The Soap Box Podcast
The politics and marketing podcast for business owners with a social conscience.
Talk about sticky issues, learn how to weave your values into your marketing, and hear from real-life business owners working it all out in real time.
The Soap Box Podcast
What do you REALLY need to do to market your business, with Danielle Thompson
We think we know what it takes to market a business online. A bit of Instagram wizardry here, a five-step LinkedIn funnel there, a sprinkle of referral strategy and maybe a course by someone who talks like Alex Hormozi but wears a skirt suit – and boom, marketing sorted. Right?
Wrong.
This isn’t technically a marketing podcast, but let’s be honest, if you’re a business owner with a social conscience, you need a way to market that actually works without selling your soul. You want to reach people, make money, and further your mission, but the idea of 24/7 content, manipulative tactics, and “girlboss” style strategies just doesn’t sit right. So what do you actually do?
That’s exactly why I wanted to chat to today’s guest, Danielle Thompson.
Danielle is the founder of Goldspun Support, a company that provides operational foundations for Fractional Directors, so they can focus on high-value strategic work, increase their revenue, and reclaim their work-life balance. With 16 years of experience spanning corporate, small and micro enterprises, she knows what it takes to run a business without burning out. Supporting people to avoid burnout is actually one of Danielle’s biggest soapboxes – though not the one she’s jumping on today.
Instead, we’re talking about one of her other passions: demystifying marketing for every single business owner out there. In this episode, Danielle gets into the real essentials of what you actually need to do to market your business (and what you absolutely don’t). We talk about values-led marketing, ethical growth, and how to cut through the noise of overcomplicated, overhyped advice. No thousand-pound courses, no terrifying sales funnels, and definitely no dancing on TikTok required. If you’ve ever felt like you're failing at marketing simply because you’re not glued to your phone, this one’s for you.
Danielle is brilliant, honest, and a joy to talk to. We chatted long before we hit record and probably could’ve kept going for hours after we stopped. I’m so excited for you to hear what she has to say. You’re going to love this one.
So grab a coffee, probably a notebook, and listen to Danielle get on her soapbox.
Danielle's Links:
Follow Danielle on Instagram
Follow Danielle on LinkedIn
Contact Danielle via Goldspun Support
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We think that we know exactly what it takes to market your business online. We think that if we find the perfect combination of Instagram expert and five Step linked in strategies a really good book about referral tactics and something by Alex Ozzi or, you know. Somebody who is wearing a skirt suit who talks like Alex Ozzy, uh, then we will have unlocked that magic key to getting our business sorted. This is not necessarily a marketing podcast, but pretty much all of you out there who are business owners with a social conscience, are in need of finding aligned and effective ways of marketing your business so that you further the cause that you are fighting for and or make the money that you need to live the life and to care for those around you and all the things that you need to do. Marketing matters. And if you are a purpose-driven business, if you are a business owner with a social conscience then you can't, and you don't, you probably don't want to grab the nearest girl boss manipulative marketing type strategy. So what do you do? Do you jump on one of those courses that promise to show you everything? Do you live 24 7 on social media constantly pumping out reels and B roll and edgy carousels and maybe doing some TikTok dances until you burn out and then you can't do it anymore. And then you think that, well, that's it. I can't market my business'cause this is the only way that you're meant to do it. That is one of the reasons why I wanted to talk to today's guest. Danielle Thompson is the founder of Gold Spun Support. Gold Spun support provides operational foundations that allow fractional directors to focus on high value strategic work so they can increase their revenue and reclaim their work life balance. She wants to support people to avoid burnout, which is another one of her soapbox, which we don't really get to today. Um, but based on her own personal experiences, over her 16 years in the industry, in corporate and small and micro enterprises, she knows exactly what you need to do to market your business. And newsflash, it is not a thousand per courses scary offers in 24 7 social media Today I talk to Danielle about demystifying marketing for every single business owner out there. Laying out for you exactly what you do and what you don't need to worry about when you are trying to build your business, and how you can do that whilst keeping your social conscience intact and keeping everything that you do aligned with your values. I thoroughly enjoyed talking to Danielle. She is an absolute blast. We, we chatted for quite a while before we realized that probably we should start recording and we could have chat for a long time afterwards. So I know that you will love this episode. So yeah, grab your coffee, probably a notebook, and listen to Danielle get on her soapbox. Danielle, it is really, really lovely to have you on the Soapbox podcast. I'm very much looking forward to our chat today.
Danielle:Thank you. Me too. I'm really excited to be here, although a little nervous, but you've already put me at ease, so I'm very excited to get talking.
