Leveraging Expert Collaboration & TikTok with Kathy at Flex-Line Automation & Ed from HARTING (Automate 2024)

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Okay, well, welcome to what is potentially our last conversation of this second day of Automate 2024.

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Although we have a potential sleeper waiting for us if we manage to wrap this up in 30 minutes, which is questionable considering me, nikki Gonzalez, your host of Automation Ladies, my better half over here is not going to take over the time talking, but Allie is here, hi and our guests.

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We were able to lure our good friends from a couple of aisles over Kathy Wren from FlexLine Automation If you're a listener of the Automation Ladies show, then you might have heard our episode from A3 Business Forum earlier this year with her and her daughter Lauren, who both run FlexLine Automation together, if I'm getting that right.

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And yeah, when we get together, we really have fun, we connect, we have a lot to talk about, and so when Amanda asked me who from Harding we should pull into this conversation, I couldn't let Ed rest, even though he's been on too many of these today for his taste, probably because, I was telling Amanda and I think this speaks, and I'm going to go on a tangent here before I ever even let you talk, kathy.

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Okay, but it especially during full days like this.

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You're talking to thousands of strangers.

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There is a huge comfort for me and the ability to keep talking and keep going, sometimes to just talk to people that you know a little bit right.

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It's a different type of energy that you have to have.

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You can have a casual conversation and because I met Ed a couple of times before we did a podcast, I've met Kathy before we've done a podcast.

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This is great for kind of the end of the day, which, if I was talking to strangers, I might be completely done by now.

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So, with that said, thank you for being here, friends.

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Thank you, kathy.

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Do you want to introduce yourself to the Harding community?

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That may not know you, because I know I just introduced you two and they hadn't heard of the conveyor cougar until a few days ago.

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Of the conveyor, cougar.

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Wow, and what a treat they had.

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I think finding your social media.

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Indeed.

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Okay, well, I'm sorry.

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Do not apologize.

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Your social media Indeed.

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Okay well, I'm sorry.

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I'm happy to be here and it's always great to see you gals.

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You know what I love about A3 and this conference is the friendships getting to see people.

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It's like a family reunion.

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I'm happy to get to know Harding and learn a lot about this product and be able to offer that to my customers.

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A little bit about who I am and what I do.

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This is my 40th year in the business.

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Flexline Automation was founded by my husband and I and his parents, our daughter Lauren and her husband, have since joined the business.

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I have a little light at the end of my tunnel, right, so it will someday be in her capable hands.

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Been the president of the company since 1999.

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Started out packing boxes, turning wrenches, doing sales, doing like every aspect of the business, so it wasn't always executive.

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My husband likes to tell everybody.

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I'm naturally bossy, so it was the perfect role for me and he is not wrong.

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So there is that.

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We do industrial automation integration, so we're a full integration company.

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We started out in conveyance about 10 years ago.

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We moved into the robotics sector.

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We have a patented robotic box erector.

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We do a lot of end-of-line palletizing, case packing box making.

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We still do a lot of conveyance bowl feeders, stretch wrappers, you know, labelers, anything ancillary.

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So pretty much our customers would come to us and say I need a whole system and we would integrate every part of it if that's what they want.

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Or if they wanted parts or engineered parts, we do that too.

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So we are very flexible, as you ladies know.

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So whatever our customers ask us to do, that's what we do.

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And I've really seen since I've gotten to know you guys I guess over the last couple of years that you guys are very community minded, you're very open.

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You guys do videos you know, that are also hilarious, by the way like look up their social media.

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They realize that us engineers also like to have a laugh every once in a while and they're really good at that.

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But something I got the vibe from you guys is also that, hey, you're the experts at certain things and you work with a lot of other people yes, for the things that you may not be the experts at or the best fit or anything and I guess kind of just that is kind of the profile of people I'm drawn to working with in this industry and I just realized, before we started recording this, that we have like a ready pun with connector.

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I like to be a connector of people, right.

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Well, 40 years ago, when I started, you kind of had to know everything, right, we didn't have the internet, I mean, we didn't have computers, we didn't.

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We use the Thomas registers, which was like this big green set of books and you'd have to go and look things up and you'd have to call people and visit them or write them a letter.

