How To Be Lucky In Your Career with Mel Barfield | 072

Is being lucky just about being in the right

place at the right time?

Why do some people just seem luckier than others?

And is it possible for you to influence how lucky you are to

maximize your career opportunities?

To help unravel these mysteries, I'm joined by Mel Barfield on this

episode of Architecture Business Club, the weekly podcast for small

firm founders who want to build their dream business in architecture

and enjoy more freedom, flexibility and fulfillment in what they do.

I'm John Clayton, your host.

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And if you have any questions, just email john that's j o n

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Now let's find out how you can be luckier in your career.

Mel Barfield is a copywriter, event speaker, and a qualified careers

advisor who studied the theory behind how we navigate the world of work.

She writes for Freelancer Magazine and is an award winning tone of voice expert.

She is also the co host of the Indie Business Club podcast for independent

creatives and anyone else that's interested in forging their own

career path to listen or subscribe.

Just search for Indie Business Club on your favorite podcast

player or visit IndieBusinessClub.

com.

Mel, welcome to Architecture Business Club.

Thank you so much for having me.

Great to have you here, Mel.

Before we dig into our topic that we're going to be talking about today, we, we

share a love of the Christopher Reeve Superman movies from the 70s and 80s.

Uh, we've talked about this a little bit before.

So I've got to ask this might be like picking a favorite child.

Do you, do you have a favorite Christopher Reeve Superman film?

And don't say Superman 4.

I know you're not going to say

When I'm, you know I'm not going to say that.

Oh, it's hard because I, as a kid I used to absolutely love Superman

3, the one with Richard Pryor.

And, um, the bit most people remember is the very scary robot lady.

Um, I think that's got to be, that's probably my favourite nostalgic watch.

Um, it's slightly less, uh, gritty than the first two because they've

got some comedy characters in there.

Um, but yeah, no, I love, I just, I love them all.

I just think they're, you know, when you're younger, today's generation

won't understand this when they're older, um, but when you had like

a certain number of VHS videos

had VHS.

VHS.

for

We had Betamax.

We were like not as advanced as you.

well, you just, you had the same thing.

So that's why I know I can almost.

Talk along with the first series of The Simpsons, because our cousins had Sky

and we didn't, so they recorded all the episodes for us and we had this tape that

just got worn to, worn to nothing, um, because we just watched it so many times.

So yeah, Superman, the Superman films were, were on, on tape for us,

so, if we were to pit Superman 2's General Zod

against Superman 3's scary robot lady, who do you think would win?

Ooh.

Oh, it would definitely be Zod, because the robot lady, like she's

got electricity and stuff, but he'd just, he'd just laser her.

That'd be fine.

It'd be over, over in an instant.

Yeah, I think I would concur with that one.

Yeah, Superman 3.

but that, that that robot is like, it's seriously nightmarish.

It's the eyeballs, I

Yeah, I

She had these weird silver contact lens things.

Anyway,

that the um, the ratings thing has just changed so much

because some of the 80s, the PG rated 80s movies, like they could give

you nightmares for weeks, they were

so scary.

10 year old is not watching that yet.

She's, She's, gonna have to wait because that would give her nightmares, I

think the other, the other two that did it for me was

the, um, uh, return to Oz where

it starts

The

wheelers.

wheelers.

And, um, Indiana Jones,

Raiders of The Lost

Yeah, yeah.

I knew you were going to say that.

The melting Nazis.

how was that PG?

Yeah.

We're going to talk about how to be luckier in your career.

I was going to ask, though, before we sort of get stuck into all of

that, could you just tell us a little bit about your background

and how you got into copywriting?

Yeah, I will keep this as brief as I possibly can because, uh, I've

told this story many times and anyone who's heard it before will be bored.

Um, I started out doing, um, admin type roles after university and

then became a careers advisor.

Moved areas entirely when I was pregnant with my eldest, who's now ten.

And, um, didn't have that job to go back to, so kind of decided to Just see

how it went being a stay at home mum.

Um, my brain does not like being a stay at home mum because I got quite bored.

Um, no offence to stay at home mums.

And I needed something to be doing.

And ended up doing a couple of qualifications, then ended up seeing this.

This is where the luck thing comes in.

I just kept seeing this advert for an admin type role at my local council.

It just, I would say like some, some stuff winks at me sometimes

and I just keep seeing things and thinking that could work.

Um, so admin type of office work, worked up to being.

Um, the events and community engagement coordinator and took a copywriting course

through work, uh, because I wanted to get better at that side of what I was doing.

And then had to, had to leave.

I couldn't, again, the winking thing, the, the, the job of copywriting was

just so alluring to me because it was, it, I was going to say a horrible term,

I was going to say, it just gave me a brain boner and sorry for that term.

