#88: Build a Community with Shanee Moret

[00:00:00] Hala Taha: You're listening to YAP young and profiting podcast, a place where you can listen, learn, and profit. Welcome to the show. I'm your host Hala Taha and on young and profiting podcast, we investigate a new topic each week and interview some of the brightest minds in the world. My goal is to turn their wisdom into actionable advice.

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I'm here with Shanee Moret. Welcome to the show. 

Shanee Moret: Thank you so much for inviting me. I haven't seen you in a, over a year. 

Hala Taha: I know, we met each other at LinkedIn global in New Jersey. Briefly funny events, fun events. I should say 

Shanee Moret: Yeah, it was definitely fun. It's great to see like how people have grown since then. And it seems like just because of everything that's happened this year.

That it, it was like five years ago, but it was only a year ago. That's crazy. 

Hala Taha: I know, can you imagine that we actually got to meet people face to face last year. It's you can't even remember those times. It seems like. So before we get started, we're gonna just introduce you to our audience. Everybody on LinkedIn probably knows who you are, but I've got thousands of listeners on my podcast who might not know who you are.

These things, Shanee Moret. Her story is one that emphasizes the idea of overcoming challenges and building a dream life for her and her daughter. [00:02:00] Shanee is a first-generation Cuban American, and as a child, she battled in one stage for bilateral Wilm's tumor cancer. And so I actually heard about the story about you, one of your first memories in the hospital, holding a wagon when they told you like to walk and you didn't want to.

And that's when you first realized that, there's a suffering in life, right? So tell us about, your experiences having cancer as a child. What that taught you, how that shaped your world view and perspective. 

Shanee Moret: It's funny because people ask me that question. And so you have to understand through my perspective, I didn't really know what being like living a normal childhood was prior to having cancer.

So it's not like I was like 13 or 14 when I was diagnosed. Like I was diagnosed very early and thank God. Because my kidneys were large. Usually, if they're not enlarged they may catch it way too late. And I was stage four and it was just like several times that [00:03:00] like they brought in the priest to baptize me because they, they do that in the hospital when they think they are gonna not make it and not have a lot of times.

So they told my mom a few times that like, I wasn't going to have a lot of time, but just so for me, it was like normal. To be there, so when I look at a hospital, I look at I feel like almost comfortable in the hospital just because that's the place for me, that lights helped heal me and helped me get stronger, helped me get better.

One, like a lot of people, adults, and like teens, they look at it like a place where you, you don't want to go to the hospital. So it's like a different perspective, but. I will say this, that I credit a lot of why I survived obviously to the medical doctors and stuff, but also to my mom, because the doctor that was on my case, the lead doctor, he advised her to not treat me like I was sick.

So he like told her to like, discipline me [00:04:00] like a regular child, because what happens is like they don't. And then a lot of children that are sick may be very aggressive towards their parents or have like serious temper tantrums that make the treatments a little bit harder for the nurses and stuff like that.

So she was like, kinda tough on me. Like the red wagon story. It was like, she wasn't the mom that was like crying, she was the mom. That's if you're not gonna walk, I'm gonna make you walk. And I'm sure she cried and was like devastated, but she never did it in front of me.

And she would always kind of. Tell me like, okay, this is like temporary, you're going to get stronger and stuff like that. So I think that like psychologically, that helped me a lot. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. And probably because she made you feel normal helped you maybe get normal faster because you believed that you are normal too, 

Shanee Moret: right?

Hala Taha: You think your health has a lot to do with the way you think and like your mental health too. I heard you say in the past that you suggest to differentiate yourself by embracing your darkness, [00:05:00] embracing your scars, but there's many people who are they feel embarrassed about their past and they're not willing to really share their story.

Why do you suggest that people be open, be authentic and share the trials and tribulations that they've had in their life? 

Shanee Moret: Because it builds trust. And now I will say I will preface that by saying that there is like a fine art of vulnerability. So you want to be vulnerable and share. The tough times that you've had maybe a certain circumstances that you could have made better decisions, so on and so forth, but you don't want to be so vulnerable that instead of gaining trust and respect that you gain like sympathy and pity.

 So you don't want to victimize yourself through vulnerability. So there is like a fine line, like on one side where it's empowering and you could inspire others and leverage that. Like build a huge community that trusts you because you're open with them, but you don't want to push it too far that then like you're victimizing yourself and then people [00:06:00] will do the opposite because nobody likes a victim.

Somebody that's like always with a sob story, right? So that's why it builds trust and it makes you seem real. And I can't tell you the amount of business opportunities that have opened up for me, not just with med snake media, initially the first company that I co-founded, but now with growth academy, just because people have heard my story.

