Paul Bradley - The Pulse Of Your Online Community

Paul Bradley - The Pulse Of Your Online Community

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Jim Fuhs: [: 00:00:00

Paul Bradley: Hello guys. Welcome, sir. I, I can't believe you guaranteed that I wouldn't disappoint. I I'm not, I'm not, um, feel pressure. I'm not re I'm not reissuing that guarantee. That's your guarantee, right? So you're gonna have to carry me. I'm not. This is up to you.

Chris Stone: Well wait. You know, it's deal casters, Paul. We always like to give people a deal and I feel like a guarantee, like I, I'm so confident in you, Paul, that I can, I can do that.

y you know, there, there are [: 00:01:00

Conference and an event in San Diego. And, um, you know, it was great meeting you got along, um, you know, uh, as, as fast friends and, uh, it's really great to be able to, to connect here. And, uh, obviously we have mutual friends and, um, and, and coworkers. Uh, as far as Christine, uh, Gritman is concerned and obviously Deb and.

And, uh, it's a, it, it's kind of a small town in that respect, but it was the, the actual, I guess considered the actual launch of what is now, you know, known as social media pulse. Mm-hmm. And so, uh, for, uh, for those who are watching for the first time and are sort of like, what, what is this? Is this another thing?

h, you know, I, I would love [: 00:02:00

Um, and probably only use about, you know, 15% of the maximum, you know, capacity that this thing actually has, uh, for, for managing social media. But the social media pulse community, um, was launched there, which is what, you know, you're, you're headed up, uh, to do that. Can you maybe, um, sort of speak to what each of those is for, uh, for someone who are, who's just kind of like maybe a, has just maybe a general idea.

Paul Bradley: Yeah, so Agora Pulse, um, the mothership is a French company who is a social media management tool. Um, you know, you've probably heard of things like Hootsuite and Sprout Social. We compete in that space and we compete really well. Uh, we have the best reviews out of all of those companies and, and, and of our other competitors.

the tool, managing multiple [: 00:03:00

And I would lose clients all the time 'cause I could never officially like prove to them. How what they were paying me was coming back to them as more money, and it's quite simple, right? If I had something that could have shown me that, and this is, this is anecdotal, but it's not something I've even queued up.

It's so true though. When we, when we released this ROI tool, I was like. I might actually not be in the community business if, if this existed 12 years ago, which in hindsight, I'm glad it didn't because I love the field that I'm in. Um, but you know, I, I, I would lose clients all the time for that reason.

thing. Um, and, and so, uh, [: 00:04:00

Okay. Um, so there is an odd distinction there. Um, we often call it the separation of church and state. Um, we, we don't market Agora Pulse here in the community. You know, when I began interviewing for this job a little over a year ago. I was really taken aback by the passion of Emeric, our, our CEO and Michael Alta, who's, who's my boss, um, our Chief Revenue Officer.

And they were just really wanting to do something for the industry and say like, we've got this, you know, we had the existing social media manager school mm-hmm. That, you know, Philis Care is still, is still, uh. Part of and, and, and, and running. And that Andrea Val had been a part of in the past, and, and people in our industry, they, they know that, um, property and, uh, we just after purchasing it two years ago, didn't have, like, couldn't come up with the right idea for how to steward it.

y idea was born out of a few [: 00:05:00

Right. And so as we all talked through it in the interview process, it was the three of us, it became this whole thing, um, which is social media pulse that is. A comprehensive one-stop shop for you to network with other social media managers who are like you. Who are people you want to be like? Who are people you're gonna be like, uh, who are people you used to be like, you know.

ight now has seven brand new [: 00:06:00

And we're gonna keep building this machine where our job board, which by the way, today, I. Amanda Robinson just told me that she got a job from our job board. It was just like one of those moments. Awesome. Yeah. Yeah. She, she's, she's working with Meta now because of our job board. So amazing. That's so meta.

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And she's brilliant. That's why she got the job we're, we can't take that much credit. It is very meta though. Um, so, um, yeah, so, um, you know, it's, it's got a lot of working parts that are all meant to be sort of a soup to nuts place for you to come. Like the ideal state is. You think of a person who comes and has no knowledge of how to service clients or work on a social media team, and they start taking courses and they start interacting in the community and they start, you know, uh, helping other people.

own, you know, bonafides and [: 00:07:00

And because of the way the job was posted, they know immediately that person's qualified because the certifications that we've given them are vetted by that, those very hiring managers and whatnot. So, um, it's all free. It costs nothing. Like I said, it's back to that sort of wanting to take responsibility for the industry, not wanting to pass on any cost to somebody who wants to become an expert in this industry, in this field.

Um, and sort of just like. Pass that along to them. And, and, you know, it's, it's a, it's a big part of how we feel like we can give, like, spread the values of Agorapulse, which internally Agorapulse is quite a benevolent company and it's quite a pleasant place to work. Um, and, and I can't restate that enough.

