Your Digital Marketing Coach with Neal Schaffer

The One Skill Every Marketer Needs (But Most Are Doing Wrong)

• Neal Schaffer • Episode 389

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Networking, connections, and relationships—these are the lifeblood of professional success. Yet, in a world dominated by numbers and KPIs, it’s easy to lose sight of the people behind the metrics.

Today’s episode of the Your Digital Marketing Coach podcast dives deep into how meaningful relationships—not just surface-level networking—can transform your career, your business, and your life. Joined by Jeff Lerner, fractional CMO and author of The Power of Relationships in Professional Growth, we’ll explore the art of turning contacts into champions, nurturing mentorships, and building a legacy of trust and collaboration.

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Speaker 1:

As a digital marketer, are you tired of focusing solely on metrics and ROI while overlooking the human connections that can truly drive your success? In this episode, you'll uncover the secrets to building powerful relationships that can elevate your personal brand, expand your network and unlock new opportunities in your marketing career. Learn the proven strategies for transitioning from just another contact to a true champion in your industry. Don't miss these insights that can transform the way you approach digital marketing. So you got to make sure you stay tuned to this next episode of the Digital Marketing Coach podcast.

Speaker 2:

Digital social media content, influencer marketing, blogging, podcasting, vlogging, tiktoking, linkedin, twitter, facebook, instagram, youtube, seo, sem, ppc, email marketing there's a lot to cover. Whether you're a marketing professional, entrepreneur or business owner, you need someone you can rely on for expert advice. Good thing you've got Neil on your side, because Neil Schaefer is your digital marketing coach. Helping you grow your business with digital-first marketing, one episode at a time. This is your digital marketing coach, and this is Neil Schaefer.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, this is Neil Schafer, nice, and yeah, I caught a cold, which sort of well I didn't want to record, even though I still have a little bit of a nasal voice. But anyway, all is good, all is healthy now, and I'm really excited about today's episode. Before we get to today's episode, I want to share with you some industry news. So a few things have happened over the last week that I think you should be aware of, and that's really the role of this few minutes that I spend before the beginning of each episode. One is that Google unveiled, amongst other things and I think at the end of the year we're having this big battle between Google and open AI for mind share and thought leadership in the world of consumer generative AI. But Google has unveiled Project Mariner. Project Mariner represents this next evolution of AI, which are AI agents. So Project Mariner is this groundbreaking experiment that lets AI navigate the web for you. Using it, or I should say using this engine it will be able to shop, book, travel and more, by controlling your Chrome browser as if it were a person Still in early testing, but really this tool could redefine how we interact with the internet, moving from direct engagement to having AI handle tasks on our behalf. It's a glimpse into the future of online convenience, and I think many believe this is the direction that AI will be heading in 2025.

Speaker 1:

Instagram launched new trial reels, which is a feature offering creators a low pressure way to test content by sharing reels with non followers first, so it allows you to experiment with new topics or styles without worrying about alienating existing audiences. Creators can review engagement metrics after 24 hours and then decide whether to share broadly or scrap the idea. Right now it's only for a small number of creators, but it is a smart tool for refining content strategy and reaching fresh viewers, and we expect that it's going to be rolling out globally soon. So that's a pretty interesting feature that I've never seen on a social network. So if you're creating reels and you want to experiment with different content types, different scripts, different ways of storytelling, different animations, what have you? I think it's an awesome idea. I really applaud Instagram for doing that.

Speaker 1:

Also, in another way in which social media is trying to encourage more content creation, youtube is now offering their AI-powered dubbing to more creators. Now, I have yet to get this feature, but it allows you. I guess it's because I'm not in the YouTube Partner Program. Yet you need to have a certain number of watch time per year in order to be accepted, but the tool automatically translates and dubs videos into multiple languages, broadening your audience reach with minimal effort. While current AI dubs may lack natural tone, future updates promise improvements in emotion and ambience, so if you want to make your content accessible globally, you'll be able to do this.