It just made me so.

It was, I was so interested in it that I would, I would sacrifice my Sunday

morning lie in, um, to learn everything I possibly could about copywriting

and become as good as I could about, at doing it, and then left my job.

So I've been freelance since the 1st of January 2022, so

three and a bit years now.

Um, that is very, that was a long story, but that's way shorter than I've ever told

it before, so I've tried to keep it brief.

Oh, very good,

but there's lots of points in that career journey,

for want of a less horrible term, where luck really played a part.

And also me being open to opportunities and seeing things, being quite observant,

seeing an opportunity and thinking, that's not exactly what I want to be

doing, but there's potential in that for me to progress and learn more and

go in a different

Because, I mean, when it comes to luck I mean, some people

will think that luck is just, I'm just in the right place at the right

time, but, I mean, what's your take on how luck works in your career?

I think being in the right place at the right time.

absolutely is a massive part of it and that's where you need to

be putting yourself in places

at the right time.

Um, so there's a book that's really made a big impression on me and it's called

The Luck Factor and the author goes into these different factors that influence

whether you would be classed as lucky or unlucky because it's not just a magic

wand, you know, chance universe thing.

Um, he identified like the main one.

that I think is relevant for people listening is about maximizing

your chance opportunities.

So maximizing the opportunities where those right place, right time

moments will hit will kind of hit.

So there are ways that people can do that in their careers, going

to networking events, networking in real life and online, um, using

LinkedIn to its full capacity.

So connecting with people that are doing the kind of job that you want

to do is as valuable as connecting with people who might employ you or

hire you to, uh, do the job for them.

And being really clear in your messaging, that's another one, so

that you're putting out there what you want and what you're good at.

Um, if you don't do that, then people aren't gonna know what

you want and what you're good at.

It sounds ever so simple, but so many people hold back from sharing

online and that is such a, such a massive, um, um, Massive game changer.

When you start doing that, and you start building your network, um, and

start saying what you want in life.

Could we dig into that a bit more about how to

maximise your opportunities?

Yeah, so for example, if you see somebody on LinkedIn who's

doing something that you want to be doing, then connecting with them and

learning a bit more about how they.

what their journey was can be really useful and seeing the kind of people

who are a few steps ahead of you, use that as inspiration to help the

people that are a few steps behind you.

So you might see, um, your knowledge and skills as being, Oh, I'm just,

I haven't been doing it that long.

So what, what have I got to share that is actually going to be useful to people?

Well, there's people who are, even somebody who's like two weeks

behind you in their experience can learn from what you know.

And I think the first step to like maximizing those chance

opportunities is to start broadening your network as much as you can.

And that doesn't mean like spam adding people on LinkedIn

just for the sake of it.

Um, but start seeing, as I say, who's in your space already, who's doing the

kind of things you like want to do.

And just start, yeah, growing, slowly but surely growing that network.

Um, and then there are three other factors listed in, in the book, and they're,

they're just kind of shorter ones really.

One is listen to your lucky hunches.

So when you have a red flag kind of client, listen to

that, to your gut and go, mmm.

Because we're really, really good at overriding our What is it?

A few hundred thousand years worth of evolution that tells

us that there's danger afoot.

Uh, we're really good at just ignoring that and telling

ourselves, Yeah, I can change them.

The, you know, tricky client that is picky about rates or whatever.

Um, but you really need to listen to those, those lucky hunches

of, um, red and green flags.

When something, you know, I said earlier about something winking at me.

Um, I've always been quite in tune with that.

Um, instinctive, hmm, there's something, I don't know what it is yet, but there's

something intriguing me about this thing.

And if you follow that curiosity, um, it can take, take you great places.

Linked to that one is to expect good things to happen.

So expect good fortune.

Because if you go into a situation thinking, oh.

It's going to be rubbish.

I'm going to mess it up.

It's going to be awful.

Then, um, there's, I can't remember who said it, but there's some famous

saying of whether you think you can or can't, you're, you're right.

I

paraphrase.

Um, so going into situations and expecting good outcomes is, is really helpful.

And then if something bad does happen.

The people who are categorized as lucky, and I'm using air quotes for

the benefit of people not watching.

Um, the people who can see the good, like the silver lining, or learn

from a bad experience, they're more likely to be the lucky ones that end

up having good fortune in the future.

Because if you keep doing the same wrong thing without learning any lessons,

then you're gonna, yeah, you're not going to end up having a lucky life.

Uh, yeah, um, but it started when I was studying careers

advice, uh, careers guidance.

And there was this book called Luck is No Accident that

really kind of stuck with me.

