Episode 15 - Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Content Hurricane

Danny Sullivan, Search Engine Content Hurricane

Announcer:  This program is brought to you by personallifemedia.com.

[Music]

Susan: Welcome to DishyMix. I'm your host, Susan Bratton. And on today's show we have Danny Sullivan. Danny is the partner and Chief Content Officer of the company called Third Door Media. But you know Danny because he is the search engine marketing master and industry leader. Probably one of the most famous names in our industry and certainly one of the most loved as well. We're gonna get to meet Danny and get to know a little bit about him.

Of course you know he's a journalist and a conference producer, and a publisher, and a pod-caster, and a blogger and a #pundet. But he's pretty much the one person search content hurricane of our industry. And we're gonna go into the eye of that hurricane and find out more about Danny Sullivan. On today's show we're gonna talk about everything from #Saint Lucia to singing, from junk food to phone casting. We're gonna cover tree houses, and shopping, and sphinn {.com}, and puppies, and snowboarding, and virtual worlds. We're gonna talk about Stonehenge, and mini coupers, and of course we'll get a few big search #trims out of Danny while we have him.

[music intro]

[intro - show's highlights]
Danny: ...The url is sphinn.com. When people hear it and they don't hear how we pronounce it they tend to go #thin. And what happened was we wanted to have a place for people to talk about current stories and online and internet marketing. And we wanted to know what their #spin was about it. But of course we weren't be able to get spin.com that was taken and spinn with two "n"s was taken so we thought why don't we put an "h" there and it could be #stuffed in. We'll go that way.

I very much view it as a forum site for people and in fact when you look at a traditional forum, you start to realize how many of the conversations get started because someone's read something somewhere.

It was interesting coming off of the #SES shell because you know the last SES shell that I programmed in august was much worse than I #could start up in prudent thrill that I could at least feel like that way was at my own shell and I'm offering people good #lunches but you know maybe I'm helping raise the standards of lunch as a craft #that lack in the search marketing conference industry.[laughs]

There was blended search. The search that was trying to blend in all these different kinds of # search, specialized search engines that they have these results all in the same place. #It's like to make up different lyrics to songs whatever I'm talking about sometimes. And I only sort of done that personally and I didn't quite realize it was years or something because until I started doing the dailysearch {.com} cast because we would be talking and sometimes I would just start singing something that we were talking about, making a song about it whatever. And people actually seem to like it rather then #tuning out for it.
[end of intro - show's highlights]

[music break]

Susan: So, Welcome to the show, Danny.

Danny: Thank you very much. What I kind introduction. I really appreciate it.

Susan: Oh, gush. It's my pleasure. It is my pleasure. One of the things that I've always been so... you know you and I have kind of been in parallel universes for many, many years. And I've just always been so impressed with the amount of affection that you've created in this industry. People truly not only respect you, but they adore you, they love you. You are someone that I really absolutely never heard anyone say anything, but good about. And so kudos to you for building massive businesses and leading the industry but doing it in a way that people really, really appreciate, and love, and respect your guidance. So it's fun and I'm looking forward to getting a little bit into what's happening with Danny.

Danny: Great.

Susan: So I wanna go. First of all I want to just talk about your background. You know. Everybody knows you from SES but it was probably what... about 1996 or 1995 you did your first book about search engine marketing. I wanna go. I want to talk about what you've been doing for the last 12 or 13 years. But let's go back just before that. What did you do before search was something you could do?

Danny: Well, my background was a newspaper journalism. After college I've gone to work with the Los Angeles Times. I was an editorial researcher there doing... writing on the #site as part of that as well. And I've got involved in doing graphic journalism where you do informational graphics - how did the airplane crash, why did a bridge fell down - that sort of stuff. And I #ended up getting what was called a graphic reporting job. So I was actually a reporter, but my job was to report in graphics for the #viable paper across town - The Orange County Register. And that was my background. It was all in journalism and I really enjoyed it.

The thing that really was happening for me about that time was... the web was starting to coming up. I think that was around 1994. I got to look at it. The newspaper, industry as a whole was trying to figure out what to do in terms of interactive and the choices seemed to be: do we do something on # , should we do a protege, shall we get a copy #sir. But I saw the web and said: "Oh, everything can be moved into the web and I want to be part of that. I want to be part of it now." So I had a friend who had his own software development company who kind of had the same bug and we started up a web development company and that's how I made a job off a newspaper into doing you know interactive and doing staff onto the web.

