The Next Big Thing

You know that conversation - the one that goes, "Holy WHAT. We're how far into 2021?" It's frightening. It's daunting. And most of us will do absolutely nothing about it. In this episode, Sam wants to flip that mentality on its head. What if we looked at the next six months as an opportunity to refresh our goals and create new habits? Listen to this episode to learn about Sam's approach to crushing the next six months and how you can turn this startling realization into your superpower. What You Will Discover This Week: What we need to let go of to get our mindset in the right place. How really defining our goals can set us up for success (even though most of us don't put a pen to paper on the goals we want to achieve) Sam's three biggest learnings that she's encountered as an entrepreneur, and how you can apply them to your own journey. Why most people fail when faced with learning something new. Contact Sam: https://www.thenextbigthingpodcast.com/

Are you feeling like social media is just a black hole, taking away precious time from what you could be doing for your brand or even your own personal brand (which probably looks a little dusty)? Today on the podcast Sam connects with Eva Jannotta, a Thought Leadership Advisor who has years of experience consulting with authors and industry experts to help them build their own brands. Eva enlightens Sam on what it means to build a true community (that doesn't have to exist on a social media platform) and how you can practice social media monogamy. What You Will Discover This Week: Why it's OK if the major you picked in college isn't what you want to end up doing long-term. How magnetic thought leadership can encompass the core values you believe in that you want to spread to the rest of the world. How you can strategically use social media to grow your thought leadership - without getting sucked into spending hours on every platform. Why creating a women's round table cultivates truly meaningful connections vs. the same old ways of networking. Mentioned: https://www.simplyputstrategies.com/ (Eva's Company Simply Put Strategies) https://www.linkedin.com/in/evajannotta (Eva On LinkedIn) Eleanor Beaton's Email List https://www.thenextbigthingpodcast.com/ (Contact Us)

Today on the podcast, Sam chats with Emily Schildt, a second-time entrepreneur who has started a multi-million dollar business in the grocery space. Emily is flipping brand discovery on its head with her business Pop Up Grocer, an innovative take on grocery shopping. Originally, Emily developed a branding business called Sourdough, but found a major opportunity to help support new brands, and bring new brands to hungry shoppers. What You Will Discover This Week: The driving criteria that Emily follows when evaluating which brands to feature in Pop Up Grocer. How brands are refashioning beloved childhood products and surfacing nostalgia to attract new customers. How proper branding is 100% a non-negotiable and has a major impact on whether or not someone decides to purchase a product. What it takes to be a founder and how having a deep connection to your product helps build a community. Mentioned: https://www.popupgrocer.co (Pop Up Grocer) https://www.instagram.com/popup.grocer/ (Pop Up Grocer on Instagram) https://www.thenextbigthingpodcast.com (Contact Us)

At any stage of entrepreneurship, it’s easy to look at other business leaders and wish you could be as productive, focused, and accomplish as much. Sam’s guest this week helps entrepreneurs get aligned with their values and in the flow with their energy to be as productive and stress free as possible. Sophie Thorn is a Business Strategist who helps solopreneurs shift from CEO and find (and stay in) their Genius Zone. Sophie shares some golden nuggets of wisdom on blocking out distractions, how to break free from busy work, and finesse your day in a way that works best for you. She also gives us a sneak peak at a day in her life plus some free resources that can help you get more productive today. What You Will Discover This Week: How Sophie bookends her day with plenty of time to get back to all her messages so they get answered, but don’t take up all of her time. Sophie is highly productive and successful, but she doesn’t work 24/7. She shares how she set up her life and schedule to work a 6 hour day. How Sophie stays concentrated on one thing at a time, and her advice for monotasking. It’s more about being intentional with your time and energy rather than putting arbitrary rules on yourself. When you set up boundaries for yourself and follow them, other people learn how to treat you. The Zone of Genius exercise Sophie does with her clients, and the biggest mistake she sees entrepreneurs making at every stage of their journey. The things that hold us back the most is our mindset and confidence. Mindset hacks and tools Sophie can’t live without. Quotes: “I’m very careful of what I allow in my space when I want to be in the flow.” - Sophie “If you don’t master your mindset. 9/10 it’s not about tactics, it’s about mindset.” - Sophie “Mastering your mindset is the biggest component to success.” - Sophie Mentioned: https://www.sophiethorne.co.uk/ (Sophie Thorne) https://asana.com/campaign/fac/do?andutm_campaign=Brand--NAMER--EN--Core--Desktop--Exactandutm_source=googleandutm_medium=pd_cpc_brandgclid=CjwKCAjwnPOEBhA0EiwA609RedL4yyOrQU1qA33liEjPB9GZvWqgEF3T5ICHHzUA6kwyB211JvzWxBoCc34QAvD_BwEandgclsrc=aw.ds (Asana) https://www.xero.com/us/resources/small-business-guides/bookkeeping/ (Xero ) https://www.google.com/ (Google)