Speaker 1:

Now until now, like what I've done is I have downloaded well, I should say. I download the video, I feed it into otterai, which I began using really recently instead of CastMagic, just in recognition that Otterai is probably the best AI transcription tool that's been around, so why not use it for what it's good at? And then I download the SRT file replacing the automatic captions. You can then auto translate it into other languages. I then go into my analytics. I look at what languages I have viewers from around the world looking at my content in, and invariably it's Hindi, spanish, vietnamese and Japanese, sometimes Punjabi, sometimes German, sometimes Russian, but inevitably I usually end up translating my content into four or five different languages. And then I also use either chat, gpt and or Google Translate to translate the title and description as well, which you can do by language to get a little bit of extra international SEO with YouTube. So, all right, well, that's it with the YouTube. And then, finally, tiktok. Even though supposedly it may be banned, they continue to expand their TikTok shop and they are really transforming social commerce. They have new features like smart plus, automated ads and TikTok symphony AI tools to help simplify selling and marketing for businesses of all sizes. I continue to get email invites to join TikTok shop. I even recently did a phone call with TikTok to go over what that means. Right now it's not available for digital products, only physical products. It is on my to-do list of many, many other things.

Speaker 1:

Now, if you didn't know, all this news comes from our weekly newsletter. If you go to newsletterneilschafercom, you could subscribe and be the first to get this information. Also, I also want to let you know that just over the past few days, I have now launched my newsletters. I'm actually publishing them on the internet, like you would on a sub stack or a beehive, so obviously you can subscribe. You can also go back into my previous newsletters to check out what it's about and if you like what you see, you can subscribe there as well.

Speaker 1:

You know they say that generative AI for search is requiring more and more businesses and creators to really publish more content everywhere. So publishing newsletter content onto the web to me is a no-brainer, and ConvertKit has always had this. I've been looking at Beehive recently. I think I mentioned this to you. I've decided to stick with ConvertKit. Beehive still is missing one or two features that are well to me. They were deal breakers. But knowing that ConvertKit has this functionality, that now I'm taking full advantage of and, like I said, you can go over to newsletterneilschafercom and check it out. All right on to personal news. So I want to share with you a true story of what happened to me recently, as the future of generative AI and its relationship to content creation forced me to make a quick decision about my future. So I already hinted at publishing my newsletters on the web gives the large language models more content, but it associates me and aligns me with more content as well, in hopes that more of these generative AI search engines, when they spit out an answer with a link, they'll be using my content right.

Speaker 1:

So large language models rely on massive amounts of data, much of which raises questions about legality and quality. As AI evolves, there is a growing concern about the scarcity of original content and the risk of AI models cannibalizing themselves by consuming their own outputs. What I mean by this is, as we know, people cannibalizing themselves by consuming their own outputs. What I mean by this is, as we know, most of the generative AI that we think of today. It has already gone through all of the internet. It's already, you know, gone through a lot of books. Whether they were legally or had the copyrights to do so is another question, but pretty much it's already gone through all the content that's available. Now it has to continually go through new content, to add new content to its model, but unfortunately, as we all know, a lot of newer content on the internet is AI generated and therefore the large language models need new content. But if it's just regurgitated content that's already in the model, it is going to decrease the quality of AI for all of us, and that's what I mean there. So Nina Schick is an AI expert. She predicts that by 2025, 90% of online content could be AI generated, which amplifies this need for authentic, high quality content to train these systems effectively.

Speaker 1:

Beyond content marketing, businesses might soon acquire publications solely for their original material to view their own AI models, and what I mean by this is we've already seen some publications. You know Sam Rush. You know buying out Backlinko Recently they bought out some other publications for search engine rankings but companies are also beginning to create their own AI models, and, by buying out content, that obviously gives you access to the content which you can utilize in your own AI model. You know David Armano, one of the smartest guys in marketing. He has already suggested that every company will eventually build its own large language model, and I agree. I already know that this is what Fortune 50 brands are doing today.

Speaker 1:

This, though, raises critical questions about ownership and compensation, especially when companies begin using employee-generated content to train their models. Companies are asking employees I mean, you know, if you have an internal Slack, internal emails, that content may be fed into the large language models of that company without your knowing it. So Bal Tran is an attorney, patent attorney, founder of patentpccom. He's also a member of my Digital First community, and I asked him for his insights and he was saying you know, similar to patent law, the rights to content often depend on an employee's role. If hired to create content, the employer likely owns it, which begs the question should employment contracts explicitly addressed AI usage of employee generated content? And what about UGC creators or user-generated content creators? Should they negotiate LLM rights alongside advertising terms? These are new dilemmas that, as we unpeel the onion of AI, companies need to start thinking about this and we as businesses, as marketers, as content creators, need to begin thinking about this as well.