And it was about, in the old days, it used to be that you'd climb the career

ladder and every job would be a promotion or a pro, you know, progression on last.

And book helped me realise that You don't, you don't have to have more

money or more status with each job as you go up and that made, that freed me

a lot to kind of go down a few steps, especially after having my daughter,

um, and starting in a position that was kind of lesser, for want of a better

term, than previous positions I'd had.

because that fitted my life.

Uh, so if you're looking at your life as a whole rather than just focusing

on the career as needing to be the next step's better, the next step's

better, the next step's better.

Um, then it's quite liberating, really.

I guess it's like sort of, if you think of it, sometimes people

talk of like a career ladder, don't they?

This is more like sort of taking, you might be taking a sidestep to

then climb up a different ladder.

So it's sort of like that sort of squiggly

career journey

Going the long way round,

yeah, yeah, yeah.

And that's the thing is that they're not, it's often isn't linear.

I think that, you know, if you.

Leave school and go to college or university and you, train to do

some sort of profession and you stay doing that for your entire life.

I would think that's quite unusual in this day and age that,

and

husband has done that.

I say,

in the set.

Yeah.

oh,

good

Coming on for

20 years in the same company, but he's a rare, a rare beast for having done that.

He's it's, he's so unusual nowadays, um, that people actually stay in the same

and this is a bit of a dinosaur really for having, having a career like that.

Um, but there's the whole, um, I think that COVID probably had a bit a bit to

do with this as well for me personally, but a lot of other business owners

I know because it made you see made a lot of people see a different way

of doing things that didn't revolve around going to a location every day.

And once you're free from.

that location based, um, thought of, of how work, work, work works.

It's a tongue twister.

You can see so many different opportunities.

So we're not, we're not tied to doing one thing, one way.

If I get an idea of a, a new business y thing I want to do, I don't have to jack

in what I'm doing now to pursue that.

I can just start putting feelers out.

If I decide I want to do a different service, I can just do it.

There's no one.

stopping me from just trying and experimenting.

And that wasn't really something that people did that much of pre COVID.

I think there are obviously people who've been portfolio career

workers for their, yeah, the last 20 years, but they were quite rare.

Whereas now there's been a massive shift to people being entrepreneurial

and having a mixture of businesses.

I think It's

Yeah.

I.

good to be diverse in your income as well.

Oh, absolutely.

Yeah, I agree with that.

Mel, you've mentioned before when we've talked about how putting

yourself out there can lead to all sorts of incredible career twists

and turns, unexpected opportunities.

Could you share a story where that's happened to you?

I can, um.

That's how I got here, um, to being, being on podcasts and stuff.

Uh, when I was back on Twitter, uh, Ben McKinney, who hosts the Indie

Business Club podcast with me, Uh, he put out a call for writers, because

he needed some freelance writers.

And I answered that, um, I think it was a Google Brief form or something.

And then started working with him a bit, got to know him really well,

also worked a bit with Dave Harland.

Um, they then, um, this is more their story really, they, um, got to know

each other because Dave had these leads coming in that, uh, he couldn't, he

couldn't possibly, work with everyone who inquired to work with him because

he's, um, just, we just have so many.

So I think it, I think he said before that it was about one in 20

that he actually worked with and then the rest he'd just hand out

Wow,

um, people that he knew.

And I

think Ben suggested to him that they have a bit of a referral scheme where if.

Dave passed a lead to, to Ben and it, it worked out, then there'd be a

bit of a referral fee type situation.

And then they ended up, um, turning that into their agency, Copy or Die.

Meanwhile, I've been working with both of them, and getting to know both of them.

And then, just a few weeks ago, they brought me on as, um, on

a retainer with Copy or Die.

So I've joined, joined the team.

Just through, if you, if you kind of go back in, back in time, Those, all

three, of us got to know each other through Twitter, which is just, it blows

my mind a little bit because it's just so silly that this, um, social media

platform can end up being a way That a business starts and then grows as well.

It's just, it blows my mind a little bit because it seems really, it seems

really trivial and silly when you start posting online, but the places it can

take you is quite ridiculous, really.

Same thing goes for, um, how I ended up writing for Freelancer magazine.

That was just getting to know Sophie Cross, the editor.

On Twitter, just posting silly little brain farts, kind of connected with

other people and, um, and then the friendships that can come from that.

I used to be a bit scathing about online friendships.

I used to think it was a bit, bit silly and sad and not real.

And now I'm a full convert to the, uh, the fact that you can make amazing

connections with people through just typing on a keyboard or into your phone.

Isn't it silly, John, when you think about it?

know it's, um, it's pretty crazy and I think what I've experienced

that's been lovely is when I've met somebody online through, maybe we've

both been part of the same online community or we've been like You I

don't know, connected on LinkedIn or something like that, but then to later

then get the opportunity to meet them in person at an event or a conference.

