The Bossticks - #76: Making Mistakes and Learning - Blogging, Influencers, Comment Groups, Podcast mistakes and more

Episode Date: August 22, 2017

On this episode Michael interviews Lauryn and asks questions all about the mistakes that have been made throughout her blogging and influencer career. We discuss finding your own voice for your brand. Engaging with your audience instead of your competition. Engagement vs Sales, and instagram comment groups. We also discuss mistakes that were made in the beginning of this podcast and what we have learned.  To connect with Lauryn click HERE To connect with Michael click HERE This episode is brought to you by The Skinny Confidential Bombshell Body Guide and Meal plan.  tired of combating inflammation & bloat? Want to feel lighter and sexier? Check out lauryn's latest 7 day meal plan. In this simple & super effective plan you'll find: + tsc grocery list with every ingredient you need for the 7 days. + what the f*ck to do when you love carbs guide. + quick and delicious recipes: breakfast, snacks, lunch, dinner and dessert. You will also find 28 weeks worth of fat burning, muscle toning, 27 minute long, effective workouts you can do at home with no equipment. USE PROMO CODE: HIMANDHER at Checkout for 20% Off

The following podcast is a Bostick media production. She's a lifestyle blogger extraordinaire. Fantastic. And he's a serial entrepreneur. A very smart cookie. And now Lauren Everts and Michael Bostic are bringing you along for the ride. Get ready for some major realness. Welcome to the skinny confidential, him and her.

Aha. Hello, hello. Hello. Welcome back to the skinny confidential, him and her show. You have me, Lauren Everton. And my lovely husband, Michael Bostic, howdy, howdy, howdy, howdy. Who did not wear mandelic serum last night on his face. And I'm sitting across from him and I can see what's happening and his skin needs it. Well, we just got off a, we, you know, we traveled for 24 hours yesterday, back to the States, back to reality. For those of you who know, we were in the south of France

for the last, close to a month. And now we are back in the office, back in biz. Were we out of biz? We weren't fully out of biz, but I did take some time to read a lot and kind of just relax. I actually will say I felt relaxed during the trip, which is rare because usually when I'm traveling, I feel like I'm trying to still create content. But I did step away because sometimes I feel like when you're creative, you do have to step away for a minute and get your head out of the game. So when you can come back, you're refreshed. Well, it's funny. People have different takes on vacation time. And I would say, Lauren and I, we travel a lot, but, you know, a lot of the time when we're traveling,

it's not per se for a vacation. You know, we're working and we're constantly on the go, doing things, whether it's meetings or, or whatnot. So we don't really, when we're traveling, we're not always taking vacation. We do, we do things to have fun, but it's not always a vacation. And this one was definitely for me, a vacation, a reset. Now I'm ready to go again. Did you get reset? I'm reset. I feel like I reset you. You set me off and you don't reset me.

I feel like I reset you. We're back and we're ready to get rolling again. We're ready to get rolling. This podcast is going to be all about mistakes. And Michael had this idea to talk about the mistakes that I've experienced myself, the mistakes I've made, the mistakes I potentially could have made and got myself out of. and mistakes that I see other bloggers and influencers making. Of course, that's my opinion.

But, you know, just kind of going over all different kinds of mistakes and how to pull yourself out of it and how to recognize it and not to let it, you know, kind of take over, but fuel you. We were going to do an episode with some of my mistakes as well, but it would take a few months. No, no, no. That's a five-part series. Yeah, it's a five-part series. So we're going to just, we're going to start this with just some of Lauren's mistakes.

We'll probably pepper in a couple of months. Maybe, maybe not. But I thought it would be interesting instead of, you know, talking about all this great stuff all the time or interviewing all these high performers. I thought it would be interesting to do an interview with Lauren, my wife, and talking about some of her mistakes because, you know, anybody that says they haven't made any mistakes is lying or they're not taking enough chances, in my opinion. I think mistakes are what help us grow. I think they're what make us learn. I don't be I there's a quote that I can't remember who said it but one of my favorites is it's not failure until you admit defeat and I think that you know you're going to have mistakes along the way in anything you're doing with it's a relationship or your business or your job and I think it's important to learn from those mistakes acknowledge them share with others so that others can you know maybe not make those same mistakes and I think it's important to share those mistakes so that people can you know see hey it's not all it's not always great there's there's problems sometimes So sometimes a lot of the times. A business is a constant problem. You're constantly putting out

fires. That's just the way it goes. I mean, for me, I'm making a lot of mistakes and learning as I, as I go. I didn't go to school for business, even though I think if I did go to school for business, it wouldn't have helped me that much. But, you know, running a business is something that's completely new to me. I've been doing it for six years, but it's definitely a work in progress. And I have made a lot of fucking mistakes. Well, and as an entrepreneur, as a business guy, businessman, you know, a lot of what I do is, I don't want to say correcting mistakes, but it's putting out fires, right? Like, that's, it's a rare day that I wake up and someone calls and says, hey, everything's just great today. Nope, nothing to do. Usually there's some,

there's some kind of issue going on. And that just comes with, you know, that just comes with running a business. And I think that the more people that understand that, the better, because it can be discouraging to, you know, especially with social media, you're looking around. And we've talked about this before. You're looking around, you're seeing what other people are doing and everything looks so perfect all the time. And trust me, I can tell you it's not. Most of the time, it's a struggle. And so I think it's important to, you know,

kind of share these mistakes, learn from them, help other people learn from them, and also show a vulnerable side so that people can realize, okay, like if these people are going through this, maybe it's not so bad for us as well. I love it. With that, we will just get right into it.

And I'm going to have Michael kind of conduct his own little interview. Okay, to start off, let's take blogging and the influencer world to start, because obviously that's your career path, that's your choice. So let's talk about mistakes in the blogging world. When you were starting out, what were some of the biggest mistakes you first made in the very beginning? Looking back, knowing what you know now. Well, let's go back to 2011, because that's when I launched. and I well the first thing is is you know everyone knows that I can be very hard on myself when it comes to creating content I want it right I want it the way I want it you know that better than anyone

and when it came to blogging it was no different when I started a blog I you know planned it out for a year and as you would say I didn't launch fast I you know took a year to launch I wanted the website right. I wanted the pictures right. I wanted the font right. Whatever. Now looking back, when I look back on my first, second, third, fourth, fifth, 15th blog post, it was not right. It was not perfect. But in my mind at that time, it was the way I wanted it to be. So I guess the point is, is I would have launched faster. And Michael's smiling at me right now because. Well, you kind of mentioned something that I talk about a lot and that is important to me is that there's really no such thing as perfect, right?

