Building a Trades Business Brand That Gets Real Results

Summary

Podcast Summary: Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades – “Building a Trades Business Brand That Gets Real Results”

Hosts: Tersh Blissett & Jim McKee
Date: April 8, 2026
Guest: Jim McKee, Owner/Founder of Keyhart Marketing
Theme: Building effective personal and business brands in the home service trades (HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical), leveraging social media and AI for genuine visibility and results.

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Episode Overview

This episode dives into the strategic role of personal and business branding for home service business owners, with practical guidance on leveraging social media authentically and the nuanced uses of AI tools for content creation and business efficiency. Jim McKee (Keyhart Marketing) shares field-tested advice for trades professionals aiming to grow their visibility, reputation, and customer base. Discussion touches on balancing personal and company brands, the realities of creating relatable content, and actionable tips on deploying AI to amplify—without losing—the human factor.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Personal Brand vs. Business Brand

• Value of Personal Branding:

  • "[As business owners] we all have this ability to fully impact, share the things that are important to us and we share who we are and what we do." (Jim, 00:00, 05:04)
  • Building a personal brand is about authenticity—sharing your passions and everyday work inspires and influences within your industry.
  • Even “boring” content can be highly engaging to outsiders (06:30–07:38).

• Is It a Conflict for Non-Owners?

  • Employees and techs can (and should) build personal brands—growth may lead them to new opportunities and naturally increases company visibility (05:04–06:50).

• Risks When Selling the Business:

  • If your personal brand is tied too tightly to your company, selling may erode perceived value—ensure your business systems and branding can stand alone (08:05–12:37).
  • Consider separating your personal IP (e.g., podcast, videos) into an LLC for greater clarity (11:38–12:37).

• What to Focus On First?

  • If under $1M in revenue (early stage), your personal brand is the most direct way to get traction and business. As you scale, invest in developing both personal and company branding (12:56–14:17).

2. Social Media Content: Authenticity Over Perfection

• Most tradespeople think their day-to-day is uninteresting, but real, unedited content is what actually creates connections and trust (06:30–07:38).

• Relatability Is Key:

  • “People are inspired by the normalcy of who we are.” (Jim, 07:08)
  • Even simple, real-life moments (house tours, routine jobs) are content gold.

• Transitioning the “Face” of the Brand:

  • Having the owner front-and-center helps initially but, with good branding, the focus can shift to team members with minimal disruption (14:37–15:57).

• Standing Out Intentionally:

  • Drawing on advice from Jesse Cole (Savannah Bananas), do something memorable—whether online or in-person—to spark conversation and stick in people’s minds. (10:21–10:58)

3. Using AI & Automation in Branding

• Current State—Augment, Don’t Replace:

  • “When your content isn't real... it's not going to connect with people as well. Right now.” (Jim, 18:34–19:15)
  • AI tools (ChatGPT, Sora, Opus Clip, Plot) are great for speeding up editing, finding trends, and scheduling—but using AI to fabricate people or emotions backfires because audiences quickly notice inauthenticity (17:02–18:47).

• Best Uses Now:

  • Editing video quickly (Opus Clip, Descript): Makes repurposing content faster and easier (19:49–21:11).
  • Analyzing trends (Plot): Use AI to spot trending content styles/hooks, then create your own authentic twist (21:12–22:14).

• Should You Use AI Scripts?

  • “They're pretty bad…” (Jim, 22:44–22:56)
  • Use AI for structure or ideas but always edit text or scripts for your own voice and style (22:56–23:44).

4. The “3S Framework” for Social Content

• Show Up, Stand Out, Scale:
  • ‘Show’ content (50%): Gets attention (trends, fun videos)
  • Stand Out/Thought Leadership: Demonstrates expertise and credibility
  • Scale/Sales: Direct calls to action
  • “If you have a whole bunch of people hanging out at the top of your marketing funnel, you're not pulling them down.” (25:03)
  • Don’t only post entertaining/trendy content—mix in expertise and clear offers to convert attention into business (24:37–25:27).

5. Practical Content Advice for Trades Owners

• Content Ideas:

  • Document what you do daily, even if it's not glamorous (installations, sales calls, computer admin) (31:03–32:29).
  • “Photo dumps” of meetings or celebrations provide an authentic glimpse into your company culture (30:33–30:51).
  • Share relatable stories: what you (or your team) are learning, challenges faced, even “boring” spreadsheets—there’s an audience for everything (32:31–32:55).

• Common Pitfalls:

  • Stock images/hollow posts actively damage your social visibility (29:58–30:26).
  • Buying followers / engagement games don’t drive real connection or local business (29:02–29:43).

