Role modeling honesty ❣️ Kibi Anderson, Red Table Talk

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TRANSCRIPT

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Kevin & Bailey: (00:00)

Welcome to Get Together!

Bailey: (00:05)

It's our show about ordinary people building extraordinary communities. I'm your host, faley Richardson. I'm a partner at people and company and a co author of get together how to build a community with your people.

Kevin: (00:18)

And I'm Kevin Bailey's biz partner at people in company where we advise organizations on how to cultivate meaningful communities.

Bailey: (00:26)

I always call you my business partner. And, uh, I, I recently got called out for that. And like, he's also your friend. I know. He's awesome. He's my best partner. All right. Yeah,

Kevin: (00:35)

No idea how deep this is. Partnership goes. We mean partners for real.

Bailey: (00:40)

In each episode, we interview everyday people who have built extraordinary communities about just how they did it. How did they get the first people to show up? How did they grow to hundreds, thousands, more members. And today we're talking to Kevi Anderson, an Emmy winning producer, and most recently the former president of red table talk.

Kevin: (01:02)

So Bailey you've known KB for a bit before this interview. Why were you excited to speak?

Bailey: (01:08)

Well, I feel like many of us know red table talk as a basic TV show in that, you know, we tune in to watch Jayda and Willow and grandma Smith talk about their lives. It was on the summer. It kind of was in the news was massively popular. And what I mean by like a basic TV shows, we just watch it like an audience and that's it passively. But what a lot of us might not know is that red table talk has a thriving grassroots community around it. Women in cities around the world have started their own red table talk in their own cities, literally getting red table claws and getting tables, assembling them and gathering strangers who are also moved by the hard, honest conversations, the Smith's role model on the TV show to get together and have those conversations themselves. I met Kevi back when she was at red table, talk through a mutual friend about a year ago, and I immediately vibed with her.

Bailey: (02:04)

She's open. She's confident. She knows herself. I loved her energy. Katie asked me to interview her for a women in media conference, keynote. She just gave, and after that talk, I was like, KB, why the heck haven't we done? What are podcasts talking about? All the community work you did. She was a community building natural. And when paired with her, her really high level business insights, I was really inspired. It moved. So we finally made the time with her, and I'm really excited to share this episode with you guys today. So y'all ready. Let's jump in. Let's jump in KV. Welcome to the podcast. We are so excited to have you here today and continue to ask you questions and learn from you. Thanks for taking the time. Thank you know, I'm excited. It's been a long time coming so glad to finally make this happen. Absolutely. You know, I'm going to ask you a question I've asked you before in different ways, but we, we like to start this podcast out, uh, talking about how, you know, you can't, the funk is what Kevin

Bailey: (03:00)

And I like to say, when you're serving a community, it has to be coming from a shared purpose for someone who's leading the community or helping organize the community. It has to resonate with you too, when you're a leader. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and how it's informed? What, what really matters to you and, and your work?

Kibi: (03:19)

Totally agree with that, that entire premise. Um, you know, I'm originally from Seattle Washington. I was an only child raised by a single mother who was an activist and, uh, very politically engaged. So I grew up within that environment. Um, and my mom had to really hustle to take care of me. You know what I mean? We grew up with, you know, meager means and in order to make sure that I was okay, she leaned into our community a lot, you know, my church family made sure that I had money when it came to programs and different things and activities that I wanted to do. We had like a cadre of like kind of other mothers and aunties who would step in if she couldn't take me to an event or couldn't get home from work in time to make sure that I was fed.

Kibi: (04:06)

Um, you know, I, I, it's funny, people always joke to me because they're like, you know, keeping your friends or, you know, you're so into kind of maintaining relationships. And you're so good with kind of keeping in contact. And a lot of that comes from the fact that I know it was because of the support of my community and, um, the love from them that I've been able to achieve and become and do any of the things that I've been able to do. And so that definitely created a strong value for it. You know, you understand just how much more you can do when you are. You're walking in accordance with people, you know, and, and not afraid to kind of receive help and, and, you know, celebrating the collective advancements that come along with, you know, shared values and shared systems and, and mutual mutual work together.

Kibi: (04:53)

Um, so that's definitely influenced, you know, how I've shown up in the world in my professional life. You know, I, uh, I also describe myself as kind of like a, a born storyteller, you know, for me, what I think kept me energized and inspired and just kind of realized that there's more out there was the fact that, you know, I read stories that expose me to different worlds, different communities, different places, you know, and a lot of that, you know, I think influenced just my excitement about learning about people. So within community is people clearly and individuals. So this idea of really trying to understand at a very specific level, a person's story, how they came to be, you know, much like you're asking this question, it definitely helps you understand kind of how they show up in the world. And so for me, a lot of my excitement when it comes to work has also been about being able to share and elevate stories of different people, especially those who have historically been marginalized or not represented.

Bailey: (05:50)

And I love, I love hearing about all those different threads, because I think it makes me realize how, when you to work on something like red table talk, it brought together so many different pieces. It's like, kind of right in the middle of a Venn diagram, you have a business background you've been to business school, you've worked in media for awhile, you've won Emmys and you had this sort of personal life experience growing up in community. But tell me a little bit about how the series came to be and what about it created a community? How did it start and how did that community emerge?

Kibi: (06:24)

Um, so go to      just like kind of everybody else. Um, but you know, Jada and her mom back when her daughter Willow was about nine had kind of come together and they wanted to have a conversation with her that allowed them to show up as themselves, you know, not as her mother, not as her grandmother, but it's two women, you know, trying to make it in the world and just kind of talk about, you know, what are the different challenges and things that you are going to face and just have a very Frank and honest and no holds bar conversation. They did that, like I said, when she was nine, put it up on YouTube, you know, it did kind of what it did, but it sort of sat for many years. And then a producer by the name of Ellen Ray Kitson came and was introduced to Jada.

