Taylor Harrington, Head of Community at Groove

Mar 29

Community is so important for individual businesses and brands alike. Community brings people together and create space for like minded folks to bounce off ideas, inspiration, and feel like they belong to something real. On the podcast, I have Taylor Harrington, Head of Community at Groove (an awesome app for creatives to co work together from home).

listen

watch

join the groove app

read

Kelly B.: Hi everyone, it's Kelly Bennett and this is kicking off a new season of Creative Direction with Kelly Bennett Podcast and I have a really special guest, someone who I really just enjoy talking with. We've had coffee together, met at a creative mornings, and someone who's super creative and helping creatives be more creative. Taylor Harrington is here. She is the head of community at Groove App, which is we'll get into, but totally you're gonna wanna join this app. And Taylor, I just really appreciate you being here. Welcome.

Taylor H.: I'm so excited for this conversation. Thank you.

Kelly B.: Me too.

Taylor H.: It's like I feel like we keep seeing each other in all of these creative spaces. And now here we are having a full conversation about creativity.

Kelly B.: I love it and I'm here for it and I'm excited. So thank you. So much. Um, I think, oh no, you're like my second. I was gonna say my first New York City, um, guest, but second.

Taylor H.: So that's second. That's sounds cool.

Kelly B.: I, that's also a goal of mine this year is to have more local creatives on my podcast and like reengaging with the local creative community here. So thank you for kicking it off for 2023. I really appreciate it.

Taylor H.: Of course, anytime. Happy to be a New Yorker.

Kelly B.: Perfect.

Taylor's background being involved with communities

Kelly B.: Yes. So let's talk about a little of your background, because, what, remember last time we got coffee, you were telling me about your career path and I was really taken by it. It just sounded really exploratory and curious and the way that you approach things and also how your experience now in tech. So how did you craft your career and what did you think it was gonna be in the beginning and where are you landing now? Like I would love to hear a little more of the behind the scenes.

Taylor H.: Totally happy to. And it's funny if all of us were in a room, all of your listeners, at the same time, it would be like everyone raising your hand. Who has had a wavy, wacky career path. And I,

Kelly B.: Oh my God.

Taylor H.: I feel like all of the listeners would be like, yes,

Kelly B.: everybody. Yes, both my hands would be up.

Taylor H.: Yes. Probably moving around dancing a little bit. I have always been a creative human. I've always loved doing things differently. I was back, you know, we're going a little bit farther back, but back in high school I knew that I wanted to go to college, but I knew that I wanted to do it differently than what was on a brochure. I knew I wanted to check the boxes of going to class and having a major, but I really knew that the things that I wanted to do were the projects outside of the classroom. So, ended up going to Penn State University, which is the biggest campus. You've got 45,000 undergrad students. and on just the main campus, but 90,000 across all over their campuses. And it's got the largest alumni network.

So that to me said two things when I was choosing a college. It said there are a ton of people here that I can meet, which as you said, I love community. I love meeting new people. And I also thought, ‘Wow, if there's such a big campus with such a student body, there's gotta be cool stuff that I can get involved with here that can help really elevate that learning experience that happens inside of the classroom in college.’

Without getting too far into it, I worked on a bunch of different student startups. You know, talking about creativity. I worked in a craft studio my senior year of college, which was so fun. And it was really a fun experience there because it started as me just raising my hand. I loved going to this craft studio and said like, ‘Hey, any chance I can work at the front desk?’ and it turned into, over the course of two semesters, me helping to lead the workshops that were there. So they had, you know, Ladies Night on Thursdays where all the moms in the local area would come in and have a glass of wine and paint a picture together. And I would tell them how to do that or they would have sorority gatherings that would happen, or, they would have preschoolers that come in for finger paintings. They hit all different types of things. And, when I look back on it now, it really was quite a “a-ha” moment for me that I enjoyed gathering people for a shared purpose and bringing people together who had similar values and wanted to create a special experience for them from the moment they walked in the door to the moment that they left and even came home with whatever that masterpiece was that they made. And one thing led to another, and I had heard two about the opposite of loneliness, which was a speech given by someone named Marina Keegan. back in 2012, and I like to say that I'm on a mission to create the opposite of loneliness in the world now.

