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Angela Henderson’s business career began in 2010, a year after her son, Finlee, was born. She was disheartened when she saw that most toys for young children were battery operated, high-technology, and invariably made of plastic. Soon, Finlee and Me was launched, a successful ecommerce store featuring a wide variety of baby items that focused on fostering creativity and sparking the imagination.
Conversation = Conversion
Finlee and Me had a custom-built site, Angela explains, and really focused on conversions. She adds that there are many people who feel their website ticks all the boxes when it comes to sales, but they’re really lacking the elements of conversion.
For me, I believe that conversation equals conversion.
In those early days, Angela was intent on having a conversional website in order to have the greatest chance of being profitable. She explains that you really only have six seconds from the time someone lands on your website to be able to tell them what you do and how you can solve their problem. She made use of her “conversation equals conversion” motto and began featuring blog articles that were relevant to her clientele whom she had taken the time to get to know.
Building a Fanbase
Featuring insightful and informative articles helped Finlee and Me grow its Facebook fanbase to over 70,000. Their Instagram had over 20,000 followers and their newsletter database had over 50,000 client contacts. Angela attributes this success to the fact that these moms began to build up a trust and credibility in her as a direct result of her blog. Moreover, she had created a space where moms could safely be heard and feel connected.
Another way Angela promoted Finlee and Me was to feature the business at Pregnancy and Baby Expos. She recounts one particular strategy at an Expo that proved to be highly successful: Angela teamed up with ten other businesses who had a booth at the Expo and they all did a giveaway as a promotion. Each business’s entry form stated that it had teamed up with the other businesses and that by completing the entry form, the customer was agreeing to have their contact information shared among the businesses. In this way, Angela was able to gather information from not only those potential customers who stopped at her booth, but also from those who stopped only at the other businesses’ booths and she was able to grow her database of valuable clients a lot more.
A New Business Chapter
As time went on and Angela’s children got older, she began to disconnect from Finlee and Me and she decided to focus on consulting. It all began rather organically when she often found herself driving 30 minutes to meet someone for coffee so they could pick her brain about effective business strategies. She realized she could easily charge for the information she was imparting. Initially, it was often just one-to-one services but she soon found herself exhausted and stretched to her limits.
Many entrepreneurs will identify with this — it’s so easy to become tapped out when working in a one-to-one capacity. She soon switched to a one-to-many model, featuring a group coaching program as well as a Women in Business Retreat — a four-day, three-night retreat attended mostly by moms, many of whom have never been away from their kids for an extended period of time. With this in mind, the retreat makes topics like self-care a priority so that these women in business can take time for themselves while learning effective business leadership.
Know Your Worth
Lastly, something Angela likes to emphasize when talking to entrepreneurs is understanding their worth. She admits that she has no problem charging what she charges for her business coaching because her clients aren’t just paying for their time with her; they’re also paying for all the time (and money) Angela has spent travelling around the world learning from the best entrepreneurs. They’re paying for the connections they will make. And they’re paying for the business experience that Angela has garnered over the years. Angela is a business coach for women and teaches her clients that they, too, need to understand their worth. And that it’s important for them to charge based on their skillset and expertise, not just on the length of time spent with clients.
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Transcription of Interview (Transcribed by Otter.ai; there may be errors.)
Adam Force 0:00
Hey, what’s going on everybody? Welcome back to the Change Creator podcast show. This is your host, Adam Force. Excited here. We got some great weather going on in Miami now that we’re reaching the winter months. It’s my favorite time of year out here. So last week, guys, if you missed the last episode, it was with Michael O’Brien. He’s an entrepreneur, business professional author. He’s got all kinds of stuff going on. He has a very powerful story. And his story is it was a traumatic moment in his life that kind of shifted his whole life trajectory. And he’s on this mission to help all these people around the world have their last bad day.
