Episode 513: Emily Hickey: Scaling Brands, Marketing That Converts, and Building What Lasts

24:42okay so you said for viory what else have you seen like what brands in that space have you thought done has done very well in personal positioning branding marketing it doesn't it doesn't have to be it could be anything by the way it doesn't have to be in the yeah um well you work with goop what do you think of them now i'm obsessed with goop i'm wearing gwynn okay Oh, yeah, she has a new – yes. Okay. Yeah. That's a nice sweater. I mean, look, I think – I mean, I'm deeply in it. Yeah, I know. You're like in the weeds over there. I know. Yeah, you kind of fall in love and now it's all you – you know.

25:14They did a fantastic job from the get-go, though. Yeah. You know, with that brand. That's right. I mean, if you – this is why I love Goop. Like, it is a truly feminist brand. And it's not that I'm some turbo strident feminist because I'm actually maybe quietly a feminist. Okay. I think every population deserves to be activated. But what I love about Goop is that it really is about supporting and equipping women to live their richest life with the greatest degree of agency and validity. And we did this whole brand exercise last summer. And the whys of that brand, why does that brand exist? First of all is to support women in pursuing themselves.

25:59You know, and that is a concept that you and I are probably, that's probably our Venn diagram is bullseye, right? It's just the pursuit of self, you know? And that that is what that brand is about. And it's also secondly about getting rid of the cultural headwinds that might prevent women from having the most honest pursuit of themselves, whether it's about divorce or sexuality or whatever, you know, just trying to clear the mud out of the water so that women really can just go for it with whatever they want to be, you know? And I think that it also is a role modeling brand of like, what is modern womanhood about?

26:35What is modern feminism? It's not like it was, I don't know if we're around the same age. I'm 51. So when I was first working, it was in the 90s. And I was often the only woman in the room. And it felt like a little bit of a, I guess, a fight. Now, I don't think that's the case at all. You know, so now what is like, we're probably fighting against ourselves in a lot of ways. And like, what's in our way, you know, and what is the conversation around? Maybe it's about restoring softness, you know, to being a strong woman. And that's something that, you know, Gwyneth and I have talked a lot about.

27:06And that her whole vision around women is just really resonates with me. And I think she has been a force for changing kind of cultural conversations. And I think that brand. Yeah. Right. And she doesn't get it. Yeah. And by the way, what's so interesting is like you never would have thought that when it started. Like people probably like poo-pooed her like, oh, Gwyneth Paltrow, what does she know about like business or branding? I mean, I think she surprised everybody. Yeah. She's like – I mean, honestly, like I was like – I mean, it's like there's like – it's been a while. How long has it been around already?

27:38It's been almost 15 years. I mean, that to me is crazy. It feels like it was just yesterday. I know. And if you think about if you, this is the thing with awareness and with branding, it is really hard to create saturated levels of awareness. Yeah. Like, and if you ask anyone, ask any woman in this country, name a lifestyle brand, I bet you anything, they would say Martha Stewart and Gwyneth and Goop. And I bet they couldn't think of a third. And so to have accomplished that level of awareness is, but then also the trust of like, okay, I need a recommendation for something. Everybody trusts what they recommend.

28:12Yeah. So that intersection of awareness and trust is very, it really is hard to do. And I'm just, it's one of those brands, I think it's just a good guy brand. I'm glad it exists. I think brands change. I feel the same way about Weight Watchers. I feel like it's a good guy brand. There are certain brands that believe in their customers, that champion their customers, I think live on the noble side of life, you know? I have this thing I'm obsessed with from this poet of like, he was talking, Seamus Heaney is my favorite poet. Really? But he's this Irish, so he hasn't read it. I mean, it's just, it's beautiful.

28:43It's, he's, he's a beautiful, beautiful writer. And he said that when he, he came from this like farm family in Northern Ireland, he was like, he felt guilty when he fell in love with poetry, but he, because they dug with their hands, you know, it's his father. And, you know, he was digging with his pen is how he put it. But he was like, you know, from the, from the, from the first line that you write, poetry lands on the side of life. And it has to do with the angularity of the words and the syntax and the surprising things that you put together. and because its whole point is to surface the sensitive sides of our nature and convince us that that's the right side of our nature in the face of so much that would tell us it's the wrong side in the world.

