442 – Building the Web Designer Pro Community [Behind the Scenes ] with Tamara & Josh

From Stuck To Supported
Tamara Salchert 0:00

I’m like, this is I’m alone. Like, this is hard. I don’t know how to figure out my contracts. I don’t know how to price myself right. And I I can’t, there’s not people that I can ask. Then I just had this idea pop in my head, like, type in web designer. And the moment I found your podcast, I was hooked. I could not stop listening to them. I found my people. You you were talking about contracts, and I was literally dealing with that situation. And it did take me a while to like work up towards and getting into the community. But like to me, I I don’t even think about it. It’s like it’s worth its weight in gold. Like I don’t even like the price doesn’t like enter my mind anymore. You have helped mentor me and also so many other people in the community to grow my business in the way that it’s like I just couldn’t have done by myself.

Welcome And Why Community Matters
Josh Hall 0:45

Welcome to the Web Design Business Podcast with your host, Josh Hong, helping you build a web design business that gives you freedom and a lifestyle you love. Hello, my friend. It’s so good to have you here. Excited about this episode here because you are going to get to hear from one of our awesome Web Designer Pro members, Tamara Salkirk, who is actually about to launch a podcast of her own for many reasons, but for her web design business, primarily to yes, get leads, get clients, and build some authority and credibility, but also just to expand her network and connect with colleagues, clients, partners, and folks in and around her sphere with her upcoming new podcast, which is primarily geared towards entrepreneurs and community builders. Now, I am, I was very excited for to have a chat with her, and she actually allowed me to repurpose the interview for her show here for you. She is still in the works at the time of releasing this, of getting her podcast going, but I was pumped to be one of her first interviews. And that’s what we’re going to be repurpose here for you because we’re really digging into Web Designer Pro and behind the scenes on creating it, building it, how it’s evolved. And of course, Tamara has a really unique perspective on this because she is a member and she has a lot of tips, I think, in this one that are really good to learn from with how to utilize community for your success. And that’s a really big point I want to make here off of the top. This is not just a deep dive into the specifics of creating Web Designer Pro. It’s really about what community can do for you as a web designer in 2026 and beyond and how important it can be to help you thrive and succeed and to give you a support network and all the things you heard there that Tamara said in the intro. So I’m really, really excited to let you in on this conversation. A big thanks to her, Tamara, for allowing me to repurpose this for you. You can go to her website, serenestudiowebdesign.com, which will be at the show notes for this one, which is going to be at joshhall.co slash 442. And as soon as her podcast is out there live, I will make sure to include that in the show notes. So be on the lookout for that. We do talk about that a little bit later on here.

Sponsor Spotlight 17hats CRM
Josh Hall 2:59

Now, before we dive in, speaking of community, somebody who has basically been a part of our community is several members of 17 Hats. 17 Hats is the CRM that I’ve been using for well over a decade, actually 11 years now, for things like invoicing, contracts, proposals, client manager. Like they can do so many things now with 17 Hats. One of their amazing team members, Jeb, has been at both of our in-person events. Jeb’s actually going to be coming on the podcast here soon. And he’s just become basically like a staple member of Web Designer Pro. Like we can’t have an event without Jeb there. And I say that because the team is freaking awesome behind 17 Hats. You know me, if you’ve been listening for a while, I value the team behind a tool just as much as I do the tool. And 17 Hats has been there for me for well over a decade with their tools for invoicing, contracting, and proposals. And the team is there too. They are just getting better and better and better. If you would like to try 17 hats out, if you are not satisfied with whatever CRM tool you you’re using, specifically if you are uh having a hard time with things like lead capture and automations and contracts, proposals, invoicing and onboarding and linking those all together, 17 hats is the tool for you. Go to joshhall.co slash 17 hats and you can get a free seven-day trial. When you do that, you’ll also at that link, joshhall.co slash 17hats, get my quote, contract and invoice templates automatically added to your account. So you don’t even need to go through my business course to do that. You can just go to joshhall.co slash 17 hats. Big thanks to 17 hats for sponsoring this episode. All right, without further ado, here is Tamara to give you a sneak peek at what is soon going to be her podcast as we dive into the making of Web Designer Pro.

Tamara’s Story And The Interview Setup
Tamara Salchert 4:52

Hey everyone. Um I have a special guest, Josh Hall, uh, who is the founder of Web Design Pro. And um I’m here to interview him on the topic of community. And Josh is someone who has personally had a huge impact uh for me in my business. Um I found him in a time where I really needed that um community as I was trying to grow my own web design business. But um I’ll let Josh uh introduce himself if there’s anything I missed. But yeah.

Josh Hall 5:25

Well, Tamara, it is so good to be here with you. I think in your first uh round of interviews for your new podcast. So I am honored to be on that list and to see how you’ve grown not only as a web designer, but just kind of like a webpreneur, like somebody who is multi-passionate and obviously has a lot more to say than just building websites. But like, yeah, I’m really excited. I told you coaching you inside of Web Designer Pro, I wouldn’t always recommend somebody do a podcast, but I feel like you’re so well suited for it. So I’m super pumped for you. I’m definitely excited to be on this show. So so yeah, nowadays, Web Designer Pro is my community, which of course Tamara’s a part of. And um I really I’m excited to dive into community because as I’ve looked back, I’ve been a community builder pretty much in like every stage of my life since I can remember back through like school, like through like high school, just getting groups of people together and introducing people. And I’ve realized that’s carried through from all my career paths, from um you know, being a web designer for a decade, selling my agency, and then and then starting online education, then eventually this community of Web Designer Pro. So I think nowadays too, it’s more important than ever. So I’m I’m really excited to I think nowadays fully lean into my my identity as a community builder in a way. Um so yeah, I’m really really excited about what I’ve learned in this world and and what’s ahead for community.

Tamara Salchert 6:55

Yeah, so one of my uh like questions that I have for you, just kind of diving right into the aspect of community.

Why Courses Shifted To Community
Tamara Salchert 7:03

So before all of the like, I mean, feel free to share your story, but just one question I have in the midst of all of this is you were doing um courses where people could just watch your your content, but then you decided to make that pivot towards community. Like what ultimately led you towards that decision? Um, do you feel it was yeah? I’d just like to hear more about that.

Josh Hall 7:27

It’s I had different versions of community leading up to before like officially starting what is now Web Designer Pro. Um initially, it actually started with a Facebook group. So I used the the WordPress theme Divi for WordPress as my builder of choice, and that had a very large following back in about a decade ago. And so I actually created a Facebook group originally um that is now the second largest Divi group online, and I don’t manage it anymore, but I grew that and I it taught me a different scale of community online, um, pros and cons. Meaning, like it was really cool to see it grow, but also I didn’t really know that many people in it. They were just so many people, yeah. And Facebook groups were a lot more active, some are really active today, but back then, back a decade ago, it was kind of the the bee’s knees, if you will. Like it was just on fire back then, which was really cool and kind of helped give me authority in the space and also was a marketing channel for me in many ways. Um, but I did enjoy bringing like people together, but that was on a much bigger scale. So when I started doing courses, I had originally Facebook groups for my courses that were individual. So I would have like an SEO course group, a business course group, a maintenance plan course group. And those were like student forums, basically, student type of uh I don’t know if they were community as much as just like student support. So I had these different variations of like online communities that I was running and learning about, and it just became so scattered and just too much to manage, all those different pieces that when I decided to go all in on a like true community of web designers, uh I basically like took everything I learned from that, and and that was the genesis of like wanting to have a more tight-knit community, but also have the coaching element. So, just for context, for as you know, Tamara, like Web Designer Pro is really three things courses, community, and coaching. It’s all of my courses, the incredible community, and then coaching with me, and now that’s tiered out to where people can get more access to me if they want. Um, and that’s been really it’s been awesome to see that play out. And that was kind of the the genesis of why I decided to go all in on community was to just bring people together and have a more closer experience, um, and also make recurring revenue. Like I, you know, I wanted to, I wanted it to be a more stable part of my business as well.

