You think you could never use video as part of your marketing strategy, then think again.
As Sue Ferreira said, “It’s mandatory”! Sue is 71 and after 40 years as an anaesthetist she is now teaching people how to become visible using video. She has over 100 video on You Tube and is now a sought after speaker……If Sue can, you can!
Hi, there this is Dylis Guyan and welcome to the Inspired Selling Podcast this the place where people learn the fact; how to find, attract, convert and treasure more of your ideal clients without any of those nasty, sleazy, pushy sales tactics. I’ve got a fabulous guest for you today, Sue Ferreira. Sue is going to talk to us and share techniques and strategies about using video successfully in your business.
So, let me just give you some background about Sue. I am so excited, I just can’t wait to hear from her because I have to admit, I am not the bravest on live video, but I am going to be after this podcast so let me tell you about Sue. After forty years practicing, as an anaesthetist in the invisible world of the Operating Room, for her second act, Sue transformed her world showing you how to be visible with video.
Living in this exciting time of rapid but unsettling change Sue realised many people were having challenges, me included, embracing the power of video as a marketing tool. You know things like camera shyness, techie terrors that hold people back from extending their reach, their influence, their impact and their income, and knowing that she can make you camera and tech confident, Sue created ‘Wisdom to Wealth Mastery’ enabling you to take your wisdom to the world in video.
So, Sue welcome, I am absolutely thrilled to have you on the podcast, and what I have loved about you in the short time that we’ve known each other is your story and how inspiring you are to so many people, and certainly to me. I just want to share with the listeners or the viewers that this is a lady who is seventy-one and is absolutely rocking it. She is out there, if you have a look on YouTube she has got dozens and dozens of videos, she is totally inspiring. So, Sue tell us what was the trigger to have you start your own business and why particularly video?
Sue: Well, I’ve got to say, first of all, I’m the one who is so honoured to be here Dylis and we really enjoy our conversations, but I’ll get to your question. Why did I move in my second act to video? It’s a good question, one I am asked quite often because there isn’t usually such a radical switch.
Dylis: Of course.
Sue: Being invisible in the Operating Room, forever in medicine and you know I couldn’t do anaesthesia 101 for the general populous because we’d get into big trouble right if I went out and taught anaesthesia. I have seen over my years in medicine which its fifty-three years since I went to Medical School at University College in London and I have seen us get older and older and older and I know we are going to live very long lives, and you know life sends you curve balls. When I was sixty, so about ten years ago I went through one of those really painful, unfortunately increasingly common grey divorces.
So, I thought I was twinkling on into a conventional older life and suddenly boom, my life changes direction and I am now looking at being a single woman into my later years. You know that requires a bit of a mindset change, and then that was in 2007. Then the next year was 2008 when we had the financial crash and I don’t know, I always say I don’t do visions, but I had a vision, which for someone who is as concrete and kind of scientific as me was, you know it was an emotional experience: and I just felt and saw all these folks whose lives were going to be severely wrecked by this financial crisis and we haven’t really come out of it now.
I knew that many were going to have to generate added income and because I’ve always been fascinated by the Web I knew if you take control of your own life and not depend on someone else, the way to do it today, to generate added income is to get yourself more seen on the Web.
So, I started with everybody and I found a lot of people weren’t interested in changing their world and I focused more on business women and business folks in general because there is as you said, there is this rapid, rapid change in the world. We are moving to a totally different way of business and Marketing and I understood video because I’ve done it for a long time and I saw its power rise over five or six years and thought wow people have to use this. So that’s basically how I ….it’s a long story because it goes through different kind of sections of things that happened to me but that’s how I ended up using video as a way to take your message to the world because it is so powerful.
