5 New Kit Features from Craft + Commerce 2026 with Jess Freeman

Allea Grummert (00:12) Hey there, welcome to Happy Subscribers, a podcast that explores how bloggers and content creators can create more purposeful relationships with your audience through email marketing. I’m Ali Grimert, email marketing strategist, copywriter, email platform expert, and founder of the Done For You Email Marketing Agency, Duet. I started as a personal finance blogger in 2016 and have since helped hundreds of bloggers and creators like you maximize your email marketing for more impact, more traffic, and a better connection with your subscribers.

Be prepared for some advanced email talk as well as tactical tips to help get your valuable content into the hands of your audience faster and easier. I’m excited you’re here, so let’s do it. We can create a deeper, more meaningful connection with the community you love and serve through email.

Hey listeners, today is a special episode. I get to have my friend Jess Freeman, who is the lovely face of Jess Creatives and the voice of the Ordinary Business Podcast. She is here today as an expert in a field of web design and SEO, and also my personal friend, Jess. Thanks for being here. So you guys should know, so since 2011, Jess has been the secret weapon behind 400 plus businesses that don’t just exist online, they thrive.

Jess Freeman (01:17)
Of course, I’m so happy to be back.

Allea Grummert (01:30)
Listen to this. She has experienced 8,156% increase in organic traffic for her clients. That is not a typo. That is four digits. ⁓ she’s experienced website transformations that turn meh into must book now and provides SEO strategies that make Google do a double take. So Jess works with inclusive science-based experts because she believes that your expertise changes lives and your website should amplify that impact.

Like I mentioned, she’s a friend of mine. Y’all, we just got back from Crafting Commerce. I got back late Saturday night. When did you get home, Jess? And it is currently Monday afternoon, and I immediately confess to Jess, I took two naps already today. It’s not even noon. I took two naps. I got out of bed, moved my couch yesterday and slept for another two hours. I’m like, holy conference, I beat. And

Jess Freeman (02:05)
I got I got home late Saturday as well. Yeah.

Allea Grummert (02:26)
I didn’t even feel that tired while I was there. It’s just like I think it’s some part of is the travel, getting home.

Jess Freeman (02:32)
It is. I also didn’t feel that tired there. I usually take a Sunday afternoon nap, but usually for like an hour. I took a two hour like was like and I woke up and it was like, like probably slept for my usual hour. ⁓ it’s been two. Great.

Allea Grummert (02:42)
Out of

Your husband comes in to check on you.

Jess Freeman (02:51)
He’s like, are you gonna wake up?

Allea Grummert (02:54)
⁓ I immediately decided, which I’d ne have never done this. I was like, We are Sunday churching from the couch. When I say we, I mean me and my cat. It’s me. but I was like, thank goodness I didn’t plan to leave the house. I didn’t realize how beat I absolutely was. So well, Jess has been on the podcast before. So we’re gonna link to that so you can go learn more about Jess’s SEO expertise and her wisdom. And I know things have obviously changed.

Jess Freeman (03:00)
Mm.

Allea Grummert (03:22)
Since fall of twenty twenty four, when we recorded that. What’s even changed, Jess? Isn’t it like all the same?

Jess Freeman (03:26)
Mm-hmm.

my god. Like I don’t even think I could cover all the things that have changed in this this singular podcast episode. Obviously AI is the big thing and AI search and all of that. ⁓ but I the other thing we talked about before we started recording is like you you said, you already posted a reel today.

Allea Grummert (03:51)
So unfair. I’ve taken two naps and I check my phone and Jess has posted a freaking reel. And I’m like and I don’t have a child. She has a child.

Jess Freeman (04:02)
Yeah, but she’s a school. She’s a daycare, so but my real was actually a a little bit related to being at Kraft and Commerce. Wasn’t like takeaways or anything, but I was like I had two main conversations while at Craft and Commerce. And the main one was like, so you do web design in SEO? Are you scared? Are you scared of AI? Like, is it affecting your business? Yeah. And ⁓ I was like, not really.

And in the real I got more a little more like sassy and I was like, I’m still consistently booked out and I just booked my largest project ever. So like, no. Yes. But ⁓ I mean, to be honest, yes, like there is still that like fear in the back of my mind. I’m like, I don’t know, like I know AI is always getting better. So like someday maybe it’ll be able to do an actually like a good website ’cause all the Claude websites right now just look exactly the same. Mm-hmm. ⁓

But what I the other thing I said in the reel was AI, like being cited by AI, showing up in the AI overviews or like having Chat GPT mention you. That all happens with the same foundations of regular old SEO. Yes. So like yes, there’s a few small things you we can all do to our website, but it’s not like you need some fancy plugin or you have to like

rewrite all of your copy. I mean you might need to, but like I’m saying if you have already good SEO foundations, you’re probably pretty set. Yeah.

Allea Grummert (05:40)
⁓

Yes. Well and something you mentioned, I think it was maybe it was in the caption of like your clients are not the people who are vibe coding a website.

