Episode 66 features Taylor Shanklin, who is not only a motivational speaker and TED Talk veteran but also CEO and founder of Barlele, which also happens to make Taylor my current boss.
We talk about why I was hired, Taylor’s professional journey to founding her own agency, plus discuss creativity, confidence, truth, and much much more.
Throughout the conversation, we discuss:
- The hiring process
- Networking
- Marketing Philosophy
- Hobbies
- Corporate Culture
- Corporate hustle
- Startup Culture
- Chasing dreams
- “New Media”
- Flash
- Being Geeky
- Creative
- Technical
- Intuition
- Saying No
- Building a team
- Balance
- Helping others
- And much more
Mentioned and Helpful Links from This Episode
Taylor’s Instagram @TShankSoars
Music created and provided by Henno Heitur of Monkey Tongue Productions.
–End Show Notes Transmission–
–Begin Transcription–
00:00:00:01 – 00:00:28:45
Agent Palmer
Previously on Agent palmer.com. As You’re a Ghost is the high stakes trilogy middle book I didn’t know I needed. Enjoying The Fellowship of Friends on an extended edition Friday break, and Jason’s probably still disappointed in my digital storage solutions, but I’ll fix it. This is The Palmer Files episode 66 with Taylor Shanklin, who is not only a motivational speaker and TEDx talk veteran, but also CEO and founder of parlay, which also happens to make Taylor my current boss.
00:00:28:49 – 00:01:03:56
Agent Palmer
We talk about why I was hired. Taylor’s professional journey to founding her own agency, plus discussed creativity, confidence, truth, and much, much more. Are you ready? Let’s do the show.
00:01:04:00 – 00:01:11:22
Agent Palmer
She’s.
00:01:11:26 – 00:01:33:04
Agent Palmer
Hello, and welcome to the Palmer Files. I’m your host, Jason Stershic. Also known as Agent Palmer. And on this 66th episode is Taylor Shanklin. You will soon hear how Taylor and I became acquainted, why she hired me, and how she came to found her company. So I won’t spoil any of that here. But what I will tell you is that her TEDx talk, minimized to maximize, is probably worth your time.
00:01:33:05 – 00:01:58:24
Agent Palmer
If you’re listening to this podcast and her podcast, soar might be worth checking out. If you want even more marketing insights from Taylor and her guests. So those are the additional things you can look up or check out after you hear us discuss. In a roundabout way. Taylor’s origin story, starting with how I came to be in her employ, as well as other topics we cover like being geeky, being involved, being creative, and much, much more.
00:01:58:26 – 00:02:23:01
Agent Palmer
But first, remember if you want to discuss this episode as you listen or afterwards, you can tweet me at Agent Palmer or this show at The Palmer Files. You can find more information on Taylor at T shank.com. That’s t s h a n kgw.com, or follow her on Instagram at T Shanks source. That’s SARS. Don’t forget, you can see all of my writings and rantings on Agent palmer.com.
00:02:23:01 – 00:02:35:42
Agent Palmer
And of course email can be sent to the Palmer files at gmail.com. So without further ado, let’s get into it.
00:02:35:47 – 00:02:58:39
Agent Palmer
Taylor. After a very long period of unemployment for myself, you hired me to work at your agency, and I don’t usually get the opportunity to have a boss on because actually, I for the length of this show, I’ve pretty much never had a boss until you came along. So I can ask this. Why did you hire me?
00:02:58:44 – 00:03:04:46
Taylor Shanklin
Well, because I wanted to be your boss. Clearly. Well.
00:03:04:51 – 00:03:16:17
Agent Palmer
But, I mean, look, I will say this. You. When when we we networked. And I don’t remember how that came to be, because I’m pretty sure somebody referred me to you.
00:03:16:21 – 00:03:23:02
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. Who was it? It was Chris. I don’t think I. I can see his face.
00:03:23:06 – 00:03:25:00
Agent Palmer
Okay. Well.
00:03:25:05 – 00:03:50:02
Taylor Shanklin
Someone introduced us. Yes. Yeah. And said you should talk to Jason. Yeah. He’s networking. I think you could give him some helpful tips and information. Right. And, like, point him in the direction of what companies to look at and who to talk to. And I said, okay, cool. I’ll, I’ll I’ll talk to this guy. Yeah. And then I didn’t have a job for you yet then.
00:03:50:04 – 00:03:50:33
Taylor Shanklin
No.
00:03:50:33 – 00:04:01:08
Agent Palmer
And then I think one of the random times I was checking LinkedIn towards the end of last year, you were looking for somebody, and I was like, I think I could do this.
00:04:01:13 – 00:04:27:56
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. That’s what happened. And I had. So. So I’ll tell you the first time I talked to you. Yeah. I had just started my agency, and it was really just me, like. I mean, I’m. I’m bootstrapping. I didn’t have any money to hire anyone yet, and I wasn’t yet making enough money or enough sales to bring anyone on.
00:04:27:57 – 00:04:48:09
Taylor Shanklin
So, like, I was doing just fine basically as myself and like, hiring people on Fiverr and Upwork when I needed a little bit of extra assistance doing like graphics and stuff like that. But when I met you, I did have this thought. I was like, I wish I could hire that guy right now.
00:04:48:11 – 00:05:04:48
Agent Palmer
Well, I guess it begs this question though, right? Like when you started, you were doing well enough on your own. Obviously, you want to grow the business, but did you want it to be what it could be like adding me and other pieces along the way and making it like a full agency? Or did you want to keep it just.
00:05:04:53 – 00:05:19:49
Agent Palmer
No, it’s just Taylor. Right? Like you’re you’re paying for Taylor. You get Taylor. I’m only going to take what I can. Like what? When you started, what was the I mean, the goals change, obviously, but when you started was the goal. Like, I want to do this, me or I want to build something.
00:05:19:54 – 00:06:02:23
Taylor Shanklin
Now the goal was to build something, okay. And the something and still continues to evolve. You know, it’s easiest, in my opinion, to start as if you’re I mean, let me take a step back. I think if you want to really just get started as a consultant and, like, go out on your own. Forge the path. It’s easiest to start either in some sort of a freelance fashion with services or as an agency, as opposed to like product and software, where quite frankly, I think you either need a lot of your own money or, you know, to hire developers and things like that, or you need to go out and search for funding.
00:06:02:23 – 00:06:38:22
Taylor Shanklin
And I didn’t want to do that. At least not at this point. Right. And so I thought, I’ll start on my own. I’ll do the work that I’m really good at, and eventually I’ll start to bring in other people to do the other things that clients are going to want, need. But to be honest, at the very beginning I wanted to build some software and I wanted to build software that would help small businesses take their brand and their storytelling to market faster in a way other than Canva, a different kind of a way.
00:06:38:27 – 00:07:11:44
Taylor Shanklin
And that’s still on my mind. But right now I just we’ve grown and gotten so much business through just pure services people saying, Taylor, I need your brain on my brand. Yeah. And then me starting to get to a point where I’m like, my brain can’t handle all of this. And and my brain’s not great at a lot of the things that clients come to me and want when it comes to marketing.
00:07:11:44 – 00:07:24:39
Taylor Shanklin
And so there are a lot of things in branding and marketing that I’m good at, but it’s a huge, vast world, and there’s a lot of things that I’m not good at. And that’s why I’m like, okay, it’s time to start building a team and bringing other people in.
00:07:24:41 – 00:07:42:13
Agent Palmer
Well, this was one of the reasons that I think you and I hit it off the first time in that first phone call was because, like, you admitted that there were things you did not know, which is rare in general in the world. People are afraid to say, I don’t know that or I can’t do that right?
00:07:42:26 – 00:07:46:58
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. And I don’t know why that is. Well, I yeah. Well.
00:07:47:03 – 00:08:08:30
Agent Palmer
I see because I don’t see it as weakness, like, you either have to learn or you just know not to go there. Right? Like, I’m not like, I, I’m not going to try brain surgery. And if somebody asks me, like, can can you be like, do you think you could go be an MD? No, no, I don’t think like like I’m I know enough to know that that’s not something I should attempt.
00:08:08:30 – 00:08:46:45
Agent Palmer
Right. Like, but the other thing was, you and I kind of melded on a, a marketing level for, like, it’s got to be real. It’s got to be authentic. And how much can we do with very little? Because, yeah, that’s my background. It’s kind of your background. And it was it was refreshing to me because after. So I we start that first networking call and I’m 18 months unemployed, having done nothing but networked and having done nothing but talk to people that have advice to give that probably haven’t been unemployed.
00:08:46:46 – 00:09:01:01
Agent Palmer
Like, look, I was unemployed during a pandemic. It’s a very different thing. But I was getting the same advice that you would have given me, I don’t know, ten years ago or like to a senior out of college, right? Like,
00:09:01:06 – 00:09:02:02
Taylor Shanklin
From other people.
00:09:02:02 – 00:09:23:31
Agent Palmer
From other people. And so it was so refreshing to just have a conversation. And it wasn’t, you know, you weren’t being like, well, what have you been doing? I mean, you asked that and you were the only person who said, well, that’s good, right? Because everybody else was like, what are you doing? And I’m like, well, I’m, you know, I’m writing and publishing once a week.
