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Speaker 1: relying on them. Hi, everyone, I'm Jinny's Torres.
Speaker 2: And I'm Awson Hankwitz. Welcome to yet another episode of
Speaker 2: Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories, a podcast by
Speaker 2: iHeartRadio in Into It QuickBooks. In each episode, Jennie and
Speaker 2: I chat with small business owners as they share their
Speaker 2: stories about the ups and downs of owning a small business.
Speaker 2: Plus we'll learn from their experience about how you can
Speaker 2: help fortify and strengthen your own business.
Speaker 1: I'm so excited for our guests today, but Austin, I
Speaker 1: have a question for you. First, how often are you
Speaker 1: working with other people? I have a team, but it's
Speaker 1: very small and my little sister actually works with me,
Speaker 1: which is super cool. So I'm curious to know what
Speaker 1: was your growth process like for building your own team.
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh wow, you get to work with family. That's
Speaker 2: actually pretty fun.
Speaker 3: I didn't know that.
Speaker 2: So I quickly realized that I was not very good
Speaker 2: at being an operator.
Speaker 3: Right. I am a creative.
Speaker 2: I can make the videos, I can tell the stories,
Speaker 2: but it's hard for me to sort of actually run
Speaker 2: and operate the back end of the business, the contracting,
Speaker 2: the invoicing, the day to days. Right, So I needed
Speaker 2: to find an operator that could help me do that,
Speaker 2: and so, weirdly enough, actually found him on TikTok. He
Speaker 2: like DM me, we became friends. But his name's Christian Blackwell.
Speaker 2: He's an absolute rock star. He was doing pricing and
Speaker 2: profitability consulting at PwC and New York City before this. Like,
Speaker 2: the guy is top notch, and together we mesh really
Speaker 2: well in the sense that I can stay this creative
Speaker 2: and he can be the guy behind the scenes doing
Speaker 2: the invoicing, the emails, all the fun stuff that us
Speaker 2: creatives don't like to do.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: So that is how we got started working together. And then,
Speaker 2: as it relates to scaling the business. In the beginning,
Speaker 2: it was a lot of like TikTok videos. That's how
Speaker 2: I really began to express myself, and I talked about
Speaker 2: personal finance and investing and all that fun stuff. But
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, TikTok became more and
Speaker 2: more competitive as it relates to editing your videos and
Speaker 2: having the cool sound effects and visual effects. And I'm
Speaker 2: not that I do not know how to edit a
Speaker 2: video to save my life. However, I began to find
Speaker 2: people who did, and that's how I sort of began
Speaker 2: to say, Okay, now we can grow a little bit.
Speaker 2: We have the desire to get the video editors, we
Speaker 2: have the need for the video editors. Let's hire them up.
Speaker 2: Let's get going. And the second part of this whole
Speaker 2: kind of equation is the social posting. So for me,
Speaker 2: a lot of that was finding someone as I'm sure
Speaker 2: you know, it's a full time job to even post
Speaker 2: these assets on social media. If it's the tweets, the
Speaker 2: Instagram story is everything in between, right. However, the only
Speaker 2: thing that was important to me was that trust factor. Right,
Speaker 2: they were going to log into my TikTok, my instagramtibe
Speaker 2: to my Twitter, and so I had to be able
Speaker 2: to trust them, and funny enough, it's my girlfriend and
Speaker 2: I definitely foist her as well.
Speaker 1: Learn that that's so cool. That trust factor is major,
Speaker 1: and I think that's part of the reason why I
Speaker 1: have my sister and also my mom working with me now,
Speaker 1: which is really cool. It's like literally becoming a family business.
Speaker 1: But my first contract hire was actually one of my
Speaker 1: Instagram followers. So I was spending so much time creating
Speaker 1: content posting content, and I just needed a VA or
Speaker 1: a virtual assistant to help me with that part of
Speaker 1: the business. That's the first thing that I decided to outsource.
