Powering Your Business with Video Value Bombs

Jeff Long  00:00

So yeah, my

Curt Anderson  00:01

first time. Hey guys, hello. Happy Friday to everyone. And what an honor, what a privilege to be here. We have no Damon Pistulka, Damon, we miss you, my friend, wherever you are. So sending you lots of love, dude. And so I have a near dear friend, Wesleyne Whittaker is in the house, taking dame’s place. Wesleyne, how are you? I’m

Wesleyne Whittaker  00:23

good. How are you? Curt, I’m excited to be here. Hey, you

Curt Anderson  00:27

know what? I’m going to play little musical chairs. Let’s move Jeff down here. Let’s move Wesleyne, so Wesleyne

00:31

Oh yeah, we’re

Curt Anderson  00:32

going to be the co host. So you know what? You feel free you chime in anytime they want you want to. Because you know what? We got this handsome devil right here. There he is. We got this handsome devil right here that’s showing us and so why this is so special. So this is Damon and I are going, we’re going into year five on this show, believe it or not. So our very first guest of all time on our little LinkedIn live show was none other than my dear friend, my bestie. Jeff, long Jeff, wow. How are you man, I’m

Jeff Long  01:05

good. I’m good. This is an honor. Curt, I mean, obviously a friend of yours, someone I respect, and to be on your first show. And then, hey, yeah, you have me back on five years later. That’s pretty fun. We’ve been on a couple times, but hasn’t been five year gap, but

Curt Anderson  01:21

multiple times since. Man, so I so this is awesome. So you know what? So it’s Wesleyan, since your calls that we’ve got transform sales, you know, give a shout out to yourself, and then then, you know what? Then it’s gonna be all about Jeff, you know. But just give a little intro to transform sales. Who’s Wesleyne Whittaker,

Wesleyne Whittaker  01:38

awesome. So you said you’re going on five years on your live show this month, transform sales will be six years old. So I am a recovering chemist. I always have to start myself. I’m a recovering chemist, and I got into sales and fell in love with it, absolutely, entirely, everything about it. And I started this company six years ago, transform sales, and we focus primarily on manufacturing and distribution, sales process, strategy and training.

Curt Anderson  02:07

Sales guru, an amazing mom and just one of the most, highest level, integrity individuals that you’ll ever meet, high energy. We’ve done tons of programs together. Wesleyan and so what an honor, privilege for you to be here today. And hey, we’ve got a couple friends popping in. So Harry says, Happy Friday. So Happy Friday to you, Harry. Thank you for being here. Diane Byers in the house, Diane, hope you had an amazing, incredible week. Happy Friday first show. What an honor, she says. And hey, George is here, dude. George, happy Friday too, man. Thank you for joining us. We appreciate you. Got one more coming in. Happy Friday. I’m a business expert here. Ready to learn something. We’ve got a asthma here, so guys drop us a note. Let us know that you’re out here. Do me a favor. Connect with Wesleyne on LinkedIn. Do yourself a favor. You’ll thank us later. Connect with my dear buddy, Jeff Long and so two wonderful human beings speaking of high level integrity, Jeff, we you and I had to, dude, we go before COVID. Man, it’s like, it’s like, dog years, right? We’ve been friends through manufacturing happy hour. Our dear mutual friend Chris Lukey, and you and I have done tons of programs together. I’ve actually had the honor and privilege being together with you at a conference couple years ago, and just wonderful dad, just a incredible human being. So give a little intro to yourself. How do you your team at true focus media? How do you guys make the world a better place?

Jeff Long  03:27

Yeah, thanks and thanks again for having me here on today. So I started my company in 2003 back, like when DVD was like a brand new, or wasn’t brand new, but it was, like a cool thing, cutting edge, right? Like, I just look back at that and you just laugh, right? How technology has evolved. And I’m sure in another 20 years, you know, we’ll look back and be like, I remember when AI was a thing, you know, and a big deal, and kind of chuckle about as our robot servants come and or maybe we’ll have to go to the robots as we’ll be their servants, I don’t know, but, so, yeah, I’ve been doing this 21 years, and we are primarily, we’re a marketing agency for manufacturers. We do a lot of video marketing, and we’ll talk about that here today. That can look like a lot of things. We We also do a lot of website design and optimization nice and so, you know, I look for opportunities to really use technology to to help manufacturers be more efficient and effective.

Curt Anderson  04:26

Yeah, and I’ll tell you, and I know you work with all sites, all sorts of different sizes. You work from a really tiny company. Maybe folks have heard of Cargill, right? That’s a you’ve worked with Cargill in the past. And so, just kidding, you know biggest companies on the planet, and all the way down. And so you’re located in western Ohio, Dayton, Ohio. Just share a little bit like, how did you navigate? How did you gravitate towards manufacturing? You could have gotten a lot of different lanes for marketing. Why manufacturing? Yeah,

Jeff Long  04:54

I should look back at when I made the switch. I think it was six or seven years ago. So. Hold me to it, but I had been, you know, doing this marketing thing for for many years. Loved it. Honestly, I my brain got full of industry jargon and technology and terms, right? So I’m, when you’re working with any industry, it could be an insurance, you know, large insurance company one day, or medical the next and manufacturing. And so a lot of it was for my own sanity. It was like, I can’t, I mean, I can, but it’s, it’s, it’s a lot to keep up with all these industries and different things. And so I did a kind of an evaluation, and then I hired an expensive consultant who pretty much told me what I already knew. And so we went through like, hey, what am I passionate about? What industries do I see potential and that need me the most, and all of those things. And like I said, he pretty much told me what I already knew. But hey, sometimes you got to hire a pro to validate your thoughts. And so a couple of reasons. Yeah, you know, there’s a lot of growth. It’s really good people, right? Every time I go into a manufacturing facility, it’s, it’s almost like immediate friendship, or I can relate to them, you know, they’re just easy to get along with. They’re normal people. They’re making cool stuff, you know, especially if there’s robots or sparks flying, or, you know, a myriad of other cool things that that are happening at these manufacturing facilities these days. So, yeah, every time I go in, I’m like, a kid in the candy store. I’m just like, oh, yeah, I better get to work here. And, you know, film this stuff, because I’m just, like, interested in what they’re doing and the story that they’re trying to tell. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  06:37

absolutely love it. And Wesley, we’ve got a few friends here stopping by. We got fry red saying, happy Friday. We’ve got a LinkedIn user saying C to C. Fashion and technology from Austin, Texas, great Friday. Usman is in the house. He drops a couple notes. Uh, nice to be here with you people. Best wishes. We’ve got a sama here dropping a note. What do you recommend? The better presence for new brands online to make themselves familiar with the relative audience. What do you recommend the better presence for new brands online to make themselves familiar with the relative audiences? I’ll put it up to both you guys. Jeff, do you want to take a stab at that one? First,

