One of my favorite AI tools is Speech Synthesis from ElevenLabs. I think the voice cloning is incredible. You can take a 1 to 2 minute clip of someone talking (I usually use podcasts or audiobooks to get a clean sample), and use the VoiceLab Instant Voice Cloning to upload it. You can adjust the…
There is a joke that goes something like “why spend 15 minutes doing a task manually when you can spend 3 hours automating it?”. While it might sound ridiculous at first, there are actually several benefits to automating tasks that would take less time to do manually. This task (or its evil twin) will show…
Come on brain, think. It’s frustrating when you want to create something impactful but your brain won’t cooperate. We know that there are a trillion ideas out there and yet we can’t seem to find them. We’re stuck. How do we get unstuck? Below are some of the strategies I use to break out of…
I’ve seen a lot of reporting during my time in marketing and much of it has been a dog and pony show. I’ve seen one marketing department hide data that gave credit to functions other than marketing. I worked at a place where every month was better (by some arbitrary metric) than the month before….
Seeking out experts is invaluable when you need something built correctly or need help in troubleshooting why something isn’t working. The drawback to expertise is the same thing that makes them valuable; they know too much. Experts know what is possible and how things should work. This is a significant disadvantage when trying to come…
I think podcasts have gone seriously off the rails. From what I observe, everyone is pretty much following the same formula. Tom Smith will invite Sophia Jones to be a guest on his podcast and then Sophia Jones will invite Tom to be a guest on hers. It’s a loop. It’s all the same people…
There seems to be a great deal of discrepancy as to how employers view education and learning with much more value given to the former. Job postings will always have education requirements but rarely will mention anything about ongoing learning. It seems like they are only interested in what you did and who you were…
I love words. I think it is important to use the mot juste and not commit verbicide like we have done with the word ‘“amazing” where it is used to describe everything from a medical breakthrough to a to a store bought cupcake. I don’t think this is merely a catachresis; I think we have…
In August, I set a goal to publish a new blog post every day and I just completed my first month. It’s crazy how hard it is to get started and then how much easier it gets. This has been such an incredible exercise because in addition to the benefit of writing leading to more…
Hook by Blues Traveler is a brilliant, satirical, and meta as hell song that makes me think about how the lyrics apply to a lot of what is posted on social media and in particular, LinkedIn. It’s about a thin façade where nothing is really being said but it is wrapped in a pretty package…
I have been part of a few rebranding projects with different companies over the years. They have all basically followed this same formula. Hire an agency to conduct market research Ask your target market what they believe and what is important to them Pick whichever belief gets the most votes Create messaging saying that is…
If I had programming skills, the first project I would work on is a social media platform that provided no analytics. And if I had wheels I’d be a wagon. So instead of actually building this myself, let me share my dream with you. The platform would still have things such as likes and comments…
You treat a heart attack differently than you treat high blood pressure. From what I’ve observed in our jobs, many people treat most things like heart attacks. Everything is urgent and needs to be tended to immediately. Doing bypass on a heart attack patient is expensive, messy, and painful, but offers quick results. Treating someone…
There has never been a better time in human history to be a creator and to start a movement. It is amazing that I can have a website, podcast, video platform, and send out emails to subscribers for a cost of almost ZERO dollars. This is like being around during the time that Gutenberg invented…
Imposter Syndrome and the Dunning–Kruger Effect seem to be two sides of the same coin. With imposter syndrome, brilliant people don’t believe they are and live in fear of being exposed as frauds. Dunning-Kruger on the other hand is a cognitive bias where people lack awareness of their skills and the less skilled they are…