Peta:We're all good. We've had, we've talked about lots of random things, so now we're just
Danielle:and we could have kept going.
Peta:That's, it would've been a very interesting podcast about none of the things that we planned to talk about today, but I think people, I think people would've loved it. It'll be fine.
Danielle:I think, I think they would've really appreciated ourselves after a squirrel esque conversation of this thing and then that shiny object over there and the randomness that is us. Yes.
Peta:Yes, I think so. But for people who did not tune in for that podcast and tuned in for a podcast about, um, people's soapboxes, can, can you, can you tell our listeners a little bit about who you are and what you do and how you got here?
Danielle:So my name's Danielle Thompson and I run a company called Gold Fund Support, which I started a decade ago, now be 11 years this year. So I started it off the back of massive Breakdown and burnout in my corporate career. Lot of. Experience in corporate is. It turns out that it's all part of a massive rejection sensitivity thing and I can't cope with people being mean to me. But long story short, I had a breakdown left corporate and wanted to set up a business that made sure no one else ever felt the way I did at the end with that sense of burnout and overwhelm and stress. And that was focused mainly on women.'cause I was in a position where I had two young children. I had a house that needed running meals, that needed cooking all this stuff that needed doing, and I know. You've got the whole world telling you you can do it all. But actually that's really hard to do and what does all look like? You know? To me that was always having fresh cupcakes made every day, which is a ridiculous standard of perfectionism that's not even possible.
Peta:a lot of cupcakes,
Danielle:a lot yet, and a lot of cupcakes, and I'm not supposed to eat that many cupcakes. So there was a lot of people having Greek cupcakes with me. So you're always welcome. There'll always be cake, but it, there was a level of perfectionism in me that led to the breakdown and it was, I mean, it's part of the whole picture, but it was part of it and it kind of made me build this business where I was trying to take that pressure off of other people and it is something I'm really passionate about. Oddly, it's not the soapbox I'm on today, but it is something I'm really passionate about stopping people feeling that awful sensation of, I dunno what to do next. I can't cope. This is too much for me. So I've been doing that for 10, nearly 11 years. I absolutely love what I do. I probably work more than I did in corporate flexibly. So yesterday afternoon I could sit in the sun half an hour. That was perfect, but it meant I did some work after I'd had dinner. And that's fine. You know, I can pick the kids up, I can drop the kids off. I've got that flexibility. I do absolutely love what I do, and I think for a lot of years, much of my business was focused on staying small and supporting people in a very backroom administrative way. What I found after I kind of came out of my recovery period from leaving corporate was that the skills I've developed in creative and marketing and branding. They were kind of knocking at the door desperate to get out. So I was working with clients in an administrative fashion and seeing things from a marketing perspective that I couldn't not say something about. I was sort of getting, I know you didn't employ me for this part, and I've noticed this. But, and the more I did it, the more I got comfortable with it. And, you know, I came to the conclusion that actually the trauma from corporate was not a result of my experience in marketing. It's not marketing's fault. It was the people, it was the situation, it was the time of my life. So marketing then came back into my life in a meaningful way and an intentional way. So it was less me accidentally doing it on the side and much more me doing it. Intentionally is what I love. I still offer the administrative support and I am very much operational support for strategic level directors, uh, sort of independent fractional directors and marketing. I just think it goes hand in hand with it. It fits really well with everything I offer. It allows me to see opportunities that maybe other people don't see, and I am incredibly privileged that I've had. In corporate working for a major household name that's given me that massive sort of, it's B2C experience, but it's big. You know, there were departments for everything. There was an above the line department and below the line department, there was a department that specifically made the posters for in-store. There was outsourced creative agencies, but I kind of sat in the middle of all of that. So I got a view of everything from the 2D print, 3D. Collateral. And then when I moved into my business, obviously that's much more with, um, micro enterprises and entrepreneurs and that's a different type of marketing. You know, you'll know it yourself entirely. Going from massive to tiny, it's a bit of a culture shock at first. And there's me looking around going, well, who's gonna make my posters? Oh, right, that's just me. Is it? So that was a bit of a learning curve, but it's 16 years of real experience of looking around at people and going. Oh, okay. I see what we're all being told out here in the business owner world, and that's kind of where little bit of a soft launch into the soapbox. That's kind of where my soapbox comes from, those things I've seen and experienced and the things I don't feel comfortable about that I see and experience every single day
Peta:Yeah. Well, from that, let's go into the hard launch of your, um, that all sounds fascinating. And I, I, I, I completely,'cause I do sometimes I work with kind of bigger, um, scaling. Brands, like tech brands and there's a department for this and there's a department for that, and there's 18 different people that you need to talk to. Um, and sometimes that means 18 different brilliant ideas that you might not have thought of. I mean, sometimes it doesn't, but that's another story. Um, no, no, not up first anyway. Um, but yeah. And then when, when I work for like a founder who's kind of bootstrapping everything or and doing it all themselves, that is, yeah. It's kind of an all hands on deck situation that is, is a very different mindset. It's
Danielle:It's, I find it much more energetic, you knows.