And I think the problem is, is whenever you're launching any business... You don't think I'm perfect? Well, you might be a rare case. Thank you. You know, I'll tell a funny story. We were just in France, and we were with my friend Alex and his dad, Gene. And I'm sorry, we're getting sidetracked here, but it's funny. And Gene was saying, you know, as I've gone through life, I've learned that there's no such thing as better or worse.

There's different. There's no better place. worse place. There's no better experience or better car that's just different. And he was going about better and worse, no such thing saying that there's only different. And I asked him to his face, I said, Gene, does that apply to women? And he looked at me and said, ah, shit. And I thought it was hilarious. So I agree. There's just, there's no better. There's no worse. There's different. But when it comes to women, in my experience, there's better and there's worse. And Lauren, you are one of the better. Okay, back back to the topic at hand. So I think when you have an idea of perfect in your

head for anyone listening, it's difficult because that's just your point of view. Yeah. So when I was launching the blog, I wanted it perfect. I had the web designer. I had the poster board. I had the textiles. All that was great. I would have sped it up and gone quicker. Keep in mind, though, I was in school and I was teaching Pilates and Pier Bar and bartending. So I had a lot on my plate. So I think That's maybe why it took me a little bit longer, but I would have stayed up later. I would have woken up earlier and I would have launched faster. So that was the first mistake. Then when I launched about a year into blogging, I decided, and I don't know if you

remember this, Fabe, because this is like super TSC vintage. This is like 2012, that I was going to open a store. Okay? An e-com store. No, it wasn't even an e-com store. I don't even, I think that I had a checkout through email. Like people would email me what they wanted. It was super vintage.

Whoa. Oh, yeah. Whoa. No, I remember you wanted to sell like straws. Like, okay, so yeah. So, you know, I was a health and fitness blogger and I was using like these pixie straw and an ice cube tray and all these like little cute dainty details and I wanted to open this store that sold them. Looking back, the reason that that wasn't the right move is because like the book,

The One Thing says we always talk about this. I wasn't doing the one thing. and that should have been to create content, to create value, and to just focus on that. A store brought in so many problems in, you know, probably three months. I had to go to the post office every day and stand in line and ship these things out. And I had to buy shipping paper. And by the time I was done, it was just a waste of time and energy. So that's one mistake.

Thank God that was only a three-month mistake. And I don't know why you didn't tell me that was a mistake. Well, I think some mistakes you have to make on your own. And, you know what, we're calling these mistakes, but I, you know, again, I think they're learning experiences. And I think for something like that, I love a mistake, though. You learn from it. It wasn't going to harm you. And I think it's valuable to learn how to sell things online in any capacity. No, it was, this was like not the way. Well, now you learned what not to do. You know, not to, if you're going to sell things online, not to do it that way. Well, this was six years ago, too.

So, you know, times have changed. Also, another thing that I decided to do was I made T-shirts. And I don't know if you guys remember this, but this is like really, really old school. I wrote sweat like a sex kitten on the t-shirt. And the reason that's wrong is because my brand's a skinny confidential. So it should have said the skinny confidential. And so let's dive into that a little bit. You're talking and I'm going to stop you because you'll go in tangents here. But I want to talk to you about why that's a mistake in branding. Why this skinny confidential, why sweat like a sex kitten is the wrong thing to do. Can you go into detail on that? Well, there's a lot of wrong things about it. The first thing is, is, in my opinion, starting a T-shirt line is way too obvious, right? That wasn't the right

move for my brand in 2012. The second mistake there is the brand had not been established. So even now, after six years, I think that you really have to be strategic with the first product that you decide to launch with, right? So, you know, whatever product I am going to launch with next year, it needs to be the right product. And a t-shirt line is, in my opinion, for me, it was lazy on my part. But if you were going to do a t-shirt, it wouldn't be sweat like a sex kitten because that doesn't make any sense to your brand unless I'm missing something. It does make sense to the brand, but the brand was the skinny confidential. So to put sweat like a sex kitten on a shirt when the brand is the skinny confidential at that point in time made absolutely no fucking sense. Well, I see a lot of

creatives kind of making a similar mistake where they have a brand and they're trying to establish that brand and then they get another creative idea in their head and they say oh i could just put this under that brand and what it does is it confuses the brand messaging so i think for anyone out there that's that's creating a brand think about how to be consistent with your brand and think about the message that you want to to give off because when you when you take creative people and you give them the gauntlet to do whatever they want it can you know you can all of a sudden become sweating like a sex kitten and it's very confusing hey honey you had to make these mistakes i'm learning it, right? You guys, I'm learning how to brand at this point. It's a year in. Then I decide,

and I have the bright idea, to start a YouTube channel with a friend. Now, why I didn't start the skinny confidential YouTube channel still boggles my mind. I don't understand that. I decided to do a completely different brand and start a new YouTube channel with a friend who wasn't in the influencer world. She was a designer. So right there, again, I'm not doing the one thing. And again, that one thing should have been creating content for the Skinny Confidential. Now, keep in mind, I was still creating content for the Skinny Confidential every single day, seven days a week. But I was channeling all this energy into a video with another person and another brand, which makes no sense. So what would you tell somebody that has a brand and, you know, their friends want

them to do something different? What would you tell? What's the takeaway there? The takeaway is that if you have a blog, right? And you want to start a YouTube channel, the, you know, the, you know, YouTube channel needs to be named after the blog, right? Your social handles need to be named after the blog. To start a whole new brand is, in my opinion, kind of, it's not the right way to go when you're just starting out. Now, if you have a super established brand and you want to make a subbrand off that brand, after a while, I believe that's okay. So the difference there is if you're just starting out, you want to make sure everything's matching up. You know, I've seen. a lot of bloggers name, you know, whether it's a clothing line or a podcast or a product,

something completely different than their brand. And sometimes that's fine, right? Sometimes that's the right avenue because they are established brand. But if they're not an established brand, it makes no sense. You want to stick with that name. That's good advice. I think so too. I think, again, consistency in branding is really important. And I think that while all of us can get created, sometimes once you've committed to a brand, you've got to commit and you need to stay on point and you can't be jumping around all over the place. So, you know, a lot of the time when people call me and they're and they're talking about their brand, they can't answer basic questions about what their brand message is. And I think it's because there's so many different thoughts in their head.

They're saying, well, I'm going to do this or I'm going to create a personal brand, but then I'm going to have my site and then I'm going to have like this YouTube thing and then I'm going to do a product. It's like, how does that all feed into one? message to one brand. And I think once you've done that for a little while, then you can branch out, like Lauren said. Also, another thing I think that I needed to ask myself in the beginning and I didn't start asking myself this. I probably started asking myself this four years ago was the why. Right. And there's a book on this that you've read, I believe. It's called Start with Why. Start with Why. And I- Simon Sinek. I think that's how you say his last name. We'll put in the show notes too.

start with why is a book about when you're building a brand why it's so important to have that why a lot of people can give me a two-second spiel about what their brand is you know they can break it down but why are you doing it and the why for me after two years became the community and providing the audience with as much value as I possibly could so they could take something away from the skinny confidential as opposed to just reading about me. So that kind of formed. So that's another thing that I want to point out. Sometimes it takes a while to form, right? It's not just going to come out perfect. When you start your brand, it's not going to be exactly what you want. It evolves. So what I was six years ago has evolved. I've grown. I've changed. My audience has grown with me. So I think that's another thing.

