the bossbabe podcast - 282. The Future of Marketing Trends: Insights from Serial Entrepreneur and Angel Investor Jaclyn Johnson, Founder of Create & Cultivate

Episode Date: April 11, 2023

What makes a successful female founder? With so many changes happening to social media, digital marketing and the creator economy, you have to keep up and adapt quickly if you want your business to thrive. But don’t worry, today’s special guest has the key to pivoting quickly and overcoming any obstacle in business, so listen up! On this week’s episode, Danielle sits down with serial entrepreneur and angel investor, Jaclyn Johnson, to chat about her rise to success in entrepreneurship, investing and fundraising. Plus, she shares her candid thoughts on the future marketing trends she sees dominating the era of creators and influencers. Jaclyn Johnson created her career. A powerhouse entrepreneur, by the time she was 28, Jaclyn had sold her first business, invested in multiple female-owned startups and launched her second multi-million dollar company, Create & Cultivate. Jaclyn recognized a gap in conversations, resources, events and community for female millennial entrepreneurs and responded with a solution, Create & Cultivate, the wildly popular media platform and nationwide conference. Jaclyn’s own work-life philosophy, built on the cornerstones of female empowerment, hustling-hard and innovation, has propelled her voice to the forefront of the discussion on workplace equality and creativity. Jaclyn is now paying it forward as a new thought-leader for millennial women and Gen-Z-ers on the career come up. Highlights: The real, behind-the-scenes of Create & Cultivate’s first-ever conference. How they got celebrities like Jessica Alba, Kim Kardashian West and Paris Hilton to attend as speakers and panelists. How Jaclyn truly feels about selling her company and becoming an angel investor. Links: Enroll in Bossbabe’s Influencer School Take The Fundraising Masterclass - use code BOSSBABE10 for 10% off Book a video call with Jaclyn Johnson on Intro Jaclyn’s website: www.jaclynrjohnson.com  Follow: bossbabe: @bossbabe.inc Danielle Canty: @daniellecanty Jaclyn Johnson: @jaclynrjohnson Create & Cultivate: @createcultivate WorkParty Podcast: @workparty Mentioned in this episode: Join our private, online community of female entrepreneurs where you can connect, build and grow.

A boss babe is unapologetically ambitious and paves the way for herself and other women to rise, keep going and fighting on. She is on a mission to be her best self in all areas. It's just believing in yourself. Confidently stepping outside her comfort zone to create her own vision of success. Welcome to the Boss Babe podcast, the place where we share with you the real behind the scenes of building successful businesses, achieving peak performance and learning how to bounce it all. I'm Danielle Canty, co-founder of Boss Babe and your host for this week's episode. Now, this episode is a real full circle moment for me because back in 2018, when I founded Boss Babe with Natalie, there was another company that I really admired called Create and Cultivate. And I watched them

grow. They ran these epic events in LA. They had speakers like Kim Kardashian and Paris Hilton and Jessica Alba. And it's a real full circle moment because today I am joined by their founder, Jacqueline Johnson. And quite often we think about these overnight successes, but Jacqueline is here to share the real story behind building a huge women-led brand called Create and Cultivate, hosting the best events in LA and sharing how it got started, how she got epic guests to actually speak for free. You're going to hear all about that. And now what she's up to next is she sold the company and moved on and how she's changing how women founders get to raise and get investments into

their business. So as always, if you love this episode, please share with me at Daniela Candy and also tag at bossbabe.inc. Okay, let's dive in. Jacqueline, I feel like we should have had you on the podcast years ago. How is this only just happening? I know. I feel like every time we talk, it is a podcast. So, you know, we're just recording this one. It really is. And I'm really excited because, you know, my journey in entrepreneurship started really 2016, 2017. And one of the brands that I really looked up to was Create and Cultivate. And I followed your journey for years. I remember being so excited. I think it was like 2018,

2019. Natalie did one of the mentor classes and it was just like, just epic, the types of women that you are bringing together. And I really just wanted to, you know, as we we are in like 2023 everyone's looking at everyone's chapter 20 like I feel like you're on chapter 20 of your entrepreneurial career but I want to take you back to the beginning and really just hear how Create and Cultivate was born and what that journey was like for you the ups the downs the roller coasters the twists and the turns because I know there were a lot of them yeah I mean, I'm like a hundred years old in entrepreneurial years, but I actually like the first, first, first Crate & Cultivate started in like 2011 and it was born out of my existing company, which was a marketing agency. So I had

a marketing background. I'd worked in marketing and corporate. Like I understood that world. It was very early days for social media. So I was like doing social media content thing, but like the word influencers did not exist. You know, Instagram was just starting. So it was very new. And I basically was an entrepreneur building this business, looking for other female entrepreneurs to chat with and have good conversations with. And Creighton Coldway was really born out of that, but it was not a business. It was like a marketing tool for the agency really, and selfishly a way for me to meet cool women. And that's how it started. It was like once a year and then never thought I would do it again. And people were like, when's the next one? When's the next one? And I was like, okay, like, I guess we'll do it again. Year two, year three, then

brands started coming to the table. Hey, how do we show up here? And it was one of those things where it was like hard to ignore it. You know, there was a lot of momentum around it. But again, I would say it didn't really make money until 2015, 2016. It was honestly kind of a break even and even a loss sometimes. But it was one of those things where it's just like a lot of energy around it, a lot of momentum, a lot of excitement. Brands that I would have killed to work with on the marketing side were emailing me about Create and Cultivate. So I was like, I got to get them in in some way. And basically around 2015, 2016, a friend of mine, her name's Raina Panchansky. She's the CEO of DBA, which is a digital talent agency who I'd known for years at that point was like, what is this thing you're doing? And I was like, oh, it's a side project and blah, blah, blah. It doesn't make any money. And she was like, I think that's your thing. And I was like, what is this thing you're doing? And I was like, oh, it's, you know, it's a side project and, you know, blah, blah, blah. It doesn't make any money. And she was like, I think that's your thing.

