Speaker 1: The views, information, or opinions expressed during this podcast are
Speaker 1: solely those of the individuals involved and do not represent
Speaker 1: those of Into It QuickBooks or any of its cornerstone
Speaker 1: brands or employees. This podcast does not constitute financial, legal,
Speaker 1: or other professional advice or services. No assurance is given
Speaker 1: that the info is comprehensive, accurate, or free of errors,
Speaker 1: and the information presented is for general information purposes only.
Speaker 1: Into It QuickBooks does not have any responsibility for updating
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Speaker 1: relying on them. Hey everyone, I'm Austin Hankwitz, host of
Speaker 1: the Rate of Return podcast and co founder of wits Ventures,
Speaker 1: but you may instead recognize me from my short form
Speaker 1: videos about personal finance and investing on TikTok and I'm
Speaker 1: Jane's Torres, creator and host of the award winning personal
Speaker 1: finance podcast jokierro de Neto. You may also have come
Speaker 1: across one of my videos on social media where I
Speaker 1: empower others with personal finance knowledge. Welcome to Mind the
Speaker 1: Business Small Business Success Stories, a podcast brought to you
Speaker 1: by iHeartRadio and Into It QuickBooks. In each episode, Austin
Speaker 1: and I chat with small business owners as they share
Speaker 1: their stories about the ups and downs of owning a
Speaker 1: small business. Plus, we'll learn from their experience about how
Speaker 1: you can help fortify and strengthen your own business. Now,
Speaker 1: this episode is especially special to Jennie and me as
Speaker 1: we discuss marketing your small business, which is a big
Speaker 1: part of our own success stories. Genius, what was one
Speaker 1: of your first file moments online and how did it
Speaker 1: come about for you? So, I feel like I am
Speaker 1: a dinosaur when it comes to virility in social media.
Speaker 1: For me, it was actually in a Facebook group. So
Speaker 1: I started my journey as a content creator as a
Speaker 1: food blogger, and so part of my marketing strategy was
Speaker 1: to join Facebook groups where folks were already looking for recipes,
Speaker 1: and I ended up sharing a recipe I think it
Speaker 1: was for like stuffed shells, and it crashed my website.
Speaker 1: So that's the first time that I realized, Oh, I
Speaker 1: think I need a better hosting plan and I also
Speaker 1: needs to plan for what virality actually looks like. And
Speaker 1: so I'm really cited about today's conversation. What about you, Austin,
Speaker 1: what was your first viral moment? Yeah, so, weirdly enough,
Speaker 1: the very first video I shared to TikTok went viral
Speaker 1: and I'm masked over one million views in just a
Speaker 1: few days. This really jump started my creator business and
Speaker 1: got me excited about creating content and connecting with my followers. However,
Speaker 1: we hear about social media being such a major factor
Speaker 1: in marketing, but I don't want people to forget that
Speaker 1: there are other ways to market your business besides social
Speaker 1: You have to know your target audience and meet them
Speaker 1: where they're at. So, for example, one of the products
Speaker 1: inside of my small business is my paid subscription newsletter.
Speaker 1: It comes with a ton of cool updates and access
Speaker 1: to exclusive content, but what had really helped me take
Speaker 1: it off the ground was allowing people to gift these subscriptions.
Speaker 1: Another massive growth lever from a marketing perspective for me
Speaker 1: was collaboration. I find a creator who was also talking
Speaker 1: about similar topics as myself, and then we'd collaborate on
Speaker 1: cool content and share with both of our audiences. This
Speaker 1: strategy can be applicable to nearly anyone, but the collaborator
Speaker 1: doesn't need to be a person or an entity. It
Speaker 1: can also be an event. Right, so think about all
Speaker 1: those Valentine's Day themed candies and chocolates we saw in
Speaker 1: February that could be applicable to your small business. What
Speaker 1: about Eugenius? So I had to learn that followers does
Speaker 1: not equal dollars, and I think that's a big mistake
Speaker 1: that a lot of people make when it comes to
Speaker 1: building their audiences on social media. I learned about SEO,
Speaker 1: or search engine optimization as I was in my journey
Speaker 1: as a blogger, and I realized now that ninety percent
Speaker 1: of my traffic comes from SEO. It doesn't come from
Speaker 1: social media. It comes from folks going on a search
Speaker 1: engine and typing in a recipe that they're looking for.
