Breaking Barriers: Navigating Online Work with Disabilities: Tammy Durden

>> AMBER HINDS: And I am going to run through a few of our announcements and then, of course, I will introduce our speaker and let her come online. 

So welcome. We’re going to be talking about breaking barriers, navigating online work with disabilities today.

A few announcements. If you have not been before, we do have a Facebook group that you can join if you want to connect between meetups, ask questions, get support, share things you’re working on, and answer questions. 

If you are interested in helping other people, we all very much appreciate that. We’re trying to build the WordPress accessibility community. It’s not really just about myself or the speakers who are here. We really want everyone to come and join. 

So you can find that if you just search “WordPress accessibility” on Facebook, or Paula has shared the link in the chat and it’ll also be on the recording notes. 

If you want to find past event recordings, this is being recorded; that is a frequently asked question, and I can almost guarantee that later in the event we’ll have someone who missed this announcement and they’ll ask in the chat. So this is being recorded. It takes us about a week to two weeks. We try to get closer to a week to get corrected captions and a transcript, and then we post up the full video and the transcript. And then any links that were shared or relevant notes on our website, you can find all of that as well as other upcoming events if you just go to equalizedigital.com/meetup. 

We always encourage people to join our email list. We send an email out in advance of events to help you remember to register for events and RSVP for them. And then we send out summary emails about twice a month that have links where you can find the recording. So if you want to get notified when the recording is available, that is the best way to do that. 

If we’ve done things right, when you leave this meet-up, there’ll be a page where you can just subscribe to the email list. But if not, you can also find it if you go to our website at equalizedigital.com/focus-state.

We also got some requests from people that we release just the audio from meetups. Some people are, like, “We don’t actually want the video,” or “We would prefer to listen while you’re folding laundry,” or maybe you can’t see the video and so there’s no point in going to YouTube to watch it. So we did start adding the audio to our podcast every other week. accessibilitycraft.com is where you can go for that. 

We are looking for sponsors for the Meetup. That’s another really important announcement. Unfortunately, the WordPress Foundation doesn’t have any budget to cover the cost of things like Zoom Webinars, our live captioner, our post-event transcription, or any of those sorts of things. So they have told us that if we want to offer those things, either we pay for it or we have to find sponsors. 

So if anyone’s company is interested in helping to sponsor the meetup, please reach out to us. We can send you information. There’s also information on that meetup page that I spoke about earlier that shares what all the benefits are and what you get and what the costs are. But we would very much appreciate anyone who is interested and willing to sponsor because we’ve had some recent changes in our sponsorships that have increased the cost of the meetup. 

You can also email me and Paula if you have any questions. If you want to learn about meetup. If you’re interested in speaking, we’re always looking for speakers, you can contact us at meetup@equalizedigital.com. 

So I am Amber Hinds. If you’ve been before, you may know that. But if you haven’t, my company is called Equalize Digital. We’re a certified B corp that specializes in WordPress accessibility. And we also make a plugin called Accessibility Checker that helps you… Sort of like an SEO plugin. It scans your website and it identifies some accessibility problems, the accessibility problems that an automated tool can’t find so that you can go and fix them and make your content and your code better. 

If you want to learn more about us, I’ve said our website about a million times so I won’t say it again [chuckles]. But we are on Twitter. We like Twitter, even though Twitter is weird and has not a bird logo anymore, which I don’t understand [laughs]. So maybe someday we won’t be saying this, but you can also find us on Twitter at @equalizedigital. 

Today, we do have one sponsor that we want to thank: IvyCat. Ivycat is generously donating funds to cover the cost of our live captioner today so that it can be accessible to people who appreciate or need captions. 

IvyCat helps clients and agencies create, market, and maintain high-performing WordPress websites and apps that are fast, easy to use, accessible, and get results. They offer care plans, search engine optimization, new website development, and accessibility services to help clients grow and succeed. 

So we definitely recommend that you check them out. You can find them at IvyCat.com. And they are also on Twitter. We always appreciate people tweeting thank yous to our sponsors. I think they’re on LinkedIn also. On Twitter, you can find Ivycat @IvyCatWeb. 

There are a couple of upcoming events that I want to share with you all. So our next meetup in April will be Monday, April 17th, at 7:00 o’clock pm Central time. And Nick Croft [phonetic], who is the lead developer at Reactive, will be speaking about color modes, specifically how you can do CSS on website in order to respect a user’s operating system preference. 

So if someone has set their operating system to prefer a dark or a high contrast, then you can have your website serve them a version of your website that is dark or high contrast or things like that with media queries. So he’s going to be talking about what that code looks like, sharing code snippets, and walking us through actually doing that. 

On Thursday, May 4th, so that’s the same time next month, we will be having Stefano Manoa [phonetic] talking about accessible fluid typography in the block editor. So how you can style your font sizes in a way that it respects all screen sizes and different zoom levels and that sort of thing, basically not using pixels. 

So if you are interested in either one of those talks, please visit our meetup page. You can find links to RSVP and register for the Zoom webinar. 

I also wanted to give a shout-out to Access You [phonetic]. This is not part of the WordPress accessibility meetup; it is a conference that is run by the nonprofit organization, Nobility, that focuses on web accessibility.

Access You is one of my favorite accessibility events. It is highly accessible. It is a hybrid conference that takes place down here at a college campus in Austin, but they also have a full online track so you can attend just as a virtual attendee.

That’s how I first started attending. When I lived in Colorado, I just attended online. And now that I moved down to Austin, I’m able to go in person, which is super fun. 

It’s from May 9 through 12th. I think they might actually be working on a discount for meetup for us. We’re working on a partnership with them on a bunch of different things. So if you’re on our email list, I know as soon as I get that info, I’m going to email it out. I was hoping I’d have what the coupon code is today. I’ll also post it in our Facebook group, so those would be other places. But definitely check it out. Again, they’re a nonprofit organization. 

It looks like Graham [phonetic] posted in the chat that some of his team will be speaking at Access You for the first time, which is very exciting. I’ll also be speaking there. There are a lot of really great people that will be speaking, and there’ll be a ton of wonderful sessions. 

So I am very excited to introduce our speaker. I’m going to pop a spotlight up so everybody can see her as well. Tammy Durden. Tammy is a business coach at Fearless Business Boss. She helps women and online service providers build a VA or a digital marketing agency. Tammy has wanted to help other disabled professionals work from home, and she brought on as many disabled professionals as possible to help her in her own business, which I think is really amazing. 