Kibi: (07:06)

She actually asked about it Willow is 17 by this time. And she's like, Hey, you know, what's going on with that red table talk. I feel like there might be a space for this, especially if we think about doing it in a non-traditional environment, such as an online platform like Facebook, the idea was let's maintain the integrity of what the initial conversation was about, which is, I said, you know, honesty and like blatant honesty, you know, not trying to sugarcoat it, not trying to make it appropriate for prime time, but just really going to those places that I think as women and women of color, especially we don't always do. And so, you know, that's the, you know, the evolution of putting a pilot together, pitching it around. And like I said, the goal was to not go to network. You know, Jada was very specific about really wanting to go to a platform that would give her the freedom and the flexibility to do the kind of programming she wanted, but also that actually had some tools to support community engagement, including the building and, you know, on Facebook, you know, it was probably one of the best platforms, despite all of his challenges with helping to support community engagement, fostering exchange in a very organic and seamless way.

Kibi: (08:12)

And so that's how the show came to be.

Bailey: (08:13)

Can you tell me a little bit about how it resonated with you personally? You said you were a fan of the show. Um, yeah. What made it so powerful? Do you remember kind of the first time seeing it?

Kibi: (08:24)

Yeah, no. I mean, again, I was blown away by the honesty, you know, and I think you hadn't seen that you didn't see it a lot period in, in talk shows I think, but I also don't think you had seen it from the Smiths at all. You know, they had been a very private family, you know, um, you know, very prominent, but very private about, you know, their challenges and their struggles. And, you know, in the first episode it was Jayda with, um, Sheree who is, uh, Will's first wife and this talking about the drama. They went through trying to reconcile their relationship and they did not hold anything back. And that was a beautiful thing. And ironically, at that time I was actually dating, I mean, my current fiance now, but he and I were dating

Bailey: (09:06)

Little Smith, no, no turn.

Kibi: (09:12)

Um, no, but my fiance has children. And so we were sort of navigating or I was beginning to navigate, okay, how do I kind of show up in his life? You know, given the fact that there were other mothers and, you know, not trying to overstep boundaries, but obviously be supportive. So it just definitely connected with me personally. And I just thought that it was so courageous and I was so energized and excited and I couldn't wait to see more, you know, and like I said, you just, weren't seeing that, especially from somebody who was as high profile is Jada was. And so that's, um, what attracted me to it, you know what I mean? And I think it's what attracted a lot of women and a lot of black women too, because, you know, unfortunately in our communities, there is a history of silence around things that may not be so positive.

Kibi: (09:56)

You know, if there's drama in your life, you don't want to talk about it, hush, hush, you know, but that's not the way you heal. It's been detrimental to our communities in many ways. And so I think when, especially a lot of black women saw that representation on camera. It just, I, I mean, it just touched them in a way that that just exploded. You know what I mean? And so the community on its own just grew soar organically. So when I came on board to basically run red table talk enterprises, which was really the arm of the company that was kind of there to exploit the IP in a lot of different areas. So leaning into how do we create tools and products and solutions for our community that span different, you know, ways people consume content, would that be podcasts or books or live events or, you know, actual merchandising, um, experiences.

Kibi: (10:43)

That was my role. The community was there. They were asking for stuff, you know, so I was actually, I always say this felt like I was playing catch-up when I got there, because the community was already self organizing was already, like I said, being very vocal, very vulnerable in a way that you just don't see. Um, so my, my focus early on was, okay, how do I harness this? You know, how do I make sure that I continue to support the, you know, the, the rockstars and the ambassadors that are helping to lead these things, but at the same time, just layer in, you know, protections for us as a brand. And like I said, the elements of the business that were going to allow us to, you know, grow over time.

Bailey: (11:20)

Yeah. You were like, had like a wild stallion horse and you were supposed to come in and like ride or put a saddle on the horse and like go with it. Why do you think red table talk became such a community?

Kibi: (11:31)

I think one of the biggest, biggest things that, um, resonated was the multi-generational aspect of the show. You know, it was three different generations. You had Gammy, you know, who's from an older generation, you know, in her sixties, you know, as a voice, like very, very specific and like what she does. And doesn't like, you know, kind of institutes sort of more old-school ways. And, and, and ideas of you had Jada, you know, who's kind of in the middle, who is, I think I S I used to always say she kind of works to create space for everybody. You know what I mean? She definitely has her positions, but I think she's the one who kind of tries to see more, multiple sides of a person's position and situation. And then there's Willow who was young, you know, and, and definitely brought her own sense of understanding and depth and ideas to conversations, but she was also able to kind of be that, uh, sort of vision into the future.

Kibi: (12:21)

You know, how are, how are we going to allow these things, these different issues that we're challenged with to influence the development of our girls going forward and that you hadn't seen before, you know, especially amongst black women, I mean, to be Frank, and I don't mean to like, say this is specifically just for black women, cause that wasn't it. But at the same time, you know, I think there has historically not been a ton of programming. I think out there that like really always speaks to some of the things that we as a community are dealing with. And this one did it in such a, like I said, unique and different way that people just stood up and they were like, Whoa, wow. I think another thing about it was the types of conversations they were having, you know, the types of topics. And like I said, you start with something like, co-parenting you go to something like, you know, narcissism and how do you deal with a narcissist person in your life?

Kibi: (13:08)

You go to something like, how do you survive addiction? How do you forgive somebody who was betrayed you? I mean, there were topics that, that just people could relate to. You know, like in my daily life, I am struggling with this right now. How do I deal with this? And you began to get one example of how folks are approaching, you know, ways to overcome these things in a manner that's a lot more healthy than say, cussing somebody out, you know, and, you know, going to turn to, you know, drugs or something to kind of numb the pain. You know, this was, this was like, no, like let's really move into how do we teach these tools? And I think that really connected with a lot of people, because like I said, kind of no subject was off, off limits. No subject was barred.

Kevin: (13:53)

That topic choice seems powerful. We were, we were doing an interview with, um, the folks that run the dinner party, which is a dinner series for people who have lost a loved one. And they talked, we were talking to them about what, you know, what makes those gatherings, those discussions special? And he said, it's, it's about talking about the elephant in the room. You know, as people going through grief, grieving a loved one, it's something that they're sort of dealing with it and, and bursting to communicate, you know, with someone else. But oftentimes it feels like the thing that sucks the air out of the room and to, to name that, to sort of find these elephants and say, no, we're discussing them.