And when you also look at that, people are much more likely to remember your, you, if you have a story than if you're just sharing information and something that can be replicated, they could replicate everything else. Your pricing your product, but they can't replicate your story. 

Hala Taha: I love that.

That's such a good point. And I'm gonna dig deeper later on in terms of how you develop your stories and some of your copywriting skills. Since we are live, I'd like everybody who's tuning in to tell us where you're located. We'll shout you out. We've got lots of folks tuning in already. So thank you so much.

And if you have any questions for [00:07:00] me or Shanee, just let us know and we'll make sure to ask it if it's relevant to the conversation. So speaking of your trials and some of your things that you've dealt with in the past, you actually left your full-time job because they would not let you take care of your daughter, or you felt like you didn't have enough time to focus on your daughter.

So tell us about that time. I think it was a turning point in your life will you share that story with us? 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. Liv, my daughter, she's a toddler now, but then she was like around six months, maybe six, eight months. And She got a flu from like a certain type of influenza strain from being left at daycare because like most parents, I would have to wake up super early, leave Friday daycare at seven o'clock in the morning, work till five.

And then go get her. So I wasn't with her for basically 12 hours and she was pretty young and like I said, she was a preemie, so she was a little bit smaller and stuff like that. She got sick. So she actually ended up going to the [00:08:00] hospital being, we had to stay there, like I had to stay there, me and my mom for 14 days.

So around the 10th day, My boss at the time was like, just getting irritated. So sending me texts like, Hey, when are you gonna we need you back at the office. One after the other, like just not understanding that I was, not to leave her there because I'm her primary caretaker. I was at the time a single mother.

And then finally like around 11:00 PM, one night basically was given like an ultimatum of my boss at the time saying find somebody that can stay with her, like return or lose your job. So I was like, okay, I'm not returning. And it's crazy. It's almost like inexplicable, how I felt in that moment.

Like it's hard to put into words. Like she was like sleeping in her crib with an IV in her hand, it was like a very tough thing. Like they didn't have a bed for me to sleep in the hospital that whole time. So my mom had left because I'm not gonna make my mom sleeping in a chair. I was sleeping [00:09:00] for several days and I was just like, listen, I like to myself, I'm tired of like the limitations.

Of my life, I'm tired of not going where I want to go. When I want to go. I'm tired of having to leave her in a daycare for 10 to 12 hours a day, tired of not having the resources to purchase, not even what I want to purchase, but what I need to purchase. I was making very little money because I had to pay for the daycare.

So what are you left with after that? Like after daycare. You're really not left with anything.  Daycare rent, diapers and food, and that's it. I had basically pennies after that. So in that moment, I really thought to myself, because at that company I was doing like copywriting and I knew, like I kept hearing of people that were making.

Money online, just blogging. So for me at the time, I was thinking more like blogging and it's amazing how like visions and things change with time. And for me,  just replacing what I was making back then, which was nothing in retrospect [00:10:00] would be enough for me if I could just make that doing what I love from home, because then I could spend more time with her.

So long story short, I got on LinkedIn because I had like lessons. A few hundred dollars in my bank account, like a couple of hundred dollars. And I spent like $50- $200. I can't remember the exact price on this one course that teaches you how to make a thousand dollars a month blogging. And one of the things in the course was, oh, make the LinkedIn and blah, blah, blah.

So I made a LinkedIn and I just, this was like probably for four to six months before I even created my first post. So I. I just put up a picture and started, just building relationships with people on the backend, like messaging them and stuff. So before I left, but I had no experience, like I had nothing to show for a portfolio that was not related to my work, which I couldn't use so long story short before I left the hospital.

So within the next 72 hours, [00:11:00] I had already reached out to people and said, Hey, I'll write a free blog for you. If you write me a recommendation on my profile. Cause they wanted samples of work to show people. And I wanted recommendations on my profile to increase trust so I can get clients. And before I left the hospital, I had three recommendations.

Hala Taha: That's amazing. It just there's so many lessons to learn in that. The first thing that, that really calls out to me is the fact that you invested in yourself, you took this course 

Shanee Moret: that's one thing. And when I did it, it's crazy. Cause when I did it, I'm like, you're insane. You may not have money for like food that you need.

I'm, I'm going to have to ask my mom for 50 bucks or something and I never like that's type of person, so I was like, you know what? I just felt like this, like feeling. And I was like, what do I really have to lose? And I told myself, I was like, what do I really have to lose?

Okay. If all, if this truly fails, like in the next month. I'll lose my car. [00:12:00] I'll lose my apartment, but that's basically it, and then I'll just have to admit defeat and go live with my mom and then find another job. That's like the worst that can happen. You know what I mean? Or it works like there's a whole world out there that I don't even know.

