Is the Amazon Influencer Program the Gateway to Social Media Success?

Hello and welcome. I'm TJ Walker. Thanks for joining me. We are live. It is Thursday, January 11, 2024, around 10, around a quarter till the top of the hour. 11am here on the East Coast. I'm joined by our fantastic community manager, Barb Tomlin. A number of our students and friends are here with us as well. Janice is with us. Karima is with us. First, Barb, I got to confess with you. I was feeling guilty about something this morning because I was getting up, getting ready and I was. I had to take my daughter to school because normally my wife does that. My, my wife is a little under the weather. So I was having to take care of things, breakfast for everyone. And I was frankly feeling guilty about something and feeling sorry for myself because a week had gone by. I didn't want to report back to you and the others that I didn't have time to make any new Amazon influencer videos because here I am telling people it's so easy, it's quick, just do them. And I hadn't done it because I'm in the midst of completely tearing apart my studio, rebuilding one. And I'm thinking, well, gosh, poor little me. I had to take my daughter to school. I had to get breakfast for my wife and coffee for her and everything else. And I'm behind. I'm running around like crazy. I'm getting into the, the studio. I've set things up, I've got. Which I'll tell you why I'm wearing a tie in a moment. I've got my makeup on, my dress the way I want it, the light on, it's 9:30 and I have a scheduled call with you at 15 minutes. And I'm thinking, I haven't posted a single new Amazon influencer video. What can I do? I don't want. Rather than make excuses, why don't I just do something? So I picked up my phone and so what's near me? And I realized, oh, I got it in my ear. So I did a short video talking about these MEE earbuds, which Barb, you were nice enough to introduce me to, I don't know, a year or so ago. And I did a short vertical video on these. I did a short long video, I did a longer one, I took a horizontal video, I took a vertical video. And between 9:30 and when we talked a few minutes before 10 again, I say this not to boast, but to really show how easy it is. I'll just share my screen and I'm only sharing my public page so I'm not sharing anything that is in violation of Amazon principles. But I do want to drive home the point that I'm as guilty as anyone. We all make excuses. Oh, I'm busy today, I've got headaches and extra thing. Just do with it. Just make the video. So this morning between 9:30am and roughly 9:52am, I recorded this video. Or recorded this. The second video I recorded the, the third video, I took this picture. Now, could that be photoshopped or look more flattering? I put more makeup on my. Yeah, but I just got it up there. I put this video up and I created a, A, A list as well. So when you go to the, the page, you'll see. Let's see, there's posts. Oh, here we go. Technology post. So I created a whole new thing. So I created six things of potential value for me that could be making money and be splattered all over the Internet in theory for a long time. And it wasn't because I had perfect conditions. It wasn't because I had a perfect studio. I went to plug in my new microphone for my iPhone, thinking, wow, it's going to be great. But I bought a new iPhone this past weekend and the whole is different. So I couldn't even use a microphone. So all these headaches and you know, I just, I just said, why am I making excuses when I don't really like listening to other people's excuses? Why not just get it up there? And that's exactly what I did. So I say this. I know, I realize it's going to sound like I'm bragging, but I gotta tell you, if I can do it, you can do it. Because I had to not only shoot the video, I uploaded it to my Google Drive, downloaded it, had to type a title, had to upload it in Amazon, type the title and the description. And I'm the world's slowest typist. So if I can get five posts up while multitasking, if I can shoot three videos, make five posts, create six posts, including a list in a half an hour while multitasking, what is your excuse not to do one video today? That's, that's really my bigger point. I want to motivate you to make a video. For those of you just joining us, thinking, well, I thought I was here to listen about communication skills, the best practices. This sounds like an infomercial for Amazon Influencer. The reason I've been talking about that and Barb has been talking about this program, Amazon Influencer is it's something really different in the world in that it's a way for the average person to speak, to speak to an audience to make money without the traditional hurdles of a network has got to sign off on you or an advertiser has to approve you or, or you have to accumulate some big huge audience on your own because those three things were the traditional reason. 99% of the world has never made a video promoting a product or making money. That's what's different, I believe about Amazon Influencer. So Barb, let me give you a quick little rebuttal time there and then let's, let's bring on our other friends. We have a lot to talk about today and Janice is with us, Karima is with us, Beth is with us. They've all been very patient. We're going to go to, to Beth first after Barb. So Barb, good morning again. Good to see you.

Good morning. Good morning. Well, I'm not going to tell you about my Amazon adventures because after what you just said there, it obviously is very irritating for you to get for a to hear our reports. So I'm, I'm good with it and I'm gonna say I'm, I'm just gonna pick on you for a tiny minute. You're a man and you have a wife and you have support system behind you. But the girl role, and here I am at this stage of my life, it hasn't changed. We still have those behind the scenes responsibilities that guys don't have every morning. So I don't know, you may have fixed. You know, I'm very fortunate. My husband is at the stage he is in life and he was fixing my breakfast for me today. That is, you know, this is the first time in my life that that's happened. We are working as a team towards our end goal and we're all in on Amazon. And I'm also the other thing you said in your introduction is I, you know, you were panicky about whether you should get. Is it really that important to get a live up every day on Amazon right now? Because you know, we are in that movement. We want to have success on Amazon this year. And the thing is, is that one of the things all of us have to remember is that Amazon, when people go there, people go there to buy. They aren't going there to be looky, lose, they're ready to buy. But it the model for us at in producing content and manufacturers are looking at. We have just gone through our big season and so this is the time to look at your numbers from what happened last year to strategize what you do in the new year and get rolling. But right across the board with Amazon influencers worldwide, this is not. These three weeks after Christmas is not the biggest time of sales. So after the year end stuff is done, then you get all of your stuff ready for the new year. So you're ahead of the game. Just relax, go with it and you're gonna do fine. I know you are.

Well, thanks. And again, my main interest is not to become the number one world best at Amazon Influencer. What I'm fascinated by is this entryway into sponsors, advertising, working with brands, because people talk about influencers like it's a new thing. Well, Nike gave Tiger Woods a $40 million influencer deal in 1996 or 1998. There have been influencers around forever. They might not have used the influence through the Internet, but the idea of people who can say or do interesting things that attract eyeballs and then companies want to be associated with them and pay them money, that's been around forever. I mean, you could make the case that's essentially what the British royalty has been for hundreds and hundreds of years. They are marketing tools for British tourism companies and hotels because they're not wielding real power. So there's nothing really new there. So, Barbad, I certainly don't mean to put anyone down or make anyone feel bad. I'm hoping to motivate people to just pick up their phone and talk about something they like about a product. To me, what fascinates me about Amazon Influencer is it eliminates so many of the things I personally can't stand about most marketing. I followed all the seminars on how to have the perfect webinar and you have to do value stacking and you say, well, this alone is worth $3,000 and this is when the whole thing is worth $50,000 and you're getting it today for 900 bucks. It sounds cheesy. You have to do all these things about creating scarcity. Act now or this will never happen again. It'll be 10,000 times more. And I personally am not comfortable with. I just feel cheesy. The beauty of Amazon Influencer is there's no script. I simply share how a particular product has solve the problem for me, what I like about it and how I think it can benefit other people. And no one has to approve it as long as it doesn't violate some principle on Amazon. Might make a lot of money, might make some money, might make no money, but it's such a small investment. So that's why I see it as an entry point into this game that's a thousand times easier than just, well, let's start off with a 45 minute infomercial sales funnel. And before you know it, you've spent $50,000 over six months and your ad, your Google Ads and all that. This is so much simpler. For those of you joining us for the first time, welcome. This is the TJ Walker Success Channel. This is the place where we try to help you become more successful through your communication skills. Building your communication skills. Whether it's giving PowerPoints, whether it's speaking to the media, whether it's talking to 10,000 or talking to your son or daughter or family member, talking to friends, it's about spoken communication. That's what we do here on this channel. So everything is devoted to that. Lately we've talked a little more about Amazon Influencer, but it's ultimately about how to help you become more successful in all you do through more effective communication. We've had Beth waiting patiently for us. Beth, if you could turn on your mic, tell us what you're doing these days and how we can help you.

