Decoding Dev Speak: How to Craft a Killer Social Media Bio

Hello guys, and welcome to the show. Today is a wonderful, cool Saturday morning over here, so let's head straight into it. Today I'm going to be running commentary on a recent interaction that I had on LinkedIn. I received a request which I accepted and got into a chat with this fellow who is a software developer. And this is a conversation that I want to share here today, or at least just certain aspect of the conversation.

Because a whole bunch of us are running around trying to promote our businesses using LinkedIn, Instagram, social media, online, whatever. And sometimes we try to promote ourselves using technical jargon, business lingo, all sorts of things. Basically, it's stuff, a whole bunch of stuff that our potential customers do not understand. And so it might not be in our best interest even though it sounds cool. So let me just head straight into it.

So me and the fellow were chatting and I'd like to find out what people are up to and have a look at his bio. And his bio says software developer, bracket React and node, front end developer, back end developer, full stack developer. So that is what he had there. And so I was curious, I wanted to know what that means. Now from my experience on LinkedIn, I've realised that when you ask the average person what kind of business they do,

they pretty much repeat the same unhelpful thing that caused you to ask the question in the 1st place. So if I asked him what does the software developer does, he would have just said oh I developed software reactor node and you know that's not helpful. Anyway, so I had to go and do some research and I found some interesting things about what software developers bracket reactor node, front end developers, back end developers,

full stack developers. I found out what it is that they do and funny enough, it sounds like things that people like me could be interested in because when I hear all these technical terms, software developer react node front and it's not just reactor node. I've seen people put all that kinds of things in their bio. So front end, back end, react node, full stack, mid stack, up, stack down, stack, all kinds of all kinds of stacks.

I always thought was some, you know, some real fancy high techie, whatever. I'm sure that for those of you who are professionals in the business right now, you're probably having a laugh thinking how can someone like me be so uneducated when it comes to these things? But honestly, I'm just speaking the truth that apart from those of you who are in this software space who know what all these terms mean, the average Joe's like me have absolutely no idea.

Now my brother studied Information Systems Management as his postgraduate degree. So for my brother, he will see software, react, node, back end, full stack. And you know, he just knows, OK, this is what this guy does. And so if he has a problem, he'll pick up the phone and call you guys. But therefore, someone like me who had a law degree, I'm not interested in tech. In fact, I'm a dinosaur. Let's see what else. And my experience so far has been in sales, business development, some marketing,

some legal wedding photography, what else? You catch a drift? For someone like me, stack react node, front end, back end, mid stack, this stack, Omni stack, like all those things mean absolutely nothing to me. And it's not just me. They mean absolutely nothing to your potential customers who you are trying to solicit for business using LinkedIn. So I sent the guy a message and I told him that, hey, have you thought about rewriting your bio to move the conversation along?

I actually used ChatGPT to come up with an alternative and then I sent it to him. I hope it proves the point to him. I don't think he's actually going to take it because what he put here, software developer, React, node, back end, front end, stack, full stack, all these stack, stack, stack, all that sounds really cool and it makes you sound really intelligent. And what it is that I proposed what I came up with using ChatGPT sounds too simple.

And I find that most people prefer to to take the complex sounding option because it makes you sound like more of a professional. It makes you sound more like you're, you know, you're the gish brown, you know, you're, you're the ish, you know, you, you know what's up, you're the Don, you know, all that kind of stuff. But anyway, I think for the purpose of sales anyway, it helps when we don't bamboozle our customers with technical jargon.

So let me share with you what I came up with on ChatGPT. So what I recommended was instead of his, his LinkedIn bio being software developer bracket react and node bracket bracket close slash front end developer slash back end developer slash full stop, full stack developer full stop. I suggested he would use this instead. I bring websites and apps to life. I'm a software developer with skills in both front end bracket open what you see close and back end bracket open what makes it work bracket close of websites and applications.

Are you looking to collaborate on a new project? Let's chat. OK, let me just read it out straight as a sentence now. So I bring websites and apps to life. I'm a software developer with skills in what you can see and on the back end, things that you can see that makes your websites and applications work. Are you looking to collaborate on the project? Let's chat. Now the second one is a whole lot more simpler. And I know it doesn't make you sound tech and intelligent and everything, but The thing is when I saw that, I was like, oh,

OK, so someone like me who is a business growth podcaster and a sales coach and business consultant actually can use the services of these kinds of people. Before now, all I saw was developer front end, back end, full stack, Omni stack, mid stack, small stack, this stack. And I had no idea. I thought that these people only do work for, you know, engineering firms or high tech medical labs or something. I had no idea that what they do actually is just to work on websites and to work on apps that run on the mobile phone and simple business solutions that everybody needs.