Jess Freeman (05:48)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Like, and I that’s the other thing is I’m like, sure, I might lose a a few potential clients, but my people, the people that I love working with and want to work with, are not going to be vibe coding or whatever creating an AI generated website because they don’t want to. They don’t have the time. They want something more unique. They want something more personalized. Or

I’m like moving in the direction of working with a lot of like biotech firms, like clinics, like larger companies. Okay. So like the admin assistant at a clinic is not going to be vibe coding a website and being like, you know, they’re like it’s not like Jen at front desk is gonna be like, Hey guys, I wanna set up this website for us. Like that’s not gonna happen. So for me, I’m also like

Allea Grummert (06:30)
Lovable. There you have it.

Yeah.

Jess Freeman (06:44)
Sure, there are people who are going to DIY website and Claude or whatever. Those are not my people. And so like I’m fine. Like you can go do that.

Allea Grummert (06:55)
Yeah, go for that. Well, and we still write handcrafted emails on my team, you know, and they’re I got the same questions about AI. It’s like, is it gonna take away your business? And I was like, I mean, AI can create faster and cheaper emails, but there’s so much that it doesn’t allow for. And it’s like the human interaction deciding what that strategy will be, you know.

getting to ask about your personal questions. Like the to that way the copy is more full. And I’m not opposed to trying out AI using emails, like alongside of handcrafted emails, but you have to be giving it new content and new voice. Otherwise it’s gonna sound like everyone else if you don’t even do that for the begin the beginning. But also like you want it to sound like how you sound now, not you so many years ago. So there’s a lot that I’m playing around with with AI as well. So

not like anti-AI and I’m using it within my business just. man, it’s slick. Just like to make our client process easier, our onboarding so that my team doesn’t have to copy and paste so much. So like there are so many sweet benefits that make our product better and faster for our clients while still having that like human touch.

Jess Freeman (08:10)
Mm-hmm. And that’s what I like to do also is like help me automate things and connect things and and you know, analyze things. I think that’s my favorite part of using the AI, which we ⁓ for the listeners, Allie was on my podcast. We recorded last week, the day before.

Allea Grummert (08:32)
Crafting commerce. We just can’t get enough.

Jess Freeman (08:35)
We can’t get enough of each other. ⁓ and you told me about task. Yes. The browser tab is still open online. Because I haven’t I don’t want to like forget about it. And I’m someone who always has I think I have like three browser windows and they each have like seven or eight tabs. So like I’m like one of those people who just always has tabs open. ⁓

Allea Grummert (08:39)
What yes.

Okay. And

Jess Freeman (08:59)
⁓ but I keep that one. Like I just haven’t obviously I was at the conference so I hadn’t had time to like look at it, but it’s it was funny ’cause I was like, look, Allie told me about that and it’s still here.

Allea Grummert (09:10)
It’s still here. Well, and I’m here to answer any questions about it too. But yeah, Tasklit.ai has been one of my favorite tools. It connects with Slack and Google Drive and all these things in a sauna. And so it’s really cool. So, listener, the short story of it is like something gets triggered in a Slack channel where Tasklit is in there. Tasklit reformats this document based off of what we’ve given it. It assigns a task in Asuna to my project manager and it notifies my team in Slack.

And it saves the file in the client’s folder in Drive. Like we’re talking like five minutes. Love it. Like it’s the nicest thing I’ve done for myself this year is saving my team all that energy. Because they’re all like, they’re willing to do it. And I’m like, y’all, I can give you other things to do. It’s not copying and pacing. Like I can give you fun things to do. So cool. And then speaking of AI and technology, while we were at Crafting Commerce, we got to hear the new like features that have dropped.

I can’t we knew this before the event, but they have an MCP, which Jess do you even know what that stands for? As wants to know.

Jess Freeman (10:15)
I’ve heard it. I don’t know it off the top of my head. I saw ⁓ I’m gonna cheat model context protocol. Does that make sense?

Allea Grummert (10:21)
Please Google that for you.

⁓ Sure.

So there’s a kit MCP, which basically means kit has figured out on their end what things to give to different GPTs for us to pull from the data that they have. So like there’s only so much you can do in kit. Perhaps you want to see who’s all clicked an email in the last 30 days. We don’t really have a way to do that within kit.

But now you can set up your kit MCP with Claude or with ChatGPT. And you just ask Claude. You’re like, hey, how many people? And it will like export a CVS file. CVS C S V. I took two naps today. So which is really cool because then you can go reach out to those people, send them a sep a special campaign if you wanted to. And that’s just one example. Have you been able to play around with the MCP yet?

Jess Freeman (11:18)
I have not, I haven’t had time yet. ⁓ but I have seen some really cool things people are like testing it with or testing it on, I guess. ⁓ over on threads. Like I’ve seen some people kind of sharing, like, I had it do this and whatever and I’m like, ⁓ I wanna go try it.

Allea Grummert (11:35)
It’s crazy because like you don’t have to even have a bank of prompts to really make use of it. You could just start playing around. Like I even had it pull I asked it, tell me what emails I’ve promoted Ready Set email in, whether it was a whole email or a snippet. It just is jaw dropped. It went and found my multiple campaigns so that I could actually like

Jess Freeman (11:56)
I was like, What?

