Hala Taha: [00:00:00] Hello, my young and profiting family. Welcome back to the show. I'm On Monday, we played part one of my interview with Cal Fussman. And we're going to be playing part two next Monday. Now in part one, we really focused on Cal's story. And in part two, we're going to be focusing on AI. And we're going to get more practical and tactical.

Now, I went on Cal's podcast, the Big Questions podcast, back in May, and I thought this interview would be the perfect bridge between his two part episode. So that's why we're replaying it today. Cal is a writer, journalist, speaker, and an expert interviewer, and I'm so impressed with his interviewing skills.

He's interviewed some of the most powerful people in the world from Muhammad Ali to the to Jeff Bezos. And so you could imagine I was super [00:01:00] excited to get on his podcast because of the legends that preceded me. And I was not disappointed. Cal is such a good interviewer. And he asked me a question that I've never been asked before.

He asked me about my ad reads and how I make them so engaging. And it's so interesting that Cal picked up on this because it's something that I'm really well known for. in my podcast industry, but it's just not something the average person would know about me because it's not something I share,

and he said when I do my commercials, it actually sounds like I'm so in love with my products that it feels like I'm doing the commercials for free.

Now, I felt really happy that he said that because I own a podcast network.

 and so I'm often asked to talk to brands about how podcasters can improve their reads and stuff like that, and it's something I'm really passionate about, and it's sort of like a hidden talent.

So it was just really fun to talk about it. I also loved how Cal was so genuinely curious about the stuff that he wanted to learn.

He's trying to get better on social [00:02:00] media. So we talked a lot about that. I explained the interest graph, which I had recently learned from Gary V, which is basically this new algorithm that all the social media platforms are using, where basically they're feeding you content that you're. interested in not necessarily the most viral content out there.

It's based on your interests, not what is popular. And we also talked about why you have to stick to the same topics. If you want to build a magnetic brand and a strong online presence, we went through all of my best practice branding tips, and then we spoke about AI, something that Cal is passionate about and what we're actually talking to Cal about.

next week. He is an AI expert and he's totally absorbed himself in the AI world. And we talked about how we use AI at Yap Media, what I feel the future of AI might look like for podcasters. But believe me, this episode is not just for podcasters. There's so much to learn if you're growing your business or trying to build your personal brand.

I think you [00:03:00] guys are going to love it. So let's get into my episode on the Big Questions podcast hosted by Cal Fussman.

Cal Fussman: I automatically have a feeling of trust for you because we both trust and have been trusted. Find somebody we both know. 

Hala Taha: Yep. 

Cal Fussman: And then we were starting to talk. I told you how I met Heather Monaghan and you said, Oh, she was my first client. How did that come about? 

Hala Taha: Mmm.

I love this. So, when I first started my podcast, this was six years ago. Heather came on for episode 50, so I was probably doing it for a little bit over a year. My podcast was growing really big. And at the time, I had grown my LinkedIn following and I was very innovative. I had a team of 20 volunteers helping me with my podcast so that I could work a full time job.

And I was this, you You know, [00:04:00] marketing guru who knew how to audio edit, video edit, social media, graphic design. And I would teach all these interns to do it for me. And so we had really cool videos before having cool videos for a podcast was a thing and Heather had a podcast. So she, after the interview was like, Hey, Holla, I see the amazing videos that you're doing on LinkedIn and your, your, your team is doing such a great job.

Can you do this for me? Um, And I was like, no, I'm so sorry. Uh, I have a team of volunteers. I was working at Disney at the time. And I was like, I just have a team of volunteers. This is just a hobby. They help me so that I can just like keep my job, corporate job. And this is just a hobby. We can't help you.

They're busy with my show. Heather didn't leave me alone about it. And she kept commenting me on LinkedIn. Like, Holly, you got to tell me how, at least how you do these videos. And so I looked up as Heather's, um, like probably like. 10, 12 years older than me, 15 years older than me. And I looked up to her as somebody who I'd want to be like when I'm older.

And so I decided, okay, let's have like a mentor [00:05:00] mentee relationship and how about on Saturdays, I'll teach you how to make these videos. And so I started coordinating these calls on Saturdays with her. And then she got on our first call. And, uh, I showed her my drive, how I do everything, our templates, our Slack channel.

And she goes, Hala, I just had a call with VaynerMedia. Your stuff is 10 times better than them. You have a company, you have an agency, you have a team. I want to be your first client. You can't tell me no. I'm not doing these videos on my own. I want you to do them for me. And I said, all right, I'll give it a shot.

It was COVID. I had a little bit more time. I was like, okay, I'll give it a shot. And so she ended up paying us. A small amount to do her videos and it turned into us taking over her LinkedIn profile, her whole podcast. And then, my second client ever was a billionaire and because I had started it off with Heather and created all these processes, then I pitched this billionaire a 30K retainer to do his LinkedIn, and he [00:06:00] said yes.

And my second client was 30, 000 a month, thanks to Heather Monahan. 

Cal Fussman: Amazing. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: Amazing. 

Hala Taha: She helped kick off my whole company. She pushed me, she also was the one that helped me quit my job because it took me six months to quit Disney and I was already making over a hundred grand a month. I had 30 employees around the world and she, I remember her, she was in the grocery store yelling at me.

To quit my job. And like you, she was like, you gotta make the leap, you're, you've got something huge. And she, and because of her I quit my job and then my company really took off after I quit my job. So I love Heather. She's one of my closest friends. She's still my mentor and she's the best. 