00:09:23:31 – 00:09:39:56
Agent Palmer
I’m writing a little bit more than that. I’m publishing once a week, and I’m putting out a podcast every two weeks, and everybody else is like, fine, but what have you done for pay? And I was like, well, I there’s no market right now. Like, what do you mean, what have I done for pay? And you were the one that was like, well, what does that do?
00:09:39:57 – 00:10:00:46
Agent Palmer
Like what? You were the first person that really talked about transferable skills from the things that I was doing to keep my skills up. And it was so, I don’t know, refreshing. I keep going back to you as a word, but like I had been 18 months of like, oh, you should, you know, put on your goals on your resume or your resume is diverse.
00:10:00:48 – 00:10:07:01
Agent Palmer
That’s not good. Or your résumé to specific. That’s not good. And I was like, none of that stuff is helpful. Like.
00:10:07:06 – 00:10:28:10
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, well, yeah. And a lot of that stuff is just I think people check in boxes and the big corporate culture, you know, whereas like I was listening to what are you capable of? I don’t care if you’re making money doing it or not. I care if you’re good at it. I care if you have a good thought process.
00:10:28:15 – 00:10:54:47
Taylor Shanklin
I care if you are someone who can challenge me on my thought process. And that’s another thing that I liked about you. And I’ll give you two things. So one, going back to the very original question, why did I hire you? I think that you came off to me like kind of a Swiss Army knife in, in marketing.
00:10:54:47 – 00:11:39:06
Taylor Shanklin
And I think that that’s a really valuable kind of a person to have around you when you’re running a digital agency that’s small and scrappy and bootstrapping, because I’m a Swiss Army knife in marketing, and I’m starting to get to this point where I’m like, I need another me who can kind of do it all. Like who gets podcasting, who gets micro video content, who gets, you know, I can get on the phone and you’re going to be speaking reasonably with a client who can log into a WordPress website and make some changes, like I needed someone else and a team of people who can kind of do it all because our clients come to
00:11:39:06 – 00:11:59:00
Taylor Shanklin
us, and that’s that. The world of digital marketing, like you need people who can kind of do it all, because I’ll be on one phone call with one client, and at the beginning of the call, we’re talking about one kind of marketing. At the end of the call, they’re asking about a totally different kind of marketing, and they have to be able to know a little bit about everything.
00:11:59:00 – 00:12:11:45
Taylor Shanklin
You don’t have to be an expert of everything. And that’s why we have other people on the team who have expertise. But it was like, I just saw the Swiss Army knife guy and I was like, I need that.
00:12:11:50 – 00:12:13:45
Agent Palmer
I, I, I mean.
00:12:13:50 – 00:12:15:06
Taylor Shanklin
Well, in my side.
00:12:15:11 – 00:12:42:04
Agent Palmer
It was very weird because for the longest time I applied for things that I, I don’t know, things that I would tolerate, and, and that usually ended up being, me knowing that there was something about it I wouldn’t like, like when we talked about this, what I’m doing now, it was, what are you comfortable doing and what will you do and and what are you willing to learn?
00:12:42:04 – 00:13:01:02
Agent Palmer
And, you know, a lot of the things I applied for during my time, it was corporate culture the whole way. So it was like, okay, we want you to be a digital marketer, but what does that mean? And then they go through the list of all the things that you need to be an expert in. And I go, that person doesn’t exist.
00:13:01:13 – 00:13:22:16
Agent Palmer
And I still apply because everybody’s like, oh, still apply. They know they’re not going to get that perfect candidate. But like I talked, I, I did get to some interviews. And for everybody out there that’s like, yeah, they know they’re not going to get the perfect client. Yeah. But they’re looking really hard for that person and they’re not paying for it at all.
00:13:22:21 – 00:13:41:39
Agent Palmer
So like I look now and I go, well am I where I want to be? I don’t know, because I don’t know where I want to be. And you were comfortable with that answer? Very few people were like, they’re like, well, what do you want to do? And like, I have a job. Like, I mean, at a certain point we have to feed ourselves, right?
00:13:41:39 – 00:14:05:44
Agent Palmer
Like, we can’t just, you know, we’re not all independently wealthy. So all of that is a preface to say, like, are you like, you want to build this agency? But, and we’ve been working together for months now, so I kind of know the answer to this, but I want to ask where, like, you’re building an agency, you’re also as a side building your personal brand.
00:14:05:48 – 00:14:09:16
Agent Palmer
Clearly you’re not where you want to be yet.
00:14:09:21 – 00:14:53:22
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I just I think that the journey is fun, so I wouldn’t say I’m not where I want to be because I’m actually quite happy with where I am. Okay. But at the same time, I just and the kind of person that likes to do different things, and I like to grow in my mindset and I like to expand my thinking, and I like to try different things and, quite frankly, I want to I this is a passion of mine to give people a place to show up and do work that they like and have flexibility and not deal with corporate crap, you know?
00:14:53:22 – 00:14:54:00
Taylor Shanklin
So like.
00:14:54:00 – 00:15:09:09
Agent Palmer
But you’ve dealt with that before, like you are coming at this having, you know, you’re you’re the person who backs up your computer rigorously because you had crash before and lost everything. So like, I don’t know, like corporate culture. I bit.
00:15:09:13 – 00:15:11:05
Taylor Shanklin
My computer. I don’t remember doing that.
00:15:11:05 – 00:15:16:43
Agent Palmer
Oh, no, it’s it. But metaphor is like, I guess, knock on wood, that it doesn’t happen. Right?
00:15:16:55 – 00:15:19:29
Taylor Shanklin
But like a story that I forgot.
00:15:19:34 – 00:15:47:21
Agent Palmer
But but like, I mean, you’ve been in corporate culture and. Yeah. And so have I. And I think one of the things about corporate culture, for me, I got complacent. I’m not going to say I was happy. But I, it was what I did, you know, it was mundane. It was you get up, you go to work like, then you have coffee, like, and and then you sit down in front and you check email, and then you go to lunch, and then you do like a little bit of work, and then you go to the water cooler, right.
00:15:47:21 – 00:16:00:59
Agent Palmer
Like, and you know, and you get into this mundane little thing of whatever it is. How long were you in the grind? Because obviously you’ve experienced this to know you don’t want to anymore.
00:16:01:13 – 00:16:27:52
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, I definitely had moments where I was okay with the grind and then it just slowly started creeping in more and more, this fire in my belly to get out of the grind. And so I started I mean, I would say I started in my first corporate job back in 2007. Before that, I mean, I was like going to school.
00:16:27:52 – 00:16:54:16
Taylor Shanklin
And then I was chasing a career in the music industry, doing a lot of grunt work, going on the road with band and like doing, you know, trying to chase this music business, who knows what artist management type of, career. And then I decided I needed to pay my bills. And so I was like, all right, stop farting around, Taylor.
00:16:54:16 – 00:17:12:08
Taylor Shanklin
Like, go learn a technical skill. And that was in about 2005, and I decided to go because I got an English major degree, like an a French minor, and I didn’t want to be an English teacher or professor or anything like that. So I love writing.
00:17:12:13 – 00:17:16:54
Agent Palmer
So, so, so is the English major just because you like writing?
00:17:16:59 – 00:17:20:29
Taylor Shanklin
I guess I just didn’t know what to do. I mean, you know.
00:17:20:38 – 00:17:27:38
Agent Palmer
I that’s it. That’s the thing. Like, do any of us like at especially at that age, like because you and I.
00:17:27:43 – 00:17:29:01
Taylor Shanklin
Know we’re not.
00:17:29:06 – 00:17:49:39
Agent Palmer
We’re in the same generation basically. Yeah. And in that regard, just like my last guest, like we were told, you go to college, like, that’s what you do. You go to high school, you go to college, then you get a job, right? And nobody said like, but it matters what you do in college. So yeah, you went for English and writing.
00:17:49:39 – 00:17:57:31
Agent Palmer
I went for liberal arts. Just general like did whatever, like math, whatever. And then as long as I have this piece of paper, I’ll be fine. And we got out and like.
00:17:57:36 – 00:18:17:42
Taylor Shanklin
No, kind of that way. It was like, Then I was like, well, what kind of job do I get? And I think at some point I changed my major a lot. Like I actually the my freshman year, let’s we’ll take a step back in time. Jason. I for Agent Palmer am I supposed to call you Agent Palmer on this thing?
00:18:17:42 – 00:18:35:56
Taylor Shanklin
I either either either I like Agent Palmer. If we take a step back in time. I went to music school. At first, I like I was again, like, what I really wanted to do when I was young was music.
00:18:36:00 – 00:18:40:23
Agent Palmer
Like, what? But. But like what? Like writing, composing, editing, producing.
00:18:40:23 – 00:18:58:10
Taylor Shanklin
To write songs and be a country singer. So I went to Nashville and I went to school for music, and then I got depression. And so I moved back home, and then I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I got better, I got well, and then I was like, well, I’m just going to get a degree, right?
