June 6, 2024 • 49 mins
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Owning a business is a challenge. Knowing how to keep innovating in your business is an even bigger one. Join restaurant owner, motivational speaker, and innovation expert Sara Frasca each week as she guides fellow business owners in taking the next step to level up their business. If you've ever pondered hiring a business coach but want a sample first, come along for the adventure!
Send us a message to join the show for free business guidance: https://pointnortheast.com/contact-us/
Sara Frasca is the founder and owner of Trasca & Co Eatery in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, an experienced and engaging motivational speaker, and the CEO of global business coaching firm Point NorthEast.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Unknown (00:00):
You're listening to level up your business, the
podcast where we talk tohardworking business owners and
leaders and help them solve realissues in real time. I'm your
host, Sarah Frasca restaurantowner, keynote speaker and
business coach. I've spent mycareer not only in corporate
(00:20):
America, but also as anentrepreneur, carrying on my
family's legacy through myrestaurant. Now a business coach
and consultant. I'm helpingother businesses to use creative
problem solving and innovativethinking to drive lasting
change. Stay tuned to hear someinspiring guidance that will
(00:40):
help you to level up yourbusiness.
All right, well, happy Thursday,everyone, and welcome to another
podcast, which is called levelup your business. And the
intention is to help folksthroughout the world but
everyday business, folks, howcan they continue to improve and
(01:00):
today we're welcoming LaurenPatterson from that random
agency. Hi, Lauren. Hello. Greatto see you. You too. You too,
Lauren. And I go way back. Sowe'll talk about that just a
minute. But it's always fun tosee you and you have such a
beautiful radiant smile that um,well, you do. Know, Lauren's in
the Detroit area, what's theexact suburb? I live in Troy?
(01:24):
Troy. Okay. All right. So I'mLauren. And I go back to a
consulting firm that we wereboth involved with many, many
years ago, and both have movedon to open our own business,
those but we always had thattime together, which was really
precious. And goodness, I metyou. I know, I couldn't imagine
another light box.
(01:48):
Well, we've had a lot of fun.
And I just spoke with actuallyanother of our colleagues this
morning. So it's fun to stayconnected with kind of folks. So
well, tell us learn a little bitabout yourself and a little bit
about why did you build thatrating? Agency? Okay, well,
thank you for having me on, Iwould say a little about myself,
(02:08):
I have about, let's see, 12years now of experience in the
social media, digital marketingspace, I've worked at different,
you know, big ad agencies,consulting firms in the Detroit
area. And then in 2020, whenSarah and I both left the
previous consulting firm, I wentahead and started that random
agency and honestly started asjust doing a little bit of
(02:32):
freelance to figure out what mynext step might be. And then,
you know, I've always had anentrepreneurial mindset. When I
was in college, I started myfirst business, I painted shoes.
So if anyone needs some shoespainted up, you know, I forgot
about that hot. Yeah, hobby.
That is so cool. Yes. So I handpainted, Star Wars and all kinds
(02:55):
of, frankly, trademarks, at thetime, but you know, it's fine.
So, being in shoes on Etsy, andthat paid all my bills in
college, and it was super fun, Iliked working for myself, and
kind of setting my schedule andfiguring out, you know, what's
important to you, you know, in aworking environment, so that was
a little dipping my toe in, incollege. And then once I started
(03:16):
freelancing, and 2020, it sortof took off a lot of people, you
know, when they found out,they're like, Hey, can can you
help with this, and thatquickly, sort of grew into
random and starting a team andbuilding a business. So I think
it's really exciting. I think alot of times, people assume you
need to have a huge businessplan and have everything planned
out ahead of time, if you wantto start a company. And it's not
(03:38):
always that way. Sometimes yourstory looks a little different.
But now we're, you know, supersuccessful. Four years later, we
have 12 people on our team,fully remote agency. So it's
super fun, where we have a lotof fun with clients and each
other. So yeah, I'm thankful. Imean, you've done a brilliant
job. And I think it has such afun character, the culture of
(03:58):
the agency has come together ina way that I feel like it's a
really kind of a good mix ofthe acumen, the personal, you
know, kind of components thatare important to you, and John
and all the folks but it'salways fun for me to watch your
social media feed and look atyour website, link, because I
(04:18):
think it's a it's a brilliantrepresentation of you, in my
view. Yeah. I mean, that wassomething that John, my co
founder and husband and I talkedabout a lot from the beginning
of if we're going to do it, youknow, take that risk to create a
business, we want to make sureone, we're having fun, and we're
creating a culture that maybe wewouldn't always find in, you
(04:41):
know, at jobs we've had in thepast. Or, you know, we'd like to
elements of different jobs. Sobringing those things we liked
together.
And recently, we went through anexercise actually last year
creating some core values forourself as you know, as our team
as we continue to grow to makesure that we always
come back to that, because Ithink that's something that can
(05:03):
be difficult as you, you know,more people and trying to keep
everything together. So that'sbeen super helpful for us. Yeah.
Okay, I have a question for youon that. I think I've both been
a part of organizations that doand do not keep those core
values front and center. And soI'm just curious, how do you
(05:24):
continue to go back to those andensure that they are ever
present? That's a greatquestion. I think, for us what's
helpful, we have a weekly teammeeting where everyone gets
together. And similar to youknow, I've been in your team
meetings for Tresca. Before weshare, you know, a little bit
about happy things in ourpersonal life, as well as
(05:44):
professional kind of startthere. But I think a big part of
it is we do talk about the corevalues regularly, I think,
a past version of myself mighthave thought that's a little
corny, or like, oh, you know,nobody cares about that. But I
do think, in a genuine way, it'shelpful just to bring that up in
conversation, not in a forcedway. But one, for example, we
(06:06):
talk about a lot is empathy. Andthat's one of the core values,
we have a strong emphasis onspecifically for, you know,
empathy for our clients, for ourclients, customers, what
problems do they have that we'rehoping to help them solve
through various, you know,digital marketing channels, but
I think it comes down to evenwhen we're looking at an
(06:26):
analytics report, for example, aspecific example came in
recently, where how can weexplain not everyone, the
audience of the report, noteveryone understands what all of
these metrics mean? becausetheir job is to do something
different, right? They don'tneed to be digital marketing
experts. That's, that's ourrole. So how can we frame up the
report in a way that'sempathetic to you know, they
(06:48):
might not know the definitionsof everything? Or how to read a
chart? Or what should thetakeaway be? So how can we add
those insights, you know, in away that's helpful for them? And
that's just a way ofdemonstrating our our core
values in a very practicalsense, too. That's great. That's
really great. Yeah, and, okay,so you are an active owner, and
(07:09):
you know, your business isgrowing. So what are the roles
that you play within that randomagency? That's a fun one. I feel
like you can probably relate ina certain way. Somedays, I feel
like, you know, you wear manyhats, as a co founder,
I would say, a lot of a big partof my role is to help, you know,
(07:29):
guide the team and the companyforward. So I'm focusing on
today, right? How do we makesure our current clients are
happy, you know, getting whatthey need, as well, as I work on
a lot of new business now of,you know, Discovery calls with
potential clients, or, you know,the new business part is a big
part of my role, it's recentlyshifted a little bit, I know,
(07:50):
you and I have talked about thatof, you have to work on the
business as well as in thebusiness and that can be
difficult at times. So I'veshifted to work a bit more on
the business as well, and reallytrusted the team to, you know,
bring me in when they need extrasupport, or, you know, a second
set of eyes on something, but,you know, thankfully, we have a
really good good group of peoplewho can take care of clients,
(08:12):
but more of my job now isshifting into, okay, you know,
we've we've started to createsome goals for three 510 years,
how do we break that up andstart, you know, working towards
that you have to start somewhereelse? Three years is gonna come
before?
I know, and you're a workingmom, too. Do you want to tell
our listeners a little bit aboutthat? Sure. Um, so my son Henry
(08:36):
is seven months old, he was bornon Halloween of last year. So
that's been a really excitingand challenging in many ways. I
would say one of the things thatI wasn't expecting about being a
mom is that it does help you.
People talk a lot about likework life balance, and all of
that. And once you have a child,from my experience, at least,
(08:57):
that becomes much easier, at theend of the day to say just
accept, you know, I've gottendone these things. Some of these
didn't, didn't get done, becauseI had other things pop up in the
day, you never expect, right?
Your your day never goes exactlyaccording to plan. But just
being okay with that, you know,I, I tried my best today, I put
(09:18):
my best foot forward, and it'sokay, I'm gonna set it down for
now and pick that up tomorrow. Ithink before I had a baby, that
was a little harder for me, tobe honest. Because I would be
like, well, I could, I couldwork all night or, you know, I
didn't always have that balancethat I think makes you better at
your job, frankly, to like, walkaway at times. Yeah, that's a
(09:38):
really good point. And, gosh, Imean, I think you have such a
good perspective on theimportance of also the mom role,
right? Yeah. And if we're notattentive to that side, I mean,
it's always good to kind of, youknow, make sure we're delicately
walking that fine balance. Sothat's, yeah, warn you some days
(09:58):
that works better than others.
Right, but But you try, like,No day is perfect and no, you
know, but hopefully over thelong run, we get it as close to
perfect as we can. Yeah, yeah.
And I think to the other part ofit now is you get another
perspective, at least for me asa working mom of, you know, what
(10:20):
might my child think? Or see asthey get older, like, am I
demonstrating? This is what apositive work experience looks
like? Or this is what goodbalance looks like, you know, as
an individual, obviously, easiersaid than done some days. But
that's just something that'sbeen more on my mind that I
didn't necessarily think about.
Yeah, no, that's really great.
(10:40):
That speaks actually back to theempathy core value, which is
kind of interesting. No wonderit's a core value of your
business, because you'redemonstrating it every day. So
yeah, well, I should alsoprobably tell our listeners, I
mean, I really, I always try tobe as transparent as possible.
And you are the agency of recordfor Treska, four point ne for
(11:03):
the Sara frescas speakingbusiness. And so you know, I
obviously not only adore you,personally, but I trust you, and
I trust your teamprofessionally, to carry on my
legacy with my restaurantbusiness, and also kind of
bringing and building mybusinesses forward. So I figured
I would just say that out loud.
So focus. Yeah.
(11:27):
Um, okay, Lauren, let me think.