And what I find really lovely is that when you meet them in person and it's like,

Oh, you're exactly like you are online,

um,

yeah.

is if they go, you're exactly how I expected

because that shows that I'm being authentic in my posts and stuff.

And I think that's a, it's such an important thing to remember when you are

going to post online and you feel the urge to like censor yourself a bit or

sanitize it by editing it into oblivion.

Just try and be as true to how you are in real life as you can.

And then people don't, people get to know the real you and they.

It's reassuring when they actually meet you in real life rather than jarring.

If you're completely different in real life to how you were on online then it's

like, hmm, which one's the real you then?

And I think as well that like your content, if you're

posting online and if it's not like, um, I don't really like you, that

word, but you know, that authentic,

the authentic

Nobody likes the word.

Nobody likes it.

Yeah, um,

We need a new

yeah, but it can end up, the content can end up being a

bit vanilla, a bit forgettable, or as you say, if you then meet them

in person, it can be quite jarring.

If it's like, oh, well, this isn't quite the person who I expected.

They seem a bit different to their LinkedIn posts.

Um, but yeah, I've also found that as well, that often with sort of social media

posts that The ones that have required the least amount of thought, when I've just,

just thought, Oh, I've just got this idea or this random thought I want to share, or

like the quick selfie when I'm out for the day somewhere, those tend to be the ones

that sort of connect with people the most.

Whereas like there's been other times when I spent ages, like, you

know, Writing a post or something and then putting it out there and

it, and it can just be like crickets.

You know?

Like it doesn't really engage people in the same way.

I mean, that might have been a rubbish post to be fair.

But there's a lot, there's a lot to be said for, I was,

let's call it going brain to fingers.

Just get it, get your thoughts out there.

Don't over edit yourself and You'll connect with people a lot quicker.

I think

So, um, Mel, do you have any other examples of people or business

owners or connections who've benefited from being more visible or from putting

themselves out there a bit more?

I do.

And you know her because she's been on your podcast.

I'd like to shout out Ange Lyons because a few years ago, was it a few years ago?

At least a year ago.

Um, I, I think I was speaking at Digital Women and I said to

Ange, Oh, don't you fancy it one day being up there giving a talk?

And she was like, absolutely not.

No way.

Um, and I think at the time she, she did already have her newsletter back then,

but I've seen her kind of evolve into this, it's like a little butterfly from

a chrysalis, um, somebody who's become so confident launching her own podcast,

being on panels, being a public speaker.

And it is just.

So cool to see her putting herself out there more.

Uh, that sounds a bit patronizing.

I hope it doesn't sound patronizing, Angie.

I'm so proud of you.

But, um, I just, I've, and I've seen that several times over with different

people where they start off thinking like absolutely no, I don't want

to put myself out there too much.

It makes me go, and then they start doing it a bit.

And then gradually you can see that confidence building to the point.

I mean, she's absolutely smashing it.

She was recording a, an in person, um, interview.

Video podcast the other week.

I was like, Yes, go on Ange.

Um, and doing events and, and building her podcast creatives like us.

Um, and really, and I think what the reason though, that I can see that in

Ange, I think I might be wrong, but I think what's made her become more

motivated to put herself out there.

She's got this purpose because of the podcast being about

spotlighting creatives of colour

and highlighting stories and she's, that's something she's really passionate

about and cares about and I think if you can find something that you've really

care about and are passionate about.

That can be the motivator to Then it's not about you putting yourself

out there, it's about you putting the message out there via you.

So

you kind of, well it's not about me, it's about this cause that I'm, or

this thing that I'm really passionate about that I want to get across.

Um, and it might be for other people that the thing they want to get

across is their intense passion for this element of their work or the

creative process or whatever it is.

Um, That can be something that motivates you to put yourself out there a bit more

and start posting more, start speaking more, going on podcasts like yours, John.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that's a really powerful shift.

The idea of getting it in your head that it isn't all about you, that you mentioned

about Anj having a purpose there.

And yeah, Anj is doing amazing.

She's, she's fantastic.

Um, as you mentioned, we've had her on the podcast.

If you haven't listened to that episode, go back

and have a

listen

There you go.

John, you're welcome.

Little plug

Little plug, go back and Listen to that

episode.

Listen to Molly Scanlan's as well, because I love her too.

Yes.

Yeah.

Molly was excellent.

Yeah.

She was on, um, very recently on the show.

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I think we're, especially if you're British, we're

raised to not show off or brag.

It's not very becoming to say, I'm really good at this thing.

