Hi there. Welcome to the Biz Communication Show. I’m your host, Bill Lampton, the Biz Communication Guy once again, bringing you and myself tips and strategies from a highly qualified guest who’s a communication expert. And as a result of these tips and strategies, you and I will be able to boost our business.

It’s a great pleasure today to bring from the Atlanta metropolitan area, Paul Zanardo. Paul is the CEO and founder of Zanardo Designs. He has been implementing award-winning website design, SEO, graphic design, and video marketing since 2015. So his team is celebrating 10 years of service with their successful clients nationwide. And his achievements and the quality of his work have not gone unrecognized. The North Fulton Chamber of Commerce has honored him as the Solopreneur of the Year in 2024. And I guess Paul and his wife Amy were celebrating that when they were seen dancing at a North Fulton Chamber of Commerce. And we celebrate Paul being with us today. So welcome, Paul, to the Biz Communication Show. It’s a privilege to host you.

Thank you, Dr. Bill. I’m very excited and honored to be here.

Paul, as I’ve watched you on social media and on LinkedIn, I’ve noticed a marketing device that you implemented a couple of years ago, which definitely is eye-catching. And that’s what’s called your runaround marketing. Now, the room you’re in now isn’t big enough to fully illustrate that, but you can do it vocally. Describe for us that system of run-by marketing, how you came up with the idea, what did you want to accomplish, and what have been the responses to that?

Absolutely. I’d love to share that with you. And I don’t believe this is going to be an exclusive. I don’t believe I’ve shared this before. So this one’s special for your show, Dr. Bill. But run-by marketing came to me as a vision, like some other business ideas. Actually, starting my business vision from, I believe, God through prayer. I was working on a lot of social media for other businesses, and it was taking up so much time. And it was becoming stressful for me to do our companies as well, because I manage ours as well, LinkedIn, Instagram, Facebook, all the platforms. And it was just becoming daunting and too much. And I was losing interest and losing the creativity aspect of it. And you need that in content.

So I was praying to God, actually, I need some help with this. What do you have in mind? Just help me to add value to other people, not to puff me up, but to serve. And I kind of had a moment, like an aha moment, sat up actually in bed, and I had run-by marketing. I knew the name. I knew how I was going to film it. And I used – it’s very simple because I’m a runner in the afternoons to stay healthy. So I’m already active that way. And I’ve implemented my exercise into our marketing strategy to save time, and it’s gone over really well.

I’ll use a ring light similar to this and some audio to mic myself up and say something real funny and run by the camera. And, you know, it’s been amazing.

Well, it seems to me in watching you run at a pretty good clip for, what, 50 or 75 yards, and then you wind up at the camera and you give a rapid-fire one-sentence description of the message you want to get across. Here we go. Call Dr. Bill. He’s the best communicator. I’ve got to stand up desk so I can do that foryou. I’ll vote for that one, yes. Go ahead, I’m sorry. One of the things, of course, we are invariably viewers who want motion. And one of the things I do as a speech coach, I look at some often even experienced speakers who are so afraid to move around. And I put it this way that some of them are holding on to that podium so tightly that they resemble somebody trying to survive the sinking of the Titanic. They just can’t let go of it. So you are implementing in a highly dramatic way what I teach. And that is that motion is impossible. Excuse me, motion is necessary. And we can reverse that in saying staying still is a great way to cure insomnia with your audience, whether it’s a video audience or whether it’s a speaking audience. So I really applaud you on that.

About how many of those segments have you done? I’ve been doing it for about two years now. And, oh, my gosh, that’s a good question. I’ll have to go back and count. But I average maybe one or two a month. Would those be available on your YouTube channel? You can find them on YouTube. I’ll put them on LinkedIn and Instagram. Yes.

Great. Well, go ahead. I was just going to mention sometimes about the nervousness, to your point, what you were saying. You know, when I was first starting this and, you know, I’m out in public at the park and so people are seeing me as I’m setting up and running by and they’re naturally curious and start asking questions. And, you know, I need to start doing this on construction sites because that’s one of our niches. That might be dangerous. Have you by any chance gotten any inquiries from some of those people who watch you do it in person? We actually have, which came to me as a surprise and was really exciting. And that’s when you know you’re reaching your market and you’re reaching people.

