Latest / The Life-First Solopreneur / 166. Turn Passion Into Profit: Alice Ford’s Advice for Solopreneurs

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166. Turn Passion Into Profit: Alice Ford’s Advice for Solopreneurs · The Life-First Solopreneur

• 0:00
  Carly Ries: What if your solopreneur journey didn't involve endless hours behind a laptop, but instead take you across the globe, scaling mountains, diving into conservation efforts, and starring in action films? Well, that's exactly what adventure filmmaker, travel host, and stunt woman Alice Ford has built for herself. In this episode, Alice shares how she turned her passion for travel, environmentalism, and storytelling into a thriving brand. We talk about standing out in a crowded content space, mastering YouTube, landing brand deals that align with your values, and staying productive while constantly on the move. So hit play now, and trust me, be prepared to be inspired.
• 0:40
  You're listening to the Aspiring Solopreneur, the podcast for those just taking the bold step or even just thinking about taking that step into the world of solo entrepreneurship. My name is Carly Ries, and my co host Joe Rando and I are your guides to navigating this crazy, but awesome journey as a company of one. We take pride in being part of LifeStarr, a digital hub dedicated to all aspects of solopreneurship that has empowered and educated countless solopreneurs looking to build a business that resonates with their life's ambitions. We help people work to live, not live to work. And if you're looking for a get rich quick scheme, this is not the show for you.
• 1:19
  So if you're eager to gain valuable insights from industry experts on running a business the right way the first time around, or want to learn from the missteps of solo solopreneurs who've paved the way before you, then stick around. We've got your back because flying solo in business doesn't mean you're alone. Oh, Alice, I am going to try not to gush too much over the career you have built for yourself in this episode, but it might be really hard. So listeners, if you hear me start fangirling, it's just because I think you have the coolest job ever. And we're just so excited to have you.
• 1:51
  So welcome to the show.
• 1:52
  Alice Ford: Thank you so much for having me. Yeah. I'm excited to share a little bit more of my story. Yeah.
• 1:58
  Carly Ries: And, one of the reasons we wanted to have you on is because so often, solopreneurs think that they kinda have to have a cookie cutter. I'm a consultant. I respond to my customers. I respond to my clients. And even though they could work from the beach, it's still, like, just clanking away the computer.
• 2:13
  And you do not do that. You have the coolest lifestyle, and you created a unique brand that kinda combine combines adventure, storytelling, and environmentalism, actually. So what advice would you give people who want to create a brand that really stands out on its own?
• 2:30
  Alice Ford: I think for me, authenticity is, the biggest and most important thing, especially for myself. And I think for anyone that wants to start their own business, you know, you are in this with just yourself. And if you're not doing something that you're incredibly passionate about or that's not always upholding your values and your belief system, and also the things that you're interested in, you're not gonna be successful, especially because if your brand is yourself or your brand is something that you're creating. If you're not doing it with authenticity, your customers are going to see that. And you're also gonna get really burned out, I think, more quickly because you're just not interested in the story that you're telling.
• 3:16
  So authenticity for me is the most important thing.
• 3:19
  Carly Ries: We always say there's a difference. And, actually, Joe, I think you posted this on LinkedIn today, but there's a difference between running a successful business and one that you actually enjoy running. But I know I always tee up the guest in the intro before. But speaking of storytelling, can you just tell your story? I wanna hear it from you.
• 3:38
  Tell people what you do and why I'm so obsessed with your lifestyle.
• 3:41
  Joe Rando: And don't leave out the martial arts part because I have all these pictures of me as a kid trying to do what I saw you doing on your video.
• 3:50
  Alice Ford: Okay. Well, I'll try to keep it as short as possible. Yeah. So for anyone that doesn't know me or who I am, I am a filmmaker, adventure filmmaker. I'm also a stunt woman.
• 4:02
  I have a television show on PBS stations. It's about adventure travel. Just to kind of give a brief, I guess, rounding of that on a YouTube channel where I've been posting travel and adventure videos for about the last decade. And I actually grew up in a really beautiful area. I grew up in New England and New Hampshire and a lot of, most of my childhood was spent just, out in the woods exploring.