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Right, we didn't have email.

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We didn't have, we didn't have any of the resources that we have available.

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So back then, to be in our industry, you had to know a lot about a lot of things.

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And now, fast forward 40 years, that's not really the case anymore.

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Now, collaboration is really the name of the game, and you don't have to reinvent the wheel every time.

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You know I don't have to know everything if I know somebody who does so.

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Using your resources is far more important in this day and age, and so it's really different.

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Things have changed a lot since when I first started.

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So I'm an industry vet, I suppose too 26 years in the connector industry and actually I find it Really heartening because surely in your applications you do have some connectors, but again, you don't have to be the expert in that, because we're surrounded at this booth by folks who are the expert in that and when you have a need there are people that you can go to and help you out with that, and I just think that's really cool.

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It is, and I'm really excited to get to know Harding as a company and find out more about your products, because I need to know just enough to be dangerous right.

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I need to know enough to get out there and let my customers know there's an advantage to a particular line.

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I don't need to be the expert because I'm going to call you in.

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You know I'm going to let you make me look like an expert.

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Right.

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So you know and that's what I like to do for people that work with us you know I like to make them look good on the portion of the project that I can provide for them.

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So it's all about supporting one another, collaboration and knowing how to use your resources 100%.

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Absolutely.

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And I think I see a parallel in this sense that you know it kind of used to be again you had to know everything in-house.

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You had to kind of have your own people do everything.

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You need to build up a team of W-2s and I mean it is a risky business.

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It is something that it's a struggle for small companies to grow, because there's an ebb and flow in systems integration, I'm sure, just like machine building.

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I mean, it is most definitely feast or famine and there are ebbs and flows in and, yeah, to have everything in house is not the most cost of effective solution.

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It's not what is best for your customers, you know.

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I mean to have a controls engineer on staff full-time and only have, you know, two or three projects for them to work on in a quarter.

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That's they're getting frustrated, right, because they're finding themselves doing things that are not what they're passionate about, and so it's it's best to have partnerships with companies like Ali's, you know, that can come in and can do that process control and they're good at it and that's what they focus on and that's what they're passionate about and it's what they love.

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And I don't have an unhappy, disgruntled employee who's just like when is our next controls project coming?

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You know this is really fun, but you you know, so having those relationships are are priceless really, and you can flex up and down based on your business right, with the seasons or big projects, you can get those partners to come sub for you or vice versa, right, and that's why you know we're not Ali and I are not experts at most things.

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Our, our combined experience, what we've been like 15 years or so, which is relative, it's a lot compared to some people.

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It's very little compared to what is out there and all the knowledge that people have and all the niches and you know we readily accept and are amazing, like it is an amazing resource for us to be able to learn from people that have all these niche experiences and specialized resources, as well as people that have just been around longer than us.

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Well, technology changes at such a rapid pace.

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You know the things that I used to know aren't relevant anymore, and so to stay relevant, you know you have to form relationships with people who have experience in these niches, because you know, technology is just moving at such a rapid pace that I can't even pretend to know.

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I learn something new every single day, and if I tried to tell you that I was an expert at anything, that would be a lie, because I'm an expert at nothing.

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You know I'm a facilitator, right, and so I try to connect people together.

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Back to your connection pun.

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You know and facilitate, yeah, and that, I think, is what we're all doing more of, especially as we move forward.

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And I think we are on the verge of the next industrial revolution and it is so cool that we all get to be a part of it.

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But it's a different transition, it's so different.

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Again, I don't want to beat the dead horse of how things have changed, but you can't be an expert at anything because everything is progressively changing every single day.

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With every next update software, there's something new you have to learn.

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There's a nuance.

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It would have to be finite for you to actually know it Exactly.

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And it won't be, and it never will be, and it's just not so.

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Having the opportunity to visit with you folks and to learn new things is something I'm really passionate about, because my customers kind of depend on me to have my eyes open and to you know, know a little bit about what's going on, to maybe make recommendations to them, yeah, and so it's important, I think, to come to these shows, to visit these booths, to talk to people, to form those relationships.

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And not just to scan a thousand people that came to your booth.

