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Interviews with Female entrepreneurs, founders, co-founders, business owners, and industry Gurus. These podcasts speak with women (women-identified) across all industries in order to shed light for those just getting into the entrepreneurial game! Histories, current companies, and lessons learned are explored. The series is designed to investigate a female (female identified) perspective in what has largely been a male-dominated industry in the world to date.
Episodes
Friday Dec 13, 2019
Friday Dec 13, 2019
Interview with Mary Fain Brandt: CEO and Founder of The LinkedIn Bakery and Mary Fain Brandt Coaching and Consulting.
This podcast series is hosted by Patricia Kathleen and Wilde Agency Media. The series interviews women (& women-identified & non-binary) entrepreneurs, founders, and gurus across all industries to investigate those voices in business today. Both the platform and discussion are designed to further the global conversation in regards to the changing climate in entrepreneurial and founding roles.
TRANSCRIPTION
*Please note, this is an automated transcription please excuse any typos or errors
[00:00:07] Hi, my name is Patricia Kathleen, and this podcast series will contain interviews I conduct with female and female identified entrepreneurs, founders, co-founders, business owners and industry gurus. These podcasts speak with women and women, identified individuals across all industries in order to shed light for those just getting into the entrepreneurial game, as well as those deeply embedded within it histories, current companies and lessons learned are explored in the conversations I have with these insightful and talented powerhouses. The series is designed to investigate a female and female identified perspective in what has largely been a male dominated industry in the USA to date. I look forward to contributing to the national dialog about the long overdue change of women in American business arenas and in particular, entrepreneurial roles. You can contact me via my media company website Wild Dot Agency. That's w i l d dot agency or my personal website. Patricia Kathleen, dot com. Thanks for listening. Now let's start the conversation. [00:01:25][77.9]
[00:01:30] Hi, everyone, and welcome back. [00:01:31][1.2]
[00:01:32] This is your host, Patricia, and today I'm sitting down with Mary Fain Brandt. Mary is the CEO and founder of the LinkedIn Bakery, as well as founder of Mary Fain Brandt Coaching and Consulting. Welcome, Mary. [00:01:44][12.3]
[00:01:45] Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here talking to you. And in this space where female founders and future entrepreneurs and business owners can help level each other up. [00:01:57][11.9]
[00:01:57] Absolutely. I'm excited to kind of unpack everything that you're doing. I think your story is going to really nicely be a nice addition to the stories that we've had so far over the past 18 months on this podcast. [00:02:08][10.8]
[00:02:09] For everyone listening, a really quick roadmap of today's podcast going to follow the same trajectory as all of them in that the roadmap will be investigating various academic background and early professional life. And then we will turn to unpacking their LinkedIn bakery, as well as Mary Fain Brandt coaching and consulting those two different endeavors of hers. And we'll get into the logistics of who, what, when, where, how, why. And then we'll kind of get into the ethos of both companies as well. Then we'll turn our attention towards the goals that Mary has for the next three years in either or both of those companies regarding scaling expansion, Brandt changes, anything she has planned for the horizon. And we'll wrap everything up with advice that Mary may have for those of you looking to emulate what she does or currently get involved with her work. Now, so quick bio on Mary. Mary Brandt is the CEO and founder of the LinkedIn Bakery and Mary Fame Brandt Coaching and Consulting. She's a national LinkedIn trainer and strategist who works with savvy business women, not to mention a few guys here and there who want to stand out as experts in their industry and get more clients using LinkedIn. She has worked with over five hundred plus clients worldwide. Mary is the host of her own live show, Bite Sized Tips for Busy Entrepreneurs, as well as the creator of two online courses. The courses are the Job Seekers Guide to Building Your LinkedIn Profile and How to Find Clients Using LinkedIn. The Entrepreneurs Guide to turning your LinkedIn profile into a lead magnet known for her fun and informative style. She is an energetic speaker and workshop facilitator who creates engaging learning environments. So I am so excited to kind of climb into your companies and what they do. I have had some recent experience with, I think, companies of a similar nature and I can't wait to kind of unpack it. But first of all, you drop us into your academic background and your early professional life. [00:04:02][113.3]
