Episode 68 - Boosting Home Builder Brands: Alyssa Abbott on SEO, Pinterest, and Creative Blogging
Episode #68 | Alyssa Abbott | Boosting Home Builder Brands
In this episode, we’re chatting with Alyssa Abbott, owner of Olive & Vine Socials about the magic of blogging, Pinterest, and SEO strategy. With a detailed look into how Alyssa helps businesses amplify their online presence through strategic blogging, Pinterest strategy, and keyword research. They also explore the irreplaceable human touch that AI just can’t replace in writing to capture brand voice. Mark shares his success with Pinterest driving impressive traffic to his website, proving the platform's value over traditional marketing strategies.
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About Alyssa Abbott
Alyssa has always had an eye for detail and a love for creativity. Her interest in blogging, Pinterest, and SEO all started when she started blogging for her husband’s wedding photo and film business, Abbott Photo and Film. She dug into the world of SEO and never looked back. Since then, she’s been working with high-end home builders and designers to help them grow their online presence through the powerhouse of Pinterest and blogging.
When she’s not running Olive and Vine, she’s spending time with her husband and two little ones and is welcoming another baby girl in July! She loves going on family adventures and spending time in her backyard garden.
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Mark D. Williams
Today on the curious builder podcast, we have Alisa Abbott from all invited socials. And it was a treat to have an interview with Alyssa. I've been working with her for a couple of years, and walking her through her business strategy, and just really how important it is to celebrate businesses, but really tell stories. And so Alyssa really focuses on Pinterest, and blog strategy along with your SEO strategy. So if you're looking to take your business to another level in terms of marketing, and really expand your reach, or you just want to know more about, you know, the vague proposition of what is Pinterest, and what is a blog, you know, this episode is for you. If you already know what it is, I still think you should listen because there's a lot of in depth information here. So without further ado, let's talk with Alisa Abbott from all of inviting socials. Welcome to the curious builder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams, your host. Today I'm joined by a very special guest, Melissa Abbott with all of invited socials. Welcome, Melissa. Hi, thank
Unknown Speaker 0:53
you for having me. I'm so excited.
Mark D. Williams<br> 0:55
This is so fun to have you on. So for the audience. Listen, I have been working together for about two years. And I was looking for a virtual assistant. And you were working with Chelsea Lopez, one of my video ographers. And she said, Well, you know, Alyssa does amazing work for me. Why don't you guys start working. And so we met and I think to best explain you For to me is like, you can complete my sentences without me even saying it. Sometimes I speak very erratically with not a lot of complete thought. And you've been an amazing part of our team. And not only launching the careers builder podcast, but sort of part there for the whole rebranding of Mark Williams custom homes. And you've been a huge help to me professionally. And I've enjoyed you immensely, personally. So that's my intro to Alyssa Abbott.
Speaker 1 1:44
Hello, I am. Yes. I'm grateful that Chelsea connected us and it has been so much fun working with you and growing with you. I started with you. Yeah, right. When you rebranded and started the podcast and Man that feels like a long time ago and no time at all. So
Mark D. Williams<br> 2:04
in that phase, it's been pretty wild, because I think we rebranded in August or September, and I can't remember when did you first and when do we first start? Were you there for the original iterations of all the branding or I think Kim Sen, who we had early on, who helped me with all my rebranding and has kind of taken a step back from the branding. You kind of stepped in as a transition period when she sort of left is that right? Yeah,
Speaker 1 2:28
yeah. So I've we started, gosh, December 2020 22, I think was that when? Yeah, and so? Yeah, all of it. I mean, I came in, I never really knew the Old branding as as well. But pretty much we were just implementing everything. And I came in just as a VA and you also had me so I was just kind of doing anything and everything as you
Mark D. Williams<br> 2:52
were my swiss army knife. You were MacGyver 3.0. You did everything did everything. Yes.
Speaker 1 2:58
And then you also I think you had just gone to the coalition, because that's why Chelsea had thought about connecting us. And we did you were interested in Pinterest, probably from learning about that the coalition and some of the benefits there. So I think that was kind of the initial start was Pinterest and some VA work. Yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 3:20
that's funny, because it was about it was actually two years ago, in May of so of May of 22, where I went to the first contractor Coalition, which is funny, because we're recording this six days before it's coming to Minneapolis. So by the time this airs, the contractor coalition will have already happened in Minneapolis. But that being said, you know, I've talked about a lot just how much you know, our personal brand has grown and how much I've grown in networking with people across the country, as well. But Morgan Molitor had basically done an entire presentation on Pinterest, and SEO and blogging that went completely over my head. I was so locked in on, you know, changing my building practices. I'm like, Well, man, I don't need SEO. I mean, everyone knows a little bit what SEO is, but it always ends up being like, oh, a bigger company is going to do that. And, you know, blogging and social and all this stuff like oh, yeah, that's, that's not for me. That's what my wife does. That's what she loves. To me. That's not what I do. I'm a builder. And oh, was I wrong? And, Matt, have you opened my eyes to that? So we'll kind of get into some of that today. But before we kind of dive down the road of what you've done and what you do, let's go a little bit into your history, just as an introduction to the audience. I mean, you're out in California. And tell us a little bit about how you even got into, you know, kind of the social game and why, you know, Pinterest and blogging has been such a, you know, a fulfilling and central part of your business now. Yeah,
Speaker 1 4:37
so, my, my husband and I actually are, I mean, mostly his kind of full time gig is we're wedding photographers and videographers and so we started that in 2018 went full time, and the best year ever to go full time for weddings. 2020 I literally quit my core for a job, I was in college admissions in March of 2020. And then the next week, everything shut down. But everything worked out, everything is fine. It was interesting, you know, obviously time to be alive. But um, we we grew and grew. And part of like, in 2020, I had been managing the back end of our business and found, you know, everyone in the wedding industry, you know, has a blog, and they share the wedding's that they do. And so I was like, well, I'll blog like, I love writing, I can do that. And so I took about a course that had Pinterest and blogging, it was like a bundle course. And so I was like, Okay, this sounds great. And I dove in, and I just was like, I love this so much. And there's so much to this. And yeah, just kind of fell in love with it. So I did that for us for a while, then I kind of realized like, I could do this for other people. And also kind of just running the backend of our business. That's kind of where I got in, like with the VA stuff. And so I put it out there on like a business Facebook group that I did VA work. And I think that's where Chelsea found me and trusted me. And so I dove in with that. And and it just kind of snowballed from there. So I did you know, the VA stuff for a while and then realized, like, I really love the Pinterest and the blogging and the SEO strategy. And I feel like that's something that I could really grow a business in, and maybe scale someday. And so we Yeah, I mean, that's kind of that's kind of the origin story it came from, from being a photographer, what
Mark D. Williams<br> 6:44
was it specifically that you loved about the blog, because your fun, you know, one of your greatest assets, I mean, you're phenomenal writer. And, you know, one of the things that might be a very entry to a lot of people that, you know, maybe read blogs or see blogs, as you see, you know, the photo, it's like, you need to be part graphic designer, because it has to be appealing and look attractive, or who wants to read it, you know, especially digitally. And then you also have to be a very thoughtful writer, but it kind of needs to get the point across quite quickly. And, but also have meaningful information. So it's a total different sub skill of, you know, writing, and how did you know that you had a talent for that? Because your talent is incredible in that department?
