The Future Lab with Lee Schneider

[00:00:00] Announcer: This. is the FutureX Podcast, episode 14. In every episode of the show, we interview a platform designer, author, or publisher. They'll talk about building their community online and engaging their audiences in ways that are welcoming and safe. Now. Here's your host, Lee Schneider.

[00:00:27] Karen Gershowitz: Welcome to the Futurex podcast, everyone. In today's episode, you'll meet Karen Gershowitz, author of Travelmania, Stories of Wanderlust. In a pursuit of a passion for travel, Karen has lost and gained friends and made a radical career change, and, as we might hear in a moment, maybe even another.

[00:00:46] Lee Schneider: She has visited remote areas of Indonesia on her own and become a translator, although originally only fluent in English. We'll hear about some of her memories with people she met around the world. Now, when Karen started promoting her book, she had a few hundred Facebook friends and about 500 or so LinkedIn connections.
And now those numbers are in the thousands. She'll tell us how she developed her online audience and sustains it. And we'll also learn a little bit about her next book and how she plans to promote that one online. So, Karen, welcome to the show.

[00:01:19] Karen Gershowitz: Thank you for inviting me. Glad to be here.

[00:01:22] Lee Schneider: why did you start writing this book about travel?

[00:01:26] Karen Gershowitz: Well, as you said, I've been a traveler for a very long time, and it is my primary passion in life. I, I, during, well, I'm going to go back for a little bit, but during, um, COVID, I get, I got crazed when I couldn't travel.
And I've been writing a travel journal. My mother got me into it when I was, oh, maybe 8 years old.
And she said, you're going to want to remember all of this. And so I wrote. And the ones from when I was 8 or 9 are pretty funny. But she really got me into the habit of doing it. And as a result of that, I have travel journals that go back a very long time. And I, I... I started just writing stories, because I have so many of them--get to become a storyteller. Um, so I started putting them together and took writing classes and just for the fun of it. And then people kept saying to me, you've got a book here. You really have a book here. And I decided, okay, I can do this. And when COVID came around, that became my, the thing I was going to do.
And I got it out during COVID. So it came out July of 2021. Um, And then I had so much fun writing that one and had so much interaction with readers that I started a second book, which is now going to come out in October. And it just was sort of an organic thing that, okay, I have a lot of material here.
[00:03:01] Lee Schneider: They say travel broadens the mind. But what is it about travel that is, has been for you so compelling?
[00:03:11] Karen Gershowitz: I... I'm somebody who is extremely curious I love the new. So to me, going somewhere that I've never been before fills a lot of void in me or a lot of, I love to learn about other cultures. It's something that I can't, I almost can't describe the feeling of going somewhere and realizing it's totally different.
in almost every way. There's certain fundamentals that you also learn that no matter where you go around the world. It doesn't make any difference. People fundamentally want the same thing. They want to be comfortable. They want to have enough to eat, to live. They want their children to have a good life.
Um, but beyond that, how they define that and how they get to that is very different. And I often travel on my own because that's the way you really meet people. Um, I, you mentioned that I switched careers and I did that because I wanted to see the business world in other places. Um, You know, I, I, I started out as a ceramicist, which is kind of a weird background and, um, realized that was never going to pay for the kind of travel that I wanted.
And so I fell into marketing, um, which turned out to be something that I loved and I was good at and worked in marketing research and marketing strategy, but I worked internationally. And so I got to be, not just to see things as a tourist, but also as somebody very involved in a certain part of the culture.
And I'm going to say one other piece, which is from the marketing research, I learned how to ask questions in a way that people were very comfortable with. And so I could get into a conversation with anyone about anything. And that helps.
[00:05:04] Lee Schneider: Sure, I bet it does. Yeah, asking a good question, just like on podcasts, is a real skill. You know, there's also something about traveling where you're just dropped down into another country, often with another language, and you have to kind of dig into yourself in a way that you wouldn't normally.
I remember my first trip to Italy, I had practiced a lot of Italian before I went, got off the plane, all the Italian jumped out of my head. And I, I literally had to kind of reach down and make the words come out to communicate with people. And by the end of that trip, I was pretty fluent. But there was something happening in me, the sort of fear or the adrenaline or the, something that, that pushed me a little bit farther outside myself and made me see myself a little bit more.
Is that resonating with you? Is it, is it, is that kind of like the feeling?