I wanted to ask you a little bitabout the future. You know, I
think, as you dream big and looktowards, you know, where does
random go in the future? I mean,what, what are your aspirations?
That's a great question. I wasactually thinking about that
this morning. And I think thereare lots of possibilities. One
(11:47):
thing I've certainly thoughtabout is how do we sort of take
what we're doing now? Because Ithink at least, you know, we
have a good culture? And how dowe share that with other people
I know, even just from otherwomen have asked me already,
like, Oh, you have a businessand how, you know, that's
inspiring to them, which makesme feel funny. But it's
(12:09):
wonderful. But I think I think,you know, one of the things that
we've we've talked aboutinternally is how do I continue
to increase my own thoughtleadership, not just like, for
my own credibility, per se, butalso, you know, sharing what
I've learned and what we'velearned collectively with
others. We've talked about abook, perhaps at some point, I
(12:30):
know, you are also working onyour own book. But that's
something and I also wasthinking a bit more recently
about, you know, our model,typically, you know, most
agencies, you work with clientson a retainer for projects or
retainer basis. And I think, Ilove that. And I love working
with clients for projects orlonger term, whatever makes
(12:51):
sense. But I think there's alsoopportunity to help people, you
know, or share our knowledge andother ways. So one thing that
I've just been thinking throughis, how could we also expand
that's maybe not the traditionalway, you know, an ad agency
would work, but who's to saythere are no rules? Right, you
could then do it however youwant. So how could we provide
services for you know,nonprofits, for example, who may
(13:16):
not have be able to pay a firm?
How could we provide some kindof product for that? That group?
That person? That's veryspecific example? Yes. So I
don't know if that would be, youknow, an online course or
something like that, but waysthat we could help more people.
That's just something I've beenthinking about. I don't know
(13:37):
what exactly that looks like. Soyeah, any ideas?
You know how much I love tobrainstorm ideas.
My first thought when you saidthat, actually, that came to my
mind is that I actually have oneof my my best friends from
elementary school, high school,etc. And she had a cousin who
(13:57):
had a failing kidney. And sothey were not a direct match. I
have a point, believe me, butit's all to say, I didn't know
this, but the organ donor kindof kidney donation, and do
triangles. So he was able todonate to another family who was
able to donate to her family.
And so it was a triangle ofsupport. And so I was just
(14:21):
thinking to myself, gosh, you'vegot a nonprofit, and there are
probably corporations that wantto help that nonprofit. So what
if the corporation paid randomto help the nonprofit? That's
cool, but the thought of like,yeah, wonder if there's a
triangle to be had and thecorporation gets the
(14:45):
credit or gets the credit fornonprofit, but they're paying
random which in turn builds thenonprofit. Yeah, I love that
idea. I mean, we've, we'vetalked about, um, you know,
offering classesIs as well, whether that's a
paid class or free classes, orworkshops, things like that. I'd
be curious, you know if anybodywatching, if that sounds
(15:09):
interesting to you definitely,you know, focus group here, let
us know.
Yeah, yeah, I think sometimesit's easy when you're in a
certain lane, let's say ofdigital marketing, like, well,
this is the way everyone doesit. So, you know, we just need
to only work in this way.
(15:29):
And I think that's sort of,you're missing an opportunity,
right to, to help with otherpeople or share your gifts, like
with someone else in a differentway. have access to it the way
you're, you know, great. I mean,I actually.
Yeah, I think there's a lot ofways to give back. I know, as a
(15:50):
small business, sometimes youhave to be careful, because if
you're spending all of your timehelping nonprofits and not
making revenue, a true revenue,put yourself in a in a bad spot.
And I've done that, too, whereI've said, like, of course, I'll
help the school, donate 1000s ofdollars of food or whatever. And
then it's like, oh, dear, whathave I done because we have lost
(16:12):
in real labor and things likethat. But
I think that's where your ideaeven of how you can help be
creative or to support that,because obviously, too, I want
to make sure we can pay our teamand the smart people who are
working hard to help them. Sothat's a great point, right? You
have to find the right balanceof, of providing help at price
(16:33):
points, that makes sense, bothstill equitably paying your team
for their time and their work.
I. But yeah, yep, that's great.
Okay, tell me how else, whatelse do you want to do? Do you
aspire to be humongous? Orgreat? Or, you know, great and
small or?
(16:54):
Old? Or? I don't know. So it'sfunny, wouldn't my very first
agency job, there were 1500people at that company. And that
felt so huge, especially foryour very first job, right? So
many people, I don't know that Inecessarily aspire to be that
size. But I think if I if wewere able to sort of maintain
(17:14):
the culture, I would be open tothat. I think that's the
biggest, most important thingfor me as well, to make sure
it's a good environment, youknow, not only for myself, but
for for the team, are we able tohelp people grow and, you know,
have a positive workplace,obviously, work is still work
some days, you know, are not asfun as other days, it's still a
(17:34):
job, but, you know, try to havethat positive culture. And I
feel like, sometimes that's sucha buzzword, you know, these days
is like, oh, we have a positiveculture, or you see memes a lot,
where people are like, Oh,that's, that, that means a pizza
party to some companies. Whereaslike to other companies, it's
more of like, how you treatothers and all of that good
(17:55):
stuff. Right? So I think, yeah,I would be open to growing I
think our for us, we've we'vedefinitely expanded and a
healthy way, as far as we'vegrown quite a lot year over
year. So it's, it's trackingthat way again, this year. But I
think, you know, we we, I wouldlove to, we started to do more
(18:18):
outbound new business, which hasbeen interesting, a lot, almost
all of our businesses comethrough referral, you know,
people I know, or our colleaguesknow, that we've worked with,
you know, and that's a great wayI feel like a lot of businesses,
you know, receive clients. Sowe've just started testing
different ways to for more coldoutreach. So that's been an
(18:39):
interesting challenge. I think Ipersonally get a ton of cold
emails that just, I delete, youknow, so like, how do we do this
in a way that feels coldoutreach, or new business
marketing that feels authenticto us that isn't just spamming
people? Right. That's somethingthat we're sort of trying to
figure out at this point? Well,I mean, if you know that most of
(19:01):
your business is coming throughreferrals, are you continuing to
kind of focus on that area andcultivate conversations that
will yield referrals? From thefederal? Yes, yeah, that's a
good point. I don't think I'vedone as much of that, as far as
specifically kind of reachingout or, like, you know, keeping
(19:21):
in touch with my network forthat purpose. Um, but it
certainly is valuable. Andthat's people trust people, and
they hire the people that theytrust and feel that they can,
you know, be a steward for theirbusiness. Agree. So I think that
makes a lot of sense. It's agreat, you know, great advice to
say, we know, we sort of win inthis area. How can we lean into
(19:42):
that a little further, right?
Because I feel a little bitlike, maybe there's some folks
even from your former world thatdon't know what you're doing
now. And they be a client. Andso it's just that and actually,
I'll say this to you and toothers out there, and I have the
same insecurity right?
I mean, there's a womanactually, that I'm going to
(20:02):
reach out to in the next coupleof days that worked for me at
General Mills and I adore her.
We have gone in the last 15years in totally different
directions. I have not stayed incontact with her, which is my
fault. I mean, I just, but I'mgoing to call her and I'm gonna
say, I have missed you. And I'msorry, it's been so many years,
but what are you up to? Yeah.
(20:24):
And I have a sincere like, justfrom a friendship perspective.
But I think we can all do thatout the fear of like, oh, gosh,
there's the shaming that we putourselves through of like, I
haven't called her and Ihaven't. I mean, Emily Post and
all her rules went out thewindow long ago, right? I mean,
I feel a little bit like ifeveryone can just give
themselves a moment of like, Oh,who cares? If I'm reaching out
(20:47):
and it's like, hey, you know,whoever, I just wanted to say,
Hi, I'm, I own my own agency.
Now. If you ever need anything,please let me know if you know,
anybody that's, you know,needing a job. There's that
connection that the people whoyou are friends with or
connected with in the past thanit was amicable are not going
to,in my opinion, they're not going
(21:08):
to judge you, you know, unlesssalesy but anyway. So that would
be a recommendation is calledpeople up, make sure they know
what you're doing now. Yeah,that's a good point. And we've
started to really amp up our ownmarketing, that's not something
you know, it's the old saying,like the cobblers son wears
shoes, or whatever, you know,however, it goes. I mean, I
(21:29):
think at first, we were sofocused on client work. We were
certainly posting but I thinknow we're sort of making that
shift to okay, how do wecontinue to demonstrate our
chops and make sure people knowwho we are, and that we're out
there loud and proud. So I'mexcited about some of those
things to come as well, just sokeep an eye out. But I think I
(21:51):
love that advice just ofreaching out to people
genuinely, because there's a tonof people who I didn't maybe
keep in contact with that. Ifollow them closely, like, what
they're posting what they'redoing. And I think sometimes I
give the advice to other peopleyou know, about posting on
LinkedIn, or just sharingupdates. They'll feel
intimidated about that. Andsometimes I'm like, but I don't
(22:13):
always take my own advice, youknow, posting, like, oh, people
don't care. And you're like,yes, they do. You know, they do
want to see what you're up to.
Yeah. So yeah, I think some ofthis is take my own advice,
perhaps. There you go.
You've also done a couple ofreally interesting things. So
you mentioned a book earlier,but I didn't want to talk about
(22:35):
your children's book at all. Oh,sure. Yes. So
by the way, yay. beyond myreach, but Okay, keep going. So,
yes, so our team helps that wewrote a children's book called
Internet safety, Sammy. And thiswas a completely inspired by AI.
So we use chat, GBT and promptengineering to help us write a
(23:00):
book. And this was actually whatwe call one of our random labs
project. So we have our ownSlack channel called random
labs, where we just come upwith, you know, other ideas to
help us practice refining ourskills, provide something with
the world, maybe it's notdirectly related to a specific
client, but it's something wecould do and share. So that's
where the idea came about. Weused AI for all the
(23:23):
illustrations as well. So it wassuper fun kind of collaborative
effort from the team. But thatwas really exciting and the the
first foray as well into selfpublishing a book so that was
not something I'd done beforebut now it's something we could
easily help you know, any clientdo so that right that's like new
skills that you just do foryourself sometimes that you can
(23:43):
then share with other people butInternet safety 70 Sammy, I
should say is about Sammy, whois learning just different
skills for navigating theinternet is directed for young
children, obviously, of youknow, a lot of the things we
know as adults, but maybehonestly sometimes can forget
about what you click on and whatinformation and who, who you see
(24:04):
online, I think as a parent nowmyself, it is you look at a job,
your job in a different way ofjust there are some things
online that you don'tnecessarily aren't necessarily
healthy, I think for young kids.
