ļ»æJulie Kirsch Full Interview Transcript
Opening & Background
AJ: Welcome to today's episode of the Thriving Through podcast. Today, my guest is Julie Kirsch. Julie, I'm delighted to have you on the podcast.
Julie: Thank you for having me, I'm so excited to be here.
AJ: Tell me, this is a question I ask every podcast guest, it's the first question right out of the gate. What was your path to becoming a self-employed consultant?
Julie: Of course, there's never a straight line to this journey. My journey to being a self-independent consultant with the Friendship Strategist was really inspired by a bigger career change. I completely pivoted and changed careers. Networking was such a pivotal part of that change, that I started writing about it, blogging about it, putting it on social media, so it kind of naturally grew out of this passion, and I knew I was good at this topic, and I started to package it for other people.
AJ: And you, currently, you are, the friendship strategist is a sort of a side hustle for you, so you're still employed full-time?
Julie: Yes, I work in marketing strategy, but also very much helps networking, it helps me understand people, because constantly in marketing, you're understanding personas and your customer, so I can use a lot of those same skills in teaching networking and building relationships.
AJ: And we'll talk a lot more about the networking building relationships. But for now, do you have a plan, or I guess maybe not, maybe not, at this point, to take it to, to expand the friendship strategist? Or are you still kind of juggling, feel like for the foreseeable future, you're going to do both?
Julie: For now, I really want to do both, because the friendship strategist brings me a lot of joy. It's also perfect for my lifestyle. I'm a mom of two little boys. And the friendship strategist, I teach workshops a lot at universities or to professional groups, so it fits in my schedule nicely that I can plus up or scale back when I need it at certain times of the year.
Building the Business
AJ: And how long have you been doing this?
Julie: That's a good question, because I started probably in 2019, first writing about it, blogging about it, took some time off when I had my kids. But then I realized how much I still loved it, wanted to talk about it, had a lot to say, so I've been ramping up the past couple years, and really within the past year, turning it truly into a business where there's actual products like workshops and coaching, and really giving the blog a more professional feel.
AJ: And over that time, as you've evolved it into a, you know, sort of a more, kind of bona fide business. Tell us a story or two about the biggest challenges that you've faced during that time, building your practice and how you overcame them.
Julie: To me, it's where I want to grow. It's sometimes a mindset. Originally, when I started writing, I thought, I will write a book. However, that was a big, scary goal to me. And a book has to be perfect, in my opinion. So, I overcame that challenge by changing it into the blog. Well, a blog, you can edit, you can change things, it's a little more fluid.
I then took that and made it into a workshop, which I have key learnings after every workshop. I get feedback from students or professionals, so then I can keep modifying it, making it better. That's a lot less scary than a very big goal. So, like, that's also probably one of my biggest recommendations, is having several goals, and maybe you can put some of those bigger ones off, and having more achievable, flexible goals in the meantime.
AJ: I like that.
Strategic vs Random Networking
AJ: So, now I want to talk about networking. You talked about, when we talked earlier, you talked about strategic networking versus random networking, and that a lot of consultants network randomly. They go to whatever event is convenient. I mean, I've had podcast guests who say they go to Chamber of Commerce events, and maybe that's right for them or not. But you talk about and teach about being strategic with your networking goals. So, how should a consultant approach networking differently to actually generate consistent client opportunities?
Julie: That's a fantastic question, because we all only have so much energy and time to give to our business, you want to use it wisely. You can think of your events, does it align with your business goals? Are the right people in the room? So, if you want clients, are there potential clients or connectors in the room that could get you to the right clients? Or maybe it's even a volunteer opportunity that would get you some brand awareness in the room.
You want to think of it as your brand for your business, and does that event or organization that you've joined align to your business? For example, I try to only go to, like, marketing and business, or women in business, because those are the things I'm very passionate about. Someone a few months ago asked me to join a sustainable business group. Well, that is very all well and good, but I don't have the extra time and energy to give to that. And I said, thank you so much for asking me to join, but these are the two paths and groups that I really want to focus my energy and my personal brand.
So, I decline that, and I make sure I plus up in the right areas, so that people get to know me, and they remember. Okay, Julie loves to support women in business. She liked to support marketing initiatives. I got it. So when they think of you in the future, it's better brand recognition.
Joining Groups vs One-Time Events
AJ: And you talked about joining groups, so when, because there's sort of a difference between a random networking event that comes up, but you, but so you, it sounds like you advocate joining some sort of group that meets regularly.