[00:06:08] Karen Gershowitz: Yes, but not about language. Because I am unfortunately fluent only in English. And, um, Um, I learned at a young age that I could manage without it, and so I've managed without it. Um, but what I do find is that I connect with people in other ways, and shared passions, things that I love, um, if you, if, if I go to a country, I always take cooking classes.
I always, and taking a cooking class with other people and somebody who knows what they're doing is one of the most incredible ways to learn about a culture because people bond over food, and I'm more likely to bond over food than other things. Um, I also do things like, you know, wander into neighborhoods.
I love taking a bus to the end of the line or just getting off when there's something interesting or taking a subway or whatever the transportation is and not having a tourist attraction there to go look at or see or do, but just to get a sense of what the place is like. And you sit in a cafe, and I always make it a point to read a book in English.
And anybody who speaks English will come over to say hello. It's one of the most amazing things. Often students, particularly if you go to near a university, and they want to practice.
[00:07:36] Lee Schneider: Hmm. That's right. If they want to
practice
[00:07:38] Karen Gershowitz: practice As a result of that, I've gotten invited to dinner. I've had people take me on tours.
I've connected with people in all kinds of ways, just by sitting and reading a book in English.
[00:07:50] Lee Schneider: Seguing a bit to the, the promotion, social media, marketing and all of that, I think part of what makes a book like yours successful with so many people is that it is about the inner journey as well as the outer journey. You know, we could, we could read guidebooks that tell us the cheapest restaurant or the best flight, but this is different.
Do you think that that internal journey of yours had something to do with the way people have connected with it? And has that been at all a part of the social media you've used to build around the
book
[00:08:29] Karen Gershowitz: Absolutely. I, um, think of the book as a travel memoir. So, it's not just travel, and it's certainly not just memoir. And I think of myself as a pretty ordinary person. I have not done anything extraordinary, but that's, I shouldn't say but, and people relate to that because I'm not extraordinary. And if I can do it and do all of these bizarre trips and, and discover things that are not in the guidebooks.
And go to places, and it does make me go inside and think about, huh, what does that mean for me? There's a story in the book, um, that certainly talks about that in terms of my I was on a, on a business trip interviewing people who were the spouses of expats and how they dealt with being in another culture that they didn't understand, couldn't speak the language.
And it made me start thinking about my grandparents who had come over from Europe, and it really put them into perspective in what their life was like. And I would write about these things not just in the book, but I have been writing for the past seven years now, I think, an essay every single day, very short essay, a hundred words every single day on Facebook, which then gets, I then transfer onto, um, Instagram and onto LinkedIn and it's on, you know, some of it's on, uh, Twitter.
I move it around, but I do it every single day. Whatever happens to be around, whatever I'm looking about, whatever I'm thinking about, if I can do it in a travel perspective, I do. People are really interested. I have people who are such loyal followers. It amazes me. Um, I, if I say I'm going to a place, I immediately have invitations for lunch, dinner, breakfast.
People have had me stay at their home, which has floored me. And it's almost at this point, certainly all over the U. S., but also in Europe. I have people who are following me in Europe. And It has become this community. I mean, Jen, genuinely, and they talk with each other, you know, you look in the comments and, and this one saying, Hey, well, I went there and I didn't like, I didn't think that at all.
I thought this, and then somebody else arguing with them and it's, it's the consistency and the fact that it's very personal.
[00:11:12] Lee Schneider: Yeah, I would say, trying to play this back in my mind, many people are complaining now that Facebook isn't letting their stuff be seen by many people. Uh, now I'm assuming that maybe you got in before the algorithm changed, or maybe what you're writing is personal enough, uh, and there's a strong community there, because what you're saying is very different from what a lot of more business y, like if someone's just trying to promote a business book or a startup book or something like that, it's pretty much a disaster on, to build a community now on Facebook.
But you're having a very
different experience.
[00:11:56] Karen Gershowitz: and I also have a little trick. I joined a slew of travel groups on Facebook, probably the beginning, I probably did 25. And again, I was not promoting. I was just writing whatever I wrote on my typical Facebook page, which was about something to do with travel. And I'm a good photographer. That's the other piece of it.
