Episode 133: Alex Sheridan – Turning Your Video Content Into a 24/7 Sales Rep for Your Business

Alex Sheridan  00:00

The non-social path is you pick up the phone, you email, you knock on doors, you drive around your territory and try to find prospects, and all this social selling for me is just doing a lot of those same activities but in a social media environment, so it’s still connecting with the right people, being intentional with your message. It’s creating content, educating potential buyers, motivating, and it’s building relationships through social channels.

Bob Woods  00:26

Welcome to the Making Sales Social podcast, featuring the top voices in sales, marketing, and business. Join Brynne Tillman and me, Bob Woods, as we each bring you the best tips and strategies our guests are teaching their clients, so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling. Enjoy the show.

Bob Woods  00:51

Welcome to Making Sales Social. I’m Bob Woods Chief Marketing Officer at Social Sales Link, where we train and coach both individuals and sales teams on converting connections to sales conversations through the power of LinkedIn and social selling without being, you know, salesy. My guest today is Alex Sheridan, the founder, and CEO of Impaxs Marketing and that’s spelled I-M-P-A-X-S. So Alex and his crack team of video pros help you turn your video content and a 24/7 sales rep for your business and you know, who doesn’t want that? we’ve all got to sleep at some point, right? So Alex and I have been following, liking, and commenting on each other’s videos, and so on for several months now I think. 

I like its content a lot because it really falls in line with our philosophy, which is presenting yourself, your company, your products, and solutions in an authentic, genuine way, and providing real value to your prospects. And nowadays for my money, there ain’t no better way to do that than with video. 

You can find Alex all over social and I mean, all over social, where he truly practices what he preaches when it comes to using video to provide value to his prospects. He also does many live events, so watch for him on those and he has the Brand in Demand podcast where he brings his audience actionable tactics, strategies, and insights on how to use your content and social media presence to build a guess what brand and demand and driving insane amount of revenue for your company. Alex, welcome to Making Sales Social, so happy to have you on today.

Alex Sheridan  02:33

Thank you, Bob. I’m glad to be here. I appreciate that intro. You nailed it! 

Bob Woods  02:38

Sure! sure. That’s always good to hear. Thanks a lot. So our first traditional question we ask this of everyone is, what does making sales social mean to you? 

Alex Sheridan  02:48

Well, I was a sales rep for 10 years, B2B sales. So for me, I was doing non-social sales. So I’ve perspective on both ways. And I’d say that, you know, the nonsocial path is you pick up the phone, you email, you knock on doors, you drive around your territory, and try to find prospects, and all this social selling for me is just doing a lot of those same activities but in a social media environment. So it’s still connecting with the right people being intentional with your message. It’s creating content, educating potential buyers, motivating, and it’s building relationships through social channels.

Bob Woods  03:23

Yes, precisely and I’ve seen enough. I’ve had enough windshield time and all that and knocking on doors. I know exactly what you’re talking about there. This is definitely the better side of the tracks to be on. 

So let’s get to video now and I want to get the big huge proverbial 800-pound elephant in the room out of the way right now. And it’s a subject that you talk about quite a bit as well, I think deservedly so and it’s the fear that many salespeople have about actually putting themselves out there and just making videos. 

I think there are a couple of things going on there but I’d like to hear about why you think that this is the case, you know, producing video for themselves and with them especially with them on camera and everything. 

Alex Sheridan  04:13

I mean, there’s a lot of reasons that probably salespeople aren’t putting out video content and using videos in the sales process and a couple of marg like some very basic things like one they may not understand the ROI of doing it or how it works or how to execute it and what would I even say if I was going to make a video and where would I send it and how would I get it out to people. 

So there’s definitely that aspect too but once you get past that I’ve just noticed with salespeople and just business owners and CEOs and a lot of different people regardless of your role, there’s just a fear of putting themselves out there. Whether it’s the actual content or a video, you’re going to send it a DM or whatever it’s going to be. And a lot of times that fear comes from we worry about what other people are going to say and how they’re going to judge us and we want validation from external sources and we wonder, “Well, what if I send it? And then nobody responds? Or what if I post a video on LinkedIn trying to educate and help my potential customers and it gets zero likes?”Or someone comments and says, “Hey, actually, that’s not right, you’re wrong,” you know. 