Susan: So, I'm not surprised that you're a trained journalist. You are a writer. And you are like a "Content Machine". You have a lot of opinions and you are very prolific.  When you were doing the graphic reporting were you using computer graphics tools like the original photoshop and illustrator types of things? Were you actually doing art as well as reporting?

Danny: I'd wish I had the talent to do the art. #I used to work with very talented artists and I would be doing the word information gathering for them. So I would go out, try to understand what the story was about, and do some interviews, and quite lengthy interviews to really figure out what #was going on and, say, how #we're gonna illustrate on how virtual reality worlds are created that sort of thing. # Come back then and talk about how we're gonna illustrate this, what kind of copy #blocks are we going to have, what kind of things would we do. And then actually it was almost #haiku style writing I had to go into because you had so few words that could fit into an informational graphic. So It's kind of complete opposite when you're out on the web where you don't have any kind of limitations such as on how long you can go if you want.

Susan: Except if you're on #twitter {mobile device?} or pounts {mobile device?} right?

Danny: Exactly [laughs]

Susan: Now, are you a #twitterer? Seems like all of my recent guests have been #twitterers. Are you in that category?

Danny: I do. I'm not very good at it. I don't maintain it and sometimes I think: "Oh, no! I've seen somebody else #find out #apollo me. I've got to do something interesting." So I tried to get out there occasionally if I'm out with my #thermal and think: "I can pop something out. I should have get it up to."

Susan: Now have you bought a new iPhone yet or you're still using something else?

Danny: I actually use a Windows Mobile phone and I #mock all the people that have iPhones.

Susan: That's what I was thinking. [laughs] Oh, well, I like my iPhone but to each - their own. And #dagle {.com} is your personal blog. I don't know that .. How does that do? Does that actually make money for you?

Danny: Actually that's not the reason why I do it, but it was useful. I had a blog and it was bringing in traffic, so I thought: "Well, I might  as well put some of the ads on top of it". [laughs] It's an interesting way to see what some of your readers are dealing with and going and handling with and understanding what google's doing. And I don't know, I think my blog probably makes like $250 a month or something like that.

Susan: Hey, that's a nice dinner out with your family.

Danny: Yes. Absolutely.

Susan: So, you have a lot of things going on. You have a searchengineland {.com} which is what you are doing now, that you sold searchenginewatch {.com} to #Insisive media. You've started the smxevents {.com} which is kind of your new SES version of events and you've got already five or six of them already planned, so you're doing events. You've launched... I want you to describe what sphinn {.com} is. So, spell the url for everyone and then describe that.

[the paragraph below repeats the one from the show's intro]
Danny: Sure. So, the url is sphinn.com which when people hear it and they don't hear how we pronounce it they tend to go #thin. And what happened was we wanted to have a place for people to talk about current stories and online and internet marketing. And we wanted to know what their #spin was about it. But of course we weren't be able to get spin.com that was taken and spinn with two "n"s was taken so we thought why don't we put an "h" there and it could be #stuffed in. We'll go that way. [laughs]

So it's funny when you actually encounter people because some people are calling it "spin" and I say I don't care you call it as long as you go to the #website.

And the idea behind it is if anybody's been to a site like Digg {.com}, I mean it's basically that kind of a clone. For those who haven't been to those kind of sites - the way it works is that you can submit, say, some news article that you've read and you put it out there and that forms the basis of a discussion. And people may start to comment and talk about this the way that may happen on any kind of a forum. But people can also vote, what we call spinning. And as they vote the numbers start to go up and if something gets enough spins then it moves out to the homepage of the website. So you have a lot of people submitting different things that they're interested in. And the community as whole kind of collectively decides what they think is most interesting that makes it go hot.

Susan: And did you build your own platform for sphinn {.com} or did you leverage something that existed?

Danny: There's existing software called pligg {.com}.

Susan: How do you spell that?

Danny: It's pligg.com and it's basically designed for anybody who wants to have a site that operates in the Digg style model. Digg, I believe, was the originator of this kind of new voting site. And what's happening is... you know, Digg is a great site and a lot of people, you know, go over there and enjoy it but it has some downsides. One thing is that the audience tend to be very young, very abusive in their comments. So you don't sometimes get a #whole of high level discussion. [laughs] And in particular search marketers aren't really well loved by the Diggers. They kind of hate them. [laughs]

Susan: Why do they hate them?

