Behind the Host with Sally Kember

Okay, welcome to another behind the Host podcast and today we are lucky to have Sally Gamber here. Sally has helmswood service departments which is based in Red Hill. She's also a fellow host of a podcast and her amazing podcast just reached a milestone of 100 episodes which I'm excited to speak about today. And that is the Serviced Accommodation Secrets podcast which has helped me, you know, sort of get started on my journey into service accommodation. So I am so pleased to have Sally here. Sally, thank you for joining us today. And yeah, how's, how are you doing?

Oh, thanks so much for having me, Liam. It's brilliant to be here. I'm really well. Thanks. Really well. And how we got to 100, I don't know, time just went, you know.

What an epic milestone. I mean, like I say, you should be having a party hat on and doing a special, special episodes and stuff like that for the 100 mark. But yeah, how long have you been sort of. Let's, let's talk about the podcast first as we started on that. So first of all, Sally, just, just tell me a little bit about obviously how you got in service accommodation and then we'll move on to the podcast.

Okay. So it wasn't really a planned thing, funnily enough, but I'm an artist and it's what I've always done and then, you know, freelanced and that kind of thing and always loved places to look nice, you know, inspire people with art. And we had kids. Pete and I been married forever now. Our kids are grown up now, but when they were little I kind of just focused on them mostly and I did various bits of my freelance work here and there. But my husband Pete, he's been in corporate IT forever and wanted to do some different things. So he looked at doing property. I do a few other things as well, you know, multiple streams as we do. And so he looked at various property strategies. But actually service accommodation looked great to me and there's more hospitality obviously than property. But yeah, so I agreed to it and it was kind of my idea because once I get shown something, I get quite carried away. And we did training actually with progressive. So Momo Mark came out brilliant community of people who very like minded and have a sort of can do attitude. So it's really inspiring from a mindset point of view as well as, you know, the nuts and bolts of what's practical. And so we went on that journey. 2016 I think really was when that happened. And then, well, I found that actually the theory was much easier than the.

Practice, as it often is, I'm afraid.

Of course, not having had any experience of it. And it's all about people from the word go, you know, even finding the properties and we work with freeholders of apartments, which is brilliant, but forming those connections all took a while. We did mastermind and stuff and very much believe in training and mentoring, you know, getting, getting the professional advice and more and more. In fact, part of Hospitable Host, I guess is that we discover it's an amazing community all over, isn't it? All over the world. So, yeah, we settled on where we are in Redhill in Surrey really because it's a very good business centre and so our main kind of clients are corporate stays, workers, that kind of thing. But obviously we're quite near London too. Well, not obviously if you don't know where Red Hill is, but we're south of London, so it's really short train ride to London Victoria, London Bridge and we're really near Gatwick Airport too, so it seemed to meet criteria. And yeah, we've just had brilliant luck of finding this company to work with who are developers as well. So we just got started with apartments really. So yeah, here we are still. Now I'm in one actually, because we've got some guest requests for special kind of arrangements for guests coming, so I thought I'd come.

That's definitely that people focus side of things. So you mentioned on there and we've had a similar journey in terms of the mindset around doing some training. How important is mindset about getting started for anyone who's listening and thinking I might give hosting a go. How important is that?

I think it's really key and because it's not necessarily what everybody does. So you don't have social proof in the people around you of, you know, your family, friends maybe you've grown up with, of how well it will work. So people worry for you, you know, and you might have setbacks. We had setbacks. It felt like walking through Korgamire at first. It's like, oh, will we ever get anywhere? But you just keep pushing and actually if you just keep doing the right things following sort of process of what to do next and you have people guiding you, encouraging you, I think that really helps. So I do think it's very good to be in a community of people who know what they're doing and support you because otherwise, you know, you might just give up and settle for less. And we don't want that for people.