And that’s the title of the episode: How to have your last bad day. So it’s an inspirational conversation, I think you’ll find his story very powerful. So check that out when you get a chance. And this week, we’re gonna be talking to Angela Henderson. She is the founder of a very successful ecommerce store, Finlee and Me. And she really has a lot of experience in the space. And since then she’s converted to start helping others with a consulting program. And she does these really cool retreats and she has a lot going on and a lot of experience. So I think you guys will find a lot of value from the conversation with Angela. So I’m excited to dive into to her world of knowledge in those things, you know, and I think you’re gonna get some really good ideas around the ecommerce stuff and, and everything else so. So hang in there. We’re going to get started in just a minute.
A big announcement for the October 1 time frame. This is the deadline we have here to open the doors, the doors are planning to be open for the Captivate Method on October 1. Alright, so keep your eyes out. If you’re not following us on Facebook, that’s the best place to be. This is where we really put a lot of our content and attention. So you go to our page Facebook page and then you can get involved. If you have a business idea, you have a business and you’re trying to really take your marketing to, you know, the next — I hate saying the next level, that’s kind of like what we’re talking about. You really want to enhance your marketing, like leaning into modern solutions, really building relationships with your audience. You get involved with our Facebook group, there’s just a couple of questions you’re asked there and we’ll give you access.
We got to make sure it’s the right fit for you, right. So yeah, you can find that link right on the Facebook page. So follow the page, and then you can go to the group. And that’s a great way to get more involved with what we’re doing. And you’ll learn more about the Captivate Method and stuff like that. So powerful stuff there. We’re very, very excited because we made lots of cool changes and updates based on our beta runs and everything since 2018. This is version 3.0. And we really made a lot of enhancements there so it’ll be a lot of fun. Okay, guys, we’re going to dive into this conversation and with Angela and see what she has to say from her experience as an entrepreneur in the ecommerce world and consulting world.
Hey, Angela, welcome to the Change Creator podcast show. How’s everything going today?
Angela Henderson 3:15
Everything’s awesome. How are you doing, Adam?
Adam Force 3:16
I’m doing pretty good. Pretty good. Bright and early here in in Miami. Well, it’s a later at night over in Australia, right?
Angela Henderson 3:24
Yeah, that’s correct. It’s almost 10 o’clock at night here in Brisbane, Australia. So a slight time difference but yeah, that we get into entrepreneurship for is to have these awesome conversations that they just happen whenever they naturally need to happen.
Adam Force 3:37
That’s it, the global community. I love it. Yeah, so I’d be curious to just to hear…I like to always tee things up and understand, you know, what’s going on in your world these days, the latest and greatest, what are you focused on? Like what’s happening?
Angela Henderson 3:51
I’d love to share that with you. So I’ve actually just come back for a seven-day business mastermind over in [unintelligible] with my own business mentor [unintelligible]. So I’m still kind of recovering from that jet lag. And just that level of enthusiasm being around really cool, like-minded people. And obviously being on the yacht in the middle of the Maldives, learning from some of the best was super exciting. What else is happening in my world?
I’m also running my sold out four-day, three-night Women in Business retreat here in Australia at the end of October. So that’s super exciting. And today, I worked with the state government here in Queensland, Australia, as one of their female business mentors. It was really great being able to give back to the community and help other businesses to really get clear on that clarity and strategy they need to move forward to gain those sustainable and profitable businesses. So that’s a little bit of what’s happening over here in the land of Australia.
Adam Force 4:45
Cool. So what led you to the consulting world? Like, where did that come from? Like, I know you mentioned you had a lot of work you did prior to getting into the consulting game. So what was the connection there?
Angela Henderson 4:59
Yes. So our son, Finlee, was born and about a year into [unintelligible] I just kind of started to see like all of these plastic toys, battery operated, high-technology…which again, we use technology every day such as yourself but for little kids, I thought there’s got to be something better, something brighter out there that can allow kids to work on fine motor skills, spark their imagination, their creativity, and just create those long, long lasting childhood memories we had back when we were growing up in the farms or doing whatever we used to do back out…you know, connecting with nature.
So I started my first business which is called Finlee and Me ecommerce platform. At one stage, we had about 1400 different products. And our core focus again there was educational component and focusing really on creating childhood memories through play, love, and travel. So the ecommerce business was great and then we also had a secondary monetary stream of income that came in which was through being an influencer and blogging over here in Australia, became one of their leading parenting bloggers.
