Produced By - From Resignation to Reinvention: How to Design Life and Business on Your Terms | #120: Emily Dunlop

Starting point is 00:00:00 They can do it, so can I. And it's not to say, like, no one's better than anyone, but also you're not better than anyone else as well. So if we ever find ourselves questioning of, like, one day I'll do that, just have a look at the people that are changing the game in multiple niches. If you just give yourself permission and license to know that you don't have to have a plan, but you do have to believe in yourself, and you will be surprised of where opportunities can take you when you just give it a go.

Starting point is 00:00:26 And it starts little by little, action by action, one person. leads to another, you start to see impact. And it doesn't, and it doesn't have to take a year. It doesn't have to take a couple of years. It can start quite quickly. But you do have to, you do owe it to yourself to see where you can take if you're not happy. I always think I, I'm not the person that advocates that everybody should leave their nine to five. If you're in a company that allows you to live up to your highest potential, then amazing. That is incredible. But oftentimes people are unhappy in their careers and don't realize that they can go and make incredible businesses, Before we dive into today's episode, please hit that subscribe button.

Starting point is 00:01:04 Your support helps us grow and inspire more people on their journeys. Thank you. Hello, Emily. Thank you for joining us today and welcome to the show. Hey, so nice to be here. So Emily, for those who don't know you, can you please introduce yourself? Yeah, so I'm Emily. I'm the founder of the Good Marketing Club and the Authority Academy, which is my flagship offer,

Starting point is 00:01:29 where I help people define and scale a high-ticket offer through their personal brand. So I literally have been in entrepreneur world for only a year. I still feel like I'm just getting started. And yeah, I've had the best time in the last year since pivoting from my corporate career into the world of solopreneurship. That's actually something I was about to ask you, because as I read more about yourself, I know that you've got a lot of experience when it comes to marketing from the corporate work. So can you tell us more about your experience back then?

Starting point is 00:02:01 And then what was the shift that made you to switch? Yeah, so I've worked for about 12 years in marketing and always, you know, was always working for either in-house at agencies or for brands like Brudog. You know, my last company was working for a technology company. And I reached this point in life where, you know, for having done so much good work, I was always really inspired and always very ambitious, but I reached this point in my career that I was like, I'm not happy anymore.

Starting point is 00:02:33 I've built this career and I've built this life. But I feel like I remember vividly reaching this point where I thought I'm not happy with anything that I've done. I'm very proud of my accomplishments. But I feel like I was always letting life happen around me. So I was, you know, very governed by the next promotion or the next, you know. Like climbing the ladder, right? Climbing the ladder.

Starting point is 00:02:58 And I feel like there's kind of two Emmylies. There's the Emily before January 2024 where I was very, you know, always wanting to work and to strive for the next big thing. And then there's the Emily after January 20204 when I'd reached that point of then starting to rewind and actually ask myself some important questions. So just for context, before January 2024, I'd. was working for technology company, traveling around the world, but I had fallen out of love with the company and I'd also gone through a long term, I'd come out of a long term relationship.

Starting point is 00:03:33 So I'm living back at home with my mum and at that point I started to ask myself, okay, what do I actually want to do? So I remember vividly going to India, I was on a work trip and taking myself off to go and work remotely from Goa and from that point starting to ask myself these questions of like, okay, if I could do anything, what would that be? And, you know, we, we avoid so many of the simple but hard to answer questions. And from that point, I started to redesign everything. So I started to spend a little bit of time in Tuscany. And I remember my friend saying to me, Emily, when you come back, your energy is just different. And so I thought, okay, why don't I just try and see what it's like to go and live in Tuscany? How, how can it be? And so I booked a one-way

Starting point is 00:04:17 ticket, landed in Florence, joined a running club, just with the idea of this can just be temporary, or it can be forever, who knows, giving yourself license to go and do what you want to do. And so my personal life started to feel really great. I started to make friends here. I very quickly, you know, had a community and was really loving my personal life, but I was still at this company. And it's no discredit to the company. The company was amazing. I'm so grateful for the opportunities that I had. But I started to notice. this imbalance of, okay, personal life's going great, but I'm still always traveling. I was on a work trip to Australia on a three-day turnaround and I looked in the mirror and I thought, okay,

Starting point is 00:04:58 you'll burn out. You want to get back to Italy. So now it's time to actually figure out what does the next step from your professional life look like. So literally, on that flight home, I decided I was going to resign from the company and I decided I was going to build a business. And I remember that whole, I mean, it takes a long time to get from Australia back to Italy. I sketched out everything. I sketched out what offers could look like, what my lifestyle and business and the type of people that I want to work with could look like. And from there, let's say the rest is history. I'm trying to imagine when you board a flight and then when you leave the plate, you've got a completely different plan basically for the new career. It sounds like exciting, hard to believe. Yeah, I think I