29:20Wow, yeah. And I think brands, so to him, you know, there was a why of the vocation of being a poet. But I feel like what people do who build brands, there's a why of that vocation too. I think that there's a, you could use it in a way to make the world better. You know, you help build the reason that we have so many family values in the United States. We're all focused on family values. We grew up watching Growing Pains and all that. You know, it's like in our media, you know, like we've been bred that, you know. But it also is in all the ads that we watch on the Super Bowl. And like it's in the fabric of the advertising that we receive is the values that we all share.

30:00And so especially right now when everyone's fighting and, you know, I think that brands actually can play this institutionalized role. of landing us all on the side of life and helping us live on the noble side of our natures. I really think that. And I think that Goop is one of those brands. I think Weight Watchers is one of those. They're brands that can help us live in that set of values. You know what I mean? Yeah. And there are people who've stayed true. Like, look at Tide. Right? Yes, I'm obsessed with Tide. But they've done a great job of keeping their position for God knows how many years, right?

30:32Decades. Decades. They've been the dominant in the category for decades. So what do you think they've done in simple terms? What have they done exceptionally well to like keep their market share? Yep. So it's the perfect example of going back to the active where it's product strategy and it's marketing. So if you think about CPG is really good at this. They know what they have promised to the customer. So Tide is about fighting 100 % of stains, making clothes smell good, and turning laundry into an act of maternal love. It is all – its positioning in the market is the robust premium family detergent, right?

31:05And the reason, if it never changed its product, so if we walked into the grocery store, we look at the shelves, and it's just same old Tide, they would lose their market share. But their collabs and their innovative new flavors of Tide is constant, but they also go back to that marketing letter. So when they do a collab, it's with Febreze, because they know that their central promise is to make clothes smell good. Or when they evolve a new type, it's sport, because as I'm sure you know with your kids, the entire American family now revolves around the kids' sports. and they're all about family.

31:35So they have to position into sports. So now if Lulu understood, you know, self-consciously, this is our promise to the customer. We keep her looking and feeling cool. And like, this is an empowering part of her identity. We keep the best fabrics and we constantly innovate on making her legs look better and better and better in those leggings, you know? That's okay. So what would you say if you were working with a Lululemon, if they were your client, what would you say the first thing that they should do to start, you know, becoming relevant? But product innovation, technical innovation, obsess over finding a fabric that suddenly makes you look so fit and trim.

32:11And, you know, that when you look in the mirror, you are so psyched about it, you know? So I think they've, and they've got to put a name on that and a handle on that, you know, whether they take their line and bring it to something new, right? Or it could also be colorways, right? That's a lot of like, color is the easiest thing in the world. It's the easiest way to drive product strategy and is so under leveraged, but you've got to keep the colorways rolling out Otherwise, people don't buy it. They're not going to buy their 10th pair of black leggings. You know what? That is exactly true because why I was buying so much aloe stuff was because every day they'd have another tone or color that I liked.

32:47I'm like, oh, that's bright red, not the dull red. Okay, I'll get that. Oh, there's an orange that's a little bit more of this. I have about 47 ,000 pairs of pants, and I don't wear any of them anymore, but I just keep on buying because I'm like the shiny ball. It's a nicer color. Yeah. They did a great, that's it. I think that's a really good point. Yeah. It drives emotional purchasing because you don't need more leggings. That's a hundred percent true. Okay. How about this one? Poppy versus Olipop, right? Both of them are going to like one just sold for a, what a couple, one billion and a half.

33:20I don't know a lot, a billion point four or something. The other one's going to could sell, I think today for a billion. Yeah. But I think Poppy kind of like went, came up a little bit higher. Yeah. Right. Right. But Olipop was out maybe a couple of years earlier. What do you think? Why do you think Poppy like kind of has been like won the game a little bit or so far? I don't I actually don't know because I haven't studied those and I don't drink. I don't drink it either, by the way. My husband buys the Poppies for the kids. But I mean, I would guess it was a combination of distribution strategy for one thing.