So this can at least help teachsome of like Internet safety
practices and a fun easy waythat's age appropriate, you
know, for a little while, maybefive years old. But yeah, that
(24:26):
was very a fun project. And Iwould love to do more of that.
We got a lot of good feedback,you know, from people about
that. So it's really cute. Ilove it.
Um, by the way, we'll put a linkin the show notes so that people
can buy the book because I thinkit's available online yet. Yeah,
(24:46):
Amazon.
Okay, what about have youstarted to announce your other
new endeavor that you arebuilding this summer? Okay,
okay. I didn't want to tell toomuch. ahead. Okay. Yeah, so we
actually launchedThe website on Monday, so very
excited, I will we can sharethat as well. It's an event
called speaker. And it's it'snot I would say that the quick
(25:07):
version to explain it is it's aconference for keynote speakers.
But it's really more than just aconference, it's an opportunity
to film a brand new sizzle reel.
And we have our production teamis amazing that we're working
with at the events in New York.
And the production team hasworked on Netflix specials and
Ted Talks. And if you wantsomebody to make you look good,
(25:27):
they are going to do it. Andthey're super nice people. So
excited to work there. Diamondgrade media is the name of our
production partners. So at theevent, it's a weekend long
event, Friday through Sunday,you'll come you'll get some
coaching from the director tohelp you you know, film your
sizzle reel, you get 20 minuteson stage, we'll have a live
audience. And you know, it's agreat opportunity. If you've not
(25:50):
kind of gone through thisexperience before we're here we
work with a lot of keynotespeakers. I'm Sarah, you're,
you're one of them. But it canbe difficult to put together a
reel if you depending on not allof your clients have great video
or it doesn't their stagedoesn't look good. Or you might
not want that in a you know, ashow reel experience. So this is
a way that you can get reallyawesome high quality footage on
(26:14):
the stage and the reactions ofpeople. And then there's also
marketing, you get newheadshots. And then there's
workshops and sessionsthroughout the weekend to teach
you okay, you have all these newcollateral for your business,
what do you do with it? How canyou, you know, use that to your
advantage? We'll have Bureaurepresentation there, so you can
network with other speakers andBureau people to help guide you
(26:35):
further in your career. It'sobviously you know, the keynote
world is very competitive. Sowhat do you need to do, from a
paper click standpoint, acontent standpoint, really
helping you market yourself abit better. So I'm very excited,
Sara is going to come and be apart of the event. Very excited.
Yeah, I will be there. I'm soexcited. And you've done such a
(26:57):
brilliant job, one of the realand for those people listening
on the keynote front, it's thiscatch 22 You really can't get a
gig of paid speaking engagementuntil you have a video. But you
can't really get a video untilyou have a paid speaking
engagement. And so this is theopportunity for someone to
(27:18):
practice their craft to get upon a stage to deliver their
keynote and then the productionstudio makes it into a video
that then will be able to beused to sell for the future. And
I mean, you've solved a reallybig problem in the industry. And
so I'm really grateful and proudof you. And I think people are
(27:39):
going to really benefit fromthis so that they can kick off
either a revamp of theirspeaking business or they can
kick start it and so veryexcited. Yeah, I think it'll be,
you know, really cool. And it'sSeptember 27. That weekend, if
anyone's interested, feel freeto send me a message on
(28:00):
LinkedIn. But yeah, the goalreally is for you to leave,
refreshed and sort of energizedin your career path as far as
keynote speaking, and obviously,we're a resource to anyone you
know, who has questions, but Ilove what you said, kind of
about the catch 22 You need thatreel and it's hard to get so and
it's expensive to do on your ownif you just wanted to make that
(28:23):
work and to hire people in theaudience and all the people. So
the the point of the event is tomake it accessible and fun and
knowledgeable. You know, we'velearned a lot at the event and
network with other people. Soyeah, very excited. Really
great, Lauren, and I'm soexcited to be part of it.
Any other things that you'relaunching, I mean, goodness
(28:46):
sakes, any other things that youwant to tell our listeners or
think things that are coming up.
Um, I'm trying to think I thinkthe biggest thing right now that
our team is working on asSpeaker, we would love this is
our inaugural event. So thefirst one, obviously, of its
kind in New York in September,but we'd love to make it a
series if people you know, enjoyit, there's 28 spots. So it's
(29:08):
limited of how many but our ourgoal or our hope is that there's
more than 28 people interestedso we will do it again or fairly
regularly to make it easy foryou to update those assets. So
that's that's kind of anexciting thing to potentially
take it as a multi event.
(29:28):
Sort of experience so indifferent cities as well to make
it easy for people to attendfrom that the travel
perspective. So that's thebiggest thing on our plates as
far as newness.
I guess the other thing I couldmention, for myself, I was
recently accepted to the ForbesBusiness Council. So I'll, I'm
going to start writing somecontent that will be featured on
(29:50):
forbes.com. So I'm excited aboutthat. Just you know, increased
opportunity for myself andvisibility for the agency and
sharing some of the knowledgewithin you
A group. So that's wonderful,very proud of you. And I'm not
proud. So thank you. Yeah, it'sreally great. Yeah, you've
helped so many people to launchtheir speaking career to build
(30:13):
their brand, whether it's apersonal brand,
you know, like mine, the SarahFranklin brand, or Dr. Lynn
Dooley, definitely, I got thename wrong.
But there's so many folks andyou have, you know, kind of a
knack for understanding theimportant things that
(30:34):
differentiate someone to helpbuild the strategy. So that's
really great.
You've also done a really goodjob of kind of building your
team. And so I just have to kindof a nod and a
gracious, thank you to thepeople that, you know, I think
have brought my businesses tolife. You know, I, I always have
(30:55):
said that, Alison, is like,directly connected, like she has
her like, you know, chart, oriPhone chargers, like, right in
my head, we are like, right onthe same page. But you've had
this knack of matching peoplewith a similar culture of
similar philosophy. It's a hardthing as a business owner, to
give your brand to an agency anda Yeah, run with it, right?
(31:19):
Because it's like, gosh, arethey going to say the right
thing? Are they going to do theright thing? And for us, and I'm
talking about Tresco, right atthis very moment, you know, the
service the the kind of love andsupport and serve mentality that
we have, it has to have theright person on the marketing
(31:39):
side to be able to bring this tolife. And then from the point
Northeast side and the SarahFrasca side. I mean, it's just
been tremendous. Especially as afemale leader, I have wanted it
to be, you know, reallyimpactful for other women, I
want to be, you know, welcomingenough. So again, you've done
such a beautiful job. I thinkthere are women out there who
(32:02):
tear other women down. Yeah, Ithink that you are one of the
good ones, where it's like youare one of the women who only
props other women up. And so Ijust Yeah, yeah. Yep. I think
it's been really fun and reallygreat. So, yeah, I think one of
the things that can be hard atfirst, when you start a new
(32:24):
business, or there's momentswhere you may feel like, oh,
there are other companies orother people who do marketing or
who offer similar services, orare my competitors, and I think,
at least for me, I try to groundmyself in like, there's plenty
of opportunity for everyone,like sort of that abundance
mindset, obviously, everyone hastheir days are like, oh, you
(32:45):
know, get down on yourself orwhatnot. But I think
coming from that place has onlyresulted in, you know, more
opportunities for myself and myteam. And I think when it comes
to our team, and how we've builtwe've been, I've been certainly
very intentional with like, whowe interview and you know, what
the wanting to preserve ourculture, which is certainly, you
(33:06):
know, easier said than done.
Alison's amazing, I call her my,my OG. She's our very first
intern. So she's been thelongest here the longest, I love
her. So, she's, she's great. Andwe try to, you know, when we
work with clients to findclients, who are a good culture
fit with us, right? Becauseevery, you know, I think what
you're,I'm very inspired by how you run
(33:26):
Treska and like your businessesas well, I think that aligns
very well with like, how we, youknow, try to run our teams with,
you know, empathy and sincerityand all that good stuff. And I,
I think to one other, I guess,reflection based on what you
said is with, with the personalbrands, or people as brands,
we're lucky we get to work witha lot of clients who we, you
(33:46):
know, help ghost write contentfor them or represent their own
personal brand. And that'ssomething we take really
seriously because I dounderstand, you know, that it
can feel scary for some peopleto like, let go of the reins
sometimes or focus on otherareas of their business. And let
us like, let us run with this.
So we really try to build upthat trust that like, hey, we,
(34:09):
you know, we won't let you down.
As far as you know, sharingcontent or working, speaking on
your behalf. So I think it'simportant to find someone who's
a good fit for you from theclient piece, who will also take
it as seriously you know, as youso that's just my thought on
that. Well, and I have alwaysagain, you know, this goes back
to yours at General Mills,the partners that you bring in
(34:34):
and build a trustingrelationship with that are
underneath the tent with you orwhatever the analogy is. So they
understand intimately thebusiness in and out and that
gosh, we may make a mistake andthey may make a mistake, but all
of it is with the kind of endgoal in mind. And that is you
(34:57):
know, againAnd for my businesses a little
bit different, but serving andproviding a product that
either tastes good or helpsbusinesses, depending on which
one we're talking about. Soyeah, I think your team has done
a done a wonderful job. And wehave so much fun. Emily Ryan,
Allison, I mean, we just reallyhave a great time with your
(35:20):
team. They're good people sowell, um, any other tidbits that
I can help you with eitherbrainstorming in the moment or
things you're hoping for, maybethere's somebody out there that
can help that's listening, orI guess I'm trying to think
through I know, for speaker, wejust launched our website this
(35:41):
week. We you know, we work withlots of keynote speakers, but
any thoughts you have ofhelping raise awareness?
Obviously, the keynote speakingspace is super busy. There's,
you know, people.
Any thoughts about that? I mean,do the Bureau's know that you're
doing it? Yeah. So we've startedsome of that outreach to let
(36:03):
them know, inviting them toattend.