[00:04:03] Sure, I'd love to. Again, just thank you so much for having me on your show. And I hope everyone listening gets a nugget or two of tips or inspiration or motivation. [00:04:13][10.3]
[00:04:14] So I didn't go to college right after high school. I, I tried and it just didn't work for me at the time. I was the sole provider and so I worked full time and going to school just didn't work. I went back to school. I went to a junior college to get all my lower credits done. [00:04:34][19.7]
[00:04:35] And then I transferred to Chatmon and I got my first degree when I was I want to say thirty eight. Nice. So I got my bachelor's at Chapman University in Organizational Leadership and I did that via satellite campuses, but it was in person classes. And then I had such a great experience at Chapman. [00:04:54][19.5]
[00:04:55] And I love organizational leadership learning about people and cultures. Right. And how we're perceived by people and how we learn differently. And so I went on and I got my master's and I did that with Chapman again, with a blended classes of online and in person. [00:05:10][14.9]
[00:05:10] I'm still in touch with some of my peers from my classes, some nice some of them came to my wedding. I got married only six years ago, so. Yeah, so my education was a little different. It's not that. [00:05:24][13.7]
[00:05:24] Go to high school, go to college, get a job. Mine was work y I was in high school, my parents were divorced. So again I was working to support myself, help my mom out, went back to college, learned so much and I think I valued it because I paid for it myself. I was working full time going to school. [00:05:43][18.2]
[00:05:43] So talk about those late nights. But it was I always say that education. No one can ever take that away from you. Right? It's yours. You've earned it. You own it. And no one can ever take that away from you. [00:05:57][13.5]
[00:05:57] And I am a big proponent of education, all types of education. So whether it's college or seminars or conferences, I'm what they call a lifelong learner. I love to learn. And if I could get paid just to study and and share what I learn, I would just do that. [00:06:13][15.8]
[00:06:13] And I guess to do that and I truth that is everything. If there's a free lecture, I'm there. I'm early now. [00:06:21][7.9]
[00:06:21] I just want to soak it up and then I want to share it with the world. So I'm a very enthusiastic person and when I love something, I tell. [00:06:29][7.5]
[00:06:29] Everyone about it, so whether it's a process we studied a lot of change development as as human beings, we do not like change. We do not embrace change because we fear it. But once you kind of understand that, then there's different ways to look at change in different ways to put change into a process. So that was a huge for me in my organizational leadership classes. And just understanding the high viewpoint, we talked a lot about the view from the balcony versus the view from the dance floor, which are two totally different viewpoints for people. [00:07:07][38.0]
[00:07:08] And they strategically put that into. I'm wondering, because that metaphor for me speaks to like the view of a company and what it is from within as opposed to what it is to your customer from without. [00:07:20][12.6]
[00:07:21] Well, it's also what the management sees here. And the team players are down here. And you've got to bring your view down on the dance floor where everything's happening. [00:07:30][9.8]
[00:07:31] The view's pretty up from the balcony. Right. But the work is getting done down on the dance floor. So you need to have a view down there. So, yeah, there's just I, I could talk about organizational leadership development, change management. Like, it brings me back to what I learned in college. And obviously I really, really enjoyed what I learned. And I take it to heart. I get to use some of that now in my business and in my personal life. [00:07:57][25.9]
[00:07:58] Did your did your degree kind of launch you into your starting up the LinkedIn bakery, or was it like a kind of a winding path? [00:08:05][7.1]
[00:08:07] So it definitely did not. Get me to start my business, my entrepreneur journey is much different, I feel for most people I did not want to be an entrepreneur. So when I when I graduated with my master's degree, I was working at the Bishop School in the great private school. I really thought I would probably stay there and see my years out there. I had a pool to swim in at lunch. We had milk break and lunch brought to us. I mean, it was a sweet gig. I went on by The Cove after work. And so when I got my masters, everyone was like, well, what are you going to do now? And I'm like, I'm not going to do anything. I have a great job. Right. And it was two thousand two thousand eight, you know, and two thousand seven and then two thousand 11 when I got my masters. So, you know, the economy up and down, I wasn't going to do anything. So I stayed put. Yeah. So I stayed put for a while and then things shifted at what caused the shift management there. My boss and I just never saw eye to eye. And so this is what