Jessica Zweig - Author & Founder of SimplyBe | When Women Have Money, Women Have Power

Because when women have money, women have power, and when women have both of those things, I think to be an entrepreneur and not have a connection to spirit or purpose or divine reason is a very soulless and depleting experience to build a business. Nobody cares about your personal brand. People care about themselves. You should care about your personal brand, but don't care about that more than you care about the people that you serve. Build a brand from ego is doing you wrong. The internet is a place for you to share wisdom once you've learned your lessons. The biggest things that I learned was you're the price. Because when women have money, women have power, and when women have both of those things, I do believe we're going to live in a different type of world. Welcome to Success Story. I'm your host, Scott Clary. The Success Story podcast is part of the HubSpot podcast network. Now, HubSpot is the resource that you need to tap into if you are an entrepreneur. 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So this is going to take you back to your old world, but it's going to sort of tee up what you know so well. Yeah. So you have a pinned tweet, which I think has been pinned. Oh god, I haven't been on Twitter. No, no, it's not a bad thing. It's not a bad thing. It says it says your personal, no one cares about your personal brand. Yes, true. That is your pinned tweet from like I think three years ago. It's pretty awesome. But I was like, okay, that's interesting to start it there because I mean, that's where you spent most of your life. So let's sort of tee up. Yeah. What you helped people with help them understand the personal brand. Maybe speak about simply be where your agency came from. It's like, we've this is the second show we did. I can't remember what the hell we spoke about. I remember loving you. That's all I remember because I think it was like a very stressful like week in your life when you did that show. Oh my god, that was right. Yeah, I remember this. I don't remember what was happening, but like I just remember it was a shit hitting the fan moment for you. I don't know why. No, wow, where do we even go? You take it wherever you want. No, so I met you Scott. Speaking of my simply be agency chapter, the business that I ran for seven years on personal branding where I tweeted that thing that's my philosophy on personal branding, which we'll get back to you. I had a podcast scheduled with you the day that I was about to reorg my entire company. I had started the business from zero, kept getting business, kept getting business went from zero to five, six, seven employees in a very short amount of time. And then I had written a book in 2021 that I was on your show to promote. That book did really well, but it doubled my business. There was just an explosion of my pipeline. I had to double my team in less than a year. So I'm from nine people to 22 people in 11 months. And as a small business, I was just chaos. And I hired up a lot of the wrong people and clients weren't happy and things weren't working. And it was all my brand reputation. And I had hired people that I really loved as people, but they weren't. They were performing. Yeah. And I had to the day the day you and I had that podcast, I was a freaking disaster. Because in three hours, I was about to tell my entire company that three of the leadership team was being let go and everyone had a new manager. And it was one of the hardest things that I'd ever have. I started this company as a solar prernor wanting to consult, wanting to help people with their brands. I kept getting business. I had to hire a team. Then I had to hire a leadership team, then an executive team. I didn't really know what I was signing up for running an agency. I kind of became a CEO, a real CEO by default and really had to learn leadership and running an organization on the job. And the people part was the hardest part for me because I'm such an empath. And I love people. And I wanted my team to love me. And they have to respect you first, not like you. Anyway, I think we had to, do we reschedule that podcast and do it again? No, we didn't. I know what happened. What we did is halfway through, I think, I think you had like a, I think it cried to you for a second. Yeah, you did. I got to your ride with you. We were a stranger. Halfway through, yeah, like super strangers. We didn't even do like a pre call. It was just like, we're going into this halfway through. It was just like the super real moment where you're like, this is a shitty day for me. And I think I was like, well, do you want to reschedule? Like, what do you want to do? And then you're like, no, I can keep going. And then I said, fine, we'll just like edit out this little bit of it, which was you basically talking about you having to let people go in three hours from when we were speaking. Yes. And how it was like, listen, it's never easy to let people go. But I think it was really hitting you hard, exceptionally hard. I mean, that day points back to the pinnacle moment of my burnout. That is absolutely one of the hardest days I've ever had in my career was terminating three of my leadership to voting one, having to call all of my staff into the big conference room at 445 at the end of the day, surprised them all. They didn't know what this was. They were all freaked out. And told them we were letting go of half their management. And I had prepared, not even prepared, stressed, lost sleep, just beat myself up for three months leading up to that meeting because my entire executive team, my board, they were all telling me I had to do it. And I dragged my heels on it because I didn't want to hurt people's feelings. And I learned how to work out. You want to know something? I wish I would have done it sooner. Like it's one of those things, you know, quick to fire, slow to hire. My entire business transformed the next day. It was the best decision I could have ever made. Everything changed for the better. I just, I remember meeting you and you saying, do you want to reschedule? And I go back to that moment in time, that girl that I was, that woman that I was. And I was like, I can't reschedule with this guy because I have no time to reschedule with this guy. Like this is all the time that I have to do this. So I have to override my nervous system. You know, power through this stress moment, not show up at my best because I don't want to miss the opportunity. And I've got all these plates spinning of being the spokesperson to the brand, to being the leader of the team, being the fiduciary responsibility CEO of the organization, being the podcast host myself, the author of this book, I was, that was the apex of my burnout when I met you. I was a mess. You know, sorry, you know, don't apologize. I think that's like the most normal, that's the most normal reaction to running a business because when you, when you interview a lot of people and you interview on your show too, and you, and now you speak and you like, now you see all these other business leaders that seem to like have their shit together. And they never do, right? I think I was also looking on your Instagram and there was a clip. I can't remember how long ago it wasn't as long as your, your tweet that I just brought up, but it was a couple weeks ago. And you were saying about every single person who's a business leader who's built something meaningful, even people that are just starting out, they have this army of people supporting them. Yes. And that is so true. And I feel like we don't really highlight how difficult entrepreneurship is, how difficult business building is, how stressful, how depressing it can be. And most people, it's so sad because entrepreneurs should not feel like they are alone. Most people have a really