Building Business Authority and Visibility with Alison Johnston

From Fractional CMO to Strategic Advisor – Building Deep, Long-Term Client Partnerships in the Attention Economy With Alison Johnston

In this episode, Charlotte Ellis Maldari welcomes Alison Johnston, founder of Electric Alley, to discuss her journey from in-house marketer to trusted fractional CMO and strategic advisor for startups and service-led businesses. Alison shares how her organic career path led her to specialise in helping founders navigate the messy, high-growth early stages, blending hands-on execution with high-level strategy.

Key topics include the value of being a generalist in startup environments, the importance of human connection and in-person networking in a digital-first world, and how to leverage AI without losing authenticity. Alison offers advice for impatient founders, the power of personal brand, and practical ways to build trust and long-term client relationships. The conversation also covers referral strategies, the evolving marketing funnel, and how British founders can confidently promote themselves without feeling boastful.

Tune in for actionable insights on sustainable growth, authentic marketing, and building a business that thrives on both expertise and genuine connection.

https://linktr.ee/alisonjohnston

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hi everybody. Welcome to the Kaffeen Authority Builder podcast. Today I'm joined by Alison Johnston, who's the founder of Electric Alley, that's a marketing consultancy that's helped startups and service led businesses scale for over a decade. She founded it in 2012 after working in the fast pace world of SaaS and tech, which I know well about, and has since guided companies through funding rounds, acquisitions, and growth worth hundreds of millions. Often the first marketer in a room at the, company she's working with, Allison, has worked side by side with founders to take ideas from scrappy beginnings mm-hmm. On the backs of napkins sometimes I imagine, to establish the brands, sorry. And her approach blends long term strategy with hands on delivery. And she's very much focused on always centering around authenticity, which is a big, parallel here with us at Kaffeen and storytelling and sustainable growth. So, welcome. Thank you for having me. So we've, I mean, we've had several conversations over a period of years, basically. Mm-hmm. And I was really glad when you, agreed to come on the podcast and just talk through how your business has evolved and how you have grown and what you're focusing on. And, I just think it's a really inspiring story for people who are, thinking about. How they craft out a niche for themselves, how they, maybe work in a fractional role and become an advisor to other businesses. So let's talk about that. You've been running your business since 2012, but your experience with founders started earlier than that. So how did that foundation kind of shape up your work today? Yeah, well, it's all been very organic. I think a lot of people who are in a similar position would say exactly the same thing. I was just very lucky to get a job. I thought it was gonna be a very boring job when I saw the advert. but when I went for the interview, it was working directly with, four very experienced founders who had made their money in the, nineties, tech boom, sold their business, got bored, and so decided to start a new business in 2010. So I was working directly on the ground with these very experienced founders and, We spent two years building, products and building our, customer base and having an office sales, having offers meeting. So it was all very exciting. And then they decided to buy a big company. So at that point, 'cause I had a network of people that would met through, these past two years, decided to go out on my own. And I gave myself, six months. it was October, so I remember that Christmas, I was basically getting, all the things that I needed and I didn't have money to buy for with my presents. So it was mascara from one person. Someone else got me moisturizer because I just told myself, you're not allowed to buy anything because you've gotta go out and get the work. And then that was sort of my drive. Yeah. so I gave myself six months and I think it was probably about five years in that I was like, oh, I think this is. Now my job. So, so it's always been very organic and I've been very lucky to have met people who have helped me. you know, they've, they've brought me on on a fractional basis and then I've been able to bring other people on. So I've always found this community has been very helpful to each other, which is one reason why I wanted to do this podcast is to pass on that knowledge to other people. 'cause I think, there's a lot of people who are out there willing to help each other. So, yeah, so I generally tend to work with businesses as, as you say, as like the first marketing hire. They've, the founder has probably got to the point where they, are doing their own marketing, but they're struggling. They've, they've got a lot of things they're trying to do. They're trying to do their finance, their hr, the sales, all of that. They've divided it up and they might have one person, two people doing marketing, but they don't have that like strategic knowledge. And so that's where I come in and take them from that point to the point where they can put, maybe hire a team or they might need like a specialist agency to do like paid or something like that. Yeah. but I still, just about all of my clients I'm in contact with in some way, you know, they might, might be a WhatsApp saying, did you set this up for us five years ago? Like, do you have the password? Or it might be that. There's a couple of businesses I work with who are growing through acquisitions, so then I'll come in because I know the marketing better than they do, so I know like how things should be set up and like bring in the other business and get things working together. So it's kind of a variety of business of, of work. and