Listen to the live podcast version of this story
This has been like equally a great week but also like kind of a chaotic week. So, I’ve been having major construction going on, literally outside of my window. They’re like redoing all the balconies on everybody’s apartment. It’s unbearable. I mean, they’re literally drilling into concrete right outside of my window. I’ve got my sound on hundred and I can’t even hear it if my ear is like up to a speaker. So, Oh my god, it’s just… it’s been a lot. Also close my balcony like right before the summer. I’m a little bummed about that but in great news, I just got fully vaccinated as of yesterday. So yay, I’m excited and optimistic that both the construction will inevitably end and that like my risk of getting Coronavirus will inevitably end in about two weeks once my body is like 95% immune to Coronavirus yay. So I do think this information is so important to share. I had heard a ton of stuff about a side effects after the first vaccine, after the second vaccine. Like what everybody felt. I wanted to share my own experience hoping that it’s valuable to somebody listening.
So after the first vaccine, I felt absolutely nothing. Oh, I got Pfizer. So I felt absolutely nothing except for like the tiniest bit of like soreness in my arm. Whatever, totally fine with me. And then I got my second vaccine just yesterday. And thank God I sort of like planned for the worst after I had heard a bunch of people had some, like uncomfortable side effects. So he pretty much took the day off. I swear I basically slept for 24 hours, a psych office second shot at about 4:30 on Thursday. I took my five year old to school at about 8:30 in the morning after because I still felt completely perfect. Nothing, not one symptom of anything. And I was like, Oh, I’m going to be one of the lucky people who like don’t experience any side effects. And then starting at like 10:30 everyone… everything went like I started feeling like utter shit. So I started feeling like I got like full body chills. I got like a pounding headache. I had no energy. And all I wanted to do was sleep. And I was like trying to sort of work even though I’d taken off the day because I’m stubborn. And essentially, it was like the worst idea ever. I just… I basically I went to sleep at about 10:30am I just like let my body go. And I woke up at 4:30 in the afternoon being like, I should eat something. I had a peanut butter sandwich because that’s what I’ve been eating pretty much every day for all of quarantine fun facts. I stayed up for like, maybe a couple of hours after that. And then I fell asleep yet again. Oh, before I fell asleep. I was like we should order dinner. And my boyfriend was like, Are you sure? And I was like yeah, let’s order dinner. I fell asleep before dinner arrived and then didn’t wake up until about 9:30 The next morning. I am recording this though. Like the day after that. And I feel completely fine again, oh my gosh, I have all my energy back and like all this good. So, let’s learn just like you know, do a close to the weekend or a day that you can take off you’re just like I just I basically had no energy. I had a mild fever. I got chills and like slept for a day and now I feel completely fine. So much so that I’m like recording the intro to a podcast. So for what it’s worth wanted to share my story. But anyways, this week’s episode is really, really good. So Aliza is somebody who I met recently and she’s awesome. And I asked her to come on the podcast because I, I just wanted to chat with her more in depth and learn more about her. So we actually shared this on Clubhouse as well. And so in the Clubhouse live version of this conversation, of course, we had some questions and answers at the end. And it was really fun. So we had this really cool conversation but then people wanted to know more. And that’s how we’ve been sharing podcast recordings on Clubhouse. So if you want sort of like a behind the scenes an opportunity, of course to like, chat one on one with some of our cool guests that we bring on the show, just follow us on Clubhouse and you’ll get notifications of when we go live with podcast recordings. Aliza, so she’s the founder and CEO of SheSpeaks, which is an award winning influencer marketing platform. She’s dedicated to building a stage for women, we obviously have this in common. Also the host of the podcast, she speaks how she does it. And I love a fellow female podcast host. So Spoken like a true podcaster you’re going to enjoy this episode. She’s incredibly articulate, well spoken, but she’s also an entrepreneur herself. I love a female entrepreneur, I don’t know, they just they practice what they preach. Like, it’s not just all theory, they’re really practicing what they’re talking about. If you continue to listen, we always include a special promo for our podcast listeners who want to join women’s collective. So people ask all the time, of course, like what is the collective. If you go to iamwiim.com slash benefits, you can see pretty much all the benefits there but to quickly sum it up. WIIM’s collective is basically like our Facebook group on steroids and so our Facebook group is just a place to learn and share and spread awareness of what everybody is working on make connections. We’re a networking organization at our core, but with the collective does is take everything that we’ve been doing over the past five years, and like amplifies it to the 10th degree. So we promote you, we do castings, we have job listings, in recruitment, I mean, like so much more. And basically everything that we’ve gotten requests for over the past five years, we like solidified it and made it into an official thing, which is now called WIIM’s collective. So if you’re looking to sort of like amp things up in your own business, or amp things up in your career in influencer marketing, check it out, keep listening to this podcast to get the promo code. We love you guys so, so much. Please continue to share this podcast to leave a review. It really truly helps get the word out. We’re always looking for new listeners and super grateful for you. So I hope you stick around and enjoy the show. This is gonna be a really, really solid conversation about female entrepreneurship. So we have a very special guest. I am so excited for her to introduce herself. So without further ado, introduce yourself to everybody share a little bit about your entrepreneur, entrepreneurial journey, and a little about you and your business. Go for it.
