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Graham Cochrane, business coach and founder of The Recording Revolution, chats about the importance of content, and how to create compelling content. Graham is an entrepreneur and business coach from Tampa, FL who helps people monetize their passions and ideas and get paid to do what they love.
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The transcript…
A note about the transcript: The interviews are transcribed by an online app, and there may be errors in the transcription. While we do our best to correct errors—especially those that may change the meaning of what a speaker was trying to say—we do not catch every error. Thus we ask that people refer back to the audio/video for quotes. Also, please refer back to the audio/video if something is not clear in transcript; however, if you are hearing impaired, feel free to email us for clarifications.
(intro)
Graham Cochrane: 00:00:12 And part of that consuming of information is just fear and insecurity, that I’m not good enough. I don’t know the right things. I don’t want to make a mistake and I’m here to just tell you that I’m not that smart and businesses, I didn’t figure this thing out because I’m a genius and it’s not luck either. It’s like a real simple tried and true serving people and creating value. I do a few simple things every single week that continue to drive the needle forward and I ignore most information. I ignore most tactics and strategies…
Davey Jones: 00:00:49 Welcome to the Brands that Book Show, where we help creative businesses find more clients and build their brands. I’m your host, Davey Jones. Today’s guest is Graham Cochrane. Graham is an entrepreneur and business coach from Tampa, Florida who helps people monetize their passions and ideas and get paid to do what they love. Today Graham shares how creating content helped him build his businesses, tips for creating content of our own and how to turn visitors who consume our content into clients.
(end intro)
Davey Jones: 00:01:21 As soon as I came up with this idea for a podcast. You were one of the guys that I wanted to reach out with and talk to you just because I think you have such an incredible story. I mean, you have so much. You have so much stuff going on. I mean, I’m with the Recording Revolution, which this audience might not be particularly familiar with, but you can find a link to that in the show notes and I encourage everybody to go and check that out. But you have the Recording Revolution. You’re a great musician. You have music on iTunes, you have just started a new business coaching venture where, you know, I’m sure I’m taking everything that you’ve learned over the last couple of years and sharing that with others. Your wife is an incredible entrepreneur as well. I mean, she pretty much started, I think what we would call this styled stock photography industry. Um, and so I imagine that just life together as sort of like one big mastermind group.
Graham Cochrane: 00:02:13 Yeah, exactly. 24/7.
Davey Jones: 00:02:17 With all of that, and I think you both do this really well, but even with this newest venture you started just in and that’ll be in the show notes as well. GrahamCochran.com. You publish content so consistently, so well, you know, uh, I just think it’s so well done and uh, I think that content is one of the most important things when it comes to, um, businesses. So with all that said, I’m really excited for this interview and if you could just give us some background, you know, about the recording revolution and how you got started in this whole entrepreneurship journey.
Graham Cochrane: 00:02:54 No, I appreciate it. Um, I definitely got into it accidentally. I mean, I wasn’t like I wasn’t the entrepreneur that was trying to start a business. Um, I, I lost a job and started a business out of necessity because I couldn’t get another job because he was in the middle of the recession.
Davey Jones: 00:03:11 So this is back in 2008, right?
Graham Cochrane: 00:03:16 Yeah. 2009 was when I actually started the Recording Revolution. To be fair, I was always freelance recording and mixing bands, but it was always like side income. So in college and out of college for about three or four years, it’d be like two nights a week I’d have bands over at our little apartment and then Saturdays I’d record and mixed bands, um, before Shea and I had kids and it was just kind of fun. It was a lot of people in our town, so I was always freelancing, like servicing clients in that realm, but I never wanted to go full time with that.
Graham Cochrane: 00:03:44 I tried that once years ago, but I just got, I couldn’t handle the lack of stability of income to be honest with you. So it’s like, ah, I’ll just go get a day job. So that was my only experience with business was freelancing on the side. And then in the recession when I lost the job, we just moved to Florida to help a bunch of friends of ours start a church down here and I got a new job and then lost that job because the company folded. And uh, I was like, what am I going to do? So I was trying to ramp up freelancing and so this is where the Recording Revolution was birthed. It’s like a blog and it’s a Youtube channel where I teach people how to record and mix music, but I started a blog just as a way to get more clients. I thought, you know what, if I put content out there, if I don’t put anything out there, no one’s going to know I exist.
Graham Cochrane: 00:04:29 So if I put something out there, I have a better chance of somebody finding me and maybe they’ll like the music I’m working on with my current clients and they will reach out to me and hire me. And that was the thought and it did that. But it also became it’s own beast in and of itself where more people were like, “Hey, can you make more content on how to do this or record vocals or guitar?” They kept asking me all these more specific questions and I sort of in between clients, since I had no day job in between gigs, I would shoot some videos, write some articles, email out. I get on Twitter and share some stuff. And this whole thing just blew up. It became very exciting. People wanted more and I figured out ways to monetize that, the content side of things. And that’s just become a whole new beast of a business that’s been really fun to learn and to grow.
Davey Jones: 00:05:17 So I’m from start to not end because Recording Revolution still exists and is still doing well today. Um, but from start to realizing, Oh wow, this is, you know, this is a full time. This is now my full time job. About how long was that process?
Graham Cochrane: 00:05:17 Two years.
Davey Jones: 00:05:17 OK, two years.
Graham Cochrane: 00:05:37 Yeah. And it was a painful two years. I mean we were, um, we were on food stamps for 18 months. Shay was trying to take weddings. I was trying to record bands but we weren’t bringing in nearly enough income. We burned through all their savings and so I’m just creating content, trying to find a way to monetize it. And I started to make a little bit of money, but it was, it took 18 months to two years to finally the revenue to hit that point where it was replacing what my previous job was making so that we had, was probably a two year process.
Davey Jones: 00:06:05 And during that two year process, like, because you had mentioned that you had given this freelance thing a shot earlier on and it just, it didn’t work out and you didn’t like the, you know, not having that stability. Um, so at what point did you learn, like where did it become “OK, I’m really trying to build this and do this and like,” were you looking for another job during that time?
Graham Cochrane: 00:06:26 No, that’s the funny thing. I wasn’t, I didn’t want, I didn’t want another job. I hated having a job. I was, I was basically a entrepreneur that didn’t know it yet because I never did well in jobs. Um, and I always felt like, you know, locked in and I wanted to do my own thing and I just didn’t realize this was an entrepreneurial spirit. I just want her to be a rock star is what thought I wanted to be, but it turns out entrepreneurship is almost as fun, if not more fun than being a rock star. Um, and so I didn’t look for a job. I try to freelance my way out of it. And then when I saw momentum with this blog and with the YouTube videos, I thought, man, I know there are people out there that make money blogging. I, this was 2009, 2010 and that was out there that people could make a living blogging. And I just didn’t know how. Um, and so I was like, I this is probably my only shot to try to figure this out and if nothing works in at least a year or two, I’ll just go get a job. So I tried to figure it out. I wasn’t actively looking for a job, so I was actively freelancing and actively try to build this brand, the Recording Revolution, to see if I could make it something more than a $500 a month thing and could, I could replace my income with that thing. And that was like my, my driving goal.
