The Entrepreneurs Radio Show 078 Stephanie Burns

THE ENTREPRENEUR’S RADIO SHOW

Conversations with Self-made Millionaires and High-level Entrepreneurs that Grow Your Business

Copyright © 2012, 2013 The Entrepreneur’s Radio Show Page 1 of 25

EPISODE #78: STEPHANIE BURNS

On this episode, Travis talks with inspirational entrepreneur Stephanie Burns. Stephanie is the founder

of Chic CEO, a company that specializes in providing support to women who want to start-up their new

business or if they want to take it to the next level. Stephanie’s determination and experience in

business allowed her to create this company, which is now a beacon of hope for aspiring women

entrepreneurs.

Stephanie and Travis share various concepts and ideas that are valuable to entrepreneurs today.

Stephanie points out that a business should focus on solving particular problem in order for it to be

relevant and profitable as well as making sure that it’s scalable and self-sustaining. She also gives

insights on what an entrepreneur should do when starting a business. And another valuable lesson

would be her motto of not be afraid to ask. These are just some of the things that entrepreneurs would

find valuable in this episode of the Entrepreneur’s Radio Show.

Stephanie Burns – How to build a following

for your business on a budget

Travis: Hey it's Travis Lane Jenkins, welcome to episode number 78 of the Entrepreneur's Radio

Show, conversations with self-made millionaires and high level entrepreneurs that will grow your

business. This show is a production of Rockstar Entrepreneur Network.

Today I'm going to introduce you to the rockstar entrepreneur Stephanie Burns. Stephanie has built a

loyal following of 30,000 plus people in a really short period of time, using what I consider a grassroots

strategy to build a huge following on a tight budget. We'll also talk about how to leverage relationships

to grow your business and several other key points to building a successful business in a very short

period of time.

Stephanie is the founder of Chic CEO and she provides a wealth of great information, so I'm confident

that you'll really enjoy this episode, plus she's a lot of fun.

Also, be sure and stay with us until the very end if you can because I want to share some inspiration

with you, plus I've got a contest that I want to tell you about where you'll have a chance to win $73,000

in cash and prizes, and a Lamborghini. So be sure and hangout with us until the very end. As you

know, everything we do with the show is about helping you and as many entrepreneurs as possible find

a new level of success while helping others, which we feel like defines a rockstar entrepreneur.




Now before I get started I want to remind you that there's two ways you can take these interviews with

you on the go. The first is if you're an iTunes person, you can go to rockstartentpreneurnetwork.com

and click on the iTunes button right there in the menu bar, and it will take you directly to the podcast on

iTunes where you can subscribe to show there. The second option is, is while you're at

rockstarentrepreneurnetwork.com, you can click on the Stitcher button and download their free app that

allows you to stream all of the shows that you like anytime, anyplace. Plus I have a cool way of

introducing you to other shows that you may like. So, now that we've got all of that stuff out of the way,

let's get down to business. Without further ado, welcome to show Stephanie.

Stephanie: Thanks for having me so much.

Travis: I'm super excited to have you here; I know that you're very busy.

Stephanie: Yes, we all are, aren't we?

Travis: Yes. Hey, I don't know if you're familiar with the show format but we like to get a little bit of the

back story of how you found the level of success that you're at today, do you mind sharing some of that

back story with us?

Stephanie: Sure. So the company that I own is Chic CEO and we are an online platform for female

entrepreneurs. And we provide how-to information, tools, and community for women when they're

starting businesses. And the reason that I started the company was I was actually getting my MBA and

I was in class, working full-time in class and I was trained for travelling. And I was really frustrated

because I was obviously exhausted, and I just couldn't find the information that I wanted to get a

business started in the classroom setting. In addition to that, bunch of my girlfriends were getting laid

off. So this was around 2008-2009, they're getting laid off and they were asking me how do I get a

business started, I want to start a small business on the side to pay my bills until I find a new job. And I

had no idea what to tell them, none. And they all said, "Well, if you're in business school how could you

not know how to start a business?" And I said that's a really good question. So, I started looking around

for a resource that I would like. And unfortunately I couldn't find anything that I really liked that spoke to

me in a way that I wanted to be talked to, that answered all my questions with real answers. So, I

decided to make it my business plan for grad school, and then I graduated, and I worked another year

and then I got laid off. So, when I got laid off I took the business plan down and I got to work. And that's

how I started working on Chic CEO. And it took me about a year to research, and write, and launch the

business. And ever since then we've been going strong, we now have 30,000 women in our network

using the information on our site.

Travis: Yeah, that's pretty impressive. Now, how long have you been at business, right at 3 years isn't

it?

Stephanie: Almost, yeah.

http://www.rockstarentrepreneurnetwork.com/





Travis: Almost 3 years.

Stephanie: Yup.

Travis: And so, I want to talk about a couple of things. Now obviously we can talk about a lot of the

things that are not available for wantrepreneurs, people that want to become an entrepreneur. And then

also, I like to look a little behind the scene of what you're doing with your business as well. Let's first

start it with you. How did you go from zero to a community of 30,000 people in such a short period of

time?

Stephanie: We use partnerships. So we try to leverage partners as much as we can and that's really

how we've grown. We find partners that have like-minded audiences that we're looking for, and then we

create a media swap. It's how we did it. So, Tory Johnson and Pierre Rawlins? and Melanie Duncan,

and those kinds of people they're all targeting the same groups. So we would send out an email on

their behalf to our community, and introducing them to Tory. And Tory would send out an email to her

community introducing us to her community. So really, that's how we've really been able to grow our list

in such a short time. We don't do any paid marketing. So that's kind of what we've done it. And we also

utilize press. So, within 6 months of launching Chic CEO we are named one of the top 10

entrepreneurial websites for women. And that really catapulted Chic CEO into the limelight, and we

were able to really garner a big following after that happened.

