Joanna Newton: [00:00:00]
Joanna Newton: . Today's episode is going to be a chatty one. Michelle and I haven't caught up in a while with what's going on in our lives outside of the podcast, so we thought we would do [00:01:00] it live with all of you listening. So if you're interested in learning more about our personal lives, our professional lives, what's happening in our day-to-Day, then.
Joanna Newton: Stay tuned. Michelle, I'd love to kick it off to you to get started, 'cause I know you've had a lot going on in the past couple days. You've shared some of that on your Instagram, but I'd love to kind of know what's going on with you.
Michelle Pualani: My personal life has been. A dichotomy of everything is amazing and also not so much at the same time. Like everything in my life I'm so grateful for. There's so much happening with my partner and my personal life and how I'm feeling and fitness, and it feels like everything is really going great. But I did get some health news in the past six months to a year that has definitely been affecting the way that I'm showing up.
Michelle Pualani: In my life, and especially in my business, and so on. This platform, we talk about prioritizing you in business and life, you. Are not your business technically, like you are a fully formed [00:02:00] person. You have relationships, you have value, you have worth, you have all of these things about yourself, interests, wants, desires that are not necessarily tied to your business, but you show up to your business as a reflection of your personal life.
Michelle Pualani: A lot of what's happening sometimes is how you can show up in your business, especially if you're a personal brand. So I think it's important to talk about the two and really understand how they relate to one another, and when you have to think critically about how you're either differentiating between the two or how you're bringing them.
Michelle Pualani: Into cohesion and making it a cohesive, synergistic relationship. So with everything that's been going on with me, I feel like it's been a lot of highs and lows. Like there are a lot of times where I'm just like so tippity top like I am at the height of my gratitude, my excitement, my energy, my joy, and I'm just living this abundant, wonderful mindset of like.
Michelle Pualani: Gosh, I'm so lucky. I'm so blessed. I have all of these wonderful things going on, and then there are times, of course, when [00:03:00] things dip and that happened to me this week on Monday what happened that set it all off was that I had a follow-up call canceled because the nurse practitioner called in sick.
Michelle Pualani: Totally fine. That happens. It's no big deal. Canceled. Okay. I get on to rebook it. We can't book you again until end of February, and that's when I lost it. Like tears, frustration, anger, and I like to think that I handle things in a cool, calm, collected manner, but for whatever reason. This really just set me off with everything that has kind of been leading up to this point.
Michelle Pualani: So if you backtrack, just about a year ago and over the past couple years, I've been navigating hormonal fluctuations and changes issues with my fertility. So I'm not trying to get pregnant right now, but My period has been inconsistent, and so it has been five weeks, seven weeks, and then it started to be longer, and it's just not consistent.
Michelle Pualani: It's not regular. There can be a lot of things that impact that and your cycle and your hormone health, but for me, [00:04:00] this has been noticeable. Along with some other things that were coming up for me, skin health, digestive health, sleep, and these fluctuations in my overall wellbeing when I felt like I was living a pretty quote unquote healthy lifestyle.
Michelle Pualani: And so when that started happening, I started getting tests. So lab results done for blood work on hormone levels, on stress levels and cortisol on vitamin levels and deficiencies and everything else. And so we started getting this information back. And that included high prolactin levels, high bioavailable testosterone, high DHEA and high growth hormone.
Michelle Pualani: And so we tried a couple lifestyle things in the beginning just to see if that was it, but they didn't decrease. So with the continued markers on my blood results or on my lab panel, we started to go the root of MRI. So. I did a pelvic MRI to get started and kind of figure it out what might be happening there.
Michelle Pualani: There may be some things indicative of PCOS, but it's not super major right now, [00:05:00] and that's kind of being managed. Okay. So we do a pituitary gland, MRI. So we do a brain MRI, which by the way, have you ever gotten an MRI, Joanna?
Joanna Newton: I have never gotten an MR. I never.
Michelle Pualani: I had never gotten an MRI before. It was totally new to me. It was. like full body. Very interesting. So they focus on a certain part of your body, right? But you have to lay down and they put you into this big tube, and then it makes these noises like. But like really loud. I don't know if that's the exact noise.
Michelle Pualani: I can't say tonality wise, but something like that. And it's, it's, it's very loud, so it's kind of an interesting experience. You're just kind of like breathing. They do give you earplugs, but it's not exactly a calming experience.
Joanna Newton: Does it take a long time?
Michelle Pualani: it does. I don't know exactly the length of time that it takes.
Michelle Pualani: Maybe 30 minutes or so, but they have to do a couple different things and there's like width or without contrast. And the contrast is this thing that they put [00:06:00] into your veins, so they put it into your bloodstream. I think it's your bloodstream. I'm, I'm almost a hundred percent sure it's your bloodstream, but it shows up differently in the scan.
Michelle Pualani: I don't know what it does. I'm not a medical. Professional in any way, shape, or form, but it's really interesting. So, so I get the MRI, my pituitary gland. I hadn't really thought about it at the time, but the technician actually asked me, oh, do you have headaches? And I was like, actually, yeah, I have started consistently getting headaches recently and hadn't thought to pair the two together.
Michelle Pualani: I was just thinking, okay, this is more of an internal thing with my hormonal levels and everything else, but I started being symptomatic sometime last year. So in terms of the MRI schedule, I was supposed to get it done earlier and then I had it booked out and then it got canceled because they had to get some parts for the machine.