Peta:Yeah.
Danielle:It's less usual to get really passionate people in corporate. You do get some, they, you know, they really care. You know, there was one point where people used to joke that if you cut me, I'd believe the same color as the company logo, because that's how passionate I was about brand consistency for this particular business. But, but it's just you, it's your baby. You've, you know, dreamt of this at night, you've conceived it from nothing. You've built it. Of course you're gonna care about it. I think that. That excitement is what drives so many small business owners. So it is a really exciting, energetic space to work in.
Peta:Cool. Okay. Soap soapbox. What is the thing that you find yourself talking to people at nine o'clock at night at the parties that you may or may not go to holding a glass of wine? Like what's your, what's
Danielle:Or or ranting on social media, which is the.
Peta:on social media? Yes. Which is the, yeah. The parent of of children equivalent of going parties.
Danielle:That is true. Yeah, so my soapbox is the absolute, I don't even know how to phrase it in a short, snappy way that doesn't sound like I'm about to go insane snake oil that people sell online around marketing and branding to confuse business owners who literally have no clue. So I have 16 years experience, so I can look at someone who's telling me that if I'm not on social media 24 7, my business is going to fail. I'm going to be poor and my children are gonna be homeless and go, uh, no, I know that's not right. I get how someone who has been, say an accountant and wanted to go self-employed or I don't know, um, worked in a beauty salon but now wants to move to the social media side. I get how those people who haven't had exposure to marketing for a long time look at those scaremongering tactics and think. Oh, I've got pay for a course, or I've spend a month on, I've be up at midnight to someone in America on my social media or I'm not going to be successful and that. That sort of mis-selling of what you need. I know it's a marketing tactic to me it's an unethical and unfair marketing tactic, but we do it in a little way all the time. You know, when you've got out down timers on offers or when you've got a special offer that isn't really a special offer. You know, in little ways it's done. But I do think there's a prevalence lately for people overselling what someone needs and playing on the ignorance or naivety of new business owners. In quite a underhand way, and it just makes me so incredibly uncomfortable because you can start your business with the very basics. And when you do start, you know, you've gotta think about accounting, invoicing, spreadsheets, finding clients, client retention contracts, all this stuff. I get how someone promising you. Six figures in six weeks with this posting strategy or spend 10,000 pounds on me. Don't worry. There's a payment plan and you'll know exactly what you're doing and you'll never run outta clients in your pipeline. I get how all of that sounds appealing because you don't know where to start and you want an easy solution. But much like weight loss, which I wish there was, there isn't an easy solution. It's something that takes work. It's something that takes effort. Yes, you could reeducate yourself, spend all your time on YouTube, you know, all that kind of thing. I want to make the landscape cleaner and clearer for those people so they know which bits to ignore. So they know which bits to listen to and so they know what they actually need. Not all this stuff they think they need. I mean, I dunno about you, but when I first started I kind of collected lead magnets and courses thinking that I'd read through all of those at some point and my business would be amazing. They are still sat there. I can't tell you how many like. Free top 10 tips I never read or challenges I signed up to. And we do it because they're free resources. I think lead magnets are becoming a bit scar these days and people are being pushed towards the paid for options. And I just, I just don't feel it's ethical, ethical, or fair to put those financial burdens on people at the start of their journey.
Peta:Okay, well I'm sold. Yeah, I. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk. Um, no, I, I mean, I completely agree. Um, can you, like, I, I've seen examples from my perspective, but like, as someone who has those 16 years of experience, what are the, um, what are the worst offenders kind of, that you've seen? Give me some examples of like, stuff that's made you go No.
Danielle:You know, I bought a book a. No web or something, but there was a guy who was advertising a book and the book was free, but you just pay postage and it would solve all of your problems.
Peta:Okay. Yes.
Danielle:I think I read about three pages before. I was like, this is not my type of marketing, this is not my type of tactic, but the sheer avalanche of information I got as a result of ordering this book. Was horrendous. It felt like being crushed under a ton of rocks. There were three to four emails a day all telling me I was doing it wrong. Had I finished the book yet, why hadn't I finished the book yet?
Peta:Oh my.
