Chris: 0:12

Hello and welcome back to another episode of the Cables to Clouds podcast. My name is Chris Miles, and with me as always is my co-host, Tim McConaughey. We are coming back from uh well, this is the first episode of the new year that we've recorded anyway. Um and uh we're you're feeling refreshed, we're feeling new, new year, new Tim. Is that right? Uh how you feeling? What's your resolution?

Tim: 0:36

Uh I have so many, but uh yeah, I I I I I'll keep them secret.

Chris: 0:40

Your current resolution is to record a podcast, and that's what we're gonna do.

Tim: 0:43

Yes, that is today's resolution. I'm going day by day now.

Chris: 0:50

Um but yeah, so with us today we have a returning guest. Uh we we we looked back and it looks like Erica was on the podcast about a year ago, um, but we wanted to bring her back on um because there's there's been some changes in her life since since that last episode happened, and and frankly, we wanted to talk about it. Um so uh Erica, if you can give a give a brief um you know description of yourself, who you are, what you do, and uh and maybe what's changed since we last talked to you.

Erika Dietrick: 1:17

Yeah, thank you for having me on. Uh so my name's Erica Dietrich or Erica the Dev Online, and uh was working as a developer advocate at Cisco. I've got a long, varied career. I'm a software engineer basically, and uh anyway, quit my job earlier this year in order to do content creation and run my own business full time. Uh so that's the gist of what I'm up to right now.

Chris: 1:38

Nice.

Erika Dietrick: 1:38

Oh, and and I guess it's I should say too, I'm I'm teaching like coding skills, like I to network engineers and uh others. Um, so yeah.

Chris: 1:48

Yeah. I think I think we kind of got into that on the the last episode we did, whereas like you know, you kind of came at it from a from a software engineering background and and you kind of got shoehorned into this network engineering world, and now you're kind of having to you're learning they basically the opposite side of the the fence that we were learning, right?

Erika Dietrick: 2:04

Um It's been interesting because I I started at Cisco, like I started my tech career in network support and getting my C CNA before I went into software engineering, but I feel like you're always much stronger in one area than the other. So that that's a little weird sometimes, but yeah.

Chris: 2:20

Um yeah, so thanks for coming back on. So yeah, we wanted to kind of um open that up and kind of understand what it's like being um kind of in that world doing content creation full-time, especially um on the kind of network engineering, maybe software automation side of the house, um, and what that all kind of looks like um from your day-to-day. So I guess before we before we get into kind of what your day-to-day looks like, what was what was kind of the tipping point that made you basically make that decision that you wanted to leave somewhere as big as Cisco, you know, being a developer advocate, you know, that's that's a job many, many people probably seek to have. So you obviously made the decision to walk away from that and do something full-time. So what was that kind of tipping point for you?

Erika Dietrick: 3:04

Um, I think it was two things. Um, so I've always had an entrepreneurial spirit, and so um I had a very clear vision for how I wanted to help the network engineering community. And when you're part of a big corporation, right, you you're creating someone else's vision or or doing what they say and not necessarily what you think you should be doing. Uh so that was definitely reason number one. Just had a way I wanted to do things, and I would say the second reason was honestly um tech industry is kind of brutal right now. People are getting worked really hard.

Tim: 3:33

A little bit.

Erika Dietrick: 3:33

And um I knew I wanted to get pregnant and I I didn't feel like suffering. So so it's a two-fold reason.

Tim: 3:40

Oh, interesting. Yeah, no, that actually makes a lot of sense. So so then part of it was just not wanting to be beholden to someone else to like grind yourself, grind yourself down to meet another deadline, right?

Erika Dietrick: 3:53

Exactly. Um, I'm not I mean, I like money, but it's not my number one driver. I really like ownership and having an impact and and I did get to do that a lot as a developer advocate. Like that, you know, if you want to do that within a corporation, I think that's a pretty good role to have a voice. Like I got to travel the world and speak at conferences, and I did have some say, you know, on my projects and things I did, but obviously it's not quite the same.

Chris: 4:17

Yeah, 100%. And I guess now you would say that I guess under the umbrella of a big organization, ownership is probably a very different thing, right? You know, there's a lot of things that you don't get to totally take account for, um, and you know, things can be taken away from you, but ultimately now everything is yours, right? Um, through and through. So I'm sure that's a that's a much better feeling.

Erika Dietrick: 4:38

Especially with like the AI angle, I think that that was something that was hard for me to stomach because first of all, I am I am pro AI, I'm not like an AI hater, but um, I just felt like all these conversations I was having with the community, there were so many people who just didn't know how to code, period, or didn't understand automation at all. And now we were trying to, you know, teach people how to like, I don't know, create their own AI agents and stuff. You know, it's like really putting the cart before the horse.

