Episode 7
Growing Prospects & Clients with Deb Wallace
Welcome Deb Wallace with DigiCard to Saturday Soundbites! Deb is the founder of this amazing company and she is going to share her insights on how networking has changed in this COVID world. Virtual networking and collaborations are more important than ever, and your personal brand and digital presences are key to your first impression.If you are more engaged in the virtual space than you have ever been, tune in and learn from this industry expert. You can learn more about Digicard at www.digitalbiz-card.com!
Transcript
Veronica: [00:00:00] Hello. Hello, and welcome to another episode of Saturday soundbites. This is Veronica Sofer and I'm your host. I am so excited to be here today. I have a phenomenal guest. We're going to talk networking. We're going to talk visibility. We're going to talk about how to engage and get new clients and customers in this new digital world.
[00:00:20] So let's, you know, we're going to dive right in, but before we do. I want to remind you to please provide your comments, ask any questions that you might have. This is a great way to learn from experts and, and really dive into some of the nuances of networking. So make sure you send your questions to us.
[00:00:37] Just type them in below. If you are watching on the replay, just put hashtag replay. And we'll go back and engage with you and make sure we follow up. And if you are listening on our podcast, hit subscribe because we want to make sure that you get notifications for every single episode. So I'm so glad that we are here today with Ms.
[00:00:55] Deb Wallace. I'm going to invite her up on the stage here, Deb. How
[00:01:00] Deb: [00:01:00] are you? Good morning. It's so great to be here. Thanks for having me.
[00:01:04] Veronica: [00:01:04] Absolutely. Absolutely. So tell us a little bit about who you are, what did you card is and you know, all the great things about this product and how it helps people. Well,
[00:01:15] Deb: [00:01:15] yeah, so I'm the CEO of Digi Digi card and what it is, it's a, basically a business card that's on steroids.
[00:01:24] So, um, that's a good way to put it. Uh, it's. Uh, how we do it is it's all digital and, um, no more passing out those Jeremy pay for your paper, business cards anymore. Right? As long as you have your phone with you, you can not share it with anyone anytime, anywhere.
[00:01:43] Veronica: [00:01:43] That's awesome. How did you come up with that idea?
[00:01:45] What brought this on? Was it just COVID or was it something that had been, you've been working on before.
[00:01:51] Deb: [00:01:51] So that's a very good question. Um, we have a digital marketing agency and of course, when COVID hit the whole pandemic, a lot of businesses closed. And, um, we were, uh, we sat down, we brainstormed, we said, how can we continue on trying to get ourselves out there?
[00:02:12] Um, promote our company and help other people empower other people as well to promote themselves. And most people are working from home. So we thought, well, let's try to do a digital business card and that's pretty much how did you cards started?
[00:02:29] Veronica: [00:02:29] Awesome. So you've only been in business sounds like less than a year then, right?
[00:02:33] Yes. Correct. That's all awesome. So tell us, tell us about the kind of clients you have and yeah. What your experience has been since you've moved into this space? I mean, I can, I can tell that there's a demand for it. And just to give our listeners a little bit background, I reached out to Deb completely out of the blue.
[00:02:52] I think I reached out on LinkedIn or something. I don't even remember exactly. And I found out about it because I was in a networking group, a BNI group out of an army, Texas. This group was out of Manhattan, New York. And of course they're completely locked down, but they're still doing business. You know, they're still networking and someone had this card and it was digital.
[00:03:11] And I was like, Oh my gosh, this is amazing. Went to the website, learned a little bit more. And I was like, I've got to talk to this woman. How did you just bring this into the forefront? Because I think it's awesome.
[00:03:22] Deb: [00:03:22] Yes, it is amazing. Um, but, uh, yeah, so that's how, pretty much how it started.
[00:03:29] Veronica: [00:03:29] Yeah, I love that.
[00:03:30] I love that. Let's um, let me pull up a sample of what we're talking about for those who need some of our visual learners. So there's, it was on my, you know, my screenshot in my phone. You can scroll down, see what some of the content that's on my website. There's all those buttons. How you can connect to me.