hard times like raising their hand and saying, like, I don't know what to do. Yeah. Like, whole world is crashing down or it feels like it never is, but it feels like it because your entire identity is in this one thing even building for the past seven years. Yes. And synonyms of the word identity is ego. And there's nothing wrong with that. It's just human nature. But we never want to seem like we don't have, if we built this business and the perception is something online, we feel like we need to maintain it. Forget online to our teams internally, externally to our boards, if we have them to our own goals and spreadsheets that say, we're going to make this much money, your, your, your quarter over quarter and chasing the maintenance of that identity is something that is so excruciatingly specifically unique to an entrepreneur. I mean, I really equate it to a bipolar experience. And I don't mean to diminish that, that experience, because it's very real, but they're the highest highs and the lowest lows. And it is really personal development school on steroids is what I say being an entrepreneur because it's your whole soul that you've poured into a business. And when you, you, you kill, it's just a different life. It's a totally different life. Did you, when you started sympathy, did you raise money or was it? No, I bootstrapped the entire, the whole thing. Yeah. I also just want to frame it. So the problem that simply be with solving was personal brand. Yes. And then why that back to that thought, why does no one carry a personal brand is when all you were doing was building personal people? I was pretty provocative thing I put on Twitter. And I read about that in my first book, B. So I built a personal branding agency rooted on the premise of authenticity that to build a brand from ego is doing Iran is what a lot of people do, which is why the idea of personal brand is sort of gross to people or people think that they never want to do it. What do you mean from ego? When you're simply self promoting, when it's all about you, when you're the star of your own platform, you're not your community as the star. They're the main character that you're showing up to be seen without any purpose or service towards your community. The biggest secret about building a personal brand is what I said in my Twitter account is that no one cares about you. No one cares about your brand. What do people care about themselves? Yeah. And so everything that you create has to come from a place of service. If you want to resonate online and create loyalty, create trust, create a compound effect of growth to create clients, it has to really come from your heart. You have to be of service knowing that you're just the vessel. You're just the channel. Your gifts are needed. You were put here for a reason. You are special with so are the people that you serve. And if you architect content every time you go post, whether it's a YouTube channel, a tweet, a blog, a talk, a book, and you put your audience first in every single thing you say and do, you're going to resonate. You're going to find your people because they feel like you care about them. And so it's great. You should you should care about your personal brand. You should care immensely about it. But don't care about that more than you care about the people that you serve. Because I think that's really what we're here to do. I think that's when we're in our highest vibration when we're helping other people. You know what's interesting though? So the issue, not the issue. Difficulty people have is we just spoke about how entrepreneurship is a shit show. Yes. And everybody feels like an imposter. Yes. Everybody's trying to build shit and nobody wants to open up as to what's really going on in their life or their business. Because if you actually spoke about what's going on in your business, arguable that it would have even like it would even be received well, because it's such a mess. It's so chaotic, right? Yeah. So if if I'm trying to inspire and I'm trying to teach, how am I going to tell them that, you know, my video editing team for my podcast didn't follow the SOPs for like the 10th time in a row? Because that's what's going on. Yeah. But that's not helping or teaching or inspiring anybody. Yeah. So then I feel that there is its disconnect between what I'm experiencing as a business leader. Yes. And then what I'm putting onto the world as a personal brand. So maybe I could try and teach and inspire, but it's not it's not really what's going on every single day. So what even as from a personal example, what I've tried to do is turn my content into like less than that I should have learned already. Beautiful. That I'm that I'm actually just telling myself. Yes. And that's worked out well so far. But I think a lot of people have a hard time being that vulnerable. I think it's difficult. I think I think it's a couple of thoughts there. I think it's important to take your audience on a journey with you. I think it's important to be the student out loud to some degree as much as you are a teacher. I think people resonate with truth in a way that they don't resonate with perfection. And it's it's a fine line. I'm I'm with you too. I just started in my whole new business. And it is somewhat clunky and chaotic. And I'm figuring it out as I go. And I haven't wanted to share it's not from it's not necessarily for my audience to know yet. Because here's what I say. I have so many thoughts on this. I'll take you back to when I was first on Facebook back in like 2010. I was going through the most horrific breakup with this guy that I was with for five years. I loved him so much. We had this horrible breakup. It was so so painful. And I was new to social media. And I didn't really, you know, understand what it was going to be. And I was getting on Facebook at the time. Instagram wasn't even out yet. And like being really cathartic and talking about my breakup and my posts and my friend of mine who was a little older than me. She pulled me aside. She was like Jessica. The internet is not a place for you to process. Give your therapist for that. The internet is a place for you to share wisdom once you learned your lessons. So break up. Go through the breakup. Feel all the feelings. Talk to your mom. Talk to your therapist. Heal from this. And then come back online in six, seven, eight, nine months when you've grieved it and have gotten over it. And you have new lessons to share about love to your audience of women and relationships. And I'll never forget that. And I think that principle has always wrong is true for me as possible because I'd like to share what I'm going through. But certain things, whether it's personal or professional, simply aren't for the public. And it's your audience probably doesn't need to know that your YouTube guide and follow the SOPs, you know, but you can talk about it once you've figured out and come back and share that. And I that would be so relevant of what you learned so that they can learn it too. And that's and the second thing I was going to say is it's so important to find community of other like-minded entrepreneurs and talk about these things in private spaces. That's why masterminds exist. That's why coach group coaching programs exist. That's just why a network is so powerful. I was mentioning all those women I'm seeing tomorrow and having dinner with here in Miami. Those are all women that are playing this game too. And those are some of my favorite spaces because we all get to just be so honest and private and it's healing. Yeah. When when you look back at the sort of the journey you went on with simply be like I would say I would ask the question like are you happy you you went through all those experiences? Do you wish anything could have been done differently? Because an agency is a very difficult business. And agency