Starting point is 00:05:43 gave myself permission to figure it out. I always think like you shouldn't have a five year plan because then you're not giving yourself the opportunity to see where to see where things take you. So what I started to do was then I was always a very, I've always been very passionate about LinkedIn, but I was always a very passive user. So I was never like building my own brand. I was just always kind of looking at what was going on. And so I started to be more visible on LinkedIn. So strategically before I actually launched, I was kind of gaining a bit of momentum, just like, you know, not massive. But I went to market with five different offers because I didn't really know. What was I really passionate about? What does the market need? I think oftentimes you can think,

Starting point is 00:06:30 okay, this is what I'm really passionate about. But if there's no demand in the market for it, then, you know, you're doing yourself a disservice there. So when I launched the good marketing club, really, all I knew at that time is that I wanted to do good work. I wanted to talk with good people and I wanted to have a good time. That's why my company was called the Good Marketing Club. And so I'm still governed by those values, but my offer has evolved. So when I first went right with my business, because my background's always been in brand marketing, I started in PR, event, social media, content, working with influences and creators and so on. So I went to market with five offers. I wanted to do PR. I wanted to do personal branding. I wanted to do social and content and so on. And so I just gave

Starting point is 00:07:09 myself permission to see where the demand was. And so it's quite interesting. I didn't have any clients for two months, but someone that was following my content then referred me. He never used to engage with my content, never saw him popping up in liking or, you know, engaging. But he was seeing my content. He could see the values. He could see my kind of journey. And then he referred me to his client. And that's when I hit my first five-figure retainer. And then from there was able to then double down of okay I can see that the market has this big demand for personal branding that's what I'm passionate about so then I was able to have the money coming in so I could double down to go and get more casities under my belt I've always done personal branding but under you know

Starting point is 00:07:53 the guys of other companies so I needed to have some casidies with like me being the brand I'm actually glad that you mention it because I think sometimes people might feel like that they're posting but there are really no results or it's not really working but as you just said you never know if there's like someone following you in a background or if people are just watching and maybe waiting for a perfect moment so for example as you said you might be posting for a few months

Starting point is 00:08:21 and then suddenly some opportunity may show up or someone might reach out to you so I think it's just a good proof that it's worth going worth continuing and you never know when it might pay off I think that happens so often of like it's not that the clients that end up having are not the people that are going to be the first ones to comment on your content. And that's why I think we need to get away with this idea of like virality is how you grow your

Starting point is 00:08:45 business. Like our egos love to see as much, you know, our analytics always going up. But that wasn't always equate to, you know, money in the bank. So, you know, I think it's really interesting to make sure that you're clear on who you want to help, how you're helping them, inspiring, educating them. But don't be full to think that it's the people that. It's the people that engaging in your content that are going to actually end up being clients because I found that I'd say about 70% of my clients never used to engage for my content, but they've come across me in some ways. Maybe they've signed up to a newsletter and so on. So yeah, I think that's definitely a myth that we need to look to dispel. I agree and I heard it even from previous guests saying

Starting point is 00:09:26 pretty much the same thing. And just coming back to when you were deciding about your offer, because I'm sure that there are many people who are in such a situation when they want to offer something, saw something, but maybe they have too many ideas or they don't really know what to choose, how to pick. So what would be your advice, such as start posting and see what works if people reach out or looking back? What would you do maybe differently? Such a good question. I feel like I don't have regrets in terms of going out to market with five because from there I was able to see. I think for sure, when I went live, it's not like I'd crafted and built an offer. I had, I just had like wording on my website and my messaging.

Starting point is 00:10:12 The worst thing that you can do is go in, if you're like building a program, for example, is to go and build that program having not actually spoken to your audience to see whether there's demand in the market for that. And that happened a lot. So for example, like now that I have gone to market with my five offers, which was really confusing. I knew that I wanted to pursue personal branding, got my case studies, was able then to reach capacity by January, which is when I then decided to go into a one to many offer. And the reason why I ended up pivoting in the direction that I did is that I had organically clients coming to me saying, you know, I want to build a program. I don't know what to do. Can you help me? And so I was already working with people to build out their high

Starting point is 00:10:54 ticket offers and their personal branding. So it happened really organically. That being said, when I launched the Authority Academy, I made sure, first of all, to launch in a beta way so that I could get. It's when you sell as you build and then you can get your customers to come in and give you feedback, that is the holy grail. Because if you then spend all of that time and all that budget and money, building something that is wrong that your audience don't need, that isn't in demand. Like, you're just going to waste time. So I don't. I don't. I don't. I don't have any regrets of what I've done. That being said, I wish I'd trust myself earlier to do a want to many offer because it's so powerful. If you are trading time for money, then you're

Starting point is 00:11:34 always at the mercy of what time allows you to do. Yeah, that's a good point. And I think it also can be quite demotivated. If you start building something or you create some kind of perfect offer or whatever, you're very excited about it and find out that there is no demand for it. I'm sure that on top of what you mentioned, you waste time, money, energy. It can be, I think, quite demotivating. So I agree with it might be worth somehow testing it in before to make sure that there is a demand for it. Exactly. I think there's also so much power in joining the dots of your career.