33:53And then social, I bet that social flammability was a big part of that. That was what I was going to ask you. What part of this or how important is influencer marketing? Beyond, beyond important. So is it that, what's the most effective strategy for influencer marketing? Is it whitelisting? Is it collaborations? Is it just real? Like what have you seen works the best? So the typical, I think the, it is a volume game for the most part. So because it is hard to predict who is going to work. So typically you're putting together like almost like a pyramid construct of, okay, we're going to have our plank, base plank of the pyramid, which is just spray and pray.

34:35Yeah. Like we're going to get this. It's an awareness. It's top of funnel marketing. Like, so let's get this out to as many people. You gift it out to thousands of people a month. And like, I was talking to someone recently about a very big beauty brand strategy for this. And it's pretty like typical for something that's really scaled is it's, let's say 5 ,000 people are gifted this thing a month. Some percentage of those are actually going to post because you're not getting paid, right? It's just organic gifting. You're hoping they post it, let's say 10 % posted or whatever, right? Some tiny percentage of those is totally going to hit.

35:12And then you dig in with them and try to build on that success. They, for some reason, are a good avatar for this brand. So that's sort of your base plank. It's a volume game. And then you kind of move it up to your very top macro influencers who might have millions of followers and are really expensive, but you think that they're a good chosen avatar for the brand, that they really represent the identity. Because again, who do you become when you wear one of these brands? And I think that top of the influencer period, it's like, that's an important way to show who you become. So that person really represents this cool, amazing woman who we think you become when you wear these clothes or whatever.

35:47And so, you know, I just think it's a tiered strategy, but it's both, it's creating awareness, it's pulling something into culture, you know, and saying that this is relevant and modern and people like you are using it. And then, of course, like that they have influence on their own followers or, you know, like you influence your followers, like they trust you, you know. A lot of people, though, I will say, you think they have a lot of influence, but they don't convert into numbers. Yeah. You know, I know a couple of brands that I was working with as a strategist for them. And they were adamant about having a few people come on board that had like 3 million followers.

36:25The other one had 5 million followers. And they were charging astronomical amounts of money for them to be in partnership. And I was like, those aren't your people. I'd rather you take that money and go, you know, wider with like micros that have 50 ,000, 10 ,000 followers. Yeah. And you will get way more bang for your buck and spend way more, like way less money. Because I also think the bigger the number of the influencer, the less engagement they have. And less people, like eyes are on them. Because that's what happens with Instagram and Meta, right? The more, like you didn't have to pay for your visibility a lot of times.

37:04Yeah. Sometimes not. But anyway, long story short, they didn't want to listen, blah, blah, blah. They went and spent like a million dollars on this person. Yeah. Something ridiculous, okay? They ended up selling, I kid you not, I kid you not,$47 worth of product. $47 worth of product. That's awful. Can you imagine? Yes. Okay. But, so I said, let's just do a little experiment. Let's take these 10 girls that I really liked and let's do blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. they sold$460 ,000 worth of product and they spent almost no money. So the point is like, I think this is a big, I think a lot of this is like a ruse, right?

37:50People assume because they see a big number. Oh, this is going to be our, that's going to be our cash cow. That's going to be our, like our panacea. And I've yet to see very few people, like there's certain people who convert, like there's like, obviously Gwyneth is amazing, right? Like you don't even need any influencers because she's like, you know, she's amazing. Jennifer Aniston, I see, she crushes it for all the brands just because she does. Many, many celebrities or many, many people who have these big names and these big followers, they're not converting even a little. Like at all. I just got off a call with one of my brands and they were saying they went to this founders thing and they came back and told me these things I don't want to say the names because I don't want to be mean, but they said that they all did these experiments with like four of these people that they're like, no one should ever work with them because they will never get an R.

38:45Like the return on investment is never there. I just find all of this stuff to be so interesting. It's so interesting. So what's your criteria when you chose those 10 women and they blew up? What was the criteria? Well, a lot of it is just I watch a lot of people just because I want to see patterns. And a lot of it's my gut, to be honest. Like I think when I did this Hot 5 app, most of the people, like what we did was we had five-minute workouts. And then you can stack those workouts if you wanted to. So you can do five minutes of abs, let's say five minutes of glutes. So you can do 5, 10, 15 minutes if you had the time.