And I like had the dedication to like work till three o'clock in the morning. If I needed to everyday to find out if it would just replace that income. Before I left the hospital, I had those recommendations and within four weeks I secured my first contract and the retainer, like when I got that check, I like tears.

When I was walking back to my car were like literally pouring out my eyes. Cause it was $500 more than what I would have made the whole month at my previous job. 

Hala Taha: Wow. 

Shanee Moret: And this was, this was to help somebody ghost write a book. And it was just the first check of a six month contract. So that was like the real validation to me that okay, like I do have what it takes and you can make real money [00:13:00] doing what you love.

And from there it was like, I'll never turn back. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, that's absolutely amazing. Such an amazing story. So tell us what happened next. You got these clients, you're resourceful, you took action, relentless action. You had the work ethic, you had the skills. So what happened next?

How did you get more clients and build your 

business? 

Shanee Moret: Yeah, so that's a great question. So obviously after getting that one client. I was like spending more time on LinkedIn. I got a couple more but I wasn't posting it. And I was watching like a lot of people that were growing and I was like, wait a second.

What are these people doing? Cause I like notice patterns and that's also around the time that like LinkedIn videos started to like really pop. So a lot of people were like, just post your first video or whatever. So I posted my first video in November. Late November. It was like around Thanksgiving, like almost two years ago of 2018.

And yeah, it did really well and I thought it was a [00:14:00] coincidence. And then I just posted my second video the next day and I did really well. So I thought it was a coincidence. Cause the image quality, the sound. It was terrible, but like it was doing well. And then the third video did really well. And I started noticing I was getting a lot of inbound prospects.

Like I didn't have to message anybody. They were coming to me and I was like, wait a second. Like, there's something to this. And I posted my fourth, my fifth video, and they also did well. So I was like, okay, maybe it's not a coincidence. Why are people watching my videos? So that's when I started asking people, I was like, Hey, why did you like this video?

If the image is terrible, it's like it's shaky and the sound is terrible. And they're like, oh, because you're real or it's because of what you're saying. And that's also something that like, it just so happened at the time to a lot of other people that were showing up on video on LinkedIn we're doing it in a very corporate type of manner [00:15:00] where they had to have their makeup.

Perfect. They were in suits and I was showing up like this with just like a 32nd message. So 

Hala Taha: Yeah. Success on LinkedIn is all about standing out and you're right. When you first started, you were like, so casual, you are just like the girl next door, who would hop on and everybody could relate to.

And I think that goes back to the stories that you were talking about before and telling your story and sharing your story and made people feel, I think, connected to you. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. 

Yeah. And I feel since then I never really prepped a video. Like I was just doing a whole different strategy and I didn't even realize what I was doing at the time.

I was just showing up. Cause I was seeing the results. So I was like, I got it. I'm the type of person that I doubled down on what works and I release what doesn't. So I'll get rid of what doesn't and I'll double down on what works by, for me, it's all about numbers. 

Hala Taha: So Shanee, let's talk about a MedSnake media.

So you started this company and I believe you helped people with like their marketing and even their billing and things like that. [00:16:00] And so you had mentioned in previous interviews and things like that, that you feel connected to the healthcare industry, you feel like you love the healthcare industry, they helped you, be able to survive when you were young.

We didn't decide to be a doctor or nurse. Like, why did you decide to like, go on the outskirts of the industry? 

Shanee Moret: That's actually a great question in college. When I started, I was in pre-med and stuff, but I just, I wasn't really passionate about it and I always loved to write so.

Like when I was in cancer treatment, a lot of the times, like my kidneys would hurt and stuff. Like I would have to lay down and just like even afterwards, so even til today, like sometimes because I had surgeries on my kidneys, so the scar tissue will hurt and I'll just have to rest For a day, like my body will let me know in a way.

When I had like downtime, I would love to read I was like one of those kids when I was young that read Harry Potter in one day like a 500 or 500 page book. And [00:17:00] so I would read and I would write so. When I was like in pre-med, I felt like I was like in this conflict of okay, I do like the idea of health care, but I would have really loved to be a writer.

And it's so funny because back then, when I was in college, 10 years ago, You had to write a book to build a community. And now it's like the opposite where it's like, publishers won't even take you on, unless you have a community already. And then your community's kind of at the point where they're demanding a book.

So it's amazing how things have changed. But in my mind, I was like, okay healthcare writing. And that's how I got into marketing. But I didn't really tie it to my story or to healthcare until I got on LinkedIn. And I was passionate about it and that's one of the main things with copywriting, you have to write what, what you're passionate about.