Jeff Long  07:15

totally. I mean, I’m a video guy, and I think when it comes down to it. You know, people buy from other people, and so don’t be afraid to get on camera and put yourself out there right again. Working with, I’ve worked with large brands, large companies, even small ones, and they just want to know, at least in my industry, you know, who’s excellent at what they do and who’s trustworthy and honest and creative, like, it’s really not that complicated, and so the more people that get to know like and trust me, the better my sales do, right? And so that’s why video and these live streams and podcasts and other outlets are so valuable. So you know, I don’t know your situation as far as what you’re trying to sell, or your audience, or all that, but to me, video is the the ultimate equalizer, right? You can really do a lot more just by putting yourself out there, and not just like, selling, selling right, like give value, teach, talk about problems you solve and and trends that you see, and things like that, and you’ll get more success.

Wesleyne Whittaker  08:29

So I want to tap in on something, and it kind of goes to this last question. So you’ve been in business for over two decades, and you used to do all the things. Curt, knows, I have a lot of these wesleyanisms. And one of the things, if you talk to everyone, you talk to no one. So when you went initially into manufacturing, so what a lot of people think is, well, if I niche down, I’m gonna lose business, and then people aren’t gonna wanna reach out to me. So from a service based business as well as a manufacturer, how does it help? How did it help you to get really, really laser focused on who you serve and how you serve them. Yeah,

Jeff Long  09:06

so I kind of look at it from like a, like an archery target perspective, right? So you have your bullseye, and then kind of the rings, and so my Bullseye typically is a manufacturer that their marketing department has between two and five people in their marketing team. And I finally, still have a tremendous need for for video, for other marketing, you know, initiatives that we do and things like that, obviously, is the outside the bullseye. I can work with smaller companies or bigger ones, you know, so, but it does help to at least know what’s my sweet spot like? Sure, I can work with a mom and pop. It For Me, it’s a little harder, you know, I have to change some things, or I can work with a gigantic company, then I have to, you know, bring, bring in more people around my team. Kind of have to, you know, build a bigger team. So that’s kind of my. Short answer, you know, to your question, oh, did

Wesleyne Whittaker  10:03

it decrease your revenue or increase your revenue? Like it made it easier?

Jeff Long  10:07

Yeah? Well, I mean, yeah, some of these big companies, it definitely increased, for sure, it just made it easier to to know who I, who I was a better fit for, right? You know, so if I’m at a networking group or what I’m doing, a video value bomb on on LinkedIn or YouTube, like I in my head, I know who I’m talking to and and it’s been really cool at different networking events or conferences, you know, people come to me like, Oh, I saw your video, Jeff. And, you know, it’s kind of pre sells myself, my services and my company. So short or I guess, the answer to questions, yeah, it definitely helped, for sure, yeah, hey,

Curt Anderson  10:47

that’s Wesleyne. We’ve got a few more friends who are stopping by. So let me grab, let me grab a couple more comments. Here. We got somebody I’m going back up here. If I pronounce this correctly, she’s right. Sharia, right. Maybe Happy Friday. Muhammad stops by. Says, Hey guys, I’m a Walmart expert. Thank you for stopping by. He says, hello everybody. Sama says, Hey Muhammad, Wow, that’s great. So again, guys drop a note. Let us know that you’re out there if you have any questions, especially around video branding content. We’ve got two experts here, you know, and connect with these guys. We’ve got Wesleyan Whitaker here in the house, from transform sales, my dear friend, Jeff Long from true focus media. Jeff, let’s keep the party rolling. Talk about some of the like, really powerful benefits of of video. I know Wesley and I love for you to chime in when following you. Do a ton on LinkedIn. Jeff, you’re always putting out video value bombs on your LinkedIn. You’re doing it for clients. Just share a little bit about the process. Again, if you guys want to drop in questions, like, you know, what’s the length I should do it? You know, does it need to be perfect? What do I wear? How do I do my hair? Right? So, what are some of the questions that we might that some that your your ideal customers are typically asking you,

Jeff Long  11:55

yeah, so a couple, a couple, I think the first question you asked Curt was, you know, was it Why is video important, or what are some ways you can utilize video, right? So I find, let’s, let’s just talk about the marketing department. We can talk about some other departments after this. But So marketing, I find they’re getting a lot of mandates, requests, whatever you want to call it, from sales, from executives from all departments. And so they’re, they’re kind of heads are spinning sometimes. And so then they’re like, well, we need to do, you know, paid ads and social media and be on YouTube and email marketing and SEO, and the list goes on and on. And so that’s one of the reasons, like my video value bombs service, and I’ll talk a lot about it here, because I want to kind of give the strategy to people. That’s where you can simplify. And I would say, have a video Foundation, or a video first approach, where, what if you create even short, simple video pieces of content, then from there, you have content from, for your email newsletter, for your your blog, for your social media, for YouTube, for all the for trade shows, right? And so by starting with video, then you can grow that out, and you can really leverage that, and it helps so many different ways. And you mentioned even, like, quality, you know, I think there’s a time and a place for, like, high end, super professional knock your socks off, right? And we do that. But there’s also this other side of the coin that a lot of companies, I don’t know if they’re scared to do, or it’s just maybe foreign. I find that sometimes certain age groups, like some of the older folks are more high end professional. Some of the younger folks want more authenticity, simple, you know, less professional. So I think is, is, I’m a Gen X or so, I’m kind of right in the middle, um, I think is, is, you kind of look at how businesses are changing. We’re going to have to take that into account, you know, so even thinking about employee retention. So if you want to, you know, hire, probably the super high end professional perfect videos, if you’re trying to hire millennials and younger might not be as effective. These simple like, day in a life like, Hey everybody, I’m blah, blah, blah. I’m here at, you know, whatever facility, and almost like, give the keys to them and then edit it in a semi professional way. You don’t want it to look sloppy. But, you know, those are just some considerations. You know, for the age demographics that we have,

14:37

I love that.