00:18:58:10 – 00:19:21:25
Taylor Shanklin
So I ended up finishing and I tried a few things. At first I was like, oh, I’m going to go get a degree in French. And I went and studied abroad and I really liked it. But then practically I was like, well, I don’t want to be a French teacher, so maybe I’ll, I loved writing and I thought there was a this is funny.
00:19:21:25 – 00:19:49:48
Taylor Shanklin
This is actually going to come full circle. At some point in that time, I thought, I can be a copywriter. And then I would explain that to people around me friends, boyfriends, whatever. They were always like, what does that mean? I was like, you know, like an ad agency. Like, I’ll write the cool taglines and all of my friends would laugh at me and just be like, please, like, people do that, right?
00:19:49:48 – 00:19:50:56
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. And so.
00:19:50:58 – 00:19:57:27
Agent Palmer
But this was before mad Men, so like, it didn’t have that, like, common knowledge thing.
00:19:57:36 – 00:20:31:52
Taylor Shanklin
I guess. So. And I guess I just knew that it existed. Right. And so then I guess I graduated and I just decided to continue to chase the music business career because I got introduced to a singer songwriter who wrote for a lot of, pretty big country stars. And I went to work for him at his recording studio, and I just did all the grunt work, you know, like, I, I did merchandizing like a I put fan mail in the mail and went on the road with them and hauled all their gear around and got the money at the end of the show and stuff like that.
00:20:31:56 – 00:20:42:31
Taylor Shanklin
And after a little while of that, that’s when I was thought, I need some sort of a technical skill and I need to pay my bills. So, so.
00:20:42:37 – 00:21:05:16
Agent Palmer
So I’ll go back on you real quick. So one of my one of the things and I, I tell this story a lot more than my parents. My parents like to tell their story about how I complained about taking a, psychology course in college. And I came home and complained that I had nothing to write about. My parents absolutely loved that, because I had a very fairly normal childhood and I.
00:21:05:18 – 00:21:34:33
Agent Palmer
But that they love that story. Right. I like to hearken back to the fact that, like, I could never write any good poetry because while I was sad and sometimes depressed like any teenager, is like nothing really bad ever happened. Like both my parents, my parents are still together and and they both still we like I have a good relationship with the both of them that would, you know, like all those things like, I’m never going to be like a good artist because there’s never been any strife.
00:21:34:36 – 00:21:36:19
Agent Palmer
There’s never been anything wrong. Right?
00:21:36:28 – 00:21:37:22
Taylor Shanklin
Darkness.
00:21:37:27 – 00:21:39:06
Agent Palmer
Yeah. There’s no darkness there.
00:21:39:06 – 00:21:42:37
Taylor Shanklin
And like, I wrote some really dark poetry.
00:21:42:37 – 00:21:57:45
Agent Palmer
Well, I mean, I think I think it to maybe all of us did. I don’t know, I mean, I do want to revisit some of that stuff. I’m sure it’s all cringe all the way from the first forced rhyme to the last. Right. But.
00:21:57:50 – 00:21:58:32
Taylor Shanklin
00:21:58:37 – 00:22:07:47
Agent Palmer
I do wonder, like, is that necessary? Like, I mean, if you had kept your depression in Nashville, like, imagine the songs you could have written.
00:22:07:47 – 00:22:10:29
Taylor Shanklin
Oh, God. I mean, maybe I’d be really famous.
00:22:10:34 – 00:22:11:55
Agent Palmer
I don’t know, I mean, do you still.
00:22:11:55 – 00:22:12:49
Taylor Shanklin
It’s possible.
00:22:12:49 – 00:22:26:03
Agent Palmer
Do you still want to write, like, is that a I mean, you do a lot, okay? And you have a family and I’m not. I’m not going to take away from any of that. But if I could give you like three weeks off and say, go write an album, like, is that a thing that’s still in you?
00:22:26:08 – 00:22:29:51
Taylor Shanklin
Yes, but it’s more so a book.
00:22:29:56 – 00:22:30:36
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:22:30:41 – 00:22:38:02
Taylor Shanklin
So. Well, okay, I will say that I, I do miss doing my music.
00:22:38:07 – 00:22:40:49
Agent Palmer
Like just singer songwriter guitar stuff.
00:22:40:54 – 00:23:08:48
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. Okay. But I never was good at composing. This is where I got stuck. I can’t compose crap, but I’m good with the words. All right? And I had a hard time with anything other than the words and and singing it. But like, instruments, I’ve never been very good at. Okay. And so I always felt a little bit, you know, like where, where can I take it?
00:23:08:48 – 00:23:30:52
Taylor Shanklin
And I guess, I don’t know, I just never I never got good enough at guitar to do it. And then, I don’t know, I’ve just changed and priorities changed after that. And for some reason I then decided to start focusing more on the business aspect of music and not as much the music itself.
00:23:30:57 – 00:23:37:02
Agent Palmer
And so that gets you to more of the business acumen which get you into the corporate wheel, so.
00:23:37:02 – 00:23:49:39
Taylor Shanklin
To speak, I suppose. So I left, I went back to school, and that’s when I went to graduate school and started City Mass Communications. And at the time it was new, you know, called New Media.
00:23:49:48 – 00:23:50:57
Agent Palmer
Yep.
00:23:51:02 – 00:24:15:51
Taylor Shanklin
Right. Yep. Like circa it was. Yeah. 2005 I went back to school and started studying new media and I had this professor who was going to teach me how to do new media. Right. And what did that mean? It meant like build a website. Okay. Create. I built a website in flash.
00:24:15:54 – 00:24:39:45
Agent Palmer
Oh, God, I don’t miss those days at all. I don’t like because I here’s the thing. Like, I started my my agency, in 2008 and I was, you know, I it started with HTML and then I went straight to WordPress once I found out about WordPress. But there was a moment, there was like a six month period in there where I was like, I’m going to build a flash website.
00:24:39:49 – 00:24:44:24
Taylor Shanklin
Oh, God. I remember I thought flash was like, cool.
00:24:44:32 – 00:24:46:38
Agent Palmer
It was, well, it was really hard.
00:24:46:45 – 00:24:50:34
Taylor Shanklin
Well, yeah, but cool.
00:24:50:38 – 00:25:01:19
Agent Palmer
Well, I, I don’t know if you were watching them, but like, I remember of that era, like Homestar Runner cartoons on the internet was all done in flash. So like there.
00:25:01:19 – 00:25:04:05
Taylor Shanklin
Were these Quiznos sub one.
00:25:04:09 – 00:25:04:45
Agent Palmer
No, not.
00:25:04:45 – 00:25:12:26
Taylor Shanklin
The XML stops that got a pepper bar. I remember that wasn’t that flash. I mean, it looked like it.
00:25:12:28 – 00:25:13:05
Agent Palmer
Well, I mean.
00:25:13:05 – 00:25:13:39
Taylor Shanklin
Shitty.
00:25:13:39 – 00:25:26:42
Agent Palmer
But but flash was supposed to be like the great equalizer. Like we could do animation, right? Like we we could do websites stupid. Like we could do animate. You want you want to do a movie. Here you go. Like, here’s all the pieces.
00:25:26:51 – 00:25:27:07
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah.
00:25:27:18 – 00:25:39:34
Agent Palmer
They don’t tell you, like, yeah, here’s all the pieces. But like, you need to have artistic talent. You need to be able to 3D render and model and oh, by the way, you should really learn to code too, because it’s not just as simple as moving stuff.
00:25:39:39 – 00:26:05:23
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, it was hard. I didn’t like flash, but I will. This is when I started getting into dork dumb mode. So I learned how to, you know, code a little bit, right? Like basic HTML stuff. I started learning about CSS and stylesheets and stuff like that, and I never really felt like I could be technical before that moment in my life.
00:26:05:23 – 00:26:24:00
Taylor Shanklin
I’ve always felt like I’m I’m just too creative, okay? I’m good at writing and I don’t know how to be technical, and I don’t ever think I will be, and I was not confident in that at all. And then I started learning and thought, oh, I can do this, even to the point where this is the dork dumb.
00:26:24:05 – 00:26:40:45
Taylor Shanklin
We had a Halloween party. I was the because I’m a nerd. I was the like president of the grad club at the school. So I helped put together like, you know, grad club parties or. Yeah, things like that.
00:26:40:59 – 00:26:56:39
Agent Palmer
I mean, look, you’re talking you’re talking to a guy that for two, three, four semesters, maybe three, and somewhere between 3 and 5 semesters. I was president of the campus activities board as an undergrad. Right. Like we’ve all I think some of us have always been there.
00:26:56:44 – 00:27:18:52
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. It’s just like I’m going to be involved and lead stuff. Yes. So we had this Halloween. I mean, this is a random story, but we had this Halloween party and most people just show up and, you know, your normal Halloween costumes, whether it’s a scary costume or a pumpkin man or bear or who knows what, right?
00:27:19:01 – 00:27:28:10
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. I dressed up as a style sheet.
