Episode 98 - Losers are Winners: Alyssa Abbott & Mary Clark on Why AI Can't Touch Real Storytelling
Episode #98 | Losers Are Winners | Alyssa Abbott & Mary Clark on Why AI Can't Touch Real Storytelling
Two social media experts walk into Mysa Hus, and what comes out is a refreshingly honest take on the wins, the flops, and the algorithm mysteries nobody can fully explain. Alyssa Abbott from Olive and Vine Socials and Mary Clark from Pella swap stories about overworked carousels that flopped, lazy Saturday posts that crushed it, and why chasing every trending audio clip is a great way to end up in murky water. They also tackle the AI elephant in the room, and spoiler, authenticity wins every single time.
About The Curious Builder
The host of the Curious Builder Posdast is Mark D. Williams, the founder of Mark D. Williams Custom Homes Inc. They are an award-winning Twin Cities-based home builder, creating quality custom homes and remodels — one-of-a-kind dream homes of all styles and scopes. Whether you’re looking to reimagine your current space or start fresh with a new construction, we build homes that reflect how you live your everyday life.
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Mary Clark 00:04
Hello, we played it pretty safe with social, but we've definitely had times where we put a lot of effort into a post or a carousel or a reel, and you know, you spend all this time editing it and putting it together, and then it doesn't do as well as you think it's going to, and then, like, a one-off post on a Saturday, a static image does like super well, and it's like, okay. What are we doing? You just look at the numbers and try to figure it out.
Mark D. Williams 00:33
Welcome to Fears Builder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams, the host. Today we're live from Misa Whose. I've got Alyssa Abbott, longtime friend of the podcast, she's been on before, and she's out from Sacramento, flew in for our big Misa Whose event, and I've got Mary - I don't even know your last name, I just call you Mary, Mary Clark with Pella Socials, so she's up from Pella, Iowa, she handles all the social media for Pella on the national level as well. Welcome, ladies, to the Misa Who Studio. So today we are going to be chatting about losers or winners, and since you guys are both experts, kind of in the social media realm, SEO, and all the wonderful things that you do, Alyssa, I thought it'd be kind of fun to share with the audience, like what are some of the biggest mistakes that you've either made or that you've seen in our industry? Just think of how many builders and architects and designers that listen to the show, they all - everyone in the world that we live in has to navigate social media. What are some mistakes that you've made, or you've seen, or Alyssa, that you've seen me make, just to kind of share? And then, what are the lessons that we've sort of learned through some of them?
Mary Clark 01:39
Really good question. I think the first thing that comes to my mind specifically with mistakes is this kind of goes across the board, even aside from Pella, but for designers, people in the food industry, just thinking that if something's a trend, you have to jump on it. I don't think that because something is trending, you have to necessarily make yourself smaller to fit into that box, and I think with social, a lot of the time brands and businesses feel that pressure to hop on viral moments and trending moments, but it can sometimes do the opposite of what you think it's going to do. So that's one thing, especially at Pella, we try to be really cognizant of is if we are going to hop on a trend or a viral moment, it has to make sense for our audience and who we're trying to connect with.
Mark D. Williams 02:18
So basically, like, it should stay authentic, like if whatever the trend thing is, is authentic too. In your case, Pella,
Mary Clark 02:24
yes,
Mark D. Williams 02:24
then sure, that makes a lot of sense, because it aligns with, say, your core marketing strategies. It's funny you say that, because early in the early days of social media, of course, Alyssa was there for this for me, but it's like my wife used to manage up my social media account, which led to some great marital tensions, and as she married Jim Carrey, I would often be a little silly over the top, or I would love to try to do like, oh, I'd see some funny movie thing, and that was what I wanted to do, because I'd see the laughs, because it's what I consume, and my wife wisely, she's right, Melissa, you're right, honey, she would say, as if she's gonna listen to this episode, she might, because you ladies are on it, but anyway, the point being is she said you're building a multi, multi million dollar home. They don't want Jim Carrey as their builder, and she's right, like you know, to be a little more professional or to be more, but you also can't change who you are. Like, at the end of the day, they're gonna get Jim Carrey one way or another, just might be live and in person. But anyway, my point in saying, bring it up is like, be authentic, I think, is what I'm hearing when you say that.
