Monetising LinkedIn from your own Brand

Eden: How can you monetize LinkedIn as a talent acquisition or recruitment professional? That is one of many questions that we're going to ask and answer in today's episode featuring the third time guest, Mr. Sean Kennedy, who I'm extremely happy to have back on. Um, if you haven't had a chance to listen to Sean's previous episodes, check out the description. But here is what you've got coming up in today's episode,

Sean Kennedy: what you post today. So if I post something today, I can guarantee you everyone has forgotten about it by the end of the week or like within two days. When you're consistent those, the images start to then stay in their brain and then you're building an audience of people. You continue to kind of repeat images. Just like um, trying to think of it's familiarity like we were talking about earlier. Yeah, you're just, you're just there and then they're like, okay, this guy's recognizing this is what he's about. I know that now because I've seen so much of his stuff as well. Um, if you do it post once and something didn't work well and you don't post again, you're not going to build that familiarity and they will forget about you and it's painful, but you just got to keep doing it. I had to see what worked for me, I had to experiment. And you look back on all the stuff that actually works. You run your LinkedIn, your analytics through ChatGPT, what worked for me, what's worked well, look at my posts, which ones have worked well. And then you'll start to see, okay, this is a pattern. Okay, well I'm just being myself on video. People seem to kind of enjoy that uh, more or like it seems to cut through more noise than I tried the whole thought leadership thing, right? Me trying to pretend like I knew exactly what I was talking about. Like as an expert, uh, fact of the matter is there are no experts in recruitment or TA because it's constantly evolving.

Eden: John has, like I said, been here for three times. Well, this will be his third time. We have seen his journey and his career grow within our own eyes from literally being in the space where many people who are listening today are, um, they're creating content to drive candidate applications and brand. And now fast forward three years, he has gone out as a content creator in the space. This is very much a conversation for anyone who is interested in creating more opportunities for themselves, more extra income for themselves whilst utilizing content. So thank you so much for being part of the conversation. Welcome to Tea Time with Tan Acquisition, the podcast aimed at fostering knowledge and sharing the stories within the vibrant Tan Acquisition community. I'm your host, Eden, and for next hour. So I'm going to be joined by a now three time guest of this show. And somehow I still convince him to come back for more. Every conversation we've had has captured a different chapter of his own journey. And honestly, watching that evolution in real time, it's been fascinating because I know it's an area that people very much want to do what he's doing today. When we first sat down here two years ago, he was just at the beginning of leaning into content creation for his employer, posting consistently, finding his voice and figuring out what it actually meant to show up online without sounding like a corporate robot. In our second conversation, we explored how that had evolved into balancing the two worlds of growing his personal brand while still championing the company that he worked for. We spoke about that awkward middle ground, the lessons learned, and how to make sure his own voice wasn't being diluted. Now we're in year three and things have taken a bit of a turn. As I'm sure he'll share. He's carved out a career path that blends content creation with talent acquisition. And I'm going to say the phrase, even though he'll probably laugh at this influencer. Um, we're going to dig into, yeah, we're going to dig into how he's got here, what he's learned along the way and how it's. How if this path is really something you want to follow, more importantly, how we can actually monetize it and pay our bills for doing this. So when you're ready, grab your favorite tea or coffee if you prefer and join me in. Welcome today's guest, Sean Kennedy. So thank you so much. Yes. Yeah, yeah. There is potentially another one. She will say yes to doing it. Um, it's just timeframe. So you two are my consistent every year, but you are the first three time and who knows? Many, many more. As many years as this rolls on, we'll be old and gray and in, uh, our Zimmer frames doing this. We'll see. I love that. Well, I appreciate you hopping on. I mean, obviously before we get into monetizing LinkedIn and what we're doing today, but I guess from your side, you're obviously in that blend of talent acquisition, content creation. From your perspective, where do you feel like the biggest challenge we're going to face as recruiters is going from in the next three year Time frame.

