January 24, 2023 • 34 mins
Rachel Simon, CEO and founder of Connect the Dots Digital, helps entrepreneurs of all backgrounds "look good on LinkedIn". LinkedIn is the top networking platform for corporate and entrepreneurial professionals, so ensuring your personal and company profiles are structured with the right information and messaged in a way that immediately connects with your target audience is paramount.
Learn to craft your headline with a hook, exactly how to use that 'Featured Section', modern use of your 'About' copy, and more. We go through every section of the LinkedIn profile and spell out exactly how to use it to your advantage.
Head over to Connect the Dots Digital to learn more about Rachel and ways you can work together.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Erin Geiger (00:02):
Welcome to the Small Business Big mindset
podcast, where we dive intotactical strategies to grow your
business. And to make an impacton this world. A huge part of
success is keeping your mindsetand vision on track. So this is
a major part of our process. Andthis podcast, let's do this.
(00:24):
Hey, everybody, welcome to theSmall Business Big mindset
podcast. I am so excited to havemy friend Rachel on Rachel
Simon, founder and CEO ofconnect the dots digital, she
helps professionals look good onLinkedIn. If I could see the
audience right now. And I took apoll of who needs help on
LinkedIn. I think everybody'slike canned would shoot up. So
(00:46):
thank you, Rachel, so so muchfor being here.
Unknown (00:50):
So excited to be here.
Yeah, it's great to have thechance to chat.
Erin Geiger (00:54):
Love it. She every year, like one of my top
LinkedIn professionals that Ialways go to, for advice,
because like, I feel likeLinkedIn is, as is a lot of
social platforms alwayschanging. And I'm like, Okay,
now what works what's best. Soyou always have the detail. So
why let's just jump right in.
Will you tell me a little bitabout you and your background?
(01:14):
How you got started? Sure, yeah.
Unknown (01:18):
It's kind of a funny story. I think like most good
things in life, you kind of fallinto stuff without planning for
it. So actually spent thebeginning of my career working
in nonprofit. And, you know,nonprofit is all about community
and building relationships. AndI did a lot of program planning.
And I eventually kind of movedinto social media because I had
(01:42):
a personal interest in it. Andthe organization where I was
working, you know, as the late,the late early 2000s, the end of
the aughts, and everything was,you know, social media was just
getting started. And they werevery nervous about social media
strategy. And I was like, let medo it. And so I launched your
(02:05):
social media strategy. And itwas really successful. And my
husband was like, I think wecould do this on your own, I was
working part time and nonprofit,which is not a tremendous amount
of money. Oleg is trying to likebreak down my door right now.
And so I started doing marketingconsulting on my own, which was
(02:28):
pretty scary step at the time,and I was brought into a client
through a friend, where therewas a healthcare company based
here in Atlanta, where I live.
And they, they brought me in todo email marketing, which now I
think is absolutely hilarious,because I do not, I am not an
email marketer at all. And theywere like, Let's put a call to
(02:50):
action in the next email toconnect with the CEO on
LinkedIn. So I take a peek athis profile. And the CEO who had
been in his industry for 30years, had 12 connections 1212,
like one, two. So I politelyrecommended that maybe wasn't
(03:11):
the right time to put that in anemail, because clearly he
doesn't use LinkedIn. And I waslike, why don't we help him
build his LinkedIn presence andget more connections and, and we
can try again in a couple ofmonths when he has a more
respectable network. But whatended up happening was that he
started to see this greatmomentum building, you know,
connecting with not only peoplethat he knew in his industry,
(03:36):
but new clients, and in oneyear, just from kind of putting
a pretty consistent strategytogether, he was able to help
the business close eight newcustomers. So I was like,
There's something really coolhere. And I started doing it for
more and more clients. And thenI incorporated connected dots
(03:56):
digital back five years ago, inJanuary of 2018. And here, we
are not now I focused solely onhelping professionals show up
and use LinkedIn to really helpmeet their business goals.
Erin Geiger (04:12):
Okay, no, that's great. And how, how important
would you say it is, if youwork? A lot of my I have a lot
of entrepreneurs on in theaudience, but also folks who
maybe do entrepreneurial stuffon the side and work for like a
corporate life, you know, thatkind of thing. So, how important
is it on either side of thefence to have someone within
(04:34):
your business within yourcompany, be the face of the
company on LinkedIn?
Unknown (04:41):
It's super important, but that's where you're going to
be found. So let's talk on theentrepreneurs side. You are your
business made? Yes. I have acompany page you have a company
page. But people are hiring me.
Because I am the face of mybusiness because I am my own. I
In the business, and so having aLinkedIn presence that really
(05:02):
shows clearly who you are, whatyou do, why you do it, who you
do it for, and presentexpertise, front and center, is
how people can make thatconnection with you. So that you
are top of mind. And then whenthat need arises, they think you
to solve their problem. On theother side, on the company side.
(05:22):
Same thing, right, except itdepends on you know who that
person is, but let's just usesomebody within the sales team
or a marketing team, right? Theyare not necessarily the face of
their company, but they are abrand ambassador, they're
putting that company brand,brand message front and center,
(05:43):
so that their audience theirnetwork, people who see their
content, associate them with thecompany, and then think about
the company when those needscome up. So it's similar
strategy, but a slightlydifferent approach, depending on
if you're a solo or smallbusiness versus a larger
company.
Erin Geiger (06:05):
Yeah, and I'm seeing that some companies are
putting their, their founder ortheir CEO out there, you know,
depending upon, right, if theyhave the right personality, and
you know, they want to be outthere. But they're kind of
framing them as sort of theirrepresentative, you know, for
the company on LinkedIn. Andthey're having them post like
(06:27):
thought leadership articles, youknow, that sort of thing to kind
of make a more of a holisticview. And so that when people
are kind of checking out like,Okay, do I want to purchase
their product, or their service?
Like, oh, wow, I see their CEOis very active, they're seen as
an expert in this space, youknow, kind of a thing, and it
kind of lends to theircredibility, you know, when
(06:47):
they're looking at their productor service, versus other options
that they might have. So I'mexcited to dive in with you of
like, okay, why it's soimportant to nail your brand
message in the profile. And thenlet's talk about the struggles,
let's get into it. Because it's,it's not easy like you, it's
easy to look at others, youknow, and you're like paying
they're like on LinkedIn liveevery day. Like they're, you
(07:09):
know, they're doing all thiscool stuff. And it's so easy for
them. It's not people arestruggling. So first of all,
let's get into like, why it's soimportant to to nail it. And
then let's talk about some ofthe struggles and solutions that
you have that you've come upwith for your clients.
Unknown (07:29):
Yeah, so when it comes to the brand message? Here's, I
think, something I see often.
And what I tried to help peopleunderstand so many times, we are
so in our business, of course,we know exactly what we do. And
it makes perfect sense. But whenyou look at it from the outside,
that's not necessarily the case.
