Latest / Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast) / Doone & Jason Atkins in Conversation: How Young Women Can Be Entrepreneurs on Startup Equity Matters Podcast

Transcript

Doone & Jason Atkins in Conversation: How Young Women Can Be Entrepreneurs on Startup Equity Matters Podcast · Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast)

• 0:09
  Hi, everyone, and welcome to today's Startup Equity Matters. The topic today, well, I've determined this topic. Hopefully, my guest agrees. It's how young women can become entrepreneurs. I'm very excited as we're getting some first-hand insights into life as a young entrepreneur and
• 0:28
  You know, we all have to start out and learn on the job. It's a pretty crazy time. And so to get, you know, real world insights today, I think is going to be awesome for heaps of our listeners. And we might pick up a few new listeners today, which will be awesome as well. So welcome, Doon Roizen, who's the founder of Female Startup Club.
• 0:50
  Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here. I'm not one of the young people. I would say I'm not that young. Well, inspire to help the young entrepreneurs. And we're going to learn more about your startup journey and how it's been going. Like all of us, there's some things we're better at and some things we're still green at and we'll unpack some of those stories today. Yeah, I'm excited. Let's do it.
• 1:20
  Let's do it. I was looking at your LinkedIn, 14 million views on TikTok. That's not bad. Is this Female Startup Club? That's all right. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. We post a lot of content.
• 1:33
  Awesome. We actually just started a new channel. We've had my personal account for a long time, and now we have a new account for our kind of U.S. entity and like the U.S. side of things because we're leaning into TikTok Shop, which is launching into Australia in July. But at the moment, to access TikTok Shop, you need to be obviously a U.S. entity and have everything set up over there. So we've just started a new channel and it's been really fun. Yeah.
• 1:59
  Awesome. Yeah. So how do people find you on there? Like, what are these channels called? Oh, like everywhere? I mean, everywhere it's either Female Startup Club or Dune Roisin, but the US one is Female Startup Club underscore US. And it's going to be all, well, I mean, it is already all educational kind of content around TikTok shop and how to get ready for the launch when it comes to Australia in July and how to access it if you're already in the US and kind of wanting to get involved.
• 2:28
  Amazing. I totally mucked up your surname. Sorry about that. Oh, don't worry. I forgot to tell you, and usually I have that on my list of things to do, but today I forgot. All good. All good. And you're a podcast host as well? Yeah, podcast host. How many episodes? Over 500? That's pretty dope. Yeah, I think we're at 600 and something now, 630 maybe. Wow. Wow.
• 2:52
  Yeah, it's pretty good. Thanks. Yeah, hundreds of hours of chatting with people. It's been so much fun. Chatting with who? Who do you get on?
• 3:02
  So the show at the moment is very much interviewing super successful founders who happen to be women about the playbook in business. So we kind of dig into, especially in the early days, you know, what it took to find product market fit, kind of getting it off the ground. What was that grassroots approach and the bootstrapped approach before kind of raising capital? And we interview kind of consumer focused entrepreneurs.
• 3:25
  direct to consumer brands. And most of the time it's consumer packaged goods, so CPG brands. And yeah, they're doing seven, eight or nine figures in ARR and absolutely crushing. Wicked. It's a lot of fun.
• 3:42
  Yeah, no, absolutely. Getting super successful, interesting entrepreneurs like yourself onto a podcast is an awesome way to learn and meet people. Yeah. And that's why I started the show. I started it out of my bedroom floor during the pandemic. I had a jewelry brand at the time, a D2C jewelry brand, and I was wanting to get some advice from people smarter than me. But if someone drops into your DMs to ask for an hour of your time, it's pretty difficult for someone to say, like, yeah, sure.
• 4:11
  sure. Like let's meet for a coffee or, you know, if they're overseas, get on Zoom. So I started the podcast, you know, with no grand plans, absolutely no experience, no confidence in public speaking to kind of learn from people smarter than me. And it just became, came a bit of a vibe, really. Amazing. I've learned a lot. So cool. How long has that been going?
• 4:33
  Technically, we started posting our first episodes in November 2019, but we weren't really doing anything with it then. It was just kind of social videos that we were doing and putting it over to the podcast. And then after the pandemic hit, we started taking it more seriously and actually, you know, sticking to a rhythm and everything circa May 2020. Yeah, cool.
• 4:52
  Have you got a couple of highlight guests or highlight moments? Or is that too hard? It's like, which kid's your favorite? You just can't tell. Oh, my gosh. There are so many. There are so many. But I loved an episode I did recently with Connie Lowe from Three Ships Beauty. She's a Canadian entrepreneur, and she's just kind of gone through a raise. And I've interviewed her before on the show back in 2021. So we're doing a follow-up.
• 5:15
  episode around like different lessons that she's kind of learned from raising and hiring and firing and like a few different topics. And she's just such a weapon. It was so interesting to hear her kind of thinking and approach to business. And because she'd come from a really lean startup, scrappy, bootstrapped vibe to now kind of going into, you know, raising capital and, and all that kind of thing. I think now this year they're, you know, it's maybe 11 million
• 5:44
  In Rev. Anyway, doing really well. So it's just, it's really cool to hear those stories. And then another episode that I loved was, I think we recorded it at the end of last year and a friend of mine, she's now a friend of mine. She sold her company for $650 million.