Tim: 5:03

And uh I don't know.

Erika Dietrick: 5:05

It it for me it didn't, it was it didn't resonate with me for like what I should be doing.

Chris: 5:09

Yeah, totally makes sense. Um so uh obviously I'm you know if we if we talk about I guess we're still talking about the piece of the decision that made you want to kind of go out on your own and do that. Um, you know, I guess one thing, how how long were you planning that? And with that piece of planning, you know, obviously there's a there's a financial burden that comes with that. That's probably the scariest thing for most people is is the financial piece of it. Um so did you have like kind of kind of like a financial runway planned out, or was it more just kind of a like a leap of faith?

Erika Dietrick: 5:41

Um, so I think the fact that I was able to do this was a little bit of luck in the first place because I was creating online in order to connect with the community, right? Because we're all remote, and I'm also a software engineer, so I'm not even actively being a network engineer and drawing from personal experience. And so this whole community I had built lent itself to jumping into content creation naturally. I knew that I probably wanted to leave, probably around the time I did the podcast last year, like December-ish. Oh, okay. Um, so you know, I gave I gave it a few months, but I knew around then that I probably wanted to piece out. Um, but um runway, runway is probably a stretch. Um, I I will say this. I have been architecting a dream life for a while now. Uh, you know, you I think when I first got into tech, you know, you have these goals like I want to have health insurance and I want to stop, you know, being paycheck to paycheck, you know. And um, so anyway, in my vision, one of the things I did was marry, you know, an equally ambitious, successful man who's gonna be able to partner with me while I take these risks with my business and take these risks as a mom and whatever. Um, so we had savings, but I more so just have the luxury of knowing, hey, if I really fuck this up, like I'm not gonna be homeless, you know, I'll at least have enough time to find another job.

Tim: 6:55

Yeah, that's that's a really good point. Like uh in my in my case, it's not like I don't I'm the I guess whatever soul breadwinner or whatever you're to call it. Like I so for me, like I couldn't like i even if I wanted to, and I don't I don't know if that would something I would want to do or not, like it it's just not an option, right? I I couldn't uh do it. So definitely just so there's some value in in in being able to have that uh that freedom to be able to do that for sure.

Erika Dietrick: 7:20

Oh 100%. Because you I don't think you can start a business from desperation, you know. I feel like you you can feel it when people need the money, you know, when they didn't have that runway or they haven't had clients, and you know, pe people know it, you know, and I don't think any business is just successful off the bat, at least to the extent you need it to be.

Chris: 7:38

So yeah, okay, so let's let's talk about, I guess, kind of the uh the day in, day out of doing content creation um uh as a full-time gig, right? So uh I guess my first question would be uh around that, you know, you you were a developer advocate, so you were talking about a lot of these things behind the lens of you know Cisco, right? So there was a you know a large vendor behind who you kind of maybe not governing what you should say, but kind of navigating the technologies and the spaces that you're working in, I would I would imagine. What is it like now? And I guess how has your relationship with the community changed now that you're not you know doing that through the lens of a of a large vendor?

Erika Dietrick: 8:19

I'm sorry, what was the first half of that question?

Chris: 8:21

The first half of the question was how has the relationship with the the community changed now that you're not doing that through the vendor?

Erika Dietrick: 8:28

Yeah. Um so I think what's interesting is that Cisco, the Cisco community or whatever, Cisconians are a very large population of people, and I think when I quit Cisco, I knew I wanted to still help the network engineering community, but I felt it felt a little bit like talking about your ex, like, oh I quit this company, but I'm gonna keep making Cisco cont- I don't know, it just felt a little weird, and so I kind of experimented with just doing like some more general network automation stuff and and you know, including other vendors, and I even branched out into just software engineering concepts, and I think I spent I spent some time lost, to be honest, and I think there was also a little bit of imposter syndrome. We talk about sometimes network engineers having imposter syndrome learning to code, because we're not developers, but I'm for the same trying to teach network automation, you know. I know that I have something valuable to bring, but you know, who's gonna listen to me when they can listen to other network engineers? Um, so anyway, um, once I navigated all that mess, which you know, content creation is half mental mess, I was like, you know what, you know, the people wanted this, so I'm gonna keep going with it. Screw, screw what my head says, and I'm going to teach coding for network automation. And I think that the reception has been mostly really positive. I think um a lot of people followed my journey even since leaving Cisco, which I did not know if that would be the case. You know, there's the prestige of being, you know, behind this giant company or whatever this giant company being behind me. And um, yeah, I mean, there's a few people who kind of fell off because, you know, they probably were hoping to get an inn at Cisco or something, but for the most part, people have been really gung-ho about it. And um, they've either been part of my target audience who want to learn how to code, or they at the very least are like, hey, love what you're doing, like let me know who I can connect you to or how I can help. And I think the other piece of what's changed is that I feel like I can be a lot more honest, um, which is a big deal for me because I people come out all the time about how I'm so brave for being honest online. And I'm like, no, actually, it's way harder for me to have to have this poker face, this corporate face, it's so painful. Um it's just a lot easier to be honest. So um I like that I can just teach from my experience and my beliefs, and even when it comes to like sponsors, right? Like you work with who you want to work with, and if you don't like it, you don't take it. Uh so I appreciate I think that that's appreciated that I can be honest.

