Andrea Chase Digital Marketing Insights

Nigel Rawlins: Welcome Andrea to the Wisepreneurs podcast. Could you tell our listeners something about yourself?

Andrea Chase: Hi, Nigel. So happy to be here. Thank you for having me. I guess I'll start off with the fact that I've been an entrepreneur for about a decade now, believe it or not, and , didn't end up here. It wasn't really a plan. I guess I'll say that. I think at the end of my university degree studying psychology, somebody had planted this seed in my head that psychology and marketing and business have a really beautiful correlation.

And so that's when that seed was first planted, but I thought, you know what, I want to go explore the world, I want to try my hand in all these different kind of industries. And that's what I did. You know, I went overseas to teach English as a foreign language in South Korea. I, um, carried on with my teaching English career for a few years after that in Canada.

I've worked in hospitality, I've worked in sales, but my true introduction to marketing was when I finished my degree before I went overseas to South Korea, I saw an ad in the newspaper. I guess I'm dating myself, but it was an ad in the local newspaper close to my hometown of Cobourg, Ontario. Shout out.

And they were looking for a post grad intern. There was a post grad internship, excuse me, and they were looking for a young person to come in and help with their fundraising and marketing initiatives. And it was kind of a full circle moment for me because growing up I was very heavily involved in dance and musical theatre, and I had performed on that stage a few times before that, and I thought, well, they're looking for somebody with a business degree, which I don't have at this point in time.

But you know what? I think I would love this. I think I would be a great fit for it. So I applied, I got the interview and I got the job. And after that, I had said to the lady who hired me, out of curiosity, why did you choose me over everybody else? Because I didn't have the educational requirements that you were seeking.

And she said, honestly speaking, we just thought based on your personality and your enthusiasm and your background in theatre, we thought that you would be a great fit for it. So you know what, you're going to have to learn a lot as you go, but that's what this opportunity is about anyway. And so it was a short stint.

I think it was about five or six months. But that's when my love of marketing really, really came to be. So that's kind of a little bit of the background to my introduction to the field of marketing.

Nigel Rawlins: Yes. Now that's an interesting thing because quite a few of the people I have spoken to started out in performing arts. One of the early podcast guests, Jane, was a musician in big musicals. One of the other health coaches used to be a dancer. Another executive coach used to be a dancer, and obviously as they got a bit older, they, you may wanted to have children or something else. Or they could no longer perform. They moved into their second career. So it's quite interesting that performing arts actually brings quite a lot into the business world. And I think it's been underestimated. So going from there, what did you do after you did that? Is that when you started doing the English teaching ?

Andrea Chase: That's right. Yeah, so after that I I just have always had this kind of yearning to explore the world, learn about different cultures and a lot of that probably attests to why I ended up in entrepreneurship, I'm kind of that person that likes to try new things put myself into, you know, situations that maybe I'm unfamiliar with but yes, that's right.

I went over to South Korea and that was a beautiful challenging, wonderful learning experience. And I was teaching English to children, between the ages of six and 13 years old, as well as adults. But one thing I realized was despite having a little bit of experience teaching dance to children, I had never really worked with kids before.

And for me, I like children. But I felt it very challenging, Nigel. I felt it really, really tough. But when I was in the classroom with the adult students, I loved the conversations that we were having. We were having talks about global issues and, you know, the East versus the West mentality and all these really fascinating things.

And I always really enjoyed writing and the English language and that was something I think I did quite well . And then I, I came back, you know, did a bit of traveling in Southeast Asia as a 20 something year old, and then came back to Canada and further pursued teaching English as a foreign language in Canada, in Vancouver, as well as in Ottawa, um, which is close to where I reside now.

Nigel Rawlins: So that's interesting because I think doing different things before you actually get into running a business is very, very important. Learning and development or learning is really, really important. Those sorts of skills I think are important. I'll be honest, I was a elementary school or primary school teacher for 16 years.

Andrea Chase: Oh, wow. Oh, I didn't know that.

Nigel Rawlins: Well, sometimes it's a bit of a problem because when you're teaching young children, it's not very complicated being a teacher. The danger is, you're tending to talk down and, talking at, and when you're working with adults, you can't always tell them what to do,

Andrea Chase: That's true.

Nigel Rawlins: but by having the conversations, I think you can actually do better. And I think that's why it was important that you did go into that adult stuff. Which is good. From there, what made you shift into running a marketing company?

Andrea Chase: . So after, after that, I'd come back to Canada. Was in Vancouver and then eventually moved to Ottawa. And the reason I initially moved to Ottawa was to go back to school. So that little seed that I talked about with business and marketing was still there.

