How to Build and Grow a Thriving YouTube Channel for Nonprofits [Nonprofit Marketing with Amber Melanie Smith, Part 8]

Transcript

Intro (John B):

[0:00] You’ve landed on episode eight of our multi-episode, multi-interview series

Introduction to Nonprofit Marketing

Intro (John B):

[0:03] all about marketing a nonprofit. This is one of the final episodes of the series and the perfect segue to our next series, which will be all about building, launching, and marketing a YouTube channel. So why is this episode the perfect segue between series?

Our next guest is Amber Melanie Smith, the longtime and very successful founder behind the nonprofit Activate Good. Activate Good is a thriving North Carolina nonprofit that helps other nonprofits find, organize, and mobilize volunteers. What an awesome idea. However, Amber’s career has taken a somewhat dramatic twist as of late, thanks to her equally successful YouTube channel all about, you guessed it, building, launching, and marketing nonprofits. Link to Amber’s show and nonprofit are in the show notes. Check it out.

Guys, this episode rules. It’s one of my favorites I’ve ever done. Amber really delivers the goods as we explore how to build a YouTube channel from absolutely nothing to something. And in Amber’s case, that something is no joke. She dominates YouTube for queries related to non-profits. If you want your YouTube channel to dominate, whether it’s for a non-profit or not, stay tuned. This episode is for you. We’ll cover tactics for increased channel engagement, tools for YouTube channel growth, editing on a budget, YouTube authenticity, newsletters, monetization. We’ll even discuss the importance or lack of importance in leveraging other social media channels to grow your YouTube.

Intro (John B):

[1:14] Huh. And just as a bonus, we talk at the end about how she grew her non-profit in the first place. Key lessons she learned, lots of other valuable stuff. She’s been doing this for 20 years.

She knows what she’s doing. Sound good? If so, please hit the like button now and consider spreading the word about our multi-episode nonprofit marketing series.

Meet Amber Melanie Smith

Intro (John B):

[1:30] If you know other nonprofit marketers, they’re going to love it. Now, Amber Melanie Smith.

Starting the YouTube Journey

John Bertino:

[1:45] And we’re back with another episode of the Niche Marketing Podcast. As always, I’m your host, John Bertino from The Agency Guide. If you’re struggling with your marketing agency, you’re unsatisfied with the results, and many people are, please give us a look at theagencyguide.com.

We represent about 300 different agencies across the US and Europe, and we can look to matchmake your specific needs with one of these vetted teams so that you can get better results from your marketing. Today, we’re here with Amber Melanie Smith. Amber, thanks so much for being here.

Amber M. Smith:

[2:15] Thanks for having me.

John Bertino:

[2:17] Absolutely. This is a special episode for me because… It’s really in the epicenter of what I’m personally focused on right now, and that makes it that much more fun. We’re going to talk a lot about YouTube, how you’ve built out what you’ve built, and then also talk a little bit about the nonprofit side of things since we’re really right in between two series, one on successful nonprofit marketing, another on building out a YouTube show, a channel, and everything that goes with it.

So, starting with the latter, start by perhaps reintroducing yourself and tell us about your YouTube channel and how you got started.

Amber M. Smith:

[2:55] Yeah. So, I’m Amber Melanie Smith. Fun fact, I didn’t used to go by my middle name, but as I started to figure out my identity outside of the nonprofit that I started when I was in college, I wanted something to differentiate who I am outside of the organization.

And so, I added my middle name to be like a whole person experience. Anyway, that’s really cheesy.

John Bertino:

[3:17] It’s got a nice ring to it.

Amber M. Smith:

[3:19] Yeah, Amber Melanie Smith. My mom knew what she wanted to hear.

John Bertino:

[3:23] Yeah, you’re not just any Amber. You’re not just any Smith. Amber Melanie Smith.

Amber M. Smith:

[3:26] That’s right. So anyway, I’m Amber Melanie Smith, and I am a nonprofit founder. I started an organization before I finished college, and now I am a social entrepreneur, which if you don’t know what that means, that’d be something to talk about for sure.

John Bertino:

[3:42] What is it?

Amber M. Smith:

[3:43] Okay, social, you can tell I’m excited. A social entrepreneur is someone who marries concepts of business and social impact nonprofits, brings them together to make an impact, usually in some kind of really innovative way that solves a problem in the world. So that’s who I aspire to be.

That’s what I try to do through, even though YouTube. And then I also am currently calling myself a social impact YouTuber. Because I think it’s a distinguished way of explaining the way I want to do YouTube, the content that I put, that was a really long explanation about who I am, but we’re here for long explanations.

The Birth of Activate Good

John Bertino:

[4:24] A short explanation would be insufficient. Okay. And so, as you’ve already alluded to, as we’ve both alluded to, you’ve built out a pretty successful YouTube channel, but perhaps before we even get to that, I mean, what was the inspiration to go there?

I’d imagine it had to do with your own nonprofit that you started. So, tell us about that nonprofit, how that led you to YouTube.

Amber M. Smith:

[4:44] A long time ago, I went on a cross-country road trip with my best friend. Her name’s Heather. We volunteered in over 20 states and just kept going on this road trip trying to do good deeds and acts of kindness until we basically ran out of money.

And this was the road trip that inspired us to start Activate Good when we came back to Raleigh, North Carolina, because what we learned on the road trip was that people really wanted to get involved in their communities, but there were barriers to getting started.

Either it was too complicated to figure out how to find the opportunities or to connect your personal skills to those opportunities, we wanted to make it easier for people to do good, to help their community. So, we came back, started Activate Good.

Amber M. Smith:

[5:27] And over the last several years, I’ve grown that organization. We’ve got a great team, great board of directors. And as of this month, May, I’m actually transitioning out of my role as executive director of Activate Good. So, throughout that period of time, I started getting a lot of questions from people who were curious. How do you start a nonprofit? How do you fundraise?

Do you have tips for our strategy? And I was getting so many questions that I thought to myself, why don’t you just start making some educational content about it? And then I can help this person who has a question and hopefully lots of other people have a question too. I really didn’t think that it was going to pick up any steam, but people surprised me with,

The Nonprofit’s Mission

Amber M. Smith:

[6:17] being actually interested in that topic. So that was really gratifying.

John Bertino:

[6:22] And specifically, just so everyone’s clear, what exactly is Activate Good?