• 4:29
  But I also competed in gymnastics from a really early age. I went on to college to compete in gymnastics, springboard diving, and track and field, and, did a lot of other jobs along the way. Eventually, I made my way into the movie business where I started working as a stunt double. Because of my gymnastics background, I was able to flip and fight and fall off things.
• 4:55
  Joe Rando: So cool. So cool.
• 4:56
  Alice Ford: Been in some martial arts as well, and I've worked on dozens of movies all around the world, television shows as well. But travel has always been, one of my biggest passions. Ever since I was a little kid, I've always loved, hiking, backpacking, national parks. And I actually got a master's degree in environmental management, because my hope was that one day when I was rich enough, I could move to Africa and save the elephants.
• 5:25
  And so when I moved to Los Angeles, and I've always had this hope of having my own television show so that I could combine my love for the wild with my education. And it was harder than I thought to get my foot in the door, on TV. So I decided to just start making my own content on YouTube. And because I have my background in environmental sciences and a real love for trying to convince other people that they should also love the planet the same way that I do. I wanted to combine my love for travel with that.
• 6:03
  And so all the stories that I tell on YouTube and on my PDF show too, like, have this through line of environmentalism, wildlife protection, conservation. And that's my authentic voice is just the need to say, hey. We should go and explore the world, but we need to do it in a way that's also showing love and respect to the Earth that we're walking on. Because we all share it together with the animals, with the plants, and everything. So that's my authenticity that I always weave into everything, and that's kind of the short story, I guess, of me.
• 6:40
  Carly Ries: Alice, my husband and I were sipping coffee this morning, and he was like, who are you interviewing? And I was like, she's basically just like, excuse my language, the ultimate badass. And I was just like, this story is incredible. So I feel like you told that so eloquently. But, Joe, I just cut you off.
• 6:56
  What were you gonna say?
• 6:57
  Joe Rando: No. I just love what you're saying. You know, I've always wanted to go to the Galapagos, and I won't do it because I feel like it's being overtouristed. And what you're saying is kind of, you know, you gotta find ways to do the tourism, to see the places without kind of trampling on everything. I love that.
• 7:15
  Alice Ford: Well and it's funny that you bring up the Galapagos because I actually my first ever group trip is in the Galapagos. And, you know, I've been a lot of places around the world, and I will say that the Galapagos is one place that is actually doing things appropriately for being such a fragile ecosystem. They have really strict rules about the number of people that can be on shore at specific times, the amount of people that can be on cruise,
• 7:40
  and things like that. So while they do have a lot of tourists, I guess, when you think about just how fragile the ecosystem is, that relationship, yes, sure, there are a lot of tourists visiting the Galapagos, but it is extremely controlled. There are no ships in the Galapagos that don't have someone from Galapagos National Parks, like a wildlife expert aboard each ship. Ships over a certain size are not allowed to make landfall. So, you know, comparing Galapagos to, like, Antarctica, for instance, Antarctica right now, they still do have a lot of strict limitations, but the amount of tourists going to Antarctica is like, extrapolating at, like, an even larger percentage than the Galapagos because more and more and more ships are just getting permits to be able to go down there.
• 8:34
  And right now, I don't know that there's a cap in the IATA treaty that's going to say, we're only gonna do a max this is the maximum amount of ships, and that's it. So yeah, I think for me, comparing Galapagos to Antarctica, not to get sidetracked from this conversation.
• 8:50
  Joe Rando: But good to know, though. I guess I can plan my trip.
• 8:52
  Carly Ries: I have that whole, you know, from the nineties, the more you know rainbow. With a screen. But, Alice, I wanna circle back to something relevant to solopreneurs because you have found so much success with video on YouTube on your show, and so many people are afraid of video. And so many people try to establish themselves on YouTube but really struggle because it's obviously a very crowded market.
• 9:17
  So what advice do you have for people that are trying to break through in the video space to try to get their brand out there?