First of all, you're incredibly amazing. I want to share with you about you. I joined Udemy for a nutrition class and then you popped up and I thought, okay, somehow I didn't understand. But I logged on to you and last week was my first week on, on this course, on this. And, and you're how you expose yourself in the subtle, quiet ways. And then I never knew anything about your public speaking. And so I was at the 8 o' clock call and there you were.

Talk.

I have a passion all my life. My, my passwords is number one speaker.

Right?

I want to be a motivational inspirational speaker. And when the student's ready, the teacher will appear because there you are. And the things I'm learning and it's. So now I'm on a couple of the other tabs to join your group, your classes. But I would never have known had you not exposed yourself in a quiet, subtle way in these other platforms or the other, like the nutrition. That's what I signed up for. And here we are.

Okay, great. Well, Beth, thank you. Thank you so much for your kind words. That means a lot.

Brilliant. You're extremely brilliant.

Well, thank you.

And so I'm just saying that too so people can know. Don't hide, you know, think you, you think outside the box, you know, and that's fabulous. So with as far as Amazon, I I always wanted to do commercials, you know, and so doing the Amazon platform is just perfect because I have a passion for that. And so I've had problems with Amazon for a couple of years now and they've blocked me. So I can't even ask a question about a product to see if it works. And so I can't leave comments. And you know, I keep spending all this money with Amazon, but I'm a black sheep, so I have to resolve that problem before. And I've got to figure that out or if you have some tips or I've, I've got candle and audios, audibles, and I don't want to lose all of those to start a new account. But I don't know how to fix my being.

I'm, I'm afraid I don't have any tips on, on that. But here I do have one tip that is a new tip. You mentioned you want to become a motivational speaker. Yeah, I'm going to give a tip. I, I would have never even occurred to me until a couple of weeks ago. And I think the number one way to be a motivational speaker today is not by sending out your demo reel to speaker bureaus and begging Anthony Robbins to be his opening act. I would not spend any time doing that. What I would do is try to become an Amazon influencer and then just give little motivational speeches. Doing product reviews for products you think are helpful. I'm sure you have a hundred motivational books that you love that have been meaningful to you, products you think make you healthier, exercise, products that you've used that you really think are much better than others. Give essentially little motivational speeches for those. Now you can do a 30 second or 20 second video and hope that gets out, but you could do a 59 or 60 minute, I think is the limit. Presentation, reviewing a product. And over time, if you do that once or twice, maybe nothing good will happen. If you do that for a thousand products, there may be a good chance that you build relationships with 10 companies that want to sponsor you on your motivational speaking tour a year and a half from now. I'm not saying it's easy, but to me that's a much more logical way of trying to proceed down this path of being a motivational speaker.

No. Yeah, you're brilliant. There you go again, showing your brilliance. That's a great idea and I will do that. And I'm having a problem with Amazon, so I've got to figure out how to. And it looks like Karima has An idea?

Yeah. I just came across something about two hours before this. You were saying you didn't. Beth, is it. You were saying you didn't want to lose your Amazon account that you have at the moment. I came across a way where you can, like, set up another account and then link it to the account that you already have without having to lose it. And you can do that even if you're not a professional, even if you're not an affiliate, even if you're not an influencer, even if you're not a seller on Amazon. So there is a way to do that. And if you want to talk to me later on your own, I'll see if I can tell you where I found it.

Okay.

I would love to be an influencer and what you're teaching, I would love to do that.

I'm just trying to learn everything.

That's a good attitude to have. Karima. Hey, Karima, we'll come back to you. And Beth, perhaps you and Karima want to chat through the Facebook page for Udemy students and you can have some solution there because I'm afraid I just don't know anything about how to deal with problems with accounts on Amazon, so. Not very helpful there. Let's. Let's bring in Janice, who's been waiting very patiently. Wanted to find out what you've been up to, Janice, and tell us what's new in your world. Well, Janice, your microphone is not on.

Sound. Is that better?

Yes, thank you.

Okay, so I've been very, very busy, you know, J, O, B, etc. I'm trying to. To post, let's say, three videos a day on my channel, which on YouTube is called Ad Advice. That works. And I'm having a lot of fun. And thank you very much, TJ for your latest tip about doing reviews like for books, etc, that. That helps Beth, and it certainly helps me. So I, I want to say thank you very much. The other thing that I'm trying to do is, is what other. What other things that I can do? And so one thing is words that do that, that are cliche, that don't work. So I thought I would post this is the word of the day that is ineffective and non productive. And then I would add what would be a better word to use instead? So for example, the term dad bodies, it's been overused. And so I would say, which, by.

The way, I. I much prefer that to just being called fat and ugly, which my daughter likes to say.

So. So, yeah, instead of dad bod, I would put Something else in it as. And I'm so I'm trying to do a spreadsheet of words that are, I think cliche and then substitute. So that would be another type of advice that works.

Great. And by the way, here is your website. Oh, I. Well, a different network I have. I am subscribed to it.

Thank you.

And I am here too now. But I would recommend others, you know, check it out. Let's support each other a lot of. Because this is. I've picked the right one, correct?

Yes.

Yeah. So this is your channel and we see you doing, you know, videos, long ones, short ones, lots of variety and a lot of good. You know, one quick tip I will give you. I'm guilty of this.

Thank you.

You're short. The first one on the left. I can't read that text at all. It is not enough contrast. You have a light orange on a light white, basically.

Yes.

Thank you so much. That's one thing that will help if you, if you look at the real superstars on YouTube it's you know, black on white, red on white, white on black. I mean it is really strong contrast. That alone isn't enough to make everything work, but it's. That helps a great deal.

Appreciate it.

Janice, tell us about your main. Your main work in helping people communicate effectively. Tell us your typical client and what you do with them.

Well, there's three things that I do. One is I teach at the University College of North. I teach business and from that springs what. The second thing I do is I help people who are newcomers, whether they are fresh graduates or new to Canada on how to improve their resume. I call it Canadianizing your resume. And from that I look at their job postings, help improve their resume and give people are interested tips on their cover letters and also how to best prepare for the job interview. I've helped people who are law students hoping to do articleing. I've helped other newcomers as well, professionals who are relocating to Canada now. The third thing I do is I like sharing these quick little tips I call maybe little tweaks that will increase people's productivity because we don't have time to waste. And I'm also a ambassador for TJ Walker success.