And I was like, no, no, no, no, no. I have this marketing agency. I don't know how to do this world. I'm kind of figuring it out as I go. And she's like, let's do it together. Let's figure it out and do it together. And I was like, no. And I kept saying no. She's like, OK, fine. We'll do a one time test to see how it goes together. We'll put a little money into it this time and like, see what happens. And basically that was our LA event in 2016, I think, where we had Julianne Hough, you know, we had Emily Weiss and about 350 people, which was huge for me at the time. Like I had never thrown an event like that. We 100% ran out of water. There was so many disaster shit shows. Like it was horrible in so many ways,

but it was amazing in a lot of ways because people loved it. Like it was packed. Brands were excited. It was the first time I had created something that was like this event that would then become super viral. And we had all these celebrities attend on their own. Like they bought tickets. It was so crazy. And I was like like I think we're on to something and then from there we were like all right let's do it we you know officially became partners and it became a real business oh my goodness I love that I want to just highlight a couple of things that you just shared there because again I think this is like sometimes people look through a lens at someone else's life and think oh it's all rosy it just happened overnight it was an overnight success but you just shared something which is

like creating cultivate wasn't making any money for a good few years yeah long time so like you were juggling the marketing agency and you had this on your side and you were like oh I just want to bring people together in a way but I I'm not really sure. Like what also made you keep it going? Like why, why did you not just not stop and be like, okay, I'm just going to concentrate on the marketing agency. Yeah, it was honestly the momentum around it. Like there was just so much interest on the consumer side and the brand side. It was like, I almost didn't have a choice in many ways, but also it was so fun.

Like I was able to, you know, tap my friends who were, you know, influencers at the time to come and speak. And it was just, I realized I loved doing events and creating events and creating special, you know, places. And it's funny looking now at Create and Cultivate, which is highly polished, highly produced, you know, all these things. It was like, I had no budget. So I took like neon electrical tape and like make these little murals on the wall, like back in the day, it was like so lame, but it was just like, I loved doing it. I loved bringing people together. So I think it was partially the interest and partially me loving to do it that kept it going. And in my head, I was like, it's a marketing expense. Worst comes to worst for the agency. You know, I didn't put too much stake in it at that point but it was funny it was like other people

for me always thought creating culture started in 2016 2017 and they're like oh my god congrats at the overnight you know success I'm like girl yeah no no yeah so okay so 2016 was that first event 350 people you ran out of water but also celebrities what what do you think was the pull for people I think the pull well one is like at that point in time it's hard to imagine now but nothing existed like this like every single conference women's conference was like in a stodgy hotel conference room it was women in suits it was not like this beautiful fun experience we had this insane, you know, glam bar where you could get your hair and makeup done. And the way I approached it was

interesting. So I, on the marketing agency side, one of our core service lines was events and influencer events. So we were doing influencer events for L'Oreal Paris, for Urban Decay, for huge brands with massive budgets. And these events were gorgeous, beautiful walls, cool experiences. We're in Napa with influencers, like amazing, amazing stuff. And I remember my sister texting me, my sister's a wedding photographer who lives in Florida being like, oh my God, these events are insane. I would like die to go to something like that. And it kind of hit me. I'm like, yeah, why isn't there something like that for just consumers? And so it was kind of this combination of like, I want to create something beautiful

and fun that's, you know, because women, you know, want to look at cool brands and get their nails done and hang out. But they also want to talk about business and learn about their taxes and how to be the best possible entrepreneur. How do we combine those two things in an interesting way where you get a full experience that doesn't look or feel or seem like anything else you've ever been to that is so smart and I also think that you know we've seen that before as well like we always say we don't do bro marketing and also it's so different how

women buy to men buy I've really been like studying it a lot because a lot of people who are teaching they're like oh yeah like this is this is exactly what a funnel looks like this is like what like a website looks like women are women do buy that like our women want aesthetically pleasing things and so I love that you like saw that gap and was like hang on a minute like this is not how women want to attend conferences and let's create it in this way how was it for you have you always been in that like influencer world? Or when you were getting some of these big names? Because you've had like Power Selton, Kim Kardashian.

I mean, there's like, who haven't you had? You had Chrissy Teigen. Like so many epic women speaking at your events. It's pretty wild. But yeah, so I was like an early blogger. Like back in the day, I had a blog in like 2006. So when I was living in New York and basically this like Teen Vogue article or maybe it was Vogue I don't even

remember it was a hundred years ago but basically it was like the five fashion girls on the internet and it was like me Jerry Hirsch it was like three other people like the OGs on the internet and my blog wasn't about me though my blog was like collages I would put together it's like so embarrassing now no I love it it was like collages of would put together. It's like so embarrassing now. No, I love that right now. It was like collages of like cool fashion I liked in home. Because like back then the internet wasn't what it is today. It was not about necessarily the person. It was like the vibe, right? So I had this thing and then that's how I knew Reina was I was signed to DBA as like one of the first influencers, bloggers as talent. So I had been in that talent world for a long time. Wait, how old were you at this point?