Travis: Cool. So you leveraged existing relationships with people that you knew that spoke to the same

audience, which is women, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: What specifically is your target avatar?

Stephanie: So, the woman that uses Chic CEO currently is the woman that is getting a business

started. So she could be still in a full-time job, starting up at night or on the weekends, she could have

clear job, she could be in her job or be in her business for 3 years. We cover all of that ground level

information that women need to get started. So how to write a business plan, how to get your EIN, what

to do if you've invented a product. In the next couple weeks we're actually going to launch or Chic CEO

Mastermind which is for the women that are now a few years into their business, or ready to take it to

next level, want to extend their network. So it's really for that woman who is aspiring to be an

entrepreneur or has just become an entrepreneur. So she's in that beginning stage, that’s where we

take their hand.

Travis: So really. Just kind of any age, they're just at this place where they're ready to make the leap

and go from working for someone to working for them self. That's really your main focus, it doesn't

matter the age?




Stephanie: Right.

Travis: Okay. And so, how have you monetized or have you been able to monetize the business?

Stephanie: Sure. So, we have a few different revenue streams, our major revenue stream is

advertising. So we sell advertising on our email database. We send out 2 new letters a week. So we

sell advertising on that and then we sell advertising on the website. In addition, we do have our

membership program which we are actually dissolving in the next week to launch the Chic CEO

mastermind. So that's membership-based, people pay $97 a month to be a part of that, which has been

great. So that's working really well. And then we also have events. We have offline events, we hold

networking events here in San Diego once a month, and we just launched in Orange County and we

recently launched in Portland. And we have a conference. So events, membership, and advertising are

really how we monetize the site.

Travis: Do you guys have like meet-ups and things like that to where-- And you have people set-up

meet-up groups in different cities and things like that, is that what you're talking about?

Stephanie: Yes, similar to that. There are networking mixers so we don't have speakers or anything

like that. I say a few words every time, just thanking the women for coming, they're women only. And

then 40-50 women come, they drink wine, they connect and mingle, and that's about it. And we have a

market builder in every market that we have. So we have one here in San Diego, Orange County, and

Portland. And then it's their job to really find a venue, get the women there, help them connect, mingle,

meet each other. So, we don't use meet-up to help facilitate those, we have a person in the market

doing it.

Travis: That's a little bit of an older business model. It sounds like you're marrying a newer laptop

mentality type business model with some of it is an older business model where you have actual

employees that go to a new town and start-up something local is that right?

Stephanie: Yeah. It' an opportunity for the women in those cities to help grow their network and be

seen as kind of the mover and shaker of their business community. So it really helps them and that they

get to grow their network. But you're right; it is kind of an older mentality. And the reason that we're

doing it is because we have a totally online business and it's really hard for us to make quick

connection with women, and we try to do that through brand voice, in our offerings, and trying to be as

visible as possible. But when we have these offline meetings we're actually able to really connect to

some of these women, find out what they need, learn more about them; keep them top of mind if

something comes up. So, we started them hoping that it would be kind of a way for us to just kind of dig

in with these people and learn more about them to help fill-in the gaps online. And it's really turned into

something much more magical than that, we had no idea they would be so kind of amazing. The




women leave and they're just buzzing and everything's electric, it's really cool to see. So the offline and

the online components are really important to our business.

Travis: Yeah, that doesn't surprise me because there's some things that happen face-to-face that just

can't happen in any other way, right? And so, I think a lot of people underestimate the amount of time

and effort that goes in to getting a 100% online business up and running, it's almost 10 times harder to

get sales coming in because you're not doing any face-to-face. And face-to-face is where that

relationship moves to the next level and that element of electricity that you're talking about, that's where

it happens, right?

Stephanie: Yes, and to your point earlier, to grow our network we utilize partnerships but my partner

and I were out networking probably 4 nights a week in the first 2 years of our business. We work

everywhere and people said it too, "I see you everywhere." I'm like, "I know, I'm sorry."

Travis: Do you take that as a bad thing? You're apologizing, "I'm sorry I'm everywhere."

Stephanie: I'm sorry I'm here.

Travis: It's me again.

Stephanie: It was the most cost-effective way for us to go out and meet people, and follow-up, and get

them on our list, and show them our content, and get them really involved in what we're doing. So it's

worked really well, that's why we know the savvies in the other cities are gonna-- Or have been

successful too, it's just those people go out and they network, and they talk about Chic CEO, and that's

really their best way to get new members is by having somebody refer. So it's great.

Travis: Yeah, so exactly what you're saying, it's a great grassroots way to expedite the growth of

something, right?

Stephanie: Yeah, and it's a great way to create an authentic relationship. We can all do just about

anything to drive a ton of traffic to our site and some crazy PR stunt, or pay a PR firm to get on the

Today's Show, that's no problem. But to really create an authentic and genuine connection with

someone, it's going to take a little bit longer but at least they’ll be there for you for awhile. They stick

around and they're loyal. So 30,000 is a great number for us. We think it's small, but truly, and without

doing paid advertising and just making connections on our own, we've built a solid foundation which

we're really proud of and wouldn't trade for anything.

Travis: Well, you've made some impressive progress in a short period of time. What have you learned

in the 3 years from going from zero to where you are right now? What have you learned?




Stephanie: Well, I learned a few things. In the events aspect, we learned that free events don't bring

people in. You have to charge for your events or people don't come. That was a big lesson. Two, I'm a

voracious reader and a consumer of knowledge. So I kind of assumed that our audience would be too.

Travis: Wrong.

Stephanie: And so, wrong. Put out all of this information, I basically put out the building blocks of how

to get a business started and really they just want handholding, they want my attention that wants

Jody's attention, they want access to each other. And even though we're giving them every single thing

that they need to know to get a business started, all they have to do is read, they truly want the

community aspect of it.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: So, that's what we're hoping to bring with the mastermind, is a better way for them to

connect with each other and with us as well is to get the resources they need. So, they like the

resources, they value the community, and that was a big "Aha" for me.