Working with companies such as Netflix as one of their top 30 influencers here in Australia and New Zealand. [unintelligible] Yeah, that’s led into the consultant side of things. It’s seven years of being in that, if people wanted to pick my brain and from that, I just thought, Well, if I start charging people to pick my brain, I can have a secondary business and that’s how the consulting came about.
Adam Force 6:23
Yeah, yeah. That’s pretty cool. And I’d be curious to know what did you run your ecommerce business on? were you using any platforms like the Shopify world or big commerce or anything like that? Or were you just doing iy custom?
Angela Henderson 6:37
So yeah, so we had a custom-built site but we obviously then connected that with WooCommerce, so on WordPress, with WooCommerce, but the build is completely custom so that we really focus on that conversional website. There’s a lot of people out there that have websites and think that they check the box but one of the things that they’re lacking is the elements of conversion.
You really only have six seconds from the time someone lands on your website to be able to tell them what you do, how you can solve their problem, and how they can buy your product. So it was really important to me starting off that ecommerce platform that we had a conversional website, ready to rock and roll, so that we could have the greatest chance of being successful and being profitable.
Adam Force 7:16
Yeah, and one more question just in the ecommerce stream, just because I know there’s a lot of people in our audience that are working ecommerce businesses and I’m curious what you found to be successful for your space. I know every category is different for getting you know, people to understand who you are and become comfortable with buying your products. Was there any kind of strategy behind that? Was it just, you know, smart landing pages? I’m curious what you think helped with your conversions and sales.
Angela Henderson 7:50
For me, I believe that conversation equals conversion. So I was really big about making sure that I got in local markets. I also did…there’s a big pregnancy and baby Expo here in Australia where they go to all the major capital cities. I also ran that for the first few years of my business. Being able to get my products into as many people’s hands as I could, so that the more they talked about it with other moms and moms’ groups or their family members, etc. They were kind of like my mini marketing agency, you could say for me. So that was one tactic that I used was really [unintelligible]. Again, those conversations, equal conversions.
And another really big thing that worked for us was not just talking about the toys all the time. And those benefits…we really got to know my ideal client, which was typically you know, mom who had two young kids under the age of five, who had disposable income, was really big about education, and the mom was the one that was buying for their child. So what I did is I started writing blog articles that were relevant to moms so that they started to build up a trust and authority and credibility with me.
And once I had that trust talking about either postnatal depression or anxiety, or say, you know, breastfeeding versus bottle feeding — whatever it was that were topics that were relevant to the mom — the buyer — we started to see our community grow fairly quickly. So we started with [unintelligible] and we ended up at about 70,000 Facebook fans in our community, we had up to 20,000 people on Instagram and over 50,000 people in our newsletter database. And that was because I didn’t just focus on selling them the product, that I focused on creating that community element and really creating a space for moms to be heard and connected. Because in motherhood, it can be quite lonely. So yeah, that’s angle I took.
Adam Force 9:27
Yeah. And that’s, that’s awesome. I like to hear that you did the articles to create a first touch point that built trust. I think that’s super important. It’s a good point. You know, and everybody’s always looking to build their email database just to continue that conversation. So in that e commerce world, I’m curious, you know, what kind of tools were effective for you to build that? I think you said 50,000-person database. You know, you see a lot of ecommerce things they do, like, you know, give me your email and I’ll give you a discount code or something. Was there other strategies that you implemented to get people onto your list so you can continue those conversations?
Angela Henderson 10:06
Yeah, one of our biggest things was at a pregnancy and baby Expo, they had the QR readers. And so what happened is I would team up with other businesses that were there, we would do a giveaway together. And then we would cross pollinate the email list with permission of those people entering. So as part of entry, we would say, You’ve teamed up with these, say, 10 businesses and as part of that you are agreeing to being on you know, receiving emails from us, and we listed every single business. So then the fact is is not everyone would stop at my booth, and not everyone stopped at those other booths. So we then were able to capture a much larger database of the valuable clients, and we weren’t competing against each other.