Danny: Well, because what's happened is that Digg's got popular. A lot of the people were trying to build links, were trying to submit their sites over there. So they get #slided by a lot of bad stuff. And then they assumed that anybody who does search marketing is just being out there trying to #gain on them. So it's not a very welcome community if you want to talk about search marketing. And the idea behind sphinn {.com} was, you know, we can be that. We've got search marketers that want to talk to each other and comment about things. And it's actually been a real warm reception by people because they are over there, they feel like they have their own home, they're talking to each other all the time and they're getting into the stories.

Susan: And how many individual... how many uniques {hits, IPs} do you get on sphinn.com on a monthly basis?

Danny: We've just been going for our first month. I tend to get it on a daily basis where we're usually having about 1500 visitors a day or so coming in.

Susan: Nice. Very Good. Very Impressive. And you decided to do a Digg {.com} clone with news voting in this particular case because you wanted to have conversations around the stories that were in the market place and in search. But did you think about having it be also a kind of a forum or... It is a community where people can talk about the news but did you ever think about where the line is between a forum and the news voting content?

Danny: I did quite heavily. And in part it was because I left behind a very healthy forum and when I left searchenginewatch {.com} it was the one thing we didn't launch at searchengineland {.com} when we got started. And I really did want to still have a forum I founded. For many years searchenginewatch {.com} didn't have that and it was difficult for your own readership to get in there and communicate with each other. So, really I looked at this as almost like a forum 2.0 type of thing.

One of the nice things about the software is that you don't have to submit a story - you can just submit a topic. And people do that. They say: "I wanna talk about this sort of thing" and people can vote on the topics as well. The other thing is that the software is configured so that it's not just based on the amount of votes that people are doing, but the commenting activity. So you could have a story that maybe doesn't have a lot of votes, but a lot of people are talking and getting into the subject. And that can make it go hot as well.

[the paragraph below repeats the one from the show's intro]
And so, I very much view it as a forum site for people and in fact when you look at a traditional forum you start to realize how many of the conversations get started because someone's read something somewhere.

Susan: Got it. That's very helpful actually because I've been trying to figure out where the world of forums and Bulletin boards {BBS} is morphing and clearly you've placed your bet in this Digg style format. So, that's great to know. Didn't you have an on-compete with #Insisive? How did you just kind of relaunched Danny Sullivan 2.0 and do all the stuff that you used to do with them?

Danny: Well, to go back with a bit of background. I mean, I started searchenginewatch {.com} up in 19... I started doing it under different  name in 1995, I think it was. And in 1996 I rebranded it as a searchenginewatch. Actually I think it was 1996 that I started up. It was called "A Web #Matrix Guide To Search Engines."  And in the following year I had rebranded it as a searchenginewatch {.com} so people could better understand what it was. And by the end of that year I was approached by Jupiter Media. They were jupitermedia.com and then they were internet.com. And as you know they kept changing their name over that time period. But they actually purchased the site from me way, way back, years ago.

And then it was around 2005 than #Insisive Media came along and purchased the whole thing from Jupiter Media. And I was just on a regular contract with Jupiter Media. I didn't have any "non-compete", you know, I had the ability to leave with I think it was something like four month notice. And so there wasn't anything preventing me from going. And when the purchase happened #my thing with Insisive was that: "I'm glad that you've bought this whole thing but I need to understand why I would want  to stay here and help you understand a space that you are brand new to. And help you build something up in a long term." And in the end we just couldn't get to an agreement on that. So, that's why I went off and headed on with my own thing.

Susan: Nice. And what are the things that you think you've done with Danny Sullivan 2.0 that are the best that you've brought? What changes did you make? Few people have the opportunity to completely do it all over again. What did you do right this time?

Danny: Gush ... #price is kind of boring in some ways. That one thing is... the site went up on blogging software. When I started we didn't have blogging software. You didn't have the ability to tap into the system that would automatically ping search engines or let people comment on your stories or send out an RSS feed. So, I had that ability right from the start. I also had, you know, ten years of experience of really thinking about how difficult it is to maintain certain kinds of content and how useful it is to organize stuff. So, I just had this experience to apply to a complete fresh start.