Yes, very much appreciate that. And you do an excellent job. Let me ask you about resume. There's a school of thought these days that says resumes don't really matter, that all that matters is your LinkedIn profile and that you so many people neglect and I'm guilty of it too of not really maximizing all the different ways LinkedIn can get you in front of people, recruiters, people who are looking to hire someone, but they haven't put out a press release and gotten 50,000 resumes sent their way. How much of your advice is about helping people with their, their LinkedIn resume?

I. Your LinkedIn resume, I think, is a nice summary and overview, but for the specific job, your resume has to be tweaked and tailored for that specific position. So I, I see no, I see no harm in having a brief overview, but if you want to be serious, you have to tailor it for your audience. Just like what you do here. Everybody when they are doing Amazon reviews, it's that's particular product, your particular experience and the channel that you communicate through any. They used to call it the pray, spray and pray approach to resumes. That doesn't work anymore. I'm not sure if it ever really did.

Well, the conventional wisdom I remember from 35 years ago, let's go back 50 years ago, was that, you know, people responding to one ads in the newspaper only got jobs that way 3% of the time. And everything else is through personal connections, meeting people, networking, and, you know, 40 years, 40 years later, it wasn't that the one ads work because no one was putting one ads, but people are putting ads online and it's still something like 90% of people are getting jobs not through a particular online listing, but through networking, through LinkedIn, through calling people, through showing up at meetups and things like that. And my biggest frustration, I won't name any names here, but some of our students here, I think, are guilty of still wanting to sit back and hit press. You know, sit at home, have your coffee cup at home, tell your family member, yeah, I did a lot of job honey today. And all they did was send out resumes when what they should be doing is doing that for an hour a day and spend seven hours a day trying to meet people in person or have a zoom coffee and really connecting with people.

And the last thing I say to people when it comes to resumes, whether you are a new Canadian or you're just moved to a new town, having people speak on your behalf. The step before that is to go join volunteer organizations on something that is, I would say, name recognized, like the Salvation Army, Red Cross. The Terry Fox run here in Canada is very well known and people will be able to speak on your behalf. So you're gradually replacing the parts in your resume that were with your former life, with what it fits into the community that you're joining and yes, that is part of the planting the seeds ahead of time and, and building your network. So exactly what you're saying, tj, thanks.

Okay, well, Janice, hold on because I do have a question for you. Help people, presumably figure out how to dress for a job interview. I'm on a job interview right here today and every day. And everyone is when they speak on YouTube and other places. I have a question for you on that in a moment, but first I want to go to. Nangal has joined us and want to see what Nangle is up to. And if we have any questions or any way we can help you, Are you with us today? Hit unmute. Nangal, are you there? Okay, yes. If you do want to. Okay, great. How are you today?

I'm fine, sir.

Good. Tell us what you're up to and if we can help you in any way.

I'm starting Amazon business. So I was hoping that I'm actually starting my Amazon business as a wholesaler.

So.

And now I'm finding my. I'm finding, actually I'm finding one to one, one on one mentorship for myself. And frankly, I can't find anyone because anyone I find there, they are charging me with a lot of money. So that's a real problem with me.

Okay, well, one, I mean, one thing I would suggest, if you have more time to invest than money and everyone has, you know, a certain amount of money or a certain amount of time, sometimes you got a lot of money, a little time. Sometimes a lot of time, little money. No one way is perfect. You can probably learn almost everything you need just from videos on YouTube on that aspect of business, I'm afraid I don't know much about it. Barb knows infinitely more things than I do about Amazon. She stepped away for a moment, but Barb, if you can hear us, if you have any advice for Nanga about where to become, where to build his expertise on Amazon business wholesaling, I think you mentioned it's not something I know much about. Please let him know because Amazon is a fascinating place. There are so many nooks and crannies and almost every day I learn about some other program they have either for brands or influencers or customers. So there's a lot of legitimate criticism of Amazon. I don't want to sound like I am a full time apologist for them, but they do a lot of things really well and are obviously wildly successful. So, Nanja, we wish, we wish you a lot of success in that when Barb comes back, we'll see if she can Add to that.

Tj. Yes, just a second. Let me turn my camera on. I think Nigel is actually in one of our sessions, previous sessions on Amazon. And the thing is, that's an entirely different program. And in my latest research, and there's actually a young man who's developed a Udemy course on this issue. So you could get that very inexpensively on Udemy. But at this stage, if you're going in from the wholesale game from that side of it and the seller side, you need to have resources to actually begin to do it right. And so if you. There's all kinds of advertisements and out there, but if you don't have anywhere between 10 and $15,000 to put into the program, this is not the time for you to do that. So I mean, I. I just hate you had said something about you didn't have time even to, you know, participate in course for mentorship, paid mentorship in these programs. But Amazon has upped its game significantly and this season and going forward. That's why I asked TJ to get on board at this particular time. But this is. We're not back in 1998. This is the now. And the bottom line is that it is very difficult and it's a very lucrative area if you can dedicate those resources up front. But it is, it is not something for the faint of heart to go in from the seller's perspective. I think that TJ just mentioned how he had developed a product a long time ago and if he'd have known about the seller's program, you know, he could have really capitalized on that. Well, that's true, but you have to be prepared and one step at a time. And, and that is the thing that right now, financially, you've at least got to be able to commit that kind of money to it.

Okay.

Speaking of product, I forgot this. I created a line, a TV, a TV tie line I created like 16 years ago. Amazon either didn't know about it or they weren't doing anything to make it accessible. I failed miserably. I had websites and videos. I'll tell you about the tie in a minute. But Nangal, what country are you in?

I'm actually, I'm from Pakistan, but I'm doing Amazon in uk, United Kingdom.

You're in the uk. So Amazon has different rules for different.

Pakistan.

Okay, so Amazon has different rules for different countries. I don't think they're making the Amazon Influencer program available to you there. So I can't recommend that. But Barb, you may have a recommendation for him on some other Amazon way of making business because presumably you want to, you want to make money and you want to use your talents. Barb knows a lot more than I do. If she's saying the particular avenue you're going on now is very capital intensive, I would give that a lot of credence and perhaps try to find another way of making money. Barb, as far as you know, for someone living or residing in Pakistan, is there an easier way to make money on Amazon these days?

I haven't really studied the Pakistanian involvement on Amazon quite frankly. And because they're literally it's the whole game has changed for everybody in this last six month period. It's time the people who've been involved a long time, it's time to regroup, assess the situation and moving forward. And so we have, we're all sitting here today able to speak to each other and all we have to do is use the resources on the Internet as well. You can research that very easily just by using keywords on through your favorite search engine. Whether it's Google or whether it's. It's being. You know, but there, the tools are there. There's also on Facebook specific groups that I recommend. I don't know how you feel about me recommending groups possibly that you aren't in tj that I know that.

Oh, that's fine if you think it's, if you think it's helpful or useful to anyone in the audience.

All right, well I'll try because Beth has an issue that there is a Facebook group T to help her with that is that I highly recommend. The guy is credible. He has a special Google Chrome, a special app that we can put on Google, Google Chrome to really analyze the situation. But you have to and in any of these groups, you can't just go in there, ride and take. You have to be willing to participate, be an active participant. And so I'm happy to do that. I will put that in our we. We do a live session in exclusively to our community on Facebook, our student community on Facebook in the afternoon right now. And I will put that in that event for you and tag you. Okay. That resource for you.