Oh God. Oh, 20, 20 maybe. Yeah. So I basically was blogging and I was doing like early sponsored content stuff, which was like, you know, so weird and antiquated, but it was all about the blog, right? You had no social platforms and then Instagram launched. And then essentially what started to happen was it became all about personal style, right? And it was everyone getting in front of the camera. And like, I didn't personally relate to that. I didn't love it. I was like more of the creative director type. So I basically made the decision to be like, okay, well, I'm going to keep that side of things, but I'm going to like build a career in a totally different way. So I kept in touch with, you know, the DBA girls and the talent side of things. So the first thing that kind of happened was I had worked with a lot of talent through my

marketing agency. So I had big clients, like I mentioned, Urban Decay, Simon Malls, et cetera. So I had been working with talent to do, you know, show up at events, sponsored content, speaking at things, you know, a great example is like I worked with Rachel Zoe on like a speaking thing for Simon and like got to meet her and Roger. And like I had these relationships, you know, built around this preexisting influencer life and agency life. So I had been in that world a little bit. Then I had the advantage of DBA, right? So DBA, again, early, early, early, you know, talent agency. And so Raina was like, let's have our girls speak. Let's get our girls out there. And so, you know, they

have massive talent, Whitney Port, Ami Song, et cetera. And so it really kind of became this thing of like, we were launching all this talent and I was cold outreaching like a psycho to anyone. And basically I would say when the talent really hit, I mean, Emily Weiss was an amazing get. It was very early in her days at Glossier. I just knew her as, since we were both entrepreneurs, that was, we were very lucky on that one. And, but the second one we did was in Chicago and I got Grand Stere and I had been following her forever. And so she had never really done a lot of speaking things. So that was a huge get. And then we had Catherine Power. So I was lucky to get my entrepreneurial girls. The big get for us, I think that changed the game for us in celebrity was the next year

in 2017, Honest Beauty had reached out to sponsor. So we were like, amazing, great. You know, and they wanted to sponsor a bunch of stuff. I think they were like just launching and they were like, oh, by the way, like, could we have Jessica speak? Like, could we maybe jessica speak like could could we maybe get jessica i was like um a hundred percent yes like one thousand percent yes and i i always tell jessica this which is funny but i'm like so first speed a paid speaking fee or no no

they're like we want jessica and so i was like yes whatever she needs how do i act not too excited no i played it very cool and then completely lost my shit um but no I and I always tell Jessica I and I always tell people this Jessica Alba is like one of the biggest supporters of female entrepreneurs out there like she has done so much for Crate and Cultivate for literally nothing except for like obviously promoting her brands but like people always say like oh sure sure sure no 100. She's such an amazing advocate for women entrepreneurs. At least I can speak for my own experience. So Jessica signs on to do it and I'm obviously dead. But then I was like, I have Jessica Alba. I'm going to go out to every so I reached out to Rachel Zoe, who I also had a warm intro with. And I was like, hey, Jessica

Alba is doing this thing. Would you be interested in doing it? Yeah, I'm in. Rachel Zoe signs on. And basically I was like, oh my God. And then Rachel's was like, can I have Jen Meyer interview me? I'm like, yes. So it was, so it was like spiraling. It was this whole big thing that was spiraling. And then, you know, Raina was connected to this woman, Alison Statter, who eventually became a partner at Create and Cultivate as well, who was like, I love what you're doing. This is amazing. We should have Chelsea Handler do it. And I was like, yeah, great. I would love to have Chelsea. She's like, I'm going to tell Chelsea to do it. Chelsea signs on. And I was just a dead body at that point. I was like, I can't believe this is happening and we have to crush this event. So this event became so crucial to make sure that one,

all these celebrities had a good experience on site, that it was like seamless for them. So I always tell this story because it's really funny. So basically Chelsea gets on site and you know, we have sponsored liquor or whatever, but like wine and stuff. And she's like, oh, I only drink vodka. And I'm like, okay. I ran to a liquor store to get Chelsea Handler, like vodka ran back. I was like, Tito's no problem. Like lemon, no problem. Like anything these girls wanted. I was like, we got to make sure that we like deliver on this experience. The room, the energy was insane. The room was packed. They were like, like, I remember Chelsea being like, where, what is this wonder? Like, where are we? Why is every woman dressed to the

night? Like what's happening here? And it was just this like insane experience. And what happened from that event moving forward was we had the names to back it. We also had the celebrities who had a good experience who would tell other celebrities to do it. And the rest was sort of history after that. Wow. Okay. I just want to pause a second there because what were your nerves like leading up until that event?

My nerves for the next six years, I would say, were shot. I was, anyone who knew me, my team especially, during that time period, I didn't sleep. I didn't eat. I was obsessive about the business and just making sure that everything went seamlessly. That was my number one focus. And not just for the celebrities, for the consumers as well. Like we never ran out of water again. Like everything went really well, you know? And so I wanted to make sure like, cause people were paying us, you know, 300, $500, whatever for tickets. Like I was like, they need to walk away and be like,

that was the best day of my life. So as well as giving the celebs like a great experience, but like, did you continue, like were any of the speakers paid for Create and Cultivate? No. Okay. So let's talk about why, why do you believe that they did it? Obviously it was like the catalyst was Jessica Alba, but why do you think over the years you've attracted so many amazing celebrities who are also women entrepreneurs, I guess. Totally. Yeah. So, you know, basically like we don't typically pay keynote speakers. If it's an event that is a brand integration, like we do a lot of one-off events, then we'll typically pay speakers because it's essentially an endorsement for that brand. So, but the reason why I think so many people did it was a few different things. One was anyone that

came to the stage had a business or something to promote. Right. And so my marketing agency hat went on where I was like, what is extremely valuable to them? And it's our audience, right? So we would work on packages for these celebrities where we would, you know, build pop-ups for them if they had a product, you know, we would do email blasts to our audience. We would put their talk on our podcast so they get extra amplification. Like we would figure out ways to make sure that whatever they were promoting, whether it was a product or a movie or whatever like would get that value that would be akin to maybe what they would get paid probably not but like you know what I mean I love that so that you like because I think that's the other key thing that a lot of people miss like there's value doesn't always look like money