Speaker 1: And I literally just made an Instagram post, Hey guys,
Speaker 1: I'm hiring for a VA. This is how much I
Speaker 1: can pay, this is how many hours, and I mean
Speaker 1: the amount of applications that came in were nuts. And
Speaker 1: that's also another thing too. I didn't even really realize
Speaker 1: how you're supposed to like do a whole job board
Speaker 1: and job listing and so that was all a work
Speaker 1: in progress. But it was really cool to find someone
Speaker 1: from my audience because they already understood the brand, they
Speaker 1: were already experiencing the brand, they already knew the aesthetic,
Speaker 1: and so it was really easy to onboard her and
Speaker 1: have her kind of be able to mimic my voice
Speaker 1: without me having to create content from like a micromanagement perspective.
Speaker 1: And then when I ended up hiring my little sister,
Speaker 1: she was recently laid off. She was making a career
Speaker 1: transition into social media management and marketing and she's actually
Speaker 1: studying that in school. So I said, Bam, I've hit
Speaker 1: the jackpot. My sister is super creative, She's a virgo.
Speaker 1: She is the organization to my chaos, and we just
Speaker 1: compliment each other so well. So she helps me look
Speaker 1: good while I am out here, like you know, splattering
Speaker 1: paint on the walls, she's kind of gathering it together
Speaker 1: and putting it into a nice cohesive package. So I
Speaker 1: think this is the theme that we're going to dive into,
Speaker 1: plus so much more of just like finding the people
Speaker 1: who are going to help you grow and who are
Speaker 1: going to compliment your skill sets. That's how you, you know,
Speaker 1: find success as a founder who is looking to.
Speaker 3: Outsource right one hundred percent, But.
Speaker 1: Enough about us, Let's go ahead and introduce our guest.
Speaker 2: Kristin Nino de Guzman has worked for social media giants
Speaker 2: like Instagram, Pinterest, and TikTok liaising with constant creators since
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen. Her career in tech and social media has
Speaker 2: offered her some keen insights into the challenges content creators
Speaker 2: face when it comes to pay, particularly LATINX content creators
Speaker 2: and other content creators of color. As a creator herself,
Speaker 2: the thirty one year old from Los Angeles quit her
Speaker 2: job to focus on her new app, Clara for Creators,
Speaker 2: which is designed to help content creators address pay disparities
Speaker 2: and access the information they need to get fair pay.
Speaker 3: From the brands they choose to work with.
Speaker 2: Kristin describes the app as glassdoor or LinkedIn for creators,
Speaker 2: allowing creators to post about how much they've gotten paid
Speaker 2: and review brands anonymously. Others can then use this information
Speaker 2: to help decide if they should work with a particular
Speaker 2: brand or leverage it to request higher compensation. The app
Speaker 2: is specifically intended to help establish pay equity for content
Speaker 2: creators on all platforms. With Clara for Creators, Kristin hopes
Speaker 2: to change the world a professional content creation by putting
Speaker 2: creators first, compiling data that ultimately explores the disparity of race, gender,
Speaker 2: and ethnic demographics in an emerging market. Her app, Clara
Speaker 2: now has twenty two thousand active users and surveys over
Speaker 2: one thousand unique brands. Kristin, thanks so much for hanging
Speaker 2: out with us.
Speaker 4: Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here.
Speaker 2: So now I think before we jump into your company
Speaker 2: and your founder journey, our audience would appreciate learning more
Speaker 2: about your experience working with creators from Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest.
Speaker 2: So how did all of that start and how did
Speaker 2: this really form and come to formation.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so originally, when I first got my first role
Speaker 4: working with creators, I was working with more like traditional
Speaker 4: mommy bloggers, women like in the Midwest, fashion food. And
Speaker 4: then I got a role at Pinterest and it was
Speaker 4: very same type of profile of creators. And then one
Speaker 4: day I discovered TikTok and I was just completely obsessed
Speaker 4: and I was just really excited about the way that
Speaker 4: TikTok was transforming discoverability and allowing anyone with talent that
Speaker 4: was entertaining to be discovered, didn't matter if they had
Speaker 4: fancy camera equipment or if they just were using their
Speaker 4: iPhone And in their car. I ended up getting a
Speaker 4: role there and was there during the height of the
Speaker 4: pandemic over two years, and I also in that time
Speaker 4: became a content creator myself, So I firsthand was just
Speaker 4: seeing like how transformative TikTok was for people's careers, for
Speaker 4: people's lives to allow them to be able to start
Speaker 4: businesses during that time. In my time working with creators,
Speaker 4: I just realized that there was a lot of issues
Speaker 4: around pay transparency and the ways that brands were working
Speaker 4: with creators. There's not really a platform out there that
Speaker 4: was allowing creators access to pay information like traditional salaried
Speaker 4: professionals had, And so I was super inspired and just
Speaker 4: like by a pain point that I was seeing in
Speaker 4: my day to day work to launch my own company.