Sean Kennedy: Mhm. Mhm, Mhm.

Eden: So from your perspective, it's not necessarily AI in the topic, but it's more about those who are willing to learn with it, adapt with it, grow with it. That's going to be the biggest challenge that we're going to face as a role as, uh, an industry. Like, Mhm.

Sean Kennedy: Mhm.

Eden: And actually, to be fair, it segues quite nicely. I'm recording a conversation next week which is actually talking about bringing in the human element into your process whilst having AI. So, uh, that was completely unintentional. I feel like we've just made that happen. Uh, so thank you. Talking of your role, I asked you the question, uh, this is a couple of weeks ago we first caught back up. Um, what the hell do you do now? Like, I mean, anyone who's been listening to the podcast hopefully will recognize your name as I think the first episode was a million impressions on LinkedIn without a budget from memory. And then your target the year after was, uh, 12 million in the year, but you did it in like six weeks or something like that. Um, and then now, obviously year three, I'm hoping someone's going to sit there and go, sean's back. But what is it you do? 30 million? Yeah. I think you had 12 million set for the first, the whole year. And then we had the conversation, like halfway through Q1, you're like, I'm nearly there. So you clearly dropped off. I'm joking, I'm joking.

Sean Kennedy: LinkedIn has really changed now in terms of like, impressions and growth and they've completely dipped because there's bigger value. Ah. From like growing an audience of people who actually want to listen to your stuff rather than just spreading to the masses. Um, but how I make money, um, you know, I think everyone's always. I actually got asked this a lot. How the fuck do you make money, John? Um, it comes from a lot. So I've set up my own business six months ago, which is very heavily lent into the, uh, content creation side of things. I use it for every aspect of my business, so I put it into different pillars. So the first thing is like some fractional work, very minimal. Like, I'm rarely doing any recruitment now, if, if at all really. Like, I'm still doing every bit.

Eden: If any of your customers are listening, he's doing it all the time.

Sean Kennedy: All the time.

Eden: Okay, fair enough. Yeah.

Sean Kennedy: Then my customers are like completely aware that I do very fractional. But it'll make sense now why it's less. So, yeah, a lot of the stuff I'M doing for them now is creating content to give them visibility on LinkedIn. Because over the past few years my network has been growing and growing and growing of specifically TA people, recruiters. And that's done by design, not by flu. You know, that's, that's me building something that I wanted to later try and monetize. Then, um, off the back of that. Some people don't want content. Some people are just looking for, like, I want eyes on my product, I want demos booked. I want to get you in to see my tool or to see my. Sounds wrong, doesn't it? But, uh, they want to see like, they want to get good recruiters or heads of talent. They want to get like recruitment leaders to have a look at what their product doing. So I do that for them as well. On a retained basis. I'll make sure that they're seeing the right people because I have conversations with recruiters every single week. I probably speak to more recruiters now than I ever have done, which is just trying to understand their pain points. And then I've actually created my own TA diagnostic, which is basically, you tell me what's going on in your life, I can break that down to you, what you should be doing. And to be honest, one of the answers even is you don't need an AI tool because some people just don't need them. They need to work on themselves and some of their processes before they even start looking at AI tools. Um, because a lot of people now just like, oh, yeah, I need to, let's just use AI. Why you don't need, you don't have a reason why. There's no point in using AI. Um, off the back of that as well, uh, I also do like personal branding courses for companies. I've just seen with the guys from Full Swing Golf, uh, simulation brand, um, golf, indoor golf simulators, they were like, hey, can you come in? We want to do more on LinkedIn. Can you come in and you know, um, teach our guys about how to build a personal brand so they can get like a very niche return of investment, which is like, you know, booking more demos, drive more sales, or just becoming more present online. Um, and a lot of that is also is back off, is just through like the, the LinkedIn stuff. Right? Um, but everything I do is content focused. So I, I drive those demos based off the content I do. You know, I create content based off of those brands and that's basically how I make money. And then, um, you know, all the other events I do to do some Other bits and bobs for customers. Like I don't, I'm at the point now where I'm not saying no to a lot of things. So you know, I'm just like, I'm trying to see what else works for me. But uh, that's the biggest, the biggest thing I'm doing at the moment. Um, but it's all come from just like putting myself out there. It's not been a quick process as you better than anyone know. You know, it's in what, three, three years in the making or four years if we go that far back. And now.

