Episode 5 Transcript

Hey everyone, it is me, Lisa, and we are back on the podcast. Welcome to our next episode of The Other 99%. And I am so excited that we have Jessica Kane here from GenieChat. And if you guys have not yet heard of GenieChat, you are gonna wanna listen in. So welcome, Jessica, thanks for joining us. Thank you so much for having me, Lisa. I am so excited. I was just chatting before we hit record I told Jessica, it’s like, I listened to all of her stuff and she has some great advice. So I’m really excited for her to chat with us today. But let’s start off because I love your story. So I would love for you to share with the listeners a little bit about Jessica and where you came from and how you came to discover or develop GenieChat.

That was quite a road. Thank you so much for having me, by the way. I love the premise and the goal of this podcast and what you do every day and you’ve been doing for years. So I have so much respect for you. So that’s a little shout out to Lisa, everybody. My tagline, I guess you could say the quick and dirty is I’m from the trailer park to tech CEO. That’s kind of how I say it. And I say it that way because I have so many times encountered people within a misconception that they thought I had like a master’s degrees I was like, I’m going to go to college. I’m going to go to college and then I even got married young, got divorced, young, moved to the big city, which for me from Portland was Portland, Oregon. And so I came from a trailer park in Oregon, by the way. So that’s, that’s legit. A legit trailer park with all the cows and the pasture, you know? Um, so I just moved to the big city and then I just, I don’t, the internet became a thing. I got on Myspace and Lisa, boom, I was off. I mean, once I hit my space, something blossomed inside my brain. I was like, Oh, I get this. I know how to do this. And I took all those things I had done from operations to purchasing accounting management, hire, fire. I had done so many different things and I was learning to code and I thought, what can I do with all this? And I started a magazine, a digital magazine, and it was for plus size fashion and I was always my, always my guiding North star was to help people, especially women, feel more confident. It always hurts my heart because confidence is a choice. And I know most people are like, no, it’s not, no way. You know, it just is. And it’s like, well, you can choose to be confident and choose to accept it as normal. And so even with the magazine, and gosh, I’ve done so many businesses between then and now, now that I’m…now that I have genie chat and yeah, it’s all revolved around empowering women who feel forgotten, overwhelmed, not spoken for, not represented. And that’s the passion we had genie chat as well. And why we say no seller left behind. So it’s just, I’m on a crusade.

Yes. And I love that because my goal is to like give a shout out to the everyday direct seller. And when I read your caption, like, you know, no seller left behind, it’s like Oh my goodness, like we are meant to do this podcast together because we are serving the same people. We want to make sure that everybody, like you said, feels empowered to do their good, whatever their good looks like. It’s not about defining it. It’s about saying the confidence is that super ingredient to achieve whatever it is you’re dreaming you want. Yes. And one of the things back in the day was I wanted to be comfortable in a swimsuit. And I’m a plus size woman. Most people probably eat. I don’t know if you can tell online or not, but I’m a big gal. And, um, I went viral in a swimsuit once because I said, this isn’t brave. And I had so many people go, Oh, you’re so brave. You’re so brave. And I just get really fired up because women are told too often that they’re so brave to start a business, to wear the swimsuit, to do the thing. And you’re like, no, in fact, I was never supported or empowered. And it’s not brave. It’s me claiming my authority. Exactly. Like, this is what I was born to do.

I love that. I mean, I heard that I heard you say that quote on another podcast that I was listening to. And I’m like, Oh, my God, that is so true. Because I’m, I’m an introvert. And I, I think it’s funny, because probably people are sitting there like, you’re not an introvert. Like you’re doing a podcast, how could you be an introvert? But I somehow built the confidence like you’re talking because, you know, whether it’s that screen that’s helping me, I don’t know what it is, but I’ve built the confidence to go out there and share what I believe it’s coming from the heart. So I totally get what you’re saying. It’s like, you know, we have to put ourselves out there to empower someone else.

For sure. And sometimes the best power, the power up, it’s like a video game, like the best power up comes from helping your fellow person because then you’re like, I mean, the best analogy is like, if it was your daughter or son doing whatever, would you judge them or no, of course not. You’d be like, oh my gosh, you’re doing amazing or you look amazing or whatever it might be. So it’s, you know, being able to like actually cheer yourself on and not be perceived and not care that people perceive you to be salesy or pushy or bitchy or whatever, right? Cause it’s not that it’s just, you’re doing something different and it’s needed.