Amber M. Smith:

[6:26] Yes, we Activate Good is a nonprofit that mobilizes people to get out and volunteer in the local community, and that’s in Raleigh, North Carolina. So we have 600 nonprofits that we partner with who have needs on the ground, and we match over 50,000 people to them over the past several years to go out and help.

John Bertino:

[6:47] Maybe it’s just because I’m an outsider to the space. I mean, I’ve worked with some clients in the space, but I’m not deep in it like you are, but it seems like such a clever but necessary thing, right? Like people have these various causes, these nonprofits, they’re trying to generate activity, but you need human bodies to execute a human capital. Some, some have referred to it.

And I would imagine that can be a really daunting and challenging thing at times to get the human participation to make it all work. And so that’s the crux of what Activate Good is you aggregate different individuals to help implement and execute the work of the various nonprofits that are part of your network, correct?

Amber M. Smith:

[7:27] That’s right. And it’s really a capacity builder for the organizations because like you pointed out, volunteers, especially the right volunteers, can be challenging to find. But when managed effectively, volunteers can really increase your ROI as a nonprofit exponentially.

John Bertino:

[7:42] Yeah, no doubt. Okay. Well, we’ll get back to your nonprofit,

Transitioning to YouTube

John Bertino:

[7:45] how you built it and some of the things you did there in a little bit. Shifting back to the YouTube part.

So, you’re like, okay, well, you’re like, I’m getting a lot of the same questions. Maybe I should just start answering them on YouTube. Was part of it like, this will be a more efficient way to just send somebody a link, so I don’t have to answer it again?

Amber M. Smith:

[8:01] Part of it, yeah. But I also realized I like teaching. I like explaining the concepts. And I thought back to when I was in college and how little I really understood about nonprofit social impact, social entrepreneurship. And I try to think of how I would talk to someone the way I would talk to my younger self. Do you know the curse of knowledge?

John Bertino:

[8:27] Do you know what that is? I’ve heard that, but please.

Amber M. Smith:

[8:29] Yeah. The curse of knowledge is when you communicate to someone assuming they know what you know.

John Bertino:

[8:34] Right, right, right.

Amber M. Smith:

[8:36] It’s the curse of knowledge.

John Bertino:

[8:38] Yeah.

Amber M. Smith:

[8:38] So I think that’s honestly, and we can get back to this too if you’re interested, but that’s a mistake I see a lot of other YouTubers and communicators in this space making is talking to people as if they know what they know, all the jargon, all the way things work, etc.

If I had had someone like me now back then, I could have accelerated my social impact, my fundraising, my marketing, et cetera, a lot faster. And that’s what I am trying to do for other change makers now.

John Bertino:

[9:11] Okay, excellent. So you’ve built up quite the following. Frankly, that’s how I found you, if memory serves me correct. I was doing research, preparing to go into a series of interviewing non- profit marketers, and you kept coming up with tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of views per episode.

And I was like, whoa, how is she doing this? And it’s also, I found it particularly impressive because as much as this non-profit space is really interesting and enticing and people want to do good, I mean, it’s not like the sexiest thing. It’s not food or music.

Amber M. Smith:

[9:44] Not video games.

John Bertino:

[9:44] Yeah, it’s not video games, right? So, I was like, wow, this is quite impressive. So, I mean, big question, but how did you start to gain significant traction where you were getting thousands of views, if not tens of thousands per episode?

Amber M. Smith:

[9:58] Yeah. And I want to be clear, your kind of alluded to this, but this is a niche channel, right? I mean, I hope one day, but probably I’m not going to get to 10 million subscribers,

Gaining YouTube Traction

Amber M. Smith:

[10:09] you know, that’s, it’s a niche. And so first understanding and looking at success and growth in the, in that context, right? So, for the channel size that I have, some of the videos are performing really well.

John Bertino:

[10:24] Right?

Amber M. Smith:

[10:25] And I think it was a lot of experimentation in the beginning. If you look at some of my earlier videos, you see me playing around with, topics like, if you’re a Myers-Briggs ENFJ, how should you change the world?

Just figuring out what’s good for people and entertaining for people and also what the algorithm is going to pick up on. And a lot of experimenting, a lot of looking at the analytics and insights. And then a lot of just listening to and observing what people are asking me in the comments.

John Bertino:

[10:57] Yeah. Let me interject right there. Would you say that looking at the comments was one of, if not the main thing you looked at to guide what your next topic would be?

Amber M. Smith:

[11:06] It was a big influence, especially if I saw many people asking the same types of questions. I have a couple videos where I’m just like answering your questions about board governance. Here are all of the top questions I’ve gotten from you and here are the answers.

John Bertino:

[11:21] And I’m inclined to ask, how did you even get to the point of getting comments? Right? Like I would really like more comments. Everyone out there listening, please comment on this video.

Now’s your chance. We need comments. But like, I’m not even there yet. We’ve got a thousand plus subs and we’re doing well with things, but nobody’s really commenting.

Amber M. Smith:

[11:40] You’re at a thousand plus. That’s awesome. Yeah.

John Bertino:

[11:42] Almost 2000.

Amber M. Smith:

[11:43] Good job.

John Bertino:

[11:44] Yeah. Thanks.

Amber M. Smith:

[11:45] I feel like that’s the hardest thing. Part, right? And then you start to pick up steam. That’s what I’ve heard.

John Bertino:

[11:51] Tell me.

Amber M. Smith:

[11:51] Yeah. So, comments, I would say what you just did is something that I’m asking. Ask for comments. Let people know you want comments and also ask people questions that they can answer in the comments.

So, what are your biggest challenges about grant writing or so forth? Leave in the comments below. I’d love to hear from you. And then I also make a point to answer as many of the comments or at least respond in some way, even if it’s just a smiley face. Just acknowledge the presence of the person who’s watching. I’m sure I miss some, but I do my best to really engage back with them and create that connection.

John Bertino:

[12:29] Were you always thoughtful enough to ask or solicit for the comment or did that something that took a while to learn?

Amber M. Smith:

[12:37] I think I started early, but it’s not because I just intuitively, magically knew to do that. I was watching other people’s videos on how to be successful on YouTube to try to learn what they knew.

John Bertino:

[12:49] All right. And so back to ideation, comments were big. How else did you decide

Engaging with Your Audience

John Bertino:

[12:53] that, hey, maybe Myers-Briggs, Ian, FJ, JF, maybe that’s not the right place to be. What else did you do then or perhaps you’re doing now to ideate what you should put out next?