Aliza Freud:
Hi everyone. I am Alisa Freud and I am the founder and CEO of SheSpeaks. We are an award winning influencer marketing platform. We work with a lot of different companies who are interested in connecting with our amazing community of create female creators and influencers. We have a quarter of a million women who are part of our community. And we take very seriously our role in helping to connect our community of women, to media and to brands. So that’s what we do. We you know, we have been doing this for a while I’d like to say that we’ve been doing this since before it was called influencer marketing back in the day, but we really started off as a research company. So I got the entrepreneurial bug. When I was working in corporate America, I came from American Express I was there. I really only so funny because I think about my career and I’ve only worked two places in my entire career. So you’d think that I’m a spring chicken but I’m a little bit of a marathoner in the way that I work. So I worked for about 10 years at American Express, doing global branding, and marketing, and product management, product, new product development. So basically kind of touring around the marketing departments, all the different marketing departments at American Express, I’m in the consumer consumer business, and I did that for a while and really just got the bug for entrepreneurship and really wanted to create my own business on and I, it took me a while to figure out exactly what I was going to be bold enough or brave enough to leave American Express because it was a great place. They were very good to me there. It’s like, you know, people I’ve met, they’re still what I consider my family members, my friends, and I actually met my husband there too. So a lot of really, really great associations for me with American Express. And it just took me a little bit of time to kind of figure out alright, what will I leave this great place for and kind of take this flying leap into entrepreneurship. And I, you know, finally kind of came up with the idea, with the help, by the way, have an amazingly supportive group of women who I met through I went, I went to Columbia Business School and there was this sort of student… I should say, alumni led Women’s Entrepreneurship group, it was back then the only really female entrepreneurship group I had been exposed to. And they were so kind to allow me to come to their meetings every week or however often it was .For almost a year, while I still worked in corporate America, as he talked through entrepreneurship, because they were really, the women I knew who were entrepreneurs, I really didn’t know mostly new corporate marketing people, I didn’t really know a whole lot of entrepreneurs. So it was really important for me to start exposing myself to that culture and what it’s like to be an entrepreneur understand it better. And so as I said, this amazing alumni led group of female entrepreneurs at Columbia Business School, allowed me to listen into them and they really helped hone for me what I you know what I should do. And so I left American Express and started my company pretty much immediately. And it was SheSpeaks and it’s still as SheSpeaks, we’ve evolved because we started as a research company. We actually started with the idea that, you know, market research and doing consumer focus groups and getting feedback from your customers was going to change significantly with digital and with social media. So we started out as a research company, where we asked women to join our community, our research panel, to try different products and services and to give their honest feedback, in return for trying those products and services. So that’s where we started. And then what we quickly figured out was that the women who were joining, to be a part of our panel, were what you now would call influencers. They were women who had blogs, they were women who were active on social media. And they would tell us that when they signed up to be a part of our panel, they would tell us, oh, I have this blog, and here’s my URL. I’m active on social media. And we as researchers, at the time, we were so worried about it, we were like wait a second, if we send you this, you know, haircare product that’s in development to test. Are you going to write about it? Don’t write about it in blog, please don’t write about it. And then after a couple of times of experiencing that back and forth with our community members, we realized that there was an opportunity to actually work with the community, not just from a research perspective, but also to tap into this amazing group of women who were building their social media followings were building their blog followings. So we evolved into what more of what we do today, which is, you know, we partner with our influencers and our community members to help really match them with companies that are interested in working with women to create content, and to amplify and distribute that content. So I knew that me I hope that that gave you a quick overview, but maybe a little bit more than you needed to know. But that’s kind of how it all started for me and what we do today.
Jessy Grossman:
No, that’s perfect. I wanted to have you keep going because there’s a long story and there’s usually a long story right when it comes to female entrepreneurship. And it’s really exciting to hear the things that you’ve accomplished the way that you’ve grown your team, just and the story is very much part of a female entrepreneurs journey. So these are never short stories to tell and that’s part of the honesty of female entrepreneurs. Sharing what they’re all about some people, you know, we have this like pipe dream, perhaps that like, oh, we’re gonna, like have this idea. And we’re going to implement it. And immediately it’s going to be, you know, a billion dollar idea or even a million dollar idea. But it takes so much hard work and so much testing and learning. And I just always want to keep it real on this on the podcast. And so I appreciate the full breadth of your story. So I want everyone to get to know you a little bit more just you personally, we talk… you know, as sharing stuff about your journey as an entrepreneur, like, I feel like we get to know you a little bit more personally because entrepreneurship is such a personal journey. But like along those lines, let’s get to know you a little bit more, we have a few like rapid fire, get to know you questions that we love to ask our guests. Are you ready for a few of those?
Aliza Freud:
Sure. I hope I don’t have to answer that quickly. But go for it.