• 6:02
  in maybe like September last year. And she had minimal investment. Really cool story. Wow. An absolute gun. And so hearing like we'd had her on the show a few years ago when she was early on in the journey. And yeah. Was that Kate? Was that Kate Morris? No, who was that?
• 6:19
  American founder, Juru. Oh, yeah. And, yeah, got the business to $100 million in revenue and then was like, cool, time to go. Well, definitely check it out. Passed that over. Listen to Startup Equity Matters on your run and then jump in the car and listen to, what's it called? Female Startup Club. Yeah, of course. Okay, so, okay, I'm getting with it. The brand, same brand for the pod. Cool, smart idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 6:47
  So what's up for 2024? Website came second. What's up for 2024? Yeah. So is it like events, education, podcasts? Like, you know, where are you taking the community to? Yeah. Oh, my gosh. It's been such a change. You know, like the economy really shifted last year at the beginning of 2023. And we had built the business primarily through brand deals, sponsorships. And obviously, when you get those kind of bigger deals, it can be really lucrative. But then...
• 7:12
  And that was mostly global kind of B2B SaaS that were my partners. And so I knew that I was in this tricky position of not really being in control of what was going to happen. And then end of 2022, things start changing. Start of 2023. Sponsorships are hard. Sponsorships are so hard. I'm trying to get sponsors at the moment for a couple of boards that I'm on. Not easy.
• 7:34
  Anyway, so yeah, I already knew that it was a bit of a risky kind of, you know, move to be just building the business primarily that way. But it was kind of just such an organic process that that's what I pursued. And then last year, we kind of tried a few different things and made the pivot more to educational opportunities.
• 7:51
  short courses. And now we're kind of going back a couple of steps to rebuild our foundations. And we're launching a new website and a few different things that are kind of happening on that foundational level. And yeah, we'll be rolling out these mini courses, affordable, highly practical for early stage founders. So that might be something like, in two weeks, get your pitch deck done. In two weeks, get your email flows all set up. And it's really like a
• 8:20
  Instead of, you know, you can spend hours searching on YouTube and having so many different people telling you where to go and getting a bit lost and overwhelmed and then bookmarking it and never actually doing it, kind of like going through the learning, the learning program taught by these incredible women who I have on the show who are really just incredible at what they do. And yeah, getting the outcome really quick so you can keep moving fast. Amazing.
• 8:45
  Very cool. I like that. It's practical. Two weeks at a time, like little bite-sized chunks, and you're always making progress. It's super important to be making progress all the time. Totally, totally. So yeah, that's something that we're working on at the moment. We've just started kind of moving through the phase of how our website's going to look and how all that kind of stuff is going to operate. And yeah, I'm excited. Well, keep me updated. I've got plenty of female-founded startups in my community and even in my portfolio. So...
• 9:12
  Yeah, make sure you keep me in the loop. Yeah, I will. Sweet. Let's go all the way back to the beginning, eh? So we chatted a little bit about this in the past and it's a cool story. How did you get into entrepreneurship? What's driving you? What's bringing your passion for leading this community?
• 9:35
  Yeah. Well, I'll start with how did I get into entrepreneurship? Because I definitely didn't even know that word when I was in my early 20s. I didn't know what a startup was, or entrepreneur, or fundraising, or anything like that. And it's certainly not my... I'm not in the industry as an expert or anything, but I... Right. But what got you to not just go get an accounting job or a regular job? And what sort of
• 10:02
  took you out into the hustle and bustle of, you know, making your own way. Yeah. So when I was in my, like, you know, after school studies and things like that, I was a uni dropout. Then I went and did like a course in visual communications and things like that. Didn't really know what I wanted to do, but I was a real...
• 10:21
  like eager person to get internships and work for free to get experience. So I would do that, like round the clock, just what could I get and how could I get it and create opportunities for myself. So for example, I really wanted to work in a magazine and I,
• 10:37
  in Brisbane where I was kind of like living after high school, I knew that there was no magazines there. Like that just wasn't a thing. But they had like a free print publication that went out with the Courier Mail, which is the newspaper. And I was like, cool, I'll get an internship there. Like I'll be able to learn some stuff. And they didn't have anything listed. But I was like, maybe if I could get a meeting with the director, I could convince the director to get me an internship. You know, why not? Let's try. So I...
• 11:06
  went to the local nursery and I bought this little potted plant, like a thyme herb. And I wrote my like portfolio on the card and was, I said something like, you know, could I have a moment of your time?
• 11:18
  potted it up in a cute little pot and dressed up in my Nike little shoes and a high-vis oversized shirt because I was like, I want to see inside the office as well. So I'm just going to go and deliver it myself. Went in, delivered it to the director, and then long story short, got a 12-week internship. So I kind of just repeated that process of being like, how could I get the attention of someone that I need to get the attention of to be able to get work experience because then maybe I'll figure out what kind of job I want from that.
• 11:44
  And I did that like a number of times in different ways. And eventually I heard that there was this company that,
• 11:52
  starting in Sydney. And at that time, I kind of wanted to work in fashion. And I was like, oh, cool, fashion company, like, let's go and work from there. So packed my bags, moved to Sydney, got this internship, and it was at the Iconic. And at the time, the Iconic was like, it was funded, but it was super scrappy in those early days. Like we were working from picnic tables, we had internet dongles to run this internet company, like it was just absolute chaos. And I think we were less than 100 people at that time.
