The Builders

Today I’m joined by Kristi Spencer.  She is an etiquette consultant helping a range of people and organizations get better in this department.  As our focus is business in this context, we talked about it from a businesses perspective (mostly.. personal can influence the other).  Of course, in true The Builders' fashion we also dug into her story a bit and her ‘why’.  Why is she passionate about Etiquette? I used my own experience in business to guide the conversation.. I have teams so we talked about etiquette in that context.  How can it be implemented, what can it improve..?  Meetings.. many listening to this have meetings!  How should we think about this topic when running or participating in meetings? Then we talk about it from a customer service perspective.  I share my own experience and she provides her thoughts.  The portion on the ‘dynamic pause’ is dynamic!  Don’t miss that. :-) Kristi’s whole life lead up to her focusing on this and she LOVES helping others get better.  Definitely tune in if you or your business could use some help in this department - or you’re just curious.

In this episode I am joined by Bob Hunter.  Bob is the founder of Oxford Pierpont and MyBusinessCredit .com. Oxford Pierpont is designed for larger corporations and My Business Credit for smaller businesses needing funding under a million dollars. The conversation starts things off by talking about his background and journey.  Bob was diagnosed with Sickle Cell Disease which took his right eye vision and his left ear hearing.  This forced him out of a job he loved and lead him to starting his own companies.  This story quickly transforms into a story of recovery and inspiration.  His strength of character and perseverance are unquestionable. From there we talk about his passion.  Selling money!  He helps businesses, big and small, get funding and financing.  We talk about how to get funding, how to improve ‘business credit’ (the differences with business credit and personal) and how to approach it all.  His expertise is helping businesses do the right things to improve their credit and get the funding they need.  GREAT conversion.. one of those I personally didn’t want to end.  Enjoy!

In this episode I’m joined by Ozan Bilgen.  He is the founder & CEO of Base64.ai Inc, the fastest-growing artificial intelligence startup in New York.  Like always, we first dive into his story and what his journey looked like as an entrepreneur.  From Turkey to the US.. from working for Microsoft, Paypal and Uber.  He’s got a fascinating story! We talk about his business.  Where did he come up with this innovative idea that leverages AI and Machine learning?  How does he approach business in general?  Like many of us he’s tried a lot of different things to market his business.. what has worked best for his company? Then we land on technology.  I picked his brain about where he sees AI and Machine Learning today and where we’re headed with it.  Don’t miss this one.. he’s a high caliber guest with amazing insights.

In this episode I am joined by Michelle Nedelec and her cat Dolores.  As I like to do, I asked her about her journey and we explored her path from her first businesses, building websites to what she does today.  Today she’s an international speaker and helps entrepreneurs be as successful as possible by taking the tech stuff off their plate. How can you partner with others to help you do more?  One of the things you can do is get help with your tech.  It’s also valuable to have another pair of experienced eyes to take a look at your business and find ways to extract more from what you’re doing currently.  She provides some examples as to how she has helped others that includes having helped a large business with a large list they never followed up with over the years. How do you grow a business without losing control?  Or ‘control the faucet’.  It’s easy to get help that brings in too much and overwhelms you.  How do you avoid that?  Get insights and more great lessons in general in this one from someone that’s been building and helping businesses for decades.  Enjoy!

In today’s episode I am joined by Matt Bailey.  Matt Bailey teaches Digital Marketing to the world's biggest brands and prestigious universities.  Microsoft, Google, Hilton, Orange, Nationwide, P&G, Disney, and HP are just a few of his training clients. We start with his personal journey and story and what lead him to ‘education’ as a focus.  Why molded him  and what were those early years like?  He was building and marketing websites in the late 90s.. what was that like, what traffic did he get and what lessons could he extract that is still applicable today? From there we dive into lessons small businesses can learn from big businesses.  The importance of business owners educating themselves so they can ask good questions; especially when talking with agencies helping them.  We also talk about analytics and data and understanding not just how to get a lot of traffic, but how to focus on what’s contributing to revenue AND most importantly profit.  A lot of great lessons in this one.. don’t miss it!