'm not lying when I say that [: 00:08:00

So, um, yeah, we're, we're really, I'm really excited to have gotten this opportunity to, to run a community that's out there just specifically to help people, you know, and I've been doing that for 10 years. And when, when you, when you work in a support community or, or a marketing community, your goal is to help people.

But at the end of the day, the company's goal is for you to deflect calls or for you, you to drive people to buy products at the and and everything. So you can live as though all you care about is helping people. But it's not, it doesn't go both directions. In this case it does. So for me as a community manager, you always kind of have those two things in con in contrast with one another.

And I don't in this case, which is, which is kind of ideal. And so I'm really excited about it. Yeah. Because

Chris Stone: it's like, you know, it, it's powered by Agora Pulse, right? Yeah. But the, the. Yeah. What you're doing, you have to maintain trust with someone that there's, okay, when is the sales pitch coming, right?

you know, like, when is the [: 00:09:00

This is free. And, um, we're, we're, we're giving to you. It's a. It's an interesting balance that you guys have.

Paul Bradley: Yeah. Well, yeah. It's true that any, like, trust is, is the key thing in community. Like you want a community manager to have empathy. You want them to have curiosity, and those are the words I talk about from the personnel side all the time.

that you're creating, you're [: 00:10:00

And so you have to get them into the, you have to get into their daily routine in some capacity that, that is, you know, different from what they're used to. And so in order to do that, they're gonna have to trust you. And so that trust as well, you have to nurture it every day, and you can never break it.

Uh, in the course of our discovery process, you know, we were working to figure out what the pain points were for social media managers across the board, and I did that for months just interviewing people. And I talked to somebody who, um, had previously been heavily engaged in, in a competitor's community, and she said, you know, one day I.

They just sort of abandoned the project. Um, and, and they only abandoned it for like a month. Um, but they told us that it was, it was not, we didn't know how long it would be. They came back a month later, they tried to get us all back and we were done. It was like, that was it. You broke trust and, and, and now we're not doing it.

ong misstep once or twice or [: 00:11:00

Those people still have other places to go where they can get information about that. You as a representative of that company, still have a lot of trust you need to build. Um, and that, so that's kind of where I started was, was I in for a number of years working for companies where there kind of wasn't, um, some trust about where they should be getting this information.

Where it's like, I'm getting it from this LinkedIn group, why should I get it from you? And one of the things I talk about all the time is you're talking about not using the rented land or, you know, doing things in different places. One of the things I think about is don't try to compete with. Uh, platforms that are doing things well already.

book group, well, I, I'm not [: 00:12:00

Um, and so kind of that's. That's what you're up against always. And that's what we were up against back in those days, trying to get people over from LinkedIn groups. And so it's, it's been the same game. It's just been a little bit different. So when you're talking about like moving away from like the traditional social media platforms, it's just an evolution of that same concept of.

You're constantly trying to get people to come to something like Amazon Live. Right. Which they mm-hmm. They don't necessarily know that's a thing, you know, and it's, it never ends and it seems to just be changing ever faster, you know? Yeah. The places where we consume this stuff.

Chris Stone: Yeah. And it sounds to me like, um, and, and we had this conversation in San Diego as well, you know, you can build a, a community on an existing thing like Discord or an existing thing like Slack or an existing thing, like, you know, all of, you know, Facebook groups or whatever.

You [: 00:13:00

Paul Bradley: Yeah, and so, um, one of the things about building community that I always say is, is if somebody tells you they know how to do it across the board, stop listening to that person.

Um, because the community is, is different. Every single use case that you enter into, um. And so I've done things in communities that have worked really well and I've taken 'em right to almost an identical community, right? Let's say the difference was it's a community for the same product owner, one in the us, one in Canada, and those same tactics fell flat in Canada because there's a difference between a Canadian person and an American person as much as we joke, you know, like culturally there's a difference and you, you have to think about those things.

're. Building community. Um, [: 00:14:00

Jim Fuhs: Yeah. We've got, we've got a question on, on Amazon from, uh, Zach, uh, Mitchum. And he wanted to know, he just recently decided to start a paid community over a course and, um, what do you think of that?

I mean, do you think that's, you know, 'cause because if you think about what you guys originally had. With, you know, before you developed this, it was a school, right? It was a social media manager's school. Like you talked about. Now you've developed a new community, but you still have the courses there for the community to enjoy.

What's your, what's your thoughts on that?

is gauged on in terms of its [: 00:15:00

So, um. I people who are, are trying to get out there and build community from scratch, obviously they, they need to try to build revenue. And so I think that when you're talking about a course and something you've put blood, sweat, tears, expertise into, you know, there's tons and tons of precedent, uh, for, for, uh, paid communities around courses.