00:27:28:15 – 00:28:08:19
Taylor Shanklin
So I literally wore all white clothing. Okay, I got a white t shirt and white pants, and I took markers, and I wrote CSS code to look like. Like a butterfly. Sort of a thing. Okay. And it was very dorky. And everyone at the party was like, what are you that. And I had to explain it. I like, okay, that’s so it’s just funny how you fall into things sometimes that you don’t expect.
00:28:08:19 – 00:28:38:25
Agent Palmer
Well, I mean, it’s it’s all come. I mean, I look back and realize that, I may have dodged a bullet by being just liberal arts because things change so fast from then in the early aughts to now that, like anything I went to college for that wasn’t classical. I don’t know, education. Right? This the regular sociology, the psychology, the biology, all of the standard stuff.
00:28:38:28 – 00:28:56:55
Agent Palmer
That’s fine. Right? But even the gender in communications class I took junior year completely not relevant anymore, right? Like the mass mass communication. Completely not because the mass communication class I took was focused on print.
00:28:57:00 – 00:28:58:55
Taylor Shanklin
Which, yeah, it’s dead.
00:28:59:00 – 00:29:00:23
Agent Palmer
I mean, it’s not that you can still.
00:29:00:23 – 00:29:02:32
Taylor Shanklin
No, it don’t say that.
00:29:02:34 – 00:29:12:41
Agent Palmer
It’s dying, okay? It’s die. It’s got a slow death and it will probably die after we do. But for now, let’s just say it’s on life support.
00:29:12:46 – 00:29:13:26
Taylor Shanklin
Right?
00:29:13:30 – 00:29:33:46
Agent Palmer
Yeah. And so all the things I learned outside of the classroom, when you would go back to the being the president of the campus, being involved. Right. Like learning how to manage, you know, you’re president of a club in a college and it means almost nothing, right? Like you put that stuff on your resume when you’re right out of college because you don’t have anything else to put on it.
00:29:33:57 – 00:29:36:05
Taylor Shanklin
Right? It says you did stuff. It means.
00:29:36:05 – 00:29:39:46
Agent Palmer
Absolutely nothing. But the things you learned there, like the.
00:29:39:57 – 00:29:40:52
Taylor Shanklin
Relationships.
00:29:40:52 – 00:30:00:53
Agent Palmer
It’s relationships. I learned I learned Robert’s Rules of Orders real well back then. And now that I’m starting to get on some boards, like it all comes back to you, like, real quick, like, oh, now I remember why I used to suspend this shit when I was president, because I don’t need this. Like, we can all come to a consensus and talk.
00:30:00:59 – 00:30:18:45
Agent Palmer
We don’t need a first and a second and or we need no need a motion and a second. When there’s seven of us, like are there’s seven of us. So how much order do you need for seven of us? Like we had to re amend the bylaws so that seven was a quorum, like, I mean, just ridiculous stuff.
00:30:18:45 – 00:30:24:56
Agent Palmer
But all that, all that external stuff helps going forward much more.
00:30:25:01 – 00:30:48:47
Taylor Shanklin
Totally. Well, one of the things I really focused on was building relationships with my professors at that time. And like that actually catapulted me into the corporate world. And I remember when I got my first job working at a software company, and they told me the salary and I was just like, mind blown that I could make that much money, you know?
00:30:49:01 – 00:30:49:52
Taylor Shanklin
00:30:49:57 – 00:30:51:22
Agent Palmer
Like, so hold on.
00:30:51:32 – 00:30:55:03
Taylor Shanklin
Because I was making like ten bucks an hour, you know, schlepping it.
00:30:55:06 – 00:31:23:13
Agent Palmer
Well, that’s that’s true. I, I, I mean, I, I do know that my first professional gig, it took me a while, like, I was in retail for seven years. It took me a while to get that first corporate gig. But that first corporate gig, well, it made about the same amount that my retail gig did. It was a guaranteed for like the the for me, the big thing was like, well, you mean I don’t have to hope that next week I get 36 hours on the schedule?
00:31:23:13 – 00:31:47:55
Agent Palmer
Like I’m just guaranteed the for like, you know, when you’re young, like, benefits are not that important to you as they are now, but that first, that first realization that, like, no, as long as I have this job, I have 40 hours a week, like, I don’t none of this nights and weekends anymore. Like, I get to live, I guess a normal life.
00:31:48:00 – 00:31:50:24
Agent Palmer
That was like, huge. And then.
00:31:50:26 – 00:31:51:00
Taylor Shanklin
Totally.
00:31:51:00 – 00:31:55:17
Agent Palmer
And then you get there and it’s just it’s just weird. Like, because.
00:31:55:18 – 00:31:58:12
Taylor Shanklin
Getting was actually great for me for a long time.
00:31:58:17 – 00:32:23:38
Agent Palmer
I mean, yeah. Now here’s the question. The new question for anyone who’s not a boomer, which is how many jobs did you have like so before you started your agency last year? Yeah. How how many? And I’m going to say how many, because you know, obviously you can move up and down the corporate ladder. How many different, organizations did you work for, like ballpark it.
00:32:23:45 – 00:32:37:49
Taylor Shanklin
Like in my corporate, like in my real professional career? Yeah. Like we’re not talking about when I was a lifeguard. No. 16. No, no. Okay. No, because, I mean, I did a lot of schlepping jobs. And my younger years. Right. Well, but.
00:32:37:52 – 00:33:13:05
Agent Palmer
Here’s the thing. While you’re thinking about that, I will say that everyone I meet that has a little more empathy towards their employees or their coworkers is someone who was also in the service industry as a teenager. And the people that are kind of like the worst bosses ever are the people that just like, look, we’re not going to make this a wealth conversation, but the people that usually can afford not to have the service industry job are fairly well off to begin with.
00:33:13:20 – 00:33:20:36
Agent Palmer
And by not being in fast food or retail, you miss out on a growth mechanism because you really.
00:33:20:38 – 00:33:21:23
Taylor Shanklin
Think you do.
00:33:21:23 – 00:33:38:04
Agent Palmer
Yeah, you learn so much. I wouldn’t want to go back. I just don’t know if I have the mentality to work in retail anymore or even in fast food. But like the the lessons you learned there and the humility like, oh my, totally.
00:33:38:09 – 00:33:39:19
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, just.
00:33:39:24 – 00:33:40:35
Agent Palmer
Off the charts.
00:33:40:40 – 00:34:07:10
Taylor Shanklin
I 100% agree with you. I think that kids who are well off and well-to-do, whose parents don’t need them to work, I still think should go work. Oh yeah, I think it’s just you get a lot of life skills there. You do learn a lot. I have tremendous empathy because, like, I’ve been there and I’ve been the one that customers have been rude to for no good reason.
00:34:07:15 – 00:34:30:55
Taylor Shanklin
You know, like, I, I was a lifeguard. I waited tables, which by the way, I was terrible at. Oh, so I’m so clumsy. I was awful as a waitress. Like I got the worst tips ever. I was terrible, even though I’m friendly, like, I just got. I was so bad that I got I made such terrible money as a waitress, so I, I also worked at a coffee shop.
00:34:30:55 – 00:34:51:18
Taylor Shanklin
So yeah, I agree, like you, you learn a lot through that. So the number of jobs I’m trying to think so here’s the, here’s kind of the interesting thing. The first company that I went to in my professional career, I stayed at for nine years. Okay. And I did several different roles at that company.
00:34:51:23 – 00:35:19:49
Agent Palmer
Yeah, that’s why I asked about. That’s why I asked for companies, the number of companies and not the number of jobs because I, I was in a company for my first professional gig was also nine years. Actually, I would have had ten, except I was unceremoniously fired. But I also had like, I don’t know, 3 or 4. My my job description was fairly this similar throughout, but my title changed time, time and time again.
00:35:19:54 – 00:35:20:55
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:35:21:00 – 00:35:48:16
Taylor Shanklin
Well, I have a question. How would you consider this? So the first place I was at, I’m like sitting here literally writing on paper, trying to account because the first I guess I’ve been a quote, professional for 15 years, and the first half of that was at this one company, but it was really two companies because one, the first company I started working at got acquired and I stayed on.
00:35:48:29 – 00:36:09:35
Taylor Shanklin
We got acquired by a much larger company. A lot of people left. There was a mass exodus, and I looked at it as an opportunity to learn what it was like to work at a huge company. Sure, yeah. So I stayed and I just kept growing and getting promoted and doing different jobs there. So I had within nine years, probably 5 or 6 different jobs.
00:36:09:35 – 00:36:22:28
Taylor Shanklin
I kept just working my way up right and doing different things and learning different things. After that I left and that’s when I started bouncing around. I went into startup mode.
00:36:22:34 – 00:36:23:01
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:36:23:11 – 00:36:26:51
Taylor Shanklin
And you bounce around in startup mode now, do you.
00:36:26:51 – 00:37:00:38
Agent Palmer
Do you like do you like the hustle of startup mode? More like, because obviously there’s something different between that nine years, regardless of the titles like that, nine years is very different than startup mode, where there’s a I hustles like the worst word to use, but it’s the only word I’ve got like that that’s so different, right? Like when you’re in corporate communications, unless something’s on fire or broken or somebody did something illegal, you’ve got some time to structure your messaging.