Allea Grummert (12:02)
And it told me whether it was just like a snippet or a mention or if it was a whole email, like a full pitch. And so I’ve done nothing with that just yet. But I’m like, okay, what can I organize for if I’m gonna do maybe another webinar promo or something in the fall? And ⁓ it just I can pull all that information for you. It’s brilliant.

Jess Freeman (12:20)
Mm. I’m really guilty of not tagging or doing like link triggers or whatever. So when people click like a like here’s like info about this service or apply now or whatever, I’m really bad about not tracking that or tagging them or whatever. ⁓ so I’m curious to like have it go get that data for me. Well

Allea Grummert (12:43)
Yeah.

In the meantime, I have something for you. So what I’ve done is you just quit you can create a one time link trigger for each of your services. So then when you do mention them, you just pull it from a drop down you know when you actually include that link. So when you pull it from the drop down, it adds the link and the l trigger to it. And so that’s what I do. I have like an interest tag. You send quotation marks. So like interest duet debut or done and delivered. And then they get a follow up email.

Dear listener, if you’ve gotten one of these, you’ll know. So if you click on it, like a day or so later, you get an email that says, like, hey, do you want to chat about this? And anybody who clicks in that email gets another tag called Hot Leads. And that’s kind of like our running list of like who’s maybe the most interested in order to reach out to them. Which leads me to another kit feature that I’m I did not even know this was happening. And I’m like in with kit people.

Jess Freeman (13:22)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Allea Grummert (13:39)
my gosh, but I didn’t even know until it was announced by everyone. The service or this feature called subscriber signals. And I think as a service provider, it is going to be really awesome. So I was just on Justice Podcast last week talking about how I like individually connect with people within my email list, but I have to go do it manually. And by I I mean my assistant Kat. Bless you. So Kat goes in and looks at all the domains. She’s Googling, like, does this person have a food site? Are they

Corporation, like how how might we connect with them? And she makes me a little list of who I I can reach out to individually with like a loom video and an email. Well, subscriber signals, which will be available for pro, so the highest tier of kit, does all of that for you. It like pulls in different subscriber ratings. And so you can pull it up at any time and be like, who in the last two weeks has clicked on a service tag or something like that? Who’s been the most interested?

And then you have your list. And it pulls in with you like what’s their industry, what are their social media platforms? Who makes up their audience? I think it even has like how much they’re earning. I don’t know how.

Jess Freeman (14:50)
Yeah, I that’s one thing I was very curious about. It was like, how are they pulling some of this data? Mm-hmm. And like, yeah, I just

Allea Grummert (15:00)
I went to the breakout session for this one and they said it’s data being pulled from three different sources. So they’re like pulling it together for us. And as a service provider, the idea of paying for pro annually feels like it’s worth the cost because it’s otherwise costing my team member time and whatnot. And that hot league tag, I’ve never cleared it out. So who knows how long people have been on that tag, you know? Like I’m not I’m not keeping house very well on that front. ⁓

And then my list always teeters around two thousand. Right. I ⁓ I would need to see it more in action to see how it applies more toward people with big lists because it would incur a greater cost, you know, paying for a pro if your list is fifty thousand people. So

Jess Freeman (15:46)
Yeah.

And n not even remotely close to that.

Allea Grummert (15:49)
No.

I I was talking specifically about you. No, I’m sorry. Talking about food bloggers or whatnot. But yeah, and it might not be as relevant to those larger audiences. You can like people can correct me. I had somebody at Craft and Commerce be I think you’re wrong. And I was like, Okay. I just don’t think it’s necessarily built for the massive creator. And I’m kind of like, Praise the Lord, we have something for the small business owners to get to know who’s most active on our list.

Jess Freeman (16:16)
Yeah. The only thought I had during the presentation, because it one of the things they specifically highlighted in just the like keynote overview of it, was like, you could find the curr the subscribers with the largest followings. ⁓ which for me and like being ordinary business, I was like, boo. but I was like, I

I was curious like how would that apply to me? Because I’m I don’t have large following. So I was like, what am I like what would I find in in that like customer data? Yeah. Because I’m like, well, I don’t have large followers. My people probably aren’t making that much. I mean, not that they’re like not making good money, but just I’m saying like they’re not these they had examples of like people making

Allea Grummert (17:09)
That’s not me either. I was just like to be clear. It’s not me either.

Jess Freeman (17:13)
So I just was like I mean it’s cool, but like mine’s gonna be like this person has four hundred followers in this way. ⁓ and so yeah, I was just like obviously that was only one data point that they highlighted. but yeah, I was I’m curious. I’m curious about it.

Allea Grummert (17:36)
Yeah, they mention even just like some people, if there are different corporations on there, you know, especially if like you’re a speaker, like, somebody from Hewlett Packard like joined your list, being able to reach out to them sooner than like waiting and waiting and waiting for them to eventually reach out to you. Or finding people like, these people on my list who have been this engaged and have over X number of followers, I know that they’ve been in business long enough. They probably have something sustainable. Maybe I’ll bring them on to the podcast.

Like in your case. Yeah. ⁓ whereas mine is I have a variety of content creators and most of them do have large audiences. So I’d be able to pull out those people perhaps from the beginners and be able to like send a more direct message to them. And then with the MCP, I believe they were also saying you could use the MCP to like draft twenty emails to those people. Tw like twenty different emails, one to each of those people. And then I don’t know what I would do with it then.