Amber M. Smith:

[13:04] It’s a couple of things. One is after 10 to 20 videos or so, you can start to see which ones are picking up steam in your insights, right? And so, I was just taking a look at what’s working, what are people really responding well to, and how big of a role is SEO playing in that.

John Bertino:

[13:24] Right?

Amber M. Smith:

[13:25] If you have a keyword search tool or planning tool of some kind, you can kind of get a sense for what people are looking for on YouTube, on Google, that they might not be finding. So key phrases like, how to start a nonprofit with no money.

John Bertino:

[13:41] Yep.

Amber M. Smith:

[13:42] Apparently a top searched phrase. I made a video with that exact title and now it’s doing really well.

John Bertino:

[13:47] Yeah. What tools do you like to use for keyword research?

Amber M. Smith:

[13:50] I’m currently using TubeBuddy, but I’ve also used just Google Keyword Planner. Is that something you’ve used, TubeBuddy?

John Bertino:

[13:58] Yes. I mean, SEO happens to be my background. So, I’ve used them all.

Amber M. Smith:

[14:02] I’m sure you know way more about it than me.

John Bertino:

[14:04] I could go on and on. Shout out SEMrush. We’ll have a link down below.

Amber M. Smith:

[14:09] That’s right. Come on, sponsors, get in on this.

John Bertino:

[14:12] But I really do endorse them, recommend them, have for years. And now that I’ve given them a plug, I don’t want to give anybody else a plug. But, you know, TubeBuddy for sure. And, you know, I guess Moz has always been there and I could go on and on and on and on. So, you know, but it’s actually, I want to push back for lack of better phrasing. We chatted with slash consulted with another YouTuber, actually, Finn McKenty.

He’s the man. I should connect you guys. And his take was like, don’t rely on SEO was actually his take. He was like, you’re never, he didn’t say never, but he’s like, you’re going to get exponentially more traffic through really just viewership metrics and the way that if your content’s good, you’ll get more visibility in the sidebar of the homepage. He’s like, an SEO won’t be a main driver for you. Now, it sounds as though you’re saying that you feel as though keyword research was significant in your success. Is that true?

Amber M. Smith:

[15:12] At this stage. Now, how big is his channel?

John Bertino:

[15:16] He’s in music. So, millions.

Amber M. Smith:

[15:18] Yeah. So, I mean, also with music, I think it’s just you are attracted to the person because you like what they put on. Like, it’s more about that than like, I’m not sure. Is it performance based or?

John Bertino:

[15:30] He analyzes bands and songs and goes in depth and has lots of controversial opinions. He’s very fun.

Amber M. Smith:

[15:38] I’ll have to check him out. So, I view myself still at somewhat the beginning of my YouTube journey. And I think at this phase, understanding SEO has served me well because I think it helped me gain traction in the beginning when I wouldn’t have otherwise.

That said, I am interested in pushing the envelope a little bit and experimenting and trying new things. I just posted a video about how I’m leaving the nonprofit that I started.

[16:05] Yes.

Amber M. Smith:

[16:05] And that wasn’t really SEO focused.

John Bertino:

[16:08] Right.

Amber M. Smith:

[16:08] But so far is my top performing video in the period of time since it was posted.

John Bertino:

[16:14] Yeah, I saw that. Lots of engagement underneath too. And I wasn’t sure if that was a byproduct of the fact that it is a significant time in your life. And therefore, you’re getting lots of comments where if you always get that many comments.

Amber M. Smith:

[16:25] It varies by video. But I think what I wanted to experiment with this video was just, does my audience want to hear more about me as a human? Or am I more just the educational talking head?

Like whom does the audience need me to be right now for them? And understanding that a little better so that I can sort of strategize my next phase of my YouTube journey, so to speak.

John Bertino:

[16:51] Okay. So many questions for you. Just staying on the SEO thing for a moment. How often do you change headlines, titles that you may have written for a video? Is it standard practice for you to change it a few times to test what performs? Or often are you just doing the keyword research, creating a title and letting it ride?

Amber M. Smith:

[17:11] The latter. And part of that.

John Bertino:

[17:14] Interesting.

Amber M. Smith:

[17:15] It doesn’t necessarily mean I’m doing it right, by the way.

John Bertino:

[17:17] Sure. I mean, you’re doing something right, Amber, Melanie Smith.

Amber M. Smith:

[17:21] Well, part of that is YouTube has been something I’ve done on the side for the past couple of years and maintained as I had my full-time job. So doing extras like that, going back and, you know, experimenting with new thumbnails or new titles, et cetera, just hasn’t been something I’ve had the capacity to put my time into. But going forward, I might experiment a little bit more with that.

[17:45] I’m sure you will. I think that’s actually a really interesting insight. I’m coming at things from the opposite side. I’m a marketer by trade. All of my research is like, what are the marketing best practices? We’re already testing different headlines, testing different thumbnails, but it’s kind of like you wonder how much you’re shooting yourself in the foot by not just letting things rise or put another way, do we have adequate sample

Structuring Video Content

John Bertino:

[18:07] size on the way that video performed with that headline, so on and so forth. Along the same lines, but slight pivot, engagement, broad topic, big question, obviously key, but specifically through the lens of trying to structure or create the videos in such a way that people stay on them and watch them.

Because again, Finn McKenty had mentioned and many other YouTubers that the key to this game, if you were to identify one thing is how long people engage with the video, this will increase your results in the algorithm. Do you put much thought into little tweaks to keep people engaged or are you just doing something right naturally and that’s just happening?

Amber M. Smith:

[18:48] I’ve tried to structure my videos with some intention, but again, it’s one of those things I feel like I’d like to experiment more with when I have more capacity going forward. But right now, my basic formula is saying what you’re going to say, say it, and reflect on what you just said. And I know I’m not the first person. I can’t remember. Some famous person said, that’s what you should do in a speech.

So, start with the end. Yeah, like in this video, here’s what you’re going to hear. And now I’m going to tell you the thing. And hey, did you like what you just heard? Let me know in the comments. And it’s kind of boring, actually, now that I say it out loud.

John Bertino:

[19:25] So it’s like the opposite of burying the lead. It’s like, start with the lead, say the thing. These little nuances really matter.

Amber M. Smith:

[19:31] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[19:32] So you make a concerted effort to do an intro of sorts to tell people where this is going.