I'm a very good photographer. And so I always put photos up. Sometimes it would be about something I did yesterday, sometimes about something I did 20 years ago. And I put it up on all of the groups as well. And when people on the groups responded, not with a like, but with a comment, I would invite them onto my personal page or my author page. And I was astounded. Probably half the people I invite join. And you want to quickly get to a lot of people? That's how you do it. But you've got to get to the right groups. Of the 25 groups, now I only go on to about 10 of them. And my criteria were that it was a big enough group and it was an active enough group.
So that there were a lot of people posting and a lot of people responding to the posts. And again, would it work if I put it on a, I don't know, a foodie one? Maybe.
[00:13:21] Lee Schneider: Maybe.
[00:13:22] Karen Gershowitz: And I might do that for the next book because there's a lot about food in it. And so I can do excerpts about food. Um, but I can't promote the book directly on any of the groups because I'll get kicked out.
But I don't.
[00:13:38] Lee Schneider: Right.
[00:13:38] Karen Gershowitz: I do mention that I'm an author. But I very subtly, very
[00:13:44] Lee Schneider: All right. Yeah, this is a skill that I think more of us need to develop where, or you've just found a way to be in this place that works perfectly between your personal stories, the book is personal stories, and people are just interested in travel and cultures in a way of someone who's, here's someone who's taking a risk, you know, here's someone, you, who's trying something that maybe they've always wanted to try.
So it's, it's interesting how it's intersecting, you know, and working for, for you in a way that's not always working
for others.
[00:14:23] Karen Gershowitz: Yeah, I mean, people, I mean, in the last, and I do travel a lot, in the last couple of months, I've been to, um, South America and Antarctica, Disney World with my family, and then Arkansas on my own. And you know, if that isn't a range of trips, I don't know what is. People were following along and saying, Thank you for taking me on these virtual journeys. I feel like I've been there. Or, "Oh, that sounds so interesting. I must go there. That's now gotten onto my list."
[00:14:58] Lee Schneider: Yeah,
[00:15:00] Karen Gershowitz: And so I'm connecting in some way where I'm telling they feel like they know me. I mean, you don't just invite people to go have dinner with you if they put up a post about their book.
[00:15:15] Lee Schneider: right. Absolutely. Now, this doesn't feel like a chore for you. It doesn't, it feels like something you would do anyway. It feels like something that you like doing. And I think there's a, there's a key to that as well. That it's not like, oh no, I gotta think of something else to post. This is so hard. You would do it anyway.
[00:15:38] Karen Gershowitz: Yeah. Oh, yeah. I love to write. I just think it's great fun. And the 100 words thing came out of a writing assignment in a writing workshop I took seven years ago. And I thought it was the best assignment ever. He gave us a topic, said, you write 100 words, can't be less than 97, more than 103, go. The idea behind it is that you have to very carefully think, and he said it has to be a story with a beginning, middle, and end. And that's a very difficult thing to do. At the beginning it probably took me 45 minutes to write 100 words. My writing improved significantly from doing that over a long period of time. Um, initially the people in the workshop were exchanging them, and then everybody dropped off. And I said, now I really like this, but I have to put it somewhere.
Where I'm going to get some kind of response to it, because otherwise I won't keep going. And at that point, it was friends, family, people I knew. It was not a lot of people. And I immediately started getting response to it because it was short, and it was easy. And I didn't even have photos at the beginning.
Then I started adding photos, and the numbers started to grow. People would tell people, you gotta, you gotta read this. Or they would, you know, switch, they would share it with other people. And that started to grow. And then once I knew I was gonna be getting the book out there, I started getting really serious about it.
But I just think it's fun. It's, you know, it's like my writing assignment in the morning. First thing I do when I get up, walk the dog, write the hundred words.
[00:17:15] Lee Schneider: Yeah.
[00:17:16] Karen Gershowitz: And it's become a habit. And so you're right, it's not. It's not a difficult thing to do, and I'm going to be really honest here. I have a virtual assistant who moves it around for me onto the other platforms. Because that's, that I don't
want to
[00:17:31] Lee Schneider: yeah, I was going to ask because look, uh, we all try to be good at everything and that'll, in the world, online world, that'll quickly get you crazy trying to post to every single platform or what's the best one. And if you had to work it down to just one or two platforms, what has been best for you?
What's worked best?
[00:17:53] Karen Gershowitz: Facebook and LinkedIn. Absolutely.
[00:17:56] Lee Schneider: Hmm.