Speaker 1: So, like many folks who start a small business, you
Speaker 1: were doing this on the side while working full time,
Speaker 1: and I'd love for you to give us some insight
Speaker 1: into what that actually looked like when you're like burning
Speaker 1: the midnight oil.
Speaker 4: It was kind of like a really interesting time for
Speaker 4: me personally because I had moved from San Francisco to
Speaker 4: La to get this role at TikTok, and I kind
Speaker 4: of envisioned my life being super fun. I would be
Speaker 4: going to events, and then the reality is that COVID
Speaker 4: happened and I had moved to a new city and
Speaker 4: I was like alone in my apartment and no one
Speaker 4: was going out, and it gave me a lot of time.
Speaker 4: And this is also when I really tried to pursue
Speaker 4: this idea of building an app. So I would do
Speaker 4: my nine to five and then at night I would
Speaker 4: work with my developer team to build the app. It
Speaker 4: was a really intense, like six months. I saw it
Speaker 4: as an opportunity to really pursue something that I normally
Speaker 4: probably wouldn't have made time for.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you are running a business, You're creating content
Speaker 1: that is difficult to do just one of those aspects,
Speaker 1: but you're doing it at the same time. How do
Speaker 1: you juggle those responsibilities?
Speaker 4: For me, the biggest thing that has really helped me
Speaker 4: prioritize my time and be more efficient in my day
Speaker 4: to day is outsourcing like things that I'm not good at.
Speaker 4: So initially when I started my entrepreneurial journey and became
Speaker 4: a founder, I was trying to just do everything myself,
Speaker 4: even things I didn't understand how to do and what
Speaker 4: I realized is I can outsource, pay someone to help
Speaker 4: me and it will save me like eight hours of
Speaker 4: my week. So I started doing that in small ways.
Speaker 4: I hired someone to help me with the TikTok presence
Speaker 4: of the account. I actually like use quick books to
Speaker 4: help me with managing my invoices, tracking my expenses as
Speaker 4: a business owner. And like anything I can do, whether
Speaker 4: it's paying for an app, outsourcing like an intern or
Speaker 4: a coordinator, it really really helps me focus on the
Speaker 4: things I really need to prioritize within my business that
Speaker 4: will make me a better founder and leader.
Speaker 2: Can we unpack that a little bit more, because I
Speaker 2: think there's a lot of people listening right now who
Speaker 2: might be tackling with the idea of should I bring
Speaker 2: on help doing to hire somebody? Do you have any
Speaker 2: key insights there as to where you made the decision? Wait,
Speaker 2: I take a step back and I began delegating work elsewhere.
Speaker 4: It can be really time consuming to be creative, come
Speaker 4: up with new ideas, new content ideas for your business,
Speaker 4: even spending time on apps like TikTok and trying to
Speaker 4: keep up with trends. And I think for me as
Speaker 4: a founder, like I just didn't feel like that was
Speaker 4: something I wanted to do. I was feeling like I'm
Speaker 4: on my phone all day, and to be honest, I
Speaker 4: also felt like I wanted someone who was just living
Speaker 4: and breathing that world. And I had a few creators
Speaker 4: reach out to me like offering to help big creators
Speaker 4: like you know, eight hundred thousand, a million followers, And
Speaker 4: so I hired an intern named Joseph to help me
Speaker 4: with my TikTok content and he brought so many innovative
Speaker 4: ideas and was really able to be my eyes and
Speaker 4: ears on social and help me understand what's trending, what
Speaker 4: creators are talking about, what pain points are happening. It
Speaker 4: was so valuable to bring him on to our team,
Speaker 4: and it really took so much of that like pressure
Speaker 4: of me constantly being on off of my plate.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I think what happens for a lot of small business
Speaker 1: owners who were in this point where they know they
Speaker 1: need to outsource, they know they need to start optimizing
Speaker 1: in order to scale. They think automatically like I got
Speaker 1: to hire people. But it's also important to think about
Speaker 1: systems right and what software and tools exist. So how
Speaker 1: did you identify what areas of your business you could
Speaker 1: implement software tools in order to make your life easier.