Great. And Barb, further validation of what you just said as it relates to Nongo. Henry Wright says I agree with Barb to use Udemy courses to understand the basics of this Amazon wholesaling program before going on to a $10,000 course.

Exactly.

And that's always a good starting point. Go ahead.

Udemy is how I found my way back to TJ after 20 some years. Okay. And I did that through Google searching an issue I had and I needed to have results right away. I needed to have that insight. And quite frankly, Udemy has just paid a tremendous amount of money to be findable, all of its resources to be findable. And so I would. Because the small amount you would have to spend there and you might even be able to find a coupon for the course that is worth, you know, just a thousand percent. It saves you so much time and because the people who are there love to learn and love to share their knowledge. And so I. That's the route I would take if I were you.

Great. Hope that's helpful. I need to switch gears a moment because I need specific feedback, Janice, from you because of your career bar. But, but really everyone. And first, you know, a little disclosure. I'm hoping.

Oops, got some feedback.

We need to mute someone because we're getting feedback. Okay. I'm hoping this is the last time you ever see this plastic brick background because I've just spent a ginormous amount of money really upping my game with, with the fanciest video cameras, lights. I'm building a whole set here. So we're not going to have virtual backgrounds or fake background. We have a real set. We're going to have video cameras so powerful you'll see every pore in my face. I'm hoping to have that up by next week because all the equipment arrives tomorrow. I'm really trying to up my game and be serious about this YouTube thing, this online video thing. So that's a part of it. I'm also trying to figure out not just how does the backdrop look better or the camera look better or the lighting or the audio and I'm getting a new thousand dollar microphone. But how does every part of me send a message that's more professional? So here's what's happened. I'm going to share sort of the inside guts. Let me hit the share screen a minute. I want to share with you some inside data from my YouTube page, my YouTube analytics and tell you and it'll explain why I'm wearing a tie and a suit and tie today. If I look at my most popular videos of the last 28 days. Let's just go to the first seven, five of the top. And I realize it's a little bit hard to see shrunken like this, but five of my last seven most popular videos that all have more than 3,000 views. It's me wearing a suit and Tie, that's the last 28 days. If I look in the last seven days, here's one. We didn't, we didn't. We only had one in the last seven days. If I look in the last 90 days, here's one. Here's another. Here's another. So three of the top five videos, five of the top eight videos of the last 90 days are all videos of me wearing a suit and tie. Now this is all pulled from a speech that I gave like 17 years ago. So what I don't know, is it just that people prefer a younger 45 year old TJ and not a 61 year old TJ? Most people, and I'm certainly no exception, look better when they're 45 than when they're 61. So it could have nothing to do with the suit and tie and simply the fact that I'm aging. I don't really know. But I'm, I'm willing to try the easiest experiment. It's easier for me to put on a suit and tie than to look like I'm 20 years younger. So that's why I'm wearing the suit and tie. And I want to get some feedback to is anyone? Because there's a part of me that says, oh, these days everyone's more casual. And you know, Anthony Robbins doesn't wear a suit and tie anymore. And you look at most of the top youtubers, they're not wearing a suit and tie. That seems a bit old and stuffy. But for whatever reason, it does seem as though that people when they're watching me are more interested, they're more willing to watch. I mean, literally any clip of this old speech where I'm wearing a suit and tie has gotten at least 2,000 views. And some of them seven, some of them 10,000 views. And in my mind, when I'm watching the videos, I'm not saying anything different from what I'm saying in new videos, but I'm looking at a camera. Now. Another difference is I'm in front of an audience and I'm on a stage. I'm looking down. That could be the factor too. Although it's not like you're seeing a lot of crowd shots. I could easily do videos in my studio here where I'm not looking at the camera and I'm looking down to give that, that same feel. So that's why I'm wearing a suit and tie. So I'm going to experiment when I really go heavy in this new program with the new studio, wearing a suit and Tie. And just to see if it may be that people are just more comfortable seeing an older guy who they think of as an older generation, more formal, I don't know. So with that, let me be quiet. I want to hear from Janice and Barb and then anyone else who would like to opine on what I'm wearing. Okay, Janice, if you want to put.

Your mic on, I hope you're not getting any flashback. So this, this is what I say to my students. I said consistency. So right now you've got a great suit and tie, but your background is very casual. Whereas when you are presenting in front of the audience, you are formally dressed and you have a formal setting. So I believe that consistent message is very helpful. The videos that I've seen, where you do reviews, those reviews are, you're an ordinary guy and this is your ordinary Crocs product. So it leads, I guess, greater legitimacy, credibility, etc and authenticity. That's authenticity and credibility. So I think that if you make those match, then it will be more appealing to people. So you've got some really good tips. And I suppose if you had a formal tie and maybe a jacket on, that would resonate more. And that's just my opinion.

Well, thanks for the feedback. And by the way, I am getting rid of this. My new backdrop will, will have more like what you see a lot of professional YouTubers have. It'll. It'll look much bigger. It'll be a much wider shot. It will look more like a cross between a YouTuber and the Today show and the Home Shopping Network. And it's going to have some ferns and some plants and maybe a globe. And you'll. I'll be at a standing desk. I'll also be able to stand and move in like a 2, 3 foot range, which is a little bit similar to that speech where the, the excerpts have done so well in the short format. Barb, I'd like your opinion on this. And again, you don't hold back. You may say, well, tj, you've gotten old and ugly. Nobody wants to look at you now. Has nothing to do with what you're wearing. I want to hear your. Your unvarnished opinions.

Well, you are a Udemy instructor and your presence on Udemy, you take the courses that you have there. And how you present yourself on those most popular courses are more. The very most popular, popular courses are more on the formal side in the business. People who are drawn to them typically are business professionals and dignitaries. Even you know that because you've had kings and even queens. You know, take your courses. And so in that realm and also your career history and what I mean, it's known to us as your Udemy students that a couple of times we've been left without you because you've been called to the, the UNN for counseling. We are also here in the USA going through a period in our country where there's a lot of political games going on in the front service of what we're seeing on the Internet. And anybody who's speaking on that front is more formal. So. And you also offer courses on that for these people who want to have a political career. Career. So I think that's about your brand, tj and like Janice said, the consistency, I, I have always hated the red brick background because that is a sign it's gone.

It's gone.

You know, the first, I mean, we, back in 2014, we all talked about it because they told all of us, anybody who was teaching online, go get that. And so you see tons and tons of early Udemy courses from back in that time frame, all being that. And so the first thing you think, oh, he's got one of those too. So just be you, is what I would say. You know, and I'm really, I'm like, I'm thinking, I know from your ego standpoint that you need to do this for you, but for your audience perspective, you are reaching people all over the world and having these 4K cameras and all this fancy setup and so forth, many of them are not. And I would say more than 50% percent of that audience that's going to be viewing you does not have that. And yet one of, I mean, they're drawn to you because you're saying, go live, come in here, talk virtually and be that. So I, I would downplay my technology if I were you, but that's just me as an old woman, you know, been online for ever so long. They just, from the technology side is one thing. The other thing is their Internet access, even though you've spent a fortune doing that. And we, because a lot of us have been there and done that, is we just. Because we come from the traditional broadcasting background where we had people doing that for us. And we know they spent a fortune on that technology to be able to, you know, make us look good on screen green. And it's a real world now that we're in, it just be you. And I think that you want to make sure that if you do press the button that you can reach as many people as possible. So you do whatever makes you feel good.