I know in my very first podcast, I shared about how, when I started my journey in direct sales, I was like, why would somebody like this be like, why would somebody like me, I should say, be doing something like this? And it was funny because I felt that I can, I could be someone else in front of people I didn’t really know so it’s weird how we put that on us. Like, why do we have to be a certain way in front of the people who know us because they expect us to be almost, right? So I love how you’re saying, you know, exactly. Like if our child did something like that, then we would say, oh, kudos. So we don’t expect them to be anything. We want them to be their best. So why just do we think that other people are not wanting that for us, right? It’s just weird.

Well, yeah. And those negative voices are always the loudest. And that couldn’t be more appropriate than for a direct seller because all you hear, especially online. So talk about you feeling more secure to do your thing. Well, that also means that people who are just miserable feel more secure in judging you out line so it’s like that give and take, but then you have to realize like they don’t, it does not matter. Like in the scheme of things, how does it affect you, your revenue, your family, your happiness, you know, and it only like, if you let it, it will, but it doesn’t actually matter.

So true. Now I want to, I was saying to you that I wanted to dig into GenieChat a bit more. I need the listeners to know a little bit about GenieChat because I feel that a lot of direct sellers out there, when you tell them, you know, fortune is in the followup, they’re like, yes, you’re right. It’s in the followup from the sale. But I love how GenieChat focuses on the new relationship building, bringing in the new customers. So can you give us a deep dive into sort of what GenieChat does and how it brings in the old and also retains the new. You know what I mean? Brings in the new and retains the old.

Absolutely. Yeah, you’re right. Follow up, we have, there’s two types of relationships and communication, and you have transactional and you have relational. And we have all defaulted into transactional, like following up on the order, following up, do they like the sample? Uh, follow up two months, you know, the two, two, two, which I think is total BS. Don’t get me started with two, two, two that worked back in the olden days, but online, no, like you have to engage, engage, engage and not wait two months. But, um, it’s, it’s about follow up on the relational and that means, Oh wait. So I commented on somebody’s thing. I really got jazzed about them. They didn’t reply back and maybe I should go follow up and go say hi to something else or go, oh my gosh, did you see this? Maybe you left a question, you know, and that follow up, it’s hard work. And there’s no way around it. And GenieChat is like a treadmill and it doesn’t work unless you use it. And it is meant to help you do the hard thing easier, not completely get rid of the hard work, because no matter which way you slice and dice it, we’re in the conversation business and you cannot sell and build a sustainable business without talking to people. And you gotta keep track. You just gotta keep track of that. Like when you have a conversation and you don’t write a note down and then you see them a month later and you forgot something and then they bring it up and you’re like, oh, I didn’t know. You know, you look ridiculous. And it’s just because you have to have a system in place. And so I was very passionate about that, which is why GenieChat and like the name suggests. It’s meant to make conversations easier. So it’s not an automated system. And the first thing I get is like, oh, is it like project broadcast? And I was like, no, I love project broadcast. It’s great for mass information delivery. But GenieChat is the only thing built for the one-to-one delivery. And so it’s one, you have one to many, one to a few, one to one. And GenieChat is for your one-to-one. So it allows you to track your people you can tag them, write notes, keep track of when you talk to them, put in their social channels. So you could one click, go find them, go talk, come back, boom, go to the next one and really pound through your reach outs and your follow ups in an intentional way, but still extremely efficiently. So that’s the premise behind GenieChat. And there’s a lot of tools built around making that easier, like the keyboard, which replaces boards for some people. And then we have AI. And I built the AI to sound like a social seller, not like a crazy chat GPT robot, which is horrible. Love some of those, those responses that you get. And it’s like, please change them. Please, please make them sound like you. And like 28 prompts later, it might be close to what you want. Um, and so I just build tools around that and I also have a commitment to the 99% and making it affordable and never raising the price. There’s no gotchas and none of that. It’s unlimited everything for 9.99 a month. And that’s $9.99 a month. So yeah, I just wanted to make it affordable and I don’t need to charge more. I could, but I don’t need to. And so that’s my commitment to it.

And I love how, you know, some of us, because let’s face it, life’s busy. Life’s busy. And I absolutely love how GenieChat has the ability to send that notification reminder, like, hey, it’s, it’s time to do what you said you wanted to do. You said you’re gonna do this. Let’s go.