Curt Anderson  14:39

Let me grab a couple comments real quick here. So someone says, Thanks, Jeff. Long you entertained my question very well, sir. Thank you. And so Muhammad says, Hey, Wesleyan, ma’am. How are you? We’ve got a little applause from Ahmed here. And coming down to Diane Byer, she says, been found Jeff’s videos for years on the internet. Friend he doesn’t know he has long. I. Tell you, you too, need to connect. Diane, definitely your close friend again, one of the high, high level integrity. Just love her to death. So Diane, thank you for your comment here. Muhammad says, Hey, Diane, same here. So apparently Muhammad’s been following you as well. So Jeff, let’s keep the conversation going. And I love that you said, Wesley, I know I was going to go into that employee retention. I really like that. You know, video is so powerful for multiple things. Okay, number one, is the recruiting tool that you’re talking about. So if we want to take a deeper dive there. Number two, I have a lot of clients that are now, you know, there’s a whole legacy of Baby Boomers and Gen Xers now starting to retire, and are taking that knowledge with them. What a great way to capture that knowledge, not just from marketing and sales growth, but just like work instructions, or this is how we do this, or this is, you know, Larry or Susie’s been, you know, managing that machine for 20 years, and nobody else knows how to do it. Just share some of the internal benefits, and, like you said, employee retention, but some of the other internal benefits that people can take advantage of not just purely from the sales, marketing side. Well,

Jeff Long  16:03

you bring up such a good point. Curt, you know, with with people retiring and, yeah, maybe it’s a machine or a process or whatever that is. I mean, let’s be honest, getting people to write down instructions is probably going to be impossible or not realistic, right? Why not? You know, put it on, on video, get out your phone, and then you could even, I mean, yeah, you could put it in Dropbox or Google Drive, but you could also put it onto, like a learning management system, and you could make it an official training, right? So when thinking about like new hire training or safety, set up, tear down, wash down, whatever that is, you know, have a a course that somebody can go through. Maybe it’s tied to their their benefits and things like that. Maybe it’s annually they have to go through. And almost like, I know, accountants and CPAs have, like, CE credits, right? So maybe your, your company has, like, a similar thing like that, that you could do, just to make sure everybody’s on the same page, that there is efficient with their knowledge as they are, you know, on the on the shop floor, and so, yeah, that’s definitely one of them. I mean, you know, even short tips about assembly, you know, hey, here’s how. You know, Bob’s been the master assembler for all these years. And as we have the new employees come in, we want to train them on Bob’s, you know, Master assembly techniques, yeah, you know. So it’s, yeah, it’s not just a, hey, let’s use Video for marketing. It really can and should be integrated in many areas. And it can be done internally, right? It doesn’t have to be, you know, the video crew and company that comes out, it can be done internally, right? You know,

Curt Anderson  17:47

I, I’m pretty sure that you introduced that idea to me ages ago. And you think about the benefits, you know, like, if you know, if I’m training somebody, you know, you know, there’s, we have a high, you know, we’re busy. We’re bringing new people in. Well, now it takes my time to or you know, not you know somebody on your shop floor. Is time to teach somebody how to do that. Number one, I’m not always going to be consistent where now, if it’s a video now, it’s certainly consistent. And if that person, you know, people learn at different levels, where you know now I can stop and I can rewind it. I can replay. What did he say again? So, what did she say? You know, so there’s just so many benefits there. Wesleyan, any thoughts that you have as far as, like, internal benefits here? Yeah,

Wesleyne Whittaker  18:27

you know, I’ve been even before I knew why I was doing it. I just started recording just about every process or everything I was doing in the business, because I was like, I don’t want to do this forever. I like, if somebody asked me a question more than twice. I’m like, I’m gonna record a video, and I think I have a library of probably 1200 videos now, and it’s a part of our culture. So we just hired a new person, and the person who’s training them is trying to offload some of their tasks. And I’m like, Do you have a video for them to watch? And they’re like, I don’t let me go record one, but it’s the thing that you can do one time, and a lot of times, you know, I think it’s people think it’s, there’s a huge barrier to get started, but just record what you’re doing. So when people give you the the barriers or the roadblocks or the reasons why they can’t, what are some of the tips that you give them to kind of get started?