Eden: Yeah, that's what I was going to say is that it's mental to think when you and I first spoke the idea was how do we use content to drive your employer at that point their brand to increase their visibility, to make better placements. No idea that I was sitting opposite someone who two years later is sitting and telling me, um, I'm, you know, I'm doing branding for other companies, I'm doing content creation for other companies. Like that was never on, on the bingo card. But like I said, it's been fascinating to watch because I've seen, I mean every year we have these check ins to kind of see what's happening in, in your life and career and there's a lot of people I know want to do things like this. When did you realize it was more than just hosting online? Like you could actually build this into your career. You set it up six months ago in regards to kind of go fulling into it. But when was that, that initial spot thinking hang about, there's a bit more to this.

Sean Kennedy: So I was in a, this was like last, mid, last year I'd got, I got laid off early part. Last year I got laid off from a company, uh, the company I first started doing the content. You know, we first had our first conversation, right. Um, they made a huge amount of layoffs. I was part of that. Of course I was, I was part of recruitment team so you know, don't need those. And then I had gone like contracting, right and really started to make some really bad decisions in where I went. In total honesty, just trying to get contracts to market is really difficult. But at the same time I was still doing content. More and more brands were wanting to do some stuff together and I was putting myself out there so much more. So whilst in contracts customers were like, hey can you book us in some demos and we'll pay you X amount of money. Whilst at the same time other brands were like, hey, can you just make us some funny video. I was like, okay. But then there are more and more brands were coming together and rather than doing like a one and done post, I was selling in like a social campaign for them over a course of like six to eight months. And that builds the, you know, money that I know is coming in that I know I can work on in that time. I know I can win new business and I know I can work with other people. So it got to a point last year where I was in another contract and I was like, you know what? Um, I'm really not enjoying this. I'm not enjoying being hands on. Like as I was, I felt like I was back in agency, um, because it was like it was an embedded model and it just, it screamed agency to me. And I've got nothing against ages agency, but that part of me died a long time ago. You know, I'm not an agency.

Eden: People have different preferences to what they want.

Sean Kennedy: I mean, that's totally fine, that's totally fair. If you want to do that, then you do, you boo boo. But for me, it's not that part of me anymore. And um, I really enjoy the TA side of things, but I love the world we live in, like the TA world. So maybe just in a different aspect because love talking about ta. I love like keeping on top of what's going on in our industry and speaking to people like on a daily basis. Like this morning alone, I was talking to about five different TA people just having that conversation on what their pain points are and then having conversations with my customers to link them up together. Like professional people connector at the moment through content or conversation. And I've just thought, I'm really going to lean into this now. And I decided to pull the plug. Contract was coming to an end, so I thought, right, cool, let's just leave it there then and let's crack on and just get into this world. Because if I don't do it now, I'd have never done it. It was a big leap of faith. I still had some money in the bank from when I was laid off. I thought, do you know what? That's my little cash cow. Just in case anything goes wrong and I haven't looked back. It's been brilliant, you know, it's opened up so many more opportunities for me now because I'm so much more active. I'm not having to worry about what other people think because you are limited to what you can do in um, a role and post online. I had a, um, last contract I was in I won't mention where does just sound like a catty bitch, but you know, that's not me.

Eden: Um, so I'm pretty sure people can check LinkedIn.

