Speaker 1 00:00:05 Hey there, a thoughtful listener. Are you looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients? Well, I've had private conversations with over 2000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from. I've got a free video you can watch with no opt in required, where I'll share the exact steps necessary to be 100% inbound in your industry over the next 6 to 8 months, with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for over 15 years, and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies. Just head to up my influence. Com and watch my free class on how to create endless high ticket sales appointments. Also, don't forget the thoughtful entrepreneur is always looking for great guests. Go to up my influence. Com and click on podcast. I'd love to have you. With us right now it is Rachel. Minion. Rachel. You were one of the co-founders of Rock Star and Moon. Your website is Rachel minion.com and I share that website because it will link off to some of the projects that you're working on, including Rockstar and Moon.

Speaker 1 00:01:21 That website, by the way, is Rock Star and moon.com, but it's Rockstar with two hours at the end. Rockstar and moon. Rachel, it's great to have you. boy, it was so hard for me to hit record on this episode because you and I instantly started talking about music. And, you know, before we get into this, I'd love to just kind of talk about the wisdom or brilliance of your brand because it it's it is it's like you could, like when music fans get together, I mean, they can talk for hours, right, about this shared experience. And, and I suspect again, that's kind of what led to do your branding.

Speaker 2 00:02:01 Well, it's the common denominator that really brings us all together. It could be a Beatles tune. It could be a Pantera song. It doesn't matter. There is that commonality where every single person who goes to see a show, there's an energy, there is an aliveness, there is something that you can't put into words, and that is that feeling that we want to bring.

Speaker 2 00:02:24 I created Rock Star Moon because I was always told I was a rock star at work. Great. What do you do with it? I can't name a brand that. But I was sitting out. we had just closed my parents business. I'm trying to figure out what in the world do we do and how do we do it? And how do I create something that gives me an extra skillset? I can do a marketing company, but what do I do? So I'm sitting in Dewey Beach. I'm behind the big bottle in cork, hear the waves of the ocean. It's dark, the moon is out, the stars are out. And it all came together. Rock star and moon.

Speaker 1 00:02:58 Well, I love it and you know. Do you mind sharing just a little bit about branding? generally it's, you know, it's it's a bit of, of kind of, what, what you oversee. But, do you mind just talking generally about, like, when we're thinking about how we communicate our brand? why, you know, commonality or, you know, it's like, why that's so important or valuable.

Speaker 1 00:03:23 in many cases, I think if not every case.

Speaker 2 00:03:28 It's brand is the life force and that energy to your company. So when you get on a call with me or you get on a call with my business partner, you'll see guitars in the background immediately. You're now thinking, Rockstar, they have something to do with music. And guess what? We have zero musical ability. We have marketing ability. Here's a brand. We bring that front and center. You come to my website, you're going to see guitars everywhere. You're going to see that fund. You're going to see the playfulness. They have a technology called the growth amplifier. Everything fits together and that helps to build out a brand infrastructure. And when we're building out this brand infrastructure or authority infrastructure, what we want to do is have a strategic backbone where we create a position. So your brand is recognized, it's respected, everything is congruent. And you can then be looked at as that go to leader in the industry. Everything is integrated from communication channels.

Speaker 2 00:04:27 So you're not going to hear something from me that says, hi, how are you now? It's going to be like, hey Rockstar, how are you doing today? It's going to have that energy in that platform.

Speaker 1 00:04:38 I love it, I'm jealous, I wish I had your brain.

Speaker 2 00:04:40 You know what I'm thinking?

Speaker 1 00:04:43 You know. Well, what's nice about this too? And I think, you know, particularly for those of us who are in service based B2B businesses, like were we spend time with our clients. you know, it is so critical to get the right kind of people to work with. Otherwise it's just miserable. Like if you don't have that right dynamic or you have a bad client, I mean, that is just a tax that soaks not only you as the founder, but it's a tax on your team as well. and so what I was saying, no.

Speaker 2 00:05:17 Was that it's all about the power of saying no and being. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 00:05:21 Yeah, yeah. Well, that was the point I was getting to is the brand allows us like it's a positive filter and it's a negative filter.

Speaker 1 00:05:29 So what I like about your brand and again, I think this is a common message for all of us is use your brand to filter and weed out the bad people. Talk about who you you know or you don't have to say this directly, right? But just, you know, talk about who you don't work with. We do, you know, for us, you know, like we do not work with marketers. It's not that I don't like pro marketers. It's just it's just they just don't work with our system. It's just it's anathema. So now I don't have conversations with Bro. We marketers.

Speaker 2 00:06:00 We have a question that we ask in every discovery session. If you're a WWE wrestler, you're getting up for a big presentation on stage. What is your walk on song? Yeah, it is the ultimate stumper. But at the same time, this tells me everything I need to know about your personality. Can we work together? Or are you someone who just really can't feel that same energy?

Speaker 1 00:06:24 Yeah.