• 12:20
  And that was my introduction to what a startup was, what it meant to raise capital, what entrepreneurship is. And, you know, it was owned by, I don't know if it's owned by these guys anymore, but it was owned by the Samway Brothers from Rocket Internet. And so it was just like cutthroat European German dudes who were like so intense. And it was a really fun time. This era of do everything, like lots of stuff going on, like just everything.
• 12:49
  I don't know. It was just so crazy, like crazy chaos. And I was like, this is so much fun. And then from there, I'd gone into working in more of a corporate environment. And that is just not my personality. And I was like, I can't work in these environments. I just can't do it. And it's not for everyone. Some people hang out there for years or decades, just like crunching away, like half sad all the time, like really never getting to
• 13:15
  I don't know, find something they care about or something that they find fun. Totally. It's cool if you're doing it, but I'd prefer for more people to be more engaged by their work.
• 13:27
  Oh yeah, it was like selling my soul. And I really realized the power and the importance of lifestyle design and like taking the action towards the things that you want to do. And there's a lot to be said about doing the things that you don't want to do to find out what you do want to do. And so I went on this journey of working in different things and freelancing and all this kind of stuff. And eventually started working with my now husband on his SaaS startup
• 13:56
  him bootstrapping a software and building a content agency arm to fund the development of the tech on the side. So we did that for a couple of years. And then I was like, cool, I think I'm ready to do something myself. I just want to do something and put my kind of skill set and the things that I'm interested in and the things that like get me excited, basically. And that started the D2C brand. And then that blended into Female Startup Club in the pandemic. Awesome. What was the big break that sort of got you hooked on
• 14:26
  on the female startup club and sort of made it, you know, allowed you to be full time doing it because it's always hard to make that transition from like interest and side hustle. And, and like, it's hard to sometimes get that critical mass or get over that, that hump of like the chicken and the egg period, you know,
• 14:44
  Totally, totally. So basically at the time, like circa March 2020, I had said to myself, I'm going to start pursuing this. And then the advice around, that was in March or April. And then the advice around that time and the advice from Tim Ferriss, and he's obviously a huge podcaster, was wait till you have 100,000 downloads and then get a sponsor. And I was like, well,
• 15:10
  I don't have 100,000 downloads. I've got like 2,000 downloads and I need a sponsor now if I'm going to focus on this podcast because I want to, I think I had a goal of like,
• 15:22
  As of May, I set a goal that I wanted 100 episodes before the end of the year, which we hit on December 29. But I was like, cool, if I'm going to hit that quota, I need to publish three times a week. And there's just no chance my husband and I were going to make it through life together with him editing my podcast. That sounds gnarly. Yeah. So I was like, cool, I need a sponsor now. And so I just started Cold Outreach and...
• 15:49
  I got my first sponsor, which was 25,000 US for like a deal with Klaviyo. And yeah, that was kind of a signal like, oh shit, maybe this can be something. Like if I can get one, I can definitely get another. And yeah, that was really, it was an early signal. It was a really early signal. Yeah, I only had 4,000.
• 16:11
  To be an entrepreneur, I've got one, I can definitely get more. Yeah, exactly. So at that time, that was then May 2020. And that was, I had 4,000 downloads. And I was like, cool, I'm going to run with this. And yeah, I just really leaned in. And so, you know, we did that first 100 episodes. We grew. I really focused on consistency. We started opening up new channels.
• 16:35
  you know, now we have an audience of about 150,000 women across our different channels and our newsletter and stuff like that. And so in 2022, we published our first book. And then that kind of led to, you know, a lot of opportunity that started the speaking gigs. And we use the book as a marketing initiative to start speaking gigs and start that kind of revenue stream in the business.
• 17:00
  Yeah, that was kind of the early signal was that first deal to be like, oh, hang on, there's something here. And at that point, I was also really interested in, and I've always been really interested in, you know, lifestyle design, like I mentioned before. And so I really wanted to build an online business that didn't have me locked into a certain location and not able to do the things that I love to do. You know, I travel a lot. My husband's team is also 100% remote. So
• 17:27
  We've really focused on making sure that we're not kind of like tied down. We travel a lot. Great. You were just saying before, how many countries have you been in the last six months? Quite a few. All sunny ones. For those of you watching on YouTube, dude's got the best tan going. Yeah.
• 17:47
  Yeah, it's been a great year. Actually, I went to Canada at the start of the year and that was obviously not sunny, but it was amazing. Any snowboarding? More time in Asia. No, actually. I did go to Whistler though. I was there with the founder of Thinkific, Greg Smith, and he took me to Whistler for a couple of days to show me around and we did this thing called Scandinave Spa and it's like you just go ultra relaxed and there's thermal pools and baths and all this stuff and I was like, oh my God, this is bliss.
• 18:16
  I'm not a skier. I mean, my husband's from Switzerland and so he is, but I'm like more into the, I don't know what else it's called, but like there it's like the rackets where you walk up the mountain in the tennis racket things. Yeah. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing.
