Sheryl Plouffe’s Tips for Growing a Successful Virtual Team

Atiba de Souza: Hey, everybody! Welcome to another episode of Build Your Team. Now, I've got someone with me today who — I was on her show a couple weeks ago, and we had a fantastic conversation about video. Go figure, right? Because you know, I love talking about video and I also love talking about teams. So today, Sheryl and I are going to be talking about team because let's face it, we all need to grow a successful team in order for our businesses to have and reach the level of success that we wanted to, and Sheryl's going to share with us today some of her tips and tricks and some of the things that she's learned running a virtual first and virtual only team for her business.

And as always, Build Your Team is brought to you by Client Attraction Pros. Hey, it's time that you become the thought leader of your industry, and we're gonna help you do that and make it fast, easy, and fun.

Atiba de Souza: Sheryl, welcome!

Sheryl Plouffe: Atiba, so great to be here with you. This is exciting. I know we're not talking about video specifically today, but more on the team side, which is not something that I talk all that much about. So I guess in some way, you're getting an exclusive.

Atiba de Souza: Y'all heard that first. We're getting an exclusive . Alright, so let's dive into our exclusive then and I want to kind of go back. Okay? I wanna go back to the start because you are in a place that a lot of people aren't. In that, you created a virtual first and virtual only environment for your team.

A lot of people were forced into virtual because of the big "P" word, right?

Sheryl Plouffe: Oh, I see.

Atiba de Souza: And you weren't. You made a conscious choice to say, "Hey, I'm not going to have a big office. I'm not gonna bring people in and have to look at them, and they look at me all day long." So I'm curious, why?

Sheryl Plouffe: When I started thinking about having my own business was quite a long time ago. It was around 2013 and it took four years of planning and plotting and deciding to get to the point where I actually left my previous profession, which was broadcasting and started my own video marketing consultancy.

It was interesting because in 2017 when I left, I didn't know it was a consultancy. I didn't really know what it was. I just knew I was starting my own business but I think the thing that drove me was this desire to have a certain kind of lifestyle, and that was the impetus for starting the business in the first place.

I didn't want to be on the road anymore. I didn't want to be commuting, and I really wanted to be home-based and I didn't have any desire to necessarily have an office, leasing an office and doing all that, despite the fact that many people who are in video marketing do such things, especially back then because sometimes people will have a studio where clients can come in and they have it all set up and they'll record videos and such.

I wanted to do everything online, so I think I had some type of vision for what I wanted and what I didn't want in my life at that point, which led me to the decision to do everything remotely.

Atiba de Souza: That's awesome. It's great that you had that vision long before everyone else did, right? Because I'm sure that it made the pandemic that much — I'm not gonna say easier. There is, what else I'm gonna say, but more palatable for you. I know we made the choice in 2019 to go remote first, right? And it was right before, obviously, and we were so glad we did. So it's great that you've had that vision.

So one of the challenges that people have when they go virtual is actually finding staff that they can trust because for whatever reason, and there are tons of them. We innately feel like in order to trust you, I have to see you. I have to be able to put my hands on you. I've gotta touch you, right? I gotta be able to look over your shoulder. So what was that process like for you? Especially coming from the broadcast world, which is very in your face, like everybody's gotta be there, right?

Sheryl Plouffe: I never really had trouble with that trust issue with remote team members. I never really have had that. My problem mostly was the fact that I had hired people in the past that they were further ahead in the process than I needed at that moment.

So, for example. I'll give you an example. Twice I actually hired an OBM, an online business manager. But at that point, when I had hired one and then a second OBM at different stages, like at different periods, it wasn't because I didn't trust them. It wasn't because they weren't amazing at what they did. I didn't have my own stuff together. I was trying to hire someone that was inappropriate for the stage that I was at.

I was just too early, too green, and I didn't need that level of person at that moment. What I needed in retrospect now, was I needed a virtual assistant as opposed to an OBM. I didn't know that at the time, and I think the case with team building is, sometimes you don't know what you don't know.