Davey Jones: 00:07:40 And what’s interesting is that it didn’t happen overnight and I’m sure you know, in the midst of that, you’d, you know, definitely you probably felt slow going, uh, I would assume at times. And I mean, uh, you know, being on food stamps and this really being, you know, at the time, maybe your only source of income, you know, for people out there listening, thinking that things are just going to, just going to happen like that, you know, uh, I think when we see people like you who are really successful, um, we see you from success on and forget like, oh, wow, you know, they really hustled and grinded for years to get to that, uh, to get to that point. And fortunately, now there’s, there’s people like you who are willing to share your expertise. So maybe it’s not quite the hustle. Um, you know, it had to be for you for the rest of us. Um, but that’s, that’s fascinating. And you know, as far as content goes, ah, I think one thing that people worry about when they’re creating content is giving away too much. You know, as you were creating content for the Recording Revolution, did that cross your mind like, Oh man, people are. I mean, they’re asking a lot of me right now, like where did you draw that line of, OK, I can’t give away this for free?
Graham Cochrane: 00:08:55 I think it’s a common question “when is too much” and you know what I tell people, I tell people that you’re thinking backwards. I think if you’re afraid of giving too much, you’re not going to win. I think you’ve got to do the opposite. You’ve got to give so much that you’re really feeling like you’re a crazy person.
Graham Cochrane: 00:09:11 Um, because content is like, it’s like free marketing. It’s, it’s, your walking advertisement, it’s free in the sense it doesn’t cost you money. It’s, it costs you time and effort, but it will pay dividends. So for example, it’s worth making an incredible, in my case, making an incredible video and spending hours to do it once, that five years later I will still be getting leads from and revenue from because I made something amazing that’s going out in the world and helping people. So I had people from day one telling me I was giving too much content away for free. I remember one month I did a, a series, I did five minute videos on this topic for every day for the month. So was 31 videos. It was like two and a half hours of training. I had people literally say I should
just bundle that as a course and sold it instead of giving it all away on YouTube. And to me is the opposite. It’s, I’m able to sell courses because I give so much content away. That’s how I’ve grown so fast and so big is the sheer amount and quality of free stuff that I give away. Otherwise if I don’t give it away, no one will have heard of me.
Davey Jones: 00:10:21 And I feel like they don’t experience that value. You’re offering so much value in the end, these light bulb moments for people. Um, and they’ve got to wonder, you know, OK, well this is free stuff. So what does the, you know, paid stuff look like?
Graham Cochrane: 00:10:34 Absolutely, absolutely. There’s something I call the value circle, right? And it’s like a simple circle. But this is like the the secret sauce of my business. It’s like the foundation of the way I think about business because it’s so simple. It’s you. If you have a circle, the very top of the circle is your free offering. You have to give first, no matter what business you’re in, whether you sell products, like me, or services like me, I do both, but you have to give them a taste of who you are. So if it’s a piece of content that’s a free offering, it could be blog posts, it could be a podcast, it could be videos, it could be social media posts, may be very active on social media. You’re always teaching and giving and helping for free first. It could also be like a free consultation or like a, a free shoot or free, something like you’re showing them the goods first, where you’re transferring risk from them to you. You’re saying, look, let me give you something for free and you can take it and run, but that’s how you do business is you transfer risk from the potential customer to yourself so they feel real comfortable. So you give first. That’s the first part of the value circle and it’s gotta be valuable. And I think that’s another point. We might might not want to skip that. A lot of people get free stuff away, but it’s just, this is kind of crap, you know, if you think about it or it’s just thrown together quickly, you want your free stuff to be really like better than other people’s paid stuff is really good.
Davey Jones: 00:11:51 And I think, you know, like Shay for instance, does this, you know really well, um, she can show us a, you know, how to take these beautiful styled stock images, you know, and that certainly does add value. It’s nice to be able to know how to do those kinds of things. But at the end of the day, we’re going to go to her because she, you know, because she does it so well and she has it just kind of on demand. So we’re, we’re still going to go to her and buy those things. Even if she were to show us step by step how to create those images.
Graham Cochrane: 00:12:18 Absolutely. But we’re afraid to give because we’re afraid if we give the stuff away or give something good away, they’re not going to have a reason to buy. And I just think it’s the opposite. If you can get over that fear giving, people are magnetic, they’re attractive, their businesses grow and you’re giving someone a taste of like, oh my gosh, this person’s amazing and they will think of you and want to go deeper with you. And that’s the second part of the value circle is making a valuable product or service, which if you’re listening, I’m assuming you have and you’re trying to get more people to see the value in that product or service. You got to start by the free offering and it always starts with value. And then from there you want to over-deliver, and from there that leads to income and referrals and it goes right back up to the top again of another free offering that’s amazing. And it’s just a beautiful virtuous cycle that’s not centered on you. It’s not centered on your business, it’s centered on the potential customer or client and just hooking them up from day one.
Davey Jones: 00:13:13 And so this is something that you learned even back in 2009 starting the Recording Revolution. Do you think that’s still relevant today? Do you think content is still, um, the, you know, one of the best ways to grow your business today?
Graham Cochrane: 00:13:25 Even more so today. Even more so, yeah, there’s more content than there was. There always is going to be more, but it’s, it’s, it’s the most important thing you could do for your brand. And you look around like every brand, the Home Depots of the world, like totally different businesses than you. The Home Depots, the Banana Republics, the Apples, whoever it is, they all need content because we’re always consuming content on our phones or wherever they need images that are beautiful. They need posts on social media, they need videos, they, they want to be creating content from day one and always because that’s how people see them, discover them or remember them or keep them top of mind. So creating valuable content and it doesn’t have to be educational stuff, it can be motivational stuff, it can be entertainment. That’s content as well.
Graham Cochrane: 00:14:11 And some of the biggest YouTube platforms is just funny people on YouTube, but they are creating content. Um, it could be, um, you know, a little taste of the product. I mean, it could be anything little taste of the service, but your content is the key because otherwise no one’s going to know about you, you know, and then what people are doing is, and I’m not going to go on a soapbox here, but just as another example, people are jumping to like Facebook ads to get leads and that’s because they don’t have a content strategy. Like, well I guess I to have to buy leads. And I’m not saying you shouldn’t ever buy leads. I’m just saying like, it’s a lot simpler than that. You don’t need to give Facebook your money, you need to give people free, good, content and commit to it and own it and make it, and it’ll be your own lead generation machine versus having to pay Mark Zuckerberg to get leads.
Davey Jones: 00:14:57 And if you don’t have something that’s valuable to give away, doesn’t matter how many Facebook ads you run, those leads aren’t going to generate into anything. But one thing that you mentioned that I thought was, um, you know, interesting and maybe something that we should pause and talk about is, uh, what we think content is because I think people often think, oh, content that, you know, he means blogging, you know, and I hate blogging or vlogging into because so many people now have blogs. Um, would you say like, what, what, uh, what do you think is the most valuable kinds of content that people will be putting out there today? Does it have to be blogging? Blogging?
