Dana Sitar from WritersBucketList.com shares her experience with creating a crowdfunding campaign through Ingiegogo. An experienced launcher, Dana decided to tackle a new approach to raise funding for a series of courses to help people self-publish their work, without losing rights or spending a lot of their own money.

She shares what she learned from the experience, advice to consider before tackling your own crowdfunding campaign, and what’s next now that the fundraising part of the process is over.  Also, tune in to find out if her campaign was a “success.”

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Team publishing for self-publishers
• Using the platform
• Choosing the platform – fixed or flexible funding
• Does audience size or list size matter when going through a campaign
• How to measure campaign success outside of dollars raised
• The critical skillsets you need to be successful with crowd funding
• Preparing products in public – the pros and cons of it
• Making big changes – does your audience notice?

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• The Ingiegogo Campaign – it’s not live, but you can see the ins and outs here
• Epub Courses that Dana is offering as a result of the campaign
• Seth Godin Kickstarter Campaign to self-publish
• Paul Jarvis Kickstarter Campaign Cancellation
• Writer’s Bucket List Book
• Catherine Caffeinated, this post in particular

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH DANA?

MORE ABOUT DANA SITAR

Dana Sitar is an author, blogger, and digital publishing coach to entrepreneurial writers and writerly entrepreneurs. She shares resources, tips, and tools to get budding writers out of their head and onto the page through coaching, courses, and the DIY Writing community at WritersBucketList.com.

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Jessica Williams from Prichard Communications and Mac’s List, shares her experience of her professional life launching with her personal life. Leaping into the unknown because she just knew she was in the right place, working through new work tasks, and successfully growing her client’s reach by over 50% – several years running.

She shares what she learned on her journey and how great it was for her professional launch to create and ignite a personal launch, at the same time.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Ways your professional launch can foster a personal launch
• Taking a leap of faith into the unknown
• Building a website and list over 50% through relationships and connections
• Trial and error and figuring it all out
• Being in the job that you are supposed to be in
• Navigating difficult situations and coming out on the other side

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Prichard Communications
• Mac’s List

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH JESSICA?

MORE ABOUT JESSICA WILLIAMS

Jessica Williams is an account director at Prichard Communications where she works with nonprofits and foundations in health and human services. She is also the account director for “Mac’s List,” a service of Prichard Communications and an online community connecting talented jobseekers with employers who offer rewarding work. She writes for the “Mac’s List” and Prichard Communications blogs.

An avid adventurer, poetry enthusiast and nature walker, Jessica is often found practicing yoga, wandering the streets of Portland, or playing with her dog. Jessica has worked in sales, marketing, and communications since she graduated from Wake Forest University in North Carolina in 2003. She has a master’s in strategic communications from the University of Oregon and is a certified yoga instructor. In 2008, she locked eyes with a killer whale in the middle of the Pacific Ocean – she can’t let it go.

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Kent Wyatt co-founded Emerging Local Government Leaders (ELGL) after a difficult career transition when he relocated to Oregon. He has thrown the doors wide open and brought transparency back into the realm of local government to help others launch their careers and grow and get involved.

He shares his “launch” moment – which starts at his future retirement party. How he makes career decisions and navigates the path of career and life with Pearl Jam at the end of the line.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• The retirement party impact – making genuine connections
• How we can make a longer impact
• Who Kent will invite to play at his retirement party
• How ELGL launches other people’s careers
• How to turn informational interviews to career success
• Being proactive – is it generational? Why are we so hesitant to do it?
• How do I get involved? What do I look for in an association?
• Sticking out in the job market

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• ELGL Website
• Mac’s List
• Thank You Notes

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH KENT?

MORE ABOUT KENT WYATT

Kent is the co-founder of the Emerging Local Government Leaders (ELGL) and a senior management analyst for the City of Tigard. His duties for Tigard include risk management, franchise management, state and federal affairs, and special projects.