(07:52):
So use my company name as anexample, if all I had in my
headline was CEO and founder atconnect the dots digital. What
does that company do? I mean,okay, digital, so people might
assume it's some sort of digitalproduct digital agency. But
these days, that means so manydifferent things. So if I don't
(08:14):
clarify that, it puts a lot ofeffort onto my potential
connections, or people in mynetwork to take the time to dig
into my profile and figure outwhat the heck, what the heck
does she do, right, you don'twant people to not have a clue
as to what you do. So when wefeed that, through the headline,
we give that you know, kind ofserve it up at a silver platter.
(08:38):
In, in the about section, it'sso much easier for people to Why
do they want to connect withyou, because they understand
what you do. And that they maypotentially be somebody who
needs to utilize your services.
For example, I see this sooften, there's so many like
funky company names out there,which are super cool. But if
(08:59):
nobody knows what that companydoes, those names don't mean
anything. So I you know, theexample I always like to share
is unless you're the CEO ofDelta Airlines, you gotta give
us a little more information,right? We know what Delta does
probably have all flown Deltamany, many times. Most other
company names are a little bitmore, you know, unclear. And so
(09:21):
let's make it easy for people.
Erin Geiger (09:27):
Right? It could be very ambiguous or hard to spell
and hard to find, as well.
Unknown (09:32):
Yes, exactly. Exactly.
You know, and same with theabout section, you know, so
often, I think an old kind oftrend a couple of years ago,
well, first of all, that shouldalways be written in the first
person, right? Because we wantto build that connection with
our audience. But you know, howmany times have you seen an
(09:54):
about section that starts with Ihave a X number of years
experience doing this, that andthe other. That's great. I mean,
wonderful. But I can see that inyour experience section. And,
frankly, I don't really care ifyou have 1518 20 or 25 years of
(10:15):
experience, can you solve myproblem? First of all, do you
understand what my problem is?
And can you solve it? So leadingwith that problem with that
value proposition, where you areclearly understanding the
(10:36):
challenge that your targetaudience faces is so much more
impactful than just tellingpeople how good you are at what
you do?
Erin Geiger (10:44):
And probably giving examples, right? Instead of just
saying, Oh, I've done this for25 years? It's like, okay, so
what, like, Were you successfulat it? Like, What have you
accomplished? Good point. Soit's like, yeah, so maybe, like,
I don't know, would yourecommend, like telling a story
of like, or, you know, tellingan example of how you've been
(11:08):
successful in what what you do,whether it's in sales, and
you're gonna say, you know, $1amount, or a project you worked
on, or, you know, or somethinglike that, but in telling it,
yes, the way that it'sconnecting, you know, to your
audience,
Unknown (11:22):
storytelling is always a winner. And you cannot go
wrong with storytelling. And Ithink you can also accomplish
that in your experience section,where a lot of times people will
use that section to kind oflike, talk about everything, you
know, all their responsibilitiesthat they had in their past
role, versus give it the highlevel understanding of what you
did, and and what are theaccomplishments? What were some
(11:44):
of the high levelaccomplishments, right, so you
can put those statistics, youknow, quantifying success is
always a good thing, you know,when you can show something that
was measurable, you know, wasable to increase revenue by X
percent, increase sales bywhatever percent. But
storytelling is really good inyour about section. And, you
(12:05):
know, for the entrepreneurs outthere, structure, and I actually
have a have this, like, createdas a slider, like a document
post, I haven't posted it yet.
But a structure that I utilizewith a lot of my clients,
particularly my, you know, smallbusinesses, and those who are
self employed is the structureof their bow section. What is
(12:29):
the problem you solve? Why areyou the right person to solve
it? How do you solve it? Andthen what is the call to action?
How do we get started? So, whenyou think about that, like
almost like a formula, itbecomes a whole lot easier to
write that section and sittingdown to a blank page.
Erin Geiger (12:48):
No, I love that.
And do you also recommend kindof adding some personal info
about yourself in that sectionas well? Okay.
Unknown (12:58):
Yeah, yeah. So you know, that's a great way to get
somebody to make a connectionwith you. So maybe, you know,
you share a little bit about thethings that you like to do
outside of work, right, maybeyou're a marathon runner, or you
are, you know, a big fan ofwhatever sports team, you know,
those are the things you can putthose towards the end of your
(13:20):
headline, again, another goodway to kind of make those points
of connection with peoplebecause you don't know what
someone else's passions are. Andif they have a similar interest
in hobby that you do, it's suchan easy way to start a
conversation, right? It's, it's,I think it's shifting that
(13:41):
mindset of LinkedIn that it is.
It's a job search tool to salestool, it is those things. But
first and foremost, it's anetworking tool. And so the key
to networking, again, is theability to build connection with
people and kind of engage withthem as human to human before we
try to get them to do somethingfor us.
Erin Geiger (14:05):
Yep. And let's go back to the call to action to so
how do you suggest peoplestructure that? You know, I
think some people might be like,What? What do I do? Like, do I
go to my website? Do I like whatyou know, what works? Best? I
guess is the question.
Unknown (14:22):
I usually keep it really simple, you know, like,
DM me or feel free to reach outvia put your email address, or
you can put your Calendly linkif you want to put it I mean,
they're not necessarilyclickable, but it's easy for
people to copy and paste them.
But it's mostly it's more of ainvitation to open that door.
So, you know, this is they'vetaken the time to read your
(14:47):
about section and just let it insaying, you know, hey, feel free
to reach out to me I'd love toconnect. You can DM me, you can
email me call, like my doorsopen
Erin Geiger (15:00):
All right, and I assume shorter is better in this
section. Right? Yeah. Peoplereading a novel.
Unknown (15:06):
Yeah, I mean, you know, you know this from just
copywriting best practices likeyou want it to be easy to read,
keep the lingo to a minimum,that insider baseball language
and make it digestible, right.
So use, you know, you can'tformat through LinkedIn itself,
(15:28):
but you can copy and pastebullets from like, you know,
emoji sites and things like thatnot saying to use a ton of
emojis but break up the textwith some bullets or some arrows
or something to make it easy toread. And, yeah, less is more
Erin Geiger (15:48):
diveagar. And then there's this featured section,
how do you suggest people tacklethat?
Unknown (15:56):
Yeah, this is a fun section, I think. So in the
featured section, if you don'thave it on your profile, you
have to click at the top whereit says Add profile section to
kind of start building that oneout. What I like about it is
that you know, it sits right inthe middle of your profile. And
it has a lot of visual interest.
Because if you share a link tosomething on your website, it
(16:18):
will pull the image associatedwith that link. But you can also
now thankfully, change theimage. So sometimes, like I was
seeing when this feature firstrolled out, you share a link and
it wasn't pulling the graphic.
And so it would get that gray,kind of blobby box. Now you can
(16:39):
actually upload anotherthumbnail, which is really nice.
So I like to use this. So youcan put as many things as you
want there. But you can only seethree full pieces of content.
And as you can see, like an ittybitty piece of the fourth one.
So I usually don't recommenddoing more than four pieces of
content there because I justdon't think people are going to
(17:01):
continue to click through. And Ilike to use it for Call to
Action content. So that might besubscribed to your email list.