Dylis: It is, it certainly is, and as you know I am deeply immersed in the world of S.M.E.’s who are selling to bigger businesses and time and time again, I hear people saying, I just can’t do this, I just can’t do it and I had to kind of feel the fear and do it anyway, I must admit and it wasn’t easy for me. I could stand on a stage with an audience of hundreds of people, you know as a keynote speaker, I could run workshops with many people, many delegates and so on, but to get in front of this, was just daunting. You know that stupid little lens, you kind of get those butterflies in your tummy and I have had to work hard at taking myself out of my comfort zone. So just tell us, why you think business owners should consider video as a marketing tool for their business to attract new clients?
Sue: I think it’s mandatory today and I commend you Dylis for overcoming your collywobbles about doing video because it is universal and maybe we can come back to that whole idea of just because you are a speaker doesn’t mean you are going to be able to transfer easily to video. In fact, I think your experience is extremely common, but I think there is core reasons that it is difficult to make that transition.
One is, it’s…especially for women, I mean we are so brutally hard on ourselves and so self-critical, you know a lot of people don’t even want to be in the family photos and so the whole idea of baring your soul and coming out potentially to the world because that’s what you’re doing when you put a video up online. You are leaving your local world that knows you and that you are comfortable in and you’re making that BIG leap through the screen to unknown people, to unknown audiences.
I think it requires a huge amount of self-work and mindset work to be able to say yes, I can do this, I can make this leap and do exactly what you said, to feel the fear and do it anyway. I think, first of all, its mindset, self-confidence that is a real, real challenge for many and then the next thing is the tech. There is this BIG thing that oh my God! It’s so technical to do video and it was even four years ago but now it isn’t and you know you brought up my favourite gizmo it really has come down now with an iPhone hit the red button give your message, hit the red button, your video is done. So, number two is, there is this perception that the tech is still difficult but it isn’t.
Then number three is; so I have made my video, what do I do with it now? Until you know where and how of each different place you can put the video, you get a little bit lost, you don’t know what to do with a video when you’ve got it so that’s the three reasons. Self-confidence, thinking the tech is more than it actually is today and knowing what to do with the video when you have made it.
Dylis: I’ll just share a very funny story with you, Sue. When I was building myself up to do my very first live, and I was actually up at the swimming pool and they’ve got nice loungers there, and I was reading a book and its behind me here, and I think it’s probably the wrong way around, but its ‘The 5 Second Rule’
Sue: Oh yes.
Dylis: I was building myself up and I read this and it just said. “Say to yourself, five, four, three, two one and just do it”, and right that’s it, I am going back home, I am going to get changed, I am going to put my lipstick on and I am going to just do it. I remember someone saying to me, ‘now put something at the side, put a picture of’…I haven’t got a picture here by the way, I’ve got a train ticket but all will be revealed. ‘Put a picture at the side of your phone, where the camera is and so just look at that because otherwise it’s as if you are not looking at the camera’.
Sue: Yeah.
Dylis: So, I didn’t have a picture, all I had on my desk was a train ticket, so I poked a hole in this train ticket, drew some eyelashes on it and away I went, I pressed the red button and away I went, and I absolutely loved it, I really, really enjoyed doing it. But when I looked back at it, and I published it, I have boosted it on Facebook and everything, but I hadn’t made the hole quite big enough, but looked like I was looking down a toilet roll. It can only get better from here really.
Sue: But you did it, I mean it’s always that first one isn’t it? And so many folks, I just say just do the first one and you will be through it because everyone after that is easier. But that is a brilliant thing to do and you can see upon this, is an old teleprompter I’ve got behind there and Teddy sits on the top because when I have got people who get like you are hesitant about doing video, it’s not good looking at that cold lens you’ve already said that blanks people out, so look at teddy, talk to teddy or talk to your train ticket, that’s the way to do it.
Dylis: But with a bigger hole in, if you are going to put a hole in your train ticket, bigger hole in when you’re doing your eye and your eyelash, and of course as a marketing strategy, for people who have been able to get out there and people who know me, know I use the phrase a lot ‘it’s about exposing yourself’ metaphorically speaking, being visible out there.