Cal Fussman: So you mentored your mentor.

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: I know what that's like because Heather screamed at me too. 

Hala Taha: Mm hmm. 

Cal Fussman: And she screams with the best of intentions. 

Hala Taha: Mm hmm. 

Cal Fussman: It like truly outrages her when she sees somebody with potential not getting the most out of it. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, and she gave me the confidence to, to do it. [00:07:00] 

Cal Fussman: Okay. So we're going to take a little time out here and, and backtrack.

Hala Taha: Sure. 

Cal Fussman: You got a great name. Where, where did you get your name? What, like, are you named after somebody like, uh, an exotic bird? What, where does it come from?

Hala Taha: So I'm actually a hundred percent Palestinian and my name in Arabic is pronounced Hella, but in English, everybody calls me Hala. It's Hala Taha. Um, and so it actually means welcome in Arabic.

It's a pretty pop. There's actually. A hundred people named Halataha in the world. It's pretty funny. For a while, it was hard to rank on search because there were so many Halatahas, but now I've outranked everybody, but yeah, it means welcome in Arabic. 

Cal Fussman: All right. So you were born with the name Welcome and where'd you grow up?

Hala Taha: I grew up in New Jersey and Central Jersey, a town called Wachung. 

Cal Fussman: I have driven through New Jersey many times, but I've never heard of this town. What's, what's it look like? 

Hala Taha: So it is, it's a really nice. [00:08:00] I would say it's a upper middle class town. You know, when I was growing up, I was one of the only brown kids in school.

So that was pretty challenging growing up. But yeah, it's mostly this like upper class town, big houses, big yards, and great school system. 

Cal Fussman: Okay. So, and even in a place that was kind of upper class or upper middle class, it was a little difficult to have different colored skin. And this is what? 

Hala Taha: Oh yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: This is late. This is 90s or so you're growing up. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, exactly It was difficult. Um 9 11 happened when I was in high school 

Cal Fussman: Wow, what did that do? 

Hala Taha: That was the big turning point because before then I feel like we were treated just sort of We were really accepted in the community. My dad's a doctor and we were, like, well off and my mom used to always help out with the PTA and whatever.

And I had three older siblings. And so we were pretty accepted in the community. But after 9 11, things drastically [00:09:00] shifted. So before that, I was, you know, getting the lead in all the school plays. I was, like, on the soccer team and, you know, just. A normal kid that was getting opportunities, after 9 11, it was way different.

They wouldn't even let me in the talent show. I had the best voice in school. What? And they wouldn't even let me perform in the talent show. Yeah. Yeah, I got, like, so, it, it happened to be that in, in high school, I didn't get any opportunities. It was, it was, and I ended up, like, my friend group changed, I was just really only friends with, like, all the immigrant kids, kind of, and, um, that actually turned out to be a blessing in disguise because I got used to rejection early on, and then by the time I got to college, I went to a very diverse school in Newark, New Jersey, because I couldn't get anywhere else because I had no extracurricular activities.

Not because I wanted to, but because I was never really accepted into any of the programs that I tried to do in high school, I ended up doing really well in college because suddenly I was [00:10:00] just treated fairly and I had the confidence and no fear of rejection because I just was rejected for like three years in a row before that.

So I always, I look at everything as like silver lining, you know. 

Cal Fussman: I'm just thinking you'd go out for the soccer team and they would just say, no, you don't make it. You show up to audition for the play. Nope. Sorry. Somebody else got the part over and over again, 

Hala Taha: over and over again. And it's, it's, it's when you, when you look at, Singing is the thing where I know for a fact that I was discriminated against because previous to that, I was literally like always the lead of the school plays.

My chorus teacher, thank God, was always still nice to me and so I always had a solo in the chorus concert throughout those years anyway because I, I literally had the best voice in school. It was an obvious thing. So for a fact, I knew that like the teachers that were running the plays and the talent shows, they were definitely discriminating against me.

Um, but. Who cares about them? 

Cal Fussman: I, I, I wonder if they [00:11:00] are like listening to your podcast now and thinking. Oh man, we got her wrong. 

Hala Taha: Oh, for sure. For sure. 

Cal Fussman: Okay, so you go to college. What's the name of the school? 

Hala Taha: New Jersey Institute of Technology. 

Cal Fussman: And were you a good math student? 

Hala Taha: No. No. 

Cal Fussman: Wild technology. 

Hala Taha: I know so well.

I was originally going there to do chemistry, because I wanted to make makeup. And then I, I ended up really focusing to, to my point of me struggling in high school to do fun extracurricular activities. Because once I got into college, I was captain of the cheerleading team. I was leading all the plays. I, I was getting all these opportunities.

I was Bye! president of the radio club. And, you know, I did like all these different things on my sorority. And I just stopped going to class. I didn't care about school. And I was [00:12:00] focused on everything else but school because I didn't get these opportunities in high school. And I'm the type of person who loves like real world experience.

So what happened was, is that I got an internship at Hot 97 when I was 19. It was the number one hip hop and radio station. And I ended up dropping out of school so that I could do this radio internship basically full time and be Angie Martinez's assistant. And that's what I did for three years, basically.

And so I ended up dropping out of school and going back. But because I wasn't really doing good in school to begin with, my GPA was really terrible and I was basically failing out of all my classes because all I cared about were these other things because I didn't get to do that in high school. In hindsight, I've realized that.