Michelle Pualani: So it pushed my MRI back actually until the end of November, November 28th, and I get the results right away. Like they're pretty good about that in terms of the MRI. So I got to log into the portal, and so I saw that there was something called [00:07:00] a pituitary adenoma. Which I have no idea about. So of course I Googled it and tried to figure out like, what is this thing?
Michelle Pualani: So it's a benign tumor that grows in the pituitary gland and can affect your hormones. So essentially there can be tumors that you find out about that have no symptoms. It's not changing your hormone levels, like there's nothing happening there. But this particular one is causing the elevated hormone levels and everything that I've been going through.
Michelle Pualani: Okay. Thank goodness. Now we know. So then I expected to get a call from my practitioner didn't Okay. Reach out to them. They can't book anything until January 22nd, which is. Two months later after I've gotten the MRI. Okay, that's fine. I will wait. And so that's why come January 22nd when my appointment got canceled, I just kind of lost it because I'm sitting in this place of not knowing, which I think we've all been there and I'm sure, Joanna, you can completely relate to this of feeling like there's something [00:08:00] wrong with you.
Michelle Pualani: Knowing then, okay, something is happening and then having to wait for the medical system to respond.
Joanna Newton: I think it's actually really interesting. Neither of us have really talked in depth about what we've both been dealing with medically, and we're both dealing with really, Difficult causes. Like when you have a cold, you go to the doctor, you maybe you have a virus, they give you an antibiotic.
Joanna Newton: you move on with your, your life. But when your body's like just not working properly, that's a really hard thing to do. And, I've shared on the podcast before that I. deal with something called ITP, which means my blood platelet counts are lower than normal, and I spent a year in and out of doctors having to advocate for myself, tell them to test for certain things, like literally be on top of my doctors to help me. Get better for a year and made zero progress, which is so frustrating to put so [00:09:00] much time and energy into something while also feeling bad. So like for almost a year I had joint pain. I was super fatigued, not feeling well, and it just is crummy and, to also not feel like there's There's any action items, there's anything you can do.
Joanna Newton: There's not a plan or anything going like that. And, towards the end of the year, my doctors wanted to get me on a new drug, a new drug for me, not a brand new drug for the world. And let me tell you, the process of getting specialty medication is just. Horrendous. It took about two to three months for my insurance to approve giving me the medication. It took a couple of months for that. I had to constantly call my doctor. Did you submit the appeal? Did you do the paperwork? Did you do the thing? Did you do that? Like I had to advocate for myself in the process. oh, you'd end up on tears on the phone because you'd be calling, [00:10:00] you'd be sent to this person, to that person, all of that. So I finally get approved for this medication, and it turns out the medication, even with my insurance, is gonna cost $4,000 a month.
Michelle Pualani: That's ridiculous. I'm sorry. Like I am all about abundance and financial health and like, yeah, okay. Making things work. And when people come to me and they tell me, oh, it's too expensive for my, my exercise thing, you know, it's like a few hundred dollars or I can't get meal prep delivery service because it's too expensive or whatever.
Michelle Pualani: This is too, that is outrageous. And that is a crime. $4,000 a month for a medication.
Joanna Newton: For a medication, right? absolutely insane. And so it's $4,000 a month. And that's because specialty medications like. Your insurance doesn't cover them in the same way like they do other medications. So my doctor's like finally got approved. It's gonna be $4,000 a month. That's all I got. okay. So then I'm like, okay, how am I gonna do this? I'm gonna take a step back because. [00:11:00] Previously I did learn there was a foundation that allows you to apply to get the medication fully covered or up to a certain amount a year. So I had applied for that foundation.
Joanna Newton: Never heard back. So I called a specialty pharmacist who my doctor's like, it's $4,000 a month call the specialty pharmacist. I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't spend $4,000 a month. I guess I just have low blood platelets and joint pain for the rest of my life. Like, I don't know this, this is my life. so I talked to the specialty pharmacist and he is like, well, have you applied at the foundation? And I'm like, yeah, I have applied at the foundation. And he's like, well. Almo, they approve almost everyone as long as you're meet these requirements, which I meet the requirements, and I'm like, but I haven't heard back. So he is like, here's the number for the foundation. Call them. So I called them and they had told me that they had been calling my doctor for very specific information and my doctor had taken a month and not called them back. I can't make this up.
Michelle Pualani: This is ridiculous. This is the thing about [00:12:00] systems like this that just make me so angry.
Joanna Newton: So angry and, and as a side note, in the meantime, between when it was $4,000, I guess, like the pharmacist reran it and it got down to a thousand dollars a month, feel like I could have figured out how to make a thousand dollars a month work if that was like life changing, but still that's a lot of money.
Joanna Newton: Also, on top of that, what I'm paying, I, you know, as a self-employed person, I'm paying fully for my insurance on my own. Like I pay for my family a good amount of money a month already in insurance. This was gonna be a big extra amount, but maybe I could have figured that out. But anyway, I got on the phone. I was on the phone with the foundation for about two and a half hours because their phone lines weren't working, and I would get disconnected, and then I'd have to call back and I'd have to reread all the HIPAA stuff every single time. So that was really fun. But anyway, I managed to get the medication for $0. Which is[00:13:00]
Joanna Newton: fantastic,
Michelle Pualani: amazing. Wonderful.