yeah and so like where is it that you can negotiate your strong suits from? Like, what can you offer in exchange for X, Y, and Z? So I think that's really cool that you did that. So then Create and Cultivate, over the next few years, you continue to do how many events did you guys do in total? So at some point, we started doing like non-conference events, other events. And like, I think our peak was like 75 events in one year, which was like insane. I was on a plane every other day. Yeah. And then what did you, how did you think pivot things in COVID? Because I imagine as an events

company, that's quite the shock. It was a real nightmare. Um, so basically, you know, we were coming off our biggest year, 2019, our best quarter Q1, 2020, we had so many events in the pipeline, you know, and I just got it's like I remember it like it was yesterday but essentially like there's these murmurs there's these rumblings about like this thing and it was like all that we're gonna flatten the curve it's just cold and it's actually more serious like it was all over the place and we were all all eyes were on South by Southwest so that was our next big event we did this big event during South by, and it was sort of like, everyone was just waiting to see what was going to happen. And then South by like the

official South by committee came on and was like, we're doing it. It's happening. And it was like this moment, our team was like, Oh, thank God. Like, you know, we had so many sponsors, so many flights booked, so many things like everyone. And then the next day, the city of Austin called a conference and we're like, what is this conference? And they get on and they're like, we're shutting it down. And it was pure adrenaline at that moment. But what we had done was in the last year, almost by like kind of random, but I was like, we can't just rely on sponsorship, but we have to create other revenue streams. So this was like 2017, 2018. And we launched the book and the podcast, which was a new revenue stream for us. We launched licensing and products. So we had our vegan leather goods line, which was in Kohl's and

other places as well. We had a office supply line at Target. So diversified in the product category, we had launched our membership, which was essentially like a VIP membership where you got extra content, extra access at events online and offline, had its own portal. So we had that going, which was this recurring revenue for our members. And then we had digital sponsored content as well. So thankfully, our offline online ratio was already kind of evening out. But at that moment, it was essentially like, okay, we have to unpack an entire year of events and entire contracts, like so many contracts. Like I became a lawyer that year, like truly with the amount of legal that we had to unpack. And essentially what happened was really hard for, I think,

every small business. So it was like, there was two buckets. One was, and thankfully, thank God for this, is I would say 90% of our sponsors stood with us. They were like, we'll figure it out. We'll do something different. We'll do digital. We'll do whatever. So that was very lucky for us is that people didn't bounce a lot. Some people did, which was understandable. They were smaller businesses. They were like, this is a big spend for us. that people didn't bounce a lot. Some people did, which was understandable. They were smaller businesses. They were like, this is, you know, a big spend for us. And then the other side was like, we had a lot of money out with vendors as well. So it was like, we were losing, we lost a lot on South by because it was two days before the event. Insurance was a hot mess with force majeure. Like where it was like, technically like we were in the right, this is a catastrophic event,

but everyone was just cash grabbing. Cause was terrified you know which I understood like every side of it so that was all happening and basically at that point I was like one trying to rally the team and not have everyone completely freaked out and to come up with a new solution so within the next three weeks I was like we're gonna launch an online and this is when everyone was like going live and like you know during the beginning of COVID and I was like, we're going to launch it on. And this is when everyone was like going live and like, you know, during the beginning of COVID. And I was like, we're going to launch an online conference. And we just did it our way.

We designed this like huge landing page. We pulled all of our OG favorites. You know, Chelsea Handler came back, like big names, Bobby from Queer Eye, like, and I'm like, we're going to do a virtual. It's going to be on Zoom. It's going to be this like full experience. We're going to have a Slack channel where people can chat, which now is like, duh. But no one had done it.

And so we launched it May 1st, I think. So like literally a month after. And we had over, I want to say like 30,000 people in the Slack channel, 50 different countries represented. Like it was mayhem. And it was great, though, because every outlet picked it up, like Adweek, you know, whatever, like it was LA Times, like it was everywhere, like that we had done this crazy thing, which got a lot of brands interested in working with us. You know, everyone's like,

what do we do right now? So we were able to salvage the rest of the year by, you know, creating this online community content, leaning fully in that direction. We had this gorgeous office space that was empty. We started shooting content there and like, you know, doing photo shoots and like fun things there. So we just like moved fast, which was an advantage that we had, I think, over a lot of people who were like, we have boards, you know, we have massive people that we need to go through to be like, what do we do? We were like, tomorrow we're doing this. Yeah, it just made that pivot. Let's take a quick pause to talk about my new favorite all-in-one platform, Kajabi.

You know I've been singing their praises lately because they have helped our business run so much smoother and with way less complexity, which I love. Not to mention our team couldn't be happier because now everything is in one place. So it makes collecting data, creating pages, collecting payment, all the things so much simpler. One of our mottos at Boss Babe is simplify to amplify and Kajabi has really helped us do that this year. So of course I needed to share it here with you. It's the perfect time of year to do a bit of spring cleaning in your business, you know. Get rid of the complexity and instead really focus on getting organized and making things as smooth as possible i definitely recommend kajabi to all of my clients

and students so if you're listening and haven't checked out kajabi yet now is the perfect time to do so because they are offering boss babe listeners a 30-day free trial go to kajabi.com slash boss babe to claim your 30-day free trial that's kajabi.com slash boss babe to claim your 30-day free trial that's kajabi.com slash boss babe this is something i'm seeing as a common theme in your life though like the ability to pivot because i feel like you know you started at that blogging point then like pivoted into the marketing agency pivoted into create and cultivate pivoted from in-person events to digital what in your personality has helped you be able to pivot so quickly and easily, whereas a lot of people can get paralyzed in it?