She transitioned her VA agency into a small digital marketing agency while mentoring and coaching. And since the end of 2020, Tammy has been coaching disabled professionals online, full-time. 

So welcome, Tammy. We’re very excited to have you speak and share your story. I’m going to stop sharing my screen; I’ll let you take over. I will be watching the Q and A module. I’ll watch the chat too, but it is helpful to me if you’re watching and you are able to put any questions you have in the Q and A module and I can pass those on to Tammy. 

>> TAMMY DURDEN: Great. Thank you so much for having me here today. I’m going to start the screen share, so please let me know if you get the right one just so we get started off correctly. 

>> AMBER: Yes, it looks good. 

>> TAMMY: OK, perfect. [laughs] As Amber said, I’m Tammy Durden. I’m a business coach, speaker, and online instructor. So I’m really thrilled to be with you all here today. My story doesn’t necessarily involve a lot of WordPress other than my websites. But I’m going to share some things that, as a disabled professional, I ran into while beginning my business, as well as, you know, throughout. I’ve been online for over 15 years now, so I will share some of the things that I’ve learned. 

One of the things that I love to say and tell others is we all have disabilities. Some are easier to identify than others. And I just wanted you to see a photo. I regularly use a forearm crutch or a scooter if I’m going to be out for long periods. So that is the device I use to help me at this time. 

I wanted to give just also an overview for those who maybe have never attended. I’m sure if you attend on a regular basis, you know a lot of this. But according to the CDC, the number or the percentage of disabled Americans in the US is 26%, which is really astonishing if you think about a quarter of our population in the US.

Anyway, I don’t know about other countries, but here, a quarter of our citizens are actually disabled. And to consider some of the accessibility issues we have, I know we’re making tons of strides in it, but I thought that was remarkable. 

I’m going to start off, first of all, just talking a little bit about my disability and what happened there, and then also about my business. So I’ll introduce you to both aspects of that in my life. 

First of all, I’m a mother of three. They’re all grown children now, and we’re expecting our fifth grandchild. My husband’s actually a pastor. We’ve been in ministry for over 30 years now. And my husband unfortunately also works a second job right now, like many people. And of course, I do the full-time coaching online. 

So when I talk to people about my disability, a couple of things happened. Over 20 years ago when I was right in the middle of my thirties, I had three young children and my youngest was four years old, I became very ill. And we really didn’t know what was going on. I’ll talk a little bit more about the symptoms in a minute. But I was eventually diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I like to say MS for that reason [chuckles]. Shortly after I was diagnosed with MS, I was also diagnosed with lupus. And since then I’ve been diagnosed with a few other autoimmune diseases. 

If any of you suffer with autoimmune, you understand that once you have one, it is of course much easier than to get other autoimmune illnesses, unfortunately. 

At the time, as I said, I had three young children and I was actually homeschooling all three of my children, so you can imagine. And what began to happen is muscle weakness. I thought I was just coming down with a simple cold, which wasn’t uncommon. We lived in the mountains, near the Appalachian Mountains at the time. But I began having problems with balance and walking. Before I went to the hospital, I was having to hold on to walls to be able to walk, and I had debilitating fatigue. 

When I first started to explain this disease to others, I would say, “I’m just tired all the time.” People say, “Oh, yes, I’m really tired too.” But to explain this a little further, what it was like for me is like somebody had actually drugged me and tied ten-pound bags of potatoes on each leg. And then imagine trying to get up and move and walk and homeschool three children, as well as all the ministry roles that I was playing at the time. So to say I could no longer work outside the home is an understatement. [laughs] So you can imagine why I began looking for work online. 

In 2008, we moved to Virginia and we were fortunate to buy a home, and I was looking for some additional family income that I could earn from home. And at that time, even in 2008, not many online opportunities. And yes, there were a lot of scams; and yes, I was taken by one. [laughs] I eventually decided I was going to look locally, and I found a local insurance agent, and I began to provide lead generation and virtual assistant services to him locally.

Apparently, I was pretty good at it because his colleagues began asking him, and he eventually began sharing my business information, which I didn’t even know was a business until he told me, “You have a business.” [laughs]

Then I realized I really did. So when I realized I had a business, one of the things that were very important to me was to be able to share work with other disabled professionals. There are just, as I said, not many opportunities back then online, you didn’t know who to believe or trust, and sometimes that’s still true. And I wanted to be able to bring the work to others who struggled with the same issues I did; maybe in a different way, but still struggled. So it became a mission, not just a business for me. 

So when I did have enough work, we created a virtual assistant agency. I worked with the Department of Rehab and the Department of Blind and visually impaired here in Virginia to be able to do some training for those who wanted to help as well. And I’ll talk more about some of this later, but so I worked with them about getting some employed through my agency so that they could come work with me. 

Our team eventually comprised… We didn’t discriminate against those who were not disabled, of course, but as much as I could, I tried to bring on as many online professionals who were disabled, as well as mothers of disabled children.

Many people don’t think about that, but many mothers of disabled children also have to stay at home and would love to earn an income, and it’s very difficult to do that when you have to stay home with your disabled child. 

So then my journey after establishing the VA Agency, I began to learn more skills with online educational opportunities. And because of client demand, we eventually pivoted to a small digital marketing agency, which I thoroughly enjoyed. And I enjoyed especially working with disabled because many of them – and I will talk about this too in a little bit – have never worked. And if they’ve been disabled all their life, they never had the opportunity to really work. Seeing the joy that it brought to their life and the confidence that grew in them was amazing. And I just thoroughly enjoyed helping to empower them to be able to become confident in who they were. 

While we did this, I also mentored and coached online as well. And then at the end of 2020, we all had that horrible year, and I had always been thinking I would get somebody to manage the digital agency, but my health started taking a toll again in managing all of that as well. And my coach actually said, “I think it’s time.” And so at the end of 2020, I exited the agency to begin providing business coaching full-time. And I love it. It’s where I thrive. I love helping other business owners, whether disabled or nondisabled, but to also build their agencies, and start their businesses and their journey. 

I want to talk about some of the stumbling blocks that I ran into while I was going through this journey. So the first one, I would say, I’m just going to go through and talk about these four issues when I was working with blind and visually impaired, as well as online learning programs, and the disabled employment in our system, and then disabled in our accessibility to systems. 

So I worked largely with the visually impaired. And at one time in our country, in the US… I’m not sure about other countries, but you can certainly do the research. At one time, though, the blind and visually impaired had a 90% unemployment rate, meaning only 10% of those who were blind and visually impaired worked full-time or were able to have employment. 