Cal Fussman: I'm loving this because I, when I was in college, it was pretty much the same thing. I never went to class. I wanted to be like a newspaper columnist and so I just was devoted to writing for newspapers at the [00:13:00] end. It actually focuses you in a way that most people don't get. And yet, at the same time, I've discovered that when I look back now, I had wished I had spent time in college maybe learning four or five languages.

I had a choice between writing about sports, which I loved, Or computers were coming of age. My dad worked for IBM. I could have gone in that direction. I could have watched Star Trek. I could have been enamored with that whole science fiction world. And I pushed it aside. And only now, decades later, am I realizing, oh man, in this age of AI, It would be really helpful if I knew what was going on in Star Trek back in the 60s because [00:14:00] it seems like everything that was on people's minds or the creators minds is now coming to fruition.

And I heard this on your last podcast with Stephen Wolfram. It was clear. People were thinking of these things, they just couldn't figure out how to do it. 

Hala Taha: Yeah, basically they, that's how everything is, basically movies predict the future, essentially, and we're manifesting our future. We kind of envision what it could be like, and then slowly we're putting the puzzles together, the puzzle pieces together to figure out how to actually execute that vision.

Cal Fussman: So you're in college, you leave, take this internship, and it sounds like good. Taking on all these tools, you're able to speak because of the radio, you're also have some video tools that you can use. Was this also at like the very start of social media so that you [00:15:00] were in on it right when it was in front of everybody?

Hala Taha: Exactly. So this was probably around 2009 when I first got the internship at Hot 97. So like blogs were super hot, Twitter was super hot. And so I really learned how to do those two things really well because at the radio station, I essentially was a full time employee. I wasn't getting paid, but I had to go there every day from nine to five and I was not getting a dollar.

And I did that for two and a half, three years where I worked for free at the station. And I would make my money selling hip hop showcase tickets at night and hosting parties with the DJs and hosting events with the DJs. And on the side of everything, I, there was like an Opportunity Set A and an Opportunity Set B, so Opportunity Set A is basically my day job.

where I would run the Dilette boards, I'd answer phones, the commercials, uh, do the research for Angie Martinez, I would meet all these celebrities, [00:16:00] and, um, really there was only like 10 people allowed in the studio area, and I was like the queen intern basically, teaching all the other interns, and I was basically being primed to be the next Angie Martinez, which is, she's the voice of New York, she's a huge on air personality.

And in Ready, you basically have to pay your dues and many of the online personalities work for free for five to seven years before they actually get airtime. Um, they had me doing commercials for, for the air and so on. And then on the side, I was doing Opportunity Set B stuff. So that was, Running hip hop showcases, hosting showcases.

I had online radio shows with the up and coming DJs on the side where I'd like interview up and coming artists or even really famous artists. It was the precursor to podcasts and even some of these shows were on podcasts. like on Apple technically, but nobody was listening to podcasts at the time. And online studios basically were, it would be like, you know, go to alistradio.

net. I'm going to be live Wednesdays from two to three, check us [00:17:00] out. And then there'd be like a recording and it was like sort of on demand, but it was just like a video recording that you could go to on a website. So it was the precursor to podcasts. And I had. four or five shows like that before I actually started my podcast, Young and Profiting.

So I was really doing podcast stuff before podcasting was really a thing. And I was also blogging for Funkmaster Flex and DJ Enough. And so I learned how to blog. And then, uh, eventually it came to a head where You know, all my siblings were in med school and I was this black sheep interning for free college dropout at a radio station.

And I started talking to Angie and Ebro and, and trying to ask for a job and just saying like, hey, I need to at least get paid minimum wage. Like I'm doing a great job. I'm here every day. Um, And it was totally illegal that I was working for free and they knew that. And so things got a little bit sticky and somebody got, uh, there was an open role for a producer.

[00:18:00] And it was actually my friend who I used to do online radio shows with and he worked in the video department and they ended up giving it to him and they wanted me to come in and train him. 

Cal Fussman: Oh, man. 

Hala Taha: And he was my, yeah, and he was my, and he was one of my close friends and so I was really upset and I remember texting him in the morning and I was like crying and I was like, Hey, I don't feel like coming into work today.

I'm not feeling good. If you want to learn how to be the producer, learn how to do it on your own. And then he showed that text to Angie, Angie got really mad at me because I think like Jay Z was coming in that day and I like. She needed me, you know, and so she was just like, she fired me. She, and she, she cut my key card.

She, she told me never come back. This is a lady I dropped out of school for. I used to babysit her kids. She never even gave me 20. And I, I, I used to like do everything for her. She never gave me a dollar and she fired me. And she told me not only that, she told everybody, if you talk to Hala, you're going to [00:19:00] be fired.

Cause I used to work with everybody, I used to do shows with everybody, I would host like, like showcases with them and she fired me and blackballed me. And so I was like devastated. At the time, I was like growing my Twitter following, my whole, uh, identity was tied to Hot 97. Every, all my friends from college knew that I was like Hala from Hot 97, like my identity was literally Hot 97's Hala, like that was my identity.

So I felt like, like somebody died and I was devastated. You know, then I, I just had a new idea. I got fired on a Thursday. By Sunday, I was like, all right, I'm going to start this thing called the sorority of hip hop. I'm going to recruit all these other girls that are in the hip hop industry that aren't getting any opportunities.