Jess Freeman (18:16)
Mm-hmm.

Allea Grummert (18:33)
If I’m sitting it out as a broadcast or an individual like Gmail. ⁓ but yeah, you could use the MCP for that. They were mentioning that you could use the MCP for like writing and formatting a landing page, which by the way, tell us what do you what did you inhale about?

Jess Freeman (18:49)
⁓ I I I’m very glad that we have the new landing page editor. I’m very excited about that. But then they were like, you can drop in a clawed design. And I was like, I mean, I’m sure some people will enjoy that, but I was like, again, Claude designs all look the same. They have the exact same look right now. It’s the very thin outline, rounded edges. Yeah. It’s the exact same. And

Don’t get me wrong, like most of them are fine. Like they don’t look bad. I’m just like, I literally know you use Claude and they just this doesn’t stand out in my brain. Right. And and so I mean, I g again, for some people that might be great for their process. I just want to use the new landing page editor.

Allea Grummert (19:37)
It’s gorgeous. I got to be on the testing team for that. Nice. And that was really fun ’cause I get opinionated ’cause that’s my time. That’s my time to be opinionated on behalf of all of my clients and any users. And like this here, this doesn’t work. This is too much. Yeah. yeah, well, even with the landing page editor, I’ll be interested to see and you know, and they encourage this too, like just get in there and try it. Like test one option, see what it what comes up. And I’ll be interested if it maintains the design.

Jess Freeman (19:41)
⁓

Allea Grummert (20:07)
of the landing page and just comes up more with copy. I don’t know. Yeah. And it’s it could be a really good first draft that you go in and you’re like, okay, but how would my audience actually say this?

Jess Freeman (20:18)
Mm. Yeah. Do we know when the landing page editor like rolls down? I don’t know. Maybe it is.

Allea Grummert (20:22)
Is it not live?

I have no idea. Pause. Everyone pause. We’re gonna look. ⁓ Jess, were there any other features that stood out to you? Or announced?

Jess Freeman (20:36)
there was I think one more. Let me pull up the list again.

Allea Grummert (20:41)
As oop, you’ve got ourselves a new builder. Yes. It’s up there, guys. It’s on kit. ⁓

Jess Freeman (20:48)
I was very I’m very interested in the newsletter sponsorships because I do podcast sponsorships and I’ve started slowly doing newsletter sponsorships and so I was like

Okay, okay, I like this, so I’m interested to look into that more.

Allea Grummert (21:09)
Do you mind explaining to the listeners the difference between the sponsorships and like the programmatic ads that kit has already done?

Jess Freeman (21:15)
⁓ like the new spot were you talking saying Mike?

Allea Grummert (21:19)
Yes. Well, okay. Well yes, because you manually add people in. But K already had a feature called ads, which basically is like you can run programmatic ads similar to like how you would see ads on a website. But newsletter sponsorships is much more I don’t know, how would you explain it? Like you get a lot more say.

Jess Freeman (21:39)
Hm, yeah. Like mine was literally like Ali is the sponsor of this newsletter. You can find her at and like and then that was it. Or like it might have a more blurb about your business, but it was just like I’m literally like you’re paying me directly, I’m like invoicing you and I just like copy and paste your info into the email.

Allea Grummert (22:00)
Yeah. So now there’s kind of like more like a marketplace. So you can say I’m interested in running sponsors and there’s like a bio similar to like the creator network. And you can kind of see which available sponsorships there are. Right now, the five that I saw are all pretty like techie companies that my audience probably I’m not interested in. And so I’m not really interested in those. But they’re as they’re building that up, we’re gonna see more options. But they can also like bid on us and say, like, hey, I like this creator because they’re going to have different

Especially with subscriber signals, they’re gonna know more about each audience in order to provide better sponsorship opportunities and options to run like, you know, three sponsorships in the next three weeks or something like that. ⁓ but yeah, that looks you don’t

Jess Freeman (22:43)
They do you know like will the sponsors be able to see our signals even if I’m not paying?

Allea Grummert (22:49)
Think so. I think that they’re going to have that data available to them on the back end, but I don’t think they’re going and looking at all of our individual signals. But Kit can say, ⁓ we’re trying to reach an audience of smaller creators in this this field, and like your your name should come up. That’s the dream anyway. And one of the things I like about Kit, so they had a whole workshop about subscriber signals and the sponsorship after the announcement is that they’re like, Yeah.

It’s not perfect yet. Let us know what more you want. So they’re rolling it out and it’s in a really great place, but it’s not or good place. It’s just not in a really great place yet. And I just appreciate that they’re willing to do that.

Jess Freeman (23:30)
Mm-hmm. Yes. And like just get it out there and that they’re open to feedback. ‘Cause I feel like sometimes tech companies are like one, they just take too long to roll it out, or they roll it out and then they do not listen to the users and they’re just like, It is what it is. Deal

Allea Grummert (23:46)
Hmm. Yeah.

