Episode 6 – Pleasurable Profits through Recurring Intensives with Hunter Niland Welling

“There’s this myth that’s floating around the online business world that you are somehow not as smart or something, if you just don’t have all of marketing, totally figure it out.  And that’s so weird to me because marketing is a skill and it’s a niche skill. I think it feels like everybody should be good at it because who gets heard most on the internet are people who are good at marketing.” – Hunter Niland Welling, The AgenShe

Episode Summary:

Are you feeling burnt out by retainer clients and sick of having to launch your program or services over and over again? Then listen up because I have Hunter Niland Welling, founder of The AgenShe, and pioneer of the Recurring Intensives business model on the show today.

Hunter is a luxury marketing expert. Whether partnering with your company as your CMO, or providing education through her membership program, she’s on a mission to help you turn the business you have into the business you want.

In this episode, Hunter and I talk about what it means to create pleasurable profits as a service-based business and she offers her CMO insights into leveraging a Recurring Intensives business model. Hunter also takes us through three steps for identifying what the best marketing strategy is for your business. I love Hunter’s original approach and encourage you to take notes because she offers some expert advice on setting boundaries and crafting a customer experience that you love.

Enjoy!

What You’ll Learn From This Episode:

• [02:04] Coming up with Recurring Intensives business model
• [03:39] Why business intensives feel orgasmic right now
• [07:53] Creating pleasurable boundaries 
• [10:40] How to retain clients with Recurring Intensives
• [16:40] Three steps to get you thinking like a CMO
• [21:52] How to market your business in alignment with who you are
• [32:11] Hunter shares what’s currently NOT orgasmic in her business
• [34:07] Learning self-trust and investing in therapy to grow your business 
• [35:55] Hunter shares her favorite system she’s implemented this year in her business

Connect with Us: 

• On Instagram | @businesslaidbare

Connect with Hunter Niland Welling:

• On Instagram | @theagenshe
• Website | theagenshe.com

Resources Mentioned:

• Trello
• Your listeners can get a 1 year free membership in The AgenShe Club ($264), the space to start turning the business you have into the business you want. Just use code WHIP at checkout
  www.theagenshe.club

“I love boundaries. So when things have really clear boundaries and everything is really clear and there’s no nebulous, icky gray areas, I’m so happy. So Intensives, tons of boundaries. Start time, end time, you know when it’s on the schedule, you know what you can do. Like, just boundaries for days, and I love that.” – Hunter Niland Welling, The AgenShe

Veronica: [00:00:00] Hey, I’m Veronica Yanhs and I’m obsessed with backends, specifically, your business backend, your operations and I’m the CEO and founder of Business Laid Bare. We’re a digital operations agency that builds well lubricated and Orgasmic Operations ™  so that your business is pleasurable, productive, and ultimately profitable because when you feel good, everything else feels good too.

Like your team, your customers, and your bank account. I mean, who doesn’t want to consent to that? This podcast gives you the tips, interviews, and mindset shifts on how to run your business and its operations so that it’s immensely, pleasurable, productive, and profitable. So ready to whip your business into shape with me?

Let’s get it on. 

Veronica: [00:00:48] Welcome to the latest episode of The Business Whip.  I have with me, Hunter here who’s going to chat about so many amazing things regarding marketing and I personally adore your origin story. So I would love for you to talk about it, but yeah, the stage is yours. Hunter, introduce yourself.

Hunter: [00:01:06] I am so excited to be here. So thanks for having me, Veronica.  I’m Hunter Niland Welling, founder of The AgenShe, and I provide marketing consulting and CMOs services for high-end service providers who want to stay booked out with really premium clients and get to focus on the parts of their work that they love the most instead of just the marketing part.

Veronica: [00:01:26]  Snapping my fingers. Okay. So, first of all, I realized I do a lot of air quotes, but in podcasting, you don’t ever see that. So I’m just like narrating snapping fingers. So. the reason why I wanted to bring you on the podcast today was because,  well, there’s two things and I’m selfish and I want to get to know you better, but like you brought up the concept of recurring intensives and I’m just like, what?

And that is like getting you all hot and bothered and it feels so pleasurable to you. So it’s like, how did you come up with this idea?

 Hunter: [00:01:59] Yeah, I absolutely love it. So for those who don’t know, Recurring Intensives is like my signature business model. It’s the way I work with my own clients.  I’m starting to teach other people how to do it. But what it basically looks like is, I think a lot of people are familiar with like VIP days or like buying a day rate or an intensive, something like that.