Speaker 1 00:06:25 Wow. That's fascinating. Yeah. If that that's a that's interesting. So to to our friend that's listening right now think about the questions that you could ask. And it might appear silly to some. And it might appear silly to someone that you don't want to work with. And that's a good thing. Rachel, I want to get into your domain expertise around marketing, too, because obviously that's that's what you do. Do you mind sharing just a little bit about your superpowers? you know, again, particularly you do a lot of work in can be to be. So you mind talking a little bit about that?

Speaker 2 00:07:01 The bottom line is for all of our clients, we build out a brand infrastructure. It helps to build that reputation that commands attention. It earns trust and it creates a lasting impact. But the really cool part of all of this is I don't want to work with you forever. So when we're working with our ideal clients, when I do my job right, not only have we grown them, we've grown them so much, they are starting to bring in someone internally and they can take our processes.

Speaker 2 00:07:28 They can take our frameworks, they take our systems, everything we've created. And here you go. So now we have that seamless handoff because I want my clients to win. We have a mission. We want to double 100 businesses in the next five years. We are working to grow that. And for the small business community, that's our not only our mission, but it's our why. That's why we exist. We are here to support and serve.

Speaker 1 00:07:56 Yeah. Do you mind sharing a little bit about the trends that you are seeing in marketing? Like what are you hooking into right now? You know, not just just generic marketing for B2B, but do you mind maybe getting a little granular about what you see working well right now versus. Yeah. No, we don't work on that.

Speaker 2 00:08:15 So my clients are all B2B, and what we see immediately get effect and get into algorithms is a LinkedIn newsletter. That LinkedIn newsletter has been revamped. So now if I start a LinkedIn newsletter today, every single, well, they start with anywhere from 10 to 50% of my connections will get a notification in their inbox asking me to subscribe from there, any single time I post that those straight to their notification bar.

Speaker 2 00:08:44 So immediately you will see. Hey Rachel, minion just posted a newsletter. The cool part about this is that also helps to grow subscribers. It costs nothing and if you have that content engine that's giving you blogs, why not utilize this for snackable content here and redirect somebody to your website to book a call with you, whatever that may be, and immediately it gets impact. One of my clients we have growing over 6000 subscribers. He never had a list, ever. Another one of my clients. We doubled her subscription list in two months based off something she was building for like five years.

Speaker 1 00:09:23 Yeah. Tell me. Tell me a little bit about. Sounds like you. You have high value of of an email list. Tell me more about that.

Speaker 2 00:09:31 I love having an email list. I think that those emails are so valuable, but it may not necessarily be emails that you're all about because getting into the inbox is really hard. How do you get not marked as spam? How do you work on deliverability? You need a team that can work on that for you.

Speaker 2 00:09:47 But there's also the other side of the world with a LinkedIn connection and getting deeper into the connection, so they are constantly seeing your content. What we want to do is create a way that you continually nurture the people that are in your system and bring them back so that they can think of you as just that one thing. You will think of me as the rockstar marketer. You will think of my client as the ultimate for CEOs who are looking to exit business. You will think of other clients in those particular ways that were branding in every article, every piece of content, everything they see. We want to keep nurturing that. So the minute somebody says, oh, I need a marketing team, I'm already there. You've known me for it could take a month. It could take six months, it could take a year. But it's constantly there. We had a client of ours who grew that newsletter, posted content about a 1031 exchange we post every other week. Two months later, one of his connections saw the newsletter, called them immediately and he got $11 million deal out of it.

Speaker 2 00:10:52 It may not happen fast, but that's the nuance of building demand and making sure that you stay warm. Whether you're actively doing it or not.

Speaker 1 00:11:04 Yeah. and in terms of like, what you have seen falling out of favor in B2B marketing. you know, and I'm kind of thinking about some of the lead gen stuff that's just, you know, what? What do you see not working, but maybe you see, you know, gurus and other marketers still advocating for it. And you're like, people stop. It's you can do that. It's just going to be real expensive and probably not work as well as some of these other things. Anything on your list?

Speaker 2 00:11:38 Oh yeah. So what I hate and gives me that cringe factor. And every time I just feel icky, I want to go take a shower is when I get some ridiculous guarantee from a child who has never done this. They. This must be their first job. They're giving me a guarantee I'm going to make $1 million in the next three months, they're going to give me a guarantee.

Speaker 2 00:11:57 That's so stupid. They think I'm going to sign up, and there's a lot of people who do, and that's great, but they never get those expectations met. And then there's that distrust and the upset and it sucks. It's the churn and burn businesses that are saying, hey, I'll give you a guarantee you're going to make $100,000 in new calls in the next two weeks. It doesn't work that way. Business has never been that simple. If it was, we would all be retired. So that's where we go for the no b.s. method of how we do things and put it out in the marketplace. Because if it's not clear, if it's not believable, nobody cares. They will never, ever, ever believe. But don't worry. Those that are clear, they're concise. They say exactly what they're going to do. That's who you go to after you gone through a churn and burn.

Speaker 1 00:12:49 Yeah. okay, so our friend that's been listening, you know, and obviously they're in B2B. Obviously they want to grow.

Speaker 1 00:12:59 do you have any long form content? You have resources. Do you have things that, folks could likely from here and they want to learn more and they, they want to see what's working in demand gen or growth hacking authority building, you know, that sort of thing. where would you recommend they go?