Mary Clark 03:22
Yeah, be authentic, but also showcase personality. I think you do a really good job of that too, being authentic, being professional, but all of your social content is still very you, and even seeing what I've seen on social and also seeing you in real life, like it's very you through and through. And I think with social, where it's going to authenticity and just personality is also very important, too, not being overly polished or super prim and proper. I think that's very important too, with social..
Mark D. Williams 03:46
I think it's real. I mean, you look at even like with AI, and you know, the videos are getting so good. I mean, it's getting harder and harder every year, it'll get more and more difficult to understand what's real. I think the personality crux of humanity will be what is obviously will will lead people more to sales and consumer content.
Mary Clark 04:05
Totally,
Mark D. Williams 04:05
you know, last week you were up here for the influencer event that we had, and you guys sent me, sent me the blooper reel. Oh, we have to show Alyssa the blooper reel. It's super funny, and I just think people appreciate the real moments, like Callie Sunbrook. Shout out to her, she posted a video, literally today, that we're recording from Beachside Custom Gyms, and she had Kaylee Lemoine, who was filming her. This is like four months ago, she was up here, three months ago, she was setting up the gym that you can see out the window there, and you know, she was just going on and on about all the mistakes she was making, and she posted the video today, and I'm like, it was so endearing, I sent her a text, or I've commented on her post. I think I like this video more than I like the actual finished video, because it's real, it's funny, it's relatable. I still got educated and understood the content, but like I got more out of that, honestly.
Mary Clark 04:53
Totally,
Mark D. Williams 04:53
what do you see, Alyssa, in terms of, you know, you do all my blog writing for Mark Williams, Misa, who's Curious Bill? There, if I had a personal one, you'd do that one too,
Alyssa Abbott 05:03
in a heartbeat.
Mark D. Williams 05:04
What do you see in terms of authenticity?
Alyssa Abbott 05:06
I think that is something that I am facing a lot lately with the world of AI, and how everything is, you can just write stuff up really quick, and I think the authentic, the authenticity, that is what people crave, that's what they're drawn to, and so content, whether it's on Instagram, a blog, an email, all of those things, you know, people relate in a much deeper way when it's real, when it's authentic, and that's really been something I've been focusing on a lot lately, as I've been navigating what do we do with all of this AI stuff, that's something we'll all continue to learn, and just had
Mark D. Williams 05:42
an idea, and guess who's gonna, and guess who's gonna help me execute it. You, I was just thinking, like, what if we actually did a blog and you wrote it, and then we wrote another blog, but have AI write it and put them side by side.
Alyssa Abbott 05:55
Yeah, and
Mark D. Williams 05:56
literally see which one performs better.
Alyssa Abbott 05:57
That'd be interesting.
Mark D. Williams 05:58
How would someone actually do that, other than I know how you write the article, whatever it is, but how would you actually test A and B out there?
Alyssa Abbott 06:05
I don't know if you could do, I mean, I know you can do A/B testing and emails and things like that, so I mean, do it that way. You could do a, I mean, you could just do two blogs, and even if they weren't like identical, you could probably run them one right after the other, post them at the same time, and just see which one does better.
Mark D. Williams 06:23
Interesting, don't that would
Alyssa Abbott 06:24
be that would be really interesting, because I know, I mean, I had conversations, we had the mixer today, and I had conversations with people about AI, and you know, some some builders use it to do their blogs, and I definitely, that's something I'm facing, that's something right now that we'll see if I'm a loser or not, but I do. I think that storytelling aspect, whether it's Instagram, and you really, you, you tell a story in a caption, or you tell a story in a video, versus, you know, what I do, where we're telling stories.