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Oh yeah, so you can spam them later.

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I know that companies have their metrics and the ROI for this type of stuff, but we were talking about this yesterday with Courtney Like, have those five in-depth?

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long conversations.

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Girl, I have 40,000 unread messages in my email, my inbox.

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I do not scan anybody that doesn't ask to be scanned, because you know that is sacred territory for me.

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If you send me an email, you better make that subject line count, because that's probably as far as it's gonna get.

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You know, I'm to just be, honest, it's so overwhelming right and everybody's like sending me emails and I don't micromanage my team and sure, if I see something cool I'll pass it to my engineering team.

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But I don't go down there and tell them hey, you need to spec this or you need to do this, you need to do that.

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I'd be very unpopular at that point.

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I don't get involved unless there's a reason that I need to be involved, and everybody's happier if there's no reason for me to be involved.

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You know everybody's happier if I'm sitting at my desk making TikToks and just doing those kinds of things.

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It's a much happier world for everyone, trust me.

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So, but yeah, I don't even know where we were going with this, because that's how this is going to work.

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I thought we were going to talk about your TikToks, my TikToks.

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Okay, yeah go ahead Like you know.

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How did you start that?

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Because you make amazing TikToks and everyone should come watch hers.

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But how did you get into that?

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Well, if you guys those of you that don't know me I'm old, right, and my daughter, lauren, aka the conve, she's my millennial we paid a company to do our B2B marketing, right, and we were making these really cool videos and they were just going out on YouTube and it's like crickets are watching them.

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And I was like something's just not right here.

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And so somebody said well, you know, if you really want to get videos out and people watch them, you need to have a TikTok.

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And my daughter was like not it, I am not doing it.

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And so me, being the elder Gen X, right, I miss Boomer by one year.

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So, um, I have a little bit of both tendencies, so I can kind of one foot in each world, right.

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So I decided, of course, I'll do the TikToks right.

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So I went out and I found myself a 12-year-old show me how and you know, reverse mentoring right there.

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And so I started making TikToks.

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And you know, the thing is, you can't be in this industry for 40 years and not have fun, right, and I'm at a point in my career where I want to enjoy.

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I didn't have that many more years left, right?

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You know, I tell customers that all the time Are we going to get this order before you know?

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I don't know how many years I got left.

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I'm going to move this along.

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We might want to expedite it.

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Great way to kill people.

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But it's true, you know you reach that certain age and it's like I don't know, I'm not going to be here indefinitely.

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We might need to close this job, right?

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Can we get this moving?

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But you know, I just started doing them and then I started sharing them to LinkedIn and I wasn't really sure what the reaction was going to be.

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And my TikToks, by the way, for the most part are application based.

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And my TikToks, by the way, for the most part are application-based.

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We do a lot of cool things at FlexLine and a lot of the coolest things unfortunately I don't get to show you because of NDAs.

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But you know, whenever I can, I like to get that stuff out there, give people some ideas of what's going on in the industry.

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And joy.

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And just to have fun and just have that.

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You know, know, 14 to 20 seconds of.

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You know she's an amazing song choice, right?

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I mean a lot of time into that.

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You know, choosing the right music's very important to me, very important so I have to say this conversation is amazing.

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We've covered the new Industrial Revolution and we've covered, we've covered.

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TikTok and how we need to use.

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TikTok.

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Yeah, and it works.

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It does.

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It's an important point and it's adapting the way you approach the market or your customers, or how you provide information.

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Yes, and being open to change.

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Something like 47% of Gen Z make their purchasing decisions based on social media.

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That's a big number, right?

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That's a lot, and you have to meet people where they are.

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Oh yeah, you know.

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So we still do some print ad for for my boomer friends.

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They're not changing where they're going for their information.

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And that's how they like it and you have to appreciate that.

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But really, when I started looking into the marketing and seeing the generational differences, it's really very stereotypical, you know.

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And being a Gen X, I kind of feel like we're like the universal buyers yeah Right, yeah right we are.

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So I look at our marketing like what would I watch?

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You know, what would compel me to make a decision?

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Because I kind of feel like I am the typical customer, right, you know?