Do you have a lead magnet? Ifyou have a LinkedIn newsletter,
you can add that as a featuredcontent. And I think that's a
great piece to put in there. Sosome, you know, you can add
(17:25):
posts, you can put LinkedInarticles, you can upload, you
know, documents and PDFs. But Ithink that having it be
something where someone has totake an action to do something
has been very beneficial. I dothat for myself. So I have my
lead magnet, my newsletter andmy email subscription link. And
(17:46):
I'm always getting more newpeople because it's easy for
them to find it right versusthem having to dig through my
website. So it's a nice tool tobe able to direct people
directly to your website.
LinkedIn doesn't give us a lotof opportunity to do that. So
what we get the opportunity tosend them off site somewhere
means take full advantage ofthat.
Erin Geiger (18:04):
Yeah, no 100% Agree. Oh, and you know, I see
so many different ways thatpeople are leveraging their
banner image on their profilepage as well like their personal
image and in the banner image.
Do you have any kind of insightinto that? Would you recommend
how people should handle that?
Unknown (18:22):
Yeah, I think, first of all, if you're an employee, and
you're comfortable, includingyour company, branding, I think
your marketing director would bevery, very happy with you.
Exactly. I think you'd maketheir day if you went and ask
them for a branded banner foryour profile. If you're a
(18:42):
business owner, you absolutelywant to bring your company brand
into your personal profile. Andif you have multiple things that
you do, you can create graphicsthat showcase those various
things. It's a little trickier,but people do it all the time. I
think the key is just to kind ofkeep it a little. Keep it
(19:03):
simple. And remember that peopleare looking at this on mobile
and desktop. So they look alittle different on mobile and
desktop. But as long as thatvisual brand stays consistent
with whatever your businessbrand is, I mean, that's really
what's nice about it when whenit's empty. It's so sad. I mean,
(19:25):
it's like I describe it when Iwhen I do workshops and you
know, do trainings. It's likeit's the equivalent of a
billboard you see on the streetthat just says your ad here. So
you know, it's one of thoseother tools that let's say
you're creating digitalproducts, you have a course
you're writing a book, you'redoing a webinar, you know,
(19:47):
switch it up, use it as yourbillboard, to showcase whatever
your newest service or offeringor product is. You can change it
as much as you need to as longas the general brand thing stays
the same right with yourwhatever your business branding
is,
Erin Geiger (20:03):
like that kind of looking at it as a billboard or
like an ad unit, really, foryour for your page. And I've,
I've heard that the LinkedInprofile, people look at it as
almost like an ad like anadvertisement for what? For what
they do you know, or what theycan do for others. Okay, we
touched on experience a littlebit, is there the experience
(20:24):
section? Is there more you wantto add there? I know you're
saying like, don't like it's nota laundry list of what you've
done in the past. It's more of ahighlights, like a highlight
reel of what you've accomplishedand how you can help. Is there
anything else that we should bekind of tuned into in that
section?
Unknown (20:42):
Yeah, I think it's just ensuring again, you're connected
to the company pages. What I've,what I see often is, you know,
some people, I've been onLinkedIn for a decade plus,
right, so maybe when theyoriginally put something in
their experience section, theremay not not have been a company
page. But now there is. So justgoing in making sure that you're
(21:06):
connected to the company pagesexist. I've also seen the
opposite, right, where companiesget acquired, and those pages no
longer exist. So there's ways ofkind of putting in brackets,
like let's say you worked for acompany that was acquired by
another one and that brand thatthe company pages gone, you can
stay, you know, acquire imprintsthese acquired by whatever the
(21:28):
new company is. So there's anunderstanding what happened to
that company, keep it highlevel, as again, speaking to the
business owners use that tobullet out your services again,
right, we need to continuouslyrepeat what we do. Because one
user may go straight to ourAbout section, and never look at
(21:50):
experience, another user mightdo the complete opposite, and go
to our experience and never readour About section. So we want to
make sure that we're hittingpeople in all of the places
where they potentially mightlearn about what we do and how
we can serve them.
Erin Geiger (22:06):
Okay, and do you how, how heavily Do you wait,
like the skills section, therecommendation section, because
I, you know, I've seen somepeople who are very seasoned in
their career, and they have,like, maybe they have no
recommendations for themselves.
Maybe they recommended oneperson, you know, or like, their
skills section is like, almostnon existent, like, Does that,
(22:27):
does that hold a lot of a lot ofweight with you? Or what are
your thoughts there?
Unknown (22:33):
I mean, personally, I like to use every section that
we can use. So if I'm workingwith a client, we're going to do
everything that there is to doup on LinkedIn, what I like
about skills now is now we canconnect them into our experience
section. So when you add askill, it's going to ask you,
where did you use this skill?
And you can literally click allthe places and your experience
where you used it. So I thinkit's, it's a more dynamic
(22:56):
function. I know that. You know,it's it weighs into search. So
you coming up in search based onkeywords. It's just a good tool.
It's one of those things, it'slike, why wouldn't you use it to
show sort of the various thingsthat you have expertise in and
making sure it's up to date. Soyou know, everybody who's
(23:16):
listening, go and check out yourexperience, your skill section,
and if you have Microsoft Word,Excel outlet, you need to remove
those, because you probably putthose on there five years, five
plus years ago. I see that allthe time. I was like, pretty
sure we all know how to usethose things right now. Now,
(23:37):
seven or eight years ago, thereprobably was a different levels
of like expertise when it comesto using the Microsoft suite.
But I think we don't need tohave those taking up real estate
in our skills section. Ipersonally put a lot of weight
into recommendations. I mean,nothing is nobody. The best way
(23:59):
to get a sense of what someoneis like to work with is to see
how other people experiencethem. So I like to ask for them.
After I've worked with a client.
I also like to give them whenI've had a good experience,
whether it was working withsomebody or participating in a
(24:22):
training, you know, you don'thave to have a client
relationship with somebody towrite them a recommendation. You
can write a recommendation for apodcast or podcast host that you
are guesting on, and what apositive experience it was and
what a good host they were.
Because you want to give themthe visibility that other people
want to say yes. Where they askif they would like to be on
(24:44):
their show. So thinking aboutthe recommendations, not just in
a client perspective, but howelse can you help highlight
people was there you know, abook that you read by one of
your LinkedIn connections thatyou thought was He's really
great. And you want to give themsome kudos for that. So it's a
really nice section. And I mean,the reason why people who are
(25:07):
very seasoned don't haverecommendations is probably
because they don't ask for them.
Erin Geiger (25:12):
Right? Yeah. And would you say like that is that
kind of one of the top strugglesthat you see with people is that
it's, it's hard. It's funny,because like, they always say,
oh, people love to just getsomeone talking about
themselves. And you know, peoplelove to talk about themselves.