Davey Jones: 00:15:34 No it doesn’t have to be blogging. I would say do what you like to do. So because they’re all successful. Blogging is people say blogging is dead. It’s not dead. There are some massive blogs just continuously generating leads and millions of dollars a year through just good old blog posts.
Davey Jones: 00:15:52 And ironically, people who are, they’re often blogging that blogging is dead. I think that’s the. That’s the irony of it all.
Graham Cochrane: 00:16:00 Thank you for pointing that out. So blogging is alive and well. Podcasting, which I thought died in 2006, came back like in 2012, 13, 14, 15. It’s alive and well. We’re doing a podcast right now. So if you would rather just get on and talk and share. If you were really gifted communicator, it might be faster and easier for you to just get a microphone and hit record and go. That’s why people love podcasting because they’re commuting to work and they can just listen to it. Consume it. Video is growing, so if you, if you’re really good on camera, if you really connect with people, um, having that I, that visual eye contact and hearing their voice and seeing their face looking at you can be very powerful. But if the video of it is overwhelming to you and it’s easier for you to grab your laptop and go to Starbucks and bang out a post where you don’t need lighting, you don’t need it to be quiet and you could do it on a plane, then blogging is good or if none of those are good, own social media, pick one platform and say, I’m going to own Instagram in my niche.
Graham Cochrane: 00:16:53 I’m going to own Facebook or wherever you are, and then commit to creating content there because the point isn’t the medium because they’re all really working great right now and we can come up with a million examples of people who are winning and all of those. It’s more about what can you commit to consistently and fits your talents and your workflow. So for me, I do a little bit of all of it, but I’ve found I really. My content also does well on video and I liked the videos because I can just hit recording, go for the Recording Revolution stuff. The video content for my new brand, for the business coaching stuff takes a lot more work than the Recording Revolution stuff for me.
Davey Jones: 00:17:35 Is there a reason that takes a lot more work?
Graham Cochrane: 00:17:37 Well I feel mostly because I feel like the concepts or are harder to teach. Um, like on the audio, it’s very, to me it’s like super black or white, like do this, do that in business there’s a lot more junk I have to get people through a lot of bad advice. Uh, you know, bad tactics and strategies, mindsets, insecurity, so I have to navigate a lot, believe it or not, just to talk about business. So I have to do a lot more time outlining the content and really zeroing in on what am I going to say and then filming it. You don’t have to lighting all that kind of stuff. But to me I made that decision because I like to be on camera and I like to communicate that way and I like to consume content that way. But if that’s too much of a hassle for you, you could do any one that fits your skill set and fits what you can commit to regularly.
Graham Cochrane: 00:18:25 Because that’s the thing that I think people get wrong is, they’re like “ugh Graham, I don’t want to blog all the time every day.” And I’m like, dude, don’t. You don’t need to. It doesn’t matter how much you make content. It’s matters is, are you consistent? Will you still be making good content 10 years from now or not if you will, you’re, you’re going to win. If you’re going to burn out after six months of making an amazing podcast and giving up, then that’s not a good strategy. I’d rather you drip it out over, you know, once a week or every two weeks, but consistently been able to deliver than just going buck wild and getting overwhelmed.
Davey Jones: 00:18:56 Yeah, I think so much of it is that consistency and persistency in showing up and doing the work and realizing, you know, as I mentioned earlier, it’s not necessarily going to happen overnight, but if you continue to show up and you continue to provide value, you know, wherever that that value is and through whatever medium, you know, I think eventually people are going to show up when people are going to start listening. Um, but moving backwards a little bit, so, you know, especially maybe talking about the Recording Revolution and even now, um, how do you decide like what kind of content to create? One thing that I’ve always been, uh, you know, so surprised about a, I think that a lot of times in business, the assumptions that we make are wrong initially, you know, or they’re not as true as we thought they would be. And so, um, you know, for me as just sound, it’s been an important skill to develop. Realizing, OK, this isn’t working, why isn’t this working? You know, and trying to figure out, OK, what is it that people want to consume? How did you go about doing that so successfully in the Recording Revolution and now successfully in GrahamCochrane.com?
Graham Cochrane: 00:20:01 No, that’s a great question. And I think you’re right. We’re wrong. Or assumptions are generally wrong. Um, so I tell people, don’t guess, just ask and so create a culture in the way you run your business where you’re always checking in on social media. You know, it could be just an Instagram story post. I was coaching a client the other day and I was like, just get on Instagram and ask, um, you know, if you could sit down, have coffee with me, ask me one thing that’s frustrating about one thing that’s frustrating you right now, what would you ask me about? Um, so we were trying to figure out what kind of content for her to create. And so it’s just a simple question on social and she’ll get all these responses of like, oh, I really want to know how you do this or what about this?
Graham Cochrane: 00:20:39 Or I’m struggling with X, Y, and Z. And we get Google Doc pages of word for word. They’re telling you what they want. And then what you do is you just go make content on those topics and when the content comes out people, they’ll email you and say, oh my gosh, you read my mind, this is exactly what I need. And it’s because you asked them and they told you and you went and built it for them. So I just, that’s sort of the, the, it’s an ongoing thing. Like it’s not like you pull your email list once, you know, it’s not like a survey that you do once. It’s like a culture of always checking in with them and then always looking. If you post social media posts or if you send out emails, which ones get opened the most? Which ones get the most engagement?
Graham Cochrane: 00:21:21 What do people really like, what do they respond to? And being aware and then saying, you know, there’s a million things I could content on. But if I just ask people and they tell me what they really want to know or what they really love to consume, don’t reinvent the wheel. Just give the people what they want. And you’ll probably over time, this is why making content for a long time helps you, even if you’re not doing a lot of training and tutorials like I am, but just being a voice out there for long enough, you start to discover your voice. You start to discover your wheelhouse. You start to discover the few topics or trends or the, the one thing you said that people are like, man, the way you explain that or your stance on this is so unique. You don’t know until you put it out there and then see what comes back.
Graham Cochrane: 00:22:03 You start to learn yourself, I would think from creating content over time and then you can just kind of dial in from there. So I’m always asking my people to tell me what to make.
Davey Jones: 00:22:11 Yeah. And I think that, um, a lot of people feel like they have to have that kind of stuff figured out before they ever create content. Um, but I love that point that this is the kind of thing that you’re going to figure out once you jump in and do, you know, and you might write a couple blog posts thinking that they’re going to be hits and they’re not and it’s, it’s, you know, don’t give up then, you figured out part of it. This is what people are not interested in, you know, and, and make those tweaks and move on. But along the lines of asking what are, um, do you have any tips for figuring out like people give you information. They say, Oh, I’d love to hear this. I, you know, I have this question for you. Um, and sometimes I find that some questions, I can answer them, but maybe they’re not really in my wheelhouse or they’re not really what I want to do. How do we figure out within the answers that we get back where we should focus? Does that make sense?