To your point, the social media manager school. Right. And I think as well, if you are a practitioner individually, there's a living to be made there. Absolutely. If, if you're a practitioner at a corporate level with hundreds and thousands of employees, it better be, I think, your only business, right? Like, 'cause you're, you're competing in a massive space.

But if you're talking about somebody who's going out there on the hustle trying to teach people how to do stuff, build a course, build a name for themselves, make themselves an influencer, I think it's a great idea and that Zach, uh, should absolutely do it. Awesome.

Jim Fuhs: Yeah, and I think that makes a lot of sense.

now Chris and I. We've been, [: 00:16:00

And then of course, courses change. And so I think there's a dynamic when it's community because when you get the people in the community, I, it seems like, and we're, and we're both members of the social media Pulse community just to, to be, uh, upfront with everyone, right? People can ask questions and you sometimes can get a different perspective or actually get questions that you wouldn't have thought of, right?

'cause sometimes we think we know all the answers, and then somebody will ask you a question like, oh, I didn't think of it that way. And I, so I think. I don't know. Do you see that too, as kind of a difference between say, course versus community as well as it's as more interactive?

sly like the course ought to [: 00:17:00

Right. And so I think even going back to your question from before about, you know, using Slack, using discord, things like that, I also wouldn't say that those things are bad. Anybody getting together and, and having community is great. The way that we, the, the reason we did it the way that we did it. Um, was because again, we have that luxury, but also going back to the community is different every time we chose an open source solution and a, and a, and a kind of a tandem of solutions because of that feeling of, I don't know what we're gonna need or want, I don't know what, how this thing's gonna go.

And having used some of the more traditional, uh, online community platforms in the past. Been in a situation where it's like we evolved to need something new, and then they would tell us, it's not on your roadmap for two years, or this, this isn't on our roadmap now. And then you're in an even more deeper pit of despair because it's like, well the last thing you told me was in the roadmap for two years.

doing it that way, you know? [: 00:18:00

Anything's better with a follow-up conversation.

Chris Stone: We've got another question from this one's from Zach. Um, uh, how should I price my community? I work with Fortune 500 accounts and nationwide marketing agencies for YouTube services now. So the price is way, uh, different. And then the second part of that question, uh, which didn't fit into one of my, uh, handy dandy banners, is should I offer a small amount of lifetime memberships?

IE one year cost is a lifelong membership for 10 people or so.

a regular basis is I. Having [: 00:19:00

Whether that's like a job board that companies pay for access to, a directory that companies pay for access to. Um, and I think that there's a lot of information out there in terms of how you would charge for things like that. And something in the question like this for Zach, I don't necessarily have an answer.

Um, 'cause I, I just haven't, I, I don't have his experience with, with providing those kind of services and, and or charging for a community like that.

Chris Stone: Well, I like, you know, and, and sort of what you, you spoke about earlier and why you used, uh, the service that you did is you didn't know quite yet, um, like if you needed to, you know, kind of like, well it seems to be going this way.

You want to be able to utilize something that morphs with it. You know, like, I think a lot of times we. We aren't in control of a lot, especially this stuff. Right? Yeah. And so all of a sudden, you know, Jim and I had this vision for what we wanted for this show. It is not what you see and hear right now.

can promise you that. Yeah. [: 00:20:00

But you can't, I mean, you could sit down and say you have this vision for exactly everything that you want for your community, for your brand and for whatever. But you gotta be malleable. You gotta be able to, to be like a shark. And, and, and do this. And kind of be like, because who knows if Elon Musk buys Twitter one day or who knows if, you know, whatever happens, um, you know, something else is launched or whatever, you're gonna have to, you're gonna have to shift or that rug gets pulled out from underneath you.

You're the community that you did, uh, have is gone because you weren't able to accommodate, uh, what. What they really needed and what you thought they did when you, when you started.

um, problems I've had on the [: 00:21:00

Like, and, and what the problem I had was, was being static and feeling like this, this was never gonna change so that I could accommodate my customers. But if you're, if you're on the major platforms, you never know what's gonna be tomorrow, right? And, and people make entire careers. Figuring out what's gonna happen tomorrow.

And in fact, those people are writing articles on social media posts because that's one of the biggest things social media managers told us was I need to have access to sources of authority who actually can track what's going on or who can get. Instagram to talk to them or whatever, when they make a change.

So I wrote one of those articles. I was, I was say, that's Christine,

Chris Stone: when Christine asked me to do that. Mm-hmm. And see, I think this is the other thing too, um, is that you'd be surprised at to how many people would, are, are, would like to give stuff like that. And I think that that's one of the things that I, I realized shortly into this thing, like how much content was being.

this. I mean, it's like, you [: 00:22:00

And you could find something and you'd be surprised. I, I was. I mean, I was surprised. Not, I mean, listen, Agora Pulse, social media, pulse, you guys, Christine, Deb, fantastic people, but I'm like, oh man, this is like, you know, so I, I think a lot of times it's like, I mean, maybe you feel this way, Paul, like people are willing to give something to something, uh, like this.