I found this speech years ago, but it basically says that there's not really a good word for the opposite of loneliness. It's this feeling it's not quite love and it's not quite community. It's just this feeling that they're an abundance of people who are in this together, who are on your team. And so that's the definition that Marina shares. And I thought, you know, I didn't really have the, quite the words for it at that stage as I'm graduating from college, but I loved Marina's words and thought, God, I, I love connecting people.

And I also, like I said, had some exposure to that entrepreneurship world, that creative wavy path. And eventually through sharing that I love connecting with people and that I wanted to keep doing that and being around the type of people that were doing things differently. It led to my first conversation where I met Seth Godin, who's a bestselling author, and so workshop leader and entrepreneur. And so we had a conversation. He had an open position at the studio, which was in Hastings on Hudson, New York, so right outside of New York City. It was a team of what became six in person at, at the small studio office. It really was an apartment building that was turned into, or an apartment. An apartment that was turned into a really cool office space. I had reached out through a mutual connection and had one conversation, which led to me working with him while in college and then eventually after college coming on full-time to work in that Hastings on Hudson office.

And so the first two years of my career were spent really working with those creative humans who were doing things differently.

Kelly B.:Like super creative. Yeah. I mean, he's like one of the top. You know, pioneers, so to speak, of doing things differently. So what a cool job right out of the gate.

Taylor H.: Yeah. And you know, he attracted so many people to the workshops and his readers, of course, that identify as what he calls lynchpins, of those people who aren't cogs in the system. They are trying to be someone who, stands out and is irreplaceable. And so through the workshops and the alumni that we host, or the online workshops we host, and all the alumni that came with that I was surrounded by so many cool, interesting people virtually or in person. And, fast forward two years, um, the company changed quite a bit. Seth stepped away from the company. He still writes books and has, you know, other things that he works on, other cool projects. But the company changed a little bit and it had me have this pause of, okay, what do I wanna do next? And I thought, let me take the digital marketing that I was doing at the time.

So that's what my title was, was Director of Digital Market. and let me figure out what I really loved about that. And it came down to the community piece of it, which was about 20% of my job if I had to put a percentage on it. And I said, how could I do that 100% of the time? And as I started to kind of go through this process, which was absolutely messy and wavy of figuring out what I wanted to do next and where I wanted to work and what was aligned with that, I ended up finding Groove at just like the perfect time when I was having aha moments and realizing what I really wanted. and I saw it on a website, on angellist.com, which has a lot of awesome startups. And I, I reached out to the founder right away and I was like, oh my gosh. If I could have written a job description like this would be it. When can we start?

Kelly B.: What were some things in the description that really caught your eye?

Taylor H.: It was, it was the people, I think, in the process of realizing that I wanted to do community. I had a really tough moment in that job process of finding things out where I was interviewing a bunch of different companies and something wasn't feeling right, like in my gut. You know that feeling when you're like, I'm sort of far down a path. But then you're like, I have enough time that I could turn back around if I really needed to. I was there and I was in the final stages of an interview. and it just wasn't feeling right. This wasn't a group, this was at a different company. And I realized that the reason it didn't feel right was the people.

If I was going to be leading a community, it wasn't the people that I was like amped up to be around. And for transparency, that group of people were people who didn't really wanna be there. It was their boss had signed them up to be a part of that community. And I realized that just wasn't the group I wanted to be around. And so there were a couple of other communities that weren't quite that. They weren't the group I wanna be around. And I was like, God, I wanna be around those creatives. I wanna be around the people building businesses who have passion projects, who are building podcasts, who were writing books, all of those creative humans. And when I had that clarity and gratefully, you know, I very nicely had a little bit of time to figure that out and then take that leap, it felt like Groove landed in my lap, like the moment that I needed it too. It was, it was pretty crazy.

