Heather Newman
Hello everyone, here we are again for another Mavens Do It Better podcast where we interview extraordinary experts who bring a light to our world. And I could not be more excited about this light in front of me here, Andrew Connell. Hello Andrew or AC as many, many people call you. Hello.
Andrew Connell
How are you doing Heather?
Heather Newman
I am awesome. I am awesome. Where are you coming to us from today?
Andrew Connell
I am in sunny and warm Florida. I live in Northeast Florida working out of my home office. I'm really looking forward to this today. It's been a long time, I've been listening to your show and I’m very eager, I'm eager to do this
Heather Newman
Well from a fellow podcast host as well so. Yeah, I want to know what's going on behind you. You got some gadgetry you've got cars you've got Lego I'm there's all kinds of stuff. This is awesome. What is that?
Andrew Connell
So, it's all it's everything's Lego. I, for me, I grew up loving Lego love building stuff. And today, one of the things that frustrates me so much about our job, I mean, we'll get into or my job at least, is that I don't get to do stuff with my hands. And I don't get to show somebody like what did you do today? I can like look I did this. As a developer I like to, I refuse to have like a lawn service and stuff. I like to do stuff my hands and Legos are fun way to do it because it's follow the instructions. But it's also very therapeutic to me because you can't think about much other stuff when you're doing it. And so, it's just sit-down focus and disconnect from the rest of the world.
Heather Newman
Yeah, I see so many great photos of you with Legos, but then also with your family. Andrew's a family, man, and there's all these great pictures of him with his kids, and it's just it's so cool to see that. So yeah, I grew up on Legos. So, I'm a big fan.
Andrew Connell
It's fun. It's fun working from home is nice, just having the ability to spend time with them. And yeah, I used to spend a lot of time on the road, but now spend most of my time at home, which is nice.
Heather Newman
Yeah, absolutely. I was looking at, so Andrew and I've known each other for a really long time and kind of grown up together in the Microsoft and the SharePoint community. When did you so origin story on tech? Where did you come up from? Like, where did that start for you?
Andrew Connell
So, I, I guess back to SharePoint or you want to go farther back than that?
Heather Newman
Let's go farther back. Why not? Yeah. The way back origin. Yeah.
Andrew Connell
So, when I went to I will, I'll do this first part kind of fast. When I first went to school, I thought that I wanted to be a finance guy because dad was a banker. So, I was like, well, that's I got to be a banker and jumped around between marketing and all that stuff. But I always it was right around the time when like the dot com stuff was really starting to hit. And I was really interested in like building websites. And I really like the client-side dev side of it. I played around with it a bunch came home, got an internship between my junior and senior year, and I didn't real, internship at one of those classic like dot com startup techie jobs. And I never knew that you could actually have a job doing this stuff. I went back changed my major right before my senior year and got a cis degree, the best I could. And it's just been, I guess, my, my passion has always been on the client-side Dev not like design, but client-side Dev and I got pushed into the SharePoint space by our company. I worked for. I worked for a fortune 100 or 300 at the time, and they were like, we're going to redo the corporate internet and corporate intranet. So, go do your research. And so, I joined the team, right as they were finishing their research and the team's like, we think we should use this product. And SharePoint was like number four on the list. And the CEO comes around, he's like, we just signed an EA with Microsoft, you're gonna use SharePoint, I'm like, damn it. That was 2003. And the rest is history. I've been forced to do it. I guess it just I saw, and we, I guess we may get into, but I just I found, I found a place I found a home. It worked for what I wanted to do. It wasn't so much SharePoint that I loved. It was just that I found a place for myself. And it, it just, it's just kind of evolved. And I just I've tried to leave one or two times and haven't been able to just like Al Pacino, I leave, they pulled me right back in.
Heather Newman
Yeah, yes, I have had that experience myself. Yeah, I think the I mean, we often on the show we have I have a lot of wonderful colleagues that you know, you know, you listen to the show. So, it's like we talk a lot about community and talk a lot about, you know, just the strength of it. And I think that's something for me, that's always been one of the reasons that I'm like, this is amazing, because we jumped into it. And many of us have that sort of, you know, well, I fell into it, or I got pulled into it, or, you know, I was theater major, and I, you know, ended up here as well, you know, and so, there's a lot of that sort of, Oh, well, now we're in it and Wow, what a great bunch of people, you know?
Andrew Connell
Yeah, it was a lot of the people and it was a lot of I mean, for the tech side of me, it was the I guess I when I found the community, I was in the community active in the community for a while before I realized that I was in something special. I didn't I because you're in it. You don't really realize I didn't realize what I was in or how it was special from other community or other groups and tech things. For me, it wasn't so much about the tech. It wasn't so much about the community. It was more that I just kind of found that I found this one part of SharePoint fascinating. And it was more fascinating that people couldn't figure it out and they weren't doing stuff and I had a way for when I would explain it to people. That's when kind of had a little bit of a you know, I maybe I'm actually found something like the education space that may be that may be my space now. My space, but
Heather Newman
You're dating yourself. I had a Myspace account too so it's all good. Yeah, no, absolutely. And, you know, you I think, to me, when I think about you, I think of so many things, but one you know, you to me, have had a lot of firsts, you know? Like you and CJ's podcast, you know the MS Cloud show that was one of the first you know, in our community I think that happened you jumped on that technology wise. Andrew is a very successful workshop presenter and course creator and all of that. So, like to me, I see you as someone who has always had his finger on the pulse of what's new, what's next and how to create something different. Where did Where did that come from? You know?