Mark D. Williams 06:54
I mean, because there's, there's video companies now, I've been approached by them before, where they can create a video avatar for you. It doesn't have to be you, it could be like I could, I could look like you ladies, which would be way more attractive. And basically, they're selling Mark Williams Custom Homes, yeah. And like the video, you know, you could create, so you could, what I understand it is, you could create, let's say, a Mary Avatar, and maybe are you familiar with, like, the Henry's, so you know, high income earning, not yet rich. Then let's say Alyssa's avatar, it for me, for Marco Ian's custom homes could be like the baby boom generation, or whatever four demographics you want, and then I would take those videos and I would market them, you know, with Alyssa's face content, her talking about her homes, but it's all AI-generated video, none of it's real, but yet I guess I'm what I'm curious is like, I don't know what the cost of that is, but you know you're putting a lot of, let's call it bullets in the air, if you're going bird hunting, like that's going to hit a lot of targets. I'm curious, and I think the biggest combat that people would say is, like, yes, an article that you write, because I'm to be clear, like, I, but I know I have three, four years of working with you, and like, you understand my voice, you make it easier for me to get out of me. So I think that creative talent in the, in the writing, I think it's real. I read them, I want them to represent my voice. I guess my question is, like, do you think that I wonder what percentage of people out there that are putting it out there were like, well, it's good enough, like, what if is it 70% or 80% and there's a cost side of it for sure, but I think the thing that they would be undervaluing is the end user, like if they don't know the difference, and then if you're attracting clients that aren't really your people, because the person they're attracted to doesn't actually exist. I don't know the answers to these questions, but I would imagine you're going to face these a lot,
Alyssa Abbott 08:41
yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, I think again it goes back to there's a lot more than just writing a blog or having Chat GPT write a blog or Claude.
Mark D. Williams 08:58
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Alyssa Abbott 09:48
For us, you know, we are, we're diving into all the keyword research, we're diving into a strategy, more than just one blog, and so hopefully when you know someone's thinking about do. Mean that I mean it's not necessarily going to just take the time off their plate, and they're going to do it in five minutes of writing. There's still a lot, and so if you want to really have a productive blog or a productive piece of content, it has to kind of be within that strategy, and I see a lot of people just throw content up and it, it doesn't perform because there's no thought to it in that way, whereas with us, you know, we're building out the strategy, we're putting together even like things like all the metadata behind a blog, the photos, all of that is optimized, and it just, it takes a lot of time and a lot of work, and so certainly you could write a blog that's totally fine and dandy, but to actually put it in and have it be a part of your strategy, it does, it takes a lot of time.
Mark D. Williams 10:45
I think part of it, like anything, when you don't understand it or you don't know how the tool works, I think then it's easy to sort of minimize it, but that'd be true of, like, honestly, we're sitting in this beautiful home, right? Like, I was here, everyone loves the plaster, you guys didn't see Scott Porter and Ty's, but they were here for like 45 days doing this, like the amount of work that goes into executing this finished product, or the windows we're looking at, triple pane Pella reserve windows, right, like the R and D that goes into it, and all we see the end result, which is great, that's what I sell, and sometimes as a consumer they don't need to know the whole story, but I do believe that you can feel the whole story even if you don't understand it all, and I think sitting in Misa, who's here, kind of a shameless plug to that is that well, for years people would come through our homes and they'd say, I don't know what's different about your homes, but your homes feel different, and I used to not like that compliment because I didn't know what to do with it, but you know, Maya Angelou really helped me understand it, which is people forget what you say, but they never forget how you, you're made to feel, and really, when we sat down to create me, so it was that was the whole point of the house, is you don't need to know all the things that I hope you do, I hope you've been following the journey, and even if you don't, we have these conveniently placed cue cards everywhere on the house, so that'll tell you the stories, but even in absence of that, the home will make it, it will feel different, because I do believe you can infuse craftsmanship and storytelling into your actual work. Mary, how do you.. what are some.. how long have you been at Pella? Now on the social sides,
Mary Clark 12:14
I'll be at a year in July. Okay, so still pulling the new card.