And so I think, you know, what if we don’t look the part the day we record the videos, you know, there’s so many aspects and elements of this, but, you know, it typically either comes down to fear of posting, you know, they’re worried about some type of external factor, typically, when they should be worried about their internal values and what they believe in themselves or two it’s, there’s, there’s a lack of knowledge or gap of understanding what it can actually do for you.

Bob Woods  05:34

Right, yeah. So I mean, I definitely think that the ROI aspect is important, because a lot of people just don’t see one, that there is ROI but two it’s not the easiest thing in the world to necessarily track ROI, especially in the world of sales, which is so numbers driven, and, you know, “This lead came from here, and this is a…” and all that type of stuff, you know, salespeople don’t understand it and management may not even understand that there may not be direct ROI from all these activities and that could be for social in general, but especially with video.

Alex Sheridan  06:07

Yeah, I mean, you know, I always separate in between social selling, and then kind of more of the content, personal branding marketing side, right. So like, I could, and I did, and I taught my clients how to do this, like, we would send video DM, you could send potentially, if you’re a salesperson right now, you could send 50 DMS or 100 DMS, whatever, every single week, and you could track how many you know get opened potentially, if they have the read receipts on their and their face shows up but at minimum, you attract response rates and you would track how many meetings that I booked off those videos, right? So just like you’re doing a cold call, you would track how many videos you sent, how many you got responses, how many booked calls, and then how many of those calls turned into actual business or revenue.

On the video and the content side, building a personal brand or a company brand or putting out content, that’s a little trickier. You still can track it with things like, you know, their booking through a Calendly link, you can track where they found you, if you’re in the conversation, you can ask where did you first come across me if you don’t already know. You know, so there’s things that you can do but it’s more of a process, you’re not going to put out two or three videos and you know, be able to go to your CEO and go, “Hey, I made two videos I posted on LinkedIn and we won two new clients because of it,” it’s probably not going to happen. So you got to think about short-term activities versus long-term activities and both of them have their place.

Bob Woods  07:19

Yeah, absolutely and I’m glad that you brought up personal messaging too because I think personally, that when it comes to that, again, this comes back to the point of so many people, salespeople specifically aren’t doing this, when you send a personal message and this is going a little beyond what we’re talking about but when you send a personal message, it’s almost like a one to one contact. Although you’re not able to go back and forth on you know, on Zoom or whatever kind of like what we’re doing right now. There’s still that person who can look you in the eyes, they can see your expressions and everything. And it’s just much more personal. It’s a much more personal connection there and because so many other salespeople aren’t doing it, I think automatically you stand out in other people’s minds just because you’re taking the action to do it.

Alex Sheridan  08:06

Totally! And if you think about you know, especially if LinkedIn for example, what are most prospects getting hit with? Spam messages, text messages, you know, it’s all text, it’s long paragraphs, book a call for me now if you want to learn more about our product. “Hey, Alex, I saw your blah, blah, blah…” And so it’s just like, you know, I was impressed with your profile. You know, it’s like all these things, they try to make it personalized, but really, it’s not personalized, really impressed with what your business is doing. “Oh, really, John, what am I doing, that is impressive to you, you know?” So they try to kind of make it even seem personal and we know it’s not. 

So one, if you go personalized, you’re now in the top 1%? Because you’ve basically separated yourself. Yes, it’s going to take longer but you’re going to book more meetings. So what’s the value of sending out a bunch of scripted spam mail and inmail, if you’re not booking any meetings, right, so you could do less and make it more personalized and book more meetings but two if you add video on top of that, well, now you’re in the top .000 1% because almost no one’s doing that. 

And when people to your point, get a video, well, now they get a sense of who you are, your personality, you can flash a smile, you can emotionally connect with them, you can reference something specific that you saw on a piece of content they put out or in their profile, or you can make a connection point. I mean, there’s so many different ways you can take it, that a video is going to give you that versus you know, a scripted text message just is never going to give you that.

Bob Woods  09:24

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. So with that, hopefully, we’ve started chipping away a little bit in the minds of the salespeople who are listening. You know, they may be thinking now about… this may be something that I want to consider doing and then they go now what? So, now what? 

Alex Sheridan  09:47

Well, the easy, I mean from again, it’s kind of separating into two different sides, one being like more of the social selling aspect. Send sending video messages to people like let’s say for example, on LinkedIn. You can literally just find a prospect. Here’s what I would advise people to do, salespeople is that you use something like Sales Navigator, or you, which is a search tool within LinkedIn, or use LinkedIn itself. Either way, find prospects and ideally, you can find people that are already in putting out content, you can actually search in Sales Navigator by posted content in the last 30 days and then search by job title and then you can search geographic territory if you want and you can drill down this list of like active potential customers of yours that are posting content, right? 