Kent founded ELGL after experiencing a difficult career transition following the move from Virginia to Oregon. ELGL is a nationwide organization of more than 450 members from 20 states who are committed to connecting, educating, and communicating with all stakeholders in the local government arena. ELGL connects through monthly forums, Twitter-sations, webinars, social media, and most importantly, face-to-face.

Prior to moving to Oregon, Kent lived in Richmond, Virginia and worked as a senior legislative analyst for the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission. Kent graduated from Elon University with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration and graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with a master’s degree in Public Administration.

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PODCAST

Kevin Kermes from All Things Career, shares his experience launching several different launches including new sites and a podcast, all at once. He talks about how he determined it was time to spin off into new brands, how he managed fear, and how to figure out what your audience really wants.

Kevin pulls back the curtain on his business and shares how he starts with the audience he has and continues to provide incredible value to them before launching into new space.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Why doesn’t engagement scale

• How is everything we are doing, going to help the people who are coming to us for advice?
• Keep moving, start moving
• Collective mindshare isn’t getting out to the people
• You are not your market
• If it’s not valuable to your market, stop wasting time on it
• If you’re looking for a reason to validate why you aren’t moving forward, you won’t move forward – you’ve already decided
• Instead of mitigating fear, how to become aware of it
• When people call you out on mistakes, it creates an opportunity to listen to your audience
• Fear can pop up at any point during the process
• How to reach out to your clients to understand what they need and how you can provide it to them
• Your knowledge that is so innate to you, is very useful to others
• Being consistent and testing
• The importance of engaged fans instead of numbers
• Creating your own business inside of your career
• Capturing your work so you can delegate

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Ryan Lee: niche-ing down twice
• Ramit Sethi – Zero to Launch
• Get Promoted Course sales page – and focusing on outcomes and being true to you
• 1000 True Fans
• Podcast Episode mentioned: Kimberly Palmer on the Economy of You
• Red Thread Thinking (book)
• Alexis Grant
• Delegating tools mentioned: Camtasia (screen recording), Wistia (video), Odesk (freelancers)

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH KEVIN?

MORE ABOUT KEVIN KERMES

Kevin Kermes is the Founder of All Things Career, a leading online media and publishing organization. As the purveyor of online resources such as Career Attraction, CareerMeh, Every Veteran Hired, ATC has published more than 30 different career focused training programs. His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, LinkedIn, Business Insider, LifeHacker, The Muse, Brazen Careerist, Monster, Career Builder, Military Times and more.

PODCAST

Emily Kapit is the founder of ReFresh Your Step – a career advisory company that she started after leaving the Finance industry to go out on her own. Through many iterations of her company, she has successfully scaled her original service of providing resume services to be a full career advisory with a staff of people working with her.

She shares her launch motto, which is growing organically – without being afraid to change directions and taking the blinders off. Following her own advice, she walks us through how she has scaled her business and her ultimate networking strategy.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Different iterations of the company
• How and when to scale
• How to get deal with the growing pains and change of scope
• This is the way it needs to be, deep breath and let it go
• Reframing the change to clients
• ABN – Always Be Networking
• Not networking, but connecting with someone with commonalities
• Marketing without marketing
• Reaching out to groups that you would naturally want to join
• Asking around the well-connected people in the community
• BNI organization – networking connections
• Reframing when things don’t go as planned
• There is always going to be the next step without a safety net
• Planning – being strategic and the growth potential is there

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH EMILY?

MORE ABOUT EMILY KAPIT

Emily Kapit, MS, CPRW, ACRW, is the founder, lead resume writer, and head career strategist at ReFresh Your Step, LLC, a career advisory firm based in Miami, Florida with clients located nationally and internationally.

Emily specializes in writing highly tailored, targeted resumes, cover letters, LinkedIn profiles and other professional documents. She is one of South Florida’s only Certified Professional Resume Writers (CPRW) and one of very few ACRWs (Academy Certified Resume Writers). In addition to written documents, she also collaborates with clients on targeted job search strategies, effective networking tactics, and comprehensive interviewing techniques.

