The Katie Lance Podcast

Being a mom and running a business is hard! This podcast episode shares how I think about the choices we make as parents, how I have thrown ‘balance’ out the window and what things are non-negotiable!

Lessons learned

• You can’t do it all – so just let it go!
• Sometimes we mess up – apologize to your kids (and yourself if needed)
• Actions speak louder than words – make your kids a priority!
• Create one special routine that is just you and your kids – for us it’s reading at night!

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy (use the promo code PODCAST to save $30/month)
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Books I’ve read my boys *affiliate link https://amzn.to/2XChhlj
• Mayim Bialik YouTube channel 

As a business owner – there comes a time when you decide to either ‘go for it’ and dive head first into your business OR you decide to keep your business as a ‘side hustle.’ There is nothing wrong with either decision, but once you truly decide to become a full time business owner, there are nine things that I think are really important for you to consider – and that’s what this podcast is all about.

From having business hours, to knowing how much you charge to having a dedicated work space – there are many things that will really solidify your business as a business. And, at the end of the day - you want to command a higher price, higher fee -  you must act like a business and not just someone with that ‘side hustle.’

Lessons learned

• Higher for your weakness but know enough to hire the right person
• Scale as you grow
• Focus on your priorities

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Basic websites resource: https://www.wix.com/
• Email marketing resource: https://mailchimp.com/ or https://keap.com/
• Project management tools: https://app.asana.com/, https://trello.com/ , https://slack.com/

In this podcast episode I share some of my very favorite books, online resources and events that have changed my life personally and professionally! The theme of this episode is, the more you learn, the more you earn. But beyond making money, the time to learn and improve is so important personally and professionally.

Here are a few of my favorite quotes from the books I mention in this episode:

“You can get everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.” - Secrets of Closing the Sale by Zig Ziglar

“Love is something you do for someone else, not something you do for yourself.” - The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman

“I think a lot of people dream. And while they are busy dreaming, the really happy people, the really successful people, the really interesting, powerful, engaged people are busy doing.” - The Year of Yes by Shonda Rimes

Lessons learned

• Make the time to continue to educate yourself
• The more you learn, the more you earn
• There is never an ideal time – make the time to read, go to events and pursue learning!

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy (use the promo code PODCAST to save $30/month)
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Check out these three books (affiliate links):
  • Secrets of Closing the Sale by Zig Ziglar
  • The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman
  • The Year of Yes by Shonda Rimes
• Podcasts to check out: Online Marketing Made Easy with Amy Porterfield and Build Your Tribe with Chalene Johnson
• Social Media Examiner, Social Media Marketing World (https://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/)
• Creative Live https://www.creativelive.com

Have you ever thought about building a team or are ready to grow your team? In this episode I share my thoughts on building and maintaining a team, how we find great people, what happens when your business evolves and more.

When I started our company, it was “me, myself and I” and as the business grew it got to the point where I started missing things. Things started to fall through the cracks – and I knew it was time to bring on someone to help. Over time, our team has evolved and I’m so thankful for everyone who has worked with us – now and in the past. We’ve been fortunate to work with some great people.

As we’ve grown our small but mighty virtual team – we believe in growing slowly to build stability and to maintain a sustainable environment. How do we hire? Simple – we look for good people. Character counts! We also look for people with a strong work ethic – people who do what they say they are going to do, people who don’t "pass the buck," but take responsibility. At the end of the day, businesses grow and change and sometimes what you need when you start isn’t what you need a few years later – and that is ok!

It’s also super important to set up systems and treat your business like a business. Pay people on time. Have your systems in place like: NDA’s for your team, contracts for your team members and clients, payment systems (not through Venmo or PayPal but through a business banking account!) We love using tools like Asana for project management and the Voxer mobile app to communicate quickly when needed. 

Growing your team is an evolution and a big part of that for me has been my own personal development. Join me for my next episode where I talk about how I invest in myself - professionally and personally through reading, courses, and more!

Lessons learned:

1. Treat your business like a business.

2. Hire for your weaknesses. Don’t try to do it all. What do YOU do that you are really good at that moves things forward?

3. Systems are key. When you 1st start – everything is in your head. Utilize project management tools to help you be organized. Systematize your business.

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Learn more about Darren Hardy here!
• Asana for project management
• Voxer mobile app
• Zoom video chat

In this podcast I share the story of how we made what felt like a Titanic change in our business. Here’s the truth: anytime you are making big changes professionally and personally it can feel like you are moving the Titanic!