It's having people who are on a similar journey. And also like you say, people who excited to be in the community, people who can share, you can share problems with and, you know, find solutions together. So you've obviously, you've set up your apartments in Red Hill, you've decided, you know, after going down the route of training to do service accommodation. You did mention that it's easier in theory than it is in practice. So again, this is so great because obviously diving into your business, I know on your podcast, you know, sort of service accommodation secrets, you're often looking at other hosts. So I'm loving getting behind your business and find out a bit more about that. What aspects would you say is something to consider when getting started and what sort of things did you was easier in theory than they were in practice, would you say?

Well, I think you have to really decide at the beginning what you want to have as the performance of what you're doing and your vision for what you're doing and why you're doing it. I think that's really key. I think if you just kind of think, oh, I'll get a property and people come and stay, it's a bit too random. So I think you need a plan, you know, what's the outcome that you want? Not just monthly cash flow, which is quite often what, you know, short term rentals are meant for. You know, it's good revenue, but there's a lot of work behind it. And so you have to think about what kind of lifestyle do you want to have as well. So it may be you want to get involved in short term rentals, but it might be that you want to have it managed by somebody else, not set it up yourself. Or if you do set it up yourself, you will most likely want to outsource a lot of it. So our cleaning team has been here this morning, done an amazing job. When you start out, if you try and do everything yourself, you'll have a really, really busy job for long hours, seven days a week. And of course the customer, you know, the guests come first, so you could hear from them at any point. So we did training to make sure we got VAs on board to help with our systems and that was after being up and running for about a year. And now we've got a great team who cover a lot of the hours and they're brilliant and I wouldn't want to do it without them for sure.

So team is so important, isn't it? Team is just, that's one thing which we see reoccurring. Nobody's an island. And they need, you know, you need good people around you 100%, definitely. So if we fast forward a bit to. You've set up your, your service accommodations, obviously, you've set up your business and you launched, you've put the theory into practice. Where did the idea for the podcast come from?

So we be at various trainings or property meetings and things like that, Pete and I, and we'd be telling people stories of things, oh, you know, this happens and that happens. And it just seemed a natural progression because people sort of said, that's really interesting, or how did you. Wow. And you know, they were saying this would be really useful for other people starting out. And I guess because I discovered there were so many parts to, you know, service accommodation as we were running it, I thought, wow, it would be helpful for other people. And although there were some podcasts out there at the time, I kind of found it good for my progression and accountability and just to kind of get things off my chest a little bit as well. So it's very much about documenting what was happening at our properties, what we were coming up against. And you know, I wasn't saying I was an expert out there, not by any means. It's just I'm a couple of steps ahead of other people. So various people who I met are progressive in fact, like Dylan Denietsche, he's one who said, you don't have to be far beyond somebody else you're helping. If you're just two steps ahead, you can actually probably help them more because you've got more of a shared reality of what you're doing. And the same with people two steps ahead of us. You know, they were encountering things, I don't know, six months or a year ahead of time of us. And so it was like, ah, so we could do that next. It's just sharing solutions really, and inspiring each other that, yes, we can do this, it's all good.

That's one of the things which, you know, you hit the nail on the head that you don't need somebody who's got, you know, hundred properties ahead of you. You just need somebody who is, who have gone through that same experience before. You have, and how they dealt with it and the lessons they learned. And I know we talked about it on your podcast, Sally, about. I was, you know, driving around and I think it was one of the late night shops at BM to set up one of my units. And I had your podcast on. I think it was talking about like terms and conditions and how you deal with, you know, getting those signed. And I can remember thinking, this is really helping me. It wasn't just the information, but knowing other people are going through the same thing, so. And just knowing that there are people in the industry to reach out to. So that was really, really amazing. And one of the things I always think is, you know, having a community around you. I mean, that's part of the reason why, you know, at Boostly, we've got obviously the hospitality community, which anyone can join for free, but obviously the Boostly Academy, which is where can go in there and there's hosts, you know, yourself is in there, I'm in there, who have gone through various experiences and, you know, we can share our knowledge with, with, with people and coach them along, can't we?