Jessy Grossman:
Well, the ideal is that we asked you and you don’t put an you don’t put a lot of thought into it. And you just share what first comes to mind. So are you ready?
Aliza Freud:
I’m ready.
Jessy Grossman:
Amazing. All right. First question. If you were completely free of obligations of any relationship, identity, ego or attachment, what would your day look like?
Aliza Freud:
I would be probably doing like dog rescue. I do that in my spare time. I’m very passionate about it. I have three rescues of my own and I spend, my team always sees these like little meetings pop up on my calendar for you know, things I do and end up needing to do in the middle of the day as it relates to dog rescue. So I would say that would probably be a thing I’d spend a lot of time doing if I had no other obligation. And my kids enjoy doing it too. So it’s something that we can do together.
Jessy Grossman:
That’s so sweet. I’m a foster fail myself. So I have a rescue. What types of dogs do you have?
Aliza Freud:
When you’re dealing with rescues. You’re never exactly sure what they are.
Jessy Grossman:
Oh, you got it, you got to do one of those DNA tests. I completely relate with you. My dog is like 12 different breeds but have you done any of those DNA tests before?
Aliza Freud:
Yes, for two of my three. We’ve done DNA testing. Actually, one of my girlfriend’s got it to us, for me as a birthday present last year. So we did do DNA testing on two of them. And they’re lab ish meaning you know, they they’re all three of them are black lab ish dogs and they have varying degrees of other stuff mixed in there some German shepherd and you know, some Chow and some other stuff, but predominantly labs
Jessy Grossman:
That’s so sweet. I love a good lab, I fostered a black lab that that was my first, my almost first foster fail. She was so beautiful. Jojos mostly Husky, but like has a little challenge her to that’s awesome. I love that so much. Um, next question, what is your favorite place on earth?
Aliza Freud :
I’m honestly my home. And this past year, I really built a new appreciation for i because I’ve spent so much time here. And I love it. I mean, you know, my people are here. And I’ve been so lucky to I feel like this has been a gift of this extra time I’ve had with my kids and my husband that I normally would not have because you know, normally we’re all out and about doing different things. Um, and I just… I love being here. And I love being here with them. And so I have a new appreciation for my home. That is definitely, you know, a something that’s happened since COVID started.
Jessy Grossman:
Oh my gosh, well, you are leaning into COVID. That’s for sure. We’re in the process of like getting our home to be more comfortable. So you have man that home is so important these days because it’s like, you know, it’s office it’s home. It’s like literally everywhere you are. What is your favorite social media platform?
Aliza Freud:
Um, I really am loving Clubhouse. I just I think there is something about the app. There’s something about the I should say it’s the nature of voice that you very quickly can find people who share your values. And because I think with voice it’s really quick you learn very quickly what somebody is about. And I have found like a wonderful group of people on Clubhouse who, you know, I obviously have never a lot of the people I’ve never met in person who I’m connected here on Clubhouse too. So I am really just loving this app. I think that the that there’s so much that it offers, especially as you said before, Jessy, you’re a curious person. I mean, I started using Clubhouse because I’m very similar. I’m somebody who wants to kind of learn as much as I can. And I have learned so much being on the app. So I don’t know, I can’t even think of another app that is close in my mind but right now it’s Clubhouse.
Jessy Grossman:
Have you tried any of the alternatives to Clubhouse like Twitter spaces or anything like that? I’m just curious.
Aliza Freud:
I was invited into a Twitter space. Um, recently, I guess you know, there’s like a, there’s, it’s a little bit different. There’s a little bit more limitation on what you can do there. And I wasn’t in it for long, so I can’t give enough of an overview to know how it compares, well enough on so really only I’ve only had one experience and it was short with with Twitter spaces. So and it seemed I mean, it seems somewhat comparable. But I just because I’m so much more used to using Clubhouse. I couldn’t tell you enough what the benefits of one versus the other are.
Jessy Grossman:
Yeah, no. I’m just curious. Like I obviously I’m on Clubhouse a lot. I you’re on Clubhouse a lot. We’re pretty strongly into Clubhouse for sure. But I love to just I’m very I’m also just pretty curious like those who are on Clubhouse like are you also curious about the other all you know, the alternatives and stuff and just how do they compare. I’ll share personally like I haven’t explored them. I know a little bit about them but I’m pretty happy on Clubhouse. So I’m like, why am I looking elsewhere? And then our last couple questions. One is list two pet peeves. What are some of your pet biggest pet peeves?
Aliza Freud:
Um, okay, so I would say that, you know, for me, the biggest issue that I have, in general, and I’ll kind of make this about entrepreneurship is when you encounter people. And for me, it’s mostly happened, it’s, it doesn’t happen. Very rarely. I don’t think I’ve ever in all my years, do I find it with my team. But I find sometimes with clients, and there’s apathy, and I just… I don’t know why, but it drives me bananas when somebody is, you know, doing something and they don’t seem to be engaged or happy in what they’re doing because it makes me want to kind of shake them and say, go find something that you want to do with this, isn’t it? So apathy is I think is my biggest pet peeve in life. And anywhere my personal life and business when I find people who just seem apatheticthat is hard for me.