That’s best case scenario and then you go to their content, you engage, you send a connection request by the time you even send a message, they’ve already got a feel for “Oh, yeah, I recognize Bob, he’s engaged with my content.” And so it’s definitely your face. And so they appreciate your support, because we all want our content to do well, and you’re helping their constant do well. So yeah, and then once you send the video message is as simple as you got that message pulled up, and you go down to the bottom, you click that little paperclip icon, and then you can take a video. And so literally, all you need is your iPhone or smartphone, whatever, Droid, whatever it is, and you can turn it on selfie mode and just position yourself you know, somewhat similar like this, if you’re watching on camera and just you know, somewhat close to your face. And you’ve probably got good visual good audio, and then you deliver a message.

I always recommend make it 60 seconds or less, you don’t want to, you know, two minutes, but like, you don’t want to be ultra long-winded, you know, they’re not expecting the message. So keep it short, keep it brief, keep it personalized, I always try to get a smile or somebody laughing, you know, something first five to 10,20 seconds, something that you reference that maybe they didn’t know, like, “Oh, they actually pay attention to what I do” and then deliver your message, you know, and so that’s a really good way to start. You know, and then if we’re talking about posting video content, it’s not crazy different, although now you’re going to start talking about things that are value driven versus talking to one person. 

So you know, if you gotta, if your target customer is a CEO, or a business owner, and maybe you do cost reduction services, you may put out a video saying, “Hey, did you know the number one cost that business owners are faced with that they just never like they always overlook is this. And this is one way you can actually reduce this costs, you know, come tax time, or come this or an end of year, whatever it is” and you’re just providing valuable stuff.

You’re educating, you’re edutaning, you’re motivating and then what happens and what happened to me when I first started doing this putting out video content, not right away, of course, but after you start putting out video content consistently, is that buyers actually see your content and go, you know, “That was a great point, why aren’t we doing that?” “Maybe we should start doing that.” And so you create this demand and they have this kind of light bulb moment to say, “You know, Alex said something in his videos that I think we should be really using and I don’t think we’re really using it to its full advantage right now.” What is Alex do? “Oh, he actually offers that as a service, like let’s book a call with Alex.” And so that’s how, and I’m sure the same way, Bob is one of our leads come in, inbound through just putting out quality content that actually helps our potential customers.

Bob Woods  12:48

Absolutely. It’s ultimately about providing real value, and not just, you know, value that you think that they want to hear. This is one point that we always make, it’s what they want to hear, right. So I mean, you really need to be in touch with your current customers, and even prospects who are just like, you know, here’s what we want to hear, here’s what we want to find out. Even if they don’t end up buying from me, you can still use that information to put out really good quality video content that people are going to find a value.

Then if they find like six months down the road, it could still, you know, stuff that you put out a long time ago, as long as you know, the facts are still valid and everything, that stuff can still be used. I think that that’s one thing that a lot of salespeople don’t think about is that this becomes like archive content that can pop up even in Google searches, especially as LinkedIn now starts to move more content on to Google or Google picks up LinkedIn, or however that’s working in the background but you know, as that starts showing up as Google search results, something you did six months ago, or even longer, that could ultimately end up netting you a sale.

Alex Sheridan  13:57

Yeah, and as a salesperson, if you think about, you know, post-meeting, think about after you get out of your meeting, and then you’ve had some or even pre-meeting, you’ve had something that but let’s say it’s post-meeting, and you get out of your meeting and you say “hey, you know, Joy, we talked about this, this and this, you know, I created a video I was telling you about a couple of weeks back that just really identified and walk through step by step, that process that we talked about, take take a look and let me know what you think.” And now you’re providing more value, you’re getting more credibility, building more trust, and it’s just an easier sale, you’re going to convert more sales. 

Bob Woods  14:27

And because it’s video, because they’re looking at you, in my mind, there’s implicit trust right there as opposed to just sending in a text or attaching a PDF or anything like that. 

