Can CEO’s take maternity leave? How to build a community & Navigating Money Guilt
This week I sat down with Amanda Smith, CEO of Dallas girl gang and we tackled all the hard issues about being a business owner. Amanda is currently pregnant and is preparing her team for maternity leave – a concept somewhat foreign to business owners. We discussed her process for preparing her team and hiring the proper positions to fill the gap that will be left when she goes on her leave. Amanda also gave us insight into how she built her business up from a fun activity to a full blown business that supports her and how she used the element of community to do that. And finally we talked about money and feeling guilt & shame around charging for your services and how to get over that!
About Amanda Smith
Amanda Smith is a Business Coach and CEO of Dallas Girl Gang, a 50,000+ global community of engaged women connecting in career, business and life. Amanda, also a former elementary music teacher of 7 years, is an expert in authentic marketing, pitching brand partnerships, and cultivating community.
After a huge life shift in 2017 and a move to Dallas, Amanda was seeking a community for women that was inclusive and offered resources for career, life, and business- and came up empty. So, she created one herself and called it “Dallas Girl Gang.”
Now Amanda is bringing “You Can Sit With Us ™” to life across the country through activations with aligned brands such as Athleta, Greetabl, FreePeople, Olive + June, as well collaborations with others in the industry and coaching women who are building new businesses.
She is passionate about bringing women together into meaningful community and lifting one another up through The Girl Gang Podcast, her personal brand content with Amanda Smith Coaching, and events online and in person.
Connect with Amanda & Dallas Girl Gang
LISTEN HERE!
Episode Transcript
Amanda Smith 00:00
I don't love the term biz bestie because it really gives people the wrong idea. Yeah, I don't want to be friend zoned. Like, I will be friendly. And I'm a fun thing. And like we can relate and you know, talk about cheesy Hallmark Christmas movies together. But also, this is what I do for a living.
Christy Bowie 00:30
Hey, CEOs, welcome back to the CEO wingwoman Show. I'm your host, Christy buoy, and we're back with a very exciting episode. And I know I say that every week, but honestly, I really need it every single week. Today, we're talking with Amanda Smith. She is a business coach and the CEO of Dallas girl game, a 50,000 plus global community of engaged women connecting in career, business and life. Amanda is also a former elementary music teacher of seven years, and she has become an expert in authentic marketing, brand, partnership, pitching and cultivating community. In 2017, Amanda moved to Dallas and was seeking a community for women that was inclusive and offered resources and she couldn't find anything. So what she did, she created it herself and called it Dallas girl gang. Amanda, we are so excited to have you here.
Amanda Smith 01:24
Thanks for having me.
Christy Bowie 01:25
So I want to start with the obvious. You are pregnant right now.
Amanda Smith 01:30
Sure. Yeah. Sure.
Christy Bowie 01:32
So how are you feeling about your business and everything that is going on? While you were preparing to hopefully maybe step away and have a maternity leave?
Amanda Smith 01:44
Yeah, it's something that is I never thought would be, like, quite so challenging. But when you are running the company, and you're responsible for people, and, you know, making sure everybody is doing what they're supposed to be doing. And then if you're not there, you know, it's not like things are not gonna get done. But like you're the leader, and so now I'm feeling okay, I'm I'm in as we record this in the end of November, I'm still in the motion pieces of putting this puzzle together and what its gonna look like, and making sure everyone has like, a structured SOP and, you know, goals and action items that they're supposed to be meeting and stuff like that. But honestly, like, I'm excited, because I do plan to take off, you know, at least eight weeks or more. Yeah, that's amazing. And I want to be flexible too. Because I know, like, if I like and I want to jump back in and like kind of check my email or check Instagram or something like, I want to give myself the freedom to do that. But also, if I get to eight weeks or 10 weeks, and I'm like, I don't want to go back yet, like I'm gonna let myself, you know, allow that to happen to so I'm trying to plan for that now.