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PODCAST

Stacey Winget is an events and casting photographer in the Los Angeles area for her own photography studio, Stacey Winget Photography. After having a successful career in the world of entertainment in casting and producing, she decided to listen to the advice the universe was giving her, and decided to turn her side hustle into a full time business.

She shares her first year struggles, how she managed the leap into entrepreneurship and her best advice to others who are looking to start their own photography business.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• A choice between two different paths
• In the long term of my life, this is what I want
• Flexibility in my career choices
• Having a safety net – financial and support
• How networking helped create success
• Missteps along the way
• Finding the right specialty and how I could find those customers
• Capturing moments, not setting them up
• How to build a business around a specific niche; how do I reach the people I want to work with?
• When you’re trying to figure it out – worrying about the “wasted year”
• How to navigate social media and the question of oversharing pictures of other people
• Getting a schedule together and structuring your day

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Andy Cochrane
• Liz Law Jewelry

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH STACEY?

MORE ABOUT STACEY WINGET

Stacey Winget is a photographer in Los Angeles with past experience as a casting, entertainment executive and producer.

She began her career working in the casting department at Fox Broadcasting Company for 8 years and ultimately became a casting executive covering shows such as House and Bob’s Burgers. She then moved to the media entertainment company BermanBraun, where she eventually was the sole editor and primary writer for the film and television community-based website, Screened.

Stacey has also produced several projects crossing over different mediums. In 2011, she produced an album and a music video for the band Darin Bennett and the Requeim. The song ‘Holdin’ Me’ is the theme song for the new Discovery Show ‘Warlocks Rising.’ The music video for the same song was featured in several film festivals and on countless music blogs. She is also working on production of an interactive short film and episodic series with director, Andrew Cochrane and the children’s Halloween book, ‘The Trick or Freaks.’

Currently, she runs an independent photography business in the Los Angeles area that focuses on events and production stills. Her experience in the entertainment industry helps guide her interactions with high-profile clients and event guests.

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Tina Lee is the founder of MotherCoders – a non-profit helping working moms grow their coding skills in the Bay Area. After having her first child, Tina had a difficult time being able to increase her coding skills while looking after her young one. An epiphany – she probably wasn’t the only mom who needed childcare assistance to find the time/space to learn.

Her organization just finished their first beta test and are in the process of raising more money for round two… and also figuring out what the next stage will look like. She shares her struggles, ideas, her measures of success, and the best advice she has for anyone starting a non-profit (or any other venture).

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• On-ramping moms into new careers in a technical economy
• At a moment of despair, you have empathy for others who may be experiencing the same thing
• Pilot – raised money to cover costs of the concept, but no profits
• Time and food was donated
• Pricing going forward to offset costs as a non-profit
• Figuring out what their eco-system will look like – what their sweet spot will be
• Making their platform available to the people who need it, without cost being a barrier
• Keep tinkering and learning
• Leap of faith not knowing what the payoff will be
• Figuring out a way to make this work financially for our family
• Having the runway to fail, learn and tinker
• Guilt that comes with being a working mom
• Being terrified everyday… also known as being an entrepreneur
• Success is a moving target
• You cannot be awesome by yourself – social capital is important

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH TINA?

MORE ABOUT TINA LEE

Tina Lee is the founder of MotherCoders, a non-profit organization whose mission is to create a more dynamic, sustainable, and inclusive economy by on-ramping moms to technical careers. She started MotherCoders in September 2013 — 4 months after her second child was born — when she wanted to get more proficient in computer programming and couldn’t find a resource that worked well for her given her work and parenting responsibilities. After surveying her options, Tina had a hunch there might be other moms like her out there, yearning for a learning experience that involved lots of social interaction and support from like-minded peers. MotherCoders just wrapped up their pilot program and are fundraising for more classes.