Tamara Salchert 10:04

Yeah. Well, and I mean you you really do. I mean, ever since I’ve joined the community, I mean, even before that, I mean I found you like, and I’ll talk about this more, but just like I found you on podcasts, and I was immediately drawn to where you just felt like someone I could just sit down and have coffee with. It you didn’t seem someone that just felt like just so far off. It’s like it’s just you were so you have a gift with like that personal like and it’s within the community too of like web pro that I love is just you have like you can have different types of community too, right? You can have ones that are like really healthy, and then ones that kind of have like this undercurrent where you’re like, oh, I don’t know, like is this my vibe? And everyone in the community loves supporting each other. Um, they’re just they’re they’ve got your back. Like that’s what’s so cool about it. Like anytime you run into an issue or um a contract thing that comes up, right? It’s just uh linking arms with the people that are in your, you know, like specifically web design. And um you’ve just curated really truly like a wonderful community, but I also know that’s definitely like a labor of love for sure.

Josh Hall 11:18

But

Building A Safe Helpful Culture
Josh Hall 11:19

yeah, it’s like it is interesting because I a community, it’s such a broad term, but for for this context, an online community membership is it’s gonna look different for everybody. Like we’ve talked a lot about this more recently. It’s like I don’t know, there’s there’s certain communities that are more just like learning communities, like cohorts of courses or like a program or a boot camp. And then there’s communities that are pure community, like you’re just kind of in a like-minded space, or maybe it’s a topic or like a club of some sort. And then there are like coaching communities where people are there mainly to get coaching from the leader or like a group of leaders or experts. And I feel like pro is kind of an odd mix of all that, which in a way makes it work really well because some people are there mostly for the courses, some people are there and often stay there just for the community, and then some people really just want my coaching. And then community is kind of a byproduct, it’s nice to have, but they’re not there for that. So it’s it’s I like having a setup that works for a lot of different people. Um, that doesn’t really answer the question of like how we’ve cultivated this incredible community, though. I I think sometimes I do think about like what, yeah, like how just the most amazing people come into Web Designer Pro. And part of me just feels like, yeah, I guess it’s leadership style. Like, I really have worked hard at being open, transparent, super helpful. And one thing I have realized in being a community builder is everything rises and falls on leadership. So your 100% DNA of a community takes after the owner, whoever’s leading the way. And if the owner is somebody who, or the the leader is somebody who is not super present, like it’s just, you know, obviously they’re not not their main thing, that’s gonna show in the feeling of the community. If it’s somebody who is kind of snarky with comments and doesn’t have a lot of patience with like new questions, that’s gonna show, which is why like Web Designer Pro is so different in the web design world. There’s, you know, like there’s just there’s never a feeling of that typical developer web design group that you’re terrified to post a question in because you’re gonna get shredded.

Tamara Salchert 13:43

That is like that is so true though, because I think in our world, right? Because some of some people in our group are like full-on coders, like they build their websites, and then some of them are kind of an in-between, or we just use like um Divi or for me, Elementor to build our websites. Um, but the thing is, is like in my experience with working with IT, when I have to reach out to them about stuff, it can feel very like either I can get a really awesome IT person or kind of like one that’s pretty like snobby, where I’m like, dude, I just I’m just trying to get this taken care of. And uh so those kind of can be like, and even when I was in college, like that was something that I had to deal with every so often. Um, it just seemed to be more of a like kind of rough environment, like from that standpoint. So the fact that within yeah, web pro, like everyone just wants to help, and there’s no shame if you don’t understand something. Like that’s that is so important.

Josh Hall 14:42

Yeah, yeah. It’s not something that I like put on the sales page, but I did have an experience similarly when I was taking night classes learning about web design at the community college here in Columbus. And I remember just like I’m talking brand spanking new to web design. This was circa 2010, 2009, 2010. And I realized I figured out how to like code a uh form. This was back before page builders. So I figured out how to make like a contact form, but I didn’t understand how it like goes from the form to an email. And I asked that question in the class, I was like, how does this like actually send to an email? And this developer guy who was like super savvy, was probably beyond that class, just like in a most typical like Reddit developer style way, was just like, oh come on, dude, like you don’t understand this, like duh, this is how you do this, and just like totally belittled me in front of the whole class. I was brand new. It’s web design, and that experience did make me think, and that was in person, so you know, even probably worse than getting that on a you know Facebook group, but that experience um in a way like re solidified a desire in me to make sure that my community, whatever it would be one day, would never be like that. And so again, you know, I didn’t that’s not like on the sales page for pro for community, but I think that comes through and like it really did give me like empathy to remember, like, you know, I’ve been in this industry for 16 years now, but somebody who’s just getting started is gonna have those type of questions. And I think the empathy and the like it’s okay, ask it. Like, we’ll get it figured out, or there, you know, we have a mix of really advanced people and and fairly new people in pro. And I want a good mix of, yeah, like if you have a question that you think is stupid or super beginner, that’s all right, ask it. Um, yeah, I don’t know. Yeah, that I just I really I think about that often as far as like um a mission and a core tenant of pro and being empathetic and op having an open environment for communication and questions.

Tamara Salchert 16:57

Yeah. No, I think just I mean, kind of just talking on like curating a healthy, you know, a healthy community, um, trying to make sure that you’re bringing that, you know, or keeping away some of that unhealthy stuff. Uh that just like, you know, and that’s a part of like any, like obviously yours is online versus in-person, but something that I’ve always felt about community is like a healthy person has healthy community. Like I just, I don’t know, because my husband and I being running an in-person, uh like biblical community, um, it’s I can tell right away if someone is in a healthy place or not, just based off of the kind of community that they have around them. Because uh I think also too, you know, within community, we have like us as humans, we can have blinders, right? So to be able to um bump into other people and have people tell us like, hey, like this is an area that um you know you could grow in or challenge in, I think is really important. Um but just off of that, that’s for us personally, for what we’ve just experienced, is like we try to tell people when we have uh where we have our groups where we meet at multiple locations or whatever, we’re just like, hey, like get to know the people, even the ones that maybe don’t always you don’t jive with right away, like just be like be okay with being uncomfortable a little bit and bump into each other, but um because those are some of the people that have grown me the most, like truly they have been. But in regards to like what makes a healthy community, I guess is there anything else that you have thoughts around that?

Josh Hall 18:43

I love that quote. Healthy person has healthy community, and of course, you know, in the physical world, that probably looks like a support network of like family and friends and different levels of like trust and communication and all that stuff. On the online world and business, I totally agree. I love that frame because it’s like the the true benefit of like a healthy member of Web Designer Pro is having all the, you know, that they’ve gone through courses, they they’re they’re set up for success. They have ideally coaching with me to to the different capacities we have in pro as someone to like guide them and challenge them. But then also they have an incredible support network behind them for support when they get stuck, for referral partners. You are a really good example of somebody who has just made like really close friends inside of Web Designer Pro. And that helps when we get together for our in-person events, of course. But you’ve done a good job of like curating friendships with people who just you jive with, um, you know, in in the forums and pro. So I love that idea because it’s totally true. Like, especially as an online entrepreneur, it’s so lonely. And it is a like you’re in your office by yourself all the time. So like you gotta be able to have an outlet, even online. Yes, in person is great too, but even online to where like you almost need to have like a safe place, you need to have your people. I think you said this right before we hit record, but you said like you found your people in pro. Yeah, and yeah, that’s it’s been so cool to see that just kind of build, you know, and to answer your question more succinctly, it really is just a matter of uh empowering people, I think in a lot of different ways in the community to just almost like take ownership of the community. And yes, you know, I don’t want people I don’t want people to feel like this is Josh’s community. I want people to feel like this is my community. I feel like I’m an integral part of this.