Tim: 10:54

Actually, so this is interesting. What about so this is always something I think about, and this you know, and I've I've I don't do it as much as I used to, but I used to make a lot of content. We were talking before we did the record, how I've got a YouTube with, you know, a few thousand uh subscriptions, and like I haven't actually posted to it in a while, and it's because of the immense amount of effort involved in keeping up with that. And how do you figure out, and maybe you don't, maybe it's all pure, you know, just guessing what people want, but like there's so much, there's so much front work to do when you create content that figuring out like what is going to be the content that is going to reach the right audience and pay off and kind of be the you know forward the the the brand or whatever you want to call it, like it's such a struggle, right? I don't I don't know if there's an answer to that.

Erika Dietrick: 11:40

Yeah, I mean I so many people have different philosophies, and uh my philosophy is probably not like as strict as it could be, but um, I generally try to do things that are either useful or make you feel something, and ideally both, but at least one of the two. And um, you know, I have kind of a general idea of who's following me, and so I follow them back. I mean, this is really the same strategy I use as a developer advocate. I follow them back and I basically like support them slash stalk them, right? Like I see like what are they struggling with, what do they care about working on right now? Like, what are they pissed off about? And um, you know, either I know exactly what they're talking about and I, you know, I plan some content, it comes out eventually. Um, or I don't know what they're talking about, and I'm like, okay, I need to talk to these people and and gain an understanding because this is my audience. Um, so I use that as a driver because it's easiest. I mean, sometimes I literally will make like a LinkedIn post, have someone comment, and then boom, the next day I put up a YouTube video based on that question or comment. Um, so I really try not to overthink it too much now. Um, and that's also why I stay away from social media platforms that I feel like I don't know. I don't know what what you want to say about it. I don't know if it they're oversaturated, I don't know if the algorithm's a bitch, what you want to say. But one of the reasons I would stay away from things like Instagram, or maybe I'm just not good at it. I could just not be good at it. But the platforms I'm doing right now have been very good for this strategy LinkedIn, YouTube, and TikTok.

Chris: 13:09

Yeah, I think there's I think there's definitely platforms, especially when they when they get to a certain scale, are much more subject to trolling and things like that, or kind of something in that camp, right? So it I think it does overflow. Um But it does, it's it's like it's interesting how because I mean if I'm sure when you worked at Cisco, like like that you have thousands of people that work in marketing at Cisco. There's thousands of people that are dedicated to getting this direct feedback from customers and understanding what that what their needs are and and and putting that into the content that they release. But I guess so now your dynamic has quite has changed quite a bit, right? This is this could be, you know, single person making a question or asking for something and get immediate feedback, right? So um, like do you do you feel that's much more personal and good, or you know, what's what's the what's the trade-off there?

Erika Dietrick: 14:01

Well, one of the benefits of being a developer advocate or really any engineer with people skills is the fact that there is this bridge between the technical people and the whatever, less technical or non-technical people at a company, right? So marketing might have an idea of what people want, but I I don't think there's a true connection or understanding in the way there needs to be. And same thing if you've always got your head in your own projects, right? Then you're not helping or connecting. Um so truthfully, I don't think there's been a single tech company out there that I've worked at that is actually hearing what their community has to say. They might be trying and think they are, but they're not actually hearing it. And uh yeah, I think I don't think that what I'm doing is special. I think it just takes somebody who is semi-technical and actually gives a shit, you know?