Speaker 1:

I especially needed to begin thinking about this because I recently faced this dilemma firsthand. A publisher of one of my books contacted me and proposed a deal with an AI firm. So my book would be fed to the AI firm's large language model and, whatever the AI firm paid the publisher, they would split the licensing fee 50-50. But to me, the fairness of the arrangement was questionable. Shouldn't factors like word count? And apparently I did an internet search they were offering the same deal to all their authors. So shouldn't factors like word count, niche rarity and future value to LLMs play a role in determining compensation? And to me, terms were dictated without room for negotiation and, as a former B2B sales professional, I tend to think when the terms are being dictated to me, I'm not really getting a good deal. So, as AI companies generate billions in revenue, the value of original content, whether it's books or blogs or business materials will only grow. For now, authors like me must grapple with these issues, but soon, anyone creating content will face similar decisions.

Speaker 1:

So I ask you how will you protect the value of your content in the age of generative AI? I decided to not go with that contract. I said I don't want your money. I wanna retain the AI rights of my content, and we'll see what the future brings. And I'll tell you. Just yesterday, I had a company reach out to me. We'd love to convert your blog into a book. If you give us permission, we'll create a draft for you Once again.

Speaker 1:

Companies that are coming for our content, looking to make money off it. And are those deals fair to content creators? I don't know. There's no market price for this. It's something that we're all trying to figure out. But I wanted to share that story with you because this is happening today, in December of 2024. And I think we are at the tip of the iceberg. All right, so let's get into today's interview.

Speaker 1:

And today's interview is sponsored by Digital Threads, the small business and entrepreneur playbook for digital-first marketing, my new digital marketing playbook for modern marketing that I published only about two months ago. It is already winning multiple awards around the world. It's already had bestseller status in Amazon. If you haven't checked it out, go over to neilschafercom slash digital threads Amazon one word. And if you want to download a free preview, they are still available at neilschafercom slash digital threads dash or hyphen preview, all right. So today I'm excited to share a great conversation I had with Jeff Lerner.

Speaker 1:

Jeff is a fractional CMO based out of San Diego, same Southern California. He's also the author of the Power of Relationships in Professional Growth. He wrote the book a few years ago and it's not directly related to what he does today as a fractional CMO, but I thought that it was actually a great book with a lot of advice, and I think that you know the importance of building genuine connections, not just networking, and how those relationships can drive your success. Whether you're an entrepreneur or marketer or just starting out in your career, I think these relationships are really critical for success in marketing and in business. So I wanted to pick his brain and have a conversation around that. Jeff shared his personal experiences, practical tips on finding the right mentors, advocating for your network and creating a personal brand that resonates. I think you're going to like this interview, so, without further ado. Here is my interview with Jeff Lerner.

Speaker 2:

You're listening to your digital marketing coach. This is Neil Schaefer.

Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, this is Neil Schaefer, and welcome to another live stream edition of the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast. So today we're going to talk about networking, connections, relationships. It is a central theme that, as business owners, entrepreneurs, marketers, that it's just a core skill that we need to have. And I think relationships how they drive success is something that every once in a while we really need to get ingrained and get reminded of, because when we work with numbers and KPIs and ROI, we tend to forget that at the end or behind those numbers are people right. Or, if we have a team of marketers or we're an agency owner, how well these people perform, how well our relationships are with them to help them perform.

Speaker 1:

And if you're just getting started out, obviously having relationships with seniors above you that are mentors can have a critical role on your success. I know that when I look back at things that I've learned, I always think of people that I've been fortunate enough to work under, that I was able to learn from. In fact, I would only join a company if I felt like I could learn something there. And even as a fractional CMO and it'll be interesting to ask today's guest as well, because he's also a fractional CMO, I tend to like to work with companies where I can learn something as well, believe it or not, based on their situation, based on their niche, based on their industry. So today we're going to be talking about, from contacts to champions, how relationships drive success, from contacts to champions how relationships drive success, and there's no better person to talk about it than the author of this book, the Power of Relationships in Professional Growth, jeff Lerner. Jeff, welcome to the your Digital Marketing Coach podcast, my friend.

Speaker 3:

Thank you so much, neil, great to be here.

Speaker 1:

Awesome to have you so, jeff, I know you're a fractional CMO marketing agency owner. You obviously do a lot in marketing and I know maybe earlier in your career you wrote this book because it is a few years old. But I just want to get your backstory on where you came from, what prompted you to write this book and how has that affected the work that you do with your clients today? I know that's a lot to consume, so take your time, but I'll give you the mic right now.

