Confidence & Communication: Janine Coombes

Janine: I remember going live on Facebook and I was like okay I can do this And I went live and I had a bit a viewer and I was like Oh somebody's watching! And I was like Hi! Somebody's watching! Who are you?

Put it in the comments! And it was my dad You've got your face and you're walking around with it all day every day and people if they don't like your face they already don't like it so you're risking nothing you're risking by going on video it's acceptance the worry that ex colleagues and ex bosses and ex direct reports would see what I was doing and judge me was really strong and I know it's a story that a lot of people resonate with especially on LinkedIn Welcome to the Confident Live Marketing Podcast with Ian Anderson Gray.

Helping you level up your impact, authority, and profits through the power of confident live video. Optimize your mindset and communication. And increase your confidence in front of the camera. Get confident with the tech and gear.

And get confident with the content and marketing. Together, we can go live! Ian: Hello, welcome to the Confident Live marketing show. My name is Ian Anderson Gray.

And in this season we're asking my guests about their confidence and communication journey. Not everyone finds creating video, or podcasting easy. For many of us this barrier that we have to get over. It's sometimes it's not an easy thing to do, but We're all on a journey and one thing that I've really enjoyed on this season is to ask my guests about their journey and to find out what the barriers they had and how they got over those.

I'm very excited to bring back Janine Coombs, who was on the show. In the last season she helps coach shaped people earn more without slogging the guts out She's a positioning messaging and pricing expert She loves creating video content and regularly appears on stages such as Atomicon marketed live And you are the media. Welcome back Janine. How are you doing?

Janine: I'm doing well. Thank you for having me back. Ian: I know you're a glutton for punishment coming back on the show. On the last episode where you were on, I asked you to introduce yourself and a little bit about your journey.

But I want to dig a little bit deeper into your journey into creating video content in particular. So you come from a corporate background, so you can maybe tell us a little bit about that. Did you do like any video content when you were working in corporate? What made you start creating video and maybe some of those early challenges that you had?

Janine: Yeah. Did I do any video in corporate? No. And in fact, I think it hampered.

my willingness to be visible when I did start trying to promote my business. Like the message came through, gosh, you've got to be visible as you. But the worry that ex colleagues and ex bosses and ex direct reports would see what I was doing and judge me was really strong. And I know it's a story that a lot of people resonate with, especially on LinkedIn.

It's like, how, ah, if I go on here. who used to know me in a different version of myself are seeing me and they're thinking I'm stupid and rubbish. But they're not on there. They're not looking.

Ian: Yeah. And if they are, that's their problem. Although it is a thing. And then, of course, we've got the whole comparison syndrome, comparing ourselves with others.

There's all those potential issues that we can have. So let's wind the clock back to the first time that you went on camera, creating video. What was that like? Can you remember how you were feeling?

I'll give you an example. For me, I remember. I think it was like Google Plus, I don't know if you remember that those days, but somebody invited me onto their Google Plus, this was live, and I was so anxious, I was so worried, I was worried about looking like a complete idiot and saying wrong things, I was really petrified about it. And then it was fine ish.

But it took me a long time. So tell us about your first kind of experience with video. Ha Janine: Oh, I'm trying to remember the first thing I did. I did A prerecorded course thing, and I remember being like watching it back a couple of years later and I'm like, Hello, welcome to this course.

So awkward. I don't think I even went on camera. And then I remember going live on Facebook. Because I was in a membership and everybody was doing Facebook Lives, and I was like okay, I can do this, I can do this.

And I went live, and I had a bit a viewer. And I was like, Oh, somebody's watching! And I was like, Hi! Somebody's watching!

Who are you? Put it in the comments! And it was my dad. And I was like, Oh no, any comment to this?

Oh, looking forward to seeing you at the weekend, Jan. I was like, Oh my God, Ian: Ha. Janine: me now. And I was, I fluff.

I just, I got totally flustered and closed the so embarrassing. I don't think I'd like, I've barely done any Facebook lives ever since. I think, I don't know whether that obviously I've just uncovered why I have never done Facebook lives ever again, but that's when I, I went over to pre recorded lives, sorry, not lives. pre recorded videos for LinkedIn, which was still outside my comfort zone because the judgment and compare it comparing to people who are doing it really well.

But that felt more comfortable. Yeah, but I, it took me a while to be myself on video. Ian: I'd love to talk to you about that because I think that's really interesting. I think it's taken me a bit more time as well.