Speaker 1: And as a business coach, when I first started, instead
Speaker 1: of launching a group program using paid ads to advertise that,
Speaker 1: I was doing one on one consultations to make sure
Speaker 1: that I'm qualifying the right people that are going to
Speaker 1: get the most benefit out of my product. And so
Speaker 1: there's just so many different ways to market yourself as
Speaker 1: a business. And that's why our audience is so lucky
Speaker 1: today because we are talking to a verifyable marketing guru.
Speaker 1: Andrea Casanova was born in Venezuela but moved to the
Speaker 1: United States by herself when she was a teen halfway
Speaker 1: through pursuing a college degree. Her parents nearly went bankrupt
Speaker 1: and she could not get financial aid With a student visa,
Speaker 1: her working options were limited. She decided to work for
Speaker 1: free as much as she could, and eventually got picked
Speaker 1: up by an internet media company that flew her out
Speaker 1: to Los Angeles to produce viral content for influencers at
Speaker 1: the mere age of eighteen. In twenty twenty, she decided
Speaker 1: to go solo and open up her own viral marketing agency.
Speaker 1: Growing as an educator on multiple platforms and strategizing for
Speaker 1: brands like TikTok, ten Cent, Amazon, the Russo Brothers, Cricket,
Speaker 1: Universal Music Group, and more. She is now refocusing her
Speaker 1: business called We Shape This, to specifically address building platforms
Speaker 1: for fellow Latina creators and brands. Andrea, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited.
Speaker 1: So I gave the audience a little bit of your background, right,
Speaker 1: but I really want to hear from you. How did
Speaker 1: you get started in marketing and how did you come
Speaker 1: up with the idea of your company? Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: how far back do I start? I was raised in
Speaker 1: a very supportive home that was like, yeah, you want
Speaker 1: to be a singer, go be a singer. You want
Speaker 1: to be an actress, go be an actress. But I
Speaker 1: always have this business savvy part of me where I
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, what is actually logical for me to
Speaker 1: pursue at a young age that will be able to
Speaker 1: set me up for financial success. And so I realized
Speaker 1: that marketing is the way to go, because that way
Speaker 1: I can pursue some sort of storytelling. I just have
Speaker 1: to figure out how I come into the equation. And
Speaker 1: so I decided to pursue a degree here in the
Speaker 1: States of Media Communications, and by the time graduation hit
Speaker 1: our last project our exams were essentially having a portfolio,
Speaker 1: website built, having our business cards to build, and a
Speaker 1: business plan. But I had to hustle and just get
Speaker 1: a lot of unpaid work. Even if it was unpaid work,
Speaker 1: I could still build my portfolio, and so that slowly
Speaker 1: started setting me up in the route of Okay, I
Speaker 1: understand viral marketing, I understand the psychology and the research
Speaker 1: as to why it works, and now I understand how
Speaker 1: to produce it as well, not for myself yet, but
Speaker 1: for other people. And so I moved to LA because
Speaker 1: I actually ended up producing for one of Latin America's
Speaker 1: biggest content creators and then start to realize that that
Speaker 1: path was not for me. In that moment, let me
Speaker 1: now go try the more corporate side of marketing and
Speaker 1: social media. And the last company that I worked at
Speaker 1: was when I was twenty one twenty two and it
Speaker 1: was called Sapphire and they were one of the first
Speaker 1: companies in the world that was a TikTok approved agency.
Speaker 1: And what that meant was before TikTok blew up back
Speaker 1: in twenty nineteen twenty eighteen, they had a couple agencies
Speaker 1: in the world that they worked with, and in fact,
Speaker 1: even to be considered a partner you had to fly
Speaker 1: to Beijing to get I approved by bite Dams themselves.