• 18:31
  Get a bit of adventure in. I'm all for the bathhouse culture. Shout out to my native state guys back on the Gold Coast. They're killing it. Keeping me sane. Love that for you. Yeah, thanks. Cool. So, right. So, we're kicking off. We've done our first, like, awesome sale. Great. Things are going along. We've got our first 100 sales.
• 18:54
  EPS done. And then TikTok comes along somewhere in there and you're like, hang on a sec, maybe this will be a good channel opportunity. Can you tell us a bit about your journey with TikTok? How's it going now? Has it been changing over the last year or two?
• 19:12
  Yeah, I mean, TikTok's just such a powerful vehicle to, especially for direct-to-consumer brands and anything consumer-focused, but also for education. And for us, like on my personal channel, we saw a lot of success and we still do see a lot of success for using it just as a lead generator. So it's really, you know, something that we're able to easily drive people into our funnel and then, you know.
• 19:34
  work with them to nurture into different products and things like that. And that was kind of like something that just happened through consistency over the last couple of years. But then when we look at, you know, what's happening in America with social commerce and this, you know, reinvented, insane, explosive growth for direct-to-consumer brands, my thinking was, you know...
• 20:01
  All these direct-to-consumer brands, like if you're blowing up and going, like the agency that I partner with in the US, they're the leading number one agency for kind of TikTok shop stuff. And their clients, you know, if you've got the right formula on TikTok, you can be going from, you know, zero to 4 million clients.
• 20:17
  just through TikTok shop alone or zero to 20 million. Like it's just insane. And like the way that TikTok shop works and like the future of TikTok shop is you can have your own channel and your own hosts who are live selling constantly multiple times a week. Or you can have like, for example, they have eight live studios in America with round the clock hosts who are
• 20:40
  TikTok shop with set designs and like all this amazing stuff. But then it's democratizing like how creators can access and be part of, you know, the upside of creating viral content. So you can have a thousand followers and create a viral video with 800,000 views and get the commission from all those sales that you're driving through TikTok shop. So as a brand,
• 21:02
  Yes, you can have your own channel and you can be, you know, like us, really committing to content and lives and all that kind of stuff. But you can also just work with the, you know, in the creator marketplace and use these affiliates, like thousands of people who are like experts at creating, you know, viral videos. And so...
• 21:20
  Even today, you can see like the importance of like growth and like having this big following used to be like, that's the old way. The new way is like, it's not about having the big following. It's just being about, can you create attention and eyeballs? Because if you can create attention and eyeballs on a video, you can drive sales. And that is the power of TikTok shop. And, you know, we're seeing so many direct to consumer brands who are
• 21:44
  If you can create content that makes someone feel something and then click to buy, you're winning. You're really winning. So the challenge, though, is that as a brand, you need to be able to have the back end sorted. You need to be able to have your manufacturing, your supply chain. Everything needs to be really locked down because if you're going to be scaling from...
• 22:07
  zero to 4 million in revenue, like you've also got to fulfill that amount of products, right? And so my thinking, you know, last year, watching what everything was going on in the US and like what's kind of happening and knowing that it's coming to Australia this year was, okay, well, what about being a first mover when it comes to these educational, affordable programs that we have and doing the same process, but we can scale without the kind of headache on the back end of products. So that's kind of what we've really...
• 22:35
  leaned into and we're kind of moving towards now. And, you know, it's, it's, we're still really at the beginning, but, um, we're pursuing like the U S market. And then in July, we'll be pursuing the Australian market as well. And, and being kind of a leader for TikTok shop times education for early stage founders.
• 22:55
  Teach them how to do it. It's such a great platform. I mean, obviously it has its detractors and, you know, all tech can have its downsides, but, geez, it can communicate in a powerful way like almost no platform has ever been able to do before. You could just have to look at, you know, reels and stories and, you know, every other platform, you know, trying to emulate. I mean, totally. The format. So absolute game changer for communicating and connecting with people.
• 23:21
  Totally. Like if you're able to also like, if you're at the beginning of your journey, starting a business or starting a brand and you really factor in like, how can you build this and reverse engineer this business as something that will thrive in the TikTok environment? Like you really put yourself kind of steps ahead versus like already manufacturing and already developing and already getting to this point and then trying to make it work on TikTok. If you can do it the other way around, like...
• 23:44
  you know, when you see people develop products with a social first kind of mindset, you know, it's just, it's just crazy. Everything's different. Yeah. Morality's there. Yeah. Ultra high growth. No old school thinking. Yeah. Just jump straight in and, and hit TikTok. Yeah. Cool. No, great insight. Thanks for sharing that. Totally.
• 24:04
  For us, like, and it's something I haven't really mentioned yet, but for us, we also started to see, you know, part of my message and we didn't get into this yet and we can go back. But, you know, my childhood was really like the kind of, I guess, driver for why I do what I do. I grew up poor, single mom, middle of the bush, only child, like all these different unique experiences that have shaped kind of the impact that I want to have in the world and the opportunity that I want to create for women, because I really...
• 24:33
  you know, struggle with the reality that gender equality is just not, it's not on track and it's just not in a good place. And so we were able to see that, yes, we can create impact through education and learning and helping in that respect, but also we can create impact by investing our own dollars into, you know, small angel investments into brands that we're really excited about and founders that we're really excited about. And so we started doing that kind of in a,
• 25:02
  here and there way at the end of 2022. And now we've got a couple of investments and we're looking to kind of increase that level of our kind of like portfolio, I guess you would say. 10, 20 years. You just opened up like four threads for me that I was looking to like pivot across to. So you're amazing. Thank you for doing that.