Danielle:it
Peta:Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Danielle:And I think that that for me, encapsulates everything that's wrong. It very much feels like a bit of a bro marketing thing. You don't get it so much. With women. Women when they market, they don't tend, I mean, there's going to be an exception to every role, obviously, but they don't tend to have that aggressive sales beat them over the head focus when they talk about their products and services. The women I've come in contact with, and it might be because I've built my tribe that way, but they tend to market from a more ethical place. You know, a place of, okay, let's see what you need and let's try and find a solution for that. Whereas the bro marketing tactics of sales and pushing and cold dms, that can stay over there for me. I don't want it in my space.
Peta:That's fair. I'm very, very jealous that you've built your tribe and your algorithm in a way that you, you don't see women using the same tactics because I do. Um, not all of them, but yeah. Um, yeah. Okay. I'm intrigued as to hear that person is now. Maybe you can tell me when we, um, when we finish our little chat. How exciting. Little bit of gossip. That's what we like. Yes, I did. Um, I wrote an email to my list a couple of weeks ago'cause I'd seen something on social media. I'd seen a woman on social media talking about, um, Alex Hormoze, who is a sales and marketing. I'm using the word guru in with my little bunny
Danielle:A word I
Peta:that know that nobody on the podcast can see. Um. And about how he talks about lead magnets, uh, and he likens them to drug dealers, giving people a free hit so that they will get addicted
Danielle:Oh,
Peta:and then want more of your stuff. And I'm like, logically yes, that makes sense. But morally, is that something that you.
Danielle:And it's funny'cause lead magnets are a funny thing because you might genuinely be wanting to give value to your audience. But at the end of the day, we all need to pay our mortgage and feed our tits and buy our Harley Quinn figurines. You know what? Whatever it is, we need to do it. We are running a business. You know, I wish we could all do this fun, but we can't. So. Where's the line between? This is value, and I do want to give it to people, but I am running a business. So actually I want those people who come into my world through the lead magnet to be converted into something else with a price attached to it. It's really hard to look at it black and white and go, you are right. They're evil. They're crack before you get addicted, you know, whichever way you wanna put it. And the line between, well. What else are we supposed to do? How else do we bring these people into our world and prove to them that we know what we're talking about?
Peta:Which is really interesting'cause one of the responses I got to that email was yes, that's a really yucky way of kind of, of thinking about your pipeline, for want of a better word, um, and a really yucky way about thinking about those people. Um, and she was like, I'd love to know if you, if you had any other ideas, like what are you, what are you doing at the moment? Um, and I had just. I just put together the first kind of ad funnel in my own business that I'd done for a while. It's something that I do for kind of clients fairly regularly, but this is the first time I put some of that to practice for my business. It's a bit of a, an experiment to see what was kind of, whether it would work, what would be going on. Um, and I did put together a lead magnet and my, but my kind of, my logic was it had been a blog post, so it had been value that I had been giving away for free anyway. And I do that on a regular basis to establish credibility, to build rapport, to show people that I know what I'm talking about before they consider paying me for anything as I would wanna do with most people. I wanna know that you know what you're talking about, um, before I give you lots of money or a little bit of money. Um, and. So I took the content from the blog post, um, and I put it into that lead maggot. And I was like, well, well, it is useful information. We will see what happens with it. I will put it out and it may bring in more interested people who are interested in that particular part of my work to my list, in which case I can continue to build that relationship and all that kind of thing. But even with that, like it wasn't, it was definitely something that I thought twice about, partly because of the, oh. Free hit of, of crack, um, metaphor, which was Yeah. To which was that now haunting me in my dreams. And partly because, um, uh, because I have a, a Google a download folder full of lead magnets that are just saying that.