For the first few years being in business I worked with dozens of consulting clients on retainer and so many of them were amazing. I was on the phone constantly pitching, sending proposals and working around the clock for my clients.

And then… I started feeling burnt out. I had gone into business for myself but was feeling like I was losing that flexibility and quality of life. Looking back, there were some people we worked with that maybe weren’t the right fit so we knew it was time to make a shift. In episode 7 and 8, I shared how we launched our #GetSocialSmart Academy and as that grew, it became more and more fulfilling and it also led to a more scalable and sustainable business. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love consulting (and big shout-out to so many of our amazing clients), but what I learned is that you have to be the right fit for the client and they have to be the right fit for you.

Here’s the truth: when you first start a business – you say ‘yes’ to a lot of things because if you are like me, you are figuring it out as you go and figuring out what you want to do (and what you don’t want to do!) I learned that saying "no" allowed us to say "yes" to opportunities that were more in line with our mission. Reading the book The Year of Yes inspired me in so many ways in this journey. (I loved this book so much I bought it for so many people over the year!) Side note - I also learned the value of having strong referral partners!

However, making change is scary! I remember a few years back attending Social Media Marketing World and being in the audience listening to Amy Porterfield share candidly how she made a similar change in her business. I remember distinctly the graph she showed with the dip her business took the year she made that change but then how much it accelerated afterward. Seeing that truly put the right expectations in place for me and we experienced that dip. But  now, we are so excited to say that we are experiencing that big upswing. It took time – for us it took about 18-24 months and the good news is that when we rang in the New Year in 2019 we could raise a glass and say, “We did it! We made that change!” And now, we still offer consulting from time to time if it’s the right client, but now the majority of our business comes from our #GetSocialSmart Academy. A big reason why we were able to make this change too came from the people on our team… that’s the next episode!

Lessons learned:

• Just because you can do something, doesn’t mean you should. You don’t always have to raise your hand!
• Say YES to saying NO. Our time is our most precious asset. In the beginning, you have to say YES but at some point, it’s ok to say NO!
• Be protective of your time. We only have one life to live.

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Check out Social Media Marketing World *affiliate link
• Connect with Amy Porterfield here!
• The Year of Yes book *affiliate link

This podcast episode is the back story of how we launched our #GetSocialSmart Academy – our on-demand 24/7 learning platform. The Academy was born out of my love for online learning (check out episode 007 for that story) but even more so - from the droves of people asking me all the time about how I could help them. I’d be on-stage and invariably afterward I would always get tons of questions about coaching and if we could help them personally. I knew we didn’t want to just serve a handful of people but we wanted to serve thousands!

Another pain point for me is that yes, there is a TON of information online about social media – but a lot of it is outdated or has nothing to do with real estate. Plus, we really felt like there wasn’t a place for an agent or broker to learn how to put a complete strategy together. 

Fast-forward to the end of 2015 – we had successfully run many of our live 6-week programs and it was at that time I discovered live streaming, specifically Periscope. It was during this time I spoke at the first Periscope Summit in NYC and met someone I had looked up to for years – Kim Garst. I nervously approached her and asked her advice about my business. She told me the power of creating online courses and online training is the ability to serve more people - I will never forget that. I wasn’t looking for a “get rich quick” scheme or “the easy button.” I was truly looking for a way to serve more people and grow and scale our company. Kim has been an amazing mentor to me and even wrote the forward to my book in 2017 - #GetSocialSmart!

After that event, I saw down with our small team and brainstormed and quickly after that launched our Academy. And as you may imagine, if you’ve listened to other episodes of this podcast, it wasn’t perfect. But guess what, done is better than perfect!

Today, our Academy family has included thousands of people over the years and we are so proud of the tribe we have attracted by staying true to our mission and what we are all about. That leads me to our next episode, which is all about how we made some BIG changes in our business!

Lessons learned:

• Listen to your gut. If you have an idea – there is an idea, there is a need. Sometimes we are our on worst enemy
• Start with where you are. You don’t have to have anything perfect. If I would have waited until everything was perfect, nothing would have changed.
• You don’t have to be all things to all people. You don’t have to serve everyone. Lean into your niche. Where are you known?

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• #GetSocialSmart book on Amazon 
• Connect with Kim Garst here!