I do that for my clients who hire me as their CMO. I give them a VIP day, but I do one every single month.  And that has just like, changed everything. So you asked how I came up with it. The like short version of that is I was at this point where my business was not working. It just wasn’t sustainable. And it was kind of in one of those, like burnt out like crisis moments.  So of course I just like called one of my beloved mentors from a Starbucks parking lot, pretty much desperate. And she started talking me through it of like, okay, here’s the parts you like? Here’s the parts you don’t like. Why don’t you just like make the people who are doing these intensives, do it with you month after month after month, instead of just one time.

And I was like, can you do that? Because I’d never seen anybody do that. And honestly, to this point, I don’t know anybody else. Who’s doing the recurring intensives this way, except for people who like I have clients who, after working with me. Have changed their business model to be that way. And I have people now who have bought workshops from me and done it, but just like, I’d never seen it. And when you haven’t seen it, you can’t conceptualize it, you know?

Veronica: [00:03:30] So why does it feel orgasmic to you right now?

Hunter: [00:03:35] Yeah. So here’s the problem I was having before that I started my business back in 2016 and by 2018, I’d built up a six-figure agency model doing all sorts of digital marketing. And so, like, I always thought like once I hit that six figure, whatever, like everything’s just going to feel fantastic. I’m going to be rich. You know, it’s going to be wonderful. 

You know, it’s like, no, none of that was true. I burnt out hardcore to the point that I wound up in the hospital, developing chronic illness and like on bed rest for five months. And I should add that. You know, at the time when I started my business, I was a single mom and the only person providing for my family. So not a great situation. And what became really clear and why all the doctors were telling me is like, this is caused by stress and you have to change your life. So it’s not stressful. That was a pretty good motivator. 

So what I knew at that time is like, I didn’t like running the agency. I didn’t like just being, I felt like I was just a manager. Like, didn’t love it. So that wasn’t the way I wanted to work with people. I also knew that I didn’t like long projects and just all these retainers that I got, they just felt like for me, it’s so different for every person. But like, for me, it just felt like they always were like looming over my head. And even when I was on vacation, I wasn’t really on vacation. Cause I just, like, I still felt like I owed everybody a response because they were like paying for me to always be on for them, you know, just wasn’t working for me. 

So during that bedrest period, I like love all my retainer clients like the agency model started over. And so the thing I knew I loved doing was strategy. So I just started in consulting. Which is cool, except for it’s really hard to make enough money when you’re just selling like one-off consulting sessions. So that’s the sticky point that I found myself in is like, I couldn’t do retainers, but selling all this one-off stuff, the sales cycle was as exhausting as being on retainer for people.

So I was like, okay, I need to do something where I can be the strategic consultant, but have really stable revenue.

Veronica: [00:05:37] So how many people were you working with in the agency before that all came crashing down on the client side and on your team’s side?

Hunter: [00:05:46] Yeah, my team varied. I brought in different contractors and stuff at different points. There’d be like five people typically is kind of what it would hover around.   And clients like, I wish I just could pull a number off the top of my head.  I can’t right now, but I know that often there was like eight or nine open projects.

Veronica: [00:06:05] That’s enough for me. 

Hunter: [00:06:07] Yeah, right. Like it just was not fantastic. So there’s just a lot going on all the time.

Veronica: [00:06:13] So now that you have, have recurring intensives, can you walk me through the process of one, like how that allows you to step into what you do best? Because it all anchors to me on pleasure, like. Building an orgasmic business starts with pleasure. So then therefore, after it’s pleasurable, then you are likely to be more productive and ultimately more profitable.

And I realized that when I say the word profit, like that seems to be a huge buzzword in our industry. Like  getting more profits, like scale and profitability. Are like the biggest buzz words, but I’m just like, what does it really mean to be profitable? It’s not just like spending a hundred thousand dollars to make a hundred thousand dollars.

It’s like,  this is what you actually have left over. Right. So it’s like, talk to me about like, how recurring intensives plays into that pleasurable part and how it makes you more productive and then ultimately more profitable.

Hunter: [00:07:03] Yeah, I love this question. I love that you’re bringing up that distinction because.  Honestly, I feel like profit needs to be a bigger buzzword because everybody that I tend to see is talking about revenue and stop telling me what your  revenue is cause I don’t care. I just don’t care what your revenue is. I know people who can bring in multiple six figures and they can’t take home enough salary to pay their bills.