Danielle:I think in the beginning when I had been not worried about client base, but in the beginning you, you're kind of in that place of desperation, aren't you? You wanna build your business, you wanna get clients and. Whatever it takes, but enough, I think some of my lead magnets at the beginning played very much on a, I'm gonna give you this bit of advice, but I'm gonna make the process sound so difficult that you need me on top of that. And that felt horrible. Like I drafted out with the words in my head from experts, inverted commas again, um, telling me that you've got to give some value, but not enough that they can do it themselves. And that I believe is where it becomes unethical. Like I, if a lead magnet gives someone everything they need that they can quite happily unsubscribe from my list the minute they've got it go away and do something useful with it. I am comfortable. The fact is you gave me your email address and you're on my list, and at any single point you can unsubscribe, that's absolutely fine. My emails, generally speaking, are more conversational. They're sharing, blogs have already written or they're sharing tips. The only time. I'd push a sales if I've launched something like I have to put out a new book, or I've got a new course or something. But again, at that point, I suppose it has to be choice. I think I had to find the line between feeling comfortable with a lead magnet and feeling uncomfortable, where I felt like I was keeping something back from people on purpose to force them to buy. That makes me incredibly uncomfortable, whereas giving someone a gift. I feel will genuinely make their lives better or their business easier, or their day smooth, or whatever that I'm comfortable with. Because I don't mind if you unsubscribe the number of people who subscribe, take whatever they want. Un you what? Fine. I'm not gonna blame you. I do it too, because at the end of the day, I can't have 700 emails a day. I can't keep up with the ones I do get about work, but alone extra ones on top of that. So I think for me, that's the line with lead magnet generation. But at the same time, in terms of bringing people into your world, my strategies are a lot less about that. They exist, but I don't ever push them on social. I'm just trying to be open, authentic, honest, say the things other people don't say, be me. And if you are attracted to that crazy, up and down energy. With the weird conversations and me straightening my hair telling you about my life revelation at three in the morning, then you'll come into my world anyway. So for me, marketing is a slow burn, organic, but I do get that there are businesses out there who almost can't afford to wait like that. If you've got a product based business
Peta:Yeah.
Danielle:waiting for people to get you. It's not as easy to do. Whereas service-based, you know, a decade I have established a business, I have got a good turnover and I've got a good client base. Do I wanna keep growing? Yes. But am I happy to do that in a, a slow, ethical way? Yes. Beginning of my journey 10 years ago, I possibly wouldn't have said the same thing. And I think that mindset of scarcity versus not, it's not even abundance of the comfort. Is a very different way to approach your business and does impact how you do it.
Peta:No, that's fair. What do you think are, what do you think is the impact on business owners, especially those who are kind of getting started or dipping their toe in of all of that noise and. Almost predatory marketing. Like what? Yeah. What, how does that impact them?
Danielle:It. I mean, it's got a massive mental health impact because it'll trigger comparisonitis compared tenitis. Definitely one of those words. It'll trigger you comparing yourself, um, partly to yourself and partly to others. So what you'll do is you'll see. Um, people online posting about the, uh, the six figures they made last week and the fact that they're currently working from a beach in Bali. Or you'll see them posting about the fact that if you are not making seven figures a year, you must be doing something wrong, and you will just sit there and think, well, okay, I've just seen all these people showing me how well they're doing and how easy it was. Why aren't I doing that? Well, why isn't it that easy for me? And those, those negative thoughts kind of bur into your head and they'll, they'll keep going. And the impact of that is on your mental health. And it'll either lead you to make poor choices out of the desperation we talked about before, or lead you to retreat and think, well, I can't, I can't do that. I'm never gonna be like that. And that, that pulling back. You know that hobbles you any, anywhere you've kind of just, you know, kind your hands a feet together by going, I can't do this. And then you, you will fail. But that's not your fault. That's those voices going on at you that have been created and shaped by the things you are seeing. You know, the minute you sit there and there's an advert that flashes up that says, um, if you do not buy this course that costs 10,000 pounds, your business will never turn over six figures. If you're sitting there thinking, well, I can't afford 10,000 pounds. I, I'm never gonna make six figures, so what's the point of running the business? And it becomes this spiral of shame without any self-compassion in it. And there are so many tools for stopping those negative thoughts and having those conversations with yourself, being kind of bringing in self-compassion. But at the beginning, you don't know what you don't know. You're so overwhelmed by noise. Noise is a great word to use because everything is throwing itself at you constantly. You know, you are trying to market your business on your phone, so you are on your phone constantly. TikTok, LinkedIn, uh, Instagram, and Facebook, and they are all shouting similar things at you. They are either showing a sanitized version of life or they are making promises. That it's almost impossible to keep. You know, when someone says seven figures, they might be making seven figures, but that's turnover and it costs them over six figures to actually run that business. You know, the money they have to put into advertising X, Y, and Z, and then at the end of the day, you find out, actually they haven't even paid themselves this month because their cash flow's so awful. That version we see online that those stories you are being fed, whether it's from over advertising or from the like, as I call it, success porn in See online. It's a clean, nice, neat show off version. It's the Christmas letter you send to your family, telling them how wonderful everyone is and how good your children behave. It's not you screaming at the kids at two in the afternoon because they won't shut up and having to shut all the doors in your 30 degree house because the kids are arguing. You don't want the neighbors to hear none of that stuff. The highlight reel. It's, I know you're laughing, but this is true. I had to do that yesterday. I was minding my own business sunbathing. They were arguing about a bumblebee, and I was like, I'm just gonna shut the doors, and then no one will know. My children are so horrendously feral,
Peta:Are they arguing about a bumblebee?
