#039 - When Technology Seems Too Hard

Hey, hey. Hit Splits Family, this is Shelly Hits. And welcome back to another episode. Today we're going to talk about when technology seems too hard or feels too hard or is overwhelming. And I'm pretty good at technology, but there are just certain things that my brain still struggles with.

And lately I've been pushing myself to move into those areas that feel hard because it's easy to then just want to stay in your comfort zone of what you know, what feels easy, what you can do without having to push into those uncomfortable places. And one of the things that I've been trying to learn is how to better segment my list in activecampaign. And for most of you, I don't recommend having a system as robust as activecampaign. And honestly, I don't even know that I would still use this system, but I'm already in it and I've already moved my email list a couple times and.

I don't know, I mean, I may at some point move it again, but right now I'm just like, I just don't think so. So anyways, I'm in there, I'm in Camp Active campaign. So I'm thinking, okay, I just need to bite the bullet and learn some of these things. And I've watched some trainings, I've, you know, gotten help with support a couple times and even the support, you know, one time like I was talking to three different people, they were all telling me different things and someone, you know, actually told me the wrong thing. So, you know, I just, I had to go through some ups and downs to learn the process. But I'm getting a better understanding. And then I'm also trying to learn some advanced things in Air Table. Air Table is like my new favorite tool. And again, it's not for everyone, you don't need to use it. But I really am loving it. And there's something in airtable called Automations. So I've used airtable as a database and just some of the basic ways. But I've been taking some trainings lately about how to use it for some automations and in different ways and it's really stretching my brain.

But anyways, I'm setting, I've been setting up this new airtable database for our one day conferences to keep track of the speakers, to keep track of all the details. And for those of you that don't know, like there are a lot of things that go into events like this. So just be grateful if you, if you enjoy, you know, events like this, be grateful to the host and really take advantage of the things that they've done for you because it is a lot of work but it also is very, as a host, it's very rewarding and it really helps to grow our business. It in the five step marketing strategy that I talked about recently, a conference or a summit or something like that is both the attract stage. So I'm attracting new people. It's nurture.

Or it's engage because you know you have a way for people to sign up to your email list. And it's nurture because you're nurturing them. They're getting to know you like you, trust you over the time. And then it's invite because you're inviting them to purchase an all access pass or purchase your product. For us it's Christian Book Academy. So anyways it combines so many of the marketing things in one and it's been, it's just been really an effective thing for us. So it's a lot of work but it's a lot of reward too. I digress. But I, so I've been putting together systems to try to make this one day conference easier to host. And I've, I've been, you know, deep into this air table thing.

I told CJ yesterday I feel cross eyed. You know, it's like, oh, what is going on? And I've, I, I was on a call with someone, a zoom call and they were showing their system this week and I was asking them questions and then I was on a one on one zoom call with someone else about Airtable this week week. And they both use different methods but different ways to accomplish things. I could not get either of their methods to work the way that I needed it to work. And I mean I even reached out to the one person and she, I showed her a video, she's like, Shelly, that should work. That looks like you set it up correctly and it wasn't working. It was so frustrating because I probably spent an hour or two on this one little step that was, I mean and it was like I said, I even showed it to her and she said it looked like it was right. So. Oh, you know, it's like so frustrating. Have you ever been there when technology, you think you have everything set up correctly? And so I took a deep breath and I tried this other way, the other way then seemed like it was going to work. I tested it and it wasn't working correctly. There was a step that was still missing and that person's really busy right now. And so I was just like, I still Reached out to them, an email, but I was like, okay, Lord, what do I need to do? Because I need to start pitching my speakers and I need to have this thing ready. And so when technology starts to get overwhelming, you're going into an arena or an area that you're unfamiliar with.

You can always take a deep breath and say, okay, is there another way to do this that might be a little bit different but it would still work. So I'm always doing this, I'm always problem solving and I think I just do it naturally now. But you know, a lot of times if something isn't working, one of my first natural inclinations to do is to restart the program, to restart my computer, to, you know, do something like that and maybe use a different browser. A lot of times those things will fix the issue. Now this was not an issue that was going to be fixed by restarting a computer or using a different browser, but there are different ways to do the automations. And so I just went ahead and used a simpler way. It takes a little more human effort. Like my virtual assistant will have to go in and do a few things manually, but it's still.