00:37:00:43 – 00:37:03:02
Agent Palmer
But in the startup mode.
00:37:03:07 – 00:37:05:25
Taylor Shanklin
You don’t. There’s never any time for anything.
00:37:05:25 – 00:37:05:56
Agent Palmer
No.
00:37:06:01 – 00:37:11:27
Taylor Shanklin
Nothing. Yeah. So I think I do like it. I think I’m a masochist.
00:37:11:32 – 00:37:29:50
Agent Palmer
I mean, there well, hold on, it’s not painful. I guess that’s the other thing. Like it’s it. Yeah, well, I shouldn’t say that. I can, I can understand why there’s a bit of masochism with it, but, like, it’s not really that painful. Like, you know what? You’re getting it. I guess no one signs on for like, startup mode without it’s.
00:37:29:51 – 00:37:57:43
Taylor Shanklin
High risk, high reward. Yeah. You know, you do know what you’re getting into. Okay, so here’s the thing. So after I left the nine years I went to a startup, I was there for like eight months, eight months, felt like three years in startup world. It was the first startup I went to, so I had no experience. And I started learning very fast about how a startup works, how you get funding, how you build quick, how you fail faster.
00:37:57:43 – 00:38:22:38
Taylor Shanklin
Like all these hustle terms. Right? I started learning and started figuring out. I also learned very quickly that you just have to kind of learn how to make stuff up a little bit and fly by the sea to your pants and learn how to do stuff that you weren’t expecting to learn how to do very, very fast. Okay, so it’s an incredible opportunity to grow very quickly.
00:38:22:43 – 00:38:56:35
Taylor Shanklin
It can also be very stressful that eight months. Like I said, it felt like about 2 to 3 years both in stress and learning. Okay. You know, so it’s easy it’s easy to start bouncing around because there’s also there’s just a lot of volatility. Right. You go from this thing that feel safe. Yeah. Into this thing where it’s exciting and at the same time you’re like are we going to get paid.
00:38:56:40 – 00:38:57:13
Taylor Shanklin
You know.
00:38:57:18 – 00:38:57:52
Agent Palmer
Okay.
00:38:57:52 – 00:39:25:30
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. So that happens. Then I went to so I was there for eight months. I got out because I just I saw some writing on the wall. Okay. I have a good intuition like this ability to call it when it’s about to get bad and you need to leave. And so I did. And then I went to another company.
00:39:25:35 – 00:39:49:18
Taylor Shanklin
This one was more like a ten year old startup. Okay. It was still and there’s a lot of those. Yeah, there’s a lot especially like tech companies and agencies too, that have been around a while. They seem like they got their shit together and they’re really very much still like an early startup. And a lot of ways, like there’s very lack of process.
00:39:49:18 – 00:39:59:38
Taylor Shanklin
There’s a lot of, you know, weird startup like politics sometimes that you don’t expect that are different than corporate politics.
00:39:59:38 – 00:40:09:37
Agent Palmer
Kind of like the founders still here, even though he’s not the CEO. Oh, and we still kind of listen to what he has to say, but maybe not weird stuff.
00:40:09:42 – 00:40:25:52
Taylor Shanklin
It can be that it also can just be weird stuff in terms of like uncertainty and you’re not sure who to trust because you’re not really sure who’s in the founders ear the most. And a little bit like of drama, you know?
00:40:25:57 – 00:40:27:43
Agent Palmer
Okay, so here’s my question, right?
00:40:27:43 – 00:40:28:27
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah.
00:40:28:31 – 00:40:52:39
Agent Palmer
From from our first networking to, to the onboarding, you have been like, you haven’t beat around the bush with me at all. Does that come from not wanting to deal with that yourself, from what you learned when you were jumping around in the startups of not having to politic? Like, no, I mean, yeah, I’m telling you, like because you’ve always shot straight, right?
00:40:52:39 – 00:41:05:22
Agent Palmer
Like and that’s I and I do too, like it’s I think one of the things that made me un hirable for people that weren’t you, you know, people that weren’t tailor was that I was not willing to lie for a job.
00:41:05:27 – 00:41:12:41
Taylor Shanklin
And oh, I agree, I think I even told you that that that was maybe why you were getting, you know, shut down.
00:41:12:46 – 00:41:32:56
Agent Palmer
Yeah. I it’s so hard because like, I just, I, I, I have a, I don’t have a good memory, okay. I don’t have a good memory. So lying means I have something else to remember. Like the truth is always easy to remember because you either remember it or you don’t or you just don’t.
00:41:32:56 – 00:41:33:04
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah.
00:41:33:05 – 00:41:40:31
Agent Palmer
And if you have to remember a lie, you’re now adding another layer, and I can’t be bothered and.
00:41:40:38 – 00:41:41:46
Taylor Shanklin
And and I.
00:41:41:46 – 00:42:14:32
Agent Palmer
Have to make it up. So like I and look I’ve been writing a lot of corporate speak like landing page type stuff blogs as far as like opinion pieces, editorials and maybe a few like, like nonfiction, like here’s the history of X and Y and Z. I haven’t written a lot of fiction. I, I don’t know if it’s left me because, like, like you, I didn’t write a lot of songs, but I wrote a lot of poetry back then, and it was all fiction.
00:42:14:37 – 00:42:14:46
Taylor Shanklin
I don’t.
00:42:14:46 – 00:42:22:57
Agent Palmer
Know if I have it any more. I don’t have the ambition, the drive, the inspiration, whatever. But like, I don’t I don’t want to have to come up with a lie. Like, it’s just so.
00:42:22:59 – 00:42:23:53
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, hard.
00:42:23:54 – 00:42:29:01
Agent Palmer
Like, I feel like I it’s the truth is just easier.
00:42:29:06 – 00:42:31:19
Taylor Shanklin
It is. It’s better.
00:42:31:24 – 00:42:31:38
Agent Palmer
So.
00:42:31:44 – 00:42:54:29
Taylor Shanklin
A lot of people lie and and I agree with you. It’s like I also have a bad memory. So first off, yeah, I like your perspective of lying because you have a bad memory. And I’m like, yeah, me too. But that that’s a good reason not to lie. Now I just, I think there’s a couple of things.
00:42:54:29 – 00:43:31:17
Taylor Shanklin
I think, yes, I learned a lot about what not to do and what I never when I said to myself, I’m never going to do that at my company, okay? Never is a strong word, but like, I’m going to try my best not to have that crap at my company. Yep. Right. And so that is one thing I also think I just, I don’t know, for some reason, at some point in my career, a, a flip was switched and I became confident in myself.
00:43:31:22 – 00:43:32:59
Agent Palmer
So hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.
00:43:33:01 – 00:43:33:26
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah.
00:43:33:26 – 00:43:48:35
Agent Palmer
So, is is this confidence? Is this switch flipped in the middle of the nine years in corporate, or is it after when you’re in start like where where’s the confidence come in.
00:43:48:40 – 00:44:13:50
Taylor Shanklin
I think it happened before I switched over to start startup. Okay. I think it happened more towards the end of my time at the large company, where I think I had realized I had done this enough, that I actually knew what I was talking about, and I finally believed it. Okay. And I think that I needed that confidence to go into startup world.
00:44:13:57 – 00:44:16:15
Taylor Shanklin
Okay. All right. You know.
00:44:16:20 – 00:44:28:08
Agent Palmer
I mean, I like that, though, because I feel like, you know, I, I this is this is this is the most egotistical, one of the most egotistical things I will ever say. But one of.
00:44:28:08 – 00:44:29:07
Taylor Shanklin
The an asshole.
00:44:29:09 – 00:44:31:12
Agent Palmer
I see sometimes.
00:44:31:17 – 00:44:33:38
Taylor Shanklin
I didn’t ask you if we can cuss on your show. Yeah.
00:44:33:41 – 00:44:57:34
Agent Palmer
No, no, it’s fine I yeah. No, I one of the things towards the end of my tenure at my first and longest corporate gig was that, I knew how to call, I like I could, I knew the bullshit other people were spewing, and I didn’t have the patience for it. Now, look, there was a house cleaning. I was one of.
00:44:57:43 – 00:45:17:37
Agent Palmer
I was one of half the staff of a staff of 13 that was removed from the situation. But like one of the things about it was some of the coworkers that got to stay. I was just happy not to have to work with them anymore. Like, I know that you’re getting your like, I know where you’re getting your information from.
00:45:17:51 – 00:45:37:10
Agent Palmer
Like you have no original ideas. I am reading the same articles you are and you’re just regurgitating. You’re not learning anything, right? And it’s just like, this isn’t going to work for us. I know you read the article. It worked for an organization that has five times the budget we do. It’s not going to work for us. But you go ahead like I’m I.
00:45:37:12 – 00:46:00:07
Agent Palmer
And one of the things that my former boss who was fired with me, got used to me saying my piece and shutting up. That’s all I want, Taylor. You’re wrong. But I’ll do it anyway, because that’s the direction you’ve chosen. I’m gonna tell you I don’t like it, but that’s. And that’s where I’ve been. That’s where that and that confidence only came towards the end.
