Everything Coworking

Mara Hauser covers the design process for coworking spaces from identifying your core user to branding to determining your program. Join us for a unique opportunity to hear from a successful coworking space operator who also owns a corporate interiors design firm!

In this episode, I talk with Kyle Coolbroth, Co-Founder and CEO of Fueled Collective which the coworking industry’s newest and most unique franchise player.

Kyle is an industry veteran - he and his co-founder Don Ball started COCO in January 2010.

Kyle shares:

1. His coworking story
2. His first space - the genesis and the experience of opening
3. An overview of the evolution from COCO #1 to Fueled Collective #1
4. The vision for Fueled Collective and the role it plays in the coworking industry

Brad Krauskopf, founder of Hub Australia, shares his experience going from one 2500 square foot location to 7 locations across Australia. How he has reshaped his model to better meet member needs, how his organizational structure has changed to fuel growth and how his own role has evolved.

Garrett Tichy is the Founder and Owner of Hygge Coworking. A strong advocate for Charlotte, Tichy is well-known for his natural ability to build diverse and inclusive communities of professionals – both online and in-person – who appreciate and thrive on the power of connection to elevate an initiative, a workplace and a city.

Before founding Hygge Coworking, Garrett was the owner creative digital marketing agency. This gives him a unique leg-up on applying marketing concepts to local businesses such as coworking spaces. Garrett facilitated a marketing break-out session at a recent industry event and his expertise and perspective drew me in and I accosted him in the hallway and asked him to be a guest on the podcast and help other owners be better marketers.

Full show notes here.

You are really going to enjoy today’s guest, Antony Slumbers. He is the keynote speaker for the 2018 FlexOffice Conference hosted by the Global Workspace Association and NAIOP. He's also a forward-looking, big picture thinker so put on your thinking cap!

The conference is September 12-14 in Austin, Texas. If you are in the shared workspace industry, this is a do-not miss event. Attending the conference can help you to stay on top of quickly evolving industry trends and it’s an opportunity to make connections and build relationships well beyond what you can accomplish through social media.

This episode explores insights from Dan Ariely's best selling book on human behavior and how they apply to coworking spaces - insights cover free trials, rewarding employees, referral programs and why you need fancy coffee condiment containers.

It can be hard to know where to focus marketing efforts. This episode encourages you to nail the basics first. Make sure your Google presence is optimized and nurtured. Active searchers are on Google. 

Put your early focus on Google and then make room for other marketing activities such as events. Digital marketing is the best way to fill your sales funnel. This podcast covers 10 actions you can take now to make sure your web presence is optimized. 

Full show notes here.

On episode 73 of the Everything Coworking podcast special guest Michael Everts, President and Co-Founder of SharedSpace, shares his insights into technology for coworking spaces, and different tools and approaches coworking space operators can use to make sure their space’s tech stands out, both to members and guests.

See the show notes here.

A recent question asked in the Everything Coworking Facebook Group was “How big should my coworking space be?”

I think one of the most challenging aspects of getting started on the journey to opening a coworking space is understanding a few fundamentals. One of the first questions a lot of people ask, and this question came up recently in the Facebook Group - is “How big should my coworking space be?"

In this episode, I want to help with how to think about the space that you are going to create using a high level framework that takes into account financial goals, startup resources, and market demand.

Get the full show notes here.

Key Performance Indicators, or “KPIs”, are metrics that you may want to consider tracking for your business.

As Yogi Berra’s famous quote says: “If you don’t know where you’re going, you’ll probably end up somewhere else.”

As a business owner, you want to set goals and then create simple metrics that flow into dashboards that make it easy for you and your team to track progress against those goals/targets. You can download the Coworking KPI list here that I reviewed on this week’s episode.

See the full show notes for tips on setting yourself up for success as you set up your KPI tracking and review process.