Alex Sheridan  14:38

Exactly. It’s the same way. If you know, I always tell people I’m like, Look, if they’re not convinced by video, I’m like, imagine you get to send 100 emails to somebody that you don’t know. And you have to build trust and credibility and likability with them, and then other person gets to send 100 videos. Imagine the difference and like you’re gonna feel like you literally know the person with 100 videos versus 100 email where like they could be catfishing. I don’t even know what this person’s real, right? So the video Yeah, it’s more memorable, it builds more trust, more credibility, you get to showcase your personality, you get to flash a smile, you get to really connect on a deeper level with a human being that you just can’t do with text only.

Bob Woods  15:15

Yeah, and in fact, it’s funny, because that actually brings to mind what we went through in setting this up. We normally do like a quick 15 minute, “hey, how you doing type of thing” And I propose the same thing and Alex was like we know each other already. Let’s go ahead and do it we’ve been looking at each other’s content and I’m just like, “Yeah, that’s a really good point, let’s just do it.” It’s exactly the same thing.

Alex Sheridan  15:43

That’s a perfect example of just like, you know, I know you, you know, me, we’ve seen each other, I don’t think there’s gonna be major surprises but you know, if we had not seen each other on video, and it was just emails, or just, you know, a couple of articles that we had written, we would need to do a call, you know, we don’t really know each other that well. 

So yeah, it’s, again, there’s just so many ways that it builds trust and credibility and gets you closer to a connection, a conversation, a sale, a partnership, hiring somebody. I mean, it impacts all areas of business.

Bob Woods  16:12

I couldn’t agree more with that definitely. So let’s get back to the video and the content production side. So you know, doing posts and things like that. Some people are like, “Okay, at this point, you got me convinced, I want to do video, but I don’t have all of these hours to produce videos and things like that” and I don’t know about you, Alex but I generally advise people start out slowly and this isn’t has to do with like any content sharing, but especially video, and then ramp up to a comfortable level but the point is, and you brought this up already, is being consistent about when you do it and it sounds like we’re of like minds there but I just want to make sure.

Alex Sheridan  16:55

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I always say post as much as you can, while being able to be consistent, you know, so a lot of people make the mistake, especially on TikTok and LinkedIn where they’re like, “I’m gonna start posting multiple times a day,” and then they get like day nine, and then they quit. So like, Man, I’m just burnt out, it’s too hard to do, I have a job to do and I’m parents. And so like, you got to think about yeah, I’d rather have you start you know, if you’re gonna start posting content, you’re brand new, two to three times a week is a great start, given that you did zero last week, you know, so it’s all about progress over perfection. 

So if you can find, you know, two to three posts that week, and then you can ramp up to four or five, and then you can ramp up to more if you want to. And you know, on LinkedIn, it can be a combination of text, picture, and video. On TikTok. It’s obviously going to be more video and so you gotta keep that in mind as well but yeah, definitely. I mean, I’m happy if someone’s going from zero postings to two or three or four a week. That’s progress in my mind.

Bob Woods  17:44

Yeah! And you did bring up a good point there, because I don’t know about you but I find myself nowadays thinking more and more about TikTok actually than LinkedIn just in terms of posting content, you can’t really do the text in, you can’t do the text. I mean, when you think about it on TikTok, but with LinkedIn, you could really get that good mix going because you want to keep showing up but you don’t have to show up in a video every single time. 

I mean, you could do one video a week, and then maybe up it to two, but then you’re putting out other content so that people are still aware of you and they’re still seeing your name, and then hopefully you’re doing the other things that we teach when it comes to social selling in terms of getting in their inbox and commenting and commenting and all that other stuff because it is about ultimately consistency, though.

Alex Sheridan  18:34

Yep, exactly. I mean, the easiest barrier of entry with content is probably text, right? So now obviously, TikTok you really can’t do you can’t type something out and have that be a post, you can use text in your videos, but you gotta be creative if you’re going to do that but, you know, with LinkedIn, you could start today and just say, I’m not gonna make a video today, maybe I’ll make a video tomorrow but I’m going to write out a text post, you just got to make sure the first line, choose something kind of punchy and attention-grabbing, and then you got to deliver value, you got to help your customer, you know, through their buying journey, experience. Educate them, entertain them, motivate them but yeah, it’s very simple to start with text. 

And then, you know, the thing with video that obviously will come into play is that when people start to see your face, well, that’s a “Brand Builder.” I mean, that’s the true trusted credibility builder. Texts, not that you can accomplish that with text but as we talked about earlier, it’s just much easier to do with video. But you know, if you’re, if you’re going to start if today’s Monday and you say I want to get a couple of posts out for the first time, and you’re doing a couple of text posts, that’s cool. That’s cool. I would definitely encourage you to, you know, start mixing in some videos whenever you can but if you’re gonna start with a few text posts, that’s great.