Tim: 14:49

Yeah, right. Yeah, I think with the marketing, I think the the the problem that I've noticed, because I've I've run into the same thing. I mean, as a technical marketing engineer at you know, now a few comp now a couple companies, it seems like there's a what the company wants to get out of their um their outreach programs, their enablement, their developer advocate, you know, whatever you want to call it, is very much tied to, I mean, uh duh, it's all tied to to closing deals, getting revenue, like bring bringing people into the ecosystem and having them use the products. Um, whereas the people who, you know, we at our who we personally tend to engage with are out there trying to solve problems, right? They're not they don't really, it's not that they're they're they're looking to close, you know, buy a uh, you know, close a PO full of gear or something like this, right? There's specific problems they're trying to solve for their job. It's a very different, exactly. I was gonna say it's very different. Uh the they don't line up necessarily the the goals there.

Erika Dietrick: 15:51

Which is why I love that I can be honest because it's tricky when you work at you know any company really, but you know, say at Cisco, you know, there's maybe some products I like better than others or certain features better than others, and you've kind of got to represent and help people, regardless. Um, you know, I like the freedom of just being like, hey, this is what you should be doing for this problem.

Chris: 16:08

Yeah, and I think um, you know, obviously I think the that that that's kind of the key word there is honesty. And the the sad part is the honesty doesn't always fuel money, right? Uh so that's that's probably true for the monetary. Yeah. But I mean that but that's the thing, is like it's you know, obviously you want to be successful, you want to be financially stable, but at the same time you want to kind of uh you know how kind of hold true to your community and and your viewers and things like that. So that's there's there's merit in that. But I guess what is um if if we look at that, you know, what is it what does a good day look like for you now versus when you're at a uh at that uh at your previous employer?

Erika Dietrick: 16:49

Um, I think that a good portion of the work is the same. Like I said, um, I mean, I there's really I would have preferred the security of just doing it under a salary, you know. I'll just be honest. Uh I don't think a lot of that work differs, but a good day for me is is the creation itself. So I I haven't mentioned this, but content creators I think kind of fall into two camps. You either make all your money from the creation itself or a lot of it, or you use the content to drive a business. Right. Um, and that's how I've been making my money, actually. Yeah, I've done some sponsored posts, but the vast majority has been I create free content that's helpful to people and that drives people to services I offer.

Tim: 17:29

Yep.

Erika Dietrick: 17:30

Um so what was my train of thought there? Oh, a good day. Pregnancy brain. Um, yeah, yeah. It's it's pretty bad now, you know, you just gotta own it. But um yeah, so a good day is when I am making content, I think, versus um doing the business because and it's not because I I do a lot of things. We can talk about that if you want, but it's not because I don't like doing other work, it's because I don't like dealing with people like in that sense. I don't like handling money and doing negotiations and contracts and email, email, email, you know. Yeah, I want I want a deep focus on something, and um, you know, I get to do that more with the content creation. Um in the case that we talked about, I might have seen something in a comment or someone else's video that they talk about a topic. I'll kind of brainstorm, brain map. I don't have a real way I do this, just be creative and kind of map out my ideas, and um hopefully something I already know about, you know, that's easiest. You know, you really can't get into the weeds of doing super perfect content all the time or doing deep research all the time, especially as one person. It's just not possible. And um, yeah, I mean, the the portion of the process that I like most just kind of depends on my mood that day, you know. Like editing is kind of nice, you know, rainy day at a coffee shop, you're feeling kind of tired, you can put on your headphones and just kind of doop doop, you know. Sometimes I'm feeling peppy. I like I like recording. Um, but yeah, that's that that's the a good day I'd say.

Tim: 19:01

Well, okay, so on the uh well, it seems I guess I what's the corollary to that? Like, I mean, we're let's talk about the the parts that are a little bit a little bit tougher. I mean, obviously the one is gonna be the number one I with a bullet I expect to be is the uncertainty associated with and you know, who's my next client, what's my next gig, like all of that stuff, right? That's obvious. But like walk us through that a little bit how you'll sort I'm looking for, uh, I don't know, how you just like my business plan around that. How do you try to plan? Yeah, how do you plan for uncertainty essentially in in this type of game?