• Comfort Zone Matters, But So Does Relatability:

  • You don’t have to overshare or lose privacy—choose relatable stories that fit your comfort level (26:58–27:20).
  • “There are things about you that you could share about… like you come to these events.” (Jim, 27:13–27:20)

• Dealing with Self-Doubt:

  • “Nobody’s personality sucks.” (Jim, 26:05)
  • Self-deprecating content can actually be highly relatable and engaging (26:20–26:30).

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Notable Quotes

• “Even if you think what you're doing is boring—watching someone else do it is really, really interesting to them.” — Jim McKee (06:50)
• “When you show up in your authentic self and you share the things that are important to you, that gives us more leverage to impact other people.” — Jim McKee (05:04)
• “If you're not creating content, just start… document what you're doing. If you're creating and not moving the needle, then optimize.” — Jim McKee (23:11)
• “If you have a gazillion followers and they're totally unengaged—you probably bought followers… I wouldn’t focus on that.” — Jim McKee (29:19)
• “You don't have to be perfect. Just be relatable.” — Jim McKee (26:42)

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Important Timestamps

• Why Personal Brands Matter in the Trades – 00:00–07:38
• Risks & Rewards of Mixing Personal/Business Branding – 07:38–12:37
• Branding Priorities for Small Businesses – 12:56–14:17
• Transitioning Brand Faces – 14:37–15:57
• Role & Limitations of AI in Content – 16:00–19:15
• AI-Assisted Content Creation Tools (Opus, Descript, Plot) – 19:49–22:14
• 3S Content Framework Explained – 24:37–25:27
• Getting Over Privacy & Relatability Hurdles – 26:58–27:20
• Pitfalls: Stock Content & Buying Followers – 29:02–30:26
• Content for Solo Operators – 31:03–32:29

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Final Takeaways

This episode provides a clear roadmap for trades business owners: Build your personal brand early, leverage social media with authenticity, use AI as a support—not a shortcut to the human element—and remember, the most powerful content is often the most relatable and real. Start where you are, share your journey, and let your actual work and personality attract your ideal customers.

For more: Attend Jim’s session “Marketing in 2026: The Power of Personal Branding and AI Driven Social Media” at S225, April 9, 1:30 PM.

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Find more resources and connect at servicebusinessmastery.com.

Transcript

[Jim McKee]

Should business owners build a personal brand? I think there's a lot of value to it. One reason I really talk a lot about personal brand and why it's important is because we all have this ability to like fully impact, share the things that are important to us and we share who we are and what we do. These people have made such an impact on the industry just because they were posting videos online of something that they already did and they were already passionate about. When you're creating video content, you're trying to get viral content. Like you want visibility, you want views, and there is something in social media that people, people really enjoy connecting with other people. And when you're putting content out just for the sake of putting content out and it's not really about you or who you are and when it's AI generated, it's not really about you, it's just like you're trying to tick the box. It's not going to connect with people as well.

[Church Blissett]

Today's episode is brought to you by one of our show partners, upfrog.

[Upfrog Announcer]

Upfrog is the OG when it comes to pricing transparency online. They find system replacement leads through paid ads and have developed an entire system to drive those hard to find system replacement opportunities, nurture the leads and book them into sold systems before your team

[Church Blissett]

arrives to help you grow your business.

[Krista from Marketstorm]

Hey, I'm Krista with Marketstorm and we work with home service companies across the country. Quick question. If another H vac or plumbing company in your area starts influencing homeowners before they ever hit Google, who gets the first call? By the time someone searches plumber near me, they've already been researching the problem. We use AI to detect those early intent signals and put your brand in front of them. So when they do search, your name already feels familiar. Visit Marketstorm AI or text us at 213-575-5448.

[Church Blissett]

Hello everyone out there. Hope you are doing well. You're listening to the service Business Mastery podcast. I am one of your hosts, Church Blissett, sitting next to the world famous Jen McKee. If you don't know Jen, we. Jen talks a lot about social media for the trades. That's predominantly what you do. That's.

[Jim McKee]

That is what we do.

[Church Blissett]

That's a social media. Okay, we're going to talk. Obviously social media is importance, whether or not it's optional and then also a personal brand. And for me I question should, should you have a personal brand and build your business brand? If you don't own the company, should you still be building a Personal brand. Is that any kind of conflict of interest there? So, but we'll talk about some other things too. Obviously we're going to talk AI at some point because that's what we always talk about. And with that being said, welcome to the show.

[Jim McKee]

Thank you. Thanks for having me.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, absolutely. So for those who don't know who you are, could you share who you are?

[Jim McKee]

Yes. My name is Jim McKee. I am the owner and founder of Keyhart Marketing and we specialize in social media for home service companies. So Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, like the day to day stuff. And I am also the host of the Keto Growth podcast which is produced by Church's team. And I am also the founder of the Growth Experience. Humber is coming to San Antonio, Texas this spring.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, that's not far from now. That's not. It's coming up, coming up soon. Okay. So first off, the, the, the events, what do. What do you expect to get out of the event if we. If we attend it?