Jeff Long  19:19

Yeah, that’s, that’s great. So, you know, if it’s it, let’s say it’s a public facing video. So maybe it is more in the marketing or sales or kind of the external because I get it, creating any type of video content can, can bring out that anxiety, right? For, even for me, and I’ve been doing this for, you know, 21 years, right? It’s like, when that camera comes on you, you second guess your your life choices. You know, like, you’re like, who am I do? I even know anything, right? So a couple things is, I find that when people are kind of in teaching mode, they’re more it just lowers that anxiety versus, oh no, I’ve got to memorize a script or outline or whatever. Oh no. Like, if you just teach. Something, typically, that helps, you know, simplify things. I find that even well with the outline thing, before you hit record, just write out some bullet points. And if you have to, like, tape them, you know, right under the camera. Now you don’t want it, like, way over here where you’re like, today we are talking about blah, like, that looks awkward, right? So you don’t want to read. I’ve come to countless video shoots where, and this is probably more, more people that are, like engineers, you know? They come with, like, a three page document type eight point font, and I’m just like, what are we doing here? Like we’re not reading. Like, I just want to have a conversation, you know. So that’s another, another piece of advice, if there are two people, maybe have somebody ask you a question, and then when you look into the camera, just answer that question. It feels a little less awkward. And then lastly, with video, you can do multiple takes, right? You don’t, you know, it’s not a one and done. We’re not dealing with film and all that, like back in the day. So if you don’t like it, just delete it or edit it, or, you know, do a couple until you’re comfortable. So those are just a few strategies I recommend. Well, absolutely love it here, and

Curt Anderson  21:15

we’ve got it. I’m trying to keep up. We got some good comments coming in. So again, keep the comments coming. Keep the questions coming. I’m going to grab a question here if I if I’m reading this correctly. So, you know, I’m a business operational analyst specialize in digital marketing. My work requires me to create content. Can somebody help me how to go about it? I usually use AI, which I think is not giving me what I want, and they’re not great at writing. So, Jeff, any any tips that you have for our friend here asking for some advice about creating content.

Jeff Long  21:45

Yeah, sorry. I was reading future comments. And so I was, I was grabbing a resource. I was I wasn’t quite listening. Got

Curt Anderson  21:53

it? So I’ll chime in real quick. So I’ll pull it up. And so if you want to, let’s see, nope, that’s not the right question. Back up here, let me I’ll get, I’m going to get, I’ll take a stab at answering this. And then if you want to read this question here, and then my suggestion is, what Wesleyan, what we love doing is, you know, get that video. So if you’re whatever your subject matter expertise is, or if you don’t possess that subject matter expertise, find somebody on your team, or go outside, like, right now, like, on this session right now. Like, you know, that’s why we do this live stream. I’m never the smartest guy in the room. I never want to be the smartest guy in the room. I just want to be the guy that brings in a lot of smart people into the room. So now, when I need sales expertise or just, you know, video expertise, I can bring in my friend Wesleyne and Jeff. So one thing that you could potentially do, man, I wish I wish I could pronounce that last name. I’m just going to call him as land. How’s that? So is land my my comment for you is, you know, either hit the area of expertise that you have or find somebody on your team that has expertise, takes Jeff’s advice, record them on a video, and then, since you are it sounds like that, you are savvy on AI, you can take the transcription of that conversation, drop in an AI. You could tweak it, massage it, make it look a little more readable. Wesleyan, any thoughts that you had

Wesleyne Whittaker  23:04

there? Yeah, I think that that’s a good thing. Um, like, just, I think I saw somebody else say so just like a talk, as if somebody you’re talking to a friend, and before you get used to it, you can have somebody on the side who’s asking you questions. So one way that we leverage video is I do customer I call them customer case studies. So after I have an event or I do a consulting engagement, I actually will do a question and answer session with them on video, and then we edit out me. So it just seems like they’re just, you know, giving testimonials. Because when I if I asked my to record a two minute video, they’re like, Well, what do I say? Like, that feels weird. So yeah, use somebody else. And if you want to take that video of the transcript, you pop it into whatever AI tool. And the key here is to ensure that you’re training it on your voice. And so say, use this transcript only. Do not research. Make sure you have an ED like it. For me, I’m like, use Wesleyan voice. Make sure you’re doing these things so it can sound like you and it doesn’t sound like it’s a robot. Love

Jeff Long  24:09

1. Jeff, any comments that you have for our friend? Those are fantastic. Yeah, you guys nail it. Well, alright, hey, we’ll grab

Curt Anderson  24:16

another comment. Diane says videos being introduced at car dealers during delivery of vehicles and make sure that the all the customers get the same information. So again, it’s that consistency that video brings. And then, Jeff, I don’t, were you? Were you taking a peek at this question here? Is this the one I

Jeff Long  24:30

think? Well, I was, I was going to put my YouTube channel because somebody mentioned if I had a resource, if you have a PDF of your technique, yeah, put my youtube channel in there, which I’m not logged into stream yard. So I put in our private chat. I put my YouTube Got it,

Curt Anderson  24:48

got it okay, you know what? Now pull it up. Yeah, thanks. I will pull it up right now for you

Jeff Long  24:52

logged into stream yard before I and I’m afraid if I log in, it’ll kick me out or do something weird. So,

Curt Anderson  24:57

yeah, yeah, that’s right, let me. Let me. Pull up your YouTube, and then what we can do is we’ll actually share it right now. So let me go there, let me go here, and let me share. And I’m going to go here, here, here. And can you guys see my screen

Jeff Long  25:11

cool? And the reason I bring that up is I actually have quite a few videos on how to feel more comfortable and confident in front of the camera. And, you know, trade show, video, trade show techniques, you know, a myriad of different topics that people have asked over the years. And so I try to talk about those, yeah, video, value bombs and all that good stuff. Perfect.

Curt Anderson  25:35

So let’s, you know what, why we’re here. Let’s dive into this. Jeff, so just talk a little bit about your strategy, about, you know, again, like, in your case, so you know, what we’re talking about is, like, a process or a system. You know, you’re trying to help manufacturers to, hey, shamelessly use my line. Stop being the best kept secret, right? And you’re using video to do so let’s go there a little bit like, because now the great thing, why I love our relationship is, like, you know, you’re not the cobblers kid with no shoes, you practice what you preach. And so like, you these are strategies, not like, Hey, I read about this last week, or I heard about it on a podcast, like, this is what you do. So let’s go through your YouTube channel a little bit and just talk about your process and how you’re you’re producing all these videos.

