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135: She’s Creating Positive Screen Time Options For Parents and Grandparents
200 Plays1 year ago
Anieke Lamers is a Dutch long-distance auntie of 2 little ones in Australia, which is what helped inspire her to create Peekabond. As the founder & CEO of Peekabond, Peekabond is designed for children and their parents to help connect with loved ones remotely.
In this week’s episode with Jill Devine, Anieke shares about her journey as a female entrepreneur and the insights she has gained speaking to many families across the globe.
FB: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100063607297369
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/69675180/admin/ and https://www.linkedin.com/in/aniekelamersnl/
IG: https://www.instagram.com/peekabond/
Two Kids and A Career Website: https://www.jilldevine.com/
Two Kids and A Career Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jilldevine/?hl=en
Two Kids and A Career Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/JillDevineMedia/
Thank you to our sponsor: Evoke Creative
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Transcript
Tech-savvy Grandparents and Family Connection
00:00:16
Speaker
My mind was quite blown when I heard that because we imagine grandparents to be like older people who don't know how to handle a mobile phone or apps or stuff like that. But there's a huge upcoming generation of grandparents who are quite tech savvy and young and want to connect to their grandchildren who are far away from them.
00:00:25
Speaker
The following podcast is a Jill Devine Media production.
00:00:34
Speaker
Evoke Creative is a proud sponsor of two kids and a career. They help small business owners like me brand with purpose and market with intent. The ladies at Evoke Creative will help make your digital presence known. Learn more at evokesco.com. That's evokesco.com.
Introduction to Jill Devine and her Podcast
00:00:51
Speaker
Hi there and welcome to Two Kids and a Career. I'm Jill Devine. As an entrepreneur, wife, and mama, the daily grind of trying to build a business while taking care of kids and trying to maintain a healthy connection with my hubby, it's a lot. With this podcast, you're going to hear candid conversations with other moms.
00:01:08
Speaker
parenting experts who can share their knowledge and insight, or you'll just hear me rambling to get it all out. There's going to be tears, there's going to be laughter, but most importantly, there will be support. Take a listen and connect with me so we can grow and learn from one another. This is Two Kids and a Career. Thank you for hitting play on this week's conversation.
Featuring Annika Lamars: Supporting Women Entrepreneurs
00:01:29
Speaker
I'd love to introduce you to this week's guest who happens to be another
00:01:33
Speaker
female entrepreneur, another huge champion and supporter of women. And I'm already embarrassed by this because off the air, I asked how to pronounce her name and she told me and then I just blanked on it all. And I'm just being honest, but I'm going to see if I got it right. Annika Lamars, is that correct? It's Annika Lamars.
00:01:57
Speaker
I was all right. And I even asked you before, and I was like, oh, tell me how to say your name. Yep. Clearly, I should just never ask that ahead of time and just say, hey, you just introduce yourself. Well, I apologize for messing that up. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you so much, Jill. Super excited to be on, and thank you so much for letting me speak to your awesome audience.
Picabond: Bridging Family Distances
00:02:22
Speaker
All right, so tell me a little bit about you, where you're from, and then we'll get into what you're doing now as a businesswoman. Yeah, thank you so much. So I'm Anika, I'm the founder of Peacabond. With Peacabond, we help families with young children to build meaningful connections
00:02:43
Speaker
with family members who are far away from them. That can be interstayed or across the world. My own family is spread all over the world. My sister lives in Australia and she has two young daughters that I'm really obsessively in love with as an aunt and I found it so painful to be away from them and I really wanted to show my presence in their lives and also enable that for my parents who were
00:03:10
Speaker
first-time grandparents during the pandemic and they really weren't able to hold their first-born granddaughter and it just, you know, it was heartbreaking and that was of course because of the pandemic but I think even now in these busy times with big differences, distances, it's really hard to build those connections because children don't have that attention span when you're video calling
00:03:37
Speaker
And, you know, adults don't know how to be playful when there's a screen in between.
Challenges of Family Video Calls
00:03:43
Speaker
So, you know, what ends up being a potential meaningful interaction turns out to be a struggle for many families and maybe many moms who are listening to this can recognize it that usually the child is just saying hi and just finds the fastest way to get out of the call and go back to playing with her toys.
00:04:04
Speaker
And I just thought this should be a better way to have those interactions with children when you can't always be physically together. So yeah, that's what I'm doing and that's what I'm building. And I don't have children myself at the moment, so Picabond is my child. But I can tell you that the moment I helped my niece for the first time,
00:04:28
Speaker
I think it came very close to what holding your own baby is like because for me time stood still and all I could think of was how I can be present and how I can help my little niece in her development.