Amber M. Smith:

[19:38] Yes, absolutely. And not only that, but I try to infuse my keywords into the verbal component of what I say in the first couple of sentences. I don’t know if this is a lie or not, but I’m told that the algorithm, the mysterious algorithm, the algorithm, I’m told that they like that.

John Bertino:

[19:56] It you know actually there’s several layers to quote-unquote the algorithm it’s actually algorithms I.

Amber M. Smith:

[20:07] Picture them like a um like a crime syndicate like shadowy silhouettes.

John Bertino:

[20:12] Right a whole group of people yeah, this mysterious them okay interesting all right so you’ve made that effort to lead out how long did it take for you to start doing that or were you doing that right out of the gate?

Amber M. Smith:

[20:24] 10 to 20 videos in probably.

John Bertino:

[20:26] Yeah. How many videos are you in now?

Amber M. Smith:

[20:28] 210-ish.

John Bertino:

[20:30] Okay.

Video Length and Formats

Amber M. Smith:

[20:30] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[20:31] Perfect segue.

Amber M. Smith:

[20:32] Okay.

John Bertino:

[20:33] Length. Do you tend to try to keep the videos to a specific length or do you try to mix up different formats of length?

Amber M. Smith:

[20:41] I think at the beginning… No, I think it’s always been the same. 10 to 20 minutes is my sweet spot. A couple go over, a couple are under, but most are in that sweet spot. And I’ve just found that that is the length that I’m comfortable speaking at. It’s the length I have the energy for. And it’s a good length to cover enough of a topic for people to feel like they got value without overwhelming them with too much.

John Bertino:

[21:09] Yeah. So, if I heard you correctly, or if I could repeat that back, the motivation there was, is that this is what felt the most comfortable for you.

Amber M. Smith:

[21:17] I think so.

John Bertino:

[21:18] But you also surmised that it’s probably also the right length of people’s attention spans. I’m putting words in your mouth, but what that, what most people want when it comes to subject matter, such as nonprofits, you know, 10 to 20 minutes is the right formula.

Amber M. Smith:

[21:33] Yes. And as I’m looking at other channels in adjacent niches, like business and stuff like that, their videos are all in the same range. So, you know, they’re modeling that for me as well.

John Bertino:

[21:47] Yeah. And so how about short form? Are you playing with that at all?

Amber M. Smith:

[21:50] I have done shorts, if that’s what you’re referring to.

John Bertino:

[21:53] Yes. So, it doesn’t sound like you’re creating content that’s a minute, two minute, three minutes by design, but rather you’re editing out the shorts from your longer form?

Amber M. Smith:

[22:04] I have done that a couple times. I have also done just some one-off shorts just with my phone on answering quick questions, stuff like that. I’m still not sold on if those are having a good ROI for me. I’m taking a look at that.

John Bertino:

[22:18] The way I’ve been thinking about that, again, kind of coming at it as a career marketer, is that I’m starting to now think of the length of the video,

Social Media Strategies

John Bertino:

[22:28] the shorter the length of the video. You can think of it as serving higher up in the funnel. Are you familiar with this funnel terminology?

Amber M. Smith:

[22:35] Right?

John Bertino:

[22:35] So as people are still higher up in the funnel, they’re less problem aware. Or they’re just starting to realize they have a problem they want to solve, give them small bite-sized nuggets because they’re unlikely to invest five minutes, 10 minutes, half hour, an hour if they’re not even sure if they have a problem they want to solve yet.

So, it’s like the shorter the content, the more targeted it is to higher up in the funnel. And conversely, the lower down in the funnel, the more they’re like, I definitely have a problem I want to solve. I’m weighing my options. I’m trying to get educated. What should I do? That’s where the longer form really comes in. And I think you could, with having said all that, you could definitely say that mid-funnel, right? Five minutes, 10 minutes is probably really good. Or I guess it depends on how complicated the subject is. But that’s the way we’ve been looking at it.

And I definitely think that’s the right approach. So short form, no doubt, a great way to start to pull people in in the first place. So again, segue off of that. I’m curious, you know, again, you’ve built up quite the following. Did you put much effort into leveraging social media aside from YouTube to do that? Or did you basically just hit YouTube?

Amber M. Smith:

[23:42] A little bit. So, a couple of posts here and there on Facebook and LinkedIn, largely YouTube though. So, in the opposite vein, I’ve built a community. Actually, it’s on Facebook right now. I built a community of subscribers who have come and want to connect with each other and connect with me further. So, it’s also worked that other way too now that’s not what you asked I know.

John Bertino:

[24:10] No I absolutely relevant what you’re doing on Facebook and how that’s helped what came first though the chicken or the egg, so you leveraged YouTube to drive people to Facebook yeah.

Amber M. Smith:

[24:20] And my newsletter.

John Bertino:

[24:21] And your newsletter the.

Amber M. Smith:

[24:22] Facebook and the newsletter are connected.

John Bertino:

[24:24] Yeah okay anything else on social or has that been most of it.

Amber M. Smith:

[24:29] It hasn’t been a lot on social It’s largely been, I think, YouTube and the algorithm picking it up, you know, and just making sure that I’m engaging with people authentically if I can, you know, sharing my many mistakes doing all the things that I’ve tried to do.

John Bertino:

[24:49] Yes. I find that fascinating, believe it or not. You know, it’s so one of the reasons I love doing what we’re doing with the niche marketing podcast and especially talking to folks that don’t do marketing for a living. But have had great success, you know, to hear that you haven’t been like, I’ve been on every social platform, you know, Gary Vee, that’s my homie. I love him. He’s great.

He’s brilliant. But, you know, in general, he’s like on most platforms. Now he’s diversifying his content. He doesn’t put the same thing everywhere, but in a lot of ways, not because you’re not a Gary fan, but you’ve done the opposite thing. You’ve been super focused on just YouTube, if I heard you correctly. And then slowly but surely, your kind of open that up to a Facebook community, but you’re not doing Instagram shorts, or if so, very few. You’re not on TikTok.

Amber M. Smith:

[25:37] No.

John Bertino:

[25:38] Even though there’s a rabid social impact-oriented base there. Haven’t done it yet, right?

Amber M. Smith:

[25:45] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[25:46] Just YouTube. Fascinating. And then the newsletter, how has that served you and how robust has that initiative gotten?