Bob Woods  19:35

Yeah, but then, you know, it’s almost like you’re amping it up to the next level when you add video because there’s that true personal presence where no matter how personality driven your text is video just always takes it to the next level. 

Alex Sheridan 19:53

Yeah. It’s still a text at the end of the day.

Bob Woods  19:58

Exactly, exactly! So now people are probably thinking, “Oh, yeah. Oh, that sounds good. I think I’m going to do it.” And then they’re going, “Oh my god, what about, you know, what do I actually record? And I knew I needed some opportunity…” What do you suggest for the beginner in terms of especially when it comes to publishing content as opposed to just messaging, which that’s really easy to do. People might see that as like a bit more of a leap to go from that one-to-one video texting to actually doing content. What would you suggest in terms of, you know, “tech.”

Alex Sheridan  20:35

The only tech you need to make video content in 2022 is just your smartphone. So you know, if you want to like I record all my videos on my smartphone, and people are sometimes surprised by that, but I’m like, you know, will I up it eventually to something else? Maybe, probably right. And so all you really need is your phone. 

Now, if you want to go maybe a level up or if you want to upgrade, yeah, you could get a camera, you could get a webcam, you definitely could get a you know, a microphone, a Yeti mic would be something very affordable, that’s plugged into your USB port that would significantly level up your audio. You know, there’s definitely things that you can do but I think if you’re just starting off, I wouldn’t overcomplicate the tech issue. 

Unless maybe you’re building some, you’re building a large, like if I were working with companies a lot of times and we’re building on a larger content strategy, they’ve got budget, we’re going to invest in some mics do the podcast thing, whatever it is, and that would make sense too but if you’re a salesperson right now starting off, and you’re saying “I just want to get started,” then I think I would just not overcomplicate it, you can do text posts on your phone, and you can film TikToks on your phone, film videos from LinkedIn on your phone and that’s all you really need.

Bob Woods  21:37

Absolutely! So getting back to video and content, there are ways that I know that we use and I see you do it all the time as well, to use video, the stuff that you’re shooting as a content machine, and actually divvying up and doing some repurposing and doing all types of things so that you’re not just knocking yourself out at video, and also trying to do all these other things. Video can actually be like the beginning point of all different other types of contexts. So how do you guys handle that exactly?

Alex Sheridan  22:14

Yeah. So I mean, one of the things that I struggled with in the beginning, when I first started creating content that most people struggle with, and it holds a lot of people back is it’s hard to be consistent over a period of time, especially when you’ve got a job and you’ve got responsibilities, right. So, you know, in the beginning, you’ve got to start off and kind of create the content and get a feel for it but ideally, over time, if you’re going to be serious about it, you’d want to start building in processes and systems that allow you to kind of scale your content and your personal brand without taking a lot more time, right. 

So a couple of quick examples would be creating a content calendar or a content idea bank, where you list out all your ideas, and you plug in, you know, you plug in your content for Monday, Wednesday, Friday, or whatever you’re gonna post and then you’ve got this week covered, and then you’re looking at next week, and so you’re just organized, right. You’re not trying to come up with ideas last minute and create content last minute, if you take it a couple steps further, what we do is we’ve got a live event and a podcast that we run every week. 

And then we batch record or we will record the live event and then we take the footage from a live event and that becomes 10 to 13 clips sometimes that we’re able to then post. So every week we’re collecting 10 to 13 new videos, and then the audio from the live event becomes the podcast and then we kind of break down and transcribe that becomes a newsletter. And then we get you know, 10 to 13 videos to post on LinkedIn and TikTok. So that’s one piece and that’s just me showing up for 45 minutes, once a week, and then a little behind-the-scenes work, and then we have editors that do the editing.

The second thing you can do, if you don’t want to go through that process, is just batch record your content. So that’s going to save you a lot of time and create a lot of less anxiety and stress about creating content, especially video content is that you just sit down for once a week for half an hour, 45 minutes, an hour, whatever it is, and you record 5-10, 15-20 whatever it is that you can record for videos. And ideally you’re keeping track of ideas throughout the week, as you talk to prospects, clients are getting these ideas “Ohh, they’re asking about this.” “They’re challenged by this,” “This is a good question. I should answer that in my content.” That’s what the idea should come from and then you put your own unique perspective on there and you share them. 