like like okay so I want to talk after this because when you build a personal brand and you build a large podcast then you your friends start asking like can you do this for me? Yeah. And I think that's how an agency starts to form and I'm like very I'm very careful not to not to because I don't know if it's scalable. I've worked with tons of agencies. I mean the margins seem like they're patience thin. Like absolute shit. I see the people that work for them don't even like working for them because they're like all overworked and underpaid. So is this a business that you were happy building in retrospect? You just described my life for 70 years. Although I did pay my people really well. I was above market for sure. It's exactly what happened. I wanted to build my own personal brand. I had run a business before simply be a random magazine. People knew me as this girl that could do marketing and branding really well. I started getting clients right away to pay the bills in consulting mode and all I really ever wanted to do was build my own brand but I was really good at building brand and so clients just kept coming and I kept saying yes and the truth is I loved I loved my clients. I wouldn't work with anybody unless I loved them. I believed in them. I wanted them to be amplified in the world. I loved that I could be the person to help them do that but it is a beast of a business model because the more clients you get the more people you have to hire and you're selling time. You're selling ideas. You're selling strategy and we were brilliant at it. That's why I continued to grow. We were really great and our clients were happy but there's a lot of attrition in the agency space. It attracts typically a very emo creative type which I'm here for but I had a lot of Gen Z millennial people who were just putting it on their resume and I was building my dream. I was building my soul's vision and I wanted a family and you're always on. It's a services based businesses regardless of what it is. Our brutal but to answer your question Scott I wouldn't take any of it back. It was a total accident that I created an agency. I became one of the top agencies in the country. I really grew my chops as a leader. I've created and trademarked a methodology that I put in my book that now almost 100,000 people have read. I feel like it was all divine. I'm pretty spiritual as you know and I am so grateful that it led me here because I learned some of the deepest darkest lessons is where I found my light and that's kind of what my new message is all for and yeah I don't regret it. So when you when you speak about your new message and light and this is like you're writing another book about this now I don't I don't really know much about what this book is actually about. So what prompted the the thesis of light and the concept of light and then it's really called light work. Yeah the light work. So what does what does that mean? So it's a big question because it's like I know your spiritual but I'm sure there's like a very like tangible entrepreneur component to it as well. There is. So what does this mean? So I started writing this book when I was coming out of the depths of my burnout. So simply be yeah oh yeah after after we spoke after we spoke about our body. That was that had to that was like October of 22. I know the date so it's October of 22. A couple of weeks after I met you I went to Egypt on a spiritual pilgrimage that was completely predestined I could not have planned that trip more effectively or perfectly and I had a full on death in Egypt like I had a total ego death in that country I had a massive experience in one of the temples I write about all of this in my book and my system activated and I was really able to understand the truth of my human experience especially in those last few years building a business as a high performing female entrepreneur that was highly addicted to success that was very much measuring her value based on how much money she was making how much you know accolade she was receiving the world was reflecting back to me that I was winning but I was miserable inside toward the end of 2022 I wanted to burn it all down speaking of your question of what was running agency like it was the hardest thing and so I've always been spiritual I've always really felt more like a spiritual being having a human experience more so than even an entrepreneur it's sort of been I've been pretty open online about my spiritual practice but it hasn't really been out loud this is really me coming out of the closet if in the spiritual world and the community is saying I'm a teacher of this to to be a light worker today which is what my book stands for it's called the Lightwork reclaim your feminine power book for women but men can get a lot out of it to live your cosmic truth not your truth but your cosmic truth and when you do those two things you can't but help illuminate the world and that's the illuminate the world is the the end of the subject line and I think that we're really in a very dark and heavy time on our planet just turn on the news and it is so important for us to show up in our full magnificence our full power our full confidence our full sovereignty our full conviction in who we are and how we find that light is through the dark and to accept these dark challenges whether they're personal or professional we as women and people have them all is where we find our brightest light so it's interesting because obviously you see a society in 2024 and obviously not just recently like for years now yeah people are more secular people like societies very much godless compared to what it used to be even you know probably 30 40 50 years ago right so it doesn't matter what religion it is just there's removal of god from it's been tainted and so now you have and I love I love this quote that everybody has a god even if you don't believe in god so the god could be money or it could be work or it could be women or it could be gambling or it could be drinking or it could be anything it doesn't have to be a negative vice but everybody has a god everybody has a reason why they wake up every day and do the things that they do right there's some purpose god could be your family too that's fine but there's a reason why but I feel like when you don't have formal religion okay that's cool but then you start to lose yourself because there is no structure or framework and as humans are very bad at just winging it yeah like it's even if you're trying to build a business yeah if you're going to build a business you learn from people that have done it before you learn from systems and processes that have worked you don't always have to reinvent the wheel yeah you can you can you know disrupt a little bit but ultimately the core concepts are not so different so when a major part of our existence and and us trying to figure out why we're here on this earth is no longer sort of structured I think a lot of people lose themselves and that's what you see and then I think it's further propagated by all the media we consume and how negative it is and it just messes with us I think we're not in a good place in society in terms of mental health so where does where does this what you're speaking about where does this tie into like our our sense of self what we believe in maybe a higher purpose yeah like explain spirituality so people can understand it because if you're going to say I went to Egypt and I went into a temple and then I had a death of ego for that's very confusing for a lot of like doesn't make any sense to the majority of people who have never who haven't even stepped into a church once in their life right correct so what is spirituality and how explain those concepts so people can wrap their head around yeah yeah a lot to say about this so I think to be an entrepreneur and not have a connection