One of the things that I found too as I began to help disabled was that some of these things just weren’t available to disabled, and I found that just to be appalling. And I decided we would do business differently, and that’s why I brought on disabled professionals. 

Now, with the JAWS technology [phonetic], that really introduced a change for those who were blind and visually impaired. This empowered them to be able to be online, to actually hear what they were missing, so that was an amazing thing. 

I worked with one woman who was blind and used the JAWS technology, and it just always amazed me how she could pay attention to the client, plus listen and do the things that she needed to do online. I just thought that had to take incredible patience as well as skill. 

Some of the challenges we faced, however, with the technology, and this was a few years back, obviously… And I know things have changed even now, and JAWS technology is always changing. They make changes weekly, if not daily. So I’m not saying these exist exactly today, but we did run into CRM software programs that were an issue and that were difficult for the JAWS technology to read. 

Also, working with online voiceover Internet technology programs was an issue. At one point, we offered answering services and that was a real problem for many of our disabled because, at the time, it wasn’t a very good fit. Because you have to port things and then you have to assign different workflows to it. And if you don’t have it exactly right, in other words, if it rings here, it has to go there, or if they dial this number and hit this extension, it goes there. And it’s very difficult for that technology to follow along the workflow. 

The other thing, and I’ve done some research on this too, because some of this isn’t necessarily what I’ve experienced, but some of it is. Call to action on social media channels is very difficult for those who are blind and visually impaired. As well as many other platforms, the call-to-action buttons aren’t always large or easy for the reader to spot. And then the captcha, and I can attest to this one myself, [laughs] it is just really difficult at times. 

I’m visually impaired, but I’m not to the extent of being nearly blind or anything. With MS, I can become that. But even now as I’m getting older even, and just some of the other issues I face with my eyes, with the autoimmune, it can be very difficult to see what they want you to retype. Even if you hit it to refresh, you can’t always tell what the numbers and letters are because they might have a line through it or it’s very blurry and different reasons that the captcha is very difficult for those who are blind or visually impaired to retype.

Also, matching images. You know, even those with the best vision can miss some of these [chuckles] because you really need to go frame by frame and everything. But it can be difficult because it could be just a side piece of a bike, or if that’s what they’re asking for you to identify. So some of these are very difficult for those who are blind and visually impaired. 

I’d like to use quotes [chuckles] when I can, and I thought this was interesting. Those who are employed with a disability were more likely to be self-employed than those with no disability. And to me, that almost says that as disabled professionals, we’ve made our own way, because when we couldn’t find work that worked for us, we made it work for us, in other words. 

I thought it was an interesting statistic, though, that most disabled are self-employed. So it’s something to think about, especially with websites. Because that means that we need websites. And how is that accessible for those who are disabled and can they use the back end of it? 

One of the things that I use is Elementor, which I love, for WordPress, and it really helps me so that I don’t have to use code and other items. But I think we’re always making changes, and I could see that in the near future, maybe everybody’s website will have to be accessible, and then what happens? So I know there are some real struggles in this area. 

The other thing that I wanted to give you was this quote too, in slate.com in 2019, and this is another one of those things about the CTAs and everything else, the call to actions. A blind social media user said, “Using Facebook as a blind person is a constant feeling of being devalued. It doesn’t matter about the stupid button that I can’t press in that moment; it’s that it keeps happening. And the message that I keep receiving is that the world doesn’t value me and that people really don’t care.” 

I can understand that feeling because as much as we have brought so many social issues to light in the last five years, even, the disability issue isn’t one of those that is always brought up. It’s very rarely brought up in media and things of that nature. So even though we may complain to Facebook and Twitter and other platforms that this is very difficult for us to use, if it doesn’t change, it means that they could care less. They don’t care what you’re saying because they have plenty of other users who are using it and they just don’t really care to change it. And so I understand what this user was saying. 

The other thing that we ran into was online learning systems, and I will tell you that I’m associated with one. I am a mentor and an online instructor with an online university system for freelancers, so I understand the struggle, and I’ve even done research for them a few years back. Because we looked at being able to have the captions, the closed captions, and everything else so that JAWS could really function on the platform we’ve run into. First of all, there’s always a new system popping up, so there are multiple systems out there. 

I know we’re making headway in this area, so I’m not trying to dig into anybody or talk negatively. I know we’re making huge headway in this area, but there’s still a lot to be desired. And some of those issues are, again, just finding the button, moving forward, progressing; and all of these things, being able to hear everything if it’s not recorded at an optimum level, being able to see or enlarge the screen, or use the JAWS technology. 

Most of these systems do not use closed caption. If they do, many of them are auto-generated, which, as you know, can be a real issue in itself. If you’ve ever seen an iPhone that tries to generate a voice message to you, you know it’s not the best. So even if they’re auto-generated, which is great, it still doesn’t mean that it’s really functioning at its optimum. 

The other thing, when I did the research on this, where I’m a mentor and instructor, the expense was astronomical to be able to get closed captioning. And we looked at it many different ways. I looked at it from a point of view of the Department of Rehab, Blind and Visually Impaired, and talked to them at length. I talked to some of the state higher-ups in the disability or the Department of Rehab, and some of the things that they told me to look at and go to this or that company because they’re trying to help, but there’s still a huge expense associated with it. 

So doing one course is expensive enough, but in this case, they do multiple courses, and to be able to put that with it is very difficult. And to really do it in a way that somebody’s actually gone in and provided the closed captioning rather than auto-generated is not even feasible to do at this point. 

The other thing that I want to talk about, and this doesn’t necessarily relate to WordPress, but it still is a big problem in our country and I’m sure in other countries, is the employability issue in our systems. So many disabled, of course, get some kind of disability help. I was never able to do that, but I understand from the point of view of hiring someone or bringing somebody on, even as a subcontractor, and what they’re able to do. 

So they have an income level, and for some reason, just because they must collect it in order to make or be able to have rent and all the other needs, food, and everything else, they really have nothing left of their income. So there really isn’t anything left most of the time. And most of the time it’s not enough to even make ends meet if they’re collecting disability. 

So having the opportunity to learn is huge within our system. We offer so many opportunities to learn for free within our system, which is amazing and wonderful. They can get associate degrees, bachelor’s degrees, and even master’s degrees through many of the programs, even doctorates. And I will tell you, I had people working with me who had bachelor’s and master’s degrees. But then once they receive it, how can they use it? 

