A Day in My Life

Jessy: Okay, so this has been a week for the record books. I feel like there’s something in the air because I keep hearing this from everybody. First of all, what the hell? I can’t believe it’s May already. That essentially means that half the year has gone by and I don’t know where the time went.

So, first of all, oh my God. Second of all, this week has just been, it’s been special. It’s been special. So the other night I wasn’t feeling so great. I feel like I’ve been like, under the weather for over a month now and it’s really annoying me. 

But anyways, after dinner I was like, I can’t even keep my eyes open. I’m going to bed. So I went to bed at eight o’clock cuz I don’t know, maybe I’m like a closeted grandmother. 

And I woke up at like the usual time at 7:00 AM to take Zoe to school. And Paul was like, did you see my text message? And I was like, I’m not conscious yet. What are you talking about? And he’s so last night I let Jojo, Jojo’s our dog. I let Jojo out into the backyard to do her business like I normally do. Like around midnight. We’ll go to bed around midnight. She goes out and makes a jitter thing. Whatever.

I open up the door a few minutes later to bring her back inside and like immediately she starts rubbing all over the new rug you got like yesterday, the rug that I bought yesterday. And he is I didn’t really think much of it. I just thought oh, it’s like a new rug and she just wants to get her scent all over and whatever.

And so a minute later he was but then I started to smell something. And then I realized that it smelled disgusting and long story long. He looked at the camera from the backyard. And if you look on my Instagram right now, if you go to Jessy Grossman on Instagram, you can also see the video of Jojo chasing after what she probably thought was a cat, but spoiler, it was a skunk and my baby got sprayed by a skunk. 

Okay. Also, side note, most of you guys know this, if you tune in regularly, that I don’t live in the middle of nowhere. I live in Bay Ridge Brooklyn, New York. 

So, I wouldn’t expect to necessarily be telling you this story because I don’t live in the woods, but we actually have fun looking at our like outdoor cameras that we have set up, and they’re like, motion activated. So we’re actually like aware that there’s like a neighborhood skunk, there’s neighborhood raccoons, possums like we’ve seen everything.

It’s like we live in a zoo outside of our house. It’s actually pretty crazy how much wildlife is around here, but it never affected Jojo and I feel so bad. I’m recording this like three days I think after this like incident happened. Her little nose, like I can’t get the smell out of her nose.

That’s like the epicenter probably where she got sprayed. He gave her two baths that night by the way, and cleaned the rug. He was up till 2:30 in the morning doing all this while I’m like sleeping. Nice gesture for sure.

He gave her two baths, you guys, and the smell is still on her little snout. I feel so bad. Of course my cat like, is basically laughing at her. He’s like a former outdoor cat. And he is ah, you’re ran into a skunk. I know skunks. I know he knows skunks. Tony is like I said, a former outdoor cat and he like grew up on Staten Islands. He’s seen some shit. Anyways. I just feel bad for Jojo. Go to my Instagram though. The video is pretty wild.

So beyond that, it’s been a busy week, but all good stuff that I wanted to sort to share with you guys. So first I had a really interesting conversation with a reporter today, about pay disparity with influencers.

And she started out the conversation basically saying we know that this is a thing, but, I’m basically trying to get to the core why it’s happening, and also of course, like we can do about it. 

So we’ll see if that story ever sees a light of day. I talk to a lot of reporters and I get really excited and sometimes they don’t publish the story. Sometimes they do. 

But it was an interesting conversation and to sum it up, cuz we spoke for an hour, I just feel as if of course there’s pay disparity, and she was focusing mostly on gender, which is why I think we were connected.

And I see it on the back end of influencer marketing, meaning I see it with influencer marketers, which trickles down to the creators because everything starts from like the top.

It’s all related. That’s why we have our salary surveys that we, share every Wednesday on our social. And if you’re a member, you can go to iamwim.com/salaries. You log in and you can see the whole list of, anonymously submitted comp packages. 

So you can see what influencer marketers are making. You can also see what race they are, you can see where they live. And you start to put together some really interesting data points. 

And, if we aren’t advocating for ourselves, why would we be able to advocate then for creators? Doesn’t it all start with ourselves? And also, that led us down a rabbit hole of conversation, is there enough ethnic diversity among creators? And what are they making more or less? 