And obviously things have evolved from there. I just launched growth academy two months ago, but with MedSnake is I really understood [00:18:00] healthcare when a lot of marketers and stuff didn't so he helped a lot of facilities and that's like the number one complaint that we would hear is these facilities would spend a lot of money with marketing companies, but then they would have to explain the healthcare space to them.

And when you're marketing for facility, when you're doing their marketing, let's say they want to attract a medication, it's completely different than attracting private pay patients or attracting private insurance patients. So a completely different demographic, if you don't really understand healthcare, you're not gonna understand that.

We continue to serve them, but it was just a great thing because it opened a lot of doors where people are like, okay, she understands the output. They remembered me for the story. And then in meetings out, obviously prove our proficiency and stuff. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. So when it comes to, like, when you were building your business, how did you know that there was actually a demand for the services that you wanted?

How did you decide that, the demand was big enough to go after. 

[00:19:00] Shanee Moret: Like for copywriting, for marketing and stuff. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Shanee Moret: Okay. That's a good questions. It's all about I listened to people and I think that's where I was going in the previous question, like, how did I build a business? So when I really started getting consistent with video, especially within the first 30 days, I saw like a huge increase in like the amount of people reaching out to me in like messages.

And I saw how the process would go and I'm a quick person. So I would immediately, and this is one tip for people like don't hang out in the DMs. So if somebody is like interested in your product or your service, or wanting to learn more, like I don't message back and forth a million times, I set up a call immediately for like today or tomorrow, because the faster you move, the faster they move.

So I see a lot of people even trying to close deals in the DMs. It's like that's it's  gonna take forever and especially on LinkedIn where the LinkedIn messaging is not like the best. So I [00:20:00] saw the demand and then like when I would get on the phone with them, there was a recurring need in healthcare where a lot of them had no idea how to even approach marketing were a lot of them.

They just really wanted to build an organic brand rather than. To pour money into ads and stuff, because a lot of these startups fail because of their marketing misspent. So they wanted to go lean and they were thinking long-term. So a lot of that had to do with, video content copywriting and just fulfilling their needs.

It was really like a custom kind of thing, but it would all be the same. We noticed a pattern variations. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, I think that's really interesting. Okay. So how did you end up meeting your co-founder at med snake media? What's the story there? 

Shanee Moret: So she 

actually reached out to me on LinkedIn and it's funny, cause you said, Hey, people can relate to you.

And I was her message to me like, Hey, your videos are so relatable. And then we built a friendship from there. And then we found the demand because. [00:21:00] She's doing medical, billing and credentialing. So once the facility is up and running, they would always ask her like, okay, we're ready for marketing to do that too.

And she'd be like, no, I don't. But she kept referring people to me initially. And I was like, okay. Well, why isn't there like a one-stop shop for all this. So that's what we created. 

Hala Taha: I know that you had a big break. You had one of your first clients was pretty big and significant and it helped you have a new life.

It helped you start a new life. And I can relate cause I worked full time at Disney streaming. I just started a podcast marketing agency and then just got three pretty huge clients. And now everything's taking off. I'm ready to quit my job. It's like just crazy. I can't even believe. Like how fast we're scaling.

And it's just goes to show the power of LinkedIn. Once you have a brand on LinkedIn, you can literally start anything, so tell us about this story. How did you land your first client? Did you have a website already? Do you have a logo or did you just 

go for it? 

Shanee Moret: I don't even know if we had a [00:22:00] website already, but he reached out on LinkedIn.

It was like very short. It was literally within. One month of December. So I think it was like in late December or early January, right when I had just started in the first month of posting videos and he just reached out and he was like, Hey, how much do you charge for copywriting services, blah, blah, blah.

It's funny because like I did the first project and then like his wife. Saw it, it was like, wait a second, who wrote this? And then they, that's how they got us on retainer because she loved it and they had so much more work. Yeah, it was life changing and I was like, wow. And we still have that relationship till today.

And then my, I would say like my next big impactful connection came six months later when a random connection that again, just watch my video content very frequently, reach out and say, Hey, I have a friend, a colleague. He lives in west Palm. He's close to you. I'd love [00:23:00] for your email for you guys, me I would love to introduce you to him.

I don't know if you guys can work together, but just whatever. And that's when I was introduced to Christopher Homo. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, I know he's one of your major 

clients. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. He's my mentor now. I would say more than anything. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, that's amazing.  For me too. I didn't have a website. I it's more important to just get the clients, show them what you could do, prove to them through actual work or past experience.