[Jim McKee]

Diving right in.

[Church Blissett]

I am.

[Jim McKee]

So the Growth Experience homage is all around profits, people and presence. It is for contractors and home service leaders to feel stronger financially, leaving bringing more money to the bottom line. We have Mike McCalit, a prophet first. You know him?

[Church Blissett]

Mike? Yeah, yeah, Mike is a buddy of mine.

[Jim McKee]

Mike is going to be there. Not because Tersh introduced us, unfortunately.

[Church Blissett]

That's. Wow. This is a small world.

[Jim McKee]

Right. And so we'll have Mike McKowicz there. We have some other incredible speakers and keynotes. We have a VIP area where it's a personal professional journey of just kind of like an identity shift into who you want to be when you leave it. So it's not just around marketing. Even though I'm a marketing company, it's really around clean or great operations. If more money to the bottom line and really owning your presence in your

[Church Blissett]

market, will there be like workshops?

[Jim McKee]

It's one thing. Everybody's in the same offers.

[Church Blissett]

Okay.

[Jim McKee]

Same concept.

[Church Blissett]

Sweet. Okay. Personal brand. Should we do that? Yes. No. I feels like something else added to my plate.

[Jim McKee]

Okay. I think first of all, I just want to start off with yesterday's Tactical Awards.

[Church Blissett]

Okay. Yeah.

[Jim McKee]

Because that was my first time attending the.

[Church Blissett]

I didn't realize that was your first time.

[Jim McKee]

I know. And last year everybody kept saying, jen, why don't you go to this? And I couldn't understand why.

[Church Blissett]

It's kind of like natural, like you should have been there.

[Jim McKee]

I know. So if you've never been to the H Vac Tactical Awards, it is a like Grammy Award show for mostly tech influencers in H Vac. Super incredible. And the reason I brought that up when we're talking about personal brand is because these people, men and women, are building a personal brand for themselves. And you asked at the beginning, like, is it a conflict of interest? And I think that it could be, but no, I mean, it is. It's all of our own responsibility to, To. To whatever that next level of growth is. And that can. Look, we don't know where that's going to take us. But one reason I really talk a lot about personal and, and why it's important is because we all have this ability to, like, fully impact. I. I say, like, we have the ability to change the world and we, when we show up in our authentic self and we share the things that are important to us and we share who we are and what we do, that gives us more leverage to, to impact other people. And that's what was so cool about the Tactical Awards, is that these were, these people had made such an impact on the industry just because they were posting videos online of something that they already did and they were already passionate about. Some of them low editing, some of them more editing. Nobody started knowing what they were doing. And they were able to, like, fully make massive impact on each other because they're willing to do it.

[Church Blissett]

I think the biggest thing for me is the fact that most of the times I think that what I'm doing is boring.

[Jim McKee]

Right.

[Church Blissett]

Because I do it all the time.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

And like, the, the people that were at that event, they probably have felt the same way at some point. But then I'm watching the videos and they're like, wow, that's really interesting.

[Jim McKee]

I was gonna say, like, how many of you here watch, like, boring videos of just stuff that maybe is someone cleaning their house, someone like, making food, someone, I don't know, like, watching. There's some things that are, like, oddly satisfying or just, like, interesting. Like, I'm watching this girl right now go on a journey of finding a house. Like, that is so normal, but it's so cool to watch. Just like, I get to go watch all of her house tours with her. And so I think that, I think who you are, everybody here, who you are is there is interesting things or things that are relatable that other people can really be, like, inspired by, but also, like, people are inspired by the normalcy of who we are.

[Church Blissett]

So, okay, what about a business owner who is trying to build the brand of the businesses or business.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

Do you also need a personal brand as well.

[Jim McKee]

I think your personal brand. Okay, so.

[Church Blissett]

Or because if you ever sold the business and your personal brand is wrapped into the business.

[Jim McKee]

Okay, yeah, that's a real thing. Okay, so you just asked me like three different things.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, that happens.

[Jim McKee]

Add well, and they're three really good things, so hopefully remember them. Should, Should a business owner build a personal brand? I think that you can. First of all, I, I tell people this, like Facebook specifically, you have a network of 20 years of people that you have friended. So people that you knew in grade school, in college, your kids, friends, your whatever. Like, you have this massive network, warm network. And those people should know what you do. If you're a business owner.

[Church Blissett]

There's so many times where I'll see somebody say, oh, yeah, I just got my H Vac system replaced.