Speaker 1 7:23
Thank you. Um, I, honestly, I think some of it is, I'm very detail oriented, I love the strategy of it all. So I mean, sure, you could write a blog, anybody, you know, can kind of put something together. But there's so much more to it, that I'm probably I've even even told you what I'm doing on the back end. With the keyword research, I think just kind of putting those puzzle pieces together and that type A like detail oriented pneus mixed with the creativity of being able to put together something that's interesting to read. And that is, you know, gonna help bring people to your website and get to know you better. It's all just kind of it just kind of fills my cup. Yeah, I think the the keyword research was something I didn't know about. I didn't know about SEO and keywords. And that's pretty, like, pretty basic for for when you're getting into blogging. And for a time I actually we even thought we might like do a travel blog. And so like I had started like a little travel blog. And as I was kind of learning and trying out some different things, because I mean, bloggers, you can make all this money as a blogger. And, you know, it's more more than that. But that's kind of where I found like, you know, I wanted to work with people who had businesses who had beautiful work, I think initially, I was planning on working with wedding photographers, and then after working with you and with Chelsea and seeing you know, the work and and honestly seeing kind of a gap and a need in the market with people who had this amazing content who needed to put it out there because that's how your clients are going to find you and connect with you. It just kind of a puzzle. That's actually
Mark D. Williams<br> 9:13
one of my follow up questions. And I guess we'll go there now is why home building I think you just answered so as I one of your first home building clients into that market, because you you just said you were looking at you know, it seemed like it would be a natural fit to do wedding photography, blogging and things like that. What was it about the home building? Because I agree with your second part of that, which is there's a huge need here. But let's set that aside. What was it about homebuilding? That was attractive or what? Why that because I obviously Pinterest and blogging strategies applied to every industry and all industries. So what was it that was so fulfilling specifically about, you know, the construction and home building?
Speaker 1 9:49
I mean, some of it was, I mean, new to me, I don't I I'm still learning so much about all the different techniques and things like that. But I mean, gosh, I I mean, it's how fun is it to get to like, look at all of these beautiful pictures and working with Chelsea, you know, I felt like I got to know a lot of people, especially in the Minnesota market where you guys are. I feel like I'm kind of connected with a circle of people there. But you were my first homebuilder client. I know. Yes, thank you. I appreciate you trusting me. And as I kind of wormed my way into into the blogging, and all of that, too, you know, yeah, I don't know exactly what I just saw it and was like, you know, I think that this might be a better place for me than wedding photographers. On some level, I mean, there's, I feel like, it might be a little bit easier for a home builder or an interior designer to invest in my services, they're maybe a little more stable than, you know, a young photographer. And then the photography market is also just really saturated with people doing Pinterest and blogging. And so, yeah, I just, I saw that, um, you know, started talking to people and hearing a lot where they're like, oh, yeah, you know, I need to blog, but it's on my to do list, I can do it. I'm just gonna wait. And
Mark D. Williams<br> 11:14
I would suspect there's a couple of reasons why. One is, when you're talking about a home, you know, everyone loves a good story. I mean, you look at movies and books, and you know, the way history used to be passed down, you know, going away old school here is just by stories by telling, right. And so people are really drawn into a story. And I think what a blog does very well is it takes some pictures. But essentially, it's a weaving a story of something that's happening. It also brings you to the point. So if you are looking at doing a kitchen remodel, or you're looking at you know, I've had you dry, you know, we did one recently about humidity and condensation. specific reason, but it's like, it's very informative. And it's helpful in our people that, you know, you just go into Google, and Google eats this stuff up, like, oh, man, you know, a kid in a hot summer ice cream stand like this thing is going fast, because Google just wants I mean, you talk about content. We'll talk about that in SEO, maybe in a little bit. But I can see why homebuilding in each, because each build is different. The variety is so much, and I'm not saying like a wedding went have, you know, the couples are a variety. But you know, there's so much interest in homebuilding, I think I'd read somewhere that, you know, as an a percentage of GDP, you know, outside, like the federal government spending, that home purchases, whether it's DIY, or construction, in general, is the largest portion of GDP in the country. And so we have a very strong culture around, you know, I'll do the air quotes of the American dream. And, you know, it's a very polarizing topic, because, you know, people even it's in the DNA, right, people, you know, left Europe, you know, immigrated to the United States, you know, they're obviously fleeing persecution, and they want opportunity and owning your own home and owning your own land, in a lot of places was not a normal thing. And so it's funny how that even multiple generations later, it is such a strong backbone, to our DNA. And thought process, but anyway, that went on a tangent there. Well, I think that's why people wrongly to it, so
Speaker 1 13:14
yeah, and I mean, the amount of content that you can create with one, even when project it doesn't even have to be a whole, I mean, a whole home, there's probably over 100 different blog topics and things that you could talk about, but even just, you know, like kitchen remodel, from the, like, the flooring, or the paint choices, or the tile, or the undercabinet outlets, like there's all kinds of different things that you can highlight and share about and, and telling those stories is, is awesome. And it's just like a way that I can get your, your viewers, your audience to connect with you and nurture them. And then that, I mean, that's like one part of it. But then on the other hand, it's all the SEO, it's just, you know, every single blog has a keyword that is, you know, we're focusing on and that's a search term that you know, I can nerd out about that all day. You know, it's it's, it's those terms are, every blog is an opportunity for someone to find you on Google.
Mark D. Williams<br> 14:17
I love I love what you I love what you shared on your website. It says Your work is already Pinterest worthy. We'll make sure everybody knows it. I love that. That's a great line. And, and you're right, I mean, there's so many builders, you know, electricians, roofers, plumbers. I mean, the construction field at large, does a very poor job at scale of sharing what we know and you look at you know, Instagramers and those that you know, sometimes I remember I can't remember her it's been a while since I've looked at her feet I think she was called the tile chick. And she was a lady that just that she installed tile and she had crazy amount of followers and like, I guess where I'm going with this is like, you have people that do something very specifically some people are marketers. I'll call myself a marketer like as far as actually knowing how to Build something myself, not trusting people, my skill set would be very low. And then you have and then so people follow me for different reasons. And then and then you have certain people that, you know, they can build something, you know, and they know all the science behind it, and they're gravitate, and then people that are following them, I just love that social media, there's a place for everybody, depending on what your interest is, you might be interested in how business runs, you might be interested in how a business thinks you might be interested how to do something, you know, now, you know how often if I asked you to do something, you're like, good question. Let me google it. And so essentially, these blogs are the answer to those questions in a much more thought out and detailed way. And you know, you've done a phenomenal job for me specifically, in trying to help, you know, we build a beautiful home, we've aligned ourselves with tremendous talents around us. But now you're just helping us, you know, kind of get recognized for what we do. And we have a lot of I think a lot of people put thought into their work without being thoughtful about explaining it. I mean, how often do you did someone say like, what do you do, and you stay pretty high level, but I feel like, well, written blog goes really deep and is very specific. And it's probably very narrow and focus, because it's answering a specific question. I mean, do you think that's, that's a helpful strategy, when you're writing a blog is to be the more specific, the better or not?