Travis: Okay, so they value the community. The free event, so the takeaway on the free event is

there's no value there if it's free, then it's more than likely going to be a waste of their time. That's the

conclusion that I would draw. Is that what you took from that lesson?

Stephanie: Well, you know, a lot of people-- If you don't charge for your events, people won’t come.

So, I think a lot of people think that if they hold a free event they're going to get hundreds and hundreds

of people, and I'll tell you right now, if you charge $20 for an event, you're going to probably get 50

people, which is amazing. Fifty to a hundred people is much better than a hundred people RSVP-ing

and 20 of them showing up.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: So, the drop off rate is so much higher when you're not charging for your events and the

perceived value isn't there either. So if you charge for your events, people come, they understand

there's going to be value there. If you don't charge for them then something comes up and they'd rather

sit at home and watch TV.

Travis: Yeah. What I had found is people have to have skin in the game.

Stephanie: Right, exactly.

Travis: Even the $20 isn't a lot of money but they have skin in the game, and people don't like to be

wasteful, and so since they've committed they'll go ahead and come down. But if they haven't spent

any money-- And also, another important lesson to take from that is if you had a hundred butts in chairs




and they didn't pay anything, versus a hundred butts in the chair that paid $20, one's a buyers list,

right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And one's just a list. And in order for you to make the difference that you need to make, you

need to monetize this thing as quickly as possible, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: Because the more financial success you have, the more people you can help. And you and I

are of the same mindset, we need as many entrepreneurs as we possibly can have, especially now, at

least from my perspective than ever before. So it's much easier to offer whether it's free services and

then escalate them up to a higher level of service if they choose to go faster, which is completely up to

them, when they're buyer's list, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: Now, those were the two major take-aways for you and the three years of building the

business?

Stephanie: (Laughing)

Travis: Well, not to trivialize everything else that you've done.

Stephanie: Oh, it's so many, yeah.

Travis: Entrepreneurship is a series of little-bitty steps, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And so, were there any kind of paradigm shifts along the way that just really kind of rung your

bell and made you have an "Aha" moment?

Stephanie: Well, I think if you're building something that you're really, really, really, really passionate

and excited about people just tend to follow, and they come onboard. And I think that we've been super

fortunate at Chic CEO that all of the people that work for us and help are people that have literally

asked to be a part of what we're doing. And so we're not really ever going out, searching for employees

or people who work for us. We are getting people that are coming to us saying, "How can I be a part of

this, I just must be a part of this," which is really, really amazing. And I don't think that if we weren't

doing something that we're super, super excited about and if that shows that we would get that kind of

response. So, I think-- And another lesson, they are two in terms of passion and everybody says,

"Follow your passion, follow your passion, follow your passion," that only goes so far as well. So, I




guess I can play the two hands here. If you're not solving a problem, then there's no point in starting a

business. You can just go help, or do whatever you're passionate about. And then if you're lucky

enough to solve a problem and be passionate about it then you know you've hit the jackpot, which is in

my case I'm really excited and lucky that I get to be passionate about the problem that I'm solving. But I

tell entrepreneurs all the time, if you're not solving somebody's problem or solving a pain point then

you're not going to make any money doing what you're doing.

Travis: Exactly, I agree with you.

Stephanie: And so that was a big one for me.

Travis: I watch Shark Tank and I see them come in with solutions to problems that really don't even

exist, right? And so to them, bless their heart for being creative but very few people buy prevention,

people don't buy prevention because they don't think it's going to happen to them, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And so, the more of a serious problem you solve, the easier it is to sell it. Now, the passion

piece of it doesn't always have to be that you're super passionate about every aspect of the business,

but you're passionate about what you're doing, of accomplishing your goals, making a difference,

helping other people, you know. Business isn't always rainbows and butterflies, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: If you're supercharged about what you're doing, it pulls you through those 12, 13-hour, 14-hour

days and it helps you work through those tough times when you're having conversations that are trying

to talk you out of what you're doing. It's that passion that helps you get through that, because without it I

think that's where most people give up.

Stephanie: Oh, absolutely.

Travis: Or at least for me.

Stephanie: True, yeah, same here. Thank goodness I'm passionate about what I'm doing and I'm

helping to solve a problem for women, but there are times where I see people that are passionate about

something ridiculous. They're not ridiculous, they're passionate about it, but they want to make money

out of it. Well, not everybody's passionate about that. And you don't have to be passionate exactly

about your business but you can be passionate about the fact that maybe have more time to spend with

your kids now, or maybe you have the money to go travel. And that's really what you're passionate

about. And so you're solving a problem and you're able to live a life that you want to live. So, I think

passion can come from a lot of different areas and be ever present in what you're doing. But you really

need to be solving a problem if you want to have the business.




Travis: Exactly. Passion can be anchored in many different areas like what you're describing, and it's

just not always just the one thing in your business.

Stephanie: Exactly, yeah.

Travis: So, I do find it interesting that you're going to business school and you're perplexed as to what

the steps are to start a business. Wow.

Stephanie: Yeah, it's so funny; I actually gave a keynote at Cal State, San Marcos. And the event was

called Female Entrepreneurship and the Gender Advantage. And I gave the keynote and I told my

story. I was in grad school and I've been working for a number of years in marketing prior to that, and I

couldn't find the answers that I was looking for, and the dean was there. And one of the professors,

student adviser to Chic CEO, he has been pushing forward this new curriculum change in the school, in

the entrepreneurship program based on that. And once she heard my keynote, she was just as

surprised as you are and they changed their entire curriculum.

Travis: Oh wow.

Stephanie: Because it's not the current curriculum is in teaching students how to get started, it's

teaching-- MBA's are really to teach you how to run an existing business, not really start one up. So,

that was really interesting.