Speaker 1: It was gnarly, but it was really awesome because since
Speaker 1: I was really young and the team was really small,
Speaker 1: I was able to have my title as director, so
Speaker 1: I was ahead of global trends overseeing the campaigns of
Speaker 1: amplification for byte Dands and TikTok. Essentially, what I did
Speaker 1: was oversee their amplification program to drive user acquisition, and
Speaker 1: that meant viralizing content through meme pages and a bunch
Speaker 1: of other cool stuff here in the US and France, Italy, Russia, Spain,
Speaker 1: and I started understanding the value of TikTok. I'm like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, people should be hopping on TikTok. And
Speaker 1: so I started onboarding brands and eventually I was like,
Speaker 1: you know what, I don't need to be working with
Speaker 1: someone else. I'd rather do it myself, and so I
Speaker 1: left in twenty twenty and solo ever since. As a
Speaker 1: small business owner, I think one of the biggest hangups
Speaker 1: that we have is around spending money. And you got
Speaker 1: to spend some money on marketing, right, So first off,
Speaker 1: how do you determine a marketing budget? And then secondly,
Speaker 1: what if you don't have the money to spend, What
Speaker 1: are some ways that you can market when you don't
Speaker 1: have a lot of initial capital. Oh my gosh. I
Speaker 1: love this question the way that I see it. Rather
Speaker 1: than seeing it as marketing as a whole, start seeing
Speaker 1: the gaps in your business and the gaps in your messaging.
Speaker 1: So when I work with small business owners, I cannot
Speaker 1: just tell them like, hire a whole social media marketer.
Speaker 1: What I tell them instead is what is a hat
Speaker 1: that you can realistically wear right now, and where are
Speaker 1: the gaps? And so they'll tell me, you know, I
Speaker 1: can film myself and I can start dabbling into organic
Speaker 1: social content, but I don't like to edit, and so
Speaker 1: I go, okay, then your gap is a video editor
Speaker 1: for now. Focus on getting that done and then we'll
Speaker 1: see that the next gap is probably copyrighting or a
Speaker 1: community manager. But the thing is, we like to tackle
Speaker 1: marketing in all aspects. We'd like to think of, oh
Speaker 1: my gosh, I need to do prints, I need to
Speaker 1: do social media marketing, I need to do paid marketing
Speaker 1: and all these different things, and then we start leaking
Speaker 1: almost a lot of that money because first we don't
Speaker 1: have data. Right, in my opinion, you should always go
Speaker 1: organic first, then paid, because that way you have data
Speaker 1: to work off of. So my recommendation is to always
Speaker 1: before thinking of your marketing budget is understand where you're
Speaker 1: apps are, what can you do in house, what can
Speaker 1: you do yourself? I mean even myself, I do have
Speaker 1: a team, but I still do a lot of the
Speaker 1: nitty gritty just because I love that it has my
Speaker 1: touch on it, and so it's a personal preference. But
Speaker 1: in the beginning, when I couldn't afford having a video
Speaker 1: editor or content producer on my team, I was just like, Okay,
Speaker 1: what are the hell knows and what are the hell
Speaker 1: yeses that I want to be investing time into. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's brilliant. And a sort of a follow up on
Speaker 1: that question here is you know, let's say that someone
Speaker 1: is building that marketing plan, right, how do they evaluate
Speaker 1: the success? Is it sales conversion? Is it impressions? Is
Speaker 1: it followers? Right? How does someone know if their marketing
Speaker 1: efforts are actually working at the end of the day.
Speaker 1: I measure the campaign's success based on what your main
Speaker 1: goal is in my opinion, followers, engagement views, that is
Speaker 1: nothing if you're not making money, at least for a
Speaker 1: business owner. However, there's people that just want to be
Speaker 1: known and they just want to start putting their brand
Speaker 1: out there, and then in a couple months they want
Speaker 1: to start a monetize. So it really does depend how
Speaker 1: would a small business owner like to run their campaign.
Speaker 1: They're having a blast, but how do they determine which
Speaker 1: platform is like for them? Right? Should they be doing TikTok?