There was still something inside of me that said, I want to know more about the business world. More specifically, I want to know what running a business looks like. And, you know, I'll preface this with, I don't think that you need an MBA or a business diploma or degree to be a business owner. I think the majority of the skills, looking back that I've learned have, of course, I can't discount the education portion, but I think that there's something really to be said by being in the trenches, of learning the hard lessons and growing a business from the ground up. But I did go back to school for two years and I did acquire a business management diploma. More specifically, that was called Small and Medium Enterprise Management back then.

And it's funny because really what it was, was the building blocks to start a business and be an entrepreneur. They've actually since changed the name of the program, I believe, to Business management and entrepreneurship, which I think is quite, uh, appropriate. So I went through that process and I really thrived in that education program.

And after that, I think it was probably a lack of confidence. I knew that I wanted to start a business. I wasn't 100 percent sure exactly what field yet. I had a lot of ideas flowing, as entrepreneurs do. But I had this part of me that thought I wasn't ready. I kept thinking, well, I don't have enough experience to do that, even though I, you know, have a degree and a diploma and I have work experience.

I just felt like, I don't think I had the confidence to jump in head first. So what did I do? I went out and I was looking for work. I was looking for work in sales and marketing in, in business in different capacities, but at that time that I had graduated, we were just coming out of a recession. It was a very bad time to be looking for work.

You know, people were losing their jobs. People were being laid off and I'm out there looking for full time work. Unfortunately, that was, uh, that didn't pan out too well. So what I did was I piecemealed things together. I was working three part time jobs. I was still teaching English privately. I was working for a catering company being, you know, a catering server.

And then I got a job at the YMCA working at the health club, but these things were all okay. I was working really weird hours. I was working almost every day. And then I finally got, uh, through, through, networking with somebody I knew, I finally got a full time role and it wasn't really in business. It was an administrator type of role for a government run, seniors rehabilitative exercise program. And I love working with seniors, but I do not have a background in this, but you know, I have a background working with people. Communication, you know, is one of my stronger skill sets and it was full time. And I thought, well, if I do this, Then I don't have to work the three jobs anymore, um, unless I want to do that.

So I went and I, I worked this full time job and things were going really well. I was managing the entire program, but because it was based on government funding, unfortunately we lost our funding. So about a year and a half into that work I was out of a job again. And at that point, it was a low point, right?

That was, uh, you know, the few months before I was going to get married. This is, you know, me going like, this is the worst time to lose a job. But that part of me inside was going, maybe this is the time to just jump in and start that business. And spoiler alert, looking back hindsight's beautiful. There's no perfect time.

You know, I think the time to jump in is when you have an idea, you know, and you're going to have to learn. It doesn't matter if you wait. It doesn't, I mean, preparation is key, but like I said before, the lessons we learn when we're doing it, those are the best kinds of lessons to be able to get to where we want to go.

So for lack of a better, uh, term, my partner and I married our skill sets together. His in IT and mine in business. And we founded our consulting company, which is Bates Global Incorporated, and we've had that incorporated in Canada since 2011. So you know, we've been in business for over 12 years now, and I'm happy to say it's been obviously a lot of learning lessons, but year after year, we're consecutively growing.

But we're a small business, right? So we have to wear all the hats like small business owners do and learn about all aspects of business. But that really is what my very long answer, I'm sorry, is what catapulted me into owning a company and to where I am today to have a digital marketing suite that is part of our company.

So that's something that I always, from the beginning, I think, wanted to do. But didn't really have the experience maybe yet. So there were some pit stops along the way, right? From the time Bates was, uh, incorporated and founded to today. There's been another company at play as well that unfortunately didn't pan out the way we wanted, but I say that that was my accelerated MBA, that business.

Nigel Rawlins: That is definitely how businesses grow, because basically the business you're talking about is what we call a knowledge based business. It's not like we're constructing something or building something, which is, you know, you can go down any main street now and most of the trades and stuff like that, they're the old businesses and they're still important because we can't do without them.

So looking back at what you're saying there, you went into survival mode by getting the three jobs because, you know, you had to work, you had to bring the money in.

So the Seniors one that was just funded, and this is a problem I guess with a lot of not for profits.

They do get funding and it dies and the people have to go away. That tells us about the precarious nature of some of the work out there. And even if you've got a full time job, it can be precarious. I don't know if we're so much in Australia where they, people get laid off so quickly as they do, I think in America, is that an issue in Canada where people get a job and they can be laid off when things go down.

Andrea Chase: Yeah. There's obviously the labour board here, right? So there is protocol in place and things like that, you know, severance needing to be paid, if you're laid off as opposed to leaving a job or being terminated, that's a different circumstance. It's a little bit of a different ball game with the private sector in Canada versus the public sector.

So, the reason I mentioned the public sector is because me being located close to the capital city of Canada, We consider ourselves a government town. So the latest statistic I read from probably a couple years ago was telling us that about 30 percent of the population in Ottawa works for the federal government.