• 9:24
  Alice Ford: Yeah. I think the the greatest thing about YouTube, the reason it's so valuable is because YouTube is the largest search engine on Earth. It's powered by Google. So anytime anyone types anything into, a Google search, they're also searching every YouTube video. So if you think about YouTube like you would a blog post, and you think about it from, the SEO side, as long as you're bringing value to someone on YouTube, you can find success.
• 9:55
  And I think when you're starting out on YouTube, in order to find your audience, you need to be really specific. You need to have a niche. And I think most people that have a business have already a niche. Like, I'm just gonna use, like, a coffee shop as an example, even though that wouldn't be usually something that's on YouTube. But say you have a coffee shop, you're probably gonna make videos about coffee.
• 10:20
  Well, that's already a super specific niche. And the one nice thing about YouTube is that if you are doing stuff that's along that same kind of, like, vertical information structure every single time, YouTube gets to know you really quickly. So then everyone that likes coffee or that might wanna watch something about coffee is gonna get recommended your content. And so you're going to find an audience rather quickly as long as you're making content around that same content vertical for your first ten, fifteen, twenty videos. Now I think where a lot of people go wrong on YouTube is that they don't figure out what they're making ahead of time, and they might just start throwing some things at the wall and seeing, like, if anything sticks.
• 11:07
  And that's really not what you wanna do for YouTube. You wanna figure out, like, okay. Who is my audience? What do I wanna tell them? What can they learn from me, or what is it that I'm going to help them with?
• 11:18
  And then your first five, ten, fifteen videos should be about that. And then you can kind of see from there, like, okay. What's working? What's not? Do they like it when I'm doing this style or that style?
• 11:31
  And then start kind of figuring out, okay. Well, when I was doing a coffee taste test, that that those are the videos that did the best. So let's let's take that content vertical and then expand on that idea instead of doing, like, a coffee talking head video. So I think that's, my best advice for people getting started on YouTube, but it's easier than you think, and it gets easier to talk on camera as well. You know, when I first started, I thought I was good, but looking back, I was terrible.
• 12:05
  A lot of the times, I overthought what I wanted to say. I wasn't really sure what I was saying, and so I would just ramble sometimes. And I also had a lot of kind of, like, nervous tics. I tended to, shake a little bit when I would talk because I was nervous. And so I think that can also be kind of a barrier for people to get on video.
• 12:27
  But it's like anything. You know? You don't go out and run a marathon your first day running.
• 12:33
  Carly Ries: No. Absolutely. Well, so you've really established yourself there. But the thing that I'm curious about both from like, a marketing standpoint, because things are constantly changing. But then even for you, your content, like, there are rules and regulations that you were just mentioning about the Galapagos and Antarctica that you need to stay on top of.
• 12:52
  How do you stay in the know both from, your expertise as well as how you market it? Because everything is just changing so fast right now.
• 13:02
  Alice Ford: Yeah. I mean, I guess part of my weekly agenda always is staying on top of trends. And, you know, if you do wanna get started, especially in video or really any business, like, part of your job as your own CEO is to always be researching. You know? You should always be researching what's going on in the news, what's going on in other businesses.
• 13:32
  For me, like, what other content creators are putting out, especially when I'm traveling to places, rules and regulations, news, politics in places that I'm traveling to. So these are all things that I have to kind of, stay up to date with. Like, last year, Machu Picchu closed twice because of political instability. That would not have been a good time for me to go and promote Peru.
• 13:58
  So depending on what your business is, yeah, of course, you wanna be staying on top of trends, on politics, on government regulations, all of these kinds of things because that's like, for me, that's if my business is travel or adventure travel, then if I don't know what's going on in travel, how can I say I'm an expert in anything that I'm doing?
• 14:20
  Carly Ries: Yeah. Absolutely. Well, so with your line of work, did you originally originally start with sustainability as the leader, or did you just kinda mention that? And because that's, such a core value of yours.
• 14:33
  How, did that happen, and how do you feature it now compared to just putting out awesome content?
