One Year of AI News!! 🎉
A little over a year ago I shifted everything.
At the time I was running a digital marketing agency & mastermind with my business partner. We were giving it everything we had and it still seemed to not be enough. Burning the candle at both ends, low on energy, at a loss for creativity, more financial stress than I’d wish on an enemy, and overall just not being the husband and father I needed to be.
My focus was scattered, my time was negative & my message was unclear. I was in a shit position and knew something had to give.
But let’s be realistic, you can’t always just commit a full change of who you are and what you do overnight. Yet, I remember the moment in time I made the decision. Can you relate to ever feeling that way too?
When I finally committed to the changes I knew I needed to implement in my life, one of the first things I did wasn’t to immediately find more work or new things “to do” even though it made logical sense.
I gave myself something intangible; I gave myself grace.
I’m going to go a bit religious for a moment but stick with me because grace is an interesting word. We use it liberally in conversations like “it’s ok, give yourself grace” but it wasn’t until I heard my pastor speak to it as a full Sunday service topic that I realized what it really meant to me, basically the unmerited favor and love of God.
He went on to explain the Biblical definition that Grace is a gift from God that is not earned or deserved. It is freely given out of God’s love and mercy. And as a Christian, we believe in the concept of salvation, however not by merit but by the grace of our faith.
That was a mic drop moment when it all came together for me.
As someone who lived most of my life earning, pushing, iterating and needing to do the work – this was the clarity I needed to remember that it’s ok to have grace in a pause & be at peace with quitting something that no longer served me. Not because I failed, because I believe in what’s next.
Why tell you all of this?
I knew in order to test my faith in myself, I had to do something for me, consistently, and with joy. And when I considered all the ‘things’ I knew I had to start doing, I decided to disconnect from all the follows, data and metrics and focus on one thing at a time, making it fun and reminding myself I can do what I commit to.
On May 23rd, 2023, I sent the very first edition 🔗 of this newsletter and committed to covering what I love, every week, without fail. It just so happens that first newsletter topic was about what I happened to cover on my Podcast this week (one year later), and serendipitously, on a topic I’ve spent a decade and a half working on… and how it’s ‘changing’; I’ll mention that below.
52 editions later, and I’ve seen that promise to myself, and to you, through with excellence.
– There were weeks I wrote the whole thing an hour before hitting send.
– There were weeks I just wanted to act like no-one read it and ignore it.
– There were weeks where I got tired of the format, and reminded myself I could change it up and evolve.
I did it anyway.
But most important to me, is knowing that every week of my life, I’m delivering value. With 50-60% open rates and still getting those of you who tell me you read this every week and love it – at the end of the day I realize I just needed a bit of grace to re-find the joy in the process.
If you’ve made it this far with me, I’m so damn grateful for you and for being part of this with me, celebrating a year of showing up for both of us.
When I sat down to write this week’s newsletter I didn’t think it would turn into this, but as entrepreneurs we KEEP MOVING THE #@&* FINISH LINE we forget to stop and celebrate the wins along the way.
Thank you for being here, whether this is Newsletter #1 or #50+.
I only ask of one thing today. If there’s ONE thing I’ve covered you remember that added value to your life, hit reply and share it with me.
It’s how I stay motivated, and will bring me more joy than you know.
Here’s to issue #100 and beyond!
Latest on The Podcast
There’s a seismic shift Google’s latest AI updates are causing in the SEO and digital marketing landscape. With Google’s introduction of AI-generated answers directly in search results, the traditional reliance on website traffic for ad revenue is under threat.
To stay relevant, content must now be of high quality, expert-level, and directly answer users’ questions to be considered for AI summaries. This shift necessitates a deeper focus on brand authority, user engagement, and alignment with broader business objectives rather than just keyword rankings.
Reminder, you can now listen to The Prompt in eleven languages thanks to the Global Network I recently launched, all with the power of AI & Automation (which I teach in my slack community).