That's something that we could perhaps learn from our American cousins

from a little bit And I think it's it's just a bit gross, isn't it?

It's gross to go I do this thing well, and I'm you should give me money and

it's good and Please love me It's a bit and that's where like I said with

what I was saying just now about if you can Make it about someone else.

So you're not promoting yourself for yourself.

You're promoting yourself so that the clients who need you can find you.

You're promoting yourself so that the people who are a few steps behind you in

your career see you, can be inspired by what you're doing, can learn from you.

If you try and shift your mindset about it as being, it's not me bragging.

It's me conveying information, um, to people that need it.

It's, It's, valuable if you can do that, that kind of mindset shift of,

I'm being helpful by self promoting.

It's

not just about me, it's about helping other people, the right people find me.

And the right people, that bit's quite important because a lot of what

I post on my LinkedIn is to put off people I don't want to work with.

If you're the kind of person that thinks woke is an insult, I don't want to work

with you because I don't, I don't agree fundamentally with your, your views.

Um, if you're somebody who, uh, doesn't have any interest in using words with

personality and, you know, words that are interesting to read, if you're more

along the We are delighted to announce Synergy's, you know, corporate speak.

Then we're not going to be well aligned.

I don't, you know, I don't hate you, but we're not going to be good, a good fit.

So when you're putting stuff out there, it's as much to put off the wrong people

as it is to attract the right people.

And that's something that I see people try and be too middle

of the road with their content.

Um, even really interesting and funny people will try and put

out very boring stuff because they don't want to offend anyone.

Um, and I'm not saying you should be offensive, but it's more to do with,

um, attracting the, the kind of people that, that really need what you do.

And they, they're not going to know where you are or who you are unless

you're putting yourself out there a bit.

Yeah, I think it's that idea of um, if you try to appeal to

everyone you you appeal to no one I know

If everyone likes you, no one loves you.

Hmm.

yeah, that's it.

In fact, that's um something that I I don't remember much from high school,

from the lessons, um, but I do remember that was one thing that my English teacher

told me, she told the class this, that she'd rather be, she'd rather be, like,

hated by a few people and loved by a few others than everyone just think, oh, well,

she's all right, or, you know, she's a, she's nice, but completely forgettable.

She'd rather that she had some, People that thought she was absolutely amazing

and then others that are like, oh, no, I can't stand her, you know At least it

feels something about her And I think that's the thing that perhaps Often we

have such a fear of being disliked that we can end up, um, being a bit vanilla

and playing it a bit safe with how we present ourselves and how we talk about

what we do and, and all of that, whereas actually being brave enough to actually

push a few people back to say, well, actually, I'm not a good fit for you.

I work with these people, these people, we work together great

and I can really help you.

But these other people, yeah.

Yeah, I don't want to work with you for all of these reasons.

Jammy Digital, Martin and Lindsay at Jammy, have you read

their book, Content Fortress?

I haven't, but I do know who they are.

So yeah,

I've seen their stuff online about, yeah, similar

yeah, they,

about putting off the wrong people.

yeah.

Martin, he was a guest on the show last year.

Um, we were talking about.

lead generation, but they talk a lot about repelling content.

So attracting content and repelling content, and it is really valuable.

And they've found that some of their most popular content is the repelling content.

It's intriguing when you see a post and it's like, X number of reasons

we're not the right fit for you or

something.

Yeah, actually that's one of my biggest ever LinkedIn

posts when I, probably in the first year of using LinkedIn properly.

Five reasons not to work for me.

And it was things like, if you want Someone you can bring on the telephone,

like, I don't give out my phone number.

Um, and we talk about that on the podcast a lot, actually, about boundary setting

and and expectation management with the client, because there's a whole lot you

can do in advance of getting on a phone call, or, like, not a phone call, because

I don't give out my number, but a Zoom call, to manage the client's expectation

and filter out those wrong people.

Because somebody might be insistent they want to ring.

The, um, copywriter every day for a catch up at 4pm.

Well, I do the school run, so I'm done by 3.

And I don't want to speak to anyone.

And I'm not giving out my phone number.

So for, for that client, which is a completely valid thing to want,

don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they're wrong for wanting that.

But I'm not their copywriter, if that's what they want in a copywriter.

So, it just eliminates so many, so much time, uh, that you could waste

on a call going through this stuff.

You can get out there in your content and even on your website.

Um, I keep meaning to do this, kind of what I'm like to work with Paige.

So I can direct people before they get on a phone call with me.

And then if there's anything in that, that they go, well that doesn't really work

for me, then I can get that out of the way early on and Discount them from my

That

pool.

is such a great idea, Mel, because you can use content as a means of

saving an awful lot of time with filtering through prospects and onboarding clients.