Speaker 3:

Perfect. So my background is in marketing. I started working in the marketing space at Google back in early 2004. So this is back when Google was kind of a startup right. We didn't even have Gmail yet. It was really early days. Google Spent almost eight years there, loved everything about it. The perks are legendary. But I wanted to get a broader experience in the marketing world. So I went to an agency to kind of learn like what agencies do, how do they balance budgets for their clients, why do they put X dollars here versus Y dollars there. And after doing that for a couple of years I then went corporate marketing world and now is really in the weeds of all things how to take and build brands for organizations. And I started at Cricket Wireless working to kind of help build that strategy through an acquisition by AT&T and then kind of since then have worked almost exclusively with startups and small companies on what is their go-to-market strategy and how do they build their brand, on what is their go-to-market strategy and how do they build their brand the book came out of.

Speaker 3:

The long story that I'll make short is when my wife and I had our second kid, she decided that she wanted to go back home where she's from in Maine for a couple of days with our older son, and so I was home alone with the baby for a week and I had all of these thoughts of like, what are the things that I've learned as I've gotten further along in my career that man I wish I knew when I was younger. And it started off as, like, I'll write an article. I mean, I've written articles in Ad Age and Click Z and some other industry publications and I thought, okay, this will be something of that nature. And after a couple of nights, you know, putting the baby to sleep, and I'm sitting down with kind of nothing to do, I started, you know, working on this.

Speaker 3:

What I thought would be a, you know, short article turned into you know, a few articles. And then as I went, I realized, okay, there's some more to it here and turned it into a book. But the goal of it was kind of really just to help people, especially early in their careers, especially those who may be struggling with advancement and other things, to understand that there's so much more that goes into relationship building than just shaking someone's hand or connecting with them on LinkedIn. And so this was kind of like my you know, learn from my mistakes if you will book and you know, do things differently.

Speaker 1:

Very cool. So you really did not have any business objective per se, and it's funny, because when I wrote my first book Windmill, networking, understanding, leveraging and Maximizing LinkedIn it was for me a networking vehicle, right, it was the same thing like share my feelings and my opinions and my experience, and that ended up really bringing me to who I am today. So that book for you, though, was more of a let me just get it all on paper, share it out there, and has it served as a vehicle to bring new people in your organization, or new customers, or make new friends, or how is that just? You know, I often get a lot of business owners and agency owners like, hey, neil, should I write a book? What do you think? What would your advice be?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's a great question. I mean I can tell you with certainty that I've given away more copies of the book than I have sold, because I didn't write it to sell it. You know, like I never wanted to be a you know bestselling author and have my book in an airport for someone to read, you know, on their flight. Like that wasn't why I did it, and at the time when I wrote it I didn't have my own fractional CMO business. So it really was like a very kind of just like therapeutic way of me just putting my ideas out there and then saying to other people hey, do you need help with this? Like here it is.

Speaker 3:

And then, if you talk a little bit in your intro about mentors like I've had some great mentors over my career, so if I can serve as a mentor to someone because they read the book or they get to know me and we build a relationship that way great, I've now satisfied my own internal feeling of purpose. And also if I can just send the book, or someone buys the book and I become a mentor even though I don't actually know this person but my experience helps them from that perspective, then I've also done my job, and so I was naive and probably stupid in thinking of, like I could write a book because I didn't have a goal. You know which sort of your question. When people ask me cause, they said to me too, should I write a book? Usually my question is well, what do you hope to get from it? And if the answer is fame and publicity, then I tell them, no, don't write a book. Yeah, but if it's to fulfill a deeper purpose or a deeper meaning, sure, yeah, go for it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I couldn't agree with you more no-transcript. And I wrote my first two books on LinkedIn. I'm writing another book on LinkedIn as we speak and therefore a lot of people listening and consuming my content are very interested in LinkedIn. I got some social selling folks and what have you? So a lot of people think I need to go to a conference, I need to go to a chamber of commerce meeting, I need to go out and network. Right, and you make a distinction between networking and relationship building. I think the opportunities in network like when I wrote that LinkedIn book back in 2009, with the exception that LinkedIn groups were actually legit back then like Facebook groups are today, and I created my own group and had in-person meetings here in Orange County. There are just so many opportunities to network today. But what is the difference between those opportunities and actually developing a relationship and what are the benefits and, I guess, what are the steps to develop that relationship and the benefits of doing so?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, you know, growing up, my parents always used to tell me you know, they're like oh, jeff, it's not what you know, it's who you know. Amen, and know it's who you know. And so that was kind of what came with me. But I also realized very quickly it's not what I know or who I know, it's who knows me. And so that's the big shift in my mindset over the past years was I used to think in a naive way that if I'm connected with someone on LinkedIn and they know who I am by name or something that they are going to speak about me, if I'm not in the room, they will advocate for me. If I ask them, they will connect me with other people that they think I should meet, and that's simply not true. We have social networks now where I have, you know. I have, however, many thousands of people you know follow me and connected with me on LinkedIn, but I could probably count, you know, the number of people I actually know. You know is considerably less than that. Right? So it's. It's not about the numbers, it's not about the oh, I know you, you know. So therefore we have a relationship. It's how do we build something more meaningful than that, and so in the book and in life, like I talk about how important it is to build these relationships through effort, and it cannot be with the goal in mind of how are you going to help me down the road right?