Sean Kennedy: But I was basically speaking with, um, one of the bosses and they were like, um, guys, you need to be, you know, careful about what we put online. Um, and they're like, well, this is like an um, onboarding call with like members of the team. Like my whole, like, whole business kind of thing. And it was like, Sean, I'm specifically talking about you because you did a video last week where you're talking about a six stage interview process. Just bearing in mind. No, our customers have six stage interview processes. I was like, that just sounds awful. Like, that's doesn't sound like a me problem. That sounds like a stakeholder management problem.

Eden: Yeah, I'm not really sure being called out in front of everyone is probably the right way to integrate you into the company.

Sean Kennedy: Correct. That M was my feelings behind it. Anyway, so then stuff like that started to happen and I, I had spent so much time, I took a load of time off where I was focusing on doing my own thing before I went into contract roles. I really, really enjoyed that time being my own kind of person, do my own thing. And then when I went back into that role, back into a role where it was quite, I'll be honest, it was quite micromanaging, you know, like, you know, leading by numbers kind of thing. And that's not my kind of style. I know some businesses lead like that and some businesses have to lead like that. Cool. But that's not going to be somewhere I'm going to work. Um, and yeah, came to it and I was like, right now's the time.

Eden: How has creating the content changed? You know, you mentioned more opportunities and I've also got my own slight perception on this as well because obviously, you know, I put myself out there quite a lot with marketing. Um, so I'm curious to see kind of how it has opened up more doors for you. How is it more organic or does it just start a better conversation when you do cold outreach? How's your kind of experience with it?

Sean Kennedy: Well, because you personal branding is all about like how people are going to view you when you're not in the room. Right. So as an example, uh, I can dictate what I put out so I can build my own personal brand. So it goes out there so much. You know, I'm not saying everyone will, everyone will know who I am because that's, that's A very egotistical thing to say. But, like, I like to think I've built a good network of people who are familiar with maybe a funny video I've done or something. I've got, uh, online or, like, podcasts like this I've done, where I've just spoken very honestly about, like, who I am, what I do. Um, so then when I go and have those conversations with people, it's like, oh, yeah, I know, I know of you. I don't know.

Eden: There's a more familiarity between it.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah. Like, they're like, this guy, you know, he's not. He's not abrasive. Kind of. I, uh, feel his vibe a little bit. Like, uh, I get who he is. And it just became a case of then of like, doing some outreach to these people and be like, hey, look, this is what I do. This is what I'm looking to do. Do you know what? Together, do you want to have at least a conversation? And now there's more and more opportunities come up when you're so much more open to just having a conversation. I had a conversation with a friend of mine the other day who's looking to do more of this stuff, and they said, how do you get these brand deals? How do you get, like, working with these customers? So if I was to sit here now and just keep posting what I was posting a few out of. Let's say you do 10 a year. You probably do a lot more than that, but 10 a year, one to maybe two of those are going to inbox you. You need to be on the, on the forefront of that being like, hey, I'm a content creator. This is the, like, the impressions I do. This is my audience. This is why it's specific to you. Do you want to work together? Let's go and do it. And that then becomes so much more powerful than having to sit around and wait for stuff. As much as opportunities do come to you, you know, great. But you've got to also do have those. A bit of outreach as well. But, for example, I spoke to, uh, a company the other week. Um, I'm not sure if I can mention company.

Eden: I'll probably say no just in case you've got anything going on with them.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, I'll probably leave those. But, like, so last week they're flying me out to a very hot location, uh, at the end of the month, very nice for an event, um, just to come and, you know, check out the event and, um, do some bits with them, you know, in the future.

Eden: That's the. That's the influencer part. Coming out here. No longer sitting in. No longer sit in front of the comic books. Now I'm going onto the plane and you're gonna do the Come get ready me recruiter edition.

Sean Kennedy: I might do. Please do I dress like a dad. No one wants to come get ready with me.

Eden: You got. Do you got to do, like, when you grab the tea at the hotel and do, like, do that stuff. Yeah.

Sean Kennedy: Recruitment asmr.