That can be something that, particularly as a small business,

if you are a freelancer or a business of one, solopreneur,

whatever you want to call yourself.

Actually going through a sales process with somebody like it can be, if you're

not careful, can take up an awful lot of time, like from that initial

inquiry, maybe there's a phone call in our industry in architecture People

might expect that you then go out and do a free consultation at their home,

like, Oh, you know, we've rung up because we want you to come and visit.

When can you come?

Can you come this afternoon?

Can you come tomorrow?

They expect you to go around for an hour or so

for free

Yeah, that's a

and then spend more time putting together a proposal

and maybe even some ideas for their design and all of that.

And there are practices and single person architecture businesses that do that

because they don't know any different.

And actually

you think,

And then they get, like, led by the, Ben talks about this on the

podcast about processes and how otherwise if you don't have it in place, you get,

you get led by the client, um, and really from that initial contact, you should be

steering everything, um, because otherwise it can, like you say, it can get out of

control and you end up going, Oh no, I've committed to this very time consuming

thing that I'm not getting paid for.

How did that happen?

Um, but the beauty of it as our own bosses is that we then can

learn from that and yeah, we can change things for the next time.

yeah, absolutely.

Yeah, continually tweaking and improving things.

That's the

idea.

And getting back to the factor of, of luck, the luck,

luck topic, um, that on the flip side, as well as putting the, the

wrong people off, obviously the, the goal is to attract the right people.

And that's where, um, posting about the kind of, like we said earlier about

Superman, um, posting about stuff that you can connect with people about.

That is.

Where, you know, the luck side comes in, because you, if you don't start putting

a bit of your personality out there, you're not going to connect with the

people who are aligned with you, who might, it's not just about those people,

it's about the people in their network.

So if somebody in their network is looking for a copywriter, and I've

already, you know, made an impact with that person, then they're more

likely to recommend me for that.

that.

job or that role.

Um, so it's, yeah, it's not just focusing on your immediate network

and connecting with them, but also thinking about the wider network

that they can, um, tap into for you.

absolutely.

And if anyone wants a great example of some personality packed copy,

just need to head over to Mel's website, head over to allcopymel.

com, go

That was smooth, John.

website because her, nobody could ever accuse you of

not having copyright infringement.

personality in your copy mail.

So,

uh, and I love

That almost sounds like an insult, thinly

veiled,

but I'll take it as a compliment.

it's not,

an insult.

could accuse her of not having personality.

Thank you.

Thank you for that little

no, no, you're very welcome.

No, but it packs, it packs a punch in it.

It's again, it's like, it's reflective of like, you read the copy and then

you, you talk to you in, in, on zoom or in person and they match.

That's great.

Isn't it?

That's what you want, isn't it?

You don't want this kind of.

Authenticity gap, we'll call it.

I

think I stole that from Chris Doe.

That was one

Okay.

that he mentioned.

Yeah, thanks Chris.

If anyone's listening to this, and they're maybe feeling invisible in their industry,

what would be one simple thing that they could do today to start changing that?

What would you recommend?

Post.

Post online.

Um, there are, I don't know, there are some LinkedIn guru types who have

quite a formulaic approach, and I'm

not saying you shouldn't have a formulaic approach, but I just never have, and they

say things like connect with 20 people a day, send 10 DMs a day to your new

connections, and you can go about things in quite a structured way if that's your

personality type and that works for you.

That is

not my personality type and it does not work for me.

Um, well it might do, I haven't tried it.

It, I just, the idea

of having, have

you,

tried, Tried.

Mmm, yeah, what was it that stopped you loving it?

Did it make it, the thing I worry about is it makes it less fun.

It makes it less of a fun place to be and it makes it much more

it made it, it made it less fun.

Also, there was decision fatigue that set in very quickly because this

thing of like, oh, well, you need to connect with, X number of people a day.

And it's like, right, so.

Which ones then, and then it like, okay, sort of narrow it down.

And, but there was still a decision to make.

And I just, I was burning through my limited supply of daily decision tokens

on just deciding who to connect with.

And it was like, I think maybe surely there's a better

way I can do this, you know,

Well, if, if I was to give my one simple thing for people

who feel invisible, start commenting.

The commenting, not hack, that sounds, makes it sound like it's not genuine,

but that strategy is much more powerful than I think, um, than doing

the method that we just said about, you know, finding randoms in your

industry and adding them for no reason.

So start commenting on other people's, um, posts, start having conversations

in the comments, because especially if you feel a bit invisible and don't

like to be visible, that's like a gateway drug to actually posting online.

Um, And that's, that's a way to start getting to know people a bit better.

Um, that's the, that's the friendliest area of LinkedIn is in the comments.