And I went on Twitter and Craigslist and I put out solicits like, Hey, if you want to learn how to blog, if you're a pretty girl in the hip hop industry, Come work for me. I'll teach you how to do everything and let's start this new movement. And, and we did, I, I recruited 14 girls in two weeks. [00:20:00] We started something called the sorority of hip hop, strawberry blunt.

com. We were bad girls back then. And, um, The, it blew up. I went back to school within three months. We were one of the most popular hip hop and R& B sites in the world. The same DJs like Angie Martinez called me up and apologized. She tried to get me on Love Hip Hop. She got me an opportunity on Sirius XM after that.

And she made up with me. All the DJs that wouldn't pay me minimum wage basically started inviting me and my girls. Cause I had 50 bloggers. At any given time when I had sorority of hip hop to start hosting their parties. And then suddenly I was everybody's peer. I wasn't anybody's intern anymore. And I'd be on the flyers with all the DJs hosting all these parties.

And, uh, MTV actually reached out to us three months into it to shoot a reality show. It didn't pan out and then a couple years later they reached back out and for a whole summer mtv was basically filming us Going to events hosting concerts. [00:21:00] We had our own radio show the strawberry blunt girls and um Two weeks before that was supposed to air they pulled the plug.

So that was like my second like big devastation. And then at that point, I was basically working for free for six years, I had gained so much skills because I figured out we could talk about it. If you want, I figured out how to hack Twitter. I figured out how to hack blogs like I had learned so much. But then I I felt like, man, I I'm, you know, 27 years old at the time, I've never had a real job, technically, I'm like leading this group of 50 girls and like, we can barely make ends meet.

And I decided to just shut everything down. And I was like, I'm just going to go get my MBA, I'm going to be normal, I'm going to go into corporate and I am not cut out to be a star. Obviously I failed. And I, I basically, I just gave up about being a personality and I went to corporate and at that point, I got my MBA and I went [00:22:00] to work in corporate at Hewlett Packard and I'll just pause there because I know I just went over a lot.

Cal Fussman: I just want to backtrack a little because one of the things I love about your podcast. is the commercials. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: The way you do the commercials, like, it's like you are in love with your pro It's almost as if you would do it for free, which I guarantee you, you're not. It feels like you're doing it for free.

And I'm wondering, when you went into that radio station for the first time, and you mentioned commercials. Did you feel when you express the words came out of your mouth talking about these products [00:23:00] that, Oh, this is my calling. Or was it just like many of the other things that you were assembling as tools to put in your backpack and take with you on your journey?

Hala Taha: This is so interesting, and nobody has ever asked me this question, and now that I think about it, I've been reading commercials for literally 20 years now, like, you know, like, so it's so, it's so interesting to think about how much experience I actually have reading commercials, right? So it's so cool that you mentioned that.

When I first started my internship at Hot 97, like I told you, I was a singer. I was making music and writing music and my reason for being at the station and even applying to radio stations was because I was pushing my music to the DJs. And my original goal was to be a famous singer. And so I was writing music, I was recording music, I was working with all these famous music producers.

And then as I saw what Angie was doing, and I was really good at doing research and really good at, [00:24:00] at, at doing these questions, as I started hosting my own shows, I realized that like, I was really good at being an on air personality. And I fell in love with that. And I also fell in love with the fact that it felt safer.

I was getting myself in a lot of trouble trying to be an artist. There was a lot of. guys that were trying to like, you know, like I was a young, really young girl, 19 years old, like in like the midst of literally the, the, the pinnacle of the hip hop industry. And I was really cute and whatever. And I was getting myself in trouble trying to be a singer, to be honest, we don't have to go into the details, but I felt like I was getting in a lot of trouble or not.

It was just unsafe. It felt unsafe. So the on air personality felt like a safe way to use my voice in my career. And I went that route. 

Cal Fussman: Okay. So, like, when you talk about Indeed. com. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: I get it. You're hiring people and they're helping you. How, like, how good is Indeed. com? I [00:25:00] mean, how, this, this podcast is about trust.

Yeah. Like, what makes them so good? 

Hala Taha: Yeah, I mean, I use Indeed for my own hiring and I make sure that whatever I rep is actually a tool that I use. So I've been personally using Indeed to get jobs, for example, since I was in college. I've been using Indeed from the other side as, as an employee trying to get a job.

I first used Indeed that way, and then now as an employer, we use it to get candidates for our company. Um, and so Indeed, in my opinion, is really great, but I think it's more of me understanding how to communicate the benefits of a tool. And also making sure that my integrity is in line with what I'm selling.

So I'm not going to go tell, like for example, I really don't like to talk about like vitamins or supplements and things like that because if I don't use it and I can't use every supplement in the world, right, [00:26:00] that's inauthentic, then I'm not going to talk about it on my podcast. But I do love to talk about the different business softwares that we actually use.

And it gives me a great way to give my personal experience with that tool in my, in my ad read. 

Cal Fussman: When you're doing your advertisements, is it different than just speaking or interviewing somebody or speaking about a topic? Is there some magical place that you go into or is it all the same to you? 

Hala Taha: It's definitely different.

I definitely feel like my commercials, because I'm always interviewing other people, I actually use my commercial time as a way for my listeners to get to know me. So I love to talk about my personal stories, I love to be funny, I love to make it interesting, and to be honest, I was, it's so funny that you're bringing this up.