Jessy Grossman:
Oh my gosh, that Yeah. 100,000 million percent. Yes. And the last question, oh, it’s fun because everybody’s working remotely right now. What is the most interesting thing that you could see out of your window right now? Go check?
Aliza Freud:
Um, well, actually, I want to tell you while we were talking, my I noticed a person walking back and forth in my neighbor’s yard. And I started getting very worried. I was like, Who is that? What are they doing? Because I mean, I sit here all day, I don’t generally see people walking back and forth over there. So I investigated and it’s my neighbor. was, that was, that was the most recent interesting thing. I saw up my window, I don’t generally see a whole lot of traffic right outside my window.
Jessy Grossman:
That’s so funny. Oh, my gosh, you scope that well. I was gonna say go scope it out. I’m glad that you did. Um, I have like a few questions here. Where do you connect with other female entrepreneurs? I I’ll speak personally, and just say that it’s been a real game changer to find others who are going through similar things. So just a very practical question, what are some of the best places that you found to connect with other female entrepreneurs going through similar journeys that you’ve gone through and are going through.
Aliza Freud:
Basically, everywhere. And I just feel like once you start on entrepreneurial journey, you tend to find people who just kind of come out and friends or connections would say, Oh, you need to talk to so and so they have a really cool business and they’re female entrepreneurs. So that initial group that I mentioned that I worked, that worked with me and kind of helped kind of mentor me from Columbia Business School, I continued to actually meet other people who were female entrepreneurs through Columbia Business School. In fact, some of our first clients were women, these amazing women who had gone to Columbia Business School and launched fabulous companies like Happy Baby. I don’t know if anyone is familiar with Happy Baby. They are a food, they started off as a food company, for moms for young babies. And they were hugely successful ended up selling to a much larger food company, one of the big guys, and they were one of our first clients. And so we met… I met a lot of women through Columbia Business School, a lot of other entrepreneurs. But then also, you know, more recently, as you know, time has gone on, I would say that, as you know, it’s really just about, you know, when you start to tell people, what you do, you end up just kind of building a community of women. And over time, I have really been lucky to have amazing experience with other female entrepreneurs. And I am so you know, you, I am so grateful that they’re in my sphere because entrepreneurship can be a very, very much of a kind of lonely and roller coaster type of experience. And so having other female entrepreneurs who understand what you’re going through, and can be sounding boards, I think is just incredibly helpful. So we are partners with a great organization called Luminary, and they have a ton of female entrepreneurs but just, you know, as I’ve gone, I found amazing women who have been so incredibly supportive. That, you know, I would say, I know people talk about how, you know, there’s this female competition thing, but I personally have only really experienced such a generosity of spirit from the female entrepreneurs that I’ve encountered. So I hope that that answers.
Jessy Grossman:
Yeah, no, absolutely. And can we like, dispel that ASAP? Because I’ve experienced the same and I don’t know it, like, Sure, let’s be real, like, I’ve definitely experienced some women who, I don’t know, whether whether it’s due to like insecurity, or just like competitiveness, or whatever it is, like, I’ve definitely experienced some women who, you know, aren’t so supportive, but like, so predominantly the other way, the other direction, and I, I, that’s certainly not the majority. And I feel like there’s this like, huge stereotype about women in business, that they are incredibly competitive with each other and I just want to just spell that because I feel like that gives some women pause about connecting with other female entrepreneurs, or networking or things like that, and just like nose to the grindstone, and, you know, in their work and moving forward, and I’ve experienced that if you connect with other entrepreneurs, the growth potential of both of your businesses is beyond. I mean, it’s so incredibly exciting, what people can do with collaboration and openness and information sharing, and all of those things. So, you know, I like to share where you can actually connect with these people because, you know, look, it’s a virtual world now, and that everybody is virtual. So you know, online, whether it’s Clubhouse, or, you know, Instagram or a ton of different networking groups not to start own, how do you think I got the idea for WIIM, it’s because I was part of so many other incredible networking organizations. There’s just a community for everybody. Facebook groups are such a good example. I am part of so many different Facebook groups and it’s great because it sort of takes out that stigma, or maybe the thing that causes some people to get nervous about connecting with other female entrepreneurs. It’s so hard to, you know, step out of your comfort zone and like to say, Hi, my name is Jessy, and I want to connect with you and like, Let’s become friends. It’s really hard to make, whether it’s like connections or fractional friends as an adult, let’s be honest but I think that like if you’re in some of these organizations like that is that piece of it is just like thrown out the window. And because you know that everybody there is there for the same purpose. So I don’t know, I just like to remind people of that of like, you know, go into the push yourself, get into those circles those communities because everybody’s there to achieve the same thing. Hope you’ve been enjoying this episode as a special treat. And a huge thank you for being such a loyal listener of the podcast. We’re offering you 10% off your first year of a VIP membership to our collective. Essentially, it’s our Facebook group on steroids. So check out all of the benefits at iamwiim.com slash benefits. And then use code podcast 2021 to get 10% off your first year of a VIP collective membership. Again, that’s code podcast 2021. Okay, so go sign up, but also keep listening to this episode. I would love to ask you. What is… I mean, this is a huge question but we’re just gonna, like, throw it out there. What do you think is like the biggest lesson that you’ve learned as an entrepreneur over the years?