You need to have everything ready and perfect. Just get started and start to get clients. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. I don't know why a lot of people spend way too much. Like branding is not brand. I always say that you could have the best logo and I'll give you a great example. So look at Quebee. Quebee just like they said that they're like calling it quits or whatever they have, like the best team.

It's I guess they try to compete with Netflix or something, but they got like billions of dollars in investment. They have the top talent. They had all the branding, they had blah, blah, blah. They even were started. They launched with a hundred [00:24:00] thousand subscribers that they had.

And 93% of the subscribers dropped off after the first month. And so you could have the best time. You could have the best branding. You could have the best this, but they, their marketing strategy was antiquated. They went after like high ticket celebrities to do like commercials and Superbowl ads and stuff like that.

And when they should have been doing stuff like to get, influencers with million followers and stuff on Tik TOK, because they were trying to reach like the 18 to 30, 35 markets. So it just goes to show you can have the best of everything, but if you're not, if you're not like adapting and if you're not like super hyper focused on your customer, you could fail.

Hala Taha: Yeah, totally. 

And it's all. And I think sometimes when your back is against the wall and you have to be resourceful, that's when people get the most creative and actually, grow an organic community because they're there. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. 

He didn't have it all. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. 

And that's one thing that's a blessing in [00:25:00] disguise for us.

It's like when we launched MedSnake, I didn't have an option to spend like thousands in Facebook ads. I didn't have any of that. So I was forced to create an organic brand and that's like the best decision that, that I could have made and been consistent with, because if you have an organic brand, you could always like add in paid advertising, but it's very difficult to sustain something with only paid ads.

Yeah. An organic brand will, the trust is just, you can't beat it. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. People think that paid ads are the way to go, but you're not retaining anything. You're just gonna have to keep paying and paying and things. So it's really important to grow that organic community. So you mentioned earlier that when you first started on LinkedIn, you actually invested a hundred dollars into a LinkedIn course, a hundred dollars that you didn't have.

If you are giving somebody guidance today, in terms of how to start their organic LinkedIn community, what would you say? 

Shanee Moret: I would say, [00:26:00] find somebody that has done what you wanna do and learn from them and apply what they teach. Because the learning curve is just gonna be cut in half or cut 30%, like the things that I had to slip up on and the tests I had to run along the way.

And that's really where again, demand, I listened to people why launch growth academy around I would say like March of this year, I started getting a ton of messages every single week. Hey, do you have a course? Do you have this? Do you have a program where I could learn how to do what you did?

 Oh, I was like, okay, that's like coincidence like blah blah blah. Then like in April, especially as like the Corona, the pandemic was like really getting serious. I was getting probably like 50 to a hundred messages a week and I was like, okay, the people need this. That's why I did that because I was like, okay, there's definitely a need.

And people want me to learn, like I could cut their learning curve and. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. So you have a course available or do you offer consulting for that? 

Shanee Moret: It's [00:27:00] more than a course. And that's another thing when I did the research, people buy courses, but what's a course, like you really watch videos and stuff, and who's gonna be there telling you to apply.

Who's gonna be there telling you to tweak this, tweak that. So when people join growth academy, they not only get the course, which has over 40 videos, but they get live weekly trainings from me. And from Chris, and if they can make the live trainings, then they get the recordings. They also get to join a private community in slack where like we track their growth and we we give them tips every day and stuff like that.

And they get to network with all the other members. Right now we have a Spanish group and an English group. 

Hala Taha: We 

have a that's awesome and very creative. So we have a question from Adam Posner. He says, what about. The copy and paste posts. And I don't know what MLM stands for, but I guess he's saying engagement pods I guess he's, I guess he's saying why post the same things over and over again?

What's your strategy 

[00:28:00] around that? 

Shanee Moret: So it depends on the post. So for me, like the connection post is not really for me more for other people to connect. And if that works and it works, like people have gotten jobs from it. They've messaged me Hey, Shanee I grew like 500 connections this week. And I haven't grown that in like months.

And if it helps the people and obviously it's not being shut down by LinkedIn, then I think that there's a reason for, I think that they obviously want other people to grow as well. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, totally. 

Shanee Moret: You have to think like they want more people on the platform, they definitely want posts that endorse more people to stay on the platform.

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Completely. And you know what, in terms of the engagement pod, I think that there's lots of engagement, pod communities out there that are actually real community is I think there's a lot of hate out there in terms of the engagement pods. But honestly, there's a lot of communities out there where people actually are friends with each other, they care about each other and they wanna actually see each other's posts.