So I don’t really care what your revenue is. So I’m glad you’re talking about profit but I’ll step off that soapbox for a moment.  Yeah, so you were asking about like, how this works with pleasure. So yeah, through all this soul searching experience, there are some things that I know that I love and that make me, like, they just light me up in terms of how I work with people.

So one of it is

I love boundaries. So when things have really clear boundaries then everything is really clear and there’s no nebulous, icky gray areas. I’m so happy. So intensives, tons of boundaries. Start time, end time, you know when it’s on the schedule, you know what you can do. Like, just boundaries for days and I love that. 

The other part of it is just, I was at this point when I was doing the agency model where I was just saying yes to any kind of work. Cause I could do it.  I know how, like I have a lot of savvy, I’ve got a lot of skills. I’ve got a lot of skills I don’t even want people to know  I have, cause I don’t want anybody to ask me. So that’s what I was doing for people is just like, “Oh, but can you also do this? Can you do this? Can you do this?” and I would wind up doing all these random projects, Veronica that would blow your mind. 

Veronica: [00:08:41] Um, I’ve been there. We’ve all been there. So no judgment.

Hunter: [00:08:45] Yeah, absolutely. So unlike a lot of online business owners, I do not work exclusively or necessarily even primarily with online businesses. I work with high-end service providers  and a lot of my clients have offline, like in-person service businesses, they’re high-end professional organizers or wedding planners, things like this. A lot of those people don’t have a lot of tech skills or tech support team. So when they hire you to like do the marketing and you’re the one who knows their way around a computer, you wind up like being IT support when you got hired to do marketing.

So when I switched to pleasure, it was like, it’s just going to be hard to every project that’s not a hundred percent in my wheelhouse and my wheelhouse is setting your big picture marketing strategy. It’s helping you make that a reality in the day-to-day so that it doesn’t just stay like a cool planning, GoogleDoc on your computer. Like you actually know what you need to do to make it real. 

And then the third part, and what I love so much about my work is I think a lot of people who love to do strategy, maybe don’t like doing a lot of like more implementation and like actual creation and I actually really enjoy telling a client what they need for their marketing and then like making some of those things, a reality. Like making that messaging real, making that copy real. I love to write and so when I switched to this, it was just like, I’m going to do this stuff. I’m only going to do this stuff. I’m only going to do it within the boundary of a day.  And yeah, like what’s not to love.

 Veronica: [00:10:16] No, I love it. So, talk to me about how you retain your clients because I think one of the big things that everybody wants to talk about is like income predictability. So in your recurring intensives, do you have like a set contract for how long this goes on for? or is it month to month? Which doesn’t sound like it. But yeah, talk to me about

Hunter: [00:10:37] It’s not month to month, this has been, it’s all a learning curve. So one of the things I love is this is all just like a scientific experiment and action, right? You come up with some hypotheses and you see what works and what doesn’t.  So for me at this point, it’s a six-month minimum contract.

And that’s because I work in marketing strategy and it takes time. It takes time to hone it and test it and see what happens and refine it and get to enjoy the results. And I only want clients who are sure enough in their business and open-minded and confident enough to be able to go through that testing period.

So if you can commit to six months here, you’re one of those people. I don’t do month to month because I just don’t believe you can do a high level marketing strategy and rollout in a month.  Maybe they can get it all produced if you had like a team of 20 people or whatever, but like, would you even see results? Like, I don’t know. You’d get it all done by day 10. You only have 20 days. I dunno. You need more time. You need more time.

Veronica: [00:11:36] Yeah. You need more time.  Marketing is a constant testing thing and it just seems like, I’ve never necessarily been in this space where I’ve got my marketing a hundred percent dialed down, but I’ve learned that once I start getting into something, it’s like the landscape begins to change again.

Or like the whole world shuts down for instance, or like, not that I do it this way, but so here’s something that I’m still trying to like grapple with. It’s like, I hate salting the wound of people already down. And yet people have said in the past, like marketing is all about realizing like, people have a pain point.

So the here comes the difference between like bro marketing. That’s hopefully getting, you know, let go and more into like empathetic and compassionate marketing where you’re like, “Hey, I’m here. I see your pain point, but here are the possibilities and opportunities, and this is how you can solve it” rather than feeling like “Oh, look, this sucks. Let me like salt that wound a little bit more, just so that you will work with me because I understand your pain in that sense.”  So I love what you’re doing and in like a marketing intensive how long do you work with that client every month?  And do they get like support between each session?  Is there some sort of like ongoing support in case like they don’t like to implement or execute?