Yeah, exactly. So I mean, for those, those of us who may be forgetful at times, it’s that good little nudge, like, you know, come on, let’s get it done. Because we know if we get it done, it’s going to come back to us tenfold, right? It’s just a matter of getting it done. And for the longest time, Jess, I used to be the person who kept it all up here in my head. Me too. And it gets to a point where it’s like, ah, you gotta get it out of there because it becomes so jumbled and everything. And I know that there’s some people who have lists of paper on their desk. And I am like you, just give me a nap because I don’t like paper. I don’t like it all over my desk. I just want everything in my phone because I take my phone everywhere and GenieChat, you can use both on your phone or on your desktop, correct?

Yep, it’s built natively for both. So it’s not a different experience that feels weird or anything. So yeah, you can get on Apple and Android and the web version. And I think like I always tracked through spreadsheets. I love spreadsheets. Like I’m a spreadsheet gangster, Lisa. Like that’s my jam. But, spreadsheet won’t ping you when you have to do something. You can’t sort the spreadsheet by, you know, if you wanted to tag, you need a column for every tag, and then you have to sort every column. And I wanted 20 tags, I’m not gonna have 20 columns. And it’s like, what did I say at my last meeting? Oh, wait, what’s their link to all the things? And then it’s like you have all this information. It’s such a big sheet. It doesn’t even help you. Yeah. So then what I find is that we all resort to the algorithm to tell us who to talk to next. And that really, really is not the best way for your business. It helps Facebook’s business or Instagram’s, but your business is to talk to people at strategically at key times consistently to build that relationship. And sometimes those people aren’t on social or maybe they’re not posting a lot, but they’ll DM you all the time, but they post nothing. Okay. How will you remember that girl in your DMs that never posts a thing? because you’ll never see her in your feet. It won’t pain your brain, you know? And that’s where those instances where you use GenieChat and then you set a reminder for yourself, like a recurring every week or every other week or whatever it is, check back in with Angie in my DMs. And I love that the link is there for you just to click and it will just go right in. And you don’t have to search or do anything. It’s just like intuitive. Like, here we go, let’s do this, right? Yes, I want to make it as easy as possible, you know, efficient.

Yeah. So let’s dig in a bit because I know you have the snippet tool, which is for those who know boards is like boards. Yeah. But it’s integrated with GenieChat, which makes it so much easier to use. So give us a little bit of insight about the snippet. Yes, the snippets. It’s much like boards. And in fact, You know, boards, I think is a great tool for some for what you need. But I wanted the CRM side. But when you have a CRM, you also need your snippets. You need your content with you in the same motion and not in a separate system and a separate app. And it’s all separate everywhere. So it’s the same thing. You have folders of content, unlimited folders, PDFs. You can upload your videos. You can upload a link. You can upload most, you know, bulk images, all the stuff that if you’re used to boards, you can do the same. If you’re not used to boards and you don’t know what we’re talking about, you are gonna be in for the ride of your life. It’s like magic. Like when you try out a content keyboard for the first time, it’s as if you’re like, where have I been? I’ve been in the dark ages in a cave and it’s like the best thing ever. So it’s really technically called text replacement. And so, you know, if you’re typing on your phone, it’s a mobile thing. So on your phone and you’re talking to your DMs and someone asks for the Zoom link, you’re like, oh, I gotta go find the Zoom link for the week call, you know, and then your Tuesday all call. Well, who has all that at their fingertips? No, you go to Zoom, you go to the thing, you hit the cop, you know, you do all this work to find your Zoom link. Well, what’s great about a tax replacements keyboard on your phone is you can switch from like emojis. Bitmojis, Giffies, right? But now you can also do a genie chat and find your Zoom link. And all you gotta do is tap it once and it pastes everything for you. So it’s just, if you’re new to the keyboard life, ah, it’s the best.

And it is a life changer because like Jess just said, it’s like you’re looking for all this content and how many times, and I know there’s gonna be people who relate to this. You think something as simple as your website and you type it in all the time. And then if you’re like me, you get a typo in there because let’s face it guys, when you type duck on a keyboard, it typically does auto correct to something else. So how many times have I sent that out with the wrong words in there? And it’s like, Oh my goodness. But when I have the ability to use the keyboard, it’s like just click there. And I know it’s gone out perfectly. So, I also love that on the GenieChat website that you have so many free resources where you’re actually giving people the snippet tools preloaded.