Andrew Connell
So, I guess when, when I was going back to the story, I was telling a minute ago when I started working. So, I was working for Fidelity back in 2003, when we got pushed into doing SharePoint, and it's not the Fidelity, like the investment company, it's the blue one, which I don't even think it has the same name anymore. They do title insurance and 70% of all the mortgages in United States goes through them. A couple years into that we brought another company in to help to do some developer training. And I there was something about that, that I when I when I interacted with them, they ended up hiring me away from Fidelity to go work for them and teach for them and there was something about explaining stuff to people and seeing that light bulb, click on or doing a workshop and seeing something that somebody was so frustrated with or couldn't figure it out. That was the I guess that's the thing that really like kind of got me into this. I tried to leave into a startup and I realized some one of the guys in my mastermind was just like basically slapped me upside the head he's like, You're an idiot, you you're good at one thing, why don't you focus on that one thing and try make a business out of it. And that to me was education it was explaining stuff to people it was doing workshops, it was writing it was blogging, it was blogging was the first thing and then it was from there, it was like well, maybe I can build a class and started teaching my own classes with a hands on classes and then it's evolved into a lot of different things. I guess the more I've learned about myself the more I've changed my business and like what makes me tick and what doesn't. As sick and twisted as this sounds, and it's probably negative as this really sounds. I don't mean it to sound this way, but it's I'm a very blunt person. I hate people. I'm very much an introvert. I can't stand like, so I found that I tried consulting. And I hate consulting because I just can't, I get stuck on something and part of it's just when I start working on something and I can't move on to, when I've figured it out, mastered it. I don't want to go do it again and again and again. It's like, I've learned that there's nothing else to learn. There's no challenge go to the next thing. And when you're teaching, like for consulting, it's always that way or somebody is, you know, complaining about, oh, this doesn't work. This doesn't work. I'm like, I'm done with that project. Don't call me anymore. Like when I was teaching hands on classes, it's like you build a class like, this is fun. I can explain this to people you do it two or three times, and then the 20th time, it's just like, this is mind numbing. This is energy, this is soul stealing. This is this is terrible. And so that's where it's like it's evolved into now where I just do video-based classes, and I don't have to speak to the people. I teach you consume it. If you have questions, I can do the questions, but at least I don't have to say the same thing 30 or 40 times a year.
Heather Newman
Yeah, you sound like the not only the heart of a technologist, but kind of the heart of an artist, you know, because like, that's how, you know, I want to do a play. It's, it's the one thing that it is or a painting or something. And then I'm gonna move on to the next thing. So, I love this. One thing I loved about working at in and around Microsoft and in tech is that I found that that sort of brain activity is the same. We do like that. We want to do it and go on and do the next thing. And I think that's why I keep seeing you. I'm like, every time I turn around, Andrew was like, Well, now I'm doing this. And now I've tried this platform, and now I'm blah, blah, blah. I'm always just like, Oh my gosh, so I love keeping up with you and folks, keeping up with him, you're always gonna learn something new and what's hot and so, yeah, we're gonna put everything about you in the show notes because I just I feel I love that about you. And it's and it's very, very specific. You know, it's cool. And you said mastermind. And I know, I know, because we've talked about it, but I know that that's something that you've been involved in for a long time. Will you tell everybody what, what that means and also sort of how that's helped you with your business and also in saying, you know, getting to know myself, and that's something I love teaching is about how to become the expert of yourself. You know, that's the whole thing about being a Maven, right? It's like, how can we learn and be that and then use that to give good things to the world? So, mastermind and learning about yourself? Is that a big piece of that for you?
Andrew Connell
It is, it's, um, it's something I've been doing now for maybe five years or so. And professionally, I've grown more as a person, like you've got when you do work stuff or personal stuff, you always have accomplishments. I see that as different than growing as a person or growing like intellectually, or more, I guess more being in tuned to your own heartbeat, right. And what's your Zen is? So, what a mastermind is it's not it's not a term that I've invented at all. It's a very common thing. So, people go Google it, or bingle it or wherever you want it, whatever you want to use. But what it does, think about it like this. So, a mastermind is for business, you sit down with other people that are that have a similarity to you. So, I'm, I'm in three different masterminds. One of them is, one of them is in person, the other two are online. The one that's in person, we all share that we're all but one of us is independent. We have our own businesses, we all are generally doing the same kind of thing, but there's absolutely zero overlap, other than we focus on Microsoft technologies. So, there's nothing really to get we don't have anything to steal from each other. Um, one of the fundamental concepts of it is that I like about it is it's a sense of accountability and the brutal honesty. So, it's for I mean, I think I can say this. It's like walking out onto a nude beach, right? You walk out and it's like I got nothing to hide, right? This is it. And so, these three, these three other people that I sit down with once a month. I actually have it tomorrow, tomorrow night. It's kind of an excuse to have beer and wings once a month. But you sit down for about three or four hours. And it is these three people know more about my business than anyone else. These they know more about what accomplishments I've had recently, what failures I've had recently, what challenges I'm dealing with and what my goals are not only for the next time we get together, but for the next six months and long term what those goals are. And when you can be brutally honest like that. It's like having your accountant sit down and give you a complete debrief. It's like having your business coach come down and give you a debrief. But then also these people are also going to challenge you. And so, when I say that my goal is XYZ for the next six months, I don't do 12-month planning, I really do six-month planning. So, when I sit down and say my goal is this over the next six months, if I come to the table and I'm like, like last year I came to the table, I said, Look, I've got this opportunity. Here's this and the two guys like going that has nothing to do with your goals. And yes, it's a good thing. But are you going to give up on your goal? Or are you going to do this? and I made a conscious decision, like you know what? I'm going to change my goals because this is too much of a good opportunity. But it's nice because you don't have Yes Men in your head you've always got Yes, men. In some of your friends always gonna have Yes Men because you know, if I tell you something you don't want to be you don't want to attack me for it. Because you don't want that to hurt a personal relationship. But with these three people, that's what they do. That's what their job is. And so, you feel like I'm sitting down later this afternoon. I've already started taking notes on what have I accomplished since our meeting last month. What am I supposed to do next month, and how's the progress growing, and I've already started getting together, put my presentation I guess together to them so that I can they can hold me accountable. Another guy that I'm with is another mastermind. We are we both do info products. He's in tech but a totally different area than I am. He does eBooks and he sells them online mainly through Kickstarter. I do video-based classes, but we both do info products, and there's a way for us to sell and to do marketing stuff and share skills and or share like tactics and stuff. And it's just the honesty for it. It's very helpful because you I know that if I show up tomorrow at my meeting, and I haven't accomplished a certain amount of stuff, I'm gonna get railed and for good reason and I'm gonna have to pick up all the beers.