Speaker 4: One of those tools was Canva. I think prior to Canval,
Speaker 4: I would have never been able to, like run my
Speaker 4: own Instagram account for my business. There's so many different
Speaker 4: apps that help streamline like very tedious processes that you
Speaker 4: might have. There's apps for you know, legal help. There's
Speaker 4: websites where you can download like templated contracts. My first
Speaker 4: mistake was I went out and hired a legal team
Speaker 4: and it was extremely expensive. I spent like ten thousand
Speaker 4: dollars on contracts. And then another founder told me about
Speaker 4: a website you paid like forty dollars a month and
Speaker 4: you had access to like all these different amazing contracts
Speaker 4: and templates like NDA. So sometimes as a new business owner,
Speaker 4: you don't really understand where to go for these resources.
Speaker 4: It's been incredibly important to have community and network with
Speaker 4: other founders because everyone is in the same boat and
Speaker 4: they're really willing to help.
Speaker 1: Can you tell us a little bit about the thought
Speaker 1: process that you go through in order to decide what
Speaker 1: things you should outsource versus what things you should maintain
Speaker 1: control over.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I think time management for me. That's like probably
Speaker 4: one of the biggest factors. If I feel like something
Speaker 4: is taking up my time or I'm not the best
Speaker 4: at it, then it's something that I want to try
Speaker 4: to outsource. For example, I would say areas of my
Speaker 4: business that I know nothing about, things like legal, things
Speaker 4: like accounting. I'm not going to pretend that I need
Speaker 4: to be that expert when I have so many other
Speaker 4: areas that I need to focus on, and I don't
Speaker 4: need to feel like I need to understand the basics
Speaker 4: of xyz to be a successful founder.
Speaker 1: And as a follow up. So when you're hiring somebody,
Speaker 1: obviously one of the things you got to start thinking
Speaker 1: about is how you're going to pay them. I know
Speaker 1: I made the mistake of not thinking about that when
Speaker 1: I hired my first contractor and I was like, oh
Speaker 1: wait a minute, how do I actually give them money?
Speaker 1: And I was like, do I do Zell? Do I
Speaker 1: do Venmo or something like that. So how did you
Speaker 1: start and implement your payroll process?
Speaker 4: Yep, I was exactly like you. I started with Venmo
Speaker 4: and Zell and it just didn't feel right. I'm like,
Speaker 4: something about this just didn't feel like I was keeping
Speaker 4: track of my expenses properly. But then I quickly realized, like, look,
Speaker 4: as a business owner, you really do have to keep
Speaker 4: track of everything, you know, for tax breaks, and there
Speaker 4: are repercussions if you don't keep track of things. So
Speaker 4: discovering QuickBooks was super helpful because it really allowed me
Speaker 4: to like sleep at night understanding that I'm keeping track
Speaker 4: of everything.
Speaker 2: Coming up on Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories.
Speaker 4: There's a big difference as a creator if you know,
Speaker 4: you just can't manage your inbox and you're having trouble
Speaker 4: responding to emails, and in that case you might just
Speaker 4: need like an intern or an assistant. You might not
Speaker 4: need a management company.
Speaker 3: We'll be right back after the break.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Mind the Business Small Business Success Stories
Speaker 1: brought to you by iHeartRadio and into a quick Books.
Speaker 2: So, you know, thinking more about this idea of hiring
Speaker 2: contractors and kind of doing that part for the business.
Speaker 2: What was like the first part of your business that
Speaker 2: you began to outsource or hire contractors for. You mentioned
Speaker 2: the intern, you mentioned the legal stuff. Can you kind
Speaker 2: of walk us through as you begin to scale your business,
Speaker 2: you started realizing, wait, I need to do this, I
Speaker 2: need this next, and this after that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So even starting back in the early days, I outsourced
Speaker 4: and worked with like an agency to help build my apps.