Aliza Freud:
Well, it’s a great question. There are… I feel like there are so many lessons but as an entrepreneur, I’m going to tell you what I think the most important lesson is. The most important lesson for I think any entrepreneur that wants a business that is going to have longevity and go the distance is becoming extremely comfortable. And really embracing failure. And when I was at a big company, it is really hard to… especially back, you know, back when I was there, which was in the late aughts. Um, you know, it is really, it was not something that people wanted to embrace. If you failed, you were like, ooh, you know, I don’t want to, I’m gonna get away from that failure, because it affects your reviews, it affects all of these things that happen for you in your career. And because when the rating systems happen at large companies, and you know, anyone who’s been at a large company, or any company that has a, you know, a process performance management process, you understand that a lot of the people who are giving insights and feedback about you have maybe had two or three interactions with you, it’s not over the course of a year, it’s not like they see you day in and day out. So perception is reality is a big thing that I used to hear when I worked at Corporate America, and you had to kind of get used to that idea and so you managed differently for that, I think. And when I started my company, what… one of the things that I have always and maybe because I grew up with a mom, who was incredibly supportive of trying things, and it being okay, if you failed, right? So I didn’t have the fear as much as I could have about failure, because growing up, my mom in particular very much encouraged me to really try different things. And if I failed, I failed. So I think that set me up a little bit more, for a little bit better for entrepreneurship because in entrepreneurship, let’s say you have 10 things that happen in a given day, three of them could be failures. And I think that it’s really important to remember that, it’s okay. In fact, failure can be a blessing, right? It’s, you can learn, I find that people learn so much from failure. I mean, it’s unbelievable how much attention we pay to failure. But I think having embracing failure, and when I say embracing, I mean, recognizing to, that you process it, you take what you can from it, and then move on, do not dwell in it. You can, you know, it is something that is just part of it’s the nature of the beast, in entrepreneurship that thinks some things are going to be are going to be good and some things are not going to be good. And you have to take those failures, recognize what you learn from it, and then move forward and not hold on to them. So I probably maybe not the most intuitive thing that I could have learned my biggest lesson from, or advice in terms of, you know, what’s important thing to know about being an entrepreneur, but I think that one has been… that’s the one that would probably be most useful for people.
Jessy Grossman:
Well, it’s also, you know, knowing that failure is inevitable. Like, it’s not even like, ooh, maybe you’ll fail. It’s inevitable as an entrepreneur. I mean, I don’t know, I think that their entrepreneurship is glamorized and romanticized. And there are absolutely parts of it that are accurate to romanticize and glamorize but failure is inevitable in entrepreneurship. It’s really just a matter of like keeping it to a low number of failures. And like so yeah, getting comfortable with it, oh my god, because I would actually take it a step further and say like, if you are slightly uncomfortable with it, like, why even go that route, because it’s inevitable that you’re going to fail and it’s gonna happen often, frequently, and you have to be the type of person that thrives in that type of environment. But my question to you like, how do you feel about the word failure? Like, what other word would you use? If you could like, even reframe the word itself?
Aliza Freud:
An excellent question. Um, I like to think of it as, like a learning opportunity and that’s why I said before that I think failure is a gift because you learn so much from it. I think as human beings, we are… we like to know… we like to really think about what didn’t go well and that’s a it’s a natural thing. And I think maybe a little bit more for women, maybe more so for women than for men, because we’re hard on ourselves, right? We are earnest women are very earnest in general. And I think we expect a lot from ourselves. I you know, I love I was talking to a friend of mine who runs an HR company, and she was telling me that, you know, it’s kind of unbelievable to her how it works with male versus female candidates, right? A female candidate will feel like she needs to have a hundred percent of the qualifications in order to apply for her next role, right for the for whatever the role is. She said, by contrast, male candidates, on average, look at their look at the job spec, and if they have 60% of the of the requirements for that job, they go ahead, and they apply for the job. So what does that tell us to bear in terms of the differences between men and women, in terms of our, you know, confidence in stepping into something, and I think a lot of it is about, you know, we as women, we don’t want to, we don’t want to let anybody else down, we don’t want to let ourselves down and failure. If you fail, you know, it’s inevitable that you think, Oh, I’m letting somebody down. I’m letting myself down. I’m letting somebody else down. So I like to think of the fear of failure to answer your question really more as a learning opportunity. Okay, what happened? And let’s think about it and assess what happened. And then, you know, learn from whatever it is that we can take out of it and move forward. And do not let… don’t languish or marinate, as I like to say, Don’t marinate in the failure, it just does not serve you and it also doesn’t serve your business.