• 25:27
  Getting back to how it all began, I think is really important part of everyone's journey and your purpose and your why. So important in business. If you don't have a real purpose for doing something and it's just about money, like you might make money and then you'll make your money and then you'll be like, oh, God, you know, this money doesn't really fulfill me. And so you just have to find purpose and passion, I think.
• 25:47
  You know, to be able to build a company that's educating, you know, young women, women into entrepreneurship that's so connected to something that's so personally important to you and your story must be really cool, eh?
• 26:01
  It is so cool. You know, I'm a really big advocate for women being financially independent of a partner and having their own access to, you know, wealth through assets or, you know, whatever it might be. And I was at, actually, I was invited last week to the U.S. consulate, U.S. consulate, U.S.
• 26:18
  I don't know. I've never been invited. The private residence of the US consul. Oh, I'm not saying it right. Anyway, whatever. We know what I'm saying. It's in Willara. No, no, in Willara. It's here. But the US ambassador for women's global rights had flown in for a few days of meetings with the government and policymakers and things like that. And her name is Dr. Gita Rao Gupta. I'm probably not saying that the best way, but you know.
• 26:43
  That's how I'm going to say it right now. That's one each for us on this podcast. Thanks for evening it out. And we were talking about a number of issues that women face when it comes to gender inequality. And that comes across, you know, the funding gap, the pay gap, that kind of, you know, bucket. And then it's also, you know, into sexual assault, domestic violence, and how all these things kind of fit together. And there are just so many different nuances in all these different buckets.
• 27:12
  You know, when you see, and it's obviously such a big problem in Australia and we're seeing a lot of change and, you know, the justice reform that's happening at the moment for sexual assault and violence, which women are disproportionately affected by, when women earn just an income, she said basically, and this resonated with me, when women earn just an income, they don't have any kind of power to opt out. They are trapped, basically. Whereas when women are able to have...
• 27:39
  It's the same for anyone. But yeah. Totally. It's important to call it out for women, but it's the same for me. Like, oh, you've got to earn an income. If you've just got a salary, you have no outs. You can earn a little bit more or you can change jobs, but you were like, there's no outs. But if you have wealth, if you have assets that can generate you a salary, like a whole salary, then you have many outs.
• 28:02
  Totally. And look, that's only one element of power. But it's so cool that we can talk about this for women as well and highlight the plight. Absolutely. And I think that when you kind of also have those insights and things in mind, it's really important to champion and create change in the impact for women to be able to.
• 28:24
  create businesses, access capital, scale their businesses so they have an asset and they have the option to opt out if they ever need to and have that financial security and independence of a partner. Yeah, love it. It also, you know, it's slightly off topic, but I mean, even like starting, like even if you're not a founder, for example, if you're one of the first five employees in a great startup and you get your 1% or whatever, and then that startup goes on to be
• 28:53
  you know, a huge amount, you can still make a tremendous amount of money like that way as well. Like I'm a big believer in ESOPs as a wealth creator. And I know I've like taken on a little bit of a tangent, but you know, if you're talking about wealth creation and equity and ownership, you know, the more startups that issue equity properly, and if we make sure that, you know, women are getting at least what they deserve when it comes to, you know, equity distribution, then that's a huge wealth creator.
• 29:20
  I think at Cake, we're also very passionate about cross-border equity issuance. So, you know, I think you go back five years, you couldn't cross-border. So like just, let's use like a really simple example. So you go back five years, you're an Aussie founder and you've got like five or 10 people working for you and two of them are international, right? They could be freelancers or, you know, you could have, you know, some particular skill set that you needed in Southeast Asia or wherever.
• 29:47
  To issue equity to that international person, which, you know, 50 is going to be a woman, you couldn't really do it, but now you can. And so by helping to issue equity internationally, we're breaking down borders and we're breaking down the borders between, you know, first world, I shouldn't use these terms, but like, you know, like wealthier.
• 30:09
  and less wealthy countries and normalizing wealth distribution, which I think, you know, it really ties into, you know, similar concepts, something that we're pretty passionate about. Totally. And I think like I even experienced this yesterday. I was trying to invest in, you know, the platform in the UK, CEDIS. Yeah. It's kind of like a, you know, equity crowdfunding platform. What were you investing in? What was tickling your fancy there?
• 30:35
  Oh, it's actually amazing. You should check it out. It's called Female Invest. And there's a lot of similarities to what we do in that it's educational content courses, that kind of thing, but really teaching women how to invest in the stock market. And, you know, they have an app and things like that. And they've raised before, but they wanted to do a community raise. And I was trying to...
• 30:52
  you know, invest into it. And I couldn't because I'm in Australia. And so I can do it because I'm going to sort out an address and all that kind of stuff. We have an entity there. But I was like, damn, like imagine all the people who are, you know, this is a global company. They have a global community. There would be so many people that want to invest into their platform that are international. And I think that's where those platforms need to evolve to be more cross-border, like you say, because then there are the US ones we funder.
• 31:20
  It's easy. You just fill it all out and it's fine if you're in Australia. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We need all this equity stuff, investment, ownership, wealth to be as global as possible. Not quite there yet, but it's definitely improving. I've only been in this space for five or 10 years.