And so I have friends that work for the feds. I know a lot of people that are that work for the government. Also has a little bit of a unique side on the business end here in the private sector because there's government contracts that we can look at and that is something that we've explored with our consulting company and plan to do more so with True Marketing versus our digital marketing suite as well.

But when you're a public servant and work for the government, there's a lot more red tape to be let go quite suddenly. So it's, I've heard that from many people. I can't say that from experience, but I've heard that from many colleagues, people that I know in the business community that maybe came from that sector.

It's very hard to fire somebody who works for the federal government. Whereas if you're in the public sector, I think it really depends on the company itself. So, I've heard about people being let go, like you know, it's a Friday afternoon kind of thing and unfortunately, sorry this will be your last day, but there's going to be a requirement at that point for them to pay a severance and that's definitely based on your contract and the organization and what's been agreed upon beforehand.

Nigel Rawlins: I think that sort of ties up with that, like Australia, we were part of the Commonwealth. So you've got some English heritage there, whereas I think America is quite different in terms of laying people off. Plus, in America they don't have health care. In Australia, we have free healthcare.

So if we have an accident, you're in hospital and if it's serious, you're operated on straight away, there is no cost.

Andrea Chase: Yeah.

Nigel Rawlins: So, I mean, you can have private insurance, Australia, so, for example, if you do need something done and it's non urgent, then you have to wait. And you could wait for a couple of years, but that's because it's non urgent.

But if it's urgent, it can be almost straight away or overnight,

I think Canada's a bit the same. I mean, you have to qualify. Like, my, my son is in Vancouver, and he's, I forget what they call it?

Andrea Chase: Yeah, like a resident or a permanent resident.

Nigel Rawlins: That gives him health cover.

Andrea Chase: okay. Yeah.

Nigel Rawlins: So he's covered by the Canadian system, which is pretty good. So the reason I was talking about that is it is one good reason to start considering starting your own business. Because if one, if you're in the government and it's really boring and you've had enough and it's driving you mad, it's a good, it's a good way to get out.

And also if you're concerned about the precariousness of your job, it's a good idea to start a business. And the other thing you were talking about was that you actually learn by doing. And now it's interesting because when you're in a marketing business, you learn what you have to do to get more work, create customers and or clients. So tell us some of the things you've learned by being in a business.

Andrea Chase: I think one of the biggest skill sets I've learned is with regards to public relations. So with my former company, Procabi, As well as Bates as well, I have never paid a dime for PR. I'll just throw that out there. I don't think that there's any problem with hiring PR professionals. I think there's a lot of merit to that, but sometimes you don't have the capital for that, right?

And like many things when you're a small business owner, you gotta bootstrap, you gotta figure it out, you know, yourself. And that's one of many types of skill sets I've learned, but I think that's one worth mentioning because if you don't have any branding and you don't have any PR, unless you just have a beautiful word of mouth business or you have clients that are repeat, clientele that you've had for years, it's going to be very hard to prospect new clientele.

And so one of the ways that I think that we can really leverage our PR presence is obviously to share your story. Whether that be through social media or if you can take it a step further, take yourself out of the comfort zone for a moment and get some public speaking gigs, right?

And that's something that I'm still exploring, but I've been very grateful to have that opportunity. And it's not like you just, you know, become a paid public speaker overnight. You've got to pay your dues kind of thing. But I think that people are more interested to hear the story than we maybe give them credit for.

I think everybody has a story to share and it doesn't all have to be about the business, right? People want to hear from real people. I think they want to know about the nitty gritty and they want to hear, if not as much more so, about what didn't work, right? So authentically sharing. Who you are, what got you into the business world, into the industry you're in, what's working, what's not working, what you've learned.

And then I think when you're really open and sharing authentically, that's when you're going to draw in your people. So I think there's a lot to be said about PR. Obviously doing things like this are great too, to up your PR game. You know, getting yourself on podcasts and there are groups out there.

If people are listening to this, there are groups out there, whether that be through LinkedIn or Facebook, believe it or not. I know it's a little bit of a dinosaur, but Facebook, one of the best things I would say about Facebook from my vantage point today is the groups. So there are great groups on Facebook still to this day that are extremely active.

I'm in groups with different women in business. Some of them are in Canada. I'm in some international groups. And some of these groups have like 40, 000 people in them. So, you know, the really beautiful thing about working for yourself is, uh, depending how you, how you structure things, you might be able to connect and work with clients all over the world.

Which would be fantastic. So not to discount that, but all of those things I think are really, really crucial when you're trying to build a business. What else would I say? Another thing I would say for me, I, you know, that's a whole other conversation about Procabi, my, my former company there, but I did not come from the professional driving space.