I feel like you have this resilience to like power through. Yeah. I mean, I think it's just like, I've been on my own since a young age. I think I like put myself in really challenging situation. Like I moved to New York city at like 18. I didn't know anyone. Like I figured it out. Like I'm, I've been, since I moved to New York City at like 18. I didn't know anyone like I figured it out. Like I've been since I was very young, able to jump into situations and figure it out, which I think is a good strength for entrepreneurs, like is to be able to take really big challenges and kind of just go in head first and be like, all right, I'm just going to like get to the bottom of this.

And I think that's always how I've been. I'm like a very solutions oriented person where I'm like, okay, that didn't work. What's next? I don't really dwell on failure. And I think that's an important asset as a CEO, as an entrepreneur. What drives you? I think for me is I love creating stuff people like. I like tapping into, I think I've done a really good job of tapping into problems that need to be solved. And I think that's the truth of all of my businesses. With Create and Cultivate, I was a female entrepreneur. When I looked online, there was nothing that looked, felt, or spoke to me. There was no conferences that I was like,

I'll create it in that way. With New Money Ventures, the venture fund, I was like, oh, venture funding is deeply problematic. And there's all these women. We hear the stats over and over again, 1.9% VC funding goes to women, blah, blah, blah. It's actually really sad and dark, but like why? And I looked into it and I was like, oh, only 5% of venture funds are run by women. That's part of the problems. Like women intend to invest in women and there needs to be a solution there. Like let's launch the fund. Like I try to create the fundraising masterclass. Perfect example. Like I talked to a ton of women that don't understand fundraising, but have amazing businesses. Like that's where the gap is. There's a knowledge gap between running a great business and getting fundraising.

And how do we bridge that? Let's launch the masterclass. So I think for me, that's always been the drive is like, how do I solve problems that I think other people have as well as myself? So let's rewind. So I want to come back to the raising funds and the venture aspect of things. But, you know, 2021, you sold Creighton Cultivate? Yes. Yeah. What was that decision like?

So basically, we had had offers to sell Creighton Cultivate early, like 2018, 2019. And we were super small and like still figuring it out. But it kind of had the spark of like, it was the type of company that was ripe for acquisition, you know, from different strategics, whether it was other media companies or things like that, where we were self-funded, we were small, but we were extremely cash efficient.

We were growing really fast. And we had something that other people didn't have, right? Like no one really had nailed that offline event marketing, you know, kind of strategy in a way that was also profitable. So we were very, we were a little bit of a jewel in the M&A world where people were very interested in us. And M&A is tricky, right? You know, we were just talking about this,

but selling your business is a full-time job. It takes so much effort. It's a business in itself. It costs a lot of money to sell your business. And so you have to be in the perfect place to do it. Otherwise, you're just going to waste a lot of your money. So for us, it was really funny because end of 2019, our best year, top of 2020, we started getting a lot of interest again from people. And we were like, this is the right time. We've come off the best year possible. We have a stack 2020 that's going to look amazing.

The team's at a good size now. We're not so small that it's going to be super disruptive. We have a full C-suite. We're crushing it. This is the right time. And we started going down the road with a lot of different partners in early 2020. Obviously, COVID hits. Nightmare.

All M&A shuts down, especially in least especially in the event world for a while and it was one of those things where it was like we actually got a lot of offers during that time period that were like fire sale offers and I was like no like we are still profitable we're still growing like we're gonna have a good year and I was like I'm not even thinking about selling the company because I know we'll survive this and be even better. Like we actually had unlocked something that was an entirely new revenue stream, which was digital events. Like, great. I'm like, once events come back, like this plus that is even more, even more. So I was like, all good. It's fine. But towards the end of 2020, we started getting more and more interesting conversations happening. and we ended up selling

to private equity, which is like a very specific type of acquisition. But essentially what private equity does is they come in, they take a majority usually of the company, a controlling stake, and they help invest in your business to then sell it again. Like their goal isn't to buy it and then be like, great, we bought something. It's to buy it and then be like great we bought something it's to buy it grow it and sell it again so you get a second bite at the apple and so for me that was an interesting opportunity because one I knew like I mean after 10 years of being the CEO like I was a little tapped and I knew we needed to bring in a fresh CEO tons of energy to come in and like take on this new digital world. And two, I knew we needed money to like accelerate growth and like, you know, get everything going that we

needed to. But I was like, I'm not going to raise. We're too profitable and big for that. And at this point, like this feels like a great opportunity for us because one, I'm still an equity owner. I still have skin in the game. Two, it gives us the capital to help build out this team and bring in like amazing people who are going to bring the company to the next level. And three, it's like a nice exit for my partners as well. So it was like, it checked all the boxes. Obviously the team stays the same, nothing changes. There was no, you know, there was a lot of fear at that time too, of like people buying companies and shutting them down, people buying companies and laying people off obviously and that was not going to

happen so it was sort of a great exit scenario for us was there an emotional like how does that feel for an emotional sampling because I feel like this is not like something people talk about because there's a lot of identity associated with being the CEO of a company oh it's so weird it's weird to wake up and not do the same thing you've done for 10 years. It's very strange. However, I think like for me, it was kind of the best case scenario because we brought in a new CEO.

Her name's Kate Spees. She came from Well and Good. And we just immediately during the interview process were like soul sisters. We were like 100% same energy, same page. She had taken over for the founders of well and good after they had sold the company. And she's like, I get founders. Like I get it. I understand. Like, you know, this is your baby. And like, I'm not here to become you.

