🎙️ S2 E14: Atomicon: Lessons On Visibility, Value And Showing Up

Someone can sit in the same room as you, hear the same talks, and still walk away with a completely different turning point. On the drive home from Atomicon in Newcastle, we debrief the moments that actually changed things for us, not just the speaker notes, but the conversations before and after, the little realisations that land when the adrenaline drops.

We dig into the pressure to niche down and why we prefer to “niche through”: building one clear thread that runs through confidence work, storytelling, book publishing, podcasting, personal brand coaching, and speaker training. If you’re neurodivergent, multi-passionate, or you have ADHD tendencies, that connected ecosystem can be your strength, not your flaw. We also talk about what “clarity” really means in marketing for small businesses, and how being a generalist can be an advantage when you know how to simplify a message and make it land.

Then we go into the messy bit: what happens when you realise someone has taken what you taught them and sold it on, and why that hits so hard when trust is already a tender subject. We unpack rejection sensitive dysphoria, boundaries, and how to turn that emotional punch into a smarter response. We also look at pricing strategy and visibility: if someone else is charging five times more for something similar, is it because they’re better, or because they’re louder and easier to find?

We finish with a reminder we both needed: go ahead, underestimate me. If you’re ready to show up more, charge with confidence, and stop being the best kept secret, press play. Subscribe, share this with a business friend, and leave a review so more people can find Awesomely Off Topic.

PS: Want to join us for #Atomicon27 in Manchester? We've bagged you the best official ticket prices. Click our SPECIAL LINK HERE to get yours.

Transcript

Recording On The Road Home

SPEAKER_00 0:00

You're listening to Awesomely Off Topic. Books, brands, business, and everything else we're not supposed to say out loud. I'm Taz and Asher. Now let's get into it. Hey everybody, we are recording this in the car on the way back from Newcastle where we've been spending a few days up north to enjoy Atomicon. It's our third year and it was bloody awesome as always. We've already booked for next year. But here's the thing: as well as seeing some awesome speakers and meeting up with all kinds of people that we've met before or that we're meeting for the first time or that we've only met online, Ash and I have had some massive revelations.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

Oh, Nikar's beeping at me.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

Yep. Again, not particularly because of the event itself, but because of things that we learned before the event, after the event, and sometimes during.

SPEAKER_01 0:53

Oh, there's so many things to take away from it. As I said, not just, yeah, I saw some amazing speakers, met up with some great people, but so many things to ponder on. Ponder on? Would you say ponder on, Ted? Yeah, I think so. I don't know where to start, to be honest, if I'm honest. I'm I'm a little bit if if I'm the way I process things is quite different to you, isn't it? Yeah. So I really feel the emotions, and in the moment I'm in the feel of the emotions thing, which is not a particularly nice place to be, but that's just my way of working through things. That's what comes first, and then comes the kind of logical brain kicks in. So I'm still kind of in that emotional state at the moment, but I feel okay with it, and I'm working things through. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:37

So some of the big learnings, actually, let me just pre-frame with this and we'll come back to it later. Gotta say, one of the biggest kick of the backside moments for me came today. Nothing to do with the event, but bumping into someone that known for years, and my feeling is that I was massively underestimated. And that's just lit the biggest fire under my backside, and that's a really good thing. Yay!

Niche Through Not Niche Down

SPEAKER_00 2:10

But more on that later. Let's talk about the event, and maybe I'll start off with a few things. Ashley, not a joggy manager. No, that's cool.

SPEAKER_01 2:16

I'm happy for you to do that, but I'm just gonna, yeah, I'll chip in. Go on.

SPEAKER_00 2:20

So, one of the first things we had, uh uh aside from a surprise visit from one of the atomic kittens, if you were there, you'll get it. Um didn't see that one coming. No, never in a million years, dingling a bit at that time in the morning. Complete with fringy bits. Yeah. Um the first speaker they had on, though, was Jamie Lane, as of made in Chelsea fame. Yeah. Candy kittens. I know, I love candy kittens. Yeah. Brilliant, vegan friendly. I really wasn't sure what to expect from Jamie because until now I hadn't listened to his podcast. So we'll be going to have a listen to it now. But I just wasn't sure. I was a little bit non-plussed. But after a brilliant talk from Andrew and Pete, where they were essentially encouraging us to the niche thing, but with a slightly different spin on it, you know, focus 90% of your efforts on the thing that's gonna, the one thing that's gonna bring you the return and 10% experimenting with other stuff, I guess. I'm really, I'm massively nutshelling here. I sat there thinking, but hold on, I don't want to suck off 90% of my offerings. I don't want to. And you know, that that might mean that it might take me longer, but I could not decide between running, for instance, my speaker training program or business coaching with people to grow their personal brand. You can't grow a personal brand, we have a personal brand, but to to help them work on it and hone it and show it off more, or help them hone their offerings to get paid what they're worth to up their visibility, to get the speaking gigs, to to write the books, all of that jam.

SPEAKER_01 4:04

Or getting on stage. Did you mean jam? Yeah, okay. All it said jams.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

Well, it would be jams, but let's change it to jam. Okay, that's not a job. Jam's sweet, baby. I like sound jams, actually. Yeah, yeah. Anyway, off topic. Or speaking on stages myself, or the spiritual empowerment programs Ashra Ashra and I run, the big one and the bigger one.