But then when you're sittingdown, you know, to write about
yourself, you know, or toshowcase yourself in such a way,
Unknown (25:34):
it's so hard. It's so hard. That's why I have a
business. It's really hard towrite about yourself. I mean,
because sort of like, when itlike what I talked about with
the company name, we're so init, we're so in our everyday
business, it's really difficultto understand what it looks like
(25:58):
for me outside. And so having astructure, again, whether it's
the about section structure Ishared, you know, what's the
problem you solve? Why you? Howdo you do it? What's your CTA,
even just understanding how do Ieven structure this? Right? You
don't sit down, I got to highschool students, you know, they
(26:22):
don't sit down. When they haveto write a paper and just open
their computer and start typing,they put an outline together. So
thinking about your aboutsection, almost like what would
the outline of that look likefor you? Like, it's really hard
to write about yourself. And theother piece with LinkedIn is
that like, always changing. Soyou know, I had a client that
(26:45):
she and I worked together threeyears ago, we did a great update
on her profile. Well, it's beenthree years. And she's like, I
gotta, I gotta update it again.
It's not relevant anymore. It'snever done. Sorry, to break it
to you. So we've never doneprogress.
Erin Geiger (27:03):
So as you've kind of gone along, like, what is a
tool or a process that like, haschanged your business for the
better, like, you know, thatother people who are listening
are like, Oh, I should try that.
Like, what would you recommend?
Unknown (27:16):
Oh, my gosh, my new favorite tool, I'm actually
gonna write a post about it iscalled fathom, I'm obsessed with
fathom. So Fathom is a zoom app,where it integrates with your
resume. And it's like,basically, like a note taker,
but it records the Zoom callgives you a transcript, and it's
free. So a lot of people, youknow, spend money on some of
(27:39):
those transcribing tools. Andthey're great too. But this one
is, it's free. And it's nice,you feel that, you know, you can
only use it in the moment. Sothat's my new favorite, because
I can get on a call with aclient, basically interview
them, and use the transcriptfrom that conversation to write
their about section because Ihave those nuggets, you know,
(28:02):
for every person that I workwith, I'm utilizing their words
in their LinkedIn profile. Andso this tool has helped me so so
much, because it just, Iliterally can just like copy and
paste straight from thetranscript and put it into a
narrative that works for them.
Erin Geiger (28:18):
It's so efficient, that's what we need, you know,
we need to I think that a lot ofcompanies, especially starting
out in this year, it's like, howcan we get more efficient? You
know, how do we minimize ourtech stack? How do we, how do
we, you know, like, get what weneed done, but in a shorter
time.
Unknown (28:35):
Exactly. And that's a great tool to Yeah, that's a
great tool, just like, I don'tknow about you, but I'm not very
good at note taking duringmeetings, because I'm trying,
it's just hard to, you know, bepresent in the meeting and, and
then be taking notes and befocused on the conversation. And
so now it's like this thing justgives me the transcription and
(28:55):
go back and review and pull thehigh level pieces I need out of
it.
Erin Geiger (28:59):
That's awesome. So check that one out. Is there
anything that you do as aroutine to kind of keep your
head straight? You know, somepeople like meditate workout,
whatever. Some people eatdoughnuts, I don't know. Is
there anything that you do you?
Unknown (29:13):
I mean, I definitely work out. I have a workout
person, I get my workout done.
You know, first thing in themorning after I've had my
coffee, so it's like wake upimmediate cup of coffee, go down
to the basement, get my workoutin and start my day. And I just
have made a commitment in thenew year because I really
struggle with prioritizing stufflike reading. Because by the end
(29:39):
of the day, my brain is mush andI just want to watch Friends
repeats on the counter that I'vewatched a million time. So I've
made a commitment to sit downand read for 10 to 15 minutes
every day. And I really hopethat's a A Sunday I can keep up
with, you know, it's only been aweek or so I was like I did
(30:04):
everyday last week. So that'sgood. So I'm trying to figure
out how to, you know, it's sohard when you're a business
owner, it's like you are in yourbusiness constantly, it's
really, really hard to dedicatesome time to work on your
business. Because we spent somuch time working in our
(30:25):
business.
Erin Geiger (30:26):
So. Yeah, and what speaking of at what goals do you
have? Like, what was the visionfor your business moving
forward?
Unknown (30:36):
Yeah. So you know, for the last five years, and
majority of my business has beenworking one on one with my
clients. So you know, I'll havea individual hire me, we'll work
on their will update theirprofile, we'll do some, you
know, I'll help them with theircontent strategy, their overall
LinkedIn strategy through somecoaching. My vision is that, you
(31:00):
know, I feel like theopportunity really lies with
helping companies and reallythose midsize companies show up
on LinkedIn with this consistentbrand message. So the struggle
is that in a lot of theseorganizations, nobody really
(31:21):
knows who owns LinkedIn, doesmarketing on it to sales on it?
Is it an HR tool, what ishappening in the trade show
space? Well, if nobody owns it,or if everybody owns it, like,
there's no consistent strategyto it. So I want to come in and
help companies really positionthemselves successfully with
(31:43):
consistent brand messaging, andan understanding of how to
empower their teams have trulythe best brand ambassadors out
there, right. So get thatconsistency going so that sales
can be more successful. So tradeshows are positioned to connect
and engage with people whenthey're out on the road. So that
(32:05):
marketing doesn't have to workso hard for marketing. And
really get everybody on board.
So that's my goal. I'm hopingthat by this time, next year,
the majority of my clients willbe companies, and then I'll
still have the opportunity towork with individuals.
Erin Geiger (32:25):
Well, it's a huge need. So yeah, I'm so excited
that you are trying to do that,because I've seen it, in my own
experience. And in others, youknow, it's like, yeah, who owns
it? How do we leverage LinkedIn?
And so many people are askingthat question. Now, I think more
than ever, as LinkedIn isbecoming more of a networking
tool, rather than or is notbecoming it is a networking
(32:47):
tool, rather than just slappingyour resume up there. Okay,
where can people find youonline?
Unknown (32:55):
They can find me on LinkedIn, that's the best place
to find me. So my profiles got,you know, Rachel Simon, I've got
a teal background on my picture,I'm pretty easy to find. And,
you know, if you want to connectfrom listening to this, just put
the name of the podcast and amessage. So I know where you
(33:16):
found me. And, yeah, I'm onthere all the time. I like to
say that, you know, for myclients, you don't have to spend
hours a day on LinkedIn. Now Ispend hours a day, but that's my
livelihood. But you can get alot done in a small amount of
time.
Erin Geiger (33:28):
Love it. Okay, we have I have a question that I
asked everybody at the end ofevery episode, which is, if you
could only listen to one musicartists for the rest of your
life, who would it be?
Unknown (33:40):
Oh, jeez, well, that was easy. It has been the
Beatles and my favorite band ofall time.
Erin Geiger (33:44):
Nice. That's cool.
I think one or two other peoplehave said that. And we have on
Spotify, we have actually have asmall business big mindset
entrepreneur playlist, wherewe've kind of put it in there.
Yeah. Which is kind of cool. Sowell, Rachel, thank you so much
for spending the time I haveabsolutely loved as I always do
chatting with you. So appreciateyou giving me some time in your
schedule.
Unknown (34:07):
Well, thank you. It's been really fun.
Erin Geiger (34:10):
Thanks for tuning into the Small Business Big
mindset podcast. To keep the fungoing. Check out our Facebook
group start and scale an onlinebusiness For even more free
trainings and resources fromfellow entrepreneurs. If you
haven't already, head on over tomuscle creative.com and click
subscribe to join our email listfor weekly updates. And if
you've enjoyed this podcastepisode, check us out on your
favorite podcast platform tofollow us and give us a review.