Speaker 1: Is it Instagram? Is at Facebook? Like? How do they
Speaker 1: determine the platform that's going to give them the results
Speaker 1: that they want. It all comes down to trying things
Speaker 1: out first and seeing what you feel the most comfortable with.
Speaker 1: In terms of the process of getting the content out there.
Speaker 1: I have clients that they love TikTok, and then I
Speaker 1: have other clients that just love to express themselves on
Speaker 1: a long form and so they choose podcasting or they
Speaker 1: choose YouTube. But the thing is, in my humble opinion
Speaker 1: right now, TikTok has been a trendsetter for a lot
Speaker 1: of the other platforms, and so you have an advantage
Speaker 1: storytelling wise, industry wise by being in the app and
Speaker 1: consuming its culture and consuming it's things, because all the
Speaker 1: other apps are grabbing from them. I go on Amazon
Speaker 1: now and now I'm fed up for you page of Amazon,
Speaker 1: which is wild, right, YouTube shorts, reels, all these different things.
Speaker 1: So I do believe that everyone should beyond TikTok because
Speaker 1: of that reason. But should you be investing a lot
Speaker 1: of time in there if you get more reach on Facebook?
Speaker 1: Maybe not right. I have friends that are for some
Speaker 1: reason making a lot of money off of Facebook, and
Speaker 1: they're getting a lot of clients off of there. So
Speaker 1: I would say beyond TikTok, just to be on the know,
Speaker 1: but then start testing things out and whatever works, keep repeating,
Speaker 1: don't refine until it doesn't work anymore. Coming up on
Speaker 1: Mind the Business Small Business success Stories. We forget that
Speaker 1: the most mundane little moments are the ones that create
Speaker 1: the best stories. So record yourself sending orders out from
Speaker 1: your basement because one day you'll have a bigger place
Speaker 1: to send them out from and you'll want to use
Speaker 1: that footage. We'll be right back after the break. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to Mind the Business Small Business success Stories, brought
Speaker 1: to you by iHeartRadio and into a quick books. Now.
Speaker 1: I want to keep rolling with this idea of providing
Speaker 1: value and engagement and stuff like that. So I was
Speaker 1: actually just watching one of your recent collaborations with TikTok
Speaker 1: on TikTok, which is just kind of funny to think
Speaker 1: about it, But in one of the videos you shared
Speaker 1: an incredible tip for small business owners trying to grow
Speaker 1: their presence on the platform. You said, your account should
Speaker 1: be an experience and a space for your audience. It
Speaker 1: should provide value. I don't think enough small business owners
Speaker 1: understand just how important that is. Do you mind unpacking
Speaker 1: that a little bit for us. Yes, that's one of
Speaker 1: my favorite things to talk about as why your account
Speaker 1: should be an experience in a space rather than a person.
Speaker 1: And it's because right now, whenever you go meet someone,
Speaker 1: they're like, hey, what's your Instagram? Let's connect, right, and
Speaker 1: so they get a little vibe of scrolling from your feet.
Speaker 1: And that doesn't mean they need to make an aesthetic.
Speaker 1: I actually hate that narrative. But what I'm talking about
Speaker 1: is it just needs to be consistent enough so people
Speaker 1: know what to expect from you. Like I know, if
Speaker 1: I can go to du A Lingos page, I can
Speaker 1: expect to laugh a lot. I know that if I
Speaker 1: go to my own page, I can expect to be
Speaker 1: given some constant strategy. I can expect giving some motivation,
Speaker 1: talking about manifestation and stuff. I can expect a lot
Speaker 1: of good value around money from the Yukio l Nano podcast.
Speaker 1: So it's like you have to see it as, Okay,
Speaker 1: what space am I creating for my audience here? What
Speaker 1: are the constant themes that they're going to be seeing
Speaker 1: that actually communicate my message? How do I put my
Speaker 1: content out there? What's the tone, what's the music? And
Speaker 1: so when you start seeing content as this whole of storytelling,
Speaker 1: you start detaching from it rather than thinking individually per
Speaker 1: content piece, you think of an overall theme feel sound look.