39:23Or you can do the style of workout. So five minutes of yoga, five minutes of strength training, whatever, right? And you can mix and match. Okay. The other part is called Hot Five was because it was hot people working out, right? Because everybody likes to look, I don't care what you say about body positivity. I can be canceled right now. I don't care. People want to watch other hot people work out. That's what they want to do. It's motivating for them. Maybe that's not PC to say, but that's what it is. Yeah. That's why you see on Instagram, all these girls who have, you know, they're not fitness coaches.

39:58They know nothing about fitness or in like in the science, but they have a zillion people looking at them because guess what? They look good doing it. Right. That's just what it is. Let's just call it a spade, a spade here. Right. Okay. Yep. So on that app, we had, I picked a bunch of these people and they're now all, all, every single, every person I picked had like four followers or six followers or like a hundred followers, whatever it was. And now they all have million, each one of these people, million. Cause it's also like, you have to have like a, I have a little bit of a knack, I think of just like recognizing.

40:32It's the nose. I know. It's like, I just have a knack of knowing. And then like, and then it's just like, just kind of like little things like that. So these 10 girls, just to get to your point was, I just saw how people, how they were engaging. It was a little bit unique. It was a little bit more original and different. It was authentic, right? Very authentic. It wasn't produced, but they were really good at like the jibber jabber, right? Like there are some people who are just really good at connecting to their audience in a way that makes people feel like, oh, you're talking to me, right? And there are other people who are just really shitty at it, but they're really good at like content creation.

41:14So I know a lot of people and brands do this, and you probably would see this too, is that brands will hire somebody because they're really good at the content creation and it's kind of used as an ad, so to speak. It's like instead of using a Shiat Day or you or whoever as like an ad agency to create this content, they use these people because they make nice content, but they're not converting for them. And they have a piece of budget for that. And then they have a piece of budget for people who are the converters for them. You know what I mean? Like, it's like kind of separated like that. That's what I just find.

41:47I find that that's how I just look at all these things. I think that like, not everyone's going to be great at the same thing. A lot of times like you want to have, like you want to, like you said, you want to like, you want to like, basically like just like flood the market with the stuff. Right. Tell me what you tell me, like, you know, give me an example of a brand that you've worked with that you've kind of utilized some of your tricks, like your first principles. Like how, talk about your first principles. So the first principles. Am I talking too much? Cause I was like, okay. I actually am learning from you and I agree with everything you just said, by the way.

42:21So what I realized, I started all this doing consulting. So I spent years building startups and then I, you know, moved on from that. What was your claim to fame? Like what company kind of put you on the map? As doing this work? I mean, Jenny Kane was a big one, I think in the apparel industry because it was a very successful, For one thing, it was a really big revenue drive. But it was the creation of the world through the digital ads that I think was so – it was the right brand at the right time and using the channel in a way that I think people hadn't used it before. You know, at that sort of elevated price point and being willing to create a world like that in kind of a raw way, but that was like driving to something that was relatively expensive and, you know, to show that that actually could be done through a casual social ad campaign.

43:08But so, yeah, here's an example. So the first, the big daddy law of gravity, you know, I think that businesses are all basically the same. And that if you look under the hood, you often see a lot of the same pieces and they should work the same way. But there's always a lot of confusion when something gets stuck or starts to slow down. And I think you can always go back to these first principles to figure out what to do. It's reliable. The same way that if I drop something, it's going to fall on the floor. Because there are physical properties that govern businesses. And I figured these out by screwing up.

43:43I spent a long time making idiotic mistakes and overthinking everything. And then I was like, okay, I just need to dumb myself down and let the plane fly the way it wants to fly. And so the first one of those that really is like one of our organizing principles of chief detective is that the winners win and they win and they win and they win, period. It just is true. It's like if you – whatever you are doing, right, some of you learn it doing content of like, wow, that one really hit. No one cared about this one. There's always asymmetrical results in anything that you do. And I think intellectually people want things to be symmetrical and thought out and everything else.

44:24And I wish I could sell five of these and five of these and five of these and five of these, but that's not how it works. Like if you open up a store, you're going to sell a ton of this one thing and like long tail of everything else. So a lot of companies will try to make that long tail work, but that's not the right thing to do. The right thing to do is to go back to that thing that was kicking ass, you know, and figure out how to build on that as signal. So it's an approach of trying to follow the cash of the business. You just dumb it down. And that's why with, you know, with apparel companies, it's relatively easy to figure out your assortment because you're building a portfolio of hero franchises.