(34:33):
As always be authentic bring himinsane amount of value and keep
crushing it
Welcome to the Small Business Big mindset
podcast, where we dive intotactical strategies to grow your
business. And to make an impacton this world. A huge part of
success is keeping your mindsetand vision on track. So this is
a major part of our process. Andthis podcast, let's do this.
(00:24):
Hey, everybody, welcome to theSmall Business Big mindset
podcast. I am so excited to havemy friend Rachel on Rachel
Simon, founder and CEO ofconnect the dots digital, she
helps professionals look good onLinkedIn. If I could see the
audience right now. And I took apoll of who needs help on
LinkedIn. I think everybody'slike canned would shoot up. So
(00:46):
thank you, Rachel, so so muchfor being here.
Unknown (00:50):
So excited to be here.
Yeah, it's great to have thechance to chat.
Erin Geiger (00:54):
Love it. She every year, like one of my top
LinkedIn professionals that Ialways go to, for advice,
because like, I feel likeLinkedIn is, as is a lot of
social platforms alwayschanging. And I'm like, Okay,
now what works what's best. Soyou always have the detail. So
why let's just jump right in.
Will you tell me a little bitabout you and your background?
(01:14):
How you got started? Sure, yeah.
Unknown (01:18):
It's kind of a funny story. I think like most good
things in life, you kind of fallinto stuff without planning for
it. So actually spent thebeginning of my career working
in nonprofit. And, you know,nonprofit is all about community
and building relationships. AndI did a lot of program planning.
And I eventually kind of movedinto social media because I had
(01:42):
a personal interest in it. Andthe organization where I was
working, you know, as the late,the late early 2000s, the end of
the aughts, and everything was,you know, social media was just
getting started. And they werevery nervous about social media
strategy. And I was like, let medo it. And so I launched your
(02:05):
social media strategy. And itwas really successful. And my
husband was like, I think wecould do this on your own, I was
working part time and nonprofit,which is not a tremendous amount
of money. Oleg is trying to likebreak down my door right now.
And so I started doing marketingconsulting on my own, which was
(02:28):
pretty scary step at the time,and I was brought into a client
through a friend, where therewas a healthcare company based
here in Atlanta, where I live.
And they, they brought me in todo email marketing, which now I
think is absolutely hilarious,because I do not, I am not an
email marketer at all. And theywere like, Let's put a call to
(02:50):
action in the next email toconnect with the CEO on
LinkedIn. So I take a peek athis profile. And the CEO who had
been in his industry for 30years, had 12 connections 1212,
like one, two. So I politelyrecommended that maybe wasn't
(03:11):
the right time to put that in anemail, because clearly he
doesn't use LinkedIn. And I waslike, why don't we help him
build his LinkedIn presence andget more connections and, and we
can try again in a couple ofmonths when he has a more
respectable network. But whatended up happening was that he
started to see this greatmomentum building, you know,
connecting with not only peoplethat he knew in his industry,
(03:36):
but new clients, and in oneyear, just from kind of putting
a pretty consistent strategytogether, he was able to help
the business close eight newcustomers. So I was like,
There's something really coolhere. And I started doing it for
more and more clients. And thenI incorporated connected dots
(03:56):
digital back five years ago, inJanuary of 2018. And here, we
are not now I focused solely onhelping professionals show up
and use LinkedIn to really helpmeet their business goals.
Erin Geiger (04:12):
Okay, no, that's great. And how, how important
would you say it is, if youwork? A lot of my I have a lot
of entrepreneurs on in theaudience, but also folks who
maybe do entrepreneurial stuffon the side and work for like a
corporate life, you know, thatkind of thing. So, how important
is it on either side of thefence to have someone within
(04:34):
your business within yourcompany, be the face of the
company on LinkedIn?
Unknown (04:41):
It's super important, but that's where you're going to
be found. So let's talk on theentrepreneurs side. You are your
business made? Yes. I have acompany page you have a company
page. But people are hiring me.
Because I am the face of mybusiness because I am my own. I
In the business, and so having aLinkedIn presence that really
(05:02):
shows clearly who you are, whatyou do, why you do it, who you
do it for, and presentexpertise, front and center, is
how people can make thatconnection with you. So that you
are top of mind. And then whenthat need arises, they think you
to solve their problem. On theother side, on the company side.
(05:22):
Same thing, right, except itdepends on you know who that
person is, but let's just usesomebody within the sales team
or a marketing team, right? Theyare not necessarily the face of
their company, but they are abrand ambassador, they're
putting that company brand,brand message front and center,
(05:43):
so that their audience theirnetwork, people who see their
content, associate them with thecompany, and then think about
the company when those needscome up. So it's similar
strategy, but a slightlydifferent approach, depending on
if you're a solo or smallbusiness versus a larger
company.
Erin Geiger (06:05):
Yeah, and I'm seeing that some companies are
putting their, their founder ortheir CEO out there, you know,
depending upon, right, if theyhave the right personality, and
you know, they want to be outthere. But they're kind of
framing them as sort of theirrepresentative, you know, for
the company on LinkedIn. Andthey're having them post like
(06:27):
thought leadership articles, youknow, that sort of thing to kind
of make a more of a holisticview. And so that when people
are kind of checking out like,Okay, do I want to purchase
their product, or their service?
Like, oh, wow, I see their CEOis very active, they're seen as
an expert in this space, youknow, kind of a thing, and it
kind of lends to theircredibility, you know, when
(06:47):
they're looking at their productor service, versus other options
that they might have. So I'mexcited to dive in with you of
like, okay, why it's soimportant to nail your brand
message in the profile. And thenlet's talk about the struggles,
let's get into it. Because it's,it's not easy like you, it's
easy to look at others, youknow, and you're like paying
they're like on LinkedIn liveevery day. Like they're, you
(07:09):
know, they're doing all thiscool stuff. And it's so easy for
them. It's not people arestruggling. So first of all,
let's get into like, why it's soimportant to to nail it. And
then let's talk about some ofthe struggles and solutions that
you have that you've come upwith for your clients.
Unknown (07:29):
Yeah, so when it comes to the brand message? Here's, I
think, something I see often.
And what I tried to help peopleunderstand so many times, we are
so in our business, of course,we know exactly what we do. And
it makes perfect sense. But whenyou look at it from the outside,
that's not necessarily the case.
(07:52):
So use my company name as anexample, if all I had in my
headline was CEO and founder atconnect the dots digital. What
does that company do? I mean,okay, digital, so people might
assume it's some sort of digitalproduct digital agency. But
these days, that means so manydifferent things. So if I don't
(08:14):
clarify that, it puts a lot ofeffort onto my potential
connections, or people in mynetwork to take the time to dig
into my profile and figure outwhat the heck, what the heck
does she do, right, you don'twant people to not have a clue
as to what you do. So when wefeed that, through the headline,
we give that you know, kind ofserve it up at a silver platter.
(08:38):
In, in the about section, it'sso much easier for people to Why
do they want to connect withyou, because they understand
what you do. And that they maypotentially be somebody who
needs to utilize your services.