Like if you're starting out of brand right away right now, know that it's going to evolve and that's okay. Speaking of evolving and starting with why, my next question is, what were some mistakes or some difficulties you had in finding your voice and your message? So at first when I started the Skinny Confidential, I was obviously reading a lot of different blogs, which I don't do anymore because I find it distracting. And it takes my eye off the ball. I'll look at what other people are doing, but I don't want it to distract. me. But what I was doing at that point was I was studying and researching everyone around me.

And I, you know, have a tendency to swear I'm very, how do you put it, kind of loud in your face. I have an opinion. I come from a very non-judgmental space. And I think sometimes I talk about things that are taboo and I'm just very unapologetically myself. A lot of the blogs at this point in 2011 and 12 were very, what's the word I'm looking for? Very safe. Safe is a good word. Conservative. They were talking about, you know, what they were wearing. There was no cuss words. It was very, I hate to use this word, but it kind of vanilla, right? So I wanted to come into the space and spice it up, show that there's there's more than just you know the safe route so at first i played it super safe you know i was writing a couple sentences about what kind of popcorn i ate at the movie theaters because i you know

had a kid size instead of an adult size and i was giving people tips and now if i wrote that post it would be very in your face very unapologetic just very the way i am in person like you're having happy hour with me so i think one of the mistakes i made and again i wouldn't call it a mistake i would call it a learning experience the learning curve was discovering my voice and actually writing the way I spoke. And I think something that people can take away from that now is what happens is now there's lots of different flavors of ice cream on the internet. And what people are doing is they're choosing someone's blog. They're focusing on that and they're writing like that person. And what I did in 2012 is I really did not, I really started to not pay attention to what anyone else was doing. And I really really

wrote in my own voice. And I think that's when I saw a leap in readers and the audience. So the mistake was that in the beginning, you were paying too much attention to other blogs. And as soon as you stopped doing that, you were able to find your own voice. Yes. And I think nowadays it's harder because it's more saturated. So you're finding someone that you can relate to that, you know, isn't vanilla, that you really feel a close connection with. And you're, you know, pulling up their blog, writing your own blog. And what's happening is people are starting to sound like each other. In my opinion on this subject, in any business,

and when you're branding or if you have a blog or if you're a content creator, any business really, I think you should be somewhat aware of strategies that are working for your competition and strategies that aren't working for your competition. And we had this conversation the other night over pizza and rosé. Yes, but you should be very, very careful to dive too deep into their brand voice or strategy or that content creator's voice or their strategy because what happens is you start to trying to, you know, kind of mimic what they're doing. And then it becomes difficult to speak in your own voice. And I think when you're paying so much attention to what other people

are doing and you're watching that closely, all of a sudden you start to sound like that person. And it becomes and it pulls you out of your voice. And it makes it difficult for you to find your vision and your voice. And so what I, to sum it up, I think you should pay attention to what competition's doing and be aware of strategies that are working and not working, but not to the extent that you're becoming obsessed with it. Yes. And what I compare this to is, you know, it's like baking a cake and you're trying to bake your own cake. You're going to pull elements like, you know, cinnamon or coconut sugar from, you know, other recipes to create your own recipe, but you also need to add your own touch. And whether that's nutmeg or, you know, almond flour, whatever that is,

you need to add your own spin on it. And, you know, Ryan Holiday was just on Gary. Van der Chucks podcast and, you know, he went on to talk about how his books are all about old, you know, strategies or, you know, he talks about things in the Roman times, but he says that he puts his own spin on that. So I think if you're going to pull elements from other bloggers or influencers, you need to put your own spin on that and really talk in your own voice. And let me tell you why that's so important. Now, you know, six, seven years later, after I started blogging, I'm doing speeches all the time. I'm podcasting. I'm talking. And, you know, back then you weren't talking. You were just behind a computer screen. You could fake it. Now we're in a day and age when people want to see you on

video. They want to hear your podcast. They want to hear you talk in person. And if you're bullshit and you're not talking in your own voice, that's going to come through when you're in person and you're speaking. I was going to just make it very difficult. I think the, where I got lucky here is that I've never known anything but myself. I've never. So when, when Lauren threw me right into the, the mix of this, I just kind of came out the gate as myself. And it's not because I'm so smarter because I've, you know, thought so much about strategy. It says I really don't pay attention to a lot of things that other people are doing. And I think it's part of the reason that I've been able to come on a podcast like this and, you know, and do it all right. Not, I don't want to say I'm an expert, but where I was

able to find a voice rather quickly is that I have not been comparing myself to other people. There's a lot of people I admire, a lot of people I look up to, but I try not to dive too deep into what they're doing or what they're saying. I like to pay attention to things that work for them, but I try not to immerse myself in their voice. So the point here is don't hold back your voice. And not only don't hold back your voice, don't emulate other people's voice, be yourself, add your own little spin and do a formula that works for you. We were just talking about. Who are we talking about Hal's wives that have been successful because let's talk about this because they you know sometimes in the beginning maybe some of them were scrutinized a little bit or people didn't like them but i think over time people have

what we're saying we're they like the ones that have been the most authentic we were talking about the housewives and the ones that have been the most successful and i told michael the ones that i see as the most successful are bethany and erika jane and you know lisa van derrump too all three of those women are strong women. They're unapologetically themselves. They say what they mean. They mean what they say. You may not like everything they say, but they're going to say it because they're being true to who they are. And all of them, all three of them have an amazing voice. And when I say voice, I mean, they get in that hot seat and you, you know their voice. You know their brand. You know, there's been some other housewives that, you know, don't know their voice. They're censoring themselves. They're more guarded. And I think that definitely

comes off. And I think a lot of them are looking for the more successful housewives formula and trying to use that formula and see if it works for them when they'd be much more successful if they would just do their own formula. No, I think, and I think that could be seen in pretty much any field. I mean, I've talked about Dan Bilsarian here before, just because I heard him on Joe Rogan's podcast. And I think there's so many people that hate that guy and can't stand him. I don't know much about him other than his Instagram or whatever. But when I listened to him on Joe Rogan, basically the thing that came through was that he's unapologetically himself. And I think there's a demographic of people like, listen, I don't agree with what this guy's doing. And I don't like what he says, but at least he's being

himself. And I think that if you start to study successful people in media and you see the people that have made a lasting impression, it's the people that have come out and said, you know what, this is who I am, this is what I am, take it or leave it, but this is it. And you're going to have haters. You always do. You want haters. Listen, I told you, if you don't have haters, you're not doing it right. Who else were we just listening to that was talking about that? Who else was talking about haters? I think we're listening to Adam Carolla. Yeah, Adam Carolla. Yeah. He's great. Okay, next question. All right. My next question is what's a mistake that you made or could have made that would have had you in the wrong direction.

