Latest / Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life / Wellness Marketing Interview with Talie Knutson With Heart Marketing
Transcript
- 0:00good day everybody thank you so much for tuning in I have just a wonderful guest to introduce to you this is the honor roll show and I talk to people here uh locally in Santa Clarita San Fernando Valley greater Los Angeles and really wherever people that I find myself that I've aligned with and I help and they help me and it really becomes just a wonderful relationship so today we're going to be talking to tally and Newton she's with with heart marketing just a fabulous lady I want her to talk about herself her business and maybe share with you some insights if you have a business and you're thinking about marketing and those approaches I think this is gonna be very helpful hello tally how are you hi hi I just wanna say that my last name is Knudsen Knudsen very good Knudsen yeah I've known you for a long time I guess I've never had a chance to even pronounce it so Knudsen very good thank you so much please tell us uh tell us a little bit about yourself uh your background and so on that'd be great oh sure where do I start well let's let's do this so you're in marketing what what was your reason to get into that what from your background kind of added to that well my entire childhood I actually grew up wanting to work in television and I grew up doing musical theater and I was always on stage but I never I never wanted to be a performer I was always so fascinated with what happened behind the scenes and so and then the TV show Dawson's Creek actually I was obsessed with and it was the show that made me want to work in television and so I did I my dream was to work on a hit WB show at the time it was WB okay and I did yeah yeah Warner Brothers and I did and I did that for five years and it was it was a dream and but then after a while it just started to take its toll on me working in TV and production it's not the the lifestyle for everybody and marketing was always something in the back of my mind my dad had a vending business and he did all of his own marketing and sales and I helped him with his graphic design elements and that was just my introduction into marketing and so it was always in the back of my mind so when I decided to shift gears and get out of television that was the natural step for me and so yeah and so I I got my first job I was just I was living in New York at the time and I was working for a lady in New York and then when I was ready to come back home my first my first kind of big job in marketing was at MTV oh very good love MTV yeah yeah and I was working in integrated marketing and working with the TV shows and the the advertisers and creating integrated programs for for the advertisers to promote within the shows what was what was like a like a kind of a shock to you going from you know into I guess what the corporate movie world working in that was it everything you expected was it I know it probably burned you out it's apparently or it got just a lot time consuming or whatever what was what was that realization that that caused you to maybe say yeah this is a lot um it it it was everything I dreamed it would be I at in the end I was I was living my dream I was living in I was working on a TV show and I was living in New York and I was living my dream every movie yeah perfect no yeah yeah and I was living in New York working on a TV show and I wanted to be social I wanted to make friends I wanted to go out I had people asking me to go out with them to hang out and I and I couldn't because I was working cause production hours in TV are very unpredictable they're very long hours and that just started to take its toll on me and I was like I'm living my dream in New York City but I'm not actually living I'm working and that's when I just wanted to get something more steady so you go from there to MTV yes well no from there I went to a small marketing agency in New York for a few months then I moved home and went to MTV and then what is it MTV kind of the same kind of the same thing as Dawson's Creek or no different um well I didn't work on Dawson's Creek it was just my favorite it was just my favorite oh I'm sorry the yeah but the the Warner Brothers yeah is that MTV it was easier or different or more difficult um well it was different cause I wasn't working I wasn't working in production I was working in marketing that's the difference yeah yeah that's the difference but I had the production background which then helped me marry the two together so the the introduction to marketing cause I was I was I was a coordinator so I was I was just learning but then my experience with productions helped me bring the two together so tell me with those two things then you have somebody coming to you what what would be that general client or somebody that you help out in in what you do now what do they look like um well right now a lot a lot has changed since I was in my MTV days hahaha okay of course hahaha um but you know when I was working in marketing all those years I was in corporate for for 15 years before I decided to do my own thing and I worked Disney MTV Princess Cruises I worked at a toy company so I worked in big brands but one of the things that I always loved so much was the strategic part of it and really thinking thinking strategically but thinking about the customer deeply and really making sure that everything that I did was rooted in what is gonna connect with the customer first and and being strategic in that direction and do you have a question you look like you're gonna ask something so the customer not your customer but your customer's customer yeah yeah so like when I was when I was at Disney the customer was the purchasers of the DVDs or the Blu rays okay got you understood oh that's a that's so instead of just focusing on trying to get your own your own client acquisition