Welcome to Digital-First Leadership. The podcast that explores the essential principles and strategies for leading in the digital age. In this dynamic podcast series, we dive deep into the realm of digital leadership. equipping leaders and teams with the necessary tools to thrive in today's rapidly evolving digital landscape.

Richard Bliss [00:00:23]:

Welcome to the show. I'm Rich Bliss your host, and you're listening to the Digital-First Leadership podcast. I am thrilled to have you here. As always, this is a opportunity for us to sit down, chat with some fascinating guests, and to cover some interesting topics. One thing before we get started that I want everybody to be aware of is that if you are in it in keeping up with some of the changes that are happening in the LinkedIn algorithm. I put out a LinkedIn tip every week through text messaging, now if you're listening and you're in US or Canada, there's a phone number you can text me, and you'll start getting those, and so phone number is 415-534-9722. Just send a text with the hashtag of LinkedIn. You'll be signed up, and you'll start getting those weekly updates. Alright. Today, my guest is someone who, technically, we've just met but we have been involved in a mutual project. We're talking about The Most Amazing Marketing Book Ever written by Mark Schafer and Friends, and I happen to be one of those friends. And my guest, Ian Anderson Gray, is one of another one of those friends, Ian, thanks for joining me.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:01:27]:

Oh, it's a pleasure. I'm really happy to to finally meet you because we've been hanging out in the same community. We've been involved with the same book. and we can finally talk and see each other. That's great. 

Richard Bliss [00:01:36]:

Right. And, you know, I think we need a new word in the English language for meeting because when my daughters I have 5 daughters. When they were going on dates, and they said, I'm going out. I say, who with? Some boy. How'd you meet them? Their definition of meeting was very different than their father's definition of meeting. Right? because they were like, well, I met him in a in a dating app. Well, that doesn't count as meeting. Right? And so this idea, right, we we've upped the level once. We met on chatbots or to me in rise community. We've met through the book. Now we're meeting online, and then someday we'll meet in person. Right? It's we need to speak different words. 

Ian Anderson Gray:

We do. It's it's a strange it's a strange time to be living in, but I also very cool and exciting one. 

Richard Bliss:

It is. Let me just read your introduction in the book so people know who you are. Do you mind if I just kinda read from the book? 

Ian Anderson Gray:

No. Go for it. 

Richard Bliss:

Ian is the founder of the Confident Live Marketing Academy as the host of confident live podcast. He helps entrepreneurs level up their impact, authority, and profits by using live video confident. Ian is also a professional classical singer and lives near Manchester in the UK. He can be found at igg. me. So Let's talk about that a little bit. Classical singer? Do you still sing?

Ian Anderson Gray [00:02:55]:

Yeah. It's not so I I don't it's not such a a thing. So because actually during the pandemic, I had to make a decision do I keep on with the the because I was teaching singing as well at the Royal Northern College of Music. They and I was also doing singing professionally. And I had to make the decision to just go full into the business now. But I still put a lot of my my singing and my experience as a performer into what I do. And so I trained as a classical singer at the Royal Northern College of Music. I met my wife there. Our kids are very musical too, and I'd still remember being on stage in front of, like, a big orchestra in quiet, feeling really nervous, big audience, and I was going on stage, and I was thinking to myself, why am I doing this? And suddenly, the adrenaline kicked in, and I gave my best performance. And I think it's the same thing when you get in front of the camera. You have to somehow turn that nervous energy into excitement. So that's kind of what I do today. I turn that to that experience that I had as a as a singer. into helping business owners get confidence in front of the camera. 

Richard Bliss [00:04:03]:

And that is such that is so applicable from tonality voice confidence, right, energy, all of those things. Let's talk, before we step into that. Let's talk just briefly about how you got involved in the book. Let me and for my audio listening audience, let me explain one more time, Mark Schafer, a co-acquaintance of Ian and I, decided through a community that he had created that there was some ideas about jointly writing a book, and so 30-plus authors of the community came together. Well, hang on, 30 plus individuals in the community who decided to contribute and become authors were joined together. Mine was on LinkedIn. Ian yours was on the live streaming video where they had a lot of different topics. How did you get pulled into this event?