Tamara Salchert 20:43

This might be confusing some for the audience, but my husband, Josh, like he like something that we also have tried to say within our community is like we’re not, we can’t be the people that are like feeding this community. We all have to like play a role in making this like healthy. Um, and it’s just one of those things that like and that’s what makes it good though. Like, you know, it takes takes a village, I think. So just to be able to have um and it it takes and also like from oh man, I could go down a whole tangent on this, but try to stay focused here. Um just going back to kind of that community within community, because that’s something that I think uh also made a really like big impact for me personally, was you having so obviously online um is has been awesome, but then you started the in-person, and that’s when I got to these like I’m trying to think, three wonderful women that we didn’t know anything about each other decided to get an Airbnb together. And it has been a core memory because now we keep up with each other and we got out of our comfort zone, but like you sometimes you have to have like those pockets with. In community. And that’s something that Josh and I have also said is like when we have our large group, we have the groups break up into four or five other large groups or smaller groups with like three to four people top so that it’s more personal and intimate that way. Just because when a community keeps growing as you want it to, um it’s important to make sure that you also find your your like people in that. But I’m just curious on your thoughts on all of that.

Josh Hall 22:28

It’s so tricky because yeah, what you’re really digging into is like core groups. Like you have like a core group of people within a larger group. And the hard thing about that as a community leader is that is very hard to like manufacture. So I go a like completely organic route with that. I don’t force it. You know, like I don’t I try to facilitate some things like this, but I know with a lot of online communities, one thing that’s really popular right now are it’s like some sort of like mastermind group where you might pair up, you know, four to six people and they have either a mutual interest in a platform or they’re at a similar stage or something like that. And that may be something we explore in pro. There’s a lot of cost to that from an administrative perspective. Um, but I found it to be like, you know, I just kind of let it happen and it seemed to work pretty well. Like it just inevitably somebody will post something, and then another member might be like, oh, I use that tool, and they’ll start talking, and then I’ll see them say, like, I’ll DM you. Yeah, and then they’re DMing, they’ll link somebody else in. And next thing you know, we’ve had literal like new businesses and agencies spring up from pro just that way. Like, you just your vibe attracts your tribe. Somebody’s on one of our coaching calls, reaches out, and that’s how it’s happened. I kind of like doing it in an unfacilitated way because you know, when you join, I would have never no, you’re awesome, Tamara. So I feel like you could talk with anybody, but I I don’t know for sure. Like, you are gonna love Sandra, you’re gonna love Megan, and you’re gonna love Alexia, and you guys are gonna be best buds. I don’t know that, you know. I I know I love you all equally, but I just I you never know how like people are gonna jive with each other, but you guys just happen you just happened to get an Airbnb for our first pro con event, and next thing you know, you got this like core group together that has continued to to last, and you know it’s yeah, that’s like so cool, but it is really hard as a community builder to like you can’t force it, you can’t force somebody like you’re really gonna like this person, so like them and you know, team up right now. So I’m really trying to just keep going. Yeah, yeah, like you will be friends. Uh so yeah, I you know, I again I’m sure there’s better ways to go about that, but and I am trying to do at this level with pro. I’m trying to connect people if they join and they don’t know anybody. I might say, like, ooh, we have this other member, you know, who is in a similar stage or has a similar model. Uh, I might like DM them and just connect them. I’m definitely trying to like personally go about that way. And Circle, we use Circle as our as the home for for pro. And it is kind of cool because you can do like connection requests now based off of what they have in their profile field. So there’s some cool ways to go about that. But yeah, I really just try to kind of like just open the floor and just let people naturally attract each other and and collaborate and support and partner up together.

Tamara Salchert 25:38

Yeah. Well, and I think you’ve set up a great environment for it too.

Taking Community Into Real Life
Tamara Salchert 25:42

Like I um curious too, because you started doing the in-person event. Was there any kind of thought behind all that? Like why you headed that direction? But I mean, I know I’ve benefited from it, but just from you again curating that environment for us to be able to like run into each other and make those connections. But I’m just yeah, like what made you start that?

Josh Hall 26:06

So from the get-go, just for context, so we I didn’t really do a good job of like laying the timeline out on this, but we started what is now Web Designer Pro in 2020, the fall of 2020. It was originally called the Web Design Club. It started as just a support, like a coaching support group for my mainly students at that time for my one-off courses. And as it grew and I realized like, okay, this is gonna be a much more serious thing. And then eventually it became like a huge part of my business revenue-wise, I knew I wanted to get us in person at some point. But I’ll be honest, like I was terrified of doing a big in-person event just because I hear horror stories of how much money people typically lose in events, and it is expensive, like to do it, you know, somewhat right, um, is it’s very expensive. If you’re gonna, depending on how many people you’re gonna have, what type of event it is, catering is extremely expensive. So I, you know, I had that I had that thought, but I didn’t pursue it initially. But what we did, and I would recommend everyone do this when it comes to trying out a community like in-person experience, is uh in 2023, there was so for for WordPress, which is the the platform that you use as well for websites, they have these things called WordCamps, which are like once a year, the big ones, everyone like thousands of people typically come. So, what we did in 2023, were you a member then, Tamara? Or did you join after that?

Tamara Salchert 27:33

I I’m like I’ve been a member for two or three years, and I’m trying to remember exactly when I think because I joined after that. I think I’m like two and a half or like years in now. I don’t know.