Today, I literally wrote my Slack channel, Yahoo Finance. I did a read for Yahoo Finance. And I'm always getting featured [00:27:00] as like A plus ad reads, like Oxford Road, which is an agency is always putting me in their newsletter as like ad read of the week or whatever, because I do a really good job with ad reads.

And a lot of people know me for that. And some sponsors keep me on, not necessarily because I convert, but because I've got the best ad. Ad reads, right? And, uh, I get a lot of renewals because I have such good ad reads. And I remember my Slack channel today, I actually told my team members, because they said Yahoo Finance, I gave really good feedback and said they're going to start using your ad as an example for other people because you did such a great job.

You didn't follow the script. You gave your own personal experience. And I said, I might be a better ad reader than I am a podcaster. And everybody started laughing. 

Cal Fussman: You know what? I, and this is no commentary. Your podcast is wonderful. But there is, there is something about the way you read your ads that is magical.

Hala Taha: Yeah. 

Cal Fussman: And, and I'm [00:28:00] getting it because what you're telling me is this is your way of showing your audience who you are. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. And, and you know what? I bear, I have, I own a podcast network. I don't know if you know that. I have the number one business and self improvement podcast network. So Jenna Kutcher's on my network, Amy Porterfield, Trent Shelton, John Lee Dumas, like I, and Heather is in my network.

So I get people's sponsorships. That's my thing. And I'm always sold out because I own a network. And that means that I have. Five or six commercials on every show. And you want to know what? I've probably only gotten three complaints in the last six years about how many ads I have on my show. 

Cal Fussman: That's amazing, because the show is packed with advertisements.

Hala Taha: Yeah, nobody complains, because I think it's entertaining, right? 

Cal Fussman: Yeah, it really hit me, because my mindset is completely the opposite. Like, for years, I would have, like, no sponsors. Just to keep it [00:29:00] to the, we're having a conversation here, you get the conversation, but listening to your podcast, it really said, you got to think differently, Cal.

And I didn't know what it was until you just told me, but I never thought of getting people to. See who I really am through commercials. 

Hala Taha: I tell stories about my boyfriend. I'll tell stories about my family. I'll tell stories about my employees and it's just a way for them to get to know me better and feel connected.

And it's also really good for the brand because podcasts, because you're listening to the host all the time, the listeners feel like you're an old friend. They, they feel like they can trust you. They know your voice. They know your stories. And I feel like I really do a good job of bridging that gap, both giving the actual benefits of the tools.

Like, I'm a marketer at heart. So anybody giving me talk, like, I'm a really good marketer. So anybody giving me talk points, I don't even look at [00:30:00] that. I go on their website, I go and look at what I want to talk about and I say whatever the mandatory call to action is and the brands always like, like that more because I actually go in, make sure I know what to do, make sure I want to talk about the things that I think is relevant for my listeners.

I don't even look at the talk points that they give me. I make my own ad read and I just read the call to action almost every time. So they really like it and I think it's as obvious to my listeners that I'm not just reading a script and I'm telling them a story. 

Cal Fussman: Now 

I'm starting to really put the pieces together here.

Okay. So you're developing all of these different social media skills and you got your own network. Does artificial intelligence give you pause? Is it, is it cautionary for you? Cause it's like, You're, you're age, you came of age right when [00:31:00] social media was blossoming, now something else is coming and it's coming fast.

Is that concerning to you that whoa, whoa, whoa, I may be just overwhelmed by a tidal wave or do you feel Like, you're surfing that wave as we speak. 

Hala Taha: I feel like we're surfing that wave. So, for example, I already have an AI version of my voice that is ready to go. And we're actually already using it on social media.

So, I have an AI voice that my team writes a script and, and, and has a voice model. And for my reels, it's not actually me talking, it's the AI voice. And that means that if I get sick, if, if, you know, I have a cold or whatever, My team or me, I can write a commercial and my AI voice model can do it. Or if I, if I can't make an intro cause I do my intros post recording, I can have an AI do it.

We're also using that potentially. We're not, we don't want, here's the thing, [00:32:00] host reads have to be authentic and it has to be the real person, but it's good cause. As you know, when you're sick, you still got to record your commercials, right? So it's a good thing as like a fail safe. And then also for, um, other podcasters to use as examples.

So for example, when we're booking deals with these advertisers, some of them really want to do back and forth, back and forth where you send them a read and then they want, They want to revise it and you send them another read and they want to revise it this way. 

I can say, 

Cal Fussman: Oh man, you don't have to do anything.

Hala Taha: Yeah. Write it and AI will do it. I can also see programmatic ads changing in the future where instead of prerecorded ads that like, let's say Ford records a prerecorded ad and then it gets flighted automatically in your podcast. That's what a programmatic ad is, right? Instead of a host reading the ad, it's just some recording.

Of a commercial that go, that inserts into the podcast. Now there could be a hybrid version. Where it's all [00:33:00] automated, but you use the AI voice generated model of the host voice and then the advertiser just writes it and the host doesn't actually have to be involved, but it reads as if it's going to hear, like the listener is going to hear it as if it's the host.

So I can see that happening in the future. But anyway, I think AI is awesome for podcasts. It helps with transcripts. It helps with editing. It helps with creating the video clips. It just helps enhance everything. And I. I do think in the future we might have competition with AI hosts and things like that, but I think we're way far away from that.

And I actually think that podcasts are going to become more, uh, like AR, VR centric and kind of evolve as well. 