In this episode I’m joined by Nicky Billou.  He’s a best-selling author, an in-demand and highly inspirational speaker, an advisor and confidante to some of the most successful and dynamic entrepreneurs in Canada and co-founder of eCircle Academy.  He’s really passionate about helping entrepreneurs which shines through in this episode! First he shares his story and message about how precious freedom is.. sharing his families story leaving Iran and moving to Canada.  He spent a stint in corporate America before going into business for himself.  He shares a number of stories starting with a life changing one where he found the money to invest in himself which resulted in huge success. Nicky also talks to us about the importance of developing a great ‘message’ for your business, the importance of embracing your ‘value’ when pricing your services AND the importance of investing in yourself to get to the next level.  A lot of gold in this one.. enjoy!!

In this episode we are joined again by AJ Saunders.  AJ and I dive deeper into the topic of building great niche content that is constructed in a way that gets results.  Learn what type of blogs he has.. we talk about how to manage content - DIY vs hiring others. We then talk about what makes good content.. how to choose topics.  I share my experience with the conversational writing style in copywriting and content creation.  Should we hold anything back with our content?  How does AJ think about that? That leads us into CTA’s.. Calls to Action.  We’ve written content so now how do we reel them in and construct something that encourages them to take a beneficial action on our site?  Because.. we aren’t writing content for our health, right!?  If you write content or are wondering how to approach it, this episode is for you!

In this episode I am joined by Melane Mullings.  Melane has an incredible story.  When she was just 17 she was diagnosed with cancer.  While she did beat cancer, the experience she had had a real impact on her and was a catalyst as to what she did with the rest of her life. One of the things I noted is she doesn’t just identify problems and endure through them.. once she has endured, she looks for ways to make change and improve those things.  As an example, her stay in the hospital and poor emotional care motivated her to become a RN and eventually start a nurse recruiting business. After 13 years she sold that business and started a consulting business and wrote the book she always planned to write.. in fact, she wrote the chapters on her business journey!  Besides her own story, we dive into some of the topics she is personally passionate about.. in the context of helping others succeed.  Getting to know yourself, the power of reading a book a month.. to Emotional Intelligence (EQ).  Great stuff!  Enjoy!

In this solo episode, I share my own business journey.  We've just completed the development of our last 2 plugins (total of 3) and the release is planned.  Then I talk Unified Toolkit and how these will be added there and what else we're doing.  And I reveal for the first time the new niche/vertical we are preparing to launch into. What does this all mean in the context of Unified Web Design?  Because that is our core.   Our anchor.  How do we continue to maintain that?  I share how I define 'AGENCY FIRST'.  Why that's so critical and how we still get other projects done; like the plugins and the work being done for this new niche. It's always fun sharing my own lessons and stories from the trenches.  If you've followed this podcast you've enjoyed a front row seat into the inner workings and progress we're making with my agency.  This episode is another glimpse.. and another step in our progression.  Enjoy!

In this solo episode I talk about my absolute FAVORITE topic.  WordPress!  This one is inspired by a Twitter post..  someone was asking if any of ‘us’ were experiencing people moving away from WordPress.  Of course, that's anecdotal right?  But it’s a great spring board into talking about why continuing to use, build sites with WordPress or move to WordPress is still a GREAT decision. I talk a lot about it’s flexibility.  How it can be used as a framework instead of a single, block solution.  From headless CMS set ups to FSE themes to classic.  We cover all the bases.  On top of that, I share real world experiences and projects to drive home my perspective.  A client moving from a non-WP to a WordPress site, non-WordPress agencies getting into the WP game.. blended builds (eg, WP, WooCommerce with a dash of Angular) .. Buckle up!  And get ready to become a fan.  Enjoy!