Josh Hall 27:47

Okay, so in 2023, what we decided to do was essentially host like a meetup at WordCamp. So we had we made an official event out of it, and what we did was we did like uh a private dinner for all Web Center Pro members who were gonna be there, and then we did a bunch of just casual hangouts, and it was awesome. It was so good. We had about a dozen of us who were all Web Center Pro members, and we all went to this WordCamp in Washington, DC. And it was the first time that I met so many people who had been students of mine and people who are really like core members of the community at that point in person. And that just like poured gasoline on the fire of like, all right, we’re doing this, we’re doing this for real every year. It was just so good. And it was like, it came at a really important time for me personally, too, because in 2023 I made the move, I pivoted my business from selling courses one-off as my primary revenue driver to the community being the primary revenue driver, and that was a very painful pivot because my course sales almost overnight went to almost nothing, and I was selling Web Designer Pro as a membership, which in hindsight was the best decision ever, but memberships grow very differently than like a one-off course, which is a lot easier to sell at scale. Memberships are very hard to sell, quite honestly. Community is hard to sell. So I had I was a very painful slow growth, and I part of me was wondering like, did I just destroy my business? Like, what am I gonna do? This is it’s growing, but it’s growing slow. And that meeting, like getting together with, I mean, a lot of these people, I wasn’t public about that at that time because it was in the middle of it happening. But when I think about meeting Michelle Barbonere for the first time, Sandy, Alexis, Austin, Cami was there. We had April, we had so many great core members who were there at that event. And they all like hearing their stories in person, and like some of them literally were like crying, talking about like what the community meant to them and how it turned their life around, their business. That changed everything. So we did bread and butter. You’re like this is incredible. We gotta facilitate more in-person events, uh, IRL in real life. So from there, we started doing a lot more intentional meetups. So I would encourage members to host a meetup, like right now. We’ve got one, I think next week happening in Edmonton. Um, obviously, I can’t make that because it’s a long flight away just for a coffee shop meetup, but we’ve got, I think, five or six members who are gonna do that. And you know, they’re and we’ve got a lot of new members who join from Edmonton and they’re getting plugged in. And I can’t wait to see what stems out of that. So we’re doing a lot of like member-led meetups, and I’m trying to incentivize those, and everyone who hosts one gets a free swag from me. So free pro swag. Um, and then yeah, then that led to us doing like an official big in-person event, which the first one we did was the one that you came to in in 2025, uh called ProCon. Now it’s really it’s renamed to ProCon. Yeah. Where uh that first event we had like 35-ish folks come, an all-day conference. Preceding that was a group social that we did at the baseball game, and then just a bunch of meetups and hangouts. This year, uh, I know Tamara, you were unfortunately able to not join us on this one. I I didn’t mean to make you jealous. I’m wearing our uh pro event, our pro con swag. I’m a freaking weapon center pro. Um, yes. I don’t want to say it was better. It was better in some ways of us like up in the ante with swag, and we were more organized and more perks and more space in the event. We had a better suite at the baseball game this year. It also doubled in cost, but it was well worth it. Um but it was interesting because the second time around, this event felt in a lot of ways more like a reunion for a lot of pro members, but we still had a lot of people come for the first time. So it was a really cool mix of like the first big event that you came to, there were like, you know, what, 30 or 40 people largely meeting each other for the first time. This event, it was like, it’s so good to see you again for a lot of other people, which means 2027 pro con is gonna feel even more like uh a bigger family reunion with some first-time members joining as well, who of course you know, fold right in, feel, feel right at home really quickly. So it’s been everything. It’s been, I don’t want to say it’s saved pro because we weren’t needing of need of being like saved, but we pro definitely got a little stagnant and we needed like a fresh jolt. And the in-person, everything. I mean, it was just key. It’s like I’ve had members tell me they’re staying in pro just so they can come to pro con, which hurts my feelings from coaching, but I’m like, you’re like, I’ll take it.

Tamara Salchert 32:54

So you’re like, all right. Oh man, it’s so crazy. Okay, like going back to what you were saying too with the the word cam thing, it’s so crazy to me because I was there. I just didn’t know you guys yet. And I feel like I have FOMO about something I didn’t get to be a part of because I I went there, I flew out there by myself uh for the uh what is it, the WordCamp USA uh in Washington, DC. I did not know you were there.

Josh Hall 33:20

Did we talk about that before?

Tamara Salchert 33:22

I don’t think so. I because I think I joined Pro either right, because I I don’t think I was a part of the community yet. I think I joined it later that fall. Okay. Um but I just was like, I just missed that episode.

Josh Hall 33:38

We probably passed through the hallway, and you were like, that is a really good looking group of people who look so nice and cool. I want to find a group like that.

Tamara Salchert 33:46

And then well, honestly, yeah, while I was there, because again, it’s you know, it’s an awesome I love WordCamp. I mean, just it’s a like a nerdfest of people just having a great time and learning stuff um about WordPress, but then everything that’s connected to it. Um, but I didn’t have anyone that I knew and it did feel lonely because it’s like, man, I like I want my people, but um, I also like I’m like, I want to do this because I think this is good for my business. Um, but um, yeah, it’s just crazy that we probably passed each other in the walk hallway, that giant hallway.

Josh Hall 34:23

Right. And I I just looked, you joined in April 24, so that was about six months or so after that work camp, or maybe a little bit longer. Because that was yeah, August 23.

Tamara Salchert 34:34

Man, but that’s crazy. Right.

Josh Hall 34:36

It’s interesting though, because like you did find your people being at WordCamp, but it’s so hard to go to an event of like 3,000 people and connect with anyone. I mean, especially folks who are a little more introverted, like web designers primarily are people who are working behind the screen and are not gonna be your like realty people who are just like hyper extroverted, you know, socialites. That’s not the average persona for web designers. So, like, you know, those type of people can go to an event. Like, I’m I’m more extroverted, so I could probably feel comfortable going to a big event. Hans from Termageddon, Mr. You know, could make 3,000 friends in a weekend. He could make 3,000 friends in a weekend, I have no doubt.

Tamara Salchert 35:20

I’m truly, truly gifted man.

Josh Hall 35:22

Yeah, but not everyone is like that. So, like, that’s like I good on you for doing that and stepping out of your comfort zone. That’s incredible. What an honor now to have a part in like, you know, having you in our community and feeling like you have your people no matter where you go. Because even if you do a WordCamp that’s a smaller one, not the big US ones, yeah. I guarantee you could find a pro or two who would travel there and then suddenly you guys got a core group.

Tamara Salchert 35:47

Well, and you’ve got me thinking because I do want to maybe do like a pro meetup because I think there are a few of us in the Wisconsin or even Illinois area. I have to double check, but I would love that. Um, because yeah, I definitely still have some FOMO missing out. But um, but something that you had mentioned before about oh shoot, I’m losing my train of thought.

Josh Hall 36:08

Um we talked in-person.

Tamara Salchert 36:13

Yeah, I’m trying to think, like, oh yeah, for your yeah, thank you. For your uh in-person event that you created, are you planning on trying to keep it? Because like you’re saying, the large numbers, like are you do you feel that it’s best being at the size that it is and nothing more? Because I know you usually keep it to a specific number. So I’m just curious

Keeping Events Small And Meaningful
Tamara Salchert 36:34

on that.

Josh Hall 36:34

Yeah, even this year was 45. We had about 10 more than we did last year, including sponsors and some plus ones. Plus ones have actually been an and a surprise to me about how many people want to bring a plus one. Um, so we need to account for that when it comes to you know the tickets and all the specifics of like, are they coming to this dinner? Are they coming to the social? Are they coming to the workshop? Um, so we had like a pretty robust intake form this year that was a huge help on that. Um I will say, for the on average, like I think about 50 people is the max for our pro con events. And a large part of that is because it’s over two days. Uh, of course, some people came earlier, and we had a lot of just you know, spur of the moment meetups and and like unofficial events before the official events. And I love those. There’s like my favorite parts, honestly. Um, so like there’s a lot of that happening that it’s just hard to connect with more than I’d say 50 people. Um, if you’re talking like a hundred people, that’s just a whole different event. It’s it’s a different venue. You think about going to the baseball game, uh like we had a suite this year that could accommodate, I think maybe 70 or 80, but you know, like we’ve we had a good crew in there at 45 or so. So I think really like, yeah, we’re we’re honestly to the point where like this next year in 27, we could probably get another 10 to 15, but that’s gonna be about it. So I’m gonna, yeah, pro con, I do not envision it being a bigger event than a pretty exclusive, like, yeah, it’s you know, it’s a 50-ish group. We could push it maybe a little bit more, but I I think once you get 75 to 100, it becomes a whole logistically a very different thing. And an experience, you know, no, it’s a it’s a lot harder to connect with 100 people than 30 or 40.

Tamara Salchert 38:25

Yeah. Well, that’s something like my husband and I also talk about within our our group is we do large group every few months. Now, obviously, this is a very different setup from what you have, but we’ve always noticed that the connections start to fall off if we do too many of them. Uh, like because it’s just I think it’s very overwhelming for people, you know, like when you have so many people in one place, it is hard to have more of those like intimate conversations. Um, so being able to that’s why we make sure that we break up like the when we have it on Sunday nights, we have it at several houses so that one, it’s easier on the host. And then two, it’s just everyone’s able to have more time to talk and share versus kind of just like this quick like touch-in, uh, which those aren’t bad, but I think it just again curates that opportunity to have go in more depth within your community. I don’t know. That’s kind of my thought on that.