Travis: Well you know, that's the problem when you have academics, and I don't have anything against

academics because becoming well-studied and well-read later in my life has really helped me. But

when you have an academic teaching business, there's missing pieces to the puzzle that nobody is

aware is missing until you go to apply it, right.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And so, to me it makes more sense to have someone that has done it teach it, right? Because

you can empathize with each step along the way, you know. And you can say, "This is what you're

going to deal with, these are all the things you're going to experience." And so, it's encouraging to see

more entrepreneurs teaching those steps to rapidly building up the business. Are you familiar with the

stats for the failure rate of businesses?

Stephanie: Wasn't it like 4 out of 5?

Travis: Yeah, right at 96% fail.

Stephanie: So sad.




Travis: It's incredible. And I've said it several times, now I've been an entrepreneur for 23 years and I

would've grown as a person regardless. But as an entrepreneur I've become a much better person on

many, many levels. A lot because of my failures, and struggling through them, and overcoming them,

and becoming a better person, a better leader, a better everything, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And so that's one of the compelling reasons why we need more entrepreneurs. Let's double

back and let's talk about some of those initial steps that people are ready to make that jump and either

start a franchise, or start their own business, or whatever it may be. What are the things that you tell

them to do?

Stephanie: The first thing I tell them to do is read. I'm a huge believer in reading; I try to read

everything I get my hands on. If I see somebody kind of struggling with an idea or what they should be

doing, I always tell them to read E-Myth just to see if they're ready to be an entrepreneur, if they

understand like what their mindset is. So first thing to do, start reading, just read whatever you can on

entrepreneurship, starting a business, just get to a reading.

Number two, there's two schools of thought here, you need to write a business plan, you have to write a

business plan, where's your business plan. And then there's some people that are just, "Screw

business plan, you don't need that." But you do need a plan. So, whether you do it in a business plan

format, whether you do it in a one page business plan format, it doesn't really matter. But you should

kind of figure out what your plan is first. And you can go to places like Chic CEO and get all of that

information for free. It's there for you to learn kind of the first steps. You need to understand exactly

what kind of business you want to run, how you're going to make money at it, and then you want to kind

of determine what the best legal structure for you? And then start following the steps after that. There's

a few, key things you need to get solidified in those first few months of getting started, figure out what

legal entity should be. Read some books, figure out how you're going to make money at this, figure out

if you're customer even wants what you're giving. That's really the first step I suppose. And get out

there and see if people truly want what you're putting together. Sometimes I see entrepreneurs in a

vacuum, building a product, or building a service, or building a website, building an app, building,

building, building, and they haven't even gone out to see if anybody wants it, you know. I think that

validating your idea and validating the market need is one of the first, crucial steps that often get

skipped.

Travis: Right, great point. So if we have the top 5, so let's reorganize this. Number one is validate your

idea, that definitely makes sense. Number two, read, become familiar, and read the E-Myth which is a

great book. Number three, create a plan. Number four, determine what the best legal structure is-- If we

were going for the top 5 what would be the 5th? I'm jotting this down as we go.

http://amzn.to/15gfylJ





Stephanie: I think the 5th is probably figure out your best market delivery. I think some people think

that getting an app is probably the coolest thing they should be doing. And people may not even need

an app, you don't really need an app for Chic CEO, you know what I mean? So, try to figure out the

best way to deliver your product, and it could be, maybe you want to help people organize their houses.

Well, it doesn't mean that you need to go to their houses and organize, maybe you make videos in you

install online, and then you help a lot of people. So figure out exactly how you're going to deliver your

product to the market and then plan your business around that.

Travis: So, that sounds to me like it's crafting what your business model is going to be. Is that it?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: That's definitely a clever take on things because a lot of people don't pay any attention to that.

And it's something that even I was guilty off for the first several, several years. I never really paid

attention to my business model, or if everything went right, absolutely perfect for 12 months in a row,

which rarely happens, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: What would be the absolute best outcome, what would be the most revenue, what would be the

most profit, I never really sit down and looked at that.

Stephanie: Oh yeah.

Travis: And so, year after year, initially I experience a 100% growth, 300% growth, 500% growth, it

gets harder and harder to do that, right? And so I started quickly becoming disappointed and later, 7, 8

years in because I'm not experiencing this incredible growth. And part of the reason was is I never took

the time to sit down and look at the business model. And unfortunately I'd created a business model

that if I wanted to make more money I had to press the gas pedal down further, which is a nightmare of

a business model. It's a very unclassy way to do things, or at least it was for me because it meant that if

I wanted to make a high income I needed to commit to working 80 hours a week which is not

sustainable, right? Whereas if I take a look at the business model and figured out ways, especially

today, there's a whole lot more reoccurring business, many to one business models with reoccurring

revenue.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: Where you can serve a thousand clients, make an incredible of amount of money, even make a

million dollars a year. And never leave your house, if you want to, if that's your thing. Or you can work

from vacation. And that model is more possible today than it ever has been before, I started in 1991.

And so, is that some of the models that you guys teach?




Stephanie: Absolutely. When I started Chic CEO I wanted a business that I could run from my phone

and my computer, because at the time I was travelling almost every weekend. I was somewhere doing

something and I wanted to be able to take my computer and my phone with me and live a life that I

want to live. Now, do I put in 80 hours a week sometimes? Absolutely, because I'm an entrepreneur.

Travis: That's what it takes.

Stephanie: Yeah, at least I'm not chained to a desk and somebody tells me what time I have to clock in

and clock out, and I can't take my dog to the park when I want to. So, I think that there's so many ways

to automate your business and I think that you've got to really figure out what kind of life you want to

lead and what kind of-- Yeah, absolutely, the business model that you put in place so that you can

execute again what's best for your customer and what's best for your life.

Travis: Right. And I completely agree with you. For me, I want to work from my laptop and I'd like to go

to Paris and if I have a scheduled webinar, just jump on my laptop from Paris.

