Ep.35 – Talking About Hollywood, Personal Branding & So Much More With Nicole Russin-McFarland

Chris Bruno 0:00
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Hey everybody. Today’s episode is very different. It’s not my usual conversation one on one with a marketer or somebody within a marketing company. However, Nicole’s got some interesting views and interesting points. Nicole Russell McFarland is a Los Angeles based composer and director for films. She’s incredibly creative, very, very passionate, and she’s definitely driven to try and make her goals a reality. The one thing I want to focus on from this episode, though, is the personal branding side, the content creation side, what it takes to constantly create content at scale for a very high quality audience. I hope you enjoy the show. Like I said, it’s very different to what it usually would be, but I think you’ll still get some great nuggets from the show, and you’ll still get some great points and tips from Nicole. Enjoy. Nicole, thank you very much for joining me today on the podcast. Hello, it’s I’m actually really excited about this because this is very different to a lot of the guests that we’ve spoken to who are digital marketers or who are working in some form of sass product or platform that helps Marketers. You, on the other hand, have a very, very different story to tell. And I really look forward to get into this. So for everybody who hasn’t met you yet, or that doesn’t know anything about you. Can you give them the little elevator pitch or the introduction to yourself?

Nicole Russin-McFarland 3:31
I’m a film director and film score composer who wants to be a combination of Peter Jackson and Hans Zimmer working at a blockbuster level with live action animation and Oscar movies.

Chris Bruno 3:46
Okay, so that’s a big ambition. Yeah. So how did you get started in the film industry or, you know, composing for film scores and things like that.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 3:57
They hired myself because people were not hiring me. I had a film director when I was 20 take my theme that I sent from a basic kind of piano recording. And I just didn’t want to deal with that again. So I didn’t really have opportunities. So I just hired myself, maybe very small budget work.

Chris Bruno 4:19
What does that mean by high yourself, you created your own film.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 4:22
And I created my work. And I just had to learn about animation. I still learned about animation. So I’m like, I know everything. But I just began doing it. And it’s a process and I didn’t like some of my initial works. I just redid it. And it felt I could do better or make it more artistic.You know, improve upon it. And so

really, the first thing I did was I released pizza delivery. It was not the first film I started working on ironically, it’s just that I wanted to improve it and different things in this short film that looks like a 19 70s filmstrip people hadn’t held class. And it’s not about that it’s just has that look like a junkie? filmstrip and it’s about a snake eating pizza from steals a pizza and family hang England. Fantastic. Yeah.

Chris Bruno 5:18
Okay, so that’s one that definitely took go into the show notes. link to that afterwards.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 5:24
Oh, yeah, I have a YouTube channel where I put all my, my shorts and I’m going to put my two animated features on it hopefully this year, but you know, plans get in the way. That’s fine. Things take longer than you anticipate.

Chris Bruno 5:39
I think they invariably take longer than you anticipate No matter how much I plan for something to take X amount of time, it will usually pretty much always goes over. Yeah. So talk to me a little bit then about yourself from a from a branding point of view, because I’ve seen different channels and I’ve seen that all the content that you’re creating. You’re doing a huge amount of pretty much everything. I would say can you talk us through a little bit?