Julie: Yes, I do. And it can go both ways. So they might be where you could meet future clients, or people that could connect you. For example, because I'm a women entrepreneur, I have a women entrepreneurship group. They have monthly coffee hours. So that works well for me, being a busy mom. Maybe I drop off the kids for school and can go to a coffee event for just 1 hour. There's where I meet connectors. Maybe I meet women who run businesses to improve your website. Maybe there's ones that do social media marketing. So those are my connectors, and I want to network with them, because they will also speak highly of my business and give me referrals.
For finding clients, for example, so say I want to try to find more universities to partner with to do workshops. I now need to network with career services. So I'm going to find connectors within universities that can make a warm introduction to someone in career services, because I want to get their business. So that's how I strategically market, and then once I get that introduction, I lean into that right contact, because that is worth my time and energy, because it's strategic of what I need next for my business.
Finding the Right People at Events
AJ: So when you go to a meeting. Do you have certain people that you want, that you've sort of targeted that you want to meet, or certain types of people? How do you find, I mean, when I think of networking, it's like, you know, there are a number of people there. How do you find the people that are most advantageous for you?
Julie: It's a little bit of intuition and being brave. I went to a marketing association meeting a few weeks back, and there was a big variety of people there, young professionals to seasoned professionals that were owning the marketing agencies. At that event, I obviously still networked and said hello to a lot of people in a variety, so I'm not saying don't socialize. But I knew I wanted to maybe get in with the bigger players that are the owners and higher-up VPs of marketing groups. So, you have to kind of go into those and introduce yourself more professionally and show off your personal brand. So for me, as I want to grow and expand my career, I need those people to be my advocates. Because they are the decision makers.
Creating a Systematic Marketing Engine
AJ: Any other thoughts on turning how to turn networking into a systematic marketing engine, rather than just random relationship building?
Julie: It's full circle, so I work in marketing, and especially omnichannel marketing. It's all different touchpoints, so you want to have a presence online. Tagging the right people, tagging the right organizations so that the algorithm is popping up to your network. It's being in person at the events.
But maybe you take photos, and you take pictures with the right people that have a lot of connections. You tag them on LinkedIn, and guess what? Their whole network sees that photo. I've been at events where people are starting to recognize me because I'm posting a lot, I'm very social on social media. And it extends my reach.
And then when I go to an in-person event, it's so much easier to talk to people when they say, I've heard of you, I've seen your post! And then, of course, I give them a big warm welcome. I ensure that I connect with them on LinkedIn. That's probably one of my biggest tactics. I always try to connect with everybody on LinkedIn. It's twofold. Then I get their connection, and I can look at their profile, maybe it's advantageous for me. Then I also get additional followers for my needs. So it's kind of, you have to do it full circle, and from all angles.
AJ: I love it, so it's not just a random tactic. It is, because when we talked earlier, you mentioned that networking helps you stay top of mind, and it feeds your content strategy, which is what you talked about a little bit. So, it would never have occurred to me to take pictures, and then post and tag those people.
Julie: Yeah, I do that all the time. Luckily, I love taking photos. I'm always taking photos at the event. Recently, I went to a summer networking happy hour on a rooftop in the city, so it was very easy to talk about the beautiful views. I made sure to take pictures with some of my friends, so the good news is they are my friends, but they're also wonderful professionals. I can then tag them on LinkedIn, thank the agency, so then you're also being very gracious, giving credit to the people who gave you that opportunity. I'm saying what a beautiful event it was.
It's also a little bit light-hearted, which I know everybody probably appreciates seeing in their workday. It's kind of fun to scroll through. It just also shows that I'm getting out there. It proves that I am a networker, so if my business is networking, I need to demonstrate my skill. Think about that when you are doing your content strategy. Whatever your skill set is, and you want to be an expert in, you need to stay in that lane, post about it. Show other people that you are out in your community, you are thanking others, you're pulling in their networks as well.
Tracking Networking ROI
AJ: Just, as you said that, I was just thinking that there are a couple posts I need to make. That stimulated my thinking. Networking can be time-consuming. So how do you track networking ROI?
Julie: Sometimes! It happens when you least expect it, so you do have to put yourself out there. I have a term that I say always-on networking is really important, because some of my biggest networking opportunities have come when I least expect it. I preach about growing your network and nurturing it. Keeping those top-of-mind people that are your champions, you do have to invest in them. Go to lunches, go to coffees. Because over the year, you will get really big opportunities that will come your way. It's not an exact science for ROI by any means. You do have to try to enjoy it a little bit.