to spirit or purpose or divine reason is a very sole list and depleting experience to build a business so I think those personally I think those things have to be intertwined like I like your metaphor like God is something to you and for I'm sure the listeners of your show God is work God is work for me too but it's not just a get up and crank zoom calls and take meetings and hustle it's like back to what I was saying about the personal branding philosophy it's like what are you in service of what is your deep mission like why do you think you are here you've been put here for an assignment and you've channeled that assignment into your business when we lose sight of that and we always become addicted to is the money the dopamine hit yeah that's when that's when it feels like we're disconnected and mental health issues arise exactly what happened to me back to Egypt you know if you really want to know the truth and this is just a huge message I hope to leave your audience with whether they are woo or ever do you even know where Egypt is on a map it doesn't matter the main message that I walked out of that experience with as a woman as a human as a business woman as Jessica was it's supposed to be fun this human experience is supposed to be joyful and you've missed the memo girl and so instead of trying to put on some sort of spiritual philosophy belief something you see on Instagram read a book which your parents told you what community you came from what community you rejected because it didn't align doesn't matter I believe that personally that the divine is you and it is intended for its highest vibration for you to be in your joy because when we're joyful we become magnetic and when we're magnetic we attract and it's effortless it's easy and I had been muscling and gripping my way through my business connected to my own survival yeah versus my thriving and humanity's thriving doing it for a bigger purpose than just what my bank account said every day and so that's really the roadmap that I've written in this book it's really at the intersection of spirituality women empowerment women leadership and a little bit of you know woo about you know goddesses and whatnot but it's really a very down-earth book on spirituality I think what you said is super important because so I'm I think that I'm a a living example of what you just described as well so think for a lot of entrepreneurs they're high performing people yep and they realize very early on because I think they realize that if they put more themselves into it there is some sort of positive outcome yeah and then that feedback loop and that response from energy output and posit energy output and then positive response it's like a drug yeah and you do it again and again and again again yeah and then you don't and then it's like it just creeps up on you it's like any drug it's you don't realize what it's actually doing to you and your life until you pause for a second and take a step back and you're like holy shit like what is my life actually become yeah and I've actually noticed it very recently um it's so interesting because I actually just had this conversation this morning with my girlfriend so I've noticed recently that like my memory isn't as good so it's not like I'm like anything serious but it's I understand like like small conversations we'd have or like somebody who I met at a party I'd forget their name when normally I wouldn't forget their name and what I started doing is I started not taking calls that don't serve me I'm not going out to events that aren't like sort of like moving in the business I'm not like I'm basically saying no to all but to shit yeah so I end up having a lot more free time and then I started to notice that like I'm sharper yeah I can I can I can remember things that like everything like probably cortisol levels decreasing everything so you just feel healthier but you don't in the moment you don't realize it there I think it has to go to an extreme before there's to physically manifest as sickness like physical sickness you're getting sick here all the time whatever it is yet depression like your your cognitive performance isn't what it used to be because you're always pushing yourself you're always you're cranking yourself at 150% as a serious issue very serious issue so I'm realizing this now because she always tells me too she's like she's I think you to it actually get along quite well but she's always like it's not supposed to be difficult it's supposed to be easy but then you share the entrepreneur stories and it's like well I struggled for like you listen to Mark Cuban I think Mark Cuban I don't remember story exactly but he'll go it was like I was broke I was poor I was sleeping in a in a room with like four other guys when I was trying to build my businesses and like oh then I'm like now that's how I became a billionaire right so you you you fall into the trap of well that's the way that it has to be because I've never really heard too many entrepreneurs say well it was always easy and I it just sort of fell into my lap and I didn't have to work hard and that's not the story yes first of all I'm proud of you I'm serious secondly I think that there is an era of grind we all go through to build what we set out to build yeah but it's not sustainable to be at that grind mentally and what you're talking about the cognitive overload of your memory going that even in small microways I'm so happy to hear you say that out loud to your community because it's what you're talking about is structure and boundaries around your time and your energy I actually a few months before I met you that horrific call that what led there were many stages to my burnout but I moved to Nashville in the winter of 2022 out of Chicago my husband and I rented this house on like 10 acres of land and it was the first time I had been in nature at that level my life and I got down in this house the first week of January in 22 and I I was so unmotivated I know energy I started crying every day I had no desire to leave the house I didn't want to shower I literally just thought I was tired and then I have an amazing therapist and one I saw her weekly and I would just get on these sessions with her and I wouldn't even be able to talk I would just cry and she diagnosed me in January of 22 with situational depression and I ended up she she recommended I explore medication I was feeling like such death I was open to it I'd never taken like an SSRI or a benzo in my life but I was like sure because this is not I can't do this is not normal yeah long story short I ended up going the holistic route and I did a ketamine protocol instead ketamine healed my depression in two weeks truly it did didn't heal my habits and I went right back into burnout but back to your point my holistic psychiatrist explained to me depression it's inflammation of the brain the left and the right brain hemispheres stop talking to each other because it's so inflamed from the stress so there's a physical it's a physical ailment wow and they can measure this if they can measure like an MRI or something like that or I'm not a doctor I say I talk a lot about ketamine in my own experience yeah but there's a way to die now yes okay ketamine is being used now for PTSD with veterans bipolar disorder clinical depression I was situationally depressed it wasn't clinical it was due to my physical full on depletion from working so hard and I went on this call with this psychiatrist this one call and I was like I need drugs he's like you don't need drugs he's a you need to sleep you need to heal your hormones and I'm going to put you on a ketamine protocol and I could see my life clearly after that but there's such a mental like think about our brains as computers what you're saying about what you just were talking about with your girlfriend this morning it's like