For example, I see this sooften, there's so many like
funky company names out there,which are super cool. But if
(08:59):
nobody knows what that companydoes, those names don't mean
anything. So I you know, theexample I always like to share
is unless you're the CEO ofDelta Airlines, you gotta give
us a little more information,right? We know what Delta does
probably have all flown Deltamany, many times. Most other
company names are a little bitmore, you know, unclear. And so
(09:21):
let's make it easy for people.
Erin Geiger (09:27):
Right? It could be very ambiguous or hard to spell
and hard to find, as well.
Unknown (09:32):
Yes, exactly. Exactly.
You know, and same with theabout section, you know, so
often, I think an old kind oftrend a couple of years ago,
well, first of all, that shouldalways be written in the first
person, right? Because we wantto build that connection with
our audience. But you know, howmany times have you seen an
(09:54):
about section that starts with Ihave a X number of years
experience doing this, that andthe other. That's great. I mean,
wonderful. But I can see that inyour experience section. And,
frankly, I don't really care ifyou have 1518 20 or 25 years of
(10:15):
experience, can you solve myproblem? First of all, do you
understand what my problem is?
And can you solve it? So leadingwith that problem with that
value proposition, where you areclearly understanding the
(10:36):
challenge that your targetaudience faces is so much more
impactful than just tellingpeople how good you are at what
you do?
Erin Geiger (10:44):
And probably giving examples, right? Instead of just
saying, Oh, I've done this for25 years? It's like, okay, so
what, like, Were you successfulat it? Like, What have you
accomplished? Good point. Soit's like, yeah, so maybe, like,
I don't know, would yourecommend, like telling a story
of like, or, you know, tellingan example of how you've been
(11:08):
successful in what what you do,whether it's in sales, and
you're gonna say, you know, $1amount, or a project you worked
on, or, you know, or somethinglike that, but in telling it,
yes, the way that it'sconnecting, you know, to your
audience,
Unknown (11:22):
storytelling is always a winner. And you cannot go
wrong with storytelling. And Ithink you can also accomplish
that in your experience section,where a lot of times people will
use that section to kind oflike, talk about everything, you
know, all their responsibilitiesthat they had in their past
role, versus give it the highlevel understanding of what you
did, and and what are theaccomplishments? What were some
(11:44):
of the high levelaccomplishments, right, so you
can put those statistics, youknow, quantifying success is
always a good thing, you know,when you can show something that
was measurable, you know, wasable to increase revenue by X
percent, increase sales bywhatever percent. But
storytelling is really good inyour about section. And, you
(12:05):
know, for the entrepreneurs outthere, structure, and I actually
have a have this, like, createdas a slider, like a document
post, I haven't posted it yet.
But a structure that I utilizewith a lot of my clients,
particularly my, you know, smallbusinesses, and those who are
self employed is the structureof their bow section. What is
(12:29):
the problem you solve? Why areyou the right person to solve
it? How do you solve it? Andthen what is the call to action?
How do we get started? So, whenyou think about that, like
almost like a formula, itbecomes a whole lot easier to
write that section and sittingdown to a blank page.
Erin Geiger (12:48):
No, I love that.
And do you also recommend kindof adding some personal info
about yourself in that sectionas well? Okay.
Unknown (12:58):
Yeah, yeah. So you know, that's a great way to get
somebody to make a connectionwith you. So maybe, you know,
you share a little bit about thethings that you like to do
outside of work, right, maybeyou're a marathon runner, or you
are, you know, a big fan ofwhatever sports team, you know,
those are the things you can putthose towards the end of your
(13:20):
headline, again, another goodway to kind of make those points
of connection with peoplebecause you don't know what
someone else's passions are. Andif they have a similar interest
in hobby that you do, it's suchan easy way to start a
conversation, right? It's, it's,I think it's shifting that
(13:41):
mindset of LinkedIn that it is.
It's a job search tool to salestool, it is those things. But
first and foremost, it's anetworking tool. And so the key
to networking, again, is theability to build connection with
people and kind of engage withthem as human to human before we
try to get them to do somethingfor us.
Erin Geiger (14:05):
Yep. And let's go back to the call to action to so
how do you suggest peoplestructure that? You know, I
think some people might be like,What? What do I do? Like, do I
go to my website? Do I like whatyou know, what works? Best? I
guess is the question.
Unknown (14:22):
I usually keep it really simple, you know, like,
DM me or feel free to reach outvia put your email address, or
you can put your Calendly linkif you want to put it I mean,
they're not necessarilyclickable, but it's easy for
people to copy and paste them.
But it's mostly it's more of ainvitation to open that door.
So, you know, this is they'vetaken the time to read your
(14:47):
about section and just let it insaying, you know, hey, feel free
to reach out to me I'd love toconnect. You can DM me, you can
email me call, like my doorsopen
Erin Geiger (15:00):
All right, and I assume shorter is better in this
section. Right? Yeah. Peoplereading a novel.
Unknown (15:06):
Yeah, I mean, you know, you know this from just
copywriting best practices likeyou want it to be easy to read,
keep the lingo to a minimum,that insider baseball language
and make it digestible, right.
So use, you know, you can'tformat through LinkedIn itself,
(15:28):
but you can copy and pastebullets from like, you know,
emoji sites and things like thatnot saying to use a ton of
emojis but break up the textwith some bullets or some arrows
or something to make it easy toread. And, yeah, less is more
Erin Geiger (15:48):
diveagar. And then there's this featured section,
how do you suggest people tacklethat?
Unknown (15:56):
Yeah, this is a fun section, I think. So in the
featured section, if you don'thave it on your profile, you
have to click at the top whereit says Add profile section to
kind of start building that oneout. What I like about it is
that you know, it sits right inthe middle of your profile. And
it has a lot of visual interest.
Because if you share a link tosomething on your website, it
(16:18):
will pull the image associatedwith that link. But you can also
now thankfully, change theimage. So sometimes, like I was
seeing when this feature firstrolled out, you share a link and
it wasn't pulling the graphic.
And so it would get that gray,kind of blobby box. Now you can
(16:39):
actually upload anotherthumbnail, which is really nice.
So I like to use this. So youcan put as many things as you
want there. But you can only seethree full pieces of content.
And as you can see, like an ittybitty piece of the fourth one.
So I usually don't recommenddoing more than four pieces of
content there because I justdon't think people are going to
(17:01):
continue to click through. And Ilike to use it for Call to
Action content. So that might besubscribed to your email list.
Do you have a lead magnet? Ifyou have a LinkedIn newsletter,
you can add that as a featuredcontent. And I think that's a
great piece to put in there. Sosome, you know, you can add
(17:25):
posts, you can put LinkedInarticles, you can upload, you
know, documents and PDFs. But Ithink that having it be
something where someone has totake an action to do something
has been very beneficial. I dothat for myself. So I have my
lead magnet, my newsletter andmy email subscription link. And
(17:46):
I'm always getting more newpeople because it's easy for
them to find it right versusthem having to dig through my
website. So it's a nice tool tobe able to direct people
directly to your website.