Deal with it. ⁓ one of the other things that I know will be important to our listeners here is that the Grow app, there’s now a Grow app, which is grocer’s list, got renamed to Grow, and now there is a kit grow app. So that’s like being able to send traffic from like a reel or a post to the DM to get people onto your email list that can now be directly integrated within Kit.

So immediately I’m making a list. I’m looking at my notes and I’m like, talk to the team about this and this and this to make sure that we’re all on the up and up and understand what’s going on as well.

⁓ were there any was there any particular session or piece of a session that stood out to you at all? Whether it was main stage or a workshop? If not, that’s okay. No.

Jess Freeman (24:35)
I my favorite, he’s always my favorite, is Pat Flynn. And I mean I saw saw he was like I loved his keynote last year. He talked about his Pokemon channel and how he grew that. And then this year he did a workshop with Liz Wilcox about ⁓ collabs. And some of it was kind of basic and like just like, you can do summits and bundles. And I was like, uh-huh. But then Pat talked about

brand sponsorships. And so of course that kind of stood out to me because again, I’m like in that world a little bit now. And it was just w interesting to kind of hear the things he’s been working on and doing. But one of the things this is like one of the main things that stood out in my brain from when he was talking. He was talking about like how to start working with brands and like different ways you can kind of go about it and like

pitching them and doing this and what and he’s like, another option is creating a problem for the brand. And I was like, what? And Liz kind of laughed and she’s like, okay, but you have to like obviously we’re gonna explain. And ⁓ so he had gone to this huge Pokemon conference or whatever. Yeah. And if I remember correctly, he had wanted to like

Allea Grummert (25:59)
Чу

Jess Freeman (26:01)
be like host a meetup or something and like couldn’t make it like the team wouldn’t let him do it. I don’t know. Well, so since he already has a following and people know him in that world, he went somewhere in the like area in the arena or whatever, and then like told his audience, like, I will be here doing a meet and greet at like one PM. Well, there was a longer line for Pat than any of the official like speakers or whatever they’re called. I don’t know.

and so like the event hosts and security came up and they were like, Who are you? And why are all these people online to see you?

Allea Grummert (26:40)
Yeah. He’s like, dude, I tried to go through the right channels.

Jess Freeman (26:43)
And ⁓ I don’t I didn’t seem like he actually got in trouble or anything, but they were just like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, like what is this? ⁓ and then that led to a conversation and now he is like an official partner with Pokemon. And I was like, Of course you are, Pat. You are. ⁓ And so it was just cool to see like again, I don’t think he like got in trouble and he wasn’t advocating like you do anything illegal, but it was just like

Allea Grummert (27:00)
Of course.

Jess Freeman (27:13)
if you can’t get the attention of whatever of whoever, like go to their event or like he said like you could have all your followers like tag them or like you could do a post and like then tell your audience to tag them in the comments. He’s like we see this on TikTok all the time. Like someone makes a video about the birthday for their kid was cancelled at Chipotle and and then everyone’s tagging Chipotle and then they send out a free lunch. You know, like whatever. Right. ⁓

But yeah, that was just again, I that doesn’t really apply to my business. Like I’m not gonna no one’s gonna stand in line to come see me. But but it was I’m gonna figure out ways to cause problems, apparently. ⁓ but ⁓ yeah, it was it was good. And it was interesting because we they gave us time to like turn and talk to people around us and say like what kind of collaborations are you looking for? And

Allea Grummert (27:51)
Like cause problems other ways.

Jess Freeman (28:12)
like who who is the good like in your audience and that kind of thing. It was I mean, it was good and interesting to kind of like practice that and like really think about that more intentionally. they said in the workshop like, you’ll walk away with three collabs. That did not happen. Like I was like Well, and I I was kind of like, are they gonna like group us like, hey, if you’re a service provider, go to this side of the room or if you’re like whatever. But it was just like

Turn to the people around you. I had a guy who was like a software developer or like helped software developers with quality assurance or something and all of us in the circle were like, huh.

Allea Grummert (28:51)
How

how are you here?

Jess Freeman (28:55)
None of us can collab with you, I’m so sorry. Like Like it was like whereas others the rest of us really overlapped and it like, yeah, I probably know somebody I could like send that you could do a workshop for or something.

Allea Grummert (29:07)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, and I know so this we were talking about this before the call. And I did just text with a friend last night. She’s I’ve always wondered about whether to go to Crafting Commerce, but I don’t really know who it’s for. Mm-hmm. And you know, I see that. As somebody who this was my fourth time going, I like I just I caught a vibe and I really like it. But I will tell you for years, I didn’t think I would be the kind of person who should go to this because I thought it would be everybody else who’s just like me.

Everybody else who like loves email, does email, has client work for email. And it’s and then I show up and I was like, my gosh, no, that’s not who’s all here. You have content creators. I mean, you’ve got some who are big on Instagram and TikTok, but you’ve got authors and speakers and people whose entire business is running a newsletter. Like that’s not my business. You know, so you kinda have this variety. And I think that that is kind of hard to explain. It is.