Erika Dietrick: 19:34

Um so again, like I said, I did have the luxury of not going into this white knuckling it because I had a financial partnership. Um, but um I had a general minimum goal that I knew I could be uh meet based on prior like brand sponsorships and stuff, right? I'm like, I know at the bare minimum I can probably get a sponsor a month, making you know X amount of dollars, and um that'll be my baseline, but I'm just gonna see where I can take this. Okay. Uh I could be more strategic. Um, and again, it that also flew out the window after getting pregnant, so I didn't really get a chance to be more strategic. But um, yeah, I basically had a minimum that I needed to meet each month, and I did a lot of experimentation, honestly, to see who I could attract with what kind of offers. So um an example of that is I would try making content with random products that I liked. Um, and and I and I typically would do this with like startups, right? When I talk about this, I'm not talking about like the Ciscos of the world. I'm talking about startups who would be more than happy to have someone with, you know, 8K followers talking about their product. Um so you know, I'd play around with um showing off certain people's tools. Um I had a series of like micro-technical tutorials where I would demo something in 60 seconds that was really popular. That was born out of trying to show companies, hey, like I could do this with your product. Like I could teach people how to solve a problem using your product. Um, so I ran a series of experiments. Um, I would say about 80% of my clients came inbound, like they saw something and they approached me. Um, and it wasn't all sponsored post. Um it was kind of random, to be honest, what some of the things people approached me for were. And uh a mistake I made was just saying yes to anything that sounded cool. Um not because I couldn't do it, but the thing is when you're again a one-person show, you need to crank out either a certain amount of volume or a certain price point. Well, I'm a micro content creator, so I can only command a certain price point. And um, you know, volume-wise, you can't get in a groove if you're doing like five different types of work. Like I did for I did freelance developer work for a cybersecurity product. I ran an influencer strategy for a startup, I gave product feedback, I did sponsor posts, you know, and and so you never got like in the groove. You're constantly renegotiating, oh, here's a package for this, you know. Exactly. Um And you guys are gonna have to keep me on track because now I don't even remember what the original question was. That's how I make money though. That's that's that's how that originated, and and the money was doing well. So I okay, I I remember now. So so I make two-thirds of Cisco's salary by month two. Uh which is stup super happy with that because I was not expecting to meet those expectations, right? Especially at the gate. Um uh but basically what happened again, I get pregnant, or you know, I guess anybody who goes through a big life thing, um, you just realize what's sustainable and not sustainable. Yeah, it's all um so I I I continued client work for a while, but it was, you know, not mentally good. And um so at this point, you know, this the ending portion of my pregnancy, I'm essentially just doing the content. And because A, I can afford to not do client work for a few months, that's very key here. Uh, but B, it's because I am nothing without my content. That is everything that got me here was helping the community, staying visible, being a part of things. Right. So when I do decide to take on more clients, I'm still top of mind.

Tim: 23:11

Right, right. Yeah. Uh yeah, and that's that's something I deal with too. Like I said, I've I've honestly, if I'm being honest, uh since I started studying Japanese like three years ago now, I really slowed down on a lot of my content creation so I could focus on that. And it and I'm right there with you. I keep thinking in the back of my head, like, man, like if I don't start cranking some stuff out here, people are gonna, you know, forget like that I ever made it.

Erika Dietrick: 23:33

It's time consuming, it's very time consuming. And you have to make trade-offs or you know, personal decisions. I mean, a lot of the big creators out there, like, you know, it's very professional and scripted and very well edited. And again, you you kind of have to uh come have these come to Jesus moments with yourself. I'm like, do I have to be this creator that looks like I'm making perfect content, or do I just need to be consistent and keep putting content out there? And I'm definitely in the latter category right now.

Chris: 23:58

Yeah, right.

Tim: 23:59

I'm real bad about that.

Chris: 24:01

Yeah, I think that's I think that's kind of the most daunting thing for me, is usually like even when I start thinking about something that I might put out there, I'm thinking of the the 99 different ways that it needs to be perfect, or else I won't do it. And then then I just don't start it. And it's like that, like the scariest thing to me is the blank page. Like uh seriously, like it's just just like taking the first step. Um, so obviously that's uh that sounds like a if I was in your shoes, that would be a an hourly battle for me, which is which is completely terrifying.

Erika Dietrick: 24:32

You know, I think that it helps if you are doing content creation in an area of expertise, right? Uh, because you can afford to put way less effort into it. It'd be different if I suddenly wanted to be like a fitness content creator or something. It's like, okay, well now I need to go learn this and make sure I don't sound like an idiot. But um, you know, the things I talk about, I try to talk about things that I can talk off the cuff and get 85% of it right, and you know, maybe just research the other 15 or we'll put a disclaimer or something. But yeah, if if I wanted to do perfect content, I would not get very much content done. And it is difficult because I do think that a lot of us know what good content looks like. I don't think that any of us are putting lower quality content out there because we don't have grand visions for how it could be, you know, it's just what's reasonable.

Chris: 25:24

No, I mean, but you're I think that's the other drawback of social media is you see how much everyone else is putting out. And it like to you, it can seem like everyone else is doing so much more than you. And it's like, and they're they're producing stuff that's at this, you know, top tier level and that you could never be that, right? But it's not it like they they have bad days just like we do, right? So it's it's not it's not just like you know, black and white.