So once they receive these great educations, how are they supposed to work and how can they use it? Because they’re still on the system. There are some programs that try to walk hand in hand with that, but there aren’t a lot of those. There’s one program in particular I know, at least a few years ago, “Ticket to work” or “Ticket to Earn” program, which really did come alongside them and allowed them to earn while they upped that earning in revenue at that time. 

Most of those who collect disability, they’re told they can earn a certain amount per month, but when it comes down to it… I will tell you firsthand experience. I worked with somebody, unfortunately, who had become very disabled from the neck down because of a car accident, a terrible accident. She was very young, she was just going to be starting college and she still wanted to go. She still wanted to work, she wanted to be a very functioning member of society. And I was excited for her. I helped train her and we were ready to get started. And she was very gifted in it, and had no trouble doing the work. OK?

So as I brought her on and onboarded her, I immediately got a call from the Department of Rehab who told me to stop, she can’t work yet. We hadn’t gotten the “OK” from the social security yet. And I said, “Well, we’ll just start training and things and we’ll go from there.” And then I got another call within days that said she wasn’t allowed to earn anything, because if she earned anything, it would take away from her benefits, as well as she was still facing multiple surgeries throughout her lifetime, and it would take away her insurance and she would not be able to. And her family could not support her without it in that way. 

So here she was very gifted, wanted to learn, and was going to go to school, which she, I’m sure still did, but she was unable to earn an income along with this. 

This is a real problem in our society because many people – and I know this is true of Medicare and all these things – who collect disability can’t support themselves on just disability. So this is a big issue and one of my passions, I guess, or pet peeves [laughs], maybe. And it was really difficult for her when she couldn’t work. 

The other thing that I personally struggle with is being disabled and having accessibility to our current systems. And by that, I simply mean; first of all, mobility issues often mean I don’t get out. Quite honestly, I get out to see family and I get out to see doctors in between I’m working and then the fatigue and the muscle weakness. 

If you can imagine, even just using a crutch or something else takes a lot of energy to do. And I’m trying to fight the balance, and this is why I use the crutch. Fighting your balance and your weakness at the same time works your body a whole lot. And using that crutch helps balance it out just a little bit, but it still completely wears you out by the end of your time out. 

We rely on others. Quite often, we have caregivers or others. I’m fortunate to have a great family and my husband, who helps me so much. But we do have to rely on others to sometimes get our groceries or do our outings and things of that nature. 

So some of the systems that I needed, especially starting businesses, was my banking system. We all need IDs or driver’s licenses. We need passports. And these are all systems or items we need to be able to get. There are not many of these that are really online. 

Now, your driver’s license, in the US, you can renew online, which is wonderful. Banking, however, they did have one online bank that you could start online, and then that ended up closing down. Now, whether another one has come in its place in the last two years, I’m not sure. But I had originally started with one of those. 

So it means that we have to go out, go to the bank, we have to bring paperwork, we have to get all this stuff. And it’s not just a simple, quick, easy open. I mean, you’re there for quite an amount of time. The same driver’s license is even worse. 

And passport, you have to go out and get the photo first, and then you have to make an appointment. At least here, we have to make an appointment with the post office in order to go and talk to them and turn everything in. 

So all of this can be very debilitating for somebody with mobility issues. It’s very tiring, it’s very stressful. And then if for some reason you don’t have anything and have to come back, you know, I’m sure you can imagine. So it is very stressful when you’re needing this assistance. 

It would be great, and I know it’s not always practical when you think of a driver’s license and passports because of fraud issues and banking, because of fraud issues and other things. But if somehow we could come up with a way where it wasn’t such a risk and a way that whether that it’s identified visually, whatever it was, that we would be able to open these accounts online versus having to leave and actually do it in person, that would be wonderful. It would make many of us who have mobility issues, it would just give us a breath of fresh air, so to speak. [chuckles] 

The other thing that I wanted to talk about is my own experience with being out shopping. The only reason I share this is, if you’re in any of these situations, I encourage you to really see the person, not the disability. And those of you who are here, I know you do, or you wouldn’t be here because you wouldn’t care about the issue. And many of you are probably disabled yourself. 

I can remember being out with my family when my children were still younger and I was using my scooter. We were actually at a Walmart. And I even had handed the checkout person the debit card to pay. And she kept talking, but she was talking to my husband who was right next to me. And then when she went to hand the card back, she handed it back to him; never looked at me or addressed me. And of course – you have to know my husband – he stopped her, and said, “She gave it to you; you need to look at her and talk to her.” 

This just goes to show you that quite often, those who are disabled are not often seen or paid attention to. So I just encourage you, when you’re out, if this happens to you, to do that; to actually see them as a person, not as a disabled. 

I also wanted to share… Now this quote is going to be on the next few slides because it’s a long quote. Stella Young, who is a disability activist, explained brilliantly the barriers that people with disability face on a societal, and that no amount of positivity will be able to break down these barriers. 

She goes on to say, “You know, no amount of smiling at the flight or stairs has ever made it turn ramp. Never. Smiling at a television screen isn’t going to make closed captions appear for people who are deaf. No amount of standing in the middle of a bookshop and radiating positivity or a positive attitude is going to turn all of these books into braille”, said Stella.

To become an all-inclusive and accessible society, we need to change the way we view disability and collaborate with the disabled community to break down barriers. And I shared it all with you because all of that quote was important, I felt like. And it’s so true because as much as we try to be positive and as many other things that have come to light in our society to be inclusive, disabilities are still on the outside of that. 

So what can we do to improve? The first thing that we can do is actually ask the disabled community what changes need to be made. And if you’re here, you’re already doing that because you’d like to see this happen and you want to know how to do that. The other thing is listening to constructive criticism. None of us want to hear it, obviously. We don’t want to hear how something’s not working properly, but when it isn’t, please listen to the constructive criticism. 

And one thing I tell a lot of my counseling or coaching clients is, you sift it. You run it through the sifter and see which things stick and really can be used. The other, you just throw out. The other thing I encourage you to be involved in, and if you’re here, I’m sure you’re doing this already, be involved in change. Help those changes to happen. Don’t just be a silent minority watching things. Actually be involved in these changes. 

And lastly, be active in your communities online and offline, so that you understand and know what’s happening in your own communities. Because often that is where the actual change takes place. And it’s not until you know what’s really needed in your communities, on and offline, that you can really help to begin to change these things. 

And I really thank you. I told the ladies it’s going to be a short one, but I’d love to take any questions if you have them. I also have a free offer if you’re interested. If any of you are doing scaling, starting a business, or working on social media, I have several offers on there. If you’re interested, just go to my website, fearlessbusinessboss.com, and sign up for them. Thank you so much for allowing me to be here today. 