then through that I've ended up helping other people who are at the very beginning stages. So with their go to market strategy, helping with investment. And when I've been sat down with them, I've found it's almost like being a, a counselor, sometimes an advisor, it might be a confidence issue. So we might be talking about the marketing, but then we're ending up, discussing, the psychology of it. And so with that in mind, that's how I ended up moving into this fractional space. I think there's. Also, with the rise of AI and things like that, a lot of the work that a marketing person would be doing, 10, 15 years ago, you might be able to use AI or a tool to do it HubSpot and go high level and things like that. So there's not so much need for the doing, but there is still that need for that knowledge, that strategic knowledge. And so that's how I've kind of moved into that fractional role. I always think that AI is super, super powerful, but I've never been afraid of it because I feel like when at least we're not at the stage and I can't quite envision it yet 'cause I'm not enough of a visionary to, see beyond when you need to be really knowledgeable in a certain area and also a multidisciplinary, Have a multidisciplinary understanding of a business in order to instruct AI the right way. I think it's a bit like having an assistant. You can't, expect them to know everything and have all of that knowledge and experience and be able to combine those two things to be able to apply it to a business. And as you are talking, I'm just, I'm hearing, which is a bit of a weird space to be in because I, I know this as well. Like when you've been in a business on, at the very early stages, whether it's a startup or it's, another fast growing business, you, it's all hands on deck. like, you don't get to say, oh no, that's not in my remit. That's not in my job description. Yeah. You really have to turn your hand to so many different things. I remember being, as an employee, thinking, oh shit, that makes me really unemployable because I'm so, I remember going for an interview with another agency and they were like, oh, you are, you are a bit too, you've got a bit too much. You are a bit too much of a generalist is basically what they said. Mm-hmm. And I was like, well, no, I'm not, because all I've had to be a specialist in lots of different areas. Yeah. Like I, I'm doing, I'm, it's not like I know a little bit in all of those areas I'm doing and I'm executing on all of those different areas at the same time because of the difference in structure in the business that I was in. So, sorry, I'm going in a bit of a monologue, but I just, you mentioned when we had a chat before about living the all in the same room stage and Yeah. I feel like that is, that kind of is, I find that the most exciting stage of a business, but it's messy. Yeah. And it's not neat. And if you're a really process driven person, it can feel chaotic. And, so, you know, looping back to what you said about, AI and, and, and what I was referencing there, I just feel like. Founders in particular, need that objectivity of somebody who's been there before, but also somebody who's seen it, seen lots of different aspects of that business. And not just in one pot because say, you know, just one very specific discipline of marketing because it's just not broad enough to be able to advise a business at that scale. so for anybody who's listening to this, who's thinking, I feel like a generalist and I feel like I have to do a bit of everything, I think there's, there's real power to that. And yeah. my experience has been particularly with tech companies and startups in general, is that people are so grateful for somebody who's been there before and is more of a generalist. Yeah. Um, so yeah, we tell me like, what does, what is it about that all in the same room stage? Why is that important for you and your client? Um, I think it's the, for me it's exciting. It's seeing those like small wins. I always kind of imagine like, my worst job would be like, working for Tesco's and you, they're like, right, well, no, our slogan is every little help and our colors are blue and red. And it's, you know, I worked in-house before and like, at a huge, um, consultancy, which had a lot of benefits in some way. 'cause I learned a lot of structure, um, like, you know, very like detail orientated. Um, like I can see a space in a document from like two meters away still. Um, but at the same time, you know, this was pre-social media and, um, well the very early days and I'll be saying like, oh, we should be doing this, we should be doing that. And you can see them all going, well, that's not how we do it. And then three years, three years later, I'll meet them and they're like, Hey, we're doing this now. And I'm like, it took you three years to kind of move like that. Whereas when you're in a starter. Um, when you're working in those early stages, you can just try this, you can try that. Um, and then like, if that doesn't work, then you can shift. Like I always say to my clients, like, I can work with zero budget. I can work with like a five figure budget, and if next week the five figure budget goes away because that has to go somewhere else, it has to go into development, something like that. That's okay. And exactly like on your point about being able to adapt, it's like, right, okay, well I can do that now because I'm a generalist and I've worked like that. Um, I, I, I always say to like my clients, the point about it feeling messy is they'll say like, oh, it feels like we're getting nowhere. And I, I always say, well, it does feel like that, but then when you look back and see where you were in a few months mm-hmm. That's where you can see the progress. It kind of feels like you are getting nowhere and nowhere. But like six months ago you were here and now you are here. I've been helping somebody raise investment and the year before they pitched to, somebody who just literally turned around and said, you're not ready. And then they saw them a year later