This podcast episode is the back-story of how I became so inspired with online learning that it helped transform our business by creating our #GetSocialSmart Academy. I was inspired early on from online marketing pioneer, Laura Roeder who is now the founder of MeetEdgar. I remember listening to webinars she hosted nearly a decade ago and being inspired, blown away, I thought to myself, “This is such a great way to learn. Here I am in my home office and fuzzy slippers. I would love to run a business one day to be able to offer this type learning!” Fast-forward to my first webinar I ever hosted back when I worked for Inman News. I was so nervous and quickly realized how different webinars were from speaking onstage. But here’s the truth – we live in an on-demand world with Netflix, Amazon, Hulu and others. Not only that, but attention is truly the name of the game. When someone signs up for your webinar and then they choose to attend live, they are choosing to spend an hour with you - that is a really big deal!

This epiphany inspired our first iteration of #GetSocialSmart – our first 6-week course which was cobbled together with Go To Meeting, Dropbox, Mailchimp – but guess what? It worked! And, more importantly, it served a huge need. In our next episode, you will hear more about that story!

Lessons learned:

• Give people more than they expect. Under-promise and over-deliver.
• Find your voice. Be brave and vulnerable.
• The riches are in the niches. When you lean into who you are and who you are not, so much is possible!

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance (Enjoying this podcast? Tag me on IG and let me know!)
• Check out MeetEdgar *affiliate link

I jumped into the real estate industry back in 2005 when I was hired by a boutique real estate firm in the San Francisco Bay Area – Empire Realty. I was over the moon! I was hired as the marketing manager and found myself in a sea of independent contractors and that is where I fell in love with the real estate industry. I love the entrepreneurial spirit of real estate agents! During my time at Empire I balanced corporate marketing along with working side-by-side agents. It was a great experience to see first-hand how hard agents work – they wake up each day unemployed! From Empire I went to work for Inman News (after attending Inman Connect and thinking, ‘these are my people!’). Learning what it meant to work at a media company at the intersection of real estate and tech was incredibly rewarding and set the stage for where I am today!

Lessons learned:

• Surround yourself with great people; people who are smarter than you!
• Dream big dreams. We only have one life to lead – make the most of it
• Say yes and figure it out later. Sometimes we don’t have all the answers. Tenacity and work ethic is the name of the game!
• Every step along the way is an important step. Live your life with no regrets.

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Crush It book *affiliate link
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance

After moving back to the San Francisco Bay Area in 2003 it was time to find a job! I interviewed with some dear friends of mine who owned the cutest boutique toy store. I worked there from 2003 through 2005 and it was one of the toughest but most rewarding experiences. If you’ve ever worked retail at the holidays – you know what I mean! I learned so much about customer service, service with a smile, how hard retail employees work and grassroots marketing skills I still employ in my business today. I also have the utmost respect for anyone who works retail around the holidays! Enjoy the episode!

P.S. Next time you are in a retail store – be extra kind to the person behind the counter – it makes a big difference!

Lessons learned:

• Be willing to wear multiple ‘hats’ – the best people to work with are the ones who say, ‘that may not be my job – but it needs to get done so I will get it done!’
• There is so much power in a smile and ‘please and thank you’ – be positive, be friendly – it makes a big difference
• There is a lot that can be accomplished even if you don’t have a big marketing budget. We started building an email list with a piece of paper and a clipboard – start small! Done is better than perfect.

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance

After getting married in 2001 we took a big leap and decided to move cross country (more than 2,200 miles) from California to Indiana! We were young, newly married and looking to save a bit of money and have an adventure. This podcast episode is the story of that two-year period in our life from moving cross country (and back), living (literally) on love, discovering what really matters and getting my first real experiences speaking on stages up and down the state of Indiana. This journey really helped to set the stage for where we are now in our life and always reminds me to be thankful for how hard we’ve worked to get to where we are today!

Lessons learned:

• There is so much value in leaning on your partner – “let the glue stick” (especially when you are newly married!)
• The value of putting yourself out there - you only live once. You want to do something? Start with small actions today that will move you toward your goal tomorrow.
• The value of what’s really important - stuff is just stuff. We started our journey living on an air mattress and going to garage sales for our first set of dishes. Stuff is just stuff - be grateful for what you have!

Additional resources:

• Visit me at KatieLance.com for more info about my speaking, consulting and our #GetSocialSmart Academy
• Follow me on Instagram for more behind-the-scenes into my life and business @katielance