>> AMBER: Thank you. That was really really great, Tammy. I really appreciate that quote from Stella Young. I had never heard that one before and I think it really does a great job of pointing out collaboration and how important it is, and that it’s more than just good thoughts, it’s actual work and effort. 

>> TAMMY: Right. Which you’re very involved in, so you know how hard it is. 

>> AMBER: Yes. I wrote down a few questions that I can ask while we’re waiting. If anyone else has any, feel free to put them in the Q and A widget and I will pass them along. So, along that line, I was sort of curious if you have ideas about good places to start when it comes to inspiring others to take part in that collaboration. I think a lot of us here on this call are agency owners or we’re developers that are doing work for clients, many of whom may not have even considered that accessibility on your website is something you have to think about. Do you have thoughts about ways to inspire our clients to want to be collaborative in that same way, both with their own employees and with their community? 

>> TAMMY: Sure. Well, I think it does come to, first of all, bringing attention to it, which you’re great at doing already, but also being involved in the community. As I said, I can’t do them as much anymore. But we used to do the MS Walk [Phonetics]. There were tons of people set up with tables there even, who were involved in helping the disabled community. And so I think being involved in that, like going out for the walks, being involved, listening while you’re walking that walk and listening, there’s [Unintelligible 04:54] walks, there are all kinds of different ones that you can be involved in yourselves. 

Also, I would say, reaching out to whatever is in your country or province or state, that association that manages the disabled community and helps. So like DARS and organizations like that, and asking them, how can we get involved? How can we bring this information to other people? What do you suggest? 

So I think those are the first couple of things that come to mind for me. And then just being a vocal voice online, really getting out there and talking about it as you’re doing, but also just bringing it. 

And maybe you do it as a company even. So, like trying to inspire employees, perhaps you get them involved in doing the walk and seeing who can raise the most and just making it fun, competitive a little bit, because everybody likes a little bit of that and bringing it to their attention. 

>> AMBER: Yes, I have actually seen, we’ve talked about that, companies that do volunteering days or things like that. And you can choose, maybe there’s an organization in your community that assists people with disabilities. My company is all distributed, we’re not in the same city or town. Sometimes there’s like virtual races or things that you can do in your own area, but then you have an online hub for something. 

>> TAMMY: Well, yes, I was even going to say though, just because you’re in different areas, they still have the same thing and so you could still kind of make it a fun little thing that everybody does and what raises awareness for something like that. But yes, it’s harder when you’re spread out a little bit. 

But I think having online meetings, making it fun, and getting everybody involved, I think is key. And probably if they’re working with you anyway, they have a good understanding of some of the challenges and just maybe even rewarding them at times for different things and bringing the awareness to others. 

>> AMBER: Yes, I think that’s also a good way to create a nice company culture too, beyond just work, like adding some outside things. 

>> TAMMY: Yes, I agree. 

>> AMBER: On that employment front, do you have any tips or thoughts on how employers could make their job postings more welcoming to people with disabilities or more appealing to people with disabilities so that they get more diverse applicants? 

>> TAMMY: Well, honestly, I don’t know that there’s a way to do that without making it almost wording and against abled. But at the same time, I think if you are willing to list it with the department, DARS and Division of Blind Visually Impaired or whatever it’s called in your state, area, or country and reaching out to them… Because you will probably get one person assigned to you when you are being disabled-friendly, and they will make sure and when you reach out to them and say, look, I have availability. 

Not only that, but let me tell you this, as employers, if you’re hiring somebody, not just even subcontracting, they will help provide the computers, whatever is needed. They’ll even send somebody if it’s an insight work, like if they had to work in the office with you let’s say, they’ll send somebody out to help them get adjusted, to help them in between with you and the employee. And they really do try to make it easy, easier to employ disabled. There are also large conferences for many states – and I’m sure other countries do this as well – you can be involved in and to show that you’re disabled friendly and talk about how you do that and how you offer jobs for them. 

>> AMBER: Yes. I was trying to Google it. I’m going to throw a link in the chat. 

>> TAMMY: Oh, great. 

>> AMBER: I think this might be what you’re missing when you say DARS. 

>> TAMMY: Department Of Aging and Rehabilitation, I think is what it’s called. 

>> AMBER: Yes. So that’s what it is in Virginia. But assumingly, other states would have the same thing. 

>> TAMMY: Right. Exactly. Yes. Every state should have one and then even other countries, I’m sure there are other things. I know Darren’s asking about the cost, especially for integrating on website. I really get that, Darren. It is. It can sometimes be cost-prohibitive. I dare say though, that soon it may be required. 

And so if they can get ahead of the game now, they’re better off. You have to be paid for your time as well in creating these sites. But I think those who really want to be disable-friendly in accessibility will spend the time and the money. 

Maybe they only do a page at a time, I don’t know, depending on how many pages they have. So maybe if it’s an e-commerce, it’s much more difficult, obviously, but maybe you do multiple pages at a time at a certain rate versus doing the whole site. I don’t know if that’s possible or not. 

>> AMBER: Yes, that’s something that we do for clients when they want remediation. And it’s not always like a whole rebuild of their entire site. It’s like, OK, we’ll do this many hours a month and we just spread it out, which is nice for us because then we can plan. 

>> TAMMY: Yes. That’s great. That’s a great way to do it. And then it makes it easier for everybody.

>> AMBER: Yes. So Darren said that I always make the cost, that yes, there’s an initial cost to learning accessibility, but once it’s integrated into our design and development flows, it’s no additional cost. Which I think is really true. I think in the beginning, even from my team, when we were first learning this, there were a couple of projects that we called learning projects because we didn’t really make what [Crosstalk 51:35] because of how much extra work we had to put in. 

>> TAMMY: Right. [Crosstalk 51:42]. Yes. You don’t make anything, but they’re invaluable to what you learned moving forward right? 

>> AMBER: Yes. Well, and I think too, from a cost perspective, when you’re talking website accessibility or even making your business accessible, like adding a ramp if you don’t have a ramp, or adding captions on your YouTube videos if you don’t, real captions, not the automated ones. 

>> TAMMY: Right. 

>> AMBER: Yes, I think there is a cost to all of those things, but I think it’s just a matter of trying to explain that there is also a benefit of all of those things. So if you have a physical building that can’t accept someone in a wheelchair because it has stairs, you might be losing out on them purchasing your products or services. And it’s the same thing with your website. 