Starting point is 00:12:10 So I remember my very first unofficial mentor in my first job when I worked in PR on a grad scheme. And this is my first, like, stab at the real world of working. and he said to him like there's no such thing as a bad job. And I never understood the power of that at the time, but there isn't actually any such thing as a bad job. When you can take what you're learning and what you like, when you come to this point of figuring out, okay, if you want to start a business and you're looking to kind of go and build an offer, it's so incredible now for me to be able to look back and join the dots of all the things that I like, what I don't like, what kinds of people I want to work with, what kind of work I want to do, what kind of, how do I want

Starting point is 00:12:48 to spend my time. So now, with what I've done with the Good Marketing Club, which is my Done for You offer, so I work with brands and founders to be able to build their personal brands in a done for you manner, I've now built an ecosystem. So you've got the Dunfor You side, which is a good marketing club, and then I've got the Authority Academy where we package up your creative zone of genius. And everybody has one. If you've led transformations, what I love now being able to do is help people understand what they love doing and what. what the market needs and create that in-demand offer from there because, you know, sometimes you just need to get a bit of guidance and help and actually packaging that up to make

Starting point is 00:13:28 sure is the positioning right? There's no niche at the moment which isn't saturated. Everything feels very busy, but what stands you apart is how you're positioned in the market. So that's what I really love now being able to make sense of my career, which we often don't really, we think we're going, what are we doing, you know, but now I've been able to reach this point of, okay, I can make sense of all the jumps and the pivots that I've made. And now I'm in a place where I'm really grateful for all the opportunities and situations that I've been in. I like it. And I think that's the right mindset because sometimes it might feel like that's maybe waste of time or something that you're not going to use. But then at some point in the future,

Starting point is 00:14:07 you might be looking back and feel like, oh, that's actually very helpful what I learned back then because I express it by myself. Really? Yeah. It's incredible. Yeah, and I think it also teaches you that when you experience such a situation again, then it reminds you that maybe it might be actually helpful in the future again. So, yeah. There's no such thing as if you get made redundant, for example, like it's happened to a lot of it's happened to me. Every time something like that has happened, you don't think it at the time, but it's actually redirecting you into what you want to do.

Starting point is 00:14:41 When we're just kind of building our careers and we're just letting life happen, you know, around us, If we're not in the driving seat, then you're always at the mercy of what opportunities come your way. And it's a really powerful point of coming to that point of like, okay, this is what I'm good at and actually being brave enough to like say, I'm good at this. You know, you don't have to wait for people to say now it's the time for you to make that jump. You can decide at any point, this is what I know I'm good at. This is the proof that I have. That's one thing that I think often people are too shy to actually claim that one, they're good at the things and two to claim the proof.

Starting point is 00:15:16 you've left transformations, if people are saying and sharing the wins with you, like you may as well look to create a business out of that because it's literally proof, right? And after all, you deserve it. If it's like a proof of something that you've achieved, why not share it with people? And other people do it as well. So don't let them maybe steal, like your clients or anything like that if you actually have proof to back it up as well. So that's a good point. And the third's like motivated. And, something that we briefly discussed before was like niching down or when it comes to any niche areas such as when it's saturated but you still need to stand out somehow.

Starting point is 00:15:59 So what is your opinion when it comes to this? Because I think it's a quite a hot topic on LinkedIn when people discuss, you know, you have to niche down. So what would you advise? Especially for starters, niche down, go broader, something in between. Do you mean from an offer perspective or for the personal brand? I would say both. Okay, because I love this question.

Starting point is 00:16:23 So from a personal brand perspective, I don't think you need to niche down because your personal brand is a reflection of you and we're all multifaceted. So I give myself license to explore certain topics with what I share on LinkedIn with what I share on Instagram. I don't only talk about personal branding. I have my topic, which is mindset. I'm not a mindset coach, but I know that so many people can relate to mindset. It's what has helped me the most in figuring out what do I want to do with my life.

Starting point is 00:16:52 What do I want to do with my career? So I talk about mindset. I talk about personal branding. I talk about quitting my job and life in Italy. So I don't specifically compete in my niche because I am sharing, I'm building in public. I'm sharing what I'm going through. I'm sharing my wins. I'm sharing my losses.

Starting point is 00:17:09 I'm sharing what's working for me and I'm paying that forward. When it comes to your offer, that's when I do believe you have to niche down because otherwise, if you want to win in your space, then you have to claim the space that you're in. But what then sets you apart is your positioning. And that's what I think too often, people start building their brand and they don't really understand that they haven't asked themselves to the questions of like, what is the intention of this brand? What's the intention of the business? And so every niche is saturated, but what no one can compete on you with is, you and your offers, right? So it's really important to ask yourself, you know, who are you

Starting point is 00:17:48 here to serve? How do you help? What's your unique way of helping serve them? What are the big pain points that you help people to be able to overcome? And what's your unique take on that, your frameworks, your IP and so on and so forth? So from a personal brand perspective, I don't think you need to niche down. But when it comes to your business, you need to define and own the niche that you're playing in. I like it. I think it's a great answer. And just, to add something to the second one. I feel like that people often are asking for, I don't know, some kind of advice or secret source or whatever, but I think that it ultimately comes down to what you said, that something that is unique about yourself, because after all, that's what

Starting point is 00:18:29 differentiates you from others. That's why clients would choose you over other people. And I think that's also kind of recurring topic or recurring factor that I've heard from other guests as well. So I'm glad that you mentioned it because I think that's true as well. Yeah. And that's the thing. That's why I think personal branding is having such a moment because we recognize now that, you know, when you choose to buy a product or to work with a coach or to buy a service, like there is many people doing the exact same thing and can get you the exact same outcome.