Amber M. Smith:

[25:53] So newsletter is great for increasing that personalized connection. And also, if someone would like to work with me in another way. So, I’ve had consulting partners and projects come through YouTube, then the newsletter, then engagement with me. I have online courses about fundraising and how to start a nonprofit. And the newsletter is a great tool to help me showcase those as well. So, yeah.

John Bertino:

[26:21] How have you managed to get subscribers to that newsletter?

Amber M. Smith:

[26:25] So I invite people in the videos to subscribe to the newsletter. Also, when you join my Facebook group, I ask you if you’d like to join the newsletter. And so I collect maybe I’d say 80 to 85% of the people who join my Facebook group are opting into the newsletter as well.

John Bertino:

[26:41] Quite the conversion rate.

Amber M. Smith:

[26:43] Yeah. And I think if someone has the mentality that they want to connect further, they want to join the Facebook group, they’re like, oh, why not? I’ll also join the newsletter. I can always unsubscribe. And I say that too. You can always unsubscribe if it’s not bringing you value. But to be fair, I haven’t been as consistent as I would like to be with my newsletter. And that’s definitely going to change now that I have more time and capacity. But making sure that I’m listening to what they’re asking for,

The Importance of Value

Amber M. Smith:

[27:09] that I’m providing that value in the newsletter, that is helping them engage further that way.

John Bertino:

[27:14] Yeah, I’m going to posit that because your focus from day one has just been value, value, value, is that a safe assumption? And very unsalesy, you’ve developed a true following of people that really appreciate you and the value you deliver. So, when they get to the Facebook group and you ask them to opt in, you’re getting an 80 plus opt-in rate to the newsletter. it’s because your focus has been on value all along and it sounds like almost nothing else. So, I think that’s probably the key to your success there.

Amber M. Smith:

[27:50] It’s just like fundraising and nonprofits, right? It requires trust. Hopefully you like the person whose part of the organization that you’re donating to. You know, it’s all about that personal connection. I think it works the same way here too.

John Bertino:

[28:03] Okay. We’ll be getting to your nonprofit journey here in just a moment. A few other things on your approach to format and, again, what has or hasn’t served you well. So, from what I’ve seen of your videos, they’re mostly what we would refer to as talking head. You and a camera on a subject.

John Bertino:

[29:30] Have you explored more interview style content, webinar style content? Is that part of your content mix that I just haven’t seen? Or have you been very intentionally focused on the talking head format and why?

Amber M. Smith:

[29:44] I’ve done a couple of interview format ones and those perform in varying levels of goodness. I think it depends on, again, the topic. Yeah, I’m interested in exploring more formats and even a little like splash documentary style or, you know, like going around the country, even like you and interviewing people who are making a difference and figuring out all their secrets to pass on to all the other change makers that I talk to.

I’m interested in doing stuff like that. I just haven’t yet. And I think that’s largely not due to a lack of interest, but again, just capacity, doing full-time nonprofit and YouTube on the side. And now that’s basically going to switch.

John Bertino:

[30:26] Okay.

Amber M. Smith:

[30:27] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[30:27] So a big part of it’s just been efficiency. Yeah. Okay. And sticking on the thread of efficiency, I think a lot of startup YouTubers or even companies that are very much doing this as a side project, they want to be as efficient and cost-effective as possible. Getting in the weeds a bit here, I’m curious your approach to editing. Um, like, are you doing it yourself? And where did you start with that? And how have you since your sounds like it looks like you’re cranking out a fair amount of content. You said a couple hundred videos over.

[30:59] A couple of years.

Exploring Different Content Formats

John Bertino:

[31:00] Yeah.

Amber M. Smith:

[31:00] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[31:01] It’s quite a few. What’s been your approach to systemizing and standardizing editing?

Amber M. Smith:

[31:06] So let me just backtrack a little bit. I’ll go through the whole process. So, production, I try to sit down and take one day to write four or five scripts or outlines at a time. And then I take one other day to film three to five videos in one day. So, batching my time.

John Bertino:

[31:22] Change outfits?

Amber M. Smith:

[31:24] Sometimes, yeah. I will actually occasionally do that. Or I’ll wear like two outfits, but I’ll put the videos in a different order, so it looks like I’m doing different outfits. So, there’s that. I did edit my videos in the very beginning.

John Bertino:

[31:40] But we’re using my tool.

Amber M. Smith:

[31:42] Oh my gosh. I can Animoto or some like free or like $15 thing.

John Bertino:

[31:47] Newbie.

Amber M. Smith:

[31:47] Yeah. Newbie. I, you know, I knew the very basics. I know you can do some of that with Canva now too. Um, but to be totally honest, I am now outsourcing my editing and, uh, my videographer is way better than me at that stuff. So, and I’m happily outsourcing it Again.

John Bertino:

[32:06] Very much in the weeds here, but I mean, hey, we’re probably talking to a bunch of aspiring YouTubers trying to understand what you did that worked. I would imagine you have like standard stocks on the editing process that maybe you’ve maintained and updated over time.

[32:19] Yeah. So, me and my videographer agreed that I want to incorporate these colors in every video. And this is my font. And this is the general style. And I want to share my website here. So put the URL there when I say it. Yes. So, we have- So templatized, I don’t know if that’s the right word because I don’t want everything to just be standards. Yeah, standards. Yes. But without making everything so identical that it’s boring.

John Bertino:

[32:48] Hopefully.

Amber M. Smith:

[32:48] And if it is, I hope someone will tell me because I would like to improve upon that and change it up.

John Bertino:

[32:54] Yeah. And are you doing like periodic production meetings to tweak things?

Amber M. Smith:

[32:59] Sure. Okay. Let me just say my videographer is my boyfriend. So yes, we have production meetings, but we have such a rhythm at this point that I can really just send an email. And since we’ve been doing this for a while, he knows what I want.

John Bertino:

[33:17] Okay. So you’re in a unique situation there.

Amber M. Smith:

[33:19] I know not everyone has an in-house videographer.

John Bertino:

[33:23] Yeah. Yeah, that’s true. Like literally in-house.

Amber M. Smith:

[33:25] A video editor. Yeah, literally.

John Bertino:

[33:28] We’re getting into the habit of having at least monthly production meetings. To go back to those standards that we have established and be like, okay, this is working. Let’s try this. Let’s tweak this. Let’s test that.

Amber M. Smith:

[33:40] But I want to clarify, since this is for people who might just be starting out, you don’t have to have an in-house video editor. If you can work the internet in basic ways, you can probably figure out some basic editing yourself. And there are lots of great tools out there that are affordable that would allow you to do that. So, I don’t want to discourage anyone to be like, you have to have an in- house video editor to make all this work because that’s definitely not the case.