[00:17:56] Karen Gershowitz: Um, and because of LinkedIn, I've gotten connected to a lot of people in the travel world. Um, which has been really terrific because I get invited to all kinds of things that I would not have been invited to, um, related to travel. So that, that's become, you know, so that's one piece of it.
And again, if you really love to travel, you want to know what's going on in the travel world. And that's my connection. And the Facebook is because that's where the travelers who connect with me. You know, I'm not looking for Gen X, that's not my audience, and I'm very clear on the fact that that is not my audience.
Um, you know, the people who really connect with me tend to be 40 and over.
[00:18:48] Lee Schneider: If someone were promoting a book, What advice would you have for them to grow their audience and create a community around that book?
[00:18:59] Karen Gershowitz: The very first thing that you have to do, and I'm speaking as a marketer here and with a lot of experience, is understand who your readership is going to be. Because if you don't understand who your readership is going to be, you can do everything right and have it be wrong. And I had to figure out for myself who my readership was.
When I said before, over 40, that was, that was clear to me very quickly. The other piece of it was, okay, let's talk about other demographics and psychographics and behaviors. In my case it was easy because I knew it was people who traveled or who were armchair travelers. But that's not always the case.
And the other piece about the traveling is that it had to be someone who was not a, if it's Tuesday, it must be Belgium because that's not what this is. And I needed to make that very clear to people that that's not what this is. And as you said before, it's not a guidebook. It's not a go here, do this. Um, and so I had to get, had to understand that what was going to attract people.
was exactly what was in the book, a combination of who I am and giving them information.
[00:20:20] Lee Schneider: Mm hmm.
[00:20:21] Karen Gershowitz: And I think that that's true for anybody who wants to build an audience. If you can't connect on those two levels, if you're just giving information, unless it is a very narrow audience with a very specific issue, um, it's going to be difficult to... To, to keep them interested.
[00:20:45] Lee Schneider: Yeah.
[00:20:46] Karen Gershowitz: And if you're just talking about the personal, people get bored with it. It has to be that combination of putting yourself into it. And I had to really learn to do that. I've been in writing groups for years and they would always say, you're writing too much about the place and not about yourself.
[00:21:05] Lee Schneider: Uh
huh.
[00:21:06] Karen Gershowitz: What were you feeling? What were you thinking as you were there? What was the experience like for you as opposed to telling me how gorgeous the place is? And it took a long time to really get it so that there was always that combination. And I think a lot of people don't do that.
[00:21:27] Lee Schneider: Mm hmm.
[00:21:28] Karen Gershowitz: I think they emphasize one over the other.
And you really need to strike the right balance, and you need to be talking to the right audience.
[00:21:38] Lee Schneider: I think that's very good advice. Thank you for that. I think, a lot of people have trouble seeing themselves and seeing their own writing. And this is where early readers come in and are really valuable. They've been extremely valuable to me. You have this book, or it's close to being ready, or you have an early proof copy, and the hardest thing in the world is to write that back jacket
promo blurb, that's much harder than writing the book. So it really, you need other people, I've found, to read it or at least read part of it. And I'd have to ask them, well, what'd you get, what'd you remember about it? What is it about to you? What did it say to you? Forgetting about me for the moment, what what was received.,
It's so hard to see into yourself and to know the book really is to people.
[00:22:35] Karen Gershowitz: Well, it was with the first book, and then again with the new book, um, when I started to give blurbs for the book, I was sort of astounded because all of the blurbs focused on the same thing, and it was not the thing that I thought they were going to focus on. And it was about me and not about the
[00:22:55] Lee Schneider: travel.
Ah.
[00:22:56] Karen Gershowitz: And I was really surprised because I thought they're going to be fascinated by all these really interesting places. And what they were interested in was, yes, they were interested in the places, but they were interested in the fact that I had gone there and what my experiences were there.
[00:23:13] Lee Schneider: right. And also as a solo traveler, right, that's a big difference because you're, you know, you're getting a direct experience and taking a
risk. That, where the group traveler is not.
[00:23:28] Karen Gershowitz: Right. That's absolutely true.
[00:23:30] Lee Schneider: Mm hmm.
[00:23:31] Karen Gershowitz: I do think in the biggest possible way it was learning the lesson from a writing group, and I've been in a writing group for a long time, where they would read a chapter and come back to me and go, too much, too much place, not enough person.
Too much person, not enough place. And helping me to strike the right balance.
[00:23:54] Lee Schneider: Yeah, in your case, that has been the magic secret
sauce.