So that was one way that we grew that list. The other way that I grew my list was through three-day and 14-day challenges. So one of the challenges that I did was 30 days/30 ways to connect to your child, because we know that parents are super busy [unintelligible] and they’re really looking for things that they can do with their kids and still connect with them on a daily basis. So I created a connection that they could do every day, right. But within that 30 day challenge, I also did a product of the day. So it was a way for me to add value, but at the same time use a 30 day challenge as an advertising hub.
And then at the end of that 30 day challenge, I gave them a 20% off discount coupon. And that worked extremely well, because they had 30 days of building that strong connection with me, we opened a Facebook community so that we could continue that dialogue. And then they were also getting the emails every day in the interactions. So we saw a significant amount of growth through our challenges.
Adam Force 11:38
And I’m sorry, you cut out a little bit. What was the challenge? That sounds really cool. And I think those challenges are actually really powerful tools for people when they’re executed properly. The challenge here was to What was it again — to connect with the mother and child? What was that?
Angela Henderson 11:53
Right. So what we found when we surveyed our audience is that parents are struggling to connect with their children because they’re just so busy. I kind of wanted to [unintelligible] that scenario. And what I thought, [unintelligible] it’s just an excuse. So everyone has 10 to 15 minutes a day to spend with their child at some stage. You could blow bubbles, you could read a book, you can draw them a bath, you can bake cookies, there’s a million different things. And so what I did was every single day, I gave them a [unintelligible] they could do that would take no more than 15 minutes every single day.
The requirement was you put your phones away, shut the TV off, go and do this with them, you know, be present and laugh with them. But then as part of that daily email that they would get the connection piece that they would do. But then the second thing is I would just have product of the day and would introduce a brand new product from our product range. So they just started to get comfortable with what we were offering in addition to the 30 Day Challenge. And then on the back of that challenge when I offer them the discount code in order to then increase our overall sales.
Adam Force 12:53
Makes sense. Yeah, I love that; it’s a good strategy. I think that should give a couple aha moments for people listening. So, yeah, I mean, because you know, people get stuck with how they should frame up some of these things. And it’s different for every category, obviously. So you know, your business might have its own twist, you know, for anybody listening here where you were working with the relationship between…
So you got to know your audience, get to know the disconnects, and kind of frame something up that would be helpful and valuable. And, you know, you make a high value content offer. And that’s basically what you had there. And it was helpful for people and you earn their trust and those types of things. So I think it’s super powerful and smart. And so, you know, you got over into the consulting gig, and are you still part of the ecommerce shops? Or did you totally detach from that now?
Angela Henderson 13:42
We’ve [unintelligible] probably about eight months ago, and it was just one of those things that always kind of knew I would continue really, really loving it or as my children got older, I would probably just start to disconnect and that’s what happened is, the consulting business came in. It was super exciting, something new. My children were older and so it seemed the best strategic avenue for me, was to wrap up Finlee and Me so that I wasn’t having that headspace and kind of dragging around and something that I wasn’t really enthusiastic about and focus on consulting.
Adam Force 14:11
Got it. Got it. So how did you get your first consulting gig? What did that look like?
Angela Henderson 14:20
But that was like for me, which really just blew my offer out into the world of Facebook and obviously also [unintelligible]. And so when I started in [unintelligible] I had an enormous amount of people that I was getting introduced to. And again, it was just like, [unintelligible] hop on a call and start to learn what your struggles are, what your goals are, and then started having conversations that didn’t even offer anything at the beginning. It was just really about me giving value back. And once I started to find out what was working, what was [unintelligible], what was people’s [unintelligible], I then cam up with an offer and at that stage I would [unintelligible] for a 30 minute call.
And through there at the end of that call I’m just talking to them about what I had on offer. At that stage, it was often just one to one services. And I got a few people on board. And then that kind of infiltrated, I got a few more people on board. Eventually, as many of you listeners might know is, you become tapped out in the one-to-one capacity. So I then opened up my 12 month group coaching program so that I could go to a one-to-many model. And that’s currently…those are my two main things that I offer, plus the Women in Business retreat now. So that’s how it all started was just serving, connecting, testing, learning [unintelligible] and coming up with a one-to-one offer, which then led into a one-to-many offer.