Absolutely. You mentioned LinkedIn and so many of our business professionals who are watching and listening use LinkedIn. I would imagine there have been times, Paul, when you are talking with somebody about developing a website. They don’t have one yet. And they say to you, well, Paul, I don’t need a website. I’m on LinkedIn. I’m very active there. I post a good bit. Not only that, I comment on what other people are doing. I even post videos on there. So explain to us, Paul, if we’re doing all that, why do we need a website?

Yes. So we get this question a lot. People say, well, my business is word of mouth or I do have a great LinkedIn presence. So what’s going to happen is even if you’re connected with someone and you’re building those relationships on LinkedIn, they’re going to research you online. They’re going to do an online search. They’re going to go to your website, your Google business, your other social media profiles, and all of those need to be buttoned up and up to date. And you want cohesive branding across the board. So the website, you know, is another way to another tool to sell and to engage your audience, build trust and help them contact you, hopefully even sooner.

Now, when you talk about websites, I know that you talk about SEO, search engine optimization. Let’s say I come to you and I say, Paul, I’ve got a website. And you respond and you say, well, what’s your SEO? And I say, I have no idea. I don’t even know what that means and had no way of testing it. What steps would you take with me as a client then?

Absolutely. So SEO is the acronym for search engine optimization. And I usually find from potential clients that there’s two ends of the spectrum. Like you’re talking about, they have no idea what it is or they have misinformation about SEO being the one-stop shop and solve everything. So SEO is extremely important. And it is how your website ranks against competitors. And also first, before it even does that, you need your website’s content to be able to be found and seen online. There’s something I believe we need to cover here in relationto that. And that’s keywords. How does that fit in? What’s the relevance there? So keywords are a very important part of SEO. When people are searching a certain speech coach. or presenter, you’re going to want those keywords kind of reverse engineer from a psychological standpoint, what your potential client is looking for. And to have those keywords strategically placed on your website makes a big difference. And the algorithm picks up on that and helps your website show up in search results.

Now, keywords are just one part of the equation. There’s many parts of SEO. And like I mentioned, SEO is not the solve all. It’s very important, but it’s very helpful. So keywords do play a big part in SEO.

You’ve been in the website business very intensely and also very successfully. Years ago, I remember when websites started and it was at that time largely print and maybe some photographs and eventually some audio. But then we’ve advanced to the video age. So when you’re working with clients, what would you tell a client who comes to you and wants to improve their website, make it more contemporary and more appealing? And they say, maybe, Paul, I should be doing something with video. How would you respond to that?

Video content is king. Even on LinkedIn, as you scroll, you’ve noticed some don’t like this, but that’s with our age of we want it now and lower attention spans. Video is taking over social media and for content as well. So hiring a professional to do video is very important. You need good lighting. You need audio. Like I mentioned this, even if you’re doing something quick like my run by marketings, these right here, here’s a microphone I can clip on here very quickly. And this clips into my phone and you get the audio straight in through your phone. Professional lighting. And if you’re doing, say, filming a speech or a presentation, you need professional video editing. And we do a lot of that and it’s very helpful. And that type of content to go on to your website shows your potential client that you’re the expert in your field and that you’re solving the problems that they need to be solved.

To me, as I mentioned, we’ve progressed from print to audio to video. And in fact, we still have all of them still have great value. But in my observation, there are many people who have not quite moved into the video arena. There’s an old saying, well, I’ve got a face for radio. But in essence, having the I guess I would say the courage and the initiative to get into video is not as daunting once you get sort of like getting your feet in the water. And eventually, I mean, there are many things we need to learn now. We need to learn AI and someone who’s not learning AI. They’re missing out. I saw my friend Terry Brock just two days ago mention that Skype is closing down. And you and I remember when Skype was it. That was before Zoom and that was before StreamYard, which we’re using now. So transitions come, changes come. And I would guess that one of your challenges and also your opportunities, Paul, is to keep very much in the forefront of knowing what the changes are and learning them. And I would think you have your own coaches and mentors to guide you through what we might call the new stuff.

Absolutely. Website design and any technology like you’re mentioning, SEO, website design, development is constantly changing. Even the landscape of social media, it’s constantly evolving and changing. And we’re growing as a society and we need to keep up with that. There are people who think that their website… I heard a friend one time said, well, I know my website’s wonderful. I’ve looked at ita thousand times myself. And it’s hard to see our own mistakes, either what we’ve got in there that shouldn’t be there or what we don’t have there that should be. So after a short break, we’re going to have you talk about the two or three major mistakes, very common mistakes, that you see with your clients and you help them correct. Be right back on that.