Kibi: (14:29)

Yes, no, I agree. And, and, and to your point, it almost felt like they had been waiting for it. And I think just also kind of given the context of the environment that we're in, just kind of, as a country we are dealing with, I think more attitudes that, you know, are kind of elevating things like individualism, you know, division, you know, things that I think folks are just kind of tired of. You know, I think people really want at the end of the day, be able to walk in accordance with those around them. And so I think red table talk at that time really sort of spoke to that need and desire, you know, the celebrity element, you know, I don't want to diminish that. I think helped, you know, I think people are always kind of excited to sort of lean into sort of celebrity.

Kibi: (15:09)

And so the fact that data was inviting some of her celebrity fins on, but they weren't talking about the book coming out. You know, they weren't talking about the new movie, you know, they were really talking about stuff that is hard, you know, and, and issues that can be sometimes more challenging to talk about. And that was a big requirement, you know, or sort of kind of policy, you know, not necessarily written down, but, you know, from the producer's perspective, whereas, you know, this is not a show where you're coming on to promote and, you know, talk about fluff. Like if you are the bigger question was, are you ready to come to the red table? You know, cause once the show got really popular, everybody wanted to come on, you know, and kind of talk about things, but it was important to message to guests. You know, this is not necessarily going to be a place where you're going to have an easy conversation, so just make sure that you're ready for that. And I think fans appreciated that.

Bailey: (15:59)

The other thing I'm hearing Kevi is like, there was a sense of role modeling how to have hard conversations, you know, not, not just in the actual topics, which you guys sort of offer to people and allow them to then have their own conversations about, and their own lives with their own friends. But also just like the format of sitting down at a table and creating a focus space to do that. And I saw this amazing video on Facebook about red table talk community and saw that, you know, women in, in other cities around the country were actually taking red tablecloths, putting them over a table and meeting strangers to sit down and sort of mimic the conversations that were happening on the show. Um, and I think that that's so interesting, like the, the conversations that Jadah Willow, you know, we're hosting other people then recreated them in their lives because they could, they had a clear format and a topic.

Kibi: (16:59)

Yeah, totally. No. And the one thing that I kind of had to fully acknowledge is I don't think I realized how little training we get and how to communicate properly. You know what I mean? Like communication is not easy by any means and anybody who's been in a relationship knows that, but just collectively, like it's just not something that we, you know, I think spend a lot of time talking about, unless you've sort of taken the time and we'd go into therapy or counseling or whatever the case is, but just as a collective sort of country, I don't think that we do that. So it was a really beautiful and powerful to your point modeling, um, offering that the show gave, you know, and, and when I think about kind of my focus area, you know, the biggest question that we would get when people would watch the shows was okay, this is amazing.

Kibi: (17:46)

And I am so inspired and I, how it can be done, but how do I implant it in my life? You know, my life is a little bit different or my situation is different. So a lot of my focus area as a, as a, as a president of the company was really crafting a strategy around the, how, you know, how do we go deeper? And, you know, when you figure people within the community have varying interests of how deep they want to go, you know, so some people, it might just be a worksheet. You know, some people it might be, Hey, I want to listen to a 12, you know, limited series podcast on, you know, how to deal with addiction in my family or whatever the case is, you know? So it was really an interesting exercise and challenge to kind of think through, from a strategy and growth perspective, how do we begin to kind of layer in those things that, you know, would really speak to that need? Yeah.

Bailey: (18:31)

When you first sort of walked in the door, you had had your first day at the office, like the old days, uh, what did

Kibi: (18:41)

The community kind of look like then? The community was actually pretty big. I mean, I think when I came on board, we may have had, you know, like a million followers on Instagram and, you know, Facebook, or I don't know where we were, but I mean, you know, maybe like six, like Jayda herself may have had like 6 million followers on Instagram. I think by the time I left, she had like 11 or 12. Um, so pretty much doubled over the time that I was there. And, you know, on Facebook, you know, had, we had probably had like half a million people in our Facebook group for red table talk, which was pretty significant. Um, and what had begun to happen. And it sort of, you, you talked about kind of some of the rock stars that, you know, sort of, um, rise to the top within the community is some of these women who you referenced, you know, who were beginning to host, you know, their own red table talk experiences have begun to organize local chapters for red table talk on Facebook. So there was a red table talk, uh, RVA kind of for Virginia and the greater DC area. There was a red table talk in Atlanta, you know, Texas. I mean, there were these small little groups that have begun to pop up that were actually like decent in size, you know, 20, 30,000 people, you know, so a decent number of members. And that's the first thing that we did was to find out who these people were, literally,

Kibi: (20:02)

Nah, everybody who is a moderate of those of these groups, because these are going to be our core, you know, ambassadors because these women were doing this completely, you know, out of the joy and the gifts that it brought them. Like there's no money, you know, they're not being at that point celebrated, you know, because we, we didn't know that knowledge.

Kibi: (20:20)

You know, the company's guidance, this is just people organizing people, just organizing yeah. On, on, on Facebook, you know, like I said, [inaudible],

Speaker 6: (20:30)

I mean, I definitely acknowledge

Kibi: (20:32)

My experience may not be typical. Um, but it's helpful because you kind of under, you kind of begin to look at it from another side, you know, I didn't necessarily have to struggle with sort of building community on social, but I did have to think about some other challenging things, because my thing was, how do I begin to engage with this community in a space that I control? You know what I mean? I, you know, Facebook is as amazing as they are. Like, they don't give you the data that you'd like to have. You know, you don't own emails, you don't own, you know, the demographics specifics that you'd like to have. So at somebody trying to build a business on that front, you know, it's very difficult. So what my other challenge was in terms of, um, kind of first days in was how do I begin to bring people to an owned and operated platform that we have, and that was red table talk.com.