It is. And I say that knowing that once you’re there, you’ll feel that it’s different. I was telling my friend over text last night, I’m like, it’s not one of those conferences you go to when you’re like, I’m gonna go to all the sessions, I’m gonna take all the notes, I’m gonna go back and I’m gonna like change my whole business. If anything, and I’m so relieved that it’s not, let’s be honest. Like from the main stage, you have a lot of mindset stuff, which we can talk a little bit about. And then the workshops, like you just pick and choose.

Sometimes like the weather was so nice to us, I didn’t want to go to a session. I was like, don’t do it. ⁓ I was like, I don’t want to go into the hotel next door for the session. but yeah, like there was a session on pitching podcasts, like to be on podcast, which another one. Jonathan Fields taught one on kind of like a content sponsorship flywheel for podcasts. And I like as a podcast host, I could consider that. and it’s all

Interesting, because I’ve been a speaker at conferences before. I’ve spoken at Kit and everybody who’s coming in with their expertise, like wants you to know about an option. Nobody’s telling you it’s the only in the best option. Like if I walked out of there feeling like I had to follow what Jonathan Field said to a T, I would be encrippling anxiety. But I think I’ve had enough reps at conferences that this one just doesn’t feel stressful to me.

Jess Freeman (31:14)
Mm-hmm. Correct.

No, not at all. Very chill. I described it to someone, I was like, it feels homey.

Allea Grummert (31:37)
Yes.

Jess Freeman (31:38)
Like it feel and not in like a cozy cute way. It just feels like I I almost want to say high school reunion, but I know a lot of people hate those and I don’t go to them either. Positive one. ⁓ and not in the way of like, it’s everyone and it’s a who’s who and like you just know everyone. Like there’s literally so many people I don’t know there. Yeah. ⁓ but it just is very chill and like I literally

Allea Grummert (31:49)
But like a positive one with the possibility.

Jess Freeman (32:08)
⁓ at the opening mixer last year was standing there with somebody and this girl just walked up like straight up to me, didn’t know me and was like, Hi, I’m Katie. And now we’re friends. Like and we saw each other this year, had lunch. No. No. ⁓ and like I mean you came up to me, you knew me from YouTube, but like

Allea Grummert (32:23)
It’s like something Katie Day would do.

Jess Freeman (32:33)
three years ago you really you just came and sat next to me. It wasn’t even like, in the hallway. You like sat next to me and you’re like, I follow YouTube. Hi. No, it was not You were not the first person to say that. So you it wasn’t weird. but it was it’s just so easy to like as someone who has social anxiety and does not like to like walk up to people. It is the right environment to like, hey, like what do you do?

Allea Grummert (32:42)
Weird. I mean it w Weird, yeah.

Jess Freeman (33:01)
Mm-hmm. You know? And ⁓ like I was leaving a session, got in the elevator with a girl, and then I was like, Hi, how do you do?

Allea Grummert (33:10)
Like if you have a badge, you will be spoken too. Yes, it’s I saw a woman, she wasn’t even wearing a badge. It was the final day, but she had a kit hat on. I go, Hi, you here for kit? And she’s like, Yep. Like, you wanna come sit with me while I finish my breakfast? Sure. And now we became buddies. It was really great. And then I think that what’s cool about how it’s set up, so it’s in this music venue, which is really dark and moody when you’re in there. And it’s cool, you know, bring a jacket.

But then in between sessions, the sessions are actually like across the hall or like spread out between a few hotels, which is kind of fun. But it ends up being that there’s like a lot of loitering outside. The front. And it’s like there’s always something h someone hanging outside of Treeford Music Hall. Mm-hmm. And I get to be this person where like I get you know, I’ve Jess and I went to get coffee and then I like, My friend Tony’s here. Do you Tony? You should know Tony. You two? No me? And then we all have a photo together. Yeah. And so

I’ve always I’ve said since my first one that Crafting Commerce is the least pretentious conference. And it I would agree. It has room to be pretentious. Like there are some big names there. And like Nathan Berry himself, I was in a mastermind prior to the event. Nathan’s the one passing the mic around the whole room. Like, and I know people have it their beef with him. Everybody’s got a beef with whoever owns whatever companies is running. But I’m like, yo, he is just

Jess Freeman (34:14)
Yes.

Mm-hmm.

Allea Grummert (34:36)
The fact that this is the the tone of this event has to come from somewhere, probably from the top, and how he has run this business and how caring he is for people. And so he gets up and he does product announcements. He talked about, you know, subscriber signals was like his baby. He’s wanted to provide this information to creators for years. And so I just really love that. and I didn’t even get much time with Nathan. I like gave him a high five on the way.

you know, walking by somewhere. And like I see him a couple of times a year. And so like I’ll catch with him another time. And then there are pl also plenty of people that like I’m not a good fit to connect with. And I also it doesn’t feel like I’m being forced to. And and so Jess and I were talking about this before we got on the call. So especially with ordinary, because if you can give people like what’s the little spiel of ordinary and like the container it kind of lives in.