So, that was one of the nicest things in doing it. Plus the ability to come in and not have to deal with an existing site, an existing look, but to come in with a fresher and cleaner, an after-loading type of thing because you didn't have some of the baggage that you had to carry along. I also went in to thinking that I wanted more people involved with it. #Be much more open to having contributing writers. We have a series of columnists that are going out there. And it's very nice to have that kind of diversity, yet we still try to go through and look at all the editorial guidance that we have put on to that as well.

In terms of the conferences I think that the nicest thing there in the relaunch is just the ability to say: "I wanna have a better conference experience for people and I can do it." When we did our first show people were raving [laughs] because we gave them lunches that were in boxes. I felt sorry because of one person who's actually left because they assumed that it would be a box. Once he came back, he said: "I don't believe this! Where's all this great food?" But it has been something I've struggling with previously to say: "Look #, people want to have better experience."

[the paragraph below repeats the one from the show's intro]
And It was interesting coming off of the #SES shell which was the last SES shell that I programmed in August. And it was much worse than I #could start up in prudent thrill that I could at least feel like that way was at my own shell and I'm offering people good #lunches but you know maybe I'm helping raise the standards of lunch as a craft #that lack in the search marketing conference industry.[laughs]

Susan: [laughs] I hope that's not you early kind of #decay. # This is lifestyle.

Danny: It's more that that. I mean, the other things #to chorus with the series that we're doing because we're still just getting the whole series going with just one show so far. And part of what I'm gonna be doing there is much more improving the experience. Because I think the content that's always been good, I mean when I would talk with people they like: "We love this content. We love that you're coming up with fresh new ideas. You've got a variety of speakers. You've got diversity in view points. You've got cutting edge topics." That was all great. It was the experience that they all were not happy with. And those were things I couldn't control. So, I think. you know, people should be able to have good content and enjoy our comfortable #speed as they're viewing it as well.

Susan: Well. We're gonna take a break. And when we'll come back what I'd like to do is have you do a two minute Danny Sullivan big trends and things that are happening in search that every one of us must know.

Not everyone of the DishyMix listeners keeps up on the latest in search. It's a part of what many of us do, but it's not our main focus. And we might not listen to the dailysearch {.com} cast every day or get to searchengineland {.com} on a frequent basis. So, while we have you, we want you to distill the four or five most important things that internet executives in general need to understand about what's happening in search today. And give us that advice. #Candymix cocktail conversation if you will. So let's go to a break. And when we come back, we'll get the Danny Sullivan's #edge advise. Stay tuned and we'll be right back.

[music intro]

[ads and announcements]

Susan: Allright. We're back in as promised. I'm your host Susan Bratton. We have Danny Sullivan and he's of Third Door Media but you know him as allthingssearch {.com ?} And Danny has promised to give us the latest tips that we need to know to run our business well as they relate to the search world. So, Danny what do you have for us?

Danny: Well, one of the biggest thing that is happening right now is that the search engines are starting to do what you could call blended search. They have different names for it: Google calls their's, their model universal search, Ask.com calls their's Ask 3D, Yahoo and Microsoft aren't quite there yet, they do things generally called shortcuts but the concept is that, you know, there's more than just searching the web. There's web pages that you can find and that are traditionally found, but sometimes you can search for images, you can search for video, you can search for news content. And a lot of people when they do the searches they are trying to find out what's going on with Steve Fosset. They'll go to Google, they'll search for him by name and they really want the latest news, but they don't use the news search engine because they are just completely oblivious to the idea that it exists. So with blended search the search engine tries to blend in all this different kinds of vertical searches, specialized search engines that they haven't pulled their results #all in the same place.

Another example is - people, they need a plumber and they type something like "San Francisco plumber" into regular Google. Really they had to do Google local or Google Maps so that they get actual local listings that are coming up. And so what's Google doing is trying to say: "OK. Let's start blending some of the different data sources". So that people will get more than just a web page experience and that will help them, you know, learn that there's a better type of search that they should be doing. Now that's important for marketers because, you know, already a lot of marketers are still struggling to even understand search. They finally make it and say: "Right, I should have some of them listed on Google and I'll buy some of ads that go around it." But they focus more on their website. And they don't think about: "Oh, I'm a local business. What's going on with our local listing?" or "I have news content and how's my news content showing up".