Adam Force 15:39
Yeah. And I want you know, people who are listening to understand that, you know, you don’t just wake up one day and say, I’m going to start this consulting gig and it’s going to take off, you know, because I put my — put an ad out there and let people know what’s going on and they’re just going to get — you’re just going to get clients. This is something that has been in development, you know, for you. I always think of the iceberg — like, people see the the tip of the iceberg, but they don’t see what’s below.
And it’s the time and energy that built up your credibility with the work that you did in the ecommerce space and everything else in your life that kind of worked its way up to make this happen for you in the consulting gig. And it seems like you learned as you went, like you were kind of pivoting and saying, Oh, now I can do this. And you kind of took opportunities as they presented themselves to you. And they were relevant at the time, but it doesn’t happen overnight, right?
Angela Henderson 16:29
Oh, gosh, it definitely doesn’t happen overnight. It’s something that I really appreciate you bringing up because I think there’s this assumption that everything just happens and [unintelligible] if everything just happened we would all be millionaires. It wouldn’t be hard, right? Like the struggle is real that we have to go through. And for me, if I kind of rewind, the question that you had said was around, how did I start off things, but even if I rewind a little bit, what happened was as I looked at my diary, and I had 16 Coffee dates is what had happened. People kept wanting to pick my brain. And then I was like, driving home one day and as like, you know, I don’t even drink coffee. I’m having to buy my own Diet Coke. You know, I was like this kind of sucks.
And then I was like, I’m driving 30 minutes there and 30 minutes back and anyone who knows me knows I was a big giver. Like, again, today I spent eight hours volunteering to work with eight businesses to help them out with the state government. Like I’m really big about giving back to community. But I was like, hold on a minute, like, if each of these coffee dates, and I don’t even drink coffee took me 16 hours. And I was like, hold on a minute, if I would have even charged a small fee for them to pick my brain, I was like, I could have a secondary business.
And that’s how it all came about was that just all of a sudden I was like driving home one day, I was like, hold on, I should try and test and start charging for this. Would people actually then buy it if I started to put a dollar figure attached to it? Or would they try and kind of use me for my expertise? And that’s when again I started to put that out there and people were like, Yeah, absolutely. You’ve got all this wealth of knowledge. We’re happy to pay you. Yeah, so that’s kind of you know, if I rewind a little bit, that’s where it came from was from really all the coffee dates, and I decided, well, let’s test this. Let’s make it a little bit more strategic and you know, really save this is viable?
Adam Force 18:03
Yeah, I mean, and that’s the cue. You know, you start getting all these requests for your time, people are asking you questions. And I always tell people like, what does ever someone ever come to you and ask for help with? I mean, it’s kind of a clue of what people see you as knowledgeable about, obviously. And here you are having your brain picked. And that’s 16 Coffee dates in your diary. So it’s like, you know, you can either look at that and see the opportunity. And some people might just be like, Oh, I’m not doing this anymore. It’s a waste of time. And they don’t actually capitalize on it. But you know, if you can see that opportunity and and then reframe it up, because you know, what, your time is probably the most — well, I won’t even say probably — it is the most valuable commodity that you have in life. It’s the only…you can’t get more of it, right? It’s like, you know, how do you value yourself? I mean, and people devalue themselves. They don’t put value against you know, their knowledge and time and they very well should. I mean, we live in an economic system. You need money. Money gives you options. It gives you control over your life. So there’s nothing wrong with capitalizing on that.
Angela Henderson 19:04
And I also think one of the things I do talk about is people understanding their worth. And when people come to me, either for my group coaching or my one-to-one, is I’ve got no problem charging what I charge because you’re not just getting me for two hours a month plus unlimited email access in our VIP groups, etc. You, like, I spend about $40,000 a year traveling around the world learning from some of the best entrepreneurs so that I’ve got that skill set to then pass on to my clients. I then spend endless hours going to local networking events, going [unintelligible] right? Like, this is how then…So if I make those connections, that means there’s opportunity for my coaching clients.