Jess Freeman (35:19)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. So the ordinary business, my what I kept saying all week at Kit is a community for service providers who don’t want seven figures, don’t want a team, don’t want to scale. We’re focused on being better, not bigger. And right now it’s just a free Slack channel that’s changing soon. But

Allea Grummert (35:51)
Yeah. And so with that, we were talking about how like I mean, right, like James Clear is there and he he actually spoke in our mastermind and I got introduced to him, but no partying. It was like, my gosh, I need to connect with James. Like someday if I want to write a book, dude, I would love everything he shared in that mastermind. I’m like, I it took two and a half pages, handwritten notes. I’m not joking. I just he just has so much good wisdom and he’s such a chill guy. Let’s take a moment for James Clear, y’all.

He is sitting there, and one of the things that stood out to me is that he he’s like, Notice how my face is not all over social media. And I was like, Wow, you’re right. He said, I want to be known for the work, not by my face. And he did that though, out of a lifestyle of how he wants to run his business. He’s like, You don’t have to do work you don’t want to do. You don’t have to create reels. You don’t have to be on YouTube. And for him, he’s just like, I’m.

Jess Freeman (36:32)
Mm.

Allea Grummert (36:48)
Yeah, like who I am and how much time I get to spend with my family or dedicate to like I get to be a writer. That’s what’s important to me. I just love that. And he even talked about how like if you’re in if you’re doing something in your business that doesn’t feel like aligned, you’re like, I really don’t want to be on camera that much. He said he’s like, You may need to write a loss as you pivot marketing channels to fit your personal lifestyle.

Jess Freeman (37:10)
Hmm. That’s really good. I know. I really wish he had stuck around after because I did I was feeling a little bit brave because I have self published books. Yeah. And I feel like like they’ve done really well. And he mentioned on stage that they have like purchased self published books and I wanted to slide up and be like, So, James.

Allea Grummert (37:31)
my gosh, you can probably just email them. Yeah, so he got to and on stage he got to share about the his new publishing company and how it’s different than traditional publishing. Super, super cool. But that being said, I think you would use this word before we recorded, but just this idea of being so sure of who ⁓ who I am, what my business is, who I serve, like a rootedness. Was that the word you used? Brilliant.

Jess Freeman (37:34)
Like

No, you said that. But I

But it is a good it’s accurate because what I was saying was there are there were every year, but like this year it felt a little bit different. That yes, there were rooms and dinners and conversations that I did not get invited to and I didn’t get to rub elbows with certain people or I got brushed off by certain people. And I know we were just talking about like kit isn’t pretentious. As a whole, it’s not. Are there still

things where people are a little exclusive, yes, but that’s everywhere. And I was like, but this year, having the ordinary business, because it’s one year old, having it like looking through my business and like life through that lens, I’m it made it so much easier for me to be like, it’s fine. I don’t need to they’re not my people. I don’t want to rub elbows with them anyway. Like it was just like fine. Okay.

Allea Grummert (38:46)
So

And I thought this was really cool. Gosh dang it, Nathan is just a gem. So we’re I’m in this pre-event mastermind. And it’s basically it started with like it was a mastermind for all the speakers years ago. And that was the one time I’ve spoken at Kit was to this group of people. And I went the first year I did it, I knew no one in that room but Nathan Barry. And so there’s people in there that later I’m like, ⁓ you’ve sold how many millions of books. Mm, thanks for learning from me in 2023.

Well, so I mean that now that I know about it and I was included one time, I make sure I get to go every year. And I’ve made myself annoying. ⁓ I’m like, you may want to disqualify me, but I know that this exists. So I have figured out how to get in there. But so we hung out from noon to five, listening to James Clear, but like it was a sweet time. Before we left, ’cause it was right before the opening party, Nathan goes, As much as you’re going to want to hang out with the other fifty people in this room, there are four hundred people.

in the music hall that want to get to know you and want to be connected. Like go be with them. I have goosebumps.

Jess Freeman (39:56)
I love that. Because that that is, I will say, like, it’s for me personally, my own observations, and it could be where I’m just standing in the room for all I know. But like it is sometimes hit or miss. Like some speakers I have gotten to talk to. And then others, too good for me. Like stays over there. and so yeah, but I and I know it’s

I’m not trying to be self deprecating. I know it is sometimes it’s just me. They don’t know me or whatever. I don’t think it’s like they personally are like, ew, Jessica Because I do see them interacting with other people. ⁓ so it could be a matter of like, maybe I just need to like walk up and introduce myself or something.

Allea Grummert (40:42)
Sometimes I do that and then sometimes I’ve kind of gotten like here’s the thing fifth grade Alley inside of me has healed so much that like that’s the that’s the age I was when I got bullied. Right. It’s like I went and introduced myself to one of the speakers and it kind of fell flat and I was like, Ain’t no thing. What’s going on over there? Like, it’s fine. I might not be the person that you feel the need to connect with. There are people and like I will say this, there are people at Crafton Commerce who love me. Like

People that I would go stay at their houses if I could, you know, like and so there’s there are those deep connections and it’s yeah, going back to it’s not really one of those conferences for us as service providers where we necessarily get leads. Like it’s for me, it’s not just a content creating space where nobody’s able to do their email. They’re at the kit conference. They probably mostly know how to do their email. But it’s really great for my personal development. Same. And I mentioned this earlier briefly, but like the main stage, a lot of it was around like shoot your shot.

be delusionally confident, like the delusional ask, be like, ⁓ I I just thought maybe you would say yes, so I asked. You know, and like where that gets you. Jay Papazan talked about ⁓ like a lot of grief over the last like five or six years of his life, even like pre pandemic, and how to kind of show up as a lighthouse for others going through grief. And like that running a business is not always easy and it’s not the business’s fault. It’s just stuff can happen to you. And so

I personally love hearing those things ’cause it feels like, this is a conference for people who have heart and soul that need be attended to as well.

