61. Real human connections (not ChatGPT ones) and why they're so important for ADHD entrepreneurs!

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In this episode, you'll learn what my high school janitor can

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teach you about attracting your ideal client.

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Hi, I'm Katie McManus, business strategist and money mindset

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coach. And welcome to the Weeniecast,

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I have the most

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traumatizing recurring nightmare. In this nightmare, I get a phone

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call from my old guidance counselor from my high school, Mr.

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Bennett. And Bennett says, hey, Kathryn, so great to talk to

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you. I'm sorry, but I have some bad news. And I'm like, what,

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Mr. Bennett? Like, what happened? I'm thinking, like, someone died or

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the school burned down, whatever. And he know. We've

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actually been auditing our past records, and it looks

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like the courses you did in your senior year of high school

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actually weren't enough for you to graduate. And unfortunately, we have

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to take your high school diploma back. And if you'd like to keep

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it, you'll just have to redo your senior year of high school, and you'll

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have to come back and enroll. And in my dream, I'm very aware that I'm

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in my 30s. There are a few ways this dream goes from there. Sometimes I

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go back to school. Sometimes I say, fuck it, I'm just not going to have

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a diploma. There's a lot of different ways that Dreamcatie handles

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this nightmare. And the only reason I bring this up

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is because I'm talking about this incredible thing that happened

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at my high school graduation that helps me prove a point

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about what you should be using to create content that will

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attract your ideal clients. Before we get to that,

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I want to share. At my high school, the senior class would always

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vote on who their main speaker would be at

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graduation. This was usually a local

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politician, a celebrated business owner, maybe one of the

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favorite teachers, maybe an administrator

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know had been influential in some big project during their

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time at school. My class, however, chose our

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school janitor. I believe his name was Dave. And I'm so

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embarrassed. I'm really bad with names from that far back. The reason

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my class chose the school janitor to

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speak at our graduation was because he was the

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adult in that building who made

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the most people in our class feel seen and

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understood and taken care of. He was there in the

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hallways when someone got kicked out of class for misbehaving,

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and they were just having a really bad day and they needed to talk to

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someone. I seem to remember him putting his mop up against the

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wall and just kind of walking with them down the hallway for a bit and

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just being an ear. After school, if kids

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were sitting around and kind of avoiding going home,

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he'd be the first person to ask, like, hey, what's going on? If you made

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an excuse to go to the bathroom in the middle of class because you needed

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to go cry, he was usually in the hallway. He was usually

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just a very kind person to speak to. He offered genuine

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connection, and it wasn't that

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structured connection that you got. If you went to the guidance counselor's

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office and set up an appointment and then had a meeting with

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Mr. Bennett and all the things, and they put the notes in your

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file that you were having a hard time with this, that and the other thing.

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He was just an adult who cared. He gave a. When he

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got up to speak, he was incredibly touched that he was

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being recognized in this way. And

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I don't think he realized until that moment what a

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difference he made in so many teenagers lives.

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Simply by being there, simply by listening, simply by

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giving a fucking caring. It's really something special

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to be able to do that for kids that have

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adults around them that might not be listening. And I'm sure as I'm

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describing this person, you're listening, thinking about

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this person that was there for you when you were younger, that

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adult who was just kind of always there in the periphery, who, if you needed

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to talk to them or if you were crying, they would ask you, what's going

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on? You okay? We remember these people.

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These people have a very special place in our hearts,

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even if we can't remember their names 20 years later. I say

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all this to prove a point, that chat GPT is

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shit.

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As you're growing your business, I know a major part

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of promoting your work and marketing yourself and being on social media

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is coming up with a crap ton of content.

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And it's so easy now that we have this incredible

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robot brain to turn to, to go

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and give them a couple prompts and get some language

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back and say, amazing. This is content that I'm going

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to share on social media that's going to convince people that they need to hire

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me. Guess what? Chat GPT can't build

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connections. Chat GPT can't make people feel

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seen or heard. Chat GPT can't make

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people laugh in a genuine way. It can't

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represent your personality, the way you

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show your personality. It's great for coming up with content

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ideas, but I don't want you becoming

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reliant on using chat GPT content to

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promote your business, because guess what? It

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won't work as well in my

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programs. Whether you work with me in my group program or one on

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one. The type of marketing that I teach is called empathetic

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marketing. And this style of marketing does a couple different

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things. It really communicates that you understand

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the troubles, the stresses, the fears that your ideal

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clients have. You exhibit that you deeply understand where they want to

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go from here. What does winning look like to them? And

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a lot of that is listening to them. And a lot of that

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is also sharing your personal stories, showing

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that you've been in their shoes, you've struggled with

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similar things, and you've overcome

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similar things. And by the way, if

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they're ready to overcome them, you're happy to be there to help them. In