Stephanie: Yup.

Travis: And handle the webinar there. Maybe do a local appearance on one of the stations or

something so that I can write the whole trip off, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: And these are all legal, ethical things that you can do when you set your business up properly,

you know, is set it up strategic. My point is, and Dean Jackson had explained this one time is a lot of

people spend an incredible amount of time building this beautiful, gold squirrel cage that's well

appointed but you're a prisoner of it, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: And I feel like entrepreneurship is the opposite of a prisoner. You're able to do things on your

own terms at any level, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: For me, the whole reason why I went out on my own many years ago is because I thought the

level of service and how they were doing things was terrible, and I didn't want to be told what to do day

in and day out.

Stephanie: Right. I think that's probably every entrepreneur, I hate being told what to do and I was a

terrible employee. I always had an idea about this and we should do this better, and this should be, you




know, I was always rocking the boat. And I didn't mean to, I was just really excited about what I was

working on.

Travis: Yeah.

Stephanie: I love that we do it better but--

Travis: Stephanie, that's not how we do it here, Stephanie.

Stephanie: "It's not how we do it." I was always in trouble.

Travis: Yeah, "Stephanie, you're not following the rules."

Stephanie: Exactly.

Travis: I know, but you're not listening to me, it's a better idea.

Stephanie: "I swear, it'll save us time and money." When I started Chic CEO, and this is another thing

that people need to think about when they're starting, I always had scalability in mind. That's why I

didn't call it Stephanie Burns, I called in Chic CEO, I want to be able at some point to step out of Chic

CEO and have it still live on.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: So now my partner and I are becoming way more visible than we ever intended to but it

was more so that I could service a lot of people without physically having to be there. There's no way

that I could help 30,000 people on my own or even with a partner. So, I think people really need to think

about how they can build a model that's scalable, that they can take themselves out of at some point.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: And have the business still run. And I see a lot of entrepreneurs with really nice lifestyle

businesses but if they walk away from it it's over. They leave it's gone, if they're not at their computer

there's no money coming in. So, I think that really needs to be thought about real hard before

somebody gets involved in starting a business.

Travis: Great point. You know that's very perceptive of you to think of that early on because most

people don't.

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: The scalability and everything.




Stephanie: Exactly. I worked for an innovation consultancy for 5 years before I started Chic CEO. And

going to business school and learning all these concepts. And so, once I really got immersed in

branding, because we were doing branding projects for companies like Nike, and Adidas, and you got

to go Philips, and those kinds of things. I really learned that if you're branding a person, and some

people have gotten past this like the Martha Stewart's and the Ralph Lauren's. They have people to run

their businesses. But for the rest of us, that's just not going to be how it is. If Martha Stewart's not there,

Martha Stewart will live on. But for me I don't see that as being in my near future. So these are

concepts I learned while I was doing all this branding work, and I was able to take them with me when I

had started the company.

Travis: Yeah, makes it very saleable also.

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: How often do people call it Chic CEO?

Stephanie: Usually only the men.

Travis: You didn't just go there Stephanie.

Stephanie: It's true. Usually it's only men that call it that.

Travis: Oh, that's too funny.

Stephanie: And we're very surprised when they actually say Chic CEO correctly. Yeah, we never hold

it against them.

Travis: Oh, well that's very nice of you. So say I want to be part of Chic CEO, will you guys let me in?

Stephanie: You are more than welcome to use any of the free material on the site, absolutely.

Travis: That's it.

Stephanie: As far as our mastermind goes, that will be women only and our events are women only.

But we've assembled what we call our Brain Trust recently which we're really excited about, and that's

an added value for the mastermind, and there are men on there. Guys like Maneesh Sethi who has

hacked the system and he just bought an island, and Jim Hamerly who is one of our advisors, his first

tech startup who sold AOL. And Howard Leonhardt who's in Santa Monica and he's a venture capitalist.

So we've got a lot of really great men on our board. We still love men and we have much to learn from

them. So we're bringing them on-board to help our master minders really get the best expert opinions

and advice from some really cool people that we know, whether they're men or women.




Travis: Right. Well you know, I like the bravery that you're willing to stand up and be crystal clear for a

specific group. Too many people try to stand in the middle and be everything to everyone and end up

being nothing to no one. And you've got to stand up for what you believe in and it's not to say that you

don't believe in men as much as, you know-- You're creating an environment that's safe for these

women, to make them feel at their highest level of comfort while they're going through these phases.

Even in the gym I see how so many women are so uncomfortable because guys are just gawking at

them. I see the environment; I see the need for separation and understanding, of nurturing this group of

people. So I just wanted to see how serious you would stick to your guns there.

Stephanie: Yeah. And you see it. Obviously, when we're holding a networking event and there's 50

women in a room, and like a really cool venue downtown, San Diego, men try to get in all the time. I

have to basically be a bouncer. And with one flips in before I can get to him, before I usher him out you

can see the whole room kind of tense up a little bit.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: It's really subtle but you can really feel it, and once I get them out the room relaxes a little

bit more because these women truly are wanting to network and they're not wanting to be hit on at that

moment. So, it's important to give them a place and space for them to really harness this

entrepreneurial spirit and connect with each other. And women are starting businesses 2 to 1 over men

right now. It's an important time for women, we have to give them the tools and we have to give them

the resources to really go out and create change and create new company cultures. And by breeding a

new group of entrepreneurs we're also starting to breed a new group of women investors, which is

really, really important for entrepreneurs and really important for women in general. We've got to

perpetuate women investing more whether it's another women or men, women need to be investing

more and women need to be starting more businesses. So we really are out there trying to create

change and trying to help these women move the needle.

Travis: Yeah, there's even a record number of high level executive female CEO's. I just interviewed

Carly Fiorina.

Stephanie: Oh yeah.