[00:23:59] Karen Gershowitz: Absolutely.
[00:23:59] Lee Schneider: That
has been the thing.
[00:24:01] Karen Gershowitz: And I don't think that's always the case because people are writing all different kinds of books.
[00:24:05] Lee Schneider: Yeah. I mean, you could have a, when you pick up a guidebook, you want a guidebook. That's it. You know, when you want just pure personal reflection, that's something else. But you're striking the balance. If you had to rank what was most effective in building a community, where would you put-- we know Facebook and LinkedIn are probably at the top.
Where would you put podcasts or what a publicist could do? Or, you know, what's the most effective? If I, if I had time and money to spend, where should I spend it?
[00:24:42] Karen Gershowitz: I did have a publicist who, my timing for the first book was unbelievable. It was just as the pandemic was allowing people to travel and there was huge pent up demand. And I had a very good publicist who got me on to, I don't know, 20 TV shows, um, not national, but I was, you know, in Philadelphia, in Chicago and, you know, on, on major networks, um, doing segments.
I was on, wrote articles for half the world. I got. in the New York Post and the New York Times. I mean, she was incredible. Um, but it was also the timing and that I couldn't control. I don't know what's going to happen with the next book. My timing isn't as good except that the, the, the, when I was thinking about getting blurbs for the second book, I talked, spoke to the publicist who said, Here's a list of people.
I guarantee they'll write a blurb for you. And she was right. They did.
And so, you know, I know I've got some repeat places to go. Um, but, but that was extremely helpful. Again, timing plays a lot into it and you can't control that. Um, and I spent a lot of time looking for the PR person. Really a lot of time.
And interviewing them.
[00:26:09] Lee Schneider: mm
hmm,
[00:26:10] Karen Gershowitz: Because what I didn't want was a canned... Something that was canned. I want somebody who is going to be a partner to me. I'm a marketer, and I know what I'm talking about. And so the combination of having a marketer and a PR person helped a lot.
[00:26:24] Lee Schneider: There's so much to think about when people cross over media, like when you're promoting in a reading environment. People are likely to get the book when you're promoting on, say, a talk show or television, the sheer numbers of people that you're reaching almost guarantees that a percentage are going to be readers and going to pick up the book.
But, but with podcasting, as fun as this is, and I'm doing a bunch of these as an interviewer and a guest, we don't know really whether people are listening to this and watching this are going to be readers and are going to make that leap. You just
don't know that.
[00:27:00] Karen Gershowitz: I don't know. And I've been on travel podcasts, I've been on book podcasts, I've been on, um, ones about women who are, you know, adventurous and all kinds of things. I'm willing to try anything, um, but I don't honestly know what the impact is. I have no way of measuring it. And as a market
researcher, I, you know, it's like I'm throwing something out there, but I have no way of, of knowing.
[00:27:28] Lee Schneider: Right. So, tell us about your next book. Title?
Timing?
[00:27:34] Karen Gershowitz: Yep, well, the next book is, currently I am supposed to be getting the first layout. It has been proofed, it has been everything else. It is called Wanderlust, Extraordinary People, Quirky Places, and Curious Cuisine. Um, so basically, people, places, and food.
[00:27:53] Lee Schneider: Yeah.
[00:27:54] Karen Gershowitz: And, um, the, that one actually came about because... I had readers.
Through the community, saying, Oh, I love when you write about food and people that you've met. And I knew places, you know, really unusual places. And I've been to some really unusual places. People are curious about because they know they're never going to go there. Um, there's a story in there about going to Andamooka, Australia, which is an opal mining town in the middle of nowhere that I flew in on a four seater plane.
It stayed the night, it has a population of 20, and so that had to be a story. It just had to be a story. But there's also a lot of, you know, just, it was really in response to readers talking about that they loved the stories that I wrote about, about people and food.
[00:28:57] Lee Schneider: Yeah, what people may not think enough about is once you build a community for, uh, your genre and you as an author, it, it hangs around. It's not an evergreen forever and ever, but it's pretty good evergreen in the sense that your next book benefits from all the work and the time and the effort and the money that you put into the first book.
[00:29:19] Karen Gershowitz: Absolutely. I mean, I haven't even said anywhere that I have a second, well, I've said I have a second book coming out, but I have not started to, to promote it in any way with the community. And yet I've had people say to me, I already pre ordered it on Amazon.