Kelly B.: It's really cool to hear and have that confirmation, cuz I'm sure someone listening to this is on that path of trying to put their finger on what exactly they want. And what it sounds like is that you were self-aware enough to know what was starting to feel good, but really what wasn't starting to feel good. and allowing yourself that time and space to pivot a bit so that you could really be like, no, this is really what I want. And then was able to attract that opportunity.That's awesome.And that's definitely a skill that takes time to refine. So thank you for sharing that because that is a huge takeaway of just trusting yourself to even do that and not forcing something on yourself just to say yes to something. because you could.

Okay, so you joined, so you got hired at Groove. Yes. And. I think it's really cool cuz your title is Head of Community, right?

Taylor H.: It is, yeah. And I was the first full-time hire there, so it was just me and two founders, which is so cool .

Kelly B.: Which is so cool that they were like, community is so important. Exactly.

Taylor H.: It means a lot to them.

Taylor’s Approach on Community Through Groove

Kelly B.: Yeah. And so from my perspective of just my experience in marketing, community is such a big piece of it, and it's something that a lot of brands struggle to find how to implement community because with bigger brands it feels so vast and like you don't have a personal connection with the brand. And then smaller businesses, I think often overlook community because they feel like they have to be bigger in order to build a community. So how did you start approaching community from, you know, being the first hire at this app company and like your perspective and like just the co-founder's perspective of like, okay, we're starting this thing where they already started, here's, here's our approach on community. I would love to hear your take on it.

Taylor H.: Yeah, totally. So when I joined the team, there were only 23 people on the Groove app. So it was mostly the, uh, it, the founders, the freelancers they were working with at the time. Uh, family and friends and a few investors, and a couple, like, like I said, a couple of family and friends. And so those things, the initial Groovers who, like you were like I joined the team and I'm like, okay, gotta get up to speed and know who these people are because they're really our first members. Listen, the moment that I joined that team, I spent the first month. I remember talking to Josh, our CEO and co-founder, and he very much supported and [00:12:00] encouraged me to just. Take the first four weeks of this job and listen as much as I can see how people are already using the product. Cuz 23 was the day I started, but of course, four weeks into it, more and more people started joining.

Kelly B.: Sure.

Taylor H.: Especially, you know, I announced like, Hey, I've got a new job. I came from a Kimbo and Allt mba, which had a lot of awesome alum alumni, so they came over to try it out. And so it was trying to build up that initial audience and so I really was listening, but it was a cool thing that I had already been connecting with people in my life that this could work for. And so it was an easy ask or an easy transition for them to say, ‘Oh, Taylor just moved jobs. This sounds interesting. Why don't I hop in?’ And so a lot of those initial Groovers were either people that I was connected to or my teammates were connected to, and that ripple effect of them then referring their friends.

So I do think there's a great lesson in there of. Start with your core group. There's a great book I have on my shelf behind me called, the “Two Hour Cocktail Party”. It's written by a guy named Nick Ray and he talks about how if you were gonna host a cocktail party, instead of just like telling the entire world show up at my apartment on this date, like I'm having a cocktail party. He talks about getting enrollment from the first six people so that. No one else shows up to the cocktail party. You've got your core six people that are gonna show up. No doubt about it, they're gonna be there. And I think about that with community a lot. If someone's listening and they're looking to start a community, figure out who your core group is, whatever that number needs to be for it to still be successful. Whether it's starting a virtual event for that community. Let's say you have some sort of a marketing company and you wanna teach other marketers how to do something. Would the zoom call that you're hosting be successful if six people showed up? If so, get your six yeses and then blast it out to everyone to start building up that community from beyond that.

so that's one tip I would have with it. The other thing I'll say is I think community means a lot of different things. It's such a buzzword now. And so there's, as you mentioned, there are like these different size companies that are trying to include community. And one of the things that's interesting about Groove is because it is an app where naturally, The community is the core of the experience. You are hopping into a co-working experience. And we'll talk about that more, but, there's no way to build Groove without community being at the center. Whereas other companies, you look at, a lot of people will point to Sephora, for example, as a huge company that does have a community. They have their beauty insiders community. I wouldn't say that that beauty insiders community is like super, super connected, but there is some sort of like an online forum where they can talk about their favorite products and they get benefits from being a part of that. So it really depends on what are you looking to build. And two of the key questions I learned working with Seth that are just like grilled into my brain , um, are, who is it for and what's it for? And if you can answer both of those questions clearly, then you can build something really intentionally. and that's how I approach anything I do at Groove with Community. Whether it's building a new feature, whether it's hosting. As you know, we host these goal planning parties every month.