45:02Okay, that one really worked. The Cocoon Cardigan at Jenny Kane or the this or the this, the Nike Dunk that, you know, there are things that you want to build on. And then that's where you're driving all your collabs. And it's going to keep – it is so much easier to make the winners produce more than to try to get the medium or the low performers to work better. Like your hero product, basically. Yeah. Yeah. And then just build on that hero product. Yeah. Do you think you see that a lot, right? Like someone does really well in one area and they want to expand. And it's like they're spending all this money and time and effort and all these other things when they should have just stayed in their niche and kind of build on that.

45:36I see that all the time. Yeah. It happens all the time. And you, you, you know, if you've got to pull a rabbit out of the hat and get revenue fast, like the strategy should be, what can we do to sell more of this? This one that's already selling the best, what can we do to sell more of that? And when you think about your product development, what was it about that? Okay, was it that it was about travel? Or was it because it was flattering and it made her legs look better? Or what was it about that that we can build on as a franchise to build into the assortment of what that was driving into? It was stripes.

46:08Okay, let's create, let's do more stripes. You know, so it is a very overlooked principle. It sounds obvious. It is obvious, but it is so under leveraged. It's shocking. And then this like colorways. Okay, that's your top selling silhouette. Don't abandon it. You know, don't like go spend, spend X percentage of your energy trying to build new heroes, but make sure you're giving her novelty colors in that thing every month. Because when I've looked like a lot of purchase path reports. So, okay, the first purchase was X sweater or X legging, X shoe, whatever, right? Guess what the second purchase was?

46:44What? The same thing in a different color. Guess what the third purchase was? The same thing in a different color. Like I said, this is like the aloe thing in 10 different, in 20 different colors, the same thing. Yeah. People, it is a fact. People collect, they've already told you, this is what I like. So why are you going to go spend a bunch of time trying to find something else that they're going And these heroes get abandoned all the time and underleveraged. Totally. And it's true with people, too. Your own sense of what you're good at. Right. Or a talent portfolio. Any portfolio approach to anything is going to cluster asymmetrically around something that does better.

47:22But the instinct is to allocate resources symmetrically across everything. It's the wrong instinct. Yeah. That's what I mean by winner's win is like wake yourself up a little bit. That's a great point. Yeah.

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49:00Give me another one of these principles. Spearpoint marketing. I was just talking about this with somebody yesterday. So spearpoint marketing, this is a horrible thing to say, but you don't kill an elephant with a plank of wood. You hunt with a spear, with the point of a spear. But if you look at most people's advertising efforts, they're kind of hunting with a plank of wood in terms of, I'll give you my favorite example, and this is one you're going to relate to. The WNBA, they spent years, decades, and I don't know how much money trying to promote the WNBA. Now, that's plank of wood. You see it all the time, that the ad is at the brand level, or even at the category level.

49:38Hey, spring dresses. I can't tell you how many apparel accounts we've looked at. And the way that they market new arrivals is at the category level. We've got new sweaters. We have new dresses. It's the same thing as the WNBA saying, watch women's basketball, right? It just doesn't work. If I say this works for all body types, I will sell zero of it. If I say I'm self-conscious about my arms and I love this shirt, I'll sell thousands of units. It is a mental, it's a protractor to pull off the board and force yourself to think about specificity of your marketing. So back to the WNBA, decades of wasted money trying to get people interested in women's basketball.

50:13But the minute Caitlin Clark comes along, they have the point of a spear. You always want to do star marketing. Whatever the best thing is in that portfolio, you mark it at the tip of the spear. And that is true whether... So with her, I don't know if this is still true, but at the time, that was the single most watched basketball game on ESPN. College, pro, men's, women's. And it happened. And everything I read, what I read is the Wall Street Journal. I read it every morning. I have time for one paper and it's that one. And I read the sports news. I love it. I watch football with my son and my husband.