Jessy Grossman:
Well, it certainly doesn’t serve your business like i i agree with all the things that you said, you have to be the type of person who like, enjoy it, like you have a curiosity about you, or you like enjoy problem solving, and like testing things, and I don’t know, I just I, I speak with a lot of younger people more, you know, starting out in their careers trying to figure out where they belong and what even like what internship to take, let’s say, and one of the first questions that I asked them, and I don’t expect them done. The answers are super young, but I want them to ask themselves these questions continuously is like, Okay, well, what Who are you? And what do you enjoy? And? And what do you thrive in? What type of environments you thrive in? Because that even answers the question like, even as an intern, like, do you want to intern for a really large company that’s going to give you a big name on your resume? And we’ll certainly open doors let’s be real? Or do you want to work for like an intern for or work for a smaller company where you are really going to get so much more hands on work, you’re going to have your ideas and voice heard a lot more often than at a huge company where it might be lost, or, or even silenced, in some instances where there’s just instances of seniority. And but you know, you’re going to be scrappy, I don’t know, there’s just a lot of adjectives that describe people that I think thrive in an entrepreneurial environment. And again, I think it’s a little dangerous because that the word entrepreneur and entrepreneurship has been so glamorized that it really truly just isn’t for everybody. And there’s no shade to that there’s no shame on that at all. I just hope that people just got real with themselves and ask these questions of themselves to really identify if it’s just the right fit for them. I don’t know what other adjectives would you describe for you know, women in particular, who would just thrive in that type of environment describe that person and what things they should enjoy or be good at?
Aliza Freud:
You know, it’s interesting that you’re asking the question, and I think I’ve seen a lot of different kinds of people. A lot of different kinds of women, be able to succeed and thrive in entrepreneurship but I think that you have to be somebody who… as I said before, kind of roll with the punches as it relates to things going wrong. Um, you also have to be somebody who really enjoys his I shouldn’t say enjoys, but you are okay with the highs and the lows of entrepreneurship because they are is a little bit more of like riding a roller coaster versus being in a corporate job, right? So I’ve only worked as I said before two places, I worked at a big company at the same day company for a long time. And then now doing my company now, and I’ve been doing that for the last 10 plus years. So, for me, I noticed that there is a huge difference in terms of that variability of the emotional, you know, the emotional highs and lows, when it is your own company, when it is your own business, there is so much share of mind, I call it share of mind that you kind of give it you give the business. And and that’s different than then what maybe you you know, you know, or experienced at a big company, when I worked at a large company, I loved working there. But I knew that if I left 10, other people could jump in and do the same role that I was doing. I mean, as unique as we all are. There are that’s how big companies are structured, right, they’re structured, so that there’s a succession plan, that if you were to leave, somebody else could take your job, other people are being trained up across different parts of the business to take your role. And that is that is how those large organizations have to function. And when you start your own business, you and you run your own business, it there is a lot more that you are bringing to the table in terms of you know, the longevity, longevity and legacy that you’re building. Right. So I think about it as in terms of the traits. It has to be somebody who I think first and foremost, most feels a huge desire to do it. If you do not crave running your own business, don’t do it. There are too many things that come up. And you know, what do they say that like nine out of ten businesses, small businesses fail. So if you are somebody who is not comfortable with failure, or if you are somebody who does not care that, you know, does not passionately want to run your own business. I think those are the things that you really have to be very tuned into, in order to do it. And to do this well, those are the attributes that I would say. And I want to mention one other thing, because when you were talking before, Jessy, you made me think about this when you’re talking about how you counsel younger women about you know what, where should they start to work, where should they go to a big companies should they go to a small company, so they start their own thing. And I think one of the things that is really important for any woman, any part I mean, men and women, I’m sure, but I mostly have knowledge and expertise of the women’s space given what I do but I think for women, it is important for us to all have a really tap into and have a practice for self awareness. And what I mean by that is, we especially as an entrepreneur, you really have to understand what is going on with you and why so much of your business is going to be based on your level of passion, your level of enthusiasm. You know, when it’s when you’re solopreneur, of course, it’s incredibly important because you are, it’s you right, you are driving this thing here but then as you grow a team, it’s also about making sure that your team has the best of you. And I think if you don’t have a strong practice, and I call it a practice for self awareness, you’re not going to give them your best, and you’re not going to give your business the best. So, um, for me, that was a big realization. And I have to really thank again, one of my early female entrepreneur buddies, who told me that she took me aside and said, you really have to start a practice on a day to day basis for really looking at what’s going on why you’re why you react to things that you read the way you do, why you want to push forward one particular type of thing, why you’re making decisions the way you are, and if you can build that you will have a much easier path in terms of building your business and I am so grateful to her because it was the best advice I have ever received. And it’s taken me a while to find the right self aware In this practice for me, but um, I highly recommend that to any woman in general. But especially if you’re thinking about being an entrepreneur and running your own business, that self awareness piece is so critical to being successful, and building a legacy over time.