Heather Newman
Ha-ha,
Andrew Connell
that's one of the penalties which is funny because one of the guys in our group is doesn't drink and so there's a couple times when he's had to buy all the beers for everybody and it's like you don't drink you’re buying all our alcohol. This is awesome.
Heather Newman
I love it. Yeah, I mean, the thing, mastermind accountability partners, you know, that kind of thing I think are so important for us as business owners and also just humans you know. I mean because I think it like I have different groups and different people for different things and for business and then also just like, you know, accountability of like, who you want to be and how you showing up and what's the emotional intelligence looking like lately, you know? And are you giving your best self in every moment and I think that's super cool I love so tell everybody the name of your business.
Andrew Connell
So, the name of the business is Voitanos I do, it's primarily. My life is focused around developer education. today it's really Microsoft 365 and related technologies, which includes things like React and Azure, but mostly it's Microsoft 365 development, education for developers. the business is Voitanos which the name was actually created for something else. And the main thing I do is I record video-based classes and then I sell those classic like show up swipe a credit card one-time purchase watch as much as you like, you got questions. You post them in a Facebook group, and I can. I'll try and help.
Heather Newman
Yeah. And how long have you been doing the video-based classes? since you started in 2016?
Andrew Connell
So, I did. Let's see. So, I started doing video-based classes for Pluralsight. That was in 2012. I think Yeah. 2012. So seven years. Wow. Seven years ago. Yeah, exactly. I started doing that when I co-founded and ran a company with a guy named Ted Pattison. You remember Ted? And we did in person SharePoint development classes. It just got to the point where I was tired of being on the road. My kids were getting older. And it was like I said, it was mind numbing. So, when I left, I sold my interest in the company to him. I kept doing Pluralsight classes and I was getting frustrated because the marketing stuff. If I see something that I don't understand or that I can't figure out, I get, I almost get like aggressive challenge I see it as an aggressive challenge where I start getting angry. I'm like, I'm gonna figure this out I'm gonna crack this nut This is not gonna be a mystery to me. And we hear the term marketing growth hacking. Yeah, all that kind of stuff it I was I got frustrated with Pluralsight because they don't let you get direct access to your customers and do the marketing development and customer development stuff. So, I tried doing my own course and the first one that I did well, I've only published one I kind of over committed I'm still finishing it. But the first one that I did, it just immediately like just hit me going the tech is fun, but the marketing side is what's really fun to me what is really a challenge. like the automated stuff, it's like, it's classic like ads and everything but it's not the kind of like sleazy kind of ads. I want to I want to if you're interested in what I have to say I want to get it in front of and convince you why that if you're in the market for this I'm going to convince you why this is the best thing. If you're not than I don't want to talk to you I mean I don't want to waste your time. I don't want to waste the space in your inbox and keep you from Inbox Zero. That's not that's not my goal.
Heather Newman
Right, right. Yeah, so it sounds to me, you know, looking for and finding some autonomy so that you can do your thing and then finding not only do you have this beautiful developer tech brain but that you really like the marketing stuff too.
Andrew Connell
I do. I love this concept of marketing automation where you can and I know they get a big they got a lot of flak for it, but I mean, I guess I'm one of the minority that doesn't have as much of a problem with it. I love Facebook ads I absolutely love Facebook ads. I love the ability to do like marketing automation with emails and have a whole bunch of workflows around it and making it seem like I mean, what you see on camera, or the listeners aren't seeing it, but what you now see on camera, this is the entire company. There's nobody else.
Heather Newman
Yeah, well, we're recording and hey, we'll put it up on YouTube. We both look great.
Andrew Connell
My blown-out forehead for my windows.
Heather Newman
Oh, I know. You're bright, right. Yeah.
Andrew Connell
Trying to find shades to put up before my forehead's like the shiniest thing on the screen. Every time I try to get the camera like autofocus and it's like, yeah, it's a little bright in there like, No, it's just my forehead.