Just kind of see what happens.

d this thing, to your point, [: 00:23:00

And we ran into almost no. Nobody in, in, in opposition to that. And, and so we've also been overwhelmed by the flow of content that, to your point, Christine, that Deb have been able to bring in the people that they've been able to bring in and activate in the community. It's been super humbling. Um, not only that, Ruth Inman, our director of education, she has contacts, uh, you know, we've got the social media world covered with, with Ruth and Deb and Christine, or, or sorry, with, with Christine and Deb, but, and Ruth to another degree.

But, but Ruth brings in this academic. Uh, component that it really diversifies the group of people that we get to the community as well. And they're educators and she's got this assessment advisory board that she's built out of professors and people who own agencies who used to be in education. And they're really gonna help us professionalize our, uh, our certifications.

So we're, we're excited about that.

Jim Fuhs: [: 00:24:00

Or you know, maybe bring someone in, I know Deb's talked about it, to help them think about like, well, how do I incorporate video, whether it's live streaming or recorded into our business processes, because that's a big part of what. People are doing on social can, can you talk a little bit more about

Paul Bradley: that?

People, yeah, people want to, that's a great point that you bring up. People want to talk to each other, you know, and that's what we found when we did Discovery, talking to 40, 50, 60 different social media managers of different personas. They talked about, I want access to people like me. I want people like me to be honest with me about their failures.

then you're getting into con [: 00:25:00

Um, and so that was one of those things where, where things kind of changed for me, like, like to your point of, you know, as a community manager, I. Would always say like, you can't have something that's in a contained environment. Community's all about being out in the open. But then when I thought about people saying that, that my business is contingent on this sort of persona, suggesting that I don't make mistakes.

ity is spec can specifically [: 00:26:00

Um, from there.

Chris Stone: Yeah. Yeah. And I think a, a lot of times just like, you know, we keep on going to Zach. Zach, you're like the Yeah. You're like the, the, the CogAT apparently now, um, on this thing. But I think, you know, like today was the day that Zach asked this question about this. Right? Well, you know, if you re rewind all of our sort of content creator Mark marketing lives somewhere along the lines.

We got better. Um, by asking someone a question, and if you ask that question in a vacuum or you try to do it yourself or you try to research it yourself. Um, you may get an answer, um, but it may not be a, a, a as great of an answer as you could if you just put it out into a community and see what ha what comes back to you.

nkedIn used to be like that, [: 00:27:00

I mean, you can't scroll without seeing emojis and people doing dances. Uh, like, it's like it's TikTok, but. Um, I think in order to get better, would you agree that sometimes you're gonna have to pull down a wall and put a question out there and hope that there's gonna be somebody in a valuable community like this that's going to give you an answer that's that's gonna help you?

question, I manage it for the: 1000

ood community where a person [: 00:28:00

So, yeah, like, ask your question. 'cause you never know how many people it's gonna help. We were having an academic conversation today as a team, um, about anonymous questions. Right? And, and how they can be serviced. Like, to your point, it goes back to what we were talking about before. There's an on a Facebook group, you can ask an anonymous question and the moderator can see it and they'll often ask it.

And I'd said in community, you know. Anonymity is, is for your, your burner Twitter community. It's about being yourself and getting an answer and, and your own voice is a big part of why your answer ought to be valued or, or whatever. But then we kind of came onto this idea of, well, what if we had anonymous questions group?

ed us this question, here it [: 00:29:00

So I, I do think that there's, there's, and this goes away from your, your question, I do think there's a world where we could have anonymity, but like, it goes against the how my brain works, which is everything ought to be back again. You know? So, so there always exceptions to the rule. Um, and you find them, you find them here and there, but yeah, you know.

It's getting people to change their behavior, getting people to ask questions. It's hard and off it goes back to trust. It goes back to trust. Like if you earn their trust over time, if somebody's coming to your community, um, years, maybe as a lurker. I, for, for instance, me, I, I taught myself community. I. 12 years ago or, or, or, or 10, 11 years ago when I started Intel by roaming my Android phone, I, I didn't know how to do it.

d it took, it took two years [: 00:30:00

I try to make environments where you don't feel intimidated by the expertise of the people involved, but. Um, yeah. You know that the, the big barrier is that, is is somebody saying like, okay, I have, I, I need to get out there, I need to put myself out.

Chris Stone: Yeah. And I, we, we covered it last week on our show with, uh, Kelly, normal Mirabella and Kendra Loey, and you touched on it here, lurking.