Eden: It is interesting because I'd say from. Please don't whisper things into my ear. It is interesting, I think. So I post heavily. I mean, you see what my side as well. And we spoke about this, I think, actually, in the second episode where my engagement is obviously drastically lower than yours. And we had this discussion where obviously, as an internal, um, versus the external world. And you've tried it when you did external as well, and it just didn't really much. It has definitely improved in some regards. Niching down helped. Um, and now I would say every month, two months, there's definitely inbound opportunities coming to me where they've seen what I'm posting, they understand what I do, and it started to click a lot more. Um, and that's taken, obviously, a long, long time to get there, I think, from your side. What I tend to find is that people find posts on LinkedIn. Let's just use LinkedIn. People post on LinkedIn is like a cringeworthy thing. Right. And I've got a, uh, friendship group that when I post within two seconds, you can almost guarantee I'm being taken a piss out of. It's just the same. M. My response always is this business, like, I'm here to do a job. I enjoy the podcast. I enjoy posting as like, this is. This is part of my job. I'm having fun so much as you want. So when they put my face on other people's faces, that's the part I'm like, yeah, I probably need to stop on that part. But there is that element.

Sean Kennedy: I got called the Joe Wilkinson of LinkedIn the other day.

Eden: Go, Wilkinson. Who's that?

Sean Kennedy: You know, the postman from after me.

Eden: The comedian. Yeah, yeah, he's brilliant.

Sean Kennedy: Because we do look very, very similar as well.

Eden: Now you've just said it. The voice. Yeah, the voice. I mean, he does look homeless.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah.

Eden: In most of the things he does. Yeah, he's fantastic. In afterlife, it is. No, it's not afterlife. Um, yeah, it is afterlife. Yeah. He was brilliant.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah. Fantastic. And I was like, is this an insult or is this I mean, I would take that.

Eden: He's fantastic.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, yeah,

Eden: worthy. Uh, post. And it's like, I don't want to do that. I want to see how perceived my. My perception is. Who gives a. Just post it. Little people are going to see it and then you keep building, keep building, keep building. But it holds people back. So for someone trying to build their brand today, from your perspective, someone who's done it and still doing it, what's more important? Consistency? Personality, Niche? Expertise? What is it that's kind of like going to start that process?

Sean Kennedy: I'd say if you're too afraid to start posting LinkedIn, fine. There's more opportunities for the rest of us. If you don't want opportunities knocking at your door, or, you know, you don't want to make it a bit of extra cash, or you don't want to like working, uh, owning your own life, then cool. Don't you leave more opportunity for the rest of us? And yes, there is cringe. There's a friend of mine who used to work at LinkedIn, Alicia Tell. She says the same thing all the time, that you have to climb over a cringe mountain to get to where you want to be in the land of opportunity. And she's absolutely. Of course it's cringe. I've got my mates that ripped the shit out of me. I walked into my local pub the other day, the White Horse, and my mate was pretending to take photos on his phone, going, all the influences here. I was, you prick. Because it's a. It's a. It's a pub full of old men. And they. You try to explain to them what it is I do for work, and it's like, I've just started seeking tongues to them and they're like, oh, cool. So you work on your phone, dear? I was like, yeah, that's it. Yeah.

Eden: You. You. You know, they're. They're the tradesmen that are just literally bending still with their bare hands.

Sean Kennedy: They're all nicknames and, uh, names that they do. So that one of the guys is called Tires. Guess what he does for a living?

Eden: I reckon he sorts cars out on motor. Like.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, no, you're absolutely spot on. That one's called Carpet or Pull Carpets because he does carpeting. And, you know what's it was m. Me, Sean. LinkedIn Sean

Eden: Guy. That's what we're calling you. But, uh, that's brilliant.