She was actually asserting that in some studies she found, she was saying that white influencers are actually making less per post than, diverse influencers, but they’re making more overall, essentially asserting that they’re so much volume business to go around that’s being, capitalized on by white influencers.

But somehow diverse creators are actually making more per post. I just question the data on that. Like I will say and we talked about this a bit. I found that diverse influencers will make more sometimes seasonally, like Black History Month or Hispanic Heritage Month, stuff like that, right? To check a box.

And who wants to be the brand who’s underpaying, a Hispanic creator during Hispanic heritage month? Like literally nobody. If you do, you have some balls. So like seasonally, maybe they make more, but I even question that. I just assumed that’s not the case. I hope it is. I think that would be awesome. And so then I guess the question is create that momentum for them? Like how do we parlay that into multiple posts at that rate? 

But anyways, this is interesting that she shared that with me and I’d be curious if you guys have had that same experience aside from this like interview that I had today, we’re also planning. So many events that I’m really excited about and I’ve taken a slightly different position than I had historically. 

So before I was just coming up with like topics that I just think are really interesting and, I’m hearing from our members a little bit more and I think that’s like something that any business owner can hopefully relate to, which is that you need to like test and learn all the time and you’re gonna explore some things in your own businesses that go fantastic. And you’re gonna repeat those things over and sometimes you’re gonna like really swing and miss. 

So I think that with the events that we’ve had in the past, I stand by a lot of them. They’re really great topics. But I think that within our community, I think the idea of timely topics is more important than I think I, gave credit to. 

So we’ve been pulling the community a lot and getting ideas for more timely topics that you guys really wanna hear about. So we just are putting together panelists for a UGC, a user-generated content, panel. 

We’re putting together panelists for an affiliate marketing panel. Also one about like how to build a consultancy. Cuz we’ve had so many freelancers in our community and that seems to be a really growing side of the business.

So we’re putting together these virtual panels for you and hope you show up and also even we used to do so many master classes, like one person would present and it was a masterclass and you tune in, and you listen the whole time. 

And I think, again, write me on Instagram, correct me if I’m wrong, but I think people are enjoying panel discussions where you get a variety of different viewpoints versus one person’s perspective.

So we are listening. We are responding, and these are some tweaks that we’ve been making and things that I’m personally really excited to bring you guys. And then I’ve been really deep into planning our next in-person events because, oh my god, they’re actually coming up pretty quickly.

So LA if you are in the LA area or you are coming to LA slash Anaheim for VidCon, you’ve got to come in a day early. So VidCon starts on June 21st. I will be speaking at VidCon, I think on two different panels. I am so excited, you guys. 

I have worked tirelessly for literally years to like, have anyone pay me any attention to speak at VidCon. I’ve tried for a long time and no one cared. 

So this is the first year that I was able to reach a different person and like he respected what I do. I don’t know what it is, to be honest, but like we really jived. And so he’s putting me on two different panels for VidCon Anaheim, and I’m so excited and putting together one of those panels.

So I was able to get Wiim members and people that I’ve just known for years on the panel with me. The one that I’m moderating, and then I’m on the other one as a panelist. I’m so excited. I’m so excited. 

Anyways, I bring that up because if you haven’t been to VidCon before, genuinely, I think it’s a really solid conference. They attract, I think tens of thousands, if not a hundred-plus thousand attendees every single year. 

They’ve been doing this for at least 10 years. I’ve gone probably like four, maybe five times I went last year and every single time I go, I get business. Like I get something out of it.

And of course, I’ve gone in different capacities, right? Years ago I went when I was a talent manager and I remember seeing my talent. I would get my talent on panels and I would be there trying to like to drum up business for them.

And just like networking and meeting people, you could always follow their hashtags on social to see, like on LinkedIn for example, look up VidCon and you could see who’s going and you plan a crap ton of meetings for that three to four-day-long event.

You have to go with an agenda, you have to go and plan it. There’s so much going on that’s the only way to get that much out of it. You can’t just wing it, which is my general MO. So that would be what I would recommend, I hope that you guys check it out.