Speaker 1: That is when you actually start to create a pattern
Speaker 1: in your audience's head, subconsciously making them more attracted to
Speaker 1: you because they already know what to expect. You're just
Speaker 1: expressing yourself. It just so happens that they see it
Speaker 1: a certain way and they relate to it a certain way. Now,
Speaker 1: I think a lot of folks will think that followers
Speaker 1: equals dollars. Probably not the case, right, So how do
Speaker 1: we actually turn followers into paid customers? That's a loaded
Speaker 1: question because not every follower will be a qualified lead
Speaker 1: for you. I actually care a lot more about viewership
Speaker 1: than the follower rate. I've seen people with two thousand
Speaker 1: followers that are making millions of dollars because they've been
Speaker 1: able to really nurture that following in the first place.
Speaker 1: And the way that I see it is if you
Speaker 1: can't nurture one hundred or a thousand of your qualified leads,
Speaker 1: then you can't do two million. Then I've seen creators
Speaker 1: that have two million, five million followers that are like, hey,
Speaker 1: can you spot me twenty? And it's really bizarre, it's
Speaker 1: really crazy. And so what happens is we equate a
Speaker 1: follower a count with a success rate almost And the
Speaker 1: way that I see it is, rather than focusing on
Speaker 1: your followers, focus on your personal brand. I've seen creators
Speaker 1: that are so small, at least compared to some of
Speaker 1: the bigger creators, but they have a lot of press,
Speaker 1: they're in the right networks, they'll have their right channels
Speaker 1: in terms of they get big people on their podcasts,
Speaker 1: they get people on their events and whatnot. And it's
Speaker 1: because they care a lot about their personal brands. It's
Speaker 1: the equivalent as to why a lot of creators that
Speaker 1: are not necessarily huge charge a lot of money in
Speaker 1: brand deals. The way that I see it is, you're
Speaker 1: not paying just for my audience to convert to you.
Speaker 1: You're paying for my reputation, for the credibility that I
Speaker 1: already have. And so when you focus on growing your
Speaker 1: personal brand rather than growing your followers, that's when things
Speaker 1: just start to align. You know. As an online business coach,
Speaker 1: one of the most common things that I've heard time
Speaker 1: and time again is this fear of showing up in
Speaker 1: front of the camera. Right As a small business owner,
Speaker 1: you know you have to market yourself. But this idea
Speaker 1: of like, I don't want to get in front of
Speaker 1: the camera and start dancing and learning choreography. What do
Speaker 1: you say to folks who have that fear of showing up?
Speaker 1: And the way that I see it is you just
Speaker 1: have to find the way that you feel the most
Speaker 1: comfortable to be seen in. I recently had a client.
Speaker 1: She came up to me. She's like, listen, I connect
Speaker 1: with people so well in real life, and as soon
Speaker 1: as you turn on a camera, I just freeze up
Speaker 1: and I don't know what else to say. And then
Speaker 1: I realize that, Okay, let's just keep a mic a
Speaker 1: laugh on you when you're doing speeches, when you're a
Speaker 1: public speaking, when you're meeting people, and let's have a
Speaker 1: cameragrapher rolling and whenever you're giving them advice or tips
Speaker 1: and whatnot, let's just record that and utilize that for content.
Speaker 1: That's what I do when I go to my speaking gigs,
Speaker 1: I always have a laugh connected to me, and it's
Speaker 1: hours of footage that then we cut down and then
Speaker 1: we grab content from there because that is where I
Speaker 1: excel at it's public speaking, it's in front of a crowd.
Speaker 1: I cannot really just do it when my camera's on
Speaker 1: and I'm alone in my room for some reason. And
Speaker 1: so just focus on the ways in the creative outlets
Speaker 1: that makes sense for you. You don't have to be
Speaker 1: doing the little trends if you don't want to. You
Speaker 1: don't have to be speaking a camera if you don't
Speaker 1: want to. You could simply find the ways that that
Speaker 1: works for you and go from there. Now, the second answer,
Speaker 1: when you attach yourself to the good comments, Unfortunately, you
Speaker 1: also attach yourself to the negative comments. And so winner
Speaker 1: on social media and on anything that they do will
Speaker 1: come from a place of neutrality. You have to get
Speaker 1: to the place where bad comments are as neutral as
Speaker 1: good comments. Then you can start putting yourself out there.