Jeff Long  26:17

Yeah. So number one is, ideally, if you can batch content. That’s the way to go, right? So if every Monday you’re creating one piece of content for the next, you know, four weeks, you know, a month’s worth of content, that’s That’s great. So it’s funny, even some of these videos, as I’m watching, I see the same shirt on or this, you know, that’s because I’m batching right? And so even though I noticed that most people might not, who knows, maybe they do, and honestly, I don’t care. And so yeah, the more you can batch together, the better my channel, of course, is a mix of like me talking, you know, showcasing my authority. It’s also a place where I put client videos that we’ve done so the you know, some of those higher, higher end, more professional type videos we put there. And so, yeah, it’s a mix of, you know, podcasts and live streams I’ve been on. There’s these video value bombs. There’s a lot of material on there. And, and it is work, right? Let’s be honest. It’s, I mean, the reason is, the reason not everybody does video is because video is challenging, and so just kind of be aware of that. I mean, yes, there are simpler tools. Yes, AI is awesome, and can help in many ways, but it still takes time. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  27:38

let’s talk about I’ve been pushing everybody on shorts, I know, you know, and you just even, like, you look at your numbers here, you know, like 149 400 you know, like you’re seeing much, you know, we’re kind of, we’re navigating from, gravitating from like that tick tock road, if you will. You know, short clips. Do you have, like, a particular, uh, YouTube short strategy, or any, any feedback that you want to give us. Short, I

Jeff Long  28:01

mean, so I think a company would have a different strategy than I would have, right? And so, you know, if they’re trying to do employee, you know, find new employees, then, yeah, their their strategy is going to be different than a more of a sales and marketing strategy. I don’t know that. You know more. I don’t know how many Gen X and Boomers or Gen X on up are really consuming many shorts. Let’s just be honest. I don’t know. I mean, some, of course. So to me, it’s an experimental. Experimental thing is, I mean, I could give you all the pros and cons for all of these things, but really it comes down to, is it working for your company? And, you know, talk to your sales people, is that something that they could leverage, or talk to your HR for hiring and retention? Is that something they can leverage? And if it is, let’s, let’s do, you know, 10 or 20 of those, and experiment with it and see how it goes. You know, I if you do one, well, that’s not gonna, that’s not gonna give you enough data to make an informed decision. So just know that you, you are gonna have to make some type of commitment. It’s not a forever commitment, but it is something where you can get some information back. And

Wesleyne Whittaker  29:16

I think something that you said, Jeff is really important. People give up too quickly on any techniques, right? Especially video. And I think it’s important for you to try something and stick with it for a little bit. Don’t give up on it after one or two instances where you’re not getting what you need from it. And I love using the example of probably 80 to 90% of my great clients have never liked or commented on anything that I put on LinkedIn ever. But every single time we get on a call, they’re like, yeah, so you know the thing that you were talking about on LinkedIn, or I’ve even had a client call me like, Oh, your post today. It was right on. Never liked. It never comments on it, right? And so as you’re producing this content, you may not get immediate feedback, you may not see a lot of views, you may not see a lot of comments or like but it’s people buy from people. So they need to see you. They need to understand your voice and what you can give them before they’ll opt in to your list or anything you have totally,

Jeff Long  30:21

and that’s the, you know, when you think about vanity metrics, a lot of times in manufacturing, you don’t have those. I mean, we have a couple videos we’ve done for companies that have hundreds of 1000s of views, and those are always fun, of course, but like, it’s, yeah, it’s the right type of buyer that you’re looking for. And so, you know, I think the other thing is, let’s say there’s a company, and let’s say it’s a smaller company, maybe they only have two or three sales people. I mean, imagine that you could duplicate your whole sales team, if you if you had a bunch of people on camera giving tips, talking about problems that that you solve, case studies, industry trends, all of those things. Maybe there’s 10 people in your office. They’re all salespeople, right? So it’s not just the sales guys and or salespeople that are going out now, you’re, you’re, you’re, you’re multiplying your your sales force. Because, again, it’s a lot of it is just educating people, helping people get to know like and trust you and your company. And so video does all that. Wow, I

Curt Anderson  31:27

love that. Let me grab a couple comments. Diane says, love teaching mode. And so what do we always preach here? You know? How do you out teach the competition, right? What a great way that video can execute that. So talk on video like you’re having a conversation with a friend, right? Is that what we’re saying? Jeff Long,

Jeff Long  31:44

I was reading another comment. Curt, my brain what

Curt Anderson  31:51

we’re saying talk like we’re having a conversation. So Jeff, we I got your back. I’m going to leave the comment up here. Wesley, what do you think of this comment

Wesleyne Whittaker  31:57

here? Yes, I think it’s really important. And, you know, even getting used to it so mindset. So I’m on the sales side, and a lot of times we have these self limiting beliefs, these stories or things that we tell ourselves that prevent us from excelling in sales. So I literally, in my trainings, I tell the sales people, I want you to take out your phone on a really good day when you’ve had lots of wins, and talk to yourself like you would talk to your best friend. You wouldn’t tell your best friend, oh my gosh, you missed this one thing. You didn’t do this. You really suck. You should probably not do this anymore. No, we talk to ourselves, and we’re like, man, you would say, oh my gosh, you’re so amazing. So when you’re on video, literally pretend like that your top client is in front of you and have some questions teed up, and you’re like, you know, I was in this thing and blah, blah, what happened? Like, it needs to be very conversational. If you’re like a robot, nobody’s going to watch you. Nobody’s going to want to hear it. They want to hear the inflections in your voice. And it takes time, because when I started doing video, probably, like, three, four years ago, um, it was a horrible, it was horrible, like, I’m like, wow, you’re not even looking at the camera. You’re like, looking off side. You’re doing all of these things. And so it’s really important to not be so hard on yourself when you get started. Yeah,

Curt Anderson  33:14

and just, and real quick, I just Wesleyne, and I just want to grab your LinkedIn profile. So again, we’ve got Wesleyne Whittaker here, transform sales and definitely, how do I get rid of that thing?

Jeff Long  33:24

Okay, I can just click away, like, click out of anywhere, out of that.