SPEAKER_01 4:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:24

You know, with all the firewalking and the medicine tools and all the brilliance that that comes from that. I don't want to strip some of those out. Because I recognise that actually one feeds the other. So when Jamie was talking, he also is ADHD, by his own admission, when he sat up on the s on the sofa. And he was saying, well, yeah, ideally you would have one focus, but I'm a bit ADHD, so boom-ba-boom. And something that he said absolutely resonated with my message. Something I've said time and time again is that you don't need to niche down, you need to niche through, i.e., you will have a niche stream that might flow through all of your products, but you might not recognize it as such. So let me give you an example. If people come to me for confidence and empowerment, they might come onto the big one or the bigger one, or maybe they've done some firewalking or arrow breaking or glasswalking with me, or been to one of the unleasher awesome empowerment events. They then through that might recognise actually, I don't want to be working in this job anymore. I don't want to be somebody else's bitch. I don't want to keep working in this environment that I hate every day from a manager that doesn't value me. I want to run my own business. So from there, that flows people straight into business coaching and personal brand and growth and build and all that stuff. And from there, then they need to show up more. They need to be more visible. So that flows into speaker training, it might flow into Ash's book programs, yeah, it might flow into our podcasting programs and development courses. Yeah, everything feeds everything else. And then they might decide, well, I want to level up again now, so I've done the bigger one, I've done the big one, I want to come and do the bigger one, I want to do the three-year. Or they might want to say, Oh, I'm gonna come and do the big one, the 30-month again and again and again, because I learned something different every time, and now I'm leveling up my business again now, so I need to go back over there.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

Yeah, amazing.

SPEAKER_00 6:27

So everything together on paper, you might think, well, how can you help people with podcasts and business coaching and confidence and empowerment and speaking? Because one feeds the other, they're all part of the same machine. Yeah, so the niche goes through. You don't have to niche down and keep reducing and reducing and reducing your offer unless it's so bloody scattergun that you can't make sense of it at all. But you can niche through. I still stand by that that old Kenneth Williams quote. Sooner or later, we're gonna have people who are so niche, they're gonna be masters of fuck all. And Jamie said pretty much the same. Yeah, ideally you'd have a niche, but what's great about my businesses is that one feeds the other. And I was like, yes! I was pumping the air a bit at that part. Yeah. Because for so many people who are neurodivergent, who get so excited at the ideas phase, but also really, really committed to their passion projects and making them pay, it's gonna be like cutting off an arm to say, no, don't do that thing you love, focus on just this thing you love over here. But that also ties

Why Generalists Win In PR

SPEAKER_00 7:40

in, I think.

SPEAKER_01 7:40

It reminded me, it takes me back in time to when we were running our digital PR media service. Yeah. And we got quite a lot of stuff from people saying, Well, how can you do that? You know, what's your specialism? We're a generalists. We like to work with a range of different businesses.

SPEAKER_00 7:56

Yeah, what's your PR specialism?

SPEAKER_01 7:58

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 7:58

I mean, it's like someone who specializes in PR on lawns.

SPEAKER_01 8:01

It was kind of looked down nose a bit, you know, what you're a generalist, yeah, because as journalists were journalists, and we've learned to write about everything from hot news stories, really hard news, political stuff, health issues, blah, blah, blah, through to random human interest stories to everything else. And that's that variety is what fuels me and always has done.

SPEAKER_00 8:23

Absolutely, and that's actually why our hit rate was so good when we were still running the PR and digital marketing. It's because we knew that if we wrote the press releases as a journalist, yeah, then nine times out of ten it's gonna be picked up and used and and run as it as is. Yeah. Where it would go wrong is when people would go, no, no, no, we need to promote this and push this and push that. Yeah. In which case that's just gonna be passed straight to the advertising.

SPEAKER_01 8:49

It's just an advert, isn't it, really? It's just an advert. Free puff. Yeah, there's no news angle in that. So that was that was music to my ears listening to the. Yeah, he was really good. I really enjoyed his his chat on the sofa. I thought it was really fab. Yeah, really wanted to know more about him. So I'm definitely gonna

When Your Work Gets Taken

SPEAKER_01 9:05

be listening to his podcast.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

What's some of the stuff that that you've you've learned? And you were saying that you're still a little bit in the emotion. What is it that's that's come up to you? What is it that's punched you in the feels bit?

SPEAKER_01 9:17

Well, some of the conversations, not so much at the event, sort of afterwards and stuff, and around the event. Some of the things that I've heard back about from other, you know, from about other practices by other wordsmiths, for want of a better phrase. But and things that have come back to me about some of the work that I've done with some people, and they've kind of taken a lot of what I do, and for me, it's really hit my value sets. They've taken a lot of what you do on what? You've you've missed it. Well they've kind of well they've taken it on, haven't they? And then charged, I don't know, whatever, you know, however much.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

They're still not saying what they've done. Well, I find it hard to say it, if I'm honest, you say it. So essentially, you've sat down and helped somebody get their story ready, get their book ready for publishing, and then in their next breath, without a word to you, they've gone off and started training other people into how to tell their story and get their book ready for publication. Yeah. And started running writers' training groups based on the stuff that you've just taught them.

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Well, yeah. I don't I can't. I really am in that stage where and some of you might be listening to this and thinking, for goodness sake, come on, grow a spine, don't be such a wuss with it. Yeah, plagiarism is the highest form of the world. But I've but I've had I've had it up to here with platitudes and people sweet talking me and giving me all the, you know, a bit of the you know, the nice language to get what they want. And I'm sick of it. I'm really sick of it, and I could get really pissed off about it. I'm not going to because that then lowers me to that standard. It's just value sets, it's value sets. I couldn't sleep at night if I thought I'd done that to somebody else. I couldn't. I would be having a breakdown over it because I'd feel so horrendous. And then to hear that back from somebody else and think, that's has that been engineered all the way along? And fancy having being in that naivety. I've been in business now, in my own business, for over 20 years. And okay, I might not have the biggest, most prosperous business, but I absolutely do what I love, and I've always done that. Everything to do with storytelling, words, all of that beautiful stuff, content. That's my heart, my soul, my blood, for want of a better phrase. And to see that other people are just coming in and working in the way that they've worked and and doing what they're doing, I just find it it makes it actually hates my makes my heart hurt a bit, if I'm honest.