Speaker 1: Because of true this, we don't fear the common itself.
Speaker 1: The comments is not going to come bite us. It's
Speaker 1: just words on a screen. What we fear is that
Speaker 1: we cannot handle that reaction. We cannot handle that rejection.
Speaker 1: And I have a lot of clients in mind the
Speaker 1: love negative comments because they know it boosts their page.
Speaker 1: But I have other clients I disappear for years months,
Speaker 1: because they just simply get so attached to both the
Speaker 1: negatives and the positives. I started making content three years ago,
Speaker 1: and I encourage everyone listening right now to go scroll
Speaker 1: endlessly all through eight hundred videos of mine on TikTok.
Speaker 1: You tell me how many videos have my face in them?
Speaker 1: Absolutely zero until I was two years into this, because
Speaker 1: I was afraid to be on camera. And so what
Speaker 1: I did to sort of solve that problem, as I said, Well,
Speaker 1: you know, I've got a decent voice. I feel like
Speaker 1: I can tell a story. Let me just like write
Speaker 1: some stuff out on a notepad and like show the
Speaker 1: camera and like just kind of get people step by
Speaker 1: step ideas. There's always a way. That's literally why I
Speaker 1: started a podcast. I'm like, nobody needs to see my face.
Speaker 1: They can just listen to me. And here we are.
Speaker 1: Now here's a fun question for you, Andrea. How have
Speaker 1: you used your own marketing advice to grow your own business?
Speaker 1: A lot of my videos are value driven and not
Speaker 1: in a way where I'm saying, hey, go buy my services,
Speaker 1: go buy my services, right I'm talking about the results
Speaker 1: that I've brought to people previously in an educational way,
Speaker 1: something that I love doing is always integrating the word
Speaker 1: clients and my videos because when I say clients or
Speaker 1: when I say yeah, one of my clients, I did
Speaker 1: this for them, or this is the process that I
Speaker 1: use with one of my clients. As soon as you
Speaker 1: say the word clients, customers and you start talking about successes,
Speaker 1: problem aware of things you put in your audience's head
Speaker 1: that it could be possible for them too, They're like,
Speaker 1: oh clients, Oh, I could work with them, right. So
Speaker 1: I focus on telling the stories from my personal experience,
Speaker 1: telling the stories of people that happen and work with me,
Speaker 1: because I know that it's something that people can relate
Speaker 1: to a lot. This whole idea of like talking to
Speaker 1: a camera and talking about what you're offering will not
Speaker 1: ressonate the same if there's not a story attached to it,
Speaker 1: because there's no emotion attached to it. Everything we do communicate,
Speaker 1: so when you see it from that perspective, it becomes
Speaker 1: a lot easier. So we typically think of social media
Speaker 1: when it comes to marketing, but can you talk about
Speaker 1: other ways that you can leverage different tools for marketing
Speaker 1: your business that don't necessarily involve social media. Well, in
Speaker 1: my opinion. Besides social media marketing, email marketing is one
Speaker 1: of my favorite ways. When it comes to email, you're
Speaker 1: having a direct access to your consumer that normally you
Speaker 1: wouldn't get and it's a much more intimate customer journey. Right.