And if you pay attention to some of these vertical areas, you have a better ability to perhaps get found because they're more open. It's almost like you're going back to 1997 or 1998 without some of the rankings that are happening. So, I suppose, one of the big top level take aways are: search is still growing, there are a lot of new frontiers and you need to pay attention to things like that. We're doing, say, our local mobile show that'll happen #right at the time this show comes out. And that's an example, that's one of the things we started saying as a new frontiers local open, mobile's open and it is a chance for people who feel like maybe they've missed some of the earlier opportunities with search.

I think the other big thing that's happening is a lot of personalization is going on. Again, Google is really taking the lead here, but Google is going through #tailoring people's search results based on web sites that they're going to, based on the searches that they do, based on the things that they're clicking on. The ads are gonna start to be more #tailored personally as well. We've got both Yahoo and Microsoft that are starting to build up your search profile, so that they can follow you across the web and deliver ads based on your search interests.

You know, search is one of the greatest advertising mediums because it's when people are actively expressing some kind of desire. They are not saying: "I'm watching TV and you're showing me an ad I don't care". They're literally, if you will, opening up that big book of search trying to find the right answer for themselves. So, #neither you're going to get this search ad just when you did a search but actually based on your past search history that's coming out there. And that's gonna be a very exciting thing for # marketers. It might be a little scary [laughs] for some of the searchers. And we'll have to see how the industry comes to #grips with all that.

Susan: So, one of the things that I wanna mention is that we do a transcript of this show. So if you're listening and you're on your commute or some place not near your computer and you want to go back and revisit some of the things that Danny's talking about you can go to personallifemedia.com and click on the DishyMix show. And when you find Danny's episode, just scroll down on a page and it'll have the whole transcript of everything he's talked about.

Another thing I was thinking, Danny, that might be really good would be for you to create three or four, maybe three to six links to content where you've covered these two areas - blended search and personalization. From a marketer's perspective in some ways that they need to mobilize their resources to leverage this for their brand. If you could do that, we'd post those links on the episode page too. Can you do that for me?

Danny: Yes, That's no problem at all.

Susan: OK. That'll be great. So we'll get some kind of customized incremental information for listeners. So I think those two things were a really good start around what we need to be paying attention to, what we need to learn about next. So thank you for that. What I wanted to do now was play a little word association game with you. I would like to know If you'd played this game with me. I would like to say a word and I would like you to give me a one-sentence response whatever comes to your mind about that word that I give you. You want to play that game?

Danny: OK. Sure.

Susan: That sounds great. I appreciate it. OK. [laughs]

So, the first one and I've got this little tip from #Darrin Babin who is at webmasterradio {.com}, a good friend of yours. He produces your dailysearch {.com} cast for you. He said the one thing that I should ask you about is "dinner at Saint Lucia".

Danny: Some day {Sunday} [laughs]

Susan: [laughs] That's not a full sentence. Was there a goat?

Danny: There was a #goat. I've not been there. He's harassing me saying that I need to come out. And I've not made it out there so that's why I say my response would be "some day" {Sunday}, because some day {Sunday} will be nice to do it.

Susan: [laughs] Well, #Darrin is a great poet and he's fun man to go to dinner with

Danny: Absolutely

Susan: He certainly gave me my start and produced DishyMix and got me podcasting so I'm eternally grateful to his graciousness for that. The second word is "singing".

Danny: [laughs] I love it.

Susan: [laughs] You gonna sing us a few somethings?

Danny: It's hard to do on command. I'm sort of notorious, I mean I like to sing and I sing very badly

Susan: [laughs] I've heard your singing - it's really #atrocious.

Danny: It is really bad and that's fine. I know what I #meant with it. But I like to just make up different lyrics to songs whatever I'm talking about sometimes. You know, I've only sort of done that personally and I don't realise it was weird or something because until a started doing the dailysearch {.com} cast we would be talking and sometimes I would just sort of start singing something that we were talking about and making up a song about it whatever. And people actually seem to like it rather tuning out from it.

Susan: People love camping, Everybody loves singing. Allright, next word "favourite American junk food".

Danny: Oh Gush, I want to say #Orio because I've had one today because # back in US and I've just I brought a big box of them

Susan: Even without #cocoa pepples. I love #cocoa pepples and it's not particularly junk food although it's not the best cereal in the world to be eating on a regular basis but I like the particular #cocoaness of it. You can't get it in the UK. So I always come back with like eight bags of it.

Susan: [laughs] Well, sweet is a junk food. It's just total crap. Don't fool yourself. Just because you stick # don't make it good. It's nasty but enjoy it. I #so chocolate {chocolaty ?} junk food. How about "tree houses"?