Kelly B.: Which is great

Taylor H.: Thank you.

Kelly B.: You're welcome. I love them.

Taylor H.: I just hosted one today and as I've hosted more and more of them the answers to those two questions has become clearer and clearer, and so that makes it easier for me to make decisions about, what to send in the follow up email, how to get people excited about coming, those types of things.

So you're not gonna, you're not gonna have the perfect answers to those two questions before you start your community or before you start that community project, but have a, have enough of a reason of like, oh, okay, this is gonna be refined, but I know I can answer those questions a little bit because it'll make your decision making a heck of a lot.

Kelly B.: I love this so much. I already took so many notes because another thing that you just touched upon was starting and then you're going to be able to refine it. So many creatives that I work with when I ask different questions like, what does the community look like and who are you building this for? Looking at a different product or service and they're not sure. A lot of them are usually saying like, oh my gosh, I should already know this. Or like, oh, I'm sorry, I don't, and I'm like, this is why we talk it through. So that you have the confidence to even test and to explore and to experiment so that you can find these answers and just keep refining the answers cuz things can shift, things can change. Business is never set in stone completely. Especially when you're working with people, right? Yes. And so I'm really glad that you talked about starting and then refining it each time you did it and having the awareness of like, okay. This is probably going to need some refining, and that's a good thing. I'm always learning from each time. I host it. I'm always taking notes of what's working, what's not working, and I'm just drilling this down more and more. So then now you're getting super clear on what that community looks like. What is it? Who is it for? Then you could really start growing it because you're so clear on what that solid group is. And it's so much easier to market that versus just trying to cast a wide net and seeing who comes to you. So I'm really glad that you said that.

Taylor H.: Well, and you know, I think two more things on this is, I'll say, I was just talking to a friend who is a financial planner, so he helps people one-on-one, plan out their finances and he's looking at creating a workshop. And so I, I had said to him like, all right, let's go through some of these questions. Okay. Like, he, he, it seems like this big scary project right now. But when you start to get clear about it, it's like, well, if you had to write a couple of sentences of who this is for, you know who this is for, like, don't doubt yourself, you know who this is for. You've been working with people that this is for, for the last X number of years. I feel confident you know the answer. And sometimes it's just having someone like repeat that back to you. That's really helpful. And also, you know, really figuring out. You don't, or I guess really leaning into the fact that you don't need to have all the answers right away, and you're not going to. So let's just embrace that because he was like, well, how much should I charge? And I'm like, well, what would you be proud of charging? And like, what would you be really excited if, if you charged certain amounts? So he threw out a number. And I said, do you think that someone would pay that? And he said, well, now I don't know. You know, that was just my dream number. And I said, well, why don't you ask people, you're talking to people, ask people tell them that this is the thing that you're starting and this is the price. And just start before you make it official. You can have a time where you're kind of like almost beta testing the idea and putting feelers out there, seeing who's interested. You don't need to make promises, but you're able to just put out feelers.

And then the other thing related to this that I wanted to add fear, you know, fear comes up when we talk about building a new project. And I was working with a coach. when I was working at a Kimbo, I took one of the workshops called the Altmba. It's a 30 day workshop and you're matched up with a coach during that program. And the coach had reflected back to me, in a conversation about fear. She said, Taylor, if you were in a car with fear, where would your fear be? Let's say you're driving on the road and fear is in the car with you. Where, where is it? She's like, is it driving the car? Is it sitting in the passenger seat? Is it in the back? Is it um, in the passenger seat and it's trying to grab the wheel from you? Is it turning up the volume on your music? Is it in the back, like in the trunk? Where's the fear? And I just thought it was such a powerful image to give. It makes you question, where do I want fear in my life?