Atiba de Souza: Yes, absolutely. So let's unpack that a little bit, Sheryl. So first — I mean, it's an insightful place to be to realize that I made a mis-hire and I thought I needed more than I actually did. Right? So I do wanna unpack how that happens and why we think — cuz we all do it — that we need more than what we actually do.

But then you also brought up two terms that I would love your definition for the audience on OBM versus a virtual assistant. So two questions there. You could choose either one of 'em to start with.

Sheryl Plouffe: Okay. Well, I'm not even sure that I know definitively cause my space isn't necessarily the hiring kind of side of things, but my understanding, an OBM is an online business manager. It's like a person that manages and if you have a team of virtual assistants, like an OBM would manage the team of virtual assistants, I say beneath them, I hate to use that term, but if we're talking about a hierarchy, that's how I understand it to be.

So when I hired the online business manager, and literally that's a person to my understanding, who is really going to be managing the actual business. That means everything to do with finances and everything that's happening in the business. The problem was that at that time I didn't have enough to manage, like there wasn't enough to manage.

I think the reason why I had gone down that path to hire an OBM twice was because I probably read an article. I had heard, said somebody else who was successful, who I wanted to emulate that level of success had an OBM. I'm like, well, if I wanna be them — and we often hear that in entrepreneurship. Right, Atiba? Is that be act and behave at the point at which you want to be, not necessarily where you are. So I thought, "Well, if successful people have OBM's, then I must have an OBM." And that's kind of what happened. That's, that's my understanding of what an OBM is, as opposed to a virtual assistant.

And I have an amazing virtual assistant now, and I almost hesitate to call her a virtual assistant because to me she's so much more than that. But she is really someone who I can delegate tasks to and know that she is going to be able to take them and be able to run with the systems that we've already outlined to complete certain tasks.

So that's my understanding of the difference between OBM and virtual assistant.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. No, that's a great definition in terms of the understanding there. If I could, I would add a little bit, and we were already on that path there is. An OBM is really somebody who can see all of the systems and all of the interworkings and make sure that everything is working together, whereas, as you said, with a virtual assistant or an international worker, depending on where they are in the world, they're really someone who can take a task or a set of tasks in a defined system and produce.

Sheryl Plouffe: Yes.

Atiba de Souza: Okay? And it is very, very different. Thanks for answering both questions too. And with that — 

Sheryl Plouffe: Did I answer questions? I know the second question. I don't remember the first one was, but I'm sure — 

Atiba de Souza: Well, you did because you said that you got to the OBM and thinking that you needed an OBM because you looked at someone else.

Sheryl Plouffe: Yes. 

Atiba de Souza: Right? And well, they had an OBM and they're successful, so therefore I must need an OBM as well. And I think that's one of the things that's interesting because we've all heard that, right?

Whether some people wanna call it, "fake it till you make it." Whether some people want to say, "act like you are." However you want to say it, but tell me how you feel about this statement. It's less about doing exactly what you saw someone else do and more about figuring out the principles and the strategy behind it, and then figure out how that works for you.

Sheryl Plouffe: I agree. I think it is about figuring out and looking between the lines and reading between the lines of that successful person and saying, what are the principles that they're applying here? So if I were to go back to my younger self, my younger business person self and think, okay, if you'd looked at those situations with a different lens, I might have read between the lines and looked at that successful person and said, "Okay, the principle that they're applying here is that you are not the doer of everything. You are not the person who has to be in the weeds, doing every single task. You do a lot of tasks still when you're growing a business, but maybe you don't need to be doing all of them."

I think that's the principle I would probably look at it with now. But at that time, I think I was probably just looking at someone who's successful and thinking, "Okay, they have an OBM, therefore I must have one. They have this tool, I need that." And I got caught up in all those shiny objects I think as so many people do, which is predominantly why I teach now, having gone through that process of a better way, and I think that is just part and parcel of the entrepreneurial journey.