So here's where I'm torn. You say, you know, just be you. Well, I mean I live in Florida and it's. The old joke is Florida is where it's August 11th months of the year. It's hot. I'm wearing either a T shirt or a very light linen button shirt, shorts and Crocs every day. That's my standard uniform. But again, when I do a video where I'm wearing the casual shirt, it might get 300 views. I'm wearing a suit and tie. I'm reaching 3,000 people. I do have a lot of nice suits. I haven't worn, worn them much in the last 10 years, but I have brought them to the office and they are very comfortable. I'm not an anti suit person, but I have an awful lot of handmade. This sounds pretentious to say I'm sorry but I have a lot of very expensive handmade tailored, you know, Savile Row suits that I can just keep here and put on a different one each day. It's not, it doesn't make me horribly uncomfortable. They are very comfortable, but it's not as comfortable as T shirt and shorts.

So if, if I could just interject. Tj Anybody speaking in front of the United nations, they're going to probably put on a formal suit.

It's still a formal place.

Yes, I, I used to work in Malaysia, I used to work in Dubai, etc. They go formal because it's the way it is in business. This. And just to be. I don't want to throw in politics, but the governor of the state of Florida, I believe there was a debate or something a few, few days ago. Last night, last night had a suit and tie. Yes, he or she were, they were in Idaho. But even when they're doing something in Florida in front of cameras, there's a suit and tie on.

Okay, it's my turn.

Yes, go ahead.

I have to. You okay? If you look at normal elder people, they don't have that piss and vinegar you do. And so, so don't ever say anything about your age. 61, 45. It doesn't matter. You've got the energy of a kid almost, you know, and just dress like your background there would be casual. But your, your energy and your passion for what you do, that's what sells you. That's, you know, that's what sells you. You're amazing. And so yes, when, when you take the course, it's nice that the guy's in the suit because he's, he's professional. He's the professor, like sharing his, his wear. And then. I'm sorry, I just got a distraction. But when, when you're in this format, you know, just be yourself and share and be passionate like you are. And you thought you could sell an ice cube to an Eskimo. You're just serious. You're amazing.

Well, thank you. So, but here's my question. When I, when I look at the, you know, you look at the traditional media world, the, the late, late night show host in America, this, you know, this, the, the Seth, I forgot his last name but. And the really late night people, they're not wearing a suit and tie. If it's the Tonight show, which is on 11:30, not 12:30, and the people and, and Stephen Colbert, the 11:30 show host, are wearing the suit and tie quite often. But when I look at the top superstars on YouTube, especially ones who talk about communications, largely, they are not wearing suit and ties. I mean, there is one gentleman in you. Some of you have heard me refer to him before, Vin Jang, who is really good and he's a communications expert. He is wild. He was so much more wildly successful on YouTube and in social media than any other communications expert. And I'll just show you his again. He's great stuff. I watch his stuff now. He is, I think, just in early to mid-30s, and I don't see a tie or a suit anywhere. He has a younger guy and he does have a background in magic, but he talks about a lot of the same things I do. But his audience is absolutely astronomical. He's had 14 million views in the last month, and that was his worst month in the, in the last year. If you look at someone who is another superstar of the Internet is this host of the Diary of a CEO. This is a podcast I've only recently started listening to. Again, he's a younger man. He's, he's only, I think, you know, 28, 29 years old, but this channel, he's, he's basically only wearing a black T shirt and he's got 25 million views a month. He's absolutely killing it. Now. It's not just the younger guys. There's the. One of the most successful podcasts in the last couple of years is Andrew Huberman. And he's, he's certainly younger than I am, but he is. Let me just see if I can pull in a part where we can just take a look. But there he's typically just wearing a black dress shirt. I mean, it's a Button. It's not a T shirt. And you know, he's got a lot of, he's younger than I am, but he's got a lot of gray hair. He's not someone 20 or 30. So I am seeing different styles and everyone has different styles. So if someone says well be yourself. I mean I'm like a lot of people. I have a lot of different selves. How I dress at the swimming pool or the beach is different than when I'm at the U.N. it's different than when I'm having lunch with a friend. We all have, have different styles. So I apologize for being so self indulgent, but I do respect you as a community and I, I am looking for some, some guidance on here. Would anyone else like to weigh in and we can switch to other topics. There are other topics in the news I would like to discuss that relate to communications and personal development. But does anyone else have any. Oh, I'm trying, not trying to show this, I'm trying to do this. Does anyone else have want to weigh in on something that relates to this? Janice.

Janice, can you speak up please?

Is this better?

Yes.

Okay. Tj, have you ever heard of the topic mutton dressed as lamb? It's an English saying and what it is is you are not 30. So people who dress like they are teenagers, it's like, like the middle aged guy who drives, he gets a sports car. So you're presenting on a serious topic and people are coming to you for serious information. So yes, if you're young you could dress with a black T shirt. If you're Steve Jobs you can dress with a black T shirt. But and I believe you had, there was a video when Steve Jobs is in front of town council or it's place of he's dressing seriously. So I would suggest that. Yeah, so the young people let them dress what they are. You have a, you're a guy with a lot of experience, you have a lot of credibility. And if they're going to be learning from somebody who has experience, they're not going to dress like somebody who has, you know, their dad trying to dress like a teenager. That's what I have to say. And did you ever watch the Brady Bunch?

Oh yes, way back in the day.

Okay, so there was season one, two, three and four. So season one and two, Mike Brady had a suit and tie then the.

Last season and he had straight hair and then he had a perm.

And he started to look like a rock stars over age a teenage father. So that's the What I'd say for you, jj, is what works for you. The data isn't lying. The data is saying when you are dressed up with a nice suit and tie, you get more traction. And myself, if I try to dress like my students, they would say, janice, you're just trying a little bit too hard. We gotta tell you, your 20s are way back in your rear view mirror. The other thing I can give as an example is you see these rock stars like Madonna with fillers, etc. Madonna, you're 60 something. It just means looks ineffective. Or as some of my students would say, that's sort of weird. So, yeah, that's what I have to say.

Tj, the data says you look better.

With the suit and tie. People want the suit and tie. Give the audience what they want.

Okay, agree.

100% agree.

Okay.

Okay.

Any, any. Any dissenters or. Beth, go ahead.

I think, I think it's the topic that brings people in because some of the ones that you've shown me, I don't go to listen because he's presenting. I'm going to listen to what's being presented. It has nothing to do with the presenter, but rather than the topic that I'm interested in and gleaming from. That's my point of view.