LinkedIn doesn't give us a lotof opportunity to do that. So
what we get the opportunity tosend them off site somewhere
means take full advantage ofthat.
Erin Geiger (18:04):
Yeah, no 100% Agree. Oh, and you know, I see
so many different ways thatpeople are leveraging their
banner image on their profilepage as well like their personal
image and in the banner image.
Do you have any kind of insightinto that? Would you recommend
how people should handle that?
Unknown (18:22):
Yeah, I think, first of all, if you're an employee, and
you're comfortable, includingyour company, branding, I think
your marketing director would bevery, very happy with you.
Exactly. I think you'd maketheir day if you went and ask
them for a branded banner foryour profile. If you're a
(18:42):
business owner, you absolutelywant to bring your company brand
into your personal profile. Andif you have multiple things that
you do, you can create graphicsthat showcase those various
things. It's a little trickier,but people do it all the time. I
think the key is just to kind ofkeep it a little. Keep it
(19:03):
simple. And remember that peopleare looking at this on mobile
and desktop. So they look alittle different on mobile and
desktop. But as long as thatvisual brand stays consistent
with whatever your businessbrand is, I mean, that's really
what's nice about it when whenit's empty. It's so sad. I mean,
(19:25):
it's like I describe it when Iwhen I do workshops and you
know, do trainings. It's likeit's the equivalent of a
billboard you see on the streetthat just says your ad here. So
you know, it's one of thoseother tools that let's say
you're creating digitalproducts, you have a course
you're writing a book, you'redoing a webinar, you know,
(19:47):
switch it up, use it as yourbillboard, to showcase whatever
your newest service or offeringor product is. You can change it
as much as you need to as longas the general brand thing stays
the same right with yourwhatever your business branding
is,
Erin Geiger (20:03):
like that kind of looking at it as a billboard or
like an ad unit, really, foryour for your page. And I've,
I've heard that the LinkedInprofile, people look at it as
almost like an ad like anadvertisement for what? For what
they do you know, or what theycan do for others. Okay, we
touched on experience a littlebit, is there the experience
(20:24):
section? Is there more you wantto add there? I know you're
saying like, don't like it's nota laundry list of what you've
done in the past. It's more of ahighlights, like a highlight
reel of what you've accomplishedand how you can help. Is there
anything else that we should bekind of tuned into in that
section?
Unknown (20:42):
Yeah, I think it's just ensuring again, you're connected
to the company pages. What I've,what I see often is, you know,
some people, I've been onLinkedIn for a decade plus,
right, so maybe when theyoriginally put something in
their experience section, theremay not not have been a company
page. But now there is. So justgoing in making sure that you're
(21:06):
connected to the company pagesexist. I've also seen the
opposite, right, where companiesget acquired, and those pages no
longer exist. So there's ways ofkind of putting in brackets,
like let's say you worked for acompany that was acquired by
another one and that brand thatthe company pages gone, you can
stay, you know, acquire imprintsthese acquired by whatever the
(21:28):
new company is. So there's anunderstanding what happened to
that company, keep it highlevel, as again, speaking to the
business owners use that tobullet out your services again,
right, we need to continuouslyrepeat what we do. Because one
user may go straight to ourAbout section, and never look at
(21:50):
experience, another user mightdo the complete opposite, and go
to our experience and never readour About section. So we want to
make sure that we're hittingpeople in all of the places
where they potentially mightlearn about what we do and how
we can serve them.
Erin Geiger (22:06):
Okay, and do you how, how heavily Do you wait,
like the skills section, therecommendation section, because
I, you know, I've seen somepeople who are very seasoned in
their career, and they have,like, maybe they have no
recommendations for themselves.
Maybe they recommended oneperson, you know, or like, their
skills section is like, almostnon existent, like, Does that,
(22:27):
does that hold a lot of a lot ofweight with you? Or what are
your thoughts there?
Unknown (22:33):
I mean, personally, I like to use every section that
we can use. So if I'm workingwith a client, we're going to do
everything that there is to doup on LinkedIn, what I like
about skills now is now we canconnect them into our experience
section. So when you add askill, it's going to ask you,
where did you use this skill?
And you can literally click allthe places and your experience
where you used it. So I thinkit's, it's a more dynamic
(22:56):
function. I know that. You know,it's it weighs into search. So
you coming up in search based onkeywords. It's just a good tool.
It's one of those things, it'slike, why wouldn't you use it to
show sort of the various thingsthat you have expertise in and
making sure it's up to date. Soyou know, everybody who's
(23:16):
listening, go and check out yourexperience, your skill section,
and if you have Microsoft Word,Excel outlet, you need to remove
those, because you probably putthose on there five years, five
plus years ago. I see that allthe time. I was like, pretty
sure we all know how to usethose things right now. Now,
(23:37):
seven or eight years ago, thereprobably was a different levels
of like expertise when it comesto using the Microsoft suite.
But I think we don't need tohave those taking up real estate
in our skills section. Ipersonally put a lot of weight
into recommendations. I mean,nothing is nobody. The best way
(23:59):
to get a sense of what someoneis like to work with is to see
how other people experiencethem. So I like to ask for them.
After I've worked with a client.
I also like to give them whenI've had a good experience,
whether it was working withsomebody or participating in a
(24:22):
training, you know, you don'thave to have a client
relationship with somebody towrite them a recommendation. You
can write a recommendation for apodcast or podcast host that you
are guesting on, and what apositive experience it was and
what a good host they were.
Because you want to give themthe visibility that other people
want to say yes. Where they askif they would like to be on
(24:44):
their show. So thinking aboutthe recommendations, not just in
a client perspective, but howelse can you help highlight
people was there you know, abook that you read by one of
your LinkedIn connections thatyou thought was He's really
great. And you want to give themsome kudos for that. So it's a
really nice section. And I mean,the reason why people who are
(25:07):
very seasoned don't haverecommendations is probably
because they don't ask for them.
Erin Geiger (25:12):
Right? Yeah. And would you say like that is that
kind of one of the top strugglesthat you see with people is that
it's, it's hard. It's funny,because like, they always say,
oh, people love to just getsomeone talking about
themselves. And you know, peoplelove to talk about themselves.
But then when you're sittingdown, you know, to write about
yourself, you know, or toshowcase yourself in such a way,
Unknown (25:34):
it's so hard. It's so hard. That's why I have a
business. It's really hard towrite about yourself. I mean,
because sort of like, when itlike what I talked about with
the company name, we're so init, we're so in our everyday
business, it's really difficultto understand what it looks like
(25:58):
for me outside. And so having astructure, again, whether it's
the about section structure Ishared, you know, what's the
problem you solve? Why you? Howdo you do it? What's your CTA,
even just understanding how do Ieven structure this? Right? You
don't sit down, I got to highschool students, you know, they
(26:22):
don't sit down. When they haveto write a paper and just open
their computer and start typing,they put an outline together. So
thinking about your aboutsection, almost like what would
the outline of that look likefor you? Like, it's really hard
to write about yourself. And theother piece with LinkedIn is
that like, always changing. Soyou know, I had a client that
(26:45):
she and I worked together threeyears ago, we did a great update
on her profile. Well, it's beenthree years. And she's like, I
gotta, I gotta update it again.