Or did you make one that had you go in the wrong direction? Yeah, I think I've definitely made mistakes that I was going in the wrong direction. You know, I think I was going, I'm really, really gung-ho on launching a product for the Skinning Confidential and I wanted to be the right product and I'm taking my time. And about a year and a half ago, I was thinking of launching a product and I realized that it wasn't the right product for my audience. so I stopped. I re-evaluated. I stepped back. I stepped out of it like I love to do when I go away. I step out of the situation so I can gain a different perspective on it. And I realized that that wasn't the right product.

And how I realized that actually is talking to you guys on Snapchat. I message everyone back. And it's so amazing to see my audience and demographic and what they're screenshotting and what they like and what they hate. And I think that the route that I'm going to take is going to be a route that's different and maybe not as safe, but it's not going to be that vanilla route. The vanilla route isn't for me. And sometimes I do try to, you know, take that conservative vanilla route and it's just not me and what I stand for. So I always have to sit down at the end of the day and really evaluate what I'm doing and make sure that it's not that overly conservative route that a lot of bloggers have taken that have worked for them, but that doesn't work for me. I want to touch on this a little bit without

diving too deep into detail on your product, but just on people in general. I think a lot of the time, especially in 2017, people, when they're coming up with a business or a product or an idea, they look around and they say, wow, this is really working for this person or this brand. And so what they do is they say, oh, I bet I could do that. And what happens is you're trying to emulate a business model and you're trying to jump into a space. You're not thinking so much about the competition. You're just saying, you know what, that person did it. They made a lot of money or they had some success. I think I can do the same. I think the question you need to ask yourself is, is this something you really want to be doing? Right? Like take the money out of it. Is this something

that you could see yourself working on every single day? Is this a product or a business that you could see yourself feeling confident selling to your customer base? And if the answers to those questions are kind of or no, then you shouldn't do it. If you don't love the product that you're selling so much that you would use it every single day like you just said, then it's pointless. Let's say you can't, and let's just say you can't hide behind a brand and you have to stand on stage in front of 100,000 people and say, this is my product. I'm the person behind it. I'm the one that's creating it and I'm doing everything behind it. Is that something that you could stand in front of that many people and confidently say like, yes, this is what I believe in? And if the answer is no, then you should probably say, pass because you might have some short-term success with it, but you're not going to have long-term success and you're definitely not going to have long-term fulfillment.

I think an example of someone that has done it on her own terms in her own way and beat the tune of her own drum. And I think a lot of people thought it wouldn't work for her, but it's turned out to really work for her as Christy Teagan. I don't know if you know a lot about her, honey. I know she's married to John Legend. Yeah, she's loud. She's in your face. She's just completely herself. She's, I think she's hilarious.

She's on Twitter. She's really funny. and she really lets you see her personality. And why I like that is so many supermodels walk around without kind of a personality. They walk around like, you know, no smile, very serious, you know, dressed to the nines. And Christy Teigen has brought you into her life. She's used storytelling, which I'm such a big fan of. She's talked about postpartum depression and she cusses and, you know, she's very masculine and I'm very attracted to that. Not everyone. Everyone's going to like her. She's not going to be for everyone. But there is a big demographic of people that fucking love her.

Well, I don't know a lot about her, but it sounds like she's doing it right. Yeah, she is. Okay. Next. This is a question, I don't know, maybe it's, I don't, it's not controversial, but maybe it's difficult for you to answer because I know you don't want to criticize anybody. But what's a mistake you see other bloggers and influencers making that you, that maybe you've made or, maybe you think they could avoid or, I know it's just your opinion, but what's something you see that you're like, oh, I wouldn't do that. Two things. And we've discussed this a lot on the podcast. The first thing is not knowing your audience, right? You got to know who you're talking to. So I feel like I know exactly who my audience is. I could draw her out. I could sketch her. I could tell you what she's wearing. I could tell you what she likes, what she doesn't like. And the reason that I know my audience so well is because I'm in constant contact with them. You know, it's become a lot harder with Instagram DMs.

We've talked about this. It's something that I try to keep up with on a day-to-day basis. But in the secret Facebook group and on Snapchat and through my comments on the blog, I'm able to talk one-on-one and really understand who I'm talking to. So I think that's something if you're out there and you're a blogger and you're wondering, you know, where do I start? The first thing you start with is your audience. And if that's two people, that's two people. Because once you know who those two people or 20 people or 100 people or 10,000 people are that are reading and consuming your content, you can go off that and use that as a foundation to build outward to more people that are just like that. Let me ask you a question. And this is maybe unique to the blogging world or content creating world that's

different maybe from the business world. For me, it's important to, if I'm launching a product or a business, to launch the product, you know, the minimum viable product that I can get out in the market quickly and then get customer feedback. And if they, you know, they don't like this or they like this or they like this part, but they like that part, I like to get that feedback and then kind of adapt and adjust the product based on what the customers are saying. So, you know, this kind of feeds into me launching quickly and getting customer feedback. But with a blog and with content, how much do you need to listen to your audience in terms of the content you create. And to kind of put it in perspective, let's say you're like, there's a musician. Let's say you're a band and you put out

music and the audience says, hey, I don't really like that. I wish you would do a song like this. When is it compromising your voice and when is it being smart? Here's the balancing act. And that's a great question. The balancing act is knowing your audience and knowing them so well. But the other side of it is that you want to be able to tell them what they don't know, right? So you're telling them and you're listening and you're communicating and you're, you know, hearing them. But at the same time, you're also putting your own spin on it and showing something they don't know they want. So what if, so let's take it a step further. So what if you wanted to talk about, I don't know, pink dresses?

I'll just use this randomly. And your audience says, Lauren, we don't want to hear anything you have to say about pink dresses. At what point do you say, okay, I don't want to talk about pink dressing more because you guys don't want it? And what point do you say, you know what? this is my voice and this is what I'm interested in talking about. That's, that's kind of what I'm trying to get into. Is what's the percentage, right? What's the percentage of the audience? Is there two people out of a hundred that are telling me they don't like pink dresses or is it all hundred of them? Let's say it's split decision. A split decision? I would try to sway the other side.