[Jim McKee]

And I'm like, how awful is that? That's what I'm saying. I, I was talking with someone, they were on my podcast and he said the worst thing is you go, you see someone, you know, you go, you go to church or you go to like Christmas, and they're like, oh, I just spent $45,000 on my new H vac unit. And you're like, what? How did you not know that I do that.

[Church Blissett]

There's such a fine line, though. Church, friends.

[Jim McKee]

Okay.

[Church Blissett]

And air conditioning. Oh, that's not a good mixture. Then every time you see them, they're like, hey, my air conditioning still don't work. Like, great.

[Jim McKee]

You still need a new one. Like, same thing, new day. But my point is, is that these people should know what you do because you don't want them to be giving their money to someone else when they could easily give it to, you know

[Church Blissett]

the statistic on how often someone needs to see your brand before, before they compute that as yours.

[Jim McKee]

I have looked that up for recent times and there's not good data on it.

[Church Blissett]

I'd heard like seven, but then I.

[Jim McKee]

It's still saying that. But then I've heard like 30 times or like 70 times.

[Church Blissett]

I've also heard once you're sick and tired of seeing your own brand, that's when others are just beginning to notice it.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah, yeah, for sure. But, so, okay, so should business owners build a personal brand? I think there's a lot of value to it. I think that your personal brand doesn't need to be like sequins and it, you know, shiny suit, five piece suit. But the advantage to that is that don't do that.

[Church Blissett]

Just so you know, don't. It gets hot, very hot. And People expect you to wear it.

[Jim McKee]

Do you? Okay. He actually was taught by. Do you guys know who Jesse Cole is? Of the Savannah Bananas. So he was taught by Jesse Cole to purposely stand out because then people remember you and you're different. You're doing something different. And so there's something to talk to you about. And so even though, like, your personal brand lives online, it also lives in real life. It gives people something to talk to you about, so then you can even start conversation. I love having something to talk to someone about. I go around looking for something.

[Church Blissett]

You do.

[Jim McKee]

My mom does too.

[Church Blissett]

You get it natural.

[Jim McKee]

My mom does too. Okay, so then the other thing that you said is, like, what happens when you sell?

[Church Blissett]

How do you remember all these questions?

[Jim McKee]

That was such a good question.

[Church Blissett]

It was a great question. I'm glad I asked. I am. Good.

[Jim McKee]

It's a legitimate concern. I mean, really. And there's people in our industry who have, really, who have lost a lot of their IP through selling.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, that's another great point.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. And so it's just something that you have to figure out whenever you make the contract of, like, and. And how valuable is your business without you. And so that's where like, your systems and your marketing and all these other things come into play.

[Church Blissett]

And so ip, when you mentioned ip, when we're building our personal brand, should we get our own personal branded LLC so that the LLC owns the ip? And when I say IP is intellectual property, so there are times when people will sell their business and some of their intellectual property. Say you have a podcast with your business, then the podcast is expected to go along with the business instead of it being your personal brands ip, I'm

[Jim McKee]

not a lawyer and I can't advise anybody on the legal.

[Church Blissett]

But you did stay at a holiday party last night.

[Jim McKee]

But I do think that that's something to consider. Is it? What is it? What is your personal brand? And no, no matter what, no matter what you decide you're create, you're going to create, draw up a contract. And so your business will be more or less valuable depending on what you sell with it.

[Church Blissett]

So whenever we're building out our IP or our personal brand, do you recommend amount of time you spend on one versus the other? Or do you say, okay, your personal brand needs to be here before you start building your business brand, or vice versa? Or if you try and do the same simultaneously? Because I feel like some of that could lead to burnout.

[Jim McKee]

I think that if you don't have the resources to have others help you with Content. If you don't have the resources for that, if you're starting out, then your personal brand is probably going to be the most valuable thing that you can work on to get initial business. Once you have resources that you can invest, whether it's time or money into getting support in creating, editing, putting things out there, then they're both important. Like they, your business needs to be there, your business brand needs to be there, your business, all of that needs attention. But when I specifically, I work with residential home service companies, residential H Vac, if I'm talking to someone who's under a million in sales for year, it's probably more beneficial for them to, to focus on their personal brand. And that's like also being in the community, introducing yourself to people, making connections, connecting in in real life and connecting in on social media or don't grow, whatever, whatever you want to do.

[Church Blissett]

If you're basically starting out, you're less than a million. You're probably one, maybe have one tech, maybe two techs. A lot of times your face is the face that's on social media. If you're going to try and build your business brand out.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

Have you experienced individuals where they get out of the truck so they're not making that content anymore? They rely on their technicians to make the content and then the social media kind of drops off because it's not them building a brand anymore.

[Jim McKee]

I think that there comes a time, especially if you have a nice strong brand, that it doesn't matter who the person is.

