How I Built Bits: Recent Episodes
Joe Casabona
The best advice from How I Built It, the podcast that helps creators and small business owners create engaging content that drives sales.
If you’re a parent, you’re probably familiar with something that’s been recently reintroduced into my life. It’s 2 am, and my 7-month-old son wakes up and is in need of a new diaper and bottle. So I get up and head into his room. I’m half asleep, I need to undo his PJs, change the diaper, and redo the PJs. And there is one type of PJ's that are head and shoulders above the rest: the reverse zip PJs. So good in fact, that I’m certain they were designed by parents that had the same exact experience I’ve shared.
Link: What Baby Clothes Can Teach You About Understanding Your Customers
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A few weeks ago Jay Clouse wrote about Experimentality on his blog. This is a concept I love because experimenting is the only way to know if what you're doing works as best as it can.
I've been experimenting a lot with my podcast, content, and automations. I like writing about what I'm trying for my members...I think it's a big benefit of the membership.
I thought I'd give you a little peek into two experiments I'm running now.
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Earlier this month I made two decisions about the newsletter that you may have noticed:
- I got rid of the “Quick Hits” section (which was mostly my own content) in favor of a 300-500 word section on some top-of-mind topic.
- I added a monthly digest of all the content I put out during the month, sent on the last weekday of the month.
The two are related. I still want a way to let my newsletter subscribers know about the content I’ve put out, in case they missed it. But it also serves 2 other purposes:
- It allows me to promote the month’s podcast episodes one more time.
- The sponsors get one more mention in the newsletter each month.
After putting it together manually, I knew there had to be a better way, so I built version one of a Monthly Digest Engine, designed to aggregate and format all of my links, which I can then add to ConvertKit.
Here’s how I built it.
Sign up at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
https://casabona.org/2023/06/building-a-monthly-digest-engine/
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Picture this: it's 2020. Your spouse is a nurse. You have one small kid with another on the way. You know child care will fall full to you for at least half the week.
Oh, and you're trying to run a business. What would you do if your work week was effectively cut in half?
I knew I needed to get help in my business, so I found a VA. Over a few episodes, I'll talk about working with my VA, starting with how I decided I needed one and where I found her.
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Apple is rarely the first to market with a product, and for good reason. Here are 4 lessons you can learn from Apple introducing the Vision Pro at the beginning of the month.
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About a month ago I went on a quest to find the perfect webinar software. I create a spreadsheet and everything.
But at CEX, I had a great conversation with Luria Petrucci of Live Stream Pros and I asked her, “What do you think is the best way to run a webinar?”
Here's what she said, and why.
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There are LOTS of great tips on LinkedIn these days, especially in the carousels. But the problem: you can’t easily get data out of the carousels. That means you can’t put them in your notes app, or even click on the links for more details.
Here are 2 ways you can do it: one using macOS’s native image-to-text feature, and one using a great shortcut by David Sparks.
Links
- YouTube Video
- Blog post on MacSparky
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In Part 3 of my Stream Deck Series, I'm covering Page 3 of my Stream Deck XL. Let's Dive in!
- Screenshot of Stream Deck XL Page 2
- eCamm Live
- How I've Configured my Stream Deck
- Get Your Own Stream Deck
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When I went back to Twitter, one of the first things I wanted to look into was how I can easily post…most ideally across multiple platforms.
And as I’m using these channels to grow my own audience, I always want features like auto-DM and auto-plug.
Hypefury fits the bill perfectly.
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A few weeks ago, I wrote that I was Considering a Different Calendar App. After testing BusyCal, Cron, and Calendar 366, while also looking at several others, nothing comes close to Fantastical. Here's why.
RSS has been such an integral part of my life basically since Google Reader. And since Google Reader shut down, I have been on a bit of a quest to find a good replacement. I think Reader by Readwise is that Replacement.
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I had a t-shirt in college that was my prized possession. It read: "There are 10 types of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't." The joke being that 10 or “one zero” in binary is actually “2” in decimal.
I’m sure if I looked hard enough, I could find my college ID from freshman year, where that shirt is featured. The shirt is top-of-mind because I saw a post on LinkedIn that made me think of it. It made me realize: There are two types of people in the world. Those who ask for answers, and those find them.