Starting point is 00:19:05 But why you make your decisions now, while we make our decisions now, it's because we like the person. We relate to that story. we relate to their character and we want to be part of their world. And that's what I think it's really important now for any founder, but also for anyone to recognize now. If you want a future proof, your business, your career, play in the space of personal branding because you can never go wrong.

Starting point is 00:19:29 I don't know anyone that started building their personal brand and then had any regrets by doing that. Yeah, exactly. I agree. But I think that now there might be people listening to us and thinking, oh, it's so easy to say to be unique. So if you look at it from that perspective, what would you say would be to find your unique edge, such as some USB or competitive advantage?

Starting point is 00:19:54 What would you advise for such a question? I think one of the areas that I see so many, and it's something that I was also shy of to begin with, is that I just didn't think I had an interesting story. one of the exercises I always take my clients on is when you map out your life from the point that you were born to now and then also looking at the legacy and the mission that you're here to serve to achieve. I've never not been impressed by someone's origin story. I've never not been impressed when someone shared with me their life story. That's when you can see, you know,

Starting point is 00:20:25 where do your opinions, where does your point of view come from? What are these pivots that you've gone through the highs, the lows and the messy moments? And so if you want to stand out in a crowded space, which every space feels crowded, it's by owning and claiming your story, owning and claiming what you stand by. Everybody starts, and before you've actually built a community, you're not going to get, every post isn't going to go off. And the reason why it ends up taking longer than others is that you're trying to appease everyone. You're trying to be liked by everyone, but we're not all the same. And so I started noticing my own momentum when I started to get braver by the things that I believe in when I had the courage to share

Starting point is 00:21:08 them and not feel fearful of, oh, if it's going to be an old boss or an old colleague or someone went to school with, what do they, I don't care anymore. I'm like, honestly giving myself that license of like, and it's a muscle, you have to kind of work through it. We're all, we all feel cringe at the beginning. But when you can genuinely say, I don't care anymore, you will see such momentum in your content. And there's always that I know sometimes if I am a bit fearful of sharing something, that's typically the content that does the best. So I think by, to your question, get clear on your origin story, get clear on what you stand for, what you stand against, because that's the beauty now of like the people that I respect and the people that I engage

Starting point is 00:21:51 with their content, they're saying what I think. But we all sometimes are a bit fearful of actually saying the thing. So the brave ones that stand, they're bold, they stand by what they believe in, and they're not trying to be liked by everyone. I think Grace Andrews says a lot at the moment of like the 80-20 and this 80-20 principle is so effective in personal branding. You need to be okay being disliked by 80% of people and just know that if you stand true to who you are and what you believe in and what you're doing, that 20% of people will be so loyal to you and they advocate for you. They share your message. And so that's the aim.

Starting point is 00:22:28 I always think, and I really have found that to be true in my own experience as well. Don't aim to be liked by everyone. Stay true to your 20%. I like it. I know part of the principle, but I haven't heard it when it comes to branding. But I agree. You just made me laugh a bit before because I could relate to it. For example, when I was starting posting on LinkedIn or even thinking about starting a podcast,

Starting point is 00:22:51 I also was thinking, oh, what are people going to think? Is it going to be courage? Are they going to judge me? But in the end, I think that's something that everyone goes through. And when you look at it back, like, for example, now, I think it just makes you laugh. And it's not a big deal. It's not.

Starting point is 00:23:08 Do you know what's all so incredible of, like, before I was building my personal brand, when I was wearing the mask of being in corporate, and it's not, I've had a great career and I really enjoyed the things that I've been able to do, but I never was, I never showed my 100%. And so what's wild now is like I feel so comfortable sharing things on LinkedIn that I actually might still hide a little bit in my personal life. You start building on LinkedIn or whatever your

Starting point is 00:23:35 channel is. And it honestly is the most therapeutic. I don't know if you found this to be the same. It's the most therapeutic experience because you grow in confidence, you grow in your community and you just learn so much about yourself. And I think that's not people, that's my advice to people. If you're afraid of getting started, just know that you will learn so much about yourself. That there's no negatives, I don't think. I agree. And another point, what you mentioned before, like, for example, with sharing something more personal or some kind of stories. I heard it from many people as well, that the content that often resonated the most,

Starting point is 00:24:16 or had, for example, the highest number of impressions or engagement was actually some kind of personal story. for example, a picture of yourself with family or something funny, but I heard many times that it performed much better than some, I don't know, educational motivation or something like that. I'm not saying it happens all the time, but I literally heard it many times. So maybe advice for people not to be scared and try something like that as well. I think that like social media in general has just changed so much before, you know, if you were sharing like thought leadership educational content,

Starting point is 00:24:50 it would have performed really well. people, they don't, we all want to be educated and inspired, but the most, if you can aim for emotion, so whether that is inspiring people, helping people, that's the goal with content now. And, you know, we're all curious by nature. People want to see what is the life that you're living behind the scenes as well. That's why pictures, lifestyle shots, they perform really, really well. But still, I would always say, don't overindex just on one content format. I like to have a bit of a rhythm with mine. So I'll do like a carousel every week. that's like educational thought leadership still in there.