Like people would look at me sideways, like, what are you doing here? Number one, you're a woman. Number two, you're not 75 years old. Cause it's a bit of the old boys club. So how do you learn to stand your ground in those circumstances? The reality is it's just you got to just kind of put yourself out there sometimes and that's what I did but behind the scenes, what does that look like? This is where the psychology obviously comes to play a bit, right? So I know that as a lot of business owners we face things like burnout That is a very, very real thing because like we said, we are wearing all of the hats. We're doing all of these things by ourselves. And a lot of it's quite mentally taxing, especially if it's things that you're not used to doing or if it's very heavily technology involved and that's not really your strength or something you're used to.

I know that we see this glorification, on social media a lot about what being an entrepreneur is like, you know, private jets and driving luxury cars all the time. And spoiler alert, that is not the reality, right? Like that is a very, very minute percentage of people. And there's people that go into business or become an entrepreneur, and believe it or not, not because of the money, it's more about the freedom and doing what they want to do and filling their day with purpose. But all of this to say, I've really come to identify the strong need to work on your mental stamina and your mental strength to go the distance of business.

And this conversation and this topic is something that I've shared in some conferences online, in some college classrooms and university classrooms. But because I really believe that it is that marathon, not a sprint. You've probably heard that before. And what does that look like, right?

If you, if you run the beginning of that marathon at Mach 1000, you're going to burn out. pretty quickly. So this is a daily practice and that may not be directly related to business, but those are skills that I really believe are super important and go hand in hand with building a company.

Nigel Rawlins: That's the issue in running a business. Uh, it's not just doing the work for a client. You've got to find clients. Then you've got to get paid, and that's the stuff that can keep you up at night. Especially if you've managed to get a big contract with somebody, that's the biggest danger when you're starting out.

It's because then you've got to deliver and that's the one that's going to keep you up at night. I've been running a marketing services company for 25 years now. I am doing far more marketing than I've ever done. It doesn't always lead to clients, but it does lead to some recognition, which is what you're talking about with PR.

And that's work, you know, your Facebook groups. That takes time. You've got to get in there and look at what's going on. If you're going to create some content. If you're running a website, you've got to keep that up to date. Then you've got to meet with clients, this is hugely taxing mentally.

So, if you've let your health go, and this is one of the biggest dangers for the 50 and 60 year olds that I work with, if they're struggling with their health, they've only got so much energy that they can put into something. And unless they've got the expertise that they can charge a big bucks for, it's going to be a hard, hard job.

So let's go back to a typical day with you or maybe a typical week because things have to balance out, don't they? What does a typical week look like for you?

Andrea Chase: Well, I love that question, Nigel, because I have to say no two weeks look the same. So that's one of the beautiful things of many reasons why I love entrepreneurship because it's not okay. Every day looks like this and it's structured the same way. It can. The beautiful, wonderful thing is you structure your own days.

So for myself, um, I'll give you a few things that I'm doing in a given week and I kind of mix it up based on appointments, right? So I'm making my own schedule, but Typically, um, I've got to obviously ensure that we've got our social content ready to go for our own marketing purposes that if we have new contracts or new clientele coming in to be tending to those, be working on marketing plans for those individuals. You know, the whole notion of working in the business and working on the business.

Gotta make time for both of those avenues of things. And working on the business is prospecting, right? There's that sales cycle that you gotta go through. So I spend a bit of time, typically every day, I'm leveraging LinkedIn a little bit more than before because it is more of a professional platform of course, but connecting with people that fuel my fire, women in business, women in tech, it doesn't have to be a woman, you know, I love connecting with business owners and entrepreneurs, men or women, but meeting these different people and growing and nurturing my network.

But not just with the intent of trying to make them into a client, right? Truly looking at who these individuals are and seeing, is there any way that I can help this person? Is there any way that maybe there's something they're doing that I can learn from? So a lot of times for me, just to speak to a little bit about that prospecting networking piece, um, I'm looking to have people in my network and continue to grow my network and fill it with people who are doing things that I want to do.

I want to learn to do and that I have a lot of admiration and respect for. So there's that, right? And that, that part of business growth can be very time consuming. Obviously, like you, like you mentioned, having to keep, um, not just your social up to date, but your website up to date, uh, following up with people is a big thing.

And then we've got to create the content for ourselves and, what does that look like? A lot of times, for us with Marketingverse, we're a fairly new entity, but trying to show clients and potential clients what we can offer. But at the end of the day, the best engagement comes when somebody sees who's behind the company, right?

So we kind of spaced that out and that more speaks to our content strategy and schedule. I've got to make time to create content, write the content, and get in front of the camera or behind the camera and record videos. We've got to write blog posts. Obviously, that's another networking and marketing tool that we're using.

And, the list kind of goes on and on. As far as Marketingverse goes, we are looking to connect with obviously women owned businesses, coaches and solopreneurs, but government is also on our radar. So it's taking time out in a given week to look at government contracts. You know, in Canada, we have a platform called Canada Buy and Sell getting on there and sifting through.