Heather Newman
No, it's just bright in there. It's not your forehead. Yeah, no, I think I mean that's like, as far as a lot of us who have independent businesses, you know, or personal brands or as individuals, you know, it's like, cutting through also, I love what you said about you know, it's like, I want to get the message out super clear so that somebody can say, Yep, or Nope, you know, and having the tools to do that, when people you know, want to leave a list or you know, or aren't interested or whatever, and you can definitely do that. And there's so many great ones out there to leverage, you know, I mean, you and I talk platform stuff a bit and are on similar platforms now, for some of the things we do and then you know. I'm working with people who, you know, they use HubSpot, or they use Buffer, or they use Hootsuite or whatever you know. And what's cool is that and then there's Marketo up on the higher end of things, you know, but I think what's great is because, I have someone in my life who loves, he's all about getting the SaaS deal. Yeah, he's my SaaS Maven, he's always sending me like, Heather, you for $47 you can get lifetime access. And I'm like, (deep breath) you know, and I was just saying, I was talking to a bunch of girls that I was like, I don't buy shoes, I buy SaaS. I'm like, it's like, it's like, I buy technology. I get so excited. And I'm like, and then I'm like, Okay, am I going to use this? I'm like, Yes, I'm gonna use it. I'm gonna teach my clients how to use it. You know? Like I right?
Andrew Connell
I'm right there with you. I got some same thing Black Friday. Hey, you can do this lifetime for $125 otherwise, it's like $19.95 a month and I'm like part $125. Okay, first of all, that's a really good deal. Second of all, that's something I really need in my business. I've created my account. That's about all I've done with it in the last two, three months, but I get it, I get it. I'll get there, I'll get to it. But, you know, the one of the cool things about it, too, is being in this small business like that you and I do. And I know we share some of the same, we use some of the same services in the world that we live in, in the Microsoft world. It's very interesting. It's very interesting for me to interact with this world because in the last few years of running my own business, I found so many more tools that I find to be so much more effective. And when you sit down, you talk to people like at Microsoft, like, you know, first it was Wunderlist. And now it's To Do app and they're like use To Do for your tasks. I'm like, absolutely not. No, I use something totally different. And it works great for me, and no, it's not called Trello. But this works. It works perfect for me. And when you show it to people, they're like, Oh, that's really cool. Or, like the marketing automation stuff. Remember sitting down talking to CVP at Microsoft. And we were talking marketing something well, how do you go about doing this? I just explained the whole thing. Their jaw was on the ground. It didn't take long to set up like, how do we get an account for that? Well, first I'll use my affiliate code. So, I can get a nice little kickback.
Heather Newman
Always right. You're like, give me the money. Yes, I know right
Andrew Connell
Now, especially if you're a CVP because you're gonna be putting a couple hundred thousand people on that. So
Heather Newman
yeah, no, I think there's something about I mean, we live in, I was talking about the gig economy and talking about like business owners. I think I answered a question on the Forbes expert panel. And I was talking about, you know, it's, they're like, what, how can you save money and it's like, well, and don't get me wrong. I love marketing teams. I think they're very amazing. And but I, a lot of times I come in and I will be an outsourced person, right, on a marketing team. But I also think that there's so many great tools out there that we can use and leverage and, you know, it's unfortunately, some people in sort of photography, video, graphic design, all of that stuff. It's like, the bottom of that for people, you know, it's like you can't you now have to compete on fivrrr. You know, like, and it's tough, you know, I know a lot of friends that are like, Man, you know, I remember when that two-minute video used to cost $50,000?
Andrew Connell
Well, it's, it's a funny, it's a funny attitude like, I mean, I've got it's, it's like in the in the tech business to me. I mean, you have to evolve, you have to look at where you are with things. I mean, there's no longer when we used to have people that would run an elevator for us, we get in and we tell what floor on there, close the door, and they do that stuff. I mean, when their jobs started going away, everyone was, you know, crying about it. But there are other jobs that have opened up that did not exist at all, because of the stuff that we end up doing now. I mean, that the stuff that able to go through and to stand up your own your own business, that post video-based training like I do, this wasn't possible five years ago without a significant monetary investment. Now I'm able to run an entire business for barely four figures a month, and it doesn't take that much that many sales just to break even a month. And when you can do that. And it's just it's so empowering. Finding, I guess I'm jumping around here, my lizard brain. I had when I come across somebody that says, and you'll show them something new and they're like, oh my god, something else I have to learn, like, you serious, right? Because maybe you should have been a carpenter or a plumber. I'm not saying that those that business hasn't evolved or doesn't have new tools and stuff, but the pace of change that's one of the aspects of this business. That's why I got into it, so that I don't I don't get bored. It everything is changing. I can't keep up with this, like going, Yeah, guess what, I'm getting older too. And it's, there's certain things we just kind of narrow your focus down, like, I'm gonna watch all the changes here, instead of all the stuff in my periphery. I don't have to know everything.
Heather Newman
Yeah. And I think, you know, being a part of the MVP program, too, you know, there's, there's specific sort of areas of focus too you know, I mean, I think that, yes, should you have a wide swath on understanding the Microsoft technology stack? Sure, but I think you know, you have a focus, I have a focus. Things that I really focus in on did I say focus. But I think that, you know, it is and we're all trying to keep up, you know, and I think that that is what's exciting about it. You're right. You know?