Okay, Paul, as I was mentioning, we need to explore. You see so many people come to you for the first time and they already have a website, many of them, and right away you can spot some deficiencies, either visible mistakes or what’s not there. What would be two or three of the more common ones?

We do get a lot of and a large majority of our clients are for website redesigns, like you mentioned, are clients that have existing websites. And when we start doing a deep dive and research into their online presence and their website, we often see outdated information, which is something that needs to be fixed. You know, if they’re calling a wrong number or the wrong email or they haven’t updated a new service that they’re offering, that’s a huge opportunity that’s missed.

And we also see information overload. If they designed their website themselves or hired a company that doesn’t exactly know what they’re doing and the nuances of beautiful design, marketing, and found in search results, that could have information overload. You mentioned keywords. Some people, an old SEO technique that I never used that is kind of used to cheat the system would be keyword stuffing. You’d see a page just with tons of information and all these keywords, and no one’s looking at that and that creates a bad user experience. So you want to create the best user experience for your potential customer or client.

We’ve heard for quite a few years from marketing experts that we’re wise to do niche marketing. That is, pick certain industries that our service will target. And one of the best analogies I know for that would be the medical profession. Because if I’ve got a broken bone, I’m not going to go to my dentist. There are many specialists. There are generalists, of course, family physicians. I had a wonderful appointment with mine yesterday. But when there are items that don’t fit his expertise, I then am directed, referred to a specialist. So you know and you teach niche marketing. What are the major markets that you targeted to serve? Why did you pick those?

So health care and construction, as I mentioned, are two of our very big niches. Construction being I did construction sales and marketing growing up, starting at the age of 15. My father, he told me, I’m not going to buy you those nice clothes at this high school you’re going to. You’re going to start working. And I found that construction paid cash every Friday. So I started in construction and actually enjoyed the hard work out of it and got into sales and marketing. So speaking the language in there and that expertise helps.

And then health care, I mentioned my father, he owns Zanardo Architects. And he’s been in business in Lawrenceville here for over 40 years. And a big niche for him is health care. And we started networking and working together on projects many years ago. And his niche is health care, doctor’s offices, hospitals and whatnot. So that naturally started to be a fit for us as well.

Reminds me of Lois Kramer. I don’t know if you’re familiar with Lois, but Lois is absolutely the best guru I know about the professional speaking situation. And her work also applies to people who are coaches and consultants. And Lois said, if you say you serve everyone,you probably are not going to serve anyone. Because again, going back to the medical profession, we like people whose niche and their expertise in that niche is very, very obvious. What would you suggest to a person who is starting a website, hasn’t done it, we’ve talked about those who already have one that you need to make some corrections on, but I’m coming to you and I have no website.

What are the steps to getting me going? It starts with a conversation. We need to make sure that we’re a good fit to work together, that our values and our mission and our expertise aligns with yours. We’re not in this for the money and websites can get very costly, so we want to make sure that we’re the best person, the best company for you and what it is that you’re trying to build.

Do you need to build brand awareness? Are you looking for generational lead? There’s many different e-commerce. Are you looking to sell products on your website? So there’s many different types of websites and having that conversation, getting to know each other, and it’s very important.

You and I have not met in person. We’ve met online many times. In our conversations, we have identified a couple of mentors and coaches who have been very valuable for us. And I go back to something I read a couple of years ago by Malcolm Gladwell. Malcolm Gladwell said, there’s not anybody who really succeeds alone. He said, not rock stars, not internet geniuses, not authors, not performers. There’s nobody who makes it alone. We do learn from those who have paved the way successfully, and we’re eager to learn from them.

Who are the couple of people that you and I mentioned and that we have definitely debts of gratitude to? Yes, there’s many great people in our network, and two that come to mind that have you and I on this show today, actually:

Greg Burkhalter, the LinkedIn guy. Him and I met right and we started our businesses at the same time. We met in a networking group, a faith-based networking group, and we hit it off really well. He has a servant’s heart, and his knowledge on LinkedIn and business getting done in a networking arena is amazing.

John Ray. I mentioned him. He’s gotten me involved with the chamber, Greater North Fulton Chamber, where I’m the diplomat chair now. And I met him actually through Greg Burkhalter on LinkedIn. And that was just, you know, John is a business coach for pricing, and he just wrote The Generosity Mindset, which is an excellent book. But I started following him on LinkedIn, and he has such great content. I started to add value to the conversation because it was such amazing content, and we developed a relationship. We had lunch, and he invited me to Business Radio X and then later invited me to the chamber where I’m very involved now, which has been hugely successful for my business. So those two gentlemen are definitely top of mind. I can speak very well for both of them as well.