Not that I, I think I've always been authentic. I don't think I've ever not been me, but I think I've, it's taken me time to feel more comfortable in who I am in front of the camera. And one of the things that I've realized is you do need to put more energy in front of the camera. The camera is this kind of energy sucking device.

If you don't put the energy in, then people are going to get bored, but you don't have to be if you're not like a really. Extroverted person. You don't have to be like that. It's full on.

You just need to be maybe put a little bit more energy by while keeping your personality intact. I call this heightened authenticity. But for you, how? What does that mean?

So like when you first went on camera and compared that, say, With the video content that you create today what's changed? Janine: I think what you've had have said just now is really useful. I think I have found that sweet spot of what is my halfway house between me normally in a room and me on a stage. It's, I think I've I found that, and once you find that comfortable zone which works, it's you've got a big part of the puzzle nailed, I think.

But I do have a story about what started me doing comedy videos, if you'd like to Ian: I'd love to hear that. Yeah Janine: I was doing quite straight to camera pieces, like learning pieces and tips and, and then a friend of mine was doing LinkedIn video and she got this message from somebody who said, Oh we produce video for other people. Do you want some free advice and free feedback on your videos? And she was like, yeah, go on then.

And the feedback was hilarious. It was really detailed. And things like, you, you look too young to be credible. This woman was in her thirties.

You look too young to be credible. Consider wearing smarter clothes, perhaps a set of pearls. Who would say that? Ian: Oh Janine: Wear more makeup.

So that you look older and your voice sounds like a, your voice sounds like a school teacher. Consider lowering it. Ian: wow Yeah, Janine: about it. And she's Oh, this is interesting.

What do we think about this LinkedIn? Do you think this advice would have been given to a man? Let's have a conversation about that. And I heard it, I thought it was absolutely hysterical.

So I could not stop myself. I had this visceral reaction. I needed to put lots of makeup on, change my voice and wear a set of pearls. I needed to do it.

Like it was, I, and I messaged her cause I was like, I know this is not about me, but I have the, I need to do this. Can, is it okay? Because it's your thing. It's your, it's a thing that happened to you.

And she said yeah, yeah, go for it. So I did, I was just like, I can't stop and I was sweating like anything because I've never done anything like this before. And I put on this twin set and pearls that I'd inherited and loads of, loads and loads of makeup as much as I could put on and I put on this stupid voice and I was, I said that it was a What did I say? I called it a credibility challenge and we needed to be more credible and to be credible we had to pretend to be someone else and join me on the credibility challenge and and I posted it.

I was so nervous but I couldn't not, I could not Stop myself which says a lot about me, I think I couldn't stop it and I pressed publish and I was sweating and sweating and and, people started reacting to it and then people started commenting and people started DMing me and I was like, oh, I'm onto something here. I am on to something. I had one woman who had gone through some really serious health challenges. I didn't know her at all, never heard of her, she'd never heard of me, but she'd happened upon my video and she said it was the first time she'd laughed in six months.

And I was like, I like this. I need to do more of this. Ian: That's awesome. So how can we see, I'm trying to think whether I've seen that video that you did.

Where does that exist? Janine: old. Where does it exist? It might be on my YouTube channel.

I don't think it is. I should bring it out, shouldn't Ian: Yeah, you should. I've been thinking about this for a while because I love to bring in humour into what I do, and I've not done that for a while. Like, I used to do these silly songs so unfortunately I'm not going to do one for this one, you missed out on that one, but I used to sing these silly songs at the beginning of this podcast episode.

And again, it was just a bit of fun. But I find that humour is a great truth teller, that, going back into the medieval times, The only person that could tell the king the truth was the jester. And what you did in that piece of humor, you did something that you might not have done quite wouldn't have had the same impact if you'd done it in a serious post, but you actually dressing up in your bells and slapping on the makeup almost had more of an impact, didn't it? Because you were poking you're poking fun, but you also been quite, you were provoking a really interesting conversation about it, weren't you?

Janine: Yeah. Yeah. Yes, that's interesting. You've got me thinking about my other, some of my other videos.

But that is, I found that there's a video I did about planners which was really quite mean. Like I had friends who, who create and sell planners, but It may it tickled me that everybody one year had a planner out and They feel like I feel this as a purchaser. They feel like the answer so I did a funny one about planners and any you know A couple of people who sell planners sent me their planner like they took it really In really good humour. Ian: oh good Janine: took it, and I was like, Oh, bless you.