You don't know what you don't know, and then you go through that whole experience, look back on it with some sense of wisdom and insight and be able to share with others now, "Hey, here's my path, and I did get caught up in all those shiny objects. I was hiring all these people and I was spending all this money, and then I was getting this tool and that tool, and I hate 8,000 things cobbled together until I realized that it is something I believe is true today." Sometimes you have to go back to basics.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah, absolutely. Sometimes you do. That's really, really great advice. And it's one that — I hope for everyone who's listening that you hear because if you haven't got caught up into shiny object syndrome, then you're actually just lying to yourself. Cause I guarantee —

Sheryl Plouffe: We all do. We all do.

Atiba de Souza: Right? We all get caught up in shiny object syndrome and we just need to recognize that and learn to be better and deal with ourselves. Now in there, you brought up an interesting point, and it's one that we've not covered a ton here on the channel. And I'm hoping that we can unpack a little bit cuz you said, you got caught up in spending a bunch of money on staff, right? And that's always a trepidation of how much do I pay? How much can I afford? How much are they worth? Right?

Sheryl Plouffe: Yes. It's challenging because you have to keep cash flow coming in. You have to keep that going, right? But at the same time, I am a believer in investing in yourself, and sometimes it does require going out on a little bit of a limb or taking — not even really a chance, it's just going out on a limb and trusting yourself that if this is the thing that you really need, it will have an ROI and then it will come back to you. 

What's challenging about that is that sometimes that ROI, especially in a team member, could take a little bit of time to get back only because there's onboarding. You have to train that person. You have to get to know that person.

You're trying to figure some stuff out, and it doesn't happen in two days. It happens over the course of — maybe a couple of months before you really are in a groove and you're in a system. So you do have to understand that depending — let's say you're paying a person, I don't know, $1,500 a month. If it's an online business manager, you should be paying somebody to do all of those tasks.

And let's just say that's what it is. Well, you might have to be in it for a few months for you to start seeing that return. When I did it, I think I was just too new. I didn't have enough work for her to do at that point. There wasn't enough to manage. 

I didn't have the clientele or the stuff to manage at that point, so I was just kind of putting the cart before the horse.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. That's a really great point. Not having it thinking you do and not having enough staff to manage, but then also tie back around into something else that you said, which is the patience. The patience that you have to have in the beginning of hiring someone. And I'm gonna raise my hand here, okay?

Because I'm just as guilty as everyone else, right? But so often you bring in somebody new and you put so much stock and faith in them way too early and feel like they're about to change the world for us.

Sheryl Plouffe: Right. I can relate to that. I think I can relate to that. I can't think of specific situations, but just kind of an overall feeling of that, at that time of, "Okay, they're here now and they're gonna tell me what to do, right? They're gonna take over and they're gonna do all the things."

And it's like, "No, you're still the leader. You're still the person who has to give that vision." And if you don't know what your vision is or what it is that you're driving for, if you're still in that phase of trying to figure it out, then it's probably, again, not the right time to hire that specific role because there is a certain stage — I don't know if you feel this way, Atiba — but there's a certain timeframe, and it could be different for some people than others. For me, it felt like it took a couple of years, maybe to a few years to figure some stuff out. And that was the period of throwing spaghetti at the wall in video marketing and just trying to figure out like, "Who am I? What do I stand for? What do I believe?" And then you work in a world of video and social media, which is always changing.

Atiba de Souza: Yep.

Sheryl Plouffe: And then you feel like you're chasing the next thing, or you, yourself, as a leader are trying to understand like, "Where are we at and what is working and what's okay now, but this is the thing I'm teaching and that doesn't seem to be working anymore. So do I change what I'm teaching?"