Speaker 1: Something that I would probably write on my newsletter is
Speaker 1: not the same as I would post on my TikTok
Speaker 1: because TikTok is a much more discovery driven platform. And
Speaker 1: so that's the way that I see it. It's like
Speaker 1: it depends on the level of intimacy. It's the right
Speaker 1: word actually that you have with your customers, and so
Speaker 1: with these newsletters, you get a lot of more opportunity
Speaker 1: to be in a more intimate conversation with your consumer. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I always like to think of when someone gives you
Speaker 1: their email address, it's like the digital version of them
Speaker 1: inviting you into their home, so you really get a
Speaker 1: chance to spend some time with them and they get
Speaker 1: to know you. So I love that tip. So you've
Speaker 1: mentioned the word brand a couple of times, and I'd
Speaker 1: love for you to kind of expand on what it
Speaker 1: actually means to be a personal brand, because I don't
Speaker 1: know if a lot of folks really understand what are
Speaker 1: the nuances there. A personal brand, in my opinion, is
Speaker 1: essentially the way that you choose how your audience feels
Speaker 1: and perceives you. Contrary to popular belief, a brand does
Speaker 1: not necessarily mean that it's a corporation or an organization.
Speaker 1: It just means that they have a clear understanding of
Speaker 1: what your boundaries are, what you stand for, what you
Speaker 1: don't stand for, the way that you speak, the way
Speaker 1: that you feel, the way that you communicate. The way
Speaker 1: that I like to break these down is by utilizing
Speaker 1: characters and film and stories huge on brand archetypes. The
Speaker 1: Explorer is a brand archeset, for example, and it's a
Speaker 1: character that represents and breaking the status quo and going
Speaker 1: out there and discovering new things. And you see a
Speaker 1: lot of adventure creators or travel creators embodying this brand archetype.
Speaker 1: And a very big brand that's known for this archetype
Speaker 1: is Jeep. Right when you think of Disney, you think
Speaker 1: of oh, amazing, magic, incredible, all these different actives, and
Speaker 1: you realize, oh, that's a magician's archetype. And when you
Speaker 1: realize that all of these things are just characters, it's
Speaker 1: so easy for you to realize which one resonates with
Speaker 1: you the most. And so when I am doing this
Speaker 1: exercise with my clients, I have them go through a
Speaker 1: whole archetype test and seeing, Okay, which one do you
Speaker 1: relate to the most and why, and so it's easier
Speaker 1: for them to communicate. But a personal brand is essentially
Speaker 1: how you choose to put yourself out there. Yeah, that's great.
Speaker 1: What's one thing that a small business owner should be
Speaker 1: doing with regards to their marketing today? Should it be
Speaker 1: focusing on social should it be long form content? Like?
Speaker 1: What's the one most return on investment driven thing that
Speaker 1: people should be focusing on. I think every small business
Speaker 1: owners should be focusing on documenting their journey, even if
Speaker 1: they don't have a video editor on hand, even if
Speaker 1: they don't plan on posting them, because at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, you will at some point, whether you
Speaker 1: want it or not, if you want to build a
Speaker 1: successful business, you have to create some sort of content.
Speaker 1: And I'd rather you have the content than not have
Speaker 1: it at all. And what I always tell you, boots like,
Speaker 1: we tend to create around moments that are iconic. I
Speaker 1: got invited to this event, I'm going to film myself.
Speaker 1: I got this new car, I'm going to film myself.
Speaker 1: I got this I'm going to film myself. But then
Speaker 1: we forget that the most mundane little moments are the
Speaker 1: ones that create the best stories. So record yourself sending
Speaker 1: out that first package, even if the person didn't pay
Speaker 1: you full price. Record yourself sending orders out from your basement,
Speaker 1: because one day you'll have a bigger place to send
Speaker 1: them out from and you'll want to use that footage.
Speaker 1: So document your journey whatever that looks for you. Even
Speaker 1: if you don't use it, it'll still be so valuable.
Speaker 1: I could not agree anymore. At the end of the day,
Speaker 1: like everyone has their own journey, everyone is doing something
Speaker 1: that is important too. If it's a customer, a potential customer,
Speaker 1: if it's someone who aspires to be like you as
Speaker 1: a small business owner. I think documenting the journey is
Speaker 1: so powerful. Totally agree. Thank you so much Andrea for
Speaker 1: being here, and I can't wait for folks to tune
Speaker 1: into this episode. There are so many gems that you dropped.