Christy Bowie 03:04
Yeah, I think that's really smart to kind of set expectations for like, this might be what it is, but also prepare everybody. Yeah. So I know you mentioned kind of putting in SOPs in place for your team. Are there any other things you're kind of doing to prepare your team from, you know, a really tactical point, like forwarding my emails, like all of these little things that we forget about? What are you doing for that?
Amanda Smith 03:27
Yeah. So probably end of October, I started to remind people and say, Hey, let's start practising. You know, here's this scenario, or here's this email we just got from a client, I'm gonna let you take it, I'm gonna let you respond. I'm gonna let you run point on this. And then I'm kind of behind the scenes, like watching as I'm being copied on the email and saying, Hey, that's great. Let's say this next, or let's do this. And kind of like layering in taking off the training wheels, if you will. So like, starting December 1, one of my teammates, she's gonna start taking over all of our invoicing and contracts, because she's gonna have to do that when I'm out. I'm not going to sit on HoneyBook all day, like sending invoices, which is like, always fun to get paid. But you know, I'm not I'm not doing that. So I'm like, let's do it. Now. Let's practice now. And same thing with like our events, you know, I have hired a new events director, Grace, she's amazing. She started in September, and did some events jumped right into the conference, which was great. And now she just ran our November events by herself. And like, couldn't be more proud. So again, taking off the training wheels and letting them kind of still have some assistance while I'm around has been really helpful.
Christy Bowie 04:48
Yeah, it almost sounds like a forced opportunity to do some things that would maybe occur naturally and later Later, you re so do you see yourself kind of going back into these roles when You're back. Where are you like, Hey, this is my excuse to to step away.
Amanda Smith 05:04
This is exactly what you just said, it's a perfect time. Because, you know, over the last five or so years, there have been a lot of things where I've still been very involved, like, very involved in all of our marketing, all of our sales. I've created and planned pretty much every event we've ever done, up until I hired grace. And it's just time for me to step out of that stuff. And it just worked out that like, I got pregnant and had to settle and now I'm having to step away. And even when he gets here, like I'm not going to, there's no reason for me to jump back into, like someone else can send our invoices that we don't even someone else can coordinate with our vendors and sponsors and locations for events. Like that's not something I am required to do. Right. I still want to be involved in the big, big picture and development and obviously, like negotiations and sales on the bigger side of things. But yeah, there are so many things that like my team is capable of doing or other hires that we could bring on, are capable of doing that I could teach and bring them into our team and trust someone else to do it.
Christy Bowie 06:18
Yeah, I think that's really insightful to kind of see, you know, this was the fourth shift that you needed, going into, you know, this shift in your business, was this something you were thinking about already? Or was it just something I know a lot of us are anxious to give up control in any capacity. So what was kind of holding you back from being like, I don't need to invoice my clients, things like that,
Amanda Smith 06:41
um, you know, this was something I was already thinking about. And so probably at the beginning of this year, I've started to layer these things away. One of them being like, managing our brand partnerships. I love our brand clients. But my favourite part is like the initial conversation, negotiating, getting them on board, and then like doing the project with them, but all the behind the scenes in the admin work in the you know, all those things. Like, I don't have to do that someone else is probably great at that and can do that. So that's what Rachel on our team is for. And, and I knew, again, even before I got pregnant, I was gonna need help with events, because I don't, I mean, this sounds terrible. And it's not like I I'm really good at setting boundaries. I don't want to be at every single event that we do. Yeah, like, we live 30 miles from the city, or from Dallas. And then, you know, Lord forbid, we like have an event in play. No, like, we just did whatever. But especially like, now we're we're getting back to doing two, three events a month, maybe like, four, who knows. And so that's a lot to do. And I
Christy Bowie 07:59
think it's even more powerful for you to be able to say, Hey, I am not the brand, the brand exists independently without me. Right. And to be able to form that.