Andrew Connell
It's something when I talk to people who are trying to figure out what they want to end up doing, like a friend, his kids getting ready to go to college, and he's like, so what would you what kind of he wants to get in tech? He's like, so what's the one thing that you would that you would recommend that he hit that he looks at? I gave him an answer is like, Yeah, he's just getting in, so he has to wait and get a job for that whole thing. I'm like, No, you can do this at 15 years old. I mean, this doesn't. I don't think it matters. It's you want personal brand kind of stuff. When you when you find something that you like, you need to you need to put something across that the community that you're in, community being not only your friends but also your potential customers and leads, when they think X they need to think of your name, right? To me, I don't I don't I'm not a big fan of working for big companies. But I think it's, you have to know like, Oh, you want that guy, or you want that girl, or I've got this What? I need somebody that does this, like you want that person. if you're a dime a dozen, and you're like, Oh, I build videos like, great. So, what's your spin? What's your angle on? It's like, I do two-minute videos that hit that have huge resonate huge on YouTube. Going I want Jim, that's the person that I want. Or I totally know how to go do a video that you can get a three second clip out of one that's a Facebook video, that gets you to stop scrolling. Watch that three seconds, and then I can build off of that. You niche down as deep as you can now. Companies don't do that. People do that. And that's what if you're just a developer, or you're just a SharePoint developer, or you're just a SharePoint designer like going that, that doesn't do it for me. That's a run of the mill. But now you're in a race to the bottom for how you're getting jobs.
Heather Newman
Yeah, I agree with you. I also it's, I mean, the word storytelling has become a, it's now a buzzword. You know, there's even a chief storyteller all around, you know, like, you see that you can go on LinkedIn and look for storyteller as a job title now. which that was not the case not too long ago, right? And interesting. You know, I think that being a generalist, or a company that says we do everything and do it all. I don't think people believe you anymore. And you know, I work with a lot of MSPs you know, Microsoft, you know, managed services partner, and I see their websites and I keep looking at them and they're like, we do it all we do this and I and then how are you different and how are you unique? Because how do I choose when you when there's four of you here in Los Angeles, or whatever it is, you know? Is it just because I like you personally? Or is it or what is it that makes you different and stand out and I think you've done a great job with that with your own personal brand. Getting specific. And that was on purpose, wasn't it?
Andrew Connell
It was on purpose. And when I, when I started to see I remember reading something about somebody talking about niching down to me. I always thought that when you started your business you had to have, you need to generate like $5 million of money in revenue a year, you need to have, like, 10-15 people you had to incorporate, had to get an office. I'm like, I don't want to do that. I don't like people. I don't want to do that stuff. So how do I do this just as a person as an individual? and I went, I got into this one community. After I after I got out of the, my, the hands-on training business that I did with Ted. I found this community just by just on a whim. And they, I saw how people were able to start a business without a ton of money, really, without much money at all. And without having this massive customer base, and they were paying the mortgage, and they were paying the car bill and they were paying their health insurance. I'm like, okay, and you start to see some of those businesses and like, right now, I'm not passing judgment or anything. But if you can make a living off that. And I have an idea to do this. Then I've got to be able to make this work. And it's not it's not like downplaying your business. It's like, I never would have thought that would work. You've proved me wrong. So then maybe there's something here. Your storytelling comment. You're spot on. There was a book that I was just reading recently. So, I was pulling up my phone. I wasn't checking my text. Heard of the book Building a Story Brand by Donald Miller?
Heather Newman
Yeah, yes. I only laugh because Russ Stalters, who is a workshop partner of mine is a story brand certified guide.
Andrew Connell
Oh, really?
Heather Newman
Yes. And so, I, I believe very wholeheartedly in the story brand methodology. I love Donald Miller's podcast. Have you ever heard his podcast?
Andrew Connell
I've heard a couple parts or episodes, yeah.
Heather Newman
Shout out to Donald Miller. I just yeah, him. Yeah. So good. Yeah. So, did you just read it? What did you think?
Andrew Connell
I've gotten I read I got through part of it. I get in those; I wonder if you're like this. So, I get in these, a friend of mine came with this word. It's not, it's not dirty. I don't think it's dirty. It's not dirty word. It's called, he calls it Entre-Porn. And it's entrepreneurship, but you're just constantly reading like the Seth Godin books and like, Donald Miller books and like the just forgot the other ones, but like all the purple calendar, you read all these business books. At a certain point, you're just like, Alright, I'm good with the theory. I gotta go get some shit done. I'm sorry, I get some stuff done. It's like, I was getting into that I was starting to go like, okay, listening to all these different things, I need to go, I need to go be productive and I'll come back to it. I got about halfway through and I'm like, Alright, pause. I get it. I started to get what the concept is I know enough to where when I'm ready to start doing stuff like that again. I know. That's, that's the resource I want to use.
Heather Newman
Yeah, I, your friends’ term. Yeah. I mean, it's like people use it for food-porn and other things. Like, I get it. It's like, yeah, I mean, I was like, I you know, I've been working on a new website for Creative Maven. And you know, I took a snapshot of my bookshelf, one of them and I like put colors together because I like how that looks, you know? And so, I was like looking and I was like, Oh my gosh, there's Johnny a cup with switch. And then there's like all the Malcom Gladwell books. And then there's Start and then there's Spark. And I was just laughing. I was like, so yeah, so I have my, my bookshelf that I'm like, you know, and like, what can you glean from this? And the thing that I really have been homing in on with that, and the books is one, it seems to me that you kind of have to have a book, you know, that's a big deal. Or online classes, especially in the sort of the business coaching, business, marketing, content, space. And it also, when I talk to people, I'm like, figure out what it is that you own, like you were saying earlier, what is it that when I say, you know, when I say hey, I just did a podcast with AC. And they're like, Oh, yeah, developer developers, and you know, and online classes. Yeah. He's amazing. You know, and that's typically what they say. And you know, personal brand. Yeah. But you know what I mean, but I think that people as people and folks who are coming in to college and thinking about careers, but also anybody who's looking at what they do, I mean, I don't know, I feel like that that's really important is to like own, you know, like leadership or communication skills or whatever those soft skills that we want to turn into the power skills of people. Like that's what I'm attracted to in books and coaching and all of that kind of stuff. Is that similar for you?