Jessy Grossman:
Oh my gosh, that’s like, that is such a self awareness, that should be the title of this conversation because it’s so important. And it takes practice, it takes feedback from other people that you trust in your life, as well. Yeah, and oh, my gosh, it could help you as a business person, it could help you as a just a human it existing in the world, right. And it lends itself to humility. And it lends itself to honesty and transparency, and all the things that just are huge, like legs up, like if you could really achieve those things and that mindset, because also much of entrepreneurship is mindset, oh my goodness, if you can achieve that, and practice it and practice it’s you get better and better being able to be truly self aware and remove ego and remove, you know, an add humility. And just be very honest and introspective about who you are and what you thrive on what you you don’t, and knowing that, oh my god, the things that you don’t necessarily thrive at, like, that’s why other people can be hired to supplement those, those things that you’re not so great on because come on, guys, like we’re human, and nobody is good at everything. And it’s crazy to think otherwise. I think that, like, so much of this conversation that I’m so hoping that we achieve, and I you’re you’re getting there, man you’re getting us there is just to dispel all these myths about entrepreneurship, that it’s easy, that it’s glamorous, that it’s, you know, I don’t know that it doesn’t take a lot of fucking work, and it takes so much work but like, that is some of the most rewarding experiences in life, isn’t it when you put forth all that energy and work and you feel like you come out the other side victorious, whether it’s with, you know, actual successful achievements, whether it’s achievements that just you alone, only, you know, about, it doesn’t always have to be for everybody else. And also, you know, just those learnings that we were talking about before, I don’t know, I’m the type of person, if I can keep learning things like the rest of my life, I will be so happy, like, I will never stop learning. It’s fun. It’s exciting. I’m just like a curious person but I think that that absolutely lends itself to entrepreneurship, for sure. I want to pivot just slightly to ask you a little bit more, you know, we’re a social media organization, right, where you know, WIIM is, of course, and I want to talk a little bit about social media. So I’m curious, as an entrepreneur, how do you personally for your personal brand, use social media? And then you know, for your business as well, I’m curious how you guys use it, and how it helps you as an entrepreneur?
Aliza Freud:
Well, I mean, our business is very much based in social media and we have to know, you know, what are the things that are going on? What are the new platforms and how to use those platforms? So I think for us as a company, we are very aware and tuned into what’s going on in social media. And and it’s critical, because we, you know, that’s how we execute everything we do we execute through digitally through social media. So I want I’m going to answer your question with also something that I kind of got occurred to me as we were just talking about the last topic we talked about, I am not personally somebody who is naturally amazing at let’s say, using Instagram, that’s not my personal strength. So knowing that Instagram was going to be critical for our business, I had to find other people who knew how to do that. Right. So you talked about, you know, when we talked about self awareness, I think that the one of the many reasons it’s so important for women and for female entrepreneurs, is because you have to get very real with yourself about what you’re good at, and what you are not good at. And so what I do is I hire people who are better than I am and I am completely and utterly comfortable and happy with having people who are smarter than I am and doing the roles, you know, doing the things that we need to do in order to be secure. cessful. So, I would say that, you know, for me personally, it isn’t, you know, social media was not like, Oh, I intuitively get what to post on Instagram. No, I didn’t. And I had to find a team of people who understood that. And so I lean into other people’s skills, and other people’s strengths. And I would say that is, you know, hugely important in entrepreneurship. It’s in any business, for sure. But entrepreneurship, it is, like, critical to find other people who can round out your skills. And, you know, I would say that, you know, we also look at one of the other really amazing things that we have access to, as I mentioned earlier, we have a quarter of a million women who are part of our community. And they are really smart. They understand social media, they understand content, they understand how to create content that works well on social media. So one of the smartest things I think we do as a team is we listen, we ask questions, and we listen, we will, you know, we are constantly putting out surveys and asking our community to share with us what’s going on with them, what platforms are they using? How are they using the platforms, so that we can learn and be smart, so that we can help them be as successful as we want to right are, we see our role as helping our community of creators and influencers be successful in in earning an income doing what they’re doing? And so in order to serve them, as well, as we want to, we have to be smart and understand the platforms. And so thankfully, we have this amazing asset of this community that we can ask the questions to. So our team spends an enormous amount of time thinking about what questions should we ask, and then how do we ensure that we’re spending the time to listen to what people are, feel tell us and using that collective knowledge to to make things better for for the community we serve.