Kibi: (21:21)

And not that you're looking to compete with it, but I was like, I just need to have a core, uh, you know, group of people that I can talk to and engage with on a direct basis that would allow me to begin to do some data research, you know, begin to beta test. So the very first thing that I did from a content perspective was offer a free online social, digital video content campaign over the summer in between our first and second season, the show was down and we weren't shooting anything. So, but the community was still there. You know, we were like, well, why aren't we doing something to kind of keep them engaged? So we launched something called a summer healing sessions where Jayda basically did over about five weeks, these video sessions with folks kind of talking about some of the key issues and things that she does to rest rejuvenate, you know, and we had a text that we decided to use and, uh, it was a great way for us to get people to kind of come to the website cause they had the, you know, sign up and give their email address in order to be included in the process.

Kibi: (22:20)

Um, and that allowed me to get, I mean, probably 40 to 50,000 email addresses and like, hi, wow. Four to five weeks, you know, and obviously the star power of Jaida helps. We definitely bought, you know, some paid ads to kind of promote it. So those things help, but you know, that was a great base, you know, clearly not the millions of folks that we had on Instagram and Facebook. But you know, if you think about it, when you're talking about, you know, sort of break, even for a business, you don't necessarily need a ton of emails in order to kind of begin to drive revenue and be profitable. And so obviously the more we could get the better, but you know, I mean like a hundred, 150,000 emails would have been great for me to do a decent business and the sky's the limit from there. Yeah.

Bailey: (22:58)

Did anything surprise you or stand out to you as you were getting to know some of these early folks? Yeah, definitely. And it's so funny we actually call it our, our

Kibi: (23:08)

Women who were running the local groups that are RTT OGs. Yes, exactly. Let me think. Well, I'll be honest. One of the things that was a pleasant surprise, especially related to our [inaudible], which is how sophisticated they were, you know what I mean? Like these, these women were sophisticated, they knew social and not, you know, I'm obviously it very, but, you know, they're, they were just very sophisticated. And like I said, in many ways, we're becoming kind of the face of their own local groups. And so that was, um, exciting and promising because one of the things that I was always mindful of is it's very dangerous to build a company on the, I mean, you know, on the kind of quote unquote the back of one person. Yeah. Bottleneck bottlenecks J you know, so Jayda obviously was the face of the show and you had Willow and Gammy, but I was mindful of, you know, if I don't have Jayda in the room, when people come, you know, that's, that's kind of the question and room being a little bit more broad, you know, she's not on the video, if she's not here, she's not there.

Kibi: (24:04)

You know? And so what I began to see from the dynamic magnetism that the ladies who were running the groups had is no, I mean, I mean, I'm sorry. Yes. People will come, you know, people will begin to connect with local folks who are helping them, uh, teaching them, bringing them into community in a way that is very powerful and, uh, sustainable and sticky. And that was a pleasant surprise because you never know, you know, is it, you know, sometimes you can be a little, a little fearful that, that, that won't be the case. And so what we began to do is really lean into celebrating and supporting them, you know, giving them the tools. If we started a kind of a bi-monthly, um, check-in call with all the ladies and they're about maybe 15 of them, um, you know, with Jayda on the line.

Kibi: (24:52)

And like I said, wow, that's awesome. I love that. I mean, you know, I am sure nobody missed that call. Yeah, exactly. You know, Jada would shout them out, you know, w when, when we did social plugs, you know, from the show on Facebook or from her Instagram, you know, so we just really, you know, want to just try to celebrate and let them know we need you, we value you. And you are just as much a part of this, if not more important to this movement and to this company's growth, as you know, obviously Jada and Willow and Gammy, and even myself, you know, as the leader,

Kevin: (25:26)

It sounds like the shift from maybe a, a fan club to a community, not to say that it was only a fan club, but it's, you know, communities have leadership that creates more leaders and it's, it's challenging to accomplish that. And there's also all those, the risks and trade-offs of really distributing ownership in that way. But at least from a, a community building perspective, you suddenly can just accomplish more together than you can alone.

Kibi: (25:54)

Totally. Yeah. And, you know, I think that it's funny because we often had this internal conversation with my leadership team about this kind of idea of like fan club versus community spaces. You know what I mean? Because, you know, Jada was already a celebrity before red tabletop came along, you know, so there were definitely fans of red table talk that were there because they were friends of hers, you know, and, and that was a category that we kind of realized we could potentially do something with, but beyond that, you know, there were people in the, especially in the Facebook community who really wanted to do the work, you know what I mean? Like who were, who were not just about kind of like Jane, it looks amazing and her clothes are amazing and you know, this type of thing, or, you know, Willow's hair is amazing, you know, or that was real cute with Gammy to said, in terms of his GAM was the queen of memes.

Kibi: (26:37)

She was great. Um, in terms of her, her words and stuff, you know, and that think can kind of be on the surface a little bit where you think about kind of fandom, but really leaning into folks who genuinely were coming to the table every week. And obviously coming to the types of products and experiences that my team began to create, because they wanted to develop, they wanted to heal, you know, they wanted to get better. You know, they wanted to figure out how to live their best life. Um, and I think those were really where the community component came to be, because I think that they were more willing, like I said, to try and experiment, you know, cause you know, some of the stuff we did focus in like, and we were like, okay, got it. We'll try that differently. You know, but in general, the consensus across the board was yes, you know, this is great.

Kibi: (27:28)

You know, one of the things that we launched, um, over the holiday season last year was a game. Uh, and it was in partnership with a company called, um, we're not really strangers. A young lady has started this game. And the whole point of it was creating an experience for people who otherwise might not get to know each other because they're strangers. But the reality is, if you ask a few questions, you realize how much more connected we are and actuality. And so we developed an expansion pack with her. So the idea was you think, you know, people closest to you, but how, how do you really know them?

Bailey: (28:04)

Yes. Especially family. Exactly. It's crazy.