Graham Cochrane: 00:23:00 Yeah. I mean, if, if you like pulled your audience informally to get a feel for what they want they want right now, service wise, what they need help with. If you see, you want to spot trends, right? Because everyone’s going to have a million different things that they want from you. Just like if Apple asked their customers or followers what products they, they should build. You’re going to get people asking for random stuff like, build a drone, build buildings or whatever.
Graham Cochrane: 00:23:28 They’re not going to build everything everyone asks for, but they’re going to look for trends like, wow. It seems like over half the people really seem to want, um, you know, a, a new type of phone. Or for awhile it was like they want a bigger phone that, they want two choices. I felt like whenever they see the trends that we should probably attention to the vast majority of people asking about this thing. So you want to look for trends, but if, if you see something that’s not in your wheelhouse, I would ignore it unless it’s the dominating trend in everyone’s asking you for something. You have to pay attention to it. And then if it’s not in your wheelhouse, so you have to find a way to address it in the sense of like, am I going to just not cover this or address this or can I partner with someone who can strategically address this and we have a cool partnership.
Graham Cochrane: 00:24:14 Um, for example, for me, um, I don’t teach, um, my audience in the recording space, how to develop themselves as an artist or a band. Like how to get signed on a record deal or how to get more shows booked or how to get more fans streaming your music. That’s not really the area of music I focus on, but I get those questions a lot. I’m teaching people how to record their songs and now they really want to grow their fan base. And they were like, what do I do next? And everyone wants that information, but that’s not my wheel house. So I’ve partnered with a guy named Rick Barker. He’s Taylor Swift’s original manager, when she like rocketed to stardom and he teaches this stuff now. He’s really, really smart guy and we’ve partnered strategically where he doesn’t teach recording stuff to his audience and I don’t teach, you know, promoting your band to my audience and so we collaborate when it’s relevant and he’s created some content for my audience.
Graham Cochrane: 00:25:06 That’s why don’t you just learn from this guy. He got Taylor swift to the top, you know, learn from him and then he promotes my stuff to his audience and it’s a good partnership. So that might be a good way to go if it’s what everybody wants and it’s not in your wheelhouse, but here’s the good news. If you’re creating content, create content that you love as long as it’s what other people want. Don’t just make what you love and hope it sticks. You have to know if it’s something people want, but if you get a list of and half the people want something and you really liked to talk about that, then you found a winter. Give them that kind of content because you’re going to be creative and innovative and that’s probably gonna attract more like-minded people and you don’t need to be for everyone. And you just need to be for the people that really like you and like what you like, but it does start with them first, not with you. You don’t want to just blog about what you care about. You want to blog about what’s going to serve people or podcast or posts on social or whatever.
Davey Jones: 00:25:56 Yeah. And so there’s some intersection there between the things that you’re passionate about and the things that other people are passionate about. And again, I think it’s just so important to, you know, as you said, to show up consistently there, um, because it’s going to take some time to figure that stuff out. And I don’t think you need a huge audience in the beginning, you know, to grow into a huge, huge audience. If you serve those people well who are showing up on your blog or your channels, you know, I think that can lead to that. You know, that leads a great word of mouth and people saying, Oh, you know, you know, you know, who knows about this topic. You should go here. They provide some, some great stuff on there on their website or their blog or whatever, whatever it might be.
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Davey Jones: 00:27:59 Do you have any tips? Because I feel like you’re publishing videos all the time and maybe, and maybe that’s, um, that’s because you’re on Facebook Live, you know, I see you on Instagram live and then you have videos that come out on your, on your blog, and then generally corresponding with the video on your blog. You have a written blog post around it. Do you have any tips for generating content so consistently? Um, and it seems like efficiently as well.
Graham Cochrane: 00:28:26 Oh yeah. I mean, part of it’s an illusion, right? So part of it is the illusion of, of always creating content. And so I’ve experimented with that for years. Um, I used to post three times a week for the first four years and then I dropped that down to two times a week to see if it made any difference to traffic fall off. Do people care? Nobody cared or noticed so that I was like, great. That saved me some time. And then uh, I dropped down to one post a week a few months ago for Recording Revolution, same thing to see anybody cared to traffic really dip, not really much, sort of the 80/20 rule of like I’m not really losing much but I’m saving so much more time. So I have found that for me one time a week is a really great rhythm because it feels like every week Graham’s publishing something cause that’s literally what I’m doing, which is once a week it’s only one piece of content.
Graham Cochrane: 00:29:13 So like with the new brand, Graham Cochrane stuff, I want to teach people everything I know about business for the last almost nine years. But I said I can’t make videos all day long. I already have a business that I run called the Recording Revolution. This is like a second. It’s like, uh, my, my passion project, like I want to make time for this. It’s important, but it can’t take up all my time. So how can it be efficient? And I’m like, well, weekly will be great. So it’s really simple. I, you know, you outlined 50 topics, you just go to Starbucks one day, you drink a lot of espresso and you’re like, what’s 50 things I could talk about? Um, and there’s a years worth of content basically if you’re going to do one thing a week and now I have a list of really, really good stuff that I could pull from at any point I can always change it up or add something, but I got a running list that’s step one where you’re not having to come up with something every week because you waste time doing that and you’re not always in a creative mode to be able to come up with something.
Graham Cochrane: 00:30:01 So I have to get out of my office, come up with brainstorming ideas and then I’ll make them later. But then for me, I’m a very like, scheduled person so that I have the freedom to do what I want to do with my life. So every Monday morning at 9:00 AM I come in and make content for Recording Revolution and I’m done by two in the afternoon. Every Tuesday now I’m making content for GrahamCochran.com and it’s again 9-2 and I’m done and that’s where I’m creating the one main piece of content and I’m, I’m usually a week ahead so if something goes live that day too, but week ahead. But then once it’s out I’m going to email it out to my list. I would jump on Instagram live and just talk about the same things in the video. I’ll just highlight one of the points. It will be a little more casual.
Graham Cochrane: 00:30:45 Maybe I’ll answer some questions, I’ll jump on Facebook a couple days later or the next day. But I like Facebook Live and Instagram Live because I just like to just turn it on and roll and just talk. Um, and it’s, it’s basically getting the same message for that week out there, a couple different ways. It seems like I’m active, it seems like I’m available, but I really don’t spend much time on social media or on email or making content. I, I literally put on the blinders most of the week, but in those four or five hours on Tuesday, that’s what I’m all about. Making this really good video for Graham Cochran and then I forget about it and move on.
Davey Jones: 00:31:18 Yeah. And the content has, um, you know, more legs than we think that it’s going to have, you know, I think sometimes, you know, people publish something to their blog post to their blog and then just expect, OK, well people read that there so I can’t talk about it anywhere else because then people would just feel like I’m saying the same thing over and over again. And that’s very rarely the case. Like, do you, have you ever had somebody show up on a Facebook Live and be like, dude, you’re talking about this again?