And I think that's superexciting. We're also working on
we're going to have a keynotespeaker at the event, a
celebrity keynote speaker. Sowe're finalizing who that might
be depending on who's available.
So that'll be exciting. We thinkthat can be a draw as well. Oh,
cool, huh.
(36:23):
But yeah, I think one of thethings that we're learning
about, I guess, as this is ourfirst in person event we've ever
thrown, so lots of new things tolearn. But as far as you know,
what the onsite collateral like,where do we want to put signs?
And how many do we do we want todo? And all of that? I know,
obviously, you have a ton ofmarketing materials for the
(36:44):
restaurant, and, you know,posters and all that kind of
stuff. But if there's any ideasyou have around, around that,
I'm certainly welcome both.
Well, I mean, yeah, I think, youknow, the, the
advice that I would have for youthere is that sometimes it's the
(37:04):
sizzle that sells the steak. Andso I would say it may seem like
a splurge to have lots ofwhether it's balloon arches, or
Yeah, balloons actually are oneof my favorites. I would tell
folks in my General Mills days,I mean, $100, you can have this
massive balloon, whatever. Andit's so dramatic, but in so
(37:29):
little, so it's like, do theballoons. Yeah, um, and so I
think, you know, sometimes itlooks more impressive, it feels
more impressive. It feels moreprofessional, or when there is
that type of signage with thebranding and the directional. So
the other thing I would say isthat if you can have the
(37:49):
empathy, which I know you do, tothink through all of the moments
in the day, or the days of whatis a person going to be
thinking, are they tired at thispoint, do they need to eat
whatever it is, you want to kindof get ahead of their needs?
Yeah. And then I'm sure you'lldo this, because again, you're
so empathetic, but it's sort ofthat like, all encompassing.
(38:14):
You're moving them through theday, through the agenda through
the process, you'reaccommodating, you know, most
you'll never accommodate all,but most of the needs and you
know, having things in thebackground that if someone needs
support, like you know, aphysician or a
dentist or I'm making all thisup, but they're they're
(38:36):
traveling in, they're notfamiliar with the area. So what
is it that they might need? Arethere extra toothbrushes or, you
know, it's a really it's kind ofa funny, because you are helping
them to be ready for a verypublic showing? Yes, yeah. And
they Yeah, so, um,I think you know, kind of, I
would, I would describe it asgreasing the skids of all the
(38:59):
things that could go wrong inthe moment. One of the things
that I do when I'm actuallygoing on the road to do my
speaking is I bring what Iagain, dumb name, but I call it
my bridesmaid kit. Basically,like every single thing you
could ever possibly need, right?
It has band aids, and it hassafety pins, and it has a little
(39:19):
thing of thread. It hasscissors, it has tape glue
in there. I mean, it's likethink through anything you might
be needing in the moment becauseyou never know when you're going
to need duct tape. And you neverknow when you're going to need a
pair of scissors. And yeah, soI'm I'm curious. That's brings
up a question for me to ask you,actually. So
(39:40):
when you were first starting outin keynote speaking, I mean, I
call you a pro. Now you know,you you book a lot of events and
you're kind of seasoned to itnow. But when you're first
starting out, is there anythingfrom either a marketing
perspective or a brandingperspective that you wish
someone maybe told you soonerthat
Maybe it could be something wecan help teach or pass along,
(40:03):
you know, at the event in the inthe workshops. Yeah, I mean, I
reallylet me think about that for a
minute. I have amaybe a couple of responses. I
mean, the first one is, youknow, finding a gracious mentor,
I think is a really importantcomponent. I mean, this is, you
know, just like any other oraleducation is taught in a way
(40:29):
where the person who is teachingyou or guiding you or correcting
you, or, I mean, everything thatthey say, helps to influence
everything you do from there on.
Yeah. And so, you know, I've hadgood coaches, and I've had bad
coaches, I've had coaches wherethey have said, Oh, no, you can
(40:54):
use what I've told you. And so Ialways think back to like, and
this is just what pops into mymind in the moment is like, if I
went to a professional baseballteam, and I was a pitcher, and
someone taught me how to pitch,I'm never going to pitch in a
different like that peerlearning follows me through my
(41:15):
career no matter what team I goto. So I sort of think that
pairing people with a mentorthat says, I have no, I have
nothing toyou, you can't take it back. I'm
only here to help serve and togive knowledge and to you take
it and run with it. Yeah,everything I've taught you is
now for you to discern is thisvaluable or not valuable. And
(41:37):
there's, and so I would sayhaving a gracious mentor, I
think that's my first tip.
Second tip is that anything thatcan go wrong someday will.
So being ready for that is anincredibly important component.
So I talked about the brides.
When I do my road traveling, Ialways bring with a couple of
(42:00):
other things. And so I alwaysbring extra batteries for a
clicker, I'm assuming that theplace that I go to will have a
clicker, but if they don't havea slide, advancing clicker, I've
brought my own. Plus, I'vebrought my own batteries, I
usually travel with almost everychord you could possibly
(42:20):
imagine, including some that Ihaven't seen since like the 80s.
I mean.
So, you know, I think kind ofbeing prepared. I've had the
audio visuals not work. I've hadthe video play, but no sound.
And so I've had to learn how totalk through that. And so again,
if you can help speakers, andthis is having the empathy of
(42:45):
what could go wrong, and let'shave them be ready for it.
I think that's really important.
And even emotional of like, atwhatever the because I've had a
keynote where the hotel'sfire alarm started going off.
There's nothing we could do thehotel said, No problem, there's
(43:05):
not really a fire. So now, nowwe know we're safe. And we don't
have to evacuate. But I'm up onthe stage, giving a keynote.
What I had to do was to tell thestory, and then stop for the
beeping, and then tell the storyagain, and then yeah, can throw
you off if you weren't ready topivot. Right. Totally. So going
with the flow. Yeah. Yeah.
That's interesting. We weretalking about, you know, as far
(43:28):
as the workshops go to actuallyhave a guest speaker come in. He
comes from the Gosh, my, it'sescaping me right now. The, the
comedy that's like,gosh, Second City, yes. But
where were you just sort of gooff of nothing.
(43:51):
Like an ad lib, like?
Good looking on the words, butyou know, what I mean, a
comedian to come in to help say,you know, in those moments
where, okay, you're, you'regreat at delivering your speech
in the perfect scenario, butyou're very, you're not always
gonna get the perfect scenario.
So whether it's a speech or Iknow a lot of speakers do
(44:12):
consulting or workshops or youknow, complementary services. So
what do you do if you notice,like, the audience is kind of
glazing over and you know, notreally participating? And you're
great at this or I've seen youdo it, like reengaging people
but to have a comedian come in,not from a how do you be funny,
but how do you sort of comediansare great at this, like bringing
(44:33):
people back in.
So that that being almost like aworkshop of sorts of like
teaching you how to do that. Ilove that. I mean, honestly,
even the fact that neither of uscan think of the word.
I still can'tcome up with that after this
podcast. Like, oh, but what Iwas gonna say is there's a
(44:54):
humility for both of us of like,oh, boy, we right
We can't think the darn word.
But that makes us more human.
And if I'm translating this to akeynote, it's what I call the
Mentos. You remember the Mentoscommercial where the lady breaks
or high heel? Yeah. And then shejust breaks the other heel. And
(45:15):
she's like, nevermind, I've gotthis. What's the type of thing
that if you're comfortableenough with yourself, it's like,
oh, gosh, I may screw up amillion different things. But
like, that makes you more human.
And so if you I mean, you'regracious enough for or I'm
grateful for you to say that Ido this? Well, I really don't
have a lot of like, I don'treally care if I have a mess up,
right? Because my ultimate goalis to help people and maybe
(45:38):
helping them is explaining howreal my life is right? Like, I'm
not perfect, I'm never going tobe perfect. And so I have screw
ups just like everybody else.
But I still have fun. And I makefun of myself. And I'm still
kind of, you know, carry on andcontinue to have a point and
(45:58):
whatever else. So I think thatyou know that that is one of the
things that I think makes a goodteacher, a good coach, a good
speaker, or a good manager isjust the ability to kind of
like, oh, well, I can't think ofthis thing. But oh, well, you
got the point. Right. Yeah.
(46:21):
Yeah, so I think I think havinga comedian that can kind of
bring that home will be great.
And that poor comedian is goingto have to help us with the word
again. But I remember it'simprov. That's the word I was.
Good work. Okay. Oh, my gosh,that's so funny. Yeah, I mean,
hey, you have to improvisationcomes to life at all points.
(46:44):
Like, personally,professionally, but a very
apropos moment for yes.
That's cute. Well, Lauren,you've done such a brilliant job
of building a business fromscratch, thank you for bringing
together your experience fromall sorts of big, small, good
times and bad. And I think, youknow, you've done such a
(47:08):
beautiful job of building a teamof having humility of bringing
that empathy.
And I really appreciate all thatyou've done for me and my
businesses, I look forward tomany years, you know, partnering
together, in my, in my lastmoment, I mean, I would just
say, you know, if there's anyway, or any, anything you come
(47:29):
across, that you feel likepeople that need help, and
especially young women, and youknow, that that need help, I
mean, let's collaborate togetherto continue to try to kind of
push them, you know, up into theworld to bring them to the
forefront of, you know, whateverit is that they need to learn.
Andthat goes for you, your team and
(47:50):
anybody you come across. So,absolutely, yeah. And same here.
If there's anyone that you meetthat, I mean, women are awesome
luminary women are amazing. AndI feel like we bring a lot to
the table. So I'm proud thatwe're, you know, women owned
women led company. And I thinkthat there's so much opportunity
to help other you know, like,bring up the next the next
(48:12):
person. So I'd love to do that.
It's our duty. Yeah, I agree.
All right, good. Well, thank youfor being on the show. And we'll
put everything we talked aboutin the show notes so people can
find you. And they can be a partof speaker if that's something
that's of interest to them. Iwill be thrilled to be in New
(48:33):
York with you very soon. ComeSeptember. And other than that,
have a great day. Good luck withHenry. Thank you. You too. Have
good luck with all your kiddos.
Thank you, Lauren. All right.
Well, we'll talk to you soon.
Thanks, everybody for listening.
If you're out there and you needmarketing help Laurens your girl
but if you need any other help,I'm very happy to help so
(48:54):
everyone have a great day. Goodluck leveling up your business.