00:04:44
Speaker
And my life doesn't matter. I just want her to be happy, loved, and feel my presence as an aunt. And yeah, I don't know if that's at all comparing to what the moms experience in your audience. But I think there's a really good intention behind what I'm building. And yeah, I want to enable that for families worldwide
00:05:13
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So I will tell you I resonated immediately because
00:05:20
Speaker
I am considered, and it's been talked about on this podcast a lot, but I'm considered the older mom. And so for quite a long time in my life, I had my nephews who were, and they still are my pride and joy. Like I doted on them and talked about them as if they were my own kids and everything centered around them. So yes, I 100% understand you don't have to be a mom to have that kind of love.
00:05:49
Speaker
I say it is obviously different when they're your own, but that love is still there. And I really, really appreciate that you said that. And I just know that there are so many people that maybe even might be a mom that still have that love and feeling. Like I said, my memories are still so, so important to me. And yeah.
00:06:18
Speaker
that closeness wasn't there, it would wreck me. So where do you live and you said your family's all over the world, where does everybody live? So I'm originally from the Netherlands, but I currently live in Portugal to get away from the cold Dutch winter, which is great. My sister, who's also my best friend, lives in Australia.
00:06:42
Speaker
And that's also where my two little nieces are, obviously, and a bigger part of my family is also there. And then I also have one stepsister, for example, who's married to an American, so they
00:06:55
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are obviously spending a lot of time in the US and having to go back and forth with family there. I think some people recognize that. Yeah, exactly. I think it's also nice to say that I lived in the US for a little while as well, studied at Notre Dame University.
00:07:18
Speaker
And I just have a lot of international friends as well as people from the US and I know how big the distances can be. As a matter of fact, the average grandparent lives more than 200 miles away from at least one grandchild. Yeah, so that was a surprising statistic to me.
00:07:40
Speaker
Also, they are on average 50 years old when they first become a grandparent. So my mind was quite blown when I heard that because we imagine grandparents to be like older people who don't know how to handle a mobile phone or apps or stuff like that. But there's a huge upcoming generation of grandparents who are quite tech savvy and young.
00:08:03
Speaker
and want to connect to their grandchildren who are far away from them and nobody's serving them. So I think, you know, obviously that's an interesting angle as well, yeah, to consider for parents as well, because, you know, these grandparents want to be involved and want to support the parents in, you know, you know, babysitting the kids from a distance and, you know, being present in the lives of their children.
00:08:32
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and grandchildren. But yeah, it's hard. We're all so busy.
Peekabond App: Enhancing Family Interactions
00:08:36
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So there should be a solution for that. And that's what we're building. Yes. So talk to me about Peekabon. Because here's the thing. When you first start talking about it, and I'm glad you made this statement, too, but you started talking. And I'm like, OK, wait a minute. FaceTime, video chat. And then you said it's beyond that. And I immediately thought about, too,
00:09:01
Speaker
during the pandemic, whenever we would FaceTime the grandparents, you're right, the kids, they would scream and say hi and then take off. And it was like, they want more time with you. And that's what I'm really interested in knowing more about what you're doing.
00:09:18
Speaker
Take it away. Tell me what it is. So what makes us better than FaceTime and WhatsApp, what people are currently using, is obviously it's centered around the child. So it's an ethical and safe platform for children to use. And what we do is we give content suggestions in the app that are based on child development milestones. So really help the child in its social, emotional development.
00:09:44
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whilst also giving playful suggestions to those family members of how to engage with those children so that it is an interesting conversation and can be a simple content suggestion like a challenge like who can hang a spoon on their nose the longest or a riddle or a magic trick or
00:10:07
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Stories in the app as well as something that we're building at the moment based on artificial intelligence to create personalized stories in the app so that you always have that hook to talk about when you're engaging with the child so that's the most important thing and then.
00:10:25
Speaker
I think people also don't realize that if you want to reach out to a child, you can always send a video. So often there's a time zone difference, or the child's already in bed when you want to call after work in the evening. So I noticed that asynchronous connection, so not connecting at the same time, is a really great solution for that. You can just send a video to the child at any time.
00:10:55
Speaker
And they can watch it when they're in the right mood for it. And they can sort of rewatch it over and over again because it's recorded. And that way, over time, when you have a lot of videos scattered in the app, you will have a meaningful way for children to watch videos rather than watching random YouTube videos, right?
