648 Debbie Allen:

If entrepreneurship is in your DNA, you’re likely the sort of person that is endlessly curious, confidently resilient, always willing to ask for help, and nimble in your ability to reinvent. Of course, not everyone is wired that way, so entrepreneurship isn’t for everyone. My guest today – Debbie Allen – knows firsthand what it takes to startup and build multimillion dollar businesses, and today listen on to hear the secrets of reinvention and resilience – and much more.

MELINDA

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock, 5-time serial entrepreneur and founder-CEO of the social podcast app Podopolo and here on Wings of Inspired Business we share the inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders … so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams.

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur who is known as the Expert of Experts. Debbie Allen has reinvented herself many times over, starting out at age 19 helping to build her family’s car rental and ministorage business. She never looked back, creating and building many more to multimillion dollar success and becoming an internationally renowned speaker and business mentor. These days Debbie helps her clients position themselves as go-to experts in their niche industry, and boost their sales.

Debbie will be here in a minute with a lot of must-listen advice wherever you are in your entrepreneurial journey. And first…

Have you downloaded Podopolo yet? If you’re listening to this podcast right now then I know you love podcasts as much as me – and that’s why it’s time to explore the app that makes listening social and curates the ideal podcasts for you from our library of more than 4 million. Find out what everyone is talking about – join us on Podopolo today – free to download in either app store.

Debbie Allen knows all about reinvention. As an entrepreneur she knows firsthand how much that is beyond your control – pandemics, recessions, changing competitive environments and more. Today we dig deep into what it takes to succeed, in particular why it is vital never to fall into the trap of what she calls being a “one trick pony”.

First a bit more about Debbie. She became a self-made millionaire by the age of 30, and then went on to build six million-dollar companies in diverse industries. She’s a Certified Speaking Professional ranked within the top 3% of business speakers worldwide, and you’ll learn why even the pandemic didn’t break her stride.  Debbie is also a best-selling author of 9 books including, Confessions of Shameless Self Promoters, Skyrocketing Sales, The Highly Paid Expert and Success is Easy. Her expertise has been featured in motivational movies, and dozens of publications including Entrepreneur Magazine, Personal Branding, Sales & Marketing Excellence, Forbes, Washington Post and USA Today.

She got her start in her family business before branching out on her own by purchasing a fledged retail business. She learned on the fly, and within two years, she had turned around the business losses and grew the income ten-times over – and soon won the National Chamber of Commerce’s Blue-Chip Enterprise Award for overcoming business obstacles and achieving fast growth.

Today we talk about why the best business learning comes from jumping into the trenches, rolling up your sleeves and just doing.  Of course, mentors are vital and Debbie, who never attended a day of college, says her business ‘professors’ were other successful entrepreneurs.

Now Debbie is paying it forward by helping other entrepreneurs with her proven business building strategies and systems, from sales and engagement to operations and finances.

So let’s put on our wings with the inspiring Debbie Allen.

Melinda Wittstock:         Debbie, welcome to Wings.

Debbie Allen:                    I’m so excited to be here. Let’s fly together today.

Melinda Wittstock:         I think it’s great when women fly together and we put on our wings. We do so much better in business when we do that, when we really are looking out for each other. And you are a fantastic speaker. I mean, you’ve been doing this for a really long time. And then coronavirus came along and all the events got canceled. You probably had to transfer from a stage to a Zoom box. What was that like?

Debbie Allen:                    Well, it actually hit me sooner than that because that was when I was really at the height of my speaking career, traveling, doing 75 to 100 a year. That’s right around 2008 when the economic crisis happened and it just was crash and burn for a long time. There was zero business. So, this already happened in my career. When you’re in this business for that long, you’ve seen reinventions, you’ve seen a lot of things, so that’s when I changed my business model all the way back then. So, I stopped calling myself a professional speaker and calling myself an expert who speaks professionally. And then I started focusing more on educating to sell, got into more of my consulting, mentoring programs, online courses. So, I was way ahead of the game.

Debbie Allen:                    I actually had to leave the country when the 2008 crisis happened because there really was no business. And I called myself at that time a one-trick pony because just being a paid professional speaker, even though I was one of the top five percent of paid professional speakers in the world, I still crashed and burned because I was a one-trick pony and I couldn’t control what was happening around me. There was no business.

Debbie Allen:                    So, I decided to go international and I stayed international for three years on a tour. And that’s how that business survived. And during that process of the tour is when I reinvented myself of how I do business now. So, it’s funny that you asked that question because, yes, coronavirus just killed it for people that were just one-trick ponies as speakers, but it actually created a lot more opportunities for other people to want to become experts and build a business online. So, since it’s been this last year, it’s like I don’t even care about speaking. I don’t even really want to travel anymore. I said this. And I was just thinking to myself, I’m going to change my website, just really play down my speaking part and really build up the other part. And then, yesterday, I get this full fee gig and I only have to go to California and it’s a franchise winery. That’d be great for me. I just drink-

Melinda Wittstock:         There are some fringe benefits there for sure.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. So, it’s still there and a lot of bureaus and things would book me, but I don’t look at that as an income stream that’s the biggest income stream for me anymore. So, I think that’s a really big lesson is that you have to have a business that you can sustain no matter what happens in the world around you, otherwise, you’re going to be in trouble and then you’re figuring it out too late.

Melinda Wittstock:         This is the lesson that all entrepreneurs, successful ones, learn, right? That there’s so much beyond your control, so the game is really about constant reinvention and also seizing opportunities. And what’s interesting is the opportunities are often shown by, I don’t know, the stress, I guess, of change or things beyond our control or things that go wrong. That’s when we learn the most if we’re open to it.

Debbie Allen:                    Oh, most definitely. Because as an entrepreneur, the scariest thing to me, and I remember when that financial crisis happened and I just couldn’t figure it out right away. And I remember talking to my brother who’s also been a lifetime entrepreneur and I’m like, “Man, I was thinking I had to go get a job or something.” And he’s like, “Me too. That’s the scariest thing ever. Let’s just sit here and figure this out.”