Hi, Ithanks so much for tuning into
this episode of level up yourbusiness with me, Sarah Frasca.
If you have a problem in yourbusiness that's keeping you up
at night. Please join us in afuture episode so we can help
get you unstuck. Just clickingthe link in the show notes and
(49:17):
send us a message. Pleaseremember, stay innovative
friends
You're listening to level up your business, the
podcast where we talk tohardworking business owners and
leaders and help them solve realissues in real time. I'm your
host, Sarah Frasca restaurantowner, keynote speaker and
business coach. I've spent mycareer not only in corporate
(00:20):
America, but also as anentrepreneur, carrying on my
family's legacy through myrestaurant. Now a business coach
and consultant. I'm helpingother businesses to use creative
problem solving and innovativethinking to drive lasting
change. Stay tuned to hear someinspiring guidance that will
(00:40):
help you to level up yourbusiness.
All right, well, happy Thursday,everyone, and welcome to another
podcast, which is called levelup your business. And the
intention is to help folksthroughout the world but
everyday business, folks, howcan they continue to improve and
(01:00):
today we're welcoming LaurenPatterson from that random
agency. Hi, Lauren. Hello. Greatto see you. You too. You too,
Lauren. And I go way back. Sowe'll talk about that just a
minute. But it's always fun tosee you and you have such a
beautiful radiant smile that um,well, you do. Know, Lauren's in
the Detroit area, what's theexact suburb? I live in Troy?
(01:24):
Troy. Okay. All right. So I'mLauren. And I go back to a
consulting firm that we wereboth involved with many, many
years ago, and both have movedon to open our own business,
those but we always had thattime together, which was really
precious. And goodness, I metyou. I know, I couldn't imagine
another light box.
(01:48):
Well, we've had a lot of fun.
And I just spoke with actuallyanother of our colleagues this
morning. So it's fun to stayconnected with kind of folks. So
well, tell us learn a little bitabout yourself and a little bit
about why did you build thatrating? Agency? Okay, well,
thank you for having me on, Iwould say a little about myself,
(02:08):
I have about, let's see, 12years now of experience in the
social media, digital marketingspace, I've worked at different,
you know, big ad agencies,consulting firms in the Detroit
area. And then in 2020, whenSarah and I both left the
previous consulting firm, I wentahead and started that random
agency and honestly started asjust doing a little bit of
(02:32):
freelance to figure out what mynext step might be. And then,
you know, I've always had anentrepreneurial mindset. When I
was in college, I started myfirst business, I painted shoes.
So if anyone needs some shoespainted up, you know, I forgot
about that hot. Yeah, hobby.
That is so cool. Yes. So I handpainted, Star Wars and all kinds
(02:55):
of, frankly, trademarks, at thetime, but you know, it's fine.
So, being in shoes on Etsy, andthat paid all my bills in
college, and it was super fun, Iliked working for myself, and
kind of setting my schedule andfiguring out, you know, what's
important to you, you know, in aworking environment, so that was
a little dipping my toe in, incollege. And then once I started
(03:16):
freelancing, and 2020, it sortof took off a lot of people, you
know, when they found out,they're like, Hey, can can you
help with this, and thatquickly, sort of grew into
random and starting a team andbuilding a business. So I think
it's really exciting. I think alot of times, people assume you
need to have a huge businessplan and have everything planned
out ahead of time, if you wantto start a company. And it's not
(03:38):
always that way. Sometimes yourstory looks a little different.
But now we're, you know, supersuccessful. Four years later, we
have 12 people on our team,fully remote agency. So it's
super fun, where we have a lotof fun with clients and each
other. So yeah, I'm thankful. Imean, you've done a brilliant
job. And I think it has such afun character, the culture of
(03:58):
the agency has come together ina way that I feel like it's a
really kind of a good mix ofthe acumen, the personal, you
know, kind of components thatare important to you, and John
and all the folks but it'salways fun for me to watch your
social media feed and look atyour website, link, because I
(04:18):
think it's a it's a brilliantrepresentation of you, in my
view. Yeah. I mean, that wassomething that John, my co
founder and husband and I talkedabout a lot from the beginning
of if we're going to do it, youknow, take that risk to create a
business, we want to make sureone, we're having fun, and we're
creating a culture that maybe wewouldn't always find in, you
(04:41):
know, at jobs we've had in thepast. Or, you know, we'd like to
elements of different jobs. Sobringing those things we liked
together.
And recently, we went through anexercise actually last year
creating some core values forourself as you know, as our team
as we continue to grow to makesure that we always
come back to that, because Ithink that's something that can
(05:03):
be difficult as you, you know,more people and trying to keep
everything together. So that'sbeen super helpful for us. Yeah.
Okay, I have a question for youon that. I think I've both been
a part of organizations that doand do not keep those core
values front and center. And soI'm just curious, how do you
(05:24):
continue to go back to those andensure that they are ever
present? That's a greatquestion. I think, for us what's
helpful, we have a weekly teammeeting where everyone gets
together. And similar to youknow, I've been in your team
meetings for Tresca. Before weshare, you know, a little bit
about happy things in ourpersonal life, as well as
(05:44):
professional kind of startthere. But I think a big part of
it is we do talk about the corevalues regularly, I think,
a past version of myself mighthave thought that's a little
corny, or like, oh, you know,nobody cares about that. But I
do think, in a genuine way, it'shelpful just to bring that up in
conversation, not in a forcedway. But one, for example, we
(06:06):
talk about a lot is empathy. Andthat's one of the core values,
we have a strong emphasis onspecifically for, you know,
empathy for our clients, for ourclients, customers, what
problems do they have that we'rehoping to help them solve
through various, you know,digital marketing channels, but
I think it comes down to evenwhen we're looking at an
(06:26):
analytics report, for example, aspecific example came in
recently, where how can weexplain not everyone, the
audience of the report, noteveryone understands what all of
these metrics mean? becausetheir job is to do something
different, right? They don'tneed to be digital marketing
experts. That's, that's ourrole. So how can we frame up the
report in a way that'sempathetic to you know, they
(06:48):
might not know the definitionsof everything? Or how to read a
chart? Or what should thetakeaway be? So how can we add
those insights, you know, in away that's helpful for them? And
that's just a way ofdemonstrating our our core
values in a very practicalsense, too. That's great. That's
really great. Yeah, and, okay,so you are an active owner, and
(07:09):
you know, your business isgrowing. So what are the roles
that you play within that randomagency? That's a fun one. I feel
like you can probably relate ina certain way. Somedays, I feel
like, you know, you wear manyhats, as a co founder,
I would say, a lot of a big partof my role is to help, you know,
(07:29):
guide the team and the companyforward. So I'm focusing on
today, right? How do we makesure our current clients are
happy, you know, getting whatthey need, as well, as I work on
a lot of new business now of,you know, Discovery calls with
potential clients, or, you know,the new business part is a big
part of my role, it's recentlyshifted a little bit, I know,
(07:50):
you and I have talked about thatof, you have to work on the
business as well as in thebusiness and that can be
difficult at times. So I'veshifted to work a bit more on
the business as well, and reallytrusted the team to, you know,
bring me in when they need extrasupport, or, you know, a second
set of eyes on something, but,you know, thankfully, we have a
really good good group of peoplewho can take care of clients,
(08:12):
but more of my job now isshifting into, okay, you know,
we've we've started to createsome goals for three 510 years,
how do we break that up andstart, you know, working towards
that you have to start somewhereelse? Three years is gonna come
before?
I know, and you're a workingmom, too. Do you want to tell
our listeners a little bit aboutthat? Sure. Um, so my son Henry
(08:36):
is seven months old, he was bornon Halloween of last year. So
that's been a really excitingand challenging in many ways. I
would say one of the things thatI wasn't expecting about being a
mom is that it does help you.
People talk a lot about likework life balance, and all of
that. And once you have a child,from my experience, at least,
(08:57):
that becomes much easier, at theend of the day to say just
accept, you know, I've gottendone these things. Some of these
didn't, didn't get done, becauseI had other things pop up in the
day, you never expect, right?
Your your day never goes exactlyaccording to plan. But just
being okay with that, you know,I, I tried my best today, I put
(09:18):
my best foot forward, and it'sokay, I'm gonna set it down for
now and pick that up tomorrow. Ithink before I had a baby, that
was a little harder for me, tobe honest. Because I would be
like, well, I could, I couldwork all night or, you know, I
didn't always have that balancethat I think makes you better at
your job, frankly, to like, walkaway at times. Yeah, that's a
(09:38):
really good point. And, gosh, Imean, I think you have such a
good perspective on theimportance of also the mom role,
right? Yeah. And if we're notattentive to that side, I mean,
it's always good to kind of, youknow, make sure we're delicately
walking that fine balance. Sothat's, yeah, warn you some days
(09:58):
that works better than others.
Right, but But you try, like,No day is perfect and no, you
know, but hopefully over thelong run, we get it as close to
perfect as we can. Yeah, yeah.
And I think to the other part ofit now is you get another
perspective, at least for me asa working mom of, you know, what
(10:20):
might my child think? Or see asthey get older, like, am I
demonstrating? This is what apositive work experience looks
like? Or this is what goodbalance looks like, you know, as
an individual, obviously, easiersaid than done some days. But
that's just something that'sbeen more on my mind that I
didn't necessarily think about.
Yeah, no, that's really great.
(10:40):
That speaks actually back to theempathy core value, which is
kind of interesting. No wonderit's a core value of your
business, because you'redemonstrating it every day. So
yeah, well, I should alsoprobably tell our listeners, I
mean, I really, I always try tobe as transparent as possible.
And you are the agency of recordfor Treska, four point ne for
(11:03):
the Sara frescas speakingbusiness. And so you know, I
obviously not only adore you,personally, but I trust you, and
I trust your teamprofessionally, to carry on my
legacy with my restaurantbusiness, and also kind of
bringing and building mybusinesses forward. So I figured
I would just say that out loud.
So focus. Yeah.
(11:27):
Um, okay, Lauren, let me think.
I wanted to ask you a little bitabout the future. You know, I
think, as you dream big and looktowards, you know, where does
random go in the future? I mean,what, what are your aspirations?