SPEAKER_00 11:46

It's like spending years doing something like, I don't know, an MBA. An MBA, what do I mean? A master's. Yeah. Spending years doing yeah, doing a master's. And then I was right, it wasn't like the first time. Hello, ADHD. So it's like spending years doing doing a master's degree, for instance, and then somebody coming along and buying a 15 quid course off Facebook and saying they've got the same level of experience and Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

And then of course and of course, then, and I know that, that's very much my new neurodivergent brain is going very strongly into RSD because it's like that they are seeing me as a mug. I think I'm thick, I'm stupid, and I actually want to reclaim the word mug. Because why do we say, you know, mug, don't we? Mug suggests somebody that's really stupid, and I'm not bloody stupid. I might be a bit naive sometimes, but I trust people at their word.

SPEAKER_00 12:34

You were talking about the word simple earlier, weren't you? Wanting to reclaim that.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

Yeah, the word simple. And I do simplify things because always throughout my career, my job has been to simplify things so that people can understand the stories that I'm writing that can connect with them. That simplicity is the absolute gold dust in your promotional material. You need if you want to really connect with people and make a difference and get them to connect with you and want to learn more about you and your business and your brand, you have to simplify it. You don't have to dress it up. You need to keep it simple. Keep it simple, stupid. We used to use the old kiss analogy, didn't we? Don't mean analogy. No, acronym. Acronym. We use that a lot. Keep it simple, stupid. Keep it simple because that's what connects you with people. So, yeah. So that's where I am. So you can probably tell by I've probably broken, I've probably broken the mic now. But I've had a to have that, and that's an that is absolutely nothing to do with that. But you had an amazing event, because I have connected with so many incredibly.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

We didn't even learn that after the event, to be fair, that was after the event, you learned. That's what I'm saying. And at the same time, in another meeting after the event, because we've had a few business meetings with people after the event.

SPEAKER_01 13:43

I know, we've had some amazing stuff.

SPEAKER_00 13:44

And then in another one, you found that somebody else was out there in a similar line of work to yours, but where you do your your little book off, your your little micro books. And Asher, at the time of recording this, was doing her micro book programs for 650 quid a pop, which includes six weeks of of group coaching and getting your coaching utility to write your book and get it ready to print, ready for publication, all of your design work, everything. And you you're doing that for 650 quid. And there's apparently someone out there doing something very similar. For five times that amount. For five times that amount.

SPEAKER_01 14:22

So, I mean, again, me being a mug, maybe it is. And I can remember having that conversation with you, because when I was trialing it, when I did my first workshop with that first course, I did it for 500 quid just to see whether people got something from they enjoyed it. You know, I said you're my kind of guinea pigs for this.

SPEAKER_00 14:39

But your wife was saying what?

SPEAKER_01 14:41

You were saying you're charging too little.

SPEAKER_00 14:43

Yeah. And the same with six pigs.

SPEAKER_01 14:45

So I I don't what I don't want is I don't want to come across as bitter and oh, you know, all pity party. I don't want that. I just want other people to recognise maybe things in their moments in their business lives their lives where they've had a similar thing happening, and how that can make you feel, how that, you know, how you respond to that. How do you what do you do as a response to that? And you're here's the difference between us again is that because I process very differently to you, you're immediately on that front foot, which is the way it should, it should be, arguably. Yeah. Get up, get on, right, I'll show you. I'm gonna, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna, I'm gonna produce this, and it's gonna be bloody awesome. And I will get there, and I'm getting there, but first, part of my processing is to allow the emotion out so that I can then move on and be a bit wiser, a bit cannier, and still to trust, because that's the other thing. My big thing throughout my life, there's a bit of a theme to my life, and that is around trust issues, and I'm quite open about that. When we do our 13-month spiritual empowerment programme and we sit in circle, I talk about it quite a bit, and that's quite hard to talk about because it's a very personal thing, but my trust issues have been, you know, affected quite a lot. So, of course, when I hear that back, it hits. Not because of anything I've done, just to clarify. No, no, not at all. No, no, no, no, no, we've done we've done that on that, but we've done a we've done a podcast on that one.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

Okay, so anyone who's listening to us knew.

SPEAKER_01 16:06

But it's but sorry, I'm just overtaking. But it's that it's it's that experience that shapes how you respond, isn't it, or how you react, and then you can go from a reaction to a response and a positive one. And so I'm we're recording this when I'm still kind of in that space. There's two very it might be a learning and a teaching for other people that are listening. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:29

So I hope it is. But you've got two very different scenarios there, haven't you? You've got somebody who has apparently soaked up everything they can from you and then just gone off and used it to make their own money and to claim expertise when it's actually your expertise they're carrying. But then you've got the other scenario where somebody's charging five times as much as you for a similar product. There's nothing wrong with them doing that. So good on you if you if you can get out there and without without ripping anybody off, if you can get out there and you're pitching that at the right audience and you're charging a lot

Pricing, Visibility, And Value Ladders

SPEAKER_00 17:05

more. Brilliant. You know, there are coaches, for instance, who charge a lot less than me and charges coaches who charge a lot more.

SPEAKER_01 17:11

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

So the point with that isn't, oh, that's so terrible of them. The point is, hold on, why am I keeping myself at this level? So small.

SPEAKER_01 17:20

And uh is it small though? Is it small?

SPEAKER_00 17:22

But that doesn't necessarily mean that you'd suddenly want to, you know, quintuple your prices?

SPEAKER_01 17:29

You can't think of the right word. Well, Wordsmiths has this is I'm so proud of us, right?

SPEAKER_00 17:33

But also we've we've had some we've had some nights that are later than the nights we usually have at home. We've had we've had some some late ones on school nights.

SPEAKER_01 17:40

In our defence, Your Honour. That's what's going on.