Speaker 1 16:16
Yeah, I mean, I think there's, it just kind of depends. I think there's so many opportunities to get really creative with with the content that you're going to put out. I mean, there's, there's a lot of home building blogs. And so something I've been trying to do lately, has been finding different angles, and, and certainly going deeper, you know, every single step deeper that we go, we can be more specific, still using kind of searchable terms, but but providing just really valuable information. And that's what Google wants. I mean, we can write fluffy blogs all day long. And those are not going to do as well as something that's more specific, I think. Because that's what people people want quality content. And that's, you know, what's going to do well on Pinterest, as well as, as just me, well,
Mark D. Williams<br> 17:03
let's talk a little bit about Pinterest. And a lot of this is, you know, you have really expanded my mind. So I'd like to go back to when my mind was not as expanded. Where, you know, I thought Pinterest is where a lot of our clients, you know, Pinterest in house is where a lot of our clients when we met him for the first time would have a lot of pictures of their homes saved. And, you know, I look at my wife, you know, in bed, oftentimes, and she would be you know, she'd have a bunch of boards of different things that she's interested in. And I'm not, you know, this isn't meant to be a sexist statement. But it's only been my own personal observations about myself. Like, I am not somebody that goes on Pinterest and saves a bunch of things my wife is and the clients that I've worked with a lot of it's mostly women that I see anyway, on Pinterest, I think the stats back that up when we you know, when you pull up Pinterest report, you can see, you know, gender demographics, as well as you know, where they are in the country, you know, downloading stuff or pinning it. And I didn't realize just what a powerful search engine Pinterest was. I just I had no idea. Can you speak a little bit of just how big of a search engine? Pinterest actually is? And why as a builder, even if you're not using it, why it should be important to you and even, you know, not even Biddle builder, but frankly, any business that's selling or doing any service, you should be active on Pinterest, can you speak a little bit about the benefits of Pinterest? Yeah,
Speaker 1 18:19
I mean, gosh, Pinterest, I mean, I think they have it's about half a billion users, active active users, and they're growing like crazy. And I think the best thing that Pinterest does is is traffic to your website. I mean, certainly that is like they are very good at that. Different than Instagram, you know, it's not really a social media platform, it kind of gets lumped in with that but it is purely going to drive traffic and then from there gives you the opportunity to nurture those people to funnel them into whatever you want. So you know, we can take that that traffic to your website and we can put him you know, funnel people to an email list if that's where you want them. We can you know, obviously share you know Guat quality content and have them become overly a follower, someone who relates to you and is excited about the work that you're doing. In your case, you know, you were building a podcast and so you're interested in and just some solid traffic to your website. So you could use that. So you could show yourself as an industry leader. I have clients who have you know, digital products where we're you know, working on selling a digital product and just getting kind of passive income from from those things. I mean, what you can do with the traffic is exciting and astounding, and it goes hand in hand obviously with the blogging but if you have good quality content and you have a solid funnel,
Mark D. Williams<br> 19:55
that is what I think so much. You can almost work this back Words, right. So you know, you have a everyone at this point in their career should have a solid website that you're proud of that's, that represents your professional work. And that gets you in contact. And that's like your landing page. And I've heard before to like, you know, own a lot of things socially, but you own your website, and you can own your mailing your mailing list, your email list, which we'll talk about a little bit later. And that's why you're trying to get people to your website. So if you spend all this money on Pinterest, or blogging, but have a lousy website, you've just spent a lot of time and money bringing people to a place that now reflects poorly on your brand. So don't you think you should almost think about this, in reverse order, you should have, you know, a very solid website that you're proud of. And that represents your brand very effectively. And then sort of the funnels that lead you there. Now, you're just trying to increase traffic, whether it's Google or Pinterest, or some other means, is that accurate?
Speaker 1 20:49
Yeah, no, definitely. And I think I'll have clients where they're, you know, websites, okay. And then they're, you know, do the rebrand. And, you know, we start kind of generating the blog content for them. And then, you know, all from there, once, once they go live, then we can just have everything up and running. So, but certainly, yeah, you want your website to really reflect who you are, and be something that is going to
Mark D. Williams<br> 21:16
dry, I think, you know, to relate to home builders out there that are listening, I think it's like if you had a Parade of Homes, like that's your website, like if your house is on the parade, but then when people come in, you want people to come through your house, and you spent a bunch of a bunch of money on ads, and whatever. So you have 1000 people lined up in the street to come see your house, but all your windows are dirty, or nobody's cleaned the house or there hasn't been painted, I think that's a good analogy of like, if you have a website that doesn't reflect you use, you just did you just wasted a ton of money getting because now not only have all those people come now, they're kind of annoyed that they spent time getting there. And so, you know, I do think you really need to spend a lot of time thinking about your website and keeping it update. I think a lot of times people, especially I've seen, you know, not the higher end builders because that they are spending a lot of time or they should I shouldn't say all of them. It's a blanket statement. But there's a lot of people that you know, they do their website, and then they don't touch it for 10 years till it needs to be redone. And well, man, that work gets so dated. And if you're not staying current, not only is it reflecting poorly on you, but you're missing a huge opportunity for Google to help rank you higher and higher. And that is what I found, again, going back to my own stereotype about myself, I mean, I think surrounding yourself, and having a team of people that don't think like you, you know, so you don't fall into that groupthink is paramount to making your business more well rounded and more approachable. And I guess I'll go down this rabbit hole a little bit like, you know, I would say, you know, women or the you know, the the missus is that we build for, I would say like, they make 80 to 90% of the decisions and not that the husband doesn't know that they're not a good couple making decisions together. But really, most home decisions are made by, you know, the woman, you know, I used to famously joke about my wife, who you've you know, you know, and as you know, I told her one time that, you know, people pay me for my opinion, when we were remodeling our house, and she joked and said, You know, I'm not paying you. The point is even a builder doesn't get, say in his own house, it's my wife. And or I'm going with this is that, as a man, especially myself, I it was a huge misstep on my part not to realize that I knew that my clients are mostly women in terms of who I have to relate to and talk to, but I was missing out on how to market to them because I'm thinking like a man. And I'm thinking like me, and I think something that you really helped me with and other people on my team, too. Coincidentally, I think there's like five people on my team that are all women. So just hire more women, you can pretty much solve this problem. It is my advice to builders out there listening or any business owner is really just this well rounded strategy of like, you know, Pinterest and all these other things to blogs, because guess who reads them? It's it's your client. It's who you're building your homes for. It's how it gets educated. And, you know, we can speak lino, we can even talk a little bit later about LinkedIn, and some other places that, you know, maybe predominantly are more male dominated, if you if you wish. But for, for what blogging has done for me, I was blown away that you know, the analytics, and maybe you can share some of our analytics going into this, like, you know, what kind of website boost did we get? And what kind of traffic are we getting? Because I think when I first started with you, you said you need to give this like three to six months to really take ground and then I think we did it for like, what a year, six months. And I think financially I'm like, you know, less, I have to pull back a little bit. So we pulled back and we saw a significant fall off in website traffic because of it. And then you know, things change economically. And I said, You know what, we need to actually reprioritize that. So I've seen having nothing that I've seen kind of like a six month approach that I've seen it pull it back and now we're back kind of on the onboarding again and trying to get her Pinterest analytics up. Again, all the concept of getting everything to the website. So maybe speak a little bit, you know to that if you can
Speaker 1 24:59
Yeah, I yours, yours was so much fun. Obviously, like yours is my first print Pinterest account outside of our own that I got to just play with and learn from. And so we started January I like I take screenshots all the time of all my analytics because I love tracking all that stuff. And so January 2, you were at 6000 impressions, you had 53 saves Pinterest saved, so just people pinning, and 52 Outbound clicks to your website, and that's in a month so that that's pretty consistent when I
Mark D. Williams<br> 25:37
was when I first started two years ago. Yeah.