Amanda Smith 08:08
Yeah. And it's about the community. And of course, like, people associate me with him will continue because especially in like the business support side of things like that in the mentorship and things like that. That's me behind the scenes. But, you know, I want it to be more about our team and the community and our partners.
Christy Bowie 08:30
Yeah. So speaking of you know, the team you've built and how you're preparing them to take over, can you kind of share a little bit like what your team looks like now, what roles you're working on outsourcing, I think a lot of our listeners are probably in a very similar stage, like, I need to start outsourcing. I don't know where so if you could give us some insight to what you started doing and any tips you have.
Amanda Smith 08:52
It's super scary. Because I mean, we said this a second ago, like I am, I'm not a type A person. And I'm not a control freak. But as an entrepreneur, and as a business owner, especially when you've been doing it by yourself for so long. Or maybe you've had a virtual assistant with you or something. It is hard to just tell someone, give them an SOP, assign them tasks and click up and then like, let go and then wait until the due date that you assign that task and and be like, did you do it like and you don't want to be that like overbearing mother of like, you know, I'm gonna check on this or whatever, but it you can only do so much and you have to let people like trial and error and learn and really how I see it and my husband I were just talking about this the other day because every season and really semester I bring on new interns and that's part of what I love to get to do is mentor the people that I bring onto our team especially our interns because we They're so young, and they're trying to figure out what they want to do. Like I just I talked to one of our girls, because their internships can end after Christmas. And I just kind of wanted to talk now before we hit enter the holidays, and I was like, how's it been? How's your experience been? And I said, What have you learned? And you know, have you learned, like, oh, actually, like doing this, or whatever. And she's, she just learned all these new things of what she thought she wanted to pursue. And now she's in her senior year, like, she's like, I don't know that I want to do that. And I'm like, now's the time to decide. But in our team, we have people, we have someone managing our brand partnerships, leading our events. These are individual people. And the thing is, if you're listening, like this has changed for me so many times, and it always will serve a purpose. And I actually put this in my stories the other day, I've made plenty of mistakes. And bad I think
Christy Bowie 10:56
so many people have.
Amanda Smith 10:57
So it's a lesson learned. It might be money lost.
Christy Bowie 11:04
Again, it's part of the game, the game,
Amanda Smith 11:06
but there's so many ways like to really avoid that. And that hasn't happened to me, but maybe twice. You get better at learning how to be a little bit more intuitive, and ask the right questions. I think one of the best things that I do now is giving people like a practice task of, especially if it's like a social media position or something, let's say, I want to see, okay, what do you know about our brand? Can you look at our branding kit, and our content and our pillars? What could you create for us? Like, give me give me an example? Yeah, so
Christy Bowie 11:43
like, see an example of what an actual product would be before you hire them? And say, Oh, wait, you're not the right. Yeah.
Amanda Smith 11:50
Or, you know, I'm probably going to be bringing on a girl who used to work with us. And she helped me pitch for brand partnerships. And when I heard her the first time, I was like, Okay, here's a scenario, we have this kind of partner, we're looking to do this, write me the kind of pitch you would send them first thing. And then I was able to see how does she write? How does she communicate? How professional is she? And give me a sense of, does this quality match what you put on your resume, or match what you said in the email that you pitched to me say you want to work for me. But yeah, basically, people managing our community, and now our new membership, you know, our brand, partnerships, events. And then social media. So there's a couple of different, like, smaller roles in there. And again, it's changing right now because of maternity. And the one thing that I'm putting in place right now and interviewing for all through all the applications that I've got, is someone to kind of manage operations while I'm out and kind of play me. And then the goal would be like, potentially keep that person after I come back, or see how things are going and then just kind of shift the puzzle pieces again, to make sure because I always want to know, and be confident in is everyone in a role that they care about, be are passionate about and good at and see, is it fitting what I need? I think we get stuck a lot when you hire a virtual assistant, or you hire a service provider, because they are really specific about what they offer. But you as the boss, like you're the one in charge. So you get to ask the questions, and you get to determine what you're hiring for. And so that's kind of a bit of a dance.