Because you could have perceived that as like a poke, like an insult, but Ian: yeah, Janine: it was just, it was just my take on it. Ian: and I think this is obviously it's part of your Personality, you know, you've you've got this kind of fun side that you mentioned that you just couldn't help but do it You know, it's just yeah, you had no choice and actually I've found in my own business that if I follow my curiosity or follow what excites me or whatever, that's usually when I do like my best work.

And when I do what everyone else tells, says that I should do, that's when I quite often fail. So I think following your instincts, there was really good. And I wanted to ask you about that about using humor. Do you think using humor enabled you to increase your confidence in front of the camera?

Like I'm interested in your confidence journey you started off Not very confident, I would assume, but over time you have become much more comfortable and confident. Do you think the humor side of things has helped with that? Janine: It certainly ticked the box of feeling like me, and feeling fun, and feeling joyful, and I struggled with confidence through you. my teens, twenties, and into my thirties, I feel like it was a, it feels a bit chicken and egg, like which came first?

Was it the confidence to get on camera or was, did the camera, sorry, the confidence come from being on the camera? And I think I must have had a level of confidence to get on the camera, but once I was on camera and I was editing my own footage, that's when my confidence really started to grow because I got used to my face and I got used to my voice. And I swear there is a. magic to video when you're looking in the lens that you connect with that person like you would do in real life, but it happens with yourself, with your own image, and if you're looking into your own eyes, it's you, this sounds really sick making, I apologize, but you fall in love with yourself like the self love comes.

Ian: So explain that a little bit more. Cause I think that's really interesting. Cause I have to admit, maybe I haven't got there yet. Like I, can listen to myself.

So like I often will listen to my podcast. I have to because I'm, I'm editing, I'm editing them, but if I'm a guest on somebody else's podcast, I still sometimes struggle to watch because I don't quite know what it is. It's not that I hate myself. It's just that I'm still not used to the way I look.

And I still see some of my mannerisms and I definitely believe that my mannerisms and my kind of quirks are the bits that actually, hopefully my audience actually really like about me. But for some reason, I still feel uncomfortable about that. So maybe explain a little bit more about what you mean by that, because I found that really interesting. Janine: Okay have you done enough of your own editing, Ian?

Maybe, you did so much live stuff that you didn't have to edit that you haven't done enough. I think you should look at your video or in the mirror and every day and say three positive things about you. Ian: Yeah, sounding like we're getting into a coaching session here. I've just been, what one, so one thing I do tend to look at the negatives first, and I think negative emotion is obviously stronger than the positive emotion if we're not too careful.

And. One thing that I'm trying to do is to focus on, the celebration, so celebrate the successes that I have done in my business and in my podcast. So instead of focusing on the bits that went wrong. So for example, in this interview, when I go back and edit it, I could focus on sometimes I've stumbled out of my words, so I've not quite got the question correct and I could focus in on that instead of actually focusing on the fact that this has been, I think, a really fascinating conversation and I think it's going to be valuable for people and maybe that's the same with the way we look at ourselves.

I think that sometimes we can get too self obsessed and actually at the end of the day what, the reason I do this primarily is because I want to help people. And so actually me getting worrying about how I sound and how I look is actually not serving anyone. But that's not what you're saying here. I think you would agree with me there, but you're from what you're saying you have to I still struggle with this, fall in love with yourself.

Janine: You might not be there with yourself, with your self image, but other people who watch you will be very used to your face and very used to your mannerisms, and I agree. There will be comforted when you do a mannerism or a turn of phrase. There was this woman I came across years ago in a membership that I was in, and she was getting on camera, and she had facial paralysis on one side. Like, you could see one side was animated and one side was drooping.

And you can imagine she was quite reluctant to get on camera. But I watched, um, the first time you see a video, you're like, oh gosh, okay, there's something going on there. And then you watch, and the more you watch, the more it just becomes normal, and it becomes her, and you love looking at her face. You just love listening to her voice, and you get used to that person.

you like that person and it's not about what you look like and you know if you're not there yet with loving watching yourself back like i'm awful now i love watching my own videos i love watching my own videos it's terrible Ian: So have you cancelled your Netflix subscription? Then you just watch yourself. What's that? Janine: Just watch myself.