Hunter: [00:12:48] Yeah. So, I do, I’m meeting with them to kick off the day and that’s where we look at their big picture goals, set priorities, set what needs to happen. I tell them what I’m going to do for them that day. Give them some ideas of what to expect their team will need to do that month. Um,but that’s part of what I do throughout the day is create like a, to do list for them, you know? And then I log off and I spend the rest of the work today, which typically is like six hours or so working for them.

Veronica: [00:13:18] Oh, so you’re not actually meeting them live for six hours because I’m like, I would be so drained.

Hunter: [00:13:26] I only meet with them for like 30 minutes, maybe an hour and a half when we get started the first month.  In my mind, you’re a busy CEO who doesn’t have time for this. You don’t have more than 30 minutes to give me in the morning, you know, so I get them in and out and then I do the rest independently.

Veronica: [00:13:43] Look at that. I love it, and then you get a checklist of things to do. I absolutely adore this.  

And so I also want to talk to you about this topic that you brought up about how to think like a CMO and designing your own marketing strategy. So it kind of like falls into that and tell me, like I don’t know what questions to ask in the marketing world because I am not a marketer.  So I’m just like, huh, what questions do I ask? But I’m just like so entrenched right now. And like, so captivated. So just like, yeah. Tell me the things, knowing that I’m asking questions like a toddler.

Hunter: [00:14:17] Yeah, love to talk about this and that’s okay. I always think it’s funny people, there’s this myth that’s floating around the online business world that A.), You are somehow not as smart or something, if you just don’t have all of marketing, totally figure out.  And that’s so weird to me because marketing is a skill and it’s like a niche skill,  but I think it feels like everybody should be good at it because who gets heard the most on the internet, people who are good at marketing are just typical marketers. Right?  

So like the marketers are all being listened to very much, but like, I don’t know anything about systems. I can’t set up a system to save my life. I don’t feel too bad about it. I would’ve known I need to hire people to do that.  So I just want to point that out is like, I hear from a lot of people, like, I don’t know why I can’t just dial in my marketing. I don’t know why I haven’t figured this out yet, because it’s like a really niche skill. Like you’re not just born knowing how to market anything.

Veronica: [00:15:14] It’s almost like we’re as CEOs expected to because we are the CEOs. And especially when you’re in startup mode and you’re a team of yourself, one to two people. It’s like, you have to wear that marketing hat. And I felt that stressed before cause I’m just like,  I’ve never launched a single thing successfully in my career.

I’m always like I have this plan.  I’m really good at creating the project plan and the Gantt chart for it. And like, Oh, look at this pretty graph. Look at this we’re going to follow this to the T and the day it launches, I’m just like, I have executing skills, but none of this feels really good. So that was a fun experiment.

 Hunter: [00:15:50] Oh man. It’s so real. I think that’s why investing in marketing help, outside perspective in whatever way makes sense for where you’re at in business, It’s just like some messaging help, some strategies, some outside perspective is so powerful. 

I do it for myself. Like I hire people to help you know me because you’re right. Like as the CEO, you kind of are expected to do that. And also you’re impossibly close to it. You’re kind of like, almost the worst person to know how to sell it because you’re so close to it. So getting any sort of outside perspective, even if it’s just for a few hours can be really helpful.

 Veronica: [00:16:27] Okay, so what does it mean to think like a CMO when you’re talking about designing your own marketing strategy if you’re trying to DIY it? 

Hunter: [00:16:37] So here, I’m just going to like lay it out and this is nothing revolutionary. I don’t have any silver bullets, never seen one in my life. So I’ve got none of it, but here’s what it is. It’s just there’s some basics that when we get all frenzied and caught up in the day-to-day and like just producing content and stuff that we don’t always think about.

So first thing as a CMO that I want to know is how much money do you want to make? and how much impact do you want to have? Like hard numbers. Not, it would be nice if it was somewhere between. 

Veronica: [00:17:10] Well, what does it mean by impact? Like. How do you put a number on impact?

 Hunter: [00:17:15] Yeah. I include this one because I didn’t always use to include it, but money isn’t always the biggest motivator for people. So, I have clients who like their thing is, is by the end of the year, they want to have started an online movement around a certain topic. And, you know, they want to be invited to X number of speaking gigs about that and whatever, maybe it’s about the terms of the size of your audience or book deal or whatever. Not just about quantity. 