Christy Bowie 13:47
Yeah, I think that's really good to hear. And also to always keep in mind, you know, we might have the exact right people, but they just might not be in the right spots, or in the right place for our business at the time. So, you know, you having the ability to step back and say, Okay, I'm not running every single one of these pots, I am stepping back and say, Okay, what is going right in each one, and really like having that CEO mindset of like, I will jump into a place that needs me at a given time. But overall, my goal is to step back and kind of watch it run. Yeah,
Amanda Smith 14:19
yeah. And I think they're going to do a great job, because several of them have been with me for a long time, first of all, and then I'm just like, everyone that I hired to, has to be on board with what we do, and like, why we do it. And I think, like, no one's gonna care about your business as much as you do. But they care a lot. And they care about our brand and what we're doing for people. So yeah, they're gonna do great.
Christy Bowie 14:47
Yeah, that's awesome. So I want to dive a little bit into something you are quite the expert in and I think a lot of us probably have a lot of questions on and that is, of course, building a community. So I really want to hear In your words, you know, how would you define a community? And what does that mean to you?
Amanda Smith 15:06
Oh, man, I mean, I think everyone has like, their different definitions of community in different spaces. I think a community is a place where you can land day after day and be yourself, period, whether you're, you know, in a corporate job at Deloitte over here, or you're running your own business, or you're a stay at home mom, or work from home mom, or you're working part time at Target for the holiday season, like I don't care who you are, I think everyone deserves a place to, to land and like have a spot to come back to,
Christy Bowie 15:43
I think that's really insightful into just the way you've built your entire business. You know, making people feel like they belong somewhere is really something that people crave, not just right now, but throughout their entire journey of not just business, a human being a human, you crave, you know, attention and people understanding exactly what you're going to. And that's kind of how we operate day in, day out. So you've obviously built a huge community over 50,000 engaged people coming to your events in your groups. Do you have any secrets to how you did this? Or what would you do have just shared all
Amanda Smith 16:22
the most secrets? I don't think I think the the one thing I will say, and this is where people ask this question a lot, right? And they're like, how do I build community and like, you know, I mean, people hire me as their coach to work on this, right? You need to be able to look at someone's story that you see on Instagram or Tiktok. And realise, I don't know, every single circumstance that allowed them to be successful in that. So I want to preface it with First of all, this was 2017. Facebook was still super popping. And there was something in the water, per se, of it catching on, and getting a lot of traction. And I think that was I have a good idea.
Christy Bowie 17:07
Like, your whole story is like you saw a need. And you went right did it. So like, yes, it was kind of right time. But also you you noticed that way the environment was shifting. And it wasn't
Amanda Smith 17:19
again, I was a full time teacher at this point. I did not wake up in 2017 in April and decide I'm going to start a business today. No, I wasn't a direct sales business. I was teaching. I just wanted to network. So I was finding events on Instagram and Eventbrite. And I was connecting with people. And it really was a passion project. At first, it was not about money, it was not about even, I had not even considered quitting teaching at that point. It was not about like, getting a lot of followers on social media, or going viral or any of that it was about I was lonely. I needed friends. And I thought to myself, I cannot be the only person I know I'm not. And once I saw once I put it out there because I was, you know, it was a little scary to say hi, I'm an adult, like I need friends like a low weight.
Christy Bowie 18:16
Unfortunately, a lot of people relate to a lot of people.
Amanda Smith 18:19
And that is the thing because and I think we're hearing this more in these last few years as an adult making friends. Especially I think as a woman, because we were all intimidated by each other for some reason.