Josh Hall 39:24

But no, I love that you’re giving that analogy just because I think when you’re in person, the deeper you can go with the people who you know you just like jibe with, and you’re just like, yeah, like they really it’s so funny. Like, literally, there have been like the coolest relationships, and they’ve been pro members a long time. They just never connected online, but they connected in person for whatever reason. And sometimes you just never know who’s gonna just hit it off together and just either partner up or be a support system or a referral partner. But you I think in order to like build really good retention to use community membership terms, you gotta go deeper. You have to allow that time to go deeper. And you guys are you, Sandra, Alexia, Megan are the perfect example of four members who like you know trusted each other enough to literally stay together, but you guys went so deep together in like building a relationship. And yeah, there was 200 people there, and you guys just maybe were at a table together briefly. It probably wouldn’t have been the same if that was the experience.

Tamara Salchert 40:33

Yeah, 100%. I think, I mean, goodness, uh, one of our core memories was the dining room table. We all just in a in the Airbnb, again, we all didn’t really know each other, so it was like kind of awkward because you know, you’re trying to figure out how each person is because you don’t really know them. And we’re just sitting there, some of us in our PJs, some of us like half asleep, half awake, and we’re just chatting and talking about our different businesses and encouraging each other.

Josh Hall 41:02

And my goodness, like man, do I wish you had a microphone going then? Because I would have loved to have heard that podcast. That was probably incredible. Because that was at like two in the morning or something, right? Because I we were we had some.

Tamara Salchert 41:24

You know, just in the background, they’re just chattering, laughing. Uh, it was so great and it was so wholesome. And um I think that’s what kind of brought us all together. So even, you know, even though I wasn’t able to go this last one, which I was really bummed about, and we were going to stay at the hotel. I I think like that aspect of just being able to have that time where we could all connect has flourished in our conversations because our group text is usually going off once or twice a week, just being like, hey, this situation came up, or hey, I’m kind of like struggling with this. How do I, you know? And then sometimes we’ll jump on a call with each other and like be like, hey, we got you, we’re here to listen. Like, what do you want? And I think that’s what came out of though the community, because those are the kind of people that are in the community. So I think I’m I’m just oh my gosh, I’m so grateful. So thank you, Josh, for the community that you created because um, you know, I found my people. I found my people and we love and support each other. And that’s like, especially like as women in business too, like to be able to just like have your like core group of girls where you’re like, hey, like I can just call you, like Megan and I. Before all this, Megan and I had been like sending audio messages to each other, like 20-minute audio messages for a while, and it was so cool because we both like just started chatting and then we got together with all the other girls, and it was just man, uh amazing.

Josh Hall 42:52

Well, it’s it’s cool from a coaching perspective for me too, because like Megan, is she is she out of the country right now or is she about to leave?

Tamara Salchert 43:01

I had just actually texted her, just being like, Hey, are you still in like are you out of the country or are you?

Josh Hall 43:07

Yeah, I know we’re like on that window, but you know, she like she’s in a situation where she’s been public about this with her adoption, and she’s gonna be living, it sounds like in Honduras for a decent amount of time. And so she was asking more recently a lot about like how do I keep the business going? I I’m I’m gonna be involved, but not as much as I normally would. And we talked about you, and it’s kind of cool for me to know like you’ve got her back. And she’s like, I thought about talking to Tamara about maybe handling some support or at least be kind of a next level back for support for my clients. And for me as a coach, it’s awesome because I can be like, Yeah, you already know and like and trust Tamara. So let’s figure out a way that is beneficial for everybody, all parties for Megan, for you, and for her clients. So it’s just awesome.

Tamara Salchert 43:52

Yeah, when I when I had to, you know, head out to get some like stuff for health problems, like the girls literally are like, What can I do? Do what do you need? What can like is there anything we can take off your plate? Like, I mean, oh my gosh, like just thinking about that makes me want to cry. Cause it’s just like you need those people, you know, to be able to like cut you back.

Josh Hall 44:12

Yes. And it’s so much easier than saying, like, all right, Tamara, go to Upwork, try to find somebody, good luck. Figure it out. Yeah, that’s what one reason I love Pro, truthfully, is like it is a built-in, trusted network. It really is. Like, we don’t have virtually anyone in there who is not going to be able to figure something out and be a support network for any other member. Like, it really is. I mean, that I think is worth the membership price anyway, just to have that fallback network. You know what I mean? Like, literally, where where else can you go where you’re literally any issue you could think of? If it’s not a member in Pro, somebody in Pro knows somebody or has somebody on their team or is contracting out or has a wider network of their own. It’s just like in-person networking. The value of an in-person networking group is not just the 20 people you’re there with, it’s their networks. And that’s the really cool thing about what we’ve curated in pro is like we all have our own networks that are just gelled together. But you know, us as the members with each other in pro, that’s what’s been so cool. So yeah. Yeah, it’s just it’s just crazy. The amount of value that is again hard to sell. Like, you know, like that doesn’t there’s things that translate when you’re you know, when I’m like promoting pro. Um, but at this stage of the game, it’s usually just letting members, yeah. Like what you’re doing here, just sharing your experience. And then somebody out there is probably gonna be like, Man, do I want that? Like, man, do I want a community larger? Like, I mean, we’re still around 200, so like I like that range. Two to three hundred is kind of the sweet spot, and I don’t really plan to grow more than that. Um, that’s such a great, like, you can know a lot of people, know a smaller group more intimately, and maybe have referral partners of of different avenues inside of Pro, but at the same time, we’re all like in this together. So yeah, I just I love it, obviously.

Tamara Salchert 46:14

Yeah, because I think again, going back to kind of beginning conversation, is as an entrepreneur, it’s so important to have community. It’s so important. And I didn’t realize that when I first started my business. That was kind of where I found myself because um, you know, I had taken the leap, the jump to start my own business full time, which that alone is terrifying. But, you know, like family and loved ones aren’t always going to understand if they’ve never experienced it before, like just the depths of like terrifying, but also like exciting, uh just feelings that come from doing that. And it’s so important to find people that can mentor you through that. And that’s literally that’s what happened for me when like literally one morning. I’ve told I’ve said this before, but just I was walking and I was praying. I was like, Lord, I I’m like, this is I’m alone. Like this is hard. Like, I don’t know how to figure out my contracts, I don’t know how to price myself right. Like, I’m like, and I I can’t, there’s not people that I can ask because, like, you know, competition, that kind of thing, like it’s that kind of I could totally go into that whole spiel. But but then I just had this idea pop in my head, like type in web designer, like, and I was like, okay. And the moment I found your podcast, I was hooked. I I like I could not stop listening to them because it was just this I again, I found my people. You you were talking about contracts, and I was literally dealing with that situation. And and then yeah, for a while, it did take me a while to like work up towards and getting into the community because right, starting my business and you feel broke about everything. So, but like to me, I I don’t even think about it. It’s like it’s worth its weight in gold. Like, I don’t even like the price doesn’t like enter my mind anymore. Um, it’s one of those things that it has you have helped mentor me and also so many other people in the community to grow my business in the way that it’s like I just couldn’t have done by myself. Like, sure, I could do some of it and like stumble more along the way, but like, you know, my God’s grace. But like, I think having people to um just also ask right away where you don’t have to wait like forever to get an answer on something. Um, man, yeah, so awesome.