Speaker 1 25:41
January 2, and then by the 24th, we were at 123,000 impressions. So we had 20x 20 times that 1000 saves, and 820 Outbound clicks to your website. Wow. So
Mark D. Williams<br> 25:55
for to recap that one from 52 to 800 hits just organically. Mm
Speaker 1 26:00
hmm. Yep. And so I was looking at your your numbers even yesterday? And yeah, I mean, we're still getting I think, right now, because we're still kind of we're ramping back up. So I think we're about 500 clicks to your website. And it's cool, because they're going to they're going to blogs, they're going to your content, it's not just like front page, and then clicking off. You can kind of see people are clicking through your portfolio pages. They're clicking through blogs. And I think what's really cool too, when someone's interested in you on Pinterest, they're clicking into your your stuff, and they're they're genuinely interested, you know, they're they're searching for that specific thing. Whether it's, you know, something, a type of house or you know, whatever. Yeah, that's, I mean, it's driving traffic to your website, unlike, you know, even like Instagram is trying to keep people on your website. Pinterest is driving people to your website. And that is what I love. Because then then you have the power to funnel and do all of the kind of the other stuff,
Mark D. Williams<br> 27:06
I think, I think Morgan Molitor had mentioned, and I guess I'd have to fact check this. But outside of Google Pinterest was the largest search engine out there. Do you know if that's true or not?
Speaker 1 27:17
I would I mean, that sounds right. I really I don't know any other search engines? Besides like, you know, Bing, or duck, duck, whatever.
Mark D. Williams<br> 27:28
I mean, Google's obviously the elephant the world was was about that. I would say that that sounds right. Yeah, you know, Pinterest, obviously, is feeding into Google as well. So it's kind of a multiplier. You know, that's amazing. So if you're getting, you know, we went from 52, to let's call it 800, you know, hits a month on our website, we recently just announced a development called Honey Hill, and we paid a local magazine. I think it was $3,800 for a one time email event to 30,000 emails, and of that 30,000 emails that led to 1000 hits on our website, which I was happy to do, and I was happy with those results. But now just hearing you say that, you know, our investment with you managing our Pinterest, which is ongoing is far less than that one time event, and yields per month, you know, a similar amount. So that's kind of interesting. You know, I think people and I think there's still a time in place, you know, for a special event. The other thing too, about, you know, paying an outside company to maybe get a hold of their email list is you might be reaching new. So I still think there's a lot of value in that. But I think just from prospective standpoint, if we're getting, let's just round up a little bit 1000 New hits a month on your website through Pinterest, and I don't know what I'm paying you for just that portion. Because you do like 18 Other things for me. But you know, it's a it's a great value. And again, you know, I think companies that are bigger than me, I mean, we're pretty small company, but if you're trying to convert those to leads to sales, you know, you can go into all kinds of other analytics that we necessarily don't go into. But anyway, that's, that's pretty impressive. Then, I guess, speaking of downloads, you know, I always thought a blog was like a written manuscript of like fire, you know, like almost like a periodical or like editorial. I mean, basically croaking from a blog is pretty much anything that you put on your website with some words, and like in very short term. And so one thing that I was really shocked by by having a podcast is every single week on our website, curious builder podcast.com. We are putting crazy amounts of data into there because it's weekly. So 52 events a year is happening. The podcast, right? So we've got photos, we're recapping the guest, we're hyperlinking to you're doing all this work, obviously, you're hyperlinking to all of our guests. On our YouTube channel. It's like the website is still the funnel that leads to everything. But because it's a blog, essentially the way in the form that it's written, and we can you know, it's also evergreen, like that blog stays there forever. And I think I didn't realize tracking it, like, you know, we'll have a podcast episode and let's just say, you know, let's say you have an episode that hits 1002 weeks, you know, I was told once that by the end of the year, whatever you hit will be triple that so that you'll be at 3000. And here's the thing, those numbers just keep going up and up and up, because someone might not stumble onto that episode or that person for a couple of years after the episode was released. Now, I would imagine that probably 70 to 80% of the people do find it in that in the, you know, that are following the show right away. But the idea that it's always out there is super appealing, because to sponsors, you can kind of tell someone like, Hey, if you're sponsoring, you know, the curious builder, podcast or whatever, you're sponsoring, that this content is not only evergreen, but you're you're going to be repping a brand out there indefinitely for years, because I don't think anyone would go back to old episodes and remove, remove sponsors, that would be crazy amount of work and editing in order to Why would you do that. But you know, that's something I probably need to work on for next year, in terms of selling to our sponsors, it's like, hey, you know, you're going to, especially if you're gonna be in business for a while, align yourself with companies that you know, will be there for a long time, and really help them understand that, you know, by aligning with whatever your company proposition is, on a blog of any sort, you don't have to have a podcast any blog will do. It's going to be there forever. And it's going to point to their website and to your website, you know, as long as their company is around. I mean, there's huge. I know, there's huge potential there. Yeah,
Speaker 1 31:31
I love that both Pinterest, the investment that my clients make in Pinterest, and in blogging is all of it is evergreen, you know, it's it's not a 24 hour little, you know, thing that you have to keep consistently chasing. I mean, I've seen people with, I mean, I've hopped into Pinterest accounts that people have worked on years ago, that, you know, still have 60,000 impressions a month, they're still driving traffic to their website, and they haven't touched it in years. And then you know, I'm able to come in and optimize it and you know, get started on it. And then of course, it grows dramatically. But the work and the investment that you're putting into those things is it's evergreen, it's going to benefit you for a very, very long time. And I mean, you even had a you had pins that went viral when I started that there was like a it was a house. I remember you saying
Mark D. Williams<br> 32:29