Christy Bowie 18:33
You're supposed to like have it all together, you know and saying like, hey, actually don't have friends. It's scary to be like I actually don't have it all together. I actually don't have like this basic level of like friendship. Yeah, it's scary. Well, and especially like five,
Amanda Smith 18:49
six years ago, like the public vulnerability of that was not like, you know, now on Tik Tok. You see people like crying on Tik Tok and being vulnerable. And I'm like, okay, but which is fine, do whatever you want. But it wasn't like a thing. And so I think it started with something that I was passionate about, and that I honestly wanted for myself. And then it became a thing where people were feeling so connected, and like they belonged, and they found a place to be themselves that I was like, Oh, I have to take care of these people now. Like, I kind of have to like Shepherd this community now, like, what does this look like? And then it developed into a business. So that's not the answer. People want to hear. Sometimes they want to, you know, know the formula of like A plus B equals C, but like it again, I think the biggest thing that can help you make something really successful is forget about the money and the notoriety and the whatever that might come with something you and like, when you strip everything away? Are you really? Are you serving? Like, is are you doing? What you and your soul are meant to do? And are you being yourself? You know, because I think it's really clear and really apparent when people try to force something that might not work. And you can't really tell sometimes when people just want to do something for a certain reason.
Christy Bowie 20:33
Yeah, that really makes sense. And I think you had a really good grasp of what your community needed. Because like you said, like you needed it to Yeah, so really getting into the core of like, what do these people need right now, and you probably had a little bit more insight, because like you said, you built it for you. But really thinking about, you know, okay, this person is telling me like, they want to make more money, but maybe the reason they want to make more money is because they want to feel respected in society. And yeah, so can we just jump to the like, hey, we respect you. And, you know, like, there's so many things that people kind of think they want, and they say they want, but really, that's not the core of the problem. And so, you truly knowing and feeling the exact same way as your community helped you, I think, really build that. Yeah. So when we're thinking about a community, as a business owner wanting to build our own community, what would you say in terms of, you know, is just having a bigger community, a bigger audience? Is that always better? Should we hone it into a very specific group of people? How do we begin this community building journey?
Amanda Smith 21:38
I think you have to not always think about it as I've got people watching me, I think that becomes a factor. But like in the beginning. That sounds so cheesy, but just you being yourself, like, if you want to put something silly on your stories, do it. If you want to write an embarrassing story to your email list, do it, you know, if there's something you want to try in your business, do it, you know, you can change your mind about stuff, you don't always have to follow what other people are telling you or like other gurus on social media. But you know, at some point, you do have this like, kind of duty, I guess, the biggest thing for us is, we don't make a move, without asking our community. Like, what do you need? How can we serve you? I think asking questions to the people watching you, following you and I and I mean, even like outside of the internet, like real face to face or Zoom face to zoom conversations that you can get feedback on. And know, a big community is not always better. I mean, they're obviously years ago, we didn't have 30,000, whatever, you know, followers or whatever, it has become increasingly not wildly difficult, but adds more to the mix for sure. When there's more people, because the thing is, the more people that come into your online community, let's get specific, the more you're going to have to research and see, okay, who are these new people? Are they all like the same people that are already here? Because what we realised in 2019, and this was after doing a an annual survey, like a formal Google Form, asking people like, your age, you know, what do you do for a living, all those kinds of things, we learned, there's a stark split down the middle of what I call Gen pop, general population, and business owners. So our community is very heavy. And I'm anxious to see how the 2022 survey comes out. Because I would venture to say it's become a little bit more heavy on the business owner percentage. But then we learned, okay, so not every event needs to be about business or not every event needs to be like, you know, a crafty, like let's make a flower arrangement because that's gonna appeal to everybody. And so, we that was really, really important. So the more you do grow, the more you need to check back and see who are all these people. It's kind of like if you do a giveaway on Instagram or something like that, as long as the giveaway is aligned to what your brand is about, you're good, but if it's not, then you're gonna get a bunch of followers that have don't give two craps about your brand or business. Yeah,
Christy Bowie 24:49
and I think that's really important to think about because, you know, you can attract ideally in your head who you want to attract. And you can position yourself and your events and everything based on that, but then you have to go back and be like, Who are you actually? Did I actually attract the right people? Or do I have to fine tune who I'm serving, because Sure, I have an idea of who I want to work with in my head. But at some point, they tell you what they want and what they
Amanda Smith 25:15
need. And it shouldn't be that way. Like, the market should, I mean, obviously, don't go and completely change your business. And you're like, I don't know who I am anymore. But like you, the market should dictate what you do and how you serve people. Because if you are trying to sell yellow pencils, and everyone hates yellow, like you're just stuck at work.