That's a great question. I wasactually thinking about that
this morning. And I think thereare lots of possibilities. One
(11:47):
thing I've certainly thoughtabout is how do we sort of take
what we're doing now? Because Ithink at least, you know, we
have a good culture? And how dowe share that with other people
I know, even just from otherwomen have asked me already,
like, Oh, you have a businessand how, you know, that's
inspiring to them, which makesme feel funny. But it's
(12:09):
wonderful. But I think I think,you know, one of the things that
we've we've talked aboutinternally is how do I continue
to increase my own thoughtleadership, not just like, for
my own credibility, per se, butalso, you know, sharing what
I've learned and what we'velearned collectively with
others. We've talked about abook, perhaps at some point, I
(12:30):
know, you are also working onyour own book. But that's
something and I also wasthinking a bit more recently
about, you know, our model,typically, you know, most
agencies, you work with clientson a retainer for projects or
retainer basis. And I think, Ilove that. And I love working
with clients for projects orlonger term, whatever makes
(12:51):
sense. But I think there's alsoopportunity to help people, you
know, or share our knowledge andother ways. So one thing that
I've just been thinking throughis, how could we also expand
that's maybe not the traditionalway, you know, an ad agency
would work, but who's to saythere are no rules? Right, you
could then do it however youwant. So how could we provide
services for you know,nonprofits, for example, who may
(13:16):
not have be able to pay a firm?
How could we provide some kindof product for that? That group?
That person? That's veryspecific example? Yes. So I
don't know if that would be, youknow, an online course or
something like that, but waysthat we could help more people.
That's just something I've beenthinking about. I don't know
(13:37):
what exactly that looks like. Soyeah, any ideas?
You know how much I love tobrainstorm ideas.
My first thought when you saidthat, actually, that came to my
mind is that I actually have oneof my my best friends from
elementary school, high school,etc. And she had a cousin who
(13:57):
had a failing kidney. And sothey were not a direct match. I
have a point, believe me, butit's all to say, I didn't know
this, but the organ donor kindof kidney donation, and do
triangles. So he was able todonate to another family who was
able to donate to her family.
And so it was a triangle ofsupport. And so I was just
(14:21):
thinking to myself, gosh, you'vegot a nonprofit, and there are
probably corporations that wantto help that nonprofit. So what
if the corporation paid randomto help the nonprofit? That's
cool, but the thought of like,yeah, wonder if there's a
triangle to be had and thecorporation gets the
(14:45):
credit or gets the credit fornonprofit, but they're paying
random which in turn builds thenonprofit. Yeah, I love that
idea. I mean, we've, we'vetalked about, um, you know,
offering classesIs as well, whether that's a
paid class or free classes, orworkshops, things like that. I'd
be curious, you know if anybodywatching, if that sounds
(15:09):
interesting to you definitely,you know, focus group here, let
us know.
Yeah, yeah, I think sometimesit's easy when you're in a
certain lane, let's say ofdigital marketing, like, well,
this is the way everyone doesit. So, you know, we just need
to only work in this way.
(15:29):
And I think that's sort of,you're missing an opportunity,
right to, to help with otherpeople or share your gifts, like
with someone else in a differentway. have access to it the way
you're, you know, great. I mean,I actually.
Yeah, I think there's a lot ofways to give back. I know, as a
(15:50):
small business, sometimes youhave to be careful, because if
you're spending all of your timehelping nonprofits and not
making revenue, a true revenue,put yourself in a in a bad spot.
And I've done that, too, whereI've said, like, of course, I'll
help the school, donate 1000s ofdollars of food or whatever. And
then it's like, oh, dear, whathave I done because we have lost
(16:12):
in real labor and things likethat. But
I think that's where your ideaeven of how you can help be
creative or to support that,because obviously, too, I want
to make sure we can pay our teamand the smart people who are
working hard to help them. Sothat's a great point, right? You
have to find the right balanceof, of providing help at price
(16:33):
points, that makes sense, bothstill equitably paying your team
for their time and their work.
I. But yeah, yep, that's great.
Okay, tell me how else, whatelse do you want to do? Do you
aspire to be humongous? Orgreat? Or, you know, great and
small or?
(16:54):
Old? Or? I don't know. So it'sfunny, wouldn't my very first
agency job, there were 1500people at that company. And that
felt so huge, especially foryour very first job, right? So
many people, I don't know that Inecessarily aspire to be that
size. But I think if I if wewere able to sort of maintain
(17:14):
the culture, I would be open tothat. I think that's the
biggest, most important thingfor me as well, to make sure
it's a good environment, youknow, not only for myself, but
for for the team, are we able tohelp people grow and, you know,
have a positive workplace,obviously, work is still work
some days, you know, are not asfun as other days, it's still a
(17:34):
job, but, you know, try to havethat positive culture. And I
feel like, sometimes that's sucha buzzword, you know, these days
is like, oh, we have a positiveculture, or you see memes a lot,
where people are like, Oh,that's, that, that means a pizza
party to some companies. Whereaslike to other companies, it's
more of like, how you treatothers and all of that good
(17:55):
stuff. Right? So I think, yeah,I would be open to growing I
think our for us, we've we'vedefinitely expanded and a
healthy way, as far as we'vegrown quite a lot year over
year. So it's, it's trackingthat way again, this year. But I
think, you know, we we, I wouldlove to, we started to do more
(18:18):
outbound new business, which hasbeen interesting, a lot, almost
all of our businesses comethrough referral, you know,
people I know, or our colleaguesknow, that we've worked with,
you know, and that's a great wayI feel like a lot of businesses,
you know, receive clients. Sowe've just started testing
different ways to for more coldoutreach. So that's been an
(18:39):
interesting challenge. I think Ipersonally get a ton of cold
emails that just, I delete, youknow, so like, how do we do this
in a way that feels coldoutreach, or new business
marketing that feels authenticto us that isn't just spamming
people? Right. That's somethingthat we're sort of trying to
figure out at this point? Well,I mean, if you know that most of
(19:01):
your business is coming throughreferrals, are you continuing to
kind of focus on that area andcultivate conversations that
will yield referrals? From thefederal? Yes, yeah, that's a
good point. I don't think I'vedone as much of that, as far as
specifically kind of reachingout or, like, you know, keeping
(19:21):
in touch with my network forthat purpose. Um, but it
certainly is valuable. Andthat's people trust people, and
they hire the people that theytrust and feel that they can,
you know, be a steward for theirbusiness. Agree. So I think that
makes a lot of sense. It's agreat, you know, great advice to
say, we know, we sort of win inthis area. How can we lean into
(19:42):
that a little further, right?
Because I feel a little bitlike, maybe there's some folks
even from your former world thatdon't know what you're doing
now. And they be a client. Andso it's just that and actually,
I'll say this to you and toothers out there, and I have the
same insecurity right?
I mean, there's a womanactually, that I'm going to
(20:02):
reach out to in the next coupleof days that worked for me at
General Mills and I adore her.
We have gone in the last 15years in totally different
directions. I have not stayed incontact with her, which is my
fault. I mean, I just, but I'mgoing to call her and I'm gonna
say, I have missed you. And I'msorry, it's been so many years,
but what are you up to? Yeah.
(20:24):
And I have a sincere like, justfrom a friendship perspective.
But I think we can all do thatout the fear of like, oh, gosh,
there's the shaming that we putourselves through of like, I
haven't called her and Ihaven't. I mean, Emily Post and
all her rules went out thewindow long ago, right? I mean,
I feel a little bit like ifeveryone can just give
themselves a moment of like, Oh,who cares? If I'm reaching out
(20:47):
and it's like, hey, you know,whoever, I just wanted to say,
Hi, I'm, I own my own agency.
Now. If you ever need anything,please let me know if you know,
anybody that's, you know,needing a job. There's that
connection that the people whoyou are friends with or
connected with in the past thanit was amicable are not going
to,in my opinion, they're not going
(21:08):
to judge you, you know, unlesssalesy but anyway. So that would
be a recommendation is calledpeople up, make sure they know
what you're doing now. Yeah,that's a good point. And we've
started to really amp up our ownmarketing, that's not something
you know, it's the old saying,like the cobblers son wears
shoes, or whatever, you know,however, it goes. I mean, I
(21:29):
think at first, we were sofocused on client work. We were
certainly posting but I thinknow we're sort of making that
shift to okay, how do wecontinue to demonstrate our
chops and make sure people knowwho we are, and that we're out
there loud and proud. So I'mexcited about some of those
things to come as well, just sokeep an eye out. But I think I
(21:51):
love that advice just ofreaching out to people
genuinely, because there's a tonof people who I didn't maybe
keep in contact with that. Ifollow them closely, like, what
they're posting what they'redoing. And I think sometimes I
give the advice to other peopleyou know, about posting on
LinkedIn, or just sharingupdates. They'll feel
intimidated about that. Andsometimes I'm like, but I don't
(22:13):
always take my own advice, youknow, posting, like, oh, people
don't care. And you're like,yes, they do. You know, they do
want to see what you're up to.
Yeah. So yeah, I think some ofthis is take my own advice,
perhaps. There you go.
You've also done a couple ofreally interesting things. So
you mentioned a book earlier,but I didn't want to talk about
(22:35):
your children's book at all. Oh,sure. Yes. So
by the way, yay. beyond myreach, but Okay, keep going. So,
yes, so our team helps that wewrote a children's book called
Internet safety, Sammy. And thiswas a completely inspired by AI.
So we use chat, GBT and promptengineering to help us write a
(23:00):
book. And this was actually whatwe call one of our random labs
project. So we have our ownSlack channel called random
labs, where we just come upwith, you know, other ideas to
help us practice refining ourskills, provide something with
the world, maybe it's notdirectly related to a specific
client, but it's something wecould do and share. So that's
where the idea came about. Weused AI for all the
(23:23):
illustrations as well. So it wassuper fun kind of collaborative
effort from the team. But thatwas really exciting and the the
first foray as well into selfpublishing a book so that was
not something I'd done beforebut now it's something we could
easily help you know, any clientdo so that right that's like new
skills that you just do foryourself sometimes that you can
(23:43):
then share with other people butInternet safety 70 Sammy, I
should say is about Sammy, whois learning just different
skills for navigating theinternet is directed for young
children, obviously, of youknow, a lot of the things we
know as adults, but maybehonestly sometimes can forget
about what you click on and whatinformation and who, who you see
(24:04):
online, I think as a parent nowmyself, it is you look at a job,
your job in a different way ofjust there are some things
online that you don'tnecessarily aren't necessarily
healthy, I think for young kids.