And so in those moments when you're going to start a new project and that fear creeps up, I like to say that fear is gonna be in the passenger seat. It's not allowed to touch the radio, not allowed to touch the steering wheel. But it can point me in a direction and I can be grateful to let for its directions for, you know. It tells me, Hey, I'm here. I'm glad I saw it because it usually shows up when something's important to me. Mm-hmm. and when I need to be a little bit careful. And so I'm glad it's there, but I also am still the one driving and I've got the wheel. So as you create a community project, think about where fear is showing up and be grateful that it is, because it probably means you're onto something.

What is Groove and how it works.

Kelly B.: Ooh Taylor, that was really good. I love, I love that so much, and I will be sending this to clients, be like, listen to this podcast, especially at whatever time that just was set. One, you're feeling the feels. Listen to that and keep listening to that. That was really good. And on that note, now you're in this new position, you're head of community, you're reaching out to your people, getting them on the app. You're, you're really stepping into this role. What has been helpful in cultivating this community? Like some things that just practically that you are doing that you. This has been really working for us or really working on building this creative community. Cuz if anyone doesn't know, can you give them just a little spiel of like, what is Groove? And then go back to how it works?

Taylor H.: Yeah. As Kelly mentioned, it's an app where you hop onto a 50 minute co-working session, so you just click the big ring button and you're matched up with one to three other people from around the world, and it's full of interesting, cool, creative humans. A lot of folks that are working from home, starting their own businesses, like I said, they're total projects, people who have long to-do lists and they gotta get some accountability on that stuff as they, as they conquer those to-dos. And so the main experience is hopping into those grooves. You can also go into a groove and privately groove with just a friend of yours. You can schedule a groove in advance. There's a few other features there. It's evolved over time and so it continues to be a way for us to connect people from all over the world who, for one reason or another are on these solo journeys working from home. Some of 'em are digital nomads hopping from place to place, and they don't have that physical community near them. Some of them are doing something different than a lot of their friends are doing, and they just want people to like cheer them on. So it's become really a community of cheerleaders, of people supporting each other on those wavy path journeys.

As far as. What have I been doing that's working and things I would share as tangible takeaways for someone else to implement. I would say one, as I mentioned before, listen, listen, listen, listen. Because people are willing to share their experiences. If you ask them good questions. If you leave a little bit of silence. We do a ton of research talking to Grover's face-to-face. Luckily for me, I'm hopping into groove sessions all the time. So sometimes at the end of a group session, I'll just like say, Hey, do you have one more minute? I had a quick question because I'm already in those sessions with them. So it's easy to grab that face-to-face time instead of scheduling on a calendar. But even just 10 minutes with a community member could teach you so much. I would also say do the things that aren't scalable as much as you can, because you're gonna wish that you did those non-scalable things. As you grow, because those are the things that are gonna make a big difference. And one day you're hopefully not gonna be able to do those things because it's so big.

So a good example of this is, we're recording this just a little bit after the holidays and last year in 2022. Well, I guess it was. 2021 going into 2022. I had sent out holiday gifts to all of our most active groovers, which at the time was, I don't know, like 60 people that were really active on the platform. And so I hand wrote everyone an individual card with a specific message because I knew those people. I really knew them. I listened and spent time with them. I hand packaged all these. I hand packaged all of these notebooks with these cute pens and it was like this groovy package. And I, as you mentioned, live in New York. So I had my little grandma grocery cart. And I loaded them up with my, um, packages and I went to the U S P S. I had to make three separate tips cuz I couldn't carry all of it. And at the end of it I almost, I was almost in tears because I was like, oh my gosh, this was such a big project and I'm never gonna do this again. But I loved doing it. It was just at the end it was like this emotional, like, oh my gosh, that was crazy. And it was crazy. Then, and I think it was emotional. I remember calling Josh, my c e o and boss and co-founder and saying like, that was a wild thing to do. And it felt wild at that time, but I think it was emotional knowing I could never do it again. I would never be able to hand write. I mean, we have so many users now. We have over a thousand users on the Groove app. There's no way I could hand write cards to everyone, right? And wish them a happy holidays. So while you have those moments where you can do those non-scalable things, do them this year. You know, a year later, like I said, we've got over a thousand people on the app. Instead of standing out these really individual holiday packages, we made these really cool graphics that reminded me of Spotify wrapped where anyone who had grooved five times, you got this like really cool wrap up of all of the things that you would accomplished and groove that year, how many people you had met. Really fun stats. And so that was our version of like the non-scalable thing, the way that we did that and created those graphics this year. I will not be able to do that in four months. I won't be able to do that in a year because we'll continue to grow and the way that I did it wasn't scalable. So if you can do those things from the early days. I think that they make such a big impact cuz people know that they're not scalable.