Christy Bowie 25:37
So talking about how you built up this community, this is actually what allowed you to quit your full time job and focus a little bit more on this community. So can you give us a little insight into how that process worked, and how you were even able to monetize this community to allow you to do that when you finally decided, hey, this is now my business,
Amanda Smith 26:00
it's time to go. Yeah. Um, I, when we started out, it was events, that was the biggest thing that we were doing, I still think it's like the thing that people come to us for to find community, especially like locally in the city, or in the surrounding areas. I had a mentor who came alongside me early 2019. And she saw who we were growing. And she saw the demand that I was seeing, too. And she was like, how else are you going to monetize this? And I was like, That's a good question. Why don't you tell me and, and so that was the year we did 40 in person events. And I don't recommend doing that. But like, it sure did help me get profitable. And I say profitable. And I, here's what I mean, I'll just be like, really transparent. That was the first year that I made gross revenue that exceeded my teaching salary. And I and that's when I had another big moment of, oh, this is not just like a side hustle anymore. I wasn't paying myself, it was just the money was sitting there I was paying taxes. Obviously, in the first few years, your business, you have a lot of expenses, depending on your business model. Events are very costly. If you want to go make a bunch of money, don't just go into events, I will tell you that right now. It looks amazing, glamorous, and it can grow over time for sure. But events take a lot of money to do stuff. So over the years, as we grow, people want to take advantage of our platform. Because what better way to get in front of your ideal client than to partner and advertise with all like 1000s of your ideal clients, or customers. So even to this day, our brand partnerships and people advertising with us on our platforms, at our events, sponsoring things is the number one way we make money. And that was very scalable. And I think the future of that in the scalability is obviously continuing to reach more local and national businesses because we don't just work with local businesses. But also as we grow the game of platform advertising. If you want to call it that, I don't know that's an official term. But is if you have more followers, brands will pay more. And so you know, there will be a stark contrast and difference if we hit 100,000 followers on Instagram and 20,000 followers on Tiktok. And our email list grows to 100,000 people, we will be making a lot more money. And so now it's just part of that is how do we get there. And I don't always want to focus on the numbers of we need more followers and blah, blah. But that part of the business model, that actually does make sense. So brand partnerships, events, sponsorships, we just launched starting a membership, the founders collective and then now since end of 2019. I've taken on private one on one coaching clients, and I've run some group programmes, and especially going into attorney that's going to be much more limited and higher ticket in a more high impact container, if you will. It's not just going to be like right now here at the end of the year, I'm doing some 90 minute intensive sessions. That's probably not going to be something I'm going to be doing in the future.
Christy Bowie 29:37
It but you got to change your business based on what works for you. Yeah, so as you shifted this business from a passion project to a business, obviously you mentioned, you know, you started to become profitable and you had to think about that. I think there are a lot of people who almost like feel guilt about being like this was supposed to be something fun and good but like now I actually have I have to pay myself because I'm doing things and this is how I run. And so, you know, was that something you faced feeling guilty about charging for these things? And how do you approach it now,
Amanda Smith 30:11
in the beginning, I would say probably like 2018 2019, especially when we started, because for the longest time, as embarrassing as it is, we didn't charge for our hips. And then when I was like, I putting a lot of time into this, now, it's actually costing me money. I'm not going into my pocket for this. And I wanted to produce them, I didn't want to just have like, these informal meetups that felt what is the word without sounding a certain way? That felt
Christy Bowie 30:42
just, like not alive?