we had halls? Yeah. So that's when you say so we had a house. And I don't I must have I don't know how I got on Pinterest. Oh, I know, I didn't, I don't think I must have had an account. Or I just saw it or something. Anyway, a well known designer pinned it in, I think was North Carolina or South Carolina. And we had like, I remember one time at the time I was I was hiring a different company just to, you know, analyze my old website like this is like six, seven years ago, and are we're normally getting this as a long time ago, we got let's say 500 1000 hits a month, we got like 30 or 40,000 hits one month, just a massive anomaly. And everyone was like, what happened? What did you do? I'm like nothing we didn't have a show on we didn't have anything. Well, that was my first taste of, you know, Pinterest stardom, if you will, is someone point, you know, pinned it, you know, it'd be like if LeBron James posted something all of a sudden, this designer posted this photo of our home and it went wild. And even to this day, it's much less frequent now, maybe only Well, it's only a couple times since Yeah. And it kind of will really light on fire. But early on, I was getting about an email a week or a phone call and they're all from Salta, North Carolina, Raleigh, you know, Tennessee, and it was I always I laugh because it always had these great accents. I'm from the north, right? And so I'd impersonate my southern accent and, you know, someone would call and say, oh, yeah, me and the missus would love that front porch. That's beautiful. I could just have some some sweet tea, and we can I can't buy that plan for you. And you know, it would always lead to a call. And you know, and I was like, you know, you know, you do beautiful work. We'd love to build with you. I'm like, unfortunately, I only build in Minnesota. By the way. I apologize to anyone in the south eastern. My accent is awful. I know. But anyway, my my point is, is that that was real actionable. You know, if I had a worldwide company or a nationwide company or in different markets, like you could you could do something with that I actually did try to monetize it. This was early on, I was still working out how to do some of this, but I tried to sell, you know, I got clearance from my, this particular one was a home designer and a draftsman. So I got a price from them said, hey, if I ever sell this plan, you know, you get this percent I get this percent and so I tried to sell the plan to people. But ultimately, one of the things I found by doing that is, you know, people in different states in particular, they don't always the home price that like, you know, I don't know exactly, but let's say you let's just say a $2 million house in Minnesota, you know, might be $700,000 Texas, I don't know, but like, you know, there are certain places United States where I mean, Minnesota is actually pretty expensive place to build. And so when I would try to, you know, I'm not just going to give somebody the plans, like we spent, you know, a year developing that plan, we designed it like I'm gonna, a lot of times people would ask for it for free. And I'm like, No, I'm not gonna give it to you for free, I will sell it to you. And I don't even remember what I was charging. It was pretty minimal, not once not a single time, did anyone actually pay me for the plan? Whenever it actually came down to it, they weren't willing to pay for what they for what they wanted. And I talked to a number of people. And so I actually got to the point where I actually pre made an email that I could just copy and paste because I was getting so many emails off of that one Pinterest anyway, we've kind of straight off the topic, I guess the point is, is Pinterest is powerful. And you know, and it's it goes viral sort of in a different way. I mean, obviously, Instagram, it goes viral, you know, you get a bunch of hits and a bunch of views on whatever. But Pinterest, you know, leads you to your actually a website. And so, you know, you're not that Instagram and those other things don't, but I actually use it. Well, Pinterest tries to send you to websites, where the other entities try to keep you there. And I think that's a fundamental difference.
Speaker 1 36:08
Yeah, and I I also think, kind of speaking to the viral pneus of Pinterest, it's really doable to to grow. And I feel like on Instagram, you know, you might try to like try to get a viral post or try to do something and my husband will put together reels for our photo business. And we're like, this is the best reel ever. And you know, it doesn't really go anywhere. And you're like, oh, I don't I just feel like a hamster on a wheel. Whereas on Pinterest you can have. I mean, certainly you can have a strategy on Instagram and there's some incredible like people who do that. But with Pinterest I mean, you know, for example, Minnesota homebuilders, if you search on on Pinterest, Minnesota homebuilders, you will you are all over there are 16 1600 people a month search that term. And you know, so I mean, those are the kind of the things that like you, you know, were popping up you have one of the pins with with Bridget, two euros. Sure you go. Yeah, sure. You guys, um, she you know that the one of I think it's in the Deephaven dream? Yes, I love that one. And that one's every month is like one of your one of your, like, most popular pins. And so it's just kind of picking those picking those keywords and being strategic with what who, you know, you want people to find you in Minnesota, because you're not in North Carolina. And so, you know, there are people actively searching even location based type searches in Pinterest, not only just Google,
Mark D. Williams<br> 37:39
and we would have, I mean, we have a different strategy, obviously, for the curious builder, because yeah, we're across the country, anyone can find us there. So it's a different strategy. So you know, if you're out there listening, and you're going to consider Pinterest strategy, you don't have to think about it too far. Just call Alyssa. She'll take care of it. But for those that don't, I mean, you can you can basically micro, it's just another form of marketing. And I like the content that it's evergreen, maybe to just kind of, I like practical examples. And it really, to me, it highlights, you know, your specific skill, which is super helpful. You know, a lot of times, you know, like a lot of business owners were really busy. And we're bouncing around. And so it's hard, the idea is sort of daunting, or at least is to meet to like write something that's well thought out, very well written, conveys your brand gets to a point. And so it's like, oh, man, it's just easier just not to do it. And what I appreciate about you, is you'll send me an email with, you know, we'll discuss, you know, monthly or quarterly, you know, what are the what are the six or seven topics we want, you know, to publish, you know, whether it's a newsletter, or however people like to push stuff out. And, you know, we'll come up with our topics, whatever they are, sometimes they're for sponsors, sometimes for Mark Williams, custom homes, it's something I want to you know, a parade of homes or an event or something like that, or a recap of something that we've done. And then what I love is you'll send me like seven questions that I can just respond to, in my own words, and then you essentially, walk the audience through like what you do, because then what comes out, it makes me look like you know, like, Walt Whitman are some, you know, genius prose writer just because I like look at I'm like, wow, that's way nicer than I could have written it. And it's so well thought out, I'm like, Who is this builder? Like, I would work with this person. And so and I understand that's like a skill that you have it's no different than a painter or trim carpenter, you know, doing excellent work, but walk us through like, let's just wrote something down right now, let's call it let's do a kitchen blog, because a lot of people can relate to that. So if I said, you know, let's, I want to do a kitchen blog, and I want to talk about you know, you know, natural light in the kitchen, and I want to highlight, you know, cabinets, you know, walk me through a little bit your process not I mean, as specific as you can on the spot, but just walk walk the audience through, like, what is your process, because even if someone tries to do it themselves, they'll gain some appreciation for what actually has to go went to that.