I've got loads of videos. I just watch them again and again. Sometimes the view count is 500 or whatever. And I'm like, yeah, I was 250 of those.

So Ian: Oh, I love that. That's great. That's well, do you know what we could spend a whole episode on that. That's fascinating stuff.

So We all, I think we all like disaster stories. I think we can all learn from those and I, I actually got to a point, I don't really seek out things going wrong, but I got to a point when I was actually quite glad when things went wrong because I could then fix the problem for next time. I could, I had a process. I was able to help with the process.

So I remember in the early days when I went live, I'd sometimes forget to switch the microphone on so people couldn't hear me. And then I remembered that for next time. And I had that kind of a process, but have you got a disaster story that you can share or like a mistake that you made on camera? Or in communicating something that was like a learning moment and how did you bounce back from that?

Janine: yeah, the only thing I can think of, it was I decided to do the A to Z of something on LinkedIn. I was going to do daily videos, live, LinkedIn live 26, like it was quite onerous to do 26. I'm not the biggest, person on the consistency on being consistent. But as soon as I started doing the lives every day, it became quite blatant that my short, I was only on video for five minutes, 10 minutes, which is just not what works on linkedin lives.

Like by the time you've gone live and people have noticed you're live, you've gone. So nobody watched live. The view count in total was really low. But I still had to do, go through the rest of the alphabet.

So I did switch it out in the halfway through. I was like, this is just soul destroying going live, and that literally nobody's there. And then even afterwards, people weren't seeming to watch it. LinkedIn just don't seem to push out at the time.

I don't know now. They didn't seem to push out. videos that had gone live. So I switched to pre recorded videos and um, it felt like a waste of time.

And then a few months later there was an event, I think it was Atomicon, one of the Atomicon news. And a few people said, oh I love that series that you did the LinkedIn lives. And I was like, did you? Nobody even commented, like there was only a small handful of viewers.

So it's so tricky because Okay, if I did it again, I wouldn't have done the lives in that format. But it also was a lesson that people are watching. They're not necessarily commenting. Ian: Yeah.

Janine: but people are watching, and it was very impactful. Ian: That's so interesting. And I don't know, I find Like with this podcast, with podcasts in general, but also I think LinkedIn lives are the same. People are much more like consumers that it's quite an intimate experience.

So with podcasts, they're effectively plugging you into their ears and it's quite an intimate experience and they're almost unwilling to get in touch and to communicate because it's their experience. And I think it's the same with LinkedIn. There are a lot more lurkers on LinkedIn. And I found that when, my first podcast years and years ago, and I just gave up by episode.

I got up to episode 19 or 20, I think, but I just was not getting any feedback. And I'm the kind of person that needs. I'm working on it, Janine, but I do need a bit of affirmation occasionally, and nobody was saying anything and then I stopped the podcast and I went to some conferences and people said similar to what happened to you. Oh, I love your podcast.

It's great. I listen to it every week. And I was thinking, why didn't you tell me? And it's the same with LinkedIn.

I was going live on LinkedIn. I found like on the other platforms, I was getting a bit more engagement, but not on LinkedIn, but I actually got some business through LinkedIn. I had no idea who this person was, but they were watching in the background and I didn't know anything about it. But the other thing I just wanted to add into the mix there is sometimes we see consistency as this, like the Holy grail, it's going to solve all our problems.

And one thing I've realized with this podcast, I, or this live show, I was going Live every or as the podcast was going out every week from May 2019. So it's a last year every single week without fail. And that was really good for me because I'm always struggled with consistency, but it got to a point when I was just being consistent for consistency's sake. And sometimes you just need to be willing to say, you know what?

I know I said I was going to go live every week, but I don't need to carry on. I can change my mind. It's our own business, isn't it? Janine: Yeah.

Yeah. That's important, isn't it? To know when to stop. Although, interestingly, You stopped that podcast when perhaps you shouldn't have done.

I'm the same. I want, I need feedback. I need people to say they love me, Ian: yeah. Oh, dear.

What does that say about Janine: Adore me. Ian: We're just all, we're all needy people, but that's awesome stuff. Just before we finish what would be your encouragement for people who are, have either not started on this journey, Or maybe they're kind of like us, they've started, but they're thinking of giving up because maybe they're not getting that affirmation. It could be something else.