SPEAKER_00 17:42

My goodness. Yeah. That doesn't m necessarily mean that you need to get out there and and do that, but what if some of those people have four minutes slow going that way or straight on? Four minutes slower if you take the route that's the pale lavender one rather than the dark purple one.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

So which one am I taking? The dark one. Right, well, that'll be the weekly road, but I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

We're looking at ways, people. Sorry. The point is, what if people are going over there to, I don't know, 3K person or whatever it is. Yeah. Because they don't know you're there at your 650. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. You know, and you have, I know you hate the term, but you've got quite a strong value ladder with your with your publishing and content coaching stuff. You've got right up at the top of the multiple thousands of pounds for ghostwriting somebody's book. And then you've got write down single content coaching sessions and some of your content prompt training programs you run, your little pop-up training mini masterclasses.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:43

And then you've got things like your 650 quid. Squirrel, squirrel. Okay, at the time of recording this in 2026, you've got lots of options for people. Yeah. But people can only take those options if they know you exist. So maybe people are paying the five times your fee because somebody over there is shouting louder and showing up for. I know it's a kick out the kick out the line. Well, you've got three very different scenarios, don't you?

SPEAKER_01 19:12

It is. It's lessons, right, left, and centre. And I need to own that. And so, well, that's what you expect. You're not promoting yourself. I'm not. I'm the biggest. Well, you are, but not as much as you could be. Best kept secret. You know, the classic. And anybody that's in the communication business, as a marketer, a PR person, when you go to work for yourself, it's that old thing, isn't it? You spend a career, a lifetime writing, creating content, and promotional stuff for other people, other businesses, and you can neglect your own. Or you find it really tough to do your own because you're so used to telling other people's stories.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

You might think, oh, the irony of somebody who used to run a very successful PR business and not promoting themselves, but that's exactly it. Your entire way of life and being has been about promoting everybody else and keeping yourself actually out of the story. Yeah. Particularly as a journalist. You know, it's very, very different today. What we see today is not really journalism in a lot of those cases. So, yeah, you've had some big lessons there. And that was kind of regardless of whether it was Atomicon or not, isn't it? Because it's it's it's about it's what you learned before and after. So that's not necessarily at Atomicon. But you know, back to Atomicon. If we think about the speakers, I think the second speaker we saw was a brilliant Canadian guy, Sean. Can you go? Yes, yeah. And his whole talk was around um work scared until you're scary. Which ties in beautifully for that though, doesn't it? It does, it does. So you know. Thank you, Sean. Yeah, but right now you're thinking about there's somebody out there who's doing the same kind of thing and is making a lot more money than me. And it's probably because they've started scared and then they keep doing it until they're the scary inadvertently.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

The very fact that we're that we're doing this is scary because I don't like rocking the boat. And again, that's another classic, isn't it? I just wanna I just wanna be able to do my boat.

SPEAKER_00 21:08

But whose boat are you rocking? My own. Don't want to run my own boat. You're not rocking anybody else's boat because you're not saying this person's shit, they're bad. You're not doing the naming and shaming thing, you're just acknowledging what's happening, why that's hit you, and what you need to do as a result. Yeah. So maybe this is the the launch pad for you to work scared and you to be be work scared until you're the scary one. Yeah, I like that. Oh, you show up until you are the person that people see first. Yeah. That's all it is, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 21:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:42

So yeah. And I think one of the things that will help with that with this is again thinking back to our experiences at Atomicon where we met so many brilliant people.

SPEAKER_01 21:51

Oh, yeah, that's let's let's really yeah, big that up because with

Work Scared Until You’re Scary

SPEAKER_01 21:55

the networking, I have to say to Andrew and Pete, thank you so much for so much, not just about the speakers as well. Brilliant. Brilliant, but brilliant. Thank you for the networking opportunities because it has been absolutely brilliant. I'm fine, I feel like I'm finding my feet a bit more now with automatic on. I think I was in awe of it the first couple of years. I felt a lot more confident this time. I'm actually quite an introvert, but I love the fact that you can be introverted and still feel really comfortable in the space. There's lots of support for everybody there.

SPEAKER_00 22:22

I think that's one of the brilliant things about the we weren't there for the pre-pre-party, but we were there for the pre-party on the Monday nights. Jazzy shirts night.

SPEAKER_01 22:33

Oh, I love it, and I did love our jazzy shirts.

SPEAKER_00 22:35

But yeah, we had shirts, custom printed shirts, like really garish Hawaiian shirts with the cartoon of the pair of us on there on the awesome awesomely off-topic yellow background. Yeah. In awesomely off-topic hoodies. Yeah. Mine in pink and yours in turquoise, obviously. Yeah, of course. And then we had the awesomely off-topic logo all round it, and then all the logos of you know, like Spotify and Apple Podcasts and blah blah blah to show where people could could go and find us. So that that was that was fab, and they got they got a lot of a lot of traction. But I think one of the reasons as a neurodivergent person who most people assume is really com confident, actually, I'm not. I've said this before, I'm naturally an introvert, but I've learned to present as an extrovert in order to serve the people I'm here to serve. Yeah. You know, so that I'm not the biggest kept secret. So if I'm somewhere where I have a purpose in air quotes, I'm okay. And I think what makes Jazzy's shirt so brilliant is that it immediately gives you a talking point. Yeah. So

Networking Wins And Jazzy Shirts

SPEAKER_00 23:35

you don't have to, you don't feel that you get that networking thing with a wall of closed shoulders you've got to chip into. You can just go up to anyone and say, Oh, I love your shirt, for instance. I did that so many times. Icebreaker.

SPEAKER_01 23:46

And I love your hair, and oh god, that's amazing. You know? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

And how many times, Ash, did we have that thing where people were going, Towson Asher, hi, hi. I know that was lovely. Which was lovely, but how many times did that happen when you were like, I don't know who you are?

SPEAKER_01 24:02

I know, but it you know, but the fact that it's so open, yeah, and you can just relax in the space. And that for me, honestly, that doesn't that doesn't happen that often. And I also have to say, as well, guys, nothing against anybody that does like a drink or two, but these days I'm pretty much teetotal, and I could do that, teetotal, because thanks to the lovely atmosphere that was created and has been created.