00:11:16
Speaker
It's more like positive screen time instead of just numbingly scrolling random YouTube videos. You will see videos of family members that love you. I like that you mentioned positive screen time because that is a huge, huge, huge thing that us parents face every single day. And I'm wondering,
00:11:44
Speaker
When you're talking, okay, so you said that you don't have kiddos. What did you go to school for? Because what I'm hearing from you, and I really love this as a parent, is the emphasis that you are putting on with the developments and the milestones. And it takes someone to really kind of dig into that to understand how
The Expertise Behind Peekabond
00:12:06
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important that is.
00:12:07
Speaker
Definitely. And that's also why my co-founder is a PhD in gamification and a master in child development science. So yeah, it's very important that whatever we're doing is really grounded in
00:12:23
Speaker
science, and it is a responsible product. Because I think there's plenty of, you know, Snapchat copy paste apps out there, you know, we're all pretending to be good for kids. And that's definitely not what we want to do. So I knew that if I wanted to make this company successful, I needed two other people on my team. And one was my co founder,
00:12:49
Speaker
who's like that scientific person who really is, you know, very much has a very strong moral compass as well, who really values that child development aspect. But I don't have a moral compass because my background is actually in impact as well. Like before I started Picabond,
00:13:14
Speaker
would invest in sustainable companies to basically make the world a better place whilst also giving a return on investment for investors. So I do have that high sense of doing something purposeful and meaningful in the world, but also having that science background in child development science. And the gamification is super relevant that my co-founder, Alia, is on board.
00:13:43
Speaker
a Colombian originally, but lived in the US for a long time. Most of her family is also in the US. So that also really helps in understanding that audience better. And then I have another co-founder. He is a tech co-founder, as you can imagine. And of course, it's very important to have someone in the team who knows how to develop the product into
00:14:07
Speaker
you know, a next level product that people are really happy to use. So yeah, that's sort of the dream team behind me. All right. So I'm thinking about something that happened the other night. So I have a four and a six year old, two daughters, and something that the oldest one said, she said, mom, when I become an adult and a mommy,
00:14:32
Speaker
I want to invent, and she told me something that she wanted to invent. And I said, you don't have to be an adult or a mommy. And she said, well, what do you mean? And I said, well, if you have an idea and you want to put it to life, you start doing that. You start telling me how you want to do that. And so I am thinking of her, and I'm thinking about these barriers that sometimes we
00:15:01
Speaker
think or we create for ourselves, especially as women, like, where did you start in this process?
Annika's Career Transition
00:15:08
Speaker
I know that you said it was because of your nieces that fueled it, but what, take me from that, okay, this is something that needs to happen to where you are now. You have an app, you have a business. Yeah.
00:15:26
Speaker
Some fire inside of me was always there, and I guess for about eight years I worked as a venture capital investor, so I saw a lot of different startups. And I always had this little spark inside of me that
00:15:43
Speaker
was curious to build something myself but i never really have that one idea where i thought that's good enough and i guess i okay for me maybe it was the fact that i was turning thirty back dance almost thirty three,
00:16:00
Speaker
I didn't have a mortgage or a house. I just felt like doing an adventure without having to take care of
00:16:16
Speaker
of kids for myself. So I thought, okay, if not now, then when will I do it? So I took a leap of faith and I just went for it. And yeah, I'm just thinking like, maybe it was also the fact that I felt like my learning curve in my former job was really flattening. So I didn't see myself doing that for another 10 years, which is what typically
00:16:46
Speaker
VCs do like they are very long term fund managers. So yeah, I didn't see myself do that. But what I did learn from that time is that, you know, in order to build a good business, you really need to have the right people besides you. And just, you know, even if you don't have the skills, you know how to get someone on board who's better at what you're doing. And
00:17:14
Speaker
don't be afraid to hire people who are better than you, basically. So I always knew that if I'm going to make it a successful company, I need to sort of put myself almost below the other people that I'm hiring because they're all better at what they're doing than I am, right? So which is sometimes a scary feeling because I feel like the most incompetent person in my own company.
00:17:41
Speaker
And I think that is good because that means I can actually hire people who are really superstars at what they do and make the company into success. And it's not about me, it's really about, you know, it's a team effort. So I guess, yeah, that is how I view it. I don't know if that completely answers your question, though. Oh, it does.
