Being Known + True Fans

Business brain, episode 523 for February 9th, National Pizza Day 2024. Greetings, folks, and welcome to Business Brain, the show where we take a few ideas, we dissect them, we analyze them, we tear them apart, and put them back together so that every single one of us can tune our business brains every time we get together. Sponsor for this episode is go squared away.com contact. Squared Away empowers highly educated military spouses to become your remote executive assistants. And we'll tell you more about that in a little bit. For now here on Casual Friday, I am. I'm Dave Hamilton.

And I'm Shannon Jean. Glad to be here.

Yeah.

Happy Friday.

Same. Happy Friday. And if you're watching the video now, it actually says Friday at the bottom of the screen. That's what threw me off there.

Switched it up.

If you pay attention and you have listened to the last episode, and of course you're listening to this one. You heard me On Wednesday, wish everyone a happy wave all your fingers at your neighbor Day. And. And today, of course, is National Pizza Day. It's also National Develop Alternative Vices Day. National Bagel and Lox Day. National Cut the Cord Day. International Winter Bike to Work Day. Nope. National Toothache Day. I hope nobody's celebrating that.

That's bad.

Yeah. I decided that on all of my podcasts, not just this one. I wanted to start doing this where I pick one of the days of the day and just acknowledge it in the intro of the show. And I'm sure it'll evolve and tweak and maybe I'll do away with it as if I decided it's silly, but I don't think so. I kind of like it, and it's something I've been thinking about for a little while, and it's one of those things. I know that, you know, we talked in the last episode about being an influencer. I know that there are. It is important to have little catch phrases.

Yeah.

Mannerisms, habits, things you teach, little things that people associate with you so that when they hear, oh, yeah, pizza. Oh, you know, Dave said it was National Pizza Day. Like that kind of thing is important. We say at the end of every. Every episode, keep living your charmed life. Right. So that's that. I mean, it's true. It's something that grew organically here, but then we just stuck to it. And I think that this, you know, everyone today has the opportunity to be an influencer. It's not like it used to be, where Walter Cronkite was the only one you know, because he's the only one who had a platform. Every business has a platform out there. You know, even if you're not in the business of influencing, you are influencing on behalf of your business, or at least you could be. And I think, you know, think about these things. Think about what you're already doing. Think about what interests you. Think about the things that make you chuckle a little bit. Like, you know, this National Day thing, this isn't going to, like, it's not going to change any lives, I don't think. Maybe. But it's fun. That's it. Right? It's fun. You know, when we started MacGeek, I mean, you know, almost 19 years ago, we. There was no Twitter. Right. There was no email, was truly the only sort of universal way that people could contact us. We put a voicemail thing together so people could use that too, which of course we have with this show too. 567-274-6977. You can text us or, or call us and leave us a voicemail there. It's in the show notes at BusinessBrain Show. But we had those two things. But it was all like, we weren't working together with our audience. Right? We were, you know, it was. They were sending us things and then maybe we were, but it was very asynchronous thing and we weren't all doing the same thing. And I stumbled onto this silly game called Nation States. It's still alive@Nation States.net and it. You run your own little nation, and all it is is every day you get five issues that you vote on, and they are ridiculous things like, you know, you, you. It's like, well, somebody had a problem because they tracked mud into the Capitol building and, you know, you had to clean it all up. And so what do you want to do about this? And you get three options, and they're all very eloquently worded, but it's basic. You know, the options could be things like, well, ban all shoes, require that people clean their shoes every five steps. You know, ridiculous things. And you just choose what you want your. Your nation to do, and then you do that. And we. And there are different regions in this thing. So we created a region for Mac Geek Gab years ago, and it had a bunch of listeners all sort of enjoying playing this game together. And then we had a message board and things like that. Yeah, but it, you know, it was a fun thing. And even to this day, we haven't done that. I think we stopped doing it 10 years ago. Or more. But I still hear from people that are like I loved when we used to do that.

You know, those kinds of things you become known for.

That's it.

And I saw accompanied at some food company. I don't know what it was. Some kind of bagel, maybe a bagel company, something. But their, their tagline is not famous but known.

Yes.

You know, and I, I thought that was really great.

Right?

Not famous but known.

That describes me to a T. Shannon.

There you go. I, I and I think we should aspire to that.

Yes.

And it's a great.

I think it's pop up bagels because I put not famous but known in it. And that's what came up. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I was disappointed that they came up when I searched for them too because I was like, I'm gonna steal that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know, you, and that's the thing. You can steal stuff like it happens.