Veronica: [00:17:45] Okay. So gotcha. Not just numbers where you’re looking at revenue, but like how big your list is or well quality. So like a quality percentage or how many times you get invited to speak at a conference. So that’s considered in the impact category.

Hunter: [00:18:03] Yeah.

Veronica: [00:18:04] Okay, love it. Okay. That seems simple. So that’s step one. What’s step two?

Hunter: [00:18:07] Okay. So then you have to reverse engineer. And the first thing you need to reverse engineer is, does the stuff you’re selling actually add up to the kinds of numbers you want to get? You can say, I really want to make $500,000 this year, but if you sell a $1,000 service that you can only do five of a year, I can’t help.  But it sounds funny. I like to use the hyperbolic terms, right. But, this isn’t innate knowledge. Like I remember being at a mastermind several years into my business and somebody’s like talking about my pricing, talking about my packages with some people, and then just being like, well, like, have you ever reverse engineered, like the revenue goal you’re after to these packages?

Does that make sense? Like, do they connect? And I was like, no, I’ve never, I’ve never done that. I’ve been in business for two years. And I’ve never seen if the math adds up. So it’s important. It’s not an innate knowledge. So that’s why I like to start there. Make sure it makes sense.  If it doesn’t make sense, you’ve got to do some foundational business ecosystem work that’s not necessarily a marketing thing.

You need to work on your offers, or your team, or, you know, something to make that gap fillable. The third thing then is just like looking at where you are right now, where you want to be, what’s the gap and start breaking it down. What needs to happen this year, this quarter, this month, this week to get you taking incremental steps there. Cause you’re not going to make that $500,000 leap or whatever it is in a week or a month. It’s going to be a process. And what I see too many people do is set really big goals. Just hope it happens.  Throw a lot of content out there and just keep hoping that just magically they’re going to get there. It’s just going to happen. And it doesn’t. You got to take all those little intentional steps.

Veronica: [00:19:58] Oh, I love this so much. So just three easy things, folks. Like you can get done.  Kidding.  So when you’re doing so I’m going back to your marketing intensive, your recurring intensives, and in terms of like the consultation slash the sales process. Like,  do you book out like at the beginning of the year, or is this more like you spend like some time or a few quarters and then you’re like, that’s it, this is like my client load, which by the way, how many clients do you have at any given time for your recurring intensives?

Hunter: [00:20:29] Yeah. Okay. I never take more than six clients at a time. That’s how many I like to work with? And I started doing this in 2019 and honestly like I’ve just always had pretty much a waitlist. This January was the first time that I had narrowed down how many clients he took last year. Cause I was. “Hi, like homeschool mom”  there for a hot mess. Like, you know, we’ve all lived through it. We won’t, I won’t even, I’m not gonna give anybody flashbacks on this podcast.  So I had narrowed down my client load at the beginning of the year. And then in January, I was like, okay, I can take some more clients.

And that was the first time that I’d opened it up really beyond like my waitlist. Ever. And I just honestly asked one client if she knew anybody who needs it. And she gave me a shout out and I filled that all up in a couple of weeks. So, the answer is, I guess just, it’s just always been full. 

Veronica: [00:21:26] No, this is amazing. Like you just blew my mind that a VIP day didn’t have to be like, with them the entire day. Like you could just like spend 90 minutes with him and you’re giving them that VIP time by just focusing on their business. Not necessarily like you need it to be all up in their business, on camera with them, because that’s what I had always imagined when I did intensives and stuff with people. Like we were always on the call together. So, this is blowing my mind and I love it. 

And I have a question for you in terms of marketing. How do you know what is like, the best way to market your business is for you?  Now, that seems like a really vague and also loaded question and the reason why I’m asking is because I have gone through an experience of figuring out, okay, I am not an E-core seller because it felt so transactional. Hello, took my strengths assessment and relater is my number one skill. Relater is the ability to cultivate deep and like, fulfilling relationships rather quickly. This is why I work one-on-one with clients. But in terms of like marketing, I realized that social media doesn’t light me up.

And it’s almost like I would rather podcast and network and have rich conversations with people, again, developing my relater skill to like market. But it took a long time to realize it because a lot of the internet marketers are like, you got to build a list. You got to show up on Facebook, live like every week or something.  From your perspective, how does one know what marketing tactics they should go with based on who they are, I guess as a person?