Joanna Newton: But here's the really interesting thing. It gets even more interesting in the meantime. I had, I think in early December, done some tests with a functional medicine doctor and those results came back and found that. There could be a different underlying root cause to where my ITP is coming from.
Joanna Newton: So my doctors came to the conclusion that this is just how your body is. We don't know why there's no known root cause. The functional medicine doctor found some things related to digestive health that she thought could make a difference. So I am in the process of following her recommendations. Started like a complete diet change, taking certain supplements. I'll be starting some new SU supplements next week. We're doing things in phases, but for the first time, one week following her recommendations for the first time, my blood platelet counts [00:14:00] went up by themselves without medication.
Michelle Pualani: Whoa, based on the diet changes that you made from this functional practitioner.
Joanna Newton: Correct. Just the diet changes. We, I hadn't started the, any of the supplements yet. it's only been like two and a half weeks really, actually. because I get my blood platelets count every single week. They went up and then they went up again. I'm trending upward I'm only. A portion of the way through her recommendations. 'cause we're we're phasing through different supplements to like fix what could be going on. You know, in my gut that could be the actual root cause of what's happening to me. Basically, my body's trying to fight an infection in my gut that it's just not doing on its own and it got stuck.
Joanna Newton: That's the simplistic version of what she thinks is happening. Now, this could not be the only thing that's happening, whatever, but I'm seeing improvements. This other vein, which is amazing and I hope that I keep, you know, going up. I did get my $0 $4,000 [00:15:00] medication. It's in my cabinet, but I'm gonna wait to start it since I'm upward trending, I'm gonna hold off and, and wait and see what's happening.
Joanna Newton: But I think if you're not feeling great, I think the point is like. Seek, yes, seek a medical medical doctor. Talk to those people. But I felt like my doctors were telling me, you know, we just wanna keep your blood platelet counts above 50,000. They didn't care about my fatigue. They didn't really care about my like joint pain.
Joanna Newton: They didn't care about my life quality. And I was like, I'm too young. To just be like, I'm gonna be tired and my body's gonna hurt all the time. I'll also add, even though my platelet counts are still not fantastic, they're going up. My fatigue is like way better. My joint pain is way better, so the symptoms actually, if I didn't know my blood platelet counts were low.
Joanna Newton: I wouldn't think anything was wrong with me right now.
Michelle Pualani: That's so interesting. So I, you know, come from the health world and I have spent years, we've never gotten into this on the podcast, of course. [00:16:00] 'cause it's not super relevant, obviously, to business as we talk about it on the whole. But I have spent years navigating that health world and doing different things.
Michelle Pualani: So I am a big believer in functional medicine. I'm a big believer in naturopathic solutions, and if you can address something in terms of diet, in terms of lifestyle, in terms of healthier supplementation options as opposed to straight prescription medication, I'm all for it and transparently.
Michelle Pualani: I did Accutane a long, like a long time ago. As an adult in my early twenties, and it completely ruined my gut health and really changed things about my body that I can never get back. So if you're listening and for some reason thinking about doing Accutane dmm me and I advise you not to, and I will tell you why.
Michelle Pualani: So in any case. Beyond that. I did address a lot of diet stuff. I was diagnosed with SIBO at some point, which is small intestinal bacteria overgrowth. I did the testing. I've done multiple, like gut health testing, [00:17:00] things I've addressed my diet. When it comes to ome, V-I-O-M-E, it's like a red light, green light system for food.
Michelle Pualani: I've done different like diet protocol when it comes to whole 30 elimination diets, Ayurvedic cleanse, like all of these. Things, and I'm predominantly gluten-free, dairy-free. for a long time I was lentil free and like legume free and tend to eat a rather healthy diet for the most part, right? from a lifestyle perspective, when it came to working out, like I started.
Michelle Pualani: Working out last year. So 2023 was a really big year for me in getting my like fitness back in order since the pandemic. 'cause I used to teach and coach in fitness and so I was really active in that area. But then the pandemic hit and it just changed that. So last year I started with bar method and I worked my stability up through the first half of the year.
Michelle Pualani: And then I moved into more circuit high intensity training and I've been doing that and I love it. So it's like three to five times a week I train. In that circuit setting and that strength training and cardio and agility and all of these things.[00:18:00] I sleep a predominant amount of time at nine hours, so I sleep a significant amount and I have my stress relief tendency.
Michelle Pualani: So I have all of these things from a lifestyle perspective and what I consider to be dialed in. And that's why over the past couple of years as I feel like my health has declined and like little things in terms of like looking at myself in the mirror, my eyes, my skin, my hair, like these things that I.
Michelle Pualani: Should be based on my very, like prolific green veggie, antioxidant fruits, um, whole foods and protein-based diet that I should be okay. And so I think the tough thing is like when you feel like you're doing the right things and then these markers are off. And so when I first started getting this, like I had to be the one who also insisted on testing my hormone levels and my vitamin levels because I felt like.
Michelle Pualani: Something must be wrong. And it's amazing how much you do have to advocate for yourself, and you also have to have [00:19:00] discernment. A lot of practitioners are going to just wanna hand you something and say, this is what you're gonna do, take this, do this, that advisement, even though coming from a good place isn't necessarily the right place for you and.