Sam welcomes the impressive young entrepreneur Emma Butler to the show this week. At age 23, Emma is the CEO and Founder of Intimately, a company with the mission to empower and amplify disabled voices and help shape an inclusive future. Emma shares how she got the idea for disability inclusive apparel through watching her mother and friends struggle with intimates that provided an extra challenge for those with a disability. She immersed herself in hard work while at Brown University, and wrote a blog post about the subject that then became a Kickstarter and real world product. Emma talks about how she built her team, scaling the Intimately community, and why we need to rethink fashion technology and funding. Emma is proud to be the leader for a sisterhood of beautiful worthy women to come together and talk on platforms about anything including relationships, beauty, sex, and travel. What You Will Discover This Week: After her mother became chronically ill, Emma started blogging about the best products in adaptive undergarments much due to her noticing the lack of options that were both easy for women to wear and left them with a feeling of confidence. This led to a Kickstarter campaign, and ultimately Intimately was born. Emma is a Brown University graduate, and attributes a lot of her knowledge to immersing herself in education surrounding business and entrepreneurialism. Emma explains what adaptive clothing is, and why it’s important for disabled bodied women to feel represented in this apparel sector. Intimately curates pieces that are simple for women who may have issues with dexterity to use, as the usual design of intimate apparel can include a lot of challenging buttons and hooks. Intimately doesn’t sacrifice fashion, and believes everyone has the right to feel beautiful and included. Emma shares how she built her team that includes a fantastic group of hardworking able and disabled bodied women. The Intimately community welcomes feedback from its members, and the women are welcome to submit their ideas to designers and watch them come to life. Intimately not only provides a one stop shop of curated pieces, but also is a safe space to be a place for women to develop a sisterhood and discuss everything from sex, relationships, to travel, and their own professional dreams. Emma shares what is next for Intimately, including manufacturing and creating their own textiles. Emma’s advice for budding entrepreneurs, and the importance of testing, market research and deep competitive analysis. A common symptom of living with a disability is feeling isolated. Intimately provides a community for women to digitally come together and thrive. Mentioned: https://www.intimately.co/ (Intimately ) https://www.instagram.com/intimately.co/?hl=en (@Intimately ) https://selfservice.brown.edu/ss/bwckctlg.p_disp_course_detail?cat_term_in=201410andsubj_code_in=ENGNandcrse_numb_in=1010 (ENGN 1010 )...

Sam takes this solo episode to discuss Apple’s new privacy feature and how it puts more of the control in the consumer’s lane, where they will now have the right to decide whether or not a brand can access their data. Sam discusses what this means for brands, and how the more broadly you can demonstrate the relevance of your product, the better off you are going to be. She gives a few practical tips to get started right away so you can take a customer's first approach and be ahead of the game for this new shift. What You Will Discover This Week: How Facebook has been tapping into our social data for a long time, and most consumers really don’t know what they are agreeing to in the fine print of the Terms and Conditions. Advertising agencies have benefitted from this data and have targeted people based on personal information collected on their social’s, even including their birthdays and interests. Apple’s new privacy feature, and why it is such a monumental deal for consumers, brands, and advertisers. Apple is telling apps that if they want to play within their ecosystem and reach their customers, then you are going to have to play by their rules. What does App Tracking Transparency actually mean and what should iPhone users be aware of? A few key ways that brands can get ready for this shift and make sure they are not just relying on FB and IG for reaching an audience. Be where your target audience is. Pinterest may make sense for some, while an online community may be more beneficial for others. Email marketing is 100% ownable and so critical to get your fans to continue their conversation and build loyalty. Ideas on how to broaden your niche and reach a wider audience by spreading your wings on different platforms. As a consumer, you now have the power to decide whether or not you see hyper relevant ads. Consumers are in control! Mentioned: https://www.apple.com/ (Apple ) https://www.thesocialdilemma.com/ (The Social Dilemma ) https://www.netflix.com/title/70132721 (The Social Network) https://www.netflix.com/title/70132721 (Lashify) https://slack.com/ (Slack) https://circle.so/ (Circle ) https://www.mightynetworks.com/ (Mighty Networks )

In this week’s episode, Sam welcomes Siran and Mel, the Co-Founders of the important new tool, Mirza. This app serves a multitude of purposes, from researching fertility options to understanding financial costs, and navigating parental leave for busy working parents. Mirza is for any type of family structure, income bracket, and can be a great resource for the most organized person to someone who just prefers to wing it. Sam speaks with Siran and Mel about why they decided to create Mirza, the staggering statistics on the parent pay gap in the workplace, and ideas on structurally adapting how we ask professional parents to balance their time and energy rather than our current band-aid fixes. What You Will Discover This Week: We all seem to know that child care and family expenses may one day be on our horizon, but very little of us plan for it financially. There is a parent penalty, even when men and women return back to the workplace. We don’t have an equity in how we share household work at home, and we need everyone who touches this ecosystem to be part of this solution. Siran and Mel each give their backgrounds, and discuss how they became Co-Founders of Mirza, and some takeaways on how to better communicate with your Co-Founder or work partner. Mirza is a tool for new and prospective parents not just to get by, but to become more financially secure and navigate the very confusing world of maternity/paternity leave and parental pay gaps. Although Mirza was launched pre-pandemic, we need it more than ever with over 4.6 million payroll jobs lost by women since the beginning of the pandemic in the United States. Of those, 32% of jobless women aged 25-44 cite the reason they don’t return as lack of child care. Supplying gyms at work so we can stay there our whole day is not an answer! Nor is paying for women to freeze their eggs. What we need is more paid time off, more support, and not to come back to jobs that limit our possibilities of financial growth. Mentioned:...