When I introduced you, Sue, I talked about the number of videos that you’ve got on YouTube and the places that you share them, and I am sure you’ll talk to us about that later on. But, it’s a really great way, not just at becoming visible but people getting to know you, as opposed to a blog for example or an article or email marketing it really allows people to see who you are and gives them the opportunity to reject you if you are not their cup of tea, or to embrace you if you are their cup of tea.
Sue: Yeah, I mean we are such visual creatures and I think that’s why video become so powerful, and it all comes down to just what you said K, L and T, know, like and trust, and we know that people will bond with you and be more interested in working with you or purchasing something from you or investing in you if they know, like and trust you. Again, folks who are hesitant to do videos say, ‘ah it doesn’t work this video thing, you know it’s different, it doesn’t work when you are at a distance and you’re doing it online’, I say oh, rubbish, it really, really works, it doesn’t make any difference.
I have a client right now whom I’d never met personally, but we already knew each other really well and then she moved into town and so now she comes here for her coaching, and the first time she walked in we just said “Hi, nice to meet you but I already know you”. So, you can get to know, like and trust people easily via video, especially as the whole mantra is don’t put on airs and graces just be yourself because you can’t keep it up if you’re not authentic, it doesn’t work.
Dylis: Yeah, that’s quite right. So Sue, what would you recommend live or pre-recorded? What are the pros and cons of both?
Sue: Both, live wasn’t really an option until maybe just a couple of years ago since Facebook Live came in. So, the world really changed with Facebook Live and I think when I am teaching, I say forget about all those other areas where you can do video because you can do a video just about anywhere. You can do video on Twitter, you can do video on Instagram and I don’t necessarily say forget that but focus on the two big, humongous areas where you can do video, which are YouTube and Facebook and those are the two areas where you can power out your presence.
If you do Facebook, then there is no doubt live is the way to go, Facebook itself will promote you a lot more if you do live video. That doesn’t mean you don’t do recorded video, you do it too, but you know if it’s a question of coming in on a race, Facebook Live will pip you at the post. When you look at YouTube which I really love, its different kettle of fish totally because when you are on Facebook, you are building relationships really, you’re building relationships and in fact, right now Facebook is pushing the whole idea of engagement which is a dynamic interaction.
When you go to YouTube, you can do YouTube live but it’s a very different medium because YouTube is a search engine and so people go to YouTube to have a problem solved, have their questions answered. So, you will make a very different video for YouTube than you will for Facebook and that’s the power of YouTube because if you can have a presence on both of them…you know the mantra is if you want to be seen today you’ve got to have you everywhere now.
So, think about what your Web footprint is like. If you put your name into Google. Where would you come up? How do people find you? Where are you visible? If you have a lot on Facebook Live and you have a lot on YouTube and you have a lot in video, you will rise to the top and be seen. So, the power is live on Facebook I would say and recorded on YouTube but answering very specific questions that people want answered.
Dylis: I noticed on your YouTube channel, you don’t put long videos on there, yours are always three to four minutes.
Sue: Yep, max, we are kind of a bit of A.D.D. these days and that again is the difference. If you are doing a Facebook live or you’re doing something like we are doing right now, it’s conversational and it can go on for quite a while. I mean you know we can do twenty, thirty, forty an hour, quite easily. You try doing that on YouTube, poof they’re gone, and you will see there is a very different structure to creating a YouTube video. Up front you say in this video; I am going to show you. If you don’t say that they’re gone.
You have to tell them that you are here giving them the answer to their query. You are going to solve their problem right up front and if you don’t do that they’re gone. So, there is a very different structure between the two and you need to solve the problem on YouTube tout suite and two to three minutes is really your max.
Dylis: Before we came on to do this recording, I was actually watching some of your videos on YouTube and you are absolutely to the point. You tell them what you’re going to tell them, you tell them, and you tell them what you’ve told them.