Speaker 1 40:00
Sure. So, um, I, yeah, I mean, the questionnaire I do that I deal with all my clients. So if my goal is to make it as hands off and as easy for them as possible, because if you wanted to write a blog, you know, you would do it yourself. So I am I send over, you know, questions. So I'm trying to think through like, what, obviously, I'm picking a keyword, I'm doing some keyword research on the front end to make sure that you know, the the topic is going to be something that is gonna be worth our time. You see an a cabinet. Yeah, I mean, I think what's what's cool about something like that is I like hearing kind of the story behind it or the purpose. You know, I'm not a home builder. I'm definitely like, I love reading those blogs. I love learning. I'm like a DIY er, kind of person myself. So finding that inspiration. And, and yeah, I think when I'm kind of putting together questions, I'll sit there for a minute and really try to think through like, what, what is going to help tell the story? Why, you know, why are we doing this? Gosh, we did. Trying to think like, even like tile backsplash, you know, something like that. You know, what kind of tile, let's talk about some of the different brands, you know, I want to find things that we can possibly link and share. I'm also thinking through like, what are some things not to do, you know, what are some things to avoid? Why are we choosing, you know, different colors or different? Yep, all those kinds of things. And so, yeah, I think,
Mark D. Williams<br> 41:48
I mean, the context is helpful. I like how you think about, you know, what, obviously, what is the messaging? You know, one of the things I think, and especially with you know, chat, GBT and other AI models, you know, we do use that to help shape sometimes, or, or get us through it. But you know, for those out there, that would be like, Oh, you can just, you know, write into AI, like, hey, write me a 300 word blog, and it probably can do that. Walk the audience through why what you have to be careful of that. Because, you know, we've had some experience where that doesn't really work very well. It's helpful tool, but it's not the end result, can you because I think a lot of people would be tempted to be like, Well, why would I hire someone to to do this for me? Can you walk us through the pros and cons of using AI and what some of its limitations might be?
Speaker 1 42:32
Definitely, I mean, AI is, is a great tool, I think it's something there's, there's times where I'm just I can't I don't have, you know, the roadblock. And I'll use that to just kind of start generating ideas and thoughts and try to get something different. But honestly, people who are just writing blogs on AI, Google's really cracking down on some of that. And there's been a lot of just bloggers, even lately, who have seen crazy dips in their in their analytics, because Google is recognizing some of that. And so even when I do kind of we, we have certain blogs where we use for you specifically where we'll use AI a little bit more, I go through and I clean up things that sound like a robot, you know, that's just, it doesn't sound as warm, you can't really get your brand voice just right when you're using a robot. And so certainly, you can push content out. And I don't think it would probably I don't think it would do nearly as good as when you actually have a real life person who can kind of differing differentiate the brand voice and the brand tone and truly understand the purpose and the vision behind whatever we're trying to put out and connect with people. I think that's I mean,
Mark D. Williams<br> 43:48
I think I mean, I can't if I'm wrong, I mean, I think the AI, I mean, it's a language model, right. So it's basically just taking what's out there, reshuffling it, regurgitating it, reordering it, which sometimes can be very helpful. I mean, I use it actually quite a bit, and LinkedIn, all write all my thoughts down, and it gets kind of the spirit of what I want. And then I'll have it often, I'll just hit, you know, rewrite. And so it'll take something already wrote and rewrite it. And I'm like, Oh, I like that. And sometimes it'll get the some of the tenses and some of the nuances wrong. And so we'll have to modify it. But to your point, it's a helpful tool, but not one that can really replace especially I think, I don't know, branding is so important to me, and I'm not an expert, but I just love it. And it's like I really want everything that the client touches and feels and sees and hears, you know, to be on brand to the best of my ability. And anyway, so one of the things again, I appreciate about you specifically and I think this is where having a relationship with somebody you know, not only do you get to see the photos, you know, in the videos from you know, obviously coming from Chelsea or my other photographers, but then you know, as obviously like anybody you get to know people you get to know their business, you understand what I'm trying to do and in some ways, you you become me or you become the brand because of the way you're writing it. If you're writing it from, like, if it was you, and I really appreciate that skill that you're able to do that, I think that's pretty, pretty remarkable.
Speaker 1 45:07
Yeah, no, I think that's something I strive to do with all my clients. And part of my like discovery, onboarding portion of bringing on a new client, I get all of their brands stuff I love when they have a brand guide. And I can really pour through and get an idea for that I go through their Instagram, their past blogs, their website, you know, everything that I possibly can to really kind of put together my own brand voice. And so I have that for each of my clients. So that as I go, and as I grow as I hire, you know, copywriters, and different people to help me manage everything, you know, I will have those things, because that's so important. I mean, if if I'm writing blogs, and it doesn't sound like you, it just it kind of is a weird, it's kind of awkward. And so that is, that's definitely a pillar of what I do when I'm kind of getting all the branding, branding stuff ahead of time.
Mark D. Williams<br> 46:02
Have you ever had a client and it can be me? Have you ever had a client where it's like, you write it and they're like, No. And like, they're basically harming themselves? Because you know what they want? Yeah, the public's not going to want this. Because I'll usually ask you like, hey, and obviously, I've left the door very open for you just be like, No, I think this would be better and be like, Okay, great. But I mean, I, most clients like that, or do some people have a pretty strong opinion, and they're constantly like, trying to change what you're writing? Or most people pretty hands off? Because, you know, they've hired you for a reason? And you're obviously excellent at what you do. What are what are managing some of those relationships? Like,
Speaker 1 46:37
yeah, I have a variety, I don't really have anyone who's like, super, like rewrite this whole thing. You know, most people, we've gotten to the point where, you know, they trust me, you know, I do with, with my clients, like, I'll write the drafts for the month, and then send those over to them so they can see them. And we'll have little tweaks here and there. But usually anything like that would be in the very beginning. And it's just kind of, I tell them, like, hey, you know, this first couple months is my learning period. I'm learning who you are and learning your brand voice. And so, you know, certainly like, please, I want to get that right. Like, that's important to me. And so, yeah, I mean, I've never had never had anybody that was like, really hard on me with that. But I'm glad I mean, I feel like most of my clients, by the time we get to writing blogs, they trust me, and they they know that, you know, I'm on their side, and I'm I'm working for for them and want to be kind of morphed into who they are when I'm when we're writing. So, yeah. What you
Mark D. Williams<br> 47:39
had mentioned earlier, maybe now's a good time to talk about it. But you know, SEO strategy. You know, I think myself included, you know, I think we understand, you know, search engine optimization. And we spoke spoke a little bit about, you know, Pinterest and blogging, but talk to us a little bit about strategy and that fresh content. Why, like, why is fresher content more valuable? Or is it more valuable than, let's say older content? Walk us a little bit of, you know, this SEO strategy, and then a little bit about how blogging and Pinterest kind of form into or fold into, you know, an actual SEO strategy?
Unknown Speaker 48:15
Yeah, I got
Mark D. Williams<br> 48:18
ya big topic. Yeah.
Speaker 1 48:21
To try to like pare it down. I mean, having a solid SEO strategy, obviously, that's, that's huge. And with that, I would say that, I mean, that's part of like, the very first thing that I'm going to do with a client, I'm gonna go in and do and do keyword research and see where they're at. And I've got some pretty cool tools to use. I mean, having your your strategy. I mean, that's, that is. Gosh, can you go save us the question?