Yeah, that was actually when I started, I was super passionate. I was like, nobody wants to start with a blank keyboard. And that’s when you really see the magic and it helps you figure out, oh, they could do this, they could do that and a lot of people don’t have an upline that’s so awesome to give them anything, you know, talk about the 99%. You don’t have the, you have no one to really go to, which is why we have, thankfully you Lisa and resources and people like you that help. So I preload, it comes preloaded. You get the GiniChat keyboard, fresh account. I created personally, I created snippets for you guys for followups, for, uh, thanking people for engaging on your stories or whatever. I gave lots of different iterations of ways to start communication that doesn’t, it’s not industry specific because it doesn’t have to be. You’re just talking to a person. You’re being a person. So it’s like, you know, the world is your oyster. So it’s preloaded for you, which is kind of cool.

And the great thing is that I don’t think you touch too much on it, but you have a lot of direct sales experience. So it’s like, you know what you’re talking about. Like you’ve been around the block a couple times when it comes to talking to people. So I mean, to get all that content preloaded from you is like hitting the gold mine, right? It’s like you have all that at the push of a button. It’s there ready for you to use.

It just like helps get your brain going, you know? Sometimes you just need, you’re like, I, even myself I write a lot. I think I’m a pretty good writer, yet I can’t tell you how many times I’ll go to the genie chat AI and go, tell me how to write a post about this. Like I just, my brain is bright. And I think all of us are probably feeling fatigue when it comes to that. And, and then we overcomplicate it and then we bungle it or we get paralyzed. So the little snippets that are preloaded are purposely super short, super simple, call the actions, like ask questions and just get your brain going, you know? And I think my favourite part, another reason I built GenieChat, it was for myself, was I needed search. I can’t tell you how many times, because if you have a team and if you join a board, but we call it a folder, if you join a folder that has tons of other folders, how are you gonna know where something is? You have no clue, you didn’t build the thing so it’s like joining someone’s Dropbox. Good luck with that. So you got to search, right? And so, yeah, I was like, that was a non-negotiable for me and my team was like, non-negotiable. I need search on the keyboard, on my phone, in the moment and everywhere else.

That’s awesome. Now I know what I love about you is that you love to offer up free training for people. And you have such a valuable Facebook group. Can you share a little bit about that and where people can find you? Because even if they’re not a GenieChat user, I mean, that information in there can be used by them, which I absolutely love. And that’s the point. I mean, a lot of the times we’ll get users who just aren’t there in their business, even for the $10 a month, which I totally get and I always tell them, go to the group and just start using the free resources. You don’t need GenieChat. You can, I want to pour into people to help them get the extra hundred dollars a month that they need, like whatever it is. And so I actually have this thing like on the website, it’s called Freebie Central. And I just love building all these tools. Like gosh, I have AI prompt downloads. We have a download for 400 icebreaker snippets. And I even did industry specific ones. So it’s a lot. And gosh, oh, how to make friends like a make friends map like a mess. I put red light stop. Okay, do not go to the next intersection till this happens, you know. And then the group is just really incredible. It’s fairly new and it’s been growing really well. And I just love the community there. And it’s so great to have a Facebook group to be able to do that. And everyone is just so supportive, so excited. And there’s nothing better than seeing people win that most people like these people are not like probably getting shout outs from the big leaders and their teams or whatever. But we are a community of sellers where everyone matters. And so you get a, you know, you get a voice in that community. And it’s really cool.

Yeah. And I’ll make sure that I link it in the show notes so that people can find and join the group because like I said, it’s, it’s gold. There the information in there and you bring in guest speakers all the time. And I absolutely love that the, the information, like you said, is available because not everybody can at this present time, put that money in to the training that they need to grow their business, but everybody deserves to have access to it totally 100% believe in that I wish I could, it’s so funny. I like, I wish so much I could do more and I want to do one-on-one coaching and I want to do all those things. But then I also have to remember like there are so many incredible coaches out in this world. Like that I’m like, do we need another? But I’m here just to like be that bridge for that people that want to hop to that level so they can afford their coach someday. Yes. And those people are not cared about enough they’re not talked about enough and they’re not supported enough. And you know what? They have a home in GenieChat.

They do. All right. So now I always like to ask our guests, is there one quote or a couple quotes you could give whatever you’d like or tips that you think that every direct seller really needs to hear?