Hunter: [00:22:57] Yeah. What a good like, juicy question. Okay. So, the first thing to say is anybody who tells you that you have to do a particular marketing tactic, they’re selling you something related to that marketing tactic.  That’s true. Like, even sometimes I give advice and I’m like, think about that even when I give you advice cause I sell certain marketing services. And that’s just because, obviously, any of these marketing platforms that we’re all on didn’t exist not that long ago, yet business was. So clearly you don’t have to have Facebook Lives to do business because there was business before there were Facebook lives.

Right. And that’s just true of all of it is there is no like one, you have to do this. And it’s just important I think for our like media literacy of business owners, to be aware of why people are telling us things so that we can learn the good stuff without putting ourselves into a black and white, like self-judgment spiral about what we are and are not.

Veronica: [00:24:00] That’s so me, because like I said, I’ve never, ever launched anything when people were like,  Oh, you have to have like a runway and then your cart opens and you launched this thing and then people join.  And I’m just like, it has never worked. Or they’re like, you should be able to build a list of like a thousand people a month.

And I’m like, I got five.  Because that’s, so me, it’s like, I don’t want just a number it’s like that relationship factor is so important. So it’s how do you like find this out with your clients? is this like a really long process or do you just know like, based on them talking to you on a consult call, you’re like Veronica, you should not be launching because this is not you. And when you don’t execute well…

 Hunter: [00:24:38] It’s a multi-pronged approach. So, the first is I look at, every client is different. And so just like your relater first and foremost, I also have a lot of like relationship strengths as well. And something that I think is important is being able to attune the marketing plan to the particular client.

Like what’s their actual situation.  Cause if I sit down and give you a marketing plan, based on the energy capacity, and the talents,  and what’s worked for the audience of, and the team capacity of a totally different client, it could have brought them multi six-figure launches and it might not get you anything. And we’re still, you might not be able to execute it at all, because if they have a video producer and a social media manager and an executive assistant and whatever, and you have you, their plan is not a good plan for you. 

I always remind people this cause a lot of people come to me with like Gary V advice.  We don’t have to get into that but what my point is always like, well, Gary V says do this much, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. And I’m like, you realize people like them have like a full-time staff of six or seven people just devoted to cranking out content.

Sure. Like if you try to match that pace and you just have you or you and a VA. That’s an unsustainable workload. So, you have to assess that, which I know is a bit of a rabbit trail, but so when I’m assessing it, I’m looking at what’s your energetic capacity. I’m a really low-energy person. I manage chronic illness. I’m low energy anyways. Like just since I was a child and I’m the introverted of introverts. So my energetic capacity is about,  an inch long. I’m going to take a nap after you and I talk, it’s really lovely. And I’m going to be so present here, but I’m gonna take a nap after this, you know?

Veronica: [00:26:33] I love your transparency. Cause that was kind of what I was thinking about too. So nappy friends 

Hunter: [00:26:38] Yeah. So if I had a marketing to-do list that involved me doing four of these back-to-back and then recording two videos to put out for a launch. I could do that. I’ll be in the hospital in two months, you know? 

So you have to look at that. You have to look at your own capacity, your team’s capacity. The other thing I always ask clients about is like, where is it easy for you to show up? So you said you liked the podcasts. Like, are great at podcasts? Cool.  I had one client and she would always just feel so terrible because she wasn’t a strong writer.  And so it would take her hours to write a newsletter that was nothing to write home about, you know, from anybody’s perspective, hers, whatever, but she could show up on video. And just like, wow you. Like, she was just amazing on video and people loved her videos and, you know, I was just like,  why aren’t you emailing them a video every week, instead of like trying to force yourself through something you don’t want to do? 

Veronica: [00:27:37] That’s so brilliant. I love it. Like, yeah, for me, I can write, but  I’m like a verbal processor, so it’s like, I talk to think and I’m an introvert too. So it’s like, I feel you on the energy part. Like, I will give so much to this podcast and it’s just, this podcast lights me up. But at the same time, like I’m going to have to, after this because I’m giving a hundred percent to you and I’ve, I’ve just enjoyed chatting with you so much. So thank you for saying that. It’s just like, but afterward, it’s like, I got to go recharge and I got to like. Go nap or do something and then we’ll get back to it. But it’s just like, I would rather show up and talk to people like this, like you and learn from you, learn who you are, learn what you’re about, hear what you’re so excited about and just to have like a really enriching conversation.

Cause apparently I never run out of things to say I’ve always been like that type of person who has so much anxiety. No, this is like transparency. Like I have so much anxiety around silent time because that’s how I was brought up. Like, if you are quiet for like a split second, that means that you’re stupid or dumb, or you don’t know how to have a good conversation. And I’m just like slowly to this day, learning to unpackage and undo that stuff and unpackage it. I don’t really want to do, I can do videos, I mean, cause I love being on video anyways, but like talking into the void sometimes, meaning like shouting into the void,  I can do it, but energetically it’s not as enriching.