• 14:39
  Alice Ford: Yeah. So when I first started on YouTube, my first two shows, one was called World Heritage Adventures. And for anyone that, you know, isn't familiar with UNESCO sites, there's over a thousand of them in the world, and these are places kind of like global national parks. Right? They've been protected for their cultural or their environmental, importance around the world.
• 15:02
  And so the first show was going to these kinds of places and talking about why they were protected for whether it was cultural, environmental, geological, etcetera. My second show was called Nate, was called Green and Fabulous, and it was literally like a kitschy show about environmental topics in a kind of funny, skit type way. And so that was me trying to come up with this show where I could tell people, like, hey. When you travel, you should bring a reusable water bottle, but in a funny way. So I would make these kind of little skit videos about different environmental topics, which, obviously, I didn't get a lot of followers doing that.
• 15:45
  But for me, it was important to have that authenticity to figure out, like, okay. Is this something that would work? And that was definitely in the beginning when I was doing that kind of, experimentation of what kind of content is going to work and could I build an audience off the more sustainable stuff. But that didn't really work. And so what I figured out is that I needed to make entertaining content about places people wanna travel to and also then put the educational component within the content that I was making.
• 16:18
  Because especially here in The United States, people are really turned off when you just talk at them about environmental problems. But if you can come to it from a learning perspective by saying,
• 16:31
  Joe Rando: oh my gosh. Wow. This is so interesting.
• 16:33
  Alice Ford: Do you guys see this dirt right here? Do you know there's actually bacteria in here and it's alive, like, while you're walking on it? That's a lot more interesting than me just saying, hey, guys. Don't walk off trail because it's blah blah blah blah blah. So yeah, that was, my experimentation phase.
• 16:50
  But sustainability has always been there, and now I've just kind of figured out how to make it more of a through line than the only line.
• 16:59
  Joe Rando: that's a subject. Question on that. When you did that experiment and did the skit concept on YouTube, did you create an entirely separate channel to do that, or do you have it on the same channel as the other stuff?
• 17:10
  Alice Ford: No. This was originally on the same channel that my main channel that I have now. If I were going to do that again today, and I will say so, for any of the listeners out there, I've been on YouTube a long time. In the beginning, I had no idea what I was doing. It was a lot of experimentation.
• 17:26
  So, the tips that I'm giving people now are things that I know now because I did all the wrong things in the beginning. And if I could go back ten years and do exactly the things that I advise people to do now, I think I would have found success a lot more quickly than I did today because I would have just gone and said, okay. These are the trending. These are the searchable topics. These are the first ten videos that I'm gonna make.
• 17:56
  I went into it with I wanna get on, I wanna have a television show, and I'm gonna make a proof of concept, and I'm gonna do this fun stuff. And my authenticity was first and not the business side. So now I know better.
• 18:13
  Joe Rando: It's the story of our lives, though. Right? I mean, if only I knew what I knew.
• 18:17
  Alice Ford: Yes. Exactly.
• 18:18
  Carly Ries: Well and, Alice, you are in a position now to give people advice. And because of this authenticity, you've attracted brands, and you've been a spokesperson for brands. And I know that's a lot of solopreneurs' dream is how do I collaborate with these other companies. So what advice do you have for solopreneurs looking to do that?
• 18:38
  Alice Ford: Yeah. I think, obviously, your niche is important. I think if you are I mean, it's so dependent on what you're making content about. Right? And what kind of brands you wanna work with.
• 18:53
  So if you wanted to work with outdoor brands and you're making content about cameras, well, you're probably not gonna get any brands in the outdoor space. So I think first, when you're making content, start thinking about, like, who you wanna work with and start making content that would speak to that audience. And if it's not the audience that you already have, then either you need to pivot how you're making things or you have to start rethinking, you know, which brands that you wanna work with that may maybe fall more into your content niche. You know, I get a lot of brands that reach out to me now that have nothing to do with what I make content about. And while it would be nice to maybe get the money from them or free stuff from them, if it's not authentic to my content, I'm not gonna make a brand deal with these companies because it doesn't make sense to my audience, and it doesn't make sense to me.