Great artist, great artist. Steel man. That's just the way it is. But it's a total in, you know, different, you know, 180 degrees from. We're talking about this massive influencer follower stuff like at the on the last show on Wednesday and kind of leads into this concept that I just want to talk more about is really instead of followers, fans and how many true fans you need to build a successful business. Whether you're a solopreneur or whether you're a huge H vac company or a real estate professional, whatever it is, how many fans do you need to make it all right?

Business brain listeners. Ever feel like your to do list is a bottomless pit? Like every time you tick something off, three more tasks mag appear. I've been there. Especially when trying to juggle recording schedules for the show or diving deep into research for the next episode. And let's not even talk about splitting my focus in meetings. I tried taking notes once and ended up doodling my way to a new podcast logo on chat GPT instead. Oops. But here's a game changer. Our sponsors squared away. It's not just about delegating. It's about delegating with style. They match you with remote executive assistants who are military spouses. Talk about a win win. Your business gets top notch support and you're supporting military families too. These assistants aren't just reactive. They're like time saving ninjas proactively slicing through your to do list before you even know what's next. They're the secret ingredient to keeping your business brain focused on the big picture. Squared away offers Custom plans and their assistants work on US time zones as W2 employees, not contractors. Whether it's administrative support, personal tasks, or spearheading your team's next project, Squared Away has got your back. So are you ready to turbocharge your productivity and live that charmed life? Don't wait. Contact Squared Away today to find out how they can help your business thrive. Just go to go squared away.com contact. That's go squared away.com contact. And our thanks to Squared Away for sponsoring this episode. All right, so I like what you. Where you were going with this, Shannon. So this idea of prioritizing fans instead of followers.

Yeah. So I've been talking about on the show. I'm trying to grow my social media presence on X Twitter, as we mentioned last time, and good branding.

Well, but see, we can brand this. Like, if we come up, if we stumble on to a funny way of saying X slash Twitter, then we just start saying it, and then that's the only way we say it.

Yeah.

Thus far, it's just awkward. So we're workshopping it.

Yeah. So I'm in. I'm in some growth groups, which is hugely helpful and beneficial. And, you know, you get to work with people and come up and share ideas, and the collaboration is awesome. And there's some guys that are just grinding, you know, focus, focus, focus, follower, follow. I got to get. Build this follower. Once I get to a thousand, like, then I can get us to 5,000. This says. And it's great. And I see that they could be successful doing that. My take on it's a little different because kind of like, you know, you mentioned last time with social media followers that maybe are not real, maybe that are automated or bots, you know, if you focus on finding people that perhaps could use your service or want to hear from you, want to hear your voice and searching for. And I keep saying this in these groups. I say, hey, look, I'm looking for fans, not followers.

Yeah.

Because I want people that want to listen to what I have to say and want to share knowledge. And we've tried to build this collaborative thing here on business Brain to grow our collective brains having to do with business and frankly, life in general. So it's much. I think it's much better to connect with people on a much deeper level than just to fill up your stuff. Because if, yeah, you have a thousand or five thousand, all these followers, you know, how many are really interacting? When I see a blog post and I go look. Or a substack post and I see 20 or 30 comments, that's a lot. You know, I go, wow, man, to get 20 or 30 comments on your blog post or your medium post or whatever, or even on, on, you know, X Twit, you, you'll, you'll have, you have to have people that really want to connect and you can see the authenticity. So my take on it, there's this concept called a thousand true fans. If you, if you search on Kevin.

Kevin Kelly, who is a co founder of Wired, came up with it or at least articulated it that way and branded it, if you will. And Twixer wasn't around then, so, you know, but like there's a lot to this and his whole thing was all you need is a thousand true fans. And you can, if you do it properly and you may maintain a respectful relationship with them, you can monetize those thousand true fans into a career, into a salary or you know, to a livelihood, whatever.

Yeah, yeah, livelihood.

You could be a creator or even.

If you're an entrepreneur providing different services or doing stuff on Etsy or whatever.

And I think some businesses, you can, you can do it with less than a thousand true fans. Yeah, I mean, depending, you know, depending.

What you do and, and also what your definition of success is. You know, there's a lot online and especially, you know, on, on X, Twit, Twixer, they, they call it SMB Twit or Retwit for real estate. Real estate Twitter. SMB for small business Twitter. There's, everybody's talking about their successes and it's like, okay, that's great. But I, I often say, you know, if all you post your is your successes, I think you turn people off and you don't.

It's not authentic. Right. That's the, that's a word that's way overused. But it's efficient, you know, it's not.

It'S not, it's not real. One of, one of my most popular posts that I've ever done was when I laid out how I made a million dollar mistake one afternoon when I said yes to something that I should have said no to.

It wasn't your marriage. Your marriage actually has been a great thing.

No, no, no.