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. That’s the worst. Different times with the five businesses that I’ve built, every now and again in a really rough point you think, “Oh gosh, maybe I should be like everyone else and get a job.” And that thought goes through your head. And then, instantly, in my case, I’m like, “I’m not employable.”

Debbie Allen:                    No, no.

Melinda Wittstock:         “I can’t get a job.” It’s not who I am.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah, they would fire the two of us. Can you imagine? We would be lighting a place on fire in the first day and they’d be like, “You two get out of here. You’re just out of control. This is not your company.” You’re like, “What? It isn’t? It should be.”

Melinda Wittstock:         It’s not my company? What? It should be. Exactly.

Debbie Allen:                    And we should buy it. Melinda, let’s just buy it. Do our own thing.

Melinda Wittstock:         It’s so true that that really is the primary difference between entrepreneurs and non-entrepreneurs. And there are so many people who want to be an entrepreneur these days because it has a glamor. It’s like being in a rock band in the ’70s. So, there are a lot of people who go into it without that full awareness. So, what does it take? What do you have to have? And we can get into the expertise part of this as well, but what are the character traits that you’ve seen over the years that separate a true entrepreneur from people who think it’s glamorous or like the idea of being their own boss but don’t really know what it actually entails?

Debbie Allen:                    Well, for the two of us, we’re independent, so we like that part, doing your thing and getting it done. But the thing is that we’re also really focused and we all will take action all the time. It’s self-motivation. If you’re not a self-motivator, you’re not going to be a good entrepreneur. If you can’t handle failure and get over yourself when you’ve screwed up, you’re going to have a hard time making it as an entrepreneur because that’s part of how we learn. I learned from the school of hard knocks. I didn’t go to college. I barely got through high school because I just didn’t want to learn what I didn’t have to learn.

Debbie Allen:                    I was already like, “I want to do what I want to do.” And so I bought into a business at age 19 because I just wanted to see it grow and I wanted to be part of it. And it’s the person that wants to create something. I think that’s the thing that I love the most about it. I’m such a creator. If somebody took all the creativity, like, you have to do this job and it’s not creative at all, I’d hate it because I like new things. I mean, my best times in business over all these years of entrepreneurship has been when I was growing a business and took this challenge on and then it just kept growing and cool things kept happening.

Debbie Allen:                    It was fun to see it happening and you’re in the middle of it and it’s growing really fast and you’re just going along and you look back and go, “Damn, I did that? That’s crazy.” But you don’t do it by yourself, you have support. And although I’ve never gone to college, my professors in life were always very, very successful entrepreneurs. I found somebody like, “Oh, I want to be like them.” As a way of saying, “I want to be successful like them. I want to learn some good traits from them.”

Debbie Allen:                    And I think that’s it. Always being a lifelong learner too and just really loving business if you’re … I mean, I love business. I love marketing. And so if you don’t love marketing, you don’t love sales, you better learn it as an entrepreneur because those are two of the biggest things that are going to help you survive. And I didn’t really even like sales at first, so that’s why I became a really good marketer. And now I even teach marketing and sales because I’ve learned a different way of doing sales that I actually love it now [crosstalk].

Melinda Wittstock:         I would love to dig into that with you because I think a lot of women and men struggle with sales, because I think we have all these negative connotations of the icky salesperson, right?

Debbie Allen:                    Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Melinda Wittstock:         How many times have you bought a car and gone through that experience? So, people really feel very uncomfortable with sales. So, what’s going on there and how to make it something that’s comfortable? What was your experience with that and getting into your comfort zone with sales?

Debbie Allen:                    Well, when I had to shift from being a paid professional speaker where, hey, you sell a gig. You’re always selling something. So, sell the gig, they give you money and you go do it. There’s no risk there really. When you go on a stage, you fly across the country or across the world, I’ve even done, and you’re put on stage and you’ve got 60 minutes, 90 minutes and you’ve got to make a sale. I mean, there’s some pressure on there. And I was learning from everybody, just taking all kinds of courses. Okay. If you’re speaking to sell, how do I learn this system? I’ll learn this system. And then I invested heavily into it. $25,000 invested in a coach to teach me because that person was selling $100,000 90 minutes on stage.

Debbie Allen:                    I’m like, “Yeah, I can speak, but there’s no way anybody could pay me that for keynote, so I think this is a good thing to learn.” And so, it was first learning the system. Over the years now, it’s really morphed into really believing in what you are offering so much that it comes from a place of service. And I think that’s when you’re going to a sales, you have to be thinking about coming from a place of your head and your heart together and coming from a place of service, and not pushing anything on somebody, because especially if you’re a highly successful person, you’re going to be working with less people.

Debbie Allen:                    You’re going to be very selective on who you work with. So, there’s a trust factor on both sides and it’s building that trust and that rapport very early on in the relationship versus coming from the idea in a sale, I have to reach my goal, which is to create the sale. Now, that gets in your head. And when I started doing that and I would have events and I’d have to get this number in my head and I had a partner, and she would always go, “I think they’re going to buy. I think they’re going to buy.” We’d have this number before we’d go in there and I hated that pressure.

Debbie Allen:                    Are you kidding me? Let’s just be ourselves and be real. And actually, that’s why I broke the partnership off because it’s like you’re really not authentic if you’re thinking about what you want out of it versus what you can give somebody else. And I think that’s the easiest way, especially for women to come into this, is just be yourself, believe in what you’re selling, and support the right people. Because if it’s not the right thing, don’t shove it down somebody’s throat. Find the right person. But another thing that’s really … Because women are not comfortable with sales, Melinda, they undervalue themselves. And I know you know that, right?

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah.

Debbie Allen:                    Price themselves too low.

Melinda Wittstock:         That is very, very true. I remember learning that lesson very early on where for some reason I had in my mind that, oh, if it was cheaper, I’d get more sales, but it’s actually quite the reverse. And having some male mentors that were like, “Wait, what? Actually, not only are you undervaluing your service, but you’re telling people it’s not worth much.”