• 31:36
  We've made a lot of progress, so I think it'll get easier and easier to invest and share equity globally, which is awesome. Yeah, I think the rise of those kind of platforms has been really interesting and obviously so great for companies who don't fit the playbook of venture capital. Yeah.
• 31:54
  The 0.1% playbook that went to Harvard. Like, sorry to call out the club, but like the rest of us need a way to do business as well if we can't afford like 50 grand in legal fees or whatever. Lol. Yeah. So awesome. So, yeah. So, yeah, we were talking about.
• 32:15
  helping educate like young females as well. And you're passionate about that. One of the things we were like half joking about was like, instead of just watching Taylor Swift and being infatuated with her music and her aura, like maybe like learn about her business. Like she's a marketing genius. I think more so than a musical genius, but look, I'm happy to be, I'm happy to be shot down on the music side of things, but she's probably bad ass. Yeah.
• 32:43
  So, yeah, how cool would that be? Maybe that could be one of your courses, you know, talk about the finance of running a global, you know, juggernaut and like compare the GDP of a tool versus like a small country or whatever. Yeah, I mean, I should. I should start a new series in the newsletter.
• 33:02
  But it's cool to be able to learn in non-traditional ways, right? I think not everyone wants to sit in a classroom and just like, blah, go to university and learn. Oh, man. If the price of beef goes up, the demand for chicken will increase and you just like, far out. Yes. That's not my brain. I can't do that. Yeah. Yeah.
• 33:21
  I need to be stimulated. I need it to be fun. I need it to be, you know, exciting. And it can be all of those things when it's in the right format. And that's why it's important to have different kinds of format. I mean, when you think about something like Duolingo and how fun that's made, you know, learning a language and how fun they are across their channels, you know, you're like, wow, this is powerful. Yeah. We haven't talked about this yet.
• 33:50
  But it sounds very interesting. Young Australian of the Year. Like I haven't spoken to someone with that award before. That's pretty cool. 2022 as well, pretty fresh. Tell us about it.
• 34:04
  Oh my gosh. It was so cool. So I was living in the UK at the time. I'd been there for about eight years and I get this email and I'm like, what? Nominated for what? Why? Like, as if this is a scam. And then I get a message. I've got a few of those emails. Actually, we won like one of these big SaaS awards last year. And I thought it was a scam too. And I sent it to the internal like
• 34:28
  scam channel and then they came back and they were like no this is legit oh my god that's so funny um yeah i thought it was a scam and then i got a linkedin message and i was like oh okay anyway um long story short the the kind of focus for i was in the uk and it's given out by the high commissioner to australia at australia house which is the embassy in the uk and um
• 34:56
  The theme for 2022 was, you know, voices in media. And they had seen my book and kind of been following the journey. And basically, yeah, I won Young Australian of the Year alongside Maren Voicy, who is one of the lead scientists for the AstraZeneca vaccine out of Oxford. And she has published a lot of papers on her research and things like that. So she won Australian of the
• 35:22
  There's a guy who, his name is Tom Hooper. He's a very successful movie producer who produces movies like Cats and Les Mis and stuff like that. And then there was an honorary award. There's four awards. That's three. There was an honorary award for Jamie Dornan for the work he had done in Australia for Tourist, which is, I think it's a movie or a show or something. Yeah.
• 35:46
  And, um, yeah, we even honestly, even going there, like we would, it's a gala, like you, you give a speech, you accept the award, like all that kind of stuff. But even going there, I was like to my husband, like, I'm just still convinced this isn't real. Like this is so weird. So we get there and we got there early because obviously I didn't want to be late. And, um,
• 36:04
  No one was there yet, but we're sitting kind of like in the waiting area of Australia House and, you know, fully, fully glammed up. I've been there. It's a crazy place. There's like marble everywhere and like... Oh, isn't it beautiful? Portraits of all these beautiful old like legends of the country and... Yeah, the wood that they've brought over from Australia. It's so beautiful, like on the roof, on the, you know, everywhere. Mm-hmm.
• 36:25
  Beautiful place. So we had an incredible night. It was just, you know, so, so special. I think at the time there was maybe like 250 people in the room and that was the most people I'd ever spoken to giving a speech. And it was only a short speech, but I...
• 36:41
  got up there and rattled it off and I was so nervous, but it was really cool. They'd made like all this, this cool video montage and story and all that kind of thing. It was just a really beautiful night. And then that award led to, um, another thing that I was like, I thought this is fake, but it was real. I was meant to fly to New York on the Saturday morning and we were going to leave really early from the house. And then I was like, oh, you know what? We haven't checked the letterbox in a while. I should check the letterbox.
• 37:05
  I'm bad at that kind of stuff. So I checked the letterbox and there's a stack of mail because I hadn't looked in like a month. And on the very top, there's the thing that's sent from Buckingham Palace. And I was like, what's this? Yeah. And then basically I opened it up and it was an invitation to Buckingham Palace to meet the now King and Queen of England.