So this can at least help teachsome of like Internet safety
practices and a fun easy waythat's age appropriate, you
know, for a little while, maybefive years old. But yeah, that
(24:26):
was very a fun project. And Iwould love to do more of that.
We got a lot of good feedback,you know, from people about
that. So it's really cute. Ilove it.
Um, by the way, we'll put a linkin the show notes so that people
can buy the book because I thinkit's available online yet. Yeah,
(24:46):
Amazon.
Okay, what about have youstarted to announce your other
new endeavor that you arebuilding this summer? Okay,
okay. I didn't want to tell toomuch. ahead. Okay. Yeah, so we
actually launchedThe website on Monday, so very
excited, I will we can sharethat as well. It's an event
called speaker. And it's it'snot I would say that the quick
(25:07):
version to explain it is it's aconference for keynote speakers.
But it's really more than just aconference, it's an opportunity
to film a brand new sizzle reel.
And we have our production teamis amazing that we're working
with at the events in New York.
And the production team hasworked on Netflix specials and
Ted Talks. And if you wantsomebody to make you look good,
(25:27):
they are going to do it. Andthey're super nice people. So
excited to work there. Diamondgrade media is the name of our
production partners. So at theevent, it's a weekend long
event, Friday through Sunday,you'll come you'll get some
coaching from the director tohelp you you know, film your
sizzle reel, you get 20 minuteson stage, we'll have a live
audience. And you know, it's agreat opportunity. If you've not
(25:50):
kind of gone through thisexperience before we're here we
work with a lot of keynotespeakers. I'm Sarah, you're,
you're one of them. But it canbe difficult to put together a
reel if you depending on not allof your clients have great video
or it doesn't their stagedoesn't look good. Or you might
not want that in a you know, ashow reel experience. So this is
a way that you can get reallyawesome high quality footage on
(26:14):
the stage and the reactions ofpeople. And then there's also
marketing, you get newheadshots. And then there's
workshops and sessionsthroughout the weekend to teach
you okay, you have all these newcollateral for your business,
what do you do with it? How canyou, you know, use that to your
advantage? We'll have Bureaurepresentation there, so you can
network with other speakers andBureau people to help guide you
(26:35):
further in your career. It'sobviously you know, the keynote
world is very competitive. Sowhat do you need to do, from a
paper click standpoint, acontent standpoint, really
helping you market yourself abit better. So I'm very excited,
Sara is going to come and be apart of the event. Very excited.
Yeah, I will be there. I'm soexcited. And you've done such a
(26:57):
brilliant job, one of the realand for those people listening
on the keynote front, it's thiscatch 22 You really can't get a
gig of paid speaking engagementuntil you have a video. But you
can't really get a video untilyou have a paid speaking
engagement. And so this is theopportunity for someone to
(27:18):
practice their craft to get upon a stage to deliver their
keynote and then the productionstudio makes it into a video
that then will be able to beused to sell for the future. And
I mean, you've solved a reallybig problem in the industry. And
so I'm really grateful and proudof you. And I think people are
(27:39):
going to really benefit fromthis so that they can kick off
either a revamp of theirspeaking business or they can
kick start it and so veryexcited. Yeah, I think it'll be,
you know, really cool. And it'sSeptember 27. That weekend, if
anyone's interested, feel freeto send me a message on
(28:00):
LinkedIn. But yeah, the goalreally is for you to leave,
refreshed and sort of energizedin your career path as far as
keynote speaking, and obviously,we're a resource to anyone you
know, who has questions, but Ilove what you said, kind of
about the catch 22 You need thatreel and it's hard to get so and
it's expensive to do on your ownif you just wanted to make that
(28:23):
work and to hire people in theaudience and all the people. So
the the point of the event is tomake it accessible and fun and
knowledgeable. You know, we'velearned a lot at the event and
network with other people. Soyeah, very excited. Really
great, Lauren, and I'm soexcited to be part of it.
Any other things that you'relaunching, I mean, goodness
(28:46):
sakes, any other things that youwant to tell our listeners or
think things that are coming up.
Um, I'm trying to think I thinkthe biggest thing right now that
our team is working on asSpeaker, we would love this is
our inaugural event. So thefirst one, obviously, of its
kind in New York in September,but we'd love to make it a
series if people you know, enjoyit, there's 28 spots. So it's
(29:08):
limited of how many but our ourgoal or our hope is that there's
more than 28 people interestedso we will do it again or fairly
regularly to make it easy foryou to update those assets. So
that's that's kind of anexciting thing to potentially
take it as a multi event.
(29:28):
Sort of experience so indifferent cities as well to make
it easy for people to attendfrom that the travel
perspective. So that's thebiggest thing on our plates as
far as newness.
I guess the other thing I couldmention, for myself, I was
recently accepted to the ForbesBusiness Council. So I'll, I'm
going to start writing somecontent that will be featured on
(29:50):
forbes.com. So I'm excited aboutthat. Just you know, increased
opportunity for myself andvisibility for the agency and
sharing some of the knowledgewithin you
A group. So that's wonderful,very proud of you. And I'm not
proud. So thank you. Yeah, it'sreally great. Yeah, you've
helped so many people to launchtheir speaking career to build
(30:13):
their brand, whether it's apersonal brand,
you know, like mine, the SarahFranklin brand, or Dr. Lynn
Dooley, definitely, I got thename wrong.
But there's so many folks andyou have, you know, kind of a
knack for understanding theimportant things that
(30:34):
differentiate someone to helpbuild the strategy. So that's
really great.
You've also done a really goodjob of kind of building your
team. And so I just have to kindof a nod and a
gracious, thank you to thepeople that, you know, I think
have brought my businesses tolife. You know, I, I always have
(30:55):
said that, Alison, is like,directly connected, like she has
her like, you know, chart, oriPhone chargers, like, right in
my head, we are like, right onthe same page. But you've had
this knack of matching peoplewith a similar culture of
similar philosophy. It's a hardthing as a business owner, to
give your brand to an agency anda Yeah, run with it, right?
(31:19):
Because it's like, gosh, arethey going to say the right
thing? Are they going to do theright thing? And for us, and I'm
talking about Tresco, right atthis very moment, you know, the
service the the kind of love andsupport and serve mentality that
we have, it has to have theright person on the marketing
(31:39):
side to be able to bring this tolife. And then from the point
Northeast side and the SarahFrasca side. I mean, it's just
been tremendous. Especially as afemale leader, I have wanted it
to be, you know, reallyimpactful for other women, I
want to be, you know, welcomingenough. So again, you've done
such a beautiful job. I thinkthere are women out there who
(32:02):
tear other women down. Yeah, Ithink that you are one of the
good ones, where it's like youare one of the women who only
props other women up. And so Ijust Yeah, yeah. Yep. I think
it's been really fun and reallygreat. So, yeah, I think one of
the things that can be hard atfirst, when you start a new
(32:24):
business, or there's momentswhere you may feel like, oh,
there are other companies orother people who do marketing or
who offer similar services, orare my competitors, and I think,
at least for me, I try to groundmyself in like, there's plenty
of opportunity for everyone,like sort of that abundance
mindset, obviously, everyone hastheir days are like, oh, you
(32:45):
know, get down on yourself orwhatnot. But I think
coming from that place has onlyresulted in, you know, more
opportunities for myself and myteam. And I think when it comes
to our team, and how we've builtwe've been, I've been certainly
very intentional with like, whowe interview and you know, what
the wanting to preserve ourculture, which is certainly, you
(33:06):
know, easier said than done.
Alison's amazing, I call her my,my OG. She's our very first
intern. So she's been thelongest here the longest, I love
her. So, she's, she's great. Andwe try to, you know, when we
work with clients to findclients, who are a good culture
fit with us, right? Becauseevery, you know, I think what
you're,I'm very inspired by how you run
(33:26):
Treska and like your businessesas well, I think that aligns
very well with like, how we, youknow, try to run our teams with,
you know, empathy and sincerityand all that good stuff. And I,
I think to one other, I guess,reflection based on what you
said is with, with the personalbrands, or people as brands,
we're lucky we get to work witha lot of clients who we, you
(33:46):
know, help ghost write contentfor them or represent their own
personal brand. And that'ssomething we take really
seriously because I dounderstand, you know, that it
can feel scary for some peopleto like, let go of the reins
sometimes or focus on otherareas of their business. And let
us like, let us run with this.
So we really try to build upthat trust that like, hey, we,
(34:09):
you know, we won't let you down.
As far as you know, sharingcontent or working, speaking on
your behalf. So I think it'simportant to find someone who's
a good fit for you from theclient piece, who will also take
it as seriously you know, as youso that's just my thought on
that. Well, and I have alwaysagain, you know, this goes back
to yours at General Mills,the partners that you bring in
(34:34):
and build a trustingrelationship with that are
underneath the tent with you orwhatever the analogy is. So they
understand intimately thebusiness in and out and that
gosh, we may make a mistake andthey may make a mistake, but all
of it is with the kind of endgoal in mind. And that is you
(34:57):
know, againAnd for my businesses a little
bit different, but serving andproviding a product that
either tastes good or helpsbusinesses, depending on which
one we're talking about. Soyeah, I think your team has done
a done a wonderful job. And wehave so much fun. Emily Ryan,
Allison, I mean, we just reallyhave a great time with your
(35:20):
team. They're good people sowell, um, any other tidbits that
I can help you with eitherbrainstorming in the moment or
things you're hoping for, maybethere's somebody out there that
can help that's listening, orI guess I'm trying to think
through I know, for speaker, wejust launched our website this
(35:41):
week. We you know, we work withlots of keynote speakers, but
any thoughts you have ofhelping raise awareness?
Obviously, the keynote speakingspace is super busy. There's,
you know, people.
Any thoughts about that? I mean,do the Bureau's know that you're
doing it? Yeah. So we've startedsome of that outreach to let
(36:03):
them know, inviting them toattend.
And I think that's superexciting. We're also working on
we're going to have a keynotespeaker at the event, a
celebrity keynote speaker. Sowe're finalizing who that might
be depending on who's available.
So that'll be exciting. We thinkthat can be a draw as well. Oh,
cool, huh.