Ian Anderson Gray [00:04:52]:

While I was in the community, and, I mean, to be honest, Mark reached out to me, and I I totally I totally missed this. And Mark said to me, look, Ian, you need to you need to be doing this. And I was so excited about being part of this because I wanted to write a book for ages, but I'm a I'm a chronic overthinker. I just I think of and I've I also know a lot of people who've written books, and I know how difficult it is. So this was an amazing opportunity to write a chapter because I could write a chapter. I mean, I can actually write it right. I know I could write. But Being being part of a community with other people, having Mark as our kind of as our teacher through all the as well because he's obviously prolific author, best selling author. And just being part of that, it's just been the most amazing experience And I've actually gained a lot of confidence in the whole process. So you never know. I might actually get around to writing, but but But, yeah, it's been that that's how I got started into it, and it's been amazing, hasn't it? 

Richard Bliss [00:06:05]:

It has. And I'd love that story. Similar to think, Mark reached out and was like, could you participate? And it's been enjoyable to for me to go through, I gotta say one of my favorite has been the audible version. I downloaded the Audible version. I didn't listen through because I seldom listened to Audible books my wife does, but I skipped from chapter to chapter because you, me, and the 30 plus other authors all recorded our own chapter in our own voice, which it's it's amazing to listen to the the different accents, the different styles, the different voices, people that we have interacted with online, but never heard their voice. And now to hear them coming through this book, That was, for me, an enjoyable experience, even just clicking through the first few seconds of of them introducing themselves.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:06:47]:

It's great. you can even do I mean, I actually do quite like audiobooks, but what I really like doing is doing both at the same time listening and reading the book because because then you then you get totally immersed into it. So, I mean, the cool thing about this book is it's a book book. It's a Kindle book, and it's an audio book as well. So you could You could do all 3.

Richard Bliss [00:07:06]:

And you can. And each chapter is almost identical in the foreman. Right? It's well, we had 1500 words ten points that you wanted to share, and so that's what you did. And so let's talk about that. Yours is the I'm gonna read it here. The extraordinary power of live streaming. Now live streaming is gotta be one of the biggest challenges. You talked about going on stage in that anxious nervousness of going in front of the audience. I've been on stage many times, and my team does not understand why I get nervous every single time, right? Every single time. And yet you take this and talk about it. So let's talk about your background. And you mentioned the the music, but as you started to come out with this, what were you thinking about? How to help people understand the power of live streaming?

Ian Anderson Gray [00:07:55]:

Well, I I've I've had an interesting journey with this because I as I say in the chapter, I could have been called the reluctance live video guy, because I remember the first time I went live, I was absolutely petrified. I was worried about looking like a complete idiot. And the reason I went live I went live reluctantly because I was being asked by lots of people to talk about live video. I I'd written loads of blogs. I'd I'd written one that had basically gone viral. And it just felt really not right that I was writing about it, but I wasn't actually doing it. So I had to go through that journey. I had to kind of push through the barriers. And that's when I realized the experience that I had as a singer, the performer would help me to do that. And I think it's also helped the fact that I have empathy with people who really struggle with this because I've been there too, and I I get it. But the the the thing about live video, there's so many advantages with it. You know, there's the authenticity. There's that human connection that is so so powerful. But the other thing is as a recovering perfectionist myself, it's so an amazing way to create content quickly and easily because it's the perfect antidote to perfectionism because live video is never gonna be perfect. So you can create content quickly and easily. You're gonna make mistakes, but that's okay. That's and in fact, people actually like the mistakes. And even if you don't want to go live, you can create video content as if you were live, pretendly on your live. There's a great way of creating content. So, yeah, I I hope of I hope of

Richard Bliss [00:09:35]:

advertised the the power of live streaming just in those few points. You have one of the challenge there's a couple of challenges that people face though when they go live, and that is and you've identified it here, and that is, oh, no. I'm gonna screw up. I'm gonna make a mistake. Right? And what you've identified here is, no, that's that's good. for those perfectionists out there, where do they, how do you help them understand that it's okay to make mistakes, that it's okay to mess up?