Michelle Pualani: Medical professionals. Unfortunately we won't get into the depth of this conversation today, but medical professionals are really trained to prescribe. They are trained on surgery. They're trained in those modalities, they're not trained on nutrition, they're not trained on functional medicine.
Michelle Pualani: They're not trained on how the different parts of the body relate to one another. so there's a huge amount of that lacking in that field. So as I started discovering these things, focusing obviously on the lifestyle aspect, ruling those things out, knowing that those weren't the case. Getting to this place of, okay, you have, an MRI, showing this pituitary adenoma, and then thinking like, okay, well what do I do about this?
Michelle Pualani: It's a benign tumor, which is great. It's not cancerous, and it is theoretically growing relatively slowly, but I am noticing these things [00:20:00] in my life symptomatically, that it's affecting, it's affecting my peripheral vision.
Michelle Pualani: So I'm running into shit more often, stuff. I'm running into stuff more often. I'm hitting things with my hands. I am. Forgetting things that I wouldn't normally forget. There's a lot of like attention and focus things that are related to it, and that's partially related to my sleep because it's affecting my sleep.
Michelle Pualani: over the past few weeks especially, have been getting like five to six hours of sleep and waking up throughout the night, and that is not normal for me. It's not normal for what I need to function at a high capacity. I'm forgetting things. I forgot to publish the podcast. I'm forgetting things and not enjoying the way in which I'm showing up in my life, which is stressful and frustrating.
Michelle Pualani: So when I got that call, the appointment's canceled. You're not gonna be able to meet for another month and a half. I was like, this is ridiculous. So I ended up sending my MRI to a very trusted friend and family member, and she has, she's a doctor, she has a history in these types of things. And so she got on, she took a look at it.
Michelle Pualani: We talked about the symptoms that I've been dealing with, [00:21:00] so she suggested that I meet with an endocrinologist. Well, in order to do that, I have to have a referral out from my primary care physician. So now I'm going through the steps of making that happen. And what that took was actually going into the office and saying, this is my situation.
Michelle Pualani: This is what's showing up on my MRI. This is not something that can wait. It needs to be addressed sooner. So I did get an appointment booked for the next couple of days, which is great. And then hopefully I can meet with my primary care sooner than that and start to deal with this. So what I've also done is started to share with my family. 'cause previously I was just like, oh, I'm just gonna wait until I hear, until I understand what's happening. In order to actually share with my family, let my partner know like what's happening. Because if I don't have any information, there's no reason to like raise concern.
Michelle Pualani: But since I have done that, now they've started like sending me information and they're researching and they're saying like, okay, this is a pituitary gland specialist outta Santa Monica. Okay, we're gonna do these things. So I'm not. Upset about it altogether. It's more just, I wanna know [00:22:00] what's happening.
Michelle Pualani: I want the right information, and I wanna be able to make the decision based off of that instead of feeling like I'm in this place of limbo. So that's kind of where my personal life has been at. We're going to Hawaii soon on vacation, so I'm looking forward to that and just kind of just getting myself to a place where I feel.
Michelle Pualani: Good on a daily basis. Like I know as women, we always have those hormonal things happening. We have those fluctuations. We're gonna have good days, we're gonna have bad days. realistically, I just wanna be in a place where I know that I'm doing the best for my health. I know that I am headed in the right direction, and I know that there's not something else that's feels like it's.
Michelle Pualani: Inhibiting me that I don't have control over. So that's my personal life. Otherwise, dogs are really good. Husband is really good. He just got back from a cider conference up in Portlandia and it's been, it's been overall really good. I'm grateful for my nieces and nephews. My niece turns four this month.
Michelle Pualani: She was born at the beginning of the pandemic. The beginning of Covid. It [00:23:00] blows my mind how rapidly the past four years have gone by, how we've been through so much, and just how everything is evolving and shifting and growing. I.
Joanna Newton: My daughter who's six, she went to her first cheerleading competition this weekend.
Michelle Pualani: Oh my gosh. I saw it on Instagram. That is so cute. Tell us more.
Joanna Newton: She, she was so cute, and I'll tell you, if you would've told me that I was gonna be a chair mom, like. I wouldn't have believed you. Like that is just not something I saw for myself. come on. Like, I also have this thing about like cheerleaders just cheering for the boys and baking them cookies in their locker like that, like that whole cheer culture thing. But May is actually on a, it's a competitive kind of cheerleading league. They don't. Cheer for sports. Not that there's anything obviously wrong with going down that path, but it's very cool because, you know, may is was pretty young in the pandemic, not as young as your niece, but I think [00:24:00] those like one to two years at home made her pretty shy and pretty close to us.
Joanna Newton: So going to activities, doing things like that is, was always a struggle. And she had danced for a while. And stopped. Stopped dancing because she didn't want to be away from us. Like that. Time away from us was really hard, but she decided she wanted to try cheer. And so we were really too late, I guess, to sign up for the town cheering.
Joanna Newton: Apparently they start signups in March for the, you know, summer, fall season where you, the little girls cheer for the little boys playing football and we missed that. But I found this little competitive division where they. They meet for a certain number of weeks and then go to a competition. And and this is the youngest group. It's for four to six year olds. And they practiced for a few weeks, went every week, learned a routine together. their cheer routine was to welcome to New York by Taylor Swift. but we get all ready.
