Intuit Accountants News Central
The Birth of Radio Free QuickBooks®
A new, unique way to learn more about QuickBooks in a fast-paced, 90-minute radio program … that’s Radio Free QuickBooks. Here’s why we chose a live, call-in show — and how it all began.
I first met Dawn Brolin in Plano, Texas, in October 2009. I was the freshman of the group chosen to present the “What’s New” seminars and webinars for Intuit’s annual QuickBooks Launch Tour, and she was a “veteran” in her second year.
To date, “Brolin” is the only person in the world I refer to strictly by last name. We connected immediately — and as we have often pondered together, how could we not? Both of us are married to Kevins, have two kids, are 100% QuickBooks nerds, and work very hard at what we do. Most importantly, we both make sure we have FUN doing what we do. When that involves teaching or presenting, we also want to make sure our audience is having a good time.
For the next year, we talked and emailed frequently. We’d spend a minute discussing the Kevins and the kids, then devote the rest of the time talking shop. So when I say “QuickBooks nerds,” I really mean it. We could spend 45 minutes on the phone discussing, in detail, exactly how we clean up a data file or the best way to set up a company in QuickBooks Online. Another regular topic of conversation for Brolin and me involved trying to find a project that we could work on together, which is one reason that when asked to do a Q&A webinar for Intuit®, I immediately suggested Brolin — along with Intuit product specialist Woody Adams.
I had the pleasure of working with Woody during the Intuit Summer Series webinars as a co-presenter. Warm and engaging, he’s definitely a kindred QuickBooks spirit. Woody played an instrumental part in the presentations for the Launch Tour for QuickBooks 2011. He provided clear, concise video demonstrations of some of the new features — earning applause from the first live audience in Dallas to see them — as well as valuable insight and what-if questions. It was during a conference call discussing Intuit’s Q&A webinar that Woody casually mentioned doing a call-in radio show, and Intuit’s Stephanie Morris suggested a website that could host it.
As soon as the call ended, the emails started flying between me, Brolin, and Woody; you could feel the excitement virtually radiating from the computer screen! Within two hours — after Woody had christened our show Radio Free QuickBooks — I had created a Show Page, an email address, a Twitter account and booked the entire month of December with guests: Upcoming programs feature CP Morey from AuditMyBooks.com discussing internal controls, Mark Gilman from Decus Communications, Intuit’s Alison Ball to talk about the QuickBooks ProAdvisor certification exam, and Intuit’s Jim Buffington for our accounting workflow show. In fact, Jim was key in getting the word out to his Intuit colleagues after Woody had explained the show to him over lunch. It was great to see his enthusiasm match ours: In a voicemail to me, he described it as “one of the best ideas he’d heard in a long time,” sharing that it even “made his week.”
The reason we chose a live, call-in show was to fill a gap. The QuickBooks Community Forums are a great resource and obviously so are the support lines, but Radio Free QuickBooks offers a little more instant gratification and some personality from people that use, teach, and support QuickBooks every day. It’s one thing to write (or read, if you’re the one in need of help) an answer; it’s quite another matter to be able to answer it and discuss it with people you respect and with whom you truly enjoy working.
And that last sentence is the whole point of the show! We have a blast doing it. We try to make things fun; every Wednesday, that 90 minutes is the fastest hour-and-a-half any of us experience all week. We really are looking forward to a long run with the show and are already booking guests for February. The program is on from 7:30–9:00 pm, EST, every Wednesday evening and guests are featured during the middle half hour. You can subscribe to our RSS feed, listen to archived shows found on the show page under “On Demand Episodes,” or download through iTunes.
You can also visit Stacy's Website
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