Now, we do get updates, but some of these contracts and RFPs, just to assess whether or not we're eligible, or that if we want to apply or not, that can take me sometimes, depending how long it is, some of these are 90 pages long. Just think, I'm not a very quick reader. I like to read every word and really go through it.

That could take me half a day, depending, right, to really read through these RFPs to see it. Okay, does this make sense to put a whole bunch of more time and energy into that? And then when we are applying for RFPs, that's another task on the to do list, is to work on the RFPs, get your stuff all ready to submit, and those are like I've mentioned, those are very, very time consuming.

So I'm probably missing things. There's obviously the accounting side of things, you know and that's, what's great about having a small but mighty team here. We are a small team, but I always say, you know, we're a mighty team. So we can delegate some tasks a little bit, but those things have to be done on a regular basis, right?

So these are all the things that we're looking at on a regular weekly basis.

Nigel Rawlins: Now, we should just say what an RFP is.

Andrea Chase: A request for proposal.

Nigel Rawlins: Yes. Now that's an interesting thing because if you're going to be chasing government work, it can be good money, but, I don't know if you have the problem we have in Australia, they could delay paying you for quite a while. You can put in a lot of time to prepare for that and then you miss out.

And that's a decision you have to make in, in any business, um, and it depends on your skill. I mean, the ideal is somebody calls you up and say, look, we like your skill, we want to hire you.

Andrea Chase: Yes,

Nigel Rawlins: that's the easiest way, isn't

Andrea Chase: Yeah, it is. That's the dream way, but unfortunately, you know, there's a lot of ins and outs with government contracting. Like you said, there are some things that might not be so favorable, but at the end of the day, you might have a good buyout. One big piece of feedback that we hear a lot when you go to government conferences and stuff like that is the bigger organizations are getting all of the contracts and the little guys are being left out.

Now, I, I can't speak to Australia's government system, but here in Canada, there is an entity Office of the Procurement and Ombudsman's Office, that makes a real strong dedication to it ensuring that the process is done fairly. Right? And so you can actually go through a whole process of filing a complaint if you felt that you were not awarded a contract and that was done so in an unfair manner.

But that's a very long, grueling process to go through something like that. Right? So one thing that we've learned, is sometimes if you partner, with an organization that is maybe already getting government contracts or has a bigger pool of employees, under their umbrella, you may have a better chance.

So that's something that we're doing with Marketing First as well, is we are, you know, being very strategic about who those companies are, but we are partnering with certain firms that we feel identify with our values and vice versa. And when something comes along at that point, we can evaluate, are we able to help them?

And so you're sort of subcontracting at that point.

Nigel Rawlins: That's, that's brilliant. See, the interesting thing you're saying here that I hope our listeners can understand is you learn by doing these things and you get smarter and smarter and smarter, but at first you've got no idea. So you might spend a lot of time going for these contracts and then you suddenly realize, well, this is our expertise area.

That's not our expertise area, but we could work with this group. So let's talk a little bit about encouraging women in business. I tend to encourage people who've got a professional background, so they're an expert in an area to consider going into business for themselves. They've got some expertise, but the difficulty that they have is, well, how do they get clients?

How do they market themselves? What do they charge for themselves? How do they get started and get going? You mentioned that when you first started out, you had to get a whole lot of part time jobs. Sometimes that's a good way of doing it, that you quit. Obviously if you're a bit older, hopefully you've got some assets, you've got a house, I don't know about homeownership in Canada, but here in Australia most of us older people have a house, like I own the house I live in, is lovely. So they've got some assets behind them, so they're not, not too desperate for money. The deadliest part would be if you were made redundant and you didn't have assets behind your savings. So let, let's just talk about how would you encourage, say professional women to go out into their own business.

Andrea Chase: I think that's a wonderful question and I do think it really depends on who the person is, how risk averse they are, and what industry they're in. So I would say there's definitely going to be a few factors if you were to ask me this question. Uh, just point blank. If somebody's not very risk averse. And they're in a full time job, but they kind of have this inkling that they think they might want to go out on their own.

Somebody like that, I would probably never encourage them to just jump ship and start because that's going to make them be out of their comfort zone completely. Like, I know we have to be out of our comfort zone, right, to grow a business, but somebody like that may not flourish the way they are capable of flourishing because they're so anxious about the money and the financial aspect of it, especially if they don't have a retirement plan behind them or, you know, a full time job.

Someone like that, I might encourage them to do that gradually. Right? Like if you're, depending what industry you're in, can you kind of reduce the amount of hours you're working for that organization and do this on the side? Or is this something you just want to have your side hustle that you do in the evenings?