Curt Anderson  33:30

There we go. Alright, so Wesleyan, you do a phenomenal job posting. Strongly encourage everybody here connect with Wesleyne. You’re posting videos. How many days a week are you posting videos on your LinkedIn profile? Um,

Wesleyne Whittaker  33:40

I probably, like three, four, um, videos a week, maybe, yeah, depending on the week, yeah, yeah.

Curt Anderson  33:46

And any, any tips, advice that you want to share, as far as, like, your process, how you’ve grown, any hacks that have made your life a little bit easier with this process?

Wesleyne Whittaker  33:54

So I have a podcast, and so it’s just like, you know, having a live and a lot of the videos you see what I do is we pull pieces of me saying something amazing or interesting in that podcast. So this is actually a pull from a podcast that I did, and so I just asked the video editor to go grab a 30 to 62nd cut, and we’re doing some, you know, new stuff now, kind of adding in some stills and some different things, just to to play around with what the millennials and Gen Z, what they’re they’re really liking in video. So again, if you are already doing something, I pull a lot from my trainings, my coaching. So I don’t really just sit here and record a bunch of videos, because I talk all day anyways, so I just use what I already have. And so if you’re already doing video, just use that, repurpose your content, and I take the transcript from these and I’m like, Okay, write me a post based on this transcript only, and then it gives me the post, so it doesn’t have to be so laborious. Yeah.

Curt Anderson  34:59

Add. Love it. So alright, Jeff, I’m coming back at you with my friend Diane. She says, talk on video like you’re having a conversation with a friend and so again. So like, for folks, maybe our introverts, our engineers, as you’re saying, like, maybe people that aren’t super, you know, camera you know, I’m gonna say they’re camera friendly, but maybe they’re just a little bit video shy. How’s that?

Jeff Long  35:18

Yeah, totally. I would say, yeah. I mean, the more, the more you can kind of be in this, like, calm, peaceful state. That’s good. But also, you know the old phrase of, like, the camera adds 10 pounds. I think the camera sucks out like 50% of your energy. So I always I talk a little faster on camera even now, yeah, I do try to, I use my hands, yeah? And I do try to increase the excitement, the animation, right? So maybe drink a big cup of coffee before you do some videos or whatever. Yeah, yeah. Because, again, for whatever reason, videos, cameras just kind of suck out all your energy. You feel maybe awkward or whatever I mean. And so, yeah, use your hands. Talk fast and add some energy. Bring,

Curt Anderson  36:07

bring your A game. Speaking of a game, I don’t know who this person is, exit your way is, isoka out there says, I think video is a great way to create content. And then he also drops a comment. AI can really help. And then I want to grab Harry’s comment. Hiring, buying, branding, etc, is an emotional process, and nothing taps in emotions better than video. Curt, Jeff leslene are showing us today, Harry, thank you, my friend. I always appreciate value, your comments, your feedback. Here I want that’s where I’d like to go, and I know I’m probably keeping you guys, we’re we’ll start winding down here the emotion. Let’s talk about Jeff. You said, People buy buy. People buy from people. Don’t buy from businesses. Don’t necessarily buy products. They buy from people. Wesleyan, you said, you know, hey, when you try to be something every, you know, when you try to be everything, everybody, we’re nothing to noone. Let’s talk about the emotions. Jeff, like, you know, either origin story of the entrepreneur, or maybe, you know, a problem I had, and how this product, this company, this solution, helped me overcome, helped me win the day. Talk a little bit about the emotion, the story, part of it, right?

Jeff Long  37:09

Yeah. So whenever I’m talking with a manufacturer, I don’t ever mention, like, 4k and the frame rate and the audio bit rate, sample rate, and like they don’t. They have a problem they’re trying to solve, and so I need to help them solve that. And I’m constantly surprised, and maybe Wesleyan can speak about this more. From a sales perspective, I find that most companies just think, hey, the more we like say we’re a great company. Buy from us, trust us. What like? Okay, well, what problems are you solving and and, you know, talk about that emotion. Give talk about stories, right? People relate to stories versus only specs and tech and all that stuff, right? There’s a time and a place for that, of course. But you know, manufacturers specifically need to be doing more storytelling as well as showcasing their own authority, like, why are you in your company? The experts in this field, you know that gets us to know like and trust you.

Wesleyne Whittaker  38:10

Yeah, I found the same thing. It’s everybody wants to talk about why they’re so great, and so I’d love to tell them, nobody cares about you, like you are unimportant to your prospects and your customers. They absolutely don’t care about you. They care about their problems. They care about their challenges. And when you connect with them at that emotional level, when that emotional level of like, like, what do you want me to do? You want me to be I’m like, No, I don’t want you talking about like, rainbows and butterflies, but I want you to understand or ask them the questions to get to the problem, and how does the problem they’re having actually impact them? And I did this session with the sales team this week, and they one of the questions they brought to the table was, I have this deal and it’s stuck. So I said, Okay, well, what are the problems that that client is having? He was like, well, they need this, this, this, and that? I said, No, no, what are the actual problems they’re trying to solve? Now, what does your product do? What problems are they trying to solve? And so if you get on video and you talk about the problems your customers are trying to solve, they’re like, oh my goodness, I feel like you are living in my facility. I feel like you understand me. And so stepping out of your world and stepping into the customer world first, and then start adding some video to it. If you’re still too product centric, and you only know how to talk about your specs and why your product is most important, then you’re really never going to be successful with video, because you’re going to be talking about stuff that nobody actually cares about. That’s right? You’re going to

Jeff Long  39:38

be missing the bull’s eye, kind of, going back to that analogy, right? You might hit the target kind of but it’s way out here, versus right in the middle. Yes, right?