And, um, uh, we, I do my, uh, a fair bit of lurking. It's not really creepy, but I think there's a ton of things that. You can learn by lurking, right? Um, and if, and you can obtain the answers to your questions like you're saying. If somebody gives a good answer and the 120 people also wanted to know, um, that answer, they got the answer and they moved on.

data too. You're, you're not [: 00:31:00

Yeah. And it may not be, uh, this show, it may be this show two years from now. It may not be this show. It may be an, uh, you know, another show. And we'll get calls and comments about things that we've done. A year and a half ago, um, or, you know, that that helped someone. And so why not give and just don't expect that, that whatever sort of return on your investment of time or, or whatever you gave to be immediate.

It, it may be a longer, a longer game, but yeah. Lurking is, um, lurking is another way to kinda learn stuff as long as you're, as long as you just don't sit back in consumption mode. Right. At some point, these, all of this information that's on social media pulses, people gotta use. Right. They gotta start doing it.

ll, yeah, but I mean, I also [: 00:32:00

Maybe somebody else can claim it. I love it. I love, I love the super lurker, right? The person who is just getting value and they don't even see a need to say anything because they're just getting value from you all the time. And I also think about even like, like a light touch lurker. For instance, I had this Nissan car for years.

That the steering wheel would lock, and I couldn't get it started and I could never remember how to unlock it. God forgive me. Like I, for whatever reason, I couldn't retain that knowledge and I, I would just google like Nissan steering wheel locked or whatever, unlock it, and I would end up on this community that was public that I didn't have an account on, and it would unlock my, I unlock my car in two seconds, end up at the same thread every single time.

I never created an [: 00:33:00

A a guy came to me once and said, I've got this thing bookmarked in the community, and it helps me every day when somebody brings up something that everyone knows I should know. I forget. And so it's like we've all been there in our job where it's like, oh God, you must know this. It's your job. You have to know it.

Otherwise we're, we're really losing. You're gonna lose some face. This guy said that to me and I was like, that's one of the more powerful things anybody's ever said is I helped you not feel like an idiot because we all know the power of of. When you know you're an idiot, but you're able to make people think you weren't.

It's huge.

Chris Stone: I can't think of

Paul Bradley: a better

me over it later. Don't feel [: 00:34:00

Samantha Kelly, how are you? Chuck Crk. What's up? Um. The Queen of the Purple Army is, is lurk listening right now in a grocery store. So we have that. And off the jacks, Cheryl, um, what is up, she says, she proudly asks dumb questions, so I. Um, love that. You know what, I haven't heard a dumb question yet from Cheryl, but I can attest.

bringing up, lurking brings [: 00:35:00

Lurk, lurk, lurk, lurk. If you're here lurking,

Jim Fuhs: let us know. We wanna know. Just type in there, just type in the word lurk and We'll, we're, we're good with that. Just so we can identify who our, who our lurkers are. That's right. So if you, you're

Chris Stone: on any of the other tubes, Twitch, YouTube, uh, Twitter. Uh, Facebook, LinkedIn.

Uh, head on over to Amazon, where our friends are here. Uh, going nuts. Doug Lehman, uh, breaking it down in layman's terms. Just join, uh, go to deal casters live. And we're joined here live with Paul Bradley of Social Media Pulse, who has, um, the, uh, two of the world's most amazing whiteboards? Um. Behind him. I know it's such a

Paul Bradley: great background.

Chris Stone: Right. We, we didn't put those in the Amazon carousel, unfortunately. We should have.

Paul Bradley: Yeah, we should

Chris Stone: have. They did come from Amazon, so. Oh, okay.

to ask you the question, and [: 00:36:00

In becoming a part of the Amazon influencer program or wanna maybe get better. And two, should we try to create a community with those that follow us so they kind of know when we're going live because Amazon wants us to get followers, it's just not always the easiest thing to do. Um, how, how would you see that possibly working?

Do you have any thoughts on that?

Paul Bradley: Yeah, so I would say if you can identify who your followers are. Start interviewing them and asking them why they watch the show, what they like to learn from you, and what maybe they're learning from you or not learning from you that they'd like to learn. Um, I potentially, I could see you guys have had success in developing this show.

Live and, and make money off [: 00:37:00

If you're just wanting to sort of give that away and, and say, you know, this is what we learned. We'd like to pass it along to you. Um. I think starts with though, with the people who are here today, you know, if, if they, if they are interested in following you, talking to them, saying, okay, all right, why do you listen to the show?

And in a lot of cases, you're, you know, some of these people, but in some cases you don't. And, um, figuring out what, what makes it unique to them, spreading it to other people who might find unique value there using social media, um, and using your management tool and, and, and targeting people. You know, I, I think those would all be good tactics.