Or outside of your regular work good at doing things outside of their jobs, or outside of your regular work, and build it that way. I know a lot of people who do that and that ends up working out really, really nicely, and then when they get some income coming through and they get some clients, it helps build their confidence to say, you know what, I do have something here, now maybe I can officially leave the 9 to 5 group.

Somebody who's maybe, maybe not as risk averse, I might say there's no better time than the present to just really jump in and it's really scary. It doesn't matter how risk averse or not you are. Like I said, with pro cabbie, I basically belly flopped into that whole thing. Like I had no idea what was going on.

Um, I knew there was a need and there was a pain point, but I do not come from that industry. So it's sort of like, are you ready to not know what the heck is going on to be able to navigate these rough waters for a while to get to where you want to be? I also would love to, this is sort of a side note, if you don't mind, Nigel, but one thing that I would really love to say is I totally agree with you about women bringing a really unique skill set to the business world and the business realm.

More specifically that women have irreplaceable communication abilities and organizational management, that may surpass some other groups out there. I am not saying men or, or other people do not have that, but I, I really believe that just based on my life experience and business experience, women just have that unique couple of skills that they bring to the business world.

And I do think as well, depending what your budget's like or your capital. If you are able to hire a coach or somebody like that, when you're getting started, that might be really helpful. But if you don't have the resources to do that, the wonderful thing is there's programming out there. I can kind of plug one program that I'm a part of here in Canada, probably in Australia, they have something similar.

We have the Forum in Canada here, which is a non profit organization that gets a lot of funding to help women grow, build, and thrive in the business world. And they have a mentor mentee program. It's, um, something they get funded. It's a free program completely. So I'm very privileged. I'm grateful to be a part of that program.

I've been a mentor with them for about a year and a half now. I'm with my second mentee and, you know, when they came to me, Nigel, they approached me through LinkedIn, beautiful LinkedIn, and one of their people with the organization said, you know, we were looking at your profile. We thought you would be a really great fit to be a mentor.

And I went, Me? You want me to, like, you want me to be a mentor? I said, I don't have everything figured out. They said, you don't have to have everything figured out, but you have some experience that other people don't have and it's not necessarily like I'm talking to you, like, down to you as a mentor and telling you what to do.

They said it's really like a peer relationship here. They said there's a lot of times that mentors are going to learn from the mentees and I can attest to that being true. So getting involved with something like that can also be really great. The other part of the learning aspect of it is the support system.

Entrepreneurship is great, but it can be a very lonely road if you're working for yourself, especially if you're a coach or you're a solopreneur. If you don't have anybody working with you. You don't have water cooler talk. You don't have anybody to share lunch with. Maybe you have a spouse or something, but you might be alone a lot of the time.

And if you're not used to that, or even if you are used to that, I think it's super important to have a network of people, even if it's virtual, you know, that you're tapping into for support. And we go back to the groups, but there's other ways to do that, right? There's incubators, especially in the tech sphere.

There's incubators that I've been a part of. And the biggest thing I got from them, besides a whole bunch of knowledge about fundraising and stuff like that, was a community of people to just kind of throw things off of when you're having a bad day. You know these people understand what you're going through and that can be the fuel to kind of pick yourself back up when you're having, when you're having a tough day.

Nigel Rawlins: That's absolutely correct. I think reaching out, it's interesting, like I have obviously been working for myself for, I think, 25 years now. I rarely speak to people.

Most of my work is email.

Andrea Chase: Right. Yes.

Nigel Rawlins: I sit in front of three big screens.

Andrea Chase: Yeah.

Nigel Rawlins: Most of the day, as long as I get out. Yeah, look, I think that's really critical, is learning something. So if, if they have got that inclination, I totally agree with you. I think they need to reach out and find where they can get that group, get that support. But I think you're dead right about the skills of women. Their abilities, compared to men, I think men prefer just to do stuff, whereas I think women have a very different skill set they bring to a business, um, and they do get stuck into the work.

But look, it is difficult I think, because there is a lot to be done and the biggest danger is to feel drowned in all of this, that you've got to market, you've got to find clients, you've got to run a business. And when you first start out, you might not have any clients, you know, and, and you can get a little bit desperate, which will be very, very scary. But that's what they all go through. Now, you've also been involved with some of the freelance talks or seminars. Could you tell us something about that?

Andrea Chase: Absolutely. So, in the height of the COVID pandemic, you know, I'm sitting at home, locked down. I was living in a condo at that time as well. Very different living environment. But one thing I knew I wanted to do was not give up, wanted to continue building my businesses. And I also have always kind of had, maybe it's the theatre background in me, but one of my bucket list goals would be to do a TED Talk one day.

I'll just say that publicly here right now. Maybe I'll regret saying that, but uh, you know, sometimes when you say it, you claim it kind of thing. And anyway, it was somebody in my network. Somebody I'd met virtually through Facebook, one of the Facebook groups, actually, she, she had introduced me to the founder and the head of the freelance business community, Alina.