SPEAKER_00 24:25

I mean, I I'm I'm almost teetotal. I think I had a single malt at the start of each day. Which is unusual for me. But again, it's because I'm a I'm a single malts nerd, not because I want to get drunk. You're not going to do that on one single malt. Um but the the facts that we did get recognised so much, and that the fact that in a lot of those cases we were sitting there thinking still trying to work out who you are, yeah, shows that what we're doing is working. So if that gives you any lift from what you were saying about needing to show up more, there's your proof that you are starting to get recognised and you are starting to cut through that noise. Yeah. You set that as the aim, that any business event you go into across the UK for starters, you'll get recognised.

SPEAKER_02 25:05

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:06

And I'd say that to anyone listening here, if you're trying to build your brand, set yourself that as a target to be able to walk into any business event in your kind of arena, if you like, and get recognized. Yeah, good advice. That's that's a really good way to play it. But yeah, that was brilliant because again the jazzy

A Standing Ovation And Real Courage

SPEAKER_00 25:25

shirts thing, you can have loads of fun with it, and they work as an immediate icebreaker. So who else did we see? Well, the first speaker we saw after the morning session, oh my god, I was like a proud mama. Sorry, I've just slapped my microphone. If you get bang on her, that's why she says putting her hand to her chest. I was like a proper proud mama bear because one of the amazing, amazing people, one of our heart of speaking delegates, was one of the speakers. And she absolutely smashed it. Honestly, I had tears in my eyes. I know she did as well. I first started working with Rapinda Kore, who is the founder of Asian Women Mean Business. She is amazing. Look her up, heart of gold. Sure is solid, solid gold. I first started working with Rapinda many, many years ago. The first time I ran Project Artemis, which is mine. Yeah. And it's an annual programme I run for a maximum of six coaches who kind of want to learn from me, pick my brains, find out what I do, how I work, and get themselves out there and get the inside track on all the stuff that I do and and level up to that position. And I only open it up to six coaches every year. So if you're listening to this and you want to be one of them, I promise you it is affordable. Drop me a line and let me know. But Rapinda was in the first two years, the first two cohorts of Project Artemis, and then this year she came along to the Heart of Speaking because she knew she'd landed this Atomicon gig and she wanted to nail it. And in her words, you got stuff out of me, Taz, that I wouldn't never have said without your help and support, and that makes me feel so just just thrilled that I was able to do that. And I don't want to tell her story, it's not fair, but there were some such beautifully touching, heart-rending moments in that talk. There were times where you could hear a pin drop. Yeah. She had the room in the palm of her hand and then finished to rapturous applause on a standing ovation. It was amazing to witness. I'm so, so, so proud of her. And watch this space. We've we've got plans to do some more stuff together as well, but that was that was wonderful. And you that really touched you as well, didn't it?

SPEAKER_01 27:47

We did. Well, I was in the front, we both were, weren't we, in the in the front row.

SPEAKER_00 27:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 27:52

And I knew I'm sure she wouldn't want me saying that. There were nerves, of course there were. That's important to have nerves, you know? Yeah. That thing between, you know, nervous and excited, you know, it's that lovely, isn't it? That kind of thing where we walk, don't we, that line between the two. Yeah. So obviously we chatted to her briefly before she went on stage, but she just nailed it on every level. And I think what she did so beautifully was she was able to, and that's why she held people in the palm of her hand, literally through that, because she gave some really, really pertinent, really valuable business advice and bring in some beautiful that human interesting again, bring in that that connecting stuff, real life stuff from her own experiences, lived experiences.

SPEAKER_00 28:34

It's all about recognising that confidence follows courage. Yeah. So it's a bit like when we say, um, don't wait to be motivated. Yeah. Don't wait to feel confident.

SPEAKER_01 28:44

You need the courage to go to find the confidence, to gain that confidence.

SPEAKER_00 28:49

People wait to feel motivated before they take action. Whereas actually, if you start taking the action, the motivation actually usually follows their bed partners. And it's the same with this courage and confidence. Find the courage to go for it, and then the confidence will come.

SPEAKER_01 29:02

And I saw, and I think that's one of the things that you do with your training, is that I saw that, I saw the eyes go a bit for her. She won't mind me saying that, I'm sure, because it was a very emotional thing that she was in the middle of that, but she held it beautifully, and she took her viewers, her audience with her on that, and you could, as I said, you could feel that. I look, I just took a look around the room to see what the reactions were, and people were absolutely in that space with that. And that for any storyteller, whatever you're doing in that way, when you're creating, you're bringing your content, you're sharing your story with people, yeah. The ability to be able to do that is wonderful. When you get that right and you hit that bit right in the middle of that, whether you're writing a book or you're doing a you know a thing to to speak at a speaking. What do I mean Taz? A speech. I can't even speak I presentation, yeah. No, presentation. Thank you. That's all of that. When you can hit that sweet spot between the two, then you know you're onto something, and that's your connector that is going to bring you all an audience and bring people that want to come with you on your own.

SPEAKER_00 30:05

Everybody there was rooting for a well. And it was a manual.

SPEAKER_01 30:08

So thank you, Rapinda, for that. And it was lovely catching up with her afterwards as well.

SPEAKER_00 30:12

Absolutely, absolutely. Who did we see after Rapinda? Straight from Rapinda

Marketing Pearls And Content Craft

SPEAKER_00 30:15

into Ryan Dice. I've seen Ryan speak a few times, and I always say that there aren't many speakers that I would pay to go and see more than once. Gary V is one, I've seen him twice now live. Yeah. And Ryan Dice, I think this is the second or the third time I've seen him speak, and he's always on it, incredible, drops some real pearls of wisdom that you can you can actually action and take away with you. And he was all about marketing strategies that are working but that nobody else is talking about. Yeah. So that was absolutely bang on.