Sean Kennedy: Consistency is one of those other things as well. Like, I joke around when I say, like, there's more opportunity for us to. More so I would love for those to be more people on LinkedIn that would start doing more stuff. It is fantastic. Like when you can start creating some cool stuff and people start to recognize it, but that only comes from being consistent. And to be consistent you need to ignore some stuff as well. Like at first vanity metric, when people start looking at um, likes, comments, even impressions to a point. Impressions aren't. Impressions are referred to as a vanity metric by marketers. I was in a room the other day full of um, CMOs from Pizza Hut, Monzo, and they said impressions are a vanity metric. We need to see what we're getting back from that return on investment or vanish actually posting. And the same goes for me. How many conversations have I had on post? Those are meaningful. How many branders have come from our engagements, have come from my potential customers? Am m I having being able to book stuff in for my customers as well? And that comes from just pulling your socks up, not being afraid to post flops. Don't delete it, uh, keep it, uh, up. LinkedIn does this weird thing where it'll come back to a post every so often. Um, to be honest with you, what is what you post today? So if I post something today, I can guarantee you everyone has forgotten about it by the end of the week or within two days. So your friends might see it, um, and give you a bit of shit or you're worried about someone seeing it that you don't want to see it. I promise you they've already forgotten about it within 24 hours to 48 hours. And then you create your next thing. But then when you're consistent, the images start to then stay in their brain and then you're building an audience of people. You continue to kind of repeat images just like, um, don't think of the way it's familiarity like we were talking about earlier. Yeah, you're just, you're just there and then they're like, okay, this guy's recognizing this is what he's about. I know that now because I've seen so much of his stuff as well. Um, if you do it, post once and something didn't work well and you don't post again, you're not going to build that familiarity and they will forget about you. And it's painful, but it's, you've got to, you just got to keep doing it.

Eden: Do you think there's been a situation where your content has worked against you in the sense of like, maybe it didn't hit how you thought it would be perceived and you Know, maybe lost brand deals out of it or maybe opportunities that were closing that didn't happen.

Sean Kennedy: Probably I probably lost like brand deals. I'm not, I'm not aware of them. Uh, if I have lost any, um, people have probably gone up against, I've probably gone up against certain other people and they've probably just gone with others because they had a better brand or better like personal brand or a better network, which is, it happens. Um, but I don't think I post anything. I purposely don't post anything too, too

Eden: wild to LinkedIn not going controversial.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, like I don't, I don't talk polite conversations at parties. Don't talk about religion, politics or what's the other one? Religion, politics or relationships. I don't know, I can't remember which one it was. But a lot of my stuff is just, I say the things that people think but want to say but don't say them. So like, but particularly around the corporate world, in the TA world. But I say in a way that isn't too offensive, isn't too, you know, in your face, but it's still enough to keep you there watching. Um, because it's funny, it's relatable. I like to think it's funny anyway. But you know, I mean, yeah, I

Eden: laugh, I laugh at them.

Sean Kennedy: Oh, good. Okay.

Eden: You know, they are, they are funny. They are funny. Do you obviously your, your content, I would say you have a very specific style now if I'm wrong, but I would say it's more like short form video content is like more comedic content. Um, obviously I've known you over this three year window where that has changed and I've seen you trial different things. How did you kind of land onto this point where you thought, okay, I'm seeing results here. I think this is working and you lent more into it because all I really see you post now is that style content. I don't really see anything outside of it.

Sean Kennedy: No, that's exactly it. Like I had to see what worked for me. I had to experiment. And you look back on all the stuff that actually works. You run your LinkedIn, your analytics through ChatGPT. What worked for me, what's worked well. Look at my posts, which ones have worked well. And then you'll start to see, okay, this is a pattern. Okay, well I'm just being myself on video. People seem to kind of enjoy that ah, more or like they, it seems to cut through more noise than I tried the whole thought leadership thing. Right. Me trying to pretend like I knew exactly What I was talking about, like, I was an expert. Fact of the matter is there are no experts in recruitment or ta because it's constantly evolving. So anyone who calls himself an expert is a liar. Um, catch some heat for that later.