people to work with you you're actually it's a very interesting concept which which I guess makes complete sense but I've never really heard explain that way you're looking at that particular your customers what the people that are gonna be hiring them so that became your focus well it was it was more the based on the role and what what company I was at I was always selling to the to the customers it wasn't the client so it was it was business to consumer B to c marketing okay and so it was always what's the consumer so at Disney it was the consumer of the Blu rays DVDs digital downloads that's the business I focused on at Princess Cruises the customer was the people that are booking their cruises having my own business that is more b to B which is business to business right where I am trying to acquire clients to hire me to support their business so that has been that's been one of the biggest shockers in starting my own business and becoming an entrepreneur is that my my experience for all those years is in direct to consumer and business and business to consumer not business to business and you speak differently you communicate differently and and that's that's I'm still just trying to figure it all out I'm sure it has a great relationship though because you're you know you're looking for the other business but you're also seeing the underlying need because most of the businesses that hire you they have some kind of a consumer base I would imagine right I mean people have to go to them to get something you want to increase that awareness so you having that focal point of of the consumer is also super helpful yes absolutely absolutely to really put the customer the customer is so important in all of it but before you get to the customer the most important part is your business first and really having really having clarity on your business okay first and and having a strong foundation for your business before you can go and connect with your customers so with heart marketing focuses on heart centered brand marketing and really helping businesses come back to the heart and soul of their business so that they can connect more deeply with their consumer when you are connected to yourself you can connect with the people that you serve in a much deeper more meaningful way who's your who's your perfect if you could describe a perfect client what would what would be that confusion point why how would they know that they need they need to hire somebody that that has your particular approach to this so I I work I could work with small businesses large businesses at any point in their stage but primarily I've been working with the smaller businesses and really it's they they're finding themselves they're they're doing their marketing they're doing their social media they're doing all these tactical elements because that's what they they're expected to do but what's happening is that they're they're they're starting to get overwhelmed with it right where they're like I I I don't know what to post today what should I post how do I say it when should I post I know I should do I know I should do email newsletters but what do I say when they sit down to do all the marketing they're they're just they're confused they're lost they're overwhelmed because I primarily work with people in the health and wellness space and these people they're healers right they're healers their their purpose is to help people live better lives not marketing and so so they're really good at that part but yeah they really lack at the other yeah I totally get that yeah and so but one of the things is like is as you know especially for small businesses right they they build a business they jump straight to the what I call the sexy stuff the tactical stuff the socials the emails the websites but they haven't really taken the time to build that foundation and get clarity on their brand first because when you have that clarity and you have a solid foundation for your business right your mission your purpose your story your values what makes you different you understand your audience when you have all of that in place all of your marketing becomes more intentional and it is more aligned with who you are as a business and at the same time more aligned with the people that you're serving so it makes it more clear you mentioned earlier talking about you mentioned the word strategic and in my mind I'm thinking strategic is a much larger beast than tactical a tactical is like a one strike situation strategic is you're looking at this entire model for this business and then you're positioning the pieces on the board to make their technique or their their presence or their brand much more clear right yes yes correct correct okay it's the like the the execution is the tactical stuff but you need to have a plan in place first and a strategy in place first before you can go do that to be effective so when they come to you what is that what's what's that look like that unpacking what kind of questions do you ask like do you do they're positioning like what what does that intake kind of look like just so when people are watching this they can identify and say you know I I think I need that I need that kind of thing yeah so my process is very unique and because I am really focused on heart centered marketing and really helping businesses connect to the heart of their business and who they are I start with a questionnaire and it's 33 questions and it is meant to be like an intentional journal when you're intentionally journaling you're just you're just writing journaling without thinking right you're just writing whatever comes to your mind well the idea of this is to answer these questions without thinking with just getting out of your head and writing whatever comes to your mind about your business and it's and it's broken down into different sections business focused getting to the heart of your business