And you could totally see when I’m interviewing somebody versus having my own episode. It’s like, it’s so much different and better.  And sometimes, I even said this a couple of weeks ago. I was like, everyone else is doing solo podcast episodes and recording YouTube videos, and no one’s bitching and complaining that they’re shouting into the void. So why am I such a baby?  and maybe I need to like buck up.

Hunter: [00:29:27] Okay. Oh man, isn’t the big old pile of trash we feed ourselves every day about everything. Like that, I don’t know. I feel that all the time on all, all the levels, like I should just be able to do this. This isn’t hard for anybody else. And it’s also like I was going to say…

Veronica: [00:29:42] Or they don’t complain

Hunter: [00:29:43] I was gonna say, or they do complain all the time, just not publicly to us.  You know what I mean? Like they have group chats and friends and partners and who knows who their therapists,  who knows who they’re complaining to. It’s easy to think that we’re the only ones who just is somehow uniquely failing at everything. And it’s like, no, this is a shared experience. So I love that you were transparent about that.

Veronica: [00:30:08] Thank you, you make it really easy to be transparent around. 

Hunter: [00:30:12] I was thinking about when you were talking about the marketing strategy. So, o the other thing is, you know, by the time I’m working with clients,  you have to be at a certain level to be thinking about hiring a CMO, right? Like you’re bringing some money. You can invest in some strategic support cause the thing is like, find what you’re really good at. The podcasting, the talking with people, maybe you do Instagram lives, like jointly with people to be able to like bounce off their energy or something like that. You do that and maybe that’s kind of like the bulk of your marketing production while you’re soloing it because the magic kind of happens once you can bring in some team.

I typically work with my clients to find the one way they are great at producing content and then I take that and turn it into a million different things.  So if they love video, I can take what they say on video and make an Instagram caption and make it emails and make an Instagram Stories and, you know, whatever. Yeah,  because it doesn’t have to, because there comes a point right where your business hits a part where maybe you do want to be showing up in more places, but they’re not all your skillset. So you show up and you create the kind of stuff you’re great at creating. And then you let your team and the people you hire turn that into other things because there’s just nobody who likes doing all of those things.

Veronica: [00:31:32] No, it’s very rare for somebody to have that vision and that execution skill or, and I can execute, but Oh my God does it take so much energy and I would rather like go do chores or something then to like create Instagram Stories. Unless it’s a picture of what I’m cooking or my dog.

Hunter: [00:31:50] Right?  I’m always like, does anybody know another me for me? Because I need to hire.

Veronica: [00:31:56] No doubt. Okay. So, I could talk to you forever. In fact, I would love to talk to you forever, but we can’t. So I want to make sure I’m cognizant of our time. And I want to go into a section of the podcast where we now talk about like, what’s currently not orgasmic in your business because I believe in transparency. Like, I hate the whole social media highlight reel, where everyone’s like doing just fine and we’re all like fucked up and like,  you know, that story.

So it’s like, and we hide it. So I’m like, I don’t want us to hide because the whole point of this podcast is to teach people how to build a pleasurable, productive, and profitable business. And yet we have to also see the negatives and not only just keep it negative, but like, what are the plans of making it positive so that it becomes orgasmic if it’s not right now.

So I would love for you to talk more about that part of your business. 

Hunter: [00:32:49] I think for me the biggest thing that is like at a tipping point where I’m looking to change things. It’s,  just always team for me. That’s the thing I’m still figuring out. I’ve done it different ways. I’ve been in business for six years and I’ve kind of been all over the map with it. And now that I’m in this different business model, figuring out what kind of support I need to stay really energized and deliver a great experience without burning out. Hiring those people. Figure out how to outsource to them effectively and like be a good communicator with my team because that’s like a whole different thing than being a great communicator, like in public. 

That’s kind of where I’m at. Like figuring that out.  And just being at that kind of uncomfortable point I’m sure other people can relate where I’ve had this happen a few times where you start hitting a ceiling where it’s like, you know, you need to take some big leaps in terms of investments and stretching and visibility to hit that next level. But you’re not like quite, there yet. So it’s like not comfortable. I’m in that spot a lot.    

Veronica: [00:33:54] And is there any, like, what is like, what goes into that big leap? Like what are some of the things that you’ve asked yourself? If I may ask.