you only have so much space in the hard drive it there it comes to a point where we are hard drive over loaded yeah and we have to slow down we have to draw boundaries we have to be discretional with our time we have to say no we have to make space for joy like not just the right meetings but like taking a walk down the beach with your girlfriend yeah going to a concert or turning off going going on a vacation and not not being on yeah which I don't think I've done in I don't even know how long right yeah I get it I get it yeah I I I I had no choice but to practice slowing down in 23 and I healed my body and I healed my nervous system is this why is this why you chose to sell yes that's exactly why I chose to sell I just want to take a second and think the HubSpot podcast network for supporting success story the HubSpot podcast network has incredible podcasts like the product boss hosted by Jacqueline Snyder and Mina Kuhnlo Sithep if you want to take your physical product sales and strategy to the next level to create your dream life you need to listen to the product boss they sit down for an hour they do a workshop style podcast they're going to talk about everything that you need to know to up level yourself social media marketing if you're a consumer package goods if you have any sort of physical widget you need to tune into the product boss wherever you get your podcasts so walk me through that because that's a huge change so you've built this thing your identity is tied into this business yeah and then you know you had this this life changing to a degree experience you're forcing yourself to operate in a different way technically you didn't have to sell you can find a way to operate the business in a different way that's more because if you were at the point where you could sell and somebody is willing to purchase you that means that you didn't have that that linchpin key person problem in the business that means you could step away and the business was still functioning means you have all the right operators and all the right leadership in the business I did so back to spirituality scouts I know it's new for you in your community I feel like everything happens for a reason and per timing and that you have to trust that timing so I came back from Egypt and I had just brought on an integrator are you familiar with uh let me see oh like every visionary is it the EOS system yeah yeah yeah so I just brought on basically like a managing director of my agency who is fully operational and focused and she got me out of the weeds of my business in like 45 days and started running my mind find a good person so quickly so freaking hard I got in it this girl I met at a conference told me about her friend who did this and I filed it my brain I was like maybe one day I'll reach back out of that girl to get that girl's number and I wasn't ready and then I was and she was I it's I just got an intuitive hit when my friend was talking about this girl I was like I'm gonna know that girl and she she helped me sell my business I brought her in she made it operationally efficient help me make more money got my team right plucked me out of the fray and put me in the COC within less than a quarter and within a year I got approached by two companies actually two companies reached out to me in the same week a private equity company and a strategic buyer in the same week this is what I'm talking about the universe it was halfway through 2023 when I had decided to slow it up fuck down yeah heal my nervous system prioritize joy play with the idea of what I would do next I wrote my second book during that time I got a book deal my coming write a book about what I want to write about now and then these two companies knocked on my door in July they both made me offers and I like how did they find you just one of them found me through LinkedIn I mean I get a lot of LinkedIn email and emails we all do and it was sort of buried in the hey stack and I he was a private equity like sort of advisor scouting companies at my revenue range and he asked for a 30 minute call and I took it and the 30 minute call was like a two and a half hour call it was like three men and me and they were like well you're impressive it's the best feeling for my ladies washing and they ended up making me an offer and then this other company hawk media the company that ended up buying me they actually had reached out to me two years before when I just was about to launch my first book and I took the call at the time just to entertain it and so really good piece of advice for those that are watching that are ever interested in exiting a company even if you're not ready even if you know your business isn't ready and you have the opportunity to take conversations with potential buyers or people in the space of exit do it it's just an education and it prepares you to know your direction what your could what how you could be valued what they're interested in seeing as far as growth and so I knew my business was about to pop because I just I was a few months before my book launch so hawk media kind of felt like they were like chasing me like I was you know like they kept knocking like every that's good I was the tries the evaluation off a little bit their head of acquisitions emailed me like twice a year and then they emailed me the same week that this other company emailed me and I ended up going with with a strategic buyer because a private equity company would have willed be down to the bone to squeeze out all the the profit meaning they would have let go of a lot of my team you knew they were going to do that that was a strategy I could just see the writing on the wall they were money guys yeah they liked that but it usually is yeah money play they it was all about money no shame I'm I love money too but the strategic buyer would keep my brand keep my team keep my clients maintain my legacy and I had said criteria of what I wanted as the founder when it came to the financials when it came to my personal brand expanding in the market my ability to interface with clients at my at my time my title what not how I wanted to engage with the agency as the accident founder because I'm still with Hawk like I'm technically a part of Hawk did you that so they kept you on his advisor or something yeah an executive vice president of personal branding and my focus is supporting business development now okay but I don't have a boss I don't have a team I'm not in a single meeting were you happy with the exit yeah I was really happy with the exit I wouldn't have sold my business to them unless I liked them you know I mean we're very different companies are very different cultures it's just like with any buy and acquisition there's a transition period that can be somewhat of a shock and certain levels for sure because it's no longer your company but I I really love the founder and CEO Eric you were in this founder and CEO of of Hawk I think he's brilliant he's a huge vision which is just not my vision which is to build the biggest marketing agency in the world go for it happy to help support your vision with my you were thinking of exiting were you looking for because now you're at the point where you hire an integrator and you're getting these offers were you looking for like F you never work again money were you looking for I just want to be out of this so I can work on something else the latter I mean my business wasn't like I wasn't going to sell for a hundred million dollars you know my revenue wasn't there but you could have grown it you can always grow it right yes that's a great question that's a I would have had I had that vision I remember saying to myself halfway through this simply be journey I was like I could scale this to a 50 million dollar company if I really wanted to I've been if you get if you get a good multiple on that it's yeah then