00:46:00:07 – 00:46:20:20
Agent Palmer
Right. Like I so I understand like you have to get there because I think early on I guess it’s the bright lights of the big city. You’re just really excited to have that job from 9 to 5 Monday through Friday. And so when somebody says, can you run this report? You go, yeah, sure. Absolutely. And can you run this campaign?
00:46:20:20 – 00:46:41:39
Agent Palmer
Yeah, sure. Absolutely. Can you write this? Yeah, sure. Absolutely. And it takes a while for you to figure out how it works. You can go I have a I have a different I have a different I difference of opinion. I have another idea or something else. Right. And I always got in trouble for saying no. Now I always had a backup like, no, we should do this.
00:46:41:39 – 00:47:01:39
Agent Palmer
But I always started with no, because it was, it’s not lying. Like I don’t have to. Well, why should I have to be creative to come up with a way to not hurt your feelings for a bad idea and be like, okay, how many ways? How many words can I use to say no without actually saying no?
00:47:01:44 – 00:47:04:14
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, no. Well, that’s an art.
00:47:04:18 – 00:47:05:52
Agent Palmer
I don’t have it, by the way.
00:47:05:52 – 00:47:15:33
Taylor Shanklin
I’m just is like that. Okay. That is something that it is an art to say no kindly.
00:47:15:47 – 00:47:16:42
Agent Palmer
Yes.
00:47:16:46 – 00:47:56:04
Taylor Shanklin
That builds trust. Yeah. Whether that’s with your team or your clients or a friend. You know, this rule applies in life. There’s a way I think, to say no in a nice way that you’re you’re confident in your answer, you’re speaking your truth and speaking your mind. But you’re not tearing the other person down. And that was something that I think I was so tired of a lot, and that I saw happen at a lot of different jobs that I had people just being jerks.
00:47:56:13 – 00:48:34:35
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, unnecessarily, because they have some big ego. They they want to be the one to impress the CEO. And I just like, you see, all through the bullshit, I just, just, I just I saw through the bullshit that started eating away at me more and more and more. And the other thing that I think finally got me over the edge was just like, just a bunch of, you know, boss people wasting their time in a bunch of meetings that didn’t actually do anything for anyone, but they made their egos feel good because I guess they made them feel important.
00:48:34:40 – 00:49:06:36
Taylor Shanklin
And then a lot of, like, indecision happens at companies large and small, where people just can’t ever make a decision and go with anything and therefore nothing ever happens. And that is, to me, bonkers. Well, I’m like, yeah, make a decision, do something if it’s the wrong decision. Course. Correct. Yeah, but make a decision like, I don’t know if you’ve picked up on this in working with me, but like I make decisions fast and they’re not always right.
00:49:06:40 – 00:49:10:15
Taylor Shanklin
But at least it’s something.
00:49:10:20 – 00:49:29:22
Agent Palmer
Yeah I it’s well I mean so agency life’s slightly different because you have you’re on the clock and nobody wants to pay you to do nothing. Right. Like clients don’t. Clients are paying you for your opinion or for you to do something, but they’re not paying you to just. Yeah, sit around, have a coffee and think about it for an hour.
00:49:29:24 – 00:49:32:30
Agent Palmer
Like, that’s that’s not going to be a thing, right?
00:49:32:35 – 00:49:34:45
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. And I have to produce.
00:49:34:45 – 00:49:58:38
Agent Palmer
And I understand that. But I also like the idea that, like, it’s a question I asked at every interview I had, and I didn’t like a lot of the answers, which was, are you okay with failure? Because they had every, you know, the the standard interview is like, well, biggest strengths, biggest weakness, whatever, whatever. And the everybody always asks like, do you have any questions at the end?
00:49:58:39 – 00:50:23:06
Agent Palmer
Like, yeah, are you okay if I screw up? And that’s always my biggest cause I’m, I’m okay with that. Like, oh, like so my, my favorite example and I only got this far in a few interviews. I think I actually told you this the first time we, we spoke at that first initial networking thing because I had just done it was I had been spending like month for three months.
00:50:23:06 – 00:50:49:25
Agent Palmer
I had scheduled, promo tweets for my back catalog of blogs and podcasts, and it was going out and it was like 35 spread out tweets over two accounts to promote the back catalog. And then I stopped for a month and nothing happened to my numbers, which tells me it wasn’t worth it. In the first place. So I got to come up with something else, and I just stopped.
00:50:49:30 – 00:51:08:21
Agent Palmer
And I’m I’m okay. Like, I’ll admit what I was doing didn’t work. Was it wrong? That’s a different discussion, but it did not work to at least drive traffic, which is what I wanted it to do. And I said that and I was like, well, I mean, I guess I failed because I’m the one who came up with the strategy to do that in the first place.
00:51:08:21 – 00:51:19:30
Agent Palmer
It didn’t work. I stopped, I moved on, and I always like to ask if people were all right with that, because there’s a lot of companies that pay you to be right or shut up.
00:51:19:34 – 00:51:21:08
Taylor Shanklin
I’m like.
00:51:21:13 – 00:51:32:44
Agent Palmer
Or that’s the feeling, right? And and so I always asked if I, if how they felt about being wrong, you had no problem with it. Like you were like, well, just fix.
00:51:32:44 – 00:51:35:30
Taylor Shanklin
You can’t remember because my memory is bad. Did you ask me that?
00:51:35:30 – 00:51:36:55
Agent Palmer
I did, you said, just fix it.
00:51:36:57 – 00:51:37:42
Taylor Shanklin
But I might say.
00:51:37:42 – 00:51:39:22
Agent Palmer
You said just fix it like that.
00:51:39:33 – 00:51:41:41
Taylor Shanklin
You know, just fix the thing, you know, like.
00:51:41:48 – 00:52:02:31
Agent Palmer
Okay, you broke it. Can you, like, fix it or make it better? Whatever. Like, don’t. Yeah, but don’t dwell on the fact that it didn’t work. Because the thing is, if you’re afraid to make the mistake, you’re never going to take the chance. And you probably won’t be successful at all. Like you like, I mean, you don’t. I started an agency because I, I, I actually don’t know why I started the agency.
00:52:02:31 – 00:52:21:02
Agent Palmer
There’s different cycle analysis for that. But you started the agency that you are running right now knowing it could fail, but you weren’t held back from that chance, like, oh, it might not work like well I but but but it won’t work if you don’t try. Right. Like you. Yeah.
00:52:21:10 – 00:52:27:45
Taylor Shanklin
I knew I would live with regret if I never tried. And I didn’t want that, you know.
00:52:27:54 – 00:52:48:22
Agent Palmer
And so. So what’s next? Because you are, And I’ve only worked alongside you for a few months. I think you’re still in startup mode because you’re working on all these other things. You’re working on your stuff. The business and your personal brand. And like, there’s other things that pop up all the time, like,
00:52:48:27 – 00:52:51:55
Taylor Shanklin
I have a lot of ideas.
00:52:51:59 – 00:53:12:50
Agent Palmer
But is it that, I mean, I guess for certain people and I fall into this category too. Like, if you leave me alone for long enough, I’ll come up with four different blog post ideas, two different guests. And another thing I should tell to a friend who’s working on a thing. Yeah, like I’m I’m full of ideas. Never have enough time for anything.
00:53:12:55 – 00:53:25:02
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, that’s actually something I’m struggling with more now is I. I do have a lot of ideas and I’m having to temper what’s realistic. Right.
00:53:25:07 – 00:53:26:46
Agent Palmer
How do you do that?
00:53:26:51 – 00:53:33:11
Taylor Shanklin
Well, It’s hard. I’ll be honest, because.
00:53:33:16 – 00:53:37:49
Agent Palmer
Well, because while you’re tempering your ideas, you’re coming up with new ideas.
00:53:38:03 – 00:53:40:11
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, it’s I am it’s a.
00:53:40:11 – 00:53:41:25
Agent Palmer
Never ending cycle.
00:53:41:25 – 00:53:56:03
Taylor Shanklin
It’s a it isn’t. I mean, that’s the that’s the life of a creative, right? Like, I sometimes my mind is in la la land, to be honest. Where like, I’m, I’m a a dreamer.
00:53:56:08 – 00:53:57:04
Agent Palmer
Okay?
00:53:57:09 – 00:54:21:34
Taylor Shanklin
And I’m dreaming about how this could be great and this could be great, and this could be great. And then I have to come back to center and to reality of what’s actually feasible and what do I actually want to do? Because I don’t want to work 80 hours a week like I want balance. Yeah. So I do struggle with, well, how much do you grow.
00:54:21:38 – 00:54:31:12
Agent Palmer
Now as part of that? Because some of your ideas are, you know, like intense like we’re not talking about oh, I’m just you know, we’re talking about like, I want to write a book, which.
00:54:31:17 – 00:54:33:07
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, you know that that’s.
00:54:33:07 – 00:54:34:13
Agent Palmer
Yeah. That’s not like.