Debbie Allen:                    Right. And then people think they’re not going to get much. So, there’s a thing about getting a value. It’s like if you undervalue yourself, you’re not going to get the right clients or you’re going to get clients that say, “Oh, I really can’t afford you.” Well, they’re going to come with every excuse. And the reason they’re coming up with excuses, I can’t afford you, it’s not the right time, let me think about it, you haven’t built enough trust. That’s where it starts. And you didn’t start from that. Even subconsciously they can feel that I’m going to be sold and we’re going to have a conversation. And if what I have to offer you based on my years of expertise can support you, then we’ll work together and-

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah, it’s like if you don’t trust your own price, then how is anyone else going to trust your service? If you’re undervaluing yourself, then you’re not trusting yourself.

Debbie Allen:                    Most definitely. And then some people are just not even realistic, they price themself way too high and then they’re not getting the clients. It is a math game depending on what you want to do in your business. But here it is, as an expert, what I help people do is position themselves an expert in their marketplace. Automatically, that marketing position, how they positioned themselves and branded themselves, moves them ahead of the game. So, people look at that, they judge you from the first glance, first impression online. Just as women, we know, hey, got to look good, got the hair looking good, first glance. And people do that.

Debbie Allen:                    And so, we know we start with that is creating this expert brand that allows us to be something that we pick a path and we are the best at that game. And that’s where you can really start moving up ahead faster versus being general. Anytime you’re general in business is you’re competing with all the other people that are general, which is majority of people and there’s less money there. So, why wouldn’t you position yourself at a higher level so that you can also price yourself at a higher level? And just that positioning alone has doubled and tripled income for my clients because it’s just how they’re pricing.

Debbie Allen:                    They automatically price themselves higher. There’s a lot of things they’re offering but they’re not packaging it together to where the value is bigger and better. And then they have to know how to, again, present that in a way that people get that value. And once they learn that skill, which is really I can teach anybody how to do this. I have had people that absolutely hate selling and have taught them how to do it from a presentation, whether it’s online or on a stage or even one-on-one. And it’s just a few tweaks. And I would say the majority of people, it’s one we touched on, undervalue. Second is they get in their head and I don’t like asking for money. And that is absolutely crazy because you can’t survive in business if you don’t ask for money. It’s just an exchange. It’s just paper. That’s all it is. It’s an exchange. Well, it’s plastic, credit card. That’s it. That’s all it is.

Melinda Wittstock:         So true. So, you became a self-made millionaire by the time you were 30. That’s an amazing accomplishment. Only three percent of women entrepreneurs even get to a million dollars in revenue. We’re not even talking about what the margin is on that revenue. And so what was the difference? Was it the mastering of the sales and the marketing and the positioning? When you go from launching your entrepreneurial career at 19, what happened between the ages of 19 and 30 that made the difference for you?

Debbie Allen:                    Well, between 19 and 30, I was in the family business and my father wasn’t an entrepreneur growing up. He was a car salesman and he did that for 25 years [crosstalk].

Melinda Wittstock:         Oh my goodness! I’m so sorry, I realize I said something about car salesmen.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. No, no, it’s true. That’s why I’m a little shameless self-promoter. That’s what pays off to be an entrepreneur too. I learned those skills. Oh, it’s true. And then he started running the leasing division, then he thought, “Oh, okay, well, I can start my own car rental business.” And we lived right outside of Gary, Indiana, which was the number one place, probably still is, there’s probably less people there now, but it’s not a good place to grow up. It’s a lot of crime and the number one place in the country for car thefts. So, car rental business made sense. So, we took it from five cars to 250 and probably three, four years building it. The business is still there.

Debbie Allen:                    My brother runs it 50 years later. But growing up in that business was really hard and I didn’t know what I couldn’t do because I was in my 20s really building this. And my dad would start new businesses and he would throw [inaudible] and me and my brother would run them. And what do we know? We weren’t taught hardly anything. And so, I talk about grassroots and also a really tough clientele. And we were also dealing with the drug lords that would come in and want to rent cars and we’d have to repossess cars in Gary. It was in the middle of the drug war. I mean, it was nuts really. But I am so thankful for that because I learned a couple lessons there before I started on my own is you got to do whatever it takes.

Debbie Allen:                    In your business, you got to be the manager, janitor, everything, as you start. Whatever it takes to run the business. So, I learned that piece. When I left the family business and said I want to own my own business because I want to make 100% of my own decisions, well, I also discovered I was going to make 100% of my own mistakes along with it. So, here’s what my dad said to me and this stuck with me for my life. And I don’t even know he realized what he said in just a short time. He said, “You better make this more than just a hobby.” He doesn’t really believe in me and my husband, at the time, listen, at the time. Had a couple trial husbands before I got the dream husband.

Melinda Wittstock:         I love that, trial husbands.

Debbie Allen:                    Yes.

Melinda Wittstock:         Funny.

Debbie Allen:                    They were too long a trials though, I think I got a little smarter. So, he didn’t want me to buy the business either. He says, “I’m not going to sign for a bank loan.” And I was buying a clothing business, a woman’s clothing store, retail. I had never worked a day in retail, never managed a retail store. I’d been to the clothing markets to buy with my mom who owned the store a couple times, but she’s moving out of state and she says, “Why don’t you buy my store?” And she lost money for six years. So, that didn’t really make sense but it’s like that was the opportunity in front of me. And I thought, “Wow! Instead of repossessing cars and dealing with this crazy life, I could dress up every day and help women dress up and feel good about themselves.”

Debbie Allen:                    And that’s when I started at age 30 loving, supporting women. Back then it was making me feel good. And I realized that they weren’t buying clothes just to buy clothes, who keep coming in, my regular clients, and people that came in it was like we built a rapport because I get to know them and it was like I realized that, where do they spend the most money? When they’re falling in love and when they’re falling out of love. Now, think about that, Melinda.

Debbie Allen:                    I’m falling in love, I want to look really good for him. I’m falling out of love, I got to look good for the next guy and just show him how great I look. I mean, look at me now. It was really funny because you’d hear all those stories. But when I started the business, again, I just kept saying in my head, “You got to make this more than a hobby. You got to make this more than a hobby.” And I didn’t know how to run the business. And you couldn’t, at that time, just find somebody and hire them off the internet. I just kept asking my sales reps when I’d go to market like, “Who are your best retailers?” And I even said, “Can I work your booth?”