Oh, Brigitte has joined us. And also I missed a number of comments from Henry, who also said he likes. He likes the. The tie and looking forward to seeing my new studio. He thinks the. He thinks the tie resonates a lot with a corporate audience, which certainly I like corporate audiences, but I would really like to reach a broad mass audience because that's part of what fascinates me about this guy, Vin Zhang, is he has 7 million followers across social media, and he has what appears to me to be hitting more than 1 million people a day across social media. So he's, he's reaching a lot of people, corporate types, individuals, students. And so that I find that very inspirational to find there that many people in the world and interested in learning how to communicate effectively. And Brigitte, if you can join us on camera, we'd certainly love to hear from you, as always. But if you're, if you're tied up with other things, we understand that as well. Okay, Barb, any final words on this? And then I want to, I think, Karima, I want to come to you and see if you had any other issues you wanted to talk about today. But, Barb, first you, then Karima, then I do want to talk about. So some, some big issues that relate to this broader issue of how the world is changing and more power is flowing to individuals, to creators and away from big media companies and traditional media and how that affects all of us who are trying to communicate more effectively because there have been a lot of big stories in the news in just the last week that relate to this theme. Barb, any, any final comments you have?

I think the girls chimed in and covered things very well that I hadn't, you know, particularly addressed and I really appreciate the contributions that they made. And like Bridgetti said, authenticity matters and particularly as we move forward in 2024. You're. But I liked in particular, particular today is what Beth had said about, or I think it was Beth about, you know, the, the topic matter, the topic that you're cutting, they come to learn that topic. So if the topic that you're addressing, you know, you have to as a presenter, think about who am I trying to attract with this topic I'm addressing. So in analyzing your YouTube videos again, I would look at that more closely because that may be something that you can adjust on that particular video since I, I have the mic at the moment is go back on those videos. You can add the description, you can change that description and add more detail on that in text because that will also draw more viewers in. And if you, one of one of the things you could add is just your target audience for that video as well. Well, because remember, the search engines are going to be the ones who send people to you and YouTube itself is the second largest search engine. So take advantage of the text areas within each of your videos that you post and don't forget that community tab.

So here's a part, all good points, Barbara. Here's part of my challenge in that part of my goal for the new year. And we've touched on this brief briefly, but my goal is to really go all in on live and to do it one hour a day, maybe two, maybe three. I want to be able to talk about top news stories that relate to communication. I want to have newsmaker interviews about, you know, things like what we did with, with Rush today. I want to talk to top communicators where it's, it's one on one interviews about serious aspects of communication. I also want to be able to talk to really successful people in a wide variety of fields to hear how they tell their story. What is it about how they told their story, the elements, the passion, the excitement that made them success that our audience can relate to and be motivated by and inspired by. I want to have a section maybe not Daily, but certainly weekly where I talk about the technology aspects of how to communicate effectively. Because, Barb, you've helped me a lot by just remind, you know, telling me if six months or a year get these things, not the old IFB thing I was using where it popped out every two seconds and certainly not having the AirPods. So there's a technology aspect of it. What I would like to do is actually have a section of the show, maybe the third hour, where I actually make my videos, what I'm doing for Amazon influencers so people can see in real time. Oh, TJ screwed up. He did that one over. Oh, he did that one in one take. He second guessed himself a little and said, eh, you know what, it's good enough. And he went to the next one. So I want to actually have a little bit of a workshop in this live thing where people can see, see me making it because I think it will break it down for people and see the process and relatively how easy it is. I also want to show sections of my courses from time to time and even make a new communication skills course live with people to get feedback in real time. So because of this, if I'm doing a topic about, you know, this prime minister who, who had an aneurysm at a press conference and fell apart and what they did one minute, the suit and tie is appropriate for that. If someone has a question about how to tell a co worker they have bad breath and I give some insight, I can't change from wearing the suit and tie to wearing something casual because I am looking at trying to really do. I don't know if it'll be three hours a day, but a live section that's relatively long each day and I'm not going to be doing changes of clothes, clothing in any one day. So I need something that people can, you know, I wear different suits and ties. I'm not suggesting I'm going to wear the exact same thing each day, but I'm not going to be shifting in between segments. So that's why I'm trying to figure out what should be my default clothing. And I was certainly leaning towards wearing a suit and tie and getting feedback from the rest of you has kind of solidified my sense that that is what I should do. Barb, did you want to comment on that?

I don't believe that going live for three hours at a time is the way to go at this stage in what's happening online and communication. And I believe that it, I mean, because I'm looking at this both from a technology side as well as the viewer side. And you know, I certainly, I had, I had, I was known early on for a way of bringing people in to watch lives. But what has happened is our world has changed to where these why are YouTube shorts important? Why are Facebook short videos important? And it's because the attention span of the audience that is coming in is so, so much shorter these days. And getting to the point it would be more important, I mean, check who your viewers are, what time zones they're mostly watching from, when they're being watched and address whatever those topics are, are what you want to do, you know, based on that information that you have. And that gets back to, you know, the whole marketing communications ball game. You've got to start with a plan. How do you formulate that plan? You got to do your research. And just like you made us aware today I'm going to wear more suits because I found my numbers were higher there. But when were those people viewing them? Also it's not just that you got more views on them, it was what time of day they're viewing them.

If you're going that's pretty, that's pretty consistent. And it's, it's different data from what vid ad the Vidiq gives. It's pretty, it's usually like consistently six hours after it was posted. And then with so many videos, all of the views come in an hour or two hours. And the interesting thing is that it doesn't change that often. It's pretty consistent. So if I post something at 7am or 6:55 because you're not supposed to do it right at the top of an hour because everyone else is doing that, it's quite often right at 1:30 or 2pm that it takes off a video that's posted. It's say. But if I try to just post something at 2pm it won't, that won't get views until 8:30pm and any day of the week.

It's pretty consistent throughout the seven days of the week.

Right. Right.

That's good information to have and massage in, in considering what you're going to do.

Can I, can I just say something?

Sure.

You, you're talking purely about America. I mean you're, I mean you're, you're, what you're saying for regards time, I mean in the Middle east, in Egypt, in Pakistan, in India, the people are up late at night and after dark is when they go out. And. I think you're very much. And even, even the work that we're doing, I mean, I'm, I am doing work and the, the guy from Pakistan that was on earlier on as well. We have a different, we have a different audience probably. And, and I, I think that you're too much tied to the clock, whereas we're. When you're, when you're in the hotter countries, and especially with Amazon moving into Africa, when you're the people, it's, it's nighttime, not daytime, that they, that they go online and they, they spend their money or they do things. It's so, I mean, or it's. But what you're saying probably applies for, for, for your audience, tj. But it definitely. There are things that are you. That you're saying that definitely will not apply to, to my, my followers or my team.

The world is a big. There's a, the world is a big. Yeah, I mean, obviously everyone, everyone who's a creator has to look at things through the, through, through the lens of their country, their culture, their audience, what works best for their audience and what works best for them. Personally, I certainly don't mean to suggest that the times that work for me are universally the best for, for any creator. That. That's definitely not the case. There is a big difference. And Barb, I think you can speak to this. There's a huge difference in the Udemy students versus the YouTube viewer. Because Udemy, for all its faults, we won't get into those. They really have done a great job at marketing themselves internationally. I get, I think only about 11% of my students are based in the United States. And the vast, well, the vast plurality, 35% plus, are based in India. And if you factor in India and other Asian countries and Africa, certainly going up to Egypt, the vast majority of my students are from, from those two continents. Whereas YouTube is known for pushing out its. Any video based on where you are, they push it out disproportionately to people in your country. And until you get to be so huge or you do really sophisticated things with dubbing everything in every language the way Mr. Beast does, I guess I won't say it can't be done. I haven't learned the way to really unlock huge international audiences. There are things you can do that are quite time and labor intensive to put the transcripts in the top 16 languages and other things. But I have not devoted the resources to that because I haven't figured out a way to make that cost effective.