So, yeah, yeah. I mean, if anyone asks a question. So I've got quite an active WhatsApp group. You know, it's completely free, just loads of people can join it and ask anything. Sometimes people are really experienced and they can help other people or they might come up across, you know, come across something, especially during, you know, the pandemic. Obviously there's quite a lot of what on earth do we do? Kind of moments, but new people as well. And I've got a Facebook group as well that kind of links in with the podcast. But I think the podcast was good in that if people needed some guidance through lockdown especially, I was doing lots of episodes as all the different guidelines came in and it was like, really hard to understand some of them, but others were fine, you know, so I think it's really good to just help each other. And also because of all the mindset, learning books, audio books and everything I listened to, it's like the more you learn and sort of share with people, the better you understand it yourself. And you can kind of tip that out and learn more. So it kind of builds, really.

It pushes yourself to that next level, doesn't it?

Definitely.

You feel the duty to, you know, find out about the answers and help others at the same time.

Yeah, I've always felt quite compelled to answer a question. I don't know what it is. I might not always know the answer, so I just don't know. I'll find out. I don't always know everything, obviously, but it's useful to find out what people need. And obviously guests need all sorts of things. You really don't know what they're going to need next. So it's. Yeah, different situations crop up. You can share when people are staying that you know, we can help each other with.

I don't think there's another industry like hospitality, which has so many different, you know, sort of moving plates to keep track of, you know, from the guest side to if you've got, you know, if you're doing rental arbitrage or rent, to rent, that side of things, there's so many different things to consider. And of course, like you mentioned, the guidelines. I mean, during the pandemic, all of the grants and all that stuff, all that information changed almost weekly. So having people like yourself who are sharing it on podcasts or in Facebook groups, it's just so important people reach out and join these groups because you never know. One little bit of information could save you making a mistake or save you hundreds of pounds or push your business forward. So that's amazing. And, of course, that brings me nicely onto one of the new projects which we're both involved in, which is the Hospitable host project, where we're both writing a chapter in a book of 40 hosts from across the world, from people like Julie George in Australia to Tia Castle in Canada. You know, there's so many different people across the world who are in that book. Tell me a bit of, you know, a bit about what got you involved in this awesome project and, you know, how you. What it is, what it means to you to be a hospitable host.

Okay, so the project was quite an interesting one because I think it was one of the first times I'd been out to public events. Last year, was it last year? I think so it all blurs into.

One that's just a Blur. That entire two years just feels about five minutes and 10 years at the same time. I know.

So I met Jodie, and I think I met you as well at the short stay show.

Do you know I had Covid? I was that one person who didn't turn up because I had Covid at the time. My business partner went. Donatas Viscontes went there.

That's how I met. I'm so sorry, Liam. I'd like to say yes, but I met Jody anyway. I do know that. And she was talking to me about her book project, and, you know, we just got chatting and things. And of course, Mark was there and he gets everywhere. Yeah, yeah, Mark Simpson, everywhere. Good for him. So we were just chatting about it then, but I think I invited her to join our WhatsApp group. So she did with us, Sterling stays and everything. And I thought it sounds quite good, but you know how you kind of forget about These things. And then, bless her, she kept asking me. And I must admit, the more I heard about all the people who were taking part, I kind of thought, oh, there's all these really well known people from across the world and everything. You know, I'm just in Red Hill. And so I kind of fended her off a little bit.

You're putting Red Hill on the map, Sally. You know, I didn't know where Red Hill is until you came along. So yeah, you are putting it on the map.