• 19:49
  And I see a lot of content creators that make this mistake in the beginning that are, say, making shopping content, and they partner with a cannabis company or something or, you know, just someone that just doesn't make any sense, and then they don't feel authentic about it. Their audience doesn't feel like it's authentic. And all you're gonna get if you're doing that is people unfollowing you because they're gonna say, why would you promote that? And then they think, oh, well, you're just now posting all these ads, and I don't even feel like it's your own content now.
• 20:23
  So always remember that, your voice is the most important thing, especially on social media. It is you that people are coming to follow or your business. And if the authenticity is taken away because of the brands that you're working with, then you no longer are yourself. So I guess it would be you know, and once you're once you're making stuff that's authentic, brands will find you, and they will reach out to you.
• 20:51
  Carly Ries: Yeah. That's such good advice. Well, I've already said I think your story is just so cool, and there might be something on a lot of solopreneurs' minds is that you travel all the time for work. And I think a lot of people aspire to do that, but even people that just wanna go work from the park next to their house, what tips do you have for staying productive while you're on the go? And especially when you're in cool places, like, oh, I could go check out this attraction or I could do this, but you have to hunker down and work.
• 21:20
  How do you balance that?
• 21:22
  Alice Ford: Yeah. Definitely having your own I mean, I think the most important thing for me as a solopreneur is having really strict kind of hours for myself. Like, when I'm home right now, I'm home in my home office. So, I'm usually on the computer at, like, 7AM, but, I will not work past usually 6PM. Like, that's my cutoff.
• 21:46
  You have to have your own kind of work hours that you are good about because once stuff starts bleeding into, your dinner time, your family time, etcetera, like, you are going to burn out. So that would be my first piece of advice. But I think when you're traveling, honestly, when I'm traveling, my workload goes down because I'm shooting. So every from the moment I wake up until the moment I go to bed, I'm usually got my camera in my hand or I'm writing a script or I'm meeting with someone or I'm, you know, doing an activity. All of that stuff has to be documented.
• 22:23
  So my travel work life is very different than my, homework life, and I think you have to figure out what works best for you. I think it's also important as you grow to not be afraid to hire some contractors to help you with stuff. I do have two assistants that are subcontractors that, help me with social media stuff while I am traveling and also help me with, my newsletter and some of my other more clerical things that just take time away from me and don't really need my creativity for. So I think that's one of the things that a lot of people that I know that are their own bosses. It's the hardest thing is hiring people because there's so many little things, especially in the world of content creation, that, we really don't need to waste our time doing, but they take up a lot of time.
• 23:21
  And so if you can find someone that can take a couple hours off of your schedule so that you can spend the time being creative and doing the things that people wanna see you doing, the important things like being in front of the camera or selling or whatever it is that are your most, the things that you're best at. Those are the things you should be focusing your time on and not the kind of, little frivolous things that somebody else could be doing for you. So, but going back, I guess, to, when I'm traveling, even at the end of the day, I have a very strict routine of the things that work for me. So, if I'm out shooting from 7AM to 8PM, I eat dinner. And then from nine to 10PM, I'm offloading all the footage.
• 24:09
  I'm putting it in folders. I am clearing the cards. I'm getting the cameras cleaned, and then I'm laying out everything that I need for the next day so that, I stay organized. So, staying organized, I think, is the best thing that you have to do when you're traveling and just figuring out, okay, what are the deadlines that I have? How can I make these deadlines work and still do all the things that I need to do when I'm traveling?
• 24:36
  Carly Ries: It's so nice because I feel like a lot of what you said, we preach all the time. But to hear somebody actually say, like, no. This is what you do to make it work. It's very refreshing. We're not making this up.
• 24:45
  This is how I should actually be doing this. And I wanted to circle back because you were saying that when you were on YouTube originally, you thought videos were great, but you had no idea what you were doing. There have been a lot of lessons. I'm curious if you had one piece of advice you would have given your younger self just starting out as a solopreneur, not necessarily YouTube. What would that piece of advice to your younger self be?