[00:03:48] You can reach over on LinkedIn or Instagram. And I love this feature here. I just hit share, and I can send it via email, right? Is that yeah, I'm doing that via email. I can do the same thing via text and I, within seconds, I can be connecting with someone whether on Facebook or clubhouse or any other networking event, physical event and just send it.
[00:04:10] I just love how you did that,
[00:04:12] Deb: [00:04:12] Deb. Oh, thank you. Yes,
[00:04:15] Veronica: [00:04:15] this is tell us how it works. Exactly.
[00:04:18] Deb: [00:04:18] Oh, okay. So basically it works. You would store your digital business card on your phone and you'd have it right on your home screen and no more reaching into your pocket. Trying to find a business card. So many times we have come across someone that we want to share our personnel or, you know, our business information with them and we've left our cards in our car.
[00:04:39] Or we've left them in our bag or funding in our first for them. So as long as you have your phone, you just pull up your phone, just like how you shared on the video there. And you have your digital business card stored right on your home screen. You'd pull it up, you click right on it and you can instantly share with the person across from you are standing right there.
[00:04:59] Um, And not just that, if they're not right next to you, you can email it to them. You can text it to them, airdrop it to them, share it in zoom classes or course or zoom meetings. Um, you're pretty much share at any anytime. So it's super easy. Just like how you showed, uh, on this, on the video, that little video that you, that you shared.
[00:05:23] You don't have to be tech savvy to work.
[00:05:26] Veronica: [00:05:26] That's good.
[00:05:27] Deb: [00:05:27] That's really good. So if you can send a text message to someone, you can share your digital business card. If you can send an email, you can share it that way. So you do not have to be tech savvy at all. Yeah,
[00:05:40] Veronica: [00:05:40] absolutely. And who do you, how do you, who do you find are your ideal clients?
[00:05:44] I mean, is it traditional business people? Is it online entrepreneurs? What kind of space do you see? You get the most engagement from this kind of product?
[00:05:54] Deb: [00:05:54] So really anyone that works with other businesses, uh, salespeople, real estate agents, our card, car salesman, um, pretty much anyone in the sales markets, the sales industry.
[00:06:09] Uh, even owners, business owners, you can set appointments up, you can keep your appointment, log, you connect your CRM with it. Uh, we do have a new feature on here that is where you can record an introduction. So if I wanted to record an introduction for yourself or someone let's say in real estate or something, hi, I'm Jeff Wallace, Wallace.
[00:06:32] And I'll call me if you want to sell your home, buy your home. I'm here to help you. And you could have an actual personal recording, um, something like that, right on your digital business card.
[00:06:44] Veronica: [00:06:44] That is a fantastic idea. I love that. And audio is so important now. I mean, with all the craze, I've mentioned it already once or twice with all the craze of clubhouse starting and it being a hundred percent audio.
[00:06:57] I think people, I got a little zoomed out. Maybe they got a little too much with the video, just because it's been so compressed for us lately that having an audio message or it's just sounds fantastic to me. Cause I can do it in my pajamas.
[00:07:12] Deb: [00:07:12] That's so true and it personalizes the card. So it makes it more you and not just that making a video, we can add videos to the cards.
[00:07:23] So all your podcasts to them are links to your podcasts. If someone has a YouTube channel or any videos related to that, you can put them on the card. Um, you can add your services. Links to your services, links to your products. So there's a lot of extra things, more things that you can add to your digital business card than you ever could have on a traditional paper card.
[00:07:49] And, uh, especially right now with COVID-19 and the whole worry about passing germs onto, you know, things that you've touched. I mean, people are so, um, Conscious of all of that now. Sure. Well, with this, you can pass your business card to someone and you don't have to touch it, or they don't have to touch something that you've handled.
[00:08:11] So it takes that whole worry right away.
[00:08:14] Veronica: [00:08:14] Yeah, I love that. That's brilliant. So you also mentioned you have a digital business. Tell us a little bit about the entrepreneurialship journey for you. A lot of our listeners and people that are watching this on Facebook are entrepreneurs. Um, I love that your business is less than a year old.
[00:08:30] You seem to be doing exceptionally well. I love the content. I love what you're putting out on social media. Tell us about your entrepreneurial spirit. What, what drove you to get
[00:08:39] Deb: [00:08:39] here? Oh, uh, so basically, um, uh, well, I would say pretty much, um, I got a divorce, so maybe this is too much information. I'm not sure.