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the content creation universe, there is this myth of giving

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value. All the social media gurus are out there saying, give

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value, give helpful tips, give listicles of things that people

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should do to move from X to Z, and blah,

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blah, blah, blah, blah. Yes, you can absolutely give

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tips. You can exhibit how smart you are. You

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can teach. But I want to remind you, my senior

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class did not nominate a single teacher to speak. They

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nominated the person who is listening, who built those connections with

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them. Your ideal clients out there who are paying attention to

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your content are waiting for you to build that

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connection. They have enough people who are throwing information at them, who

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are trying to teach them shit that's like, in that moment, they're not ready to

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accept. And to prove this point,

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I'm going to tell you. Oh, what am I going to say next? Well, you'll

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have to keep listening to find out. But first, squirrel, squirrel, squirrel,

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squirrel.

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And to prove this point, I'm going to tell you the story of the two

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old men in the park. I've told this story previously, but it really shows

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you what works in marketing. Every single day,

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there is a young mom, and she has a three year old daughter. And they

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go to the park, and this little girl is obsessed with the

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fishes in the pond. She insists

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that every single day, rain or shine, they have to take some pieces of

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bread to go and feed the fish. And she checks on them, and she kind

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of names them, and she gets really excited when they come up

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to the surface and they bite the bread and all the things. And she really

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takes her time to spend time with her fish, right? And the mom,

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of course, any excuse to get out of the house and give her child

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an activity that she doesn't have to really be the entertainer for

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is a nice little break. And so every single day, around the

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same time, they go to the pond, the daughter feeds the fish, and the mom

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just kind of hangs back, watches, and occasionally she'll

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notice that around the same time every day, there are two old men that sit

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on either side of this little pond. One day, after they've been doing

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this for a long time, she realizes, like, this is so silly. I should just

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go and introduce myself. So she goes up to the first old man

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and tells him her name and says, hi, I see you here a lot.

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Thought it was just time that I introduced myself. And he says, oh, it's so

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nice of you to do that. Yes, my name is so and so. Please have

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a seat on the bench. How's your day going? She says, oh, it's going really

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well. And he starts talking, and he starts saying,

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I saw your daughter having a temper tantrum last week. And here's what I would

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have done differently. Here's, like, the three step process that I would have taken to

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handle a child having a temper tantrum. And also,

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do you ever have a squeaky wheel on your office chair?

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Here's how you fix it. Also, if your door hinge is

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ever out of alignment, here's what you do with a hammer to

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just tap it back into place. And if you ever have

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a leaky faucet in your house, here's how you'd fix it from a plumbing perspective.

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But if you don't have those tools and you're a little nervous about

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doing plumbing work and you're waiting for an actual plumber, what you can do is

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you can tie a string around the tip of the faucet, and instead

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of the water doing the drip, drip, drip, that drives you crazy, the water will

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just fall down that string to the bottom of the sink. And he goes on,

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and he's sharing fairly helpful tips with her throughout the time

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that they're sitting on this bench together. And then, of course, it's time to go.

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The bread is done, and the little girl has lost interest in the fish for

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the day. And the woman says, it's been so nice to talk to you.

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I will see you tomorrow. And they say goodbye. The next

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day, the woman comes back to the pond, and instead of

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talking to the first old man, she decides she wants to say hi to the

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second old man, who's also there every day. And so she goes, and again, she

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introduces herself and explains that she sees him there all the time and

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thought it was time that she introduced herself. And he says, oh, my God. It's

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so nice to meet you. My name is so and so. Please come and sit

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down. And he asks her how's your day going? And he

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says, I saw your daughter have that temper tantrum last week,

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and I just want to say you did a great job. I know having kids

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at that age is so tough. I had three of them,

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and the oldest one used to do this and it drove me crazy. And

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then the middle one would go off on these tears and,

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oh, my God, I thought my wife was going to burn the house down.

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And our youngEst, oh, our youngest,

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we are so delighted that our youngest has children now. So they get

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their comeuppance, right?

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They have kids, and their kids are around your daughter's age,

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and you know what they call us? They're at their wits end sometimes. And

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being a parent is so hard, isn't it? But it's so gratifying. And then

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he goes on to ask her questions about her life and about what's

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going on for her, and then he shares stories about himself.

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And throughout this time, she feels really

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connected to him. She feels seen, she feels acknowledged.

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She doesn't feel at all shamed for how he's observed her

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parenting her daughter. And then, of course, the

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daughter runs out of bread, loses interest, it's time to

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go. The next day, who is she going back to?

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The first old man or the second old man?