Speaker 3:

A lot of the relationships that I have built over my career and over my life, both personally and professionally, are ones where I am truly invested in building that relationship because I simply want to have that partnership and relationship and with not a preconceived oh, by building a relationship with Neil, I will get something from that down the road. And to build that relationship it takes effort, it takes time. If I meet someone at a conference, for example, it's important for me to make sure I follow up with them, that I engage with them in other meaningful ways. They can be small but impactful. For example, if I see something like an interesting article, I can just send it. Hey, I was reading this article.

Speaker 3:

I remember the conversation. You and I had thought this might be interesting to you Hope all is well right. Like it took less than 30 seconds for me to do that. But to the other person they are now being like wow, jeff thought about me when I wasn't. We weren't talking about anything. It wasn't like we were in the middle of a conversation and he brought it up. I'm not even there and Jeff saw something that he related to me and our relationship. Now maybe they're thinking the same thing, and so a lot of times then you get something back down the road of, hey, this is cool, you should check it out, or I'm going to this event, are you planning on going? If not, you should come. So it's those kinds of little back and forth, just putting your effort and energy into building relationships. That's what makes the difference between relationship and a connection.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I think and I couldn't agree more, and I think it comes down to Jeff, you've been doing this. Obviously it's been a few years since you wrote the book and I've been doing this for a while as well that those relationships over time it's like, hey, I need a consultant, or hey, do you know of another consultant that you can introduce me to? Or hey, I'm looking for a new hire. You're not investing in those relationships for those purposes, but because we're all in this game of life and we all either work or have our own business. It always opens the door, not necessarily for your own opportunities, but maybe for those in your network, and I think, with that understanding and investment in what I call many call the bank account of karma, it does come back to reap rewards. I'm curious if you have any anecdotes around that that have helped you or that you've been able to help others.

Speaker 3:

You're 100% accurate, right? Of course I want people to talk about me when I'm not in the room Hopefully positively talk about me when I'm not in the room the definition of personal branding right there, right, yep, and that's exactly right.

Speaker 3:

Like I have had people reach out to me and say hey, jeff, I was talking to so-and-so at this conference, or I met this person, or they're a friend of mine or they're whatever it is and I was telling them some of the challenges I have with my startup and how I could use help, and they said that you would be the person to talk to. And those moments like that feeling that I get of somebody else spoke highly enough of me and who I am as a person, the work that I do to tell someone else that they should want to know me or connect with me in some way, that is, hands down, for me, one of the best feelings I can have professionally. At the same time, I take that with me in how I think about and treat others. I am always looking to advocate for my friends, for people that I'm connected with. You go look at my LinkedIn activity.

Speaker 3:

Right, like I go through these waves of being really active and then not active, don't we all? But one of the things that I do a lot of if I see someone post a job and it's like I'm looking for a great X, right, I will go in. I will just tag people that I know in that role and send a follow-up to the person who put that role and be like hey, I tagged these people Like I think they would be great if you know for your role, based on my experience and working with them. So I don't even know if they're interested, I don't even know if they're going to apply, but if they do and I let them know that this job is open, these would be great people for you to interview and it's again 30 seconds of my time, but it has a meaningful and lasting impact on others.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I'm just thinking about it and I'm sure you have a few people you think of, but I think of people like Wing Lam, who is the founder of Wahoo's Fish Tacos, which in California we all know, and I'll see him speak at conferences, give away everything he knows, and he says hey, by the way, when I'm on my way down and you're on your way up, please remember me right, knowing that there's always a need for the help of other people, and there have been so many other people. I think of Matt Prince, who is actually director of PR at Taco Bell locally here in Orange County and he teaches a class at Chapman University and he gives it all for his students and he actually set up a little job board. It's like, hey, if any of you want to hire aspiring marketers, I have great students and it's just doing a little bit extra, not with the intent of like I need something back, but then knowing somehow, somewhere, it might reap dividends. But more than anything, you're helping someone else, right, and that's really what life is all about. So if you're looking for inspiration, hopefully those two case studies and obviously what Jeff is teaching here will help you.