And it's just this cyclical thing. When you're in that kind of world, it's really difficult to bring on, let's say an OBM as an example, since that's what we're talking about mostly here, you bring that person on and like you are confused about your own business. So how can they have clarity if you don't even know yet?

Atiba de Souza: I want you to say that last statement again. I was gonna say it, but I want you to say it.

Sheryl Plouffe: How can they know what your business is if you don't? You can't. If they come into your business and it's a hot mess only because you're at a stage — and there's nothing wrong with this stage, I just wanna be clear, I think this is part of figuring your stuff out. I think it's a natural stage.

It's a stage that I see a lot of people now that I'm mentoring, going through. I think that's a natural thing to figure. You gotta figure some stuff out.

But if you don't know yet, then I think you have to be very careful about who you're hiring or what level of person that you're hiring, because they can't figure out what your business is for you. That was really the biggest lesson I had at that point.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. And it's a huge lesson. One of the things that we talk about here a lot is first hiring for fit like you gotta hire someone that fits you and your organization and your current team, but then after you hire for fit, understand that if you're hiring for a position that you don't know how it works, if you don't have SOPs, if you don't have some sort of plan for them to walk into, don't have to be the perfect plan, but if you don't have a good plan for them to walk into, you're just wasting time.

I heard Ryan Deiss say this a couple months ago, he said, "You know, stop hiring good people for bad systems."

Sheryl Plouffe: Yeah. And I think you're right that you might not have all of the details drilled down in terms of what that system is, but you have to have some understanding of what your customer journey is, what your product is, what the general lead generation strategy is, like you have to have some things dialed in.

I think that depending on who the person is that you bring in, let's say it is a virtual assistant, depending on that person and their skillset, you might even be able to collaborate with that person a little bit and say, "Hey, new virtual assistant, let's have these regular meetings and let's discuss, like, here's what I have."

And then they might even see some steps that's like, "Well, I'm unclear about this." Now all of a sudden there's a bit of a red flag on that, where you go, "Oh, I hadn't thought. Yeah, you're right. That isn't clear. Okay, let's together collaborate. What would make this more clear? Well, make it more clear if you said this, this, this and this."

Okay! Let's add that into the system, right? So now you are almost co-creating that SOP together, depending again on the skillset of that of that person.

Atiba de Souza: Of that person. Yes. It's great that we're having this conversation right now cause I can tell you this is something that's going on right now, this minute inside of my company. We've been doing LinkedIn prospecting for almost a year now. We've built our system, we've tested it, and worked through it, and it had a fair amount of success. Okay? Isn't perfect, we just had a fair amount of success. 

We just last week hired someone who has been doing LinkedIn prospecting at a very high level for four years. She is an expert at it, inside and out. And she's getting trained on our system right now, and tomorrow we're gonna meet and she's going to sit down with us and talk about, "Okay. You've just trained me on your system. I'm gonna do your system, but here's some things that I can see upfront based on my experience, which is exactly what you just said." And now we're gonna go forward and co-create with her, because she does have that expertise.

Sheryl Plouffe: Yes. Depending on, again, the person that you hire, they can also contribute to the system that they're then gonna execute.

Atiba de Souza: Yes, yes, yes. That's a really clear distinction and evaluation there. So let me ask you this question. How do you make that distinction of this person is someone who can help me co-create and someone I can trust? Because there are a lot of people who will love to help you co-create. Quick story, if I could.

I had a guy apply for this same position and his application said that he was an expert level. But he's never done it for anyone before.

Sheryl Plouffe: Oh. Interesting.

Atiba de Souza: But he's an expert. And so — normally we would've just ignored his application, but we decided, let's just respond to him and say, what makes you an expert?

Well, I took the class and I believe I understand the theories, and so I am an expert.

Sheryl Plouffe: Right.

Atiba de Souza: Right? And I can come in and show you how you can be better with your prospecting.

Sheryl Plouffe: Right.

Atiba de Souza: I'm not about to trust you.