And when you become an [00:29:00] influencer, you start to lose sight of your friend's post. And it's actually very helpful to have a chat with everybody's posts in one place where you can keep in touch with the people you actually care about. And so I think people have this like weird idea about engagement pods that it's fake this or that, but I would like these people's posts if I had seen them in my feed, but I don't control the algorithm and this is a way to control the algorithm.

So I think everybody's hate about engagement. Pods is a little bit of jealousy mixed with other thing, 

Shanee Moret: yeah

 All plays like it's easy to critique. Everyone's always gonna have something to say. But, like I said at the end of the day, if LinkedIn was in Ford, they would shut down the posts. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

So what would you say is your secret sauce when it comes to your growth on LinkedIn?

Cause like we said, all of a sudden you had this huge, actually we were talking offline when we were talking about this. So let's talk about your tipping points. So when we met at LinkedIn global, that was in 2018 meaning you had like the same amount of followers. And here I am, like only doubled my growth and you've 10 X your growth.

[00:30:00] So what would you say was the tipping point? Like when did you start noticing oh my God, like things are just escalating quickly. Cause there's really not that many people who have over. 30,000 letter loans. You have 600,000 followers on LinkedIn. How did you get to that 

point? 

Shanee Moret: Yeah, so it's crazy because last September I did have what at LinkedIn global event, like 30,000 hours, something like that.

And then I just. I stayed consistent. So I started posting more again, I would double down on what was working in terms of what my audience wanted. Like I'm super hyper focused on my audience. So if my audience is gonna gain benefit from a certain type of posts, like that's what I'm gonna post. I'm thinking about less of myself and more about what people want.

And I determined that through numbers. I don't let, like my personal perspective be like, oh this post should have done amazing. But it got no engagement. That's because people couldn't relate to it when people relate to a post, it gets high engagement. [00:31:00] So it just, like I kept doing that.

I kept staying consistent. And then in. January. I would say like late January of this year is when I really had my tipping point that gen Z posts that I wrote it just I didn't even expect, I thought it was just going to be another post. You just never know what's gonna go viral. And it went like super viral.

Like it got like over 240,000 likes over 12 million views. So then through that month, But there's like a secret to that. So through that month I grew a lot and it's not like I like let my foot off the pedal because one post went viral. What's one post I posted more and I really took advantage of the momentum.

And then I had another post that went viral. But somebody on LinkedIn took a screenshot of the post that I had no idea who they were and they posted it on Facebook. And then it also went viral on Facebook. Yeah. I got 150,000 shares on Facebook and it was [00:32:00] crazy. People were like messaging me and they were like, Hey, I saw you on Facebook.

And I'm like, Facebook. Like I'm never even on Facebook. And then after the 10th message that day, I was like, can you like, tell me where you saw me on Facebook to some random person and be like, yeah, I'll share the post with you. And it was just a girl who took a screenshot and she was like, Hey, I saw this on LinkedIn and I had to share it.

And it like blew off. And then like 20 other pages shared and also went like 50,000 shares, 8,000 shares. Like I had people all over the country that were messaging me, being like, Hey, Shanee, like people from high school, I saw your posts. 

Hala Taha: Oh my God. That's so insane. And it wasn't even it didn't even get credited to you as some other girl's page.

Shanee Moret: No, it did. Because the way she screenshot it had my name and said And that's how, like, all these people, like there was like even one page at one viral and put your job. My guy friends were like, messaging me, like hush, your name went viral. Quit your job. It's crazy. [00:33:00] What happens when you go viral on Facebook?

Hala Taha: That's funny. 

I've never been viral on Facebook. So I had, I've only been viral on LinkedIn, so that's all I know. So what so special about that post. Let's send that gen Z post. What was it about, why do you think it went viral? 

Shanee Moret: I do know. So when I thought like it was doing well and doing viral, I thought it was, it was about gen Z.

So I was like, oh, it's because gen Z is sharing in so much, blah, blah, blah. But when I actually started looking at the shares and what people were doing with the shares, what they were saying, so it's actually targeting the people that want an opportunity now, the gen Z population, but then a lot of the older people were resharing it and saying.

I'll never forget my first manager that gave me an opportunity, please pay it forward for somebody. So it was like targeting like people my mom's age. And they were like resharing it like crazy thanking the people that had given them the first opportunity. [00:34:00] And then it was also, the gen Z were resharing it, but I thought it was just the gen Z that was making a viral wasn't a lot of older people were paying like

thanks to the people that had given them an opportunity, 

Hala Taha: just for context, if I don't remember the gen Z post. So what was the gen, like? What did it say? What was it about? 

Shanee Moret: The general gist was just like, Hey cause an intern, a paid intern. I just started with us. And. It was like, Hey, you don't, this person doesn't have experience, but for me, it was so basic.