Nicole Russin-McFarland 6:03
Well basically I want people to know first before I get into what I do, you can never win because if you are pretending to be in there are many piece of advice people give one of them is be very highbrow be classy, be relatable, be vulgar be this. And if you’re being someone other than yourself, not only is a very difficult, but it doesn’t work. And I have tried all those things like I have pretended to over the years. And I would create an Instagram account for let’s pretend to be wild or let’s pretend to be highbrow and very studious or whatever it may be doesn’t work. So I just kind of act like myself. And you know, I have pad pictures or things that I’m doing or just in addition to work, I share whatever I naturally want to share as they like yesterday comic book about sake getting together with another snake. It’s not a comic book. It’s a little joke. It’s a meme. And I thought it was funny. So I put it online. It’s it’s not vulgar. It’s not highbrow it’s kind of in the middle. You know, very, I don’t know what you call everyday humour. So that’s an example, I guess, I think I’m somewhere in the middle. I don’t want to be too vulgar, as is the direction many people go in to be relevant on social media. But I also don’t want to be so highbrow like some of these brands where they don’t write back to people where they only, you know, they want people to think they sit around and, you know, gold all day long and only more diamonds to go take a bath. You know, there are people like that, trust me. And they only, they only eat on Rodeo Drive, and it’s not the case with me. So that’s where I’m coming from. And my advice to people is don’t fake anything because you won’t win you will not become rich, or successful, pretending to be someone you are not. Even though it’s 10th Because you see other people doing it, it’s not going to work for you. But I just trying to get out there. I mean, I have a YouTube channel, which you think that being on amazon prime, you would get more attention. But actually an Amazon Prime I don’t find the right audience. For some of the cartoons for some of the interviews I’ve done that I post on there I do. But for some of the cartoons I attract, like, I look up the people reviewing them. They’re not my target audience and then they write one star reviews like nobody. There’s a person who wrote in America one star review on a cartoon I did called Martians take Belfast, which actually has real scenes filmed in Belfast mixed with a cartoon, kind of a comic strip looking cartoon. And the woman was when I say not my target audience, I looked up the woman reviewing it. I don’t know if it’s IMDb or Amazon, one of those two. If it’s the same person, and she’s hold, you know, like, what is this? This is stupid, whatever. And then if you would only read the description Martians take Belfast. It’s a retro cartoon about Martians landing in Belfast, of course, it’s going to be silly as animation, of course, it’s going to be silly. And then she wrote a view review how upset she was that it was silly. You know, it’s ridiculous. So on YouTube, I find the right audience. So that’s a good thing. And more of an audience.

Chris Bruno 9:20
I was just going to ask because it’s quite interesting, because it’s a short film. I’ve got your YouTube channel up as well. It’s a short film. So it’s like under 12 minutes. So it’s not like, you know, it’s something that she had to sit through or for, you know, for two and a half hours, right.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 9:37
Jimmy, how it had retro clips of alien movies within it. And I was going to say it’s a whole little tribute to old science fiction movies made on a very low budget with some silly footage from Belfast from, you know, actually going to a farm in Belfast and real animals. And also a friend of mine. Did we mixed it so looks like he’s in Belfast, but he’s actually on a farm in Springfield, Illinois in America. And he plays this retro anchorman like a Ron Burgundy and it’s just silly for you know, it’s for young adults. It’s not, I wouldn’t say for children, but you know, very silly South Park. Not even except that it doesn’t curse or anything. It’s just you know what you’re in for. You’re going to watch it and on YouTube people understand that but on Amazon Prime I run into problems like people who would rather watch reality programming but Katie Price or Real Housewives and then instead of watching my work and getting upset that it’s not reality TV about women yelling at people I mean, of course not. It’s not that so that’s one other thing sometimes my piece of advice could be a find your audience and you don’t know your you you don’t all you knows you have not found your audience. That’s all you know right now. But you have to keep trying until you do. At least some people who like your work. And that’s for any business owner, not only with films I mean, it could be say that you have commercials about your business. If they aren’t working, just find another means of promoting yourself because you just have to try. And I did have a podcast. I have a personal one and they had want to share with some other people. It’s more about acting tips, directing tips, things like that. called House of film. I do have an Etsy story share with them. Also, we have a fundraiser for Women in Film. Um, they have an apple news section, the tied to my website blog. So I have some interviews with people on there. And it’s interesting, because very much like YouTube versus amazon prime prestige doesn’t always win. So you would think, with Google that I would get many hits on my website. And again, it’s very unpredictable, but an Amazon Prime, I mean, sorry to con apple. I do very well and it’s It’s very unpredictable with the content that does well. But I always do well. Actually, I had my best year last year with the amount of readers landing on it. It’s just one of those things that many people in any profession, look at things like is this going to give me branding and prestige in a name? And indeed it does. But it doesn’t give you the audience or the numbers he wants to see. So why do I care? That say 50 people watch my cartoon on amazon prime. And some of them don’t like it because it’s not a reality programme, versus me getting thousands of people on YouTube or thousands of people on Apple news with an article like say, if 25,000 people read an article, for instance, there was a recent article I have it did really well with Randy fault from NECA toys who does all the movie toys and action figures and everything. He’s not Brad Pitt, but his article did really, really well. I remember the exact number like 15,000 or something that many people read it on Apple news last year, that versus me just having a standalone website and say that 350 people been I’m not even joking. Guillermo del Toro shared it online on his Twitter account. And something like 350 400 people came in from the Twitter version. But people found it on their own without anybody sharing it on Apple news, like by the thousands. And that’s something that people have to consider, you know, prestige versus numbers. I don’t know where to go from here. This is very conversational in this podcast. And if you’re like him just