Debbie Allen:                    So, I worked some of the trade show booth and I would talk to the retailers and get to know them, pick their brain. And then I was invited into this group called Fashion Alliance in Chicago area. And there was 13 of us. And the first time I was invited, it was like, “Okay. I’m just going to be invited for dinner. This is really an amazing opportunity.” I was taking notes like a mad woman. I was just a sponge to learn. These were my superstars. All of them had anywhere from 20, 35 years experience. They were all doing multimillion dollar business. I was doing a mere $100,000 out of my store, gross sales. And I was clueless six months into the business.

Debbie Allen:                    And at the end of the meeting they said, “Deb, we’d like to invite you to join the group.” I was like, “What? Me? Why?” I remember saying that like, “Why would you want me?” Because I always knew that networking was giving and receiving and what am I going to give to you? And they said, “We see your vision. You’re so enthusiastic. We know how much you want to be successful. We see that you see where you’re going to go with this. And we would not only love to support you, but you’re going to inspire us and make us more enthusiastic because we’ve been in this business so long we take it for granted. And every month you’d have to get up and talk about your store, what’s selling, what’s not selling.”

Debbie Allen:                    It’s just a small group. And then you would say, okay … We’d write on a piece of paper that was hidden and would say, “Write what percentage you’re up this month or down this month.” So, it was amazing motivator to have this mastermind. And people say, “Oh, I’m down 10%.” And then I put on the paper 50% and they go, “Okay, Debbie, 50%, you’re up. None of us are going to be 50% up. How did you do that?” Well, because I had no place to go but grow. And that’s really where I took the business. By age 32, I had built it to two and a half million dollars. And then from there, I just kept building and selling retail stores until I got into my speaking business.

Melinda Wittstock:         What a fantastic, fantastic story. I mean, I love listening to entrepreneurs tell their story because every one of us has those heart-stopping moments where there’s a change that’s external to us, that affects the market, or we make a mistake or, I mean, God knows, there’s such a long list of things that can happen. I don’t know. I feel like I’m old enough to have almost seen it all. So, those moments as opportunities for learning but the tenacity to just keep going, to just keep learning is what really separates folks out. Was there a time when you struggled with something that a lot of other women struggle with too, which is the ability to delegate and figure out scale and figure out your own leverage so you weren’t having to say do it all to have it all, if you know what I mean?

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. And that’s one of the biggest lessons, like you said … You touched on a couple things here, Melinda. The tenacity, what keeps you going? What drives you? For me, I’m going to cover that and I’ll go to the other thing, is it was achievement more than money at first. And it still probably is. I think what I enjoyed the most of my career was when I achieved the most versus having the most money. I just love that feeling of success and achievement. And now, when I have success, as a speaker, as a mentor for other people, when I have success I’m going to share success. That’s just in my DNA. So, that’s really what just drove me all these years. And the other part was … I forgot your question now.

Melinda Wittstock:         Well, we were talking about tenacity and how you keep going when you have these moments that are just almost soul destroying, you know?

Debbie Allen:                    Oh yeah, right, crash and burn. We’ve all done that. Hey, I look at those and I just think what were some of the worst times in your career, hardest? The worst times weren’t when I was going through the worst, it was having to learn those lessons. But I think what differentiates a successful entrepreneur is they go, “Hey, that is really messed up. And I’m in a tough time and I’m scared and I’m nervous.” And I can remember a story. When you think about that, everybody’s listening to this podcast right now, you’re going to go right there right now. You’re going to go there, what was the scariest, most stressful thing you were going through in business?

Debbie Allen:                    But then you think about how you overcame that. And so, I think as an entrepreneur when you have been in business so many years and you know you have overcome some of the most outrageous things that there’s truly nothing you can’t throw at me that I’m not going to be able to overcome and [crosstalk].

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. You start to get a confidence that something will happen, it’ll be outside of your comfort zone. You’ll have to learn something new. You’ll have to figure it out. But the more you’ve been through of those, the more confidence you have and the more skill, frankly, you have to be able to navigate whatever comes at you.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. And when I’m trying to make a decision, and that’s another huge skill for entrepreneurs. So, especially lady entrepreneurs, make decisions fast. Learn how to make fast decisions because longer you sit and look at the little details, trying to be perfect, I mean, you’ve lost money along the way. And it drives me nuts. So, as a consultant, I’ll be working on somebody’s brand and rebuilding their whole business or rebuilding their business and they’ll be like, “Oh, I don’t really like that color or this little thing over here.”

Debbie Allen:                    I’m like, “You know what? You’re not utilizing my services. Let’s just get this done. It’s never going to be forever, but we want to get to the part where you’re making money. How about that? That’s my goal for you is return on investment so you can pay off your program as quick as possible. And you’re slowing it down with these little details.” So, I have to teach a lot of people that come from the corporate world or have never even been entrepreneurs at all in their life how to think like an entrepreneur when I’m building their business. And that’s one of the biggest things I see. And that’s mostly women. I hate to say it, guys, but it is mostly women. We have this little perfection thing because it’s always been about our looks and our hair and our this and that. So, we bring that into business, which isn’t good.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. We need an AA for perfectionism. I mean, it does actually … Yeah. It slows you down and you need to make decisions quickly. And, I mean, this might be a really great jumping off point to this issue of scale and leverage because even as an entrepreneur with a team, it’s constantly coaching your team to be able to move quickly and nimbly and iteratively and make decisions quickly, because the whole market opportunity can pass you by if you’re quibbling about what color something is or something, making it perfect.

Debbie Allen:                    Right. And they do.

Melinda Wittstock:         Making a mobile app perfect. I don’t know. You want to be able to co-create with your customers and give them a say in what you’re building as well. So, let’s get into this leverage part because it does combine with how we overcome perfectionism. The other part of perfectionism, I guess, is this insistence that I see in all women that they have to be involved in every single thing or have to do every single thing and struggle to delegate.