I work with, with my clients. I tell them life is too short. It's not a dress rehearsal. Don't be stuck in a career that doesn't fulfill you. I was walking on eggshells. I had anxiety, I had insomnia. And I have something. It was called The Sun 60s, where you get so full of anxiety on Sunday night about going to your job on Monday that you get sick, you can't sleep. You call in sick on Monday because you're just full of tension. So those of you that are listening, you can't see me. But Kathleen can say, like, I'm clenching up about it and I do that naturally, like not even thinking about it. It was so bad. And I thought I had to stay there. And we don't we have options. But taking a chance, making a move, making a change is scary, right? We are unknown. And so what happened was my mother got sick, so I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. My dad had his own real estate company I tried working for. I was like, no, because he had great months and then he had bad months. So it was like you were rolling in the money. Everything's great. Oh, we don't have any money. Health care is four hundred dollars a month. This was way back then. And so I saw my dad go through the struggles and so it wasn't a journey I was ready to take. And so that's why I say my journey to entrepreneurship is a little different. I didn't seek out to be an entrepreneur. I was kind of forced or thrusted into it when my mother got sick. But a lot of strain on me at my job. I decided to leave so I could be her caregiver and take care of her. [00:10:53][166.6]
[00:10:54] And I had already coached some people out of jobs at bishops. I was meeting with him at lunch. We were talking through what they liked, what they didn't like, and two of them left the school for better opportunities. And this was all for free. I was kind of like just that go to person. So it made sense that I would want to help more women find fulfilling careers. [00:11:15][21.2]
[00:11:16] And so at that point when I left, I couldn't get a nine to five job because I needed to be there for my mom. She had Alzheimer's and I wanted to keep her at home as long as possible. And so what I did is I worked part time at another school. Why I launched my business and launching a business. You guys, it's not easy. I can't lie. It's hard. It takes a lot of your time, your resources, your money, and you don't know what you don't know. And one day I'm going to write a book about how to save ten thousand dollars your first year. Because I bought every program out there. I spent a lot of money that I didn't need to because I thought everything had to be perfect to launch websites and logos and and you do need to work on all that. But I've already changed my work. I changed my website and my logo within two years of launching because it wasn't right the first time, because I didn't do the homework. [00:12:06][49.9]
[00:12:08] Yeah, absolutely. And that evolution is it can be a lot a lot more gentle if it is allowed to be more malleable in the beginning and grow that kind of like just get something up and you can change it later, I think. [00:12:21][12.9]
[00:12:21] Absolutely highly recommend that. Just go for it, get something out there, work with a branding expert to establish your Brandt like I know my brand. Now I can describe it in four words. It's fun and informative, casual and conversational. That is who I am. That is who my Brandt is. I was trying to fit myself inside a box. [00:12:41][20.2]
[00:12:42] So my advice to you is be you in this day and age, just be you. [00:12:48][6.0]
[00:12:49] Don't try to be somebody else, don't try to put yourself in a box and look like everybody else out there in social media because there is only one you and you have something valuable to bring to the table. [00:13:00][10.9]
[00:13:01] Yeah, absolutely. So when you how did it kind of come together? How did you recognize. So the LinkedIn bakery first give us a little bit of a background. So exactly what is it? [00:13:13][11.3]
[00:13:14] So the LinkedIn bakery, that's a second division of my company, Mary Faceprint Coaching and consulting. [00:13:19][5.5]
[00:13:20] I started as a career coach helping women because I didn't want to see I didn't want women to go through what I went through, feeling stuck, trapped, didn't know how to execute a job search, didn't know what platforms to be on. So I started as a career coach. And one thing I found is all my clients needed help with LinkedIn like they either weren't on the platform or they had a profile that was probably four years old and didn't showcase their true talents and skills. So I started learning about LinkedIn and then I was doing some seminars and conferences and I had this light go off that, oh, my gosh, entrepreneurs need to be on this platform. And it was always thought of. Lincoln was always thought of as a platform to put your resume. Yeah. Up your resume up there. Right. And find a job. So when I started this five years ago now, I always would say that LinkedIn was the ugly duckling of the social media platforms. It was clunky. [00:14:20][59.9]