[00:29:34] Lee Schneider: Hmm.
Terrific.
[00:29:36] Karen Gershowitz: Without my saying go order the book on on Amazon.
Now I don't even know how many pre-orders there are, but I know for a fact that there are, cuz people have told me that they've done it and somebody said, oh, you mean I can get, yeah, I can pre-order it, you know, in the community. So then a whole bunch more people are doing it. So yes, I really developed a community there.
There's no, you know, that, that I don't question and I know that they'll be supportive.
[00:30:00] Lee Schneider: I know I'd be remiss if I didn't ask what the numbers were, knowing that numbers don't really matter. It's engagement. You know, you could have 200 people who love you, and that might be enough, and you could have a million followers and blips and things, but if only a few people are responding, so what?
So what does that number universe look like for you?
[00:30:25] Karen Gershowitz: Currently, I have 2, 600 people on Facebook, which doesn't sound like it's a huge number, but they are very active and very engaged. When I was in Antarctica, um, which was a month ago, I was getting 150 comments a day. Yeah.
[00:30:48] Lee Schneider: Yeah,
[00:30:49] Karen Gershowitz: So people were really involved.
And You know, I just was in Arkansas, not the same level of interest, but getting 25, 30 comments a day.
[00:31:00] Lee Schneider: Mm,
yeah,
[00:31:02] Karen Gershowitz: And that's fairly typical, and it's not always the same people.
[00:31:06] Lee Schneider: Right,
right, yes.
[00:31:08] Karen Gershowitz: So you know, some names I recognize because they show up all the time, and then there's a, and then I know that there's a whole lot of people who are reading it and not commenting.
[00:31:17] Lee Schneider: Mm
[00:31:18] Karen Gershowitz: And how I know this is they're people I know. Who say I go on every, every morning because I know that's when you post and I read it.
But have never put a comment. Have never even put a like, for that matter.
[00:31:32] Lee Schneider: Mm hm.
[00:31:35] Karen Gershowitz: And that's a fairly large group of people. I mean, I'll start talking to a friend and they'll say, Oh, you were, and I haven't seen them in, you know, three months. Oh, yeah, you've been in the here, there, wherever. You know, that was really interesting.
You got to tell me more about it. It's like, you followed me? Oh yeah, I read every post.
[00:31:51] Lee Schneider: Yeah.
[00:31:52] Karen Gershowitz: So, the numbers don't exactly say. I also have an author page that's got another, and they're not duplicative. Some of them are, but
not most
of
it. And that's got about a thousand. And then I have all these groups. And the groups, one of the groups has 25, 000 people.
And I know that. And, uh, before I got on here, I was invited to be on their editorial board. So, so, clearly, you know, and I'm now writing for them, getting paid to write for them, because they were so intrigued by the posts I was putting up.
[00:32:30] Lee Schneider: Well, again, it comes down to this every single day. The habit building on your part and habit building on the part of the reader viewer is a very powerful
thing.
[00:32:43] Karen Gershowitz: Yeah, I think if I did it only occasionally, it wouldn't work.
So speaking of brevity, we're reaching our end of our time here. Is there anything else that we should talk about?
One of the things that has been very helpful, um, we were talking about podcasts is getting podcasters as allies.
[00:33:05] Lee Schneider: Mm hmm.
[00:33:06] Karen Gershowitz: I connected with somebody who I had no idea at the time was on his podcast, has become a very big deal in the travel world and he's become a friend.
And he has introduced me to numerous people that have been extremely helpful to me in a lot of ways. And that connection, which I could never have known, but it's one of the reasons that I will go on, you know, podcasts that I really don't know very well, is that you can make connections. You also learn a lot, but you can, you can really make connections that are surprising in lots of ways.
So it's worth it for that, if nothing else.
[00:33:53] Lee Schneider: That's good. Also wise words, the connections and the what are called weak ties between people can get you a lot of mileage and can also
be fun.
[00:34:05] Karen Gershowitz: And they're fun.
[00:34:11] Lee Schneider: Well, Karen, thanks so much for joining us today on the podcast. It has been fun.
[00:34:12] Karen Gershowitz: Well, thank you for having me. I enjoyed it too.
[00:34:15] Announcer: Thanks for joining us on the FutureX Podcast. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, Google, or anywhere fine podcasts appear in your feed. For more info about FutureX, visit FutureX dot Studio.