SPEAKER_01 30:49

And he's so lightning with his responses and his and his humour. I love his humour as well. He's really grounded, yeah, really, really grounded, and and pretty humble as well. I really love that. He kind of I love that. He's got a he builds a beautiful rapport with his audience. Yeah. So thank you. That was amazing. So many things. Do you know what I've realized, Taz? I've said to you the other night, because we we did a bit of filming, didn't we, while we were there with um Andrew and Pete's approval, they were fine with us doing that.

SPEAKER_00 31:15

Yeah, we did some little so look out on social media for us doing some video interviews with some of the attendees just talking about the event. We're not on commission and promise. Actually, we do have an affiliate code for next year's conference. So if you want to.

SPEAKER_01 31:27

Do you want to come with us and come and check this?

SPEAKER_00 31:28

Come with us, we're gonna bring uh bring an awesomely off-topic delegation. Let's do that for next year.

SPEAKER_01 31:33

But what I was gonna say was obviously I was we were doing that and I did the interviews while Taz did the camera because we've got a new piece of kit, which is amazing is amazing. There you go, so what I've realized is my word of the conference of the of the last few days was amazing, and every person I interviewed, I used the word amazing. That may change. I know. Just like, oh for goodness sake, Alison. Alison? I said Alison. You've not been Alison for years.

SPEAKER_00 31:58

I know that was Ash's birth name.

SPEAKER_01 31:59

It was. Why did that come up? How many decades ago did you change your name? See, I'm getting so old I can't even actually remember what my name is now. That's an old pattern coming up for you.

SPEAKER_00 32:09

Yeah, I know.

SPEAKER_01 32:10

Well, it's interesting, isn't it? Because of the stuff that's been covered up. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some more work to be done. But yes, amazing. I'm gonna try not to use that in my next load of uh interviews.

SPEAKER_00 32:19

Yeah, she said to me next time we're doing that, if I say amazing, just cut the interview. So I'm not gonna cut an interview, but it's going really well just because you say amazing. We did have to cut one interview because let's just say loads of Asher and your interviewee, who luckily we know quite well, are both um somewhat ample of chest. And given that we're recording in portrait mode, they had to keep standing closer together to get them into the shop. But they both had natural barriers to that. It was quite outtakes are going to be brilliant. Then we got a fit of the giggles, that was it then. So from we were moved into lunch after that, didn't we? Which was a lovely catch-up. It was lovely to see some of the people who were in Leah Turner's The Holt. I joined the Holt quite a few months back, but I've not shown up for anything. It's ridiculous. I've been paying my dues every month. It's like a a business community for solopreneurs and small businesses. There's some cracking people in there. But really, in terms of communication, WhatsApp's my jam. If I've got to go across to another platform or go and book onto a Zoom, I tend to forget to do it unless it's one of my clients. Yeah. Whereas when it's on WhatsApp, or when it's a live event, I'm there. All over it. So that was really lovely because there was a WhatsApp group for all the Holties coming to Atomicon. So finally I was able to catch up with some of the people there and find out what's what and catch up with Leah.

SPEAKER_01 33:48

And I did interview Leah actually. I did briefly. Thank you, Leah, for taking the time. Because I know how busy you were at the event, so I really appreciate it. She has more tattoos than me. And I'm sure and I loved your hat. She had a fantastic hat on.

SPEAKER_00 34:02

She wore my purple fedora.

SPEAKER_01 34:04

I know, I just kept looking and thinking, why didn't I wear my purple fedora? I know, but what I was going to say, but we did, yeah, we had a good old, we had a five-minute chat, didn't we? And that was really cool. And I'm sure I used the word amazing.

SPEAKER_00 34:14

You probably did. You probably did.

SPEAKER_01 34:16

That's because it was, and she is.

SPEAKER_00 34:17

So they So that was lovely, and it did launch me in so that now I need to start carving out more time to go and you know be part of the Hulk community. I missed the group photos twice. So Leah came and snapped a full under picture of me inside the inside the event hall. We're going to try and photoshop it in the way.

SPEAKER_01 34:34

I didn't know you'd done it. Do you know what it's reminding me of? Does everybody remember? You remember the scene in Four Weddings and a Funeral when he's in the shot and he keeps getting oh, sorry, sorry, and he keeps going into the wrong, you know when they're doing the wedding photographs. He keeps tripping in. Do you remember that scene? Yeah, yes, mate.

SPEAKER_00 34:49

That's where it took me. I could imagine you doing that. So anyway, lots of catch-ups. We spent a load of time hanging out with the social dragonfly, Flick Hamlet Day. You might know. Hello, Flick. Hello. I know listens to this podcast and has an awesome podcast of her own. She does. So look that up too. Flick and Vanessa. Is it Vanessa or have I just made that up? It is, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 35:07

Oh don't. Now I'm questioning it. I'm so sorry. Oh, move on. We're sorry. Anyway, we love your public. I know we have.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

We have.

SPEAKER_00 35:15

But who else did we catch up? Oh, just so many people were caught up with. So many, so many, so many. After lunch, we saw the guy who started off doing YouTube with Stop Motion Lego with him and his bus. Saf Mohammed. Saf Mohammed.

SPEAKER_01 35:31

Yeah. Thank you, Saf. Great talk. We were up in the gardens looking at you from above. But it was. It was about the size of a little Lego figure from where we were. I love that because I've got one of those. What did you buy me? You bought one of those little motion things. Stop motion robot things. I love it, but I've not had the patience to do that because that takes real dedication to do that. I absolutely don't you think? Yeah. It's so much work, isn't it, to do that? But the effects are so cool.

SPEAKER_00 35:55

Yeah. Okay, yeah. Yeah. And then what? I think we we took a little break out after that, didn't we? And did a bit of extra networking and missed one of the sessions. We can get more recorded afterwards.

SPEAKER_01 36:04

I've got slightly

People First Communities And Curiosity

SPEAKER_01 36:05

addicted to their um their muffins. They were very nice with a cup of coffee.