And so people…I think it’s really important that you’re not just paying for the coaching, you’re paying for connections, you’re paying for their ongoing training and learnings because not everyone is able to travel the world to learn from these people. They might…I wasn’t in the position at the beginning, but now I make it a priority. So again, it’s, you know, when you’re looking for a coach or you’re looking for that mentor, and they do put a price figure on it just like web developers do, or designers do, they didn’t just get that skill overnight. That took hours and hours of practice. And that’s why people charge or start to charge and know their worth because of what they have to assess, and what’s gone into that expertise and that skill set.
Adam Force 20:25
Yeah, I love that. And, it’s so true. And I think a lot of people who are looking for coaching misunderstand, like what’s really beneath the surface of what they’re paying for. There was a funny analogy, and I’m going to totally butcher it, but I’ll get the essence of it across here. Let’s just say there was this big piece of machinery and it wasn’t performing properly after all these years of being perfect and they couldn’t figure out what was going on. And they found this guy who has all this experience in fixing these things. So he comes over there. And he’s been doing this for let’s say 20 years and he comes over there. And he’s like, oh, and he takes a wrench and he taps it in like one spot. And it took him less than, like 30 seconds. And the guys like, here’s your bill for $10,000. He’s like, What are you talking about? $10,000. And he’s like, all you did is hit it with the wrench and it took you 30 seconds. He’s like, yeah, maybe all I did he goes is a $2 for the wrench and hitting it. And it was the rest of the money that $9,998 was for knowing where to hit it.
Angela Henderson 21:29
But it’s so true, right? And he had to learn that skill. He had to figure out what you know, what does that sound and what does that make, and why does it happen? He knew exactly what to do. But it’s 100% true that paying for years and years of teaching — and I know that some person said in this group I was in they’re like, Why should we…Why should you charge more than what, say, a lawyer charges? For example, you don’t have a formal education. I said, Well hold on a minute.
If I’m spending $40,000 a year to be in masterminds and go around the world and learn from the best… it might not be a piece of paper from Harvard University. But the knowledge that is there is just as equivalent to sitting in a classroom environment. I still have to sit through, say an eight hour conference. When I did Caitlin [unintelligible] course and we did the summit, it was two days’ worth of, you know, sitting there. It was my plane tickets from Australia to America, it was all of those things, right? And people…just because it’s not a degree on paper, doesn’t mean that it’s any less important than the degree from the University.
Adam Force 22:28
Absolutely not. No, I’m one of these people that combats you know, college and schooling and all these things, and it’s evolving. It’s changing over the years of what’s actually, you know, the best experience and people are going to pay for experience over classroom education. I mean, I would say what 60-70% of the teachers who are teaching, let’s say key topics like entrepreneurship in college, they’ve never even owned a business.
Angela Henderson 22:56
And a lot of universities here in Australia are now reaching out. Like, I was asked by the University of South Australia, which is in the city of Adelaide, down south here in Australia to come and work with some of their entrepreneur students [unintelligible] What does it look like? What is messaging, brand voice, you know, funnels, emails etc. And I was like, for a university to reach out I think that’s really that growth mindset that they’re looking to capitalize on it because they know that they’re not the experts in that when it comes to that field.
Adam Force 23:28
No, no, and they’re not they’re not. And school is, you know, traditionally to teach you how to get a job and do certain things a certain way and it frames up a mindset that is very opposite of what an entrepreneur’s mindset is. It’s very, very different.
Angela Henderson 23:46
Totally. I couldn’t agree more.
Adam Force 23:48
Yeah, it’s a 180. And that’s been a hard thing for me because I worked in corporate for, you know, 15 years or so and then to start my own businesses and do things on…the from, you know, grassroots starting point, it’s a whole other way of thinking about not just business, but thinking about money and like hard work and what that means and all that kind of stuff. It’s just, I don’t know, you have these like blueprints in your brain from years of just, you know, being told what to believe. And that stuff’s great for a job, but it just does not work for entrepreneurship.