I also try to use my time wisely, so maybe always on Fridays I do my networking, maybe coffee or lunch, because it's the end of the work week, and people are a little bit more relaxed, so I do a lot of either virtual 30-minute informational networking sessions, coffee, or lunch, I would highly recommend those, so that maybe your ROI is a little bit lower if you do a virtual meeting. Because then you don't have to go anywhere. But if it's someone you genuinely think is a long-term investment that will give you contacts for a long time, those are the people you should meet in person, go to coffee, go to lunch and stay more deeply connected.
So I think you should almost put networking, maybe think of it as, like, part of your marketing plan. Like, maybe dedicate even just an hour a week to, say, 30 minutes of a virtual networking, and then another 30 minutes just messaging people on LinkedIn, I will just say, how are you? How have you been? By doing that, they will then come back to me later and say, hey, I thought of you, you were top of mind, because you just said hello. It's really that simple.
Lead Nurturing vs Networking
AJ: You know, you have, what I'm hearing here is when I, in the past, when I thought of networking. I've got kind of narrow to networking events. And what you're talking about with networking, I would almost call lead nurturing, you know, but it's, so you meet somebody, for example, at an event. You get their information, and then you follow up with, let's do a coffee, or let's do lunch, something like that. So you are not just collecting business cards at these events, you actually follow up with these people, and then maybe reach out to them on LinkedIn, check in with them.
Julie: Yes. It can be lead nurturing. I think you need to think of it also very genuine, because not, you're not gonna get something out of everybody. Maybe it's even just a mentor or inspiration. I have a lot of women in business that I'm just in awe of, and they actually fuel me, and I get something out of it, because they're running these businesses that are amazing, and I'm watching them. I'm just so thankful to even be in their circle, that I can watch them be a business owner. So I guess that's where I get my ROI, is I get energized, I get inspired. Even so I talk about maybe a business owner. Even students, I get inspired by. So I give back a lot to universities. Who knows? Those students could have really amazing jobs one day, and they will be out in the world, so you never want to belittle anybody or talk down to anybody. You want to give everybody respect.
I also love working with students, graduate students in particular, because they are doing amazing things, and I love hearing their stories. So, by just listening to their story, it keeps me going and gives me ideas to boost my career, to keep going, to remind myself that people are out there working really hard, overcoming obstacles. And on a really good path to success.
Real-World Networking Examples
AJ: Wow. Expanding the concept, because you do talk about networking and relationship building, so what, you know, rather than thinking about it as lead nurturing, think about it as building relationships with people who inspire you, people who could maybe refer, and maybe also some people who could hire you. But it's, it's really the gamut, and not, it's not as transactional of, I'm only going to talk to people who could hire me.
Julie: Correct, because you just never know who is connected. For example, one of my biggest opportunities was when I was in graduate school getting my MBA, a professor of mine, I got to be the teaching assistant. That's how I got my original job in strategy, because I got to tell my story, I was being very genuine. Got hired, been at my job for over 7 years now. Turns out his daughter now works at the university in career services, who then hires me to come back. So, it just comes full circle, and I was just being genuine to these people. Well, now, guess what? I have these champions inside that I've built relationships, and then it does fuel business from that.
AJ: That's awesome.
Networking for Introverts
AJ: I want to switch to something that's near and dear to my heart. You talked about networking for introverts. And it's near and dear to me because I am an introvert, and I think I mentioned to you when we met earlier that when I think of networking, and because I think of it as networking events, I would rather go get a root canal than go to a networking event. So, and you work with introverted professionals, so walk us through your approach for helping introverted professionals network effectively.
Julie: Absolutely. I say you need to use confidence as a tool in networking. Now, you don't have to always believe it, or be confidence all the time, but it's about pulling your confidence lever when you go to an event. Well, how do you be confident? There are some steps.
You could just even be a good listener. For example, you're asking me really good questions because you're listening to what I say, so we're having a really good conversation. You could take that as an approach at a networking event. Be a good listener and ask that person thoughtful questions. And they'll actually start to like you, because they're talking about themselves, you're asking really good questions. So the attention doesn't even need to be on you.
If you do want to highlight yourself in your skill set, talk about what you're good at. We all have some sort of skill or knowledge set. Lean on that. And you know what you are talking about. So then you can say, find some little connection, and offer what you do, and that should be easy to talk about. It's about you, it's about your skill set, it's about what you do. You don't have to know everything. But you should lean on what you know, and just talk about it. So it, make sure it's just back and forth, and that's how you can build your confidence, because you do have something valuable to say.
AJ: I love that. And the asking good questions is, introverts are actually at a distinct advantage. Because introverts tend to be better listeners, and better question askers, so lean into the strength.
Julie: And that could, if you're trying to get a new lead or a business prospect while listening to what that person has to say, you could chime in and then offer your solution, maybe you could refer a friend, or another business colleague, like, that's how you actually find out about business opportunities. You could ask, what keeps you up at night? What is your biggest challenge? Where do you want to take your business? Those are really easy questions.