Andrew Connell
It is similar to me. There's one thing that you said that I had the same kind of thought and I've evolved the way I think about it, um, over the last couple of years. I thought the same about books because I was involved in like writing books and stuff and books to me are just from a consumption point of view. I love it. I couldn't take a picture of my bookshelf; I can take a picture a screenshot of audible. I read books for an escape. I listen to books to grow, right. So, my, my, my business books are all on Audible. Same thing with podcasts. But I'm like, I want to go I want to go read science fiction. I want to go read like the Tom Clancy ish kind of stuff. That's stuff that helps me disconnect. Now, I thought the same thing where you needed a book to be kind of, to be to have like an authority. But I think a little bit differently now. To me, I see a book is like a blog, like a podcast, like a, like a course. And it is too many times, like even our discussion today, right? There are things that we could just keep going off and off and off and just riff on if the other person wouldn't say anything, right? Same deal, same thing with my podcast. But when you can go and say everything you want in a clear story, and you can't get interrupted, that to me that body of work is something you can keep going back and referring to. And that's the thing with all those different business books that are out there. And it's like, well, here's how to go do it. If I if you sit down and go talk, or listen to interview with Donald Miller, would that be more interesting than a book and to me, it would be in some ways, but to me, it's, I can put forth a complete thought and not be interrupted in my class or in this and then later on when I have a conversation with someone I can say, go watch this lesson or go read this chapter. I've already talked about it. I've already said what I have to say I don't have any new words to add to it. Go read that. And that to me, that's the thing. I used to say that about books now I see it as you have a class or you have a video class on Udemy or your own stuff that you end up doing or you have a book or you have a blog that body of work of just that that single channel not interact that single channel of let me just put forth an entire thought that is researched and well thought out. That's the part that I that's the part that I really liked about it.
Heather Newman
Yeah, no, I like that. I because I think as far as levels of things, if we, if you will, I like it that you're putting books, a podcast, a course, or whatever, kind of on the same level because it's just a different medium really. Um, and, you know, with books comes, you know, having to deal with publishers and a lot of people are self-publishing, which is great, but books take a lot of time. You know what I mean? And as you know, being podcast hosts, we can you know, do you drop weekly, the MS Cloud Show?
Andrew Connell
We rarely miss a week. For six years. I think we've only we've missed probably maybe 10 weeks out of six years, something like that.
Heather Newman
Wow. Shout out to CJ lovely.
Andrew Connell
Oh, I carry the show. I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Not really, but yeah, so um, no, it's fun. I wanted to I've been playing the idea of starting another one that's just me. Yeah, but mostly for the business side to kind of, but also for a marketing piece. But yeah, I love it. I mean, I find that I don't, I don't blog. I don't write as much and you know, I don't write as much now that I'm going to spend more time podcasting because I have a co-host and we'll have interviews. Yeah, you lose that. That one-way kind of thing. So, when it's like when I want to explain something, I'm gonna do it as a blog. Why? Because no one's gonna interrupt me while I'm writing it. When I publish it, it's just one thing. You want ask questions? That's fine. But let me get this whole thing. I mean, one of the biggest pet peeves in the world is being interrupted, that you want to you somebody wants to be on my bad side really quick. Just keep interrupting me and I'll just, you'll just see me shut down. I used to get angry. I'm just like, you know what, fine. You like to hear yourself more go for it. But I don't have the time for this like a better thing to do.
Heather Newman
Yeah, yeah. No, that's, that's funny. Yeah. And I know it because you started in 2013. You said six, something like that?
Andrew Connell
I started the I got out of the I started doing video-based classes in 2012-2013. But I didn't really find my footing until 16,17.
Heather Newman
Got it. Yeah, have you, are there things tools that you want to share that you like?
Andrew Connell
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's I mean, I'm sure that everybody being that I mean, we're both Microsoft people so pretty unsurprised with the whole the OneNote, the Teams, the Outlook I'm still a Slack guy for some stuff.
Heather Newman
Some require it right?
Andrew Connell
Yeah, it's great. I mean, it's Microsoft is great for the enterprise. If you want to do small business Microsoft sucks and their guest user access and everything it just sucks so but for me, I think the one app that I love more than anything that nobody else I know uses it is called Teamwork. Used to be teamwork project used to be teamwork chat, they just changed their teamwork desk. They just changed the name to just teamwork. And it is like for like the Microsoft people out there. Think Planner, think Microsoft Project slash Help Desk slash Project, like personal tasks like I used to use To Do I'm getting stuff out of To Do and moving them over to my personal project. It's easier for me to manage. The mobile app kind of sucks, but that's fine. I don't need to do everything on mobile. But that's the I think that is my favorite thing. It runs the all tasks for our podcast for my, my, my biggest client, my biggest client is Microsoft and then and also for Voitanos for running our entire that entire business. And it's also in the chat or the desk part of it is my help desk. Behind the scenes as well.
Heather Newman
Okay, yeah, I finally you know, teamwork. A writing coach of mine, we use teamwork for dealing with her. Yeah, I haven't touched it in forever. But, but yeah, that's what she had me use. And that was about five years ago. But um, yeah, yeah. It's a cool product. I really like it.