Angela Henderson 24:22
No, because I mean, in entrepreneurship, we are testing every single day; we are testing what’s working on an ad, we’re testing what a product resonates with our audience. We’re testing with email subject headers work better, like it’s an ongoing investigation, entrepreneurship, and just when you think you’ve got something worked out, the algorithms were changed or the market or the dollar will change whatever, like, you can’t learn that in a book. You have to be adaptable at all times.
Adam Force 24:49
Absolutely. Absolutely. So I just you know, as we get a little bit closer to the end of the talk here, I want to make sure we touch on your retreats because they sound pretty cool and I’d like to learn a little bit more about what you’re doing there and why did you decide to do these retreats and what is in it for the people that attend when they do that?
Angela Henderson 25:13
Yeah, sure. So I initially did a mastermind with Chris Ducker over in the Philippines three years ago and the way Chris had his, you know, seven day retreat laid out, I thought it was super interesting. He flew in amazing speakers from around the world. You know, Peter Shankman, he had Jada Zellner there, like just to name a few. And what happened [unintelligible], like so many amazing people were there. And what I noticed there is that it was an intimate group of 50 really solid, like-minded, enthusiastic, growth mindset individuals, and there is no division between speaker and attendee. The speakers were in the pool with us having mojitos, playing, you know, beach volleyball. And it was just this really great dynamic and I thought one day I’d really like to test that.
And then as I started to grow the consulting business over the last couple years what I realized was, there’s not a lot of conferences in Australia, there really isn’t. That’s why I pay as much money as I do to go overseas because we just…there’s a few great entrepreneurs…I mean, there’s lots of great entrepreneurs, let’s get that straight. But there’s not a lot that are leading the way from a conference perspective. And I didn’t want to go big. I’m really big about human-to-human marketing and really high touch point — maybe, you know, being able to walk down the street and give someone a hug, give them a handshake and know who they are.
So I wasn’t looking at creating a conference that had 200 people, 500 people or 1000. That just wasn’t it. So I wanted to create an intimate retreat with 50 people. My target market is women in business. And so I created it around a four-day, three-night women in business retreat. And then I also…my ideal client is mothers; a lot of moms haven’t even been away from their kids. And so I wanted to give them the experience that when they come, you know, their breakfast is cooked, their morning and afternoon teas are cooked, their dinners are cooked, their nighttime meals are cooked. Like, everything is absolutely done for them because it’s not just about learning when you’re there; it’s about the connections that you make both short- and long-term.
But it’s equally about giving those entrepreneurs, and specifically those moms, too, who don’t get a lot of sleep and rest, to be able to have self-care, and equally to be able to work on their business for four days versus working in their business as so many entrepreneurs just do, especially in those startup phases. And it’s high touch point. So I’ve got two different creative sessions because I also think people, even though we’re super creative, as entrepreneurs, naturally like we stopped doing arts and crafts at a particular age. We stopped just allowing ourselves just to have a creative energy and flow. So I’ve got two high creative sessions that happen there. I also rent a boat on one of the nights and we’ve got this, you know, theme party that we have.
And then there’s downtime and then there’s time with the speakers and then we also break into mini masterminds, so that everyone has an opportunity to work on a specific one to two problems over the days to get insight and help from those experts, but equally their peers to be able to help move them forward. And then the last day is all about mindset and preparing them for the next 12 months and equally allowing them to plan out the next 12 months, which a lot of businesses, you know, “I don’t have time to do that,” they’re kind of flying by the seat of their pants. So that’s why I really wanted the four days and three nights so that we can make it a really immersion type experience and experience that again, just didn’t focus on learning, but allowing the self care and creativeness and all those fun things to flow.
Adam Force 28:28
I love it. That sounds really cool. I mean, it makes me start thinking if one of my favorite places is Costa Rica, and my wife and I go there all the time. And I’m just like, man, I would love to, like rent out just an amazing spot, like near the beach and just do these, like incredible masterminds where everyone’s got their defense down and likw, we’re just in a really good environment and you can just kind of, kind of really have those epiphanies, you know, it sets up that setting.