Speaker 4: I think that was the very beginning like stages of
Speaker 4: hiring help. And then once I launched the business, I
Speaker 4: quickly realized that I needed help. I needed help with
Speaker 4: social I needed help with content, I needed legal help.
Speaker 4: And so I have kind of gone through and hired
Speaker 4: a bunch of different types of contractors as things are needed,
Speaker 4: like I've hired copywriters.
Speaker 1: So having an agent or a talent manager, that's another
Speaker 1: form of outsourcing, right, because now you're not having to
Speaker 1: be the one to negotiate these deals and review contracts.
Speaker 1: That was a decision that I made as a creator,
Speaker 1: maybe like two years into my journey, just because I
Speaker 1: felt like I wasn't no longer qualified to be reading
Speaker 1: all of these legal documents and understanding like what is exclusivity,
Speaker 1: what is whitelisting? All of these things? So how do
Speaker 1: you determine as a creator, like when it makes sense
Speaker 1: or if it makes sense to hire a talent manager
Speaker 1: or an agent.
Speaker 4: Yeah, this is seen as sort of a north star,
Speaker 4: like I am successful because now I have a management
Speaker 4: company and I think in reality, like you really have
Speaker 4: to protect yourself as a creator. There's a big difference
Speaker 4: as a creator if you know you just can't manage
Speaker 4: your inbox and you're having trouble responding to emails, and
Speaker 4: in that case you might just need like an intern
Speaker 4: or an assistant. You might not need a management company.
Speaker 4: There are so many different ways to approach, Like having
Speaker 4: a management company, you know, you don't have to be
Speaker 4: exclusive with them, you don't have to let them have
Speaker 4: full control of your inbox. For me, when I did
Speaker 4: sign with the management company, I made sure a lawyer
Speaker 4: looked over my contract so I was able to protect
Speaker 4: myself my business separate the two. It's really important as
Speaker 4: creators and as like freelancers that we really make sure
Speaker 4: that we're protecting ourselves and we don't just kind of
Speaker 4: get excited by the idea of having a manager because
Speaker 4: it doesn't necessarily mean we'll get more brand deals or
Speaker 4: make more money.
Speaker 2: I totally agree, and as a content creator, I agree
Speaker 2: with everything you just said, right, But I kind of
Speaker 2: want to backtrack here to the idea of your company
Speaker 2: in the beginning, and when you were finding that product
Speaker 2: market fit right, when you were observing the paid disparities
Speaker 2: between different content creators. I'm curious around the research process.
Speaker 2: Were you interviewing creators, talking to agencies perhaps, how are
Speaker 2: you sort of doing your research and conducting research for
Speaker 2: your company.
Speaker 3: In the early.
Speaker 4: Stages, I had had positions at Instagram, at Pictures and TikTok,
Speaker 4: and I was like the internal point of contact for
Speaker 4: creators and as a result, I would be seed on
Speaker 4: deals with the biggest brands and creators, and having different
Speaker 4: creators that I represented, I would see like firsthand the
Speaker 4: disparities on email. It was never like malicious intent by
Speaker 4: the brands to pay creators different amounts. The issue was
Speaker 4: always just that, like a lot of the creators didn't
Speaker 4: have access to resources, so the brands met the creator
Speaker 4: at their desired rate, and as a result, I was like, Wow,
Speaker 4: I really wish this creator knew that this creator was
Speaker 4: getting paid ten times as much. And I just felt like,
Speaker 4: you know, both the brands and the creators really needed
Speaker 4: access to that information to make it a more fruitful relationship.
Speaker 4: I was also seeing a lot of brands being canceled
Speaker 4: online because they were paying creators less, and I just
Speaker 4: felt like it's such a new industry, and so I
Speaker 4: wanted to really help with that transparency on both the
Speaker 4: creator and the brand side to really help with the
Speaker 4: pay disparities.
Speaker 1: So, Chris, did we all know that entrepreneurship can feel
Speaker 1: like you're juggling a million different things at the same time.
Speaker 1: So how do you manage your work life balance? Is
Speaker 1: there even such a thing in terms of work life balance?