Erika Dietrick: 25:47

Well I actually don't know what their revenue streams look like either, because I mean I guess it depends on if you're just being a content creator to be one or if you're doing it to make money, but um, a lot of the really good looking videos that I've seen, they're using a variety of AI tools, and those all have subscriptions, and like it really adds up. Um so you know, I've been down that route because I wanted to level up and I did the math, and I'm like, this just doesn't make any sense, you know? At least not at this stage in the game.

Tim: 26:15

Yeah, we did that. I mean, we there's definitely been some tools that we were doing using the on the podcast, like jazz up clips and all this other stuff. And I think we came to the same dis conclusion that if you go and look at the actual uh statistics for like who's looking at it, how much engagement it actually drives, and like just do the math essentially. You're like, yeah, actually, this might not be the worth the the money to get what we're getting. I mean, they're cool, they're great, and right? And then we're constantly chewing out new content, like on TikTok for a while. We'd have new videos coming out every every day, I think, for a long time, right? Which I'm sure helped with the algorithm to some degree, but you know, then some of the comments would be like, this this clip doesn't make any sense. Because they were like clips of the show or something like that, right? And we and we didn't neither of us wanted to spend 20 hours a day curating like every little clip to be the perfect star, perfect end. You know what I mean? Like that that's that's part of it too, right? I'm sure I'm sure for you, you gotta do that math yourself on like what is worth the effort that I'm gonna put into this particular.

Erika Dietrick: 27:13

I felt the exact same with the clips. Um, so I'm actually using Opus Clip now, and I'm pretty happy with Opus Clip. It's been the best, like the only tool that's been worthwhile in my opinion, for for doing stuff like that. But and I did have to bite the bullet and uh sign up for a social media scheduler just for maternity leave. Otherwise, I I would not be doing it. Um but I think that's I mean, I have to pay for editing software. Um yeah, I try to keep it lean because I'm I'm not that important yet to pay that much. You know, you have to if I don't have something worth listening to with just my face with some good light at this point, then I need to work on what I'm saying. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Tim: 27:51

The content is worth so and it's hard to remember this when in the moment when you're creating this material, but like the content matters so much more than the perfect lighting or like the the the the AI swizzle stick thing, right? Like the content sucks, it sucks.

Chris: 28:05

Yeah, and I think it's it's tricky too, because I think uh I'm assuming you've probably seen some of this, uh or like I s I see a lot of it on LinkedIn, is like people are kind of taking notice to when content itself is AI generated and just they really fucking hate it. Like and so I've even even some of the editing stuff, I think you gotta be careful because if it's obvious that that that was kind of the the piece that that was used, people are gonna be turned off immediately. There's there's a lot of backlash.

Erika Dietrick: 28:38

You know, I didn't think it was possible for social media to get much worse because I feel like it's really declined over time. Like it started out being like really fun and you know, and then it was a good way to make money, and now it's I mean, I don't know, I I've not like researched the history of social media and what they're calling the eras, but yeah, somehow it got even worse with with the arrival of AI. And uh, that's the thing too, is if you are being authentic and showing up consistently, you're in a sea of voices, but they're also mostly AI voices.

Tim: 29:08

So you know people can pick yeah, yeah, yeah. People can pick out quality over time. The then the the problem actually becomes literally just getting in front of someone. Like uh almost like the the the the how AI's destroyed uh hiring and and and good keeper jobs, right? Now there's 10,000 AI apps that'll uh apply, you'll have a hundred thousand applicants, and now how are you gonna get in front of a hiring manager, right? Like that's it's the same thing, right? Except with content now, we've got so much slop out there.

Erika Dietrick: 29:37

You know, that's a good point too, and I will say that um because I get asked about this a lot, I did have the luxury of having of being catapulted a little bit by working for Cisco, right? Like people were looking at me because it was Cisco. Sure. Um, but if I was somebody else like looking to follow a similar path and I didn't work somewhere like Cisco, like it's exactly like you say, like you um need to get more eyeballs from different avenues on you. So I mean that's part of why I do podcasts, right? Like I I say yes to pretty much every podcast because I mean it's a nice, easy conversation and it's a chance to see and talk to other people, you know what I mean? Be seen by other people. Um, and you know, finding ways to showcase your credibility, so it might not happen as quickly as again working at Cisco, but you know, if you're presenting at reputable conferences or I don't know, just being part of communities, you know, you get known.