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Tanya Geisler is a leadership coach and leading expert on the Impostor Complex – having helped hundreds of people be more of who they are supposed to be and step into their starring role. Having successfully launched several different programs, products and coaching services, Tanya’s approach to launching is to focus not only on over-delivering, but also on listening to her audience’s needs.

In this episode, Tanya shares the launch of her free ebook which you can get here, 12 Lies of the Impostor Complex (and One Truth) – which was the culmination and philosophy of all of the work that she does.  But the ebook is really just a primer to her biggest launch ahead – her program, Step Into Your Starring Role. This will be the fourth time she launches this program, but each iteration has a different focus, target audience, and core deliverable – with the same life-changing content.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Understanding what the Impostor Complex is
• Some of the myths we tell ourselves that are really the Impostor Complex speaking
• Step Into Your Starring Role – a comprehensive coaching program that helps you move past the Impostor Complex
• How to launch… and why we hold ourselves back
• Slipping it in the water launching – and why our results are a direct reflection of our approach
• Why being able to talk about yourself is essential as a coach or business owner

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Tedx Talk on Owning Our Authority and the Impostor Complex
• Step Into Your Starring Role Program
• Board of Your Life

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH TANYA?

MORE ABOUT TANYA GEISLER

Tanya Geisler is Leadership Coach (CPCC, ACC) with a penchant for clarity and an abhorrence of the Impostor Complex. She’s coached hundreds of people who were ready to step into the starring roles of their lives. The 12 Lies of the Impostor Complex (and One Truth), The Joy Pages, created Board of Your Life and the transformational 12-week Step into Your Starring Role program, is a blogger for the wildly popular The Daily Love, has served as contributor and was featured in Canadian Living, and is an in-demand TEDx speaker who talks with great passion about the Impostor Complex, personal leadership, on all things joy, meaning and purpose (just try to stop her).

It is her indomitable belief that if everyone knew their own unique recipe for their personal brand of joy, they’d hold the key to shining in their life, in their work and in their life’s work. (It really does change everything.)

PODCAST

Terry “Starbucker” St. Marie is a former corporate executive turned entrepreneur and Angel investor, who is known for his More Human Leadership mantra. He has a very successful blog and is in the process of launching a new magazine for entrepreneurs called Built Oregon.

In this episode, Terry shares his current launch progress, why he decided to focus on building a magazine for entrepreneurs, and how to apply being More Human in every aspect of your life.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Take what Terry’s learned over my career and teach it – became a mentor first, angel investor, and now sharing all of the lessons that I learned
• Like any entrepreneurial spark, it always come from opportunity
• Shifting blog topics – how it has evolved and impacted the audience
• Leadership can be found in any social situation – people want to follow good leaders and be part of something bigger than themselves
• More Human Leadership – Applying More Human to everything I do
• Building an audience or building a business? And how it would be if you were starting today
• Can you have your cake and eat it too, when it comes to building an online audience?
• Building relationships instead of hoping a post goes viral
• Being a better business person because I had to interview so many people – and finding qualified people
• You cannot change someone’s personality
• How will big companies handle the millennial shift in the workplace and the search for meaning in work

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• BuiltOregon.com
• TerryStarbucker.com
• Pamela Slim‘s Body of Work (check out her podcast about Body of Work here)
• Simon Sinek’s: Start with Why
• Aaron Hurst’s: The Purpose Economy

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH TERRY?

MORE ABOUT TERRY “STARBUCKER” ST. MARIE

Terry “Starbucker” St. Marie is a writer, consultant, and startup investor living in Portland, Oregon.  Before moving to the Rose City in 2010, he had a successful 23 year tenure as an executive in the cable television industry.

Terry has extensive experience in business operations, customer care, strategy and financial management.  For the past 8 years he has also published a popular blog featuring his “More Human” leadership philosophy, TerryStarbucker.com, and was recently cited by Inc. Magazine as one of the “Top 100 Leadership and Management Experts.”