[00:14:20] Absolutely. I would agree. [00:14:21][0.8]
[00:14:21] Yeah, it wasn't user friendly. It wasn't it wasn't valuable content out there. And thankfully, it's really improved. So what happened? I was working with clients. They needed help with LinkedIn. And so I went into full training mode and then I saw an opportunity for entrepreneurs to stand out. You don't have to pay to be on LinkedIn. You can do everything. You can do it using the free version. And so fast forward to April 30th. Twenty sixteen. And my mom passed and I hadn't rebranded yet, but it took me a couple of months to work through that. And to be honest, I was like, OK, God, I had a lot of conversations with God. I was like, OK, if I need to go get a job, I'll go do this now because I'm not tied to taking care of my mom. [00:15:11][50.3]
[00:15:12] And I had no clients at the time. Right, because I was taking care of her and my clients had wrapped up and I wasn't really marketing and I got one client for seventy nine dollars. I know that sounds hilarious, but it was like an intro strategy session. And then I got an opportunity to do a workshop for one hundred and fifty dollars. Again, it sounds ridiculous, but it was these little breadcrumbs that were coming into my path that got me excited that like, OK, I'm supposed to do this. I have a purpose. [00:15:42][29.3]
[00:15:43] I'm supposed to use what I learned to help other people. And so we rebranded in Twenty Seventeen and the LinkedIn bakery that honors my mom because she was this amazing baker and I inherited that skill. [00:15:56][13.1]
[00:15:57] So the LinkedIn bakery serving up bite size tips, I wanted my Brandt to be more of who I am. A little more fun, colorful. I didn't want most people think LinkedIn is boring and it's it's just all professional and it is a professional platform, but it's OK to infuse some of your personality. So I wanted to reBrandt with a fun name that would get people thinking like, oh, what is that? And I wanted to honor my mom. So when we rebranded, we also give three percent of all sales to the local Alzheimer's Association. [00:16:29][32.2]
[00:16:30] Oh, wonderful. That's a great that's a great contribution to her and her memory and her name. [00:16:35][4.9]
[00:16:36] I think that all companies should give back, like, that's just part of who I am. Like every company should be set up from day one where you're giving back something. [00:16:43][7.3]
[00:16:44] Absolutely. So differentiating the bakery for me are the two the two online courses are those through the bakery? Are those through the coaching and consulting? [00:16:54][10.1]
[00:16:55] Well, there they're actually on teachable, so they're both there so anyone can find them. So the career coaching one. Right for the job seekers, that is through Mary Fain Brandt coaching and consulting. And then the one for the entrepreneurs is really through the LinkedIn bakery. [00:17:10][14.6]
[00:17:11] And how to both of those courses come about? Was it just a collective action of knowledge over the past two years that you just wanted to put into course? [00:17:17][5.9]
[00:17:18] So I started this journey in twenty fourteen. We rebranded in twenty seventeen. So it's been about five years, four years of learning about LinkedIn and. I used to hold live workshops, write monthly LinkedIn labs, and we get 10 to 12 people together. We did that for two years and then they started dying down and I. I couldn't serve the masses. Right. There are so many people that could do so well on LinkedIn, but I don't have time to serve the one on one coaching takes up a lot of time. And so I wanted to create courses where people could go and learn everything that I teach in a one on one. But the beauty about my courses is I've taken so many online courses half the time you don't finish them or you get stuck, right. You get stuck and you have paralysis analysis and you can't move forward. So with my courses, they all come with live office hours. So once a week I go live. Students can tune in, they can ask questions, they can get immediate feedback. They can share their profiles. Or if it's a job seeking course, they can share their car statements or their day in the dream job. Whatever course you're in, we have leave office hours so that you have a accountability feedback and immediate help. Right. Right. Have you ever taken an online course where you get stuck or you don't use it? Oh, sure. [00:18:47][89.7]
[00:18:48] Yeah. And it's also I get bored if it's not written beautifully, if the interaction isn't correct. [00:18:53][4.6]
[00:18:53] I mean, there's an absolute elegant I've I've I've taught online courses as an art history professor and there is an art to it. There's it's a completely different platform. It integrates some of the same axiomatic details as the knowledge taught in person or in class in lecture. But there is there's different tools that you can utilize to your benefit. But there's also ways that you can really lose your audience in just this constant reading of a script or too many articles that could have dead links. I mean, you have to have a fluidity. You've got to make sure everything's buttoned up. And I've taken online courses that didn't have any of those things. And I thought, this is a waste of my time. [00:19:31][38.0]