Starting point is 00:25:25 But I layer that in with the behind the scenes. I'll always share a high, I'll share a low. And so give people a variety to content. Because I think you can get bored of the same content if you're only ever doing that same style. So it's something that I found that works well for me, having that kind of rhythm. And it's worked really well for my clients as well. I agree. And I like it from both perspective of myself as a creator so that I find it more engaging,

Starting point is 00:25:52 creating and sharing different type of content, but also as a follower or your audience, because I like to see maybe different areas of your life and different type of content. So I think there are just many benefits to this approach. That's it. I think if you're not giving the true picture to actually what is going on in your business and what you're learning and so on, I have found people will celebrate your highs more and there's more depth to your highs if you actually show the tree picture. So no one starts growing their business and it's only ever wins and highs.

Starting point is 00:26:25 No one has a clear trajectory. Great if we did. And I think that's what I found really powerful of like if you do give that true picture, people want to learn. Like maybe you're inspiring somebody else to follow the same path as well. So give that real reality. Otherwise, it's not really believable if you're only ever sharing wins, wins, wins, humble brags. We all love a humble brag.

Starting point is 00:26:46 I love to celebrate people that, you know, are winning. But I think it's so much more powerful when you actually give that truer picture of the reality of what goes on. I think so, too. And I always admire those people who are not afraid to share highs on top of lows. Because, let's be honest, it's part of the journey. And I think that that's actually something that stands out more because not that many people maybe want to share it, maybe are not brave to share it. But always when I see it, that resonates with me really.

Starting point is 00:27:18 For sure. And that comes back to the story of like people are scared of their origin story. People are scared of actually sharing the reality. And I think again, back to the benefits of building your personal brand, you start to realize how powerful your story is and the vulnerabilities. They really help people so much more than you realize. So I think it's again, it's a muscle that you start. You don't start and you're brave straight away.

Starting point is 00:27:45 But little by little, you start to see the impact that your reality actually or your real story has has to people as well. So it's this kind of beautiful, yeah, it's a beautiful experience. That is true and I only agree. Are you struggling to stay consistent on LinkedIn? Fan post helps you create high-quality posts in minutes so you can write faster, show up more and stress way less. Built by creators for creators is the easiest way to grow your presents without burning out.

Starting point is 00:28:18 Try it free. at fanpost.com. Before Emily, you mentioned that you also run your academy. So is that something that you actually had in mind straight from the start or something that you started developing along the way? I had no insight. I didn't really, when I launched my business back in June last year, I really didn't expect anything.

Starting point is 00:28:43 I didn't know what was going to happen. I just knew that I was going to make it work. So before I went live, actually reached out to a couple of people that were building in public. And they gave me some amazing advice. He's a guy called Nick Lafferty. He'd left Loom to go and build his own business. And he was running this Sockstack newsletter where he was sharing his reality in the journey. And also his friend, Tamara, she'd left, she was the ex-vip of product marketing from Kajabi. She was also documenting her journey and she had a one-to-many offer. So two very different models.

Starting point is 00:29:15 One was a solopreneur working one-to-one with people and Tamara was doing a want-to-men. And I was really inspired by their journey because they helped inspire me and kind of tell me like what you're saying now. You're going to make it work. You're going to make it. You're going to be fine. But give yourselves license to pivot, license to, you know, explore what works. So when I founded the good marketing club and I went down the route of personal branding, it was when I got to January when I was maxed out and I had my highest billing month, which was great on one side. But the reality was it was, it was stressful. And I had to then ask myself some questions of like, do I want to build an agency? I don't think I was a leader in the last company that I worked for and I didn't want

Starting point is 00:30:00 to manage lots of people. And so I asked myself some questions and I was exploring. And I was also really inspired by some people that I'd been following like Laura Acosta. She had scaled her agency and then launched the literally, literally academy. And I'd seen the power of going from one to when to and want to many offer in terms of revenue, but also in terms of impact. And I think by asking myself again these important questions, I knew that I wanted to help people just like me that had wanted to leave their corporate jobs or that they knew that they had, they knew they had like transformations that they'd led and they needed help to package it up. So it was a very organic process, to be honest. So that happened in January where I was at capacity. And then I started

Starting point is 00:30:45 just to go down some, you know, rabbit holes on YouTube. like learning from other creators that had scaled their agency into one to many offer. And so I found my coach in March and that's when I invested. I've always kind of had unofficial and official mentors. But that was my highest investment that I made in March. And that then helped me understand that. Actually, where do I want to take this next? And so again, it was an organic process of taking what I knew, taking what I was good at,

Starting point is 00:31:13 taking what I'd help clients with, and then packaging that up into an offer, which is the Authority Academy. And assuming there are many, like, academies or similar, let's say, courses or something like that, what is it that makes yours stand out or what makes it different? So I like to think mine's not a course. It's not like how I work with clients is it's typically entrepreneurs, creators, coaches that know that they have a transformative offer, but they haven't yet packaged that up into a scalable package. So when people come to me, it's either there at the very beginning.