SPEAKER_00 36:09

The the multi-fruit, multi-berry, vegan muffins. They were really good. Yeah, yeah. So we took a break after that, then we saw one more talk, and then it was everybody back into the main stage. Yeah. Where we had. It was Anne Handley, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_01 36:30

Anne. Yeah, we've seen her before, haven't we? With the flowery. She had the most amazing. I'm sorry, no, we've talked about what people were wrong, but she had the most amazing suit. Anybody that was in the room, you'll know what we're doing.

SPEAKER_00 36:38

Anne Handley had a black suit covered in yellow flowers with a big yellow bow at the front.

SPEAKER_01 36:45

It looks stunning.

SPEAKER_00 36:47

She did. So thank you, Annette. We really enjoyed your talk. And that she played Mounty Mighty Mouse clips from when we were kids. So Anne, brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. So again, it's a marketing conference for for small businesses and solopreneurs, and it might sound like we're we're just suddenly on the payroll. Again, aside from having an affiliate for tickets, we we don't, but it's such a brilliant event in the same way that we brought you a review of the podcast show. I felt any right to give you a bit of a of a snapshot from that as well.

SPEAKER_01 37:17

I think also it's it's about you know, we've talked about some of the stuff that's come up around it, nothing to do with the cop the event itself, but it also it always gives you some an energy boost, you know. I mean it's don't get me wrong, it's a full day and it's full on, but it's it's so there's so much to take away from it, and I always feel like, yeah, I'm really it really gets my enthusiasm up again.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

What I love about Atomicon is it's so people-centric, yeah. So in many ways, I well, we have. We've already booked tickets for next year's Atomicon without having a clue who's on the bill, yeah, yeah, because it's about the people. Yeah, whereas something like I don't know, expert empires. Yeah, I've not been to expert empires for years because that for me feels more about the speakers, which is great, but if I'm gonna drop that amount of cash and give up that amount of time for that kind of event, yeah, I want to know that I'm gonna learn shed loads from the speakers, and it's speakers who are on the bill who are gonna really turn me on.

SPEAKER_01 38:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:15

And it's just not had that impact on me for a while.

SPEAKER_01 38:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:19

Whereas Tomicon, the other great thing is that everybody's in the same place. Yeah. And all the speakers are in the same place. Oh, gosh, it was always brilliant to see the Mguru. Oh, yeah.

unknown 38:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:31

I interviewed him as well. Absolutely, and he got to run a LinkedIn workshop on the the day before the conference, too. And he was telling everybody, I'm not a speaker, I'm not a speaker. I did a workshop the day before. Because you are a speaker. No, I'm not, because I'm not on here. I was on the day before. Yes, you ran a workshop. The day before Gus, you are a speaker. Yeah. So you're always fun to catch up with us. Yeah. Yeah. Mark Franklin, Leah Turner, quick catch-up with Danny Wallace. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 38:57

Twice who I know, sorry, Danny. I think I accidentally sent you flying when I saw you and at the party.

SPEAKER_00 39:04

Danny was like, Taz, why do we always meet like this? I said, Because we're both going to Atomicon. What do you mean? No, like at the end of the night when I've had loads to drink, and you know, and there's no time. I said, because you're off meeting everybody and everything else to drink. And then at we saw her free fleetingly at the event as well. Yeah. And then at the host party. That was that's what I was talking about. That's when you accidentally tripped her up. I think I did, yeah. And we had a little bit of a same again.

SPEAKER_01 39:33

A jokey smile. I know. But it was, yeah, that was, yeah, because that was it was yeah. At the time that was quite late, wasn't it? I think it was late for me. Past me being a bit more.

SPEAKER_00 39:43

It's really funny. The great thing about that event is there are people that you see once a year, and you I'm sure a lot of you listening to this will recognise it. There's somebody you see, you love to bits, you know you've got shared values, and you know that you're gonna go and you have every intention of keeping in touch. Yeah, but then life gets in the way, before you know it, the time's up, and oh, I haven't spoken to them.

SPEAKER_01 40:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:07

And that's the same for me with Atomicon. We're all busy people, and there's there are people there every year. I mean, I just said Danny, apart from we'll have occasional messages on social and then that that's it. She's never been to my events, I've never been to her events, but we both both have respect for we we both uh understand what the other does, and we we work in similar arenas um in terms of speaker training. We both have quite a different vibe with our speaker training. But the support is there anyway. Yeah. But we only see each other there. Yeah. We've we'd been moving in similar circles for years because we both do sit speaker training and we hadn't actually met until Atomicon, like three years ago in person.

SPEAKER_02 40:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:48

And there's loads of people like that that Andrew and Pete, we have occasional chats, you know, discussions on LinkedIn, but we only see them at Atomicon.

SPEAKER_02 40:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:58

Who else? There's there's loads of people like that that we only see at Atomicon, and that's cool. And nobody has this, well, you haven't spoken to me, you haven't done this, you haven't done that. Because we're just like set, we're busy people, and it's all cool.

SPEAKER_01 41:11

And I love the fact that you know at the after show party, we're chatting with Lisa, weren't we? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Got talking about all sorts of things, had a lot of laughs. Yeah, a lot of laughs. We had Brett as well, who was talking about all sorts of stuff around business, but then also talking about moths. And shamanism. And shamanism. Yeah. We got everything. Yeah. But the variety of the world.

SPEAKER_00 41:31

Yeah, we turn up to talk about variety again. We turn up to talk about and learn about marketing and visibility, and we have people saying to us, Oh, I want to come to the big one.

unknown 41:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:39

I want to come and learn about shamanism and the medicine path and do firewalking with you.