Travis: And she was responsible for doubling HP's revenue from 44 billion to 88 billion.

Stephanie: Wow.

Travis: Pretty impressive, right?

Stephanie: Yeah, she's cool.




Travis: Yeah, and so when it's just a group of women it eliminates the dynamics of other things that

happen when men and women mix. So I really like that. Let's go back a little bit and let's cover the flip

side of something that we've talked about, okay?

Stephanie: Sure.

Travis: So you've given me a top 5 off the top of your head of the things that someone should do when

they're starting a business. Can you give me kind of the flip side, looking at it from a different angle?

What are the most common mistakes that people make when they start a business that you found? And

to be fair to you I'll tell everyone that none of this is pre-planned, so this is just all extemporaneous

putting Stephanie on the spot.

Stephanie: One of the mistakes, I think that, I'll tell you--

Travis: Or maybe it's just mistakes they should void, right?

Stephanie: Yeah, mistakes they should avoid for sure. I think a lot of women don't think big enough.

Travis: I like that.

Stephanie: And I would like to see them think bigger for themselves. Sometimes people come to me

with these amazing ideas and I haven't thought about this and this and this. And they're like, "Well, no,

but I don't know if I can do, you know." And so, I would really like it if women could, and I think they

eventually will. We're just kind of edging into this woman into entrepreneurship really as a movement.

But I think that I'd like to see them think really big for themselves and really get creative with their

models. That's one thing I'd like to see.

Another mistake I think women should avoid is not thinking that they have to do everything themselves

and asking for help. And I hear this a lot, I do a lot of interviews too and I just interviewed Denise

Purslow who started Springboard Enterprises, and that was her biggest. We always ask what your

favorite mistake is, and so her favorite mistake was that she hadn't asked for help when she truly

needed it, when she was in the beginning stages of running her business. And early on, my partner and

I set-up an advisory board. Fran Maier who is one of the co-founders of Match.com, Veronica Belmont

who's really involved in the start-up space in the Bay area. And then Dr. Hamerly who I mentioned

before, and they're our advisory board. And we've been leaning on them for a long time now, making

sure that we have what we need or we're not making a wrong decision. So, I think women forget or

don't even think about that they can ask people to be on their advisory boards and really lean on them

and ask them, "Hey, I'm looking for investors and I need you guys to help," or "I want to set-up a new

revenue stream, I need your advice. I need a connection here, do you guys have it?" So I think people

don't do that and it's a really crucial step to making sure your business is successful.




Travis: Yeah, great point.

Stephanie: And another one is the mentality of, "I'll build it and they will come", you know. So I think

some people set-up businesses thinking, "I wanna put up a website and then all of a sudden I'm just

going to start collecting my millions." And that sounds lovely but you really got to get out there and

hustle. And we knew it was not easy going to 3 to 4 networking events every single week for 2 years,

that's not fun. But I'll do it for a few years so I don't have to for the rest of my life, you know.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: And so you've got to put in the time, you've got to realize you got to make some sacrifices

in the beginning. You got to really hustle and give it your all and give them more than your all in the

beginning, or you're just gonna-- You just might be mediocre and I think most of us are trying to go

through something extraordinary.

Travis: I wanna double back and go deeper on some of these things and I've got a second all of the

things that you've suggested here. So for me one of the things that I had an "Aha" moment, I think 8

years into my business, when I was listening to a stock report of how much Exxon made that made

something like $4 billion that quarter. And I thought, "Wow, I'm thinking too small." Now I'm no Exxon,

but obviously I'm thinking way too small if that's possible, right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: And that really had an incredible shift for me. And it's funny how things operate. Once I got

crystal clear on how big my dream was the path to it become much straighter and much shorter, right?

Stephanie: Uhm hmm

Travis: And I think that's the by-product of what you're explaining there, by dreaming, daring, and being

brave enough to look silly and say bold, brave, crazy dreams, right?

Stephanie: Yeah, right.

Travis: You got to be willing to do that, because people are going to laugh at you.

Stephanie: Oh yeah.

Travis: My family, 22 years ago, tried to talk me out of this silly idea of starting a business. Now they

love me, right? And so they didn't want to see me hurt. Now 8 years into it when I was super

successful, everyone remembered that they helped me get started. Now, I didn't say anything but I

wanted to say, "Now wait a minute, you actually told me that I shouldn't be doing this." But you know

that's a by-product; I was brave enough and maybe even naive enough to dream incredibly big, right?




So I love that point. The not thinking they need to ask for help, I've been guilty of that, and even I've

been guilty of and I think this is a connotation of what you're talking about. I've been guilty of thinking

that I need to hold the head, the position, since I founded the company. And really, I don't like

managing a bunch of people. And so, one day someone told me, "Travis, you don't have to do all of

that stuff if you don't want to." And it was like someone tapping me on the shoulder and given me

permission to drop some things that I don't enjoy doing.

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: And I was like, "Duh, okay thanks. Thank you for telling me what's obvious in front of me."

Sometimes we need to be told what's in front of us. Now, I have a multi-million dollar business that I

spend 2-3 hours a week in, maybe 4 hours a week at the most.

Stephanie: Wow.

Travis: And you know, and I hated the business and I was ready to get rid of it because I was just

exhausted with the repetition. But rather than do that, why not give it to someone else and cash flow it.

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: And so, that only happened because I quit thinking that I needed to be the head person. And

also, I started asking for help, right? And then the last one that you'd mentioned, "I'll build it and then

they'll come." You know, a mindset comes to mind for me that most people-- Monetizing your business

is kind of like drilling for water, in a crazy way. And so most people build their town and then invest all of

this time and money and effort and then start drilling for water when really the best thing to do is find

where the water is and build your town around it.

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: Right? It's a whole lot easier. Now that may sound crazy but it's just the easiest way. Even

universities do a version of this. They say, "We're having a program that we're thinking about putting

on. It's going to be titled ABC and it's going to cost X amount of dollars. Sign up and if we get enough

people we'll hold the class," right?