Danny: I can't wait to finish it. In fact I just got more wood delivered today. I wrote out on my blog how I had promised my boys that I was going to build a tree house for them this summer. I had a week off. Sort of a week off. And I thought: "Well, I should do it this week". I've never built one before. [laughs] And It turned out to be a summer-long project and I've been blogging about how things are going together. And it's been a lot of fun. I've never built anything like that before and the book has been kind of helpful in getting me along the way. I've got one or two books advising me and I'm kind of #wining out. It's up, hasn't fallen down, I just need to finish up the walls and we're set.

Susan: Your project is really ambitious as hell. You're really building a beauty. And you have two gorgeous little boys. How old are they?

Danny: They are six and eight.

Susan: Six and eight. Alright, how about "target shopping"?

Danny: Hours and hours I can #spend a target

Susan: And why is that? Do you like to shop in general or is it just the target thing?

Danny: I do love to shop in general. I really enjoy it. The right kind of shopping is if you'd take me into a few #storage. A #vent shoe storage will be OK. [laughs] What # kind of zone out. But I just like shopping and one of the things about target - we don't have them in the UK. I like that I can go there and it can be in the evening and it's not gonna be closed. And there's a lot of products that I normally don't get to see. And they all are priced in dollars {$} rather than in pounds. And dollar-pound exchange rate #isn't that good right now. So, It's just might #to be there. And I can easily spend an hour or two finally before you get zoned out in that target wave.

Susan: Nice. I agree. I'm a target lover myself. So, you just recently had a #litter of puppies. Tell us, if you'd named your puppies.

Danny: We did. Only two of them made it. There were a #litter of four and, unfortunately, two of them died. The two remaining ones... One's actually left now - sold out to somebody else. That was Spotty, it was a little boy. And I #caved in and said: "I'd keep the other girl" and that's it.

Susan: What's her name?

Danny: Fizz.

Susan: Fizz?

Danny: You know I think that's it. I've never actually asked the spelling. It's from a character of one of my kid's comic book.

Susan: Well, It seems that you're having... Well, you travel all the time. You do a lot of conferences. You speak at other conferences, but it sounds like you're finding some time to fit things in. You recently tried snowboarding. How did that go?

Danny: Snowboarding is fantastic. It's been of the highlights of my year. I did some #what is for to get going with it. I've got really going in January #went on a trip. And just absolutely loved it. [laughs] I don't know if I'll ever go back to skiing again. I've been skiing for years and years. I'm good at skiing but, you know, at the end of the day, not even at the end of the day - when you're ready to get those boots off and go snowboarding. The footwear is comfortable. I can just keep going with it forever so it's great.

Susan: Nice. I was just afraid I'd break something. I think you might be about ten years younger than I am. How old are you?

Danny: I'm 42

Susan: Oh, you're not that young. I'm 46. I thought you were probably about 35 or 36. Good for you. I'm impressed that at 42 or 41 or whenever you started trying snowboarding that you did because I was just too afraid to break my wrists. [laughs] I thought: "I'll just stay on skis." Now, there's no skiing in England. You have to go where? Do you go to the Alps? Do you come to Colorado?

Danny: Yes. It's truly sad. They have those things called dry slopes here which are like giant tooth brushes. That's where people go. Most people here tend to go over to France when they go on their skiing holidays as they call it. We actually tend to go back to Vermont. It gives me a change to get the boys back to the US so that you know they feel comfortable with their US half of the #will. And when they need to learn I just have them being taught by somebody who's a native English speaker and get going with it. Not that you know, they have great instruction in the Alps and everything is well but it's just a nice chance to go back home.

Susan: Absolutely. Now, You're an Orange County boy, right?

Danny: I am indeed.

Susan: Nice, your parents still out there?

Danny: No, there are bailed away actually.

Susan: Oh, yes? Where are your parents now?

Danny: They went to college #and in Orange County everybody went off. So it's my mother #up there in Northern California.

Susan: OK. Where does she live in Northern California?

Danny: She lives out on the East Bay side, near #Concorde.

Susan. Nice. That's close to me. So if we come and visit you in England, will you drive us in your mini couper out for a private viewing of Stonehenge?

Danny: I'd be happy to. [laughs]

Susan: Really? Will I fit into mini couper? [laughs] Do you have to be little to fit into mini coupers because I'm six feet tall?