Angela Henderson 28:54
It does and you should see like some of the aha moments like it’s funny. One of the touch points that I do is I’ve actually not…It was yesterday, actually here in Australia, I rang all 50 attendees that are coming. So I spent two hours literally picking up the phone and calling every single person. Now, not everyone picked up the phone because God forbid you get on the phone and speak to people if you don’t recognize the number that’s coming up. But I had some really great conversations with those attendees that I did get through to. And one of the things that came through is, I can’t wait to learn from the speakers. And I said to them, I said, you might want to be surprised because the majority of aha moments probably won’t come from the speakers.
And they go, Well, what do you mean, you guys are the experts and I said, trust the process, allow it to happen, because what happens is, is when you’re able to let your guard down and do those experiences, creativity just kind of happens and people get to just be in the moment and be present. And the aha moments aren’t what they expect that they’re going to be. So I would say if you did something in Costa Rica, something similar would happen. Like, when we were at Chris Ducker’s event, it was when we were in the pool, drinking mojitos and playing beach volleyball, right, is when the moments like, Oh yeah, I could do that. And then you’re like, Okay, you have great and then you just carried on; it was really quite magical when those moments would come.
Adam Force 30:07
Yeah, I love that. You know, and people talk about like shower thinking and stuff like that. It’s the moments, you know, where you’re just walking and or inactivity and you’re not thinking about the situation where these epiphanies will most likely happen. And I love your pool moment. That’s cool.
Angela Henderson 30:26
Yes, well, let me know if you do a Costa Rica, because I’m always about connecting with new people. So if you do do that, keep me posted. I’m looking at actually doing a mastermind over in Colombia next year with — I could never say his name correctly — Ron Reich. Looking at the Colombia one next year. So [unintelligible] I could be a first person signing up.
Adam Force 30:51
Awesome. Yeah, well, definitely. I mean, I think when we get in the right place at the right time, we’re going to do stuff like that. Hopefully in like 2021 most likely would be a good year for that. So we’ll definitely keep you in mind as we get to those steps and we’ll close out this — I got my new closing question I want to ask that I’ve been asking people like Blake Mycoskie and Nasreen and stuff like that. And this is just a chance to really say like you’ve had all this experience, you’re pursuing things you want to pursue. And so if there was one, if you had the world’s ear right now, right, and you were able to tell them a very important message, what would that one message be that you would want to share with people?
Angela Henderson 31:32
Sure, my message would be is eight people take their lives every single day here in Australia, it’s almost 3000 people every single year that die in Australia due to suicide. And for me the message that I would want to get across to people, whether or not it’s you, a family member or friend, or etc, is if you broke your leg, you’d go to the hospital, if you had a heart attack, you would go to the hospital. If you broke your arm, you would go to hospital. If you needed glasses, you would go to the eye doctor and get the glasses. If you are feeling down or anxious or suicidal, or any or that go to the doctor and get the help that you need because that health is just as much there as it is for those that need the heart of you know, heart surgeons, or the eye doctors etc. and that there are people ready to help you
It might not feel like it. If you’re friend and you don’t know what to do, you could suggest taking them to the doctor, going with them. Here in Australia, we have a thing called a mental health care plan where you can get 10 psychology sessions for free. If you go to your regular family doctor and get your mental health care plan. There are different avenues that are available in any country to be able to help you with your mental health because eight people every single day which is much higher in the United States and Canada just because your population so much bigger — eight people a day is eight people too many.
Adam Force 32:49
Amazing. Yeah, that is a staggering number. And it’s a whole other interview to talk about why they feel that way. Listen, thanks a lot, Angela, appreciate everything you’re doing and sharing your insights around the retreats, the consulting and the ecommerce. Really great stuff. Keep up the good work. Appreciate your time.
Angela Henderson 33:10
No worries. Have an awesome day, Adam.
Adam Force 33:12
You, too.
Announcer 33:13
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Transcribed by https://otter.ai