Like I'm here to take this to the next level. And I, we had this really good understanding. And so our relationship is so great. And I'm still super involved that like a lot has changed, but like a lot hasn't changed in a way. So I think that's really nice. And it's really important when you're, you know, going, I can't imagine going through that period and finding a CEO that you didn't get along with. Like, I feel like that'd be much harder. So I think for me, it's been good in that way, but it's so weird, especially because I think, you know, people still are just like, think I'm so day to day on the business and I'm not anymore, which is also weird, but it's, it's, you know, I know I'll always be the founder of Crate and Cultivate and like, that's something

I'm proud of. Like it's something I, you know, hold onto, you know, in a, in a good way. I'm on the board. I'm very involved in the business. But I think for also me personally, like I definitely needed a break. Any CEO who got through 2020 like needed a break, you know. So it was nice in a way to just take a step back. Throughout your career, you've spotted a lot of new trends, marketing trends, whether it being from blogging or social media or to, you know, I guess what we call like moving towards female businesses being more aesthetically pleasing, let's say. What do you think are some trends that you see coming for the future, particularly in marketing? Yeah, I mean, look, I think we're in our creator era.

Like I think right now it's been really interesting because we've been seeing it kind of happen over time, but there is this big blurred line, right? So you have influencers initially starting and then you have brands paying influencers to promote their product. Then you have influencers starting their own brands and like launching them from there. Then you have CEOs becoming influencers because their brands are popular. Like there's this crazy crossover happening in like the social media and marketing world. What's been interesting

and what I've been hearing like rumblings of is like in the same way people raise money for their companies, influencers are raising money for themselves, right? Like you're investing in me, I am the brand, right? So like imagine if you met Mr. Beast, you know, year two and he's like invest in 50% of me and I'll go create all these amazing things and you have 50% of everything I do. That's a lot of value that you're creating because people are becoming commodities in

a way. And like, that's an interesting kind of way to think about things, especially the smart influencers. You know, they're not just doing, uh, sponsored content and affiliates. Like they're building, they're investing, they're growing their own things. So it's kind of this interesting trend. So I'm, I think that's like, we're kind of in this weird moment where it's like, everyone's like, someone said to me the other day, it's like, I feel like there's more famous people than non-famous people. And I'm like, so true. It's like, there's a lot of influence out there and there's a lot of money to be made from influence, but like the markets and the money

haven't figured out how to work with that yet. But I think we're on the precipice of that happening. And I don't know exactly what that looks like, but I think there's something there where there might be more of a move towards people as businesses versus people creating businesses interesting yeah I think influencer marketing is so powerful like we talk about social media nowadays and I'm like you cannot be a business owner and not understand influencer marketing right now you have to understand like how social media works whether you're building it and you are being a creator or like you say you're doing business with a creator or you're buying creator real estate 100 paying people to post for you because you know since the ios update not getting too technical but

like ads are much trickier right now and i feel like you know if you can find direct relationships with influencers to support your brands that really is the gateway to a lot of your growth. And so it's just kind of like when we were in that blogging stage, the websites, I feel like there's just there's a lot of change. I feel like particularly even with the, you know, now paying to be verified. Oh, this is going to get real interesting. Real interesting. We're in an inflection point in the creator economy what's going to happen next is going to be really interesting because also like with instagram launching subscriptions and like there's a lot of paywall things and like intro we were just talking about which is like paid for mentorship like there's so many ways to

monetize your own existence and it's actually interesting because my friend drea and i were doing a walk the other day and she said something and I was like, oh my God. And she was like, I can't find someone to fix my heater. Like my heater's broken. I cannot find someone to fix my heater. Why? Because like no one wants to do that technical skill when it's harder to find someone to fix a heater than it is to find someone to build an app.

Like you can build apps, you can build websites, you can do stuff. So quickly with little money that why would you spend the time to do a technical skill like so it's going to be this weird thing too where it's like everyone's sort of creating there's never been more access and ease to create businesses online and the skills are going to move to that versus technical skills so it's going to be like an interesting shake up in the job market in general for sure and also it's like very glorified that's what I also think is like really interesting and I try and like share with people you know people who join our courses for influencer school and like don't you don't

necessarily have to be it to be the creator you can come to learn about what it is to be creating because you also need to remember that you watch people online they are the creators but there's so many business people that you just don't see posting every day because they're not creators they're in the back ends they're in the operations they're in the m&a they're in the restructuring and I also feel like that's gets forgotten a little bit I think we see what we what we can create what we can see and therefore we see a lot of creators because they're the ones putting the creative content out there. But what we don't see is the actual builders

and the mechanics behind the scenes that actually build the valuations and get all of that to work. But it doesn't mean it's not there. You have to just go and look in different places. And I think it's just really interesting about the types of personalities now that we have. Whereas like everyone thinks, oh, success looks like

how many followers you have or success looks like how many you know posts you're doing or whatever but that actually isn't really a true metric of success nor the only way to create success in business and I kind of just want to be a voice to remind people of that because I think that's getting lost a little bit a hundred percent yeah you know there's so many amazing businesses out there that don't require like that constant posting. There's people doing the work. Right. And I think that's like evident in like when you look at people like Emily Weiss's social or Jen Rubio's social, like they're not on social. You know what I mean? So it is an interesting thing. And I do think it's hard though, because now, and I think we were an early to this movement type thing but now it's like to be a small business

owner you almost have to be a creator like you or like have people on your team that are constantly creating content which is just a new way of doing business whether it's you or someone else like you absolutely have to understand like what is your hook like how are you holding it how are you redirecting that direction how to play that game Because it's like really the number one form of marketing. Yep. So selling Create and Cultivate, then you set up your venture funds. Let's talk about why you chose to do that and the brands that you feel passionate about supporting. Yeah, totally. So, you know, you know, with Create and Cultivate and all those things, as I mentioned before, I kept hearing like the stats around venture capital. And, you know, the reality is, is like the access for women is so limited.