Like I, but sometimes the posts you never expect to will go viral. The person did everything right during the interview. And I believe if somebody does something right during the interview, even if they don't have a lot of experience, it doesn't mean that they can't be effective. And I always say that, like when people come to me and they're like, oh, I have 10 years of experience.

What does that mean? If like you can't translate what you've done in those 10 years to be effective, then it's just like how long you've been [00:35:00] doing it, not what you've done within that amount of time. 

Hala Taha: Totally. 

Shanee Moret: That's how the post is, like what it talks about. And then it just says if somebody has a chance.

  Leaders and it like blew up and then that's it. 

Hala Taha: So when 

it comes to your LinkedIn, like you talk a lot about like HR stories and things like that. Are those, like your stories, are those stories that you like find, how do you decide what to post? 

Shanee Moret: So like the ones that I say are mine.

I just can't like, some people are not gonna tell me, allow me to share their names. Other people, like I get probably hundreds of messages a week with people being like, Hey, can you please show this story on my behalf? Obviously they don't wanna be tagged because they're gonna get fired or whatever.

You know what I mean? But yeah, I could have a whole blog with like people being like, Hey, Shanee, this happened to me at work today. Can you please share this story or Hey, I was shut down for the fourth time for my dream job and they'll like, they'll get into really what happened. 

Hala Taha: It's interesting.

And so what I guess the [00:36:00] moral of the story that I wanna tell here is that. You actually don't need to have your own interesting stories. If you wanna be a content creators, especially on social media and things like that, you can find other people's stories and people will relate to them.

And you can put your own perspective on that story or your call to action or whatever, like points that you want to point out. But it's that story that gets people talking and connecting and sharing. Like people love to hear a good story. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah I know. Listen, it's how our brains are wired. That's one thing that I've also done differently is I've shared a ton of stories.

The other, the one that went viral on Facebook was from a friend that like his boss was being a jerk, just cause he was late to work something so simple, but something that a lot of people can relate to. So it has to be relatable and it has to be just. Obviously there's a science to copywriting and that's a different discussion in and of itself, but basically if you position something as a story, it's gonna be [00:37:00] more likely to be remembered.

People are gonna connect with them more, which means they're gonna connect with you more. And They'll forget information a lot more quickly. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. So I noticed that a lot of the influencers, like who are really huge on LinkedIn, like you, Oleg, Bridget, everybody's talking about like H a lot of HR and recruitment content.

Do you think that LinkedIn favors that type 

of content? 

Shanee Moret: I don't think that LinkedIn favors that type of content. I think it's obviously like supply and demand. So if there's millions of people that are laid off, then when you talk about getting laid off or you give them tips to find a job, they're going to like the post.

It's just again, you it's less thinking about what you wanna create and what your brand is about and relating it to like what people need and people like why does inspiration do so well on LinkedIn? People are having a hard time. They're isolated in their homes, away from their family.

And a lot of them are, [00:38:00] don't have a job anymore and don't have benefits coming in either. Reading a post, like I've had people saying basically your posts have saved my life during the pandemic people now more than ever need positivity. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, I totally agree. And I can totally relate.

And especially on LinkedIn, people on LinkedIn are really into like self-improvement and bettering themselves. And that's why that kind of content always works. So in terms of writing the story, you obviously are super talented when it comes to you getting things to go viral or getting people to actually connect with your stories.

So is there like a certain framework or recipe or formula that you have when it comes to creating a good story? 

Shanee Moret: I wouldn't say that I am like amazing at going viral. You just need a few posts to go viral. I will say that. My consistency, like your consistency can lead to your virality. So when you look at like the data, like a lot of posts and a lot of people, like somebody may be posting 30 posts a month and I'm probably posting [00:39:00] 300.

So it's just a matter of time. Like I'm increasing the probability of my post going viral. So that's another thing like people, like they don't break down metrics. They don't know how to break down numbers correctly. And it's if you want to post once a day or once every week, that's fine. But don't expect your percentage of going viral to increase.

Like the more you post and the more you get engagement, the algorithm is in a favor one of your posts to go viral. It's numbers. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. That's pretty eye opening for me because I post one or two times a day and I think that's consistent. How many times a day are you 

Shanee Moret: So it's 

also compound effects.

So like in the beginning you can post once a day and then like maybe after three months rev it up and after nine months rev it up, but like I've never stayed complacent. That's like another thing, like I'll always try and test different things to see what works better. Now I'm posting probably like four or five times a day, depending on the day I'm going live a lot more because, people love when you go alive.