Cal Fussman: AR, VR, what, what's AR, VR? 

Hala Taha: So, like, basically, I think that podcasts are gonna become more of, like, a virtual reality thing where listeners might be able to, like, join a host and the guest, like, in a room.

And it will be more, more of, [00:34:00] like, um, an immersive experience. 

Cal Fussman: You know, here, here's the thing. And, and your last guest that I referenced, Stephen Wolfram, who basically came from the day where they first started to think about artificial intelligence.

And I noticed in the conversation, there were so many times Where he was saying something good that was about to happen, or that might happen, and then he would say something in order of, uh The problem is, and, and there was always a problem, I was, I saw on the internet an influencer, I think she had like 10, 000 followers, wasn't that much.

But somebody in China, basically using AI, hijacked her voice, hijacked her face, and was putting out, like, content in China and getting people to respond to [00:35:00] her as if she was the influencer. Does this bring butterflies to your stomach, or do you think we're going to be able to sidestep these problems.

Hala Taha: It's scary because that could really happen, right? Somebody can take over your identity. That was happening before AI though, you know, all these like fake, for example, like before I was verified on Instagram and it took me forever to get verified. Uh, that's a whole nother story. It's because I'm Palestinian, right?

They wouldn't verify me. And I had so many fake profiles for years. They would always be popping up. Because people knew I wasn't verified and they would try to scam people off my name. And so this was happening, this is happening before AI. People trying to, uh, you know, pretend to be somebody else on social media.

So I feel like they're just gonna, we're gonna need to figure out ways to like verify whether it's a human or AI in the same way that they did it in the past too. So I feel like these are problems that feel like they'll, they're [00:36:00] solvable because they were already happening in the past. 

Cal Fussman: I always felt like a big mistake was made at the beginning of the creation of the internet that everybody should who wanted to go on the internet should have been issued a license like a driver's license and you don't get to I you don't get to threaten somebody and hide if you're going to threaten somebody everybody's going to know who you are Uh, and in, in some, for, I don't know what the reasons were, they just allow this anonymity to prevail.

And now we can be in a place where we just don't know where an attack is coming from. You know, a lot of people, I say younger, cause I'm a little older. They just seem to accept, well this, this is [00:37:00] the price of the internet. Uh, Yeah. There is no privacy. This, you want the good things, then take the bad. Is, is that pretty much your way of thinking?

Hala Taha: Yeah, I feel like, I hope that we can find ways to navigate this. You know, it's scary. Nobody wants to be scammed. I've been scammed before, right? There, there's a lot of sketchy things happening on the internet, but at the same time, there's so many great things happening on the internet and there's so much access to information and access to tools and it's easier than ever to become an entrepreneur and you have all these resources at your fingertips that I feel like the benefits definitely outweigh the negatives.

But to your point with AI, it's going to get even worse. Especially with somebody like me, there's so much voice content of mine, that when AI started to come out, I created a secret code word with my family. And I was like, hey guys, if anybody ever, because there were some scams happening where, with podcasters especially, where people were calling up family members and pretend, [00:38:00] uh, would be able to like use my voice and, and act as if I was in trouble and I needed money or something like this.

And so now we have a code word if that ever happens. So I feel like people just need to wise up and understand that like, this is coming. There's nothing we can do to prevent it. And if you've got a lot of content out there, you need to think about ways that you can mitigate bad things from happening or people stealing your identity.

Um, so me and you are in trouble. We got too much content out there. 

Cal Fussman: Oh 

 do you trust the future? 

Hala Taha: Yeah. I'm excited for the future. You know what? I think Steve, I'm not sure if Steven was the one that told me this. I think he was. He made the analogy that let's say AI becomes like apex intelligence, smartest thing in the world.

It's already like smarter than most humans, right? At one point, AI might be operating on its own, like there might not be anything telling [00:39:00] AI what to do, and AI might be making decisions on its own, operating on its own. And he made the analogy that that's just like nature. I was like, aren't you worried that this is going to just take over the world and control us?

And he's like, well, we already live in a world that we don't control. We already live in nature and we can predict it and we can analyze it. But at the end of the day, we have. no idea what it's really going to do. And we can't control it. And one day that might be what AI is like, just some other phenomenon that we created that operates on its own.

And we live in the same world, and we are going to have to figure out how to navigate it. Now that's a little bit scary, but it's A little bit more comforting than to think that AI is going to come kill us all or, and you know, not be able to live with us. Maybe it might be something that is good for humanity where like, let's, maybe they'll stop wars and [00:40:00] get involved or, you know, maybe AI will end up being good.

You know, or neutral, at least, and just operate in its own thing, just like nature does. So, eased my mind a little bit when I thought about it that way, to be honest, and I've been thinking about that, what he told me a lot in regards to the nature piece. 

Cal Fussman: Yeah, it was, it was actually a great description of it, and if, you know, the, the way he explained it, and the way I've heard it from a lot of people, it's really Not like a brain, look, it's taught itself how to do this, but really it's had a lot of information dumped inside a whole like fertilizer and it is just Figuring out like on chat GPT.

Okay, as Your guest said every time you see a sentence It goes like the cat was sitting on the it just can [00:41:00] quickly access how many times? You That sentence has ever been done before and know what the probability of the best word that's going to come after it. My, my thoughts are. That this actually, it's basically telling us what we did in our past, and I don't know how good that is, especially in art form for the future, because you're just going back and saying, look, this is how Rocky 1 was done, this is how Rocky 2 was done, this is how Rocky 3 was done, we're on Rocky 38 now, So, create your characters and do it this way, and I just wonder about a loss of creativity in this time.