[Church Blissett]

Okay, so, so it doesn't like if, if my face is what people see most of the times, even though we have a mascot and all that other stuff, they see my face, they associate my face with the brand. Whenever I start, they start to see someone else's face with our branded logo on it. That's.

[Jim McKee]

Okay, that's a really nuanced question. It's like so specific.

[Church Blissett]

What are you trying to say here?

[Jim McKee]

I think, okay, this is why. So we have a. We work with a H Vac company in Florida and they rebranded about a year ago. They, they do organic with us, they do ads, they. The owner has never been on video ever. He gets stopped in public for people saying they see him on social media. So in that case, they're, they're correlating the brand. Like, and so when they see him wearing the shirt, they're correlating. I see you on social media. For me specifically, I think that people would, it would take a transition period, which we're working on for keyhard marketing social media to be multiple people rather than just me. But then my personal brand is taking precedence.

[Church Blissett]

He's going to be on there too.

[Jim McKee]

Get Jason on there.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, yeah. All right, let's transition a little bit to AI. AI and social media. We talked about this last week or two weeks ago. We just recorded a podcast.

[Jim McKee]

I wasn't going to tell you.

[Church Blissett]

We just recorded a podcast together.

[Jim McKee]

We did.

[Church Blissett]

Anyways, we were talking a lot about AI on that podcast episode. Good, Bad and Ugly. Share your thoughts on it.

[Jim McKee]

So just to shill my presentation tomorrow on social media, AI and personal branding.

[Church Blissett]

What time is it?

[Jim McKee]

At 1:30 maybe. Okay, so tomorrow in the presentation, what I'll be sharing around AI is some tools that you can use to help you be more effective and consistent.

[Church Blissett]

Like mid Journey.

[Jim McKee]

Like what?

[Church Blissett]

Mid journey?

[Jim McKee]

No, not even that. No. These are like, specific social media tools.

[Church Blissett]

Like, I didn't see her turn her nose up.

[Jim McKee]

I'm not. I'm not even bringing up ChatGPT. I'm not bringing up Sora. Like, we're not talking about that. I'm not talking about. But that's good stuff to create content with. I'm talking about tools that are specifically created to make social media easier.

[Church Blissett]

Okay.

[Jim McKee]

There's AI tools.

[Church Blissett]

That's not the fun stuff, though.

[Jim McKee]

Okay, so can you use Sora instead of yourself in your content? Yeah. How. How do you think that looks when you see it?

[Church Blissett]

I look stupid. Especially every time I try to use my image, it always makes me look ridiculous.

[Jim McKee]

Right. So right now the technology is not there. Okay, I saw.

[Church Blissett]

But what if it's not a video? Like, what if it's a photo? Yeah, like. Like, Gemini is doing a really good job.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah, chat is too. You can. There's a level of like. So, okay, when Florida got snow, I saw multiple of my clients are, like, freezing. Florida got freezing. I saw multiple of my clients create AI gym. AI generated photos of their trucks in the snow. It looks AI generated.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, yeah.

[Jim McKee]

So that's the thing. So it looks AI generated. So there is something in social media that people really enjoy connecting with other people. And when your content isn't real, how many of you guys have ever seen something written by ChatGPT? And you can, like, tell immediately that it's written by ChatGPT. Like, how often do you just go past it? Because you're like, jason, nobody took any time doing this, so why would I take the time to read it? It just. It's not. It's not that we do it. Like, screw that person. It's just like that obviously wasn't that important because they didn't put that much time and energy into it. So it's kind of the same thing. Like it could be a novelty, it's like kind of fun. But to be like what people. If you think about like who we really like to see when we're scrolling on Facebook, what we're looking at is pictures of people that we know doing things that they enjoy. So like their birthdays, their vacation.

[Church Blissett]

What if I enjoy AI?

[Jim McKee]

Well then talk about that. Make a video about that. You do make content around that. So that's what people enjoy. So when you're putting content out just for the sake of putting content out and it's not really about you or who you are and when it's AI generated it's not really about you. It's just like you're trying to tick the box. It's not going to connect with people as well. Right now. I can always caveat that with right now. Yeah, I mean it'll change or it will evolve and we'll think differently about it. But right now that's what's happening.

[Church Blissett]

But honestly, what you said is valid about the, the comments and the posts that are generated by chat GPT especially if you know someone is very like to the point, direct and then all of a sudden they come to you with a paragraph.

[Jim McKee]

That's me.

[Church Blissett]

Yes. A lot of filler words and I'm like yeah, nope.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. And we, we just see it. So if you can use it AI to help you move faster and more efficiently, use automations to help you schedule, to help you.

[Church Blissett]

Okay, so what about using AI to help with the editing? So you created your own video.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

And then you use like Opus clip.

[Jim McKee]

Oh that's awesome.

[Church Blissett]

Is it?

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

But is there any negative inside of the social media platforms?