Joanna Newton: We curl her hair, we get to the cheerleading competition, and we walk [00:25:00] in and there's a stage and there's lights and there's screens, and there's all girls walking around in cheerleading outfits costumes, uniforms, cheerleading, uniforms. And she looks at me and she goes, mommy, this is my calling. which was just the sweetest thing ever.
Joanna Newton: Um, and she really wants to go back. She wants to start the next season and, do cheer. And it was, it was actually really fun to be there and watch. And when you're watching the competition, you get to see different age groups. And there were some like 12, 13-year-old girls doing some crazy stunts and tumbling.
Joanna Newton: It was actually really super impressive and for her too. She got to watch the older girls, you know, see what, they're doing, see what she's doing, work with her team. She just absolutely loved it.
Michelle Pualani: That's so wonderful, and having her walk in and say, this is my calling that is just so adorable and so neat. Now, cheerleading is a competitive sport. This'll [00:26:00] date me, but bring it on. I. Blew my mind when it came to cheerleading and like what they go through. So I think it's actually a really interesting, phenomenal sport to be a part of when it comes to dance and tumbling and gymnastics.
Michelle Pualani: It's like a really interesting blend of skills and I think that she'll evolve with those skills over time. I see a lot of. Online social media folks who do those stunts. And I think it's really impressive. And it takes agility, it takes power, it takes strength, it takes trust and relationship building.
Michelle Pualani: And so I There are a lot of positive dynamics that can come out of cheerleading in that experience. So that's really sweet.
Michelle Pualani: Well, as far as professionally, let's get a little update on millennial marketer and see how things are going there for you.
Joanna Newton: so we're having a great year so far. we're continuing to grow, uh, find new clients, find new folks to work on our team. We've been expanding our copywriting team, which has been a lot of fun, bringing new people to help [00:27:00] and write because that's just such an important and time consuming part of a process of a lot of projects. but we're really close. To launching something that's gonna put us in like the next phase of our business, which we're really excited about. I was working on this yesterday and watching all the content and putting it together. for this new thing we're calling, I'm not gonna say what it's called yet 'cause I don't know when we're gonna like, reveal the name of it, but basically what it is, is we're creating video content and trainings to go along with each of our services. So when someone gets a. Webinar funnel and we're building a webinar funnel for them. Not only will we build that funnel for them, but we've created a course to go along with it. That's gonna teach them the skills for any of the portions they need to do themselves, but also help them walk through our process. So it's gonna be a really great way to teach our clients strategy and skills they need, [00:28:00] but also help. Automate our internal processes a little bit more. So it's kind of starts to become this hybrid of like a done for you service and a course meeting somewhere in the middle. And we're building out our webinar funnel course right now, as well as, um, an onboarding course to help walk everyone through the steps that we need done for onboarding to make that experience so much better.
Joanna Newton: And I'm excited about it because. One, I think it's gonna help us just provide even better service to our clients. There's so much more added value to what we do. That starts, I know we've talked on this podcast about figuring out how to do less trading time for money, right? Like, how can we stop doing that?
Joanna Newton: that's moving us into that direction of not just trading time for money. Because a lot of those videos would have been one-on-one calls with clients. And not that we won't have one-on-one calls with clients, but we can say, [00:29:00] watch that video and then let's get right to talking about your specific situation versus having to go back and do that teaching. So we're gonna be able to spend, Likely a lot of fewer face-to-face hours with clients because they have this great instructions available to them, and then they're using their one-on-one time with us or anyone on our team more wisely because they're, properly prepared for it. So I think this is gonna really help us scale our business faster, um, and take on more clients as we build out these systems that are, are better for them.
Joanna Newton: And I'm actually doing a. In a couple of weeks to fill more for that portal. So we're just creating more and more content for it.
Michelle Pualani: Such a powerful tool to be able to offer your clients and within the services that you do. Not only are you focusing on the automation and the systems, which enables you as a business owner to free up more of your time, more of your energy, more of your mental space, but I have to [00:30:00] say. In the past when I have done programs or gotten into courses or done offers and the coaching calls are specifically geared around teaching or the one-to-one calls are specifically geared around teaching.
Michelle Pualani: It feels like a waste of time and energy. I don't wanna get on a one-to-one call. I don't wanna carve out time in my schedule. Get on a Zoom and learn how to do something from someone. That's not what I'm there for. I'm there to be individually guided. I wanna talk about the things that are, like you said, uniquely specific to me, where I am, what my needs are, what's going on in my business, what's going on in my mental space in terms of blocking me from doing that thing that I'm supposed to do.
Michelle Pualani: A lot of coaching conversations go that way, right? A lot of people know what they're supposed to do, but just aren't doing it. So a lot of that coaching is helping them to actually do that thing, or maybe clarifying something that they didn't understand from the videos. But I think freeing up that time and energy for both the [00:31:00] client and the service provider is super helpful and really important.
Michelle Pualani: I think that's gonna be really powerful for millennial marketer, and I'm excited to see you guys take that to the next level and the next step I.
Joanna Newton: Yeah, it's really exciting and when you think about it, when you're a service provider of any sort. There's a whole bunch of information that is the same regardless of the particular client situation. So if you are teaching health and wellness, if you are teaching someone a very particular business or sales skill, there's so much stuff that you'd likely just repeat over and over again to individuals. that stuff that no matter what kind of service provider Having resources, having video content, having prerecorded things that are like, oh, you wanna learn about that here, here you go. We don't need to talk about it for an hour. I don't need to talk at you for an hour about this. You watch this thing that I've done and then come back to me with questions.