I didn't realize. Yeah, I, Sorry, I, I actually wasn't taking the YouTube thing into account. I was, I was thinking much more, much more broadly.

Sorry, I'll just check a minute and see, because I haven't checked in the last month. But YouTube does give you in their analytics, a breakdown of your students, not just by gender, which is interesting because when you look at our. Our live sessions, and today is a perfect example, we were what, 80, 80. Not counting me, we were 80. 90% female. And it's often that case when I look at the. The data on my students From Facebook, from YouTube, other places, it's typically 80% men. Now, I don't know quite know what the difference is as far as the people who are willing to participate and be active being so different from the ones who show up in the data. But it is, it is interesting to me, and I'm. I'm trying to look and see where in the analytics, my audience of their. Okay, here we have it right here. So 30% of the people who've watched my YouTube channel in the last 30. Excuse me, last 30 days, 28 days, 30% are from the United States, 9% the United Kingdom, 6.8% Canada, only 6% India. Whereas again, on Udemy, it is 35 from India. So it's a very, very different breakdown. And my audience on YouTube is 86.2% male and only 13.7% female. So that's. That's kind of consistent from what I'm seeing on other social media like Facebook. I'm not quite sure why that is, and I'm not particularly happy about it, but I don't really know what else to do about it. Barb, any thoughts on those audience disparities?

I would be hesitant to say anything without research doing research. And that's, that's just how I roll. I've done that my whole career. And I'm. I'm really. As far as far as men being on YouTube, I think you'll find across the board that more men are on YouTube than women. That's been writing all the. All this time.

I would like to know, is it because women are willing to pay to learn and, and they go to uni Udemy to learn and they pay for it. But men, you get it free, so they go to YouTube. Could that be the discrepancies? There is. Women are willing to pay to learn where men don't have the same attitude.

Simple biology. Men are more visual visual than women are anyway.

Except eudemity is visual. You sit and watch that.

He has more men watching the YouTube than he had done than women.

So, yes, because they're the udemity paying for learning. And they can watch it and watch it. I mean, so can you on YouTube. But could that be the difference? Women are willing to pay for it where men aren't?

That I'm not sure. And I just check the udemy data and they give me a breakdown of the countries people are from and the languages they speak, but it does not give me a breakdown by gender. So afraid I don't know about that. Hey, we're closing up. Getting to the top of the hour. There were a couple of news stories that just really jumped out at me that I thought were interesting. There's a united and forgive us, Karima, for being so US Centric. There is a extraordinarily famous sportscaster in the United states called Pat McAfee. And very few men in the United States know less about sports than I do. So I will apologize. I am ignorant about this person. But what jumped out at me was he's now able to criticize and trash his corporate bosses. In the past, host at this sports network who criticized their bosses even mildly were typically benched. They were fined, they were fired. They were put on probation. That's not happening anymore. And the theory is the balance of power has changed. It used to be the studio executives, the guys in the suits again, I guess suits are a good thing. The guys in the suits called the shots and the talent was seen as disposable, interchangeable. Now we live in a world where the talent has their own fan base. And this particular gentleman, Pat McAfee, and I'm not endorsing him, I don't really know what he stands for, but he has a huge following. He just received an $85 million salary, I believe I saw in the story over five years, which is a lot more than what the executives of that company are making. So the theory is he has all the power now. He can criticize these executives if he wants to, and they. If they fire him, they still got to pay $85 million. So they can't afford to do that. To me, that's again, he may be doing all sorts of horror. I don't know anything about him, but I do think it's a good development that the people actually creating have more power and the people pushing paper and executives are now sort of in a secondary role. Henry wrote, wrote in with a quick comment. I know you recently profiled Ali Abdaal. He has a video on. If I wanted to grow an audience on 2024, I would do that. I believe I'VE seen that Ali Abdul is someone I do like. I've favorably reviewed his book a couple of times in a couple of different ways, which. Well, I'll share that with you perhaps at the end of the show. So we'll, we'll check that out. Henry. And Henry, if you want to link in the chat, the URL, feel free to do that. We're happy to do that. And it just occurred to me I missed some of the things coming into private chat. So, Beth, I see you did a lot of comments. I do appreciate that. I'm afraid, afraid I didn't get to see that till now. Couple of other stories that I do think have an impact on all of us as communicators, as creators that really jumped out at me as, as profound. One of them is the largest radio station radio network has filed for bankruptcy. Now why is this significant? Now this Audacity is a company or Odyssey is a company that does own podcast. And initially there was thought that, well, maybe they got too far ahead in podcast. But it turns out all of their losses are coming from CBS radio stations that they bought, they, they, they overpaid, paid for it and now they're going bankrupt. Well, why is that? It's because you and I are seeing it every day, Barb. Everyone else is. People are not listening to radio anymore, traditional radio. They are listening to podcasts, they are listening to YouTube, they're listening to YouTube podcast. Ideally they're listening to this because by the way, this is turned into a podcast. As soon as we're done, I click a link. This becomes a, you know, YouTube podcast which then can be heard on YouTube music. So the podcast world is continuing to grow. The personal creator business is continuing to grow. As Henry just pointed out, you've got a guy like Ali Abdaal who came from nowhere and has got a business now with dozen or so employees. He's making $5 million a year according to his own channel. He's doing really well. He's experiencing massive growth. These old time media companies, even if they try to be hit by grab buying a few podcasters, if they're tied to this legacy of audiences for traditional radio, they're literally going bankrupt. This is just another sign of that which, which I personally find fascinating. And Barb, if you're with us, I would love your analysis of that as well. The other thing that, well, there's two more stories I did want to comment on. One is even companies that were considered the hot new thing 10, 15 years ago, which Bud Buzzfeed was one of them. They were a new startup. They are now. I mean they could go out of business. They are being squeezed massively. They have massive debt from things they bought. And what they're finding is just putting something the stamp of approval. Oh, we're buspeed. Listen to us. Really talented creators, the Ali Abduls of the world don't need the stamp of approval of BuzzFeed. And that individual creators, whether they're, they can write books, whether they write newsletters that they sell, whether they're doing a podcast where they're doing a video channel, simply having an umbrella media company over them to buy and sell the ads and have a bunch of executives with six and seven figure salary is not adding anything. So that's what's interesting to me. It's not just hundred year old companies like cbs, which maybe they're not quite that old, are having problems. It's 15 year old companies that have that same structure of a lot of overhead and talent being at the bottom. They are getting hurt and becoming less and less relevant. The final story that really caught my eye was about Tiger Woods. He, and it's interesting to me for a couple of reasons. He just finished his sponsorship with Nike. Now before you feel Nike's not going to work with him anymore, now before you feel too sorry for him and pass the tin cup for Tiger Woods, Nike has paid him a half a billion dollars in the last 27 years. And when you look at all of his sponsorships, he's easily a billionaire and he's obviously very talented. The reason this jumped out at me is I think more and more podcasters and so called influencers. Everyone likes to think of influencer being like this, this cool new thing. No, it's nothing new at all. It's really what's happened. For as I mentioned earlier today, you could make the case the British monarchy is really just highly paid influencers. But someone like a Tiger woods is an influencer. He might not be doing a daily podcast, but he makes most of his money and certainly in some years virtually a hundred percent. But even a good year when he's winning major tournaments, 90% of his income comes from being an influence or being a spokesperson with whether it's for Buick, whether it's for Nike, whether it's for a particular for Rolex, he's being paid as a spokesperson. Even when he doesn't speak, it's his image. Because certainly as you can see right there, that Nike swoosh mark on his red shirt is something that people have seen for about 27 years, the consistent imagery of that. So when he's on it, when he's on a tournament and winning and all the TV cameras are on him, Nike sort of counts up how many impressions they're getting. The same way someone counts how many impressions are seen when an Ali Abdaal video goes out and is seen by a million people. So it's really an old game and it's just that there are new pathways. I don't have the golf talent of Tiger woods, obviously, but there are people who have different talents. I'm not really a Kim Kardashian fan, but she has a tremendous talent for generating attention and eyeballs. And we live in a world where that's monetizable. And what's, what is exciting to me is how the power has shifted. There used to be a time, certainly when I was a kid, it was the kid whose parents donated a lot of money to the congressman 30 years earlier. They got a license to have the TV station or the radio station in their community. And just by having that license, it became a printing press. Well, those days are gone. I mean, radio stations, you can't even give them away sometimes. But it was because of political power, political connections, that a lot of people were able to amass wealth. Now we see, Certainly not everyone, 97% of influencers supposedly don't make much money at all. But we are seeing hundreds of thousands, millions of people essentially getting their hands on their own radio station, their own TV station, and making a lot of money in a way that really isn't much different than Tiger Woods. He's making his money by directing eyeballs to a product, whether it's a logo, whether it's him driving a Buick in a TV commercial, which who can imagine a billionaire driving. No offense against Buick, but that always seemed like a funny sponsorship deal to me. That did not seem like a car he would drive. But that's what's interesting to me. And I think as I look at how I'm trying to progress my own career and a lot of influencers, the model is really to be like a Tiger woods in the sense that you're going after a handful of companies where you have long term relationships with. And like in his case, sometimes you build your own product. He helped design golf clubs. Sometimes you're just promoting their stuff like a Rolex watch, but you're trying to build a relationship with really maybe more than a handful, but certainly fewer than 30 companies where you can grow together and build long term relationships so that everyone wins to Me, that's the ultimate goal of an influencer. Whether you're Tiger woods, whether you're 82 year old Martha Stewart and her relationships with, with, you know, major stores, whether it's Target or Kmart or Walmart or Skechers and building those relationships with the brands with your own product and your audience. So that's, that's what I see is consistent and growing, you know, in a way that radio networks going out of business and other old media companies losing their power is the change. We've gone a little over today, but I've just had so much fun and I appreciate all of your time. Wanted to give anyone any last thoughts on what they want to share today and then, you know, what I will sign off with is Henry had mentioned the Ali Abdali. I don't want to play it live because then that's too much like stealing his content. I will, since Henry mentioned it, play my video where I talk about Ali Abdul and why I think he's a good communicator. I'll share that with us to end. But before I do that, does anyone else have any final thoughts they'd like to share today?