>> TAMMY: I agree. And think about it from the standpoint… I mean, even when we talk about blind and visually impaired, and at one time, 90% were not employed, well, what if that group could see the website, could be involved in purchasing your items, and not have to go out and purchase them? That’s a huge upswing to your profit. 

So, yes, there’s a cost up front, but the end part of that is that you may receive so many more. And the fact is word of mouth, right? So once there is one and somebody really enjoyed it, they were able to move through it easily, they’re going to get the word out that, “Hey guys, this site is great, visit this site.” 

>> AMBER: Yes. So let’s see. Someone asked in the Q and A, they said, my mom had a stroke about six months ago and isn’t able to go back to the job she was doing before, what would be your advice for her to get started in this area while trying to collect disability or while collecting disability? 

>> TAMMY: Well, it really depends on the deficit she now suffers and what she’s able to do. I don’t know what she did before, but let’s say she was an administrative assistant to somebody. Maybe she can’t go in, but maybe she can still provide those types of services. I will say it’s probably great to get started in an online community, first of all. And I’ll give a little plug to freelanceu.com. 

They give so much training in there that it’s a very small monthly fee. So for those who need or want to learn some additional skills for online work, it’s amazing. That’s the one I’m associated with, and I just love it. The owners are very open. They’re just very open to that. And they’re the ones that I was doing research for. So I would say learning some of those things that are necessary to be online, if she’s not used to that, and then beginning to start her own business, even. 

I mean, look at what we found out just even today about most disabled actually owning their own business versus being employed. So maybe that’s her new journey. I’m sorry she’s going through that. I know it’s very difficult for the whole family, and it’s a big life change. We used to call it the new normal in my house because every time I had a flare and lost an ability, we’re now at a new normal. 

>> AMBER: You just had to constantly adjust your expectations, which I’m sure is very challenging. 

>> TAMMY: Yes. 

>> AMBER: So I threw a link to FreelanceU in the chat. That’s the right one, right? 

>> TAMMY: Yes. 

>> AMBER: Great. So I think that is interesting. Kind of needing to figure out what you were doing, what skills you still can do, and then maybe are there other areas where you can skill up. 

>> TAMMY: Yes. A lot of people become disabled later in life, but they still want to feel valuable. They have so much wisdom from the work that they’ve done. And so it’s so important that if they can make the transition to online, there is so much need out there right now. 

Some of the biggest needs that we see right now are online course developers that can provide, take their courses if somebody wants to teach. Content managers as well as digital marketing managers in general. 

Email marketing is still one of the biggest ways people get clients online today. So email marketing people and then just general administrative assistant, virtual assistants are needed. 

>> AMBER: People who can keep things moving, check email boxes, that kind of stuff is what it would mean?

>> TAMMY: Absolutely. And then also things like this: online event managers who are in the background, helping with the chats, helping with questions, things like that. 

>> AMBER: It looks like Glenn also mentioned another great accessibility community willing to help. 

They said online discussion groups such as webaim.org/community and web-a11y.slack.com. And then of course there are lots of accessibility meetups like ours. 

>> TAMMY: All right, that’s great. 

>> AMBER: OK. Aaron had a question in the Q and A, it says, do you have any thoughts on plugins that claim to make sites more accessible? I’ve heard they can do more harm than good. One called “Recite me”… That’s one I haven’t heard of. One called “recite me” has been persistent in trying to sell Aaron on using that plugin. 

>> TAMMY: I do not create websites other than my own. I manage my own. But I don’t know of any directly. I really don’t. I mean, maybe, Amber, you’re better to address that question than I am. I don’t know any right off the top of my head. As much as I want my site to be accessible too, I know it isn’t. And I would love to do things to change it and make it more accessible to others. 

>> AMBER: So my blunt advice is don’t let them sell you, because anything that it promises, like magic, overnight fixes is not possible. It’s not real. 

I think there are one or two things that I’ve seen an overlay do right. But I’ve also seen a lot of things that those overlays do wrong. And that’s why, at the beginning, even with our plugin, I was like, it can find some of the problems with accessibility because there are just some things that require a human to look at it and say, well, this is the correct context-specific alternative text for this image. 

It’s hard for AI to really generate a good alternative text, for example. 

>> TAMMY: And I think that’s an important piece, too, Amber. Many people don’t know to put the alternative text for all their photos. So they just throw the photos in there and they don’t think about, that Google can’t see that, and neither can jaws, machines, and things like that. So describing the photos that you’re putting in is really important. 

>> AMBER: Yes, I mean, that’s part of kind of what motivated us to create our thing. It’s like a plugin that tells you what you forgot. But I think going back to the overlay, just in general, I would say if you want to learn more, go to overlayfactsheet.com. I think it looks like Glenn actually, threw a link to that in the chat. 

What I like about that website is it has a lot of information that Carl Groves, who put it together, has done a lot of research on overlays. But it also has a lot of quotes from real people who rely on assistive technology. 

And I’ve seen New York Times articles, Los Angeles Times, big newspapers, and media outlets putting out stories where people with disabilities say those overlays can actually make the websites worse for them. So we never recommend them. 

I am curious because you mentioned Jaws a lot. I actually don’t know the history of NVDA, which is the open-source free screen reader. So I don’t know when that came into play verse when you first were working with individuals. But do you have any thoughts about the fact that Jaws is a paid software and does that cause problems like access problems for people who are unlimited income to be able to get work? 

>> TAMMY: Well, I think certainly it could. Those who are on disability, generally speaking, can get the help because if they’re working, they can get the technology and all of that and even get training with it. In our case, it was through the blind and visually impaired division, DARS. 

And so most of the time, if they are already in the system or on the system, which I hate to say, they get the help. Like even starting a business or starting with an employer, they can get many of the things they need to be able to work because they’re going to be employed. 

Now, the hard part of that is, with any technology, if the upkeep and things like that, or if later on they have to repurchase… I don’t know how that works with Jaws I do know they’re always maintaining it. I did some research even coming into today because of the limited knowledge that I had. But I know that they’re always updating it and everything. 

I think that it could be prohibitive. Definitely. I definitely think they were the leader in the industry. And it can be prohibitive for those who aren’t in the system and need it to work. 

>> AMBER: So I guess I didn’t realize this. So there are ways through the states, you’re saying, where they would actually purchase the Jaws software and pay the license fees for users? 

>> TAMMY: Yes. They actually did. Because Jaws, I think, does provide some free access to certain non-profits. But I’m not sure if that’s the case for the states. That would be a lot that they would be giving away. So I’m not really sure if that’s the case or not. 