Josh Hall 48:34

So well, my good I so appreciate hearing that, Tamara. Like, it’s obviously on my end, I’ve had a front row seat on all that, and it’s so cool. One thing I’ve learned with yourself and a lot of other members is you just you go so much further, so much faster together. Like, if you are somebody who is just a lone ranger or lone wolf, lone ranger was a show or something right. Anywho, if you’re the lone wolf, like you know, and a lot of us are at solopreneurs, because our our gift and our curse is to be able to just figure stuff out. So we’re like, nah, I don’t need help, I can figure it out, which is great as a web designer for a bit, but then you get to a point where that the loneliness I think really hits. This happened for me, and it’s happened time and time again for a lot of other pros too. Is like you’re you want to start your business, it’s a side hustle usually, and then it becomes something more legit. And you’re like, awesome, you’re pumped up. You still have your family, your friends, all these ideas, and you may be a part of a group online, or you may be listening to a podcast or something. But as you get further along, what happens, and I think this is what really leads into the loneliness factor, is you start to distance yourself as you become an entrepreneur, which web designers, I’m letting the cat out of the bag now. You’re actually not a web designer, you’re an entrepreneur when you build your own web design business. And most web designers don’t think like that. I sure didn’t. I didn’t realize I was becoming an entrepreneur. But what happened to me is what I see happen to so many others, and maybe you experience this too, is you like, I don’t want to say you grow past your friends, because that sounds like we’re better than them, but we do grow to a different version of ourselves. We do not think the same way as somebody who has a job thinks. We do not look at the world to the same lens that somebody has a stable salary, quote unquote stable nowadays. And we do not have the same money mindset that those people have, because we’re we’re suddenly around people who are thinking in way different terms. And oh yeah, have a whole different lens on life and opportunity and scarcity. You mentioned the whole corporate thing of like, you know, I know I’m not gonna trust this person because they could be my you know competitor. We’re all competitors technically in Weber’s on a pro, but no one thinks like that because there’s millions and millions and millions of businesses. You know, most people need like 20 or 30 to make six figures. So I think that’s what happens. And I don’t know, yeah.

Coopetition With Competitors And Partners
Tamara Salchert 51:00

I was just gonna say like a word that you use that I was going to bring up is co-opetition, because I absolutely love that you use that word because most people in our industry is like don’t talk to the person that’s like your competitor in this industry. And I’ve seen you like link arms with people that could, in a sense, be you know, in the business world, they would see that as a threat versus like an opportunity. So I kind of wanted to pick your brain a little bit on that just before we wrap up here. But yeah.

Josh Hall 51:28

I love cooperation, and yeah, I mean, there is some of my best friends are my direct competitors, like Shannon Mattern, one of my good friends who’s local here in Columbus. Complete competitor in many ways. In fact, we’ve had people literally move from Web Designer Pro to her Web Designer Academy, and we’ve had she’s had people go from Web Designer Academy to Web Designer Pro. Now, we have an affiliate agreement, so like honestly, we’re like, yeah, if you want to go over there, I’ll get an affiliate kickback. At least we’re you know, still in our world. But we don’t have the exact same teachings or the exact same framework. And she she is coaching specifically women web design business owners, so it’s not an exact overlap, but I also just kind of feel like I’m more I’m more powerful and can help a lot more people and make a bigger impact while retaining a very small community with having referral partners who are like my direct competitors. For example, like Sam, who was one of our like rock star members, grew his agency to six figures really quickly, took a took an interest in SEO, particularly local SEO. It worked out great because like that’s not an area that I go far into. And I really just don’t have the desire to be like the SEO guy. So when he had the idea of like sharing his resources and what was doing, we kind of came up together with this idea of creating essentially like a little brother community to Web Center Pro with his local SEO Academy. And I look in there and it’s he just crossed six figures recently with that community, and he’s he’s growing that thing into this mighty little beast of a local SEO academy. And over 50% of the members are pro members, and they’re also still in pro. Like it’s a real but it’s it’s mutually beneficial because I don’t want to go too far into SEO, but I’d rather those people still be in my world. So heck yeah, go to our partner community, and then we can both serve you in different areas. Go to Sam to learn local SEO in depth and sales for SEO. Come to me for general business advice and entrepreneurship and building recurring revenue and scaling your business and getting the processes in place for just generalized web design business. And it’s worked out really well. So yeah, I I’ve learned to definitely um go headfirst into coopetition, and it’s yet to like burn me in any way, you know. And it’s just a better way to live. I admire that so much. Yeah, I think it’s a better way to live than being like, oop, that person’s my direct competitor. I want to, you know, think of a snake scheme that can burn their business down. Like, no, I want them to succeed too, and I’m sure there’s there’s gonna be a way to, you know, if it’s not a like direct referral, like some sort of partnership or affiliate. Honestly, part of me it keeps me fresh because I’m like, you know what? If people are leaving pro for any reason for another community, I’ve got work to do. Like maybe I’m getting a little too comfortable or a little I I it’s kind of challenged me to be like like you know, honestly, in some ways, I’m like, I’m happy to take on a bunch of partners because I’m kind of like at this point, good luck recreating Web Designer Pro. Like, it ain’t gonna happen. Yeah, like you gotta find your own lane. I found my own lane. So, in a way, like it’s like giving me a proper like like kick in the ass in some ways to be like, let’s make sure pro continues to be the the best in its lane, yeah.

Tamara Salchert 54:56

So that’s so awesome, man. I guess like I just have two final questions and then I can really. I’m good.

Josh Hall 55:03

I’m good on time, Tamara.

Tamara Salchert 55:04

So okay, because I don’t have I’m like shoes, sorry, like that a minute here, but um do you have any words for someone that is looking to do like a community that like what you’ve done? Uh just any just from all the experiences that you’ve had. Um words of wisdom, if you will, for someone that’s trying to start something

Start Small And Do Unscalable Work
Tamara Salchert 55:27

like this?

Josh Hall 55:27

Yeah, for particularly for those who are more like starting or ideation and and thinking about launching, I always recommend start small and do the unscalable things right from the get-go. What I mean by that is like I was super bummed when we launched what is now Web Designer Pro. It was called the Web Design Club in 2020. I thought we were gonna launch with like a hundred members and it was gonna be way bigger than it was because I had over a thousand students in my courses at that point. So I was like, for sure, at least a hundred people are gonna want my coaching and you know, get the get the community. 37 people joined in our first wave. And I was certainly bummed I wanted more, but at the same time, that was the like biggest blessing in disguise because I got to know those people so well and on a much deeper level. And that was still a lot of people. As I found out, 30 plus people was a lot of people to coach, to build relationships with. And I’m like, thank god I didn’t launch with a hundred, because I probably would have like lost over half of them in the first month. Cause I just you can’t take in that many people with the type of you got to be careful about what you set up literally. Like, you know, like if you’re doing one-on-one calls and you get 100 people, do you have space in your calendar for a hundred calls? Like there are practical things like that that you need, yeah. You need to be really careful about how you structure a community. So um that was really helpful. I I’m so glad we and that’s big by by some degree, like 30 plus people is still large. Um, depending on the community, maybe starting like with four people is the way to go. And you just start a little more high-level, super intense, and then you kind of broaden it and do more like one-to-many style calls and coaching sessions or programs or cohorts or whatever. So, yeah, start small, do the unscalable things. Like, I have been big, as you know. When somebody joins, I send a personal video to everyone who joins. And sometimes I do a personal audio if for some reason I’m not on camera, or if they joined on like a Friday night and I want to, I don’t want them to hear from me maybe Tuesday of next week. I might send an audio and be like, hey, I just wanted to pop in and saw that you joined. I’ll I’ll send you a formal welcome early next week, but I just want to say welcome. Uh, can’t wait to get to know you, your business. Maybe I checked out your site, those kind of things. Nobody does that. Nobody does that.