[34:07] Agree. The other side of it is, boy, trying to do all the editing yourself might be really slowing you down. Trying to find some type of outsource resource to help you do it efficiently might be exactly what the doctor ordered, so to speak. Just a few more things in the weeds before we broaden the lens a little bit.

I’m curious about cannibalization of content. Is this something that you think about at all? Like, hey, I did a video on X. Now keyword research is suggesting something similar. I don’t want to cannibalize my other video. Or when should you dismiss an old video and do a better one? I’d just talk through that a little bit.

Amber M. Smith:

[34:43] And I’ve thought about this a little bit, but my general philosophy here is just to add a new take. You have to remember that someone coming to your channel probably has only seen a couple of your videos, if that. They can find you through a single video, and they might not even know that you have a similar video from three years before that. Odds are against it.

It’s very rare that someone is watching my entire library of videos and they’re really scrutinizing that. So, I think that’s a little bit of the spotlight effect when you have that concern as you’re worrying the things might be happening that might not be happening. Just to be respectful to my audience, make sure that I’m always delivering that value. I do try to give a fresh take on it. Sometimes I’ll do an update video. I did this a couple of years ago, this topic, but you know what? Some things in the world have changed. Here’s how I approached the same topic in 2024.

John Bertino:

[35:35] For example. And with the title, do you just kind of, for lack of better phrasing, go right after your old video, put the same darn term in the title and almost want the new fresh video to outrank the old one? Or do you try to stay away from cannibalizing the same keyword target?

Amber M. Smith:

[35:52] I have used similar titles, but then I say update for 2024 or something like that. And then a thumbnail that makes it very clear. It’s an updated take on that. My understanding and observation is that over time, your top performing videos from a couple of years ago, they’re just naturally going to have a reduction in viewership.

John Bertino:

[36:15] It’s just.

Amber M. Smith:

[36:16] Natural so i don’t get too worried about cannibalizing older videos because of that.

John Bertino:

[36:20] And then uh shifting gears a little bit um rounding out our exploration of your YouTube journey i want to read you a quote okay um, so this is from uh one of who I believe to be one of the great thinkers of our time a gentleman who’s a little bit under the radar named Naval Ravikant. Have you heard of him by any chance?

Amber M. Smith:

[36:43] I’m not sure. Tell me more.

[36:44] He was one of the founders of, oh boy, I want to say Thumbtack or maybe Angie’s List.

Authenticity in Marketing

John Bertino:

[36:52] Okay. No, Angel’s List. Yeah, Angel’s List, which is where I thank you a platform for getting like a marketplace for funding, I believe. But anyway, he’s a very successful entrepreneur, brilliant speaker, thinker, and he has some really interesting commentary around authenticity and also the exponential reach of media, which we’re doing, leveraging media, using media for leverage, so exponential gain and exposure.

But I want to read you his quote on how to escape competition through authenticity. In fact, that’s the thing is that you can escape competition through authenticity or being authentic. And I think that’s a really novel idea. And he says that if you combine what you love to do and what you do, that is the key to escaping competition through authenticity. If you are fundamentally building and marketing something that is just an extension of who you are, no one else can compete with that. It’s impossible. So, having heard that for the first time, what’s your thought on that?

Amber M. Smith:

[38:05] I like it. And I think it’s true. There are always going to be other nonprofit channels, business channels, et cetera. But no one knows my story. I can share my personal experiences, my mistakes, my failures, things I’ve learned, and I can make it clear that this is just my experience.

And literally no one else in the whole world can have the exact experience that I can have. And some people are going to connect to it and some people aren’t. And that’s okay. The people who do are my people.

John Bertino:

[38:35] And that’s brilliantly stated. and I really think that that ends up being, the key to this whole thing that we’re doing there will be and are many other marketers, putting out content about marketing but nobody can give the spin the take that I can because I am me and there’s some intrinsic value in that that’s really hard to put your finger on and I think at the end of the day, people are opting into Amber’s take on building a non-profit or John’s take on marketing or John’s take on interviewing marketers. And that’s really what they’re signing up for. So, I think that’s the key.

Amber M. Smith:

[39:18] Can I ask you a question?

John Bertino:

[39:20] Please.

Amber M. Smith:

[39:20] Can I turn the tables?

[39:21] Sure. Okay.

Amber M. Smith:

[39:22] Why marketing? How did you get into this?

John Bertino:

[39:25] Oh boy. I’ve been in marketing my entire career, 20 years almost at this point. And for 10 years, I’ve been matchmaking brands with marketing agencies. But there’s just this endless morass of content out there. It’s really hard to break through the noise. And so, I decided to structure the channel around what not only interested me in the most authentic way possible, but I thought was a little different.

And that would be aggregating a collection of marketers with specific experience on a specific thing and going deep sometimes into the nooks and crannies of it to collectively get this great base of information on certain subjects. That keeps me genuinely interested, which gets back to the point perhaps why you asked it. It allows me to be my most authentic self because I’m genuinely interested in it while I think also providing value to others.

Amber M. Smith:

[40:23] And it’s fun.

John Bertino:

[40:23] Yeah. It keeps it fun. It keeps it interesting. Allows me to ask more interesting questions.

Key Lessons from 19 Years

Amber M. Smith:

[40:29] There you go.

John Bertino:

[40:29] Now let’s talk a little bit more about, the nonprofit space specifically and what you’ve learned on your journey. Now, how Activate Good, we talked about what that was earlier. How old did you say Activate Good was?

Amber M. Smith:

[40:46] Turned 19 this year.

John Bertino:

[40:47] Whoa, 19 years.

Amber M. Smith:

[40:49] Yeah.

John Bertino:

[40:50] Oh, to be honest, I had no idea you were doing it for that long. Yep. Whoa. Okay. I probably would have prepared better questions if I realized.

Amber M. Smith:

[40:56] No worries. You know, and a lot of those years are just figuring things out, like I said. Great.

John Bertino:

[41:03] Okay. So let me ask this question. How important was YouTube for ActivateGood? And if it wasn’t all that important, tell us that.

Amber M. Smith:

[41:14] I think for ActivateGood specifically, that is not a platform we’re focusing heavily on. And the reasons are just how YouTube works and the types of audience we would be reaching is not the audience we need for our specific mission. YouTube is great if a nonprofit wants to have national or global reach, possibly. In my experience, it’s not necessarily the platform for hyper-localized content.