It's not relevant anymore. It'snever done. Sorry, to break it
to you. So we've never doneprogress.
Erin Geiger (27:03):
So as you've kind of gone along, like, what is a
tool or a process that like, haschanged your business for the
better, like, you know, thatother people who are listening
are like, Oh, I should try that.
Like, what would you recommend?
Unknown (27:16):
Oh, my gosh, my new favorite tool, I'm actually
gonna write a post about it iscalled fathom, I'm obsessed with
fathom. So Fathom is a zoom app,where it integrates with your
resume. And it's like,basically, like a note taker,
but it records the Zoom callgives you a transcript, and it's
free. So a lot of people, youknow, spend money on some of
(27:39):
those transcribing tools. Andthey're great too. But this one
is, it's free. And it's nice,you feel that, you know, you can
only use it in the moment. Sothat's my new favorite, because
I can get on a call with aclient, basically interview
them, and use the transcriptfrom that conversation to write
their about section because Ihave those nuggets, you know,
(28:02):
for every person that I workwith, I'm utilizing their words
in their LinkedIn profile. Andso this tool has helped me so so
much, because it just, Iliterally can just like copy and
paste straight from thetranscript and put it into a
narrative that works for them.
Erin Geiger (28:18):
It's so efficient, that's what we need, you know,
we need to I think that a lot ofcompanies, especially starting
out in this year, it's like, howcan we get more efficient? You
know, how do we minimize ourtech stack? How do we, how do
we, you know, like, get what weneed done, but in a shorter
time.
Unknown (28:35):
Exactly. And that's a great tool to Yeah, that's a
great tool, just like, I don'tknow about you, but I'm not very
good at note taking duringmeetings, because I'm trying,
it's just hard to, you know, bepresent in the meeting and, and
then be taking notes and befocused on the conversation. And
so now it's like this thing justgives me the transcription and
(28:55):
go back and review and pull thehigh level pieces I need out of
it.
Erin Geiger (28:59):
That's awesome. So check that one out. Is there
anything that you do as aroutine to kind of keep your
head straight? You know, somepeople like meditate workout,
whatever. Some people eatdoughnuts, I don't know. Is
there anything that you do you?
Unknown (29:13):
I mean, I definitely work out. I have a workout
person, I get my workout done.
You know, first thing in themorning after I've had my
coffee, so it's like wake upimmediate cup of coffee, go down
to the basement, get my workoutin and start my day. And I just
have made a commitment in thenew year because I really
struggle with prioritizing stufflike reading. Because by the end
(29:39):
of the day, my brain is mush andI just want to watch Friends
repeats on the counter that I'vewatched a million time. So I've
made a commitment to sit downand read for 10 to 15 minutes
every day. And I really hopethat's a A Sunday I can keep up
with, you know, it's only been aweek or so I was like I did
(30:04):
everyday last week. So that'sgood. So I'm trying to figure
out how to, you know, it's sohard when you're a business
owner, it's like you are in yourbusiness constantly, it's
really, really hard to dedicatesome time to work on your
business. Because we spent somuch time working in our
(30:25):
business.
Erin Geiger (30:26):
So. Yeah, and what speaking of at what goals do you
have? Like, what was the visionfor your business moving
forward?
Unknown (30:36):
Yeah. So you know, for the last five years, and
majority of my business has beenworking one on one with my
clients. So you know, I'll havea individual hire me, we'll work
on their will update theirprofile, we'll do some, you
know, I'll help them with theircontent strategy, their overall
LinkedIn strategy through somecoaching. My vision is that, you
(31:00):
know, I feel like theopportunity really lies with
helping companies and reallythose midsize companies show up
on LinkedIn with this consistentbrand message. So the struggle
is that in a lot of theseorganizations, nobody really
(31:21):
knows who owns LinkedIn, doesmarketing on it to sales on it?
Is it an HR tool, what ishappening in the trade show
space? Well, if nobody owns it,or if everybody owns it, like,
there's no consistent strategyto it. So I want to come in and
help companies really positionthemselves successfully with
(31:43):
consistent brand messaging, andan understanding of how to
empower their teams have trulythe best brand ambassadors out
there, right. So get thatconsistency going so that sales
can be more successful. So tradeshows are positioned to connect
and engage with people whenthey're out on the road. So that
(32:05):
marketing doesn't have to workso hard for marketing. And
really get everybody on board.
So that's my goal. I'm hopingthat by this time, next year,
the majority of my clients willbe companies, and then I'll
still have the opportunity towork with individuals.
Erin Geiger (32:25):
Well, it's a huge need. So yeah, I'm so excited
that you are trying to do that,because I've seen it, in my own
experience. And in others, youknow, it's like, yeah, who owns
it? How do we leverage LinkedIn?
And so many people are askingthat question. Now, I think more
than ever, as LinkedIn isbecoming more of a networking
tool, rather than or is notbecoming it is a networking
(32:47):
tool, rather than just slappingyour resume up there. Okay,
where can people find youonline?
Unknown (32:55):
They can find me on LinkedIn, that's the best place
to find me. So my profiles got,you know, Rachel Simon, I've got
a teal background on my picture,I'm pretty easy to find. And,
you know, if you want to connectfrom listening to this, just put
the name of the podcast and amessage. So I know where you
(33:16):
found me. And, yeah, I'm onthere all the time. I like to
say that, you know, for myclients, you don't have to spend
hours a day on LinkedIn. Now Ispend hours a day, but that's my
livelihood. But you can get alot done in a small amount of
time.
Erin Geiger (33:28):
Love it. Okay, we have I have a question that I
asked everybody at the end ofevery episode, which is, if you
could only listen to one musicartists for the rest of your
life, who would it be?
Unknown (33:40):
Oh, jeez, well, that was easy. It has been the
Beatles and my favorite band ofall time.
Erin Geiger (33:44):
Nice. That's cool.
I think one or two other peoplehave said that. And we have on
Spotify, we have actually have asmall business big mindset
entrepreneur playlist, wherewe've kind of put it in there.
Yeah. Which is kind of cool. Sowell, Rachel, thank you so much
for spending the time I haveabsolutely loved as I always do
chatting with you. So appreciateyou giving me some time in your
schedule.
Unknown (34:07):
Well, thank you. It's been really fun.
Erin Geiger (34:10):
Thanks for tuning into the Small Business Big
mindset podcast. To keep the fungoing. Check out our Facebook
group start and scale an onlinebusiness For even more free
trainings and resources fromfellow entrepreneurs. If you
haven't already, head on over tomuscle creative.com and click
subscribe to join our email listfor weekly updates. And if
you've enjoyed this podcastepisode, check us out on your
favorite podcast platform tofollow us and give us a review.
(34:33):
As always be authentic bring himinsane amount of value and keep
crushing it
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.
Therapy Gecko
An unlicensed lizard psychologist travels the universe talking to strangers about absolutely nothing. TO CALL THE GECKO: follow me on https://www.twitch.tv/lyleforever to get a notification for when I am taking calls. I am usually live Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays but lately a lot of other times too. I am a gecko.