Again I always get business from it. And then, so these days I go like at a different capacity. Like I have my consultancy now, and for me, it’s just like general networking to get Wiim out there. 

We do some like live podcast recording. I interviewed people at VidCon to see what they were getting out of it cuz there are also so many panels and just so many things going on that it’s like impossible to be at everything and virtually impossible to be at like 50% of it. 

Anyways, I go in a different capacity now. I went in a different capacity back then and regardless, I love Vidcon. You just have to like mentally prepare for it cuz it’s so overwhelming. 

But I’m excited to go and if you guys are going, come in a day early, because on June 20th, very strategically planned the day before Vidcom starts in Beverly Hills. We are hosting our LA experience, and nothing beats meeting women members in person. 

So we always make it fun. We’ve got food, we’ve got drinks, we’ve got music and activities. So join us. The link will be in the show notes. 

And then we’re also planning the New York version as well, which is on July 27th. They’re both gonna be so, so, so much fun. 

Then the last couple of things that had taken up my week, and I’m wondering how you guys can relate. I’m so excited. I’ve got a few new coaching clients. Which I’m really excited about like coaching is a smaller side of my consultancy business, but like it’s probably the part that I enjoy the most.

I love being able to make an impact on other people’s businesses. So I have a creator actually that I’m gonna be coaching, and that has only really happened a handful of times. I mostly coach talent managers. 

But I’m gonna be coaching a creator. And I’ve actually, we’ve worked together before, so it’s really cool that she’s come back and we wanna work together again.

And, we talk about things like how to sell more products. She works at a major retailer and she is like a shopping influencer essentially, and a fashion influencer.

And so we’re gonna be talking about, ways to broaden that and what more opportunities are out there for her and, how to maybe expand onto other platforms, things like that. So I cannot wait to start working together. We’re gonna start really soon. 

And then I’ve also been hired recently, by a couple of different companies actually to advise on things like salary banding and appropriate benefits to offer employees that are influencer marketers and, some like competitive sort of research basically to see if the company is on par with what other people are paying their employees and how they’re being compensated and the benefits that they’re receiving. 

So I love that people wanna do right by their employees. They wanna be competitive in the industry and it’s an interesting position for me to be in. Again, I love helping other people’s businesses, so I love the work.

I wouldn’t think of myself as someone who offers this type of service. I wouldn’t think of myself as someone who necessarily offers this type of service per se, but It makes sense and I’m glad that people have come to me and asked me to do these things, and I think that’s like maybe where I’ll leave it with you guys, which is the following sentiment.

Be open to wherever your business takes you because I can tell you as a solopreneur who like, I love working for myself so fricking much, but if you were to ask me like a couple of years ago what my business now would’ve looked like, there’s no way I could have honestly have described what I currently do.

There are so few people that I know who like have a community and like a networking group and with a consultancy who consults on things like salary banding and influence and marketing. It’s so niche.

And I think that that’s probably, the best advice that I can give you guys for anyone else who is a consultant or a freelancer or has their own business, it’s the same advice I used to give to influencers when I was managing talent.

It’s like continue to hone in on your unique superpower. Don’t look left. Don’t look right, and like really double down on how you are like nobody else out there. And as soon as you can start to really cultivate your superpower, like how you’re different, how you differentiate yourself, then the business will come, and people will are attracted to that.

I think it seems to be working for me and I want to share what’s been working for me because I would love for it to work for you as well. 

So, Let me know. Hit me up on Instagram. I know I’ve been asking you for the past few weeks to do that, and it’s been really cool hearing from you guys. 

We’re on Instagram at Iamwiim. That’s I A M W I I M. Hit me up on there. And let me know what’s been working for you in your business. Are you working for yourself? Is it a consultancy? How are you liking it? How’s it going? And what do you think about leaning into just being unique and being like nobody else?

Do you think that would really benefit you? Or do you think that there are just certain services that, there’s so much business to go around that sure I can be another this or another that? I don’t know, tell me what works for you guys. But anyways, I hope you enjoyed this solo episode.

I hope you enjoyed getting a little peak behind the curtain as to like my week. And I wanna hear more about you guys in your week. I will see you next week for another episode. Have a great week you guys and I’ll see you more on Wiim.