Chris Bruno 13:39
know it’s good. It’s I think, to be honest with you, again, it’s giving people an insight into what actually happens and what really happens behind the scenes. Right. And funnily enough, you know, we were talking about this just before we went live and we started recording, but too many people are focused on the, the magic or the overnight success or the pretence of, of you know, I’ve made it or Suddenly made it or whatever it is. But the reality is, is everything takes time it takes effort. And again, it’s about trial and error. And you mentioned it earlier, when you said, you know, it’s not just for videos or for what you’re doing for films, it’s for anything, it doesn’t matter who you are and what you’re trying to do. You’re constantly trialling things with your marketing, to see where your audience are to see where you get the best fit to see where you get the best results for what it is that you’re trying to do. And that’s something that a lot of people that that we’ve come across as an agency, and don’t do, you know, we’ve had people tell us that video doesn’t work for them. And we said, Well, what do you mean, it doesn’t work? And they said, Well, we tried one, and it never worked. We didn’t get any sales from it. And you sit there you going. So you tried one video that you posted on a social network, and you didn’t get a sale from it. So you decided that video doesn’t work. I mean, the idea of that, or the concept of that is absolutely mad. But actually a lot of people aren’t willing to put in the time and effort to try and find those things that do work and the things that don’t invariably they both come Hand in hand. Megan, that’s something that’s really important for, for anybody, regardless if it’s personal, a corporate brand, or whether you’re trying to sell a product or film or promote anything, right?

Nicole Russin-McFarland 15:11
And there’s so much tied up in fame that people think if they hire an influencer, an actress whomever, that part and that’s why he’s the example of the super pleasant gentleman, you know, and Mr. Del Toro and some other people who shared the article. And I can tell from, you know, when they shared it, and how many links came in and that sort of thing. Um, there’s so much value placed on that, and it’s not always true to what you think. So very often somebody who is not a household name, not an Oscar winner, or if he or she is an Oscar winner. They’re not famous to people who read the tabloids and things like that sometimes those people sharing things with you, okay? And they’re perfect example. There is a filmmaker I interviewed recently who directs the spin off from the Big Bang Theory. But he’s not an Oscar winner. He’s not like Steven Spielberg or anything. And he has so many people from his hometown in New Jersey, who routinely Come on my website and find it through Google, like, at least 1500. People I want to estimate have found it just because of him being this hometown boy from New Jersey, he did really well in Hollywood. And yet, you can have an interview with a very famous person, or at least somebody who’s an established person with the studios and their interview doesn’t do that. Well. That’s very strange. And then people were publicist, marketers, brands, all these people have this mistaken belief that somebody is going to have more power if he or she is prominent. And sometimes you can have as an example here, of course, even though I love the guy say that Steven Spielberg has amblin sharing link. Do you see that sometimes? amblin has a video on YouTube, and then it has 75 views. Okay? That doesn’t guarantee that you share something, it’s automatically popular. Or it’s going to be seen or noticed just because you give someone an item of clothing or you let somebody have an app download. It’s very false. But on the flip side, there’s a very important reason as to why people she wants to be famous, because regardless of your industry, and who any of you just want to be public speaker, doctor, nurse talking about health care reform, or whatever it may be, because people have this mistaken belief. If you were famous, it doesn’t matter what you do in your field, the more famous you are, the more people will respect you, and will believe that you were able to turn out success from working with them, even if it’s not true. I don’t know where you want to go from here with that, but that’s kind of a very complex topic. I’m liking this episode already, because you’re challenging me now in terms of trying to make the country association is