So, for that, because we’re a local organization, we’re not a national organization. We need to reach our people here in Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill, and all the little towns in between. So, Facebook, we haven’t really done much on Twitter, now X, recently. Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn have been our top platforms for Activate Good. And LinkedIn is having a moment right now. And we’re kind of investing more in that.

John Bertino:

[42:05] Okay, cool. Do you mind unpacking your strategy on LinkedIn a bit for us?

Amber M. Smith:

[42:09] We’re figuring that out. But we’ve noticed we’ve gotten a lot of traction with socially responsible companies. And LinkedIn is, of course, where all the business professionals go. And that’s a great audience for us. Because if our mission is to mobilize people to volunteer, companies who employ hundreds or thousands of people who also care about the community, that’s a great target audience for us. Because they can bring us tons of volunteers, right?

So, LinkedIn’s been great. We’ve been really increasing our efforts to be seen as a thought leader in the social responsibility space on LinkedIn. So, we’ve started playing with a LinkedIn newsletter that talks about how to effectively launch an employee volunteer program, things like that, things that matter to that population.

John Bertino:

[42:57] Now, LinkedIn, I heard you say, is somewhat of a newer focal point for you guys. It sounds like Facebook is maybe where you concentrated most of your social media efforts for.

Amber M. Smith:

[43:09] In the beginning. Yeah.

John Bertino:

[43:10] Okay. Talk us through social media in general from Facebook, the role it played, what you did there, and where you are with social media. Like bring us up to current day.

Amber M. Smith:

[43:21] So I think when we were first getting started out, Facebook was the platform.

[43:26] Right?

Amber M. Smith:

[43:26] So we put a lot of energy into that, sharing a lot of photos. Didn’t experiment as much as I would have liked to with live streaming. So that’s a regret that I have.

John Bertino:

[43:36] What about the paid side? Just organic mostly?

Amber M. Smith:

[43:38] Just organic. Yeah, we’ve tried a couple paid ads. And usually those worked when we had a very targeted event, something very specific that was coming up. There was a sense of urgency, but not with our general mission. And for us on Facebook, if I had to name a top conversion, it would be someone signed up to volunteer. Because they saw us on Facebook, right?

So, we would promote volunteer opportunities, provide the links to sign up. I would see some good traction there and people love to share those types of things, right? Because even if they can’t volunteer, they can share it with people in their networks and maybe someone in their networks can volunteer. And then the person who shared it gets to feel like they did the good deed also.

John Bertino:

[44:19] Which is great for us.

Amber M. Smith:

[44:21] Yeah. So that was kind of our approach with Facebook. Instagram, you know, a lot of storytelling, uh highlighting volunteer volunteers that we work with um their stories um this is one of my favorite things that happened at a volunteer project we had two long-term volunteers they uh got engaged at one of our volunteer projects so little stories like that that really humanize our mission yeah great for Facebook I’m sorry Instagram great for Instagram yeah uh and then like I said LinkedIn is all about targeting the business community because that’s where they are.

John Bertino:

[44:56] Any TikTok?

Amber M. Smith:

[44:57] We’ve only recently been playing with TikTok. And that’s just a capacity issue, right? We’re still a smallish team.

John Bertino:

[45:04] Yeah, sure. One of the key insights that’s come from not just one, but more than one of the interviews we’ve done with nonprofit marketing experts thus far has been, the diversification of the types of plot lines or storylines that you put into your social and also your email.

Amber M. Smith:

[45:24] Right?

[45:25] And kind of trying to be somewhat reserved on making an ask. So, putting you on the spot didn’t prepare you for a lot of what we’ve talked about today. But could you talk through how you think about providing value in just making the content interesting for Activate good so that you cannot just constantly be asking.

Amber M. Smith:

[45:47] It’s a fine line for us because we are asking people to sign up to volunteer. We also occasionally ask them to donate to Active Vega to support our work. But in addition to us asking other people to volunteer, that’s also why they’re coming to us because they’re looking for volunteer opportunities.

So, you have to ask yourself, is that an ask or are you meeting a need that they came to you looking for? So, I don’t know. I don’t know the answer. I guess it depends on the person, right? But our hope is that we’re providing value by sharing the volunteer opportunities that we hope that they’ll then sign out for.

John Bertino:

[46:23] And there’s value there, no doubt. Have you done a lot of success story content or testimonial content or things like that?

Amber M. Smith:

[46:32] We have. And it has had moderate success. But if you look at like our Facebook, our Instagram posts, the ones that get the best engagement seem to be more of the just or get like the natural, like behind the scenes, like, hey, you know, Amber went to the warehouse that where we keep all our supplies and got some shovels.

And here’s, you know, why having a warehouse is so important for nonprofit. You know, obviously I’m making that up. But stuff that’s more giving people a behind the scenes look at how things work. Has been weirdly engaging for people.

John Bertino:

[47:10] Behind the scenes. Yeah. That’s interesting. Behind the scenes. Okay. Let’s talk storytelling. So, I mentioned in part one of this interview about my background in SEO, and I tend to look at everything through an initial lens of keyword research or topic modeling.

And when running the topic model associated with nonprofit marketing, storytelling is at the top of the list as one of the most important areas to cover. So, I’m curious in your multiple roles as a YouTuber, as a entrepreneur, and as a nonprofit founder, how do you think about storytelling?

Amber M. Smith:

[47:51] I have to be honest, in the very beginning, I didn’t get it. I was like, storytelling, no data. People want to know the percent of people who do this or that obviously I was very wrong but I’m someone who thought that storytelling was this sort of like mysterious mystical force that why would it have the influence that it clearly does have on humans.

I didn’t get it um my friend heather actually with whom I went on the cross country road trip that started activator now she actually is a journalist now so she was all in on storytelling she taught me some things um and storytelling now I see helps people see the connection between what I’m talking about and themselves in a way that just data can’t right um it’s the human side and so with activate good obviously once I caught on to the power of storytelling we started doing a bit more of that things like the you know someone just got proposed to one of our volunteer projects like that’s a cool story and also it shows you how human connection occurs when you volunteer.

Amber M. Smith:

[49:02] So important, you know, rounding out the theme there, those stories, the behind the scenes, I think has that element too. And that’s why those posts might be more engaging. There’s that storytelling. It’s not asking for something. It’s not sign up. It’s not done this, not give us money. It’s, um, you know, we’re just like you, we have to organize our warehouse or whatever posts might be about on YouTube.

