AJV (00:03): So I’ve got a question for you. How good are you at building and nurturing your own community? And I think that’s a really relevant question to at least me. As you know, I sit as c e o, which is, you know, more like I just do all the things. Other people don’t have time for more than anything fancy. But as I sit as the c e o of Brand Builders Group this is just a question I ask myself all the time. It’s like our number one priority is to build and nurture deep, meaningful relationships with our community. And our team is always asking, how do we do that? And then how do we do it better? How do we do it more efficiently? How do we build community and nurture them faster in the way that they want? And that led to a, a conversation with a friend of mine, Amanda Moriuchi, who also happens to be a client at Brand Builders Group, which was even more helpful and insightful. AJV (01:01): And she happens to be the owner of this really cool custom app company. They build apps called app. And it led to this often conversation around how we use technology to deepen relationships and nurture relationships. And let me say, without going any further, I believe deeply in the importance of one-on-one human interaction on a phone call or in person over coffee. And I also know that there’s just so many minutes in the day. And so to be able to supplement some of that nurturing and some of that community building with technology is just, it’s where we are and there’s components that are really good and healthy and some that are kind of exhausting and overwhelming. So I’m gonna focus on the good and healthy ones. So I thought this was a really great question to go and how do we use technology to increase our relationships with our community as a company? AJV (02:00): And so there’s a couple of things I thought were just really noteworthy in this conversation that I would share in this little video with you. So number one is having an app is really what this conversation is about. It’s taking your relationship building off of social media and putting it into a platform that is yours. And in this particular conversation, we’re talking about an app that could also be in an email list. But I think the interactive nature of all the things that are happening in app make it really diverse and unique. Whereas an email list is, that’s an email list. But not to negate that, but this is specifically about how do we use apps to deepen relationships and sit, here’s some of the benefits that came out of this conversation of having an app. One is you own your audience, and that was, that is a number one priority for asset Brand Builders group is we can’t expect that the algorithm is always going to be on our, in our favor on other people’s AJV (02:58): Platforms. So, you know, regardless if it’s YouTube or Instagram or Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn, it, it doesn’t matter. It’s, we don’t own those audiences. We don’t own that platform. We don’t own that content, even though it’s our content, it’s on their platform. And so to be at the mercy of that is a little debating when you hear about a lot of the, a lot of these stories that are happening right now, you get locked out of your own account and it’s gone. And so it’s the importance of owning your audience. And again, this is on an app, if you can do that too with, you know, your email list with a, a blog RSS feed or your podcast, right? But it’s owning it so that you have more control over how you engage and interact and who actually sees it. So that’s step one. AJV (03:43): Two is technology is really leveling the playing field. And right now it’s, if I have a small audience with not tons of engagement, I’m not favored on social media, but in my own community where it, although I may have fewer followers, they’re deeper loyal followers, I have more opportunity to even go deeper and broaden those relationships when it’s in my control. So there’s a lot of benefit of having all of your audience or ha giving them the opportunity to have more of you, and thus you get more of them in this technology, you know, component that we’re talking about with an app, right? So it, it levels the playing field and let the small guys, the small gals have more opportunity to have deeper engagement and more access to our community and vice versa. So I think that’s really important. AJV (04:32): It’s the difference. The next thing is the difference between community and connection on social media. And I’m not slamming our dog and social media right now. It seems like a, a comparison and a little, a little comparison, but I’m not dogging. I think social media is really important, don’t get me wrong here, but there’s a lot of connection on social media, but not a lot of deep community is being built on social media. And so again, whether it’s your email list, podcast, whatever, but for me, it’s this idea of an app that allows you to create real community where there’s back and forth chats and there’s notifications and there’s internal challenges that you’re not paying for. It’s like you’re getting unique content just for you. You’re getting correspondence. You’re, you’re getting videos, you’re getting all this different stuff all in one platform that is actually you’re subscribing to, you’re saying, give this to me. AJV (05:23): I want this. And it allows the person who is managing the community to tailor and augment and make it better for the people who are saying, I want more of this, and just creates more community. It creates a like-minded group of people who are going, this is what I want, more of this, less of this. And they’re asking for it, which is hence why they’re on the app, right? So there’s just a lot of opportunity to build more community versus connection which happens on social media. The next is talking about a, a simple way of taking all of your content as a content creator and having it on one place. So with an app, it’s like, I can have my podcast there, I can have virtual trainings there. I can have live events there. I can have community correspondence and interactions video engagement, eBooks, challenges, the list goes on and on and on. AJV (06:16): And I’m not having to send some people to this funnel, some people to my website, some over here to iTunes. It’s like, no, no, no, I’m gonna take everything that I’m doing and I’m gonna consolidate it, condense it into one awesome platform that allows you to have everything you want in one place at your fingertips that has just been a game changer of a conversation of how do we do all these things and do it effectively while also keeping in place the integrity of the relationship with the individual. And so as you’re kind of thinking through your strategies for the year and in the years to come, I would just encourage you to think about three things as you listen to this rant on the importance of building community, not just on social media would be one what are you doing to own your audience? AJV (07:08): What are you doing to take back control of the engagement, interaction and correspondence that you have with people who subscribe to you, right? In other words, they follow you, like you engage with you. That’s number one. What are you doing to own it? Versus having everything that you’ve built on somebody else’s platform, which is rented real estate. So how can you own those, that audience engagement? Second thing is, how can you consolidate? How can you put everything that you’re doing online and put it into a centralized place where people have a go-to place to get all the things right? Workbooks, downloads, video, content, engagements events, whatever it is you’re doing, webinars. But how can they just get everything into one place to create a better member community experience? So that’d be the second. First one is how do you own your engagement? AJV (07:59): Number two is how do you consolidate your engagement? And then the third one is, how do you actually create better deeper community, right? And that just means you’ve got more time with people a huge part of community and relationships. It just takes time. So how are you doing that? How are you creating, you know, better and deeper relationships within the community? And that doesn’t mean just you and one-on-one to your community, but creating them amongst your community and how are you gonna do that? And so the app is not the answer for everyone. The app is the obvious answer for us at Brain Builders Group and what we’re moving ahead with. But I would just pose those questions for you to go back and sit with and think about of how can I do more of this? How can I own it, consolidate it, and make it better and deeper for the people that subscribe to what I have to say and what I have to share. So with that, you have your homework assignments speed . Hope this helps, and I’ll see you next time.