An introduction to Lorraine McNulty, the host of Just A Digital Moment!
So who am I and why am I podcasting about digital things? And more importantly why should you listen to me?
Well I’ve been around while online – in fact this year is my 26th year in business. Yup, I’m old! And, my business is nearly as old as the internet! Yes kids, there was a time before internet!
But let’s start before that…
I studied Analytical Chemistry at Portsmouth Poly in the UK and armed with my science degree, started my career for a large analytical instrumentation company doing technical support and sales. I’ve also workedin R&D for a pharmaceutical company and a water treatment company and as a recruitment consultant for scientists. Not your average background for a web designer!
I then started my own company as a Virtal Assistant offering business support services to small businesses. I got a job transcribing a set of talks at a pharmaceutical conference and they also wanted them to be available olnline. “I can do that”, I said with absolutely no clue how to do it and no Google to find out!
But after a quick trip to the library and several coding books later I had created my first website.
That was 1992 – fast forward a decade and my husband and I decided to ‘up-sticks’ and move our family, my business and a 1 year old Newfoundland puppy to Canada.
We arrived straight of the boat, well airplane actually, and my business carried on, with a few of my clients not even realising I had moved continents. After some phone calls in the early hours I soon had everyone on track with the 5 hour time difference. That’s the beauty of this ‘digital age’ that we live in! We can work from anywhere.
Those of you that know me know I have two sons, who are both avid golfers and got NCAA scholarships, one is now a pro golfer and the other one still at school in the US. But I have been known to fix someone’s website using my smartphone whilst walking around a golf course. Who doesn’t like technology and devices that let you do that?
So to cut a long story short, I’ve been helping small businesses get online for over 25 years and have seen many things come and go in that time. There wasn’t Social Media back then – which may not have been a bad thing but I could dedicate a whole podcast just to that subject.
Years ago your business was thought progressive if it just had a website. Now you need a website and a marketing strategy to make you stand out from the other ‘noise’ online. I think this is where my background as a scientist helps. I love finding solutions to problems and working out marketing funnels, email campaigns, social media campaigns, keyword strategies, sales carts for different businesses and niches all pose their own problems.
I’ve been told by friends and clients that I have a knack for explaining things in ‘non-geek’ talk. I’m not sure about that but have certainly experienced listening to a tech person waffle on in what seems like a foreign language when all he was trying to say was ‘unplug the bloody thing and plug it back in again’! I’ve also had an ex-service provider ask me “Is there anyone more technical I can talk to?” I’m assuming he meant my husband! So, I’ll try to keep everything BS free, as that’s how I like it.
What else can I tell you? Oh, my business has been voted Best Webdesign Company for the last 13 years here locally. And locally is the lovely town of Port Perry on the shores of Lake Scugog in Ontario, Canada.
I play the saxophone (badly). I play hockey (the ice kind) (equally badly) although to be fair most Canadians are born on skates and I didn’t strap on a pair until I moved here and signed up for the hockey league! I love Dragon Boating (Google it if you don;t know what it is!) And I love to relax over a nice meal and a glass (or two) of wine.
What I don’t like is having my photo taken or hearing myself recorded. So in the same spirit that I started playing hockey, I’m starting this podcast.
Nothing ventured – nothing gained. Right?
So I hope you’ll join me on this adventure as I stumble along on audio and video. I’ll try, for the sake if my kids, not to embarrass myself too much – although my hockey skills (or lack of them) are an endless source of amusement for them.
I may not be great at hockey but I show up week after week – so that’s what I am going to do now with this podcast. And we’ll see how it goes.
If I crash and burn at least it will be with a smile on my face (and more than likely a glass of wine in my hand), rather than a face-plant on ice, which definitely happened the first time I played hockey!
So I hope you’ll join me on future episodes and we’ll see if I can answer some of the marketing and website design questions I get asked a lot. I’ll share some of my best tips and favourite tools. Hopefully I’ll grab a guest or two along the way.
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