Sue: You got it, that’s right and that is the structure, and it’s the structure that works. I’ll be honest it breaks my heart because there is an awful lot of incredibly talented people, women again especially who are excellent speakers, who put their videos up onto YouTube but they’re never seen because they don’t have that structure. I know they have put their effort into creating the video, they put it up on to YouTube and they never get exposure because they are not using that structured way and also S.E.O.-ing their video properly and Search Engine Optimization is very important on YouTube as well so, it’s very different. Facebook is kind of looser, you need a strategy, but its looser whereas YouTube is tight, tight, focused and pre-planned.
Dylis: It’s a case of getting started isn’t it because people could have a look at your channel and go yeah but look at all the video she has got up there, but you had to start somewhere with video number one.
Sue: Yep, and I didn’t start this channel until about… I got a couple videos that I pulled from elsewhere but that’s basically an eight months channel now, and I think if you are going to put videos up on YouTube you do really need to learn about the structure of how to do it on YouTube first about the S.E.O. and then consistency. I try to have one video a week go out every Friday and then people get used to your channel, they get used to what you are doing and if they subscribe they get a notification when your video goes out, so it helps to build your community and I’ll be honest right now the vast majority of the opt-ins to my email list come from YouTube, rather than anywhere else.
Dylis: Yeah and I noticed that too, that in the description you don’t actually describe what’s in the video, you put; Subscribe to my five steps to effective videoing or five steps to the essentials for video.
Sue: I put a freebie in there.
Dylis: Yes.
Sue: And then that freebie obviously goes to an opt-in page and then I collect emails from there, and I will be honest that’s where I get the vast majority of my opt-ins.
Dylis: Yeah, so your people can in fact go and subscribe to your video channel and have a look at your strategy and those elements that you include, like the free resource in the description box and the “I am going to tell you what I am going to tell you, I’ll tell you it and now I’ll tell you what I’ve told you.
Sue: It’s interesting, someone last week who subscribe to my channel then followed up with an email to me or a message saying…’what do I now/make my videos about because other people have already made the videos about the subject that I want to talk about?’ I said it doesn’t matter, if you look at YouTube there are sixty gazillion videos about how to use your iPhone to create a video. It doesn’t matter, there is room enough for everyone, because comes back again Dylis to just what you said, people are looking for someone they know and like and trust.
I am not going to attract the teenybopper who is on Snapchat, I am going to attract where I think there is a vast need. Older women and men who need to move into this world and you know we grew up before the Web, so it’s a world that they don’t understand, and I know one of my talents is to simplify it and make it easy. So, that’s who I am gearing to, who I am attracting mostly folks fifty plus who need to move into this and you know don’t like it but they can do it.
Dylis: Again, it goes back to…I am certainly inspired, the fact that you re-invented yourself at the age of sixty going through that awful divorce.
Sue: It wasn’t great.
Dylis: Re-inventing yourself, and being who you are, and there is nobody who can replicate you, because even though there are tons of people out there talking about how to do video, nobody can do it way Sue Ferreira does it.
Sue: Yeah, and you know there are some outstanding folks’ way, way, way better than me but I still am building my own little tribe and so it doesn’t matter who you are, don’t think you can’t do it because someone else has already done it.
Dylis: Yes.
Sue: You are you, just do it and people will come.
Dylis: So, what would be your top tips for doing effective videos on a regular basis?
Sue: I think first of all it comes right back to your message and whatever…. folks say ‘I don’t know how to do video, I don’t know what to say’ and I will just say “who are you, what is your message”? If you already have a business in what I call the real world and you were doing workshops or you are speaking, your message is already there, you know who you are and you know what your message is and you know what you offer. It’s absolutely no different to then go on to video and say the same thing.
You can just parcel it depending on whether you are going on to YouTube or Facebook live. Parcel it in a different way, but there is nothing more you need to learn or do, it’s already up here, your wisdom is here. Your wisdom is here just brain dump it and take it out to the world and as I say, then your influence will grow and eventually your income which is a whole idea of Wisdom to Wealth.