Um, and yeah, just start getting to know people that way.

Start dipping a toe in.

And then just do an intro post.

Say, here's three things about me.

It doesn't have to be really, really long.

You can do, I, and that's I think why when I first started on LinkedIn I

had quite a bit of success early on because I brought the Twitter energy and

started bringing flippant short posts in amongst like the longer posts that I was

doing and I think that's where people can see a bit of your personality so

don't overthink it and start commenting rather than, if you're not, if you don't

want to post straight away then start

I think that's a really good tip.

And I think.

I don't have the statistics to hand, but I'm pretty sure that in terms of

reach actually you commenting on other people's posts is actually a really

good way to raise your visibility on LinkedIn, and it can, I think, even more

so in some instances than certain types of posts that you, you actually get

more visibility from, from commenting.

Especially if you have like a few hundred followers to begin with

and you're, you're commenting, I don't like, I'm not suggesting people should

intentionally seek out big creators because then, then again, it just

comes back to, are you doing this for transactional reasons or are you

actually doing it in an authentic way?

Um, I, I think if you can comment on people's Posts where there's already

quite a few comments and people are into engaging and interacting with stuff and

then reply to other people's comments It's it's just a really good way of showing

your opinion on stuff and that you have a stance and that you have a personality

and an opinion on things So yeah, I definitely definitely recommend comments.

You can come and comment on my posts anytime listener

Yeah, go and check out Mel's LinkedIn posts,

yeah, another shameless plug.

We've had a few, we've had a few

this episode,

I know, he's been great.

Crowbarring him

that's it, yeah.

Mel, you co host the Indie Business Club

podcast.

I do.

So, what inspired this podcast?

How did, how did this podcast come about?

And, and what kind of conversations do you have there?

Um, um,

Well, I've already touched on how Ben and I met through

Twitter, and we started whatsapping each other when I started doing some

work for him, as a subcontractor.

And then I had lots of voice notes back and forth talking

about various business stuff.

Ben, I don't think you'd like me calling him this now, but

at the time, bit of a mentor.

Eww, does that sound weird now, Ben?

Um, and now we, we kept having these conversations about general business

stuff, like ways of doing things, how to stay, as I said earlier, how to be the

one steering things when you first meet a client and get to know them and stuff.

And Every now and then we go, this is, this is great content on the end

of like, if we'd had a really kind of light bulb moment talking to each other

about, about this stuff and this would make a great podcast was the kind of

thing we say, but we, we dipped a toe in first by doing LinkedIn lives went back

when they had audio events that seemed to have disappeared completely now.

And we, so we decided to go, go live on on LinkedIn.

First couple of goes didn't work very well cause we were.

in situ in a, like a pub trying to interview Dave because he'd

spoken at CopyCon that day.

Uh, it didn't work.

It didn't work.

The audio was dreadful.

And then we, when we did start doing it properly from, from home and

people were listening, they'd go.

Well, they wanted to listen.

They'd say, is it being recorded?

I can't make it.

And we couldn't record it.

So the next step was to actually do a podcast and we decided

to do it, do it all properly.

We had Ant Henderson from day one doing our, um, he wrote our theme tune and

all the little musical bits in there.

And.

smashed the brief, I have to say.

And he now edits the podcast so we get it all edited properly.

And it's, we're coming up on a year soon since we first started properly doing.

Like podcast admin.

So it's gone really quickly in some ways, but at the same time, I can't

remember life without it because we have, um, we have conversations about

everything that impacts people who are running their own business or

are freelance or, you know, founders.

So we talk about pricing, how to get clients, how to stop being

ghosted, conferences, whether they're you know, good or bad, but

all of the episodes have an indie.

Normally, the most recent one we recorded veered out of indie as the

genre for the, um, the title inspo, but mostly it's song or band or

album titles as the, as the episodes.

Um, but yeah, we love doing it.

It's been, it's really enriched.

My life in terms of like the creativity side, just having this little outlet

that this thing that is a little side project, like I said earlier, you can do

what you want when you're, when you're your own boss, you can just decide that

you're going to podcast and arguably some people shouldn't start a podcast because

they have terrible takes on things.

Um, but it's one of the beauty, beautiful things of being, um,

freelance and being able to decide.

There's a shiny thing over there that's winking at me.

I'm going to go and see where it leads me.

Yeah, and I think that the fact that you really enjoy it, it, it's

more likely to have, uh, that longevity to, it's easier to stay consistent

with me, that content, that medium, if it is something you enjoy doing.

And I mean, I, I love podcasting.

There's just so many.

Doors it can open and opportunities and the conversations, they were amazing.

You get to have conversations with people that perhaps would otherwise

might not have the time of day for you.