• 25:10
  Alice Ford: I think it would have been to do a little bit more research about the YouTube platform and really think about, the five year plan or the five year goal. Because I went into it thinking, okay. I want a TV show. I'm gonna make a pilot. I never even really thought about, what other benefits YouTube could bring me until, a few years later when I realized, oh, actually, maybe I should just try to grow an audience on YouTube.
• 25:42
  And so I think, yeah, looking back, if I had done a bit more research on the business side of whether or not the platform could have helped me more so than just being a place to host one video or two videos. I think I would have looked at it differently and maybe started a little bit sooner on, being consistent and trying to grow an audience.
• 26:06
  Carly Ries: Consistency is key. A lot of people think it happens overnight, and it just doesn't.
• 26:10
  Joe Rando: we always wish we started sooner, so start now. Right?
• 26:13
  Alice Ford: Yes. Or yesterday. Absolutely. And I think one of the things with YouTube too, because I see videos on this all the time on YouTube, is, like, it's never too late to start. And I will say this to, all of the 40 people that might be listening too.
• 26:30
  If you are over the age of 40, it is an amazing time to get on YouTube because YouTube has a lot of the younger age group on there, and we need content for older adults as well. So if you're 40 or even 60 and you wanna start a YouTube channel, it's a great time to do that. Alright.
• 26:51
  Carly Ries: Joe, not to expose your age, but you're gonna now be the face of this.
• 26:55
  Joe Rando: I am there. I am there.
• 26:58
  Carly Ries: Well, Alice, this has been so wonderful. We have to ask you the question that we ask all of our guests. How or what is your favorite quote about success?
• 27:06
  Alice Ford: Never let your memories be bigger than your dreams.
• 27:09
  Joe Rando: Wow. Oh. That's a new one.
• 27:12
  Carly Ries: I had to think About it for a second. But I like it.
• 27:15
  Joe Rando: I think what popped in my head was the song Glory Days Bruce Springsteen.
• 27:22
  Alice Ford: Okay. Yeah. That you know?
• 27:24
  Joe Rando: I mean, kind of people that live in the past and their memories, you know, how great it was in high school Versus how great it's gonna be in ten years.
• 27:31
  Alice Ford: Yeah.
• 27:33
  Joe Rando: So yeah. Cool. That's a new one.
• 27:35
  Alice Ford: I always have a bigger dream, a bigger bucket list. It just keeps on growing.
• 27:40
  Carly Ries: That's awesome. My superlative in the high school yearbook was most likely to say high school was the best four years of my life. Wow Has that changed?
• 27:51
  Joe Rando: That was so not me.
• 27:53
  Carly Ries: Oh, I love my high school, but I was like, no. I hope I proved them wrong.
• 27:59
  Alice Ford: I think you have.
• 28:00
  Carly Ries: But, Alice, if people wanna learn more about you, follow your YouTube channel, everything, where can they find you?
• 28:06
  Alice Ford: Yeah. Absolutely. So I have a website. It's alicesadventuresonearth.com. I know it's a little long.
• 28:12
  But you can find everything there. You can also find me on YouTube at Alice Ford Adventures, or you can just type in Alice Ford to Google, and you'll find everything there as well.
• 28:23
  Carly Ries: And it's so refreshing because it's Alice Ford, exactly how it sounds. Nice. Easy. Yes. I so appreciate that.
• 28:33
  Well, Alice, thank you so so much for coming on the show today. This is such a fun episode, and, we just appreciate you taking the time.
• 28:40
  Alice Ford: Absolutely. Thank you guys so much for having me.
• 28:43
  Carly Ries: Yeah. And listeners, you know what to do. Give that five star review. Subscribes on any of your favorite platforms. Subscribe to our YouTube channel, which is what we've been talking about so much today, and we will see you next time on the Aspiring Solopreneur.
• 28:56
  Joe Rando: Bye bye.
• 28:59
  Carly Ries: You may be going solo in business, but that doesn't mean you're alone. In fact, millions of people are in your shoes, running a one person business and figuring it out as they go. So why not connect with them and learn from each other's successes and failures? At LifeStarr, we're creating a one person business community where you can go to meet and get advice from other solopreneurs. Be sure to join in on the conversations at community.lifestarr.com.