He’s also the co-founder of a new online magazine focused on entrepreneurs, BuiltOregon.com, which will be launching this fall.

Terry is the President of the Portland chapter of the Social Media Club, an investor in the Oregon Angel Fund and Angel Oregon, and is on the board of the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network.

PODCAST

Danny Iny has been a life-long entrepreneur and is the founder of Firepole Marketing – one of the best online resources to learn how to market successfully and painlessly. Danny gained notoriety after he was featured everywhere, after writing over 80 guest posts in one year – which then urged him to create his first viral product Write Like Freddy.

In this episode, Danny shares how he creates and launches successful, income-generating, and useful courses. Throughout the interview, he provides many insights, scripts, and shares his secrets to various launch and marketing strategies.

PS – I’ll be hosting a webinar with Danny on September 24th about Passion, Purpose and Prosperity this Year (The Proven 4-Step/12-Month Process to Create a Raving Fan-Base That Buys Over $250K of Your Stuff… Per Year!).

Sign-up here to reserve your spot – and be on the lookout for more details to come soon. 

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• How to build, launch and deploy training courses
• Getting clear on what people need and will respond to, before you launch
• Small iterative pilots and learning from the experience, validate and learn from there
• Freedom and reciprocity to give the people what they need and how to teach it
• The key to getting joint venture partners (affiliates)
• What is the product they want, and build it for them – and it takes humility and vulnerability
• How to do a JV, if you have a smaller list/audience – and the steps to gain traction (this is a great secret tip!)
• Failure is only failure if you stop playing the game

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• FirepoleMarketing.com
• Jeff Walker – circle of awesomeness
• “The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency.” – Bill Gates
• WriteLikeFreddy.com
• Super Hero Summit and the Course Builders Bootcamp
• CourseBuildersLive.com

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH DANNY?

Christie Mims believes that everyone should be happy in their career (something I fully agree with!) and she’s started a revolution to get you happy at work. Launching her first big JV/affiliate program for her flagship product, Christie pulls back the curtain mid-launch to share her mid-launch strategy.

In this episode, Christie talks about why she decided to get affiliate partners, how she’s using Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Strategy to deliver content and attract more customers, and what she’s learning in the process.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• How to find your JV partners
• What is a market match – serving the same community
• The process to create videos for her launch
• Some “rules” if you are considering Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Formula
• Not letting competing launches get in the way of your most important product

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Career Happiness Revolution – the product/launch discussed
• The Revolutionary Club – her main site/home
• Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Formula
• Danny Iny’s Podcast on JV’s

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH CHRISTIE?

Tim Grahl, for many years, was the man behind bestselling books and authors – helping them launch their book onto the list and create a platform and audience to help them engage with their fans online. As a long-time follower of Tim’s, I was excited to get his take on launching – and he shares with us two launches of his course, Instant Best Seller.

As you’ll hear, Tim shares specific and actionable information on what he did to take his course from disaster to a high-performing launch – and how you can too.

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TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• The exact five steps Tim took to turn his launch around
• How to reach beyond your core group of excited fans and find new customers
• Thoughts on webinar launches for his audience
• How to write effective sales copy for emails
• Evaluating the pre-launch window and activities
• The power of bonuses
• When to except sales during your launch window
• How to get better – and who to ask

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Out:think – Tim’s website
• Evernote – an online resource for you to store ideas, thoughts, notes and so much more
• I Will Teach You to Be Rich – Ramit Sethi’s website and Zero to Launch course
• Noah Kagan over at AppSumo and OkDork – here’s the Email 1k program
• Joseph Michael at Learn Scrivener Fast
• Scrivener – online content-generation tool for writers (like a more powerful word processor), allowing you to write out of order and easily make updates and rearrange and more 

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH TIM?