Kelly B.: Totally. And I'm, again, I'm so happy you said that because that is something that means a lot to me when I receive things like that. And also, I did something this past year, I did a presale of my new book. And I packaged everything myself, and I wrote notes in all the books. And my girlfriend, she was helping me and she was like, you, you know, this isn't scalable. She's a, she's a director of ops.

Taylor H.: She knows what's up.

Kelly B.: Yeah. And I was like, no, I know. And so, and I had a very similar emotional feeling. I was like, wow, I'm never gonna be able to do this again. Like It was insane. Thank God she helped me because we went into the post office, like with bags.

Taylor H.: It was like Santa's workshop over here.

Kelly B.: Yeah. No, same in my tiny New York City apartment. And it was something that like I knew I was never going to be able to do that again. , but it felt so good. That I was able to really support the community that kicked it all off. And so I love that and that really resonate. That just was me a few weeks ago. So thank you for saying that. And the way that you articulated it really helps me put words to what I was feeling, cuz I was like, why am I feeling so emotional about this? But that totally makes sense. Like that moment will never happen again.

How do people get involved with Groove?

Kelly B.: With that said, building a community, there was so much great advice in here. If people, not, if I know, people are gonna, people are gonna wanna groove, how do they find the groove? How do they start grooving? Yeah, like how does it work? Because I would say the, one of the number one things with all the creatives that I work with who are building their small businesses, making it a consistent practice to work on just their business and not necessarily always doing client or customer projects or, you know, fulfilling orders if it's service or product base, but really working on their own goals and keeping accountable to that groove is a Great solution. I've told many clients about it already. So how does someone get started. To start? Get in the groove?

Taylor H.: I know. It's so groovy to talk about.

Kelly B.: I love, I love the, I really love the name.

Taylor H.: Yeah. I was not a part about the, uh, I was not a part of that decision at all. Um, but like, groove, groover, grooving, I'm like, yes, we're, and all of it. And then people will say like, oh, I really got in a groove. And then we're all like, Ha ha. You just used it .

Kelly B.: Yeah, no, I love it.

Taylor H.: Yeah. Cool. Well, we'll put the link into the show notes and that way everyone can hop in. It's super easy. And just sign up right away and you'll be in the app and it'll be, um, yeah, quick and easy.

Kelly B.:So they download the app and then walk us through of how to do your first groove. Because I remember my first groove, you were so nice and like you, were part of it and it made me feel comfortable, cuz I'm actually pretty introverted. So even showing up to new spaces digitally sometimes gives me anxiety. So it was so nice to like see your face there, but if someone's just starting for the first time and they don't know anybody, yet, I've already connected with some people that I've met through the Groove app, which was really cool. How do you do it? So you're, you're working on your business, it's like maybe a Monday, and you're like, okay, I have a lot of shit to do. I need to stay accountable. A good co-working session would sound really good right now? W hat do they do next?

Taylor H.: Yeah, so there's a big green button on the home screen. You can just click that and that'll bring one to three other people into that groove with you. You know what, I think what you just said about like, that stranger danger of like, who am I gonna meet on here is the question we hear from so many new groovers. And so we're launching new features as we speak. By the time that this podcast comes out, they might even be live. And some of them have to do, you know, with exactly what I had just said of. You're gonna laugh. One of the new features that we just created is, we're joking, it's called Virtual Taylor. And basically, oh my gosh. It's like hilarious. I'm like, I better win an award for my performance in this, but basically the idea is when you hop into the Groove app and this will come out in the next month or so people will have the option to either hop into their first groove or do a test groove with virtual Taylor.