Stephanie: Right.

Travis: And then if they don't they give the money back.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: That is a trial offer, right?

Stephanie: Yeah.




Travis: And I think that it's one connotation of what you're talking about, right?

Stephanie: And the same goes with crab funding, you know. Crab funding's really big now and people

have a misconception that, "I'm going to throw something up on Kickstarter and I'm going to make

millions of dollars." No. You still have to prove that people want something, you still have to find the

water, you've already built your town.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: So, I think people really need to adhere to that and really be thinking about that hard for

sure.

Travis: Right, great point. I've got to ask you, how have you managed to get access to so many high

level people that are on your board and advising you?

Stephanie: You know what; I get this question a lot. We've been doing amazing interviews with people

like Barbara Corcoran, and Fran Maier, and Denise Purslow, people that come aboard, and I tell you

it's really just asking. And it sounds so simple, it's not easy but it's simple. And my partner and I follow

the motto of just ask. We literally have no fear anymore when asking for things that we want and we

have no limit on the things that we will ask for. And again, it's simple, it's not easy but it's simple. And

we are continually surprised by the things that we get and the people that say yes because we just ask.

So truly that's the secret formula, we reach out, we ask a question, and we get a yes or no. And we are

constantly, delightfully surprised on how many times we get a yes.

Travis: And so do you focus on providing value first? Do you interview them first, what is it?

Stephanie: Yeah, we try to create a relationship first. Interview them or just reach out and say, "We like

your work and here's what we're working on, and we'd love to collaborate with you in some way, shape,

or form. And I've always said good people, they'll help, but great people will really, really dig in and

share. So I think that when we ask those amazing people to share with our audience and share with our

community the things that they know, they just do because they're great.

Travis: Yeah.

Stephanie: And I think we even wrote a blog post about this recently called Just Ask because it's

something we've really learned and we follow it daily.

Travis: Well, you know, I've had similar happen. This show has given me incredible connections. And

successful people normally come from a place of abundance, and even if you're in the same field, we're

just not worried about it because there's so many great clients out there. I think if you give value first

and you're working with somebody that's brilliant, or they recognize that you're pretty squared away in

an authentic, ethical person; it is easy to build those relationships with a lot of great people.




Stephanie: Yeah, it's pretty amazing. We follow something too internally that we call the Win, win, win

policy. So when we create a partnership with someone, it has to win for them, it has to win for Chic

CEO, and it has to win for Chic CEO's community.

Travis: Right.

Stephanie: So it's not a win for everybody, say, somebody wants to partner with us and they want to

give our community a 50% off for whatever they're doing and then we promote them, that sounds

awesome but Chic CEO doesn't win on that, you know? We're not getting paid or we're not getting

additional exposure. So when we do reach out and ask for something we're always asking how we can

help too. So every conversation that we typically have with somebody, we always typically ask, "How

can we help you? How can we further your business? How can we partner with you?" So that's kind of

a staple and something we talk about a lot too is making sure that you're providing value, if you're going

to ask somebody for help. Because we can ask for things all the time. "Promote my company, send this

out to your group, or can I come speak at your event--"

Travis: Then you're like "What's your name?"

Stephanie: Yeah, what's your name, and who are you, and why are you coming to Chic CEO with

something too? So I try to remind people or steer them towards the direction, "Hey, if you want us to

provide value to you then it's great, and you can pay us in a few different ways. Either with money, or

you can also promote us, or we can work out some sort of a deal. But you do have to come to the table

with value as well." Great point.

Travis: Right, reciprocation.

Stephanie: Exactly.

Travis: Yeah, all marriages are a two-way street, or happy marriages at least.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: We won't go down that road for now. Hey Stephanie, we're running short on time, we need to

transition into lightning round. Do you have a seat belt on your chair there?

Stephanie: Always.

Travis: Alright, well buckle it. Are you ready?

Stephanie: Yup.

Travis: Okay, so the three questions that I did send you, and then I'm going to throw fourth one in there

that I did not send you.




Stephanie: Okay.

Travis: Just to shake you up, just to get you a little nervous.

Stephanie: Okay.

Travis: So the first question is what book or program made an impact on you related to business that

you'd recommend and why?

Stephanie: Well, I already mentioned E-Myth, and I think that's a great practical book to get started in

business. But I'm a big fan of James Altucher and I don't know if you've heard of him but he's got a blog

that's amazing. I just like the way he thinks, he thinks completely different than anybody I've ever read

in my whole life. And he just came out with a book called Choose Yourself, and it's basically about

being able to recognize that you deserve the things that you want in life too, and that if you choose

yourself, then you're effectively choosing everyone around you as well. And that it's not selfish to go

after the things that you want to get, because then you're happier and the people around you are

happier, and you are able to serve better. So, it's a great book and I love his blog and all of his stuff,

and I highly recommend him.

Travis: Very cool, how do you spell his name?

Stephanie: James Altucher, Altucher.

Travis: Okay, alright.

Stephanie: And he has grown, and sold, and lost millions in businesses, and chess master-- It's a

super interesting life. And now he's got a blog, kind of relaying all of the things that he's learned. And he

hasn't done everything perfect and he doesn't claim to. So I like that about him too.

Travis: Perfection's boring anyways.

Stephanie: It is.

Travis: It sounds a major strategist.

Stephanie: Yeah, he's cool.

Travis: Cool. What's one of your favorite tools or pieces of technology that you've recently discovered if

any that you'd recommend to other business owners?

