Latest / The SmallBizChat with Melinda Emerson / Get More Productive On Social Media with Stephanie Humphrey

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Get More Productive On Social Media with Stephanie Humphrey · The SmallBizChat with Melinda Emerson

• 0:00
  Hi, everybody.
• 0:00
  I'm Melinda Emerson, the small biz lady, and I wanna invite you to enter the small biz check
• 0:05
  podcast, giveaway contest, for the next 30 days starting today, you'll have the chance to win
• 0:10
  amazing prizes if you subscribe to the podcast.
• 0:14
  All you need to do is take a screenshot after you subscribe to the small biz chat podcast and
• 0:18
  tag me small biz lady on Twitter or Instagram.
• 0:22
  Once a week.
• 0:23
  I'll select a winner, and you have a chance to win one of my autograph books become your own
• 0:27
  boss in 12 months or fix your business, or you might even get a chance to win one of my
• 0:31
  limited edition small business chat podcast t shirts.
• 0:35
  Don't delay.
• 0:36
  Subscribe to the small business chat podcast today.
• 0:39
  3, 2, 1, 0, ignition Left off.
• 0:47
  Ending small business failure.
• 0:50
  Welcome to the Small Biz Chat podcast with a number 1 small business expert Melinda Emerson.
• 0:56
  Melinda's goal is to end small business failure, and she'll give you the information
• 1:00
  you need to succeed and live the life you dream of.
• 1:04
  Now here's the small Biz lady herself.
• 1:08
  Melinda Everson.
• 1:10
  Hi, everybody.
• 1:11
  I'm Melinda ever send a small biz lady.
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  America's number one small business expert, and I am so excited to welcome you to small biz
• 1:20
  shot.
• 1:20
  Now tonight's show is all about productivity, networking, and small business hacks.
• 1:26
  Now before I get to my guests, we have to thank our general sponsor, Adobe.
• 1:31
  You know, Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences.
• 1:35
  Adobe has all these great tools for small business.
• 1:38
  We all know about Adobe Acrobat.
• 1:39
  Right?
• 1:40
  They've got Adobe Sign.
• 1:41
  They've got Adobe scanned.
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  There's so many great tools in the Adobe document suite, excuse me, Adobe document
• 1:48
  cloud.
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  So, you know, There's so many cool things that you can do.
• 1:52
  They are all about creating digital workflows, and you got to get into what they're doing.
• 1:58
  So we're really excited to be partnering with them tonight.
• 2:01
  Now for the last 9 years, I have hosted small VISHET.
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  We are a peer to peer networking program.
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  That is all about getting you the information you need to start and more importantly grow a
• 2:12
  successful small business.
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  The mission of small business chat is to end small business failure.
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  Now we are streaming live today on Facebook on my small business lady Facebook page, We are
• 2:24
  also streaming live on YouTube, and we are streaming live on Twitter.
• 2:28
  You know, we can't forget our Twitter piece.
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  Right?
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  So listen.
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  I feel like giving away some free stuff tonight.
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  So here's what I want you to do.
• 2:36
  If you are interested in a copy of my new book, fix your business, I wanna invite you to leave
• 2:42
  us a comment.
• 2:43
  Tell us what your favorite Adobe tool is.
• 2:46
  What it is and why you like it.
• 2:48
  And we like your answer.
• 2:49
  Look, my team is out there looking.
• 2:51
  If we like your answer, we're gonna send you a free copy of my new book, fix your business.
• 2:55
  You guys know I love to give away free stuff, but you have to do your part.
• 2:59
  We're so excited to have 3 amazing guests with us tonight.
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  First up, we're gonna be talking to Stephanie Humphrey, and she is a technology and lifestyle
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  expert who's gonna be talking to us about how to get more productivity out of each day in our
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  business.
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  We're also gonna be talking to my good friend, Barry Mould, live from Chicago.
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  He is gonna give us his favorite small business hacks.
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  And we're gonna end our show today with Pamela Lim, who joins us from Arizona.
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  And she's gonna be talking to us about networking and leveraging your network.
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  So, listen, I do not play.
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  You guys know that I have some amazing guests in store for you tonight.
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  So now it's actually time for me to introduce my first guest.
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  Stephanie Humphy.
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  This is her first time on small business chat.
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  And Stephanie, as I said before, she is a tech expert.
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  He helps people increase their productivity, and she has been everywhere.
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  Like, you know, we're lucky she even had time for us tonight.
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  You know, she's been on Good morning, America, the Harry County 2, good day Philadelphia, and
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  she actually happened to be from Philadelphia like me.
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  You guys know I'm coming to you live from small biz lady studios in Philadelphia.
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  And Stephanie and I also have some else in common.
