TCC Podcast 181: The Biggest Take Aways from TCCIRL 2020

In the 181st episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast, Kira and Rob talk about what happened at TCCIRL—the best event we've held yet. Several speakers stepped up at the last minute, others brought their A-game and shared ideas and stories that have changed the businesses of the 130+ copywriters who were there. We talk about: •  the earthquake, the virus and the economic response to it •  why we can’t afford to operate from a place of fear no matter what is going on •  why TCCIRL felt “better” this year than in the past •  the speakers who had less than 48 hours to get stage ready •  a few of the speakers who really stood out to us •  what Jasmine Star taught us about scaling a business •  the hero’s journey and what marketers miss when they talk about it •  some of the advice that came out of the panel discussions •  how to think about branding from the standpoint of authenticity •  the power of constraints to make us more creative •  why its important to think about your role as a human asset, not just a copywriter •  what you should do differently during a recession •  why the Copywriter Think Tank is about and the transformation members see If you can't get enough of what happened at TCCIRL or you want more information about The Copywriter Think Tank, click the play button below, or scroll down for a full transcript.   The people and stuff we mentioned on the show: The Copywriter Think Tank TCCIRL Mike Kim Dana Malstaff Marcella Allison Ray Edwards Jasmine Star Jamie Jensen Tanya Geisler Linda Perry Lindsay Hotmire Justin Blackman Matt Hall Gin Walker Bond Halbert Stefan Georgi Sam Woods Kira’s website Rob’s website The Copywriter Club Facebook Group The Copywriter Underground   Full Transcript: Rob:   So, we do not have an intro for this episode of The Copywriter Club Podcast because it's just me and Kira chatting about what went down over the last week or so at The Copywriter Club In Real Life. And so yeah, we just wanted to jump in and share some of our biggest takeaways, what happened and express our gratitude for some things that happened. And reflect a little bit on the magic that we got to experience last week. Kira:  Well it's not just me and you, it's me and you and the earthquake. Rob:   So, we did have an earthquake here this morning, so hopefully- Kira:  No biggy. Rob:   The power will stay on long enough to make sure that everything here is good. But yeah, it's been kind of a crazy morning Kira while it's been not just the morning, right? With the virus, with everything that's going on it's a crazy, a lot of things. Kira:  And Rob is kind of downplaying the earthquake like, ‘Oh, it's just a little earthquake.’ It was a big one and with several follow-up tremors. I don't speak earthquake language because I live on the East Coast, we don't have earthquakes here typically. But can you just share, I mean these are big earthquakes that you experienced today. Rob:   Yeah, the first big one that we felt this morning was like a 5.7 on the Richter scale, which is- Kira:  It's a big deal. Rob:   It's big enough to knock down walls and there's definitely been a little bit of damage. They closed the airport because of some water main breakage, they had to evacuate I think the tower. I'm not sure if there was any damage there, but I'm far enough away from the epicenter that I've walked around my house, there's no damage to our house and there are no fatalities reported, no injuries. So while it could have certainly been worse and maybe someday a worse earthquake will happen here. We survived this one. But it is freaky when the ground starts moving, when everything in your house starts to shake and it's happened seven or eight times this morning of the ones that we could feel. And yeah. So, who knows? Like if you hear a rumble in the background while we're chatting here, it could be another aftershock going on and on and I'll just dive under my desk. Kira:  That'd be cool footage to have. I experienced my first mini earthquake this past summer in Bali in the middle of the night and it was a baby earthquake. It was probably nothing even compared to what you experienced today. But it was my first really my first one. And it was terrifying even though it was just a little shake, shake and we did exactly what you're not supposed to do because we haven't experienced it before. We ran out of the building, which you're not supposed to do because debris could fall. So you probably know the etiquette of how you're supposed to react but it was a terrifying experience. And I know we also wrote recently about earthquakes in one of our promo emails for the event and we talked about the big earthquake coming and potentially harming your city. So anyway hoping that you stay safe. And I'm just wondering Rob how are you staying so like cool and calm and collected now that we've kind of gone through the event ordeal of the stress around the event and just squeezing that in before all events were canceled. Then coming back home, dealing with the Coronavirus and everything being shut down and now the earthquake, like how are you just staying focused because it might be helpful to other people who are struggling. Rob:   Yeah. Well I wish I had a really good answer for that. I mean, first of all you said, you're not supposed to run out of the building. It's funny because we know that and yet when your house starts shaking, like the last thing you want to do is stay in the house because you don't want the roof to fall on you. You're supposed to get underneath your desk or underneath the table or whatever. But my first reaction was like, grab the girl's head for the front door. Kira:  Yeah. Get me out of here. Rob:   Yeah, exactly. So at that fight or flight is a really powerful response and I think a lot of people are feeling that with everything that's going on in the world, not just like the immediate physical threat of something like an earthquake, but the fight or flight response to the virus to the things that are happening to the economy in response to the virus. It's very likely going to become a recession here in the States and it already, like the indicators show that, that's starting to happen. So we all want to flight from that. Like we want to get away from it. And so we try to hide and bury ourselves maybe we're being quiet and that's exactly the wrong response. Like, we still need to be showing up. We still need to be there because our clients need leadership, our clients needs stability, and if we can be there to help and support them that's part of our role as service providers, as copywriters, as ideal people to help them through it and to give them ideas for it. So yeah, how have I been handling it all? Well, I took a couple of hours to kind of stop shaking or have my heart rate come down from the earthquake this morning. But the reality is that we can only move forward, panic is the wrong response. And we posted something in the Facebook group about that yesterday and hopefully people will respond to that with leadership, with compassion for everyone around them but still showing up and doing everything that we can to support our clients, to support the people around us. We're certainly going to be trying to do that more in The Copywriter Underground in the big Copywriter Club group itself with members of our Think Tank. To the extent that we can that's where our efforts are going to be going. Kira:  I think it's a really good practice and not operating from a place of fear. And I think even going into our event pre-event when the Coronavirus was just starting to spread and we were like, what are we going to do? Our event’s coming up. Are we going to lose people? We're going to lose speakers. I feel like I had to keep kind of going back to that mindset and telling myself I will not operate from a place of fear with this event. We will move forward; we will figure it out and problem solve. And now I feel like that was good practice just coming back to the real life and everything we're dealing with now with schools shutting down and everything really shutting down. So, but I do feel like it's a good thing to not operate from a place of fear in your business and in your life, but also to forgive yourself when you do, because we're human. And that's kind of where we go back to. Just like you said, running out of the building, even if you're not supposed to. It doesn't make sense that we're only human and that's programmed into us. So I think at this point, like I'm trying to be very gentle with myself this week, especially. Because I find myself being really hard on myself. I'm like, ‘Why aren't you getting more done? Why aren't you being more fun with your kids? Why aren't you...’ A lot of pressure and so I think it's easy just to ... Well, it's not easy, but we should just give ourselves a little bit more grace during this period. Rob:   Yeah. And I think leading out in this way people appreciate it. So we could have canceled TCC IRL this year we could have postponed it. Neither one of those would have been our preferred way to move forward obviously, but I was amazed at how many people came in spite of all of the craziness going on around us. And so many people who came said that they really needed this, that with all of the things going on with the fear, with everything that we're reading in the news, that it was good to get together with a group of people who could share how they're feeling about that, but also to put it behind them just a little bit and to explore new ideas for their business and to move forward. So if the conference had been scheduled for a week later, I don't think there's any way that it would have happened. Rob:   There's no way that we would have had everybody show up.