00:18:06
Speaker
I'm going to hit pause on this week's conversation to talk to you about Evoke Creative, one of the sponsors of the podcast. And I like one of the very first things that they have on their website. It's evokeseco.com. But the first sentence is, feeling overwhelmed with your marketing? Contact us. We can help. Smiley face. It is overwhelming being a business owner, whether you have a small business like mine or a giant business.
00:18:36
Speaker
The marketing game, it's intense. It's super crazy. You got to stay on top of it all. And sometimes it's just one of those things where you just don't even know where to go. And Evoque Creative, they are a creative marketing company. They support small businesses. They want to help you. They want to get your name out there. They want to make sure that you are happy and proud and excited about your business.
00:19:02
Speaker
So whether it is a new logo or a website refresh or a whole new website, I mean, in general, like you don't have a website or you just need a little bit of social media consulting, evoked creative, they've got your back. Seriously. So if you are thinking, wait a minute, I am a very small business. My budget is really, really low. Trust me, it is worth the call to them because they work with every single budget.
00:19:32
Speaker
It's evoccco.com, evoccco.com. Back to this week's conversation. But I mean, you just said something that so many people would never
The Importance of Support Networks
00:19:44
Speaker
do. And that is hiring people or surrounding yourself with people that you know have the skill set and you don't. That's intimidating. But you're right. It's what makes you a better person because you can learn from one another or
00:20:02
Speaker
You can, I don't know, I find that very insightful because I do see a shift happening, especially with women where it's not as competitive or jealous or catty or whatever you want to say that you actually are working together. And that takes also being able to kind of
00:20:26
Speaker
swell a little bit of that pride and go, listen, I don't know. I don't know the answer. I need to find someone who does. Another thing, and I would add on to that, is you always hear, what would you give your younger self? What kind of advice would you give? And I know that in starting out in my career,
00:20:53
Speaker
would not own up to mistakes or I, you know, wouldn't I did whatever I could, not that I would lie or anything like that, but I wouldn't just come forward and say, hey, I screwed this up. I need help. I would maybe screw something up or not do it properly, not on purpose, and then try to do the research to figure it out, which would put me behind or
00:21:22
Speaker
it would throw something else off. When I could have just said, I messed up, I need help. And I think that that's really important too for anyone in their career, but especially if you're just starting out. Yeah, I think a lot of women have trouble with asking for help.
00:21:42
Speaker
Yeah, we're usually the person who helps others. I see it a lot around me with my friends and also female founders, indeed, that they're having.
00:21:53
Speaker
trouble to ask for help. Whereas, you know, guys, they're very used to sort of having this old boys network, if you will, just asking, you know, older guys to help them out. And there's like this mentor ship that's happening very naturally. And us women, I don't think we're that easy to approach, like someone who's, for example, more experienced to say, hey, you know, can you help me? I love what you're doing. And, you know,
00:22:23
Speaker
can you help me to get where you are and you know something like that because there's this thing where women sometimes had to work really hard to get where they are and they feel like if I had to work hard for it then you know others will have to do the same instead of you know helping those younger women ambitious women to get ahead as well so I think that's a really a mindset shift that needs to change where we also help others
00:22:53
Speaker
get ahead because I don't know if you've heard this quote, but there's a special place in hell for women who don't help other women. And yeah, I think it was Arianna Huffington who made that quote, and I think it's so true. So I actually, in 2012 already, which is, wow, more than 10 years ago,
00:23:16
Speaker
set up a network which was called Old Girls Network, sort of with a wink to the old boys network, you know, helping women to get where they want to be in life and helping women to ask for help more easily. And, you know, how cool is it that someone approaches you like, hey, I think you're cool. Do you want to be my mentor? Like, it is such an ego stroke.
00:23:43
Speaker
for women to get that as well. So usually when someone asks me for help, I always say yes. So I think we should make it a habit to do that more ourselves as well. And I think another implied question that you had, which I really loved, what advice would you give to your younger self?
00:24:06
Speaker
And I loved what you said to your own daughter where she said, Oh, I want to be an inventor one day. And then you said, just do it. You don't have to be a mommy or, you know, an adult to do that. And I think that's actually an advice that I would have given myself as well, because I always thought I wasn't good enough to start a company or that I needed a lot of experience or
00:24:31
Speaker
I needed to have more in my backpack in order to make that journey of a founder, I guess. But I think just do it because the earlier you do it, I think the higher the likelihood you'll become successful because
00:24:54
Speaker
I think I honestly waited too long to do it. It took me, I guess, eight years being a VC. And after eight years, like I tell you, I knew how to do everything a VC does. And it was just a bit boring at a certain point, you know? So I should have done it maybe five years earlier even. But it just becomes scarier as well, the longer you wait.