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  We are both from Pittsburgh.
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  So, you know, it's about time, we finally got around to bringing her on.
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  And, you know, she helps people be better digital citizens, and she's known for her
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  special talk on how to death to each week.
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  So she is all about how to be, you know, not corporate citizen, but technology citizen.
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  Right?
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  So I am so excited Stephanie to welcome you to small fish chat live.
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  Thank you so much for having me.
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  I'm excited to be here.
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  Now, listen, I want
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  you to talk to us first about how can businesses use technology better to communicate
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  with their target audience.
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  It's super simple and it might seem really, really obvious, but you have to get social.
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  I hate to write up the bad news to you.
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  You have to get social.
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  That is where customers live.
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  That is where we all live.
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  All of those platforms, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, you know, it it seems obvious, but
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  there are a lot of even larger businesses that aren't doing the best job at it and a lot of
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  small businesses that aren't doing it at all because they don't think they have time or they
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  don't think they have the staff or, you know, it's just one more thing added to the pile, but
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  honestly, that's gonna get you your best ROI for your investment of time and money, get
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  social, get on some type of social networking button.
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  Alright.
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  Alright.
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  But listen, I don't want my employees out here wasting an hour on Facebook every day right
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  now.
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  I want you to talk to me about Like, what are the biggest time wasters for business owners?
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  Like, on social and now
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  on social?
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  Well, not on social.
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  I think we can all agree meetings that could have been emails little chat.
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  And there are enough memes out there on on social now about meetings that could have been
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  emails.
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  So yeah, figure out how to how to maximize, you know, your communication tools that you already
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  have instead of bringing everybody together, but Another big time washer is paper.
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  I mean, we shuffle so much paper around that it is it's just It's just ridiculous.
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  The admin part of of what I do specifically with business cards and and with receipts and
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  do an expense report.
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  So, you know, I use Adobe Scan, and it's really, really cool because you can literally
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  take a picture of a business car and it will import all of that information into the context
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  on your phone so you can add your little note for where you met him and and have that done.
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  I mean, I have tons of random business cards sprinkled all about this room, and and it and
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  it makes my life orders of magnitude easier when I can take care of it right then and there
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  on the spot quickly and get it out of the way.
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  Save them right now.
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  Adobe scan is free.
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  Right?
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  That's one of the
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  It is.
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  It is.
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  The best part about it because the budget being what they are, you know, it really helps me,
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  especially for my receipts, but I have a tendency to procrastinate on those when tax
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  time comes around, but if I can get it done when I make the purchase or when I receive my
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  hand and then just, you know, figure out the rest on the back end.
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  It really really makes my life a whole lot easier.
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  Yes.
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  Yes.
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  Yes.
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  Alright.
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  Now you mentioned Adobe Scan, but what are some of your other favorite technology time savers?
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  Well, if this, then that is a really good,
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  that helps you create what they call applets for all of the things that you do most often.
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  So say you every time you download a particular email, you want to save that attachment to the
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  Adobe Cloud, you can put you can put together an applet that'll do it automatically.
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  The the one I use the most is showing photos from Instagram and Twitter in line because, you
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  know, Instagram and Twitter used to be connected, and you can see the photo, but now
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  They don't really play that nice together.
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  So when you share a photo from Instagram to Twitter, you get an Instagram link.
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  And let me tell you, nobody wants to click that one.
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  Back to your Instagram account to see what you posted.
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  So you put an if and and if this, then that uplift together that will post the picture in
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  line on Twitter.
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  So all kind of just think about the little things that you do every single day on your
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  phone.
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  There's probably a way to automate them with this than that.
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  I mean, tons of different things beyond social media, productivity, the web, storage,
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  everything, but also Adobe Sign, surprisingly enough, because most of my life is W9.
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  You know, with all of the jobs I do.
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  I have freelance everywhere.
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  It's all w 9.
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  They all need a different one.
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  You know, so I already have it in Acrobat, but you gotta sign it.
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  It needs the it needs the current date when you're sending it out to these vendors and
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  these clients.
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  So Adobe Sign comes in so so handy to save you time.
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  And so I'm not printing that w nine out, signing it, standing it back, and sending it
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  back to the person.
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  So just just those little things that really make a big difference
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  I really I I I love Adobe Sign too, but there's nothing like getting that contract signed
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  because if I send you a contract, I can send you a invoice.
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  That's why I like it.
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  That's right.
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  I know that there's a lot of us that work with people in virtual teams all over the place.
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  So do you have what are your favorite tools for collaboration with, you know, virtual teams
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  and, you know, like, kind of version control and things like that?
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  Right.
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  Right.
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  Well, you you need some sort of communication tool.