you're set but I knew that it would be another probably seven years of the agency grind yeah and honestly I didn't want to do it I wanted I had built that agency from debt Scott I had no money when I started that company I was a solo pernor I had no strategy I had no clients I had no website I literally had the name simply being a logo and I was like I'm for hire need help with marketing branding like everyone was priced differently and I scaled it to a best in class agency a multi multi-million dollar company in less than five years actually was awarded Forbes personal branding expert ink five thousands fastest growing company got a multi seven six figure book deal wrote the book about the agency I had nothing left to prove I fucking left it all on the floor yeah and I was done when you were gonna so now mentally you're like okay I'm gonna sell it yeah are you already planning what you're doing next because a lot of entrepreneurs they they have this this identity crisis is second they sell yeah so have you thought about it yet or no oh yeah you're that calculated with it because I know people that have sold that even if it's a not a hundred million dollar exit they start to do a little bit of angel investing and then they start to you know be advisor mentor for some companies but they're kind of just like floating floating yeah no I'm not floating I had a back to Egypt a lot of it should have why Egypt for a spiritual journey by the way oh my god Egypt is I could that's a big question wait because I I'm trying to figure out like because a lot of people like they'll go to like like Israel for like a spiritual yeah or Ollie Costa Rica yeah I've never heard of Egypt Egypt is based on where it's located on the planet yeah like a direct cosmic doorway it's it's an open port it really into this I love it read my book yeah scratching the surface got no I love it I just don't know anything about this world I didn't know Egypt was a cosmic doorway yeah it's not tied to a religion that not necessarily no okay no it's more about kind of galactic connection you studied this a long time yeah yeah I wrote my whole book about it so do you know we'll take a little bird walk do you know like Orion's your three stars in a row in the sky so for a certain month I don't know exactly when in the year but those three stars line up exactly with the three pyramids of Giza and Egypt in Cairo yeah it's a portal it's a direct open gate and when you go there you it's a it's a massive experience to go there it's not a vacation it's amazing yeah yeah um I died in Egypt like I said and that you know identity the bright yellow simply be face and founder that girl really left left the building after that trip and so I spent 2023 creating a new relationship with with this new version of myself in fact the first section of my book is called I am new because that was the only way I could describe myself when I got back from that trip people like how was it do you like it tell me about it I'm new that was like the only way I could define what happens to me there and I I hosted a couple of retreats in 2023 for women I just pulled a rabbit out of my hat like I said I was like I'm gonna host some retreats they sold out within a month they were high ticket retreats I got like 20 women assigned up for each a half of those women asked me to coach with them after the retreats were done meanwhile I'm still running the agency but I've taken my hand off the wheel in a huge way because I've got this integrator now that's running the day-to-day anyway and I started to formulate like what would I do next I I love to work I'll always want to make money and grow and serve and I got this vision to launch myself as a coach and really reclaim my spiritual story and to put that at the forefront of my message and so the agency's acquisition like I said that that week in July halfway through 23 when I got that knock on my door I took that as such a sign that it was meant to be and I knew where I was going next and I I have had don't get me wrong like I'm no longer the CEO of a big company I don't have the team I don't have the same systems and process and support and I'm also not really at all needed at Hawk right like they don't call me for anything you know so I have been in a bit of like a redefining this new identity and it has been amazing and it's also come with a lot of awkwardness and fear frankly like what's my place yes the identity it's a day that day of who you and have you have you figured out what is is next for you yeah because you wrote a book okay yeah so awesome but that's not a full time no no no you have to you have to figure out what to do for the next 30 40 years yeah no good your poignant timing I'm I'm launched myself as a coach I'm working with high performing female entrepreneurs and a lot of VIP high ticket coaching programs I just launched a mastermind of my own I have another retreat coming up I'm going to be launching a brand new business school online for women in August after my book it's a digital program I plan to roll out a membership next year so I'm doing all the things but I'm doing it my way and bringing that blend of business branding and spirituality to to high performing females after going through the exit event what is one thing that you wish you knew about an exit that is not part of like the entrepreneurial there it is what one of the biggest things that I learned was you're the prize that if a company is interested in buying you you don't you you don't need to be subservient to what they want they're knocking on your door because you're the asset it's a roll of roll reversal and at least this is my advice as much as something that I learned this is just what I did is I asked for exactly what I wanted I was super forthright with knowing my value and I think we can feel like oh they're the they're the big guys you know pick me pick me am I good enough for you and we really value at we think that valuation is purely based upon EBITDA right I ran an agency my profit margins weren't that high but I showed growth like this was one two I had a incredible brand in the market I had trademarked IP I had long standing employees I had a big book of business I had won a ton of awards in the media all of those things open up the aperture of how you can be valued and that was not something that I walked into starting simply be understanding but as the years went on and granted I talked to a few advisors about it they finding your competitive advantage in the market based on a lot of other things outside of EBITDA like one of the reasons that Hawk bought us was they've been wanting to do personal branding as a service for five years they could build it from the inside out and take years to build it or they could have speed to market and by me and plug and play and so all of that had how we were able to achieve that for Hawk was yes of course about our revenue but also about the machine that I had built and the credibility of the brand in the market that I had built no one's going to question simply be if they Google us we're still our company of course so did that did that answer your question that no I just because you've gone through it and I think a lot of people are aspiring that's like kind of the the goal right when you're trying to build a business yeah and I think that a lot of people unfortunately not everyone so people are very good at maintaining their value yeah but it's like the power balance of a discussion around selling a business especially women I don't know how many women who are listening but actually about 50 percent awesome yeah awesome because we undervalue ourselves too much yeah but I see that not so I think I see I see that in career too yeah right like I've heard this before and I'm sure there's some truth to it like if a guy is applying for a job they could be like 70 percent