and after they had pitched out a group of another investor, and this investor was wow, in a year you've just gone away and changed everything and you've come back now as a proper proposition. so yeah, so I think it's that, it's that excitement basically. And so as you're talking, I'm recognizing myself and recognizing some of the founders that I've worked with in the past and one in particular that I'm working with right now. There's, I think the, one of the crucial things about being, I dunno how to describe this, the, so it's more inclusive, but the founder of a, an ambitious business. Like whether it's, You are wanting to get your series B funding or whether you have lower expectations in terms of growth, but you wanna do your best and you wanna maximize it. There is an impatience that's required to that kind of personality that I think can me really, I know when I'm working with suppliers, I feel for them because I'm so impatient and I just want everything done, so, but you are a very measured person and you're a very calm person, and I imagine that's a massive asset. Can you talk a bit about how, you know, you mentioned in the future you'll look back and you'll see how far you've come or you'll have that objective marker like an investor who sees you once a year. A bit like when my kids see a relative once a year and they're like, oh my goodness, they've grown so much. Well, of course they have. It's been a year, but you've got that objective point of view. What, what else do you advise to people who feel a bit like me? Are those kind of impatient style founders? Mm. How. Like, but are in a messy business and it's very much in the growth phase. Do you have any advice for those people? Well, I always say that's your, that you need to turn that into drive. That's your energy, that impatience, it can obviously tip too far into anxiety and then you get stalemate and then you sort of dunno what to do at all. But I think there's a very, there's that, me saying about getting my Christmas presents was things that I needed and telling myself I wasn't allowed to. By myself. Anything that became my impatience because it's well, I wanna get there and I wanna prove it. Whereas I, if I had thought about paying my his rent at the time, if I lay in bed thinking about that, that would be too stressful and I would probably end up doing nothing. So you need to have that, it's there on the dial where your, it's your impatience is drive rather than it flipping into anxiety or flipping the other way where you're nah, it doesn't matter. It will happen. So I would, I think that I, I, for a lot of founders, I think it's actually a benefit that impatience, but it's just funneling it. And I think that's where an advisor comes in, like someone that you can sit with and talk to and they can tell you that, and that exactly that, don't feel bad, that you feel impatient, that's good, but you just need to make sure that you balance it. Yeah, absolutely. And just know as well that I'm just thinking about on client in particular at the moment, that that can, it can, one week it can look like impatience and frustration, and the next week it can look like lack of confidence or wobbling about what the mission is or what's happening. And, I think it just know that you need people around you, advisors, coaches, whatever, who are gonna be the steady rudder during that period and just remind you whether you're on a high or a low, they move you back to the central point and keep you on course to kind of fulfill your vi vision. because I, yeah, I completely agree. I, I think it is a massive superpower as a founder, but I do think that it can flip into the negative quite easily, and I don't think. Enough people recognize that they're not unique in that sense. Yeah. I think there's more founders share that impatience and drive and energy than don't, and know that somebody like Alison has worked with a lot of people who've been like that too. Yeah. And, and yeah, so I, I think everyone needs somebody in whatever guy is in their business who is that kind of steadying force who isn't gonna take things too personally. If you are having one of those frustrated days Yeah. But is gonna pick you back up and get you just like, bring you back to the central point. I know that's what I look for in terms of the coach that I work with. Mm. so, and, and I would just add to that about, it's, I think if you're a founder, another key skill is knowing what you know and knowing what you don't know. Yeah. and I think the best founders are one who, ones who will go to people and say, I need help. And I think a lot of people might feel like they should have the answer before they get to people. have, I always find people are so happy to just sit down and have a coffee with you, going on LinkedIn and finding people who have been where you've been but are further down the line and just think, can we have a Zoom call? Can we have a coffee? Yeah. And just, laying it all out there, being vulnerable as they say and just saying I need help with this or, I don't know what to do here. I think is a really key skill for a founder. 'cause there's a lot of people who find that difficult and then that keeps all of that impatience inside and that's when they struggle. Yeah, absolutely. And Just kind of further to how you work with clients. I think, we, we've spoken about this already, but you sit in a rare space. You are balancing high level strategy plus roll up your sleeves execution, the fact that you can flip between a a five figure budget and a zero budget and not by an eyelid. And having worked in tech startups, I know how quickly that can become a reality and, and, you know, in the, the move fast and break things attitude of particularly tech startup space, yeah, it's an unusual skill to have. how do you balance those, those things. how do you, I'm thinking as well, how do you communicate those in a way that doesn't undervalue you? and I'll give a bit more context there. I, you know, we are told to niche down. We're told that we need to, be really