Jess Freeman (42:15)
Mm. And it’s not just like go out and do the thing and get over it.

Allea Grummert (42:20)
Yeah. No excuses. I was like, I was telling texting my friend, I was like, there are no brillarketers. Like I had to think about like, why do I like this? But I don’t also don’t spend any time with brometers to know even what conferences with them would feel like. but yeah, I would say on a final note, the the tone that I felt and maybe you agree with me, is that so much of this year was about relationships.

Jess Freeman (42:41)
Mm-hmm. Yes. Between like I see subscriber signals as like a very technical way of like relationships. Obviously, not all of them are going to be relationships, but it’s like a way to actually connect and like it’s like people focused. And then this was definitely the year that I knew the most amount of people. And it was just like, who do I want to go to dinner with?

Allea Grummert (43:05)
I know. I know. It’s almost like when I go back home to Nebraska and I’m only there for like ten days, which is still a long time, and everyone’s like, I want time with you, I want time with you. And you’re like, I only have so much alley to go around. And that was also part of being there and knowing a bunch of these people and being like, I have Katie Day’s number. I can also just call her. I don’t have to take her time away from meeting new people. Yeah. Here. but yes, I think subscriber signals was a big part of that. And actually there was no sessions on AI.

Jess Freeman (43:34)
There was not, you’re right.

Allea Grummert (43:35)
Not

a single one. But it’s not that we didn’t talk about AI, it’s just that like that wasn’t the focus. So interesting. I w I need to have Haley on the podcast to explain why. Tell me what we’re seeing. ⁓ but I think it just it really backs up the things that they’re putting their time and energy into with the you know, the creator network, which is only like what, three or four years old, and then subscriber signals. I think it supports what they’re doing. And so I’m grateful to be part of it. ⁓ if y’all

Jess Freeman (43:40)
Guess. Mm-hmm.

Allea Grummert (44:03)
You’ve probably never thought of visiting Boise, Idaho. We hear you. ⁓ I also hadn’t. And I will say, three out of the four times I’ve flown to Boise, three years in a row now, I’ve had travel issues. ⁓ to the point that it feels personal. I spent the night in the Denver airport on the way there this year, on the way back two years ago. Spent four hours in the Salt Lake City Airport the year in between. And so

Jess Freeman (44:17)
⁓ no.

Allea Grummert (44:30)
And so I literally went into this year being like, I might have to take a break. Like, if I wanna maintain my sanity because I don’t know if I can have this keep happening. But then I was there and within two days I like, Yeah, but I like, but once you’re here

Jess Freeman (44:42)
Mm-hmm. Once you’re here, I I’ve never had knock on wood, I’ve not had travel problems, but like a few months before I was like, Why do I spend so much money with between hotels and flights and the actual ticket going to this conference when I don’t ha come home with like a notebook full of notes and ideas and then like got there and I was like, yeah, because I like all the people.

Allea Grummert (45:08)
Be

like all the people. ⁓ the people, the there’s like so much walkable too. So you just are like, Hey, you just want to like grab a coffee and go for a walk? Do you want to go I didn’t even get to check out any of the shops this year? ⁓ I think I’ve dedicated like next year. I’m just gonna have to go like way early because I want to check out downtown Poise, guys. They’ve got food and shops and markets and I have local friends there from Lincoln and now they have a baby. I was like

It was only like I only like an hour and a half with him and I’m like, I’m gonna need a day and a half next year. So ⁓ there’s so much good to be had there. Don’t write it off because it’s in Boise. If anything, I think that that’s an absolute perk. ⁓ Jess, thank you so much for joining me today.

Jess Freeman (45:49)
⁓

Of course. Of course. I hope we influenced a bunch of people to come to the conference next year.

Allea Grummert (45:56)
I think it does help saying too that they have a they have a cap on how many people. Like the goal isn’t that they’re going to like fill up a big conference center. Like I think it is at four hundred and fifty. So if you want to go get your tickets and it sounds like you had a roommate this year, I had a roommate this year. We’re all grown A women. We can get our own hotel rooms, but one of my favorite things this year is that I asked Christina Flynn to be my roommate. And she’s like, she immediately said yes. And then she was like, Why did I say yes? I can have my own room. But y’all getting the like

Do like you wanna see my jam jams? You wanna see my

Jess Freeman (46:28)
So

fun to have a little sleepover. So fun.

Allea Grummert (46:31)
And have somebody

to like debrief with, but also be a good roommate and let your roommate sleep. ⁓ don’t bother them either. As like, man, I haven’t shared a room with anybody in a long time. ⁓ so I had to remember my manners. so yeah, y’all, we hope to see you in Boise next year. See you there.

Jess Freeman (46:49)
Yes. You there.

Allea Grummert (46:55)
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