Chris: 30:28

Yeah, 100%.

Tim: 30:29

Yeah, I mean, even even working at Cisco, I find it hard to um like submit RFPs to other now. There's been some conferences that'll come to me and be like, hey, you should submit for this, and then sometimes it's like you'll submit to something you really want to do, and then you know, you'll never hear back from them, or you'll get the standard rejection letter. I mean, it doesn't matter, right? But you are right. Obviously, working for a big company in that industry in which you are doing your content, it matters, right? It it does.

Erika Dietrick: 30:53

Uh-huh. It's definitely a faster path to visibility, I think.

Chris: 30:56

Nice. All right. Um, so I guess I guess if if there are people out there that are kind of maybe in a kind of role where they're doing some kind of advocacy, like a dev rel type thing, or I don't know what what's the new name for DevRel? Didn't they rename it recently? Is it something?

Erika Dietrick: 31:15

Oh, there's like five different names for it. I don't know. Well, it and that's and people who are looking for advocates who aren't developers, like there's technology of Angels. There's all kinds of stuff, yeah.

Chris: 31:27

But yeah, so it's someone, I guess if someone's in that role and they were thinking about going independent, kind of full-time, uh, I guess, you know, kind of now that you're, you know, 10, 12 months into this, um, in hindsight, what would you what would you tell them to make sure you get sorted before you make that leap?

Erika Dietrick: 31:45

Good question. Um, I think that you really want to build trust and credibility. I think the credibility is going to come a little easier, again, if you're coming from some sort of big company. Uh, but the trust, getting people to actually know you and not just talking about products or or whatever. I mean, I advise this to all technical creators, and I know that that's a little bit uh of an odd feeling because people want to keep it technical and and very straightforward and professional. And like, I get that to a sense, but also again, if you want people to follow you, you know, why would they care about you? And if someone knew you at the office, you know, it was probably because you did more than wrote memorized and and spit off, you know, facts. It probably because you I don't know, you always helped them late night with their questions, or you're really generous, or you had the best movie references. I don't know. Yeah, you just you have a personality. Yeah, so um obviously you can't unleash your fool crazy while working for a company, but but let people get to know you and trust that you're a person would be, I guess, good advice.

Tim: 32:51

Be authentic. Like don't just be a mouthpiece of for content, right? Be be part of the content and and have it being you, right? I I would agree with that. I think that's a big one. Also having a lot of people.

Erika Dietrick: 33:02

Well, yeah, I was gonna say, would your advice be the same, Tim or Chris? Either of you? I mean you guys are c creators as well.

Tim: 33:09

Yeah.

Chris: 33:10

We're still waiting for that first dollar, but we're it happens.

Tim: 33:16

I'll I'll still get some, but uh no, I I think I think definitely being authentic is like the number I actually I I I put this on my blog like years and years and years ago about like the the rules that network engine I said network engineers uh should follow, but really it's really everybody. And the number one is just like guard your credibility, like be authentic and don't be fake. And it's okay to like if you're a content creator or uh I hesitate to say influencer, but whatever, tech influencer, whatever you want to call it. Um if you it's okay to like have brand partnerships and do that, right? It's all part of everybody's gotta eat. Um the thing is that if you are doing your job as that person, you are talking about products that you actually give a shit about or have an opinion about or or you know believe in, hopefully. And that's what separates you from just one of those influencer people that'll literally just take any brand deal and just shill whatever the hell's put in front of it.

Erika Dietrick: 34:11

Very good point. I I guess if I had to offer a second runner-up piece of advice, it would be uh, I don't think it's very easy to rely solely on brand partnerships. Um again, so like the AWS developer advocates who they're a lot of who I modeled what I did after. I mean, they they start working AWS and their followers like shoot up, you know. So I guess maybe if you got a hundred thousand followers, maybe, maybe you can make that work. But um, it's just it's it's um what's it called? Drought or what's the other word?

Tim: 34:39

Fam out or feast.

Erika Dietrick: 34:40

Yeah, fan out or feast, fan out or feast. Um, so it's fan interface with the brand partnerships. When times are good, they're good, and when they're not, they're not. And also, you know, anything can happen. And you probably want business revenue that doesn't just rely on the platforms themselves. So I would have an idea of how you're gonna make money besides just talk about products or something.

Chris: 35:00

Oh, yeah, for sure. I uh business strategy. I guess on that point, yeah, on that point, would you say, like, what what would be your advice for kind of diversifying your income streams then to make sure that you know, maybe when one thing is kind of you know in a valley, the other one's having you know peak, you know, what what what would you say about that?