Shannon Whitehead from Factory45.co, is a distinguished sustainable apparel designer, who now helps other aspiring designers learn how to take their design idea to launch. Can you imagine – having a fashion sketch and then finally knowing how to get it made? You can do that just that in her program (applications are open until March 2nd).

In this episode, Shannon talks about her accelerator program Factory 45. She walks us through two different launches with different approaches and what her best advice is, for people looking to create their own program.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• How she ended up in fashion… the non-traditional route
• What is sustainable and ethical apparel creation
• Her approach to launches… with and without a detailed launch plan (guess which one worked better?)
• Getting clear on who is buying your program
• Being ok with targeting one, very specific, market and person
• Her best advice to those of you thinking about launching something

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Factory 45 – Shannon’s accelerator program (applications are open until March 2nd!)
• Be sure to check-out the blog posts on the Factory 45 site if you’re looking for the best information around!

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH SHANNON?

Laura Leigh Clarke from ProsperityQM is a successful author and coach, not to mention a recovering quantum physicist cum prosperity creator, profiler, and also actor, martial artist, and die hard Dr. Who Fan. She was running a very successful coaching business following the success of her book, Wire Yourself for Wealth, when she realized she was a vanilla life coach.

In this episode, Laura talks about her realization that she wasn’t be uniquely who she is and how she pivoted her business to let her authentic self shine through… and how that impacted her business and life.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Realizing that you have been holding back important parts of your authentic self to have a “vanilla coaching” business
• Accepting and embracing what makes you, uniquely you – and how that shows up in your business
• What a prosperity shift is and how you can experience one
• Getting limiting beliefs out of your way… regardless of where they show up
• Pivoting a successful business into the unknown – what to consider and how to move forward

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• ProsperityQM – learn how to make a prosperity shift
• Danny Iny from Firepole Marketing
• Wire Yourself for Wealth
• Laura’s Get Unstuck program

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH LAURA?

Ann Christiano is a professor at the University of Florida and created frank – an event bringing together communicators for social change. Stepping outside of her comfort zone when it launched, Ann shares how frank came to be and perhaps, a future shift in the way of the working world.

In this episode, Ann talks about the importance of community events, how to build partnerships with others and being your most authentic self at work – and how that impacts others.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Social change communications
• Building a destination for community
• Intersectionality and confluence of activists and journalist
• Remembering your passion and why you followed the path in the first place
• How to create a large-scale event from scratch – what to consider to make it happen
• Letting others help, create something better than you could have done on my own
• Does excitement reduce credibility at work? People want to have the opportunity to feel what you feel and want to be a part of that
• Difference between being this highly controlled individual versus being your best self
• When more people buy-in to the energy and see others being their best self, change happens
• The possibility of the new way of work
• How to become a change maker

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• frank
• Grist
• Prichard Communications
• Washington Post Hunt

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH ANN?

Rick Turoczy is a serial entrepreneur with many successes under his belt – all stemming from a popular blog about the Portland, OR startup community. Rick has applied his experience to an accelerator program in Portland called PIE – the Portland Incubator Experiment.

In this episode, Rick talks about the creativity of entrepreneurs and how, through various endeavors, helps entrepreneurs interact more creatively. And of course, how to ask for help to succeed (or fail faster).

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• PIE – how large corp can effectively work with startups and vice versa
• Converted from co-working space to an accelerator
• Opportunity to take active role in maturing and growing startups
• Entrepreneurs are just a different flavor of creative (bus or tech)
• How do we get more creatives interacting more creatively?
• How to help build better founders to teach them to be better at what they want to do so it’s easier for companies to start up and stay in Portland
• Good business but much better at what we do by the accelerator
• Serial entrepreneurship and the curse of knowledge
• Learn what works to enhance the entrepreneurial creativity
• Accelerate creative output in any form
• Trust to ask for help
• Keep your eyes open so you’re not blind to a really good opportunity
• Everyone is capable of being a mentor
• Have to be willing to be receptive to feedback – take advice and figure out what to do with it
• What you do everyday is one small tiny step towards your big vision (one of millions)
• Every time you start a company, is the first time you’re starting the company

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Prichard Communications (thanks for connecting us!)
• The Relaunch discussed: PIE – an accelerator program in Portland
• Sponsoring partner of PIE, Weiden+Kennedy
• Rick’s blog about the start-up community in Portland
• Oregon Story Board – digital storytelling
• Well-known accelerator programs: Y Combinator and Techstars
• Jim Collins’ book, Good to Great

WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH RICK?