Amanda Smith 30:45
Yeah, not aligned. But I wanted real curated events that people would come and have an experience. And no, of this is their brand, like, you know. And so, yes, I sort of feel guilt to feel guilty, because I, of course, people have something to say sometimes. And they were like, Why is this $15? Or, you know, is do you have any discounts? Or, and I'm like, why are they complaining? Cost $15. Like, and so that was a shift for people to get used to. But our community was not huge. And I had a moment of, I'm just, I'm making this a business now. The mission hasn't changed, the purpose hasn't changed. And who we are hasn't changed, but we have expenses now. So and I was just trying to break even on what it costs to, you know, give flowers and tote bags and gift things or whatever. I did have a little bit of guilt around that. And then even so, there are I mean, even to this day, like yesterday, we were just talking to some people who wanted to maybe advertise in our Holiday Gift Guide, which we do every year, corporate sponsors can join small businesses can join whatever. And, you know, we do support small business, we are a small business, I think it's what people forget about. And people still have a misconception of that we will do it because we're nice. And nice is not a business and nice is not a business and nice doesn't pay my bills. And you know, and so I'm like, Well, this is how much it costs to advertise with us. Normally, actually, this is a lower price, or whatever the situation was. And, and you learn and things like that, but it's just business. Like, it's, you have to really value yourself. And what I've learned over the years is the people who value you and want to join you on the journey will join you. And the people who won't walk and anybody who's listening, that's an entrepreneur probably gets this concept. When it's when it costs them nothing, or a very little amount. That's when you might get the most complaints. Oh my gosh, yes. The Most Out of someone,
Christy Bowie 33:16
because they're not as invested. Like they don't have anything on the line. So why are they going to work for Yeah,
Amanda Smith 33:21
and then typically, when it's, you know, people on the higher price point higher ticket, whatever, they're just like, send me the invoice. Or they know, they're so aligned. And they've, they trust and value what you do, there's no convincing. And that's, that's what I had to get over for a while was i There's it is not my job to convince anybody that, like, coaching with me for 1000s of dollars is worth it. Or that like our conference ticket of 200 $300 is worth it. You're you're with it and you see the value or you don't and that's okay, like I am, I will still be your friend. That is fine. I also think people mix. I don't love the term biz bestie a little bit, because it really gives people the wrong idea. Yeah, I don't want to be friend zoned. Like, I will be friendly. And I'm a fun thing. And like we can relate and you know, talk about cheesy Hallmark Christmas movies together. But also, this is what I do for a living like
Christy Bowie 34:32
there's no casual like get coffee and pick your brain. Of course I've been there as well. Yeah, you totally understand. So yeah, and I even think I would say especially as women with perceived successful businesses, people just like the concept of us wanting money is like foreign to people. And it like should be shied away from it's like oh yeah, like I I don't take home a tonne of money, why? Like, why I will shout from the rooftops, I like nice things, and I want money and there's literally nothing wrong with that I'm not like doing it unethically. I'm not charging more than the value I've providing. But like, there is nothing wrong with just wanting money and wanting things in life,
Amanda Smith 35:20
there's really not especially, and my my perspective have has even become stronger. Because I'm we're about to have our first kid. You, there's nothing you can make me feel bad about that. Because I know after doing this for almost six years, and the people that believe in us, the people that support us, our community, what we're doing for people, the proof is now in the pudding. And, you know, I'm we're not going to change our price on XYZ or it's just there is it is possible to have this happy balance of being yourself and having fun and being friendly, and totally getting paid for what you deserve. For your experience expertise and your years of like work and your degree or whatever it might be for you like you deserve that. And other people, it's not our job to convince those people. And if we have to do that, they're probably not people.