qualified and they're still going to put in the resume and if a woman's applying for a job she won't put in a resume till she's like 150 percent qualified yeah and that's an issue yeah because you have to take more shots to win yes so I can only imagine not many people have a support system that can tell you how to deal with private equity correct a very that's a very small percentage of people in on navigate that discussion even as a man going that discussion I'd feel nervous yeah I can only imagine like it's not easy and I put resources around me they as a privately held company I constructed a board and I had meetings with them every single quarter as I was going to scale my company to exit because I needed to know the answers and ask questions in safe spaces but when you show up as a woman in those conversations I mean my whole career is founded upon like the principle of like fake it to you make it right like just pretend you're confident just pretend like you know exactly who the fuck you are and what you're saying and people will believe you they don't know the difference and it's my mission on this planet back to my own spiritual assignment that women have money that women have lots of money because when women have money women have power I say this all the time and it's just the reality we are and those two things are conjoined and when women have both of those things I do believe we're going to live in a different type of world I think not to say that men aren't incredible and I love men and you're one of those amazing men who's definitely in his heart and gets it but women have a different sense of empathy and community and collaboration when we're in our healthy feminine that makes safer spaces to work makes you know more equitable communities more reverence for the planet we should all be practicing those things but I feel like women undervalue their power when I coach my clients I'm like I'm gonna say you have a front row seat to all this I do yeah my clients are like I think I'm gonna charge a thousand dollars a month for this thing I'm like at a zero do it I'm serious no I know you're not I know you're zero to that and then they're like I could never do that why let's feel into that in your body where is that coming from where does that fear come from who told you you're not worth that and we unpack that and we understand their story their fears their failures and their successes and their expertise what they know that no one else knows and it's all about perception of value like if you turn ten thousand dollars a month for something someone's gonna assume this chick knows what she's doing and I'm gonna stand up really straight when I become her client who are you not to charge who are you not to add a zero that's what I say to my clients all the time and it's a lesson that I had to learn and the more and more I charged the more more clients I got the more more right clients I got that's that's that's a key thought the more more right clients you got the clients that don't give you all the pain in the ass BS the clients that pay on time like the right clients you want to out of that yourself like you want to move up in the market always yeah there was a point in your life when you chose to to rebrand yeah so speak to me about why that was because you know we're prepping for these shows yet we send a voice that over as a different days you want to chat about and I thought that was interesting because for for most entrepreneurs that's just like a you know slight strategic pivot whatever it's not like a like a major notable thing in their life when again they've gone through an exit who cares about the rebrand that was like one of the many million things that I did why is that so important for you well I'll speak for myself my rebrand I rebranded me yeah I'm in the space of personal branding we were just talking about it all three of us the importance of a personal brand is everything and people need to catch on more right and obviously I wrote a whole book about personal branding and even though I was associated with simply be agency for seven years as the CEO I always had and maintained my own personal brand is Jessica the founder and I I created its own platform and its own strategy and its own messaging its own podcast or a book had very specific Instagram grid I wrote about very specific things on LinkedIn and when I sold the business and that identity died in Egypt back to that I I didn't want to tell that story anymore it was no longer who I was so I rebranded my life I rebranded my story I rebranded my look and feel I rebranded my website I rebranded my podcast I rebranded my entire Instagram I like I like three thousand photos on Instagram my archive to most of them down to like two little red yeah I like just cleared it you're very intentional about this yeah very very intentional I think we have to be personally I think that your brand is your lighthouse it's your hallmark your personal brand is your ultimate business card it's your reputation in the market I believe that a brand is what creates the flywheel for marketing and for sales it starts with brands and it's intention is to create an emotional affinity to its consumer within less than 10 seconds at this at this stage in the internet like 10 nanoseconds and so the brand was the business it is my business I'm watching myself as a coach and so it was more than just rebranding my platform though it felt like I was rebranding my whole life um do you feel like it was a rebrand do you feel like it was an evolution it's a really good question I think it was both I think it was first an evolution and the brand was an expression of that evolution was there hesitation when you were rebranding because obviously everybody's known you for one thing yeah so when you're known for one thing it's a little bit riskier to rebrand than if you're known for nothing at all yeah so was there hesitation was there pushback just for somebody who maybe is putting themselves out there right now who doesn't really love how they've presented themselves how did you decide after you have an audience like which direction to go in so one thing that I going back full circle to the beginning of this interview when you asked me about that tweet yeah nobody cares about your personal brand people care about themselves that's a principle that I've tried to live for the last decade and I feel like I've created a really beautiful community from that and because I've taken them along with me when I decided to evolve and when I decided to rebrand they were a part of it and because I sort of hard launched it all of once like I sold my business and made the announcement a few weeks later I launched my new platform and they were all so excited about it there were that's not to say that I did that also made you build up true community I did I did I built a true community and I think that that's if there's a takeaway for your audience around personal branding like show up every day for your community be of service to them make them the main character and they will feel that and whether you close your business sell your business pivot your business decide to go into a totally different industry quit entrepreneurship altogether become a parent like they'll go with you if you've given them the honor of showing them that you care about them one idea that you have and I think this is sort of just like a nice spot to leave the audience the full light consciousness yeah so again educate me Jessica yeah I'm like I'm laughing because listen I can I can find some various strategic talking points around exiting a business I'm building a personal brand or like social content when you talk about full life oh like I just ask if I can go to take into anywhere but I'm so I'm no because you know I this is this is a podcast like a podcast lesson how do you do a good