So, don’t get caught up in the idea that you need to do something different you don’t, you have it all already. Then I would just say, think about what your audience needs if you go to YouTube, think about what questions you’re most commonly asked. I always will say, think about the ten questions you are asked most frequently, think about the ten questions they should ask you but they don’t. If you put down the FAQ’s and ten SAQ’s you’ve already got twenty videos and then you just write your text in the format that I have just mentioned if you’re going to do YouTube. Here I am going to solve this problem, this is who I am, here is the solution and tell them again to subscribe, that’s your YouTube format.
If you go to Facebook live, you can have exactly the same twenty videos or twenty subjects, but you can chat to them more loosely and bring people in, in a more engaging way, that’s where I would start. Think of the ten questions that they frequently ask, the ten that they should ask, it gives you the structure to then move forward. Once you have done those, I tell you, you will realise you have so many more videos or discussion points, it becomes a non issue.
Dylis: Yeah, and one of the things I do Sue, with everything that I do, afterwards I do a; what went well, what didn’t go so well, what do I need do better next time. so you are always making those marginal gains and moving forward and upward all of the time.
Sue: Yeah and that is a really important point Dylis, I had a lady bless her an eighty-year-old, I mean it’s amazing an eighty-year-old from California, I don’t even know who she is and she sent me an email this week and said, “I’ve just done a video, I didn’t like it, I am not going to do anymore” That was hilarious.
Dylis: And that’s that.
Sue: We’ve had dialogue since and I said “That’s right, your first video will be so awful, you will never want to see it again, but it’s done, it’s your first video.”
Dylis: With the bus ticket, with the train ticket with the hole in, with eyelashes drawn.
Sue: I mean it will be, it’s guaranteed that your first video will be awful. So, if you want to make it without going live and practice first, yeah I think it’s a great thing to practice but at some point, you’ve got to stop using practicing as an excuse and move out to the real world. Honestly, and truthfully accept that your first one is going to be awful and then you found I am sure Dylis that you are learning curve is very steep and you get better very, very quickly especially if you do the review that you’ve just mentioned.
Dylis: Yeah so, what about tech then Sue? I’ve got this little tripod thing now that I can take and I can fit my phone in, just a cheap Amazon thing, now I don’t know whether you would recommend that or if you would recommend something different?
Sue: No, what you’ve got is perfect, I basically have almost the same thing behind me here. I did a podcast last week with someone, she came here a local person, a realtor just wanted people talking about the neighbourhood and what they offered in the neighbourhood. We did it all on her iPhone, dead simple, in fact, she didn’t even have a separate microphone that would plug into her iPhone, we used an ice-cream cone microphone and it worked just fine.
So, in essence, you don’t need anything more than this, I mean if you’ve got a nice steady arm and you don’t joggle it, you don’t need anything more than a Smartphone. I do have actually a freebie which is the only three tools under twenty dollars you need to create client attracting videos. So, I would recommend that if you really want to have what I call a B.B.C. setup, because you basically have the B.B.C. or in Canada the Canadian Broadcasting Service on here. If you take your iPhone and you add one single little microphone on here, which in fact is the one I am using here because it also works in my computer and you take what you have shown there Dylis, a clamp and any kind of tripod, that is it.
Dylis: It’s important to put it this way, am I correct?
Sue: Yes, the microphone on the native Smartphone’s are okay but the audio isn’t that great, so get one of the little lapel mics like I have got or I actually have another one here that I quite often use, this is my Yeti mic, I use sometimes use this one but more and more because I like to be mobile and small I just use this little Lavaliere mic, lapel mic I just steady it.
Dylis: Is that on your free resource?
Sue: Yes.
Dylis: Did you refer to that?
Sue: Yes, it is.
Dylis: Excellent what about lighting? What would you recommend for lighting?
Sue: It’s interesting we were talking about this before we started, I think if you have natural light that you can put yourself in front of that works really, really well. I don’t have that in this particular room that I use so I have two lights on either side here that are about forty dollars US, they are LED lights, I have a little diffuser that I put on top of them and I can just adjust the intensity depending on the day outside.