Speaker 1:

I want to switch gears a little bit, because relationship building can work both when you think of outside of your network and then we think inside of our network and specifically, you had mentioned, and I had also mentioned, mentorship right and mentorship for career growth. So we do have some listeners who are not on their own, but they're part of larger organizations. What would your advice be about mentorship, about leveraging relationship building, in finding a mentor and in really investing in that relationship and, on the flip side, if you are a more experienced person, how can they help others through mentorship?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, it's a great question. I've found some of the best mentors that I've ever had. They were great for a few different reasons, but one of them was because that's who they are as people. They wanted to teach, they wanted to share their knowledge and their experience so that I could be better in my job, both in the actual role that I had, but also I can grow and be better in my career. I could be a better person, I could be a better father, right, like it's not always siloed, it doesn't need to be siloed of. I need to find a marketing mentor who's going to make me a better marketer.

Speaker 3:

Like that is absolutely not true, that you have to have that like one-to-one relationship between your job and the mentor. In fact, the best mentor I ever had knew absolutely nothing about marketing and the reason why his name is Bill Ingram. He was the chief strategy officer at Cricket Wireless, a Harvard, you know, mba guy, like military guy. Like we are very different in how we see the world. He has a CFO background, so he's a numbers organization structure and I'm like the marketer who talks about feelings and emotions and all of those things. So we're very different people and he was the best mentor because, a he cared deeply about me and my success, but, b he wanted to and was willing to teach me all of the things that I didn't know well, the areas of his expertise he wanted to work with me on. So I don't have a finance background and I can understand, like a P&L statement and all of those things, but he walked me through and put time into, jeff, here's how to think about a business or an organization differently by looking at the financials, by looking at all of these other external factors that, as a marketing leader, I was not thinking about. And so it was such a deep relationship of I want to help you be better in your career and your life, even though he could not help me be better in marketing, because that's just, he didn't have anything to add there in terms of like. This is what I've thought about when I've built an ad campaign right.

Speaker 3:

So the only way it also worked is I gave him everything of me right, like it. You know it was. I would come to him with questions. I was vulnerable, I was open with hey, I don't understand this, I don't learn. You know, I don't know how to do this. Like there's no ego, there's no cockiness. It had to be completely open.

Speaker 3:

Bill, I want to learn, I want to get better, and I had to over-communicate that I want to improve. I want you to show me and I want as much time of yours as I possibly can get, because that's what's going to learn be vulnerable, number one. Be open and honest about what you hope to accomplish. Speak your truth right. I want to get to be better at X and I think you can help me get there and you tell me what you need from me so that I am worth your time and your investment as well. So make sure that it is that two-way street and you're offering yourself to them.

Speaker 3:

On the flip side, if you're interested in being a mentor, take everything I just said and what Bill did for me and realize your abilities as a mentor are really all about. Where can you help make someone better in their career, you know, in their life? It doesn't have to be I need to teach you my skill. It can be. I want to teach you a more generalized you know thing, a new approach, how to think strategically, how to you know evaluate things. I mean it doesn't matter. The opportunities are endless. Find what will enable you to be. You know to feel good about sharing your expertise with somebody who wants to hear it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's such such sound advice and, you know, if you're looking for a mentor, I don't know about you, jeff, but I have lots of people reach out to me like, hey, you know, can I, will you be my mentor? And I look at my kids, who you know in high school, both interested in marketing, and they're reaching out to university professors of marketing and saying, hey, I'm eager to learn. Is there any help you need on? You know I'm Gen Z, so if you need any help researching TikTok and my daughter actually was able to hook up with a professor at Northwestern University Kellogg School of Management. My son is working with a professor at UC Irvine and because there are people that not only need the help but they also understand the value of mentoring and as mentors, jeff, I think you'd agree we also learn as well from the people we are mentoring.

Speaker 3:

Without a doubt.

Speaker 1:

Right. So you said earlier I thought that was really powerful it's not about what you know, but who you know is the common one. Then you took it one step further and I'm like huh, which is? It's about your being known, and I think that really comes down to anybody in sales or anybody who's looking for a job or who wants to sell more of their product or any business. They all want to be known by a broader number of people. They all want to be known by a broader number of people. They all want to, in marketing terms, increase their brand awareness among people that don't know them. So, understanding that importance, what are some steps that the listeners, whether it's for their personal brand, their professional brand or for their corporate brand what are some steps that you recommend they take to get started on that today?