Sheryl Plouffe: No, no.

Atiba de Souza: How do you know who you can trust?

Sheryl Plouffe: Well, I think it's in the meeting. It's in the onboarding. I think it's in having regular meetings and having regular touchpoints and discussions and maybe a lot of this too has to do with instinct, you get a vibe. There's a vibe between human beings and do you vibe or don't you vibe?

But then the second thing is the demonstration of ability and their willingness to share with you. It's a better way. I like people that are gonna come to the table with different skillsets than mine, different knowledge than mine, and be able to say, "I think there's a better way or have you considered this?"

I remember, like my current virtual assistant now when she came on, I said to her, "Listen, I'm very open to suggestions, just so you know, you're not stepping on toes. I encourage that. I want you to raise your hand. I want you to ask questions. I want you to question things because I see you as someone who has skillset and abilities and wisdom, and I don't think that it's just about pushing buttons at this point. I want you to share that." I was very upfront about that from the beginning. And then I think it gave her the knowledge or the desire to then say, "Okay, if she doesn't see something working well, she does." She'll say, "Hey, just a suggestion, would it work better if we did this, this, and this?"

And more often than not, she's right. So I think it's partly instinct in terms of the vibe to people have to get along and understand each other, but I think you have to also be upfront as the leader and establish those parameters from the beginning.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah. No, that's so key there on what you also said. Establish those parameters from the beginning. Establish those parameters from the beginning. I know for us, when we hire people, in their onboarding and actually in the interview process as well. When they get to interview with me, I always tell 'em, "Listen, if you get this job, I'm hiring you for your brain. I expect you to think.

Sheryl Plouffe: Yeah.

Atiba de Souza: And bring your thoughts and bring your questions, and bring your ideas and bring your suggestions, cuz that's how we all grow and we all get better."

Sheryl Plouffe: But Atiba, the thing to keep in mind in terms of hiring and say again, if we're talking about a virtual assistant in this case that not all virtual assistants want to be that involved. They don't all want to co-create. They want to be told, here are the tasks, do the tasks. And that's it. And they don't really want to think that much, like more task-oriented type people.

So in the interview process, it's really important to get a vibe for what motivates them? What gets them excited? Not everyone does. Some people just want a list of like, "I just gotta do these tasks every day.

And that's it. So you have to be careful about that I think.

Atiba de Souza: No, absolutely, and that gets back to understanding. Who you want in your environment. If you just want a task monkey, then hire a task monkey, right? If that's what you're looking for. Someone who's just gonna say, tell me what to do, and that's all I'm going to do. But if you're looking for someone who wants to do more or that's who you want on around you, then you're absolutely right in terms of how we figure that out in the interview process. One of the tricks that I use is, I ask them in the interview process at least six times, what questions do you have?

Sheryl Plouffe: That's a good one because then it puts it on them to, you know, and tells you a lot if there aren't any questions.

Atiba de Souza: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah.

Sheryl Plouffe: Right?

Atiba de Souza: Oh, yeah. They're no questions, interview's over.

Sheryl Plouffe: Yeah, there should be questions. Absolutely. 

Atiba de Souza: Right? Because then I know you're gonna continue asking me questions cuz that's who I'm looking for. Right? But if you are looking for someone — and it's okay if you are. If you're looking for someone who is gonna come in and do exactly what you want them to do, the way you want them to do it without deviation, then because there are some roles that exist like that, then know that that's what you're looking for and that's okay too.

Sheryl Plouffe: And that's okay. Yeah, exactly. I don't think there's anything wrong with that. It's just that you have to be cognizant of what it is that you need and want at that time and be able to determine what kind of, I guess, personality or attributes, characteristics does that person have. What kind of work is it that they are looking for? And you will have to ask questions to figure that out.