I try to bring in stories, but it’s my stories and other people’s stories because I’m not the only person doing this work, obviously. And sometimes I’m not the person who’s going to be the most relatable to my audience, but I can give a case study or an example of someone else who did a thing, and it might connect to someone.

John Bertino:

[49:41] Yeah. One of our previous guests in the nonprofit marketing series, Alex Morse, he’s a brilliant boy, just marketer all around, founder of an agency called SideSee. He talked about how we assume that those who follow our nonprofit understand the impact that the nonprofit is having or understand what it’s like on the ground for those that are being served.

He said, but that’s the improper assumption to make. As the nonprofit founder, I don’t believe he’s one, but he’s an agency. As the one responsible for telling the story, we need people to really feel and connect with those that are being served, understand the work that is being done. And the most powerful way to do that is through the story. That was his take on it. What do you make of that?

Amber M. Smith:

[50:38] I like that. And he’s absolutely right. I mean, nonprofits barely know the impact we’re making half the time because, well, lots of reasons. That would be a whole other podcast episode. You have to understand that non-profit social impact organizations are different from businesses in the sense that our end outcome isn’t profit, it’s social change.

Amber M. Smith:

[51:04] And people who come to you who volunteer who donate who support who advocate for your cause, they’re not coming to you because they are looking to be sold something you’re selling them purpose you’re selling them connection you’re selling them meaning that’s what they’re looking for when they connect to your cause the non-profit to them is a vehicle to achieve meaning and connection and to feel like you have agency in a world where a lot of the time you can feel like you’re completely out of control of anything in your life, right? So that’s why a donor or volunteer, that might be their first subconscious reasoning for getting involved.

So, if you don’t reinforce that constantly by showing them the impacts, then you will lose them. And a lot of the research around giving and volunteering even shows that that’s the most important thing they’re looking for at the end of their volunteer time after their donation is they want to know that it made a difference. It’s nice to get a thank you note, but what they really want to know is, did it matter? Otherwise, why did I do it?

John Bertino:

[52:14] Brilliant. Well, stated. I think we’d be remiss with some of the time we have remaining, not to just zoom out and talk in general about what you’ve learned after 19 years of running a nonprofit, what are some key lessons or takeaways that you would bestow upon other individuals starting a nonprofit or at the early stages? Give us some key lessons and takeaways.

Amber M. Smith:

[52:40] So many to count. The first is, you can’t do it all, even if you think you can, even if you have lots of talents and skills, because time is your most important asset.

Listening to Your Community

Amber M. Smith:

[52:54] And if you know what you’re really good at and you can really invest most of your time on that and figure out other people who can do the other parts of the organization who might be really good at those other parts, you’re going to make an impact a lot faster than if you’re trying to do it all by yourself.

John Bertino:

[53:11] So delegate, outsource.

Amber M. Smith:

[53:14] Delegate but also know yourself really well. I guess that could be a separate lesson, right? Really take the time to understand your work style, your work preferences, your top skills. Make a list. What are the things that you really enjoy doing that you could just spend hours doing? You get into a flow doing it. What’s that compared to what is just a drudgery for you? Like, what do you hate doing?

You would gladly give it to someone else if they would just take care of it. For me, it’s accounting. I really hate accounting, even though I enjoy a good spreadsheet here and there. But yeah, I never want to do accounting again if I could avoid it. And I would rather pay money to have someone else do it because my time is valuable, right? So that was an important and hard lesson to learn because when you’re a nonprofit, it’s hard to find the help sometimes.

John Bertino:

[54:08] Yeah. We need to lean into our strengths and focus our efforts there, no doubt about it. What would you say was perhaps… What are some of the key things you did along the 19-year journey that attributed to some of the most success or growth that Activate Good achieved?

Amber M. Smith:

[54:29] It’s always about listening to your community and having mechanisms that allow you to collect feedback from your community on a regular basis. Just like marketing. It’s very similar, right?

John Bertino:

[54:39] Yes. You beat me to it. I was going to say the same.

Amber M. Smith:

[54:42] Yeah. With nonprofits, your end outcome is social change. In order to create social change, you have to know what you need to change. And you have to hear it from the people who need the change. You can’t just make assumptions about it yourself based on what you think needs to be changed. Because very often you’re wrong when you do that. Do you have time for a quick story?

John Bertino:

[55:01] Yes.

Amber M. Smith:

[55:01] Okay. I love the story of a young woman from Florida. Her name is Brianna Daniels. She started a nonprofit called Street Team Movement. And her story goes that she was walking home from work one day and noticed that there were an increasing amount of people experiencing homelessness on the streets as she was going and she really wanted to do something about it and she thought to herself you know what I’d like to start a food pantry to help these people but something in her told her to stop and to get curious instead so instead of start a food pantry based on her assumption of what these people needed.

She spent a month living on the street with these people, just listening to what they needed, their experiences, their challenges. And what she heard was actually, they didn’t need a food pantry. They needed a laundromat. They needed a place to clean their clothes. So, she started a laundromat and it’s that street team movement, very successful. And you have to have that curiosity and that humility and mechanism to collect feedback if you’re going to make progress that’s meaningful.

John Bertino:

[56:04] It’s a great story. It’s a great tip. And actually, it brings our conversation full circle.

As you had discussed earlier in part one about on YouTube, one of the keys of your success, it sounded like is listening to feedback, questions, what people are asking for and filling that need.

Closing Thoughts and Future Endeavors

John Bertino:

[56:22] It’s such an obvious point, but mission critical on both sides of your business. And that’s probably the perfect place to end our discussion for today. Other than Amber, if people want to learn more about you or follow you, what’s the best way to do that?

Amber M. Smith:

[56:36] Of course. I don’t know which camera I’m looking at. Of course. Connect on YouTube, Amber Melanie Smith. I think if you type that in, you should find me. I don’t think there are any other Amber Melanie Smiths out there. That’s also my website, ambermelaniesmith.com, where I share more about YouTube and also the speaking engagements that I do.

John Bertino:

[56:57] Great. Well, thanks so much for your content today. Congratulations on the success of Activate. Good. And good luck to you in the next chapter of your journey as you transition into new endeavors. Thanks, Amber.

Amber M. Smith:

[57:08] Thank you.