Erika Dietrick: 35:17

So I think it depends a little bit on like what your goals are and your risk tolerance. If you listen to a lot of creators online, they'll tell you to do things like digital products. Um but again, when it comes to things like digital products, it's still a feast or famine cycle. And uh at least in the beginning, right? Depends on how big of a creator you are.

Tim: 35:37

You mean like create, like write a book or create a lab or book, KDI, of course.

Erika Dietrick: 35:42

I got it. Um and and and you know, and you might have a community that's really engaged and that works, and again, everybody's got their own thing, but um I this is the most luxury in life I've ever had, do not care about money. I've not really had that luxury in life. And so I'm a very big proponent of service-based businesses, not product-based businesses. Yeah. Um, that is why I was doing developer work still, uh, because it's reliable, it's high income, um, and if you're leaving a corporate job, you probably have some sort of skill people are willing to pay you for. Um so that's a really easy thing to do is to educate people for free, help them for free in some way, and then offer your services.

Tim: 36:20

Yep. So before I came back to Cisco, I was I did that, I did some of that on the side uh services. And I agree, I mean, it's as long as people know where to find you, essentially, or or you know where to find them, you know, and that's where networking comes into it. Like not the digital kind, but the the people kind, right? Uh into getting gigs and stuff. Uh the product thing is also like I, you know, a few years ago wrote some workbooks. I I managed to hit it when it was perfect because uh software-defined uh access had just come out, and I was uh I wrote some workbooks on Lisp and VXLAN, and they were not Cisco branded, but and they were talking about the technology, not about data, you know, not about DNA center because data center wanted to abstract all of the technology, but network engineers want to understand the technology. So I managed to hit that, and honestly, I still make sales on that book. That book's like four years old now. I still today make books. My point is you're you're what you're what you're saying is you're right. So you can't rely on any one thing, and you may or may not get lucky with the timing or or the audience for your products, you know. Right.

Erika Dietrick: 37:23

And if you've got runway or another job and you want flexibility, maybe you go the product route, right? Because you're you're wanting to hit those that passive income, or but you know, but there's a there's the other side of it too, basically. That's awesome though, Tim.

Tim: 37:35

Thanks.

Erika Dietrick: 37:37

Living living my dream right now. I've I don't think I've done anything like that yet.

Tim: 37:41

Well, I couldn't go full-time like you, so I think you're you're I think we're living each other's dream here a little bit.

Chris: 37:47

Yeah, that's awesome. All right. Uh well, I think we're about at time here. So I guess, you know, Erica, thanks again for coming on. We just wanted to kind of have a casual conversation. I think we I think we did that successfully. And um we especially especially thank you for coming on the show when you're several months pregnant. Um we really appreciate that. Uh really. I was going shirt crazy.

Erika Dietrick: 38:10

If you guys wanted to talk to me, I mean we'll have been all day on the TV, you know, like I'm glad we could distract you for a little while.

Tim: 38:18

Yeah.

Chris: 38:18

Yeah. Yeah. Um well yeah, maybe we'll maybe we'll do another 12-month check-in uh next year and we'll we'll see how things are going and uh and we'll come back and get a status update. But um, I guess in the meantime, so um I guess tell everyone where they uh where they can find you and what you're doing.

Erika Dietrick: 38:35

Yeah, so again, you'll see my name various places, but the only places I'm proud of being are YouTube at Erica underscore the dev, same handle for TikTok, and then Erica Dietrich on LinkedIn. And yeah, mix of educational and business content, I guess, and just being a person.

Tim: 38:52

We're all fans of being a person here, so yeah. I love it.

Chris: 38:54

Keep doing that. I think I'm gonna do it till the day that I'm dead. I don't know.

Erika Dietrick: 38:59

They can improve. I think I could be more of a person. It's like the part I'm not getting right.

Chris: 39:02

Maybe still being a cyborg at some point, but for now I am a person.

Tim: 39:05

Brain in a jar.

Chris: 39:07

Yeah. All right. Well, thanks everyone for listening. If you made it to this point, uh, hopefully you enjoyed the episode. And if you could please uh like this, share it, send it to a friend. Um, that's how we get the word out there. So we would flame it. Flame it on X.

Tim: 39:22

We'll we need the engagement X.

Chris: 39:24

Flame it on X.

Erika Dietrick: 39:24

They're ready for their next sponsor, so you gotta share it.

Chris: 39:27

Yeah. All right, and with that, we'll take it away and we'll see you in a couple weeks on Cables Clouds. Thank you so much.

Tim: 39:34

Say ya.