The other side to let you talk about it. Yeah. Because I don't want to give up on something that easily. And if I really, you know who I am. What do you mean? You know how I am. And on the business side, if you're selling pink dresses and 50% of your customer base is saying no, I would maybe consider getting rid of it. But I don't know. I could be wrong. Definitely if more than 50% saying no, get rid of it. I think I would get rid of it if it was more than 50%. But if it was just 50% and I truthfully believed in it. And I knew that eventually I think that I could put a spin on it and make it attractive. I would try to implement strategies and that would maybe push it forward. I think the reason I ask you this is because I know a lot of,

of content creators and I and I see some of them get really frustrated because there are certain things that they want to talk about and it's just not gaining traction and I look at it and say okay if that's not gaining traction my mind says okay you switch to something else that you can get some traction which and then maybe come back to that once you develop an interested audience but some people say you know what this is I'm an artist and this is what I want to talk about and too bad for them so I guess I'm trying to get to the bottom line as someone that does this regularly at what point do you pivot and say, you know what, I'm not going to talk about that anymore because it's not getting traction? That's such a situational question, though, because has it been a year?

Has it been a day? Has it been a week? Like, how long do I have? Let's say it's been six months that somebody's been talking about a certain subject and it's just not getting traction. Do they pivot or do they keep, do they keep going? Because there's consistency and persistence and then there's recognizing when something's not working. Well, it's like that quote, what did Denzel Washington say the other day? I don't know. Denzel Washington says a lot of things. No, he said something the other day about, you know progress. Oh, I know. He basically said just because you're working hard. And I don't know, this wasn't the other day. This was in a clip. But he basically was saying, just because you're working harder than everybody doesn't mean you're necessarily moving further up the line than everybody.

Bingo. You have to, you don't want to be the hardest working person in the room running in place. Right. Like progress matters. You got to figure out what's moving the chain forward. I'm using a football term here. What's moving the needle? Yeah, you got to, you got to figure out what's moving you forward. You could be the hardest working person in the world, but if you're not moving forward, then it doesn't matter. You got to work smart and you got to work hard. I agree with you. I think that, I thought the question was the first time I ever presented it, they don't like it. If it's over a six month year period, no one likes it, obviously I'm going to, you know, move on. Okay. Well, it was just, so I guess that was.

Like my dad says move on.org. I told your dad not. No, you didn't. Yeah, I did. Good. Okay, so what are some other mistakes you see bloggers, influencers making that you think they could avoid or mistakes that you made that you think you could avoid? Well, one of the things kind of just plays into what you just said and that's being relentless. You know, I just read the book by Tim Grover and I loved his book because it shows the importance of waking up every day, creating smart habits as opposed to habits that maybe aren't that great and implementing those habits every single day and not taking no for an answer. I mean, I've told you guys this before. I have heard no six million times. I've heard yes a thousand times, right? You know, we've asked a lot of

people to come on our podcast that said no. I can't believe it. So, but we've also asked a lot of people like Gary V to come on and he said yes, right? So you have to really be relentless and put your blinders on and you're going to hear no. It's part of the game. If you don't want to hear that word no, get out of the game, right? Get out of the game of business. You're going to hear no all the time. So what's the mistake there that people are giving up when they, I don't know if that's a mistake or just like a, you know, like a fear of failure thing. The mistake is not being relentless, right? The mistake is not getting up every day and you're letting the past and what's happened in the past affect the future and affect the future of the business. So I'll see a lot of influencers

start on an Instagram account. And if they don't have 5,000 followers in, six months, they're out. I see it all the time. But is this really a mistake or is this just a impatient fear of failure not gutting it through things? Because I don't, I don't necessarily maybe not an mistake. Maybe the word is. So what's like a common mistake? Because I agree with what you're saying that people need to be tougher and they need to be more patient and they need to be more persistent. That's all like that's all been said and done and I agree and I can't say it enough. But what's a what are some common mistakes? And I know this is difficult for you to answer because you don't want to call anybody out, but what are some mistakes that you look at? You're like, ooh, that is

not smart. That's not what I would do. I know, like, she's smiling loud because she doesn't want to answer this. No, I'll answer. I don't know you do, but what, what is something where you see, and you don't have to give specific examples or call anybody out, but what is something you see where you, where you're like, I really want to get into this. There's a couple. Yeah, I didn't write this down. No, I want to get into it. This is your opinion, but I want to, I think that, listen, you're in this space and there's a lot of people that listen that are interested in this space. And to extract the value out of this conversation, I want to know from somebody who's been doing it for a while with a level of success what you think, either mistakes you've made or what you see other people doing. They're like, ooh, I don't think so.

That's not good. Okay. So the first mistake I see is when people post a picture of their outfit on Instagram. And in the caption, there's absolutely no value, like nothing. Now, this is okay once in a while, right? It's okay. It's no value, meaning they didn't share. They do an emoji or they write like summer days, right?

With like a sun emoji. But then again, sometimes I'll post an Instagram. I'm not an influencer, but I'll post something you say I'm too wordy. Well, sometimes you're like all over the fucking place. Like we don't need a child's dick and novel. I don't think anyone cares about my pictures. I think that they only care about my comments. Okay.

You think your captions are like gold. Guys, get in my, get in my comments. Let me know what you think. I help him with his captions, guys. Michael Bostick. All right. Hit me up. Michael, you're not an influencer.

We're not talking about you. I just said I'm not. I preface it with him. Okay. So. I mean, I should, you know, someone should start sending me the big bucks here because I'm, I'm, I'm moved the needle.

I'm going to go throw up. Do you want me to answer the question? Okay. Back back. Okay. So they'll post an Instagram or they'll do a blog post and it's all about me, me, me, me, I, I, I, I, I, I, and there's absolutely no value. I was reading this blog the other day.

And she said, three mistakes I've made blogging. And the whole article was just so narcissistic and self-involved. And we can all be narcissistic and self-involved. That's like the 2017 social media. However, what can the reader walk away with? So on Instagram, I'll see someone post a picture. And underneath is like, if the caption doesn't make you laugh, go to the link in bio,

give you some kind of value or teach you something or show you something you didn't know about what's the fucking point okay so the mistake is not providing value in being narcissistic once once in a while I don't like to use the word narcissistic because social media is narcissistic because we're all posting selfies of ourselves so but it could be it could be entertainment though is what you're saying entertainment's great it could be entertainment what do you the fat Jew hello he's great okay I just want to I just want to make that clear absolutely if you have a fucking funny caption it just can't be like like you said summer days

No, it can be summer days once in a while, but when every single freaking Instagram is summer days. Or like a TBT to your summer trip. Or you post the cutest outfit in the world and nothing's tagged and it says summer days. Like, shoot me. Shoot me. If you're going to post an Instagram with the cutest outfit ever with all the story on and write summer days and then log off your Instagram account, it's just, it's not what we as influencers are there to do. Okay. another mistake I see big mistake is no engagement in the comment section if someone

ask you a question I'm not saying you have to answer it right away you know sometimes I'm traveling or I turn my phone off but I go back and I answer questions answering questions is part of the job in my opinion it's what you signed up for you don't want to answer questions don't be an influencer if you're wearing I saw this girl this blogger huge blogger post this pair of blue linen pants They were gorgeous. She posts three pictures. Not one of them were tagged. She didn't answer any questions.