And they were just starting out at the time, I believe. And they run this inaugural, if you haven't heard of it, I will plug it. They run this freelance business month every October, and it's phenomenal. I'm sure you're familiar with it yourself, Nigel. Um, well, yeah, so I would encourage you to check it out.

Nigel Rawlins: Yeah, I will. But you know, Alina was the one who said, I should talk to you.

Andrea Chase: Yes. So, the nice thing is it was this person who introduced me to Alina said, so you want to get more experience with public speaking. This event is new. They're looking for speakers. You don't get paid at this point, but it's something that's really great for your portfolio.

And if you have a topic that you think you want to share with the freelance community, I think this would be a great fit. So I applied. I honestly, Nigel, I did not expect to get chosen. I thought, I don't think they're going to choose me, but they did. And I think the first year I was the only Canadian presenter that they had.

And I think the first time I was talking, it might have been a little bit about my windy path of entrepreneurship, the highs and the lows, talking about the successes and the failures and what that really looks like, and that kind of got me more interested in wanting to do more of these signature talks.

So, I, I will praise the freelance business community until I'm blue in the face. There's people from around the globe, freelancers in all different kinds of industries. So it's a talking about community. If somebody out there listening to this isn't sure where to start, no matter where you're located, I would recommend checking them out.

And if you don't want to speak, you can listen to the talks yourself and learn something.

Nigel Rawlins: One thing we should talk about is what is a freelancer? Because this is a real big issue out there at the moment is nutting down this term because there's multiple terms. Some people call themselves consultants, some call themselves self employed, some call themselves solopreneurs. Can you tell us what you think a freelancer is, or is it all of those, or should we just stick with one term?

Andrea Chase: I've never actually been asked that before, which is interesting. You know what, for me, I actually use the term freelancer consultant, probably solopreneur interchangeably. I sort of steer a little bit clear self employed just because that to me, and maybe I'm wrong, but to me that speaks to the corporate structure, like in Canada, if you're incorporated as a business, or if you're in a partnership, or an LLC, or self employed, those have very, very different implications for your taxes.

So I, I would be very careful about classifying somebody as self employed. But yeah, freelancer to me is somebody who works for themselves in very, very simplistic terms. That's how I would define it.

Nigel Rawlins: I think that's a perfect definition. I think what's happening at the moment is the term freelance is being pushed to be the term that covers the person who works for themselves. Whether they're a consultant or anything like that, but some people prefer that word consultant. I think freelance means that they can't get a job which is totally untrue because there's millions of freelancers out there today.

Andrea Chase: Oh, yeah. And that industry, people working for themselves, that's growing, as we know, and I know the freelance business community has a lot of statistics. If you go on their website, I'm pretty sure about that sort of thing. Um, but it, yeah, you're right. I think that's a misconception. Just because you're a freelancer or work for yourself doesn't mean that you're lacking revenue or income or that you're not successful or that you couldn't get a job.

I mean, a lot of people, to be honest, that I've met have become consultants and freelancers after leaving the corporate world. And most times when I meet those people, it's because they went through, to wheel back to our previous uh, discussion about mental stamina, they've burnt out. That is just plain as day.

They are working their butts off, sometimes 16 to 18 hours a day, not really sleeping, taking care of themselves to make money for somebody else, to make somebody else get richer, to make that organization flourish when really they have the skill sets to do that for themselves. So again, it comes back to the idea of somebody's willing or wanting to be a freelancer. It's not for everybody. It's not for the faint of heart, but, uh, I think that there's more people doing that now and things come into your own hands at that point a little bit more, right? Like you can't control everything, but you have a little bit more control over your path, right?

And where you're going with things. I think it's wonderful. I think being a freelancer, I, I always have a lot of respect for people who've taken that avenue.

Nigel Rawlins: I agree, one of the big issues is if you've got some talent. You can freelance because I think what a lot of organizations are now finding, if they try and employ somebody with that talent, it takes several months and then they've got to get them up to speed. Whereas if you've got a project, it's worth bringing in a group of talented people to work on that project.

And if they are freelancing, then you're going to get them in much quicker if they're available, and get going. And that's the big issue, for example, if you get a big project, you know, you need people in there and it's not always good to have full timers. It's great to have some people to do a project.

I mean, I use freelancers all the time. If I've got a project, I can call on them. But I make sure that they're well paid. I use online platforms to find my people. And yeah, you can get some very cheap prices, but not good for them if they're hired out too cheaply.

Andrea Chase: I agree.

Nigel Rawlins: So Andrea, what sort of clients would you like to work with, in your business or attract to your business? Who's the ideal client for you and what can you help them with?