Jessy Grossman:
Yeah, I love that. And similarly, or, you know, to piggyback off of that, we always get a lot of influencers, who will listen to our content, and I never want to leave them out, right? We’re marketers, and we’re hiring influencers, and we are, you know, business owners, but so were they. And so I think that I’d love to hear from you. If you could give influencers some advice to get a leg up on their entrepreneurial journey, what would you tell them,
Aliza Freud:
Be true to yourself, if you’re an influencer, you know, your main, the main thing that you’re doing is creating content and building that an audience that wants to see that content. So, be true to who you and listen to your audience so as you create content and push it out. One of the things that I absolutely love about but working with influencers and working with creators is their insane knowledge, like incredible knowledge of what their audience wants. And they know so when you go and work with an influencer, and you say, Hey, we’re creating this campaign for XYZ, I don’t know, this food company, the good influencers, right and so an influencer, one of the things I would say is, you know, use your knowledge of your audience and yourself and what you bring to the table and represent that represented as authentically, I know, we said at the top of this, Jessy, we need to come up with another word for authenticity, because it’s so hackneyed, but you know, be true to who you are, and bring to the table that information to the companies that you serve, right the companies that you work with because those companies need your knowledge. They do not have a direct line day to day with a chart with their target customer, you do as the influencer, you have that direct line, you have these people who are following you, who you interact with, and you and you understand every day, right you are talking to them, the brands, these marketers, these agencies, they do not and so that you lean into that differentiation and that value that you are bringing to the table. So I would say if you’re an influencer, you know to build you know, if you’re building your audience, be really clear on who you are. That’s going back to the self awareness piece. And bring that you know very truthfully to your audience on a day to day basis, but then as you start working with companies on if you are doing you know if you’re doing on monetizing your following, you know, recognize that you bring that value to the table. So I hope that’s helpful.
Jessy Grossman:
Yeah. A hundred percent it’s helpful. Absolutely. And we could talk about that alone for that could be a whole other episode, a whole other conversation. So yeah, one hundred percent and, you know, I like, I attribute my, a lot of my entrepreneurial journey to when I was representing influencers, and I got a peek behind the curtain as to what it was to own your own business as an influencer. And I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I mean, all influencers, they’re entrepreneurs, they’re small business owners, in some instances, most of them are solopreneurs. And we don’t talk about it enough about, you know, the tools that they need to run their business well, and the mindset that they need to have, they’re sort of just left to their own devices, and so many different instances. So I never want to forget speaking to the influencers directly. In anything that we create, they’re like, absolutely the backbone of our industry. And like, come on, like, they deserve that advice, as well. And there are nuances of course, to their business and how it’s distinguished from ours. So, I think it’s important to chat about and so one of my last questions for you for today. I always like to talk about like a good hack, like something that we could sort of implement tomorrow, or something that like you, you’re like, I wish it like if I could have gone back, started my business over and done it a little bit differently. This is the hack, or the distinction or the change that I would have made to sort of give myself a leg up. What would that be?
Aliza Freud:
I love this question. And I’m glad you asked it, because the for me, I it took me a while to really lean into the idea of partnerships and partnering, you mentioned this, I think at the beginning of our conversation about, you know, the idea of partnering with other other female entrepreneurs, because then together, you know, you sort of read you both rise when you do that. And I did not spend enough time focusing early on, on building those partnerships. And I will say that as soon as I did, start focusing on it, our business grew and I will tell you, even if you think you’re partnering with someone who may be considered an entre, a competitor, like it, really just go with your gut, on part and, and on partnerships and find people find other companies and other women, other businesses that you can partner with, because it absolutely makes you both better and I that’s my one thing that I wish I had done sooner. I mean, there’s so many other things along the way but I think partnerships and and creating that community of people who are in your corner, their business is aligned with your business and you’re mutually supporting each other from a you know, on business projects. That is hugely valuable.
Jessy Grossman:
Yes, it is. So thank you for sharing that. I love that. That’s like, it is, it’s a question that people asked me before. And that’s sort of how to put a lot of thought into it. I didn’t necessarily know the answer right away. So I’m glad that you did. I think that it’s it could be you know, it’s like look, it’s like I talk a lot about this it’s what type of legacy do we want to leave for the next generation of women in business of female entrepreneurs have you know people in the influencer marketing industry and isn’t that the goal to be able to give them a leg up so that they learn from us and you know, we can’t do it over that’s just how life is but there are going to be a ton of others behind us that we’re paving the way for and I want to share that information with them so that they can get a leg up and they can achieve even more than we did so I am so appreciative of that. I have a feeling that everybody is listening is going to want to get in touch with you Aliza is amazing and she’s an incredible wealth of information. For those listening what is the best way for our listeners to get in touch with you.
Aliza Freud:
Um, that you can email me directly at Aliza. Aliza@shespeaks.com and then on LinkedIn on Aliza Freud I think I’m pretty much Aliza Freud. We’re on think I’m on Instagram, mo no maybe on Instagram on as she’s speaking but, um, but we can I can provide that for you if you want you can have it in the in the notes, since I can’t even remember what all my handles are but if you want to contact me directly Aliza@shespeaks. I really try to get through all of my emails. So you know, I hopefully will be able to respond to somebody reaches out to me that way.
Jessy Grossman:
That’s perfect. And we will list all of that in the show notes for sure. It’s been such a pleasure having you on today. I again, like I know that our listeners are definitely want to get in touch and you are just a wealth of information. I was so excited to have you on the podcast today. And thank you so much for being on.
Aliza Freud:
Thank you so much for doing what you do, Jessy, it’s such a great value and building the community that you’re building and it’s so it’s, you know, what you’re doing is so cool. And I think women a lot of different women are finding so much value in what you’re doing. So thank you for what you’re doing. And thanks for having me on.