Starting point is 00:31:50 They know that they have this offer to create or they've already built something, but there isn't the demand. So that's why it's not a course because people don't all start at the same levels, but it's a 16 week container. So it's not a cohort that there's like start and end dates. It's a 16 week container where we get really clear, first of all, on the mindset. The only thing that's going to deviate you from the goals that you have is mindset. We get into these comparison trapped.

Starting point is 00:32:15 We tend to get distracted by thinking we need to do all. all of these things. So it starts with the mindset and the foundations. Then we go through the actual offer. Sometimes people have incredible offers, but how it's being packaged and positioned to the market is just jarring and confusing. So again, with that packaging piece, people at different layers. Some people have already built that offer or some people are starting from scratch. I've got a couple of clients that they're actually looking to leave their corporate jobs by building out this in-demand offer for when that time is ready. So I help them get clear. about what that offer is, how do you build, sell as you build? How can we ensure that there is

Starting point is 00:32:53 actually demand in the market for this offer? It's amazing. The wins that I'm seeing my clients having of like within a couple of weeks, they're feeling demand. They're actually selling this concept that doesn't yet exist. So again, we get clear on the offer, we get clear on the packaging and then we get clear on the positioning. So again, coming back to what we discussed earlier, niches are saturated, but what stands you out is how do you actually position that, that offer the market so that you can compete and become a category of one. And then we look at the authority credentials. You know, we're so often sat on gold that we just don't realize. So, and you can engineer authority. You might think, well, I can't ever do what I want to do because I haven't

Starting point is 00:33:31 got the case studies or I haven't got the clout. You can engineer that and I help people get clear about how do you actually start to stack that authority. And then what content actually moves the needle. So, you know, people, again, are quite fearful of LinkedIn. So it's like an immersive, immersive experience to start getting comfortable with LinkedIn, to start building momentum, to start building a community. And then how do you actually sell? Again, it's very different. You know, we think that we have to have thousands and thousands and thousand and thousands followers to actually build an empire. I had a prospect call last week. A lady that I met, she has 77 connections on LinkedIn, but she's making 250K a year. So I teach people how to actually

Starting point is 00:34:10 sell, how to sell in the DMs, how to handle objections that come up on sales calls. And And then we go right through then from content then to the ecosystem that sits behind it. So I say email is the empire. How can we move people from your rented audiences, LinkedIn, Instagram into an owned ecosystem? So that's where it's different because it's not a content course. It's not a offer course. It's the whole ecosystem from packaging your offer, building out your content, building out your brand, building momentum with your community through to how do you actually then build communities in terms of like school, whether that's Qajabi, building. out your office that you have an audience ready to scale your business. Thank you. Explain it really well.

Starting point is 00:34:51 What are your target clients? Is there like any specific type of people that you work with or it can be literally anyone? So it's essentially founders, creators and coaches. You might be in a company and you want to go and pivot career. So it's people that is, I don't like to think of like ICPs. For me, it's like people like me. People that are ambitious, hungry, know that they have had transformation that they've led or they want to build out these types of offers. So it's people that are at different stages that are looking to either pivot into being an entrepreneur or they're looking to scale their businesses. So typically it's coaches, creators and soon to be creatopreneurs.

Starting point is 00:35:32 I was about to say that I think that's something that makes it unique or maybe more personal is that you are actually someone who went through the similar transformation, such as working in corporate job and then transitioning. So I'm sure that it's something that makes your clients relate to you. I think so. And I think when we work at companies, you know, we've all led transformations. And we often think that, you know, careers have to be. Because, you know, we grow up thinking that you have to be part of companies.

Starting point is 00:36:03 We think that to be a founder, or at least I always thought that being a founder meant that I'd have to like build an app or a product or, you know, something like that. But now I think we've realized that actually the bar to enter the market and to get into the creator economy, it's not that it's a low bar, but we're now starting to understand that we have value. If you've led transformations, if you've been part of a company's expansion and growth, how can you then package your lived experience? Or maybe it's something that you've transformed yourself through. Maybe you have gone through an illness that you're now like, there's lots of different areas. There's lots of different niches that you can package up and off. offering to. So I think we're now understanding that we have value to offer and that there is demand in the market. It's all how we package it up. And that's why I think we're in a really exciting time now with personal branding because the creator economy is only going to explode further and further. So now think about what's happening and the pace of innovation with AI, how much industries are changing to future proof yourself, whether you are a, you know, part of a company or if you're a founder, everybody should be investing in their personal brand.