Curt Anderson  39:45

You know, we had, we had a client or a client. We had a guest come on the show. Years ago, wonderful, dear friend of mine, Jeff, you met her. She was with the Queen’s Small Business Development Center when we did programs like early COVID, and she came on the show. And I’ll never, I find my dying day. Never forget this. She said, You know what, we all have an obligation to exhaust our God given talents and just like, bring it every day, whatever it is, if you’re the best street sweeper, you’re the best, you know, Baker, whatever you do, like, bring your A game. And I just, I just that hit home for me. And I think, you know, bringing that passion with this video, everything you’re describing really hits that home. Couple more comments. Zan, if I’m pronouncing this correctly, says very great tips. Thank you very much. Diane, has a comment here. I’m going to pull up, try it. You might like it. In order to try it, we need to get over the fear. Thank you, Diane, of doing something new. For me, it’s good in how over how I sound to self on video compared to live. Diane, thank you for your transparency. Thank you for being honest. Here. I saw a question here, Jeff, so

Jeff Long  40:46

1. Let me even with that one. Yeah. I mean, I think everyone struggles with how they look, how they sound. I know I do. You know, after I watch my videos, I’m like, oh man. Like, who’s that guy? So it’s just a fact of life. You know, just everyone’s there.

Curt Anderson  41:01

Well, you know, you said, like, how, you know, Cameron puts on 10 pounds. Is there any chance? Like, couldn’t camera put on, like, some hair? Like, I can’t find that. Jeff, you keep recommending cameras? I bought like, 20 different cameras. None of them put hair on me. So they’re not working.

Wesleyne Whittaker  41:15

No hair, no new hair. I

Curt Anderson  41:16

have. I do have a question. Jeff, I’m coming at you with a question. You ready? We’re in the zone here. So it looks like Ahmed asks I’m working on my business hero, Super App. Hey, congratulations, Mr. Entrepreneur, wishing you wonderful success. How can I use Video for marketing my project to investors? That’s I’m putting it out to both you. Jeff, if you are ready and raring to go, I’d love to hit you first. Wesleyan, I’d love for you to chime in as well?

Jeff Long  41:41

Yeah, I would break down. Maybe it’s, let’s say the top five problems your app solves. Have one video with all five, and then break that video into five smaller segments, right? Then you have six pieces of video content. You know that can be, of course, for investors, specifically, if you’re meeting with them, but it could be like a pre sale type of situation, you know, through email or social media or things like that, you could have product comparisons. So maybe there’s other competition around what do? What is your solution? Have they don’t or that isn’t as good, tell your story as well, right? A lot of times apps and services can be almost like faceless corporations and companies. I mean, tell your story, you know, a lot of times people are like, Well, I had these, you know, two things, two solutions, in mind, but I really like, you know, Ahmed story, I’m going to go with his. Like, he seems like a pretty cool guy doing amazing things passionate, and sounds like he’s here to stay.

Curt Anderson  42:45

Love it. Great. Answer, people do business with people. Wesleyne, what are your thoughts? What advice you have here for Ahmed,

Wesleyne Whittaker  42:50

so it’s really important to understand what’s important to the audience you’re speaking to. So what investors want to know is, how am I going to get my money back and with interest, perfect. So as you’re thinking about your video content, you need to be speaking in terms that matter to them. You want to speak in terms of ROI. You want to speak in terms of dollars, percentages, market share. So use words that are important to them, and it shows them one. Okay, you get it. You understand what you’re doing. You have a good sense of your business. And you’re also speaking my language, because the video is really just the teaser, so they take a meeting with you. So kind of like Jeff said, if you have these four or five different if this four or five video series, you want to make sure that it’s just enough to wet their appetite, but use terms that speak to them.

Curt Anderson  43:43

Great, hey, great answer to both you so. And guess what? Ahmad, gives you guys a little round of applause. So, Ahmad, thank you for the question. And, man, we wish you just massive success with your new app. I think that is super, super exciting. Couple more comments here we’ve got from Diane says video helps you to quote, be present when your customer employee viewer is available. 24/7, Wesleyan, we’ve said for years, you know, how can you help that ideal buyer make a buying decision on a Friday night at midnight without having to wait for you to open up your doors on Monday morning? And Jeff Long, you’ve taught me many ways of how video can absolutely do that. Let’s grab one more comment from Diane, when you are super see, when we are so busy problem solving our own issues, we wear our fireman’s hats putting out the fires. It’s not just we don’t care about others, but when the house is on fire, we don’t want help putting it out. So that’s a great comment there. Okay, we’ll start. We’re going to start winding down here. Uh, man, Wesley, was this fight like this, like a fast 40, I don’t know how long we’ve got 45 minutes we’re at right now. So this was, uh, phenomenal. Jeff, what are we leaving out here? Any other tips, any other blind spots, any gaps for our friends out there that, um, I know that’s a broad that’s, I

Jeff Long  44:55

know, right, how long we got here? Yeah. Yeah, no, I think, I think the key, and I think Wesleyan mentioned this, like, just get started. You know, when you look back these early videos you’re not gonna like, and just accept that. You know, there’s stuff I’m doing right now. I’m planting seeds of success, and I know my future self will look back and probably laugh or chuckle or whatever. Yeah, okay, that’s fine. But you know, getting started is the key, and so just accept, hey, hardly anyone likes being on camera, but it’s one of the best ways to showcase your expertise the problems you solve. It does a lot for marketing and sales and all that good stuff like we talked about. So just get started.