SPEAKER_02 41:43

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:43

And how many people, when they knew we were speaking at the shamanic gathering this year, were like, I want to go there, I want to go there. Send me the details. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's amazing that it absolutely reminds us that people by people, and even if you're at a specialist event to talk about one kind of topic area, once people know what you do, even if they feel yeah, you've even if you've got some really quirky interests, they're gonna be just as interested in that. How many people did we have conversations with at Atomicon and at either side of Atomicon that had nothing to do with marketing? Yeah. I know. Well, you know, I coach people with a lot of the visibility of marketing. We both help people with we are no longer in PR, we have our MPR. Shout out to Fee Scott if you're listening, Scott Media. But of course, we still sometimes help our clients with bits of their PR as well. We're constantly helping people to work on their visibility and their brand and to make the money they deserve and all of that jazz. You know, I help people get up on stage, you help people write their books, we help people get their podcasts out there. So so much of what we do ties back in to marketing. You know, we have unleashed our group for coaches, healers, and therapists that's really low cost and really to help them with not just marketing, but a lot of it is that sales and and great.

SPEAKER_01 43:08

So it all sits together, doesn't it? It's that's ecosystems.

SPEAKER_00 43:12

Yeah, so that ecosystem. That ecosystem, again, don't niche down, niche through, it's all there, but then we show up to an event all about that, and how many conversations are we having that's got nothing nothing to do with marketing? They're to do with tattoos, they're to do with LGBTQIA, visibility and parties, moths, bats, shamanism, yeah, goodness mate, pink hair, hair colour, yeah, all kinds of stuff. So and jazzy shirts.

SPEAKER_02 43:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:41

So again, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, amazing event. Can't work wait to go and watch all the replays of the other speakers then.

SPEAKER_01 43:47

Well, that's the other thing as well, because we will catch up and we'll have a day when we do that. I know that they, you know, there's a there is, isn't there, after the event themselves that they put on an event for people to actually actually. Yeah, on Friday, they'll have a send implementation. And actually make sure you're actually doing something with it rather than just leaving it in a notebook.

SPEAKER_00 44:04

Yeah. So cracking event, and definitely one of the Atomicon fan base. Great to finally get in with some of the Holt members as well. Such a brilliant community that Leah's created there. Lovely, lovely, happy community. We all got these little little pink rubber wristbands and that say officially not a knob. So we're all looking out for one another's pink wristbands, so we knew another Holty. Still trying to persuade Asher to come in. I think we'll get her there eventually. But good. So your biggest take-home,

Go Ahead Underestimate Me

SPEAKER_00 44:35

Ash. Oh, full circle. Full circle? Go ahead, underestimate me.

SPEAKER_01 44:41

Yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00 44:43

There's a little tell you'll sometimes see with every now and then you'll meet someone and you just get a vibe that they are wanting to coattail ride. And if you watch someone go and ask for a selfie with someone that they perceive has a massive community, but that they don't ask you for one in the same breath. There's a bit of an indication there, I think. But also you know when someone's under underestimating you, and I know again, I'm not gonna go into all the details because it wouldn't be fair. Uh it would give away give the game away. But yeah, let's just say I've been underestimated and it's the best thing that could have happened. One of the best examples I can give you, listeners, of being underestimated was years ago before I started coaching properly, when I was going through my breakdown and I sat there with my GP who was giving me the spiel about, you know, you should leave your job, it's not filling you up anymore when I was still in corporate landing, corporate publishing. And him saying, What do you want to do? And I went, Oh, through my sobs, I want to create a career where I'm I'm helping people to thrive and to be happy and feel healthy and good in what they do, and I want to learn lots of therapies and coaching and stuff like that. And my GP said, You will never, never be able to create a sustainable career that will pay you enough money to live on doing that. And it was the best thing he could have said to me. Because what, 20 odd years later, hello, here I am doing just that.

SPEAKER_02 46:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:27

So little note to anyone listening who's ever felt underestimated, let them let them underestimate you all you like, and then set out to make it happen. And just let somebody else hand them a hanky to wipe the egg off their face later on. You know, best thing. I don't know how many years ago it was I created the the t-shirts that are available in the TAS merch shop that say, go ahead, underestimate me. Yeah. But today was a reminder. Yeah. Yeah. Today was a reminder. So let people underestimate you. Biggest take-home, Ash, for you, and how are you feeling now compared to when we first started and the RST was still biting you in the bum a little bit?

SPEAKER_01 47:06

Oh, good, good. I I feel like I'm I've got so many things that I've got from the event. Yeah. And I'm really going to focus on those because genuinely there's stuff in there that can make a difference to my business.

SPEAKER_00 47:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 47:17

So that's what I'm focusing on. I'm not focusing on stuff that's happened in the past. I am focusing on refining my offerings, getting my pricing right. Yeah. And also going out there and showing me more, you know, getting out there more. And be and being actually having an opinion and not being afraid to share it. Yeah. That's the other thing, you know, and again that comes back to that journalism training. Yeah. I always bang on about how I get across with a lot of journalists today that seem to always have an opinion. When in my view, they shouldn't, they should be completely impartial. But ironically, I need to take a bit of that myself and go, well, actually, Ashley, you need to have an opinion, you need to express it and share it. Well, there's nothing wrong with that. In fact, there's it's quite the opposite. There's everything right with that. Because that's what will help people buy into what you do and how you do that.

SPEAKER_00 48:06

Absolutely. So, any any more quick shout-outs? Anyone else you want to shout out? Just been Hughes. Yeah. Oh, Cheryl Thornton. Oh, yes, been on this issue. Yeah. Atomicon. Atomicon. Project Artemis. No relation. Lovely, lovely to see Cheryl. Oh, it's just so many. I I can't remember everybody by name, but so many. We'll met some lovely new friends there. Yeah, we certainly do. Lovely new friends. So my take-home is again, let people let people underestimate you. Yours is whatever I said just now. Whatever you said just now. Until next time, we will see you next Tuesday.

SPEAKER_01 48:47

You've been listening to Autumn Me Off Topic. Make sure you're following so you don't miss the next one. And if you'd like more, come and find Autumn Me Off Topic on social media. You'll find behind the scenes footage, Bluefoot, and more. See you next time.