Starting point is 00:37:13 Everybody actually has a personal brand. You know, think about how you think about people that you used to work with a boss, anybody. We've all got, we identify with this character. And so we need to realize that we have a personal brand and it's up to us to control the narrative and the opportunities that can come from that. I think so too. And I feel like that it has, I mean, I haven't been in the kind of industry or this sphere for such long time. But I feel like that it has evolved a lot. And as you mentioned,

Starting point is 00:37:45 with the development of technology or AI, I'm pretty sure it's going to keep evolving even more. So I think people also often think that it might be too late. But I think that it's never late and richer you can start anytime. And even like today or now. Exactly. And I think even in the last couple of weeks, for me, some pretty big things have happened where you've got Duolingo, the guru of social there, Zarya, she's now left that company. Grace Samedis just left the direct CEO. Really? No, I don't know.

Starting point is 00:38:18 We're now seeing, like, oh, really? I didn't know whether you're joking. And then, yeah, like, this has happened in the last couple of weeks, right? So we're now seeing in real time what happens when you pivot and you've already built a really strong personal brand. Like I look at Grace Andrews. She launched her vlog. She was documented her leaving the diary of the CEO. Within a couple of weeks, she's got book deals. There's so many opportunities that are coming her way. And I think this is playing out in real time now. So, you know, again, we're only going to see more and more opportunities.

Starting point is 00:38:52 And these kind of casities in front of us of what happens when you do invest yourself in yourself, when you invest in your personal brand, where you just see where opportunities can come from. Like if I'm honest, when I rewind to leaving my last job, I had seen somebody from a direct competitor had built out, had left that company and had built out a really amazing personal brand on LinkedIn and had just gone from strength to strength. That really inspired me because we shouldn't all think, you know, if they can do it, so can I. And it's not to say like no one's better than anyone, but also you're not better than anyone else as well. So if we think, if we ever find ourselves questioning of like, oh, one day I'll do that, just have a look at the people that are changing the game in multiple niches. If you just give yourself permission and license to know that you don't have to have a plan, but you do have to believe in yourself and you will be surprised of where opportunities can take you when you just give it a go. And it starts little by little, action by action. one post leads to another, you start to see impact.

Starting point is 00:39:58 And it doesn't have to take a year. It doesn't have to take a couple of years. It can start quite quickly, but you do have to, you do owe it to yourself to see where you can take if you're not happy. I always think, I'm not the person that advocates that everybody should leave their nine to five. If you're in a company that allows you to live up to your highest potential, then amazing, that is incredible. But oftentimes people are unhappy in their careers and don't realize that they can go and

Starting point is 00:40:23 make incredible businesses, profitable businesses, that enable them to live the life that they want. I agree. And just to come back to Duolingo, because I'm someone who uses Duolingo every day to do my streak, and I know that their marketing is or has been like super smart and obviously you can see it everywhere it's working. Of course, there was this moment with AI integration and the CEO not mentioning it in a best way, but I didn't know that. So that's why I was surprised. And same with, Grace, I guess I've been a bit behind, but I didn't know that. I don't, I think Zaria has left just a couple of days ago, but I think it only came out today. So that's something that we'll all be watching to see what she goes on to do next.

Starting point is 00:41:08 But yeah, you know, personal brand is not exclusive for just founders. It's not exclusive for just entrepreneurs. Like, you can be part of a company, but still investing in your personal brand. And that's what I would say to founders, like encourage your teams because the knock on effect of having a team where they have a presence and they're building their personal brand. Like the company benefits from that tenfold. But oftentimes I think companies are fearful of when their team start actually putting themselves out there and building.

Starting point is 00:41:40 I don't know why. It's a good question. But I feel the same that for me, it wouldn't make sense to stop my employees, not to build their breadth because I feel like that it would help the company with the promotion. I would rather encourage them. And if I was like a CEO or founder, it was actually inspiring me as well to start building mine too. But I don't know either.

Starting point is 00:42:02 And just to add to the point what you mentioned before, or just what I was about to say is that what I always try to keep in mind is that the regret of not doing something is the worst, such as, yes, something that I want to do. It might not work, but at least I find out that it's not working, but I will not have regrets thinking for the rest of my life. like, oh, what if I try? It might have work.

Starting point is 00:42:26 But if you try, it fails, you at least know. And you also may find out something better or something different. That is so true. And that's one of the biggest things that, like, inspires me to do certain things. It's like, I don't want to get to 100 and look back at a life long of regrets. So the idea of like, so what if it fails, most people fail a hell of a lot of time before they actually have success. And so failure is just a lesson.

Starting point is 00:42:51 And like if you fail it, I think, like, great, that's data of then what you don't do again or what you can then go on to do. So I think we have to kind of just get over ourselves a bit of like, we think worst case scenario for not doing the things, but people aren't actually watching our every move as much as we think they are. And when you're building a personal brand, just know that like, yeah, the first 50 are probably going to be terrible posts, but that at least is giving you data. It's helping you find your voice.