Andrew Connell
It's really good. They do a really good job with it. And it's a startup out of out of Ireland. And they, I've met the owner, he came and spoke at a conference I was at one time. sat down and talked to the guy who was just, he's an absolute riot. And just, he's a developer he's like I didn't want to keep I want to keep doing I didn't want to manage people. I'm like, that's me.
Heather Newman
Yeah, absolutely. That's so cool. Do you find you mentioned Facebook ads? I love Facebook ads too. To be honest, I really like them a lot. I think they can be affordable, and the targeting is really good. And I click on them a lot because you know, my SaaS buying problem. But if you're looking at other sort of mediums of say advertising or social media, where do you think for you has got the most plays? Is it LinkedIn? Is it Twitter? You know, like, what's, what's your
Andrew Connell
I can't figure out LinkedIn, I've tried it multiple times. I've even got they apparently are having a bunch of updates are going to it this year, I signed up for a webinar and it's still sitting in my email the Hey, you missed us. Here's the recording of it. I'll go back and look at it. But I use Twitter but not the paid part of Twitter just because I find that that's a, I use other products that interface with Twitter. So, like you talked, you mentioned Buffer earlier, I'm a longtime Buffer user. I use another product called another app called Bulkly, B U L K dot LY. And what you can do is you can like you can put a bunch of tweets in or connect it to an RSS feed or upload a CSV. And over time, it'll just randomize and just keep dripping tweets. And so, I'll take some of my popular blog posts. And I'll just constantly post them in like, a couple months ago, I wrote a thing about stop using Internet Explorer 11. And it just all of a sudden, I realized that Oh, yeah, people are still reading that how because they're responding to a tweet. Well, the tweets been up like probably 40 or 50 times. It just got dropped again. Two days ago, and people just aren't commenting on the post. Next thing I know I've seen it go higher up on SEO juice and, so that that ends up being that's a big one. But I mean, Facebook ads, video ads. I love it. I understand why people get, you know, have like a negative connotation to it. But if you can, it's a tool. Right? As much as you can bag on Facebook ads, you can bag on cars. You can say cars kill people like no, the people behind the cars are killing the people. If they're if they're drinking, they're using it the wrong way. They're screwed, but they're incredibly useful otherwise. Facebook ads, incredibly useful otherwise, if you tell me that I don't want to see more any more ads from Voitanos because I'm not interested in SharePoint development. Please actually do that because I want to find people like you and stay away from you because you're not gonna be a potential customer. Help me keep my costs down.
Heather Newman
Don't click on my ad.
Andrew Connell
Yeah, we started using it for actually promoting our podcast. It's actually really hard to do that with Facebook ads because you can't get a one to one of, I can't tell if someone converted because I can't tell if they listen to it or download the show based on if they clicked on an ad. So it's kind of a built in and they will come and go like, Alright, we're just gonna we're gonna dedicate this much money to Facebook ads for the next two months and see if our subscribers, our downloads and subscription numbers go up and if they do, it's like oh, that's the only thing that changed so that's it.
Heather Newman
Yeah, sometimes you got to do a one to one shot to see does this work and check and then does this work and check? Yeah, no, absolutely.
Andrew Connell
Yeah, it's just I don't get I don't get much out of it. I've tried LinkedIn ads a couple times. It's been very ineffective. I've tried Twitter ads, very ineffective. The one I haven't done yet that I want to spend more time on is Google Ads, but I really feel like Google Ads slash YouTube ads but I there's just there's so much that you can get out of Facebook ads. and but you know, it's just people just get so bent out of shape about it. like I tell people about like I'm going to be really brash here about it. I don't care about you. I care about your persona. If you're if you're if you care to buy something, and if you don't tell me you don't want it so that I cannot push it on you. It's, it's better than getting an ad just a blanket ad out of the email, like, someone mobile app development from India. I'm like, stop.
Heather Newman
Right. Well that happens in LinkedIn all the time, right? You connect with people and. Yeah. How about how can you play with Tiktok yet?
Andrew Connell
I have not. I was scared of tik tok because of the security things with it. I read an article by a German researcher late last year that was eye opening to where I looked at my kids and I'm like, you will not put that on your phones or on your iPads. It will not be used in our house. It's fascinating. It is. It's fascinating what they're doing.
Heather Newman
I'm gonna have to go check out that link. So that's very interesting.
Andrew Connell
I will dig that up and send it to you. Here's the scary part. So, I'll give you one other quick example. If you have a like if I had a TikTok app or TikTok video that I played right now while we were playing or on the show, there is a, it creates an audio an audible fingerprint. And without you and I even know each other on TikTok. If your phone picked up that sound it would know that you and I are friends and specifically that I was using my phone when I did it. You can't hear it. I can't hear it. The dogs can hear it. But it is unbelievable. You think that Facebook was tracking you? And then there's just the whole concern that I had about I don't really care about people tracking me. But the, at least I should say don't get bent out of shape about it like the whole cancel culture does these days. But I do have a concern with like my data going to people who I don't trust and I, generally speaking like China and North Korea, I have a I have a genuine distrust for when all that data is going straight into China. I'm like, what are you using that for?
Heather Newman
Yeah, yeah. Interesting. Wow. Like everybody who's got kids who are like TikToking 4000 gazillion times a day. They're like, what did he say? I think we need to put that in the show notes.