Graham Cochrane: 00:31:44 No, never. Um, and it’s funny Ramit Sethi to you is talented speaker, an author and a voice in the entrepreneur space, but he said something that resonated with me a few years ago that blew my mind. He was talking about this exact thing about like if I, if I get invited to speak somewhere and I’m talking about a topic that I already have a course on and I had my book is about, and that blog post is about. And what if they’ve heard me talk about that before previously, and he said, man, you should be so lucky that someone gets to hear your message twice or here your thing twice. Most people don’t get any audience and if so someone hears you twice and you should be so lucky. And it was just like a shift in my mind of you know what, I suffered from over publishing. I published so much content but under promoted.
Graham Cochrane: 00:32:29 So I had so much going out. But then it got buried in my blog. Nobody knew about it. What a waste. Um, and I’m, I’m shifting over the years I’ve gone the opposite. Now I’ll make less content still consistently, and I still like weekly, ideally for me, but I’m trying to do a better job of promoting and then I’ll dig back in old post and bring it back out and remind people or jump on social and talk about a thing that’s still relevant today that I maybe posted about four months ago because someone is new and they’ve never seen it before. They’ve never thought about it before. And it’s just repurposing content. Um, that’s still valuable because it’s not about older new. It’s about is it valuable or not and that’s what matters.
Davey Jones: 00:33:07 Yeah. And a lot of, especially a lot of the stuff that you’re creating a, you know, not only for a couple months, but I imagine for a couple of years would be, would be valuable. Especially, I mean some of these principles are things that you learned when you were starting the Recording Revolution back in 2009 that are probably still as relevant today as they were back then. And then in addition to that, I think for some people it’s a matter of hearing it multiple times through different mediums set a different way, you know, and so maybe you know, where you know, somebody is listening to one of your videos and it doesn’t click then, but they see on Instagram Live and in a casual way, you rephrased it a little bit and then all of a sudden it clicks. And we found even with photography, there’s a couple of weddings that we’ve shot there still some of our favorite weddings.
Davey Jones: 00:33:48 There were beautiful weddings, you know, type of clients that we want to work with, a type of weddings we want to shoot and you know, back in 2014. Why wouldn’t we share that today? It’s not like those pictures are any less good than they were, you know, uh, you know back then. So I think that’s so valuable is that your content has more, you know, um, more live time than a more life than you would a than, than people generally expect. But you know, with that said, do you have kind of a formula that you work on or do you just kind of jump on? Do you make sure you hit different platforms? Um, how does that work for sharing content? So you have your, your main piece of content. What are your primary vehicles for getting that content out there? What are your primary channels?
Graham Cochrane: 00:34:33 Yeah, so for the Recording Revolution, historically it’s been the content goes up in two places. It goes up in YouTube because a lot of it’s video based and then I embed that obviously in the blog and in the beginning I had written articles and videos and I felt like both were getting traffic. I saw over the years that YouTube has become my biggest source of traffic. So just by posting the videos every week there, it’s almost like a social media platform and people are finding it, sharing it. So it kind of is built in social media over there. That’s my biggest following is on YouTube for that, but I would every week for that, it’s posted on the site, email it to my list, which is something I didn’t do for years. I figured they’re already on my list and won’t bug them. They’re probably going to go to the site anyway and check it out because they bookmarked and they watch my stuff every day and it turns out people don’t go to my site every day. They’ve got busy lives and they don’t really care about me that much, so I realized if I email it out to them, even though they’re already on my list, they’re like, oh my gosh, thank you for sharing. This is a really good posts and it only establishes that relationship. They might become a client or a customer in the future, so sharing with my email list number one and then I would put it on Facebook and Twitter was all I’ve been doing for Recording Revolution. Instagram came on and that’s because it was the age of when I started. It was 2009 and it was just YouTube and Facebook and Twitter was really in its infancy then and I hated Twitter at the time because I didn’t get it and then, but I got on because that’s where everybody was at the time.
Graham Cochrane: 00:35:55 So those things I hit hard for the Graham Cochran stuff. I’m still figuring that out. I like Instagram now because it’s less crowded and cluttered and I, I like what I love is the stories and Instagram Live because I like talking to people. I love the live aspect. I love how quick and casual it is. Um, so I’m playing with that, but what I don’t love is the Instagram live stories disappear and so you make the content once and it’s gone and whereas a Facebook Live I could do the same thing and it lives on forever so it has a little more longevity there. So I’m doing both Instagram and Facebook. I kind of decided to not focus on Twitter for this new brand. I thought I would because it’s my personal favorite is Twitter, but it’s just too much for me and it’s, it’s not really a good use of my time to just spread myself over all these social media platforms are really should ideally pick one and be there all the time. That makes sense all the time that I have to give. Right now it’s instagram and facebook are where I’m just re sharing the stuff and just engaging a little bit with them.
Davey Jones: 00:37:00 Yeah. And the nice thing about Instagram and Facebook is that they are, you know, they’re integrated pretty well. I mean obviously because Facebook owns Instagram and all and all of that. And I will say that Instagram, one thing that I’ve liked and I think it’s a relatively new feature or maybe I just noticed it recently, but on the business accounts you can, you know, save your stories into, and I forget what they’re called, you know, what were your highlights? That’s right. Um, and so and so they’re, they live on a little bit more and you can kind of create different categories of those. Um, so we’ve been getting into that a little bit more in exploring that feature some more just because, like you said, it provides a little bit more longevity for, for those stories instead of them disappearing, disappearing. Um, after 24 hours.
Graham Cochrane: 00:37:42 Yeah. They don’t do that with the live ones though, which they did highlight your regular stories. Yeah. But maybe they’ll change that.
Davey Jones: 00:37:49 Yeah. Um, so for video, how did you get comfortable with video? You know, one of the things that, um, this is one of my goals I’ve set in on a couple of different, uh, different episodes now, but one of my goals for the year is to get more comfortable with video and I feel like that’s why I like writing so much is I can go back and I can revise a blog post as many, as many times as I want. You’re only going to see, you know, what’s, what’s a pretty polished version. Whereas with video, you know, like, Oh man, that’s not good enough. I look silly there and then I, you know, I feel like I have to do it all over again. So how did you get so comfortable, you know, talking on video and publishing that and you’d do you do it so well.
Graham Cochrane: 00:38:25 I would tell any, but thank you. I would tell anybody to go to the Recording Revolutions YouTube channel and look for the oldest YouTube
videos you can find on that channel sorted by date. Go to the oldest one and look at how awful they are. Looking at how well the video quality is awful for one. But let’s just take quality aside. Like I sound board, I look like a deer in the headlights. Um, it’s just awful. I’m so awkward on camera back in 2009, early 2010. So you learn it, you get more comfortable. I mean if you think about shooting a video is a awkward thing to look at a camera lens and talk to it. It’s just strange. You talking to yourself is nothing natural about it. So there’s, I don’t think there’s anyone that comes out of the womb naturally able to get in front of the camera, even if they get it quickly.