Starting point is 00:43:20 It's helping you find your tone. It's helping you with your confidence, helping you get into that kind of rhythm. And, you know, it's like a muscle. You start building it. I think, yeah, to your point, we need to really not be afraid of failure, but also be aware of like you don't want to get to a point when you have regrets. That's the worst. It is true. And be aware of the spotlight effect that people don't care about us and they don't watch really every move that we do as much as we think they do.

Starting point is 00:43:51 It's one of I love that. The spotlight effect, I tell my friends all the time. And I have to remind myself of that as well. If I think no one is watching you as much as you think they are. We're all constantly watching ourselves. So let that be permission to just give the thing a go. Me too. I have to remind myself as well. And Emily, just to be aware of time, I want to ask you a few a bit lighter questions, such as what is it that you do in your free time or what are some of your hobbies. So I'm a massive runner. I meet fitness to me is something that I love to do. It's something that I crave to do. Even when I'm on holidays, I always find myself doing like a Pilates class or, but running is my, my big thing. Also, I moved to Italy last year and I never, I never really enjoyed cooking,

Starting point is 00:44:40 but now I really enjoy, maybe it's the Italian and Mediterranean cuisine, but really like cooking and also traveling. I am always reminded after I come. back from a trip of like we live in a time when you can work from anywhere so get out there more to go and work from places that inspire you so yeah I'm typically running typically cooking in my spare time or planning my next trip what is your favorite place that you visited or what is your dream place my sister's just moved I've actually never been to North America my sister used to live in South America so I've I've been to Chile and done quite a bit of like Brazil and so on but I've never been to the US.

Starting point is 00:45:20 So my sister's just moved to Arizona, so I'm really looking forward to planning a trip to get to a going experience the US. Also, Cape Town keeps coming up from me in a place I'd like to visit. I've traveled quite a fair bit with my last job in general, but those two places I am excited to get to go and visit. What about you?

Starting point is 00:45:41 I was going to say, I would love to share more, but I haven't visited any of those two. But I love traveling as well. I think the place that I enjoyed the most that I visited is it's probably going to, I've been only across Europe. I'm trying to think now, but actually I enjoyed the most probably Denmark. I've been to Copenhagen. I don't know why it is. I think it's culture.

Starting point is 00:46:09 There was a beautiful weather. And I feel like everything just worked out and the trip was beautiful. So I feel like it was my favorite place. and what I would love to visit I don't want to be a copycat but I love to visit US as well because I've never been there and I think there are so many cool places to see

Starting point is 00:46:27 people always think it's surprising isn't it of like oh you've not been to the US I feel like everyone's been to the US but it never really appealed to me that much but New York I'd love to go to California San Francisco and yeah I think you could one thing I'm scared about is enjoyment that much

Starting point is 00:46:44 yeah but I'd like to then go move there but we'll see i'll be looking forward to pictures on linked it that's the thing that's the thing with brand it's like you know we're coming back to the conversation we've had about personal branding like i love to see what people get up to and i think when you share you when you hold back of what you're doing in your personal life and you only ever talk about work like we are so curious by nature so i love to see what people get to go and experience and do as they're building their company so let's see you if we get to the US.

Starting point is 00:47:18 Yeah. We share the pictures first. Emily, then can you please summarize where people can find you, follow you, and promote any of your services? Sure. So my main channel for growth is LinkedIn. I'm a massive LinkedIn advocate.

Starting point is 00:47:35 Love, lovely. I've always been an observer of LinkedIn, but in the last 14 months have really taken it seriously and it has been one of the most powerful channels to fuel my business. My company is called the Good Marketing Club. That's my Done for You agency offer.

Starting point is 00:47:51 And then I have the Authority Academy. But you can find out more about me on my LinkedIn. And then my website is this is emily donelop.com. I also have a newsletter that I share every Friday as well. So come and join my one-to-one world. And yeah, thank you so much, Thomas. It was lovely. It's an absolute pleasure to connect with you today and have the conversation that we've had.

Starting point is 00:48:11 Likewise, Emily. And maybe the very last question I wanted to ask you that if there is anything, that I should have asked you any doubt or any final piece of advice, wisdom or anything to leave with the audience? Okay. So I would say if you have, if you're curious about something, whether it's building your personal brand, whether it's building a business, just know that you have a higher potential that you can live up to if you allow yourself to go and explore and give it a go. And just know that there is a community of people waiting to, support you and to build with you if you put yourself out there and give yourself

Starting point is 00:48:51 permission to really go and make your dreams reality. I think that's a great one. It's a great piece of advice to finish with. So Emily, I want to say a big thank you. I really enjoyed it. As I said, I've been following you for some time. I think you've got amazing content, some great wisdom you've shared. And I will be looking forward to those pictures from your Trevor's on LinkedIn. So thank you again for joining me and I wish you all the best. much Thomas. It was a pleasure to chat and I look forward to chatting to you again soon. Thanks for listening to Prejudice By with Tomen. Check the show notes for all the links. And don't forget to subscribe, like and share your feedback. Speak soon.

Produced By - From Resignation to Reinvention: How to Design Life and Business on Your Terms | #120: Emily Dunlop

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.