Ian Anderson Gray [00:10:05]:

It's part it's well, so what what what it is, it's it's easier said than done this, but it's getting out of your own head because, ultimately, Why are you creating this content? It's for your audience. And they do one perfect. You do, you but I I went through a through a whole month of not going live because I was worried about my background being boring and sounding like an idiot. And My audience were there waiting for me to create content. I would I would I would go as far to say, I was actually being selfish. I was being self absorbed. So you need to get out of your own head and realize why are you creating this and and have a goal in mind. So the thing that made the difference for me was actually having a plan. having reasons for doing this. And once I had that in place, that didn't take away all the nervousness and the the, you know, the sheer terror but I had a reason for doing it. And then I then had to go through the process of just pressing the button starting. making mistakes. because the thing is the first few videos that you do, I would say the first even the first dozen videos that you do, I hate to say this. they're not gonna be like good, but that's okay. Look back. Some of the other you know, I mean, I'm I'm sure your your first videos were were great, but made are you balls You go back to the beginning. And the usually pretty horrendous. Go back to look at my YouTube videos and and the horrendous. So, like, we're we're all We're all like that. And and the other thing that plays into this is is the comparison game. And this is a big problem. You know, we can look at other people. and said, well, I could never be like that. You know, I've got a nice microphone. I've got a nice background. But 2 or 3 years ago, I didn't. I'd and I was still creating content. And people liked what I was doing. So it doesn't have to be fancy. It doesn't have to be perfect. So, yeah, just just get started.

Richard Bliss [00:12:05]:

One of the things that you mentioned in the in your experience is that if you were on stage singing and you made a mistake, stop the performance right there and said, oh, I'm sorry. I'm gonna make a mistake. I'm gonna start over.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:12:17]:

I'm guessing no. No. No. So that's a really interesting point because when I first started singing, I was so aware of when I made mistakes. And so I I was quite young. I was I was I started singing, like, I remember where I was sixteen, seventeen, and My parents were in the audience. And afterwards, I got so I made a mistake. It was awful. And they said, did you? I had no idea. And I I thought that everyone else yeah. Well, I was that made a mistake. But so I think the the key is Okay. There might be 1 or 2 people who notice. But who cares? Most people don't. You just gotta keep going. And if you do make a mistake, it's really obvious, which sometimes I do. I mean, I actually this start this was actually last last month. I have an intro and then an outro video. And for some reason, I got them mixed up, and I played the outro. own it. Love it yourself. Don't take yourself seriously. And so, like, people actually like it when you make a mistake. I could have edited the podcast afterwards, but you know what? I didn't. I just And the the funny thing is, I think that the more I've done this, the less precious I am about these things. You know? Like, it doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. People are not they're not gonna not hire you because you've you've messed up. If you In fact, they probably will more likely hire you because, oh, like, Ian's a human being. You know? Yeah. And and and you make them feel comfortable and confident. And, hey, I he's not caught up on himself. We're we're seeing that all the time. And so you've got this ability to just

Richard Bliss [00:13:55]:

keep going. And even let's just take this example of you and I. Oftentimes, when I ask people to come on the bike podcast, not often, but occasionally okay. Well, I need to have a call before the call because we need talk about what we're gonna talk about, and then they need a script, and they need a plan. I need the question. I'm like, no. I'm I'm like, okay. I'll do that for them. But that's not the plan here. The plan is I really wanna get to know you. My audience wants to get to know you. Let's just talk. Yeah. We've got some talking points we're gonna talk about, but let's just And sometimes some things happen that I don't know. And that level of confidence to just let it go and not know where you're going, that takes a lot of that takes a lot of practice. It's not easy for people. Here's something that's not easy too that I wanted to ask you. Energy. When doing a live podcast, oftentimes people become much more subdued, they slow down their talking, they lose that energy, And it's and it's it has happened to me. I did a whole video series. And then when I watched it, I realized, man, it was like I was asleep. That energy is really important to come through on those videos, isn't it? And and then I'm gonna ask you, what secrets are there to make sure that energy does come through. So let's talk about that.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:15:10]:

Yeah. There's there's a balance obviously here. You know, I I call this heightened authenticity because You wanna be yourself. So I I have a friend, Molly Mahody, who's a live video coach like myself, she is so much more energy than me. You know? If if if she came on to the show, she'd be, hey. How are you doing? That, you know, would be like that. Right? Now not me. But so it it's really a case of of understanding what the camera is. If I was on stage giving a giving a presentation, giving a keynote, or or whatever. I would I would be able to bounce off the energy of the people in the room. I said human being, We that's how we come of that's how we're wired. Yeah. But the camera is an inanimate object. It's a yes. bit of glass plasticy plasticy thing. And it just doesn't it feel particularly if you can't see the person, because most cameras are above the screen. Now I've actually I've actually teleprompter set up, so I can actually look at you directly and look at the camera. But It it's tough. It's it's a really tough thing. So you have to that's why you have to raise your energy level a little bit more. And so I have, like I I get my clients to practice 5 stages, and often I will get them to kind of say their catch their their tagline. So mine is level up your impact and authority. Let's just call it that. And the first level is just you're just talking to someone on one to one, and they might be, like, level up your authority and your your confidence and and authority. If I was speaking with a group of people, it would be level up your confidence and authority. If I was doing a workshop, level up your impact and authority If I was on a on video, I'd be more level up your impact and authority. And if I was doing a keynote on stage at Wembley Stadium, He'd be like that. You're thanks. An authority. Now if you get to that level level 5 and you feel uncomfortable, You've got it right. Most people don't

Richard Bliss [00:17:17]:

Interesting. And so

Ian Anderson Gray [00:17:18]:

you would never you would never do it at that level on camera, but the fact is you have to practice overdoing it to get to the right level when you get in front of the camera. And the key is here to remind yourself to keep the energy going because you might stop speaking like that at the beginning, but by the end of it, your -- Speaking like this, that is

Richard Bliss [00:17:41]:

And and what happens is people notice that that was an artificial construct, right, that you artificially jumped up there and then have dropped back down to what you would call a normal And so being cognizant of maintaining that energy level, I think, is what you're identifying there, is that you have really have to be present. And you talk about the camera because as I look at the camera now, You have this takes practice. I have to see you through the camera. Right? I have to see my audience. I don't see the camera. I see my audience. I see who I'm talking to, and that takes that takes a lot of practice.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:18:12]:

Alright, Doug. Yeah. Go ahead. I was just gonna say, I've got a very high-tech solution for this, which is Gap piece of paper, put some four arrows into it, and then stick your camera through it, and that'll help you remind you to look at the camera. It it works.

Richard Bliss [00:18:26]:

It does work. It does work. Speaking of the camera and the equipment, let's just talk we're gonna wrap up here in just a second, but I wanted to talk about the equipment itself because oftentimes that also holds people back because they're like, well, my sound doesn't sound as good. The camera is not as quality. I don't have fancy equipment. I don't have a green screen or a background. And yet, really, as we've kind of alluded to it, but don't let that hold you back. Yeah. Yeah. And so what would your advice be for when it comes to actual equipment? Let's talk about some of the equipment you're using, but what other people can use in a pit -- Yeah. -- or just to make it start, at least to start.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:19:05]:

So don't use the tech as a scapegoat for mindset struggles, like, with your confidence. You you know, because your tech just can be really, really simple. The first thing I would always go for is just enhance the audio. Audio matters so much more than video. So you don't have to get a an expensive microphone I quite like the Samsung, q t u. That's s a m s o n. That's a nice dynamic microphone that's okay, and it has a really good quality. So So so that's good. In terms of live video, the things that you need, check your Internet speed. You need to have a decent upload speed. That's important. because you you wanna have a stability there if you're streaming. You also have to have a a computer that is, you know, is gonna do the job. If it's a very old computer, you might have some problems. So those those are the 2 things. And then audio quality is important. Cameras? Yeah. I mean, there's there's a big range. You can go from, like, a Logitech webcam up to something like what I'm using, I'm using a a Sony camera, a mirrorless camera, I'm I'm plugging that in via HDMI, using a a little device called the cam link So you can use basically a camera like that, a professional camera like a webcam. So so yeah. That there's And just Yes. I was gonna say just to well, I'm using a Canon

Richard Bliss [00:20:25]:

EOS d s DSLR that's piped in through a ATM mini It allows me to control the right. Control the camera. My my microphone is a road podcast. Hang on just a second. My daughter my can you hear me? I just wanna make sure you can hear me. I can hear you. Yeah. That was that. My daughter just interrupted, and my computer brought it up in front. I'm sorry. It was a phone call. But I'm using a a road podcaster microphone that allows me Now I'm not technical, but it has the condenser inside.