Joanna Newton: And actually in, in education, in the [00:32:00] education world, that's called like the flipped classroom model where they talk about. Instead of lecturing students in class time, give them the materials to learn on their own, and then when they come to class, we're gonna practice. We're gonna discuss, we're going to apply, right?
Joanna Newton: We're not gonna just sit, sit here and watch me lecture you, because that's a waste of everyone's time.
Michelle Pualani: I think that this brings up the conversation of how digital products are so important at so many different levels. They really give you space, time, and freedom. With a lot of what you're doing, whether you are just one-to-one, whether you're in the group setting, whether you are creating content on a larger scale, just from an audience building perspective, you have the opportunity to next level, educate people, connect with people, and really translate what it is that you know, what is it, what it is that you're skilled at, your information, your knowledge at that level, and then be able to [00:33:00] dive.
Michelle Pualani: Deeper with additional support. We were just actually having this conversation in my next level coaching membership. One of the participants and business owners brought this question is essentially, how do I add a VIP option onto what I already deliver for my customers at this time? Perhaps they have a membership, perhaps they have a course, perhaps they have something that's at like your initial or mid ticket entry level and you wanna add additional revenue to your business, and you're trying to figure out how to do that at a VIP level.
Michelle Pualani: Well, one is you look at what you're doing already. and seeing if there's anything in the one-to-one or the small group, or the one to many model that you're doing over and over and over again. Okay. Systematize, automate that, record it and get it to them so that they can access it without your actual time and energy.
Michelle Pualani: then two, once you have that baseline structure, once you have something that you're already delivering to someone, how can you maybe add on that [00:34:00] little piece of. Communication that's really gonna be beneficial to them, but maybe not take so much of your time, whether that is Voxer contact or whether they can submit something for review, where you don't have to be on a, a phone call or a Zoom call.
Michelle Pualani: You just look at it on your own time when you are working, send them back a loom or send them back an audio or send them back. Whatever description makes sense for you. These little ways are really great opportunities to see how you can add to the bottom line of your business, improve the experience for your customer or consumer, and continue to grow and scale your business.
Michelle Pualani: I think it's a really great way to approach what it is that you're doing and looking how you can enhance that experience.
Joanna Newton: and I'll add to that piece too, another added benefit of doing that, of doing what we're doing with millennial is. Quality control and training of new employees. So imagine when we have all of this built out and I bring on a new copywriter, I can say this is our webinar funnel [00:35:00] system. Go watch it Your role is the copywriter role. then I'm not sitting on a call training them. And then they have very clear expectations of their job and, and what my job, what the client's doing, what they're doing by watching it from the client's perspective. They watch through the system, they hop on me with a call, we talk through any questions, they're ready to go.
Joanna Newton: They're trained, So you can also use these materials to train and grow and scale your team. I don't know how many times any of you have ever started a new job, but. You get to a new job. Most new jobs don't have really good training. you are lucky if you have a couple of calls with someone telling you what to do and mostly like you're on your own figuring it out.
Joanna Newton: Imagine if you went to a new job and you actually had for that first, you know, that first week. You never know what to do with yourself. You're not sure what to do. You're waiting for your boss to. Tell you what to do, and it's super awkward. If you had a video catalog that talked about the company culture, the experiences, even if you had [00:36:00] training videos for your customers, the person could watch those and learn everything that they needed to know about the company.
Joanna Newton: So digital content and digital resources have so many uses, right? Like you can sell them, you can monetize them, but you can also utilize them to just make your business better overall.
Michelle Pualani: Beautiful. I love it. Yep. That's exactly a great way to go about leveraging what it is that you've done and being smart about it and noticing that. This takes time. It takes effort. You have to be able to pull back from the services from what you're doing on a daily basis to be able to think strategically about this.
Michelle Pualani: But you make the time, you make the space, and you know what? It's gonna save you time, energy, and resources across the course of your business in the trajectory of what it is that you're doing as you scale and grow. So I know if you're thinking to yourself, I don't have the time for that. I don't even know how to get started.
Michelle Pualani: I don't know what I'm doing when it comes to that. Well, obviously you can reach out to us. You can join the Her First Collective in our Facebook group. You can ask these questions where we speak [00:37:00] openly about it. It's a complimentary group that you can get feedback directly from either Joanna or myself or other business owners who are experiencing similar challenges or setbacks.
Michelle Pualani: So awesome. I love it. I'm so excited to see Millennial Soar this year.
Joanna Newton: And I'd love to pivot a little bit because I know you are very busy with TBH and have a lot going on. Lots of things, but it's in a completely different realm than both of us normally live in because it's a physical product. Do you have any updates and things you wanna share about how all of that's going?
Michelle Pualani: Yeah, absolutely. I have to say again, transparently that it's been challenging. And balancing. Both businesses, right? It's been challenging thinking about my personal brand, introducing this new offer, this new product, while also focusing on TBH. I think that I'm gonna take the time on our trip to actually really invest into Michelle Pulani, set up the systems that I wanna have for this new smaller product, and then really just focus on [00:38:00] traffic from there.
Michelle Pualani: 'cause I can do the traffic, the content creation that makes sense to me. It's easier to implement in my schedule, but sometimes when I'm like. Building something out. I go back and forth a little too much. So I will say I feel like I'm a little scattered in my schedule and I'm really working on solidifying that and nailing it down.