right like your your purpose your mission your values and then and then it's understanding your audience and questions rooted to your audience questions about your competitors and what's happening in the market questions about your your personality and your messages and how do you express yourself so it's 33 questions in those different um sections and it's really meant to just be a complete mind dump and you get out of your head and because so many so many people they hold all the ideas in their head and they've never really taken the time to get out of their head and onto the paper and when they go through that process and they answer these questions at the end of it all of that information comes together and forms their brand strategy the heart and soul of their business who their audience is what's the competitive landscape what makes them different what's their messaging their personality and and then all of that strategy gets taken to the next to the next phase which is the marketing plan because now you can be intentional about what you're doing so what's that what's extrapolate on that a little bit give us give us kind of what what that next step looks like so this is something they they probably can get your guidance if they have questions over apparently they're they're probably self explanatory the the 33 after that you get this this document back and then you have the next step is what yeah so so I actually just to take one step back I actually have created a framework I call it the with heart approach and the first two phases of the approach make up this brand strategy process and it's called root and reveal and the root phase is all about planting your roots right that's the foundational work of the business I see and then reveal is all about revealing yourself and expressing yourself right how do you express yourself your personality your tone your messaging and that makes up the brand strategy and I offer that in two ways I I support businesses and I can do it for them I also offer a DIY workbook so people can do it at their own pace with consulting services attached to that and and then after the root and reveal phase when you have that foundation you have that clarity built the next phase is called rise and that's all about rising up and how do you take everything that's in your heart and soul of your business rise up bring it forward in your marketing and putting together a marketing strategy and a marketing plan and that plan is it's business goals marketing goals it includes a social media playbook right how do you how do you speak on social and it guides it guides everything from your Mark for your marketing so from this point after they've done this work what's what's the process if they're very on it if if they're executing quickly how long would this this does this process take generally I know it's probably a consistent refining process right or is there a time frame it takes or how's that work so based on based on how people move through the the the phases in working with me typically it's a the all four phases the final phase I forgot to mention is called radiate and that's all about radiating and that's the leadership the the executional part of it where I come in and I guide that process and so for somebody that that is coming in to do the full the full scope I'm working with a business right now who's a yoga studio expanding to be a holistic wellness center she has come in to and purchased the full with heart approach all four phases and that is six that is six months and it's approximately you know three months for the first brand strategy you know six to eight weeks for the second and then the rest of it is kind of bringing it all to life but businesses could come in at any point if a business comes in and just needs brand strategy that's you know up to um three to six weeks and if they do the do the workbook that's at their own pace I see so there's no time frame time limit on that let me ask you why why the wellness space why it was it was different before and then you made a decision that you wanted to start to focus on that why was that um when I first started my business I had as I started to figure it all out I was like I have entertainment and travel and consumer products and yeah I've seen your website you have a lot you have a vast array of of education and knowledge and experience yeah so it covers a lot of realms that's why I'm asking yeah no I'm glad you did and you know I didn't want to put myself in a box I'm like I can do everything I can do all marketing all all types of businesses but you know the question kept coming to me who's your market who's your market who do you focus on and I just started to recognize okay tally you need to figure this out and it hit me one day it was just like a light it was a light bulb went off and somebody asked me the same question like if you could work with any business who would it be and my immediate answer was businesses in the health and wellness space it's my personal passion my personal um how I how I live my life and focusing on my own well being my kids well being and I have I've gone through my own spiritual journey and my own healing journey and because of that I I connect really deeply with people in the space and we speak the same language and those are the people I want to work with and the one caveat though is that my workbook is for any business right any business that needs brand clarity but the work that I do that I do the do it for you projects the working side by side those are the health and wellness business that I'm most passionate about who who's in that space specifically like if how how do we know who identifies as I I know that's probably a very elementary question but so so coaches or or transformational coaches uh some kind of nutritional experts what where's that where's that who who fits in there yeah I mean it is a very broad it is very broad