I think she got 200 comments per picture. And she did not answer anyone's question about the pants. What I did is I took it to Google Images and I searched it and I found the pants. But the point is, what is your problem? Why are you posting these cute pants? You're a fashion blogger and you're not going to tell anyone what they are. So the mistake there is not engaging with the audience. There's no value.

Listen, I think it's reasonable to point out that somebody with a large following is going to have a difficult time getting to everyone. You know, it's just so, you know, it's impossible. But if you're starting out and people are interacting with you and asking you questions, don't think you're too cool to respond. Like, that's the job. Like that's how you're going to increase engagement. That's how you're, if someone snaps me or messages me, I do my very, very best to get back to them. Even if they've commented on my photo, even at a minimum, I try to like their post just so that they can see, listen, I'm paying attention. I may be busy. I may not be able to get to everything. But I'm on a small skill. If you have an audience and you're neglecting them and you're ignoring them, that is a very...

This isn't the job for you. No, but it's a very short-sighted tactic. I mean, I have told everyone this on the podcast. I take an hour in the morning and an hour at night to respond. Yeah, it's like if you have a business and someone sends you a message in customer service or on your Instagram and you ignore them. What do you think is going to happen with that customer? Okay, let's talk about comments though, okay? We just kind of did, but let's go deeper. So about a year and a half ago, I was invited to something called a comment pod. I think that's what it's called. And basically what it is is it's a bunch of bloggers that get together.

I think there's like 20 or 30 that get into a DM group on Instagram. So you're all in a DM group. So there's like 20 or 30. of you. And you tried this? I tried this. So I got invited and I thought, oh, I'll try this. We all comment on each other's photos. Wait, explain to me to how this works. Okay, so you get invited to this thing called a comment pod. And basically it's 20 to 30 bloggers like I just said and we're all in one message. And whenever someone posts, we send the picture to the group and then the whole group will go comment on it. So it's like I scratch your back, you scratch mine. Wait, but so you have 30 people

in this group where you did? I did. And so if let's say that each person posts one, time you have to go in and write to 30 different people? No. So what you do is say I post, yes. All 29 of them would come comment. Yeah, but what I'm saying is if all 30 of them, let's say the other say all 29 of them posts as well, you have to go comment on every one of there? Yes. Oh my God. I'd be out of that in day one. Okay. So here's the scoop. First of all. What's the comment say? What do you have to say? You have to say more than four words. Okay. So first of all, the reason that bloggers are doing this is to appeal to brands. and I'm just going to call it out. I don't know if anyone's called this out. It's to appeal to brands.

So they want to look like they're getting a lot of engagement. And you guys would be floored at the amount of top bloggers that do this that 75% of their comments are from other bloggers because they're all commenting on each other's photos. So at first, it wasn't too bad. After two weeks, I wanted to blow my head off. After four weeks, I wanted to blow my head off. Now, yes, my engagement was going up. because there was other bloggers commenting on my photo. But what's the point? It's fake. They wear it like cute shoes.

Love it, girl. Well, there's different tactics, right? Like, I can understand why they would want to do that to appeal to brands if brands are trying to pay on engagement. It's not a long-term play. No, no, no, no. It's definitely, well, what I always find interesting is the engagement conversation really only matters if you have real engagement.

Right. So here I am in this group. Four weeks, five weeks. I don't remember how long. I was probably in there for two months. All the girls were great. They're super nice. I'm not talking shit about anyone that does it. I'm just saying it's not for me. I want to create a brand that's based on the community, not other bloggers in the industry, because at the end of the day, that's not going to translate. Do you think that those comment pods help get more comments from actual? I think if you're starting out, you could toy with the idea. For me, what it was

doing was it was taking away from the audience and the reader's questions and putting my time and effort and energy towards other bloggers. And I am not in this game to hang out with other bloggers. That's not why I'm in the game. I'm in the game to connect and create a community with the audience and the readership. I'm not a big person on going to events and taking squad pictures with other bloggers. It's just not me. It's never been me. I was in a sorority for. I was in a sorority. 10 minutes and couldn't deal. It's just not my personality. So when I started to see that I was, I was taking this energy that I had every day, the thermometer of energy and some of it was going towards other bloggers as opposed to the readers. And it wasn't a long-term play. I dropped out of the

group. My whole take on that is one, first, that sounds like way too much work with very little return unless. It was. Yeah. And two, at the end of the day, let's just say that I have a product and I want to work with an influencer. And I go and I see, oh, wow, look at this person has so many comments. And I pay them to, I think, well, they must, they get so many comments, so much engagement. They must be able to move the needle and sell my product. Bingo. And then I pay that person to do it. And then I get zero return on that placement. I'm never going to work with that person again. And as a matter of fact, I'm probably going to tell my business associates and other people, hey, that person's going to rip you off. So I think the reason I think this could be a big mistake for people.

two cents on is one. I don't care if people are doing it if they, if it makes them feel good or if, or if it's if they want to get paid for brands, but just recognize that at the end of the day, especially hovering around this industry for for a while now with Lauren, all these PR companies, all these brands, all these people, they speak with each other. They talk. They talk. They know. And they're going to catch on. You have to really, really control your voice and control your brand to the point where when a brand works with you, you can either move the needle for them and you actually have an engaged demographic because if you don't, brand A is going to go talk to B, C, D, and E and say, you know what, I work with so and so and they didn't work and it's BS.

And as soon as that happens, it's not good because you may have got a short term deal, but at the expense of a long-term career. Well, you're essentially creating a facade and you have to figure out, Do you want to create a house of cards or do you want to create strong foundation? And with strong foundation comes slow and steady work. It's laying those bricks and it takes longer. And, you know, you have to decide what kind of blogger are you. Are you trying to create a house of cards? Are you trying to create a foundation?

You're much better off if you're going to create one of those groups to create a group with a demographic of your readers or your audience and ask them their opinions as opposed to your competition. In my opinion, if I was doing something like that, I would put like a big group of people that are, you know, my most engaged customers or my most engaged audience. And then I would put them in that group and talk to them. That's what's going to make a difference. Doing it the other way with your competitions, not smart. Can you imagine if I created a company and I got all my competitors and said, hey, every time I post you talk about my product.