[Jim McKee]

It's no, not like it. But I will say in general it's still not the best content. You know, like it's better, it's better than nothing. I was just talking to somebody about this yesterday. Oh the other day. So like if a zoom recording like zoom into short form video, it does, it's not really great but it's better than nothing. Especially if it's real people. So there's that and, and I like Opus Lips. It's better like I mean the Streamyard AI is terrible but Opus does a better job. So I do like that and that makes it faster and like if you need to get videos out there and

[Church Blissett]

you can the grading scale inside of Opus clips Is it legit? Like, it'll give you a score by 85?

[Jim McKee]

I think it does a pretty good job of, like, pulling actual context. I still sometimes will delete stuff if it's too long or something. But I think that Opus is a great tool for making video editing painless and quit.

[Church Blissett]

What about any of the other platforms or is there anything else that you use similar to Opus? There was that one. Oh, descript.

[Jim McKee]

My team uses descript.

[Church Blissett]

I gave up on it.

[Jim McKee]

My team uses descript and Opus, and they use Plot, which is what I'm going to talk about tomorrow. That one's cool.

[Church Blissett]

What is it?

[Jim McKee]

Plot. So it helps find trends on TikTok.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, so trends are good.

[Jim McKee]

Really cool. Analyzing tools. AI analyzing.

[Church Blissett]

Explain that. What do you mean? Analyzing what?

[Jim McKee]

A lot of times when you're creating video content, you're trying to get viral content. Like, you want visibility, you want views, and you'll see other. One thing that we teach or that we know is like, you could look at what other people have done if you have a video that's going viral or has done really well and analyze what is it about this video that may perform well. There are AI tools now that are actually able. Which I was trying to have your team help us with that. I need to share it with them. I think I did. But basically it finds viral videos and then it can analyze what the hook was, why it performed well. You can take that, put it into another AI tool.

[Church Blissett]

Do you ever get this. This, like, analysis paralysis where it's like, oh, here's a list of hooks, and you're like, oh, that's great. Now I gotta make a video.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. I think the biggest trick there is not to overthink it. It's better to just put content out there with you in it and then, like, optimize it later.

[Church Blissett]

Can I be in the background?

[Jim McKee]

B roll?

[Church Blissett]

You said I just got to be in it.

[Jim McKee]

What? You're making video content right now? This is video content.

[Church Blissett]

Hi, Mom.

[Jim McKee]

It's good.

[Church Blissett]

Yep.

[Jim McKee]

So much video, now that I look at it.

[Church Blissett]

I think that's all the questions I have on ar.

[Jim McKee]

Let's talk about all the tools that you use to make your AI life easier.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, God, I use so many tools, so. But I do have a question about scripts, though, because I did hear somebody the other day say, absolutely, do not use AI scripts for your videos.

[Jim McKee]

They're pretty bad. But also, if you. Okay, so the question is, can you go to ChatGPT and, like, create a script and then use it? And so if you were to use the analyzation from some of these other AI tools, you could potentially put that in there.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, okay.

[Jim McKee]

And help generate a description with it. Here's the thing. If you're not creating content, start off by just creating content and don't overthink it and just document what you're doing and put it out there. If you are creating content and you're not creating video, start creating video and just document what you're doing and talk about what's important to what you know, Put that out there. If you're already creating video and content and it's not really moving the needle, then you start to optimize. So then you start to look at, well, what are other people doing in my field or in a different type of field that serves the same type of person? And how could I potentially do that too?

[Church Blissett]

So copy them.

[Jim McKee]

What?

[Church Blissett]

Copy them.

[Jim McKee]

I mean, so like, okay, so if you work in residential H vac and you have a team and you want to do some fun trending videos, you can go to like realtors or like nail salons or like other people who work, have a team in an office and like, what types of fun things are they doing?

[Church Blissett]

Or how are they do videos like that convert?

[Jim McKee]

They get attention. So if you don't have attention, you don't have to worry about conversion. So you have to like, start by we.

[Church Blissett]

But whenever people are watching a video and like, I have a good friend of mine who's in Florida makes some really hilarious videos and a lot of people know that he does air conditioning as well. But there's times where it's. It's like, okay, what are you selling me? Like, you're doing the same trend as everybody else. That's all you do is the trends.

[Jim McKee]

When we look at social media content, we use or we follow the 3S framework, which is a framework that we created, which is based on the data of what works. So show up, stand out, and scale. So your show content is 50% of your content that's actually meant to get people's attention. And then if you're only like that, if you're only doing that, if you're only doing show content like our friend, then you are.