So I pre-recorded this video walkthrough that's very similar to the experience that I had given you, where I'm like, Hey, Taylor from New York City here. I'm not actually here right now, but this is how Groove works. I'm, I'm gonna show you over the next -

Kelly B: Oh, I love that.

Taylor H.:Oh, it's really cool cuz then while you're in, so there's a lot of structure to the Groove app where when you get into that first video chat, Someone has the mic, which is great because you've got a pink box around you. Someone's got the mic. It means that it's time for them to go first and share what they're up to for the next 50 minutes. Then it says pass the mic. So in the virtual Taylor session, I will pass the mic to you, whoever's listening. And then I'll give you the chance to like practice saying out loud what a goal is that you have for that session. and then you'll click the button that says Start work. Once that start, Burke button has been clicked, we go off of video, off of audio. t's time to actually focus and get stuff done. You'll see a to-do list where you can add anything that you wanna get done during those 50 minutes. Um, cross things off as we're accomplishing them. Cheer each other on in that written chat we're in. And then at the very end, you click a button to come back on video, regroup and share how it went. So with virtual Taylor, you're, you're able to walk through that whole experience in just three minutes, but like I said, a normal group session is 50 minutes long with a couple of minutes, uh, at the beginning for the video chat, and a couple minutes at the end for the video chat.

So I think that virtual Taylor will change the game for a lot of people. I am also grooving all the time. The team's grooving all the time. You'll see if you click on anyone's profile how many times they grooved. So it does feel good when you are looking and someone has already started a groove. Maybe you're not feeling up for creating your own quite yet, but you see someone else just started groove and that person has 231 grooves under their belt, and you might be like, you know what? They know what they're doing around here. I'll go ahead and join them. So you can do that.

And then the other thing that we're building right now that again will be live pretty soon is something called spaces. So I feel like your audience would love this. The idea is to have private spaces inside a groove for people with shared identities, for people, who work certain, certain fields, habits. So for example, . If you're like, okay, I need to be rocking my Mondays, or I need to be getting my, my mornings going. You could be a part of a, a space that's specific to people who are getting their day started. So then you can start a groove and the only people that will be joining you are people also getting their day started. Or if you're a writer and you wanna join, I love that. The writer's space. Yeah. You can go ahead and just be matched up just with writers. So you're welcome to join the other ones, to join one with everyone, to join, one with just friends that you might know on the app already. And of course, like I said, these spaces features are coming out soon, so we're always building new features and addressing those types of questions and comments because you're not alone in thinking that so many people are.

Kelly B.: No. I, I think that all sounds really good. I'm really excited about the spaces.

Taylor H.: I know. Me too. A game changer.

Kelly B.: Yeah, I really love that. And also I'm thinking too, I would love to use it for people who are in my incubator, could be like, meet me at Groove on this day. Or, you know what I, yeah. Something like that would be really cool. Okay. I'm in, I'm, I'm down. I'm down to do the spaces.

Taylor H.: Yeah. And also, of course, I'm happy to groove with any of your listeners, like if someone's listening. Oh, perfect. Like I wanna do a walk through with Taylor. You'll find me in the app. I send a little message to everyone that joins. We can do our own little private group together.

Kelly B.: I love it. Thank you so much, Taylor. This was awesome. You shared such great advice. Everything will be in the show notes and I was telling Taylor and everyone listening now. I wanna shift the, application of what people learn on this podcast because I'm bringing on such cool, interesting, inspiring, uh, people, but also I wanna make sure that people feel like they can apply it to what they're working on.

So stay tuned everyone. Next week we're gonna be talking about building community in your own creative small business. Based off of all the awesome advice Taylor just shared. and we'll make sure that you are getting your, uh, Groove app downloaded and start grooving and we could do it together, um, so that it feels approachable and doable because this is, these are small habits that we could start in our day-to-day life that really build up over time. And I love how this has intersected into community and also showing up for yourself because both are equally important. And I love applications that help do both. So thank you again, Taylor. Thanks to the Groove team, like you all are just doing something really cool and um, yeah, I'll see you very soon.

Taylor H.: Thanks for having me. Bye everyone.

Kelly B.: Bye!