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  That's 1st and foremost.
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  So, obviously, Slack probably the most obvious choice, one of the most more one or more robust
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  tools out there for that type of thing, but there's another service called HipChat, which
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  actually has a free version, which is basically slack light, for the most part, all of the
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  other functionality of of slack, you know, we don't have to pay for it.
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  They have a new update called Stripe that's coming out that does a lot of the same things
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  that Slack does with some improvements as well.
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  So start with some sort of whatever you're using, even if it's just you know, Skype or or
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  Zoom or, you know, but what we're doing right now, you have to have some sort of
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  communication tool if you're trying to run a virtual office And then something like, Adobe
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  Document Cloud.
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  It sounds really simple and intuitive, but it connects with everything else that you use.
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  So there's a Microsoft integration.
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  There's a Salesforce integration.
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  There's a Dropbox integration.
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  So most of the other tools that you're already using can sync up with the document cloud to
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  save all of your information to communicate.
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  You can actually mark up p PDFs and and and share them between your group.
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  And so it really makes life a lot easier when you're when you're not in the same location.
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  That's the I agree with you.
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  You know, my team and I, we actually use the the teamwork software that's, like, black, but
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  it's, like, a little bit more like, project management.
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  Project.
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  Yep.
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  Yep.
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  So that's been a great tool for for us, for my team.
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  Now let's quickly talk about you know, email.
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  Email is like, I love email, but I hate opening my email.
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  Right?
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  So how can you What what do you suggest is the small business owner's dues for taming Emus?
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  This then, prayer, prayer works.
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  I'm telling you, my my inbox is is so out of control.
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  It is not even funny.
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  Right now, I'm testing inbox by Gmail.
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  It's a it's a separate app called inbox.
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  Testing it.
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  It's supposed to sort of group things for you intuitively.
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  It uses a lot of AI to sort of get a feel for how you use your email and help you use a
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  little bit more effectively.
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  I'll let you know how it goes, but yeah, that's one of those time worn $64 questions that
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  everybody thinks they have the answer to, but It it's tough.
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  It's a tough thing to manage.
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  Alright.
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  Last question.
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  Social media, do you schedule or not to schedule it?
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  If you schedule what's your favorite tool versus scheduling social media.
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  Few thumbs up for scheduling, and I use Hootsuite.
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  I love it.
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  I think it is super super robust.
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  It has, you know, different versions, pro versions if you wanna add your team as
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  administrators to manage some of your social channels.
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  But, yeah, it it really is a a really powerful tool, and and I've been using it for years.
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  I've been using it for years.
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  I swear by it.
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  I love it.
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  Alright.
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  Now my favorite tool is proud social.
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  I gotta tell you, we upgraded from Hootsuite a little bit to get better handed.
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  Oh.
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  You
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  know what?
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  I still have a Hootsuite account too.
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  We use both.
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  But, listen, I wanna come back to you, Stephanie.
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  Thank you so much for, you know, giving us this terrific advice, but I don't want anybody to go
• 12:43
  away because we're gonna come back and we're gonna talk social media secrets with Stephanie
• 12:48
  Humphrey.
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  Don't go away.
• 12:49
  We'll be right back.
• 12:52
  My new book picture business is really about encouraging people to take back control of
• 12:56
  their business and change how their businesses is run.
• 12:59
  It's not okay to skip paychecks.
• 13:01
  It's not okay to never feel like you can take a vacation, and it's also not okay to not know
• 13:06
  how much profit you've made in your business until your taxes are done.
• 13:09
  I really want business owners to stop letting their businesses be run away trained.
• 13:14
  I've written this book to teach people processes and systems to help them run their
• 13:18
  businesses intentionally.
• 13:20
  My goal is to help existing entrepreneurs create a business that allows them to live
• 13:25
  their dream life.
• 13:29
  Hi, everybody, and welcome back.
• 13:31
  I'm Melinda Emerson, the small biz lady.
• 13:33
  Now we have been talking technology with Stephanie Humphrey's But now we're gonna bring
• 13:37
  that conversation over to social media secrets.
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  You know, they say that social media is the great equalizer What do you think, Stephanie?
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  Is is social media really, really where it's at still?
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  You know, has it changed
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  the game for all?
• 13:51
  Absolutely.
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  I absolutely.
• 13:53
  It can be.
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  I mean, we're we're looking at a a twenty year old who is on the cover of Forbes this month
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  for a business that was grown largely on Instagram from selfies.
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  So it it it really is that powerful toy.
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  It really does give you access to different people and to a wide variety of people all at
• 14:12
  once, but you have to find that common ground intelligence school.
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  Alright.
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  So let's talk about social media no nos.
