll talk about it here on an episode. We'll help each other. We're all trying to come up with ways to beat the system.

That's it. Yes. Help us beat the system. Feedback at BusinessBrain show. And that way we can all keep living that charmed life individually, together. We'll see you next week. Have a great weekend.