Danielle:neither of them like bumblebees. Abigail thought she'd use Logan's physical form to get rid of the bumblebee by pushing him at it repeatedly. It didn't go well.
Peta:I like her logic. I think that's, yeah, that's an every man for herself type of vibe that I can I get on board with.
Danielle:I just this 12-year-old at it, fine.
Peta:Yeah. And it's very sensible. I'm with Abigail. Okay. So that's, those are the things that people are faced with when they start. Their business if they've not, if they're coming from a completely different industry, if they, if they don't have that background in marketing and branding. Um, and I think it's really interesting that you talk about how people are running their businesses from their phones now. Like you are trying to make this work. You are trying to find all this information. You are trying to work out where are the credible sources. Who you should be listening to. Um, and it tends to be whoever's the loudest or has, you know, the nicest brand photos, um, depending on your vibe.
Danielle:Someone who's been there,
Peta:Yes,
Danielle:looks pretty. She must know what she's.
Peta:yes. She, she can do, she can do her own makeup. I will trust her to write me an onboarding sequence for a SaaS product. Okay. That makes sense. Anyway, so, so what do they need? If they, if they don't need any of this stuff, what do they need?
Danielle:You need to understand a lot of the words you're hearing because that's where it starts to demystify the process. So great example. The word branding and the word marketing are mixed up together, and. They're all the same thing, aren't they? Or worse, we don't need a brand because we're a small business and small businesses aren't brands that's big businesses. I'll just focus on marketing. You know, if you take those two as the kind of foundation of that, pulling apart what those mean. You know, I'm a small business. Do I need a brand? Yes you do. And here's why. Because it's like having a strong foundation in your house. If your marketing and your business are the house itself, the foundations underneath of that brand, they are the consistency. They are the values, they are your mission statement. They are what holds everything up and will help it. Whether a storm marketing, on the other hand, that is how you are presenting yourself to people on a day-to-day basis. That is. Selling inverted commerce, want to a better word, your service. Whether you do that in an ethical way, in an ethical way, whether you do it through slow growth or fast growth, whichever way you do it, marketing is that presentation for the world that you are intentionally doing on a day-to-day basis. I believe no business should focus on one or the other. I think the two of them together build a really, really strong building. I think. The other thing you have to recognize is running a business is a little bit like being on a rollercoaster whilst being in the dec cups with the round and the up and down, and in my case, the throwing up
Peta:Unsurrendered.
Danielle:it, it's never flat. You look at, you say the word growth that everyone thinks of that silly little emoji on the phone, which is a graph that just has pretty much a straight line going up. Nobody grow like that. You know, if you have a financial goal of. A 5,000 pound month, for example, you might hit that in January, but in February it's a shorter month. And actually you didn't bill as much. So you get less and you're like, oh my God, what a failure. I got to 5K months and now I'm not at 5K months. But March you go back up again and then, you know, in the summer months you're off on holiday with your kids. And that's two weeks not billing any time. Nothing about this lifestyle. This lifestyle makes me sound a bit suspicious. Nothing about running your own business is smooth. It's a journey. You're gonna take two steps forward and one step back. Sometimes you're gonna run forward a hundred meters, stop, look round and go, how the heck did I get here? Which is what I did at 10 years because I had no idea. Got. The things they need are to break down those individual bits, understand what the individual bits mean, and then develop your, your strategy for each of those. There is no silver bullet. There is nothing that will solve all of your problems. There is no one course that will make your life better. There is no posting strategy that will definitely make you six figures.
Peta:I'm devastated.
Danielle:I know, sorry. There is no burnout in the world worth it for your business. This flexibility is fantastic. I love what I do. I love getting up every day. I don't dread a Monday morning. I act like being off. It upsets me that I can't be on my laptop. I know I'm very weird, but it's not worth my mental health. At the times over the decade where I felt it dipping, it's because of external pressure. It's not, I mean, it is a chemical imbalance in my brain, obviously, but it's not because of anything with me personally. It's because I've been in a low income month and I've looked around and everyone else seems to be doing fine, so why aren't I doing fine? It's been because I don't know. There's been a lot of shouting online about pipeline. So the I, I know the dips have come from those external pressures I've been feeling online, and there are tools I can use. You know, I can have a bit of a digital detox, you know, no phones after this won't happen, but no phones after 4:00 PM because that'll make me feel calmer. There are things I could do. I think I just, in those moments, I'm kind to myself. I'm like, look. That's not how everyone is. I mean, great example. I've got a friend who's 10 years older than myself and my husband, and they've paid off their mortgage, and sometimes I look at'em and think, why haven't I paid off a mortgage? They paid off their mortgage, and I have to physically go, Danielle, they are 10 years older than you. Imagine you in 10 years time because they're there. And they're a, they're a good friend, so they don't feel 10 years old, and it doesn't, it doesn't feel that gap. You just put that pressure on yourself. Give yourself a break,
Peta:Yeah,
Danielle:be kind. No one else is gonna be kind to you if you are not kind to yourself. Are they?