Ian Anderson Gray [00:21:00]:

Does that make sense from a technical standpoint? Yeah. Well, there there are 2 types of well, there's plenty of different types of microphone. I have a dynamic microphone, so I use a high l p r 40. The Samsung QT user is a is also a dynamic one. It means you have to have it fairly close to you. But the good thing about that is that it picks. It's less likely to pick. Yes. That noise is it's practicing or shouting down the street or whatever. So so that but you a lot of people use, like, the blue yeti microphone, which is a gap microphone, but condenser mic. And if you're not too careful, it can pick up a lot of sounds

Richard Bliss [00:21:31]:

or, like, tap tapping on their keyboard, shuffling papers, all of those too. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, there's kind of thing. That's good to know. What about just

Ian Anderson Gray [00:21:40]:

the phone. What about just your iPhone or your phone? Yeah. Yeah. So there are 2 so the so I I've been talking about maybe a more professional way of doing it. in in the chapter, I actually talk about the differences between going live from your phone and going live from your computer. Advantages with going live from your phone is it's easier. You can't schedule your broadcasts, and it's more difficult to bring in guests, but it's it gives you that more raw and authentic feel. And let's face it most phones, whether it's an iPhone or an Android phone, the quality of the camera is really good. Actually, one thing you can do, if you're gonna go live from your computer, you can use your iPhone phone or Android phone's camera by plugging it into your computer. You know, there's a there's an app called camo, which I really like. and I can use my iPhone's camera on my computer as a webcam. So that's another thing to think about as well without having to buy an expensive camera.

Richard Bliss [00:22:29]:

Oh, that's an excellent point. And the last thing and I just realized, streaming software, what do I use to actually stream the life? because after the camera on the side, I've got everything set up. Now how do I actually give it to the audience?

Ian Anderson Gray [00:22:43]:

Yeah. Well, you I would recommend using a 3rd party tool for this. You you you for LinkedIn live, you have to use 3rd party tool. There's no other way of doing it. The the easiest way is probably like a web a browser based tool like streamyard or re stream. Or if you want take take things to the next level, you could use a a tool like ECAM Live. That's what I use. It's a Mac only tool. There's other ones for PC like Wirecast and Vemix. They're a little bit more complicated. I've actually got a comparison tool on my website. If you go to my website, i e g dot me, you can actually put in some questions, and it will basically give you the perfect live video tools for you for for what you need. There's because there's lots I mean, we haven't got time to go into it, but there's lots of different advantages and disadvantages, you could do multi streaming, which means broadcast to more than one platform at the same time. There's comments,

Richard Bliss [00:23:36]:

guests. I won't go on. But, yeah, lots of things might -- And my advice to those who are just starting would be to keep it simple, start simple. Don't worry about having to compete with everybody else, got the professional setups, but just keep it simple. Even if it's just your phone, and streaming to do that. Yeah. It's boot it's bootstrapping your live video studio. Start small, start simple, and then you can you can get fancy camera in the microphone later. Just get started. Just get started. Ian, this has been great and it's been so informative. Thank you so much for joining. It's been a pleasure. Thank you so much for having me. We've been listening to Ian Anderson Gray who has written a chapter called the Extraordinary Power of Live Streaming, in a book called The Most Amazing Marketing Book ever written by 30 plus authors, yours truly included, and his chapter is specifically about the power of live streaming. I hope you found something interesting. And he's given us some resources, iag. me, where you can go and find out more information about Ian and the services that he offers. Thank you for listening. Thank you for the support that you provided to the show. We appreciate all that you've done.

Take care. 

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