[00:19:32] I can't exactly. Mine has PDF templates because nobody likes writing about themselves. Right? It's hard. It's hard. It's like my clients are always like, well, I don't like to sell myself. I'm like, you're not selling, you are selling yourself. We all have to sell ourselves. So I have all these exercises, templates, video tutorials that walk them through whatever the module is about. [00:19:55][23.7]
[00:19:56] But I think the the magic, it happens in the office hours and the private groups. So we have private groups set up where people can put their homework and stuff. And I just I don't want to just have a chorus to have a course. I want to have a course that makes a difference. I want to have a course that people actually like and they finish and they get results. [00:20:14][18.2]
[00:20:15] Yeah, absolutely. The implementation. So now tell me, what kind of a profile is someone who's who's best for your courses or for your consulting, or are you looking for people who are in sales driven enterprises or product driven? [00:20:29][13.6]
[00:20:32] So for the for the LinkedIn Guide for the entrepreneurs, how to turn your LinkedIn profile into a lead magnet sales is great. [00:20:39][7.2]
[00:20:40] Consultants, coaches, speakers, social media managers, contractors, freelancers. Also, we could do sales training, how to teach your your sales team to lead on LinkedIn and have those leads coming to them directly, right? [00:20:59][19.1]
[00:21:00] Absolutely. [00:21:00][0.0]
[00:21:01] So from both of these, you, I'm guessing, was a bootstrapped or did you in the very beginning in launching in 2014, did you have any funding, any seed capital or anything like that? [00:21:12][11.1]
[00:21:14] I'm like, I'm going to write a book of what not to buy your first year. You don't need to hire expensive coaches, I believe, and coaches. And I think there's a time and place for them. [00:21:25][11.5]
[00:21:26] But that first year you're trying to unless you already have a coach, you're really trying to figure things out. Yeah. What are your services? I think that you need to have a tribe. You need to have a community. I was a member of a hub. And I have to say, like, that was a great starting space for me to bounce ideas off of and to get feedback. I presented some workshops there which helped get my feet wet. [00:21:48][22.3]
[00:21:48] And listening is a kind of a female focused. I know that you can join as men as well, but it's a coworking space that I'm not sure it's internationally. I've interviewed two people. [00:21:59][10.8]
[00:21:59] It has viewed the founder, Felina Hansen, as well as love her hub in Sweden and in Washington, DC, Orange County three here in San Diego, Mission Valley, Sorento Valley, Carlsbad, Arizona. There's one in Phenix now. Yeah. [00:22:16][16.5]
[00:22:17] So anyone listening? Listening, that's the basis of it. And anyone who wants a back story on the founder of that, listen to Felina Hansen. So you are a member of that community. That's an interesting one, because I've always wondered. [00:22:28][11.4]
[00:22:30] What the utility like, it feels like out of a hub, I mean, the office coworking environment has been heavily utilized for kind of what it sounds like you were doing, bouncing ideas off of people, getting useful information that they offer during lecture and things of that nature. But what did you personally receive from it? [00:22:46][16.6]
[00:22:47] Well, I received a place where I could practice my speaking skills so I could go and I could do these business boosters. And there was a guideline and a template of how Felina like some structured and that helped me get in front of small groups to practice my trade. Right. I could practice what I'm teaching. Was it valuable? They gave feedback. I also was one. I was the LinkedIn guru. They have guru hours. So I was a LinkedIn guru and I would sit in the lobby and people could come and ask me questions again. That practice that you need in the beginning of sharing, what information are you sharing for free and what information does someone need to pay you for? Because it's hard when you're starting off. You want to be known like I want to be someone that provides value all the time. We drop a Tuesday tip every Tuesday at nine a.m. you can follow me. And every Tuesday we were at one hundred and seven tips. And so we drop free tips. But how much? When I was starting off as an entrepreneur, how much do I give away? How do I give that away? So they want to work with me. And I think that is something that a lot of entrepreneurs when they're starting up. That's something difficult like, well, I don't want to give them everything because I want them to hire me or I want them to buy a contract with me. So how much do you give to be shown as that expert versus. Saying it in a way of like, you need to have a profile and here's three tips, but there's so much more that you need, this is just the tip of the iceberg, right? So I feel I feel like Karaba allowed me to practice my trade there in front of safe. In my opinion, it was a safe environment. [00:24:30][102.8]