I mean, 1.9% of VC funding. When you hear that stat, that's wild. It's nothing. It's literally nothing, which is so crazy. Especially when you think that you've learned that, you know, women over 1,800 businesses are opened by women daily. Like we're the fastest growing people creating businesses. Black women are actually the fastest women

creating businesses on the daily. Where's the money? So it really came down to, and this is what I realized having been now an angel investor for a long time, the way venture capital is a business built on deal flow. Deal flow is built on your personal relationships. So when you think about personal relationships, it has a lot to do with socioeconomic status,

class, where you grew up, the privileges that you have. And the majority of VCs are white men, especially at the top ones. They're white men. So you have to imagine that their deal flow looks a lot like them, them and their network and them and what they've been doing. So over the years, that's who's been funded, right And slowly, but surely like more women have creeped in, but in terms of women being 5% of the people, the decision-making power in a VC firm, only 5%. So that's where I think the issue is. And like, I knew I had something unprecedented.

I knew I had access to female deal flow just by nature of being the founder of Create & Cultivate. So I had this unique advantage and I wanted to double down on it. So started New Money Ventures. It's a $20 million fund focused on funding the next generation of female-led businesses. We typically invest in Series A, so a little bit more established. But we're invested in companies like Crown Affair, Gia, Joyo which is Jay and Roddy's line, High Note which is Sophia Rossi former CEO of Hello Giggles, her new project with Roy Choi so we're invested in a lot of amazing businesses that you know it's exciting to support not only

with mentorship but money. I think that's so cool because also it's like in the household spend isn't like women control like 80% of the money but like obviously when you're pitching ideas that are supportive to what a woman wants but then that is being signed off by a man like they don't get it like no matter what happens like a man is not really going to understand a woman's needs and likewise I think that comes from like all kinds of different conversations like you can only imagine what it's like to walk in woman's needs. And likewise, I think that comes from like all kinds of different conversations. Like you can only imagine what it's like to walk in someone's shoes. You can't, if you haven't walked in those shoes, how can you actually know and make informed decisions of what's needed? I think a great example of that is the how I built this episode

with the founder of Rent the Runway. So she, obviously that's a business that needs a lot of money, like a lot of venture capital to start. And she would go into VC rooms and she said every single time they'd be like, well, let me talk to my wife about it. Like every, or like, let me ask the assistant about it. And she was like, it was so upsetting because it was like, she knew this idea needed to exist. There was a problem to solve for it, but they could not wrap

their heads around it. You know? So that's a perfect example though, of like what we're up against essentially, like when it comes to securing those funds, like to your point, you haven't, you know, lived it. You don't understand it and you probably won't see the need for it. So what are you most excited about in your next chapter? Yeah. So now it's like I have this very interesting perspective. I've been a bootstrap self-funded founder who's exited. I've been a venture-backed founder. I've been a VC. I've been an angel investor. So I've been on like all sides of the table. So I see all the issues and all the problems and where things are a little sticky. But for me, what has really come up over the past year of taking thousands of pitches is that

there is this education gap when it comes to fundraising. It is a very specific language. It is a very specific skill set. It is not something that if you have the best business in the world and you're like the most charismatic founder, you still might not get funding because you have to understand the game and the landscape and the terminology, frankly, behind it. And also you need to know what to negotiate for and ask for as you're giving up equity in your business. It's not just that percentage. That's not the number you're working towards. It's valuations, exits, control clauses. All these things are crucial to your business.

And if you don't know how to navigate that, it can be very tricky. And so what I've found is like there is this gap and there's a lot of women I talk to that are like running incredible businesses, but are like, I know I want to raise money. Where do I start? What do I need to know? And so after answering that question for so long, I was like, I feel like I need to create something around this. So I'm watching the fundraising masterclass. It's basically a breakdown of everything you need to know going into venture from how the

processes work, the paperwork you need, the team you need behind you to actually do this properly. You know, basically it's either going to talk you into raising money or talk you out of raising money. But I'm really excited about it and excited to see, you know, hopefully people come out of it and raise lots and lots of money. Before we turn the mics on, we were having a conversation a little bit about this, about it being an education gap can we just talk about that for a second because you know

as you know a founder of boss babe i've we've never raised money and i think that is really interesting what you're saying like there's this place like where where do you find out about this stuff and you were sharing before coming online like what looking at some pitch decks sometimes and being like i wish someone had helped critique these because they are not what a VC is looking for and it's like that you know when you're in school and you learn to pass a test when you're learning science you're not learning everything about science you are learning a curriculum to pass that science test yeah and I think that's a little bit about the VC world like you're actually like you have to realize you're learning a curriculum that you need to pass and know the next steps to and whereas I don't think that's really understood by a lot of founders they're like oh I'm just

gonna raise money versus like what are you what is the textbook of raising money what is the textbook of what this life is gonna look like for you what is the textbook of what this life is going to look like for you? What is the textbook of how to exit and actually win the game? Because there's an art to it. Exactly. And like, I spend a lot of my time talking people out of raising money. You know, I think there's been a lot of like media attention around raising and valuations, all these things. And everyone's like, I need to do that. But like, not every single person needs venture. And I talk about in the masterclass a few things, but one is like types of capital you can take. Venture is just one type of capital you can take. There's strategics, there's angels, there's micro VC, there's loans, there's all these things that you can do. And it really depends on the need you have around your business. And I explain