Kibi: (28:07)

How many times have you had these conversations that are just not really, like Kevin said the elephant in the room, but you're not really saying it, you know, or, you know, I'm your mom, but I'm also a woman who has passions and you know, has all these other dreams and stuff. And so that actually was one of our most popular, um, products because in many ways it empowered people to have their own red table talk conversations, but it gave them a really easily accessible tool. You know what I mean? The box was red, you know, you could take it on the road with you. You could really have a conversation really with anybody. It ended up being a helpful kind of case study for us to sort of understand, okay, like this is sort of a really nice medium because it allows people who may be more casual fans of the show, but are still interested in having a cool game, you know, that, that speaks to the brand. But also the people who really, really were like, no, no, I really want to be able to, you know, enlist these, these, uh, these tools in my life. Um, another also gave them a tool that they could really do. And some of the stuff that we got from our fans, I mean, it was absolutely beautiful, you know, just people talking about how the games help them break through things and, you know, learn stuff. And, um, you know, in ways that I think they may not have been able to do otherwise,

Bailey: (29:22)

I love that. I want to ask you a question that goes back to something you said a few minutes ago about zeroing in, on your most passionate people. That's like, you know, Kevin and my creed, we're like Alex telling everybody that we are drinking that Kool-Aid, you know, and you're a business woman. You've worked at big media companies and it's really hard to, to work at a media company and see big numbers, like a million people following us here. And also understand that in some cases it's important to zoom in on Nina, maybe a set of most passionate people. And I'm just curious, how did you know that you needed to do that? How did you know, what was your thinking about this? These 15 people were worth an hour long phone call. How did you realize that given the size and scale of your

Kibi: (30:13)

Overall? Yeah, definitely. Um, you know, it's, it's a combination of things, you know, I think the first thing was, you know, having worked in media, you know, and, and media ranging from, you know, sort of ABC news, which was a more, you know, kind of mainstream, you know, accessible and in many ways commoditizable type of news to a Bloomberg media, you know, which was more specific in terms of its target audience and the types of things you could get. So you're able to kind of like, think about, uh, how you're able to take advantage of that to having worked in just traditional entertainment content. I had a really good education and kind of understanding what are the things that are necessary to kind of scale something, you know, and when you're talking about a piece of content, like everyday news, you know, you got to work really, really, really hard to kind of figure out what are the things that are going to make people come back because you can go anywhere to really get that news, you know, ranging from a movie or TV show that has like rabid fans and people that are gonna come and they're going to tweet.

Kibi: (31:14)

And then, you know, just because they're so excited about the content and I think kind of walking that spectrum over the course of my career, one of the things that became very evident to me is that in order for me to reach the level of power and access, and I think reached with this community, I got to figure out how to tap into the, I'm sorry, the Facebook community. I got to figure out how to tap into this broader community. And so, but in order to understand the broader community, I need to understand the local community because they can probably tell me how they're feeling. And so that's why I decided to go to go local first. You know, I feel like, you know, in many ways we think about statistics, you know, you, you don't have to like talk to everybody to kind of understand what the, um, essence of the, you know, the data is showing you.

Kibi: (31:59)

You can kind of talk to some specifics and these women were from all over the country. I mean, they weren't specific to a certain geographical area graphically like similar, they were passionate. Maybe they had passionate. I mean, they were, most of them were, I think there were maybe like two men and many of them were black men. I think there may have been a, like couple of Latina women in the mix, but in general, you know, at least I could kind of say, okay, I've got a woman in South Africa, I've got a woman in, you know, in, uh, in California, you know, so at least when I think about trying to, uh, create the most ideal environment for kind of understanding and data collection, this is going to be a little bit, um, more reliable, you know, then if it was like everybody was in California per, um, so that's honestly what would drove me to kind of start there.

Kibi: (32:42)

And then from the lessons that I learned from, you know, honing in on them and just understanding how far their reach was, because like I said, these women were building communities on their own that while they didn't reach half a million, you're talking about growth rates over the course of a six to 12 month period that were in the 50% to 100%. I mean, you know, women starting with members of their Facebook groups that may have been in the 10 thousands by the end of the year where 50,000, you know, 40,000, I mean, so they knew what they were doing and they were able to grow. So it just, it just, it was like, why not start here? Because if I can understand the best practices that these women are doing, I can then model that out, create an entire program that allows me to begin to recruit other women to do the same thing in their communities.

Kibi: (33:32)

And that was the idea. We were going to basically create an entire, um, kind of community building program where we would have our OGs sort of be the best, you know, best in case examples. And people could come to the website over time that we were going to build out and get, you know, instructions on how to start their own community group. You know, here's some videos here, you know, lessons over time, as we were able to coordinate, um, the show topics with perhaps in-person or virtual experiences that the women wanted to do. But if you're able to create a system that is scalable, you know, the sky's the limit, you know, and then you have a really nice network of people who can then become like buyers of your products, you know, testers of certain things you're trying to promote, you know, uh, showing up, you know, to geographic events that we were planning to host across the country.

Bailey: (34:22)

That's amazing. I, I love that you had all these, these insights. I feel like sometimes we interview these people like different people on this podcast and you're like, dang, you just like had the right read, you know, and, and it's not necessarily like this specifically is in your background, but you, you understood how to like analyze the information in front of you and pull out meaningful insights and make strategic decisions even in the community building context. So it's just rad to hear you like process process to make those decisions. Totally. We recently interviewed a woman on the podcast who was a super fan of Mariah Carey's and 16 bunkers. The story is bonkers when she's 16 RIAA, like kind of spotted her at a tower record signing because Bree had brought a binder with 6,000 notes from 6,000 different fans. And when she came on to work for him, right.

Bailey: (35:20)

Carey, um, to help mobilize the fan community and to help at the time, kind of get Mariah on TRL and the virtuous cycle between, uh, kind of the fans working together to get Mariah videos up on the charts in TRL. And they're still doing that like billboard and Spotify and stuff. It's crazy. Um, and, and the value that they got back was of course seeing Mariah succeed, but also just acknowledgement yeah. Acknowledgement from Mariah and in different forms, which was what Brie sort of facilitated was, you know, as people that really love Mariah feeling like they had more access and connection to her information about her. And you talked a little bit about acknowledgement with these OGs earlier and maybe different members of the community, but how did you think through that? And, you know, you're coming in maybe to add some process and structure to a blooming community. How did you think about the importance of that and any kind of process or structure you put around it?