[00:24:31] You know, it wasn't the big stage being thrown there or in an environment that I wasn't familiar with. [00:24:35][4.5]
[00:24:36] Right. I'm curious with the like getting into your platform, reaching back to what you said about LinkedIn. [00:24:42][5.7]
[00:24:43] It reminds me of when when I first started seeing job postings, what, four years ago on Instagram. [00:24:49][6.2]
[00:24:50] I thought, this is so why is someone doing this? [00:24:52][2.3]
[00:24:53] And now it's like the number one place, aside from LinkedIn to learn about new job positions or. Yeah. And I think that the creativity in that is that someone took a platform that was largely just based for photo sharing and small video files and decided that because they had a business account, they were going to put a job piece up there. And and since then, I've talked to doctors that have switched hospitals based on a job they found on Instagram. I mean, just so many different things. But I feel like LinkedIn has the same prophecy built in. And ironically, it hasn't been fully utilized by at least not the people I know of. Even to date. You can get some background information and people such as myself will research someone's academic history or something like that if you're if you're trying to get more information on a guest. But. I think that there are moments of kind of exactly what it sounds like the ethos of Billington Bakery is in your coaching and consulting, is that the tools not being utilized to its fullest capacity for you're given NEACH instead of a guide is is, I think, crucial. [00:25:58][65.8]
[00:26:00] People tend to put a profile up. They'll even spruce it up, create a custom headline, make that custom URL so that you'll rank higher on Google and LinkedIn because we all want to rank higher on social media. [00:26:11][11.4]
[00:26:12] But then they do nothing, know they do nothing. They wait until they need the platform and then they want it to work for them. And that's not how it works. I tell people that LinkedIn is a long game. It's not a short game. [00:26:25][12.5]
[00:26:25] Right. Get in it for the long game for the payoff in a year, two years, three years. Grow your strong and strategic network now and it will serve you in the future. So for my job seekers, even once they secure a new job, I'm like, don't give up on LinkedIn, keep building your network, keep posting on there because you still want to stay top of mind and tip of tongue, as my girl Stephanie says. And you want to be ready. I love that saying top of mind, pipitone. You want to be ready for that next career move, because most jobs, the average length of a job these days is about three years. Two months. That's from manpower. So my job seekers need to be ready all the time. And for my entrepreneurs, you're always want to be filling your your pipeline. Right. And somebody might be following you on LinkedIn. They're not ready to buy from you, to work with you, to hire you yet. But if you're top of mind, Antiproton, and you're known and if you're niche down, you know, female entrepreneurs, that's my target market. Right. Niche down. And they're seeing that I'm constantly providing value and I'm letting them into who I am because I am on a couple other platforms. When the time is right, I have people that will reach out to me and say, I've been following you for a year, Mary. I'm like, wow, and they are silent, like, I don't know, they're following me, I don't I don't they're not commenting on my posts and stuff. They might be watching. I do my live show twice a month, know, and I'll get a lot of use. I don't know everybody who's watching, but they're watching. And you want to feel your pipeline not just for 30 days, 60 days. I'm talking long term goals. [00:28:06][100.8]
[00:28:07] Yeah, a thousand percent. So what are speaking of goals over the next? [00:28:13][6.0]
[00:28:13] That's a great Segway. You led me right into it and I'm going to return it back to you. [00:28:18][4.4]
[00:28:18] So over the next three years, what are your basic plans also? Do you look at goals that way? Do you go as far out as three years? I feel like coaches and people like that have a really refined sense of goals and horizon tasks and things like that. So what is your particular flavor of that and what are your future goals for your company? [00:28:37][18.8]
[00:28:37] I love goals, so I usually attend Felina Strategic Planning Day where we map out the goals for the year. And it's hilarious because I have these huge posters still in my office with my goals for this year made. [00:28:52][14.1]