Debbie Allen:                    Right. And there’s just no way. You can’t grow. It’s like as an entrepreneur, you have to wear a lot of different hats. And so, as your business grows, you take off one hat, you put on another hat, and you learn how to delegate, otherwise, you can never grow. You’ll always be a solo entrepreneur or a small business owner that just gets by, just enough to get by. It is critical as you learn to delegate, and you keep creating new goals for yourself and keep moving. And I think once you do that, you can trust yourself enough to allow other people to support you that you’re going to start seeing some momentum. I mean, I have an amazing team. Now, it’s really great because I don’t have to have 30 to 50 employees working for me in a retail store.

Debbie Allen:                    Now everything is outsourced. Virtual assistants for this and this and this. And we don’t have to hang out together and we don’t have to be in the same state. It’s like you can work with people that just do certain things that you don’t like doing. I don’t like technology, so I don’t need to sit and figure it out. I need to delegate that, because this is what I want done and I don’t even want to take the time to learn how to do it. It’s like people that want to learn how to put their website up because they’re thinking, “I’ll do it myself because I’m going to save money.” No. No. No.

Melinda Wittstock:         No, you’re going to spend more money in the end because your time is money.

Debbie Allen:                    Right. And they’re going to do it lousy and it’s going to look wrong and, no, that’s not thinking like an entrepreneur. You’ve got to be thinking beyond the solo entrepreneur. So, for me, I really believe that the model of an entrepreneur is build to sell or build to magnify. And so, when I got that in my head and when I read the book EMyth very early on, I started to insist-

Melinda Wittstock:         Oh, that’s a great book.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. I built my business like a franchise with all these systems even if I had one store because when I did those systems, then I could open up another store and I could open another store. So, I did the build to magnify. But my goal from the very beginning was to build those businesses to sell those businesses because I always know there’s another chapter in my life. There’s another thing I want to do. And you know the most successful entrepreneurs, Melinda, we get bored and we want to do something else. What’s the next thing? And I learned that from my dad because he was always starting new businesses, but I also learned that he didn’t focus on them.

Debbie Allen:                    He would just start a new business and then he wouldn’t really focus on enough to get the momentum of those going and then he would end up losing those businesses. So, I saw a lot of that too. And so, I learned from those lessons to stay the path, remain focused. Don’t get the squirrel syndrome going on. Oh, I should go over here. I should do this. You got to stay focused on where you’re going and your goals at all times. So, you got to be thinking, you wake up in the morning, you go into your office, which is probably your home office, if you’re a solo entrepreneur these days, it’s working from home, and you go in there and you go, “Okay, what’s my goal today?” Your goal is to achieve your biggest thing. Have three goals in mind. And every single thing you do that day needs to help you build to that goal, otherwise, you’re wasting your time and you’re doing the wrong things, wrong marketing, wrong efforts.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah, it’s so interesting. I see a lot of people who don’t really have the exit in mind when they grow a business. So, there’s a lot of businesses, say, that are cashflow businesses and there are no assets in those businesses. There are no repeatable systems. It’s based on an individual and the individual’s personality and the individual’s cashflow. This is true, particularly, in info products and whatnot. And so, when they get tired of it, they really have nothing to sell.

Debbie Allen:                    Very true. Very true. And that’s why creating a lot of different income streams for myself. And so, even besides what I do in my speaking businesses, I offer VIP days where people come and work with me in strategic planning to build their business and give them that whole six-month checklist. Here’s what you do every single month. Give them an action plan. That’s what people love. And then I do the online courses and group classes and personal mentoring programs, all of those things. It still involves me for the most part except courses and things that are done, but nothing really is a passive income. You can’t just stop and the money just keeps coming in. So, I also have a real estate business on the side that I’ve always been doing fix and flips.

Debbie Allen:                    I don’t run the business. I had partners … Now my partner in my real estate fix and flip business is my husband and he’s been so successful with it. And he never knew anything about it. When we got together, he was actually changing his career and I said, “Why don’t we do fix and flips together?” And he’s like, “I know you like finding deals and I know you like challenges and fixing them up.” And so, he got into this business and he’s blew it up. And now he’s a home builder and he’s building multiple homes at a time. And he didn’t know how to build a house. And we know we have plan A, plan B, plan C for real estate.

Debbie Allen:                    You always have to have something else that has that leverage for you that if something else happened in one business or one income stream, you’ve got something that changes. So, when the market right now it’s really hot, everything sells before it’s even done. I’m in Arizona and we just are growing massively. And we’re in an area where it’s probably one of the fastest and continuous growth in the whole country. So, we’ve probably got another year, maybe two at this rate, as long as interest rates stay low. But you got to look at this, what I like about real estate is it’s a cycle. It’s [inaudible] seven years or whatever, and you can look at it and see that you know you could see the foresight of where it’s going to be. So, then plan B is like, okay, then there’s going to be a lot more rental properties that people need.

Debbie Allen:                    Well, we already know that because these foreclosures are coming up and they’ve been holding back on this and now they’re going to start kicking people out of their houses. Now, there’s going to be a lot more. A house is coming on the market and there’s going to be a lot more people who need rentals. And so, you just have to know how to create any business whether it’s real estate, whether it’s speaking coach, whatever it is, is that there’s cycles. And that you have to be on the forefront of it to be a really successful entrepreneur. And when you’ve been in the business a while, you see these patterns and you just know it’s coming and then you just have that plan B on the side.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. So, so smart. So, I want to get into your expertise of helping your clients find their expertise, their expert positioning. Take me through your expert formula and how that works.

Debbie Allen:                    Well, first of all, I’ll say one of the things that you talk about, position yourself as an expert is find an area that you can really claim. And the thing that I claimed that really blew up my business was becoming the expert of experts. And that seemed like a really big title but I kept hearing it. Four people telling me [inaudible] fourth time, I’m like, “Okay, I better claim this.”

Debbie Allen:                    And now I claim the world’s number one authority on expert positioning. So, I am the number one authority. I wrote the book on it. I’ve been doing this for 10 years and I’m very business intuitive. I can look at somebody’s idea and turn it into a business model and then create multiple income streams around it. So, it’s just something that I’m very, very good at doing. And so, it’s a great thing because people have to look at themselves as experts or authorities if they want to make more money.