But I do know that everybody that worked with me were actually subcontractors. So they were 1099s and order for them to work. They have to provide their own equipment and everything as of 1099. I can’t purchase it or provide it for them. 

And so every one of my 1099 employees actually – seems weird to say employees but that’s the way they refer to them – received a laptop or desktop. They received the Jaws technology. If they needed a headset, they received a headset. I mean whatever they needed, they received. So they had everything to be able to work. 

We sometimes had to wait weeks and weeks before they come together. But it’s a real blessing for somebody who really wants to work and does not have anything or the ability to purchase those things. But if you’re somebody that’s working and want to come home and start working from home or if you’ve become disabled and you really haven’t filed for disability or things like that, I can imagine it’s very frustrating. 

I mean I never had a disability so I had to start from nothing basically. And so I think those, it can be very cost prohibitive for everything, truly. And it used to be. I started in the corner of my bedroom with nearly nothing. I already had a laptop. But today everything costs. There are subscriptions for everything. You don’t just go in and purchase the Microsoft program anymore. You have to pay for the subscription monthly and everything has done that now. 

One of the other frustrations I will say, and I meant to put it in there is the chat. You can’t talk to software companies anymore. You can’t just reach out to them and you’re fortunate if you can chat with them. And quite often you can send an email, might be days or things of that nature. Very frustrating. I also started to have issues starting to have issues with my dexterity. And so to be able to sit and type in and type in everything that I need to with a chat person is very difficult. 

So it gets harder to do those kinds of things. So even the fact that they’re just not very customer user or user friendly in many ways when it comes to their customer support. 

>> AMBER: Yes. I think a lot of the chats don’t work well with screen readers at all. 

>> TAMMY: No. I wouldn’t think that.

>> AMBER: It’s almost impossible to use live chat with a screen reader. I think that’s a good point. How are we providing customer support online? Those of us that do it, really trying to figure out if there are multiple ways that people can contact us. Because if we try to funnel everyone through one way and that one way doesn’t work for someone’s assistive technology… 

One of my friends, Meryl Evans, she’s deaf and she will frequently complain when a phone number is required on support forms. And she’s like, but I don’t want them to call me. She has a phone. 

>> TAMMY: Right.

>> AMBER: She uses it for other things. So she would rather that field be optional. Or then she’s like, well, maybe she’ll put in like fives, but sometimes it’s smart enough, it’ll be like, no, you have to give us a real phone number. 

>> TAMMY: Yes. 

>> AMBER: And she’s like, “But I don’t want them to call me because that’s not the best way for me to communicate with their support. So I don’t want to give them a phone number.” So I think us really being open to having varieties of ways of communicating with people is really important. 

>> TAMMY: I agree. Absolutely. Yes. And now with AI, everything’s smarter, too, because if you put in the wrong address or if you just miss a digit or something like that, they’re like, no, that doesn’t work right away. You don’t have to wait. It just tells you, no, you can’t submit the form. So, yes, I think definitely being open to communicating in a variety of ways for those who need it. 

>> AMBER: I have a question from – hopefully, I’m saying this right – Anya. “Are there any notable accessibility issues on more high-profile popular websites or online services? Or have they received the training and funds to implement sufficient accessibility features?” Do you want to call anybody out? 

>> TAMMY: I don’t want to call anybody out. I do think there are, as I said… I could call a few out. 

>> AMBER: This is a safe space. We only post it on YouTube. 

>> TAMMY: That’s right. It is very very frustrating, especially with the chat and all of that. You get a bot in the beginning and then you tell them, no, that doesn’t work, that doesn’t answer it or you have to click an article that they’re sending you. And then you go back and say, no, that doesn’t work. And then some of them will just close down. They don’t even give any options to go any further. And you still haven’t gotten your answer to your question. And then when you try to look for a support email, you can’t always find it. 

I will say, I’ll give a shout-out to Google because honestly, the fact that they still run a phone number for those who have paid Google account workspace and things like that. It is remarkable to me that you can actually talk to them when so many other software do not have a phone number you can call. So I think that is remarkable. But there are many many software that I use on a regular basis and have to, that don’t give me the option to reach out to them. 

>> AMBER: Yes. So I would say my thought on this notable accessibility issue on more high-profile popular websites is unfortunately the vast majority, including very high-profile websites, have accessibility problems. If you haven’t heard of it, the Web Aim million is a really interesting report to look at. So Web Aim, every year they scan the top 1 million websites by traffic.

So this would be all brands; Facebook, Amazon, whatever that might be, salesforce.com, big brands that have major websites that get a lot of traffic. New York Times. And I can’t remember what the percentage is this year, but every February they put out a report of what percent of them have easily detectable accessibility problems. These aren’t even like deeper accessibility problems that require really figuring out if the tab order is the right or whatever, but things like color contrast and stuff like that. 

I think it’s like 96% this year. I’ve seen it flow between 98% and 96%. Paula put a link to it if you want to find it, in the chat. But unfortunately, there is a lot to do, maybe fortunately if you are a web developer. But yes, hopefully, we can see more companies taking it seriously. I do see some of the bigger ones, like… Apple, I feel like I’ve seen them put a lot of effort into accessibility. 

I don’t know that it’s always perfect, but I do think I’ve seen some good efforts coming out from them. We used to say Twitter was a good example, but they don’t have an accessibility team anymore. 

>> TAMMY: Well, they took the bird away, so I didn’t know that. I haven’t been on in a while, obviously. 

>> AMBER: I keep wondering at what point I’m going to abandon it. Paula got the number for me. So this year it was 96.3% of homepages had WCAG 2 failures, which was a slight improvement. 96.8% in 2022. 

>> TAMMY: Like I said, with all the ways that we bring societal things to the public right now, why is it that this is a constant issue and never gets brought up? 

>> AMBER: Do you think we need to just have stronger laws and more enforcement of those laws? 

>> TAMMY: I think for accessibility in person, it’s important, like the ramps and people being able to get in that way. And then I guess, of course, it makes sense that you should have it online. But I’m not sure that I think government enforcement is always the way to go. 

I mean, look at the changes we’re making in society now, just from societal pressure. I just think it’s not out there enough. How often do you hear anybody loud speaking about these issues? I mean, it’s just not something that’s out there often enough. And I think that it’s unfortunate. 

Years and years ago, I can remember certain ones like Johnny Erickson Tata. She was out there all the time. And you may be too young to know that, but some of you who are older remember her. And she ended up becoming paralyzed because of an accident; diving in the water. And she was out there all the time. And she even started many associations that would help people get wheelchairs in third-world countries, who didn’t have them, just a lot of things. And she was out there all the time. 