Yeah, somebody, somebody could probably make that same joke. Right?

Yeah, that's right.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah. But you know, the, the question I have on this thousand true fans is how many people do you have to get to follow you to create that thousand true fans?

Right.

You're not going to get it with just a thousand followers or whatever. No subscribers, because people don't pay attention. Everybody's thinking, what's in it for me? You know, what value are you adding to my life?

Well, and that's how you get fans, is by continually adding value to their lives. And you know, what we talked about at the intro here? The silly things of being National Pizza Day. Like, okay, like, that can be a thing. I'll let you know if it. Actually, you'll let me know if that turns out to be a thing.

Like, you know, I have a question. I have a. I have a pizza question for you before we look.

Okay, great.

I want to. I want to ask you. But, yeah, and so this. This whole thing of what value can add? What? It was a guy I was following on. On X, where I'm spending way too much time, obviously, but he was a deck builder that built a company called West Coast Decks, and he posted, say, hey, I got some new shirts in. Anybody want one? Send me a message and I'll send you one.

Yep.

And I'm like, that's awesome. You know, just reaching out, trying to share stuff. And. And so there's a lot of this, you know, like, we started to show. What are you known for? What are you adding value? What is it that you're doing? Are you going. You know, in my area, we always get these flyers, like, hey, we'll come do a checkout of your H VAC system for 75 bucks or whatever it is. Or if you're in the H Vac business, why don't you do free filter replacements? You know, I saw a company this morning paying to advertise on Facebook that they'll come drop off free mulch at your house. So this was a tree business. They're cutting down trees. The thing that they have extra of every single day is the chips and the mulch. So they have this huge picture of a huge pile of mulch in your driveway, and they said, here, click here, and we'll come drop mulch in your yard. It's a local business to us, and you know that. They're getting goodwill. The law of reciprocity. I'm giving you something for free, but it must be valuable enough for them to pay for a Facebook ad.

Well, they don't have to go pay to dump it somewhere.

They don't have to pay dump. Yeah. And I'll bet I know they're getting clients out of it, of course.

Oh, yeah. If you give me free mulch when I need to have tree work done. Well, who are those people with the mulch.

Yeah. Yeah. Why wouldn't you call quality tree care? Those guys come every six months and drop mulch in my driveway. So adding value, building that fan base up is the, that's the focus, I think. And that's. And that's the future. There's so much competition, you know, trying to get your voice heard, especially if you're in a. I don't want to use, we'll use this word, a commodity type business where everybody, everybody's competing on price. What can you do? What can you be known for? Is it the wrap on your trucks that looks kind of funny or whatever your name. Is it the fact that you show up and you, you change people's filters for free or give free mulch? Think about it and then let us know so we can talk more about it.

Yeah.

Feedback at Businessbrain show. We want to hear from you. We want to share your story. You can come on the show and talk about it next week. We have a great guest coming on that's going to talk about his business that's focuses solely on a local newsletter for a single town.

I want to learn about this.

Yeah, me too. And he's great. And now he's helping other. Other entrepreneurs throughout the country start local newsletters and grow them with sponsorship and stuff. So come back and listen to us and share your stories. And what are you known for? We'd love to hear it.

Now, Shannon, I know you wanted to ask a pizza question. I'll give you the answer. New Haven pizza is absolutely the best.

No, no, that's not the question.

Oh.

The question is what? Yes. What is the best condiment to put on pizza and why Is it honey?

Huh. Interesting. Yeah.

If you have not tried honey on pizza, please try it and let me know what you think.

Yeah, no, I have tried it in Denver. That was the first place that I encountered it. And there I was taught to use it just for like the crust.

Okay. Yeah, sure. I suggest drizzling it all over the combination of the savory and the sweet. Woo.

Yeah.

Amazing.

Yeah. Yep. That's for you. I. Well, I don't. I don't have a heck of a sweet tooth, so.

I see. I do.

I. I will try this on pizza because you recommended it, but I don't, I don't think I'll like it. Like, I don't like here in New Hampshire.

Preconceived bias here. Well, open up.

I know I'm willing to try it, but like we Barbec barbecue chicken pizza is a huge thing in New England, and I do not care for it.

No, because they use the sweet.

They use the sweet barbecue sauce. If they use the tangy stuff, I might be into that. So.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Maybe hot honey. Maybe I'll try some of that spicy honey.

Hot honey. Yeah, Spicy honey would be great. That works. Good.

Thanks for hanging out with us, folks. Tell us how you like our how you like your pizza feedback at Business Brain Show. Also, tell us anything else you want to tell us. And make sure you check out our sponsor, gosquaredaway.com contact. Keep living that charmed life and have a great weekend. We'll see you next week.