Tamara Salchert 57:54

Yeah, I don’t know how you have such a possible Yeah. You had such a personal touch though. That’s what I noticed too when I joined, is like right away being able to like have a personal video from you, it it did really help with the easing in because it just like put a face to the name. But um it reminds me of the book, like Unreasonable Hospitality. It’s like it’s like curating in a way that like is so unique, but it makes the person feel seen and known. And like with an online community, even more so, right? You have to be so much more intentional, I think. Cause it can be so easy to slip through the cracks, like right where people start if you’re not intentional with your people. So yeah, like 30 to some, like if you compare that to like social media numbers, that might sound like nothing, but then in like online, in person, like trying to chat with all these people. Oh my gosh, your calendar would be like oozing over.

Josh Hall 58:43

Like, it’s funny you mention it’s funny you mentioned that because like I have a a diverse ecosystem in the sense of like podcast, YouTube, and some social media, but social media is not my jam. Like my social media is extreme. My my Instagram is like 2300 people follow me. That’s pitily changed compared to a lot of bigger creators. And I know I could play that game if I wanted to, but I don’t want to. And it’s interesting because I’ve seen some really big creators who have massive followings, and their community falls completely fat flat on its face. And I think a lot of that is because it’s too much, it’s too big to make those deep connections. And I think the because like you you come from like a church background, I think there’s a lot of parallels that online communities can learn from the church world, which is like you go into the mega church and there’s 10,000 people, that is an overwhelming chance for the for the newbie who is like, I don’t know anybody. I hopefully I can find a seat. I, you know, like I’m definitely not gonna probably like meet somebody and have a deep connection unless it’s somebody who works for the church. So what churches do as they grow is they typically like just break off into micro locations and have like maybe a smaller two, three hundred size like mini church. That’s a part of the broader organization, but it’s just more it’s suited to get people connected better than like the main campus of yeah, 10 10,000 people. So I actually very much view communities at scale, and then pro is not gonna be the 10,000 or even the thousand group, like I really at its very top end 500, but I don’t even I kind of like the two to three hundred like active together. We do you need to have it big enough as a global group, like to have you know, hopefully some people near you. So when you do a pro meetup, there’s some members near you. That’s the goal, but at the same time, yeah, past a certain range, you just can’t get connected, I feel like. And I and I’ve seen that play out time and time again. I’ve been a part of some bigger communities where like I just see it. I see our little 200-person group, Tamara. You know, you know the introduction spread thread. Like new members join, and within two days, there’s like 20 or 30 likes, maybe 15, 20 comments. I go into groups I’m a part of that are like 3,000 members, and there’s like three likes and like two comments. And it’s because that’s that sense of like yeah, unity that just bigger groups don’t have. So I think those are all really important lessons for for starters. Yeah.

Tamara Salchert 1:01:32

Yeah, I agree. I think it’s so important to yeah, well, just with the numbers, because again, like we we take on like yeah, a little bit of that uh cookie cutter style of like the microchurch stuff for like what we do, because um not that I have any hate on like large size church stuff, but I think you can get so lost in that. And then also for like if you’re a leader in that, how do you maintain and obviously again it’s everyone chipping in? It can’t just be where people are expecting the leader to do all the legwork. Um, obviously there’s gonna be seasons where more is demanded of you, but um, it’s just so important that everyone is like chipping in on this, and yeah, but then I think that number because once it starts getting bigger and bigger, that you kind of get this mentality of like, oh, like if someone posts posts, someone would be like, Oh, that per like someone else will take care of it. So the ball starts getting dropped more because everyone kind of assumes that things will be taken care of. Because I just think the bigger it gets, the more the breakdown on that communication, too, of like that intentionality. I don’t know. That’s something I’ve been chewing.

Josh Hall 1:02:38

I’m so glad you mentioned that because we addressed some of those top tips for the starters, but then if I can selfishly take this into like the tips for the scalers of a community, yeah, how do you scale? Like, I’ve really thought about this over the past couple years because pro did get to a point where I did reach my personal bandwidth. Um, just for context, and as you know, Tamara, like Pro started with courses, community, and coaching all together, one tier, which meant that I personally was overseeing every member. Now, some members were more um intensive than others as far as their amount of questions or support they needed. Um, and often I found with coaching, and the way I do coaching is a weekly coaching call that everyone can join. We do like hot seats, like little mini coaching sessions, and then DM coaching. So it’s kind of async. It’s like they’ll post a question, I try to get to it in DM within 24 to 48 hours on weekdays. But at scale, at over 200 members, that became almost unmanageable. I got to the point where I was like, I cannot literally take on any new people. I was personally starting to mix people up in my mind. I was like, wait a minute, this challenge that Mike had, or no, it wasn’t Mike, it was Matt. And then Jim had this, but Jerry had this. Like, I was starting to mix people up. It was too many people in my head. So I got to the point where I was like, okay, the next step of pro was to split it out into tiers to where new people could still join the community, and I would have, I would give them initial coaching boosts and I would get to know them a little bit, but I can’t support the ongoing coaching because I literally don’t have the bandwidth as one person. And when you mention, you know, the pastor who has a church that gets to typically two to three hundred people, that’s when you’ll see like an assistant pastor typically step in, or they may break into a campus that has like a campus pastor, then the lead pastor, and that’s there for a reason because the lead pastor can’t serve that many people.

Tamara Salchert 1:04:41

Um my gosh, if you want a good way to get burnout, right? Like that’s how I think that’s how many people get into burnout, right? Is you don’t realize when the numbers are growing as big as they are that you can’t manage it after a certain point, like what you were saying, where your brain’s like crosswiring, where you’re like, wait, this part, you know, um, it’s just we’re human. We can’t, we can only do so big until things start getting dropped. But you’re so good about that’s something I’ve always admired about you, is you’re so good about, I don’t know how you do it, but you’re so good about responding and like you’re you respond within such like good time, like every time, and you’re consistent. And I think also a good leader is consistent. And like I think I could tell if this wasn’t working is if there was more, you know, like we’re like dropping the ball and getting back to people where you’re you know, like, and I don’t see that. And I think you’ve really found, I mean, obviously feel free to speak for yourself. I feel like you’ve really found like a really cool, like solid rhythm for yeah, your community.