podcast you talk about the things that are important to the person the guest that's really at the end of the day because it doesn't matter for me I can try and pull out things that yeah you know a little bit about or like you know you've done in the past but ultimately what creates a good show and what just creates a good conversation yeah is when you care about the other person yeah this is a podcast lesson this is a social lesson this is like a life lesson like stop being selfish like just stop being selfish so for me I want to understand everything that you're going through right now and what's top of mind right now because there's a lot of people that I could speak to about personal brand there's a lot of people speak about social content right but not everybody's gone in the journey that you've gone on and you've gone on it successfully like you've not just build a massive agency you sold an agency you now close high ticket clients like exceptionally quickly like you fill out events like it's not like you're doing anything for from a from lacking of experience like you've all done this stuff yourself so I want to understand after all of this this is the mental framework that you operate from yes I do so I think it's very important to dive into that more thank you thank you I'm so happy we're gonna leave your audience with this one so as I define it in my book and in my life light is a synonym for information light is information darkness is lack of information when we turn on the light in a dark room we can see and I believe that most people consciously or unconsciously are in the dark around the truth of who they really are darkness isn't evil darkness isn't bad evil and darkness and fear and toxicity and jealousy and competition and scarcity those things manifest when we don't turn on the light and we don't see the truth of our magnificence our uniqueness our essential responsibility that we have here on this planet to make it better and that we are capable of that we were we were put here to do just that and so light consciousness is really tapping into your one of a kind DNA that makes you as rare as a diamond on this planet and I think when we really truly get in touch with that we shine differently that's what a diamond does and that whole that experience has to however be found in polarity I think we find just exactly who we are authentic and needed and special we are in the friction and the hard start challenging experiences and so that's been my journey so the way that I interpret that and I'm a big fan of this concept is if you're going to be successful as an entrepreneur there's a tactical you can go learn on YouTube you can go figure out how to be a great graphic designer you can go figure how to run like a great ad set that has a high row as right yeah but the other piece of it is the mindset piece yeah so there's two concepts that I believe in fully one is that you have to find a way to build systems processes and a mental framework that allows you to do the thing for an unreasonable amount of time yeah that's where you succeed but the other piece is to constantly be open to learning and improvement yes and when you say light is access to information and then darkness is like closed off from information at a very like fundamental layman term understanding it's like you are always being open you're understanding your value yes but simultaneously you're always being open to new information and off-skilling and yeah that's the way that I see it beautiful so you are not closed off you're not closed off you're not saying that like I know everything and I'm like I'm peeked out at who I am as an individual you're always open to improving in like the most basic sense of the understanding yeah it's a it's a journey and humility yeah as much as it is confidence yes yeah if you wanted to tell an entrepreneur like these are the steps you have to take to think the right way to be successful to operate the right way to be successful to to embody full laid consciousness or or some version of it yeah what is a practice it's worked really well for you I would say two things getting super clear on what makes you you and embodying that that is a journey in and of itself but we have to truly believe that we are needed here on this planet I think that when we click on to that understanding everything shifts and the practices I have found to get there personally have been working with mentors coaches guides you know we can talk about it's the team you need for your business you need a team for you as a CEO or a founder or an entrepreneur and I've invested a lot of time and energy and resources and people who have really accelerated me and who have held up mirrors to me to show me who I am because it's hard to do it for yourself and this sounds so basic and I'm not going to sit here and tell you sit on a meditation pillow because it's overplayed but like really truly get in silence be with yourself close down the mental computer get into nature get into your body yeah I just feel like that's such an essential game and to play whether you're an entrepreneur or not but I have found the deepest messages of my light when I've been with myself I agree with that fully for for me actually what I end up doing is is just beating myself up in the gym because then I can't think of anything else other than what I'm trying to do right now your gym is a spiritual practice yeah very much is yeah very much is I'm sure I'm sure the the endorphins that come from yes working out what not come out with the fact that you really can't focus on work right it just puts you in like a really good space so again for me that's my shut off from the world and just focus on me and my thoughts and and get very real about what your life is and what it isn't and are you happy and are you fulfilled and are you on your right journey and I think however you architect that super important yeah because we always lose ourselves it's very easy to get distracted right we've got to slow down Amen yeah I agree with that fully um okay so if people want to connect with you where they going where obviously the book is anywhere you can get books yeah but what's the website social everything I'll shout it all out thank you for having me this was so fun so you can go to Jessica's wag.com that's how you say my last name's wag Jessica's wag.com is my website where you could find out all of the things that I'm doing you can go to the lightworkbook.com that's where you can buy the book if you buy one copy I send you close to three thousand dollars worth of pre-order bonuses get some live events you get a masterclass you get a sneak peek you get a bunch of stuff so I would go there if you want to buy a copy you can buy wherever books are sold just choose your retailer and enter your code and I'll send you everything and then come say hi to me on Instagram and and that's right so most my most of my time on social and my podcast is called the spiritual hustler which is a show mainly for female entrepreneurs but guys listen to it too about the intersection of business branding and spirituality you find more people are having to find spirituality in their life like a lot of entrepreneurs high-performing people are leasing themselves yeah I think people are more interested in that conversation than ever so hopefully they got something out of today because you don't want to you don't want to build something impressive and then you have no soul it's no soul yeah you know your your family relationships are broken you have no friends like you have money in the bank but everything is superficial right it's not good either um if you're gonna look back and tell your younger self your 20-year-old self one thing after everything you've learned what would that thing be you've got this you're gonna be great don't stress so much I'll work down the end