Mark D. Williams<br> 48:56
Well, I think your SEO strategy is a little bit like the blueprint of the house, right? I mean, it's, it's the path that you are orchestrating everything around. So maybe, I was just asking, like, how does Pinterest and blogs, you know, how does that support your overall SEO strategy? So let's say you've got your, your website, you've got your social channels, you have your Pinterest, you have your blogging, and you know, we'll focus mostly on Pinterest and blogs, because that's what you do specifically. Why, like, how do they help support an SEO strategy?
Speaker 1 49:28
Got it. So yeah, I mean, I feel like you kind of start with the blogs. So you had viewer had asked about like refreshing content, so fresh content. Google loves that they love seeing content that is popping up over and over again, new stuff that relates and is valuable to what they see you're talking about. So home builder. You know, you had mentioned at the beginning of the podcast that you know, there's some some people who just put their website out They're in there, like I did everything, and I'm good to go. And certainly, you know, you could be found, but people are gonna start creeping up on on the Google and going higher and higher, where you're not really growing, because you're not putting out fresh content. And so there's a couple of kind of like, tips and tricks of the SEO. Game, essentially, you want to have content that's coming out consistently, you want it to be obviously relevant and valuable. And so those are kind of the two things that I'm gauging when we're finding keywords and different things like that, sure, I want to find stuff that is, when when you're choosing keywords, you're you're looking for stuff that has a good amount of searches every month, but also something that is, you know, reasonably competitive. You know, there's kind of a scale that I can I can look at. And see. I think the other thing that also can be valuable, if you have a lot of old blogs is going back and revitalizing those, I had a client that just started and they have like 135 Old blogs, and they're, they're great. There's a lot of things that I think we can go in and do and tweak. And, you know, we'll we'll do that. So we can reuse some of that content, going into kind of its evergreen
Mark D. Williams<br> 51:19
solar question. And let's just say you have 100 blogs, and let's just say you name them one through 100. And let's say number 17 was a was a great one. And you're like, I think we should re issue republish 17, do you go back and modify number 17? Or do you create number 101? It has basically, number 17 just rewritten new pictures, kind of like basically recapping what 17 was, what is what's the right way to go there from an SEO standpoint?
Speaker 1 51:46
I would I would definitely do a blog for it a new one, just just to kind of revitalize. But then I also would go back through it and just kind of see like, what did we do? What were the keywords? What were you know, what did we do right so that we can move? You know, we can replicate that. And I do that on Pinterest a lot too. I'll look back at the analytics and see what pins were doing so good. And for homebuilders, a lot of my home builders, their their pins have just images of their homes. I wonder then, it's
Mark D. Williams<br> 52:18
so funny you say that. I mean, I remember one of our when we first actually and I haven't done it in a while in a while because I just know you're doing it. So I don't need to look micromanage it, obviously. But I remember we had like just some some plain mudrooms like nothing fancy, like nothing that great. And, you know, sometimes I think as homebuilders, you know, and I think our website is for this, you know, we want to show our best work a beautiful work we want. That's what we want to do more of, but you go on Pinterest, and like I remember seeing a mudroom that I did like 2009. That was nothing fancy. But think about this. You just mentioned there's a half of Bill, you say there's a half a billion alien. So there's a half, I mean, a half a billion people can't afford the homes that I build. I mean, I can't afford the homes that I build. And so the point of it is is like that mudroom is way more approachable to a half a billion people than some ridiculous over the top home. And I'm not saying don't show the most ridiculous home or over the top because it's cool. But keep in mind that even some basic photos, things that I think this is where sometimes you need a well rounded team because, you know, just because we all have really great mushrooms or just basic mushrooms doesn't mean that someone isn't doing a little DIY project, you know, in Wisconsin on their cabin, or, you know, they're in Iowa and they want to do a new front porch, and you just don't know where someone is going to search for something. So I think that's where the quantity is really helpful. If you're putting a lot of pins out there that you know, it could be just a bathroom sink. Well, it could be the bathroom sink to, you know, Taylor Swift's you know a master bedroom, or it could be a bathroom sink and a bar. And I mean, there's a huge range there of sinks, and yet, someone might like it. And so anyway, I guess my point is, is you never know what somebody's going to like. So don't be afraid to post a lot on Pinterest, I feel like you can be a little less brand sensitive. I don't think you put out junk out there. But you know, I wouldn't probably put a powder unless it was a sweet powder room. I mean, I would probably not just put a regular bathroom vanity on my website because I you know, I'm going to try to eliminate some of the fluffy photos or not fluff just, I don't want 100 photos per my gallery. I want to have like seven to 10 and I think sometimes like architects do too few like architects will do like the shot of the front and like one kitchen or like and everyone's like, Well what about the other 12 photos and I get that they do it for a reason like not be able to reach out to us if you want to see the rest where you know, everyone has a different comfort zone and how much they want to share. But I think Pinterest is a great place to honestly share as much as you can and have time for are willing to pay for it because how can it really hurt you can only help you.
Speaker 1 54:46
Yeah, and that's something like, you know, strategy wise. We we had kind of slowed down and ramping back up. I'm definitely evaluating where we're at and I'm shifting strategy And I'm always doing that with my clients because, you know, algorithms change, things change. And so you know, what's working here might not work there. But then it could go viral, you know, in a year and a half. So it's just, I think, with Pinterest, what I love is, I can test things out, I can try things. My clients, trust me, we're good, we're seeing growth either way. And then it's like finding that that sweet spot, and just really, I
Mark D. Williams<br> 55:28
just thought of something funny off the blue. So I had interviewed my dad over Christmas, maybe 1520 episodes ago, and he was building in the 70s, and 80s. And now my mom ended up being an interior designer for him. But before they met, he used to, you know, his homes were much, much more modest than what I build now. But he would just call like the paint store and say, What's your most, you know, what's your best selling paint? And then he would call the carpet company and like, Hey, what's your, your, your best selling carpet, and he would just order that, and he would just go, it's not the worst thing in the world. I mean, there's certainly a lot better things. But he was basically just letting the people decide what was in his home. And where I'm going with this is like, you know, I haven't done a spec home in a long time. And I'm considering about doing one again, here for honey hill or development up in Orono. And my thought process behind it is, it'd be interesting to go into Pinterest, specifically for let's say, the homes that we do, and and prioritize like, what are the favorite styles? What are the favorite homes, the favorite bathrooms, the favorite colors? Like how you could use some of that data to sort of infer what your local market? Or, you know, I think you have to be a little careful there. Because if I'm building a house that someone in Florida wants in Minnesota, maybe the some maybe the person in Minnesota doesn't want that house. So I think you'd have to be a little thoughtful. I don't know how you would pare down the information, but you get the concept. Do you think you could use Pinterest to identify what your client actually wants you to build?