[00:28:52] Some of us didn't make some of them. I really believe in setting goals. I believe in setting six month goals, reviewing them at six months, because most likely you're going to pivot a service, worked a course work, of course, didn't work. You want more speaking gigs, so set at least your first six months of goals. My three year goal is that we leave San Diego and we're moving to Lake Havasu City, Arizona, where my dad is, and a humble friends have bought houses. We have a boat out there and I'd like to be closer to the boat, to the lake and the goal next year. I have like I said, I have a virtual assistant and a resume writer. I'd like to have a small team. I'm not looking to build the Amy Porterfield of LinkedIn. Right. If you guys don't know who Amy Porterfield is, she's local. She started with Facebook ads and now she has a digital course academy and she's fabulous. I love her podcast. I'm looking to build a small team of about five to eight people where we're producing done for youth services and something that we tested out this year because there's a lot of busy professionals out there that need no they need to have a better LinkedIn presence, but they don't have the time to write it so we can do that for them. So that is something that I see next year happening. I see more courses coming and I see me reducing the number of hours I'm working because the packages are bigger and I have a team doing the work. That's the three year goal. [00:30:18][86.3]
[00:30:19] Excellent. How do you like your virtual assistant? I love her, yeah. [00:30:23][3.7]
[00:30:23] Do you find that there's a ton of I'm curious because it's kind of just burgeoning. [00:30:27][3.6]
[00:30:28] I've had friends using virtual assistants without having even that name on it for several years now. But I've talked to people who've said, oh, it's genius, depending on the kind of work you need done. And I've had other people say, you know, it took so much explanation. It was just it was the delegation. I said, I feel like it's task oriented. [00:30:45][17.5]
[00:30:46] It is task oriented. So so I learned that to hire a VA the right way. So this is my third one. Is that you? Actually, here's my tip, you guys. If you're thinking about hiring a VA first, you test them. You give them a project that will take less than an hour and you tell them that you want to see their work. So I did not pay her. I gave her a specific task that I knew was about forty five minutes. And you see how long it's going to take them. And do they do a good job? Is it 90 percent right. If they can do that then give them a try. If they can't get that done in the time and it's less than 90 percent, maybe eighty five, maybe eighty percent. Right. That's probably not the right person for you. Also, a VA can't do everything you need to have different views. So my VA does email marketing the social media. We're working on transcribing all the videos and she's taking over, like creating the Facebook events, all the social media stuff. She is great. I need someone else for videos. Right. She's not a video expert. So so my advice is hire the right VA for the right job. Don't hire one VA to do everything. Test your VA, give them a tax. It'll take an hour. And if you don't think you can afford VA, I'm telling you, it is the best decision that I made over a year ago. Start with two hours a week. That is how we started, because it's scary to hand your business over to a stranger in a different country. That mine is in the Philippines and I've heard that the Filipino visas are the best FFI, so I've heard that as well. Yeah. So start with just two hours a week or an hour a week hand over something simple that isn't going to ruin your business if there's a mistake and then just build on that. So we're up to eight hours a week. No. [00:32:37][111.0]
[00:32:39] Yeah, absolutely, that's amazing and I yeah, I think outsourcing anyone who's looking at outsourcing, it's kind of a burgeoning industry and there's a lot of chatter online. [00:32:47][8.7]
[00:32:48] I know that people can cross reference. When I first started thinking about a virtual assistant, things of that nature, I felt like it was a big thing. People had people with them. I just spoke I just interviewed someone who had an issue with identity theft through an assistant that was and stateside that was here and working with her. And I think that the greatest fear of VA is when you're handing over, for instance, to social media manager account, things of that nature, you're handing them over the identity of your business. [00:33:16][27.9]
[00:33:17] And that's true. And you have to. [00:33:18][1.3]
[00:33:19] But I think there's vetting happening, right? [00:33:21][1.6]
[00:33:21] Yeah. And you have to you have to be smart. So I use a password manager. She doesn't have any passwords. I can lock her out at any time. [00:33:28][7.2]
[00:33:30] OK, and you do that for all your social media accounts. It's interesting. [00:33:32][2.7]
[00:33:33] She yeah. She has access to all my programs that I use. I have a ton of different programs that we use for producing shows and the just the video stuff and transcriptions. [00:33:45][11.9]