Hunter: [00:34:03] Yeah, absolutely you can. I’m an open book. So, I think for me what it’s been mostly about, and I say this a lot and it might sound cheesy, but I’m just kind of like, over the point of caring is that for me, it’s just all been about learning self-trust. I think that’s all of what business is. It’s maybe what all of life is. I’m not sure. Self-trust is a big one. 

So, for me, it’s funny. Whenever people ask, what are the best investments I’ve ever made in my business? Like in full transparency, it’s like therapy and life coaching and that kind of stuff for me not for, business. That’s the best stuff I do because that’s what makes me trust me more. And then when you’re at those uncomfortable growth stages like I am right now and having to make some big leaps without any sure guarantee that that’ll work out, you can get over that better.

Veronica: [00:34:57] I love this. I love this. And especially as women, like our intuition, is strong and  I don’t have to go into all of this now, but it’s like, my intuition was like pretty much cut off from me because I went through abuse and a lot of trauma. And I was just like, Oh, if listening to my intuition caused me this I should just stick with logic. And the moment intuition came back, it’s like, you just got to run with it. And for me, it’s like, I know when shit’s good, when my nose starts running, where I start crying.  So I almost want to like have this theme around follow the drip, like hashtag follow the drip.  Yeah.

If my nose is running, it’s like a sign I need to be running towards whatever that thing is that’s causing my nose to run. So it’s like, for me, intuition,  trusting myself that just hit home a lot. So thank you for that. Okay so before I let you go and, you know, promote, I want you to tell us where you can find you and all that good stuff because I want people to find you.

Tell me, because this is an operations thing and you know, I’m an operations person. Tell me what has been the best system that you’ve created or implemented for your business that has just made everything amazing like curious minds want to know  

Hunter: [00:36:07] Personally, so awesome, because it’s really funny. I rely on systems so deeply to keep my head about me in any sort of way.  And also the way you were talking about marketing,  they are just totally foreign to my brain. Like you asked me to come up with a system for something and I’m just like staring at it like I’m trying to read Polish, which I have no business trying to do. So with that said,  I think for me, the most helpful system has been, I actually implemented my friend, Tracy Stanger has a Trello planning program for your business called Plan Your Year.  And she kept telling me to use it and I kept being like, Oh, Hey Tracy. But Tracy is always right. When he tells you to do something, you should probably do it.  So this year I finally did it and so like I’ve got my year. All those goals we talked about, all those revenue goals and impact goals and things. I got my year mapped out. I’ve got a system for breaking that down by month, every month, and updating each month as we’d go to track progress. And that has been a lifesaver cause me having those visual reminders of where I’m at, so that it’s not just all in my brain.

Veronica: [00:37:18] That is brilliant. I love it. This has been amazing. So thank you so much for coming onto the podcast and sharing your story and wisdom with us Hunter. I’m so grateful. So where can people find you?

Hunter: [00:37:32] Yeah. So, I am always on Instagram and way too much, according to my weekly screen time report. So I’m at The AgenShe over there, I know it’s a tongue twister. So come and say hi on Instagram. If you’re following from over here, like drop me a voice memo or a message to say that you’ve followed from here and what you’re up to. I love to connect with people.  

And while you’re over there and you’re checking things out my business is The AgenShe. I’ve got a workshop on how to launch your own recurring intensives if you’re any sort of service provider consultant or coach thinking about that.  Yeah, and lots of other fun-free treats.

Veronica: [00:38:07] I love it. And are you still working through your waitlist if people want to work with you? 

Hunter: [00:38:12]  Yeah. So if you hit my website, there’s a link to reach out and apply. And I always take those applications. If there’s a spot I let you know, and we can set up a call. Otherwise, I will just let you know that we’re on a waitlist, but always happy to talk to anybody who’s interested in that.

Veronica: [00:38:28] Love it. Thank you so much Hunter for being on the show today. And as a reminder to everyone, including myself, if it’s not orgasmic, don’t fucking settle. So, that’s it. 

Hunter: [00:38:40] Thanks so much.

Veronica: [00:38:41] Thanks for listening to The Business Whip, hosted by yours truly Veronica Yanhs CEO, and founder of Business Laid Bare. If you enjoy this episode, spank that subscribe button in whichever podcast app you’re listening in and share this with your friends.

Your support means everything.  So thank you from the bottom of my butt, because let’s be real. It’s so much bigger than my heart. I’ll see you in the next episode.