Speaker 4: What I do think is great about being a business
Speaker 4: owner and like owning your own business is there is
Speaker 4: usually some sort of flexibility in terms of you're able
Speaker 4: to set your own schedule in a lot of ways.
Speaker 4: So for me, the typical day is I tend to
Speaker 4: take all my meetings before like eleven am Pacific, and
Speaker 4: then I literally the whole day will do errands, I'll
Speaker 4: go on a hike, I'll be away from my computer,
Speaker 4: and then around five pm, six pm, I'll come back
Speaker 4: and do all my work. I'm kind of a night owl.
Speaker 4: I'm awake at night. I feel more creative, and I
Speaker 4: feel like for me that's been really really helpful for
Speaker 4: like my mental health and for work life balance. I'm
Speaker 4: able to see my family, I'm able to like exercise
Speaker 4: and do fun things, go to the Trader Joe's when
Speaker 4: it's not super crowded, and also able to like maintain
Speaker 4: and feel good about me running my business.
Speaker 1: I think that's the beauty of having your own business right.
Speaker 1: It's the ability to build a career that also aligns
Speaker 1: with the lifestyle that you're looking for. And you're not
Speaker 1: set to a specific schedule. You know, the work date
Speaker 1: will never look the same twice, and that's both the
Speaker 1: beauty and the curse. But you got to figure out
Speaker 1: how to make your work right exactly.
Speaker 2: So we know the history of your company, but what's
Speaker 2: next right, what's next for Clara? And where can the
Speaker 2: people find you?
Speaker 4: When I started off, it was like a lot of
Speaker 4: brands just wanted to work with creators based on their
Speaker 4: following and their reach. It was all about how many
Speaker 4: followers does this creators have. I think, of course a
Speaker 4: lot of that still range true today and that's always
Speaker 4: going to be something that brands care about, is overall
Speaker 4: reach and engagement impressions and things like that. But what
Speaker 4: I have noticed, you know, in the past couple of years,
Speaker 4: it's more about hiring creators based off of skill set.
Speaker 4: And I think even like think you two are a
Speaker 4: great example of this, brands want to hire creators as
Speaker 4: like voiceover actors, as podcast hosts, as you know, creative directors.
Speaker 4: There's not really a platform that allows creators to be
Speaker 4: seen for all these different skills aside from being like
Speaker 4: a fashion creator, someone might also be a photographer or
Speaker 4: a model, and like, is there a platform that's capturing that?
Speaker 4: And so a lot of what I'm working on for
Speaker 4: Clara in the next year is really helping creators be
Speaker 4: seen for their skill set aside from just like audience
Speaker 4: and following. And then Clara for creators is on TikTok
Speaker 4: and Instagram. My personal Instagram is just Kristen Hri I
Speaker 4: s t e N Kristin. This has been an amazing conversation.
Speaker 1: I just want to thank you for all of the
Speaker 1: knowledge that you've been able to share with us about
Speaker 1: how to start outsourcing and thinking about delegating different tasks
Speaker 1: in your business, because it's something that I think most
Speaker 1: of us are going to have to confront at some point,
Speaker 1: and just knowing that it's a work in progress. You're
Speaker 1: going to get things right sometimes and you're not going
Speaker 1: to get them right all the time. It's just part
Speaker 1: of the journey. So thanks so much for being here.
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, Christen, this was a blast.
Speaker 4: Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2: That was such an incredible conversation with Kristin Denis. What's
Speaker 2: stuck out to you the most in this conversation.
Speaker 1: Well, it's hard to pick just one, but absolutely I
Speaker 1: love how real she was about how we have to
Speaker 1: work our way towards putting in actual systems when we're
Speaker 1: thinking about outsourcing and scaling. I love the fact that
Speaker 1: we both related on the fact that we use Venmo
Speaker 1: and Zel to pay our first contractors, so I don't
Speaker 1: feel so bad about it, because unless you come from
Speaker 1: a family of small business owners, you're not necessarily going
Speaker 1: to know what you should be doing and how to
Speaker 1: structure this stuff. So I just love how it's an
Speaker 1: evolutionary process for a lot of us and we kind
Speaker 1: of figure out what not to do by doing that thing, and.