[00:08:53] Veronica: [00:08:53] No people will connect. People will connect. They love the entrepreneurial story because it all starts somewhere, somewhere. And for a lot of us, sometimes it comes out of situations like that. So it's absolutely perfect.
[00:09:06] Deb: [00:09:06] Yeah. So that's basically what happened with me. And during that whole process, I was very determined to find out, find a way to provide for me and my children.
[00:09:15] So, um, that's when I started doing, uh, the, uh, digital marketing, I started creating the, um, websites for a lot of, uh, Restaurants and setting them up with online, ordering and things like that. So that's how my marketing agency started. And that was about four years ago when that started.
[00:09:36] Veronica: [00:09:36] Wow. I love that. I love that.
[00:09:38] We have a lot of people who are maybe got laid off. Um, I've got several friends in the oil and gas industry, as I mentioned, I'm in Texas and they were finding themselves, laid off and, and professionals who needed to try to find a way to make money and, and started breaking into the online space. And you did it, you took it by the horns and you literally launched it.
[00:09:58] And from there you were able to grow another business. Yes.
[00:10:02] Deb: [00:10:02] Yes. When a very challenging, it's been so much hard work, but it's been so rewarding.
[00:10:07] Veronica: [00:10:07] Yeah. I'm so glad. And I'm so glad to see that your, your company is doing well. Um, and what do you think some of the challenges are with people? You know, you mentioned realtors and you mentioned working with salespeople.
[00:10:19] What do you think some of the challenges are for the way you see it with the clients you work with? Um, with COVID now, how are they, how are they pivoting?
[00:10:28] Deb: [00:10:28] Yeah. So I, a lot of people are working out of their homes. Um, many were not allowed to even go out and I'm not sure in some States they even still are.
[00:10:38] So they're still on lockdown, but we still have to work. So, this is a way to get you, get your business out there and get your services out there. Get your products out there and just share it to other people with the digital business card.
[00:10:52] Veronica: [00:10:52] Yeah, I love it. And you know, like, uh, I mentioned earlier I was in a guest at a BNI networking event and honestly, Being at home and a lot of people having a lot more time in the evening.
[00:11:05] And the other thing too is we, we spent less time in the car. I mean, there were weeks, literally weeks when we didn't put gas in our vehicle, you know? So we were at home for so long that we started. Branching out into this online space. And that's how I got into that one networking group that I was invited to, but where I, where I saw the digit card and it really opened my eyes to how important visibility is for your digital footprint or your digital impression of who people think you are.
[00:11:36] Um, and as I was connecting with people, I saw that there was a lot of misalignment with their branding. So their website had one brand or maybe, you know, a palette of colors and then you see something else on their social media that looks completely different. And I wasn't even sure if it was the right person and your card kind of solves that problem.
[00:11:56] Deb: [00:11:56] Yes. It really does because we can customize it specific to your brand, um, specific to you. Uh, and then also the other great thing about it is, you know, sometimes when we're not sometimes, but when we've ordered regular business cards before, if we've had a name change or we've had a promotion or we've moved addresses or something like that, we've had to, we've had a whole box of cards and we have to go in and an order more.
[00:12:22] So with the digital business card, you can just email us with the change and. Within 24 40 hours, you have your, your updated card. It does not cost anything extra it's included with the annual fee. And, um, so you can change. Even if you want to change your products, change your services. Or if you add new ones, just call us.
[00:12:43] We'll easily change those and update your business card for you. At no additional cost.
[00:12:49] Veronica: [00:12:49] I love that. And so I've put your website down there so people can, um, check it out and explain to us how it works. I mean, you mentioned an annual fee. Um, if I'm an online entrepreneur, maybe in a similar situation, I'm branching out I'm, um, maybe no longer have a nine to five and maybe I'm in the Sam, a mindset coach.
[00:13:09] Cause I work with a lot of mindset coaches. Um, how would I get started in working with you?
[00:13:16] Deb: [00:13:16] It's super easy. Just go to the website and there are a lot of samples on there. You could just browse through the samples, decide and one that you like. And then, um, just fill out the order form. It comes to us.