Debbie Allen:                    And some people are just afraid of that word expert. “Oh, that’s big. That’s big. I don’t know if I’m really an expert.” Do you know two or three times more than the average person about that subject or that topic that you’re teaching? And you’re probably 10 times more passionate than they are about it? Yeah. Okay. Well, consider yourself an expert. And as you become better and better of an expert you can keep raising your fees. But it’s really just like I’m the best at. And I think that came from when I wrote the book Confessions of Shameless Self-Promoters, you’re going to promote yourself-

Melinda Wittstock:         I love that name.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. You got to toot your own horn. And the same thing with titles and brands is it’s got to be big because people aren’t going to pay attention to you if it’s not. And why … Okay. You say you’re the best at what you do. You’re going to get the world’s best hamburger it says. Okay, well, what makes it better? Then you got to have an answer to that. You got to own up to it. And we know, we see this all the time. Melinda, you probably go into businesses like I do and go, “They won’t be here six months from now.” You see that they’re too general. You don’t even get them. Their service is bad or whatever. And it’s almost like it’s witchery or something because I go into a business, I’ll tell my husband, “Oh my, they’re not going to last.” And then they’ll go out of business, he’s like, “Well, you nailed that one.” Right?

Melinda Wittstock:         Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Debbie Allen:                    It’s like you just see it. When you’re business intuitive, you see that. And I think that’s the thing, I dig out from them, where are their talents? Where is their passion? What is their uniqueness? And then put a brand on it, an expert brand on it. And then that positioning is the foundation for rebuilding their business or building a new business. So, won’t you rather start at the top versus having to pay your dues all the way? I don’t believe you have to pay your dues in anything. I think sometimes you’re ready for an opportunity because of how you position yourself and that’s another thing, one is I wouldn’t have met you. I wouldn’t have met you if I hadn’t positioned myself as an expert who’s written books and done everything else.

Debbie Allen:                    I’ve never looked for a major publisher, they’ve found me. I closed a really big client yesterday. They found me. They found me through the internet. And they’re investing thousands and thousands of dollars before they ever met me after a short conversation because I have what they need. It’s very specific what I’m an expert at and anybody could pick that area and find what that thing is. And so, I help them find that and help them get domains around what they have. So, we get the business idea together and then I go research three search engines. Number one search engine’s Google. You have to be seen on there. You have to be seen highly on there.

Debbie Allen:                    So, if you put in highly paid expert, when I decided to write the book. I’ve got a workshop on it, everything … I saturate page one, page two, page three Google on that brand, highly paid expert. And so, I help people do that. YouTube’s a second search engine. And I just teach people how to keyword their videos so that they’re getting listed higher. And it’s coming up when people are searching just like the Google search, but people don’t know how to do it. And it’s really simple when you learn how to do it. And then Amazon, actually, is the third largest search engine. So, anybody could write a little ebook, a little Kindle book. You could even offer it for free if you wanted to, use it as a marketing tool that sends people back to your website to get your services. So, those are the three. You play that game. But here’s the biggest thing, Melinda, they hire me because they’re so, so close to it they can’t see the obvious.

Melinda Wittstock:         Oh, we’re always blinded by our own thing. I feel that sometimes where you get really, really close to it and you’re communicating the value of your product or service or whatever makes sense to you but it doesn’t necessarily translate to how other people see it. And yeah, that being close to it is really a dangerous place. It gets into the unknown unknowns. Right?

Debbie Allen:                    Well, and you see people that really don’t have it nailed. Like I said, you got to have it nailed what you’re an expert in in five to 15 words. And so, you see these people that go to networking events and they’re [inaudible], telling you all about their business. They haven’t even built the rapport and they’re telling you all … And they keep telling you more because they don’t have it figured out what is the thing that people will know, like a trust factor, to buy you and want to know more from you? And so, it starts with that foundation. You’ve got to have that really strong foundation and be really, really clear about what you’re an expert or you’re the best at so that people say, “Tell me more about that.”

Melinda Wittstock:         Exactly. So, it’s partly unique differentiation. It’s partly clarity. And then it’s having that confidence to claim it. You don’t need a gazillion credentials. I know that women really fall in this trap of I can’t do it until I have all these different credentials behind my name. And I don’t know, when I was looking back on my career, a lot of people have asked me things like, did you go to business school? No. Earlier in my career I was an award-winning journalist. Did you go to journalism school? No.

Debbie Allen:                    Well, and that’s the inspiration, I think, for other people. I’ve never gone to college and people are like, “You’ve never been to college? How’d you learn this?” And I never have … The only certification behind my name is CSP, Certified Speaking Professional. And that was because it was you’re top five percent of the professional speakers once you’ve gone through that. Just really it’s a hard thing to get because you have to have done a lot of business in a five-year period of time, 100 different clients, and you have to list them all, and you have … It’s a lot of things. So, most people won’t do. It’s only five percent of the people that will do it. So, as soon as I got in there, that was my goal to get it.

Debbie Allen:                    It was for me. Who cares? You don’t even know what a CSP is. You don’t care. It’s just for me. But I have clients and you’re so right, Melinda, it’s like they have to have that doctor in front of their name or all those initials at the end. And I said, “I understand that that’s important to you. And you’ve worked for it. If it’s really important for you, we’ll put it in your branding and your marketing, but I’ll tell you, you’re playing in a different world here.” The entrepreneurial world says, “What have you done? How much money have you made? And how can you help me? Can you help me learn how to make the money you made and teach me a system or a process to do that?” That’s what they care about.

Melinda Wittstock:         Absolutely. 100%. So, it’s your track record. You learn by doing, but I think you also learn by asking people. Very early on a mentor of mine said, “Find the person who’s the very, very best at what you want to learn or what you need to accomplish in your business at any phase of your business and ask them.” It’s like, okay. And I’ve done that. If there’s something that I really need to learn, especially at a different stage of scaling a business, all mine have been in media and technology, and there are different phases of a business. There’s different things you need to learn. There’s just different challenges at different steps. Just like what you were saying, you have to be changing hats all the time as you grow and scale a business. Figure out who’s really great at what you need to learn and ask them.