Eden: But I don't want to share anything controversial. Eh?

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, but I've always said, like, there's no experts in this. And I, uh, It didn't. I like sharing information every now, and I still do. But you'd be absolutely right in what you said that you'll. You'll see more of my comedic stuff or like the trying to be funny stuff, because I like doing more of that. Ah. Because it's more me. Um, I've said this in probably every conversation I've had with people when they ask who I am and what I'm up to. I'm not a serious person, as you well know. Like, I don't take much seriously. Funny enough. I do take, like, how I do content seriously, but it's not fun, it's not serious stuff, if that makes sense. Such a conversation. Um, um. But you know, that, that kind of stuff really works for me. It cuts through the noise because LinkedIn in. LinkedIn in general, as much as I love the platform, it's full of a lot of boring stuff. You know, it's full of people trying to be those thought leaders. It's full of AI posts, you know, that can. Clearly everyone can see has been written by AI. You know, I've got friends who, uh, can barely string a sentence together and I love them to pieces, but all of a sudden they're writing War and

Eden: peace on LinkedIn, like eloquent professionals. Yeah.

Sean Kennedy: Do you know what I mean? Like, have a day off. I saw you try to eat a kebab for a box the other day, like, and now you're going to tell me you've written that on LinkedIn, like. Yeah. All right, so then you just. I'd rather be myself and just go through all the stuff that I like to talk about because it's real, it's authentic. Uh, I still think as it can be. You know, obviously I play characters in some of these things like an idiot, but, you know, I love it. It's what I want to do. And when you love something, I think it does genuinely show. And, um, people tune into that kind of stuff as well.

Eden: I mean, you can see it in the content you share and you can see in the conversation we're having now. I guarantee if you look back into year one and year two conversations we had yes, you was enjoying hopefully the chat we had. But you sound happier, dare I say now in this talking about your career. Whereas I felt like maybe even before it was like this is what I think I should be doing to help the business. Whereas now you're like, I love this. Like I um, dressed up as the characters or whatever. Like you can see it. I again please. I'm going to put the other two episodes in. I'm really do I just to listen to it because the other two episodes were brilliant as well from a actual TA perspective on how to do content whilst employed. Because this is that journey. They are so, so information heavy that are really good. But like I said, this conversation you can see from a mile off how you are.

Sean Kennedy: It's really weird because that's how I learned to love this was from those things. So like I'd worked for a startup, the startup didn't have visibility and like to give. This is like basically a rundown of that, uh, in a really short period of time. Those last two episodes I worked for a company, didn't have any visibility and I wanted to create content on them for LinkedIn to help drive applications. So I'd create stuff around the benefits of the business, talking about like what they were doing, all that stuff to help drive engagement, to help them get the visibility they wanted. It worked. It started going really well. But then I started kind of twisting the content into talking about how the benefits affected me as a person and I'd create content around my life and how that was impacting me and I started talking about myself and kind of building my own personal brand that really started to kind of escalate and escalate. Then I started adding more of myself into my content and more of who I was, who's just a, uh, class clown. And then when that really comes out, it's fantastic. And people were just like, okay, well this is what we're going to engage with now. And I found out I love doing this and doing what I do now. I've got great bunch of clients I work with other great customers I collaborate with and I write scripts for them about like what the, what the content could look like. I've got one doing next week which is out of recruitment actually for a company, um, that sell um, technology or bits of tech like consoles, um, laptops, um, but I can say their name, right?