Oh, bless. So, and I don't know, I just had a bit of a busy year personally and things. And I just thought, you know what, it's time to do it. But it was only like the end of February and I'd forgotten that the deadline was really soon. So it was like, okay, Sally, she said, really glad you're taking part, the deadline in two days time or something. So it's like, okay, I better write something. And so there are loads of different things I could have shared, but being a host, I think, I don't know, I come from the heart and I just really like to care for people and make sure they're okay. So, yeah, it's really hard to select what to choose for the chapter, but I'm desperate to read everybody else's as well. But I just really love hosting people and giving them a great stay and sometimes for really happy reasons, you know, people are staying for a week or something, maybe longer because they're traveling with their family, maybe going to London and stuff. Other times it might be like, you know, months of working here and we just make sure they're okay. And they love it. You know, they got places to park even though there isn't any parking. So that's like sort of become a magician at this point. And they've got all their different channels, they want to see sports and everything and just chat to them. So some guests I do speak to quite often, even though we've got the VA's just because they like to have a chat. So it's fine and it's really nice. You find out all sorts of things. And then other people are here because we've got a hospital quite nearby for, well, nice things like having babies and family and traveling here and other people have sort of sad things. So you have all the whole spectrum of life really. You know, I just really like to have compassion for people because you don't know what's going on with somebody. Sometimes people are a bit grumpy and I like to think, well, I have no idea why that is, because they probably have something going on in their lives. So it's really just to care for people and make sure they're okay.

There's two things which has come evident, obviously, by looking behind the hosts and seeing. I mean, we were talking to Pamela Holt from near Lake Michigan the other day, and she said a similar sort of thing. You've kind of got to have that innate caring, wanting to look after people. That's something that we see in hosts, you know, across the. Across the world. And certainly something which I'm looking forward to seeing the evidence within the book when it comes out. So, obviously the book is launching in May and, you know, it's one of those things where the stories will be so varied in it. Like you say, people be staying for different reasons. Some people in the book are coaches. Mark Simpson's in there, Julie George is in there. And you've got amazing people from across the industry who are putting their stories together. I know their stories from, you know, how people start hosting their worst guest, their best guest. Saving somebody's life is in there. There's all these different things. And you really, you know, reminded me that being that adaptable person is so important as a host. To just be adaptable, like. Like you. You've had these situations and to be positive and optimistic about it as well. You know, like if, you know, to be able to jump in and know that you'll be able to. To host and care for these people in their various different ways. So it's really cool. It's really cool.

It's good. And you meet all sorts of people. Obviously you don't always meet people, but a lot of it is remote. But quite often you do when they stay a long time. Yeah. So it's really fascinating. So long, may it continue. And I think the book's just going to be amazing to just, I don't know, hear about all the different locations people are, apart from anything else. We can all go and stay in all these wonderful parts of the world and know who the hosts are. But yeah, just to hear how they encountered different situations, maybe I don't know who they've had staying funny. I mean, funny things happen all the time. It's just hilarious.

There is. What is the, you know, is there any guests that stick out in your mind where you'd say, that was so random. Any guests that you've had which stayed in your sort of Red Hill apartments, which you can think.

Yeah, there's some. I probably won't mention that's the trouble.

Our minds instantly go to the. Oh, I can't say that on a podcast or I can't say that on a. Sort of. On a live. So be prepared, isn't it? Is the story. Be prepared for absolutely anything. And some things which you may not be able to say publicly, which you find unfortunately, which is the nature of the game. Do you know what I mean? That is the nature of the game. Yeah.

I don't know. I mean, so many people are just lovely and, you know, people worry about who they're going to have to see stay and what it's going to be like, but most of the time it's just brilliant fun helping people, getting to know them. And I don't know, there's so many people. I find it really quite hard to choose an example. But funny things that happen, I guess, is that sometimes you. Although we do a lot of guest due diligence, sometimes somebody slips to the net who maybe isn't staying for a holiday and they're working in a certain profession, the oldest profession. So once I was here and some did stay the previous week, we'd realized what happened, but the apartment was fine, but we don't allow it. And I think it's really sad. It happens. I might be beating about the bush a bit too much, but anyway, hopefully you know what I'm talking about. And so this guy knocks at the door when I was actually here because I had a zoom call and I thought he meant he wanted to stay because he's saying, oh, yeah, I want to book to stay. Okay, great. I said, that's really quite odd, though, because we advertise online and you know what I can do, though, is take the details and the team can sort out the booking, check our availability and everything.