clear about who we're working with and what level we work at them at and what our price is. But you, your asset, is that flex and that stretch? how do you communicate it? I like to get in front of people to communicate that. I mean, it is definitely something that's difficult to get across, like in your marketing because a lot of people will say very similar things. I'm really lucky that most people I meet have come through referrals or people who have started their own businesses and now they're starting another one. So I think as well, demonstrating success, so I, like I said, I've worked with people for a long time. Yeah. So like two to five years. So that ends up being quite a good case study where you can talk about these things. yeah, got a really good case study up at the moment, about funnel fixes where a client wasn't seeing as much coming through organic and paid. So, You know, if you just used an agency just focused on paid or organic, then you would decide that that isn't working. Whereas, because I'm completely under the hood, we were able to go into the CRM and see what was happening. Yeah. Was basically that they were taking longer to convert. So the sales team weren't focusing on those, they were focusing on the easy ones first. Yeah. Um, so it's that kind of showing that end to end like function, which I think helps, helps sell it. Yeah. And yeah. Yeah. That's really interesting. 'cause that's something that applies regardless of the scale of the business, right. It becomes more urgent if it's a, a higher revenue loss problem, but having somebody. Because many people think, you know, they're aspiring to get to the stage of business where they have lots of different specialist agencies or specialist consultants working on particular areas. But having somebody who is able to see across the span of the, the whole of the marketing, mix in the way that you do as a CMO, fractionally or, you know, in an advisory role, yeah, the potential to recoup what they spend on you is huge because you're able to kind of look at it at a glance and, and see what is the thing that's not working. So, I, you, I know you work with people a really long period of time and you've so, and referrals because the nature of what you do are really key. And I know that people talk a lot within the tech space and I was working with a. a, a tech startup at one point who were part of an incubator program that was really well respected. So that was a good way for, and I was in a fractional CMO role, so I was able to kind of move between different businesses within that incubator, but also the, the investors themselves, like the, the backers of the business would mention to other companies that they had invested in, that they were on the board of, well, Charlotte can help you with that. Like, get in touch with this person. She's helping X company do that. And that was a really great, Referral method for me in terms of how I was growing my consultancy at that time. But I know you've talked about how human connection is really important to you as well, and I, I know, you know, post COVID and, the, with the new style of working, becoming the norm, that has become more of a rarity. I know the last time we spoke, you were starting a walking network group instead of going to traditional events. I, I, which I just thought was a great idea, in terms of two birds, one stone. But how do you see in-person connection, connection fitting into a mostly digital marketing landscape? And is that aada, is that changing with AI and, and. Is human connection actually more important now than ever? Mm-hmm. Loaded question because I have a personal opinion. Well, yeah. Well I was just gonna say with regards to kind of promoting yourself, the other problem is that, well, there's two benefits to ai. One, it makes, it makes you, I mean, I use it, it makes my life far easier and faster. It also means that, you know, people can start businesses faster and they can get to the point where they maybe need me. So there's lots of benefits. But then the other thing is it's just gonna increase the volume of content and the demand for our, attention Yeah. As consumers and as business consumers. so it's just making it a bit more competitive to stand out. Yeah. Yeah. I would kind of use the HubSpot model of attract, convert and delight and, They've just changed that now to a, a new version called Loop 'cause they've. You know, they've identified that people are no longer coming to a website and then filling in a form and then going through the same funnel. And I've seen that on some of my clients as well. They're doing quite well on ai. And when you look at what AI traffic is doing, it's converting far higher, like 40% versus 20% and faster. So they're not hanging around on the site. They're going straight to fill in a form because they, they've been sold on chat, GPT. so it's, it means that like this is a big opportunity for people. but it also means it's harder to stand out because there's just so much demand. So from, from my side, these kind of in-person events came out of that. It's like, how can you make a connection with people, as a consultant, as a brand, while we've only got so much attention we can give. So a lot of that is, you know, building a moat around your business. Like, like a good example of that is like notion that has all its templates because you get a template, then you use their product. it might be seeing, sharing your roadmap so it can see like what's coming up and then that gets people excited. Yeah. But I think the other way is kind of value based marketing. So who are you, what do you stand for? And getting people to buy into your brand that way. Yeah. And then just yeah, getting face to face. Um, you know, I've one benefit of being around for a long time as I've seen. Things come in that have declared other things dead, like email's dead, email's still here. Um, you know, all, all of these Slack is gonna kill this and then nobody's doing any print anymore and adverts are dead. And, but one, it is almost secular so it comes back round again. So because we are bombarded with emails in our inbox, because every time we go on social media, we're getting so many different, ads and posts and things like that. Yeah. Meeting someone face to face is like, far more effective. 