Speaker 3:

Yeah, so you know it's a great question. I'll start with, like, the personal brand. Right, like, if you want to be known, and known is a very, you know, loose term, right Like we're not talking like you know celebrity known. But if you want to be known within, like your circles, if you want to create those kinds of relationships so that people are talking about you and you're not in the room, you need to give people a reason why. And so the steps really start off with you know A what value do you bring, who are you as a person and how are you showcasing what makes you unique? And it's everything from just being authentic, you know, on your professional social profiles, it's also putting in. You mentioned going to conferences and meeting people, spending time with people, getting to know them, having them get to know you. And on top of that, it's, like I said earlier, putting in the effort to continuously engage and build that relationship over time. Continuously engage and build that relationship over time, even when there is no short-term like this is what I'm hoping to accomplish, and I told the story of just sending an article or whatever it may be.

Speaker 3:

I have somebody that was, I admitted, a conference early on in my career. We kind of lost touch for a little while, reconnected at some point. Then he and I would randomly send each other things of like, hey, this is an interesting technology or this is cool Very much business type of conversation. And then one day I noticed a post that he had put on LinkedIn and it was something about his family and I reached out and said like, hey, I saw that, whatever it is, I've had a similar experience.

Speaker 3:

Let me share a little bit about that Again, just to make it more personal than just we only see each other in this business sense. Over the years we've become not just great professional colleagues or professional connections, we've become friends and I have brought on new business to my fractional CMO business because he has sent people to me simply by saying, hey, if you're looking for not just these services, which the services I offer are not all that unique from other fractional CMOs or agencies but because Jeff's just the type of person he is would align with this organization that you're building, mr Co-Founder or Founder, you should really be talking to Jeff. That never would have happened had our relationship stayed. Hey, here's a cool technology. Hey, there's this, you know. Hey, what are you doing with AI Like, and so it took literally six years and a bunch an effort for us to bring that relationship to a little bit more personal one, and the outcome of that was he literally talked about me when I wasn't in the room.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and you know it's funny and, Jeff, both of us being fractional CMOs, I always get these like general, like hey, we can refer you to other fractional CMO. You know potential clients and I always say, looking back at all the business I got, it is 100% relationship based. It is 100% of people that already know me or that got a very, very warm introduction. And that's the other part that we didn't talk about is, when you build a relationship with someone, you also potentially get introduced to their network. And then we look at the LinkedIn, the first degree connection, versus all those secondary connections. It becomes really powerful. So, Jeff, this has really been awesome, A lot of great advice. I know that obviously you know you're a fractional CMO, so I do want to give you a chance to talk about what you've been working on lately and if someone is really into what you're talking about and wants to reach out to you, how can they do that?

Speaker 3:

Yeah. So thank you for having me, Neil, it's been a great conversation. My business again coming back to the who I am and what makes me tick and what I get out of life, I've really focused over the last few years building my business as a fractional CMO with a focus on purpose-driven startups. I am a big believer that the next great startup or the cure for cancer, the solution to climate change, the whatever macro issue we have as a society, will be solved by a startup that is either trying to launch or hopefully will launch, or maybe is a year into their journey. And so that's my passion is stepping into those roles and, with those organizations, to say how can I help with bringing your product or service to market, growing your users, bringing in some fundraising so that, hopefully, what you're trying to accomplish will have a massive impact on the world and, as we've talked, and our kids, right? So that's what gets me up in the morning and going throughout the day, At the same time being a mentor, collaborating with other people huge part of what I do because I want to give back, I want to.

Speaker 3:

You know, as Bill did for me, I want to do for others. I can be found on LinkedIn or Jeff at misnomerco, or go to my website, misnomerco. And you know I'm happy to connect and collaborate and really appreciate just being a part of this and aligning with someone. And you know, while this may be the with someone and you know, while this may be the beginning of our professional relationship, neil.

Speaker 1:

It certainly won't be the end of it. Yeah, definitely. You know it's funny because a lot of people they want to start a podcast because they want to monetize it and it's like one of the huge ROIs of doing a podcast is to be able to interview people like yourself and be able to develop those relationships. I was thinking the same thing and on that note I have to comment. So I see a Shea Stadium and a Giant Stadium poster behind you. So I am assuming you are a New Yorker or have some New York connection.