Graham Cochrane: 00:39:12 It’s awkward at first. So it’s like we were talking about you have to just do it and make some stupid video, some ugly video, some awkward videos, but just if you’re in it to win it for the long term, then you know you’re going to get past the awkward phase. You know, if you’re, if you’re not in it to win it for the long-term, then you’re going to have, you’re going to be identified as awkward, cause you’re gonna stay awkward and then close up shop so you never get past awkward. So you got to have a long-term mentality. You’ve got to commit to regularly doing it and you’ll get better. And you’ll learn the pacing. You’ll learn how to interact with people. You’ll learn simple things like don’t talk to the collective “you” talk to the singular “you” and, and, and the one person who’s listening or watching it has more impact.
Graham Cochrane: 00:39:55 You learn some of those things just by like, you know what? That does make more sense if I make it zeroed in and you develop your personality on camera because everyone’s different. So that’s the other thing too is you might watch someone who is great on camera and they’re really funny and they’re really witty and they’re really bubbly. And you’re like that’s not me. I’m more introverted. I’m more serious. And that’s OK. The only thing on camera you have to pump it up a little bit more, but you don’t have to be someone you’re not because. Again, you’re not trying to attract people that are different in the sense that you want attract the right person and some people are attracted to more serious people than they are to the bubbly person. So you can kind of develop your own voice too.
Davey Jones: 00:40:34 I do feel like there’s more out there now to to practice and play around. I mean even the Instagram stories as a place that I’m trying to show up a little bit more because like you said, it does disappear after 24 hours. So you get on there, you do your thing, you get great practice, you’re getting in front of people, but at the same time it does it, it fades away. And then you’re, you know, you’ve got a brand new slate, um, the next day. So there is and technology. It’s just easier I think to make video than it was even five years ago. You know, you have, you can make it with your phone and you can still have a quality, a quality video. So one of the big things that I want to talk to you about is transitioning from creating this content that people are consuming for free to getting, getting paid, you know, whether it’s somebody booking your service or buy your product or whatever it looks like. Um, do you have any tips you know, for, you know, for getting people to, to start buying from you?
Graham Cochrane: 00:41:35 Yeah, I mean
it depends on what you sell in a lot of ways because the method will be a little different. But one thing I think is consistent for all people, product or service or whatever you offer is, is don’t underestimate the power of your email list. I think that email gets underplayed in this age of social media of like, Oh, you, you know, you gotta have a big Instagram following to grow your business.
Graham Cochrane: 00:41:59 It was a big email list, big email list because Instagram is just like Facebook, same company, right? They can change the algorithms and they do and they did again this year. Um, so your, your posts will show up and fewer and fewer people’s feeds. If Zuckerberg and company decide that’s what they want to do, you don’t have control over actually the audience that you’ve built there. So you could build 100,000 followers on Instagram and then next year lose access to interact with them based off of a company’s changing policy. And that’s their prerogative because it’s their land you’re playing in. Or they’ll start to make Instagram, like Facebook. Well, pay us, will boost your instagram posts. So then people will see your stuff. That’s when that happened in Facebook. It just proved my web traffic cut in half because I wasn’t doing ads or anything. I was just posting my stuff there.
Graham Cochrane: 00:42:46 But now three to 10 percent of my followers see my stuff.
Davey Jones: 00:42:50 Even if they’ve liked your page.
Graham Cochrane: 00:42:53 Email on the other hand… oh yeah, these are. I have 100,000 followers on Facebook and most of them will never see what I post just because of the rules changed their like, did you start posting? I’m like, no, it’s just Facebook and I’m not going to pay the Facebook. I don’t want to play that game because I just feel like it’s. But it’s the they’re. I’m not mad at them. It’s a business that’s it’s there to playground. So if you build your business on social media, just know you’re building it on someone else’s playground. If you build your email list, however you own that list, it’s your playground. You can email them directly in their inbox whenever you want. Even if Facebook closes its doors, even if no one’s on Instagram in 10 years and they’re all moved to something else, like email has been here the longest and continues to be used.
Graham Cochrane: 00:43:31 And what is the most effective way to reach out to people? So the mistake a lot of business owners make is they focus on a social media following without focusing on building their email list when that’s where your clients are going to come from. It’s not that you don’t want to do social media, it’s helpful and branding and being top of mind, but use social media only as a means, I think to get people on your email list because that’s where you can then the moment you got a discount on your service or you got, you’re doing new types of, do you have fall many sessions or whatever you want to promote, you can quick email, “hey, just letting everybody know that we’re doing this this fall. We’ve got these many openings for weddings.” Instantly you can show up in thousands of people’s inbox. And they’re like, oh yeah, that’s great. So I would say start by building your email list.
Davey Jones: 00:44:15 Yeah, for sure. And I think, uh, you know, especially people that do something like wedding photography where there is a, a short, there’s a shorter time that you can nurture those. Uh, you know, those, those people on your email list a before they buy because you can’t spend, you know, if we’re, if we’re selling a website, for instance, you know, if somebody spends, if somebody signs up to our email list, I might spend two years nurturing them before they ever, before they ever purchase something from me with weddings is a little different because you can’t, you can’t spend two years, the person is already going to be married by then. But I mean think about a contact form and really what you’re trying to do is get their email, you know, and so if you’re offering somebody something that’s valuable to them as they’re getting ready to get married, you know, or as they’re in that process that they just got engaged and you can get their email address, then all of a sudden you can follow up with them and say, Hey, you know, I noticed you downloaded that. Are you planning your wedding? Are you looking for a photographer? You’re looking for a planner. Um, you know, can I, uh, can I help in any way? And so I think it’s still an effective strategy for somebody who’s dealing with maybe a shorter sales cycle, so to speak, um, but especially for somebody who is a family photographer and people are going to be wanting, um, you know, Christmas mini sessions for pictures for their Christmas card every single a year for sure.
Graham Cochrane: 00:45:36 I mean, think about, I think about other, when I’m trying to think about how this would work for my business, I try to think about other industries that are totally different than mine. So I’m thinking about like a realtor. Let’s say I’m a realtor and I need more clients. Um, one way to get more clients. And I’ve seen smart realtors do things like this, is you build a website where you start to create content on the housing market. You know, trends, how to sell your home buy your home, get your home ready to sell. But you have a clear on your website, you have a clear offer like “download this free guide to learn how to sell your next home” or “sell your home for 20 percent more than the average sale price.” This is something free and valuable to someone who’s looking to sell their home and hire a realtor.
Graham Cochrane: 00:46:19 They may not hire you, but they’re going to download to guide to learn how to sell their house for 20 percent more. They’re going to read it. If it’s good, they’re going to be like, dude, that guy was legit and it’s. They can take it and technically go hire another realtor to sell their house. That’s the transfer of risk you’re giving first, but who do you think they’re going to want to higher? If they really need to pick somebody, some other realtor that they don’t really know or someone who’s already given them five steps to sell their house for 20 percent more. They have trust with that guy that gave them the guide or that Gal, so they’re going to probably want to hire that person and that’s. That’s how you know if you’re listening to this. That’s how I would say to think is what does my target customer, my ideal client want that I could give them for free right now? That would establish trust. They would download it in a heartbeat and they would exchange their email address for it. That way, at the very least, I’m building goodwill, adding value, but now I can contact them, like you said, whenever there’s something new I want to offer.