[00:13:30] You'll have your digital business card within three to five days. And, um, it's a one-time annual fee, $99. Now, if you have a team of people, the cost starts going down. So like sometimes businesses have 10 people on staff or they have multiple people. So the price goes down and it's super easy to get started.
[00:13:54] You'll fill out a form with all your information on there, and then we communicate back and forth and to get your card customized.
[00:14:02] Veronica: [00:14:02] I love it. I love it. And I hadn't even thought about the idea of teams because again, a lot of people in our space are online. Uh, most of our teams are remote. So for instance, I have two virtual assistants and they're remote.
[00:14:15] It never occurred to me to get them a card as well. But it sounds like if. They're engaging with clients and vendors remotely. I should probably go ahead and get carts for them too,
[00:14:26] Deb: [00:14:26] right? Yeah. It definitely helps to build the brands. Uh, you have your whole entire staff using them and, uh, your clients begin to, uh, you know, see your brand more often.
[00:14:38] So it definitely helps to build your brands.
[00:14:41] Veronica: [00:14:41] I love it. I love it. And what about the email functionality? Um, I saw the email button on there and I've played with it a little bit. Is there a way to embed, um, your digit card in your emails? Like maybe on your signature or something? Oh, definitely.
[00:14:55] Deb: [00:14:55] Yeah,
[00:14:57] Veronica: [00:14:57] I'm going to play with that.
[00:14:57] That's my next task for this week is to embed that because it occurred to me that, um, yeah, your email is it's, you know, it's got your name, your business company, but it doesn't always have the visual appeal. And I love that those hyperlinks just take you right there and you can see the photos. And if you noticed on mine, I have my courses, you know, And I love that because oftentimes that's where I'm sending people to my website specifically for my courses or my services.
[00:15:23] And so I think that's a good way to very quickly connect with people as, as you're meeting and engaging with them. Um, Deb, do you have any tips for our viewers on, on how to network and how to do it? Well, yes.
[00:15:38] Deb: [00:15:38] So, um, that's another great question. Um, I know it's so hard right now with COVID, uh, with us staying at home.
[00:15:47] But I would still, I'll try to be creative in getting your name out there, finding ways like the digital business card, um, it helps you become different than your competitor. And when people start seeing that you're different than you start getting noticed. So I would, um, Find ways like that don't give up.
[00:16:07] Don't, you know, just continue to talk to people, communicate people, join networking groups, uh, become, um, do you like what you're doing with podcasts? Uh, it's it's a great way to just keep active, stay busy and, and get your name out there and get, be visible.
[00:16:24] Veronica: [00:16:24] Yeah, I love it. In fact, I, um, I'm in a couple of networking groups for podcasters and I'm going to suggest, um, that they start embedding their podcast on their digit cards because it never occurred to me.
[00:16:36] I knew there was an audio function in, and I had understood there was a video function, but until you mentioned it right now, it never occurred to me that I could send that to somebody. And then they wouldn't have to go to any platforms to search a name. They didn't have to type it in, right? Yes. So true.
[00:16:52] Fewer strokes. That's the motto. Fewer strokes. Yeah. That's great. Well, did you have any other tips or suggestions before we, um, show people one last time, I'm going to share them one last time, that video, for those of you that are joining us late,
[00:17:09] Deb: [00:17:09] let's on that first screen, you can see where you have it stored and saved on your home
[00:17:15] Veronica: [00:17:15] screen.
[00:17:16] Okay. I'm going to pull that up. So there you go. There's the home screen right at the
[00:17:20] Deb: [00:17:20] bottom there. Perfect. And all the social media links at the top there.
[00:17:25] Veronica: [00:17:25] Love it love it. And those are the courses. So that's how I set mine up, but I'm going to be adding my podcast to that. So, and I love the connection to Lincoln and all the social media platforms.
[00:17:35] And my favorite function is that one right there. I can just easily email texts and airdropped it, it didn't occur to me to airdrop, but you're absolutely right. Oftentimes that's a much better way to connect with people.
[00:17:45] Deb: [00:17:45] Well, right. Oh, and then also, um, this is something that happens with salespeople. For example, if you need someone, this is a.