He's thinking, oh, my God, you've got a team for this.

And so he said he was working in the area. So I just chatted to him a bit and then I said, okay. So I took his details and then I said, so, how long do you want to stay for? And he said, oh, about an hour.

Oh, there. All the signs. When did. When did it drop where you were? Like, oh, God, this isn't. And how did you deal with that? How did you.

Oh, I'm quite over. I just. Oh, right. That's why you're here. I'm so sorry. What we do is rent these boxes out for, like, you know, a minimum of two days for people who want to come and stay in work or leisure, guests who are having a time, wait and Bless him. He was so embarrassed, but I was.

I can imagine. That's a story. That's a story that you can tell and he probably can't, to be honest.

And the funniest thing was is I said, oh, I'm not normally here. And the penny kind of dropped me when he said, oh, yes, I saw this girl, I think she's Brazilian. And I thought, oh, maybe it was that previous guest. And so he probably thought I was the madam.

Yeah, you know what, let's just be prepared for anything in, you know, short term rental. It happens, unfortunately, doesn't it? Is something which happens. But yeah, that's. I've not had anything similar to that. So.

Yeah.

But do you know what another skill which I've picked up on is just being really good with communication. You know, like you being able to communicate with people from landlords to, you know, guests who are here for leisure, guests like you say, who may be here at the hospital for various reasons and then dealing with people, you know, sometimes quite sternly, if you've got guests which haven't looked after your place and that side of things, you kind of need to have that various ability to communicate on all those levels. So.

Yes, yes, always diplomatic, but, well, except we once had to call the police. But we won't go into that.

That's for another, another story. So one thing I'd love to dive into, obviously we, we've. Obviously you've got the podcast, you've got your service accommodation units and obviously we've covered the book. But I'd love to know what tools that you use within your business that you couldn't do without that. Somebody listening to this obviously looking to pick up tips of what they could apply to their business. What tools do you use every day or something which you go, do you know what? That has changed the way I run my business and that's so important to have.

Okay, so definitely a channel manager. We used to have quite a simple one, but now we use a bit more of a sophisticated one, which is resharmonics and so that's really cool. It's more of a property management system as well. But Asana links in with all of our systems too. And because I think it's really important to delegate, we've actually got a bit of a suite of systems. My husband still writes amazing spreadsheets which are bespoke and do all sorts of things. I'm a good tester because I break spreadsheets really well. You can make them really robust.

So if anybody listening and Needs a spreadsheet test. Just send it, send it to Sally. She'll break it.

But yeah, so Asana and anything that you use for sharing. So we, we use Trello quite a lot, but we kind of probably. That's probably going on back burner. But if you like things that are visual, Trello is a really good alternative to Asana. But Asana is amazing just for sharing what's happening in your business with other people updating, messaging, each other. And so that in conjunction with our channel Manager, we definitely not be without. We do use a few other tools like Slack for quick communication and stuff like that. And our team have a VoIP system that they use, so they make phone calls and everything. So I don't have to answer the phone all the time and you don't.

Get the calls overnight anymore.

So, yeah, somebody was asking me last night, actually, you know, do you answer the phone when it's ringing? It's like, no.

One of the first things you outsource is to try, try and get that to your team. If you've got a team, obviously in place, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah. And then obviously, when needed, I'm really happy to speak to people, whether it's guests or corporate agents or other types of agent or anybody, you know, to do with property or the business. It's just that if you're doing that all day, you can't focus on, you know, improving things and growing the business. So I think it's really important to have that support. And also it means that if you've got a system in place, your guests have a predictable experience, they can have a lovely time and they often want to come back so they know it's going to be the same, it's not going to be a radically different thing going on. Because people like to be reassured and have a bit of certainty, don't they? So all those kind of things with our systems, I think are good.