'cause people aren't getting that anymore. And they, like we said before about people being so willing to help, um, I find a lot of value in connecting people. Yeah. Like people who, um, oh you should speak to so and so or have you, have you met them? And then I found people are doing that for me as well and kind of up a network of people that way. Um, yeah. And yeah, I think that's really valuable. And, uh, just kind of building on that, I know there's a lot of founders listening in, uh, who hate big networking events. You know what's really funny? I, I love to chat. I love to meet people. I think human connection is more valuable and needed now, um, more than ever for many different reasons. Political, machine learning, all, all of the reasons, but also just the volume and like you said, being able to allow you to stand out. But for me, as a part-time working mother, going to big events in person is not necessarily something that I'm able to do. Not just because of my schedule, but also just because of time and logistics. Yeah, like I, I'm not willing to travel for an hour within. London. I mean, I live in London and you know what it's like, it takes you like 90 minutes to get from one side to the other. Like I'm not willing to waste an hour of my very precious working week to get somewhere to spend an hour there, to then spend an hour to come back again and not know what the return is gonna be. Having conversations like this that we can then use with something else to me is a much more valuable and efficient way of doing that. And I get that human connection and then I get to share, the way what we've spoken about and the benefit on with other people. So there's multiple reasons for it. But do you have any other thoughts on alternatives to try, because I know particularly in, in in startup space, there are a lot of people who do naturally avoid. human interaction. So what, what are, what, what are the methods that you've seen? What do you think works? Introverts, introverts, ways of meeting people? Yeah. No, I completely agree on the big networking ones. my local council invited me to their networking breakfast and they're promoting it. There's 150 to 200 people. it's an advantage. Yeah. I was like, oh my God, no, I don't wanna meet. I can't in three hours. I don't wanna speak to 200 people. Oh my goodness. There's nothing worse as well. When you go to an event, it's probably scarred from when I was younger and went to events and wasn't that important and people would look at your badge. And then, oh yeah. Walk off yeah, oh my gosh. Oh, okay. I'm not, because you're not gonna buy, you are not important enough. And, I always advise people to go and try and find these smaller groups. there's one I go to round here and it's literally, it's on the same time every month. They have a variety of speakers. They often have people who go there as speakers. Might be eight people in the room, might be 20 people. And what I like the best is when they go round and you introduce yourself. Another thing which puts dread into my heart. Instead of giving you who you are, they say. say who you are. And also one thing you could do with someone's help with, so for example, the local air ambulance goes to it, the lady who's in charge of fundraising. So her thing was, well, I wanna get in with the local council because I want them to put more of our, clothes bin collection, bins out. And I thought that was such a nice way of taking the pressure off you trying to be who I am. It's like, well, I'm looking for people who can help me with this, or I'm looking for people who can introduce me to clients who are this. And everyone's like, oh yeah, actually I know somebody that can do that. So it's a really nice conversation. and I, I mean, it's short time that you can't go to every single networking event, but a lot of them now are on LinkedIn, so you can go and have a look at the photos and around here I always see the same people at the same events, and that you just know that it's the same kind of boring conversations. and beyond that, I think there's great value in Different networks. So I'm in Female Founders Social, which is basically a WhatsApp group. And you know, people will post in there all sorts of things that they're looking for. Like with help, it might be like IT support or it might be like, I'm looking for a new agency to do this. And then you don't have to say anything, you can message them back. And so there's a lot of online groups now, which are good for people who don't wanna leave the house. I think, but I was just gonna say, if that isn't for you, that isn't for you. it doesn't work, it doesn't work, there's something else will work for you. I'd feel you shouldn't feel peer pressure to go along, to these things if you don't want to. Yeah, absolutely. And I know just moving on on the, the marketing front, I know that I. You said, and you alluded to earlier, that barriers to starting a business, a marketing plan, whatever, a lower than ever, ever, particularly with, AI moving mainstream mm-hmm. But getting traction is harder. How do you help clients cut through in that kind of scenario? Like, you touched on the loop method, did you say that HubSpot's changed? It's HubSpots Yeah. Sort of thing, right? Yeah. so loop, can you talk us through what, what are you seeing the shifts and kind of maybe touch on, I know you've got a, a report coming up, mm-hmm. And it's different from the typical PDF lead magnet that somebody might go download. So it can maybe within the context of that. Yeah. Well, again, it really does depend on the business, but I'm a big fan of giving something back to people that kind of hooks them in. So in the old days it would be like a playbook. but you know. Everyone's bombarded with playbooks and then they know