Eden: Your customer.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, yeah. I mean working with a company called Raylo, um, next week so you can buy like a PlayStation 5 up there like and pay an installment. So what we Kind of do is I wrote them a script on how it could impact my network. Right. The whole script is based off me trying to get a laptop while I'm doing onboarding. But they've just given me a notepad and pen and there's a whole funny skit around that, like, where's my laptop? Sorry, mate, with skin. Like that kind of thing. And then they're like, oh, cool. We like that kind of pitch and that idea because that'll fall quite nicely within your world. And that for me, like that whole creative thing is really brilliant. And then I feel very much like my to, uh, sound very cheesy, like my cup's full up and I'm my boss. I, I own my own time now. I can put the effort into areas where I need to, as I need to. And yeah, dude, it's just completely changed from where I was. Yeah, it's. It's nuts. We just spent the last month in, um, recent. Me and my kids. My wife spent the last month living in South Africa. We were there just. I was working there, doing what needs to do, really enjoyed life, spending time with family whilst creating content but for brands and myself and it was class, mate. I just, I don't. I'm not sure I think I'll ever go back to, uh, what I was doing before.

Eden: Unless this all comes never going back to TA leader, never going back to hands on.

Sean Kennedy: Probably not, mate.

Eden: We'll see. No, I mean, I mean that does lead into my last question, which is, you know, what does year four look like for Sean Kennedy? Uh, M. Where do we go from here? Because like I said, you've gone that full circle. Employed, personal, brand, self employed, fully into the content world. What's the next step look like?

Sean Kennedy: I think it will be working with a longer list of customers. Like in terms of like what I'm doing now in the sales side of things. I'll be working with even bigger brands next year. Um, and I'll be doing not just one off post for them, I'll be doing social campaigns for them, uh, and like marketing campaigns for them. I also think next year I'll be acting um, as well. Um, I think I'll be doing more acting work and I'll be doing a lot more comedy stuff as well. Like I plan to do my first stand up this year as well.

Eden: Uh, nice.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah.

Eden: Local or where are we going?

Sean Kennedy: Far away from where I live as possible.

Eden: Yeah, that's what I was going to probably suggest.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah.

Eden: Oh, I love that.

Sean Kennedy: I've got.

Eden: Tell me Where I'm gonna, I'm gonna take it. I'll be front row. I'll cheer you on. Love a good old comedy show. I. I hope all that comes true, genuinely. I think, like I said, I know I keep sharing that we've had these conversations every year, but it's so good to see someone's heart that they've just absolutely themselves. And I shared it to you as like, um, when we spoke the other day, what you do. I know about three people that do what you do. All right. One's Hung Lee, which we all know. All right.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, I'm seeing that in a couple of weeks actually.

Eden: And, um, can you tell him that he needs to come on the podcast? Because he told me twice he's going to join me and I can't lock him in for a date. And now I feel like a naggy anaggy X if I'm like, text him a third time. So it's unusual. And if we get hung on the, uh, on the podcast, it's on you. He's a great guy.

Sean Kennedy: He's going to be stuck on a boat with me in Barcelona for a few hours in a couple of weeks.

Eden: I mean, it's. It's rude not to corner him and tell you. Tell me to tell me about this. He knows about it. I'm just waiting for him to give me slots, I think every time he was away traveling or something. So, um, time slots wasn't working.

Sean Kennedy: He's a busy, busy guy.

Eden: He is. He is. I mean, but you've got Hung. You've got yourself and you've got Dominic, and obviously Dominic's also been on the, um, on the podcast before. And it's the three of you that at least I know are like, holding down the thought of what this type of role looks like. Um, and you kind of all just, I don't want to say the word winging it, but almost in some way, like there's no, there's no roadmap. Like it is. It's trying and I see your engagement between you and kind of, it's a good support network. So I do urge, uh, if anyone wants to continue the conversation with you, always to find you, you know, because I know a lot of the content side, so many people have a passion for this and want to do it and they, they don't necessarily know how to take it to that next level. So thank you so much for joining and being honest and sharing us that you can make money from LinkedIn, not just write shit posts.

Sean Kennedy: Yeah, not too many of them, but, yeah, absolute pleasure. I always love speaking to you and, uh, yeah, look forward to year four.

Eden: Nice. Best of luck. Meet you later.

Sean Kennedy: Cheers, mate. See you later.