It's you get the realest thing that you can get. It's an unfilled form of [00:40:00] content creation. So 

Hala Taha: Yeah, people love when you go. I get so much engagement if I just go by myself and I'm just like, maybe question I'm here. 

Shanee Moret: Somebody, you could tell somebody these things and then they won't do it. And then they're like, why am I not growing?

And it's you haven't applied to anything that works. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, totally. So we have a question here. From Brenda does going viral result in income from LinkedIn. And it's mostly from leads. It's not like YouTube where they're gonna 

Shanee Moret: oh yeah. You're like, you're not like monetizing it, but it's numbers.

So it, when, if you get a post that is seen by 12 million people, even if .01% of those people are your, quality prospects. If you message them in a certain amount of time, like reply to them and stuff, And you're hyper aware of who's looking at your profile and just stuff like that.

And you could close the deal through a phone call and stuff then. Absolutely. Obviously everybody's skills on the phone and back end development are completely [00:41:00] different. That's another thing like you have to, like I said prior, you have to really take it off of LinkedIn and you have, that's where like sales.

Those types of skills come in 

Hala Taha: Awesome! If anybody has any more questions, please feel free to comment in the chat would love to hear what you guys want to ask. 

Shanee Moret: I know it's like boring. I don't have a secret formula. Like my secret formula is just like consistency and doubling down on what works. Like 

Hala Taha: I don't think that's boring at all.

I think that's real advice. It suggests keep doing what works, look at you. You don't even, you're not even in the HR space, right? So this is a lesson from your book. I need to take. You're not even in the HR space, but you're building your business. By putiing out posts that are related to the HR space because they blow up on LinkedIn and they bring you visibility.

Shanee Moret: And like the text post could be HR. But like when I go live, it's completely different topics. It's more like business focused and entrepreneur focused. Another thing is [00:42:00] like, it's again about numbers. If you're able to attract a hundred thousand people to profile every month or 50,000 or 5,000 or whatever, if you, no matter what you're posting, if your profile is optimized correctly for your target audience, they're gonna reach out and at least be curious as to how you can help them, but without consistency, without being in their feed every single day.

And building that trust and being someone that they remember, it's very difficult for them to reach out. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

You've grown your following so much on LinkedIn. You've got over 600,000 followers. You've got a growing business, med snake media. You've got several businesses, in fact. So what's next for you?

What are you? Do you have any big moves? 

Shanee Moret: Yeah, so I, yeah, moving into 2021 more of my focus will be in growth academy and, we've reached over 30 countries already. We're in two languages and we're expanding into 5 more. So obviously my heart is with the e-learning [00:43:00] space. I love to teach and I love to see other people grow.

So that's gonna be where my focus is. And then, yeah, I have some other things coming up as well, surprised I'm like a surprise person where I just launched something like, no, pre-launch no like,

Hala Taha: You just gonna go with it. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah. I'm just like, Hey guys, I have this, like I did this when they they're like, what. 

Hala Taha: And the last question I ask all my guests is what is your secret to profiting in life 

Shanee Moret: Exceeding expectations, because when you are excellent at whatever, you can have one chance with one customer, but if you exceed their expectations and.

If you give them excellent customer service, they're gonna go tell 10 friends. And then that one chance turns into 10 chances, which could turn into a hundred chances, which can turn into a huge business. So a lot of people, they over promise and under deliver. [00:44:00] So then they're constantly trying to recruit new customers over and over again.

Then retaining ones that they have, and then. If you have very happy customers, they should bring in referrals. They should bring in trust to your brand by giving you recommendations. There's a lot of other things that go into that, but exceeding expectations and doing more. Then what's expected, always going above and beyond.

Hala Taha: I love that. I couldn't agree more giving 110% and everything that you do, they say how you do anything is how you do everything. And I think that's a good gems to always keep by your side. So thank you so much Shanee. I think this was such a great session, so happy that you joined us 

today. 

Shanee Moret: Thank you so much.

I appreciate it. And yeah, like I just really appreciate the time and continue to grow. You'll get to a hundred thousand soon. 

Hala Taha: I hope so. 

Shanee Moret: Yeah, you

will 

Hala Taha: Bye guys 

Shanee Moret: Bye

Hala Taha:  Thanks for listening to young and [00:45:00] profiting podcast. If you enjoyed the show, please write us a review or comment on your favorite platform. Nothing makes us happier than reading your reviews.

We'd love to hear what you think about the show, and don't forget to share this podcast with your friends, family, and on social media. I always repost, reshare and support those who support us. You can find me on Instagram @yapwithhala or LinkedIn, just search for my name. It's Hala Taha. Big, thanks to the YAP team as always.

This is Hala signing off.