Kibi: (36:17)

I mean, I definitely thought it was important, you know, like I said, because many of these women had been working, you know, for months on their own without really any acknowledgement, you know, and I, listen, I, this is just sort of me as a business leader who kind of, has also studied and kind of understands how incentive structures work, you know, and everybody has what I call their currency. Um, whether it's money, whether it's, you know, praise, whether it's promotion, whatever the case is. But at the end of the day, everybody likes to be told as told, thank you, you know what I mean? And you know, and that's just kind of basic principle. So, you know, honestly the first thing I did when we actually connected with all of the women who were the OGs, was send them all a thank you package. I mean, stock something signed from Jayda, you know, T a t-shirt from red tabletop, you know, just like a really cool thing just to sort of start and acknowledge the work that they have been doing.

Kibi: (37:06)

Um, you know, and, and just sort of in a very personal way, you know, just to kind of establish that personal connection. So this wasn't something that we, you know, promoted on social or anything. It was just stuff that, you know, they got, but, you know, again, because we had the, uh, platform of the show to also leverage, you know, they were coming on every week. We also began to incorporate, you know, shout outs to these women, but also other people, obviously who were doing things that were noticeable to us as a team, we know, so Jada Willow and Gunn

Speaker 6: (37:35)

The air time, air time,

Kibi: (37:39)

You know, so after the show, they would shout people out, you know, thank you. So-and-so, you know, using their handles and stuff. Um, you know, and that's just the beauty of social media, because then you're able to, you let people know, Hey, like if you do certain things, you will get celebrated. And ideally that encourages them to do more. I mean, so that was sort of how we thought about it, just from a very practical perspective, you know, as I began to think about sort of infrastructure and process, I honestly went a lot to the group to ask them, you know, Hey, what are some of the things that, you know, we should be doing? You know, and I'll be honest. I think one of the things that really helped the team even get more organized of our OGs was when we actually, cause we, cause we probably met for about three or four, three or four months, just, you know, Hey, pick up the phone, calling them. But then we realized, okay, we're going to start sharing certain secrets and internal information with them because we wanted them to feel like they were part of the family. And so we had them all sign non-disclosure agreements, confidentiality agreements. And we were initially concerned that that was going to a lot of them off, you know, because you never know, like when you start kind of asking people to sign paperwork, it can be a little

Bailey: (38:42)

They're like, give me everything. I felt like they were

Kibi: (38:46)

Outsiders. And so that in itself is a sign of celebration. It's a sign of, Hey, I trust you. You know, it's a sign of, thank you, you know, for what you've done so far. And I want to bring you more into the fold. So stuff like that, um, from like, you know, an infrastructure perspective, at least with LGS began to allow us to create even more systems for us to say, thank you. You know? So when we did surveys and stuff, you know, we would kind of layer in certain things and all that kinds of, and the plan was honestly to fly all of them to California, we had actually planned to do it would have been amazing. Yeah. But you know, just to kind of have a retreat, you know, obviously Jayda would've been there to help support, but also, you know, bring in some other elements, uh, to create some really cool programming around that.

Kibi: (39:28)

That was the idea. And then in terms of the broader community, you know, and this is where certain things like some of the, um, original content, uh, programs, like I said, the summer healing sessions, you know, we did something over the summer, which was called the refresh. You know, a lot of those things were free and the whole point of those types of campaigns was to really sort of say, thank you, you know, we appreciate you coming. We know that the show is only successful because of you. So here's kind of free content, free tools, free things. You can sort of download that, you know, if you're interested, we'll allow you to do more in your own life. And people really appreciated that. You know, they really saw because we were giving away some gyms that we were giving away, very, very good information. And folks were just like, wow, I can't get this anywhere else. And it's free.

Bailey: (40:15)

Hmm. Were there any like big challenges that you felt like you still couldn't crack with community building or anything that you feel like you took as a misstep?

Kibi: (40:24)

Yeah, definitely. Well, it's funny. I don't know if this was necessarily a mess up on my part, but the deal that they struck prior to me joining in terms of kind of getting the show going and getting on Facebook actually, um, gave Facebook and this is not common, but gave Facebook control of all of our social media pages. So [inaudible]

Bailey: (40:46)

Partner,

Kibi: (40:46)

You know, they were funding the show. So not, not, you know, no by no means saying there's anything necessarily wrong with that, but it, it proved to be a very difficult hurdle for us to overcome because, um, you know, Facebook has its own very specific things that they're mindful of and, you know, their legal team is very, very, you know, uh, vocal. And so some of the stuff that we wanted to do, we always, well, all of the stuff that we wanted to post on the main Facebook pages had to be run through their team, their legal. And so some of the stuff, you know, it was like for them, if we wanted to give health information out, you know, that type of thing was a little bit more taboo just because of, um, concerns about, you know, liability and all that kind of stuff.

Kibi: (41:25)

Um, but that was a big hurdle, you know, because again, we did not own those channels, you know, so our ability to really get as creative and as innovative as we would have liked just wasn't there. And to be Frank, in my opinion, I felt that the show page for red table talk was too focused on the show. Like it was really about like promoting show clips as opposed to really building community and, you know, things that really, I think resonate with communities means, you know, like just all, if you think about all the stuff that goes viral, you know, in, in community, you know, beginning to celebrate, you know, kind of user generated content in a more specific way to encourage folks to come back, because they're interested in seeing what the coolest, you know, thing is going to be from the community or whatever you just weren't able to do. And so I think a lot of the storytelling kind of, as you go deeper behind the scenes for some of the episodes that we have, you know, there were some really dynamic footage that no one ever saw because we would shoot for two hours, but the show was 25 minutes. So imagine how much content is not showing up on the screen. Um, but I would have never, I would never do a deal like that going forward. Yeah.

Bailey: (42:35)

So I think it's an important point of like anything that might block you from being able to communicate honestly, and making sure those messages are seen by your community is it's a pretty big red flag. I think it can be really big challenge to overcome. And I hear you kind of identifying that very early on and trying to like create a space where you can communicate directly with these people.