that they're gonna get seven emails one a week for seven weeks and you know, they do nothing for off those 'cause they've just got loads of them. So it's about giving back a bit more value. Yeah, so I've been around the AI and I said, I've got a few clients who are doing quite well and when I've looked at what in particular, what the prompts are coming back, it's kind of directly back to the marketing we are doing. So I've kind of reverse engineered, how we've probably ended up getting these results on ai. Yeah. So I've put together a audit, which people can, get me to do and see how they kind of measure up to other businesses in their area, wherever that's a local area. Or it could be like their service area, to measure themselves up. Alongside that I've, as a freebie is I've got a series of kind of prompts, that they can put into chat GPT clause and, you know, around building their, ICPs, their ideal customer profiles, their working out how, tracking their marketing. I think people are very good at, like you say at the start bit, but how are they, how working out exactly what's working and where they should be putting their efforts in. and a few other kind of prompts in there. I think there's seven in total. and then building that into like a notion template, which people can then just use. And there's a lot in there. but you know, you're happy to give that away. Like a lot of people might feel like, well that's my secret. yeah, secret sauce and yeah. But, I'm willing to share it because it's that, it's you say, it's that grave point. It's like. They, everyone's gonna get to the point, fingers is crossed where they can't do all everything themselves, so they're gonna need some support. so that's kind of working on that basis that they will start to apply this and then they'll need some help. Yeah. I, yeah, so interesting. As you're speaking, I was just thinking a couple of things. I think, you know, what's really key here is that you've got an awareness of how long the life cycle is for you from mm-hmm. Somebody becoming aware of you to potentially becoming a client and not trying to accelerate that beyond what's feasible, but instead playing into it and being, we, I talk a lot about generating goodwill at that stage at which you introduce yourself and you are absolutely doing that with this very generous resource that you've created. What, how do you decide what, what channels? what, where are you gonna put this out? how you focus your time in terms of distributing that? Because clearly you are working as an individual, right? Like you don't have a big agency, you don't have a lot of, you don't have a team. Is that correct, Alison? No, no. I have people that kind of help with things PR and content and stuff like that, but I think everyone can relate. You end up doing your own stuff because, you know, they work on client work. I always feel I'm a bit of enough, we were saying before about being a generalist. I know enough about things to have to do it myself, where it's it's not worth outsourcing it. But then on the other hand it's oh, it'd be so much easier if I could just pay someone to do this. Yeah. Yeah. It's, yeah, it's a challenge like I see. I see the clients that I work with, FlipFlop between this, they're like, no, I want control of everything. No, I'm overwhelmed. I need to hand it off to somebody else. And I think finding a happy medium is important. Yeah. But in terms of the marketing channels you use, like how mm-hmm. Do you decide where to share things and, and how to prioritize the channels given that you are mostly doing this on your own? Yeah, I mean, I will be honest, I don't think I've kind of cracked that because, there's always something that comes up. But I try and put aside at least a day, a month, maybe a couple of days a month when it's all just on, electric alley. And in fact, after this I'm gonna do some videos, for, I'm testing out TikTok to see what happens, but then also putting those on Instagram and LinkedIn as well. and then that kind of pushes into the content. But then I'm very aware that not everybody wants to. See video content, so then I'll do a written piece as well. And that will be a social media post. in terms of getting that out, I don't use any paid advertising simply because the return, because it is a longer cycle. It's, it's almost like an a BM method of marketing. So, it's not really worth doing some top of the funnel paid ads for that you're competing with about, 500 marketing agencies at a time. so then it will be, keeping on people's radar. So, making connections either virtually or in person. And then sharing the content through the channels where they can find me. Yeah. And do you ever ask, because I know referrals are important, do you ever do anything to kind of accelerate referrals? Do you have any campaign or strategy around encouraging those to come in? Or do you just kind of sit and wait for them? Well, I mean, I always say to clients, happy to sort of, if you wanna, have a cut, but a lot of them just don't don't seem to take that up. They'll just probably like, refer you on to people. I do advise that for, my clients who have a shorter kind of sales cycle or a more volume of clients. that's kind of the first thing I'll suggest is, is a referral scheme of some way. Similarly with getting reviews too, one client, that's actually why they've ended up doing quite well on chat GPT is 'cause they have such good reviews. Yeah. On Google My business and with them, they give a, five pound donation to charity for every review and it'll be a local charity. So it would be the local hospice. So then people know, they know of it and it creates that connection. Yeah. And then they only get, they probably only get a hundred odd reviews, so it's not breaking the bank, the five pound per review, but it's obviously paying off now, when we are looking at what's happening in chat GBT. Interesting. Very good. okay. And what role do you think that personal brand brand plays in securing long-term client work? I, I know also I'm aware that