Chris Bruno 18:00
as interesting stroke as as different as possible. But I think I’ll pull you up on a couple of things that you mentioned there. And I do agree with you completely. And for me, it’s this mistaken concept between vanity metrics I influencer X has 2 million followers, versus what actual influence does that person have with those 2 million followers? So what you were saying earlier about, you know, New Jersey boy does good. And the local town, the local community buying into that and actually wanting to understand more about him and know about Him and follow Him and whatever else. That to me is a huge sphere of influence that’s created by that person, compared to you know, influencer x who has 2 million people. And when she decides she wants to launch her own clothing line, or whatever it is, she can’t sell 43 units, which that actually is a real story that happened last year. And I think that’s something that a lot of people get mistaken. And I think the what You mentioned and you sort of took it on to that afterwards, which is this, this idea of being famous. So we refer to it probably more as, you know, thought leadership within your industry or within your field. But actually having a sphere of influence whereby you are a thought leader, and you’re respected within your community, within your industry within your field, if you can target an access, you know, even if you’re, it’s a really super specific niche, but even if there’s only 10,000 people, and 3000 of them follow you, because they want to hear what your version of it is, or what your opinion is on X or Y. That to me is worth more than having, like you mentioned, like the amblin, for example, having millions of subscribers on the YouTube channel, but some videos that they post or share will get a lot less than somebody who’s really got that sphere of influence kind of nailed, and has that audience who are super engaged with them and wants to see what they’re posting and what they’re sharing and why. And I think that’s the kind of the relationship that you build up with your followers, the relationship that you build up with that kind of With that ecosystem that you build around yourself, and it’s something that a lot of people mistake, they think numbers equate to success. Whereas quite often, like you’ve mentioned there, you know, the numbers will tell you where people are watching what they’re looking at or what they’re kind of doing. But it doesn’t necessarily mean because you’ve got a million followers, that that’s a million people who are actually looking watching involved and that want to continue being involved.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 20:24
Yeah. And there’s also a gentleman who, like I said, doesn’t have very many followers for his business and where he works, and he also is not, you know, on his Facebook page, he doesn’t have a public Facebook or anything, but he shared it. He’s an Oscar nominee from the special effects industry from the same world. And it also posted an article from my website, where he was not in it, but you know, it was about Mr. del Toro’s toys with the neck of toys things Randy Fox article, and his thing that he was posting on Facebook and I saw a book have returned from that from him, just from him sharing it within his special effects community of friends on Facebook on his private facebook account. So, that goes to show you that very often people who are not in the public eye are the most effective of promoting something. And and you know with me, I’m just like I told you before we went on the air, I tell people everything. Okay, so my problem is right now, and I don’t have a lot of problems, but this is one area that I really need. I don’t know what to do. I constantly compete with people who have and I don’t hate Kim Kardashian. I want to specify that but there are many people who have plastic surgeries look like Kim Kardashian. And they are influencers and they carve up their faces, not to look like a prettier version of themselves, but like Kim Kardashian and you know, you’ve seen it, and it when when it’s not that there are UK they call them mummy. In the US, they call them mommy. But mommy bloggers, people like that. And again, I don’t hate them. But there are certain boxes, you have to check to be an influencer, or a paid spokesperson, whatever you want to call it on social media. And I have gone to companies and brands and ask them because I’ve done modelling before a long time ago at a professional level, you know, Manhattan, can I work with you for these, whatever they are like the makeup collection or eyeshadow palette or whatever it may be. And I’m not even seeing my rates or anything. I’m just saying it’s I’ve said like, you know, I’ve had people want to buy some things that they have seen me with online, but the note that I consistently get back, it’s usually some very corporate jargon. They know about how I don’t fit the image of what they’re going for him. And it was about to say what is the image you’re going for, and I look at their And there are all these people. And this is not from a place of hate. It’s just why do you have to have one look who have plastic surgery to rebuild themselves to look like Kardashians, and very often have tattoos, or have a rough around the edges look to them. And that’s not me. And I’m sorry that that’s not me. But I don’t understand it. And it doesn’t matter that I’ve been able to convert. That’s one reason I’m so afraid. Unless I really, really like something and even then, I’m so afraid to mention brands that I like online. Because people buy them, and people tell me they like them. But the brands that don’t think me, you know, the other day, there’s a film director has talked to this guy, and he was telling me you know, like for the amount of publicity you give these brands over the years, they should have at least sent you a free gift of makeup or free whatever it may be. and different things like because I’ve done like little teams or notes from people saying that they went and bought something after I bought it and that’s one reason I I’m just I don’t know what to think of this state of mind people have about influencers, because it’s like, you have to fit a look. And I’m not any particular Look, I just look like a normal, healthy young lady who doesn’t starve or overeat or whatever works out enough, but I will have fit in 1950s Hollywood, but you know, I don’t fit in now. And it’s like, so because I don’t fit a look that you were seeking, that I’m an ineffective spokesperson. Is that what you’re trying to say? And it’s just so offensive. I don’t know what happened. This will stop. But I have definitely stopped promoting brands, if you know what I mean. I’ve even deleted all posts. Okay.