Danny: You'll probably be alright. I've seen tall people in there. The seats can be lowered down. They are surprisingly big, I mean, they are much larger than the old minis were. And they are great cars. I'm 5'8" {five eights} and I fit into them a lot easier [laughs] but it's a wonderful little car. And I'm out here... I live out in #Woodshere which is in #a foreign land for England, about five miles in #stallions so it's kind of nice to #whip it around on a little rose out here.

Susan: Well, It's absolutely beautiful out there. I've recently spent a long extremely romantic weekend in #Bath with my husband. And we had the opportunity to go to Stonehenge. And at the end of every DishyMix I really like to end with something that's uplifting, you know, gives us whatever it is, hope for the future, feeling of positive humanity - something along those lines and what I'd like to do with you is I'd like you to invoke that journalistic part of yourself and I'd love for you to just take us on a visual and spiritual trip to Stonehenge. Give you a minute or two, and just tell us the story, take us on a trip. Pretend we're like your sons and you're telling us a bedtime story but make it like an adult Stonehenge moment and describe it in detail for us.

Danny: [laughs] Well, It's terrible because Stonehenge is terribly boring.

Susan: No, It's not [being sarcastic]

Danny: [laughs] It is. OK, I'll make it positive. The way most people see Stonehenge is that you come into a parking lot and it's full of people. You walk down this tunnel, you come out and you see it surrounded by people and you walk from distance with an #asphalt and you can't go up to the stones. And a lot of people are listening to these audio devices that they hold up to their ears. The narration is not exciting and they tend to spend more time trying to listen to what's being said then actually just looking at the stones.

Now the way you really should go to Stonehenge is that you do with what is called a private booking. If you went on a private booking you'll have Stonehenge #satisfied for you, say, in the morning or the early evening. You would go out and chances are you may be the only person there. There could be maybe up to 10 possibly 20 other people but chances are that you're gonna have it to yourself. And you're gonna go to this tunnel I mentioned before that takes you under this road that separates the parking lot from Stonehenge. And you'll come out. And there won't be anybody surrounding #, you'll just sit there on a landscape of grass. And you'll step over this very small little #buckle up and just cross right over and walk on the grass heavy with #doo still in the morning. And you'll be right into it.

And then you really get the more of the majesty of these stones that have been there for thousands of years. You'll get up close to them, you'll realize that they're not just gray, but they are gray #in slakes of white and they've got sort of greenish #likeness all over them. You'll start to discover that they're actually covered in all sorts of graffiti. Not bad kind of graffiti, but it's people who's been there over the years that have #lost their names. In eighteen hundreds {1800} a lot of people used to stop off, rent hammer and #chezle so that they could #chezle in their name and their year and have a little picnic there. And you'll see all that stuff that's on the stones. You'll be able to walk inside of it. You'll probably try to get a sense of how the sun might come up and most likely it would be cloudy and you won't really get a good view of it. And you'll just sit there and enjoy it. You might see a few of the sheep wandering around. The sheep do whatever they want in that area. And that's kind of distillness and the peacefulness of it. That's not boring. That's the way you really should see Stonehenge. It takes a little bit more time and planning to do it but it's a much better experience.

Susan: Nice. Well, thank you. I was imagining those big stones and how it reminds us of our ancestors and the #grandure of Man and his ability to create such beautiful things out of natural materials. So, I had the picture of Stonehenge in my mind and I'm sure everyone did as you were talking us through our tour. So thank you, thank you so much for that, It's been really fun to have you on the show. Thanks for telling us some of your little corks and #foybles and your Danny Sullivan 2.0 dreams and plans and just sharing a little bit of yourself and your life with us. We really appreciate it.

Danny: You're very welcome. Thank you for having me on the show. It's been great.

Susan. Absolutely. All the success to you this year for your Third Door Media ideas and we'll be participating.

Danny: Great, thank you.

Susan: Well, for all of you who have listened to the show today, we had Danny Sullivan, partner and Chief Content Officer of Third Door Media. I mentioned that we have transcripts of the show on the site at personallifemedia.com so, please, feel free to download those too. Also If you would like to call and leave a message for us we might be able to run it on the air and the number is 206-350-5333. That's 206-350-5333. I'm your host, Susan Bratton. It's been great to have some time with you today and I hope to hear you next week or have you listen to us, have you hear us next week. So have a great day and see you then, Bye, bye!

[Music]

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