• 37:24
  and I was in like lucky I didn't go to New York. Oh, lucky I saw it before I went to New York because it was for that week. And so I changed my flight, obviously, and got to go to Buckingham Palace and, yeah, meet the king and queen or queen consort of England and the Commonwealth. And, yeah, that was basically in recognition of – How do you do it? Did you get trained on like – do you like –
• 37:49
  bow or no no no it was more more casual than that it's like an event that they host for people who have contributed to culture and community within the commonwealth and mine was in recognition of the work for women and girls around the world and when you go it's just more of like a procedure of security I guess like all that kind of stuff and then yeah it was amazing basically yeah
• 38:16
  Very stoked. You must have been ecstatic. What a great year. It was a really cool experience. Icing on the cake. No, very cool. Very jealous. That sounds amazing. Well done. I think I'm not going to be able to top that as a career highlight. No, no way. The best is yet to come. We'll see.
• 38:36
  Look, let's talk a bit about your equity journey, you know, as a founder. How do you see equity? Do you have a co-founder? You know, have you got employee equity? Have you raised any capital? Like, what are you happy to sort of share on your equity journey?
• 38:50
  Yeah, I mean, no, no, and no. I am a solo founder. So far, we've just been really kind of bootstrapped. It's definitely something I've seen more as an asset that I'm creating for myself as a cash flow kind of business and as a vehicle to be able to do the things that I want to do. So if I want to invest in other businesses, if I want to travel and do all these kind of things, like this is my vehicle to be able to do that as a cash flow kind of structure.
• 39:19
  You know, never say never. Who knows what the future holds? But at the moment, 100%. Cool. Over here. All good. Yeah. I can appreciate that. Some businesses are cash flow businesses. You know, they're not necessarily, you know, things that you're ever going to sell. You know, I would probably advocate for having some sort of, you know, employee equity or team equity and cutting some people in and maybe...
• 39:44
  giving access to dividends. I hope your team aren't going to listen to this. But anyway, that's the sort of thing I normally advocate for. We're very small, but yeah. But yeah, look, I totally appreciate that. You know, some businesses are...
• 39:56
  are best made that way. And look, maybe down the track, you'll have other products that you want to spin out that might need capital. Maybe, maybe not. Yeah, I think for me, I can see a structure where there are different assets that are kind of connected to and we can use Female Startup Club as a media entity to drive sales awareness, et cetera, to and have a team and have a lot of people involved.
• 40:23
  um but yeah right now uh it's we're quite small all good and angel investing you've been doing a bit how's that going
• 40:33
  Yeah, it's been good. I mean, I get a lot of decks coming my way and, you know, I'm also really passionate about connecting dots where I can. Oh, I will. I'll add you to my list. I have a list of people who receive my sends. I'll add you to it. Yeah, so...
• 40:55
  one of the things that I really try to do is connect the right dots where possible and, and, you know, to, to match up people where I know there might be a good, a good fit, even if it's not me. So to provide some value in some way and yeah, I'm, you know, I'm not investing in tons of businesses all at once. I'm taking more of that long-term approach of a few a year and, you know, in the next 10 or 20 years, I'll have a really nice portfolio and hopefully some, some nice wins in there. And yeah,
• 41:23
  I'm excited about a few businesses this year. There's one we're about to invest in. It's called Everform, and it is compression wear for pregnant women and postpartum.
• 41:39
  The founder is a physio and it's been designed with this patented technology to kind of help the issues that happen when you're pregnant and after pregnancy and after labor and things like that. So, yeah, this is a really cool one. All the help we can get, Argan. Exactly. Exactly. But, yeah, Everform, you should check it out. Anyone who's interested in learning more could also drop into my DMs and I can connect those dots.
• 42:06
  She's amazing. Nice plug. Jason Calacanis would be proud of that plug. Who's that? He's like this massive angel investor. He runs the All In Pod, which is one of the biggest pods around. Yeah, yeah. He's also one of our investors. Amazing. Wow, cool. Cool. Yeah, he loves to talk his own book on his podcast. That's all. Anyway. Right, right, right, right. They're really big on TikTok, right? Yeah.
• 42:34
  I don't know. Yeah, I was on TikTok for a while, but I have a bit of an addictive personality. And I was just like, I felt like it was like just on me and I couldn't get out. So I have to. You have to set really strong boundaries. Me too, though. I can like lose two hours and then be like, what in the hell? I've never experienced anything like that. That algorithm just knows you like better than yourself. It's crazy. Yeah, it's pretty powerful. Cool. Well, I mean, we're right out of time nearly and we always finish with
• 43:03
  A little question about health and mental health. Being a founder is a hard journey. We're big believers that we just need to look after your health to have a happy life and be creative. How do you see that when it comes to entrepreneurship? Obviously, you like getting in the sunshine. That'll help with your mental health. I thrive in the sunshine. The UK, I was there for like
• 43:31
  eight years maybe and yeah it was just not good for my soul i get the sad lamps out there all sorts of weird stuff it gets pretty depressing
• 43:39
  Yeah, it's great like most of the year. So day to day, I focus on the small things and the things that are definitely within my control. So even if I'm having a shit time, I know that I can pull the lever and do one thing that gives me a little moment of joy. So for me, that is daily cold shower, love cold therapy, really find it as like a mood booster. And especially on the days where you don't want to do it is the days where you get the best results.