50:49I love metaphorically watching and reading about sports. I think it's such a great, it's also a microcosm of life. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. Yeah. But so that's the perfect spear point example is all of a sudden, when they think of the billions of dollars of industry value that they created because of the way that they marketed Caitlin Clark. Every cutaway to the ads would be, it wouldn't even be a good play. And they'd be like, man, did you see how she stepped back and took that, you know, like it was always about her and all the articles and the press push. It was about glorifying her. Yeah. And that is what put WNBA on the map.

51:25Not all that broad. So always it's a good discipline to think about how do I make my marketing message specific? And it's probably going to be more effective. I love that. So then with Goop, what is their hero product? I really don't even know. Well, the beauty business, they've got a really killer beauty. That beauty product is incredible. Yeah. You know what I use from them? You should get me some because I'm out of it. I will get you some. That is really good. The micro. The microderm. Yes. Exfoliate. Yeah. I love it. It's awesome. It really is a great product. It is. It is a great product.

51:58It is, right? Okay. Is it good quality? I mean, of course you're going to say it. It is misunderstood. It's a big business. It's a very good business. It is. But it is misunderstood at the general population level how good that product is. Like they do not mess around. Like it is. I know. Yeah. I couldn't believe it. I got it as a gift one time and they're like, I'm like, oh God, am I even going to use it? And I'm like, ah, I'll use it one time. I was like, this, it made my skin shine better and like glow more than anything else I've ever used. Yeah. Ever. Yeah. And I'm not just saying this because you're sitting here or whatever.

52:30I'm not getting paid to say this. I'm saying it because it actually is really good. right? Yeah. But so is that not their, so what is the hero? Well, it's that, it's the microderm. Is that the big one? That's a big one. Peptide, their peptide serum, I think is the number one seller. That's also a very good product. The one I use both of those, the eye masks, I am obsessed with. I've never tried the eye masks. And that's a good, that's a good, I'm going to send you those too. I'll send you the whole thing. Send me a whole thing, now that we're friends. Yeah, I got you. I got your skincare covered.

52:59Thank you. But the eye masks are like, I mean, I'm like bag lady. It's a big problem for me. Really? I don't see any bags in there? Well, I use the eye masks for it. Oh, there you go. I'm not trying to make this an ad, but they're just really good, especially for people who are on the go and busy. But they have probably four or five hero products within that beauty business. But I think the ultimate hero of that is the editorial product and the curation and the travel tips. And that to me is what drives the trust of that brand. Yeah. By the way, you know what other brand I use for like concealer?

53:33Tell me what you think. Merit. I think I saw your name. So I don't know how good it is or not good. I don't know how to put makeup on. I'm like, I'm literally like, I'm terrible. I tried to put it on today. I probably look like a clown. I don't know what I'm doing. I'm like, I think this goes here. Just not good. But I like, I think I like the Merit like overall. It's clean, isn't it? It goes with your ethos. It's a really no fuss. Well, just in the sense that she really tried to make it easy to put on for people who were busy and didn't want to deal with it that much. Okay. Well, why would it be harder than putting on a different concealer?

54:07Well, because the concealer might be different, but for example, that flush balm, everything was just sort of the use case of it was like, okay, if I'm in the car, could I put this on? Or if I had literally five minutes, could I put this on? Does it do well? Yeah. It does do really well. That's a good company. Yeah. What happened with like Cracker Barrel? Do you remember them? Yeah. You did a video with them a long time ago or something, I thought. Like they kind of, what did they do to their brand? Well, I mean, that was, they, I don't know. So they changed the logo and the whole internet got really fired up about it.

54:39And it was, I mean, but you know, it goes back to that. Because they kind of just, they were like screwing around with their main audience, their main demo. Yeah. But they just changed the logo. What's the difference? Well, they took that guy, you know, I don't know anything about them. I mean, it's not that I'm a big Cracker Barrel customer, but they really, no, that's shocking. But go on. No, I mean, they took the, the old Yeehaw guy out of the, I don't, I don't know how much people actually care, but I think it just was, it became a sort of hot button on the internet, I think, because they screwed up.