Every time you post, I'll talk about it. It just doesn't make any sense. Yeah, it does it? So anyways, those are some mistakes that I see people making. Okay. Well, I want to jump now because it's a podcast. And I think some people, you know, podcasting, I was ahead of the curve. Lauren, I told you we needed to do a podcast.

Do you have to flex your muscles when you say that? I'm sorry. They're just, you know, I get excited. She wasn't sure. We did this podcast. It's one of our favorite things to do now. A lot of people are jumping into the podcast space, which I think is great. There's plenty of room for everybody.

The cream will rise. The cream. Whatever. You know what I'm talking about. I think I'm excited because I like when new podcasts come out as long as this stuff's interesting. Now, talking to you now, Lauren, as a podcaster, is the other half of this podcast. Maybe the other...

Michael. 30%. Get to the point. Okay, fine. What are some mistakes you've made podcasting that you can look back on and say, well, I shouldn't have done that? Let me pull out my scroll that's called What to Blame Michael for when it comes to podcasting. Okay, so you're going to start blaming me.

Yeah. Okay. So what am I saying? You can say what mistakes that I've made then? No, I'm just kidding. Mistakes that we've made together as a team are deciding that we were going to film the podcast while we spoke. Was it really a mistake though? Or was it another learning thing?

I hate the word mistake. We're going to call this episode mistakes. Okay. Well, there was a mistake to call this podcast mistakes. Okay. Well, too late. Wait, do you really, you didn't like the first one? Something got, Lauren always gets mad when I point back to.

the to the first episodes. She doesn't like it because, what is it? With the first like three or four, maybe five, we filmed, and it was super awkward to go to YouTube and see and I've got this weird green sweater. My sister Jordan was kind of in the frame. She was working for us at the time and she was like kind of on the show, kind of not. Soup's awkward. And I, and part of me, like, I love looking back on him and laughing because they were so.

Do you really look back on him? No, I don't really. I can't even look at it. I like to think about it because. If I don't like something, I can't look at it. Lauren wanted to take him off the YouTube. channel for a long time, but I keep them up because I just think it's, it's good to point back to. So if anyone's listening, new listener, old listener, go back, no one wants to see that.

Well, you can also see why we had bad sound quality in the beginning too. Whoa. I get the wrong equipment. Michael got the wrong equipment. Another thing to blame Michael for. Another thing that was a learning experience. I wouldn't call it a mistake was joining a network. And here's why.

I think that I'm so glad that we did it and it was really, really worth it to learn and adjust. But I think Michael and I are so set on beating to the tune of our own drum and kind of evolving this space too. This space sometimes has kind of a retirement vibe to it. Well, here's the, here's people, people buy ad space and then people aren't, I'm going to get in a lot of trouble for saying that. people get mad. People buy ad space in the podcast world, how you used to buy old banner space on websites, right? Which what we used to do like 10 years ago, right? You buy a banner on somebody's website for X amount based on CPM. And when, you know, we're with the network, and it's not the same thing bad about the network. They were trying to sell a lot of ad space based on a CPM. And I just

thought it was so outdated. Didn't make sense. I didn't like the interruptions in the show. I didn't like to be talking about, you know, interviewing someone or having a topic and then all of a sudden have some crazy ad come in in the middle of the conversation. It just drove me nuts. And while the money was good and while you can't complain about that, for me, it's much more important. And I think to jump in on this and I know I'm kind of overtaking this, I think if you're going to start a podcast, the number one thing you should be concerned about is providing value to your listeners, giving the listeners a great experience so that when they come in, they say, you know what, I really enjoy listening to this podcast. This is great. I'm happy. It's enhancing my life. It's bringing me value.

It's bringing me entertainment. Whatever it is. Without the listeners, without you guys, this show would be worthless. I don't, it doesn't, to me and to Lauren, I don't care about any ad space. The only time I want to bring ads is if I say, hey, look, this is something that we really like and it's a really good deal. We've used it. We've used it. And, we believe in it and I want to bring it to the audience so that they can get some value. And I think we've done a pretty good job getting the right advertisers. But what's more important, what's more important about monetizing is building this audience and creating great listener experiences because if you have an audience that believes in your show

and likes listening, that is what's going to set the tone if you later want to monetize the podcast. Not the other way. Not getting ads up front and selling ads up front so that you can make money up front. It's what the reason you'll get big is because you have an engaged listenership. I want to run the podcast the same way I ran the skinny confidential in the beginning. I did not think about money for two to three years. Did not think about it. I am a huge believer and I've talked about this a lot of not focusing on money.

99% of bloggers are so focused on how to make money. It will come if you are consistent and your habits are right and you're relentlessly. and you beat to the tune of your own drum and you do you, it will come. I was never concerned about money at all. The podcast, I don't care if we don't monetize for a long time. If it's not the right ad, I don't want to do it. If it's not the right fit, I don't want to do it. It has no interest to me.

So I think with a network, we were put in a position where everyone else was doing it one way, where they were selling ad space of maybe stuff they didn't believe in. And we were put in this position where we had to be boxed into that. And we wanted to be a triangle. So without a network, we're allowed to be a triangle and just do it the way we want to do it. And we really hope that we can be pioneers in evolving this industry and changing the conversation and the narrative.

Yeah. Like I said from the beginning, It's important to me to protect the listenership, protect you guys. I don't want anyone coming on here and, you know, I'm not going to call any podcasts out or call anyone out, but there's a lot of people that will come in with some podcasts that we know and say way too many ads, annoying, don't want to do it. And I've seen a lot of shows that started off really good, become oversaturated with advertisements and they lose their listenership because people just don't want that.

You don't want to disrupt people's time. You want to enhance their time. And that comes down to anything you're doing, whether it's your content, whether you're an advertiser, whether they're in marketing, whether you're running a business, anything.

You want to enhance people's time. If you're advertising in a way where you're taking people's time and annoying them, you're not going to have good results. You might have good results initially. You may make some money up front, but it's going to come at the detriment

of your business or your brand. I could promise you that. Okay, with that, let's see. I got one more question. What is one, last, let's say mistake or one last takeaway or one last message that you would want to help somebody avoid with their business or their brand or their content. You have 30 seconds. No, I'm just kidding. You have as much time as you want. What's one takeaway? One final thing that you would say that's

maybe been a mistake or a pitfall that you would caution someone to avoid. One mistake I've made that I think people should avoid, and one takeaway from this, that I haven't talked about, is I tend to get romantic. And what I mean by that is I get too artistic and get too artistic and attached to an idea and I'm unwilling to see it any other way sometimes. And that's been something that's gotten in my way. Give an example. Oh my gosh, there's so many examples. An example would be that I was blogging seven days a week when I started.