Speaker 2: Some of us still fall victim to that, which is
Speaker 2: totally fine. It's totally fine. Build up those processes. You're
Speaker 2: going to get there eventually. I think for me, Janise,
Speaker 2: it was how self aware she was by what she knew,
Speaker 2: what she was good at and not good at. Right,
Speaker 2: she talked about how she outsourced for the legal paperwork
Speaker 2: and the legal help. There she outsourced with building the
Speaker 2: app and the coding and the design.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 2: I think every small business owner listening right now needs
Speaker 2: to have that self awareness to know, wait a second,
Speaker 2: I'm really good at marketing, I'm really good at accounting,
Speaker 2: I'm really good at sales, but I'm not good at
Speaker 2: insert thing here, Right, and having that self awareness really
Speaker 2: allows you to say it, now, it'side for me to delegate. Now,
Speaker 2: it's time for me to find those processes and put
Speaker 2: those processes in place for my business so I can
Speaker 2: begin to take it to the next level.
Speaker 3: Which is clearly what she's doing right.
Speaker 2: One of the first things I realized I needed to
Speaker 2: delegate was my accounting before hiring an accountant. QuickBooks definitely
Speaker 2: was a lifesaver for me in terms of keeping record
Speaker 2: in my cash blow and being ready for tax season.
Speaker 2: Especially with QuickBooks live experts, I was able to ask
Speaker 2: more questions and get specific insights into things I wouldn't
Speaker 2: have normally.
Speaker 3: Thought of for my own business.
Speaker 2: Really excited to hear about the future of Clara and
Speaker 2: how she's sort of building this marketplace of sports between
Speaker 2: companies looking for creators.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I love the idea that folks are finally taking
Speaker 1: content creators seriously and actually realizing that this is a
Speaker 1: viable career and creating tools to help us make it
Speaker 1: sustainable too. You know, Kristen talked a lot about how
Speaker 1: her company helps creators, but I also see a lot
Speaker 1: of opportunities for small business owners as well. Thinking back
Speaker 1: to our marketing episode, we learned about the importance of
Speaker 1: social media marketing, but as a small business, I know
Speaker 1: and you know that it's hard to create this kind
Speaker 1: of content in house. Having a platform like the Claara
Speaker 1: app makes it so much easier for small businesses to
Speaker 1: identify which creators best aligned with their brands so that
Speaker 1: they can actually go back to focusing on their day
Speaker 1: to day operations. I also appreciate that Kristen's business is
Speaker 1: built around content creators finding community with one another and
Speaker 1: not simply just trying to manage everything alone. Some of
Speaker 1: the best advice I've received has come from other business owners,
Speaker 1: and I think a big part of being a founder
Speaker 1: is learning how to learn from others in order to
Speaker 1: improve your own business.
Speaker 2: Well that's it for today's episode. You can find me
Speaker 2: on social Media at Austin Hanklets.
Speaker 1: And you can find me at Jochiato within netto podcast.
Speaker 2: And you can follow Into It QuickBooks on all social
Speaker 2: media at QuickBooks.
Speaker 3: To get the tools you need to.
Speaker 2: Start, run and grow your business, head to QuickBooks dot
Speaker 2: com today.
Speaker 1: Catch the next episode of Mind the Business Small Business
Speaker 1: Success Stories on Thursday, June eighth, where we speak to
Speaker 1: Kevin Wong, co founder of lunarhart Seltzer, on how to
Speaker 1: build a quality team of employees.
Speaker 2: You won't want to miss this one, so don't forget
Speaker 2: to follow, rate, and review this show wherever you listening
Speaker 2: to podcasts so you can stay up to date on
Speaker 2: our future episodes and.
Speaker 1: Check out our show notes for more information from this
Speaker 1: episode and founder dependence and a huge thank you to
Speaker 1: our guest Kristen Nino Degouzman.
Speaker 2: This podcast is a production of iHeartRadio and Into It QuickBooks.
Speaker 1: Our executive producer is Molly Soosha, our supervising producer is
Speaker 1: Nikiah Swinton, and our writer is Tyree Rush.
Speaker 2: Our head of post production is James Foster, and we
Speaker 2: will see you next Stick