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And so I try to make my content based on what I would be attracted to and throw in a little bit for the younger and a little bit for the older.

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It's like sometimes I'll use like an old song, you know yeah, I can relate.

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And some of the, you know, the newer stuff.

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So it's and you do.

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You have to reach across all of the generations right now in our industry, but the younger kids, that's how they're making their decisions.

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So you have to get your product out there and that's the best way.

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And TikTok, you know it has been very beneficial.

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Our web traffic jumped 300% after I started making TikToks, which is really crazy for just TikTok, right it's crazy, it's amazing.

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But what it's doing is it's bringing in an audience that's catching you and your TikTok and it's gaining.

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They thought there was something there, right.

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And then they go to your website to check if you're credible, if you really are a company behind this fun woman on TikTok, right?

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Yes, and then maybe they watch one of your boring B2B videos, exactly To make sure you really got the chops right.

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You're not a one hit wonder sensation on TikTok that doesn't really know anything, yes, but all of those layers build the story, yes, and it brings a lot of people through a different front door than maybe the ones that you had were able to open through those other channels.

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But it is a tricky time to be alive because you got to be in all of them.

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Relationships are so different.

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Before I would make physical calls, sales calls to customers, right, and I would know them because I would make regular calls.

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I would know their wives' names or their kids or their pets, and right, and you formed those relationships.

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And then, you know, times change.

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Covid comes along and now it's not go visit people face-to face anymore.

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So if you want to build relationships now you have to do it through social media.

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You know it's the same concept as a physical visit, but you're doing it via social media.

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Speaking of kind of building relationships, and I think what you guys do is so cool to bring you know us together.

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What you guys do is so cool to bring us together, and I would love to understand more about what your industry needs.

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You know how, and not even having the connector piece of it, but in understanding what you need or what your customers need, then we can design products or point you to products that complement that.

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Then we can design products or point you to products that complement that.

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So that's, I think, this relationship, this conversation, all of that.

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I think it's very important.

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It is, and I mean, I would like give me your best 14-second TikTok delivery.

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I mean, what message would you want me to have?

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Okay, so Harding is a gold standard of connectivity.

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No, we focus on again addressing your pain points, your needs.

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We know that a connector isn't.

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You're not building a product around a connector, as I said this before last time.

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You're building a product that does something.

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And if we, our product, can complement that, whether it's by reducing size and weight, whether it's by adding functionality, whether it's by making it more robust so you can use it in different environments, that's what we do to make your life and your product better.

00:19:20.404 --> 00:19:26.178
Don't undersell yourself, because there's nothing more frustrating than a broken pin in a connector.

00:19:26.178 --> 00:19:32.756
Right Right, it can cause a huge issue.

00:19:32.756 --> 00:19:35.240
So what you're doing is really relevant.

00:19:35.240 --> 00:19:36.872
First of all, I want to throw that out there.

00:19:36.872 --> 00:19:46.189
Don't ever just say, well, we just do connectors, because if anybody out there has ever had to troubleshoot and that's been what it is that's probably like the last place.

00:19:46.189 --> 00:19:52.515
You're looking as you go through everything else in a system and Allie knows how time-consuming that is.

00:19:52.515 --> 00:19:54.667
So it's not just a connector.

00:19:54.667 --> 00:19:57.372
I mean, having the gold standard of connectors is awesome.

00:19:58.012 --> 00:20:02.058
Absolutely, absolutely, and I don't mean to be tongue-in-cheek about it.

00:20:02.058 --> 00:20:02.920
It's very important.

00:20:02.920 --> 00:20:11.407
We want to think about that kind of thing so you don't have to worry about that thing.

00:20:11.407 --> 00:20:23.540
And if a pin is damaged, we want to make it as quick and easy to replace as I don't want to use the word seamless, because we talked about that earlier but just as convenient and as less disruptive.

00:20:23.540 --> 00:20:24.622
Maybe that's a way to do it.

00:20:33.365 --> 00:20:37.359
Yeah, I think some of the plug-and-play things that you're bringing to market are really helping in that instance and making it easier to troubleshoot.

00:20:37.359 --> 00:20:38.723
That's always a big thing.

00:20:38.723 --> 00:20:45.278
But you know, connectivity, you guys do it so well that that's usually never a problem.