Do you know, that reminds me of a story of. I think this was read in one of the books, one of the famous books, like Rich Dad, Poor dad, one of those. I have to. I'll have to remember which one it is. But they were talking about when they went for a haircut once. And, you know, the first time they went there, they get served a cup of tea. The second time they go there, they get served a glass of wine. The third time they don't get anything at all. And they stopped going back because of the inconsistencies with what they didn't know what to expect. And this is one thing we see in the big hotel chains that you can pretty much book any one of them in any location and you kind of know what you're going to get every single time. And building that trust with guests is so important for us as hosts of our short term rental units. It's so important that we get that consistency. Right. So they know that when they book once, they know what they'll get again and not be disappointed or confused by our offering. So, yeah, that's so important to have that system.

Awesome.

So what?

Sorry.

There you go.

I think it's really good if we can develop that trust and people can rely on us, because some people rely completely on online travel agents. And I know obviously you and Mark Simpson are huge advocates of getting direct bookings, but some people are actually quite scared of it. But obviously the lockdown experience taught us all that it's much better to diversify and we get loads of direct bookings. And I think if you can't build that trust and can't give a consistent service, people are going to struggle to keep staying with you, aren't they? So I think it's really important to try and focus on that and be there. So every which way you can be there for your guests when they need you, but also provide the same or improve the service you give. Because obviously if they would like something else, then you can help them with that as well. Because we're here to help them. But, yeah, trust is like doing the.

Special, special request like today, you know, talking about the trust. And I know there's some accreditors across the industry, people like IPRAC are amazing to help build trust with guests and certainly get more people move across from booking.com Airbnb want to, you know, trust the host and book direct. But the key thing you've mentioned is actually just having a personable kind of service where people can talk to you. You know, they can, you know, through experience and referrals, you're going to get more and more people trust you. And the more we do that with our guests across the industry, the more they'll be more confident to book with people direct if they've had a good experience with one of us. So by us all raising our game and making sure we're delivering on our. On our words, making sure our places are clean, it's kind of helping everyone. You.

I mean, that's definitely, definitely. Yeah, for sure. I think I practice. Great. We're part of iprac, so guests can register their bookings for their peace of mind if they, you know, want to do that and we advertise that. But yeah, you do have to deliver on it, obviously, and be there. So. But I think it's brilliant thing that iCrack exists because people can see exactly who you are. You know, you've got your incorporation of your company, who runs it, the bio images of your property and the fact that you've got bank account for your business and all of that, so they can check you out rather than finding online and discovering that the property doesn't exist or something awful like that. Which can happen, obviously, through booking.com and Airbnb as well.

Exactly. Nobody wants to feel uneasy about booking through someone. And with services like iprac, it just makes it so much easier to. To see there's a third party accredited party involved who, who can verify the, you know, the host. So it is amazing. So what does the future hold for yourself, Sally, for Helmswood service departments, you know, what does the future look like?

Oh, future is exciting. So, obviously the lockdown's kind of ending. We're getting busy again. People are traveling more, people are working away more. And I think it has been a little bit slow at the beginning of the year, but we're gaining momentum. So we're looking to expand and get houses as well, because apartments are brilliant. But I think houses are great for groups of guests or certain numbers of guests. So that would be a thing that we're doing. And I also want to do a bit more in our community. So because networking wasn't really possible, I did quite a lot of online networking, so I'm getting much more into our business community and what we can do in the area, you know, charitable things that we can do as well and, you know, sustainability and everything. It's a really big thing. So we're researching really how to improve all of those things because, you know, we try and be green. I wouldn't say I can't claim to be completely. I don't think we need to do a bit of an audit of that kind of thing. I think it's really important because, you know, it's our planet, we need to look after it.

But one thing guests are looking for now, aren't they? And do you know, that's amazing, reaching out to the business communities. And if. Are you talking about in your local area as well, getting involved in that? Yeah, it's something that again, we see from hosts, if you get more involved in the community, who are they going to recommend when, you know, when they've got people Coming to the area. Well, they're going to recommend, you know, yourself and your business. So not that feels good to help out the local community which is also funding your business, do you know what I mean? Is a given. You get sort of thing from it.