And, and one of the things, so it's like. It always starts with who you got at the beginning. Um, and if you know your audience, you're lucky. And so in the case of of Agora Polls, we were lu really lucky to know our audience and have a lot of people who liked us that would talk to us. In your case, you've been doing the show, so imagine you've got a built-in audience, um, but then you could always just be looking out for the folk.

I mean, [: 00:38:00

I never heard of it. I never knew it was a revenue stream. And then b, you guys have been doing it for a while, so you're experts, right? And so figuring out a way to sort of purvey that out to the masses, I think it'd be easy for you. Awesome. Awesome.

Jim Fuhs: And, and our, our other co-host, uh, Zach has another question.

If you're doing a paid community, should you offer a free membership for moderators to help your community stay, um, active. That's actually

Paul Bradley: interesting. I think moderators are, um, you wanna do anything to hang on to moderators, so offer them as many benefits as you can. Um, anybody who's, who's going to be active, um, in helping you out in managing a community is worth their weight in gold.

, and so if you don't have a [: 00:39:00

Jim Fuhs: Yeah. Yeah. And, and I see that Deb says that, uh, I know Deb's been in communities, uh, probably, probably about as long as you Paul May, I know she's been doing it for a long time, since it's a strategy that totally works and that makes sense, right?

'cause they're giving up their time a lot of times. 'cause in a sense, they're like the, uh, the super fans that Pat Flynn talks about, that, you know, if they get to get more active and involved. They, they do it out of love of the community, probably sometimes more than anything else. And to your point, if you can roll more to more eventually, great.

And, and I've seen some cases too where people that maybe started out as community moderators, right, they've actually at some points got offered jobs by some of these companies. So I think that's, uh, that's a great, uh, great point. And also a, a very good question from, from Zach.

, and to, to, to that notion.[: 00:40:00

When I was at a DPI started, I was the only community manager on staff and, and we had a really successful program support community built out. And we had moderators who are from our support team who out of the goodness of their hearts, would come in after a long day and clean up dozens of questions and three of them.

Um, Stephanie Voss Smith, who to this day is running community, um, for them, but she was, she was support. She had 10, 15 years of support under her belt. Stephanie Hertz, Janelle Cooley, these are all people that got hired into community Within a year or two of just starting to go there at a DP as something that was outside of their job function.

Their boss didn't tell 'em to do it. To your point, they just felt like. They wanted to help people who had problems with this product and they had the knowledge to do it, and they changed their careers fundamentally outta it. And that's, that's I think one of the fun things about it. You guys are in social media, I'm in community, I've been in social media.

is a great option. Much like [: 00:41:00

I've seen a ton of it in community as well.

Jim Fuhs: Yeah. And uh, something too I want us to clarify for people, because I think sometimes, you know, social media pulse is not just for social media managers, right? It's for people that wanna learn it, right? That's part of the, the educational part and learning from people that have successfully done it.

So, I think I. Sometimes people may say, oh, well this is for people that are already social media managers, but that's not really the case. Am I correct there?

Paul Bradley: That is correct. Yeah. You know, and, and as we're building our audience that the full breadth of that will, will build out. You know, I think that at the beginning, you know, we're, we're up near a thousand members this stage.

the high end of social media [: 00:42:00

Whether it's just to mentor people or to get their profile raised or to, you know, get, get, get, um, exposure to some things that they do so that they, you know, can move on and do more influencer things, but also that, you know, somebody could build from zero to that person. And thereby, if we think about that journey, we serve everybody in between.

Chris Stone: Yeah. And it's, yeah, it's, it, it's difficult to do, like when you come in at first and there's all of that. It's just, it can be overwhelming to someone that's, you know, on any, uh, part of that spectrum. So you, yeah. But you're, it sounds like you're building it the right way, and we've got some comments here about I.

they're building, um, this, [: 00:43:00

And it, I, I guess, you know, for us as well, and, uh, initially before we started having, you know, teams that we, uh, you know, teams of people that we use to do our, our collective businesses. Doing it by yourself is a lot, it can take a lot of time, whether you're managing a Facebook group that may have a hundred or more people, but they're solid.

Right? They're, you know, like these are not just fly by night, you know, um, people, these are people, you know, it's all of that stuff. You wanna be responsive, you wanna be, you wanna manage a really great, it, it just feels like a lot of time or, you know, and, and I know at you're at a level now where you have teams of people, but what may be some practical sort of strategies.

manage their time while also [: 00:44:00

Paul Bradley: I mean, it's something we talk about all the time.

You know, I talk to agency owners who say they, they are so focused on their current clients. They don't, they don't fully fill the top of the funnel. Or, you know, even myself, going back to when I was, uh, doing Twitter growth hacking and voice development for 50 clients, guess who's growth hacking and voice development suffered mine.