[Church Blissett]

You know who I'm talking about.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. Then we're missing the. We're missing the scale content, which is the last layer of it. So basically you have a whole bunch of people hanging out at the top of your marketing funnel. You're not pulling them down. So of course you're not.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, it's not converting or anything because

[Jim McKee]

you haven't even told them what your expertise is, which is our CNL content. That's your like thought leadership content. And then your skill content is your sales content. You have to bring them all. If you're.

[Church Blissett]

How do you know when to. To transition from one to the other? Because you see some people's. Some people's stuff is just like, sell, sell, sell, call me. Here's my phone number.

[Jim McKee]

And then nobody sees it.

[Church Blissett]

Nobody sees it.

[Jim McKee]

Right? That's why you have to have the show up on that. You have to have all three of them. So if you look at your content,

[Church Blissett]

I hope I'm recording this somewhere.

[Jim McKee]

You have a whole bunch, a whole bunch of fun content. But nobody knows what you do and what your expertise is. Then you need to start adding that in. If you're only educating and there's nothing about who you are personality wise and there's nothing about what you sell, you need to add those in.

[Church Blissett]

What if my personality sucks?

[Jim McKee]

Nobody's personality sucks.

[Church Blissett]

That's debatable.

[Jim McKee]

No, no, it doesn't. There's always something about you that other people can relate to.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, go.

[Jim McKee]

Other people can relate to.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, okay.

[Jim McKee]

That's what it is.

[Church Blissett]

Maybe that's what it is.

[Jim McKee]

You could be self deprecating and other people can relate to that. I've been wanting to use that word for like a month. Did I use it right?

[Church Blissett]

Nailed it. I don't know if it's the best. I googled it the other day to

[Jim McKee]

make sure that it wasn't a bad word.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, that's awesome.

[Jim McKee]

Y' all know I'm not joking.

[Church Blissett]

She's not joking at all. Okay, sorry I interrupted you. Keep going.

[Jim McKee]

I think that was it.

[Church Blissett]

What were you talking about?

[Jim McKee]

No, being relatable. You don't have to be. You don't have to wear sequins. You could just be relatable. What makes you you? What shows do you like to watch? What books do you like to read? What do you do in your free time? What do your kids like to do? What is your vacations? All of those things are what makes you relatable.

[Church Blissett]

Okay, so where is the invasion of privacy?

[Jim McKee]

You get to decide. You get to decide what those stories are.

[Church Blissett]

I decided the moment I get off of work. Everything after that is invasion of privacy.

[Jim McKee]

But there are things about you that you could share about and you do. Like you come to these events.

[Church Blissett]

You are always talking about me.

[Jim McKee]

Now you are. You're friends with Jessica.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, I feel like this transitions a Little bit. I was thinking of hypothetical. Hypothetically.

[Jim McKee]

I mean, there's things you have to decide. What's more important to you. Is it more important to you to get rich? Keep building your. Your. Your stuff. Then you have to sometimes do things that you don't want to do. You have to be a little bit uncomfortable.

[Church Blissett]

Uncomfortable. Check.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. Put yourself out there.

[Church Blissett]

I'm out there.

[Jim McKee]

In whatever capacities.

[Church Blissett]

Not rich yet.

[Jim McKee]

If you. If you. You have season tickets to the Savannah Bananas. That is not rich. That is rich.

[Church Blissett]

No, no.

[Jim McKee]

That's rich. If you. Dang it. You made me lose my train of thought. Yes.

[Church Blissett]

Nailed it.

[Jim McKee]

Anyways, you have to. You have to be willing to.

[Church Blissett]

Do you relate to sequins?

[Jim McKee]

I think they're pretty and shiny. One of our core values is show up shiny.

[Church Blissett]

You created it in you, so he did.

[Jim McKee]

We wear sequins because the first rule that we teach people is that you. It's okay to stand out.

[Church Blissett]

And when you just normally do the

[Jim McKee]

exact opposite, when you stand out, you have, like, Trish, this was your. This is every way you live your life.

[Church Blissett]

I feel like you're scolding me.

[Jim McKee]

You can be different. And when what makes you different gives you something to talk about with people or something to share, it's something different. And you want to stand out. On social media, you don't want content that doesn't actually show up on the newsfeed. Say that you don't want content that doesn't show up on the newsfeed.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like the. For your page.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. Or, you know, I like Facebook newsfeed. If your content never shows up, then it's not actually doing anything for you. It's a waste of your time.

[Church Blissett]

Okay, so what if you have a gazillion followers and. But you're not getting very many likes.

[Jim McKee]

Do you. Did you buy followers?

[Church Blissett]

I don't know what that.

[Jim McKee]

Usually you bought followers if you have a gazillion followers and they're totally unengaged. Yeah, yeah, that's.

[Church Blissett]

I see that from time to time, though. Like where somebody had like 4 million followers on tick tock and they'll have like 17 likes on their videos.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah, I wouldn't focus as much on followers, especially if we're trying to, like, connect with our community, our local community. You don't need it.