Do you, do you see that? 

Hala Taha: I totally agree. I think that's where humans are going to shine. I think humans are going to shine with being creative. I feel like we're going to be able to, I feel like AI doesn't have [00:42:00] nuance, right? And I think Steven was talking about how, like, humans, like, think, like, quickly and, and we don't, like, they almost can't, they almost don't know, like, how our, our brain exactly works.

Like, there's, like, chemical reactions going on and, and things like that, where, like, AI doesn't have that. We've got, like, millions of years of evolution of chemical reactions going on in our brains to help us decide things or, or think about things differently. Um, Whereas the AI is going to be more structured because it's engineered, it's not biological, you know, it's, it's, it's something that we're engineering.

So I feel like to your point, I think humans are going to maintain with the creativity and maybe be able to innovate and leverage AI to help us with all the stuff that we don't necessarily want to do anymore or want to compute ourselves anymore. 

Cal Fussman: Well, it takes me to one last area that I'm very curious about, and that is like social [00:43:00] media, which you jumped on as soon as it came out and it hit you at the right time.

Um, I came from like two generations back and it was very, I made it foreign and that it was a foolish thing to do. My mind stayed back in the old days of print journalism and. I was able to get away with it because I did it really well and there was a market for it. It was kind of like being on a bridge that was burning in a movie, and like, you gotta get to the other side or else you're going down.

And, you know, I'm realizing, okay, especially with what's coming, if you're not completely understanding the way The internet works and social media works and the way AI is going to work. You're really going to be left [00:44:00] behind. So what, what do you recommend for somebody like me? And you're, you're in a, we're in a Heather Monaghan moment here.

Same way Heather was telling me. You're gonna go into that hotel, and you're gonna ask for an upgrade, and you're gonna get an upgrade, Cal. You understand me? And you can yell at me if you want. You can be like Heather. What would you tell me to do in order to Zoom ahead on the things that I should have known like years ago, like, how would I, how would I go about it?

How would I educate myself? I'm going to go back and watch all the old episodes of Star Trek to understand what people were thinking in the 60s, to understand what kind of fueled the whole AI because it was these ideas that were then, they were executed, they were, they were Like nature, they were turned into fruition.

[00:45:00] What do I, how do I got to think? How, what, where do I start? Like, LinkedIn, Instagram, I, Let me know. 

Hala Taha: Let me ask you something. Are you on any social media channels strongly right now? What is your strongest channels right now? 

Cal Fussman: I think I just started on LinkedIn and uh, it actually surprised me because I, I am writing in an older school way.

I'm not putting out listicles and people respond to it like, wow, great story. Like thanks for that. But I'm not doing the things. That either a young person or somebody who grew up with this in their DNA is doing. 

Hala Taha: So are you on Instagram? 

Cal Fussman: I'm there. 

I have to jump back on it. And I, I had an idea. Let me know what you think of this.

Uh, what I wanted to do is, and I said, I'm going to do this for myself. I'm going to every day, [00:46:00] just in one minute, describe what's going on with artificial intelligence. Something new that came up today. And just. You're going to post it and there's no call to action there. They're not selling anything, which you'd probably say, hey, throw a commercial in there.

What I would be able to do 25 years from now, if I kept that up every day is look back and I'd be able to see a whole staircase, which I've never really done with anything before. What do you think of that? And how would you translate it? into something you would do. 

Hala Taha: Yeah. So I think focusing on one topic is great because the new trend with all these social media algorithms is having interest relevancy.

Okay. So in the past, social media used to be about engagement and popularity and virality. And essentially, you had [00:47:00] followers. And your followers would see your content, right? It was basically like having an email list, right? And maybe 20 or 30 percent of your following would see your content based on when they were logging on and when you posted.

And they would basically match, uh, sending users content based on the engagement probability of them interacting with that content. And they would. They really focus on just virality, which means that in the past, uh, really like inspirational, motivational content used to always go viral. Now, all these algorithms, it's, it's with TikTok especially started it.

They try to feed you things that you're interested in instead of most viral things or the most recent things. They try to feed you things that you're interested in. So as you're approaching all these social media sites, You want to think about the different topics you're going to continuously talk about.

So that you can be an expert in these topics, and these social media sites can identify you as an expert. Uh, you've got to [00:48:00] have keywords of these topics, and hashtags depending on the platform, on your posts. And you need to start establishing yourself as an expert on those, this top, these topics so that the social media sites can start serving the people who are searching for those topics and engaged with other profiles that talk about those topics.

They'll start serving that content to them. So really you should be thinking about your social media more as like what topics am I going to own and not just one topic because things are different now. You can, you can own three topics, four topics. So what are the topics that I'm going to always talk about and brand myself about and consistently post about so that these algorithms know how to match me to other users that want that content?

The other thing is that you've got to think about is like every social post now like operates as its own thing, right? So it's like, like more and more now, everything is more like YouTube where like one video can pop off and get millions of views. views, right? So like, for example, I [00:49:00] had a reel the other day that got like 2 million views.

Most of my reels got like 70, 000, 50, 000, right? This one got 2 million, because everything's just operating on its own. It's that one struck a chord, you know, and went viral. So you got to think about how every single like post kind of can just Operate on its own. 