Speaker 3:

I don't hear it in the accent, but I well, I am a New Yorker born and raised, lived in New York my entire life until I moved here to Southern California 11 years ago when Cricket Wireless which I didn't know what Cricket was being a New Yorker they said, hey, we need you out here to really launch our brand strategy and grow our e-commerce. And my wife had lived in San Diego previously and so it was kind of like an easy decision. But I hold true to my New York roots, despite the fact that my oldest son is a Padres fan and likes to kind of give me a hard time whenever the Padres are playing the Mets. But I am a true New Yorker. I've worked hard at getting rid of the accent, but if you put a pizza in front of me and you see how fast I eat it, you will know that I am still a New Yorker by DNA.

Speaker 1:

Well, I want to say you know Mets and Giants. I take it. You know what part of New York are you from? I don't want to take a guess, but I'll let you explain. Yeah, I'm from.

Speaker 3:

Long Island and typically a Mets fan is a Jets fan because they shared a stadium for so long. So it's kind of as people. I mean people have been telling me I'm odd my entire life but there would definitely be people who would say, as a New Yorker, it's more rare for someone to be a Giants fan and a Mets fan. But you know, sometimes you just can't help who you fall in love with.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you know, my parents were from New York, so a lot of respect for New Yorkers. And yeah, I mean hey, for those of you who are, you know, who are dissing on the Mets. I mean I remember the days of Dwight Gooden and Daryl Strawberry and I've been a Dodger fan all my life and, you know, very happy these days. But yeah, mets are always a good team in the contention and you know everybody. You know everybody. You know, when I saw the dodgers play the red socks in the world series, the one thing that the fans agreed on was the yankee suck chant, and I'm sure we can. I also see one last question. I also see a soccer ball there. So I'm thinking new york red bulls. Maybe you played soccer, so, and my, my kid, plays soccer, so what's the connection there?

Speaker 3:

yeah, so this is actually a ball that was signed by leo. Oh wow, one of my clients works with Leo Messi and his brand and so when I started working with them and I would go down to South Florida to spend time with them, I had an opportunity to get this autographed soccer ball. So you know my kids play soccer. You know I'm not much of a soccer player, but you know it's Leo Messi, right?

Speaker 1:

The ROI of relationships. There you go Right, right there.

Speaker 3:

Exactly Very cool, and I'll say this too, just to kind of wrap this up. If you want to talk about unhealthy relationships, all right. I could write six books and do God knows how many podcasts about the unhealthy relationship of being a Mets fan, because there is very little in this world that is as gut-wrenching as being a Mets fan when the alternative, growing up in New York, is a Yankees fan. So my brother's a Yankees fan, a lot of my friends are Yankees fans and they're like oh, we have all these world championships, we're the greatest team you know global icons, and if you want to have an inferiority complex, be a Mets fan. It is a toxic relationship, but one I will never let go of.

Speaker 1:

You know it's like being an Angels fan, but the Angels are just so bad that people don't even care.

Speaker 1:

But the Mets obviously have had some really good years in the past, so really fun talking to you, jeff, getting to know you. I'm sure our paths will cross again, especially since we both live in Southern California. Thanks for joining us everybody. Please reach out to Jeff on LinkedIn or go to misnomerco. That's M-I-S-N-O-M-E-Rco. Jeff, thanks again and, you know, hope to see you in real life in the near future. You got it. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1:

All right, I hope you enjoyed that interview. Hey, I hope you're already subscribed to this podcast, but if you're not, hope you'll hit that subscribe button and if you had a minute before the end of the year I would love to hear from you is in the form of a review. You know, podcasters are always looking for more reviews of their podcasts, especially because this podcast is still at the double digit number of reviews on Apple podcasts and therefore, every once in a while I will just remind you if you haven't. But you found value. It would really mean a lot to me if you could just spend a second going to your Apple podcast app. It's really easy to, you know, put a star rating and then write a quick review One or two sentences is totally fine and then take a screenshot, send it to me, neil, at neilschafercom. I would love to hear from you and, yes, today's podcast was all about relationships and I would love to have the opportunity to deepen my relationship with all of my podcast listeners.

Speaker 1:

Alrighty well, that's it for another episode, my podcast listeners. Alrighty well, that's it for another episode. This is your digital marketing coach.

Speaker 2:

Neal Schaefer signing off. You've been listening to your digital marketing coach Questions, comments, requests, links. Go to podcastnealschaefercom Get the show notes to this and 200 plus podcast episodes, and nealschaefercom to tap into the 400 plus blog posts that Neil has published to support your business. While you're there, check out Neil's digital first group coaching membership community if you or your business needs a little helping hand. See you next time on your Digital Marketing Coach.

Speaker 1:

Your digital marketing coach.