Peta:very true. No, I have a similar thing with, um, so I had my, I had my eldest, um, I mean, not very young, but like younger than a lot of them. Of the people that we hang out with from the, from schools and things, and they are like 10 years older than me. And I do look around and go, why am I not doing better? And then I remember that I still have 10 years and everything's
Danielle:But that that takes intention.
Peta:Yeah, yeah, yeah. And constantly reminding
Danielle:If I'd let that spiral, I'd just be sitting there going, oh, I've just not saved enough. I've not done enough. And I would beat myself up over it because I know what I'm like. It does take me stopping going 10 years older. 10 years is a long time, but what I've done in the last 10 years, I mean, I'm really excited about the next 10 years,
Peta:Yes.
Danielle:although I will be 50 and that's quite scary.
Peta:Okay, let's not really think about that. Let's move on. Um, okay, so talked about people who, what people need when they are just starting.
Danielle:Yeah.
Peta:Um, so, um, a lot of the people that I've talked to on this podcast or who listen to this podcast, like they've been around, they've been around in this kind of business world for a while. That sounded, yeah, that sounded derogatory, but I didn't mean it like that. Um, so what should we be doing? What should we be showing in our, in our content or in our, in our marketing that is different so that we don't end up perpetuating this cycle? Because it's really easy to get to the point where you are that like slightly more established and you're, you are, you're doing things differently. You're not just starting out. How do we make sure that we are not causing the same problems? For those people coming up by the promises that we are promising and the
Danielle:That is ultimately, that's our responsibility because otherwise it will continue over and over again. I mean, honesty and openness is the biggest thing when you post. Think about sort of the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Think of the messy middle and the bit that you don't usually want people to see. You know, if it's a, if you only ever take photos of your perfect little desk set up with your beautiful Mac and your mouse and everything that matches, and your pink mat, yes, it's gonna look very aesthetic. But why not occasionally turn the camera around and show the fact that all your laundry is piled up in one corner and the rest of your desk is a mess.'cause you pushed it all out the way for that perfect photo. If you, if, if there's any part of you that feels a post is almost like boasting, that for me feels a bit uncomfortable sharing success. I am happy with. And I'm very, very conscious of the words. I'm lucky. I am not lucky. I have worked incredibly hard my entire life. I've been through a lot of trauma. I've done a lot of work on myself. I've, you know, developed a lot of tools for it. There's no luck about it. And I think phrases like, I'm lucky, or, look how easy this is, perpetuate the belief that well. I can't ever achieve that because I'm not lucky or because I had a really bad start or'cause I don't have 10,000 pounds to start my business. I had nothing. When I started mine, I'd walked out of a corporate job. I literally had nothing. I had to rely on the one thing I hate, which is networking. I had to talk to human beings. I have never been so terrified in my life. But I did it because I had to do it. So I think letting people know, having a vulnerability to how you present yourself is key. I'm not saying don't share your successes. I'm absolutely not saying, um, I'm so proud of this launch. I wasn't sure if it would work. I made this off of it. There's, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with saying, I saved client X 10,000 pounds a month by doing this, but also sharing. I've had an awful day. The clients won't stop shouting at me. I've had back to back meetings and I'm desperate for the toilet is an equally valuable message because you want someone to look at you and go, that's me. I'm desperate for the can. Go please. You know what I mean? You,
Peta:anybody listening, to this who needs to go to the toilet, this is your permission
Danielle:you can pause. Yeah.
Peta:Pause. Go to the toilet. It's fine. We don't mind. Whatever you need to do.
Danielle:Oh dear.
Peta:I love it. Okay. No, that's really, I think that's really helpful advice because I think there is, there is that, um, that temptation to be, not to be like now I've made it, but to, to feel like you have to put on that persona of the people
Danielle:you have to be the leader, that you have to take some kind of aspirational role, and I. You should, but that comes with a weight of responsibility. You know, it comes with giving people advice, you know, reaching back down the ladder and helping them up. That's what we're all here for. You know, there is no such thing as competition. There is space for all of us. We are all working together essentially to, to build an economy at the end of the day, but to build lives for ourselves. And I think the other thing people. Would really benefit from is understanding what their end point is. So you will see a lot online about, oh, I dunno, some of the UN yacht or working from the beach or working whilst traveling. Me personally, that's my idea of living hell. I don't mind traveling. I'd love to do it. I'd love to do it with everything. Switched off, no connection to the internet whatsoever, and literally enjoying what.