But you know, having some type of system in place where you can either batch record or repurpose content or have a calendar, something like that is going to help you keep on track because if you are trying to create content, you know, if it’s Monday, and you’re trying to like “I don’t know what I’m going to post tomorrow.” I mean, yeah, you could do it but eventually it’s going to be harder to create content, and you’re probably going to either burnout or not be as consistent and it’s not going to be fun and so you want to make sure you try to keep it fun and you can stay consistent and a process and a system helps you do that.

Bob Woods  24:42

And then one of the things that we do here is we actually take that like a little step farther and that we’ll grab quotes from what we say in our content. And then we may put out a graphic with that quote or maybe even use that as the basis for a text posts as well. So those are just like a couple of other different ways that people can, I mean, video can really be a springboard to all other types of content and because it all started with one action, and that’s making the video. It’s not, as I said, it’s not nearly as stressful as it might appear to be if you think about it and doing it in the right way.

Alex Sheridan  25:23

Yeah, exactly. I would say it’s easier to go from video to text or graphics than it is to go text or graphics to video because once you’ve got the video, you’ve got the video for clips, you’ve got the audio if you want to do something with that. And then you can just simply transcribe and turn into graphics, quotes, text posts, blogs, because you’ve already got what’s been said. So it’s like a really easy conversion versus if you only did text posts the last six months, and now you’re trying to go to video, you can do it but it’s a more of a challenging conversion.

Bob Woods  25:51

Much more difficult to do, it’s much more difficult to do. So before we wrap up. We’ve mainly been talking about LinkedIn and also TikTok as well, just because we’re both on it. But there’s so many different social platforms out there that want people to use video in their posts and content sharing because that’s how they grow too I mean, let’s make no doubt about it. These companies are there to grow and make money. 

So you know, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and now LinkedIn, LinkedIn is kind of late but now that they’re here, they’re doing really well with it. I don’t know about you but for me, it’s difficult to peg down to just one and say, “You need to be in this one and that’s it.“ But for salespeople, and I would say especially B2B sales pros, like the ones who mainly listen to this, what do you think are probably the most effective ones to have a significant present upon?

Alex Sheridan  26:42

For a B2B sales folks, It’s definitely LinkedIn. I mean, for me, it’s hands down LinkedIn because of the social selling applications, have you been able to go into Sales Navigator and search for prospects, like your Dm-ing capabilities, your commenting capabilities, you’re able to start conversations in a much more deeper level than you can on TikTok, where you can’t even comment a few you know, you get to certain characters and it cuts you off. It’s like it’s almost not a conversation, right? 

So yeah, definitely, LinkedIn should be top priority and there’s still good organic reach there. So you’ve got an opportunity to grow pretty quickly  but I would say, you know, kind of creeping up on that, is TikTok for sure because more and more people are getting on there. You’ve just noticed, I know, you’ve noticed, Bob, the platform is changing. It’s evolving. They’re a lot more educational than it was six months ago, a year ago, definitely two years ago. It’s really changed and it’s evolved and you know, I’m sure you win clients or I win clients or like, it’s, you know, B2B folks, and business owners, CEOs, they’re there, you know, maybe they don’t have.

The unique thing about LinkedIn versus TikTok and like even on Instagram is that TikTok is one of those platforms where you get a lot of lurkers that don’t really set up their profile. They just kind of have an account. It’s kind of bare they’re not really making videos, but they’re consuming the heck out of videos. And so LinkedIn, and Instagram, people feel like I gotta have a profile, I gotta have something on my page, I kind of take pride in having like a decent profile, TikTok’s, a little bit different, where people are just kind of consuming but yeah, it’s definitely becoming more of a B2B tool, for sure and so I would take both very seriously. 

That’s why I try to when we repurpose content, we’re going vertical now because you know, 60 something percent of people are on LinkedIn or using their mobile app anyways, to take that content and get it to TikTok you’re kind of knocking two birds out with one stone but yeah, that would be my one-two punch LinkedIn. 

Bob Woods  28:28

Yeah, same here and that’s exactly where we’re definitely scaling up our presence on TikTok as well without having to do any dancing. So that’s…

Alex Sheridan  28:38

That’s what I tell people. Like, I don’t do any dances, I don’t do any trends. I don’t do any work in the audio with the lip stuff. You know, I think a lot of people get over there and they start conforming to what they think they should be on the platform and the same with LinkedIn. “Oh, it’s very professional. I need to, you know, wear a suit and tie and I need to post articles about this, this and this.” No, you don’t, right. Like stay true to your message and what you stand for and who you’re trying to attract but when you go to LinkedIn, absolutely express your personality, your unique perspective, and you can do creative things. 