So, really, I mean, you don’t even really need that, you can have two little table lamps either side of your camera, so it lights you pretty much the same on both sides that’s all you need. I always stress don’t let any tech details stop you from pushing the red button. The main thing is…its interesting we will accept poor video over poor audio, so if you are going to buy one thing it would be the microphone and there are so many. It’s fascinating to watch this explosion of creativity that we have these days where, its only ten years ago since YouTube, Facebook and Smartphone’s appeared: and they have changed everything, and they have really been responsible for this massive rise in video which is now 82% of all web content, that is amazing in ten years.
Dylis: That’s staggering, isn’t it? It’s staggering.
Sue: It’s absolutely staggering. So don’t worry too much about the quality of video, if you are going to buy one single thing it would be a decent mic.
Dylis: Excellent and I look like I am sitting in a cave compared to you Sue, but of course its daytime for you in Canada, it’s the evening for me in the UK but I am actually in front of a window that normally would give me really brilliant natural light. So, if I am going to do more podcasts in the evening or videos in the evening, I am certainly going to invest in some lights.
Sue: Yeah, I think that’s worth it. But you know I think you look fantastic right now, you’ve got good light on both sides,
Dylis: Brilliant, brilliant. Sue thank you so much, we are going to have to talk again because this is kind of the fundamentals that we have talked about and I think we can take a deeper dive into some of more of the technical ways of how to do a recorded video and a Facebook live, maybe we can do something around that. How can the audience get in touch with you if they want to learn more or just get your free resource?
Sue: Well, I can give you the free resource and we can add that to wherever the podcast is going but I try to make it consistent. Just about anywhere is Wisdom to Wealth Mastery, Twitter, YouTube my website, my Facebook is all Wisdom to Wealth Mastery. I do have a Facebook group Visible on Video which you are welcome to join but, pretty much it’s Wisdom to Wealth in any of the modalities that you care to find. It’s interesting because I knew how powerful video is so most of my stuff is out there in video.
Free Resources
- i) Camera Confidence Tips – http://wisdomtowealthmastery.com/recommends/2382-2/
- ii) The Only Three Tools Under $20.00 You Will Need To Create Client Attracting Videos – http://bit.ly/2CP8WQ1
Dylis: Brilliant, and where do people get the free resource? Is that on your website Sue?
Sue: At the moment it’s not on my website because I am changing it, but I could send you the PDF, the link or if anyone wants it just Facebook message me and I am more than happy to send you those quick little three tool under twenty dollars that will basically help create….
Dylis: Well if you send me the link Sue, then I can add that.
Sue: Yep I will send you the link.
Dylis: I’ll also have this transcribed so I can put it into the transcription for people to just be able to click that and from a message from me who really struggled and I have thoroughly, thoroughly been inspired by you and the simplicity of your messages Sue, and the authenticity in which you deliver them has helped me enormously. I think the four words I would give to anyone is, just flipping do it, J.F.D.I. just flipping do it. What’s the worst that can happen, nothing.
You know even if it’s the hole in the train ticket and it looks like you’re looking down a toilet roll. You would not believe the wonderful comments I got on that because it wasn’t perfect and it really stood out. In fact, there were many, many positives that came from that. So, Sue thank you again it’s been an utter pleasure.
Sue: Always my pleasure too Dylis, and as I always say just hit the red button and away you go.
Dylis: Fantastic, thanks again Sue, bye for now.
Free resources
- i) Camera Confidence Tips – http://wisdomtowealthmastery.com/recommends/2382-2/
- ii) The Only Three Tools Under $20.00 You Will Need To Create Client Attracting Videos – http://bit.ly/2CP8WQ1
If you haven’t already downloaded your FREE “21 Surefire Ways to Find Your Ideal Clients”
Do it today. CLICK HERE
Find a Way and Be The Best You Can Be
Email: dylis@dylisguyan.com