So I now know that if I need to come up with a website or come up with an app for some product offering that I'm trying to come up with, I now know that I can reach out to these sorts of fellows because it's easy, it's accessible and it's it makes a world of difference. The words that we use when we're trying to reach out to the market and when we're trying to have conversations with our potential customers. So for those of you who are still on LinkedIn talking mid stack, full stack only stack this stack that stack front end,

back end reactor node. I mean like, how am I supposed to know what reactor node means? And how is your potential customer supposed to know what reactor node means? Just make it more simple. Put something simple there. I build websites and apps. I specialize on the front end, the beautiful things that you people see and the back end, all the things in the background that make the website work. Are you looking on starting a new project?

Click the link below and you know whatever. Put a reasonable CT at the end of it. CT meaning call to action. So that is my suggestion, not just for you guys who are software developers, full stack developers, Omni stack developers, whatever. Stack developers, try and keep it simple. Sometimes the reason why your business is struggling is because in your business promotions, your potential customers have absolutely no idea what it is that you do.

Unfortunately, all these Omni stacking, full stacking, whatever, apparently it's very simple stuff. People who run primary schools, they could use your service. People who run hospitals, they could use your service. Podcasters like me could use your service. My mom who is starting an NGO that is devoted to the education of the girl child, she could use your services. But if you use all these high end fancy blingo, my mom might see them like, oh OK, this guy works in the engineering industry.

And then she moves on. I'll look at it and I have no idea what this fellow does and moves on. The people who run my children's primary school will see your bio and they will move on because we have absolutely no idea what a full stack or what an Omni stack or what a mid stack or what a reactant node is. So the same goes for whatever profession it is that you are involved in. Back in the days when this podcast was called the sales for the Nigerian for Nigerian wedding professional or something like that, it was something that I spoke about time and time again.

So if you're wedding photographer, stop talking about apertures and apertures and depth of field and blah, blah, blah. The average bride has no idea what that means. You can look for simple ways to communicate the kind of vision that you're trying to create. You can say, oh, your photographs are going to be soft and dreamy. Every bride understands soft and dreamy. She has a good idea. But if you say I'm going to be firing at the smallest apertures possible to enhance maximum depth of field, the average bride, you've lost her.

She has no idea what it is that you're talking about. So keep it simple. It's not just for software developers. Whatever business it is that we're involved in, minimize the technical jargon. Let people understand what it is that you're trying to say. It will improve the chances that you're going to end up doing business with them later on. So that's pretty much so. Those are the two lessons for today #1 keep it simple #2 if you want to make it simple, we have free, what are they called,

free AI tools that make all these things a whole lot easier. All I had to do was do a Google search, understand exactly what all these full stacking and mid stacking is about. And then I took a couple of things, threw it into ChatGPT gave a description for how simple I wanted it. In fact, this thing that I said, I bring websites and apps to life. I'm a software developer with skills in the front end of what you see on the back end of what makes it work for websites and applications.

Are you interested? Let's collaborate for some of you might say, look, even that is still too technical, beautiful. Take what I have said, copy and paste it in ChatGPT. And then you tell ChatGPT that this is how you want it to sound. You want it to sound more conversational or you want it to be shorter. You want it to be no more than 300 characters. You want to write it at the intelligence level of someone who is in primary school or secondary school, or optimize the bio so that it sounds more attractive to women.

Whatever it is that you want to do, just give the instruction, put it there, and then put up two seconds later. ChatGPT would have given you something. Of course, it's not going to be perfect. You take it, you edit it for you edit it, you, you make the desired edits. And then you can now take that, put that on your Instagram bio, your LinkedIn bio, or whoever it is that you've been trying to promote yourself. And believe me, it's going to make a world of a difference because at least now when people see you, they're going to understand that this is who you are.

This is what you do. These are the kind of results that you can, that you promise and that you're open for business. And that's the whole point of listening to the show. And those are the main things that we discuss on the show. Because if you can't put out to the world that this is who I am, this is what I do, these are the results that I can deliver, and this is how you can work with me, you have absolutely no hope for growing your business.

Well, you can, but you'll be growing your business by by accident. If you want to grow your business deliberately, these are some of the small things that we can do that will help optimize our chances for success in the future. So let me not belabor the point and don't worry if you do follow me on. If you do connect with me on LinkedIn, don't worry, I'm not going to criticize your profile. I just figured this is one of these things that would benefit the wider house if I share some of the interactions that I have with folks on the day-to-day.

So connect with me on WhatsApp. The phone number is 08064662140. I'd love to hear from you guys, especially the things that you guys disagree about. It's nice to hear that you agree with this or this has changed your life or your business. But I'm also keen to hear about what you disagree with or things that maybe I haven't expressed properly. Also connect with me on LinkedIn. My name is Tavishma Ayede. I'm the host of the show.

You can confirm the spelling of my name from the website or the link where you're listening to this episode. So thank you very much for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next recording.