You could even plan in advance. So you could kind of have a little script of questions if you get really nervous, that you could ask anybody. You could even just say, tell me about your career, I'd love to hear about your career journey. How did you get to where you are?
AJ: I love the idea of coming up with questions ahead of time, because I, you know, it's easy to get into a situation, and go completely blank. It's like, I am. I don't know. I don't know what to say.
Julie: The one thing I realized is everybody's nervous. Even if you're extroverted, like myself, I'll walk into a room where I don't know anybody, or I don't know what the venue even looks like. Of course I'm nervous! That's human nature. Once I realized that we're all nervous, I realized if I just go say hi to someone, it breaks the tension. It makes them feel better, it makes me feel better. I can ask how they are, I can ask them if they've ever been here, I could ask what do you recommend? Are you, did you get something good to eat? Did you get something good to drink? Those are really simple questions that I use all the time to break the ice with someone, because anybody can answer that. And it gets us talking a little bit more.
AJ: I love, I especially love what you just said, is we're all nervous. You know, you, because I'll go into a networking event, and I just assume everybody else feels great, and they're all really happy to be there and not feeling the slightest bit awkward, whereas I'm feeling incredibly awkward. You know, and it's just remembering that we're all pretty much, I mean, we're all pretty much the same.
Julie: Right, and everybody's being strategic at these events. Maybe you're in a group, maybe the conversation's dying out a little bit, and you see someone across the room that you know you need to talk to. How do you even get over there? How do you even break into that group? Oh, no, she's, she's so popular. There's a whole line of people, how do I even go over there? Do I stand there quietly? Do I say hello? These are all completely natural things. Honestly, if you just say hi, put out your hand, I just always go into a group and I just say, hi, I'm Julie, how are you? And of course they talk back to you. It's a really, really easy way to break the ice.
Balancing Business, Work, and Family
AJ: You've given me some great tips about networking that I love, and I know the listeners will also like them. I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about balancing your side business development with a full-time job and children.
AJ: So, for consultants who are thinking about diversifying their offerings, or building something alongside their consulting work, or for those who may be listening that are still full-time employed, how do you manage both of these? All of these, because it's not just the full-time job and the business, it's the family. How do you manage all of this without burning out?
Julie: Managing your burnout and being kind to yourself is really key. Like I said at the beginning, I do this still for the joy. While I do want it to be a business, and grow it, and make money from it, if certain times of the year that I'm just not feeling it, for example, January through March, it's dark, it's gloomy. I was really hard on myself this year, and I said, ugh, you're not doing enough, you should be growing, you should be working on this. But then I said, no, this is meant to be for joy. If you need a break, you can take it, because now.
Usually July till the end of the year is probably my busiest time. Like I said, with universities going back to school, teaching workshops, conferences are coming up. I, you can plus up your energy during certain times and scale back when you need it. So, for example, if the kids are in need, and there's a lot of activities, maybe that's where you scale back and focus on your family. But when maybe things get more back into a routine, you can set time to work on this.
It also, you have to listen to yourself, like, when is your natural reset? For me, I love actually September, this time of the year. It's back to school. It feels like such a reset for me that I get a spike of motivation. I try to then ride that wave and work extra hard on my offerings, my ideas, my inspiration.
The nice thing about juggling it is we're in a virtual world. I take a lot of notes on my phone, I'll email myself ideas, I leverage Google Docs, so you can get that literally on any device. ChatGPT has an app, so if I needed to write a post for me on LinkedIn, and then pivot to Instagram, I can do all that and start posting.
I would also say, like we talked about, planning ahead, so if you have a content strategy, a lot of my LinkedIn posts I can schedule ahead of time. And I will plan out different cadences that I think are appropriate. For example, if I have a back-to-school post, so I want to highlight my workshops, I'll make sure that it's a logical day of the week when school comes back. If I know I even actually need to get a lead's attention, I'll start posting certain times of the year because I want to remind them that I'm an expert. So it's strategic of when you want to plus up and give that energy to balance full-time job, your side hustle, and family obligations.
Future Goals and Challenges
AJ: Now, as we start, well, actually, I, I have a couple questions about where you see your, the friendship strategist 3 to 5 years from now.
Julie: If you could fast-forward into the future. Into the future, I would like to be scaling what I do, doing workshops at more universities, and for businesses such as insurance companies, maybe real estate, targeting professionals that need to grow their network to help their business ongoing. I would love to travel, I'm very well traveled, so I am willing to do that.
I would also like to be doing more one-on-