Christy Bowie 36:22
Exactly. And I found like a little bit more of a tangible thing that I think helps on, you know, people asking for discounts or not wanting to pay, it's just like, put procedures in place like, this is my standard. This is the template email, I send you this, like, there is no opportunity for me to sit there and compose an email and be like, Oh, am I going to offer a discount or not? Like, this is the standard way we do things, whoever it is, whether they're a friend of mine, or whether they're I'd never met them before, like, just putting procedures in place and being like, these are the procedures that follow. And also like, if people can tell it's kind of a standard templatized thing like, yeah, they're like, Oh, this is like standard is wasn't somebody who I can negotiate with? Yes,
Amanda Smith 37:06
that is one thing. I will say anytime I've been in a moment of scarcity mindset, or, you know, before I really learned how to deal with those kind of conversations. The reason why sometimes it went that way, and people thought they could negotiate was because I made it seem that way. And that's not me, or whoever you're if you're listening, if you're getting that a lot. If you're opening yourself up to it, it's probably on you and how you're saying it, right. Like if you're like I would love to help you, let's grab coffee, that is not specific enough. You pay me to say, Hey, I specialise in this. I've helped clients with this. We could set up a whatever service. Is that interesting to you? That is, there's no doubt about that. That's not it'll be free. You know? So,
Christy Bowie 37:59
yeah, that's really good advice to just be like, here are my packages. You know, what, what do you like? Because you're right. Sometimes it may be people are like, Oh, they just want to chat with me. And like, I try not to have the mindset that other people are trying to take advantage of me often. Because most of the time, that's not the case. Sure. You are just doing it to yourself. So you have to be a lot more confident that you're worth a really Yes. So I would love to hear what's next for you. There's so much you've done. What you said you're always moving on to the next one. What's next? No,
Amanda Smith 38:32
well, let's have this baby. Oh, yeah. Let's have how Christmas and Thanksgiving and Atmos baby. Um, and I'm really excited to watch my team, as I'm on maternity, and kind of let things shift in my position as CEO and our with our team into q1 q2 of next year. And then, I mean, we have some really great conversations going privately with some brand partners, that could be really amazing. And then next year, so and then we would love to like, you know, my dream, for example, for the with the conferences, I'd love to like, do it in Dallas, and then do it in Austin. Or, you know, apparently we have a lot of people in Georgia in Atlanta. A lot of people follow us and you joined our community from Atlanta. You know, I think so kind of popping up around the country. What does that look like? And then, you know, stuff like this, like, making time for stuff like this because we had a podcast for four years and I love being a host. I loved talking. I loved interviewing people, but it it became a thing that I was not passionate about for our business model. So but I would rather you know, go and continue to build You know, not even just my name, but share our story. And these different platforms and have different open conversations, whether it's about business or life or being a mom now and all that stuff, but and I think to, then the last thing would be leaning into serving moms in our community, whether you're a first time mom, or you got four kids, whatever looks like I think we probably have some of that coming up.
Christy Bowie 40:32
Yeah, I think that's so important that you're shifting your community with you. You said you built it on what you needed. So let it shift on what you need.
Amanda Smith 40:41
It's like, I started this, you know, if people joined us, back when I started, and you were anywhere near my age, we're growing up together. So a lot of people are kind of like me, and they might be married now, or they might have kids now. And, you know, it sounds a little selfish, because I'm a mom now. But let's like, well, we should probably do that there are a lot because we've heard it more. In the last year. Again, going back to asking your community and listening to them. I think we get that a lot from our Facebook group, because there's so many people talking in there all the time, we can really pull and see. Okay, what are some of the common topics and over the last year, we've we've heard, moms are lonely. And they just need a place to like be adults again, you know, like bring their kids or not, I don't care, but they just need something. So
Christy Bowie 41:30
that's fantastic. So I'm so excited to hear kind of what you have coming next and see that come to fruition. So thank you so much, Amanda for spending time with us today. I loved having you here. And to our CEO listeners, don't forget to check the show notes for links to connect with Amanda and also to join the CEO wingwoman community. See what I did there. So thank you guys for listening, and I will see you next week.