Kibi: (42:58)

Absolutely. Yeah, no, that's a huge point and I can't reiterate it enough, you know, I mean, you're right, because you always have a filter if you don't control that you're trying to navigate. And, and then also, you know, you just have time lags, you know what I mean? Like, you know, in many instances, especially when you're dealing with social stuff, you know, the timing matters, you know, how are you able to capitalize on something that might be hot or, you know, uh, resonating well and kind of elevate it, you know, that type of thing. And if you have to wait four days for legal to turn it around, I mean, you've kind of lost, lost, lost the opportunity. Um, the other thing I would say that we didn't do enough and we were working on that, but like I said, um, it was kind of ignored early on was the power of Twitter. And actually Facebook did not own the, I mean, we, we controlled the Twitter channels. Um, so that,

Bailey: (43:43)

I think they'd just probably pretended like the word Twitter doesn't exist in the platform.

Kibi: (43:48)

Don't say that word, although they were much more aggressive about us using YouTube to be Frank, but that's another conversation interesting. But yeah, it's, what are they, you know, they weren't really as, uh, focused on clearly cause they didn't put it in the deal. And I think that, um, you know, I was able to bring on a head of content and a head of community probably about eight months into my tenure, just because we were sort of dealing with some early on, um, structural things that we kind of had to work through. And when, when they both came on, they were like, we've got to use Twitter because if you think about it, it's a natural extension. You know, even though the show is, you know, video-based and obviously, um, you know, has its, you know, sort of feel and vibe that I think comes with having a visual experience, the co the topics we were talking about, you know, generate so much additional content, you know, and so much additional conversation, you know, and all the things that I think Twitter does well, you know, the show could also lend itself well to, and if you think about sub-communities and conversations, you know, around topics around, you know, dealing with say parents and staff and relationships, and, you know, so we began to break down some of the topic areas that were beginning to sort of show up as like consistent things.

Kibi: (45:02)

Um, so that's an area that I think, you know, unfortunately we, we, we got to a, but not probably as, as soon as I would have liked. And I think that, um, you know, we could have definitely done some powerful community building on that platform too.

Bailey: (45:14)

Yeah. Would you mind sharing just, you know, where's the red tabletop community at now and what are you focusing on? So the community,

Kibi: (45:22)

From what I can tell, you know, is still primarily on sort of the Facebook Instagram platforms, you know, I, from what I can gauge, I don't think there's been a ton of effort, continued around creating our own direct, uh, communication, you know, to kind of direct to consumer direct to community, um, strategy that I was focusing on. You know, a lot of the control of the platforms has shifted back solely to Facebook and Instagram, you know, from what I can tell. But I think, you know, especially with the OGs, you know, the infrastructure that I have set up is no longer in place, you know what I mean? So I, I know that there's a desire to potentially engage with them, but right now a lot of the current leadership of the show is focusing purely on making the show, you know, which for me is, you know, a slight disappointment, because I do believe that, you know, the community was really where the power was.

Kibi: (46:13)

And I, you know, in terms of growth and opportunity for business, definitely where that foundation was going to be built. So, yeah, I mean, you know, it's, I don't think it's being as prioritized as it was, but at the same time, you know, like I said, because there was already a strong, just sort of organic momentum that I think kind of came from, especially within the Facebook group, people are still posting, you know, they're still going to the main Facebook group to get advice and folks are still being vulnerable. Folks are still saying stuff that when I think about me, I'm like, wow, I can't believe you actually said that. I mean, it was people talking about

Bailey: (46:52)

That. No, I mean, it's beautiful. You know, like their

Kibi: (46:54)

Child tried to commit suicide yesterday. Their husband just left them, you know, their husband gave them an STD. I mean, like it's, it's, it's amazing the level of vulnerability that folks show in this group and people show up, you know, and they're there and they provide commentary and they give advice. So I do see that stuff still happening, cause I'm obviously still a part of the, the broader community. And so that's beautiful. I just don't know if we're going to be able if, if the focus is going to be on turbocharging, that, which is unfortunate, because I think that there was a lot of power that could come from doing that, especially when it comes to just healing, you know, and, and helping live better lives. Yeah.

Kevin: (47:33)

Yeah. It sounds like part of the driving purpose, you know, part of the driving magic of red table talks is healing through blatantly honest conversation. And, um, if that is the purpose there, it sounds like there's just so much, uh, so many wonderful ingredients to piece together to provide some structure for, to turbocharge and different ways to heal more people through blatantly honest conversation. And that, especially how the world looked like six months ago to now, I think there's plenty of healing through blatantly honest conversation that can be realized in this moment.

Kibi: (48:08)

That's great. Cause you know, I'm not sure the show usually comes back in October. So I've heard that they're shooting, you know, kind of through my grapevine and you know, I'm intrigued to see how they continue to develop content, um, you know, sort of while shooting during kind of these COVID production limitations that we have to maintain. And then the other thing is, I don't know if folks are aware, but you know, there was actually an announcement made right around the time I was leaving, where they were moving into, um, a Latin version of a tabletop with Gloria Estefan as the kind of core celebrity. And I think I did see that pod for Gloria Estefan. That's a, that's a good mood. And it's interesting, you know, cause I think there was absolutely a huge part of our community that was Spanish speaking, Latin, Mexican, you know, the whole nine that really resonated and this show could potentially talk to them.

Kibi: (48:56)

And also, you know, when you think about a lot of the sort of just cultural, just kind of cultural challenges that I think exists within the Latin X community, there's a lot of diversity, which I think lends itself to some really interesting and tough conversations. And so the question is, you know, will Gloria and her family kind of go there in the same way that Jayda and her family did. Um, if, you know, if they're able to kind of get it going, I know it's been kind of put on hold just because of COVID, but that was another area where you're like, okay, there's a whole nother community that can be built off of that. Yeah. You know, there's a lot of places to rent some of what you did, but like you said, it depends on people actually being vulnerable, like up and down the kind of tree, the trunk of the tree, you know, what is working with a community like the red table talk community meant to you or to the future of your work?