In the midst of 2020, Sam wanted to make herself better and overcome some limiting beliefs when it came to dating and finding a space for a partner in an already busy life. Enter Dr. Christie Kederian, a professional matchmaker, licensed M.F.T., and dating and relationship therapist. It may sound weird, but it makes sense when you think of looking for love and applying the principles to dating like any successful business endeavor. Christie talks about her experience at eHarmony and Match and what she learned about compatibility and long-lasting love, and what she believes the biggest misconceptions are when it comes to career-oriented women putting themselves on the dating market. She gives advice for women dating in their 30’s and above, how dating is more a long-distance run than a sprint, and what to do if you find there are just no good potential men in your city. What You Will Discover This Week: Why Sam decided to enlist a dating therapist, and how she and Dr. Christie has worked through some of her limiting beliefs about relationships and dating! Women tend to not believe they can have it all when it comes to a successful career and healthy love, but Dr. Christie proves time and time again that it is possible, and maybe even easier and less stressful than we think. Christie herself knows a thing or two about not keeping yourself in a box. This superwoman has three degrees and a Doctorate in Organizational Leadership. Some of the biggest takeaways about compatibility that Christie learned from her time at eHarmony and Match. Love at first swipe is possible — just ask Christie and her husband! Singles have more success when they build in dating more like a daily habit such as exercise. Christie’s advice for dating during a pandemic! Should you give up on love, or is this possibly a great opportunity? Showing up fully as yourself in dating is important, especially in your 30’s, rather than feeling like you need to act a certain way. Mentioned: https://therapyfordating.com/ (Therapy For Dating) https://www.instagram.com/thedatedoctorchristie/ (Christie on Instagram)

Sam discovered Lauren Kane, Founder of VC Worthy Business, on Clubhouse, and was blown away at how she was so able to connect her own experience with female entrepreneurs looking for funding, advice, or even just a point in the right direction. Lauren joins the show to talk about her work as a Pitch Strategist and angel investor, some advice on how to make investors feel connected to you, and her vision on the future of female funding. She also talks about the strides we still have to make in investing so that there is an equal representation and everyone has a seat at the table. What You Will Discover This Week: Lauren is a Pitch Strategist and works with female founders on many aspects of finding the right investor, deciding what type of investor they may need, building their pitch and making sure they are ready to receive the funding. How Lauren went from the corporate world and banking to investment, and why she decided to also branch out and become an angel investor herself. The not so pretty stats of how women aren’t getting their fair share of funding! With the lion’s share (up to 90%) of venture capitalists being male, Lauren is a thought leader on ways we can shift this and move forward to get women more capital. A few of the missteps and mistakes that Lauren sees women make when going after funding. Key criteria that make a company fundable. Lauren’s advice for CEOs that she wishes more people knew! What company is even right for an investor, and how to know when it’s time to fundraise. Some honest truths that women need to have in mind when they are going into a pitching scenario. Mentioned: https://goldenseeds.com/ (Golden Seeds) https://www.crunchbase.com/ (Crunch Base) Lauren Kane: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauren-kane/ (LinkedIn) | http://www.vcworthybusiness.com/ (VC Worthy)

Email marketing is one of the best tactics to reach and grow your audience, yet it is one of the most overlooked practices. But just having an email marketing campaign isn’t good enough — you need to know what works, and what doesn’t. This week, Sam is joined by Sobrina Pies, the head of marketing at Flodesk, the world’s most intuitive email builder. Sobrina talks about what makes a great email campaign, the mistakes she sees marketers make most often, and how to improve your click-through rate in an already existing campaign. She and Sam also talk about using Flodesk along with a few other affordable recommendations to create a beautiful and impactful email that provides value and fosters a reciprocal, memorable conversation. What You Will Discover This Week: Why marketers tend to put email marketing on the backburner and instead focus all the attention on social, and why Sabrina and Sam feel that it results in a lot of missed opportunities. Not only do you have an opportunity to reach 100% of your subscribers and audience with email marketing, but it is the largest organic growth driver. Why Sam is a big fan of Flodesk and their ability to help marketers of all skill levels create stunning emails. Sobrina’s advice on creating emails that entertain, inform, provide value, and leave your audience wanting more. Flodesk offers a flat fee, so the rate doesn’t go up exponentially as you grow your audience. A little bit more about Sobrina’s background in the marketing side of tech for 15 years, and how she combined that with her love of the side hustle to bring the best of both worlds to Flodesk. Some great resources for high-quality photos, copy, imagery, and pointers on how long an email should be for best engagement. Mentioned: https://flodesk.com/ (Flodesk) https://www.socialsquares.com/ (Social Squares) https://www.replicasurfaces.com/ (Replica Services) https://unsplash.com/ (Unsplash ) https://talkingshrimp.com/ (Talking Shrimp)