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And this is a rhetorical question, but there is a right answer, and it's the

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second. Second one. Of course, not only that, but

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if she ever has a parenting

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question, if she ever wants feedback from someone who's

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been there, she's not asking the first old man who gave a ton of quote

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unquote value. She's going to the second old man

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who normalized the struggle, who didn't

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give her any suggestions how to do it better, just

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acknowledged that it's hard, and shared that he had a

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lot of experience with it, didn't try to fix her problems,

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and made her feel seen and listened to.

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When we're thinking about value, we oftentimes

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think of, well, what's the lesson that they're going to take away? What is

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the actual curriculum that they're going to walk away with that is

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going to show them how to get from point A to point B?

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But that's not all value is. Value

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is also a feeling. Value is that

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connection that trust you build.

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I would actually argue that the value the first old man

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gave was pretty worthless.

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It was all stuff that if she actually had that problem, she could go onto

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the interwebs, Google, search it and find the

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answer. It was all stuff that I'm sure a

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million first old men have created YouTube videos

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about, but she can't get what she got from the

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second old man from a Google search. And neither can your

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clients. As you're thinking about what kind of

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content to create, I know it's really

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tempting to turn to tools like chat GPT, because

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that's what everyone's telling you to do, and it seems so easy. And

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as ADHD entrepreneurs, we're always looking for different

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ways to hack things and make it easier for ourselves.

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But it's not going to be as effective as actually just connecting with

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your ideal clients and showing that you understand

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where they are. There's this funny thing that happens with new

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business owners in particular, and especially people who have ADHD,

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is that when you start a business, you feel like you have to prove to

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the world that you know what you're talking about, that you're an expert,

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that you are a

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quantifiable authority in your

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industry. It's almost like you feel like you have to make a list

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of all the things that you know and present this list to everyone so that

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they can see that you know, stuff. Because we're so self conscious that people

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are going to think that we're dumb or we're doing it wrong or that we're

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not qualified for the thing. And this can come from a myriad of things.

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This can come from having massive shiny object syndrome, right where

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you're jumping from topic to topic. So you become a very

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spread out generalist. You're not necessarily an expert in

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one particular area. It can also come from people

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just treating you like you're not good enough. And it

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doesn't necessarily even have to be true. It could be rejection, sensitivity,

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dysphoria, where you're just perceiving the tone that they're

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speaking to you in as they're thinking that you're not good enough or you're

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not smart enough or you're not qualified enough. It's that

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self rejection that you do to yourself that makes you feel like you

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have to prove to the world that you are smart and capable.

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The interesting thing about humans is we actually don't go

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around assuming everyone else is stupid. We actually go around

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assuming that everyone else is just as smart as we are until

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proven otherwise. So unless you hang around with

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really, really dumb people who are very aware that they're

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dumb, you do not have to prove anything.

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What you do have to do is you have to build connection with your

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ideal clients. That is the thing that is going to make you the most memorable.

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That is the thing that is going to create a special

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part in their hearts for you because you understood them

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more than anyone else, especially if you're selling a high level

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service that costs a lot of money. I want you to think about the people

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who are out there in the world, who are following your content, who

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are reading it every single day and reading other people's

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content that's giving a ton of value. If they're going to spend

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a ton of money on solving this problem that you

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fix, are they likely to hire the person

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who's offering advice they can find on Google? Or are they

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likely to hire the person who they feel deeply connected

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to, who they trust more than anyone,

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and who they know will not shame

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them for being in this problem?

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Bet you it's the latter.

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This doesn't just go for creating content, it also goes for

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engaging on other people's content.

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I want to urge you not to use chat,

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GPT or other AI

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tools to comment on other people's posts.

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It's obvious I have started deleting comments

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that are obviously written by a robot because I'm not

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online to connect with robots. If I'm having a conversation

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with you in my comment section, I'm having a conversation with you.

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I don't want to have a conversation with a robot. If I did, I'd be

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spending a lot more time on chat GPT and I'd be getting a little weird.

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We both know that. Not that I'm not already weird. I know using

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chat GPT comes from a place of fear and worry,

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that what you have to say is not good enough, that being you is

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not good enough. But I promise you you

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are. I promise you that it doesn't matter how

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you show up. There are going to be people

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who, when you show up as your authentic self, will be drawn

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to you. You can make all the spelling mistakes,

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the grammatical mistakes that you want, and it really doesn't matter.

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And please, for the love of God, do not use chat GBT to comment on

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my posts. Squirrel, squirrel, if you're ready to stop being a weenie and

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actually run a business that makes money, then go ahead and book a

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generate income strategy call with me by going to

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Weeniecast.com strategycall.

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On this call we will talk about your goals, your dreams,

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and your frustrations in getting there. And if it's a fit

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for both of us, then we can talk about different ways to work together.

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Wow,

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it's just like there's so many comments where they're just summarizing my post and

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I'm like, Are you kidding me? Squirrel,

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squirrel, squirrel, squirrel.