Debbie Allen:                    I’m sorry. I think you’re an inspiration when you say, you didn’t have to have all this journalism, you didn’t have to go to this school and do all this, and you have that background on what you’ve been so successful, what you’re doing right now. I really believe when you’re in the entrepreneurial world is that it’s more motivating to people when they actually hear that, look what you’ve done. And you tell that story. It’s like the She Rose Journey story. I was here and I crashed and burned and I came back stronger than ever. Even all the way back to high school, my English teacher told me, “Well, you better pass this next test or you’re not even going to graduate.” Now, how do you think I felt when I was going to write my first book?

Debbie Allen:                    “Oh, I can’t write. I’m not good in English. How am I going to do this?” And so I wrote my first book interviewing people because I wasn’t comfortable. And I did that for the first couple books until I got comfortable being a writer. Because little things we hear growing up, it just sticks in our head and then we put ourself in a box like, “I’m not good for that or I have to do this.” So, when I think, Melinda, when you say, “I don’t have all those things on the wall and I didn’t have to go to this school and whatever, and look what I’m doing and you can do it too.” And that’s the inspiration women need to hear.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. I think back and way, way back when I was in college at McGill and my degree was in political science and economics. And my-

Debbie Allen:                    Really? It’s like really?

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah, that was my degree. Okay? But my real degree was working on the daily student newspaper. The daily student newspaper I wrote articles every day. I just started out doing that. There were a couple of young women on the paper. It was mostly guys, but said, no, you’re going to write your first article now. And so, I started writing articles. I started breaking stories. One of my stories in a student newspaper ended up in the Wall Street Journal. So, all my experience was there. But then while I was doing that, I saw that the paper wasn’t making any money, so I thought we need to create an advertising department.

Melinda Wittstock:         Oh, but the college isn’t big enough to support that. So, oh, what can we do? Oh, I know, in Montreal, we’ll create the first ever entertainment listings in English. And then we expanded the paper to citywide distribution and it became this business.

Debbie Allen:                    I love it.

Melinda Wittstock:         So, back then, at age 18, 19, 20, when I was in college, I was doing all the things that I do now. You know what I mean? It was interesting. And so, then came time to, well, should I get a job as a journalist in Canada? And no one would hire anyone that didn’t have a journalism degree. So, the choice was, do you go get your master’s in journalism? Or … And I thought that’s a waste of time. Here I am already doing this. And so, I just moved to London with this idea that I would work on a major English newspaper like The Times or …

Debbie Allen:                    You say that so casually.

Melinda Wittstock:         Right? So-

Debbie Allen:                    Let’s move to London. Oh, okay. I’ll go to London.

Melinda Wittstock:         I did the international thing that you were talking about doing, earlier. All my friends said, “You can’t do that.” And I said, “Why not?” I mean, I could because I had an English grandparent, so I just moved to London. And within seven months, I was a correspondent on The Times of London.

Debbie Allen:                    Wow! [crosstalk].

Melinda Wittstock:         Okay, so no journalism career.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. But the lesson I heard out of that was people told you you couldn’t do something.

Melinda Wittstock:         Right. Yes.

Debbie Allen:                    They were dreams stealers, but they didn’t really mean to hurt you. Now see, that’s the thing, dream stealers-

Melinda Wittstock:         They were trying to protect me but they meant well.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. [crosstalk]. Right. So, that’s good to know, people that are listening here, it’s like dreams stealers come in a form of people that love you too because they don’t want to see you hurt or fail. And you got to get beyond that. It’s not just because they’re trying to be mean or don’t believe in you even. They don’t believe in it themselves because they haven’t done it. So, they’re putting what their thoughts are on you. Just keep that in mind when you hear somebody trying to steal your dream.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. Well, the next time that happened to me, of course, is leaving journalism. I became a TV anchor and all of that and there was a certain point where I was like, “No, I want to start my own business, my own media company.” And all the journalists around me are like, “You can’t do that. You’re a journalist. How can you do that?” Watch me. I mean-

Debbie Allen:                    You heard that a lot. You can’t do that. Oh yeah. See, that was like me, you got to make it more than a hobby.

Melinda Wittstock:         Oh, my entire career.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. So, you can take a phrase like that, “You can’t do it, you got to make this more than a hobby.” These people are dreams stealers out there. You have to be like what Melinda was saying, you got to just say, “I’m going to kick butt, take names, and I’m going to prove it to you.” You turn it the other way around. It pushes me to want to even be more successful.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. It had that impact on me. All of these things in business and I find this in this podcast now, almost 650 episodes, at this point, and the pattern that emerges from every single successful entrepreneur on this show it’s all the things you’re saying, Debbie. I mean, the tenacity, the flexibility, the constant curiosity, the capacity to learn. And at the end of the day, it all comes down to mindset. It all comes down to what we think we can do. If we can’t visualize it, or if we don’t believe in ourselves, then you lose right at that first hurdle. And so, how to develop the mindset that allows you-

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. That’s huge or people don’t even know what they can do. They’re just like, “I don’t know what I can or can’t do.” So, when I start working with somebody, the first thing they do is start with a business plan. It’s a one-page business plan. How much money do you want to make next year? When they say a million dollars and they’re making 100,000, I say, “Okay, let’s be realistic based on where you’re at and what skills you need to learn.” We come up with a number. Most people just pick a number and I go, “Okay. I already think that they could be making more, but let me show them how we could do this.” And then we start talking about all the different income streams and where the money is, and then how to go get that money in those different streams.

Debbie Allen:                    And by the time we add it all up, often that amount in the middle, which is how much money you want to make in a year doubles. And then when they can see it, they go, “Oh, I could see that’s possible. And I can do this in a matter of 10 minutes.” And so people don’t look at that. They just jump into a business. They don’t have a plan. They don’t even realize, “Well, how many clients do I need to get to get this much money? And what do I need to do to get that much money?” They’re just going from one client to the next and one sale to the next. And it’s not how you run a business. You got to have that plan.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah. You got to know your number too. This is a really, really important thing that you bring up because a lot of people go into it not knowing their number or they pick a number out of the sky and they can’t connect the dots in terms of how to get to that number. How many people do you need to speak to to close how much business at what … Just the basics of that.