[00:33:46] So everything's done via last pass. So she doesn't actually have a password the same. I also have a web designer on my team. Right. So my Web person, she has access through last pass. You never give your passwords out. You don't need to in today's technology and get a password manager. When I start working with entrepreneurs, I'm like, here's the basics. We go through it. Every on my checklist is do you have a password manager? When they say no, I'm like, that's your number one priority. A business email and a password manager. Yeah, right. You got to have those things when you're launching your business. [00:34:22][36.1]
[00:34:23] Absolutely. For protection. I agree. And it's peace of mind. So I'm wondering if someone kind of stumbled into you tomorrow at the park or at the lake next time you're out on your boat, right up next to you and said, you know, I was kind of late to some of the game. [00:34:40][16.7]
[00:34:40] I had a professional life and I went back to school. And now things have kind of turned and it looks like I'm going to start my own company. [00:34:45][5.5]
[00:34:46] And I'd be like, yes, congratulations. [00:34:48][1.3]
[00:34:49] What are the three pieces of advice you'd give her? [00:34:52][2.2]
[00:34:56] One piece of advice is if you don't have a big chunk of money, you should probably work part time while you build your business, it takes longer to build the business to profit than you think. That is the biggest thing. And there's no shame in that, you guys. [00:35:13][17.0]
[00:35:13] There is no shame in working full time or part time when you launched your business. A lot of people do it. What? They just don't talk about it. So there's no shame in that. No. To really work with a branding marketing person, get your Brandt down the first time and it can change as you go along. But I think the the more that, you know, your Brandt and your Brandt is on point, the better, the easier it is for you to market and for you to sell it. Third, you don't need to be on every platform. That was one of the mistakes I made. I thought I had to be on every platform. And before I had a social media tool, I would get up in the morning. I'd like tell my husband, oh my God, I got to post on all these different platforms and I would be copying and pasting until I have a social media tool. Pictou. Don't you know what, Pictou That you are a rock star on my two hour LinkedIn and Facebook, I have an Instagram account, I post some stuff, but I don't engage. If you are not going to engage with your network and your community on that platform, don't be on it. [00:36:17][63.9]
[00:36:18] Right. [00:36:18][0.0]
[00:36:19] Yeah, engagement is key, so I've got if you don't have a chunk of dough, it's there's no shame in working part time or full time work with a branding marketing person. And you don't have to be on every platform. Pictou Like that. That's really cool. [00:36:34][14.8]
[00:36:34] You're the first person, I think in the past year and a half that I've spoken with at one of the top three pieces of advice is based. Well, it's very apropos given what you do, but is based on limiting the social media platforms that I think you're right. People really waste time doing this necessary post because the advice is the kind of YouTube advice is like you've got to stay present and there is a difference between staying present and just kind of manically posting these half baked ideas across all platforms. [00:37:03][28.9]
[00:37:04] And you do have to say stay present. But where are your clients? Like my clients, my career clients, were they there on LinkedIn looking for jobs? Right. My entrepreneurs that don't know they need to be there. [00:37:16][12.0]
[00:37:16] I love LinkedIn because I find so much value in content. I started with Facebook and for my generation were on Facebook. The younger generation, they're on Instagram. So if your clients are twenty five, right. Twenty five to thirty five, they're going to be on Instagram. So no, your clients. And that's not to say you guys, that you won't find clients on those other platforms, that you won't get referred. But don't, don't spend hours, hours every day trying to be on every platform. Be good on two. [00:37:45][28.6]
[00:37:46] That's awesome. I love it. Well we are out of time, but I wanted to say thank you so much, Mary. I know you have a crazy schedule with the holidays upon us, it's magnified or amplified by ten. And so I just wanted to say thank you for giving us your time and your advice today. [00:37:59][13.5]
[00:38:00] Oh, thank you so much for having me. And I hope that everyone has a wonderful year end wrap up and you guys start setting those goals. [00:38:07][7.3]
[00:38:08] Absolutely. We're looking forward to the new year. Let's get goal making. Well, we'll circle back to I would love to find out in about six months how how your goals are looking and kind of reaching further to some of your advice. [00:38:20][12.1]
[00:38:21] Sweet. I would love to chat again for everyone listening. [00:38:24][2.5]
[00:38:24] Thank you so much for giving us your time. And until we chat again, remember to always bet on yourself. Slainte. [00:38:24][0.0]
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