Andrew Connell
It's really geeky, it's really technical. But your jaw, you kind of hit the ground you're like, Oh, now I see why the US government, so they're open up investigation towards them like, woah.
Heather Newman
Wow, wow. Oh, my goodness, I could talk to you for like four more hours. You're wonderful. But I'm gonna because my producer is gonna be like Heather and I'm like, all right. I have to pay attention to her, or she doesn't put my podcasts out. You know, she and she's very smart and does a great job. So, anyway, so Annelise Thank you so much.
Andrew Connell
You do do a you do do a great job. And your interview from what like last November ish was also fantastic.
Heather Newman
We had a good time talking about creating a podcast and what we learned so yeah, she's awesome. So, my last question that I ask everyone is if you would share with our listeners, a spark or a moment, person, place, a thing that seats you in who you are today that you'd love to share.
Andrew Connell
I think it was in. There's a couple, but one that stands out to me is the first big conference I spoke at. It was in, I forget the name of the conference, it might have been like SharePoint connections. It was in Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas in 2007. And I it was the first big conference I spoke at. classic every time we've done that my back was soaking wet, so I never turned around because I was sweating so bad. But I remember going through something that I thought was really interesting. And seeing like this row of people in the front, and they're like, their jaws were on the ground. They're like, I've never heard it explained like that. Now I get it. It was I can't remember what I was talking about. But then I had another one where it was where I was talking about OAuth, authentication model when it was just getting introduced to SharePoint. I was teaching it for like four months before I really understood what I was talking about. I was just rehearsing and hoping that nobody asked a question and called my bluff. I was just regurgitating what I were repeating what I what I had memorized. And then someone I kind of had this idea of like, well, this is all it is right? And they're like, yeah, so then I explained it this way to some people and I remember like three ladies, two guy, two ladies and one guy in a class in Boston in like 2009. And you could we always use it as a figure speech, but I almost could see it literally seeing that light bulb click on their heads, like, oh my god, I got it. now I totally get it. I was like, it's not that hard. It's simple. And they're like, it really is simple. And it's, it's, that's the thing that I love to do is. If you think it's hard. It's not hard, none of this stuff is hard. AI, that stuff's hard, like deep learning that stuff's hard. But we're just talking about standard dev. This isn't hard. And so, if I when I see the person click when they get that that that's the thing that I love that that's what gives me the that's what gives me energy to do to do more of that. That's why I love presenting. I love getting in front of people to do that.
Heather Newman
Yeah, yeah. The introvert. Yeah.
Andrew Connell
People say that they're like, Oh, yeah, but you're an introvert. How can you like to go through and present? I'm like, because nobody talks to you when your presenting. nobody's up there with me, I'm just b myself.
Heather Newman
Yeah. I've talked to other people in our community they're like, put me on stage. I'm great. But like, get me off the stage and not to hang out and ask questions. Or get me off. So yeah, get me off the stage. So yeah. You said you have one more. Do you have one more?
Andrew Connell
Um, there was those two? Those were, I think, oh, there was there was an there was actually right. There was another one. It was in 2010. I was presenting at the SharePoint conference in Las Vegas. It was one of the biggest rooms I've ever had. 800 people were in the room and I was presenting something that it was a 400-level topic, but to me after figuring it out, it was like six or 700 level. The product group had never done what I was doing. I had my demo that I was finishing on a USB stick and after my presentation, they asked for the demo because they needed it for their research. And it was one of those things that is like one of the hardest things in the world to pull off. Everything went almost exactly according to plan one or two little tiny hiccups that only I could see nobody else could really see it. But it was it's still one of those sessions that I actually I, maybe once a year, I hear somebody say it and it just happened to be I saw it this morning on Facebook. Somebody made a comment like, Oh, you should ask AC to talk about what are they called custom service applications. Like oh my god, I remember that the amount of work that went into that one, that one presentation, but seeing people come up afterwards and they still talk about it. Like oh my now I understand how those things are. That was like, that was epic. I'm like, yeah, you have no idea how hard that was leading up to it. And it's made it seem easy, but um, yeah, that was, but it's one of those things just kind of says, this is what I do. Need to do the education stuff. This is just, I have a knack for so embrace it.
Heather Newman
You're a teacher and you that's, that's the other thing always about you. You always make it seem easy. And you always talk to people in a way where you, you teach them you don't make them feel stupid. And I appreciate that wholeheartedly because sometimes when you get in to technical things, people are like, Oh, you know, you know that and you that you are the epitome of an excellent teacher in that way and a leader, so I appreciate that about you.
Andrew Connell
I appreciate that. You've got to send people when someone asks a question or teach them something, you need them to walk away, energized and dying to get back to whatever you just taught them so they can try it. Because if you just kind of explain their question and just roll off, it's like, I don't remember that? I mean, I don't want to tick a box. It's like, inspire me to go do something. That's fun.
Heather Newman
Yeah, absolutely. You’re a doll. Yay!
Andrew Connell
Love that we got to do this.
Heather Newman
I know. I know. It was wonderful. Thank you so much for sharing your story and being on and you've had me on the Cloud Show, gosh, forever ago. So
Andrew Connell
It's been a while. We got to do that again.
Heather Newman
Yeah. All right. Deal. So yeah, absolutely. Cool. Andrew, thank you so much. Really appreciate it.
Andrew Connell
Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.
Heather Newman
You betcha everybody we'll put show notes up and you can find all the goodness that we've been talking about. And that has been another episode of The Mavens Do It Better podcast and here's to another beautiful day on this big blue spinning sphere. Thanks ya'all