Atiba de Souza: Absolutely. One of the things that I love about you is, some people would look at us from the outside and say, "The two of them are in the same field. Why did she have him on her show?" But the beauty of what we do and understanding is, number one, we serve different audiences.

Number two, we do different things and we can learn so much from each other, which helps us co-create, right? Getting back to that and so I really appreciate that about you as a human being first and foremost, secondly, as a business person, and so do me a favor, tell us about your company. What do you do and who do you serve?

Sheryl Plouffe: We serve business leaders, be it entrepreneurs, online business owners, coaches, consultants, people in the knowledge space to leverage a podcast in order to get more clients, referrals and speaking engagements. So we're helping people to create an organic marketing strategy that really a highly lucrative podcast is really what we're doing.

So the name of my company is my name at Sheryl Plouffe Media, and that is now what we're focused on. So back to your question about like, "Why would she have him on our show? They do competing things." We don't. We don't compete. Because I believe in abundance and that is just a philosophical thing that I have come to know and learn over the course of doing personal development for a very long time now.

Depends on how you see the world. If you see the world as "Oh, I gotta get what's mine and keep things close to the vest and don't share with anybody and they can't see my answers." Then that's the kind of world you're gonna live in. And I believe in abundance and having you on the show, I mean, it was great. You shared some really great stuff for my audience. That's what I care about. I care about putting out great content for other people to learn and that we live in an abundant world. So, it was great having you on and the thing with video marketing — I mean, listen, I would be completely naive if I thought that I was the only person who did video. Right? There are like thousands if not, tens of thousands of people doing video. But there's room for everyone. And everyone has different philosophies around it, and I think that's great. But yeah, it's something that's important to me is to be — and again, it comes back to brand building too. It's like, what is your brand? Your brand is your reputation. It's the things that you believe. And so I believe in abundance and I believe in service first, as do you.

Atiba de Souza: Absolutely. I want to hang a hat literally on that term, abundance. And I want hang a hat on that because I know that my companies and Sheryl Plouffe Media also believes so greatly in abundance cause that's who we serve. We don't just believe in it in terms of what we give, but we believe in it for our clients as well, in terms of the clients that we work with, that you must come from a mindset of abundance. You must come from a mindset of I've been given information to share this information. I have to pour out. I have to pour out. And if you're listening to us right now and you're thinking about your team and growing your team at the same time, and you're thinking, "Okay. Well, I need to be the smartest person in the room on my team. Guess what? You're way off. 

Sheryl Plouffe: I agree. It's like a sports team, right? You don't necessarily wanna be, you wanna be kind of in the middle to maybe somewhere closer to the top. But I don't believe that you gain as much by being the absolute leader of the team, necessarily from a development perspective.

Maybe from a leadership perspective, yeah, I guess you could, but in terms of development, I think that you wanna have some wiggle room to be able to develop further. 

Atiba de Souza: Yes. 

Sheryl Plouffe: You don't wanna be the smartest person in the room. Surround yourself so that you can learn and you can grow.

Atiba de Souza: Yes, absolutely. And it's the only way your company is also going to grow.

Sheryl Plouffe: I wanna just say one thing I think about team. I didn't really consider team when I first, first started. I think when I first, first started and I left broadcasting and I started my company, like it was just me and I didn't have really any idea that it would be anything but me. And it took some time for me to realize, "Oh, this is how it works. I can't do it all alone, and to some degree I'm maybe still learning that lesson.

I've been a very independent person really since I was 15. I feel like I've been like battling and fighting and everything, like since I was 15 years old for a different life and whatever. I wanna do it myself and I can do it. Those things are true. But at some point you realize like, "I can't do this in isolation. I really need to rely on other people and that it is okay to do that. It's okay to let go and accept help, and ask for help and find help." That wasn't my mentality when I first, first started.

I thought, I'm starting this business, I'm doing it myself, and now I'm realizing all these many years later that that's not really how it goes. That can be the case when you're first starting out. In terms of, again, that stage, like that bootstrapped place that you're in, just trying to figure stuff out. But very soon you'll realize, if you don't build a business in isolation and that you will have to ask for help, find help, accept help.