I mentioned the yoga studio I'm working with um I worked with the holistic mental health wellness center in my neighborhood um I've had conversations with with therapists and coaches and um people in the gut health space and and um it it could also be people that have the supplement brands and or are building a mental health app and so it's it's really a holistic space anything in the wellness space fitness well being anything that's people are really just trying to help others make their lives better and heal and heal in various modalities in various ways and with your background and experience this this was that best fit for you and of course you're open to whoever calls up and and if if it's a good fit you'll still work with whoever but the wellness space is definitely the focus yes absolutely I have a call with somebody um in a few weeks who has um a a a product like a facial products and beauty products and and we're connecting but but she needs someone with experience with parenting with parents and moms cause that's her audience and somebody who has direct to consumer experience and so I'm we're having a conversation because I bring a breath of knowledge in my 15 years of marketing experience so I can still talk to people in all industries that that's just the focus of my own marketing yes are the people in that space sounds like you're incredibly aligned and that's very very impressive as part of this show you know we always talk about artificial intelligence kind of kind of as we uh we get close to to talking about you know after we cover what the guest is talking about how does that fit into this is there warnings against people using it or positive does it help you in your workflow what are your thoughts on that um I mean it's it makes my workflow a lot easier to be honest um I think just to cover it from a health and wellness space I think what's happening in the health and wellness space right now is that people people are going straight to you know their AI platforms mostly or Google to do their own research on different different healing things or supplements and there's so much information and there's just a lack of trust right how can you trust that this is the right that this is right for me there's no accountability you know there's no there's no human behind that process yeah yeah or the the credibility behind it and so it's more important for brands in the health and wellness space to have that authenticity and to create that meaningful connection and create that heart to heart connection because that's what's gonna help them build trust and credibility in this AI world and when the health and wellness space is growing like crazy and there's so many I mean I probably had 100 conversations and 50% of them have been with various coaches and something right and what makes one person better than the next or what makes one person more credible than the next and and they need to do that they cannot rely on AI to do that and that's why heart centered marketing and really focusing on the heart of your business and who you are and what makes you special and you unique as a brand is so important because of all the AI yeah it's becoming more and more that way yeah it's becoming more and more that way people the more AI generates slop and garbage and you know human beings are behind it pushing it the more of that the more important your human connections going to be when people are looking for something that really matters you can't you can't mimic your experience or your your knowledge your expertise in your field all that you've been through whatever your life experiences have been they they have that metal to all of us and you know AI a lot of people go in they try to prompt it and ask it the question but yeah there's no accountability it's kind of nice to be able to pick up the phone and call you up and say hey this is where I am at this week what do you think my next move should be and of course I know you get those things scheduled out so that's fantastic yeah yeah and I have an element of in my DIY brand strategy workbook it's called the with Heart Brand Strategy Workbook in that I have I actually do give AI prompts and it's the the questions I mentioned earlier and at the end of each section it gives you a prompt to use an AI to write those particular phrases or statements for your brand strategy but you're guiding it because you're feeding it all of that true information from the heart of your business because that's the intentional journaling right so you're intentionally journaling answering these questions and then you're feeding that to AI so AI can really get a sense of how you write or how you talk and then it's gonna help you and then it's all about going back and forth and refining and not ever walking away with like a direct copy and a paste right you have to and I and I give all of this direction right huge that's so important huge and and I and look I use it like it it I'm I'm a one woman show here right so it's it and and I'm a mom and I don't work crazy hours and so it helps me be more efficient but I never ever just do a copy and a paste I use it to help me it knows me very well and I nitpick every little word if I if one word doesn't sound like me I tell it I would never ever say that word don't ever use it again hahaha and I do that almost on everything and even after using some of these AI platforms for over two years it still does it it still does it but that's why I have to read it and why I never copy and paste it yeah see that's so rare really my my words and a lot of people they're they're they're doing it you know opposite of what you're saying but you're that that testimony is valuable you have you have to keep going at it and and that's I think where we get smarter and not more dull once you start just accepting it and just taking it and copying and pasting it yeah that's a problem but yeah you're very much like