Right. You know, and so, um, totally understand when you are, when you are. Functioning, like doing everything on the hustle, working for yourself. So solopreneur, you know, um. Our community has sort of built off that persona and I, well, even though we're expanding it out, that's who we are. You know, all of us on this team have run our own businesses.

ve meaningful conversations, [: 00:45:00

Use it as 'cause. The worst thing too is like when you are on the hustle, anytime that you spend with somebody who's not paying you or doing something that's not getting you paid, it's just pushing back the time that that stuff is gonna get done. It makes it an hour later that night and suddenly you're working till 10 30, 11.

And it, it kind of is the same with community where we think about, um, I want somebody who's doing their job to, to not think, to go to social media pulse as a distraction from doing my job. I need to go over there because it's gonna help me do that job today. Um, so I think that if you get a community together, you're a solopreneur, you think about, okay, what's a group of people that I could get together where we're actually helping ourselves get business that day?

little or we've sped up the [: 00:46:00

Jim Fuhs: That's right. 'cause I think sometimes we do work too much. And, uh, I think we got, we, we got time. I think for one final question Zach just brought up. And, uh, are great communities built better by being in a sub niche? Niche within a niche or being in a larger niche. That's, that's interesting. I hadn't thought of that.

Paul Bradley: Yes. Uh, I think great, great communities can be built, um, all of those ways. I think that really active communities can be in tiny little niches. Um, there's a report by Rich Millington, who's kind of a, a top voice in the online community game. And he is been around longer than anyone, uh, other than John O Bacon, but he's got a report out there, uh, that shows.

There was a [: 00:47:00

So if people are really passionate, passionate about that sub niche of a niche, you know, then it's gonna be a great community. If people are really passionate about, you know, supply chain, which is just like an overarching thing, um, it's gonna be a good community. It just, it depends on the passion of the people you get involved, and it depends on your ability as a person running that community to.

nd become really extroverted.[: 00:48:00

You might be at an event where you're recognizing this person as having been the most extroverted, awesome person in your community, and you meet them and they can, they barely speak or something, right. But community revealed something in them that they didn't even know was there. Um, so I, I think that, you know, that's, that's when, that's when something's been done.

Right? Right. And so, again, to dance around the question even more, um, it, it just depends on, it just depends on the level of, of excitement for the people who are involved.

Chris Stone: Amazing, amazing stuff. Thanks. Uh, thanks for all of this, Geraldine Wilkins. Thanks for joining us, uh, in, in the, uh, Amazon chat. Deb Mitchell, um, is, is not a super lurker today.

No. She, what, what do we call, what do we call the polar opposite of a super lurker? Deb Mitchell's on all the tubes. Super, super fan. Maybe. Oh, a fan, super, super fan of Paul Bradley. Probably, I dunno about deal casters just yet.

Paul Bradley: Uh,

Chris Stone: Deb is my partner in

Paul Bradley: crime. She's,

Chris Stone: she's the best. Yes. Yeah, it's a, it's a great team.

here. And, and the folks at, [: 00:49:00

Paul Bradley: what should we call you? I would, I would fall short of Guru and just say, I like to buy a bunch of stuff.

Your free guru and use it. Yeah. Okay.

Chris Stone: Okay. Um, what's, uh, what's up Alex? So, um, yeah, there's a number of these items I'm really intrigued by because, um, you know, they are tech related, but. Kind of off my, my grid, uh, one was this anchor, uh, power bank. Yeah. Um, that I think you had, you had, uh, you had told me that you, you bought them for, for holiday gifts.

I think for, for people I bought eight

hat is it's a portable power [: 00:50:00

Geez. Um, it's not that big and, uh, it will charge a MacBook Pro from zero to a hundred, which you don't find on a power or any laptop. But, you know, one of the things I've found over the years is if a, if a MacBook even takes a charge from your portable power bank. It'll destroy it within about 15 minutes and you'll get like 20%.

Whereas that thing, it's not going to, once you've gone from zero to a hundred on a MacBook Pro, it's going to, it is gonna destroy it, but it's gonna, it's gonna charge it all the way. And that goes for, I have like the new model of MacBook Pro and it will charge it all the way. Um, so I love that thing. I bought one for me and my wife and then when it came down for like buying gifts for the whole family, I'm notorious for buying chargers, particularly power delivery chargers.

ple to this day with like a, [: 00:51:00

Chris Stone: Yeah. And I think now, now, you know, and then Jim and I talk about going to Orlando, um, next week for, for for Pod Fest and Vid Fest. And like, um, things are opening back up. We're gonna be, you're gonna be needing these portable chargers even now more than ever. Right. Uh, to, to steal Tim Stone's, uh, phrase.