(36:23):
But yeah, I think one of thethings that we're learning
about, I guess, as this is ourfirst in person event we've ever
thrown, so lots of new things tolearn. But as far as you know,
what the onsite collateral like,where do we want to put signs?
And how many do we do we want todo? And all of that? I know,
obviously, you have a ton ofmarketing materials for the
(36:44):
restaurant, and, you know,posters and all that kind of
stuff. But if there's any ideasyou have around, around that,
I'm certainly welcome both.
Well, I mean, yeah, I think, youknow, the, the
advice that I would have for youthere is that sometimes it's the
(37:04):
sizzle that sells the steak. Andso I would say it may seem like
a splurge to have lots ofwhether it's balloon arches, or
Yeah, balloons actually are oneof my favorites. I would tell
folks in my General Mills days,I mean, $100, you can have this
massive balloon, whatever. Andit's so dramatic, but in so
(37:29):
little, so it's like, do theballoons. Yeah, um, and so I
think, you know, sometimes itlooks more impressive, it feels
more impressive. It feels moreprofessional, or when there is
that type of signage with thebranding and the directional. So
the other thing I would say isthat if you can have the
(37:49):
empathy, which I know you do, tothink through all of the moments
in the day, or the days of whatis a person going to be
thinking, are they tired at thispoint, do they need to eat
whatever it is, you want to kindof get ahead of their needs?
Yeah. And then I'm sure you'lldo this, because again, you're
so empathetic, but it's sort ofthat like, all encompassing.
(38:14):
You're moving them through theday, through the agenda through
the process, you'reaccommodating, you know, most
you'll never accommodate all,but most of the needs and you
know, having things in thebackground that if someone needs
support, like you know, aphysician or a
dentist or I'm making all thisup, but they're they're
(38:36):
traveling in, they're notfamiliar with the area. So what
is it that they might need? Arethere extra toothbrushes or, you
know, it's a really it's kind ofa funny, because you are helping
them to be ready for a verypublic showing? Yes, yeah. And
they Yeah, so, um,I think you know, kind of, I
would, I would describe it asgreasing the skids of all the
(38:59):
things that could go wrong inthe moment. One of the things
that I do when I'm actuallygoing on the road to do my
speaking is I bring what Iagain, dumb name, but I call it
my bridesmaid kit. Basically,like every single thing you
could ever possibly need, right?
It has band aids, and it hassafety pins, and it has a little
(39:19):
thing of thread. It hasscissors, it has tape glue
in there. I mean, it's likethink through anything you might
be needing in the moment becauseyou never know when you're going
to need duct tape. And you neverknow when you're going to need a
pair of scissors. And yeah, soI'm I'm curious. That's brings
up a question for me to ask you,actually. So
(39:40):
when you were first starting outin keynote speaking, I mean, I
call you a pro. Now you know,you you book a lot of events and
you're kind of seasoned to itnow. But when you're first
starting out, is there anythingfrom either a marketing
perspective or a brandingperspective that you wish
someone maybe told you soonerthat
Maybe it could be something wecan help teach or pass along,
(40:03):
you know, at the event in the inthe workshops. Yeah, I mean, I
reallylet me think about that for a
minute. I have amaybe a couple of responses. I
mean, the first one is, youknow, finding a gracious mentor,
I think is a really importantcomponent. I mean, this is, you
know, just like any other oraleducation is taught in a way
(40:29):
where the person who is teachingyou or guiding you or correcting
you, or, I mean, everything thatthey say, helps to influence
everything you do from there on.
Yeah. And so, you know, I've hadgood coaches, and I've had bad
coaches, I've had coaches wherethey have said, Oh, no, you can
(40:54):
use what I've told you. And so Ialways think back to like, and
this is just what pops into mymind in the moment is like, if I
went to a professional baseballteam, and I was a pitcher, and
someone taught me how to pitch,I'm never going to pitch in a
different like that peerlearning follows me through my
(41:15):
career no matter what team I goto. So I sort of think that
pairing people with a mentorthat says, I have no, I have
nothing toyou, you can't take it back. I'm
only here to help serve and togive knowledge and to you take
it and run with it. Yeah,everything I've taught you is
now for you to discern is thisvaluable or not valuable. And
(41:37):
there's, and so I would sayhaving a gracious mentor, I
think that's my first tip.
Second tip is that anything thatcan go wrong someday will.
So being ready for that is anincredibly important component.
So I talked about the brides.
When I do my road traveling, Ialways bring with a couple of
(42:00):
other things. And so I alwaysbring extra batteries for a
clicker, I'm assuming that theplace that I go to will have a
clicker, but if they don't havea slide, advancing clicker, I've
brought my own. Plus, I'vebrought my own batteries, I
usually travel with almost everychord you could possibly
(42:20):
imagine, including some that Ihaven't seen since like the 80s.
I mean.
So, you know, I think kind ofbeing prepared. I've had the
audio visuals not work. I've hadthe video play, but no sound.
And so I've had to learn how totalk through that. And so again,
if you can help speakers, andthis is having the empathy of
(42:45):
what could go wrong, and let'shave them be ready for it.
I think that's really important.
And even emotional of like, atwhatever the because I've had a
keynote where the hotel'sfire alarm started going off.
There's nothing we could do thehotel said, No problem, there's
(43:05):
not really a fire. So now, nowwe know we're safe. And we don't
have to evacuate. But I'm up onthe stage, giving a keynote.
What I had to do was to tell thestory, and then stop for the
beeping, and then tell the storyagain, and then yeah, can throw
you off if you weren't ready topivot. Right. Totally. So going
with the flow. Yeah. Yeah.
That's interesting. We weretalking about, you know, as far
(43:28):
as the workshops go to actuallyhave a guest speaker come in. He
comes from the Gosh, my, it'sescaping me right now. The, the
comedy that's like,gosh, Second City, yes. But
where were you just sort of gooff of nothing.
(43:51):
Like an ad lib, like?
Good looking on the words, butyou know, what I mean, a
comedian to come in to help say,you know, in those moments
where, okay, you're, you'regreat at delivering your speech
in the perfect scenario, butyou're very, you're not always
gonna get the perfect scenario.
So whether it's a speech or Iknow a lot of speakers do
(44:12):
consulting or workshops or youknow, complementary services. So
what do you do if you notice,like, the audience is kind of
glazing over and you know, notreally participating? And you're
great at this or I've seen youdo it, like reengaging people
but to have a comedian come in,not from a how do you be funny,
but how do you sort of comediansare great at this, like bringing
(44:33):
people back in.
So that that being almost like aworkshop of sorts of like
teaching you how to do that. Ilove that. I mean, honestly,
even the fact that neither of uscan think of the word.
I still can'tcome up with that after this
podcast. Like, oh, but what Iwas gonna say is there's a
(44:54):
humility for both of us of like,oh, boy, we right
We can't think the darn word.
But that makes us more human.
And if I'm translating this to akeynote, it's what I call the
Mentos. You remember the Mentoscommercial where the lady breaks
or high heel? Yeah. And then shejust breaks the other heel. And
(45:15):
she's like, nevermind, I've gotthis. What's the type of thing
that if you're comfortableenough with yourself, it's like,
oh, gosh, I may screw up amillion different things. But
like, that makes you more human.
And so if you I mean, you'regracious enough for or I'm
grateful for you to say that Ido this? Well, I really don't
have a lot of like, I don'treally care if I have a mess up,
right? Because my ultimate goalis to help people and maybe
(45:38):
helping them is explaining howreal my life is right? Like, I'm
not perfect, I'm never going tobe perfect. And so I have screw
ups just like everybody else.
But I still have fun. And I makefun of myself. And I'm still
kind of, you know, carry on andcontinue to have a point and
(45:58):
whatever else. So I think thatyou know that that is one of the
things that I think makes a goodteacher, a good coach, a good
speaker, or a good manager isjust the ability to kind of
like, oh, well, I can't think ofthis thing. But oh, well, you
got the point. Right. Yeah.
(46:21):
Yeah, so I think I think havinga comedian that can kind of
bring that home will be great.
And that poor comedian is goingto have to help us with the word
again. But I remember it'simprov. That's the word I was.
Good work. Okay. Oh, my gosh,that's so funny. Yeah, I mean,
hey, you have to improvisationcomes to life at all points.
(46:44):
Like, personally,professionally, but a very
apropos moment for yes.
That's cute. Well, Lauren,you've done such a brilliant job
of building a business fromscratch, thank you for bringing
together your experience fromall sorts of big, small, good
times and bad. And I think, youknow, you've done such a
(47:08):
beautiful job of building a teamof having humility of bringing
that empathy.
And I really appreciate all thatyou've done for me and my
businesses, I look forward tomany years, you know, partnering
together, in my, in my lastmoment, I mean, I would just
say, you know, if there's anyway, or any, anything you come
(47:29):
across, that you feel likepeople that need help, and
especially young women, and youknow, that that need help, I
mean, let's collaborate togetherto continue to try to kind of
push them, you know, up into theworld to bring them to the
forefront of, you know, whateverit is that they need to learn.
Andthat goes for you, your team and
(47:50):
anybody you come across. So,absolutely, yeah. And same here.
If there's anyone that you meetthat, I mean, women are awesome
luminary women are amazing. AndI feel like we bring a lot to
the table. So I'm proud thatwe're, you know, women owned
women led company. And I thinkthat there's so much opportunity
to help other you know, like,bring up the next the next
(48:12):
person. So I'd love to do that.
It's our duty. Yeah, I agree.
All right, good. Well, thank youfor being on the show. And we'll
put everything we talked aboutin the show notes so people can
find you. And they can be a partof speaker if that's something
that's of interest to them. Iwill be thrilled to be in New
(48:33):
York with you very soon. ComeSeptember. And other than that,
have a great day. Good luck withHenry. Thank you. You too. Have
good luck with all your kiddos.
Thank you, Lauren. All right.
Well, we'll talk to you soon.
Thanks, everybody for listening.
If you're out there and you needmarketing help Laurens your girl
but if you need any other help,I'm very happy to help so
(48:54):
everyone have a great day. Goodluck leveling up your business.
Hi, Ithanks so much for tuning into
this episode of level up yourbusiness with me, Sarah Frasca.
If you have a problem in yourbusiness that's keeping you up
at night. Please join us in afuture episode so we can help
get you unstuck. Just clickingthe link in the show notes and
(49:17):
send us a message. Pleaseremember, stay innovative
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