Peta:Mm-hmm.
Danielle:I don't wanna travel and work because that's distracting and my tan lines will look weird.
Peta:They will. Yes.
Danielle:So my dream is not that my dream is enough money in my bank account that I never have to think, oh my God, is that gonna bounce? Do I have to move money from one to the other? You know, at the end of the month? My dream is knowing that every single year I can take my kids on a nice holiday and not have to scrape together the money to do it. Those are my dreams. When you know what your dream is. You can be very kind of tunnel vision almost about that place you are going to and some of that external noise, well, it doesn't matter anymore because those are not the things you want. Those are not the things you are aiming for. That's not the path you are on. And I do think that focus on your goal, your passion, your endpoint will ultimately be what supports people outta the comparison. Outta the fear and the scare mongering and all the rest of it, and into a path that's okay. I genuinely need this thing for my journey. This thing right here is what I need. This person is the person I need to connect with. This client is the right client. Once you know what your end point is, all the steps in between do come a lot clearer.
Peta:I think that's the thing, like there are some things that are, that you do that are worth investing in. Like there are some masterminds that can be really helpful for how you wanna run your business. There are some courses that can give you really valid skills. Can help you, help your clients, but, but yeah, the key is working out what you want so you can plot the line to get there.
Danielle:Yeah, if you know what Z is, you can work out the rest of the alphabet in between. If you have no idea what you're aiming for or you're aiming for someone else's z.
Peta:Mm-hmm.
Danielle:You are gonna have a problem because the gap between me right now and getting on a super yacht is pretty big. I would literally have to sell my soul and also I get really badly seasick, so not ideal.
Peta:I think you need to choose a different set.
Danielle:I do need, yeah, so you know, you, your said might be completely different. That gap between me and in terms of financial, it's just insurmountable at this moment. I don't wanna be in that place. Don't need that much money. I'm not particularly materialistic unless you count all my Harley Quinn figurines and my yen for handbags. I mean, they're small in comparison.
Peta:No, that's true. Okay. Yeah. And if we can, if we can change the conversation by pulling up the curtain and going, this is, this is my Z, this is what I'm working towards. This is what it would take to get there. This is what I'm willing to do. This is what I'm not willing to do. What about you? opening
Danielle:It's scary. That is a scary thing to do because it makes you very vulnerable. It also opens you up to criticism from other people.
Peta:Yeah, your Z is the wrong Zed.
Danielle:Why are you aiming for that? That's not good enough. You should be aiming for more, but unfortunately, that's the other side of the coin, isn't it? Vulnerability. There will always be people who disagree with you.
Peta:Yes. This is very true.
Danielle:Just have to wish them well and ignore them.
Peta:that's so true. and on that note, for people who are, yeah, we are wishing well and ignoring who have gone away by now, and hopefully people have gone through it too,
Danielle:and just wandered off.
Peta:switched off really early, so don't need to worry about did. Excellent. Um, if, um, if people who are listening would like to find you to continue this conversation to find out, more about what you are doing and, and what you are working towards and even how you can help them, where can they go to find you?
Danielle:So probably the best place to fully appreciate my personality is Instagram. So if you look up Gold spun support on Instagram, you will find me, because that's where I put most of my fun stuff. LinkedIn, I find I'm restricted in how much I can let the crazy out, but on Instagram, I'll have a lampshade on my head and all sorts. So I would absolutely love to have people join me over there.
Peta:cool. No, that sounds great. I'm very into, yeah, wacky Instagram content, although I'm feeling like I'm seeing more of the wacky on LinkedIn at the moment. It's quite nice to,
Danielle:Yeah. I just need to get over my fear of fully letting it go. Yeah. There, there used to be an old meme that said you need to tuck that back in. You are crazy showing. And I'm still a little bit like that. I'm, um, LinkedIn. Yeah.
Peta:no, we are learning crazy out. Cool. Well, Danielle, this has been an absolute blast. Thank you so much for coming on. Um, and yeah, and sharing all of that with us. Um, I loved it.
Danielle:thank you. I loved it too, and there was nothing to be nervous about. I
Peta:No, see. Excellent. We like that. Anybody who's listening, because they're thinking of being a guest on the soapbox. It is very, um, yeah, nerve free. We're all good.
Danielle:Fritz. Just a lovely chat with someone. Lovely.
Peta:Oh, thanks. I'm gonna finish there on that note. That's.