It might be a conversation that you might not get the chance to have otherwise,

but like, by having a podcast to be able to interview amazing people, then you

get to have some amazing conversations.

So it's, um, yeah, it's all good.

Podcasts for the win.

Podcasts for the win.

Absolutely.

So, Mel, I think we should probably try and wrap things up now.

What would be the main thing you'd like everyone to take away

from our conversation today?

Well, it's the title of one of the talks I deliver, and it is

Get Over Yourself and Post, because that can lead to so many opportunities.

My entire business has been built on posting online, basically.

And as I said earlier, it's quite ridiculous when you think about

it that it's just tip tapping some words into, into the computer and

sending it off into the world.

Um, but yeah, that's my, my main thing I would urge people to do

is to start getting yourself out there because the luck follows.

Um, and it's, it's that, there's a cartoon of, um, somebody praying

to win the lottery and God's going at least buy a ticket.

Um, you've got to, you've got to kind of be in it to win it if you like.

Um, so if you're not already, um, putting yourself out there and

sharing case studies of work you've done, testimonials from clients.

sharing your expertise and personality, crucially personality, um, then

you're missing a trick really.

And I'd encourage you strongly to get out there and do it.

Great advice.

Mel, was there anything else that we haven't covered

that you wanted to mention?

about the topic.

I think we've done quite well at covering the topic and putting

in some shameless, shameless plugs.

We have, absolutely, yeah, making the most of the opportunity.

One last thing I wanted to ask you.

I, I love to travel.

Not that I do as much of it these days, but I'm, I'm a previous travel junkie, ex

backpacker, love discovering new places.

I was wondering if you could just share with us one of your favourite

places and what you love about it.

I'm going to cheat and give you two.

One is South Africa.

Cause my mom is South African or was, she's very much.

She's got a British passport now.

She's no accent left.

She, she moved here when she was about 20, I think.

Um, and I visited a few times when I was younger.

I'd love to go back.

And the other is New Zealand, where I spent a wonderful

three months or so in 2003.

And when I say my heart aches for it every now and then.

I'm not exaggerating.

I just absolutely loved the country and the people and I'd love to go back.

Why do you have to be so far away in New Zealand?

It's not fair.

Yeah, it's, uh, it's not the most convenient of places to get

to, unfortunately, from the UK, is it?

But, um,

nevermind.

your favourite place, John?

Oh, I'd really struggle to pick one.

Although, you

know what?

Well, I picked two.

You can cheat as well.

Okay.

I will, one that springs to mind and it's not anywhere, like.

I've been to all sorts of exotic places that I've been all over, like Asia,

Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, South, I haven't been to South Africa,

I've been to South America, and all sorts of other spots, but actually the

first place that springs to mind is, um, Porto Palenca in Mallorca, is a tourist

town, um, on the north of the island.

It's one of the less Chavvy tourist towns I want to

say so it's like,

No judgment here though, John.

you know If you like chavvy, that's fine, you know, no

judgment each to their own But it is it's just a nice sort of family sort of

beach resort place with nice restaurants Lovely beach and I just have got a

lot of happy family holiday memories from that That place that we went

there when the kids were really young.

And we had such a great time that we went back again, and then we went

back again, and I think over the years, we've been probably five or

six times, and every time, it's just been a really relaxing, chilled family

holiday, sunshine, nice food, all of

I love that,

There's something nice about taking your kid somewhere where they recognize Oh.

And they get to know the places.

I bet there's some landmarks and,

um, restaurants and things.

They're like, oh, can we go to this place again?

That's nice.

My place like that is Frinton on Sea where my grandparents retired to.

My grandma, um, lived, lived out her days.

Which is a little seaside town in Essex.

Sadly, uh, I think Nigel Farage is the MP now.

So that's, that's tainted it slightly for me.

Haven't been back since.

Oh, never mind, eh?

Mel, this has been awesome.

Thank you so much for coming on the show, sharing your

expertise and your experiences.

Really appreciate it.

Where is the best place for people to connect with you online?

Mmm.

Ha ha

Can you guess it's, it's

um,

Um, so I'm Mel Barfield on LinkedIn and my

website is all copy mail.com.

The Indie Business Club website is indie business club.com and copy or

dies website is copy or die.co.uk.

I had to think about that last one because I haven't had to remember it until now.

I'll put some links in the show notes so that

people can connect with you.

Thank you so much.

Well

done not coughing as well, because I know you've got a tickly throat.

I have, if I've stumbled my words a few times today, it's

because there's a, there was a cough lurking there, but I've managed to

hold it

off.

You've done very

well.

I think we've done alright.

Alright, thanks again

Mel.

Thank you.

Cheers, John.

Bye.

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