00:20:45.278 --> 00:20:51.497
So it is an afterthought, and I find that in my business and marketing too, conveyors are always an afterthought.

00:20:51.497 --> 00:20:59.272
You know, everybody thinks about all of the rest of it, oh, and then all of a sudden is oh heck, how are we going to get this product from point A to point B?

00:20:59.272 --> 00:21:03.494
Well, how are we going to, you know, get this information?

00:21:03.515 --> 00:21:04.616
from point A to point B.

00:21:05.205 --> 00:21:06.230
So it's very similar.

00:21:06.230 --> 00:21:07.153
Yeah, agreed.

00:21:07.684 --> 00:21:14.816
And now you're going to be looking for and thinking about connectors a whole lot more than you did in the past 100%.

00:21:15.729 --> 00:21:22.005
If you and your customers now start to think about them more or have questions, now you know who to call, which is Ed and the folks over here.

00:21:22.005 --> 00:21:45.175
So that's really what I love about this and actually also want to give a big shout out and I think I've done it almost every time, hopefully today to Amanda, who set this up this lounge for us to have these conversations here and to be able to have these conversations and connections, and the fact that we just did this whole recording and did not talk about decentralization of conveyance at all, and that is what we love about doing this.

00:21:45.376 --> 00:21:48.134
I mean, I mean obviously we, we certainly can.

00:21:48.515 --> 00:21:54.132
Well, I think we should save that conversation for another time, because we are about uh, done on, okay.

00:21:54.613 --> 00:21:57.157
And connectors can help with that and connectors can.

00:21:57.157 --> 00:21:57.679
They can.

00:21:57.679 --> 00:21:59.893
Connectors are going to make that happen right.

00:22:00.065 --> 00:22:00.547
In the future.

00:22:00.606 --> 00:22:04.805
that's where it's going to be and I'll tell you that is going to be on my radar more going forward.

00:22:04.805 --> 00:22:10.855
So probably when we have that conversation, I will probably sound a whole lot smarter on it.

00:22:10.855 --> 00:22:23.893
So it's probably good that we didn't talk about that today, because you know that really was not a topic that I have a lot of experience, familiarity, full disclosure but it is something I would love to learn more about.

00:22:24.513 --> 00:22:59.980
That's why we love being a part of your circle, being, you know, looking to you as women in the industry, just somebody as open and collaborative as you are, in a position of leadership in the industry, just it means a whole lot to the two of us, I think, allie and I you know I can speak for her on that point, Thank you, and a lot of other ladies that we know, and so you gals are very inspiring to me and it has been a blessing to be a part of your circle and I am very grateful for that and thank you, and it has been a pleasure to do this recording and I look forward to learning more about that topic and more about connectors.

00:23:00.019 --> 00:23:06.666
I mean, I'm definitely going to get my badge scanned before I leave here and you guys will be catching up as old friends next time, I'm sure.

00:23:07.749 --> 00:23:09.992
And then we also uh, we owe you.

00:23:09.992 --> 00:23:12.419
We need to reschedule you guys on the live show.

00:23:12.419 --> 00:23:16.305
I think we might have already done that actually yeah, I think we did.

00:23:16.305 --> 00:23:19.074
I think it's coming up sometime here in the next month or two.

00:23:19.074 --> 00:23:24.498
I'm not sure we are all kind of in like we'll get to all of that after Automate right.

00:23:24.806 --> 00:23:28.352
Lots of things waiting until after Automate All of these are tomorrow me problems.

00:23:28.352 --> 00:23:30.547
I'm still focusing on today me problems.

00:23:31.188 --> 00:23:35.471
Okay, so we will sign off from today at day two at Automate 2024.

00:23:35.471 --> 00:23:37.814
We've had a blast.

00:23:37.814 --> 00:23:38.994
Thank you for having me.

00:23:38.994 --> 00:23:40.016
Thank you so much, Kathy.

00:23:40.757 --> 00:23:41.738
And thank you Ed.

00:23:41.837 --> 00:23:42.218
Thanks, Ed.

00:23:42.959 --> 00:23:44.240
Bye, bye-bye.