Josh Hall 1:05:44

No, I have. I it’s it’s it’s been odd. Like I I have found a really good rhythm. And you know, there are certain types of coaching DM situations that are much more intensive than others. If it’s like a quick question or like talking about this podcast, that’s something that not All members are asking me about. So it’s kind of fun, you know, for you and me to just audio back and forth. There are some situations that are at a different level of coaching where I’m like, okay, I’m looking at their contract or looking at their proposals. And it’s uh sometimes it’s more exhausting than others, but I’ve been able to balance all the different coaching. Primarily, I’ll I’ll share my secret. Tamara, would you like to know how I’m able to coach so many people via DM and Pro and not get burned out? I don’t have another job. Like that’s my secret. I think a lot of people are running a community as an additional thing. And I started like that. I did, I did start like that. But yeah, my leg up is like this is the main thing I do. So the coaching DMs, like it’s a priority slot in almost every one of my days. There are some days where I might just mention, like, hey, I’m gonna get to this next week or get to this in a couple days. Or if it’s a situation I know isn’t urgent, then I might have a little bit of a longer leeway for for replying back. But yeah, almost every day I try to have at least a like a reactionary block where I’ll get in and scan the DMs. Um, but then generally at least a couple times a week, I’ll clear like a good two or three hours to where I can just bulk, go through and hit a bunch of folks. Um, but a lot of time, like when you and I, when you initially reached out via DM recently for the coaching segment, um, we were kind of having a back and forth on this podcast idea that you’re launching. And again, for me, that was exciting and fun. So when I would see a new message from you, I already have the context. I was, you know, even at that point, I think I was outside playing with my kids, probably shouldn’t have been, you know, popping into pro, but I was excited to continue on. So I gave you a quick audio and that was it. So I do give myself a lot of grace too on those boundaries. There are some times where I will do audio messages while my kids are taking a bath or while I’m cleaning or whatever it is. Um, but yeah, like it hasn’t intruded in our personal life to where like it’s been an issue. So um, but that’s the biggest secret. Yeah, I do I do those deep work segments at least a couple times a week in bulk, and then try to have a reactionary segment almost every weekday. And then um yeah, like it’s just there are some times where more coaching requests come in at the same time, but it’s it’s evened out. Like typically, I think right now I’ve got like seven DMs to get back to. So over the next couple days, I’ll get to those, and then next week there’ll be another wave, and then I’ll get back to those. But but I love it. Like, I think that’s another thing too. You you need to set a community up that you love to show up for. If you don’t like doing one-on-one calls, don’t do one-on-one calls. If you, you know, like it’s just you have to set it up to make sure you like it. If you don’t like doing DM coaching, don’t do DM coaching. Like, just do a live call with like maybe a QA forum or something. You can really build a community that suits your personality, your energy, your your mission. So I’ve certainly learned to tweak pro as it’s evolved.

Tamara Salchert 1:09:10

Yeah, yeah. Also the book Deep Work, definitely recommend for anyone listening. That is such a good book. Yeah, I even had my husband listen to it, and he really liked it too.

Josh Hall 1:09:18

So I was gonna say it’s that yellow one right there on the on my bookshelf, just because yeah, that’s I took that one to heart.

Tamara Salchert 1:09:25

Yeah, it it’s so good. Like it it really is so good because in a world of distraction, right? Like it’s so good to just make sure that you are locking in and um yeah, oh gosh, we could talk about that, talk about boundaries within like business and man, so many things to touch on. Um so uh the only like other final question that I have for you, and um just do you have any uh insight for someone that is looking for community and specifically maybe also looking for your type of community? And if you have any um insight or also uh resources for them.

How To Choose The Right Community
Josh Hall 1:10:01

Well, if you are a web designer, if you’re not convinced by the end of this conversation, I guess just keep on listening to your show or my show. I do host the Web Design Business Podcast, which is my number one lead generator, by the way. Like you mentioned. Everyone, like 90, probably 99% of people who join Pro say they listen to the podcast. Um, so I’m gonna I’m I mentioned that because obviously WebdesignerPro.com is where to go to jump into our community and and to join me and to join Tamara and this incredible group of folks. Um, if you’re not ready to join pro for any reason, listen to the podcast. My show is called the Web Design Business Podcast. Hopefully that’ll give you a sense of kind of what we’re all about because I view it as an extension of Pro. Like I all the time have members come onto the show to share case studies and wins or dive into topics of what they’re doing. Of course, I interview a lot of people in the industry. Um, but I do I think to answer the question of like how to find a community if it’s not in web design, I do recommend like you can do some basic research and just find different communities. But if the if the leader or the show runner has a podcast or a show or any other social media, I would like I would try to get their vibe and make sure that your vibe lines up with their vibe because the quote, your vibe attracts your tribe is 100% true for a community. And I think the reason so many people come into pro and they already kind of feel like they’ve been a like a member, like they just gel so fast, is because they’ve been listening to this podcast, my podcast, because they get a good feel for me and they’ve listened, like podcasts has a way of building trust like no other medium. And you can go long form, you can keep it super casual if they’re if it’s low editing. Like I do have a YouTube channel, but you know, I do have to be cognizant of like a lot of my YouTube videos. If it’s not an interview, I need to be pretty edited, pretty concise. And it’s not the full Josh. Like I’m long-winded, long form, like to get into the weeds and tangents, so like podcasts suits me well. Um, and that while that’s why I think a lot of people who join Pro are like they’re already primed because they’ve been a listener of the show. They’ve often heard a lot of people who are members at like on interviews and heard their experience. And like in this one, Tamara, sharing your story of like how you felt alone and how pro kind of filled in those gaps and became you know your people. That’s gonna resonate, I have no doubt, with a lot of people who are right there and who are in the the spot that you were in three years ago. And that’s yeah, that’s why like it’s exciting from a community leader perspective to attract the right people. And for the people who are looking for that, yeah, I would just I’d go with your gut, honestly, because you don’t want to join a community who yeah, isn’t going where you want to go and doesn’t have the vibe the right vibe. Like we’ve had some people who join Pro who are like, I want to make seven figures in a year, and I’m like, uh, you’re just pro is not right for you. I’m sorry, bro. Like, go to there are so many other bro hustling communities, probably on school. Go to go to there, go there, and then best of luck. But like we’re it’s lifestyle web design businesses. We’re people who are cool, who are gonna be here for each other. You know, revenue is a big part of a lot of goals, but some people it’s lifestyle, some people it’s a second career. Um, it’s a different vibe, it’s a different vibe here in Pro. So we want to make sure obviously, you know, we’re attracting the right people as well.

Tamara Salchert 1:13:43

Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, just thank you so much, Josh, for uh coming on here and sharing and just uh taking your time to do this. And yeah, for anyone listening to you, it’s just yeah, so important to find your community, especially as an entrepreneur. Um, I just that’s that’s what makes you grow. So yeah, but thank you so much.

Josh Hall 1:14:07

Thank you, Tamara. If and just if I can double-click on that as we sign off, nearly every big entrepreneur or any successful business owner at any level always says they have like a core group of people who help them get there, whether it’s a mastermind, a community, whatever it is. So yeah, you just you can’t go alone. You can’t you can’t do this life alone. So what an honor, Tamara, to be a part of your journey. And I so love having you as a core member of Pro. So thank you for all your contributions and for doing what you do.

Tamara Salchert 1:14:38

Thank you. I’m very excited, thankful, and grateful to be a part of the community. It’s been awesome.

Wrap Up And Links
Josh Hall 1:14:46

All right. Big thanks again to Tamara for not only doing this interview, but allowing me to repurpose it with you before her podcast even goes live. Really, really excited for Tamara and love the fact that she’s really leaning into personal relationships to build her business. I think it’s something that most web designers are sleeping on. But if you do an interview series or a podcast or even a series-based show, you can expand your network and utilize that to get out to other people’s network is a great way to attract good fit clients for you. I’m so excited to see how this helps Tamara in the long run. I just want to thank her for again allowing me to share this conversation with you. All the links we talked about are going to be at the show notes, joshhall.co slash 442. That’s where you’ll be able to connect with Tamara. And again, big thanks to 17 Hats for sponsoring this particular episode and for bringing our community together as a sponsor of our ProCon events over the last two years. So big thanks to just 17 Hats. Go to joshhall.co slash 17hats to claim your special trial and to get my invoice contract and proposal templates all automatically on your account. Hi, friends. Thanks so much for joining. I’ll see you on the next one. Show notes joshhall.co slash 442.