You know, that’s such a great question. I have two, and I have to show the first one because it’s funny, but it’s literally the truth. I actually taught my son very young in life. Like this is, this is legit is never accept the first offer. Never. I can’t tell you how many people just accept the first offers and things like it’s wild to me. And maybe it might not pertain to your direct sales. I’m not sure. Maybe it’s just in life like when you have to go do other things, but just like that’s a good one. Um, But with selling and entrepreneurial endeavours, I would say there’s a whole lot of dreamers, not enough doers. Everyone can dream, not everyone will do. And that’s the difference between hitting whatever mark you’re trying to go after, and it’s not another webinar funnel. It’s not another, it’s not, I think, we have inspiration overload and we’re all inspired 24/7. It feels so good. Um, that’s like watching like Peloton videos and going, yeah, that’s so cool. Yeah. Watching them from your coach. Yes, exactly. But I’ve been challenged to use, just get on the treadmill. Just take a step and just do it slowly. Like baby steps are still steps. And if you’re a baby step is uh, and my keyboard, by the way, is only $3 99 cents. So if it’s just a keyboard, get the keyboard. So then you can actually have conversations and some words to help you out and then force yourself to do 10 convos a day or five or three. But it’s like forcing yourself out of that, do the thing, take the step, no matter how hard it is, because it’ll always be hard until you get it done. Then it’s like, Oh, it gets easier and easier.

Yeah, exactly building that habit and just having that, that resource there to help you so that you don’t have to use, I always say like using all the brain power takes up so much of your energy. And then you have no more energy left to do anything else. So if you’re using all the pre loaded stuff, like even you, you can go in there and put your own words in the snippet tool so that you can use it again and again and again because how many times have you sent the same or similar messaging to about 20 or 30 people? And then all of a sudden you’re in Facebook jail because you’re doing your copy paste, copy paste, copy paste. Whereas when it’s coming from your keyboard, it’s not generating that copy paste function. So Facebook doesn’t recognize it as a threat, right? I love that part of it. And I don’t think a lot of people realize that. It’s like, and we won’t get on the topic of Facebook with all the changes coming there. It’s like, oh Lord, that’s a whole nother thing. We really need to get our business in our own hands, right? That is the truth. And you know what? That’s another reason with the CRM. You can work for five companies and they can each have their own apps and they each have their own CRMs, but you need to own that data and those relationships, you need to have it in your hands, yours. And with GenieChat, there’s no company saying what you can and can’t do with it. So you could put all your people in there, tag them by whatever company you’re you know them through, get their emails and stuff, have them do a self-service, we have a self-serve form, make them fill it all out for you and make sure you own that info because you never know what could happen, right? You got to have it.

Yeah, I can, you know, when you sit there and think it’s like, can you imagine what would happen if all of a sudden just Facebook just went away? I know that there’s a, there’s a number of people who rely on that as sort of their CRM, right? It’s like, I have everything in my, my messenger chat. I just go there and find them. And it’s like, I know that it’s funny because I know of some people who have lost their Facebook account or their social media account. And they’re like sending messages to the odd person. Okay, I don’t know how to get in touch with so and so. So can you send a message to them? And it’s like, we don’t know how to talk to people anymore. Like we don’t have emails or phone numbers or anything like that. We rely on social media.

So if we can get as much information as we can into GenieChat, then we never run into that situation of wondering what happens to our business if because we just never know what’s going to happen. Right and all the information just stuck in that messenger that like you can’t get out, whether it’s like a birthday or their phone number or their mailing address or whatever it is. So I definitely encourage you like anyone to, I don’t care if it’s a Google form, whatever you have to do if you can’t afford GenieChat, but get the information from your people for sure.

Yeah. All right, Jess, well, I appreciate you taking the time to chat with us. Can you, before we close off, just tell people, where can they find you on social? What’s my, well, I’m Jessica Kane on Facebook. I’m mostly on Instagram stories. I really love Instagram stories. I’m obviously an older millennial. But really Instagram, Facebook is where to find me. And in the GenieChat Facebook group, I’m there a lot at pouring into the community. So that’s a great place to find me too. Awesome. Well, I appreciate you once again and thank you everyone for tuning in. I know that you have taken a lot from this chat between Jess and I and trust me, try it out. You have a seven day trial, right? With GenieChat. Yeah. So give it a try and see if it suits your needs. And I honestly feel that once you get in there and use it, you’re going to see huge growth in your business because once we start connecting with people, that’s how our business grows. So I’ll wrap it up for today, everyone. And thank you for joining me and Jessica. And like I always say, if you have a few minutes, take a take some time to rate and review the podcast. We’re just getting started. We have so many awesome guests on the list to still interview. So stay tuned and we will talk to you soon. Thanks again, Jess.