Andrea Chase: So we've talked a lot about that community that I have in my network of women in business, women in tech. So for me, that's what lights me up because I can identify with those people and sometimes the path they've been on. So if you are a woman owned business, if you are a startup tech founder, maybe if you're a coach, if you're a solopreneur or freelancer, whatever term you want to use.

And you need to take that load off because, you know, we all know if you don't have a marketing presence, you don't have a business arguably. So you need somebody to take the load off for you and you want boutique digital marketing solutions, then we're the type of agency that you could approach.

When you talk about freelancers versus employees, the way that we are sort of putting it out there to the audience, target audiences, is, you know, we're a boutique digital marketing agency, but it'll cost you the fraction of hiring a full time employee. So that's a big draw there. Somebody who maybe just needs some people to come in, maybe help with a rebrand or something like that, or just take the social content off of their plate completely. We're happy to do that. So a big focus that we have with Marketingverse is creating and generating professionally polished content for clientele. We also are offering marketing and branding consulting.

So bringing our combined experience of, you know, 40 plus years in different industries to the table and doing a brand audit or maybe helping somebody who's starting out. And I really believe in the psychology behind branding. So we get into a bit of that. We also can help you run paid campaigns on social, if that's something you want to do, or Google ads, things like that.

We can do analytic reporting. So get all those nice, beautiful insights and analytics put together in a package with a bow on it and go over that with you. That includes a consult, not just the numerics, but let's dive into what do these numbers actually mean. And the one offering that I'm super excited about that I think really kind of sets us apart is we also offer professional voiceover services as well.

So, that's something that I've taken a couple of courses on. I've done a little bit of voiceover work myself. I'm doing a lot of the voiceover work for Marketing First for us now, because what do you do when you start out? You use what you have, but that is something that we would be very happy if you have, you know, a corporate video or some marketing or branding material that you want to have a professional voiceover done for, we'd be more than happy to engage with you for that as well.

So, um, I hope I answered that. That

question.

Nigel Rawlins: You did well. So what else would you like to mention before we get to the end here?

Andrea Chase: This has been a wonderful, very engaging conversation. I just want to say, so thank you so much again for the opportunity. And one thing that came to me through my entrepreneurial endeavors and failures over the years has been this. Your desire to achieve must be greater than your desire for everyone to see your vision. And what I really mean by that, success isn't always measured by money, but you know what your own personal success is, and there are going to be naysayers, and there are going to be people, I will almost guarantee or put money on it, that if you go out on your own, people are gonna question you, especially if you leave a really cushy job.

People are gonna question you till you're blue in the face. Why are you doing this? Are you crazy? You're giving up like a 401k in the US or a retirement or pension or something like that, but you don't need to explain that to anybody but yourself. That's the reality, right? You know, if you know in your heart of hearts, why you're doing something, what your mission is, what your driving force is, that's all that really matters at the end of the day.

And if you know that, that will shine through in your marketing as well. And that will shine through in your messaging when you get on video. If you're not really too confident there, that will also shine through that people can kind of see through that, right? That you're wavering a bit. So that's, I think, what I would love to close with.

And thank you for asking me to share that.

Nigel Rawlins: That is fabulous. Thank you very much. Alright, well let's talk about how they can connect with you. How would you like them to do that?

Andrea Chase: I am, like I said, I'm loving LinkedIn. I am spending more time on LinkedIn than I used to. So I'm just Andrea Chase on LinkedIn. Um, but I would love to get people's feedback on the marketing materials that we're putting out there for our own organization. So we, uh, are pretty active on Instagram. We're kind of new ish there, but our name there is True Marketing Verse, and I'm sure you'll put the info in the show notes. And I guess the last place would be TikTok is a great platform that we need to leverage more. Like I'm a little bit out of that generation, but we don't have a ton of followers on there yet, but we're getting a lot of views and I would just love to be able to grow our TikTok account.

So we are a true marketing verse on TikTok and um, and also our website, you know, our website is tmv. baseglobal. com and you can go there to book your free discovery call. So I guess this is the time I tell you, I offer free discovery calls and no expectations or no pressure required, but that's just to get to know each other and see again how we might be able to help each other.

So with that, I think that that pretty much wraps it up for my contact.

So Andrea, thank you very much for being a guest, on the podcast. That was a fabulous talk and I think it's going to be very, very helpful to people to listen to somebody who's really working in a business, but also a marketing business where you have to do this marketing and we, we can share what we have to do.

Nigel Rawlins: So thank you very much.

Andrea Chase: Well thankyou Nigel. I just have to send the gratitude right back your way for this opportunity. I've also thoroughly enjoyed this conversation today, from one marketer to a next, obviously. I wish you much, much success in your continued journey of entrepreneurship. And yeah, I look forward to the episode dropping and keeping up our relationship as well.

So many thanks to you for today.

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