But we do not see figures like that very often anymore. People out there willing to talk… I can remember being told when I first started in the industry and I was in a group. I don’t know if you remember Google Plus. Those of you who’ve been online for a while might remember that. But anyway, I was in a group for virtual assistants, and I was talking about my disability and how to integrate it into my story and things like that, because I’m not ashamed of my story. 

And somebody else who had MS was in there too, and said, “I would never disclose that. I would never. I think it’s wrong and you shouldn’t do that.” I won’t go into all that person said. But it was just very nasty, the thought that I would talk about my disability for some reason, like it was something to be hidden. And I thought I found that very strange. But I will also say I do not hear very often anybody’s story anymore about this. Not very often. Unless it’s a big figure who’s already like an influencer or something, and something happened and they become disabled. 

>> AMBER: Yes. So you think it’s good for more people to be out in the community talking about their stories and sharing their experience? 

>> TAMMY: Yeah, I do. I think that’s where change is made. Not many people like to talk about it and all the things that we have to deal with as a disabled person. But I don’t mind talking about it either, because I think that’s how change is made if we’re talking about it and what the issues are that we face every day. 

>> AMBER: Diane said what if, instead of more legal action, if sites are not accessible, websites were required to have an email address where someone could reach out to them and they could receive feedback, and then they would see the number of emails from users or customers that they are losing business by not having accessible information. 

>> TAMMY: I think that’s a great option versus making… Now we have to put terms and conditions, we have to put the cookies, and then now the US has new laws that we had to make changes to. So why not make that a requirement that’s minor compared to many of the other things that we have to implement nowadays? I like that idea. 

>> AMBER: Yes. I think having an accessibility statement I’ve heard from attorneys here in the US that it’s a good practice and it can be helpful that says, this is what we’re doing. This is how you can contact us if you need help. I think the challenge, though, with saying that puts the onus on the person with disability. I mean, if 96% of the website you go to have problems, should you really have to document those problems for free on every website you visit? That’s a challenge, I think. 

>> TAMMY: That is. But I do think that if you’re using that website already, maybe that’s what she’s referring to. But I’m sure there are plenty of disabled out there that would be willing to visit a lot of websites just to do it. But in my opinion, just having that email address for support or whatever it is, to be able to reach out to somebody and say, “Look, I’m having this issue. Can you help me?” Because I pay for their stuff, I use their program. I need a way to be able to function and use it right. And then I can’t reach out to anybody, that doesn’t make sense when I’m paying for it. 

>> AMBER: So there are just some conversations in the chat about that. This is the other thought that I’ve talked about with my partners quite a bit. So Curtis said, “If Google continues to penalize sites for poor lighthouse accessibility scores, that will help”. But people will always make poor web design decisions, which I definitely agree with. 

There are some people that I’m just like, you think this looks good when I visit their website. But I do. My partners and I have talked about this a fair bit, which is the other place beyond its laws is Google. If Google were to release a statement that accessibility problems impact your ranking like they did with mobile, where they said websites have to be mobile friendly. And guess what? All those websites that didn’t have mobile designs or styles were very quickly going, “Oh, no, we got to make our websites work on mobile.” So that’s the other pressure, the big pressure there. 

>> TAMMY: It’s interesting, too, that now it’s the norm. And even, page builders such as Elementor will show you what it looks like on tablets and on mobile. I think that would be amazing. I think that as much as everybody scrambled with it when it first came out, now companies, WordPress and page builders, and other companies, even Wix, some of the others have it where it’s an automatic thing almost, that you can at least view it so you can make changes at least.

And it’s almost automatic. And I think that would probably be the case as well eventually if they came out and made a statement like that, that many people would, first of all, go right away to change things. But also then I think you might get more plugins, you might get other ways that we’re able to use it in an accessible way. People are going to think of ways to use it more and be more accessible. 

>> AMBER: Well, and I think mentioning Elementor or other page builders or website builders that have large market shares, I think I saw something like 8% of websites are built with Elementor now which is huge actually. 

>> TAMMY: I’m surprised it’s not more actually. 

>> AMBER: So they’re one that they could probably put more effort into the accessibility of their tools. But also if they were to put guidance in their editor… So gravity forms, I don’t know if that’s a plugin you’ve ever used, but they have specific things like if you leave a label blank on a field, it’ll say this is a WCAG violation and it has a message in the little red banner that’s like, hey, you’re doing something wrong. To teach the person as they’re building in the editor that they have to make good accessible choices. So I would love to see plugins like Elementor do that. 

>> TAMMY: I agree with you. Yes, I think that would be amazing. Just like Yoast SEO plugin, it taught me how to write better, how to be more SEO friendly and everything else so that now it’s just second nature. And I think the same would be true if the page builders and website themes that have them in it would provide that information, that feedback, and grade it like Yoast SEO does. It grades whether it’s a smiley face and all that. But I think that would be a huge win if we could get them to do that. 

And then how do you get them to that point? It used to be petitions and everything else, but then how do you get to that point?

>> AMBER: Well, that’s my personal thing. I just gave a talk at Word Camp Phoenix and it was about accessibility for plugin and theme developers. Because I really think – now we’re going on a whole tangent – that the reality of WordPress websites being accessible is that the people who make the tools, the authoring tools, have to have no accessibility problems and they have to teach people how to use their tool the right way. 

Because we can’t expect the general public that aren’t web experts to be able to build accessible websites if they aren’t given the right tools to do it. 

We’re about in time and I feel like I could go on another tangent. I have been having so much fun chatting with you and reading all the comments from everyone in the chat. But just before we sign off, can you remind us again where’s the best place to get in touch with you if anyone wants to follow up? Maybe share your website again as well? 

>> TAMMY: Yes, absolutely. It’s fearlessbusinessboss.com. It’s F-E-A-R-L-E-S-S. Business. B-U-S-I-N-E-S-S. Boss. B-O-S-S .com. And you can either hit contact or download one of our free offers, or you can catch me on Messenger, and on Facebook as well, under Tammy Durden. Or under Fearless Business Boss. 

>> AMBER: Great. Well, thank you so much for coming and speaking. 

>> TAMMY: Thank you. 

>> AMBER: We’re going to do a little smile, wave kind of thing at the end before I actually sign us off because I need to watch the captions and make sure that everything in the captions comes out before I hit the end button. 

>> TAMMY: Well, thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. It was great to be here and talk with all of you. 

>> AMBER: Yes, thank you.