[Church Blissett]

Back in the day, we used to do followers, like, competitions where, like, you. If you like this, like, the page shared some post and you got put into a drawing or something. You remember that? Yeah, back in the day.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah, that's not. You could still do that.

[Church Blissett]

Not good.

[Jim McKee]

Or the goal is. So anybody who has potentially thought like it's okay if we just like post stuff on social media that is stock images or it doesn't matter. But what happens is it actually can hurt you and it can hurt your account in the long run because you're basically telling the social media platforms that the content you put out there isn't valuable. And so then when you do post something you want people to see, it's not going to be anybody.

[Church Blissett]

Hypothetically, that happened to your account. How long would it take to fix it?

[Jim McKee]

I would start posting some really valuable content. So like behind the scenes stuff.

[Church Blissett]

Real valuable content?

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. Your valuable content would be things that people actually want to engage with. So that goes into like what we actually see on social. So probably photo dumps of like meetings, celebrations.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, people want to see that.

[Jim McKee]

Yes, it's people. It feels very natural and normal to social and it tells a lot about your culture and that's what people care about. They don't care about what you do.

[Church Blissett]

Well, what if you are like a one man show and you don't have an office?

[Jim McKee]

Then do something.

[Church Blissett]

Office.

[Jim McKee]

No, do some fun training TikToks. No, be like those guys h vac tactical yesterday. Just document what you're doing.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, but what if you suck at actually doing installs?

[Jim McKee]

Well then you're probably not going to get very far. Well, I don't know. Watch some of those videos.

[Church Blissett]

They were good. Better that every time I watch one of those videos I'm like, nope, not doing one of them videos because mine looks like complete garbage compared to other people.

[Jim McKee]

To judge you.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, they will judge me and I'll judge myself.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah, you could just do like. Well, don't actually. Do not record and drive. Do not record and drive.

[Church Blissett]

Why? Because it, I was hanging this room my mirror the other day and it was recording me.

[Jim McKee]

That's a little bit different. But I know somebody who like somebody got into a car accident in the company car and they went back and used videos from social media of them recording while driving as like against the case of them.

[Church Blissett]

What if you have the medical glasses? Did that matter?

[Jim McKee]

No, these are, these are like talking to the camera while they're driving. So just a psa. Don't record and drive. But your, your story, what you tell, what you share about. Like maybe instead of recording yourself doing installs, you're recording yourself after the fact of what you encountered that day or what you learned. And if you're not doing Installs. You're sitting at the computer. Same thing.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah, because that's exciting.

[Jim McKee]

People are interested in it. I used to watch this girl and she recorded Excel spreadsheets. Sales calls. What?

[Church Blissett]

Excel spreadsheets recorded.

[Jim McKee]

No, I don't watch those. She recorded her sales calls. Just calling. Ringing. Just ringing. Not even. Leave it even here. It was on the other line. You just heard her and like them answer the phone.

[Church Blissett]

You didn't watch that?

[Jim McKee]

I watch it all the time. I still watch her. I like her.

[Church Blissett]

I'm concerned.

[Jim McKee]

It's so interesting. People are interested in all kinds of things, so.

[Church Blissett]

Well, there's hope for us all then, right?

[Jim McKee]

Exactly.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah. Cool. Anything else we didn't talk about?

[Jim McKee]

I feel like we talked about all of it.

[Church Blissett]

Anybody have any questions about social media

[Jim McKee]

or AI?

[Church Blissett]

Not me, no. Yeah. Lively crowd out here.

[Jim McKee]

I know. Thanks for being here. Thanks for joining us.

[Church Blissett]

I think they're here because lunch is right next to us.

[Jim McKee]

I'm okay with that. I'm okay with that being the reason. Come down and eat.

[Church Blissett]

Yeah. Come hang out with us.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah.

[Church Blissett]

Cool. We appreciate y'.

[Jim McKee]

All.

[Church Blissett]

If you do have any questions, don't hesitate. Ask Jen. Don't ask me because I'm not going to answer them.

[Jim McKee]

Yeah. Like I said, I'm talking about this tomorrow. Talking about this tomorrow upstairs.

[Church Blissett]

What's the room number?

[Jim McKee]

Okay. It's called marketing in 2026. The power of personal branding and AI driven social media. Tomorrow at 1:30 to 2:30 and S225.

[Church Blissett]

Oh, that's the exact same room I was in this morning. Presenting way. It wasn't cool. We appreciate you. Thank you. Thanks for hanging out. Being on the podcast for the 12th time, third time this week.

[Jim McKee]

Right. I feel like it would be great.

[Church Blissett]

Okay, thanks. We're good.

[Jim McKee]

Thank you.

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