When you go to TikTok, absolutely, you can post and should post your educational content, you know, your content that you want to attract clients for and that kind of stuff. And so people get that mix. I see people go to take that all the time. And they start doing, you know, 10,20 trends in a row. And I’m like, that’s not gonna win your business. Like, that’s not the content that, you know, I mean, it could be I’m not saying you never use trends or sounds, there’s a place for them but don’t think that you got to use all the time and that’s all you can do because it’s TikTok because that’s just not true.

Bob Woods  29:34

Yeah. Yeah. So you had mentioned edutainment a couple of times. And I just want to get your real quick definition of that. I mean, especially because people might be thinking “okay, now how do I put a kind of an entertainment spin but obviously not, you know, not going to the pole and we’re doing dances and everything else that we just mentioned” but at the same time, you know, making things a little more entertaining than what they might expect to see on LinkedIn, although that’s even changing on LinkedIn now, too, but still, you know, what’s, you know, what’s kind of your definition of that? And what’s like, you know, realizing that there’s so many industries and stuff like that out there. What’s a possible spin on that?

Alex Sheridan  30:17

Yeah, I mean, edutainment is just fusing educational content with an entertainment twist. So it’s just taking a you’ve got to, you know, you should start with a good message, you should have a good message in there. You know, that’s the difference between entertainment, which can be used and B2B content too but between that and edutainment, where you’re actually teaching or motivating, or changing perspective of someone as you’re entertaining them. 

So I’ve done a ton of different things, whether it’s skits or raps, or you know, whatever it is, but you know, a basic version of this as you do like a, let’s take your, your potential customer, if it’s a CEO, and you’re having him the CEO, have a conversation, and it’s you and you’re kind of doing the split personality thing, you know, where you wear a hat in the executive or you put on glasses, you’re the executive, and then you’ve got a suit jacket, and you’re the CEO, let’s say for example, and you’re just having a little bit of a conversation back and forth, that kind of points out some of the silly things that, you know, maybe it’s happening in the industry, or like, it points out some of the things that they could be doing better to drive better results. 

And so it’s kind of like funny and kind of makes you smile, but it also was like, “That’s a good point. You know, I think we’re kind of doing that, we should really think about doing something different.” So, you know, there’s a lot of different layers to edutainment, you know, that you could go like, full on script and characters and do a lot of different stuff. And there’s just very simple things like adding in some, you know, like an example would be a day in the life where you’re kind of making it entertaining, and you’re showing people this is how I do what I do. And you do a couple of seconds of you walking out the door next a couple of seconds, you’re doing this the next couple of seconds, you’re doing that. So you’re kind of highlighting something, and it’s just kind of fun to watch. You know, I would say, you know, it’s fun to watch, but you’re also learning something at the same time.

Bob Woods  31:49

Yes, I mean, so definitely the “edu” in edutainment should, in my mind there’s a reason why “edu” is first and that’s because you really do need to educate at the same time. In fact, I’m thinking about doing something, and it’s just starting in my mind, and I have no idea how this is gonna go but I want to do like “Law and Order Social Selling Unit.” (Alex: Oh, that’d be good) You know how, like in the beginning where they always come up on, like a victim or something like that as like, every single episode. I mean, I’m still sucking that out a little bit but I mean, well, yeah, yes. Something like that.

Alex Sheridan  32:30

You know, it’s a great example. Like a long time ago, I don’t even know when it was maybe a couple of years ago, I did the “LinkedIn detective.” And I think I did, I think I did one maybe a year ago was like another version of that but it was a while ago. And so that was a good example. I was like a LinkedIn detective, and I’d come up on another detective and I’d be like, “Detective, what have we got?” And he’d be like, “Oh, we got a guy who posted a video, you know, it completely flopped…” Then he got that, you know, I think I did a couple on TikTok. It was like a version of that that I did before but that’s a great example of like, you should totally try that, by the way it’ll be awesome. 