I would like to just say that I'd like to invite everybody who's watching from other locations to join us in TJ's Facebook community, his student support Facebook community. I think you'll have a link for that on your YouTube channel. We as Udemy students, of course we have links in our, all of our courses for that group. But I think the real conversation ongoing through the week takes place there. And we, we certainly have had a lot of topics come up today that we can unpack in more detail just, just through day to day conversation. And it does get back to the conversation. And so like tj, whether he's going live now for a long period of time or short, it's, he needs our feedback. He's open to it and you can see he's got a pretty tough character. He can take it and he can also dish it out. So I just want to thank everybody for joining us and I'll see you back in group. Have a great weekend, everyone.

Great. Thanks, Barb. Thanks, Beth. Thanks Janice. And thanks Karima. Okay, I'm gonna, I'm gonna close with playing this video about Ali Abdul, who I do think is a fantastic communicator. Henry is with us and was nice enough to say that he had shared the fact that I did this video about Ali Abdul with Ali and his team. So appreciate that and that is a good example And I need to do a better job of it. Barb is always the master of, of communicating effectively and networking. Oh, actually this is not the video I did on him as a speaker. This is the video I did reviewing his book. And this is the book. And I did this for Amazon Influencer and Barb. I think I've now properly listed the fact that my YouTube channel is one of the channels where I'm doing this. And then in the description I have the link to where someone can buy the book, where I am the affiliate and I would get, I don't know, 20 cents or something like that. That's not really why I did it. I wanted to connect with Ali and his, his audience. But I'm going to play this. It's only two minutes long and zero. It's not fancy at all. It was just done while I was on vacation with a simple cell phone. So I'll, I'll close with that and then we'll be done and I'll see you next time. Thanks. Let me make sure I'm sharing it properly. The screen audio tab. Sharing audio. And we are good. I'll put it full screen and full screen and you can see. All right, this is tj. I'm signing off live and we'll be done when this, this recorded video finishes. And I'm not. Oh, I don't have the audio on. Let's go back.

I just got my digital version of Ali Abdel Feel Good Productivity and I finished it in one day. I ordered the hardback book too, but it hasn't gotten here yet. Now, full disclosure, I'm not a friend or business associate of Ali Abduls. We've never met, but I am a fan of his and his YouTube channel. In recent years, he has taken the productivity world by storm with his provocative YouTube videos. This book distills a lot of his most important principles in a text format. If you like Ali Abdul et al, his videos, his podcast, you're gonna love this book. It's up there in the ranks of four hour work week anatomic habits because it goes against conventional wisdom. Now, every productivity book talks about smart goals. You got to have smart goals. He actually gives the origin of smart goals here and debunks it. He comes up with his own version, his own set of acronyms. They're actually more insightful. He's a big believer that you've got to figure out, find things that make you happy that put you in the proper frame of mind. So much of the productivity world is about set your alarm at 4am Be at your desk at 5am Grind an extra hour to make another 30 sales calls.

When everyone else is off at the bar.

Don't go out and have any fun on the weekends. Just grind, grind, grind. The problem with that advice is that for most people I know, for me it's so depressing. All it does is make you feel lazy. Ali Abdaal is on our side now. He is someone very relatable. On the one hand, yes, he's really, really smart and makes tons and tons of money. But he's also someone who has he talked about how he procrastinated for seven years before he started his YouTube channel. He talks about times when he lacks confidence and gives you specific tips in this book about how to get over those hurdles. If you're looking for ways of being more productive, especially if you've read a lot of other books, watched a lot of other YouTubers, I think you're going to get a lot out of this book. I know I did.

All right, thanks everybody. Let me show you how we do stuff around here.

Actually, my department uses Monday.

Com, so.