Greg and I met when we were, oh, about three years or so networking together, the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce in Atlanta. I saw Greg develop, change careers, change his focus, become the LinkedIn guy. And, oh, man, he’s a prime example of somebody who can switch occupations, basically, and get into something that everybody needed and do so well with it.

John Ray and Greg have both been my guests several times on this Biz Communication show. I learned something from them every time. And John, in fact, recently helped me learn how to post weekly a LinkedIn newsletter. I had no idea how to do that. It’s quite complexto get started, and John was so helpful on that. And this is a lesson for every one of our viewers and listeners, no matter how advanced you are professionally and in your business and in your niche, there’s somebody who can help you take the next steps. You and I’ve learned that, haven’t we? We absolutely have. And I want to thank you again for having me on.

Now, I’ve seen Greg’s episode on your show and I’ve seen John’s episodes on your show. And I said, one day I’m going to be there. So now I’m a part of the club. Well, we can call you the terrific trio. There we go. Thank you. The triumvirate, if we want to. That’s great. It’s my privilege to host you.

The old clock on the wall tells me that we need to move along. And so I know, Paul, that there are many people who have been viewing and listening who want your contact information. So would you please give that to us?

Yes, absolutely. You can connect with me on LinkedIn, Paul Zanardo, and I’m happy to get to know you there. Or obviously through our website, and that is zanardodesigns.com, Z-A-N-A-R-D-O-D-E-Z-I-G-N-Z.com.

No surprise to me that you’ve got a website. Yes, go there. It’ll help SEO. Yes, no surprise there. Now that you’ve given your contact information, and thank you for that. And I know people will want to contact you.

I’m happy to share mine. My YouTube channel has my name, Bill Lampton, PhD. Invite you to go there and subscribe. I have been posting communication instruction videos since 2007. Now, I don’t encourage you to go back and look at the first ones. Hopefully I’ve developed presentation and skill-wise since then. And of course, I have moved to more contemporary topics as well. But I invite you to subscribe to my YouTube channel.

And then naturally, my, hey, guess what, Paul? I’ve got a website. And my website is, since my moniker is the biz communication guy, no surprise that my website is bizcommunicationguy.com. On that website, there’s a place for you to subscribe to the podcast. And I certainly invite you to do that.

I would welcome inquiry phone calls with no initial financial obligation, just a discussion, an exploration of what your communication problems and challenges are and how I can assist you with them. And my phone number is 678-316-4300.

I also want to give recognition to the guy who got me started on that crazy thing called the internet. I met this guy, Mike Stewart, based in Nashville now, met him in 1997. And he has been my guru ever since. He first was here in Gainesville, Georgia for a while. He’s in Nashville now. His website, localinternetpresence.com. I encourage you to get to know him.

Paul, I would say that this has been stimulating, informative, helpful. And as the guest, I would like for you to pull together in 30 seconds or a minute what you would like to leave with our guests.

Absolutely. And like I mentioned, it is an honor and exciting to be on your show. So two things come to mind.

God built us to do community together, whether you’re a believer or not. Like you mentioned, we’re not supposed to do this alone. We need to surround ourselves with community, good people, especially if you’re in business, you want to surround yourself with successful people, people that have been in your field for a long time that can help.

And also I would say that for me, prayer. Prayer plays a huge role in my life and in my business, with family, with everything that I do. As it pertains to business, I say, I pray, where does the Lord need me?Who can I serve every day? I just wake up and I’m grateful for everything and all of our many blessings. Every day, I just wake up and I’m grateful for everything and all of our many blessings. And I just say, you know, I don’t ask for success from a monetary standpoint. It’s more like, who can I serve? Who can I help? And a lot of amazing things have come out of that for me.

Thank you for those inspiring words. Thank you so much for being a guest today. You and I have looked forward to this for quite a while. And I’m delighted with the information that you have brought and with the inspiration as well.

Thanks to those of you who joined us on the Biz Communication Show, the video portion, and also on the podcast. I invite you to be with us again next week when once more I host a guest who will help you and help me develop our communication skills and therefore boost our business.

See you next week. Thank you.