Chris Bruno 24:43
I think it’s a challenge though, because I think even for brands themselves, the ones that we’ve spoken to influences and kind of shocked to fame, and it was very hard for the brands to kind of keep up. And what’s ended up happening invariably is that you know, a lot of these people and again, You know, you have huge following or whatever it might be, that doesn’t make you effective in terms of converting people in terms of sales in terms of marketing that particular product in a particular way. And I think that there’s, there’s a huge space that’s kind of developed around that for more of a niche kind of element. And I think that’s where brands are, again, very similar to what we talked about earlier. It’s not because somebody has the biggest following. It’s not because Kim Kardashian has millions of people following her because of whatever it is that she’s up to, or because they think this is the glamorous lifestyle that they want to live or whatever it might be. But actually, again, having 10,000 followers that actually give a shit about what you do, versus having 2 million that may be just kind of like window shopping or that just kind of want to see what you’re up to nowadays, or because you post great travel pics or whatever else. Those things don’t necessarily make you a good influence. And I think with a lot of brands, their destiny They’re struggling to be honest to kind of make this work for them in the right way. But not saying that haven’t been great, hugely successful campaigns with influencers but there’s there’s become this mad rush for people and you know even if you talk to youngsters nowadays they’ll tell you they want to be youtubers for example, something that you know, it’s not a it’s not necessarily if

Nicole Russin-McFarland 26:19
I ask you this why what is the value in okay and example I can give to you just because I don’t personally work with leave Aton but I know somebody who told me about leave Aton giving up product to influencers and I don’t quite understand because Louie Vuitton is so famous and so iconic to people that there’s no need to give anything free to influencers, maybe maybe possibly to an actress at the Oscars, carrying a little handbag perhaps. But other than that there’s no need and brands left and right are blowing money, in product on influencers and actresses nobody has ever heard of. It’s really Strange and I don’t quite get it what is the value in that?

Chris Bruno 27:06
But I think that’s probably a deeper question but it’s on being part of the LVMH group which is huge but you know, they have probably the most successful rose a wine now from from the south of France, which has made it across the globe everywhere. I think it’s called endermen ut And literally, it’s not necessarily the best wine it’s not something that local people would drink if they were from the area which I happen to know quite well cuz my dad’s from that area originally. And they’re all about this ultra luxury lifestyle. So if they can put something that feels like it’s just out of your reach so whether it be that guy on the YouTube video influencer for example, who’s driving around and what is probably a rented Lamborghini as a hazard analysis Lv bag next to him. People seem to think that that correlate Any kind of real world satisfaction or reality, which invariably, you know, it works like that. That’s why these people get watched so much as why people, you know, follow these accounts and stuff like that. It doesn’t necessarily make it real, or, you know, for anybody who’s got any kind of sense, I think they can distinguish between those things. But also, again, it’s targeting a really specific niche, which is a bunch of people who are at the point in their lives where they honestly believe that buying a three grand bag when they can’t afford to, you know, put money into savings or whatever else is going to impact their lives and impact their happiness. And that I think, is a challenge in itself and probably a much deeper conversation and not something really that we’ve talked about today, but but i think that’s that’s very much the issue. And you know, there’s a lot of people out there that are gunning for that that want to be able to say they bought five grand or 10 grand handbag or whatever it might be. So there’s a place in the market for it, and again, with for a group that size, you know, it’s nothing, it’s peanuts, giving away multiple pieces of clothing or items or bags or whatever else. And in the grand scheme of things if it helps to keep that, that dream alive that Lv is you know, the ultimate in luxury. And as part of this lifestyle, it’s just out of your reach, I think