Last week I told you about the best way to create an only course...but what's the best way to sell it? I firmly believe tools like Teachable and Kajabi are overpriced. When looking at LMSs, I turn to WordPress. And these days, Sensei is doing the coolest stuff, as it attempts to retake the title of best WordPress LMS.
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Too many people create online courses the wrong way. They go into a cave for 6 months, develop the course based only on what they want to teach, then announce it's for sale...to crickets. Sound familiar?
There's a better way! A way that will save you time, validate your idea, and make you money faster.
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Paid Memberships Pro is the lifeblood of my main product offering, The Podcast Liftoff Playbook. So in this first bit of 2023, I want to tell you everything I love about the plugin, and why I thought it best for my membership/learning site.
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Earlier this year, Amazon announced the Kindle Scribe -- their competitor to the reMarkable 2. It's more affordable, they had an initial deal for Prime members, and a good trade-in price for my Kindle Oasis. SO the $500 device got down to $238. I bought it. Here are my initial impressions.
Show Notes* Kindle Scribe * reMarkable 2 * Read my initial thoughts * Want to see a video demo? Join How I Built It Pro
How I Built Bits is back, and better than ever! The focus on the show moving forward will be highlighting helpful tools and processes for creators to run a better business. And I'm excited that the first episode is presented by Groundhogg.
Groundhogg is an open-source CRM & Marketing Automation suite for serious agencies, small businesses, content creators, eCommerce experts, and WordPress professionals. Let's take a deep dive into what it is, how it works, and why it could be perfect for your creator business!
Show Notes
- Get Groundhogg (20% off with code HOWIBUILTIT)
- Interview with Adrian Tobey
Creating a course isn't just about making a series of videos. It's about doing it in a way that gives the students skills or knowledge they can use at the end of the course. Troy Dean calls that taking a student from "zero to win."
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/027
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Coming up with content can be a tough task, especially across multiple channels. But Nathan Ellering of CoSchedule gave us the perfect advice in episode 20: answer customer questions.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/020
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Jeff Sheldon does what he does extremely well. But he's also expanded his business from clothes to coffee and paper products. How does he do it without burning out? Listen to today's bit to find out.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/013
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Chris Lema knows a lot about a lot. But did you know he was doing no-code well before it became the movement it is today? In this bit, he tells us a little about how to successfully build a web app without code.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/012
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Chris Coyier is a man of many hats and has successfully started and sold websites, wrote books, and has a great tech startup. In today's bit, he offers some advice that is the key to his success.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/006
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Carrie Dils was building communities before it was cool. And was actually doing the building! In today's bit, Carrie tells us about how she built her podcast community and the pros and cons of doing your own dev work.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/005
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Cory Miller dolled out so much great advice in Episode 4 that we're getting a twofer. He tells us about how one of iThemes' most popular products came out of solving a big problem they had. Then he tells us the importance of maintaining an email list.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/004
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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When you have a membership or subscription, your goal is to prevent churn, or people leaving. The best way to do that is to deliver value. But it's also a matter of how often you ask your subscribers to evaluate the value they get. Here's what Brian Krogsgard recommended.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/003
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Too many people decided they want to make an online course, spend 6 months making it, and launch to crickets. Rebecca Gill knew better, and her advice from Episode 2 can save you a ton of time (and heartache).
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/002
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Jason Coleman was the very first guest on How I Built It, and he started the show strong with a ton of fantastic advice. Here's my favorite: a bit about why charging monthly might not align with the value you deliver, as well as how to handle negative reviews.
Listen to the entire episode at https://howibuilt.it/001
Be sure to subscribe at https://howibuilt.it/subscribe
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Have you ever seen a great talk, video, or even podcast episode that dolled out some fantastic advice, only for you to forget it before you implement it? Maybe that feeling is amplified when you go to a conference. There are so many great takeaways...how can you remember it all?
It's almost like you need a TL;DR for when that happens.
And How I Built It has been going pretty much weekly for nearly 7 years! As we approach 300 episodes, I wanted to surface some of the best advice from asking "how did you build that" over all that time.
So I'd like to introduce How I Built Bits, a weekly clip show that aims to be around 15 mins, replaying some of the best clips from How I Built It. New episodes come out on Saturday mornings.
If you'd like to learn more, head over to https://howibuilt.it/clips. And of course, be sure to subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.