PODCAST

In the inaugural episode of the Launch Yourself Podcast, I interview Pamela Slim, author of Body of Work and Escape from Cubicle Nation. She walks us through her current launch strategies for a successful book launch.

The success of Pam’s first book, has helped many unhappy corporate workers become thriving entrepreneurs. She has been instrumental in my own career – first from afar, providing me with the idea that you can create your own work path outside of the traditional route, and then as a mentor and coach – helping me define my own body of work.

In this episode, Pam will share so many rich nuggets of wisdom, not only about her current book launch strategies, but also about how to define your own Body of Work.

Topics discussed include:

• Career development post-economic “apocalypse”
• Specific details about her book launch including:
  • Activities to reach new markets while still engaging and interacting with your fans
  • Converting fence-sitters into fans
  • Obstacles that have come up during this launch and how she’s tackled them
• The power of networking and tactics to consider when you make the Big Ask

Resources Mentioned During this Episode:

• Pre-purchase Body of Work
• Escape from Cubicle Nation
• Pamela Slim – Pam’s new online home
• Press details page – good model for any launch
• Tim Grahl of the OutThink Group

Want to get in touch with Pam?

• Twitter: @PamSlim
• Facebook

More about Pam Slim

Pamela Slim is an award-winning author, business coach and speaker. She spent the first 10 years of her business as a consultant to large companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Charles Schwab and Cisco Systems, where she worked with thousands of executives, managers and employees.

In 2005, she started the Escape from Cubicle Nation blog, which is now one of the top career and business blogs on the web. In the last 8 years, she helped hundreds of entrepreneurs to start successful businesses.

Pam’s first book Escape from Cubicle Nation: From Corporate Prisoner to Thriving Entrepreneur was released in Spring, 2009 and won Best Small Business/Entrepreneur Book of 2009 by 800 CEO Read. Her new book, Body of Work, gives a fresh perspective on the skills required in the new world of work for people in all work modes, from corporate to non-profit to small business.

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Emily Sandford from Authentically Emmie and Authentically Social, is featured in this episode. She is a well-known blogger in the fitness and wellness category, and also has a thriving social media business. We chat about her own big launch – moving from a stable corporate job into launching her own social media firm.

Emily has been by my side as I launched my own business – through all of the ups and downs, helping keeping me on track and striving for more. She has helped thousands (or more!) of women feel comfortable in their own skin, and extremely open about sharing her struggles with her weight and confidence. (Spoiler alert – she continues to smash through them!).

In this episode, Emily shares how she knew it was time to walk away from her stable job, how she prepared for the leap, and how things have been since.

TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• The mindset of an “IBMer” to a solopreneur
• The moment of clarity, when she knew that it was time to leave the corporate world
• Letting go of the “shoulds”
• Her pre-planning into action for her launch – what worked and what didn’t
• Continued struggles and wins

RESOURCES MENTIONED DURING THIS EPISODE:

• Authentically Emmie – Emily’s online home and blog
• Authentically Social – Emily’s company
• Where we met: Jenny Blake’s Make Sh*t Happen Course
• Ladies Home Journal featuring Emily

Want to get in touch with Emily?