Curt Anderson  45:41

Let’s Hey, dude, I’m coming at you with one more question. You ready? You’re locked and loaded, and this looks like a good one here. So Ron stops and first off, thank you everybody for the questions. You guys have been phenomenal. What a wonderful panel we have here, and what a wonderful group of guests that we have asking questions. Fantastic session on using video to boost business. So hey, round of applause for Jeff Long, thank you, Jeff, the passion and insights here are invaluable. How do you recommend small businesses start integrating video effectively without a large budget? Jeff, I’m coming at you. Wesley, I love for you to chime in. Jeff Long, what do you think here? Yeah. I

Jeff Long  46:18

mean, it’s getting more affordable every day, right? With Apps and AI and services and so Exactly. So sometimes it’s hard for me to recommend, like, cost effective apps, because I don’t use them, like we use more than pro stuff, right? And so, but just know, yeah, you don’t have to spend 1000s of dollars, yeah, if you’re getting started. So yeah, use even chat GBT, you know, create a custom GPT for your company, for your ideal buyer personas. Ask it, hey, what video content should I create? Hey, write a short outline or a short script. And, you know, go from there. I mean, even we use Riverside a lot, it’s a podcasting and editing kind of service thing. So we use that. But, yeah, I guess, I mean, there’s, it’s almost infinite. How many new services are these days? Well,

Curt Anderson  47:12

again, Wesleyne, I’m here to hear your thoughts. But before, Jeff, so you know, if you guys missed it. So we’ve been doing this little, little LinkedIn live thing we’re pushing five years now. Jeff Long was our absolute, very first guest. And you know, the founder of LinkedIn, he always says, if you if you’re not embarrassed by your first outing, whether like your website, your social, your video, whatever it is, if you’re not embarrassed by your first outing, you waited too long. So, you know, just put yourself out there. Diane made a great comment about just get out of your comfort zone. So good. But Jeff, you know, I came to you and you coached me. I bought, you know, the $100 camera. I had a 20, a $19 1999 cent microphone, and that’s how I started. You know, many years ago, thanks to you coaching me. And so, you know, it’s not a huge investment to get started. Wesleyan, just share a little bit your thoughts on like on a small budget, you’re just a fierce advocate for for videos, your thoughts,

Wesleyne Whittaker  48:07

I think the most important part is kind of what you just mentioned. Curt, it’s get a decent camera and microphone. Those are the most important things. The editing. You can outsource it. You can use apps. You can figure out how to do that, but if you have bad quality video, it can never be good. So start with really good quality video. If you have the latest cell phone, iPhone or Google phone, or something like that, they have really good cameras on them also. So you just want to make sure that you start with that is where you should invest your money. And it’s a one time investment, the editing, all the post production, you can learn how to do it. It’s, I always say, you have to decide, am I more important? Is it more important right now for me to invest time or money? If you have the money, outsource it, hire somebody. If you don’t learn how to do it yourself and you can, there’s so many tools out there, so I would say those would be, that would be my advice, yeah,

Curt Anderson  49:02

and we definitely need to wrap up here soon. Diane says cell phone, laptop computers to start any thoughts there,

Jeff Long  49:09

yeah. I mean, I would probably go more with your phone versus a laptop or desktop. You know. I mean, micro external microphones a plug into your phone or computer are fairly cheap and affordable. So yeah, I think either, either are fine to start with.

Curt Anderson  49:27

Yeah, excellent. Okay, we and I, we will start winding down. I want to get everybody on with their day. So first off, I want to grab Hey, Raj gives us a little round of applause. Ahmed says, Great. Thanks a lot. I’m going to work on it. So first off, I want to give a huge, huge thank you to everybody in our audience here. So thank you for the comments, the questions. You guys have been absolutely phenomenal. But most importantly, man, I want to give a huge thank you to my co host. Let’s start with there. Wesleyan, thank you for filling in for Damon rich. Who’s you guys? You know? What was the guy? Lou Gehrig, what was that? Jeff was the first base. Before Lou Gehrig, right? Was it Wally Pip? I think was the name. So, yeah, Wally PIP decided to take a day off for the New York Yankees. And then I think Lou Gehrig came in and he didn’t take a day off for 2000 and whatever game. So Damon, just be just give me a little I’m teasing mostly. Next time around with Damon, we’ll call him Wally Pip, so you’ll be the next one. So I’m just teasing. So Jeff, long I want to send you huge thank you. Tons of my respect, admiration. I Hey, I’m a man. I can say this. My love for you, dude. You’re an amazing father. You’re a wonderful dad, husband, just a great human being. I tell you, iron sharpens iron. I just, I feel so much better as a person, just being in your world, in your circle, you make everybody around you better. I mean that from the by my heart, from the day that you and I met, uh, Wesley, you love this. My wife’s a preschool teacher. When COVID hit, Jeff did a little session with my what with myself and my wife, we had no idea what zoom was like. The fact that, like, I’m live streaming here, Jeff, what my wife and I sat in the living room, and Jeff was like coaching us how she could, like, teach her four year olds. Zoom, when COVID, COVID first started. And so that’s my friendship with Jeff. Long, so Jeff, I applaud you. Let’s give a big round of applause for Jeff. Long, yeah. This is good. This was awesome. So Jeff, I want to thank you. I appreciate you. Places to find you. We know LinkedIn website, just give, give everybody where they can find you to connect

Jeff Long  51:27

and learn more. Yeah, my website, true focus media.com, and then yeah, LinkedIn and YouTube are kind of my other primary channels. Awesome. Hey, we’ve

Curt Anderson  51:38

got noted. Thanks a lot for your insights. Diane gives a round of applause. Thank you so much. Appreciate you all make your weekends absolutely fabulous, and Diane right back at you so Wesleyan parting thoughts, words of wisdom. Any Wesleyan wisdom for us?

51:51

Hmm,

Wesleyne Whittaker  51:52

I think that the with the what I would say, I listened to a podcast, my avid podcast, the center, and it was all about taking risk and as business owners, as sales people, as marketing professionals, if we stay in our comfort zone and we never take risk, then we never see what’s on the other side of that. So just try. If it doesn’t work, that’s okay, but at least you can say I tried it, so just take the first step. Well,

Curt Anderson  52:19

excellent. So guys, as we close out every week, what I love to say is just go out and be someone’s inspiration, just like this lovely lady over here and just like this handsome guy over over here I was getting backwards over there. So Jeff, Long. So I want to thank both you for joining me today. Thank you guys for being in the chat box. For all of you that didn’t drop a comment, we appreciate you. Everybody did drop a comment? Come back next Friday, we have a wonderful guest coming back. So guys, God bless you. Have a great, amazing rest of your day, and we appreciate you. Keep crushing it. Jeff boys. Wesleyne, hang out one second, and we will we’ll see you guys soon. Peace, bye.