Speaker 1 56:51
Yeah, I mean, that's a really interesting idea. I feel like you could you could look at your own pins. I mean, you've got years worth of content out there now. So you could see the analytics on different, you know, different styles. You also could, I mean, could use keywords and see what people are searching for what people are looking for. There's a lot of resources out there for that too. And specifically in a specific area. So whether it's, you know, Minnesota as a whole or Minneapolis, and you could get as detailed as you want. But I think, do you think
Mark D. Williams<br> 57:22
maybe this is a social? Instagram? What about this? What if you, you know, because everyone loves this or that? And I'm thinking of just Oh, yeah, so what if we did, like, you know, would this work better on social media? Or do you think would work better on Pinterest, and what I'm thinking of is, like, you know, holding on my hands like this, and that so, you know, two story or one story, this or that, so then the people vote, and then you show like a kitchen of painted kitchen, kind of a mixed kitchen or a stained kitchen. So that's like this, that or another you have to pick three on that one. And like, what if you did a series of like, 12 this or that? Oh, it's and then it kind of announced to people like we're for the next 12 days, we are going to put this or that out there. And whatever people vote, that is the home that we will design and build. What do you think? What do you think like
Speaker 1 58:09
that's, I could see that on Instagram, for sure. I feel like you could just because it's a little more instant Pinterest. I mean, Pinterest is gonna take time before those pins who really kind of pull but that is a fun idea. I like that you're gonna write you
Mark D. Williams<br> 58:23
could do like, I will I actually just wrote it down and run it by Melissa. It'd be like, you could even do like this or that with like, architects this or that with like interior designers. And like, basically, you'd be like, The people decided, you know, who to pick. And what were you know, either the House would, you know, be a fan favorite, or the House would look like, you know, no cohesive design. It just looked like a rainbow house. But anyway, well as we come in for the landing here. What tell us a little bit about yourself. Personally, I know you're expecting number two here shortly. So that's pretty exciting this summer.
Speaker 1 58:58
Number three, number three. I'm sorry. I know. Yeah. Yeah. So I have I have two little ones, too. And while they're almost three, she's almost three and my son is almost four. And baby do in July. So we're, it's gonna be madness. But I'm thankful when
Mark D. Williams<br> 59:18
you switch from man defense to zone defense. I'll tell you what, as a dad of three, it's definitely I know that the third one is a game changer.
Speaker 1 59:28
I know I definitely have been asking people who had three kids like what, what do I expect? Not that there's anything that you could possibly Oh,
Mark D. Williams<br> 59:37
that's that's the best. I mean, that's the best thing ever. How, what else? I mean, obviously, that's probably the biggest news and that'll kind of reshuffle shuffled the deck or anything else that you were kind of excited for and 24 or beyond professionally. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1 59:52
I mean, my I think just with all of in mind, my business has been growing and I'm so excited and thankful. I've been taking calls and doing a lot of onboarding and things like that. So it's it's weird, obviously being being pregnant and trying to, like, manage and take things on. I have, I have a small team of people that I have set up to kind of help me during the time that I'm going to be off. So that is good. And yeah, yeah, I mean, I have goals and different dreams of of growing all of environ. And I'm going to be continuing to push for that. So I
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:00:33
love what I one of the things I loved. It was like my first hire John, as a and we started working together your virtual assistant. And then now my virtual assistant has a virtual assistant. I just think that's amazing. I laughed so hard when you're, I think I asked you to do something like six months ago, and you're like, I'll have my VA take care of that. Like, that's awesome. My VA
Speaker 1 1:00:54
it was, it was hard to do, because I still in my head. I mean, I feel like I'm kind of stepped out of it now. But my husband was like, you can't hire somebody, like, you can't do all this. And so, yeah, I it is funny.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:01:09
I mean, every I think every business owner can relate to that, you know, we all I think all struggle with it, you can do arms of, you know, I'm going to do it or we have a hard time letting go. Or, you know, it's in some ways, it's almost easier when you can't do something because then you have to hire it. And I think, you know, writing a blog, I mean, all the stuff that you do for me, I do not have the skill set for and so it's not I'm not even tempted to try. In some ways, it's much, much easier to hire that in. I think when you can do something, I think that's where it gets a little bit more difficult. You're like, Oh, I could just do this right now. Right? I think that's a very common owners mentality. But ya
Speaker 1 1:01:45
know, I definitely in my business have seen like, there's been times where my my my husband, he's, he's kind of a jack of all trades. He he does web design and graphic design. And so I mean, even at one point thought about having him do my own website. And then I was like, you know, I'm going to invest in someone who knows what they're doing. I were just too close to this. So hire out for someone. And yeah, no, I definitely agree with that. Steven,
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:02:11
what are for those that are listening that are interested in working with you? What's that? What are the best places to go? Yeah,
Speaker 1 1:02:18
I you can find me at all of them find socials.com You can find me at all have in mind socials on Instagram. We'll have all of that linked, I'm sure below.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:02:30
But I'm sure we will. I wonder who will do we sure Well, I
Speaker 1 1:02:33
know. I will make sure of it. But yeah, I'm I'm accessible even you know, Instagram, DMS or email. But I love talking with business owners, I love hearing your stories and your goals. And I truly believe that, you know, Pinterest and blogging are is a tool that really can help take you to that next level and grow in a way that man, it's just it's so worth the investment and the time that goes into it, because it's going to forever help your business. It's like a foundational, one
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:03:08
thing I just thought of here to end on an idea as well, that just came to me is you know, we with a curious builder. You know, part of our sponsorship platform is, you know, for sponsors, we offer them a certain number of blogs about their business, because they're obviously supporting the podcast and we want to support them. I never thought about this before. I had heard a builder one time that he he was you know, he was trying to get to work with an architect. So he would he would pay for an ad for the architect in a magazine which I thought was very clever way of ingratiating himself to that architect, right? He's he's trying to get the architect business and in return, obviously hoping that the architect will be like, well, thank you, here's, you know, here's a client, I'm wondering if it would become a neat gift for people that want to celebrate people in their company or celebrate other businesses, or celebrate a trade partner, you know, not everyone's gonna have a podcast, but let's just say you're a builder, you know, your ABC builder, and you are really impressed with your cabinet shop. And you know, you would reach out to a, you know, a blogger like yourself, and you would say as a thank you, you know, I would like to write a basically a blog on the path of my company for this company, and then you would publish it or send it to him. Like that'd be kind of a thoughtful way that businesses could kind of sometimes we have a hard time of knowing like how do you think someone who's gone above and beyond and we've sort of used the blog, both to attract sponsors, but also to be thankful for the people that we work with and celebrate their stories but anyway, just a side idea that you know, if someone just wants to dip their toes into it, you can almost almost like it's like a thank you like Hey, who do you work with that you want to thank you know, have all of invited write you a custom blog as a thank you right. I think that'd be kind of cool. Yeah,
Speaker 1 1:04:51
yeah. No, that's I mean, and then that's something that's just there forever and people find the cabinet owner they find you definitely I
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:05:00
mean maybe this extends personally maybe I'll have you write a blog for my wife and Mother's Day is coming up her birthday is coming up and there's no you know watch out Hallmark you know here comes all
Unknown Speaker 1:05:09
I'm gonna read blogs
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:05:11
Oh very good thanks again for coming on thanks for everyone that's listening and have a great day we'll see you soon thank you
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