Stephanie: Right now I'm kind of obsessed with Wunderlist and I don't know if you've heard of it, it's

Wunderlist, Wunderlist. And it's an app that you can download to your iPad, and your computer, and

your phone, and it's just a really beautiful, simple to-do list. And I have a to-do list for almost everything,


http://amzn.to/179bRwU

https://www.wunderlist.com/en/




but the best part is that I can share to-do list with my team. So I put together a to-do list for the support

person that we have, her name's Esther we call her our Jane of All Trades because she does

everything for us, really. So I have my list for Esther and I put stuff in there for her all the time, and then

when she completes it she checkmarks the box and sends me an email that it's done. So it's continually

circling back all the time when things get done and I know, so she doesn't have to email me or tell me,

it just pops up. So I'm loving that because I can manage my team virtually if I need to by giving them

tasks and finding out when they're done.

Travis: Very cool. Wunderlist.

Stephanie: Wunderlist, simple but beautiful.

Travis: I'll check it out. What famous quote would best summarize your belief or your attitude in

business?

Stephanie: I really, really enjoy a quote that I heard Diane Sawyer say and it says, "Believe in yourself

enough to accept the fact that whatever you want in life, other people are going to want it to. And to

believe in yourself enough that you have as just as much right to achieve it as they do. So whatever

you want in life people are going to want it to, believe in yourself enough to accept that you deserve it

as well", I think. I can't relay exactly the words but basically she's saying choose yourself. Like saying is

we all want big things for ourselves, we all have goals and dreams, and sometimes we don't believe

that we deserve them or that somebody else might deserve them more than we do. And that's just not

true, we can all have what we want, we can all achieve the goals that we want, there's enough for all of

us.

Travis: Yeah, in fact that's a key part of success is you've got to believe that you deserve it.

Stephanie: Yeah.

Travis: What superpowers do you have that you could share with us that most people don't know?

Stephanie: I hardly ever forget a name.

Travis: Very useful.

Stephanie: Very useful and very, very lucky because I always remember somebody's name. They only

have to tell me once and I never forget, so I'm very, very lucky.

Travis: Can I borrow that? Or can I copy it? Can you shoot a copy of it and send it over to me?

Stephanie: Wouldn't that be nice, I'm very lucky; I do know how lucky I am.

https://www.wunderlist.com/en/




Travis: Wonderful, I've completely, thoroughly enjoyed spending time with you and talking to you about

this, and I love what your focus is. We definitely need more entrepreneurs. So I want to play a part in

helping support you in any way possible. How do people connect with you?

Stephanie: Can I get this through Facebook, through Twitter, and you can also email us at

[email protected], and again we're going to launch our mastermind program in the next couple of

weeks. We're really, really excited about it, it's going to be a great program filled with lots and lots of

stuff to help women for their businesses.

Travis: What's the date on that, the launch date?

Stephanie: October 21st.

Travis: Okay, alright. Cool, excellent. Can you hangout like a couple more minutes?

Stephanie: Absolutely.

Travis: Great, I'm going to wrap things up. Now remember, you can find all of the links to the books

and the resources mentioned in the show in the show notes. Just go to

rockstarentrepreneurnetwork.com. Can you sing Stephanie?

Stephanie: Can I sing?

Travis: Yeah, can you sing, can you do like the dot com part?

Stephanie: Dot com.

Travis: So wait, I'll do the URL and then you do the .com part, okay?

Stephanie: Okay.

Travis: Just go to rockstarentrepreneurnetwork--

Stephanie: Dot com.

End of Interview

Travis: It's a brand new site that we're building out that's completely focused on giving you the

resources to grow your business. Now, earlier I had told you that I have something really exciting for

you that we've been talking about it on the last couple of episodes. It's a program that we've put

together to help you apply a proven formula that basically shows you how to create an extremely





profitable business when you combine this formula with your great service or product. It's called the

Business Breakthrough Program and it's free to join. When you enter the sweepstakes you'll have a

chance to win $73,000 in cash and prizes plus my personal Lamborghini. The formula is exactly what

I've used to build several multi-million dollar businesses with very little start-up money. It's a gradual

process. Now the reasons for these grandiose prizes are to motivate you to get out of your comfort

zone and take constant action while showing you how to reach your true potential. As we've talked

about with Stephanie today, we need more great entrepreneurs right now more than ever before, or at

least in my lifetime. For more information just go to rockstarentrepreneurnetwork.com and look for the

sweepstakes promotion. My quote for today comes from Henry Ward Beecher, and the quote reads,

"Your best successes come after some of your biggest disappointments."

This is Travis Lane Jenkins signing off. You may already know this although I think it's worth

mentioning. No matter where you're at in your journey as an entrepreneur, what you're doing really

does matter because you're an example of what it looks like to go after your dreams on your own

terms, so keep it up. To your incredible success, take care.





How We Can Help You

We know that finding someone that you can trust online today is hard and that so many “so called

gurus” are self-‐appointed and have never really even done what they teach you to do. That’s exactly

why we created the Double Your Profits Business Accelerator. This is an exclusive offer for our fans at

a fraction of its normal cost.

Here's what to expect. We'll Schedule a 'One on One' private session, where we'll take the time to dive

deep into your business and tell you what is missing, so that you can have your best year ever!

We'll do this by performing a S.W.O.T. Analysis. This tells us your Strengths, Weaknesses,

Opportunities and Threats within your business.

This will be an eye opener for YOU, for several reasons, however some of the most common reasons

are.

As the 'Business Owner' it’s difficult to see the big picture of your own business because you’re in the

middle of a daily management.

And you are too emotionally involved to completely impartial.

This is a common problem for EVERY business owner. It doesn’t matter if you are a one-man army, or

an army of 150, the problem is still the same.

Travis Lane Jenkins

Business Mentor-Turn Around Specialist

Radio Host of The Entrepreneurs Radio Show

“Conversations with Self-made Millionaires and High-level Entrepreneurs That Grow Your Business"

http://www.rockstarentrepreneurnetwork.com/biz-accelerator

http://theentrepreneursradioshow.com/

The Entrepreneurs Radio Show 078 Stephanie Burns

Small Business & Entrepreneurship

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