your. Working with founders who are likely thinking about their next move. And for them, personal brand is also important in terms of attracting the right investors and mm-hmm. Potentially people who might acquire them in the future. I think it's so important. I'm just thinking back to my kind of most successful clients and they've all been very good at promoting themselves. Yeah. but then I don't wanna discredit at the same time people who don't. Again, talking about networking, there's a lot of people who don't feel like they can do that, but I, and I think then having a great product can also push it along. So it's almost what you talk about. you know, I know some founders whose product is, kind of held together with tape at this point, but they're so, they're so good in front of people. You know, they, I think one of them was gonna go to the House of Commons, to speak. And I'm thinking, well, the product isn't even, doesn't exist yet, but 'cause they're so good at, I mean, they're passionate about what they do. I always tell people you are the expert. This is why you started your business. It's because you know, you know what you are talking about. So, go out there. I think having a great PR person is really invaluable. having somebody who can do that, push you, push you in front of the right people. but yeah, I think just be yourself. I think you. Charlotte, you have a great personal brand, like everything that you produced, oh, thank you. Looks amazing. and I think it feels a bit like it's held together with tape on the back end, but Yeah. No, not entirely, but, but yeah, and I think that's what you attract. I would also say I think some people are a little bit scared of being themselves because you're gonna, you might repel some people, but you're gonna repel them anyway. Yeah. there's different people out there for, for everyone really. and it might be that you completely turn off some people, but other people are going, this is the person for me. And you just have to stick on your course and know, stamp, put your flag in the ground of this is who I am. Yeah. I think that's a really important point. I think, Yeah, a few thoughts were coming up for me as you were talking then the, I come from a background in Yorkshire where, I heard somebody describe this as, we don't like tall poppies recently. And I think that is exactly it. like there's, it's, you are encouraged to I think, not be too big for your boots, is the description. Mm-hmm. I would've been told a lot as a child and, and I think yes, absolutely there's, but there's a fine line between being egotistical and leaning into what you know your assets are and who you can help. And I also heard somebody else who not, surprisingly was American who said, if you don't communicate. Something to the people who might wanna work with you that is gonna help them, then effectively you're stealing from them. And, being the good girl that I am, like hearing that I might be stealing from somebody by not putting something out there, not putting marketing out there that encouraged me to do it. So yes, I think there's, there's a very, it's a very kind of polarizing experience working on your. Marketing, especially when it's inextricably linked to yourself. Yeah. You know, I've created a company that doesn't use my name as just as you have. Alison doesn't use my name as the actual company name. However, for all intents and purposes, when people are hiring, they're hiring me. They're not hiring like a company, uh, with, there are many people working in this company at this point, but they are ostensibly hiring me. And so it does feel very personal, very much like a personal brand. but you said something really important, which I think is, it, is another, is a part of this people pleasing that's really important to get over in order to kind of unlock your, the right people and, and attract them towards like magnetize the right people towards you. And that is no, that you're never gonna be for everybody. It doesn't matter how hard you try to do that, not everybody's gonna like you. So the sooner you get over that and lean into. Giving to the people who you most wanna work with and who most wanna work with you, the people you're gonna be the best fit for, like leaning to that sooner rather than later is, I think is just, is the, the, the big key between businesses that grow at a slow pace versus fast paced. Mm-hmm. And of course, this is about, you know, whether you want your business to grow at all, but assuming that you're doing any kind of marketing, like you want it to be as efficient as possible for the amount of time, energy, and, and money that you put into it. And I think just leaning into that, knowing you're not gonna be for everybody. So leaning into who you are gonna be for, is a good thing. And you know, I've said this before, there's gonna be people who listen to a podcast and don't like my accent or Mm, don't like that. I swear. And you know what, that's a good thing that they self-select out because that means, I'm not wasting. Time, energy and money. Yeah. Like continuing to speak to those people where, fruitlessly. so I actually think there's huge advantage to that and I don't think people realize it. As soon as you re, as soon as you do lean into that, you authentic voice comes out in a way that feels really unique, feels like you are able to then. Create that human connection at scale in many ways. Yeah. Because you're showing up as you would in a one-to-one interaction with somebody. okay. So you are the person when they work with you, the person in front of them is the same person they've seen online. Like your point about swearing, if you didn't swear now and then you were sat in a meeting effing and blinding at them, then you know, you've wasted everybody's time. and I do think, it is really hard. We are all, we're all taught not to boast and, sort of talk about ourselves. So it is hard. Yeah. But then on your point about ego, I think, I think if you are somebody that, I think ego is only a problem when you don't know