• 44:04
  love going for a walk by the beach or a swim in the ocean. Just those kind of like small rituals that you have in your day-to-day life that bring you joy. You know, for me, even just like having a coffee, I just have to go out and have a coffee every morning, get out of the house before I kind of like get into my day. So on that kind of level, I'm going to have a coffee. I'm going to have a
• 44:22
  Those small things really are the, you know, they keep me on track. But I go through ups and downs like everyone. I've definitely experienced times of deep anxiety and deep burnout and just what feelings. Why am I doing this? I should not do this anymore. But, you know, there's ups and downs. I think it's really hard when people, you know, tout the whole thing.
• 44:45
  Like, balance and, I don't know, like, when you're a solo bootstrapped founder, and you're really trying to climb the mountain, like, your brain is thinking about this thing that you're doing all the time. And it is, I find it really hard to switch off from that. Yeah.
• 45:04
  If you're doing something important, meaningful, and you care about it, then what's balance? Like, just go for it. Just go, go, go. Like, what's, you know, I must only work seven hours a day. Like, no, F that. It's like, just get into it. Like, what else are you going to do? Sit down and watch Channel 7 in the evening or like binge some show?
• 45:20
  People waste so much of their life trying to find balance. So I love that, you know, if you're passionate, powerful and striving, then just rip in. It's an awesome way to think. Absolutely. I think for me as well, like the other thing that I really enjoy doing is just reading and not reading anything business, not reading anything like...
• 45:41
  That's to like make you smarter. It's like reading to like switch off and like get into a different like world and universe that isn't work related. And that's an actual like tool that I use to like switch off my brain is just like reading a rom-com at the end of the day or like reading like just a story that isn't like somehow connected to like me trying to build this business and me trying to do this thing or learn this thing or upscale or whatever it is. That's like a way that I can actively like switch off my brain.
• 46:10
  All right, let's finish on a share. Have you got a good book people could check out? Oh, my God, I have so many books. Okay. Oh, I'm just going to open my Kindle. Yeah, you put me on the spot. Let me just open my Kindle here. I read like, I mean, especially when I'm in a really, a rhythm, I can read a couple books a week. While you're doing that, I've been reading books with my 12-year-old daughter lately, so I've been reading all these books.
• 46:37
  teenage girl books just to like connect with her hey they're fine they're fine you know like they're interesting enough bit of action bit of young love i tried to get into the you know the ones that are going you know super viral at the moment the akatar a court of thorns and roses it's like the oh you'll have to share it with me could a 13 year old read it or is it too hectic
• 46:58
  I don't know. I haven't been able to get into it yet. People say that once you get past the first half of the first book, it's like insane and you read all the five books or whatever, but I just can't get to that point. And I'm like, oh, but everyone, even boyfriends of the girls on TikTok that are like reading it, then they get into it. And it's like, anyway, it's a whole thing. I just finished Yellow Face, which is a story that was...
• 47:19
  really interesting, not rom-com or anything, but it's won like a lot of awards and loved it. What else do I really like? I'm just like going through here. I feel like they're all such chick books. I really, one of my favorite books ever is Boy Swallows Universe and that's by Trent Dalton. He was growing up in Brisbane in the fifties and it's kind of his story of his life. It's now been made into a show and that's just like such a great book.
• 47:48
  into the magic shop. That show was amazing. I could not stop watching it. I haven't watched it yet. I haven't watched it yet. Oh, my God.
• 47:54
  I need to. It's on my list. It's on my list. Into the Magic Shop is a true story from a neurosurgeon, and it kind of, like, tells a story. It's just a crazy story, but it tells a story while also giving kind of lessons in, like, mindfulness and, like, the brain, and it's really, really interesting. What else is there? That's a good bit of philosophy wrapped into fiction. I like that as well. You can learn things and it.
• 48:22
  Totally. I also do love like a biography or an autobiography. I just read the Britney Spears and Paris Hilton's and they're both, you know, so fascinating and just these intense stories and, you know, just so full on and they're just so amazing. I also actually, not chick flick style. I just read recently, what's the guy...
• 48:48
  trying to find the name of it. I can't find the name here, but it's the book that's written about David Goggins, but while he was not known as David Goggins, before his book came out, the Can't Hurt Me book. And it's written by Jesse Itzler, the guy who's married to Sarah Blakely from Spanx. And
• 49:06
  It is so funny and so interesting. And Jesse Itzler is just like such a good storyteller. And so I read that and loved it. And then Can't Hurt Me is less my vibe. And David Goggins in that, in his book is less my vibe. But still really interesting to read the two and have these like two wildly different kind of like takes on David Goggins. And another one of my all-time favorite books is...
• 49:31
  actually, that I do recommend a lot of people is The Spy and the Traitor. And it's this like true story from, you know, it spans decades up until now, from Russian intelligence and British intelligence and American intelligence. And it's just like fascinating and like gripping, but without being like too much. And it's a really good story.
• 49:52
  Amazing. Thanks for sharing. I've got a few books now for my reading list as well. I could actually send you my list afterwards. I can curate a list for you. I have so many. Do it. I love that. I love that. Inspiring. Well, thanks for inspiring me and thanks for inspiring our listeners as well. It's been wonderful to have you on. Love hearing your perspective and you bring awesome energy to what you do and you're doing something really meaningful. And so thanks for doing that and congrats on your success. Thank you so much for having me. This was so fun. This was great.
• 50:22
  See you, everyone. Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 50:52
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 51:14
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that.