But, um, yeah. So I, you know, I'm always on the lookout for a good, and, um, I'm a fan of Anchors stuff. I, I actually have, um, uh, two chargers, not this one, but I'm, I'm giving it a, uh, a, a very, uh, a laser eye. Um, but I love their, their portable speaker. Um, they have, um, oh, okay. Yeah. And it's in the best, uh, besides the sound.

I, I feel like I hardly ever [: 00:52:00

Paul Bradley: The anchor stuff, I won't buy anything of it. Like all my chargers are anchor.

I don't use any native chargers. It's all anchor stuff. So, and I, again, I'm not, I'm not, no one's even reached out to me. Anchor call me. Oh, they see you now? Yeah. They see you now. Yeah,

Jim Fuhs: that's right. Free. Free anchors for everyone in the social media. Pulse community. Not just kidding.

Paul Bradley: Would've saved me a bunch of money last Christmas.

That's for sure.

Chris Stone: And, uh, it, I, you've got a Samsung Q2 U microphone, which we, um, are, are big fans of. I think it's a, it's a new microphone, uh, uh, for you. Um, and I, and I think one of the things that I, I love mostly about the Q2 U, and I don't know if you've noticed this as well, is plug and play right, goes right into your, um, into your computer, but you can sound almost as good as Jim Fuse.

plugging. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. [: 00:53:00

Paul Bradley: right.

Chris Stone: It's a great microphone.

Paul Bradley: You're

Chris Stone: too kind.

Paul Bradley: Yeah. You're, you're still propping me up from that guarantee at the beginning. That's what this is. Oh, no, we've, yeah.

Chris Stone: No one, no one's gonna be cashing outta the guarantee.

This has been money. This has been money. Um, apparently David s says, the new iPad Pro is supposed to have wireless charging, the one that's coming out. I guess, oh,

Jim Fuhs: I've got, I have the newest one, I'll recent one to check one, and maybe it does,

Paul Bradley: maybe it does wireless. I haven't tried, but it's right here. You guys both bought it and didn't know if it did.

That's interesting. I mean, it's

Jim Fuhs: usc, I just charge it with, uh, the USBC cord, you know? Yeah. Like, yeah, and it lasts a while.

Paul Bradley: The thing for me is that like, I don't, I don't do much wireless charging. I, I have this thing here with it. It's like a stand. For my phone, and so I put my phone on that. It has like the mag safe.

's so convenient that I just [: 00:54:00

Hmm. So I'm throwing shade at wireless charging. That's, wow, that's, that's what's happening. No, that's a, that's a good, I hadn't really thought

Jim Fuhs: about that. I mean, 'cause with the Apple watch, you do have to do the, the wireless charging. 'cause that's kind of the way they, they designed it where you gotta kind of throw it on that little disc to charge it up.

And, uh, but I hadn't really, I've never thought about, and I'm kinda like you Paul, I usually just plug this stuff in. I mean, I have. Some of those mag chargers, like I do have one in my car. I do like that because with the case I have, I just stick it on the charger and it, you know, it'll charge up my phone as opposed to like, oh, I forgot my cable.

at's a, that's a good point. [: 00:55:00

Chris Stone: Well, we're running across the top of the hour.

Um, and we didn't get through everything that you, that you gave us in the carousel, but what you did give us, Paul was an amazing conversation. I know Jim. Um, you know, I, I, I mean, this is just a amazing that, uh, we were able to share this past hour with someone who knows as much as you do, Paul, about this stuff.

I don't know about you, Jim, but I feel like, uh, everybody got a little bit better. Yeah.

Jim Fuhs: Oh yeah. And, and what's exciting, I mean, not only is, is as exciting, make sure you guys check out the chats. Uh, if not, we'll also share it, uh, in our show notes. When this, with the podcast, you can join the community for free.

And, oh, we gotta, we don't wanna get in trouble. Deb said to remind everyone that you do something on Mondays that, that they should pay attention to. I think it's like some sort of news that you put out.

Yeah. The social media news. [: 00:56:00

So just come over on Monday. This is where you can find out. Right here. Yeah. Right. Go to social media, pulse.community. Um, find me on there. Message me on there. Um, and, uh, poke around. Yep. Awesome. Paul,

Chris Stone: thank you so much. Um, everyone here, uh, social media, pulse doc, community, go learn. Um, it, it's there, it's free.

Why wouldn't you want to do this? And Paul, thanks for making good on the guarantee. And as always, don't fear

Jim Fuhs: the gear. Thanks for listening to deal casters. Congratulations, you've taken another step forward in your content creation journey. Please don't forget to hit the subscribe or follow button here in your favorite podcast player so you can be reminded every time we drop an episode.

Chris Stone: We love hearing [: 00:57:00

Jim Fuhs: If you have questions about this episode or have something you want us to review, you can also. So email us at deal casters, deal casters live. Thanks again for listening. And you know, the.