Speaker 2 00:13:17 I'm on my website, Rachel minion.com. I have 18 playbooks that are ready to roll for marketing. You will become a marketing rockstar from them. I have three frameworks. We are constantly growing our content engine, so if you're looking to get a quick start, quick wins. We have those playbooks available for you.

Speaker 1 00:13:35 Yeah. And so again you're sorry I'm on rock star and moon.com Rachel minion. and that's just our actual minion. And to our friend that's listening, we have the links for everything, included right now. Rachel, if you're looking into your crystal ball for 20, 2025. what do you what would you recommend to all be to be founders? You know, kind of in that 6 to 8 figure territory.

Speaker 1 00:14:05 what do you what do you think that they really need to make a focus on for the year ahead?

Speaker 2 00:14:11 My belief is congruence. If we take a look at all the different activities that you're doing. First we need to see the data, making sure that these are playing out. But is the message that you're putting out there absolutely congruent with what you're saying on social versus what you're saying in emails? Are you talking to the right people with the right message? If you're going to well, I'll give you an example. I help Verizon rebuild their website from the ground up. So at Verizon Wireless, if I'm an iPhone customer, why would you ever send me emails about an Android and iPhone customer since the beginning, since iPhones came out? Why give me something that's completely incongruent? I don't think you know who I am, and it doesn't fit with the brand messaging of the value that you've given me. So what I think in 2025, we need to be really cognizant of how not only we're coming across the messaging that we're using all the different platforms so that it is omnichannel and look to see how it's resonating.

Speaker 2 00:15:10 You'll know how it's resonating based off the data. And it doesn't mean go follow any shiny object. Don't go jump on TikTok. Don't go jump on all these other platforms. Let's get really good at what we're doing and making sure that's hitting first before we do that. And then we work on who your ideal customer is and keeping to dig down. So we hit those pain points appropriately.

Speaker 1 00:15:33 Yeah. again Rachel minion.com Rockstar and moon.com. Rachel. It's been fun chatting. the pre-interview chat was was equally as enjoyable for you. It's always fun when you can geek out with your fellow geeks. And you and I are both huge fans of live music. we're both. It sounds like we both love a lot of the same genres and stuff, a lot of 90s rock. So and you're not.

Speaker 2 00:15:59 That far from me. So I'll see you at a show.

Speaker 1 00:16:01 Yes. Right. Oh, I'm sure we will be at. I'm sure if we were to go through our previous concert schedule, and my wife and I probably go to a live show about once every three weeks, at this point now, and, you know, that was something, I think, after Covid that we really committed to, like, we're just like, you know what? We miss community.

Speaker 1 00:16:22 It it makes us happy. Like, I feel like I feel better about the world. Give you a sharing example. there was a, so locally and I mentioned this to you, Orlando or Central Florida tends to be, it's a real hot spot for tribute bands, second only to like LA in terms of total number of tribute bands, I believe. and so it's nice. So like if you love all these famous, you know, kind of classic and, you know, original like these artists from the 90s and so forth. Like there's a tribute band in Central Florida you go to. But, you know, I was at this once you'd mentioned Pantera, but I went to a a metallica hardwired. who I'm sure you've seen and then, the Pantera experience and, you know, it's like I looked around, like when everyone's just, like, really getting into Metallica, and I'm like, you know, in our day to day world, these are a bunch of people that we may or may not have much in common.

Speaker 1 00:17:14 But man, we have this moment in common right now. And then I started thinking about, you know, the workweek and and how it's like looking around. It's like, man, you know what? There's a lot of people with a lot of stuff going on in their lives. There's a lot of, you know, people that work their tail off all week long. You know, they've got the stresses of the week, all the things, you know, systemically that they worry about. But in this moment right here, we are a community and we are one together. And we get to this, this cathartic, you know, kind of like, you know, as like, you know, again, you know, they're coming in with blackened, you know, or something like that. You know, it's just it was just so liberating, so free. Anyway, there's my little, soapbox about how much I love music. Rachel, again, thank you so much for this great conversation.

Speaker 1 00:18:02 Rock star and moon. Rachel. minion.com. Rachel, thanks for joining us. Thanks for listening to the Thoughtful Entrepreneur Show. If you are a thoughtful business owner or professional who would like to be on this daily program, please visit up my influence. Com and click on podcast. We believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. We love our community who listens and shares our program every day. Together we are empowering one another as thoughtful leaders. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, if you're looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients, I have had private conversations with over 2000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from. I've got a free video that you can watch right now with no opt in or email required, where I'm going to share the exact steps necessary to be 100% inbound in your industry over the next 6 to 8 months, with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for more than 15 years and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies.

Speaker 1 00:19:17 Just head to up my influencer.com and watch my free class on how to create endless high ticket sales appointments. Make sure to hit subscribe so that tomorrow morning. That's right, seven days a week you are going to be inspired and motivated to succeed. I promise to bring positivity and inspiration to you for around 15 minutes every single day. Thanks for listening and thank you for being a part of the Thoughtful Entrepreneur movement.