Speaker 1: Thank you and thank you both so much. I really
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Andrea was such an incredible guest. Her story
Speaker 1: as an immigrant really embodies the American dream. Austin, what
Speaker 1: struck you as most impactful about her journey? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think for me, it was her tenacity and her focus
Speaker 1: to succeed, Just having this awesome mindset to say, I'm
Speaker 1: passionate about this, I'm going to use the resources my
Speaker 1: college has, I'm going to use every single piece that
Speaker 1: I can pull together to succeed against this dream. And
Speaker 1: her willingness to say I'm not going to give up.
Speaker 1: I'm going to do this regardless. Yeah, I think for
Speaker 1: me there was a lot that I could resonate with,
Speaker 1: being a fellow entrepreneur and being the first in my
Speaker 1: family to do something like this, right. I definitely identified
Speaker 1: with her story around not feeling worthy of asking for
Speaker 1: what you're worth, And I think a lot of people
Speaker 1: can identify with this idea of not really understanding the
Speaker 1: value of our skills. And so I just really like
Speaker 1: to remind folks they're not just paying you for the
Speaker 1: time and the labor that you're investing into whoever you're
Speaker 1: working with as a client. You also have to pay
Speaker 1: for the years of experience that I've collected along the way,
Speaker 1: all of the trials and errors. That's really how you
Speaker 1: start to get your worth as a small business owner.
Speaker 1: So I think it's important that you mentioned that, and
Speaker 1: also the mindset work that it takes. Right. You got
Speaker 1: to kind of build your confidence muscle as an entrepreneur
Speaker 1: the same way that you would build your muscles at
Speaker 1: the gym. I just really want to speak now to
Speaker 1: all the small business owners who are listening that might
Speaker 1: have not taken that step to create content yet, if
Speaker 1: it's a video on TikTok or video anywhere else or
Speaker 1: whatever that content might be, Like, document the journey. You
Speaker 1: don't have to have a crazy content plan, not to
Speaker 1: have a calendar, you do not to have a notion page.
Speaker 1: You literally just pick up your phone and say I'm
Speaker 1: packing packages today, I'm just gonna record myself or this
Speaker 1: just happened to me in an email, just like whatever.
Speaker 1: The mundane things that you're thinking is so like, oh no,
Speaker 1: I wants to listen to that. Seriously, Just share it.
Speaker 1: Just document the journey, Share it with people, and someone's
Speaker 1: going to resonate and that will turn into hopefully something
Speaker 1: larger than just a posting. Beginning. Absolutely, people love to
Speaker 1: watch the journey. I get messages from followers who started
Speaker 1: listening to the podcast back in twenty twenty and they're
Speaker 1: just like wow. You know, watching you grow as an
Speaker 1: entrepreneur also inspires me in my own journey to see
Speaker 1: what is possible. So you never know who you're inspiring
Speaker 1: just by being yourself. Well that's it for today's episode.
Speaker 1: You can find me on social media at Austin Hankwitz
Speaker 1: and you can find me at Jokiero Dineto podcast. You
Speaker 1: can follow Into It QuickBooks on all social media at QuickBooks,
Speaker 1: and to get the tools that you need to start,
Speaker 1: run and grow your business, head to QuickBooks dot com
Speaker 1: today and be sure to catch the next episode of
Speaker 1: Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories on Thursday, April
Speaker 1: twenty seventh, where we speak to Chocolate Tier Jessica Spalding
Speaker 1: on balancing the books. You won't want to miss that one,
Speaker 1: so don't forget to follow, rate and review the show
Speaker 1: wherever you listen to podcast so you can stay up
Speaker 1: to date on our future episodes and check out our
Speaker 1: show notes for more information from this episode and marketing
Speaker 1: your business. And a huge thank you to our guest
Speaker 1: Andrea Casanova. This podcast is a production of iHeartRadio and
Speaker 1: Into It QuickBooks Our executive producer is Molly Sosha, our
Speaker 1: supervising producer is na Kia Swinton, and our writer is
Speaker 1: Tyree Rush. Our Head of post production is James Foster.
Speaker 1: And we will see you next time. Bye.