very clearly like what the expectation is once you take venture on. And it's a very specific expectation. It is not like getting money from your best friend. You're getting money kind of from your worst enemy, who basically is going to put the most amount of pressure on you to 10x their investment, right? So I have a whole doc on red flags and green flags, like things that VCs will look out for during your pitch and things you'll say and curious how you'll handle things in certain directions. But I think by the first lesson of the masterclass, I think you're either going to be like, I don't want to raise money. I don't think I want VC. I think I want strategics. Or you'll be like, I'm ready to go. I'm doubling down. So that's also part of the education too, right? Is like,

what does it mean to raise money? It's not free money at the end of the day. It also doesn't mean, I think a lot of times people see these valuations and they're like oh that person's a billionaire they're only billionaires on paper yeah it's all just you know so it's it's explaining all the nuances of what it means to raise money and like the questions that you need to ask yes to i think that's the other thing it's like you have to understand the rules of the game and And I don't necessarily, the VC is not gonna be like, oh, here are the rules of this game. They're gonna let you figure out yourself. Oh, 100%.

And whereas like the course, the masterclass that you're teaching is like, okay, let me give you the rules of the game so that you know. And I think that's really important. I think, you know, like you say, we not only to get more caps on the hands, do we not only need people like you

who are setting up these funds but we also need more women knowing how to play the game 100 because if they know how to play the game they can attract the money into it as well exactly so let's just i would love for you to give a shout out to some of the um female owned brands that you are supporting with your fund because you know like say crown affair i have actually bought crown affair stuff before i'm trying to remember the founder's name diana diana yeah because of the d she's the best i love her i have her towel oh it's the best yeah and all the stuff yeah well so i'm invested in a lot of different companies but i have some of my like favorite portfolio companies i'm invested in lib tinted which is deep because oh my god i love deep i love her eye stuff she's the best yeah so

they're they just closed they announced it yesterday their series a 10 million dollar raise so proud of her I was like early friends and family on that one I'm trying to get her on the podcast yeah I'll move it so I like need her yeah no she's hilarious and her story is so great as well um I'm in Ceremonia as well which is Baba I don't know if you know she's incredible entrepreneur like absolutely crushing it I met her when we did the partnership with Al. She was part of that. Oh, yay. Yeah. She's so great. And then I'm in Frame Reformer, which is a digitally connected Pilates reformer, which is really cool. So think like Peloton for Pilates. Yeah. So that's going

to be launching soon. Yeah. It's really cool. It's compact. It's like super cool. And that's this woman, Melissa, who's absolutely awesome. Joyoo k skin which is winnie harlow's um yes when they came to creighton yes yeah and if you haven't it's honestly like it's funny because it's like i love all my portfolio companies but i'm like their products are insane i'm obsessed with them like they're the best sunscreen on the market like your skin looks shimmery and beautiful it's awesome so definitely check them out this is the horrible like white yeah he look that you get totally no it's not that at all it's so fun it's like every day it started to get me to wear sunscreen every day so I love it and yeah I mean now I'm like who else in my chill house Cindy Ramirez I'm invested in

what do you think sets female founders apart because this is the other thing that I love actually chatting about is like when you actually look at the statistics of what happens when a woman is on a board or with women founded companies this percentage success rate of those companies is actually much higher of course why from working with these founders what do you think sets apart the founders that go on to become really successful and those that don't. I mean, I think with women founders, like the reason why that is true is like we're less risk adverse because we have less opportunity, right? So we run things very tightly because the world isn't our oyster.

You know, we have limited funding. We have limited opportunities to get it right. So we typically tend to get it right because we are very calculated. But that also doesn't let us take as many risks, which you can see will grow your company substantially if you're willing to take those risks and spend big and do it. And that's what we see with the big boys like Uber and Airbnb and all these different things. So I think that's why women are successful, but also not as successful in that way. But I think the women who honestly are able to get to those next level, sell companies, do these things, is because they have people helping them in their way. But I think the women who honestly like are able to get to those next level,

sell companies, do these things is because they have people helping them in their corner. Like I'm a perfect example of that. Like my partnership with Raina at DBA, like she had gone through the process like two years before Create and Cultivate had sold of selling her own business. So she knew she filled me in on everything. She's like, here's your legal team. Here's everything you need to know. You know, so without that person having got to guide me through it, like, I don't know if I would have been able to do it. So it's like, you have to have the people in your corner that are helping you do that. And I feel like I can provide that for, I provide that for a lot of women that I talk to because I'm like, yeah, I didn't, you know, after CNC, when that headline hit that we had sold the amount of calls I got from female founders who run successful businesses that were

like, how did you do that? I was like was like here's the playbook like go sell your business don't be scared to sell your business like that's how you make real money you know over time it's how you grow it's how you keep building yeah I love that so so true well listen Jacqueline thank you so much for the podcast I know we're gonna do like I want you to come back in a game 100% talk more about like the raising side of things as well because I think our audience would really love to know like some of the the pitfalls and stuff so I definitely want to get you back on but thanks just sharing the journey of create and cultivate too because like I said it's like this overnight success that as well as 10 years in the making yeah so thank you um do you want to just share a few handles

and where people can find out more about you because I also knew you on intro as well and yeah yeah so I'm at Jacqueline R Johnson on like every platform at create cultivate at work party is the podcast um and yeah just you can follow me on all those I'm on intro if you ever want to book a session and that's it I love it thank you yeah thank you so much for listening and if you enjoyed this episode on the boss babe podcast then That's it. I love it. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much for listening. And if you enjoyed this episode on the Boss Babe podcast, then I'd absolutely love it if you leave us a review. As a thank you, we'll send you our side hustle success kit, your simple no BS guide to keeping track of everything that you need to do to start and grow your business. To access this freebie,

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