Michelle Pualani: TBH, to be honest, beverage company is going wonderfully. It is growing at a really reasonable rate. It's not like booming too quickly, which obviously sales could always be better on that front. And then that being said, you also don't want to grow beyond your. Potential from the very get go that can also really have a business come crashing down.
Michelle Pualani: Again, another coaching, call that I was in had this conversation of, you know, she was aiming, I think for 50 new members in her product and program online, and she got a hundred members and she kind of had a little bit of like a, a, a reaction. Nope, that's not gonna work for me. Sometimes we don't realize the limitations [00:39:00] that we put on ourselves.
Michelle Pualani: based on our growth and our ability to reach a certain level. Because we need to overcome or go through something a little bit different in order to get there. So I think that to a certain degree, I'm holding myself back a little bit with, to be honest, because I don't want to hit a level where I'm completely overwhelmed.
Michelle Pualani: you know, we only have about 250 bottles left of this first batch, if all of those sold tomorrow, then I need to ship out 250 bottles. Like that's a lot. And it's. A lot of things that I don't wanna do and just be completely overwhelmed with someone was just sharing with me that this pie company had gotten on this television show and it just.
Michelle Pualani: Blew up, which is great, but then they immediately had to bring in all of their family members, all of their friends, and as many people as they possibly could in order to fulfill orders. Again, a good problem to have, but is that what you want for your growth and your trajectory? So. In any case, just something to think about.
Michelle Pualani: So with the physical product, things are going really well. I just went to an event in Santa Monica. [00:40:00] I made a lot of connections with some bigger names in the industry that I definitely look up to, and that have been doing really good things in the non ALK space. And so making those connections and potential collaborations for the future are a really wonderful way for me to network as we're getting started and as we're growing.
Michelle Pualani: you know what it also made me realize is that there's so much about this industry that I do not know. Like I feel like I've been in business for a long time. My husband has been in business for a long time, so there are a lot of things in the business world, Brick and mortar online that we get, that we understand. There's lingo, there are different things that we look out for KPIs like we think differently than your traditional nine to five employee. We talk differently. I know that we approach things differently, but being at this event made me realize there's so much to learn about this new industry that I'm getting into, not in a bad way.
Michelle Pualani: What I'm really actually trying to do right now is to celebrate and honor and acknowledge that I don't know everything, and that's okay. That it's actually [00:41:00] a more exciting for me and I can bring more passion when I don't know. Everything makes me think of that music thing. That's like more passion, more passion, more footwork, more footwork, more energy, more energy.
Joanna Newton: I love that you just did that.
Michelle Pualani: so yeah. So it's making me realize there's so much to learn, but that we're also doing really well. Like our table display when we go to markets, when we go to events is really refined our product. Is top notch. You know, I went to an event, we were drinking all day. We went to a zero proof bar at night in Chinatown, la, and the comparison of the products that we were having made me feel like we are right in there with everyone else and.
Michelle Pualani: Giving people that elevated experience of drinking without the effects of alcohol. And so it really solidified our mission, our vision, our intention, and what we are doing in a really positive way. So I'm really grateful for the event. I'm really grateful for everything that's happening [00:42:00] right now. We have consistent orders coming through.
Michelle Pualani: We have restaurant partners that we've signed up, and so. People are getting to consume the product in a live drinking bar environment as well as in their home. And the really cool thing about this is that the way that we've cultivated the brand is something that I'm gonna continue, I think to speak to at a larger business level.
Michelle Pualani: Because independent of the business that you have or that you are starting the brand and the presentation of what you're doing is so important. It's so important, especially based on how you plan to get. Customers. Joanna and I have talked about different models of gaining clients, whether that is direct outreach, right?
Michelle Pualani: The communication where you're going out to people, you're emailing, you're DMing, you're trying to gain and muster up sales that way, getting in front of other people's audiences, whether that's guests on our podcasts or whether we are being guests. On other people's platforms, getting into other people's memberships, presenting to their audiences, [00:43:00] growing in that front.
Michelle Pualani: Whether you are running ads or doing paid media, or whether you're doing organic brand awareness, there are all these opportunities to get in front of people and. You have to be conscious about the way that you're presenting yourself, whether that's language in an email, or whether that's your caption, or whether that's your video, or whether that is your podcast and you're just in that audio presence is being mindful of what that brand awareness is and how you're cultivating the perception how you're cultivating the way in which other people see you. And what we've been able to do in my mind, and the feedback that we're getting from customers, community members, and anyone who's paying attention to the product is, wow, this is a beautiful brand. I wanna try it just based off of the content alone.
Michelle Pualani: Oh my goodness. I feel like it's so luxurious. There's just this sense of attraction that happens with the [00:44:00] brand and the way that we've cultivated the type of products that we wanna present to the community, and Obviously we're trying to back that up with a really high quality product that people enjoy and love to consume, and that way there'll be repeat customers.
Michelle Pualani: But in order to bring people into us, we have been really, really intentional about the brand that we've created, and I think that's really important to talk about and think about for yourself as an in a personal brand. As an agency, as a physical product, as a digital product, service, whatever that is, I think that people are gonna buy into that brand of who you are and how you're showing up in a really big way.