Davey Jones: 00:47:18 And one thing I do want to, I want to talk about kind of along these lines that I think you’d do really well on your website. Um, and in general is, uh, is your call to action, you know, um, especially when creating content, again, just kind of this expectation that we’re going to put something up, it’s going to be on our blog, a bunch of people were going to go read it and then they’re just going to know, oh, I need to, I need to reach out to that person or I need to, you know, do this. And I think we forget. People need to know exactly what the next step is that they should take. So you know, like if, if, if we go on your website and we’re going to see your free audio training and it’s going to be very clear that this is, you know, this is where we’re being, this is where we’re being directed. Like what are some things that you think about as you’re creating a call to action for your, uh, for your audience?
Graham Cochrane: 00:48:08 Yeah, you’re absolutely right. You have to give them a next step. And I missed this for about four years. I would make content and then just like done. That’s how you record vocals, goodbye. I didn’t even ask for a comment, I just was like, I’m the teacher and now you’ve learned it. Um, again, I’m a slow learner but I’m getting better. But the call to action is so important because after the end of a piece of content, even if it’s just an encouraging posts on social, you want to engage them. You want to get a relationship going and you could ask them to comment, “Hey, let me know your thoughts. What do you think about this?” That would be a simple call to action to leave a comment below. Let me know what’s the number one thing that you struggle with as it relates to losing weight or you know, getting ready for your wedding or whatever it is you can ask them to engage with a comment, but what really is going to drive your business is get them on your email list.
Graham Cochrane: 00:48:56 So I. Most of my content that goes out there, I’m always ending with, I just gave you something valuable. Let me give you something else valuable. If you like this, you know, so if I’m doing a video on GrahamCochran.com is a great example and I’m teaching you how to get more traffic to your website. At the end of that video I might say, look, not only do you need more traffic to your website, but you’re probably going to want to be able to monetize that traffic and turn them into customers or clients when they get there. And how do you do that? How do you monetize your thing? Well, let’s go a little bit further and let me give you my free audio training called get paid to do what you love. And in this training I’m going to walk you through the three steps to turn your ideas and knowledge of what you love to do into a monetized business.
Graham Cochrane: 00:49:37 And it’s free. It’s 45 minutes. Download it here. And so I’m offering them another valuable thing. That’s the call to action is, let me give you something else. Why don’t you take this thing, but to get that thing, they have to just enter their email address. Um, so it’s another step in the relationship. So always, eh, content needs to have a purpose and it’s the first purpose would be to serve and to add value. And then it should end with a purpose which is to get people to go deeper with you in the relationship, give them the opportunity. And I didn’t take that opportunity for years. I’ve got hundreds of videos on youtube that are great, but they don’t have any call to action. It’s all in the last few years that I got better at that. Um, but that’s how I build my email list even bigger and that’s how I’ve built revenue even bigger. So I would say yeah, definitely give something more valuable and if you don’t know what to give, think about just like read one of your blogposts or listen to a podcast of your own and say what would, what would be something cool I can give to them at the end of this specific episode or this article that would take them deeper and it might give you an idea of what kind of content you could offer for free.
Davey Jones: 00:50:41 And as you started to add call to actions to the end of your different pieces of content. What effect did that have on your business?
Graham Cochrane: 00:50:48 I’ll tell you, um, last year 2017, I really got more, even more intentional with my call to actions. Um, I used to be like a generic, you know, join my email list, you know, if you want to know more, I get my best stuff. I turned it from generic that to a, created a bunch of different free, valuable things that were more relevant to the video. And say, hey, why don’t you download this if you want to go deeper with this. I quadrupled my opt-in rate for a few months. It was five times the normal amount of people who are opting in, which means my list grew substantially very quickly and then that gets more people through my sequence where I’m able to offer the courses and trainings and stuff and sales. So it’s been, it’s been night and day because if you think about it, if, if you are so lucky to quote me, if you’re so lucky that someone’s watching your video or reading your article or listening to your podcast, then you know that they clearly like what you’re doing, so don’t just stop. Give them something else to go deeper. That’s free. Don’t say like, if you liked this article, why don’t you buy my thing? I don’t think selling works really well in a blog post. Something selling works really well in a video, like a YouTube video. They’re not in the mindset to buy or they’re in the mindset to learn and enjoy and consume. So selling works better, I think in email, so get them on your email list by offering them something new and just get that process going.
Davey Jones: 00:52:09 Think that makes sense to like in a, in a blog post, a blog post might be the first time they ever hear of you, you know, or they might still be getting, you know, getting to know you or, or becoming familiar, you know, I think it’s often compared to a dating, you know, uh, and that would be, uh, you know, early on in the relationship, but it makes sense. You know, when somebody is ready to give you their email address at that point they know you and they trust you. They’ve most likely consumed something from you that has been valuable for them already. So they trust you a little bit more. And so I love, I love what you’re saying there about a call to action being, um, you know, relevant to that stage of a, that stage of a relationship that you’re in with, uh, with that person. And that’s why, you know, on the homepage I’m, it’s maybe not necessarily the best place to say, Hey, book me now, you know, uh, that’s probably because when somebody lands on your home page, especially for the first time and they’re just getting a sense of what you do and what you have to offer, it makes more sense to give them an awesome audio training. Uh, telling them how they can get paid to do what, what they love.
Graham Cochrane: 00:53:14 I mean, think about it people, the average attention span when they land on your website, if you’re lucky enough that someone gets to your website, again, if you’re lucky enough that they get there, they’re gone in less than five seconds on average. So you gotta be very strategic. But what are you going to show them? What are they going to read at the very top? You know, you’re not gonna want to talk about yourself. You’re not going to say, follow me on Instagram. You’re missing an opportunity if you don’t have a giant, amazing benefit driven headline at the top, offering them something valuable for free. Give me your email address and I’ll send this guide to you a free consultation, whatever, right away. That’s, that’s your best chance. And that’s what your website should exist to do, is to capture email addresses because then and only then can you let them know about other great blog posts you have or other podcast or eventually services and products.
Graham Cochrane: 00:54:02 So this is, um, I look at so many people’s websites and they’re like a one giant business card. It’s like a giant digital business card and it looks beautiful, but it’s not functional the way it should be. The most important function of the website for a brand is to capture an email address. And if you don’t believe me, go to Home Depot, go to Banana Republic, go to any major retailer or wherever you’d like to buy stuff and see what little thing pops up. What do they want? They don’t want us. They don’t pop up and say, follow us on Facebook. They pop up and say, get 10 percent off your first order by entering your email address. Everybody wants an email just because they know that that’s the most important thing because I’m going to, I’m not going to go back to Banana Republic, but then I’m going to get their emails every week. Sale, president’s Day sale on, you know, Khakis and it’s like, OK, they can stay in touch with me now because they have my email address and I don’t even remember when they got it, but it’s probably something valuable that gave me like a discount or something and that’s using it as a giant missed opportunity for brands is misuse their website.