00:25:19
Speaker
you do have to make a certain amount of mileage or hours as a founder to sort of learn from your own mistakes and get better. That's why a lot of investors sometimes they don't invest in first time founders because they want founders to have made and learned some mistakes along the way before they become sort of the better version of their, their selves. So yeah, that's, um,
00:25:46
Speaker
Yeah, just do it. That would be my advice for my younger self. And it doesn't have to be a perfect idea either, because that's another thing that I thought like, Oh, I have to have the perfect idea in order to build something. It's not about the idea. It's really about the execution. And, you know, there are so many good ideas. But if you don't know how to execute, that's never going to work. Well, I just
00:26:13
Speaker
I'm so super impressed. You're only 33 and you have been making a difference for quite some time. Before we wrap things up, I just want to know what is your next goal with Peekabon or what is the next goal for you?
Vision for Meaningful Family Moments by 2028
00:26:31
Speaker
Wow. Great question. I have a very big hairy goal, which is a long-term goal.
00:26:42
Speaker
And that is to create a lot of meaningful moments for family members, no matter where they are, how old they are, and what time zone they are. So we've sort of had this really ambitious goal that in 2028, we will have 80 million moments created for families across the world.
00:27:06
Speaker
That's a big goal. But to make it very small, my next goal is to get people enthusiastic about the Picabond app so that they would refer it to their family and friends. And that it actually adds value for them and that it helps them to create those moments now. So I think
00:27:30
Speaker
If we are able to do that now, then I don't think it's a very unrealistic goal to reach those 18 million memories then because if one person tells a few others about it and those people tell others about it, it will become a movement that people really realize, okay, just because I'm far away doesn't mean I cannot have a beautiful relationship with the people that I love and care about. So you will create this ripple effect of
00:27:59
Speaker
love is how I see it. I love that and I love love and I am all about memories and experiences, so I am rooting for you. All right, so tell the listener where they can find you. Can you just find Peekabon on the app store for both? Yes. Okay, perfect. And then you also have a website. What is that and what can people find there?
00:28:26
Speaker
Yeah, so you can just go to the peekabond.com website that is spelled P-E-K-A-B-O-N-D. So it's like peekaboo the game, but it ends with bond because it's about family bonding. And you can find me personally on LinkedIn. I'm most active almost every day on LinkedIn. So if you hit me up there, please do. I usually respond as well to every message that I get.
00:28:55
Speaker
If you know anyone who would like to try out the app, it's completely free. And yeah, we're still learning as an early startup as well. So if you have feedback on how we can improve, I'm super eager to learn and improve it so that it really helps families create those meaningful moments together. And I will have everything on the show notes at JillDivine.com so that people can reference it pretty quickly.
00:29:22
Speaker
Thank you so much for taking the time and for what you're doing, not only for families, but for other women. My gosh, you are definitely a champion of women, and that is something I definitely notice and value. Thank you so much, Jill. It was lovely to be here and to speak to your audience, and I think it's also really cool what you're building. Keep hustling and keep being playful, and we'll speak again soon.
00:29:51
Speaker
As we wrap up, one more shout out to Evoke Creative. They are the wonderful creators of my website, www.jilldivine.com. They also helped create my cover art for this podcast, Two Kids and a Career, and so many other things that they did for my business, Jill Devine Media. And if this is something that you're needing a little help with,
00:30:13
Speaker
Maybe you're a small business, you have a little bit of a blueprint, but you need that blueprint to come to action or you need a little fine tuning. It's the ladies that evoke creative. I have seen them go from being like the smallest business to being able to grow their own team. And that's what it's all about. They are here to help you. They are passionate.
00:30:37
Speaker
They want to get your business out there. And it doesn't hurt to pick up the phone and give them a call for a consultation. And they will tell you. They'll be upfront and honest. They're not going to try to sell you on something that they can't do or if you can't afford. So I just encourage you to check them out. It's evokescco.com. And like I mentioned, they're the ones that did my website. You can check that out, gildivine.com. You can kind of see what you would be working with.
00:31:05
Speaker
I just am so thankful for them and for what they have done for me. So again, evokeseco.com, also jilldivine.com, and thank you for your support of two kids and a career.