And that's changed. And the reason that that's changed is for multiple reasons. One of the reasons being that, you know, people are on Instagram and Snapchat now, so I need to constantly be creating content there. I took a while to switch to Instagram story, and I haven't switched. I do both. I'll always do both. Well, for now, I don't want to get romantic about that. But for a while, I resisted Instagram story because I was just on Snapchat. So I think sometimes I tend to get in my own way. And I think that when it comes to blogging, I can't blog seven days a week. It's just not in the cards anymore. I'm 100 million times more busy than I am today

than I was seven years ago. You know, seven years ago, I was just blogging. Now there's 20 different elements. Well, I would say if consumer attention was fully on written format blogs all the time like it was when you first started, you would still be doing it. But the fact of the matter is that people consume content in so many ways, whether it's video, whether it's on Insta stories, if it's on Instagram, if it's blogs, if it's podcast. So there's a lot of different delivery methods now in 2017 that didn't exist when you first started.

but they weren't as big. So I think that it's not so much about getting romantic and saying, I need to blog seven days a week. I think you still need to produce content on a high impact content regularly, but you just need to recognize now that there's a lot of different delivery methods. Right. And I think that what's really helped me with that is growth hacking and learning about growth hacking. If you haven't read that book, you guys should read it if you're an influencer or blogger. And just... Ryan Holiday.

Yes. And learning the different platforms and how to utilize them in the best way for your audience. Snapchat's different than Instagram story. Instagram story is different than Facebook. I resisted getting a secret Facebook page for the Skinny Confidential for like six months. And now the community's grown and it's this amazing space. And I don't know why I resisted it. So with blogging, I think that, you know, seven days a week is not something that I'm

able to do anymore and I don't want to get a ghostwriter. I think creating that content that has an impact that's so valuable, that's a long form post that has something that the reader can really walk away with, you know, maybe four days a week or five days a week instead of seven is, you know, where everything's headed. It's also headed towards video. I kind of resisted that for a while and now I'm really jumping in head first to the video space. So what I'm trying to learn as I go is to hop on fast, get on faster, stop taking so long to wrap my head around things. And Michael, I see your grin. We'll do a podcast on your mistakes. Like I said, it's going to need to be a series. All right. Might have to start another podcast channel. All right. So, yeah, I think that

I need to stop getting romantic. And if you're out there and you're getting romantic about something, take it from me and evolve. If there's one, One thing that I've learned is that it doesn't cost really anything but time in most cases to start trying new things. And you jump into a space of, hey, is this working or is this working? Or maybe you're running a business and you say, okay, is this advertising method working? Is that? Is this PR campaign working?

Is that, you know, sometimes you're going to spend some money. But I think what's more important is to recognize when things are working and when they are to double down and go all in and when they're not working to move quick into another area. I think the people that hang on as the ship's sinking and say, you know what, this has been a great ship for a really long time. And I believe in it. And I love it. I'm never going to change. Those are the people that get screwed.

It's the same reason why the hotels didn't come out with Airbnb. It's the same reason the taxi companies didn't come out with Uber. You can't get too romantic. You have to be willing to evolve and to change. And if you're not, you're going to, history repeats itself. I need to channel that Jeff Bezos in me. Yeah, that guy is a beast. He gets it. He's constantly evolving.

You know what's funny, though, if you read the book that was written about him while he's a beast and while he's had, you know, I believe that Jeff Bezos will be the richest guy in the world by two times within the next 10 years. Wait, you're not going to be the richest guy in the world? No, you chose wrong. But if you read some of the, if you read a lot about him, you realize that he really channels a lot of what Sam Walton did. and Sam Walton is the person that created Walmart. Yes. For those of you who don't know. And I think he's, I think back in 87 when he died, I think that was a year or maybe I can't remember it.

Around then, I think he was worth close to a hundred billion. Now think about this. That was 20 years ago, 30 years ago almost. If it knows 87, it would be 30 years. And he was worth 100 billion then, right? Nobody, right now, even in 2017, nobody's worth that. He split his fortune, I think, four or five ways in his cancer. kids are still on the, you know, the top, you know, 50 richest people or top 10, whatever it is.

So it just puts in perspective. And if you really, if you study Jeff Bezos, he studied Sam Walton. So there's always somebody that you can, that you can study and look at and see, okay, like, this is what they did right and this what they did wrong. But do it your own way. Do it your own spin on it. Add that nutmeg. But why is Walmart not Amazon? It's because the people that took over after them were unwilling to evolve and unwilling to adapt. Why is Amazon the largest books that are in the world and not Barnes and Noble. It's because Barnes and Noble was not willing to adapt. Don't be Barnes & Noble. Yeah. I miss Barnes and Noble. All these grocery chains, watch, you'll see what's going to happen. Amazon is going to come through and crush them

because they are unwilling to adapt the model. And it's just, that's just how it is. You've got to be willing to adapt. You've got to be willing to change. You can't get romantic. You know, I get a lot of messages from a lot of young people coming into family businesses and they're saying, you know, my parents, they want to do it this old way. And I, and I know there's a new way to do it. Instead of arguing with them, figure a way to show them. Give them examples. That's my advice. Great advice.

Okay, we hope you guys enjoyed that episode on mistakes, or as I like to call it, life lessons. I wanted to let you guys know if you're in San Diego, I am going to be speaking at Bing Bing on Thursday night. You didn't know that, honey, did you? At 6 p.m. to 10 p.m. I think I'm speaking from 7 to 8, though. the tickets are available online at the ladykillas.com.

You can just put in the ladykillas into Google and then put in the skinny confidential next to it. And that's K-I-L-L-A-S. And it's going to be fun. There's going to be food. I'm giving out free meal plans. And there's going to be a lot of women in San Diego connecting and networking and meeting that are from the Skinny Confidential Facebook group. So I'm going to be talking about.

confidence. And I think it should be good. So definitely come if you're in the San Diego area. I am bringing Michael. You can bring your boyfriend if you want. Guys can come. They're allowed. I thought I was out of it. I was like, oh, cool. It's just women. Nope. You're not out of it. So come have a glass of champagne with me. We can meet. We can talk. I can hear about your business and what you do at bang bang, 6 p.m. on Thursday night. And I will leave that in the show notes. Thank you guys so much for listening, subscribing, rating, and reviewing our podcast. If you do review the podcast, definitely screenshot it and send it to Ask Lauren at the skinny confidential.com. And we will send you my five top secret beauty tips right to your inbox. Michael doesn't have his five top

beauty secrets yet, but maybe he will one day if he uses mandelic serum like I told him to. All right. With that, we're off. We have to go to dinner with Michael's grandma. It's her. 87th birthday She is a hot piece of ass Don't call my grandma A hot piece of ass Jesus She is

All right you guys Thanks for listening We love you see you next Tuesday