But you know, that’s an example of like, you’re just having fun with it but it’s also teaching people you know, I can say something like, “Guys crying because this video didn’t perform.” And I’m like, “Well, how many videos did he post?” he’s like, “just one.” I’m like, “He posted just one video and he’s sad that it didn’t perform like you need to post 100 videos.” You know, so you’re just kind of like poking fun at some of the things that maybe your customer would do, or like they’re trying but it’s not working and you’re kind of providing a solution in a way but it’s just, it’s just a very entertaining thing to watch.

Bob Woods  33:27

And that’s just one example. I mean, there’s so many ways that can be done, you know, entertain not, I don’t want to say not too much so entertaining, but really keeping the key on education and just having a laugh about it the same. So finally, we all love those, you know, here’s one thing you can do right now, takeaways, types of things. 

So what I’m wondering is, what’s the one thing our listeners can do today to get themselves on a path to start creating videos? What can they do, not literally right now, but you know, right now?

Alex Sheridan  34:01

Well, I mean, you know, for me, it’s you gotta if you’re new at something, especially video creation, but with anything, you’re not going to be amazing at it right away. You know, it’s not like you’re, whether you’re playing tennis or golf, or you’re doing acting or whatever it is, like you’re not going to be phenomenal at something when you’ve never done it before more than likely. 

So for me a good action item is like just commit to maybe if you’re going to do the video DMS on LinkedIn, you’re going to send some and honestly couldn’t be something as simple as like I talked to a prospect three or four weeks ago, they didn’t get back to me. I’m already connected with them on LinkedIn anyways, let me just send a video DM and mention something that we had talked about in the conversation that I can sprinkle a little bit of value on and that just starts the conversation back up you know sometimes it’s literally as simple as that. 

“John we talked, Sally we talked you know three or four weeks ago I just thought of you because remember when we’re talking about this, this and this , so I just did a video. I said this or I saw this, this and this made me think about you guys…” know that added our question for you. You know, anything little like that. 

You just need to get into practice and the habit of making videos. So maybe you just commit and say, I’m going to send 10 of those videos this week or I’m gonna send 20 of those DMS with either old prospects that I lost touch with, or people in my pipeline, or people I’m close to closing or the dream customers, whatever it is commit to send in 10,20 videos this week, you know, and I think that’s a great place to start

Bob Woods  35:16

And here’s a key secret behind all this, once you start and if you’re consistent, it gets easier.

Alex Sheridan  35:24

Yes, absolutely. You get more confident on camera and you build skills and you’re able to convey your message a lot more clearly because you’re constantly doing it on video, you’re almost forcing yourself to refine your value prop and opening line and getting attention and all that stuff builds. So you know, just don’t don’t focus on like so many crazy results right off the bat, just say I’m gonna send 20 videos a week starting now. And let’s just see what happens. Let me send 20 videos a week to people in my pipeline, dream clients I want to get a hold of, people I have lost touch with.

Just do that a couple of weeks and then maybe you say, you know, gather some questions and challenges that are constantly coming up as common challenges. And then maybe you make a video for the feed and you address “Hey, you know, if you’re a business owner, and you’re wondering how to do X, Y, and Z, let me tell you what most people don’t realize it’s actually going to work for you.” You know, like I got a video coming out this week where I’m like, you’re not feeling creative, you don’t know what to post next, here’s what you do. And then I’ll give you and I’ll provide the value right? So then you can start adding videos and your content.

Bob Woods  36:24

Absolutely, and that is a great that’s a great way to end with Alex Sheridan founder and CEO of Impaxs Marketing look for him, as he’s got big presences on LinkedIn, TikTok and other social platforms as well as host of the Brand in Demand podcast. We definitely appreciate your time. We know you’re you’re busy guy doing videos. So definitely, definitely like it. Again, Alex’s company’s website is impaxs.com. I-M-P-A-X-S.com. There you can find out about the company and its main services, video content, demand creation strategy and advising, creative video editing services and one that we didn’t even get into today’s social media management. 

So Alex, fantastic! Really appreciate you coming on today, sir. 

Alex Sheridan  37:11

Thanks, Bob. I appreciate you having me. 

Bob Woods  37:12

Sure! And remember when you’re out and about this week, be sure to make your sales social, and with video. Bye-bye, everybody. 

Outro  37:21

Thanks for watching and join us again for more special guest instructors bringing you marketing, sales training, and social selling strategies that will set you apart. Hit the Subscribe button below to get the latest episodes from the Making Sales Social podcast. Give this video a thumbs up and comment down below on what you want to hear from us next. You can also listen to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play. Visit our website socialsaleslink.com for more information.