Mark D. Williams 12:17
New card, what.. what are some mistakes? I just think they're fun. Like, have you, you know, what would be like some mistakes? Like, you launched, you know, there's no simple stuff, probably. Like, hey, we launched a video, and you can always edit it. I'm trying to think of, like, what would be sort of like I'm trying to think of some of the mistakes I've made in social media, like bad edits, bad cuts, bad audio. I think audio is probably one of the worst. Audio
Mary Clark 12:38
is hard, yeah, choosing audio, especially a lot of the audio trending audio you want to use on social, because that can help boost you in the algorithms, but a lot of the trending audio pieces aren't necessarily like PG all the time, so that can sometimes get you in like murky water, even though it does really well on social and it's a catchy song, it's not always like the safest choice, so Wayne, like, do we want to use a trending song and one that's like viral, or do we want to play it safe and do something a little bit more conservative? Pella, we've played it pretty safe with social, but we've definitely had times where we put a lot of effort into a post or a carousel or a reel, and you know, you spend all this time editing it and putting it together, and then it doesn't do as well as you think it's going to, and then, like, a one-off post on a Saturday, a static image does like super well, and it's like, okay, what are we doing? You just look at the numbers and try to figure it out. So, not not a ton of failure when you were talking a little bit ago about just like one-off posting, not necessarily with Pella, but in the past I think there's been a lot of pressure to be like, oh, we have to post five times a week without having a lot of strategy behind it, and one thing I've learned is consistency matters more than just posting. So, I'd rather have three really good posts every week with strategy and thought behind them, instead of just posting five random things, just to have five posts on our feed. I think that's really important too. That's been a big takeaway for me in social.
Mark D. Williams 13:57
Do you think being a small company like myself or like Alyssa's, what benefits and advantages do you think we have as social media creators and content creators? I mean, there's a whole industry from it, right? Like, I mean, to be clear, like Pell is one of my biggest sponsors, like I get paid to generate content, but I'm also a home builder that puts it all in. What are some advantages? I think what I want to go with a little bit. This is that so many of the people that listen to podcasts have small businesses, and a lot of them have been, maybe they're just getting into social media, or they're like a lot of them don't like to do it, but they feel like they have to, which is why you need people like Alyssa on your team, or a social media team that helps you, I guess. My question is, from your point of view as a bigger company, what advantages do you see that the smaller businesses have over, say, a bigger corporation? Because I think there's some big ones, I'm curious to hear from your point of view.
Mary Clark 14:49
Yeah, bigger corporation, you obviously have a lot more eyes, and just internally, a lot of people have a lot of opinions, so a lot of approvals, you know, we've done things a certain way for a long time, really have. To prove changes you want to make, and that's just kind of a corporate thing. It can take longer to get things done on a smaller scale. You really have that freedom and flexibility to make it whatever you want to make it. And I think even, I don't know, 510, years ago, there was a really big push on having a large number of following, that meant a lot on social media, where I feel like today it's kind of the opposite. I don't think that follower count necessarily resonates as much as it used to, and having a smaller audience can sometimes be a little bit more authentic, and people resonate with that more than a big corporate company. They have a lot more trust, they can see themselves more locally, it's not going to be as branded or feel as like product heavy like a lot of big corporate companies sometimes feel. So, I feel you have, like, a little bit more flexibility, and just some more freedom being on a smaller scale to test and trial different things than you would with a super big company.
Mark D. Williams 15:47
I mean, I agree. I think it's kind of like being a nimble, like, think of a blue whale versus, you know, a dolphin. In this analogy, I'm the dolphin. I'd like jumping out of the water and being playful. I mean, I do think it's like, I also think it's what attracts bigger companies to the smaller fish, totally or dolphins. In this case, I guess I'm a dolphin. I do like dolphins. This is actually this question came up this weekend when my kids, we play this game sometimes at dinner of if you could be any animal, what would you be? I was a dolphin, although someone told me recently, I think an orca is a pretty baller animal, apex predator. Sorry, little tangent brought to you by my ADHD, and this nice bubbler antioxidant sparkling water with
Mary Clark 16:22
caffeine, right?
Mark D. Williams 16:22
With caffeine, I'm sure it does better. Yeah, it is better. But anyway, being small and nimble, and if something doesn't work, you can pivot super quickly. I mean, I think of like a corporate structure, like you might create, you know, months of content draw on a simple thing, and you're like, it's not working. It's like, well, we just invested a lot of money, time, and thought. It's not as easy to sort of like scrap it up and chuck it, and that's hard, because sometimes you don't know when you should stay the course and when you should pivot.