Debbie Allen:                    Well, and the other thing is you got to define success on your own terms. So, if you’re just getting that number and putting yourself like, “I want to get that number because I think successful people in my area or my field make that money.” Versus, what makes you feel successful? Success is defined by how you determine it. And I know, Melinda, you’re going to relate to this is that success in our minds changes as we get older. As we’ve been in business longer the word success has a different meaning.

Melinda Wittstock:         It does because it’s so multilayered and textured when you think of it could be about money, it could be about mission. It could be about your lifestyle. It could be about all of those things as it is for me. I mean, yeah, it’s very nuanced, I guess.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. For me, growing up and I was a workaholic, always trying to improve, do better, make money, make money and then, now, it’s lifestyle. And so, I really build my business around the business lifestyle I want. I don’t want my business controlling what I want to do. And so, I built that whole thing around what clients I want and I manifest them and they manifest me, and how many of those clients, and what are the things I do? As long as I have that freedom. They never take my freedom away from me.

Debbie Allen:                    And that’s the true entrepreneur. It’s like they want a business lifestyle that they love their business, they’re passionate about it but when somebody calls, their friend says, “Hey, let’s play today. Let’s go shopping. Let’s go do … ” And you go, “Oh, I got to work.” I don’t want to have to say that. I want to play too. I like to play hard as well as-

Melinda Wittstock:         Well, exactly. And I think so the Podopolo, the podcasting app and platform that we have, we went from basically two people at the beginning of the year to a team of 24. And closing our next financing now, we could well be more than 100 people early next year. And that rapid scaling is a really interesting thing for a founder to be in because your job, in a way, it changes so much. I just find that my investment in my team and enabling them to be great is increasingly more and more and more of my time. I happen to really enjoy that. I love to see people grow personally as well as grow professionally. And I see that.

Melinda Wittstock:         And the team culture and what it’s like to create this amazing culture where everybody is creating a product from a place of joy and excitement and fulfillment and doing the things that they’re really meant to do. And everybody on this personal growth journey, as well as the business growth journey together. And that’s just a delight to me. I love that whole process and creating [crosstalk].

Debbie Allen:                    And that’s why you’ll be successful because if people say, I don’t really like to work with a lot of people, I want to run my business by myself, then you really don’t want to delegate. You don’t like delegating. You don’t like having a team. You have to realize how do you want to have your business? And the business you’re building has to build with a team. And you love them. You’re probably picking people based on sometimes their personalities and their enthusiasm for what you’re doing, even more than the skillset, because you can teach the people skillsets. You can’t teach attitude.

Melinda Wittstock:         Exactly. So, the culture and, I guess, the mindset, the people that are willing to really be at that sharp edge of innovation and that requires a culture that allows people to fail, I guess, in a way, as long as they’re learning from that. It’s very iterative. It’s very flexible. But it really involves getting the right people in the right seats, giving them the tools they need to succeed, giving them the mentorship they need to succeed and then getting out of their way.

Debbie Allen:                    Yeah. Right. Don’t multitask them. Right. Exactly. You got it. That says it all right there.

Melinda Wittstock:         It’s so, so true. It’s really interesting these journeys though because each lesson builds on the next, builds on the next and it’s never really done. And the other thing that I’ve really taken away from entrepreneurship is enjoy the journey. It’s not about the destination per se.

Debbie Allen:                    Enjoy the journey. And I think the journey’s really, besides your own team and building that team, if you’re listening to this, you don’t really have the team yet, it’s like building your team is also meaning building these relationships, these joint venture partners like you and I have done, Melinda. And I love just sitting here having conversations about business and that’s what makes your podcast, so you’re just like you love business too. It shows. And just sitting down by really smart people. And every time you’re on one of these, you’re learning something. And it feeds your subconscious of positive and success.

Debbie Allen:                    And you start hanging around with different people. And that’s a huge thing too because somebody might be listening to this podcast and you’re like, “I don’t know anybody that’s really successful. All my friends don’t make much money. My parents never made much money.” Well, find some new friends. Find some people that have made money and people that you can have these wonderful conversations with about business. And when you love having business conversations and you learn from other smart people, it can only help you grow. It’s amazing.

Melinda Wittstock:         Yeah, you need masterminds, coaches. We go back full circle to you need your wings. You need your community of other women and men around you that help you be the best you can. You constantly, constantly learning. And, to that point, every single interview I do, including this one, Debbie, I always learn. That’s one of the joys of doing a podcast. It’s like my own personal mastermind.

Debbie Allen:                    It is. Yeah. Right. And I’ve got a mastermind that’s all experts. They’re all high-level. Most of them are online experts for the most part. And they all have different things that they teach. And I interview a lot of them too. And it’s like, yeah, I sit there and I take notes as I’m doing this. It’s like, “Wow! That was really cool.” Just the way somebody says something in a different way or makes you think differently. Like you said, the community, the wings, I love that scenario because it’s … And that’s really what I feel like that Fashion Alliance group when it was very early on in my entrepreneurial career, on my own, it was like I felt like they had pulled their wings out. And when I think of that group, I think of them like wings. They allowed me to fly with them. And that’s how I really picture that.

Melinda Wittstock:         How wonderful. So, Debbie, I want to make sure people know how to work with you. What’s the best way? Because there’s a bunch of different ways. So, let’s go through them all.

Debbie Allen:                    Sure. Well, debbieallen.com. You can’t forget that name. Remember the name? So, it’s D-E-B-B-I-E-A-L-L-E-N.com. You can go on there, sign up for my online classes that I do. I do a lot of free online classes. Just check it around, check around there and see what works for you. And the other one you want to learn more about, what we’ve been touching on here about expert positioning, how to position yourself as that expert to make more money, I’ve done a video, a short 30-minute video to explain to you what expert positioning is. And I actually walk you through that business plan I talked about with the income streams. You can actually see it in action. And this is expertpositioningsuccess.com. Expertpositioningsuccess.com.

Melinda Wittstock:         Fantastic. And if you’re driving or something, or doing something else as you’re listening to this podcast, that’s be in all the show notes and everything. All those links and all the different ways to get Debbie’s great books, and all of that as well. Debbie, I want to thank you for putting on your wings and flying with us.

Debbie Allen:                    It was an absolute pleasure. Anytime. Love hanging out with you.