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  I mean, everybody knows about, you know, social media is great, but but how can you make
• 14:23
  yourself a pariah quickly on social media?
• 14:27
  Well, I think especially for small businesses, small and large businesses, don't jump on Van
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  Wagons.
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  We've seen that happen far too often where there's a trending topic.
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  A company wants to take advantage of it to get seen when it is completely inappropriate to
• 14:44
  their business.
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  It may be a situation that is sensitive possibly, and you're just jumping on it for for
• 14:51
  for lights, basically.
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  So, yeah, don't don't jump on the hashtag bandwagon wagon.
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  I think that is, you know, especially for a brand that where where your authenticity is
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  your currency online, and it means so much to you that really can kill that really, really
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  quickly.
• 15:09
  Well, I I hear you, but how can we be creative about building more engagement?
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  Right?
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  It's not about likes and follows anymore.
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  It's about engagement.
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  So how can small business owners build more engagement in social media?
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  It's the content.
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  It's the content photos and videos.
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  I see a lot of businesses that just we have links to their blog or, you know, a text
• 15:30
  statement about a sale or something like that.
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  You gotta have some sort of photo or video in every post.
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  I mean, I'm gonna go out on a limb and say every post has I I just believe that that is
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  where we are as a society.
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  Are there tempting friends or short?
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  We wanna see a pretty picture, you know, and we wanna be able to to get whatever the story is a
• 15:50
  very, very short amount of time.
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  You got, like, 3 seconds to grab somebody's attention.
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  So, you know, photos and videos, and and respond if they're social networks, So you
• 15:59
  really have to have a conversation with the people that follow you.
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  Address their concerns as quickly as you can, have conversation, see what they're doing, and
• 16:08
  and, you know, make comments on things.
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  Now listen, you know, you're killing me seeing a picture with every post.
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  Right?
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  You're killing me I've been blogging for 10 years.
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  You're killing me.
• 16:16
  Anyway, but, listen, what is the best advice that you can give a business owner's day who's
• 16:23
  struggling with their social media with?
• 16:26
  Find a platform that makes sense for you.
• 16:28
  I think the problem with social, I think what what business get stuck in their heads on is
• 16:33
  that they think they need to be everywhere.
• 16:35
  Oh, Snapchat's hot now.
• 16:36
  I gotta get a Snapchat account.
• 16:38
  Oh, I don't have a Pinterest board yet, so let me do what you can, where you can, figure out
• 16:43
  where your customers are, figure out what network you can do consistently, And even if
• 16:49
  it's just the one, even if it's just your Facebook page, if that's what you can do, then
• 16:53
  that's what you can do because the consistency is really gonna be the key to building your
• 16:57
  brand.
• 16:57
  So figure out what that looks like, and then use those automation tools to to make it work
• 17:02
  for you.
• 17:02
  Set up an editorial schedule, schedule all those posts on Sunday night, and and respond as
• 17:08
  quickly as you can to comments.
• 17:10
  Thank you, Stephanie.
• 17:11
  That was brilliant and actually truly helpful.
• 17:14
  You know, we are here on small business chat, and our mission is to end small business
• 17:18
  failure and knowing how to effectively use social media and technology is a big part of
• 17:23
  running a successful Thank you guys so much.
• 17:26
  And thank you to tonight's sponsor, Adobe.
• 17:28
  Adobe is changing the world through digital experiences.
• 17:32
  Small businesses can leverage Adobe Document Cloud for everything you need to create your
• 17:37
  digital workflows, including Adobe Acrobat, Adobe Sign and their free app Adobe scan.
• 17:43
  There's lots of great things in the Adobe document cloud.
• 17:46
  So you gotta go check it out.
• 17:47
  Thank you for joining us tonight on smallbiz chat live.
• 17:50
  Next week, we're gonna be back on Twitter with our special guest government contracting guru,
• 17:56
  Gloria Larkin who's gonna be talking about how to develop and pursue government contracts.
• 18:00
  Don't miss it.
• 18:01
  The mission of small biz chat is to end small business failure.
• 18:04
  I am Melinda Emerson, the small biz lady, and it is my privilege to help you take your
• 18:09
  business to the next level.
• 18:11
  If you want more tools and tips for me, please go and subscribe to my website, which is
• 18:16
  succeed as your own boss.
• 18:18
  Dotcom.
• 18:19
  Next time, I wanna help you live your dream life as an entrepreneur.
• 18:24
  Thank you so much, guys, and good night.
• 18:30
  Thank you for listening to the Small Biz Chat podcast with Melinda Emerson.
• 18:35
  For more resources and small business success strategies, visit succeed as your own boss.com.
• 18:41
  Subscribe to this podcast wherever you listen to podcasts and join us next Wednesday.