Michelle Pualani: And that's been demonstrated in even the fact that we've gotten launched in the past few months. People really feel like it's already a big brand, that it's already a big business and they're excited to be a part of it. So I think that everything's going really well on that front. We're excited to continue to grow.
Michelle Pualani: I think that 2024 is gonna be a big launch year for us. I think that we have a lot of [00:45:00] opportunity in the future to get even bigger. You know, I'm looking at people like Three Spirits and they just finished $3 million round of funding for their next evolution and growth path. And we are bootstrap company with like only in the, you know, tens of thousands of discussion in terms of launching and getting started.
Michelle Pualani: And so we are small now, but I'm really, honoring and celebrating exactly where we are, acknowledging that we may be small right now, but that's okay because we may be a multi, not just a multimillion dollar company, but this company and product and potential has the chance to be huge. And it may be someday, and that's gonna be great too when we get there.
Michelle Pualani: Every single step along the way, I really wanna celebrate and I wanna be present for, and I want to enjoy and not compare myself to someday or not like compare myself to where other people are on their process.
Joanna Newton: You shared so many good things. I'm so excited for all you've accomplished with TVH so far and [00:46:00] everything that's to come. But one thing I wanna pull out and kind of highlight for those listening is that you shared that. You have so much to learn, right? You're building this company with a product and you know, there are things you have to learn.
Joanna Newton: And I think so many times I hear people say, or I've said to myself I will start the thing when, when I know enough, when I have, when I'm smart enough, when I've achieved a certain thing. If you start, you're going to answer all of the questions. Now, if you start with a mindset of I know everything, you're probably actually not gonna grow.
Joanna Newton: That would be bad. But if you just start say, I'm gonna do this thing. I'm gonna go down this path. I'm going to read the books I need to read. Talk to the people that know more than me, do my research. Take one step at a time, do it. By the end, you will be an expert in that thing and that's great. I remember when I.
Joanna Newton: First started, like social media freelancing. I didn't feel like I had the right to sell [00:47:00] myself as an expert, which is like funny because I ran social media accounts for brands. It's not like I didn't do it, but I looked at other people doing it and thought they're so much better or smarter or no more than I do. But then as I started actually digging into some of those people's content, I was like, oh, I know that. I know that. I know that. Oh, that's something I didn't know, but now I know it. Now I know it. So going into it thinking, yeah, I don't know everything, but I don't have to know everything. I have to be willing to learn, I have to have some sort of skill, you know, baseline knowledge to run with, but like, I'm gonna learn it as I go.
Joanna Newton: I'm gonna figure it out and to not just think down on what you don't know, right? But like, really be confident in what you do know, and then your ability to learn and grow.
Michelle Pualani: Yeah, absolutely. And I think this is such a great thing to highlight because in the content creation, in the online business space, In the creator economy, we have a huge sense of imposter syndrome, self-doubt. These feelings that we can't do it, we don't know enough [00:48:00] yet. We're not skilled enough, we're not experienced enough, whatever it is. There's something that Rachel Rogers said recently that.
Michelle Pualani: Stuck out to me that we have, to discern for ourselves this difference between qualified and experienced. Just because you are not experienced doesn't mean that you're not qualified, and a lot of times we're not giving ourselves enough credit for even the experience that we do have. Right. The experience that you had, Joanna, in running large social media accounts for brands, I've run a lot of people's social media accounts.
Michelle Pualani: Do I think that I'm skilled or qualified enough in social media? I question that all the time, but you know what? I've done it and successfully and pretty well for most people. Also, when I see what other people deliver, I'm always disappointed. So I guess there's that. But realistically is that we have to recognize that we can start at any time.
Michelle Pualani: And a lot of our influencers in the content economy, they started because they were passionate about something. Ali Abdal, Justin [00:49:00] Welsh. Sahil Bloom. And others really started when they were passionate about something and they were learning so much about it.
Michelle Pualani: We have this kind of voracious appetite to learn to grow, we think that we have to get all of the information in order to start when really it's the exact opposite. Once we're. Interested in something once we love an idea, a content topic or anything else. You don't have to say, I'm the expert and authority in this, but you can talk about learning about it.
Michelle Pualani: Hey, I read this book and I pulled out this idea. This is what I think about it. The. Social media space is more about contributing your thoughts and your opinions now than it ever has been before. It's not just a platform for education. It's not just a, here's tips one, two, and three, and this is what you do for X, Y, and z.
Michelle Pualani: That rhyme.
Michelle Pualani: But realistically, it's about bringing who you are, what you think, and how you feel about whatever the content topic is. So being more mindful about that and just being able to dive [00:50:00] in, take the leap, and know that there's plenty more to learn. There's There's plenty more for you to grow in the space, but bring the passion, bring the interest, and bring the excitement of whatever it is that you are interested in
Joanna Newton: Well, this was a lot of fun, Michelle. I feel like we should, Do some completely unplanned off the cuff catch ups more regularly. If this was something you enjoyed, make sure you leave us a review or join our Facebook group and talk about this episode with us. We really appreciate you and have loved kind of just sharing a little bit behind the scenes of what our lives are like.
Thanks for tuning in. Find the link in the show notes to join us in the Her First Collective, a free Facebook group to discuss the podcast, ask questions of our guest experts, and network with a group of female entrepreneurs who value collaboration over competition. Please subscribe, share, leave [00:51:00] a review, and be sure to catch our next episode.
What is one thing you can do today to prioritize you in business and life?