Cal Fussman: Okay. 

Hala Taha: If that makes sense. 

Cal Fussman: So, I think I'm getting it, but let me focus this, this is great advice, I'm very appreciative.

So like the things I want to focus in on are authentic human connection in the age of AI. Because my, my feeling is with the more and more AI This keeps developing, the more important the connections, authentic connections are going to be, because you trust your authentic connections, and it would be great to think that AI is going to always be good, but as your last [00:50:00] guest said many times, the problem is, and it was created by humans, and humans aren't good all the time.

So, I think, basically, the way to maintain trust is just to be connected to as many people that you can trust. And you're putting yourself in the healthiest situation. So those two, along with my ability to tell a story, those are the three things that I would focus on. 

Hala Taha: And here's the thing. What I want you to realize is that when you're being more topical focused, you are going to be repetitive.

Okay? So if you go on, if you go look at people's Instagrams who are doing really, really well right now, and you go look at their reels, they're often posting very similar reels. That almost say the same thing because they know that these reels are operating on their own, right? They're going to, different people are going to see the different reels and if one reel went viral, you [00:51:00] want to just replicate that almost like very similarly to just try to go viral again.

Right? And so that's why you see on these pages, these people posting very similar content, and almost repeating themselves. Once something goes viral, they're going to want to do it again and again and again in different million different ways, right? So that's one thing. But aside from the content, so Having good content and good focus and being repetitive when something goes well is really, really smart and really important to win in these like in the interest graph algorithms.

That's what they call it right in this age of interest graph algorithms. The other thing that you need to think about is like every platform is different, right? So every platform has features they're prioritizing. Every platform has different publishing and engagement strategies that you need to think about.

Every platform has different like organic reach. So for example, LinkedIn is still like completely hackable, right? I, I'm the, I have the number one LinkedIn marketing agency. I run Heather's account. I'm a huge LinkedIn [00:52:00] influencer. I run a lot of influencer accounts. And it's completely hackable still, um, because they haven't fully transitioned to this interest relevancy model, first of all.

And second of all, because there's so many different publishing strategies that you can do to manipulate the algorithm. Uh, and every social media site is the same. I figured out LinkedIn, so I know that it's hackable, right? If you understand how to publish things in a certain way, you will get 10x further than if you publish things in the wrong way.

Cal Fussman: Wow. 

Hala Taha: Okay? So, so for example. When you publish something up on LinkedIn, and let's say, uh, you put a link in the caption, all right? 

Cal Fussman: Right. 

Hala Taha: LinkedIn wants to keep people on LinkedIn for as long as possible. You put a link in the caption, you're taking users off platform, LinkedIn's gonna deprioritize your post.

That's one example. Another example is like LinkedIn has spam filters. So, if you have typos, if you have big, chunky [00:53:00] paragraphs. If you are tagging more than five people, if you're using more than five hashtags, LinkedIn is going to put you in the spam filter and deprioritize your post. Uh, another example is, you know, after you post something up, LinkedIn is judging how fast people are engaging on your content, right?

They're trying to see like, is this boring? Is this not boring? So if you, and they're serving it to a subset of your first connections. So if. Your first connections are dead. They hopped on LinkedIn. They got a job. They never came back. If your first connections have not engaged in your stuff in a while.

Right? So it's sort of like a, the rich get richer. If somebody engages on your stuff, if they like comment, share, DM. On a sliding scale, it, it, it actually impacts how often they're going to see your posts. So DMs are the highest viral action. If somebody DMs you back, they're 85 percent more likely to see your content in their feed.

If somebody shares it, they're like 70 [00:54:00] percent more likely. If somebody comments, they're 50 percent more likely. Somebody likes it, they're 30 percent more likely. So it's like on a sliding scale, there's different weights to viral action. So let's say you've got a first connection that hasn't liked your stuff in a long time, they're not going to see.

You're posting that small window of time where LinkedIn is judging whether or not your first connections are engaging, right? Then your post is not going to do well, right? So there's like lots of, there's so many different hacks. So for example, let's say you've got stagnant first connections. What do you do?

You want to go back and DM them and get them to DM you back. And you reinvigorate your first connections that way, then those people start to see your content again, right? So you really got to understand and, and my advice to people is if you aren't big on one platform yet, figure out one platform at a time, then branch out.

So figure out one platform, work with some, take a masterclass from somebody who's doing it well, [00:55:00] understand how to leverage all the features. Lean into new features, understand what messages, again, you're going to consistently repeat over and over again, like what are your key topics and how are you going to make sure your profile and your posts have the same topics and that, you know, the platform can identify you as an expert to serve your content to other users, right?

So that, those are like the basics and I would focus on one platform and then once you get that right, move on to the next platform and you're going to take the same material and concepts and topics, but you're going to lean into that. platform's algorithm and features and how you need to publish on that platform and what features you need to use on that platform.

So that's kind of how I'd go about it. 

Cal Fussman: I am so clueless.

Oh man. Okay. I'm going to play that back about 10 times and see if I can put it to good use. I'm so grateful for that. It really, this, this was [00:56:00] another, this wasn't an inspired by Heather Monaghan conversation. And 

Hala Taha: thank you 

Cal Fussman: very, very grateful for all that you passed on. And I hope that we somehow keep the conversation going.

Hala Taha: Yeah, I'd love to help you get ads on your show if you're interested and we can talk about that. 

Cal Fussman: Alright.