• Twitter: @Authemmie
• Facebook

MORE ABOUT EMILY SANDFORD

Emily Sandford is the blogger behind Authentically Emmie and has been featured in Ladies’ Home Journal, Shape Magazine, the New York Post, Prevention Magazine, the AP, and more. She is also the owner of Authentically Social, a social media marketing consultancy for health/wellness, fashion/beauty, and lifestyle companies. Founded in 2012 after eight years of traditional brand management experience, her results-oriented social media, blogger outreach, and community management plans have earned Emily clients across the United States.

Emily was recently named Amazing Woman of the Year by Stiletto Women – a Forbes-ranked leadership-centric lifestyle company for modern working business women. She serves on the Board of Directors for both the Junior League of Lexington and AAF Lexington. She received her undergraduate degree and MBA from the University of Kentucky.

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Paul Angone from All Groan Up and author of 101 Secrets for Your Twenties, is featured in this episode. Paul tells us how he marketed and launched his book, on a short turnaround time.

Paul landed his book deal after his post 21 Secrets from Your 20s went viral – being read by more than a million people in 180 countries. Paul has a background in “traditional” marketing – but walks us through how he leveraged his skills in marketing to go on a book tour, getting the word out, and landing his book on bestseller’s lists.

In this episode, Paul reflects back on his recent book launch – what worked well, what could have been done better, and what he’s working on now. And keeps me giggling throughout.

Topics Discussed Include:

• How to talk about what you’re doing and selling
• What marketing really is (hint: reinforcing your message)
• Fear of a dull launch
• Learning how to have grace
• What to do when you’re out of books
• The power behind creating a launch team
• How to make the ask

Resources Mentioned In this Episode:

• 101 Secrets for Your Twenties
• AllGroanUp
• Where Paul and I are in cahoots together – Jenny Blake’s Life After College

Want to get in touch with Paul?

• Twitter: @PaulAngone
• Facebook

More About Paul Angone

Paul Angone is a speaker, humorist, the author of 101 Secrets for Your Twenties, and the creator of AllGroanUp.com, a place for those struggling with “what now?” His work has been featured on the Huffington Post, SiriusXM radio, The Chelsea Krost Show, Collegiate Magazine, Relevant Magazine etc. with his article 21 Secrets for your 20s having been read by over a million people in 180 countries.

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Jenny Blake from JennyBlake.me and Life After College and author of Life After College: The Complete Guide to Getting What You Want, is featured in this episode. Jenny shares her story of expanding her brand and online presence through the launch of her new website, JennyBlake.me.

After running a very successful blog for eight years, Jenny launched a new website under her own name, hoping to share new sides of her and reflecting the various ways in which she helps her clients. Jenny is a sought-after speaker and coach, and has personally helped me launch my business and expand my own realm of possibilities.

In this episode, Jenny shares the behind the scenes story about her website launch – why she decided it was time, figuring out who she is with a new story to tell, what went according to plan, and what didn’t work as well as she had hoped.

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TOPICS DISCUSSED INCLUDE:

• Expanding past your current niche market
• Branding is more than just picking colors and fonts
• Figuring out what your value is – who am I without that story?
• Fear of not being unique enough
• Commitment to quality when things don’t happen as you’d hope them to
• When to spend money on a rebrand or website launch

RESOURCES MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• JennyBlake.me
• Life After College
• Life After College the Book
• Jenny’s creative director: Adam Chaloeicheep
• Jenny’s Toolkit of amazing goodies and useful templates
• Website Launch Template
• Blog post: Speak Like a Pro

Want to get in touch with Jenny?

• Twitter: @Jenny_Blake
• Website: JennyBlake.me

MORE ABOUT JENNY BLAKE

Jenny Blake is a bestselling author, career and business coach and international speaker who helps people move beyond burnout to build sustainable, dynamic careers they love. With two years at a technology start-up as the first employee, over five years at Google on the Training and Career Development teams, and two  years of running her own business, Jenny combines her love of technology with her superpower of organizing information to help clients through big transitions — often to pivot in their career or launch a book, blog or business.

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