what you're talking about. I think if you are an expert and you are you, you are secure in what you're saying. I think a little bit of ego's. Okay. So I think I wouldn't be too scared if people are well, what if everybody thinks I'm Showing off or they think I've got a big ego. It's well if you can back up what you're saying then yeah. Lean into it. Yeah, absolutely. It's not about saying it's confidence and nobody's gonna buy from somebody that they don't feel confident in. Doesn't radiate confidence. You never, at no point do you have to say, I know everything on this topic, but really lean into the area that you do know more than most people on and you are staying within the safe ground of Yeah. You're becoming an authority in that space. Yeah. Um, yeah. So interesting. So it is, I see it kind of makes me a little bit sad for some of the British. People that I work with, 'cause I know they're so bloody good at what they do. Yeah. And they don't they don't necess, they can't necessarily put themselves out there. And I, I'm guessing you see a lot of this because if you're working in the startup space, obviously there's, you know, so much, so many of the, the most successful startups over the past decade have come outta the us. But the British founders are also creating phenomenal stuff. They just don't necessarily have the same kind of concept of self-worth and confidence and Yeah. Ability to put themselves out there. Yeah. I think it is slowly changing. But yeah, I do have clients in the US as well as, UK and in Europe too. And so you can see the differences in them. and I think there's benefits to both, I think. And I think there is a way that British people can be, Kind of authentically pushing themselves out there. I mean, we're very good at being self-deprecating for a start, and people like to see that as well. Like, I mean, that's how we make friends in some cases, like face-to-face. So I think there's ways of leaning in. I've got one client who, you know, grew up in a council house and has now got a really successful business. They've bought the, when we first started there was one, competitor we really admired. They've just bought them. So that Oh my goodness. Amazing. Nice achievement. so, you know, he posts about his humble beginnings, but not in a braggy way, but in giving back. Like he went back to his school to talk to the kids there, kind of saying you know, you could be in my position one day. Yeah. And that, that's the sort of stuff he promotes. So, you know, it's nice, there's a bit of ego there because he's talking about where he came from and then he's showing where he is now. But at the same time, I think any British person would just be warm reading that story. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And, and, one great piece of advice I had early on, was from a woman leader who's quite high up in this business, who did a lot of speaking within the organization. So you know, a thousand people, those sort of numbers. And I, I was like, oh my God, I can't even imagine standing. I was like, how do you do it? And she, she said, well, I used to act when I was at school, so when I go on stage now, it's not me, it's the character of me. Yeah. Who is the char who works in a sales director role, and this is what I'm discussing. And so I always try and Step out. And, I take that further and I kind of look at some of the attributes in her in particular, but then other people that I've met through my career that I've quite admired and almost to try and build that into a persona that I'm trying to push out. So again, it's not, it is me, but it's also, it's tricking my brain into thinking that it's not. Yeah. To make you feel safe, so you do the thing. Yeah. Because our brains are hardwired to keep us safe and keep us within the pack and avoid alienation and avoid, yeah. Anything that's gonna put us at the mercy of the, the wolves beyond the cave, because we are still cave people. Exactly. And yeah, and it gets easier over time. I mean, everybody said that to me and now that I am there too, you do, there's things that I couldn't imagine doing before now. Like it's just dead easy. You just have to push it out there. And I do know it is more and more people are doing their own kind of promotion, which I also think is a good thing about, chat GPT. there's somebody I worked with early in my career who's a designer who is putting, pushing out great posts and 'cause I know him, I know that he's. Hasn't written that because he can't write like that. But I'm like, well that's kind of leveled the playing field there. And I'm sure he's been in exactly the same. It's like, well, it's not me that's out there. It's like the character of me on LinkedIn talking about design. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he's, yeah, he's found a way to do it that he feels like he can repeat. So interesting. Well, look, I could talk to you all day, but I'm mindful of time Alison and being respectful of yours. So I wanna thank you so much for coming on the podcast. Thank you. Happy and lovely chat. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And yeah, I think we first spoke a good two and a half years ago at this point, so it's been over a long, sustained period of time. But I just want to ask who should get in contact with you and how should they get in touch? Well, I think any founder, any, it doesn't even have to be a founder, you could just be hitting that, infliction point where you're struggling to grow, who just needs a little bit of support. I mean, it could be that it is working on the full marketing function or it could be on that fractional advisor, side. I'm also just happy to have a quick zoom call with people if they wanna, if they're struggling and they just want some reassurance, I'm always happy to do that. so yeah, so anybody that is trying to grow, generally like service led businesses or people who kind of sell their services online in some way, they generate leads. yeah, get in touch. Lovely. Thanks so much for joining us, Alison. Thank you.