00:54:34:13 – 00:55:05:33
Taylor Shanklin
That. That’s it’s not, it’s not a small thing, you know, it’s like one minute I’m thinking about the book that’s been in my head for a long time that I’ve started putting down on paper, and it’s just disorganized, like there’s a lot of, the thought there, but it needs organization and then, you know, I’ll also be thinking about, okay, well, we’re going to launch this new service line that’s like subscription based, you know, design and SEO and podcasting.
00:55:05:34 – 00:55:23:12
Taylor Shanklin
Right? Okay. So that’s a different thing. And then at the same time, I’m also thinking about, well, I should probably do my next Ted talk. You know. And then I’m like, oh wait, I don’t want to work all the time either.
00:55:23:17 – 00:55:25:18
Agent Palmer
I’ll tell you what I.
00:55:25:23 – 00:55:28:21
Taylor Shanklin
I’m being.
00:55:28:26 – 00:56:04:44
Agent Palmer
One of the hardest things for me has been trying to justify to myself the work life balance thing because I had a 40 hour a week job podcast and did podcast producing to the tune of like 20 hours a week back then. Not my show, but other people’s right and and time zones and staying up until 1 or 2 like and just always being busy and always having ideas for other people and just that was I don’t know how I did it, but it was fun.
00:56:04:49 – 00:56:12:08
Agent Palmer
But then again, I don’t want to work for like you. I don’t want to work for 80 hours. But I keep having these ideas and.
00:56:12:08 – 00:56:15:10
Taylor Shanklin
Obviously you.
00:56:15:15 – 00:56:17:52
Agent Palmer
I can’t do all the things.
00:56:17:57 – 00:56:26:42
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, I’m just getting better at saying no, you know? I mean, you’ll even notice that sometimes, like, I just don’t respond to your email as fast as you’d probably want me to.
00:56:26:42 – 00:56:51:10
Agent Palmer
Well, I mean, but but and I have learned this, people want tailor like I may be helpful, and I may give a like, I may I may have a good idea in a meeting or in an email. People want you, I mean, or, you know, I mean, and that’s I think maybe it changes the way you sell the business, but right now people are buying you.
00:56:51:14 – 00:57:21:49
Taylor Shanklin
It’s it’s true. And that’s. I know it’s true. And that and that is something that I am very I’m happy with. I appreciate very deeply the relationships that I have with our clients. And, you know, one part of me thinks, well, I just want to keep providing this white glove service or, like, you really get my brain on your brand, right?
00:57:21:49 – 00:58:04:45
Taylor Shanklin
And your stuff. And I have a team of other people who help to support it, but, like, you’re you’re talking to me too. Yeah. And I’m not going to just hand you off. But I also know that there are certain things we could do that don’t require me. And that’s some of the stuff I’m starting to think about, like, because I want other people to be able to grow and to lead out and to build these other things that other people on the team are very capable of doing and in my opinion, can really help the small business owner or the small or nonprofit that doesn’t have a, gigantic budget like a big corporate
00:58:04:45 – 00:58:09:06
Taylor Shanklin
place does, but still needs good marketing, you know? So like.
00:58:09:21 – 00:58:12:57
Agent Palmer
And it helps that you have some time to write your book.
00:58:13:02 – 00:58:35:13
Taylor Shanklin
Right? Yeah. But I do want to get into a place where more of my time can be spent on being the big thinker and the big idea person. I can walk into a room and walk into a meeting and give a lot of big ideas, and I’ve just started to learn and become confident that that’s a gift of mine.
00:58:35:18 – 00:58:42:49
Taylor Shanklin
And I didn’t always have that gift. I had to grow it and I had to nurture it. And that’s it’s come over time.
00:58:43:02 – 00:58:58:32
Agent Palmer
I’ve been accused of being too far ahead of my friends in their own projects, like enough times to know that I can see the. I might miss a few middle steps, but I can see where this is going.
00:58:58:37 – 00:58:59:37
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah.
00:58:59:42 – 00:59:12:12
Agent Palmer
And, you have to either establish that that’s what you’re going to say or people have to know you because otherwise, come on, hold your horses.
00:59:12:17 – 00:59:44:08
Taylor Shanklin
Right. But again, and I say that also recognizing that there are like, I’m not necessarily the best execute. Okay. And that’s why there are other people here now too, you know, because I can again, it’s about being realistic with strengths and weaknesses and why you need to form a body of people who work well together in different ways to create the things.
00:59:44:08 – 00:59:54:02
Taylor Shanklin
Right. So like, yeah, like people buy Taylor and this sounds conceited to say so like, I don’t want to. Come on. It’s a no.
00:59:54:12 – 01:00:08:00
Agent Palmer
No. It sounds I know it sounds that way, but like, I’ve sat in the meetings like I know like I’m not invisible in those meetings, but at the same time, if you said the same thing I did, the response would be tenfold.
01:00:08:05 – 01:00:12:08
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, well, it’s just they know me, you know, I think I.
01:00:12:08 – 01:00:18:35
Agent Palmer
Think that’s part of it. But I, you know, it right now. You and your brand. Are you.
01:00:18:40 – 01:00:19:51
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. Yeah.
01:00:19:55 – 01:00:49:41
Agent Palmer
Now here’s the here’s the real question. You’ve, you’ve you’ve started a business. You have a family. You you did a Ted talk. You tried the music like you did chase some dreams. And obviously some have come true. And discounting the book, which I feel like is inevitable, like you will eventually start putting like a page down here and a page down there, like, what’s the one pie in the sky thing?
01:00:49:41 – 01:01:01:35
Agent Palmer
Like, what’s the one thing that you to you’re going to go climb Everest? Like, what’s the one big thing that that like top of mind right now. That’s that’s next.
01:01:01:40 – 01:01:29:33
Taylor Shanklin
That’s a good question. You know, I the book really is one of the big things. But I will also say, I think that certain things have happened in my life that have also changed my perspective on this. And I am a little bit less hungry now to go and be like, go, go, go all the time, right?
01:01:29:38 – 01:01:43:22
Taylor Shanklin
But I do want to go live abroad more, and I don’t know when that will be, but that is something that I would like to do. I don’t want to climb Everest.
01:01:43:27 – 01:01:48:52
Taylor Shanklin
You know, maybe I used to cycle a lot. So here’s one.
01:01:48:52 – 01:01:51:37
Agent Palmer
Get out of the mountains and it’ll be fine.
01:01:51:41 – 01:02:32:49
Taylor Shanklin
Right? I, you know, and even like like, you know. So, you know, I ski a lot, but I don’t have this dream of, like, I’ve got to be the best skier. I just get out there and have fun. Kind of easy street, have fun, enjoy it. Like, enjoy the fresh air. I’m not trying to, like, get better and do crazy jumps and shit like that, you know, like and break my legs because I’m also realistic where I’m like, I’m getting older, I got bad news, you know, like, so I think it’s, continuing to grow in the, I guess creative field.
01:02:32:54 – 01:03:11:45
Taylor Shanklin
And I don’t know, I just, I here’s one thing I’ll say, and this is something that’s a passion project, I think, in my podcasting and my writing and why there is a focus on personal, the personal brand and thought leadership and speaking. Yeah. Is I want to be a voice for people to be okay with saying the stuff that’s on everyone’s minds that most people are afraid to say.
01:03:11:50 – 01:03:47:13
Taylor Shanklin
And I don’t know if that makes any sense, but there’s something in me and I can’t tell you why that feels passionate about helping other people by relating to them and helping them understand that, you know, a lot of societal pressures and fear and shame and judgment that we all feel are normal feelings. Everybody feels you’re not alone and this is how you deal with it.
01:03:47:13 – 01:04:07:30
Taylor Shanklin
So just like you said, I think how I told you, okay, so you failed, so fix it. Yeah, I think that that is something that people get hung up along it. They can’t accept the failure. So therefore they can’t fix the failure.
01:04:07:34 – 01:04:12:19
Agent Palmer
You.
01:04:12:24 – 01:04:35:20
Agent Palmer
It should not be understated that Taylor took her shot. She can lament her lack of talent in composing music, but she chased that dream. Maybe not to success or failure, but she went after it. It led to where she is now, in a way. And so I’m left wondering what it is I’ve chased or not chased. I’m narrowing down my what do I want to be?
01:04:35:20 – 01:04:58:22
Agent Palmer
Or what do I want to do when I grow up? And in many ways, it’s almost never about me. I really enjoy being a producer and editor, so perhaps that’s where I will focus my efforts for now. But you take your shot and you move on. Just like I can’t be bothered to remember the lie. I don’t want to lament the things I didn’t explore or for that matter, couldn’t explore.
01:04:58:35 – 01:05:18:55
Agent Palmer
Maybe one day I’ll help produce a multi-million dollar feature film. But I won’t lament the fact that right now, all I can do is help a friend out on a shoestring budget because I enjoy doing the thing I enjoy the process. Maybe I just enjoy helping people too. So I ask you this do you know what you want to do when you grow up?
01:05:19:00 – 01:05:40:18
Agent Palmer
I think as discussed in this episode, it can change as you add more birthday candles to your cake. But we all have more growing up to do, don’t we? No matter what, I hope none of us ever stop searching for meaning and purpose. Thanks for listening to The Palmer Files episode 66. As a reminder, all links are available in the show notes.