Nicole Russin-McFarland 29:27
you know what I mean? It’s very, very sad.

Chris Bruno 29:30
But it is but unfortunately, you know, that there is there are people out there that are materialistic and there are people out there that for them that is more important. You know, what you drive and comparing your car to your next door neighbours is more important than you know what you’ve got inside your cupboards or inside your fridge to be able to eat at night. So everyone, I mean horses for courses and everyone’s different. So I think it’s, it’s always a challenge, but you know it. I think what’s very interesting though, and in terms of that, as part of what you’re doing, obviously you’ve got a career You’re making these shorts, you’re making films, you’re doing animation, you’re creating film scores as well, which is another channel that you’re using, which I believe is on Spotify, you’ve got your, your film scores on there as well. You’re creating a huge amount on a regular basis. I mean, this is, this is big. So not just to mention, so your social media and keeping that alive, but you’re actually creating massive amounts of content. How do you fit all that in? And how do you manage to do all these, oh,

Nicole Russin-McFarland 30:26
I only do one thing at a time. So just for the sake of two reasons, one, mental well being. And number two, just the way my mind works, it’s very difficult to focus on music and then flip over to animation in the same day you just can’t. So I really like what I’m doing right now that I’m going to put out hopefully it will be available in a month. The latest is the album for the main music from Wonderland, which is the feature the first animated feature I’m going to put up on YouTube. And it’s going to be it’s basically here again, but it’s mixed and they rewrote here again. And it’s my music mixed with the old. So I’m putting that together, but I’m not touching the animation or drawing or anything right now. And I think usually people have an impression that people do everything in the same day. And that’s not the case. So you just focus on one thing and then go from there. Otherwise, you will go crazy and do a terrible job and everything is just my mind.

Chris Bruno 31:39
That’s okay. I agree completely. I try to focus on just one thing at the same time, anytime, because otherwise, you end up doing two things badly as opposed to one thing well, and and in terms of, you know, all of these different platforms, what have been the driving forces for you in terms of actually you know, getting out there and making sure that you just keep going All these different platforms cuz I mean, I found you online, everything from the usual kind of social media, Instagram, Twitter and stuff like that. But, you know, you’re on Apple news, you’re on Spotify for the music stuff, you’re on YouTube for the video stuff. You’re constantly trying all these things and is that basically to try and figure out what works best or is it part of sort of a bigger plan for you or