Atiba de Souza: Yeah, absolutely. That's so very true. And someone said that to me in a different way last year that rocked my world. And it was Kris Krohn. I don't know if you know Kris Krohn. He's real estate mogul. And this is what Kris said to me last year — so he said it from stage and then I had a chance to actually spend time one-on-one with Kris this year at a different event.

And we got to talk about it in depth. And he said, "You know, I only work three days a week. My company makes a hundred million or worth a hundred million dollars. I only work three days a week and people always wanna know how it is that I work three days a week."

And he went through his schedule. He said, "But that's not what does it. What does it is, I have made a commitment four years ago, something like that, that every hundred and 20 days I replace myself in my company.

Sheryl Plouffe: Interesting.

Atiba de Souza: I look at what I do and I find new people to do it every 120 days." And he said, "That's how we've grown. That's how I got to work in three days a week. That is the secret sauce." I haven't gotten to 120 days on replacing myself.

Sheryl Plouffe: I haven't got to replacing myself. I'm not there yet. That's a very inspiring story, obviously, and it makes a lot of sense. Really what we're talking about, like when you wanna grow and when you wanna scale, you really do have to find a way to replace yourself, because those 24 hours in the day are the same for all of us. And then you leverage, right? By bringing other people on, and then that's when you come into, again, team building and onboarding and all the things we've been talking about in this episode.

I'm not there yet. I'm really not. I'm not at the point where I've replaced myself in my business. I still personally feel like I'm still in the growth phase. I guess, maybe feel like I'm getting closer to the scaling phase, but I'm still in growth phase, I think.

And I'm not ready, or I'm just not at the place yet to replace myself quite yet, but I'm working toward it. And I guess the important thing is to understand where you are at, right? And there's nothing wrong with, you do have to go through that phase. Like can't just jump the line. So you're gonna have to go through it, but understand and look at the situation and say, "Okay, what phase am I in?" Because that's half the battle, is just knowing where you are..

Atiba de Souza: Yes. And accepting it and doing the age appropriate things.

Sheryl Plouffe: That's right. Yes.

Atiba de Souza: Right? This has been awesome and I know we can keep on going because there's so much more that we can continue unpacking. There was stuff that I missed that you said deliberately because like, "Oh my gosh! We talked for a whole hour on that topic alone."

But I do want you to tell everybody, how they can find you, how they can connect with you if they're in the knowledge space and they're ready to leverage a podcast to really start to grow their business.

Sheryl Plouffe: The advantage of having a French Canadian name like Plouffe made it so that I had Sheryl Plouffe available on all the platforms way back when I signed up for Facebook and Twitter and Instagram and all. So you can find me at Sheryl Plouffe, Sheryl with an "S" and send me a message. Listen, there's something to be said about going back to basics. Send me a message. I'm reachable. Send me an email. Send me a message. Just say, "Hey, I heard you on Atiba show. Like to chat with you." Happy to send you resources from there. But profitable podcast method.com is also another place people can find information.

Atiba de Souza: Awesome. And as always, all of her links will be in the description. If you're on the podcast, it'll be in the show notes. If you're on YouTube, in the description down below. Sheryl, thank you so much for being here. It's been a pleasure to chat with you and I know you bless some people today because you shared from your abundance and the beauty about sharing from your abundance is as you pour out more is going to be poured into you. So get ready for even more for you. And so thank you for being here.

Sheryl Plouffe: Thank you, Atiba. This has been a lot of fun. I think interviews like this all make me realize some things about myself as well, right? It's a process that as I'm verbally expressing this, I'm realizing some things even that I've learned about myself in this process. So thank you.

Atiba de Souza: Absolutely. Absolutely. All right everybody. We'll see you next time. Bye-bye.