Mary Clark 16:47
Yeah,
Mark D. Williams 16:48
how about you, Alyssa? Is there any, what are some notable mistakes that you've made in your career that you've sort of learned from in a positive way?
Alyssa Abbott 16:58
Oh man, put me on the spot. Let's see, I mean, I, I'm trying to think back to, like, there's been a lot of pivoting, and I mean, I think that kind of goes back what you were just saying, that's kind of the blessing of being a small, just kind of, there's nimble dolphin, nimble dolphin, I like that, I just picture you like,
Mark D. Williams 17:19
oh, that's totally what I would be doing.
Alyssa Abbott 17:21
Yeah, no, we've been able to pivot quite a bit and been able to get a feel for where things are going, what's working, what's not working, and it's myself. I have a copywriter, a Pinterest manager, and an amazing assistant that just kind of helps between all of us at this point. We've got our systems down, but I think what I'm looking at right now, and like what we were talking about with just the changes in my industry, specifically with writing and with creating content. Yeah, I'm trying to figure out exactly which way to go, and so you know we've done that a little bit in the past. We've pivoted, and I think I kind of feel a little bit of a pivot in the future, just whether that's directly like how we are sharing what we do and how we're different versus, you know, just the noise that's out in the world, and so I don't, I
Mark D. Williams 18:11
mean, I think in general, if you're not innovating, you're sort of dying, and I think people that are afraid of change, you know, I think there's a great quote, I think it was Marc Al Levitt showed it like, if you don't like change, you're gonna like irreverent - what's the right word - irrelevant, you're gonna write, you're gonna like irreverent. I can't say that word, irrelevance. Yeah, if you don't like
Alyssa Abbott 18:32
irrelevant,
Mark D. Williams 18:32
yeah, if you don't like change, you're gonna like being irrelevant even less. And I think that was his point, is like, you know, in building science, people don't want to change, they want to build a home the way they always were, but like, sorry, that doesn't work anymore. And so I think, like, all of us, myself included, everyone, I think the faster we can come to market and we can change, but yet still stay true to our finding new principles, whatever those might be, because it's very rare that you would change a core principle like that would be honestly catastrophic, unless you, you know, right, because to change it's not like you can change your personality, or and if you do, like that's probably a warning sign too, like right, I mean, so, but I just think of like companies that you know, I think we've all consumed social media or print advertising or whatever, and maybe you see an established brand take a heart and you're like, whoa, what are they doing, but what did they learn from it, but a great example is Coca Cola, you know, they did the was it New Coke, was that in their late 90s? You guys are pretty young, but so they did this New Coke, so they wanted to change, they tried a new formula, and people hated it, hated it, and they pivoted to classic Coke, which is the same thing, but different branding in their sales, like doubled or tripled, but my point was that success was preceded by failure. They tried something, it didn't work. And I know Brad Robinson, who's one of my curious collective ambassadors down in Atlanta, is the first one that kind of told me this, and it's pretty common now. But fail fast, you know, don't be afraid of failure, but make sure you fail fast, like a long slow death. It sounds pretty terrible. I mean, you know, just get it over with, and like, move on to the next idea.
Alyssa Abbott 20:03
Yeah, and I mean, I'm thankful to own my own business, and to have that kind of small the way to be able to just pivot and say, yeah, okay, we're gonna try something different, like that's definitely on my mind a lot. And how we're gonna, how we're gonna navigate just the world that we live in, in the future, and what things are are gonna look like. So,
Mark D. Williams 20:21
well, thanks for coming on the podcast. You guys are amazing. We'll have everything in the show notes. And thanks again for tuning the Curious Builder podcast. Thanks for tuning in to the Curious Builder Podcast. If you like this episode, do us a favor, share it with three other business owners. The best way that we can spread what we're doing is by word of mouth, and with your help, we can continue to help other curious builders expand their business. Please share it with your friends, like and review online, and thanks again for tuning in.
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