Nicole Russin-McFarland 32:23
if you understand this, you have to understand, I mentioned at the beginning of the show, which is said to be a roll up of Peter Jackson and Hans Zimmer. And that’s not only because they excel in their fields, because there’s my two favourite Hollywood businessman, Steven Spielberg, and other people are also you know, like you could count James Cameron album but those are my two favourites those two. And that is because they do what they do very well. But they also bring what they do to the attention of people who don’t typically follow that. So everybody knows the special effects from Lord of the Rings. But what they don’t always realise was that Peter Jackson created many many jobs for people in New Zealand’s from those movies. He has lots where people fail movies, he doesn’t direct or produce, but he owns. And there are many businesses around his revitalization of the film industry, New Zealand, people from Hollywood go down in there to film movies. There was a wolf Smith movie that his company did the effects for so many things. He’s not just the guy from Lord of the Rings. And he really is super involved. Hans Zimmer, same thing on several hundred that are a while back, he had an app. He has concerts for film scoring music, he invented that practically. You know, he has so much going on for him that it’s not just him sitting, composing music for the film screen and nobody knows who he is. He had the first music video on MTV. People don’t connect when they see those things. They just think Hans Zimmer showed up out of nowhere and indeed Video killed the radio star. That was his song and his music video. So it’s not something that people realise that once they start connecting it, you can see the little ways that people are so heavily involved in the actual business of show business. So that’s the actual reason I do everything. And I would hope to extend that moment. I’m a big studio director, and, you know, hopefully even Oscar would be nice, but you know what I mean? It’s not just, oh, hey, I want to do this. And what I always tell people is, well, there’s several things I tell people, but someday, I will be an Oscar winner for Best Director and Best Original Score, but it’s not because I did what other people did. It’s going to be because it’s like winning the lottery, you’re sacrificing everything that many men and I say, Man, because stereotypes are true. Most women live up to stereotypes and it’s not nice of me to say that but there are many women who just want To have kids and wants to do whatever, and I don’t care about that. And there are many women who wants to have certain lifestyles or they just want to coast along sometimes and work less and be more family oriented or care about small things in life. That’s great. And I’m not hating on those people, but I’m not one of them. And also men included, I will say, because we often make it look like only women won’t that that’s not true with men. I’ve met plenty of men who say they only want to spend time thinking about having children, or having you know, family life at home with the wife or whatever it may be. And you can be married and be you know, a James Cameron totally. But it’s, it’s a different thing. You know, like, I don’t necessarily care about some of the smaller things in life that men care about, and some women and and I hope I don’t sound mean and saying that because I stand behind what I say but you know, it’s true, like, women live up to stereotypes and men we don’t talk about Also live up to the female stereotype. So it’s both genders. But, you know, if you look at, you know, Hans Zimmer, he’s just alone in a dark room where he could be walking at the beach or whatever. She’s alone in a dark room writing music. She’s working on stuff. He’s like a workaholic. And he’s been like that forever. And other people. Don’t tell me that James Cameron was not out, you know, thinking about things a mile a minute, when he instead of reading a book, okay? Those are the things that I’m talking about that instead of using it with a book, in the morning, you’re plotting out and very often with grand failure, okay, many things fail, but you just try everything. So it’s kind of, I guess it’s my voice crack there for a minute because I’m like, how do I say this? It’s from me. Wanting to be like those men. I wouldn’t even I mean, like I said, I mentioned those are my two favourites but there’s other business man you could have Steven Spielberg mentioned James Cameron yesterday. Jerry Bruckheimer different people who are business people first. And they just kind of obsess over things because they’re dissatisfied with just being, you know, and I don’t want to make fun of people but, you know, like a graddic gerwig Greta gerwig happy, you know, or I’m trying to think of a male equivalent to her without offending anybody.

I’m Darren Aronofsky. Okay, he’s a good example. And I don’t think I’m being offensive when I say that, you know, there’s a huge difference between Darren Aronofsky credit gerwig credit cards husband, to a James Cameron. And that’s not they’re just what do you want to sacrifice in life? You know, there’s no other way around it and people think it’s crazy. But

Chris Bruno 37:53
no, I don’t think it’s crazy. I think there’s, there’s an element that clearly of passion and desire in terms of what it is that you’re trying to achieve. And I think that the the reality is, and I think it was Thomas Edison the quote, which was, you know, opportunities are missed because they’re often disguised as hard work. And people don’t realise that but you know, the big successes, and we talked about this again earlier on, but even the overnight successes people seem to ignore the years and years and years of hard work that go into that beforehand.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 38:25
People who were like, you know, they made a movie in 1990, whatever, 1980 whatever, and they’re happy and they live off and fans come up to them for you know, whatever movie and they’re just thrilled. Or, you know, they write them online, like, Oh, you mean my favourite movie and they never directed anything or restarting anything relevant since then and good for them. I mean, they’re happy and this is something that my mom, now other people, including directors, and people try to tell me is, I suspect I have like James Cameron disease. Totally because they tell me like this McFarland, you need to understand, not everyone likes what you like, many people are happy, if they have just a little bit of success, and they have three children, and they do this and you have to understand they’re going to be happy. And I’m like, why are they doing that? That’s not what I’d say literally out loud. But my internal. When I sometimes I don’t know, if you see things like some of these interviews with people that are in the press, like the New York Times, or Elle Magazine, or whatever it may be British, American, whatever. They’re all like, I’m so happy doing this. And they will allow regard and then they took care of the garden and cook with the kids. Andthat’s my internal data. Like, I mean, Goofy. That’s like, one of my other quirks. But yeah,