[00:17:54] I gave this example for a car salesman. It can happen with anyone really in sales, in sales. But oftentimes let's say for example, someone drives up to a car lot and, um, they're looking for a car and or you meet someone out on the street or, you know, wherever you are, even in networking groups, sometimes you pass your card.
[00:18:15] So then they may not have their information. Sometimes you may not get their information back to you. For example, like in that cart car situation, you're getting the salesmens. If you're the customer, you're getting their card, but most often the car, the customer is not giving their information back to the salesman and with the digital business card, if you text it to them, you say, Hey, here, I can give you my card.
[00:18:38] Let me, I'll just text it to you. Or what are you getting right in that moment, you're getting their phone number. And you have, now you have their phone number. You can follow up with them later. And, uh, so in addition to the airdrop, would you just want to airdrop it, if you want to text it to them or email, you're getting that information from your customer, whereas maybe before you may not have received that from them, but it's a great conversation piece.
[00:19:01] Uh, of course you can show it to them. Uh, there'll be super intrigued by it. It's a great conversation piece on talking with people about it.
[00:19:11] Veronica: [00:19:11] Yeah, it is that's. That's exactly right. And that's what brought you today was it was just a great, I was just so intrigued by how it worked and I saw the possibilities and Deb, I haven't shared this story with you, but I'm going to give you a quick little antidote.
[00:19:24] Um, we were visiting with, uh, one of the doctors, my husband, I were at a doctor's appointment. We're visiting with one of the doctors and he said, so what exactly do you do? And I shared with him what I did, and I talked about how I work with my clients on getting them in media and getting them. On podcasts and getting recognition.
[00:19:43] He's like, well, do you have a website or something? Because I think, you know, the, the, the practice that I work with, they provide us marketing, but they don't provide personal physician marketing. He's like, and I want to be known for, for being the best orthopedic surgeon in, in the Houston area. And I was like, Oh, sure, absolutely.
[00:20:01] And I gave him my website, but I didn't physically give him anything. And I don't know if he's going to remember. What the website was, and I feel like that was a missed opportunity. So just know that next time I go to that doctor's appointment for up, I'm going to drop him my, my disregard, because that was a missed opportunity with the very successful, interested leads, right?
[00:20:24] Deb: [00:20:24] Yes, exactly.
[00:20:26] Veronica: [00:20:26] I feel like I should have had that then
[00:20:29] Deb: [00:20:29] yes, that happened so many times to so many people. We forgot our cards at home or, you know, we ran out, um, that kind of thing. But if you have your phone with you, you'll never leave your digital business card at home ever again.
[00:20:46] Veronica: [00:20:46] Yeah. Either. Yeah, no, I love it.
[00:20:49] My mind is just the opportunities missed it. It started to bother me. That's okay though. Cause I can follow up and tomorrow's a new day so I can start over. Yeah. That's right. That's right. And you are certainly a Testament to that with what you've done. So I just, I wanted to wrap up, um, before you leave and just thank you for coming on and just share with people how important networking is, especially as we are working from home, um, we're, we're networking in a company slightly different way.
[00:21:22] And this, when I saw this product, I knew I had to share it because while it may not necessarily fall into the public relations, Space, which is my jam. It's certainly in the marketing space and advertising, marketing, and ad and public relations are the perfect trifecta of how to launch your visibility strategy.
[00:21:40] So, Deb, thank you so much for joining us. I loved the chat. It was awesome. Thank you so much for having me. Great. Great. And for those of you watching, um, I'm going to put in the show notes, uh, one more time, the, um, website, so you can go check it out as well. Make sure you drop a little note that you heard all about it here on Saturday.
[00:22:00] Sound bites. We come to you every Saturday at 10:00 AM central. If you are listening on our podcast, you can listen to anytime, but make sure you hit subscribe. We talk all things. Visibility, strategy branding. Communications public relations advertising. That's our jam. Make sure you follow me on Facebook at Veronica V Sofer.
[00:22:20] My website is also down there. You can learn more about me and my products, and I look forward to seeing you on, on social media. So make sure you connect and I'm sending you lots of positive energy and light and have a great week, everyone.