that I'm sure when you log on to your chat GPT or Claude it's probably like ugh here we go again yeah it's gonna just be more and more and more and and she's not gonna trust what I'm saying and yeah she's gonna push back and have another question and that's perfect good for you yeah and you know what I do a lot of is I I will I'll I'll write it like I'll do a mind dump right like I'll get out of my head almost like that intentional journaling thing and I'll be like I wanna write a post about blah blah blah and here's it in my words help you know take my words but then help me with transitions OK right so it so it flows better but it's my words with some added parts to do it and then that's when I go back and I'll edit it because it still has to sound like me and it's I it takes time like even though it's supposed to be fast it takes me a lot of time yeah I was gonna ask you I don't know if if you were writing I'm sure you were writing content before before AI now is it really saving time I mean maybe the product comes out a little better cause it goes deeper than maybe we would have gone but we still have to go back and forth with it you still have to look at it and read it and re re have it rewritten and go through it it takes longer now or the same um it doesn't it doesn't take longer I have never like it sometimes it's hard for me in all honesty to express myself in words unless I'm just talking out of like talking to make no sense right and to me it's like it's like I'm journaling out loud or I'm even journaling with chat GPT or whichever platform I'm using at the time and it helps it helps me take my thoughts and make them flow better and not like I'm writing a journal and then posting it on LinkedIn right hahaha it is a large language model yeah that's that's yeah but but like everything I post on all of my social platforms it's all me it's all like it's all me it's all it's all my words it's just there are other elements of it that help bring it together yeah I don't have any I don't have any clients that that probably put as much time in it as you do whenever you're writing content some of them just kind of set it and forget it and I say well you know you're gonna be judged on this when people see it but you're you're one of the ones that I I think is just incredible because you push back on everything and I think that's a true testimony to your business and the way that you operate definitely thank you well it has to sound like me that right right yeah very very true so what would you leave people that are watching this thinking you know is should I should I should I go to her site should I book some time with her should I do this what would what would you ask what would you say for them to think about um I would that's a good question um I would say if you are a business leader or a business founder to really think about kind of where you are and how easy is it for you to sit down and write a social media post how easy is it for you to write a newsletter do you feel like you you know how to express your business and can you do it without being overwhelmed can you do it without second guessing yourself can you do it with consistency where everything that you do is consistent and you're not saying different things on different platforms in different ways and if any of that or any of your marketing is overwhelming then I would say take a pause and come back to the heart and soul of your business and really and really go go deeper and kind of recognize do I have true clarity have I built my foundation have I planted my roots and if the answer is remotely well I don't know no definitely not then I would say let's talk if you are feeling that way and the overwhelm with all the marketing and you have done all of that brand clarity work but you're also not a marketer so anything with marketing no matter how clear you are is still hard then let's talk there too because I can help you with that as well right we take everything that you've already done cause I have met with people who have done a lot of that deep brain clarity work and now they're like well now what do I do did it not just get applied or did they they there's there's no execution is that this that's the part where they get stuck at least in those scenarios you're talking about the execution I think I think it's more they're not marketers so they don't necessarily know how to take that information right to take their values their mission their their purpose their personality their tone they don't actually they don't know what to do with it and that's why they don't know how to get it seen yeah yeah so if you're if you're two different places any business can be in two different places you could be I am so lost I have zero clarity no foundation I think I have clarity but maybe I should talk to her see if I do or I know I have clarity but now I don't know how to use it or marketing is so hard for me that's where I come in at different places to support it's very valuable very very valuable I really appreciate you taking the time with with us today and talking about your business and letting us into a little bit of your world it's very much appreciated thank you thank you for chatting with me it'll be incredible and again thank you so much tally everybody that's Tally Canoothan with with Heart marketing her her website with heartdashmarketing.com and uh tally give us some some numbers you're on uh Instagram of course LinkedIn where's like your favorite place for people to come look you up primarily on LinkedIn and under my name Tally Canoetsen um I'm on Instagram as well at with Heart Dot Marketing on Instagram but LinkedIn is where I spend most of my time awesome they can just send you a message on there definitely book a book sometime with you on your website with heartdashmarketing.com I appreciate you coming on the show today and I look forward to talking to you again thank you take care