It'S still a lot easier, a lot better than what I had. So I was thinking last night, oh, you know, I finally have this done. But I have learned so much in the process. Like I've gotten so much more comfortable using automations and airtable. I was almost afraid of them. Are you ever, do you ever feel afraid of technology? Oh my goodness, if so, you're not alone. Like even myself, I've been, I've been doing online business for 18 years and I still feel afraid of technology sometimes. Like I'm really good at technology most of the time but sometimes there are just certain things that it's hard for my brain to figure out. Like I just was not good at physics and calculus and you know, those types of things in college.

And so anyways, I want to tell you that sometimes you won't be able to maybe get as far as you want or figure out all the things that you want, but you're still able to get it to work. And in the process you've learned a whole lot. So the only way to really get better at technology is to practice, is to use it, is to learn, is to take a course, is to, you know, be on a zoom call with someone that's showing you how to do it, is, you know, to hire someone or to get on a call with somebody that offers to help you and just try, you know, and there could be a time when you decide, you know, this, this just isn't for me. And like in my business personally I don't like to have too many systems that like I can't understand enough to go in and hack around or edit things on the fly so that if I need to do something last minute I'm not dependent on someone else. Now I, we do depend on my graphic designer to do our formatting for our books and so that is something that I'm not doing on my own anymore. I might be able to go into indesign and change a thing or two. I've learned enough about it but for the most part I just leave that to her. But you know, a lot of things I try to, to at least know enough about it that I can keep the ship running. And.

So anyways I didn't want to get into a system in Airtable that was so complicated or was so over my head that I didn't know what I was doing. But I also didn't want to keep, you know, not you know, even looking at the automations part of it. So this was a long story to say ah, sometimes we're afraid of technology and sometimes we just need to go in, take a course, learn it and like just use it. Just keep using it and trying it and Googling and watching YouTube videos and, and, and just giving ourselves a chance to learn it. So even though I didn't reach the goal that I wanted and I'm not an air table superstar like some of my friends or some of the people that I know, I feel so much more competent in it. I feel so much more advanced than even a week ago and even though I am not an active campaign, you know, guru or anything like that, I feel so much more confident in how to like the segments and that that's one thing I don't like about their system is how they do the segments and, and things for who you're sending the list to. But anyways but I feel more confident in it because I finally just went in and did it and there were certain limitations and I, I, I reached some roadblocks where it's like ActiveCampaign has things where you can only do 20 things at a time. I have like 200, almost 300 tags in my system. I mean it's crazy, I'm so prolific and I've been in this business for so long and you, they only allow me 20 tags, you know, to segment and I was like I have way more than 20 tags to segment everyone that's interested in anything marketing related. So then I had to, you know, find a workaround. And the thing is, I prayed, asked God, and he gave me a workaround. And so now we have multiple automation, you know, with those, you know, multiple 20 tags in it, and. And just. But it's working. You know, it works. And so anytime you reach a roadblock, anytime you reach a place, you know, sometimes there's seasons to just not go there, to not go into the new technology. And I've been there, too. I've been there for a long time, actually. But this has been a season to push my. Like, say it. Okay, Shelly, it is time to learn this. It is time to stretch your brain. And I feel like I gained a few new brain cells this week.

All right. I know this was long, drawn out, and.

You know, it's. It's just life. I want you to know you're not alone. I want you to know I'm in it with you. And I want you to know that God is able to not only give you problem solving on the fly and show you ways to do things even if you're not able to learn it exactly the way that you hoped and that you can get better at technology. You can, my friend. It just takes practice. Like, with anything. At musical instrument, with sports, with athletics, with parenting, with anything. It just takes practice. And so I encourage you, whatever you need to learn this week, maybe take aside an hour or two, realize it may be frustrating, you may not solve it in that time. You may not get where you need to go or where you want to go, but you will learn something. You will move forward. And I'm so glad that I took the.

The deep dive into these tools. I don't recommend that. That you need to do this right now, but I just wanted to share my own experience. So I will talk to you in the next lesson or in the next. In the next. In the next episode. Bye, friends.