Davey Jones: 00:55:00 J. Crew won’t even let me leave without me giving them an email address and I’ll be like, hey, yeah, you actually already have it knowing that they’re just going to give us to us anyway as if they need to like put that in for the cash register to work.
Graham Cochrane: 00:55:12 Yeah, they might in a corporate might want that.
Davey Jones: 00:55:13 Yeah. I’m sure you know, and they. And they push it and so, you know, like you said, I think if you just look around, there’s a reason why all these companies are collecting their email address and before that they were collecting your physical address because direct mail, believe it or not was an effective way of selling things to people. Um, and now that’s, you know, I think the next step of that was, you know, email and that’s still what we see. Um, you know, and I, and I do think that there’s also people out there saying email lists or are dying and stuff like that. But, um, but I don’t think that’s the case. Just like people blogging about blogging being dead. All right? So it’s been, uh, it’s been awesome chatting. You know, I know that people are going to listen to this and they’re going to want to know, you know, more and, and, and what you have to offer on a GrahamCochran.com. Where can people, where can people learn more? What, where should people connect with you?
Graham Cochrane: 00:56:11 Yeah, I would say go to the site, GrahamCochran.com. And here’s your call to action. Download my free training, a get paid to do what you love. I think if you’re brand new to business, this is going to show you the fastest way to transition or pivot from where you are. Maybe it’s a job you hate. Maybe it’s a business that’s not getting off the ground into a thriving business. It’s not going to be fast necessarily. It’s not going to be easy, but it’s very simple. It’s three steps to pivot and then if you’re already into business, it’s going to sort of show you the core model because here’s where I think people will go wrong. There’s so many tactics and strategies and we’re consuming so much information about business that we just get. We do all the things and we don’t really know what is really the most strategic thing underneath it.
Graham Cochrane: 00:56:49 And the good thing is that business is very simple and so in this training, I break down the three things that really drive all business no matter what you decorate it with or make it look like. And so it might be a helpful refresher for people and it’s a simple 45 minute podcasts. They can download and just get cracking.
Davey Jones: 00:57:06 Real quick. One thing I do want to ask you about is your. I think it’s a really like your latest piece of content that you’ve been creating about, um, what you’re consuming and how much you’re consuming content. I love that. It really resonated with me partly because I’m an over consumer, you know, of information. I love reading. I love learning for learning’s sake. You know, I just like to learn new things and to a certain extent that’s what inspires me and gets me go in and uh, and whatnot.
Davey Jones: 00:57:31 But at the same time the downside is, is I, I have a tendency to go from project to project or, you know, slam things onto my to do lists because I’m, I’m just consuming so much information. And fortunately I have a wife who is a much, she’s much better at filtering, you know, the content that she needs now, you know, and keeping me on track, on the idea, on an idea and completing a project before, you know, moving on to another project. Um, so could you talk about that a little bit? You know, just like how much content somebody somebody consumes or should be consuming.
Graham Cochrane: 00:58:05 Yeah, I mean, I’m with you. I’m a lifelong learner. I, if I could do nothing but whatever I want to do, I’ll do that. I want to read books all day long. Um, and um, information is powerful, but there’s a point where which most people are like bloated and just overstuffed with information and they’re not actually doing a lot of production. And business only happens when you do stuff. So you don’t need to know much to be successful in business is only a few things you need to know, but you need to do a lot of the right things. Um, Herbert Simon is this Nobel Prize winner, brilliant thinker, and he’s this amazing quote that always blows my mind. He says that what information consumes is rather obvious, information consumes attention. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention.
Graham Cochrane: 00:58:50 That’s the era we live in. If you have tons of information at your fingertips on your phone or your computer and if you’re consuming tons of information, then you have a void of attention and you need to have attention and focus to actually create massive output in your business in life. So I think a lot of people, I think social media is part of the problem, but we willingly just consume. We buy all the courses or go to all the webinars or all the conferences and I’m not knocking any of those things, but if that’s all you do or eighty percent of what you do and then you have a hard time like getting the business off the ground, you might want to look at your lack of attention is because you’re consuming so much of a wealth of information and it’s. I think underneath all that, and we can talk about this on another day, underneath all of that consuming information is just fear and insecurity. That I’m not good enough. I don’t know the right things and I don’t want to make a mistake and I’m here to just tell you that. I’m not that smart. I didn’t figure this thing out because I’m a genius and it’s not luck either. It’s like a real simple tried and true serving people, creating value, but I do a few simple things every single week that continue to drive the needle forward. And I ignore most information. I ignore most tactics and strategies. I’m not completely unaware. I just know that I don’t need them to drive sales. When you find something that works, just do a lot of it and protect the attention and focus that you have. Don’t, don’t let it be consumed by all the information available to you.
Davey Jones: 01:00:20 Yeah, and I think you’re such a great example of that showing up, creating consistent value for your, uh, for your audience. And then repeat and, uh, you know, I think we met, we met at a business retreat where we’re all kind of sharing different stuff that we were, uh, you know, that we have that were our strong suits. And uh, and I remember you were, uh, one of the highlights of that business retreat. Certainly for me in what you’re teaching, you were talking a lot about email list, the email list then. Ah, and then I know you spoke at Creative at Heart a this past conference and uh, and I know that you were the talk of that conference for, for a lot of people and you know, how, uh, how much they enjoyed your talk then and you’re back at Creative at Heart this year.
Graham Cochrane: 01:01:05 Yes! They let me, they let me come back as a keynote this time.
New Speaker: 01:01:07 Well, yeah, I mean, I think that was, I think that’s a testament to how many people enjoyed your breakout session, um, that now your back as a keynote. Um, but I remember people filtering out of that and really enjoying that. So, um, we have your website downloading that free audio training. Uh, you’re on Instagram and Facebook, uh, for sure. Um, is there anywhere else or did I, have I covered everything?
Graham Cochrane: 01:01:30 No, that’s it. Yeah, on, on social. It’s at @thegrahamcochran for Instagram and Facebook.
Davey Jones: 01:01:35 OK, perfect. Well, at some point we’re going to have to have Shay on here for sure. And, uh, and maybe both of you, I’ve loved the videos that you guys are, you guys are doing together, but I encourage everybody to go to GrahamCochran.com, download that free, uh, that free audio training. I think really, regardless of where you are in your business that you’re going to find, you’re going to find value there. So I encourage you to do that. And, um, you can find all this stuff in the show notes.
Graham Cochrane: 01:02:01 Thanks. Awesome. Yeah, thanks for having me.
Davey Jones: 01:02:06 Thanks for tuning in to the Brands that Book Show – to stay up to date with the latest episodes, make sure you hit the subscribe button.
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