Maybe they're struggling with their confidence and they just don't think that they don't have what it takes. They've got this message. They know they are an expert in their field, but they're really struggling. What would be your words of encouragement for those people listening and watching?

Janine: For the people who haven't got going yet, I'd, I think I can, I'm going to assume that you're, you fear judgment. And I've heard this a lot, what people will, what if they don't like my face or whatever it, to them, I'd say, You've got your face and you're walking around with it all day, every day. And people, if they don't like your face, they already don't like it. So why, you know, you're risking nothing.

You're risking by going on video. It's you know, acceptance. And to the people who are considering giving up if I had chat with them, I'd be asking them what is incorrect? What is making them feel like they want to give up?

Is it lack of results? Is it because they're not enjoying it if they're not enjoying it, but there are so many different ways you can approach. video you can do it, you can do it sketch style, you can do interviews, you can do short form, you can do long form, you could do live, like there's so many different ways and there's a million different people doing it, all these different ways. Get inspired and take a break and get inspired by something else and do it your way and Do something that makes, that feels easy to you and fun for you.

That's always the answer, which you said, and I completely agree with. If it's, if it feels fun and natural for you, you're going to get better results. Ian: I couldn't have said it better. I think that's awesome stuff.

Sometimes you do need to push yourself a little bit, like setting up doing some YouTube videos, for example, Janine, sometimes but yeah, you've got to go. It's got it. I think ultimately it's got to be fun. And I found that with, this is one of the reasons why I don't do this show live anymore.

I will go back to that and I will be doing live. So I do believe in live. But I got to a point when I was getting burnt out and it just didn't fit into my schedule. So I thought, you know what?

I think I've demonstrated that I can do live and that life's good. I think it's time to switch up, switch out the format and do something different. And that's cool. That's cool.

Thank you, Janine. I, you know what? I've really thoroughly enjoyed this conversation. I feel we could have talked Janine: Don't sound surprised Ian.

Don't sound surprised. Ian: I'm not surprised at all. It's just, but no we've gone down some interesting rabbit holes and I'm yeah, I feel we could have talked a lot more, but we're trying to keep these episodes short and snappy. So you'll just have to come back on the show.

How can people find out more about you? You said last time that you hang out a lot on LinkedIn. So people can follow you on LinkedIn. That's just presumably just search for your name, Janine Coombs, on, on LinkedIn.

And your lovely website, which is, reminds us of your website address. Janine: Code. UK. Ian: janinecoombs.

co.Uk. And yeah, so connect with you that way. And what else are you working on?

What's next in the world of Janine? Janine: I'm always working on the Freedom Giver, which is my hybrid program, which has group and one to one in it to help coach shape people to, Position their offer as must haves and make sure that they're comfortable selling it. Ian: So people can find out more about that on your website and by coach shape people just to clarify that. Cause I love that.

I love this. And this is something I've been thinking about as I diversifying my services, cause. I'd like to think of myself as a coach and consultant. I'm probably more of a consultant but coach.

So I how would I was thinking about this the other day? It's a flexible hybrid approach. Is that kind of what you're working? Not just with coaches, but other types of people as well.

Can you maybe just tell us what you mean by that? Janine: Yeah Exactly as you say that's a good example is like a co a consultant who does introduce some coaching kind of techniques I do work with pure coaches but most of my clients do a bit of mentoring or a bit of consulting in the service or A typical one is a leadership coach who also offers corporate consulting. So that kind of thing Ian: Awesome. Janine's website and connect with her on LinkedIn.

Thank you. It's been awesome to have you on. And we're gonna have to carry on this conversation. Another time, definitely.

Thank you. How about that? My goodness, it's we've run out of time again. I hope that you found today really useful.

Helpful and impactful. And if there's anything that's stopping you from getting in front of the camera or maybe or carrying on being consistent, telling your story, communicating with the audience, then do reach out to either me or Janine, you can come with. Go to my website, iog. me and the podcast part is iog.

me forward slash podcast and do connect with Janine as well. But thank you so much for plugging us into your ears and watching us on YouTube. But until next time, I encourage you to level up your impact authority and profits through the power of confident live video. See you soon.

Thanks for listening to the Confident Live Marketing Podcast with Ian Anderson Gray. Make sure you subscribe at iag.me/podcast so you can continue to level up your impact, authority and profits through the power of live video.