Chris Bruno 39:50
well, to be honest, I think it’s perfect because again, if everyone was exactly like you, then it would be a hell of a lot harder for anybody to actually make it and to be able to Sacrifice those things to get to where they want to be.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 40:02
So I don’t care about vacations. I don’t care about anything. Like, this is my happiness. I don’t know. I mean, it’s not to say you can’t have a flower garden to grow onions or something. I have actually tried growing Herbes and fun things. But you know, it’s not like I centre my life around, like, I’m gonna sit here for six hours and watch my herps grow every morning now. You know, it’s that kind of, I don’t know, I think you have to be like, a little neurotic. That’s the way to say you’re not

Chris Bruno 40:32
you know, well, I think there’s a there’s probably definitely a correlation between that kind of mentality and success. Why not keep it up and and keep going towards what you want to do? So I think that’s perfect. And Nicole, this has been awesome. I think we’re gonna wrap up but before I do, what’s your one favourite channel online and why? on YouTube? No, just in general for yourself in terms of what you use. What’s your favourite?

Nicole Russin-McFarland 41:00
Well, I mean, probably Twitter, because people may pay more attention to what I’m saying, you know what I mean? Sometimes they get the strangest things on Instagram or, or people or any platform, they just get strange things that I didn’t know people will not tell someone, john Williams, you know what I mean? And they’re not really sexist either. It’s just odd. And on Twitter, it gets a lot less of that on occasion and get people cursing at me for food pictures, but I block them. And most of time people focus on what I’m saying, or what the picture is the image, which, on other platforms, people do, but there’s always someone who’s missing. You say that you’re posing. This is not the case. Let’s say that you’re posing with the dinosaur lunch box. That’s jurassic park or something and they’re like, you know, your waist is this or whatever. And then your ear like what do you Tell Hans Zimmer on his Instagram about his waist. You know, and then you have a choice if you want to delete the comment or block it or whatever it may be. That’s one reason. It’s just very strange towards female users. And it’s, that’s another topic in itself. And I’m not a me to activists or anything, but that’s just a fact of life. And I think on Twitter, it’s a little more equal, draws a different audience.

Chris Bruno 42:25
I think that’s a slightly higher level of discourse and conversation like this. happening on Twitter. I’m not saying that there aren’t trolls, and it isn’t brutal on some occasions. But I do find myself spending more time on on Twitter than on Instagram these days as well. So but then, again, no one has ever commented on my eyebrows or my waist unless it’s telling me that it’s too big

Nicole Russin-McFarland 42:49
people. I don’t know. I mean, but that’s not to say bad people are an Instagram. Every platform is wonderful fun. It’s just that some of its strange and it’s laughable when we look at Back on that right now. So it’s not bad.

Chris Bruno 43:03
Well, Nicole, this has definitely been the strangest but also remarkably enjoyable podcast that I’ve done as part of the all about Digital Marketing Show. But thank you so much for joining us. And I’m going to make sure that everyone has your your links and can connect with you as well. Show Notes. But just very quickly, would you say Twitter is the best place to get in touch with you or to reach out to you? Yeah, I mean, for now. It’s excellent. I use everything now. But Twitter, I just check it all the time. And you can also find Nicole’s shorts on Amazon. And if you don’t like it, then you feel free to leave a comment on there just to let her know because she doesn’t like that. And, Nicole, thank you so much for joining me today.

Nicole Russin-McFarland 43:45
Thank you.

Chris Bruno 43:48
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