Kibi: (49:48)

Well, you know, I will say that this was probably one of the best, um, professional experiences I've had from the context of, and you highlighted this early on Bailey, you know, I felt that I was using every aspect of me. You know what I mean? You sort of have a 20-year career that spans kind of an interesting, unique variety of experiences. You know, like I said, I've worked as a film producer, a storyteller, you know, I've worked in sort of media companies doing everything from business development to digital strategy, to working with product teams and developing technology. And this was an opportunity to bring all of that together. In addition to layering in that I was working in a space that I really believed in personally, you know what I'm saying? Like I really was excited about the mission that we were on, you know, the way we showed up in the world and the type of impact we were having personally, you know, so you just feel excited about coming to work, you know, you feel excited about what you're doing. Um, and so that was just personally a very beautiful experience and I will always be grateful, um, for, for being able to have that, you know, I, I, and it's funny, I T's, I've teased you Bailey on this because I'm always like Jack and your words, but

Bailey: (50:58)

Please do. And nothing is more flat. One of the things that you shared

Kibi: (51:02)

With me, you know, and I think in one of our conversations was this analogy where you think about, you know, kind of the last 20 years of value that's been created by a lot of our, um, you know, major platforms, the Amazons, the Uber's, the, you know, even frankly the Facebooks and everything is right

Bailey: (51:18)

Software as a service

Kibi: (51:21)

Software, as a service. Exactly. And you had said, you know, I think that one of the differences moving forward is I do that community as a service is actually going to be a huge growth, um, component, you know, and, and companies that are really able to kind of understand and, uh, you know, kind of crack that code because it's not the same for every company I haven't seen. That's not the same for every experience, you know? So as you think about community, how are you approaching it in a really strategic way, um, is gonna really influence, you know, how successful you are over time. And that has resonated with me to be honest. So as I think about opportunities going forward, that are important. I mean, so sorry, that could be really interesting and important to me from a, from a professional perspective, you know, whether or not I'm able to have a community component is actually important.

Kibi: (52:12)

Um, you know, just how hard it is, you know, cause people are fickle and things are fickle, you know, and you're not always and to, you know, read things. And one thing you might think is one way actually ends up backfiring. And it, I mean that in itself, I think as a business person is an as a, as a challenging component that I actually enjoyed, you know? So being able to kind of have that, be a layer of all the problems you're trying to navigate, you know, when you're running and starting a business, um, is really, is really, um, intriguing and it's exciting, but so it's definitely influenced me. And it's funny, cause like I said, I grew up with community, you know, like it's always been something that I've kind of used even, even saying you feel like it's sort of a cliche word, but I realize now that it's really important, you know what I mean?

Kibi: (52:56)

Like it, it actually is something that I want to make sure is incorporated in not only my personal life and my professional life. Um, you know, it's funny, you talked about, you asked me my last question, kinda like what, what am I up to now? And, um, you know, one of the things that I have always been very passionate about is community building, especially within the black community, around financial empowerment, you know, legacy and intergenerational wealth creation, you know? And so while I'm not sure if this is going to be my next job, you know, or whatever, but I do have a desire to ultimately shift into, um, you know, some sort of tech offering experience that is focused around leveraging community as a way to encourage financial literacy as a way to really beyond that. Because I mean, there are a lot of apps out there that I think are doing that, but really beyond that sort of thinking about how you can leverage community concepts, I E you know, is there a way for us to bring together people who have a collective interest, single mothers who want to save for the kids to go to college or, you know, entrepreneurs who were trying to go from, you know, 50 million to a hundred million, you know, in dollars.

Kibi: (54:04)

And it's, I'm, I'm still very early in this, but how do you layer that on top of a really interesting technology offering to, you know, create some, some, some really powerful change when it comes to folks understanding the true, true insights into how intergenerational wealth is created. And I feel like there's sort of the surface stuff that you kind of get, but then there's like the deeper stuff that like, they don't want us to know, you know, unfortunately I've been in certain rooms and I've had the opportunity to be exposed to some of this stuff. So I feel like, you know, I can bring a very unique perspective to the table. Um, in addition to like the fact that, you know, if I wanted to layer in content, you know, I can access my Hollywood connect connections to create really compelling content to also push this forward.

Kibi: (54:48)

So that's an area of passion and interest of mine, um, that, you know, ultimately I would, you know, I, I am sort of working on sort of in the background. Yeah. Yeah. Well, there might be some people listening that are also interested in that. Uh, one comes to mind, maybe I was listening from our last podcast, but, uh, yeah. Yeah. Well, I think, you know, there's, there's just to me like alone, we're limited and together we can do so much more. And there are spaces where deeper conversations, like you might see something on TV and want to have that conversation yourself are, are going to increase the value or, you know, a deeper conversation you can have with other people who are also trying to figure out a financial question can, can deepen the learnings. You're trying to have the China think about where those social connections bring added value. And, you know, I think the funny thing is we're really social people. So it shows up in a lot. There's a lot of opportunities, I think, for a community to bring more value if it makes sense, but Brad KV, thank you so much for being on our podcast and sharing so many wonderful stories. It sounds like a red table talk. OGs are amazing human beings and you're listening. I hope to meet you all someday. Oh geez. You guys are awesome. You guys absolutely keep, keep doing what you're doing.

Kevin: (56:06)

If you want to connect with Kibi, you can reach her on Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn at, at Kibi Anderson. K I B I A N D E R S O N. Follow or follow thank you to our team. Thank you. Rosanna Gabon for sound engineering and editing it. Thank you to Katie. O'Connell from marketing

Kevin: (56:24)

This episode and Greg David for his design work

Bailey: (56:27)

Can find out more about the work we do as people and company, helping organizations get clear on who their most important communities are and how to build with those people. By heading to our website, people and.company. Also, if you want to start your own community or supercharged one, you're already a part of our handbook is here for you. Is it get together book.com to grab a copy. It's full of stories and learnings from conversations with community leaders like this one with Katie, if you don't mind, we really appreciate any reviews on the podcast. And also anytime you click the button, subscribe, it helps get the podcasts and stories like cubies out to more people. So if you don't mind, that'd be great. It was pretty. All right. Thank you. Talk to you next time.

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