01:05:40:18 – 01:06:00:19
Agent Palmer
And now for the official business. The Palmer Files releases every two weeks on Tuesdays. If you’re still listening, I encourage you to join the discussion. You can tweet me at Agent Palmer and this show at The Palmer Files. You can find more information on Taylor at T Shanks Comm, that’s T, A and KGW.com, or follow her on Instagram at T Shank Saws.
01:06:00:19 – 01:06:15:35
Agent Palmer
That’s SARS email can be sent to this show at the Palmer Files at gmail.com. And remember, you’re home for all things agent Palmer is Agent palmer.com.
01:06:15:40 – 01:06:51:37
Agent Palmer
You.
01:06:51:41 – 01:06:58:00
Agent Palmer
See.
01:06:58:04 – 01:07:00:28
Agent Palmer
All right. Taylor, do you have one final question for me?
01:07:00:37 – 01:07:23:56
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. You’ve asked me a lot about my goals and things I aspire to do, but what about you? Like what? What is it that drew you to doing what you do and what is something that you want to do? Like I, I’ve been trying to get under your skin a little bit and understand what’s going to make you tick.
01:07:24:07 – 01:07:52:27
Agent Palmer
I, I will say this, the unemployment taught me that I will never truly stop working because the blog and the podcast endured through all that time. And there were moments when I went, you know, if I didn’t have to find a job, this is the fucking life, right? Like, I enjoy consuming things and sharing my opinions about them.
01:07:52:32 – 01:08:16:46
Agent Palmer
And I enjoy having conversations like this with you and other people and strangers and friends alike. Right. I’m, I’m I’m okay with all of that. And I enjoy the editing process. And, you know, we could all be better promoting our own stuff. So that’s not it’s not a surprise that I could do more. But like as far as what else there is, you know, as a blogger, you always get the question like you’re going to write a book.
01:08:16:55 – 01:08:37:34
Agent Palmer
Like, I mean, no, not unless I ever need separate. Like unless I get the inspiration for like, yeah, okay. If you take like if you take certain tags or tags specifically, right. Like of like this author or this artist or this series. Right. And you put all of my stuff together. Maybe I have a small novel that I’ve already written about a topic.
01:08:37:34 – 01:09:17:03
Agent Palmer
Right. But that was never the intent. I didn’t start out to collect that. That just kind of happened over time. You do something for ten years and you collect a lot of things. I, I do think that, I’m coming around on the idea of, of consulting to a certain level. And I don’t mean like monetarily, I mean like that I have the confidence to do it, because it’s like my mother when I was, I don’t know, a toddler started her business, and she’s been a consultant for my basically my entire life.
01:09:17:08 – 01:09:34:49
Agent Palmer
I don’t know what a consultant does. I know have a, I have a general idea that my mother does internal marketing, but as far as being a consultant, until, I don’t know, the last 5 or 6 years, I didn’t know what that meant. Still, and I still have trouble putting my brain around it like.
01:09:34:51 – 01:09:36:14
Taylor Shanklin
01:09:36:19 – 01:10:07:04
Agent Palmer
Generally speaking, I have trouble putting my brain around marketing because it’s just so vast. And I think consulting is that similar thing. But, consulting’s in that vein of like, teaching slash coaching and but it’s not. But it is, but it’s also having the conversation in the right way. And I, I enjoy helping people. And I think one of the things that I learned being unemployed while networking is I’m all right answering the questions, I, I’m okay with it.
01:10:07:15 – 01:10:27:10
Agent Palmer
Like, I don’t have to be publicly thanked because I networked with somebody who was having technical issues with their zoom, and I helped them troubleshoot it just because I happen to know a little bit about tech, right? Or like they asked me a question about Twitter’s algorithm or the new Google search thing or whatever, and I just helped.
01:10:27:10 – 01:10:51:02
Agent Palmer
I’m all right with it. So I guess there’s a part of that that I guess will coalesce into something, but I’m horrible at selling myself. So those those scenarios only happen when I’m put in a room because you put me there as my boss, or I reached out to network with somebody and they asked me a question that I can answer.
01:10:51:07 – 01:11:05:09
Agent Palmer
So there’s a balance there, but I feel like it falls into that same brand of, you know, I’m doing like I’m learning by doing so, I can easily dole out some of this advice based on experience.
01:11:05:14 – 01:11:10:25
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, it’s part of why I put you in things that will stretch you a little bit.
01:11:10:40 – 01:11:37:08
Agent Palmer
And I’m all right with that. Like, I also know that like there’s a ton of stuff, there’s a ton about myself, I don’t know, like I and I’m all right to find out where I sink and where I swim, mainly because I’ve learned that I’m a little more rounded, well-rounded than I thought I was originally. And, I’ve also started to.
01:11:37:13 – 01:12:05:17
Agent Palmer
The chip on my shoulder has grown, being unemployed for so long, not because nobody wanted me, but because everybody was like, oh, you can’t. Being well-rounded is not a good thing, right? Like, and it wasn’t it wasn’t 5050. I’d say it was probably about only about a quarter of all the people were more in line with you that like, oh, you’re flexible, you’re well-rounded, you’ll be able to do a lot.
01:12:05:21 – 01:12:35:47
Agent Palmer
But the majority of people I networked with were like, yeah, you need to specialize in something. And the chip just gets bigger because I’m reading books that I wouldn’t normally read, or I’m trying to expand my knowledge base so I know a little bit more and I just, I like I want to help other people through, like the things I’ve learned, like because, yeah, I’m reading these books for myself, but I can also learn lessons that will benefit you or somebody else.
01:12:35:47 – 01:13:00:43
Agent Palmer
Right. And I’m not learning all this stuff just for me. That would be a waste, right? Like, you know, the going through the motions, the whole Twitter thing of like it not working out like all of these things are okay for me, but they end up being really good lessons to learn if I can share them with like five people, ten people who ever write.
01:13:00:43 – 01:13:28:00
Agent Palmer
And so I think I just want to help people. And I think I’ve also learned that, small business and nonprofit are idealism. I can wrap my brain around. I have a hard time talking to somebody who’s number one goal is money.
01:13:28:04 – 01:13:28:33
Taylor Shanklin
01:13:28:39 – 01:13:52:32
Agent Palmer
Mainly because my number one goal is never been money. And I know I’m privileged to say that as someone who was lucky enough to save and make a decent white collar living, but, I mean, I, I’ve sat in a room with some people that are like, what can you do for my bottom line? I mean, like, I, I mean, I can help tell your story, but I don’t know what I can do for your bottom line like that.
01:13:52:32 – 01:14:04:46
Agent Palmer
Yeah. My brain doesn’t go there first. Like, are you communicating? Well, do people know what you do? Like those questions as opposed to like, well, how much can we get for this? Like I don’t.
01:14:04:51 – 01:14:35:11
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah, yeah I don’t I don’t like that either. I also have learned how to have that conversation, okay. In a way where you just you steer it back to what gets you there. Like, I get it, you’re worried about your bottom line. Here’s here’s what I think you need to do. And I’m still going to shoot you straight about what I think will get you there, knowing that that’s the only thing you care about.
01:14:35:16 – 01:15:06:26
Taylor Shanklin
And here’s one other thing I’ll learn that I I’ve seen enough now at this point in my professional career to understand why we encounter people that way in the corporate world. Everybody always has someone breathing down their neck about money. Okay, right. If it’s not, let’s say if it’s the head of sales is breathing down the marketer’s neck, you know why that’s happening?
01:15:06:26 – 01:15:07:34
Taylor Shanklin
It’s because.
01:15:07:34 – 01:15:09:03
Agent Palmer
The president’s breathing down the.
01:15:09:15 – 01:15:52:57
Taylor Shanklin
President that the CEO and the board and the investors. Right. There’s always someone higher up that’s breathing down their neck. And so I actually think this is a bit of a problem with corporate culture. Yeah. Is that there’s just always someone breathing down someone else’s neck about money. And that creates the environment where people are so worried all the time about money that they often make bad decisions because they’re just trying to get a release valve for a little while opened up.
01:15:52:59 – 01:15:56:48
Taylor Shanklin
Yeah. To say, stop breathing down my neck for like five minutes.
01:15:56:52 – 01:15:57:48
Agent Palmer
Yeah. And they’re all.
01:15:57:55 – 01:16:04:47
Taylor Shanklin
They’re all just trying to take a paycheck home and provide for their family. So it’s like there’s a lot to it. There’s a lot of layers.
01:16:04:47 – 01:16:30:36
Agent Palmer
Yeah. I’ve also seen it be like leveraging today because I need the release now versus saving it for the long term because I need the release now. Like I get that too. But I just it’s one of the things that changes when you move into smaller businesses and nonprofits, because it’s about the mission and it’s about the service, and it’s about something else.
01:16:30:41 – 01:16:37:52
Agent Palmer
And the conversations that we get to have when you’re not talking about that big corporate thing, are much more engaging and better.
–End Transcription–
This transcription was processed by PalmerTech 3.1 and may contain errors for HUMINT (human intelligence).