So definitely. And there's lots of developments of, you know, leisure areas in Med Hill is going to have a new light cinema and loads of stuff going on. And we're friendly with our local council as well because I know some SA operators, they have difficulties with that kind of thing, but, you know, we're fully compliant and find all of that kind of thing important. So the council are really supportive here actually and they sponsor some different events and things for businesses. So I go to those as well as, you know, local business networking. That's separate. So I think it's really good to just get on board with lots of people and people in our area. We can work together to provide extra services for our guests as well. So it's all kind of improving what we do and, you know, making it more available, different locations as well.

So Horizon Tide floats all the ships, doesn't it? Horizon Tide will. Will do that. So what I'd like to do is obviously it's been awesome. I'd just like a couple of fun questions just at the end here, these quick fire questions, but, you know, as short or as long answers as you like. IPhone or Android? Sally?

Oh, iPhone.

IPhone, yeah, that's a tick. That's good. Android or Facebook? Sorry, Android or Facebook? Instagram. Or Facebook.

Sorry, you confused me there. Instagram.

Instagram. Awesome. And what is the one app you use on your phone all the time? You know, every day?

The one app. Well, slack, I guess, to talk to my team Communication. Yeah.

And lastly, we're all about travel. So where would you recommend, you know, where should people go and see and where is your favourite travel destination?

Oh, well, apart from Red Hill, we mean.

Well, that's on the map. I know that is on the map. I put a circle around it. I will travel there.

Oh, loads of places. So in the uk, I really love places like Cornwall. There's nothing like the feeling of velvety soft sand between your toes. And I don't know, anywhere in Italy I completely love. Yeah, I'm escaping to Rome in May, so that's exciting.

Oh, nice travels. Open up again. It's nice to be able to look forward to that and yeah, just to close on. I know you've been in the boostly academy, you know, for quite a while now, haven't you? I Think similar time to me. We joined the Boostly Academy, which is obviously Mark's training academy. How has it helped you during that time?

Oh, I've done loads of his campaigns that he does and you know, often he gets lots more people joining at those. But it's amazing to have all those different ideas. And most recently I did the one with Paul Anderson about Instagram and that was brilliant because while mostly I know Instagram, some of my kids who are in their early 20s, you know, I haven't got around to learning it in detail, but Paul opened my eyes. So all those kind of things is brilliant. And also just all the Facebook help and support for everybody. I really love that too. So, yeah, I mean there's so much because marketing is obviously really important. Social media we all need to use, but use it in a strategic way I think is the word, isn't it?

It's being the producer of it, isn't it? Not the consumer of it. But producing posts and having a strategy on their is so important. And we actually had Paul on the podcast recently and he's just a hive of information. Also in the book as well, isn't he? So. And also absolutely amazing. Well, Sally, today has been absolutely amazing. I mean, I've picked up so many, you know, communication, making sure that you're, you know, sort of identifying your guest avatar, making sure that you're reaching out in your communities and that sort of thing. There's so many tips that people can pick up from today, from yourself if people want more information. You mentioned you got the Facebook group and obviously the podcast. How can people find these things?

So there's a link tree, sallykember, which has got like everything. But the podcast is service to service, accommodation secrets. You can search that up on itunes. I think that's probably the best way. Yeah.

Awesome. And if people want to get in touch, can they do so on social media or anything like that? Is that just going through the link tree?

For sure. So SallyCamber and Instagram, our company is Helmswood. So Helmsworth Service Department. So it's Helmswood SA. So either of those is all good.

Awesome, awesome. Well, you've put it on the map. People are going to be flocking to Red Hill now and getting in touch and yeah, look forward to. You know, we've got the book launch coming up in May, so I'm sure I'm going to see you there. And thanks again for today, Sally. It's been really interesting and really enjoyed it.

Oh, thanks so much, Liam. It's been really good to speak with you. Thank you for having me on.

Don't worry. See you again. Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee like Bruce Lee? Cause it's so hard and the tea is loose leaf Making up those rhymes don't write it, just do it loosely.