55:14It's a nostalgia brand. It's sort of what we were talking about before, but it is nostalgia. It's about yesterday and permanence and never, the promise with a nostalgia brand is we won't change, you know? Oh, versus the heritage you said earlier, right? Yeah, or versus just like something that's, I mean, they still need to change too, but you, so you know how Hermes, like they are good at changing, but staying the same? Yeah. That's a trick. Cracker Barrel changed and they changed, you know? They needed to find a way to change and stay the same. And instead they changed and they changed. And that's why people revolted because the central promise of that brand is we're not going to change.

55:51Right. It's a nostalgia brand. So that makes sense, actually. What about like, OK, so I saw the whole you said this before about growing a business and growing yourself is like a dual journey. Right. What does that mean? Because you're about like fully like kind of everything should be dual, like everything should be encompassing together. Right. Like your personal growth and the company, it all kind of they're not separate entities. basically. Yeah. Right. So can you kind of talk more about that and like how What you mean by all that? Like, is it as people are growing on their own, their company then evolves and changes?

56:28Is that more or less what you're meaning? Well, I think the American way, when I was like 22 or, you know, just starting my career, I subscribed to Forbes magazine. I was a liberal arts major. I didn't, you know, this wasn't my thing. And my mom was like, I wanted to go be a professor. I wanted to be an intellectual, you know, and my mom was like, no, you're going to go to work. Then you can decide later if you want to do that. So anyway, so I... Where'd you go to college? I went to Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina. That's a great school. And then you went to Stanford, right? Yeah, business school.

57:05Yeah. So I went to Chapel Hill and then I moved to New York City and I started doing consulting and I would read Forbes magazine because it was 1996. It was, by the way, back then, that's what people were doing. That's what you did. Yeah, I know. There wasn't an internet yet. Yeah. You know, it wasn't a wide, there really wasn't. And so the quote from Malcolm Forbes in the opening masthead of Forbes magazine, I don't know if it still is, but at the time it was a proverb and it was with all thy getting, get understanding. And that to me, that was his approach to capitalism, you know, was that the American way was to build a business and succeed.

57:43But in the process of doing that, that you're succeeding as a person and in the world and there's an ethical point of view to it and there's a pursuit of self that happens in the crucible of working. So your pursuit, presumably, has been fitness. You know, you've used that as a focal point for developing out whether it's perseverance or, you know, all of the traits that you're trying to get in yourself, you know. And I just have used business for that because this was not a natural thing for me to do. You know, I really am very, very shy and introverted as a person. It's always been a lifelong.

58:19I know. Isn't that cute? But no, so it was hard for me, you know, when I was younger and, you know, like. Look at you now. Yeah, look at me now. I know. But I mean, but even things like, you know, you always have to check. To be successful, you have to cultivate yourself. You know, you have to figure out your ego. You have to do things wrong and be like, that's not, I'm not going to do that again. You know, in terms of how you treat people. I mean, the whole thing is an exercise in maturity. It is the inner journey of leadership and of, you know, so just using whatever it is that you're trying to do and understanding that what you're getting at the other end of that is you.

58:57It is you, you know, and. It's so true. Yeah. You know what I think that, I think I saw you talk about like the fact that like you really leaned into what you're good at. And so kind of like that resonated with me because like I went to business school. I did all the things. Like I have like a bunch of degrees and all that stuff. But the culture of working in an office was like sickening for me. I did it and I hated it. And so, cause I wanted to, I rode my bike to work in my little shorts and I rode back. I loved being active. So what I just did, and I tell this to people all the time, is I used fitness as my business.

59:35I created businesses around me liking being fitness and fitness stuff and become an entrepreneur in that space. And so I always say people should really know what they like and then create around that when they can. Otherwise, you're just always fitting a circle into a square and you're never going to thrive and flourish in a real way. right? Like when you are the most authentic and you're able to do that, it doesn't always happen. You can't always do that. But if you can, you'll just be more successful versus, you know, trying to do something that you're not even good at. Like I, people tell me what you think.

1:00:11I think that people should do what they're really good at and then get other, delegate or find other people to balance you out by doing the things that you're really bad at. Some people say, no, I don't like that idea. Like you should get good at the other things that you're bad at. But I'm like, well, why? I'm just going to be bad at them. I'm not going to be as good. I don't want to do them. And then therefore, why even do that? What do you think? Well, it's winners win. Winners win. I love it. I love it. I love it. You pour water. But I'm curious about when you did that. So how long were you in an office type thing?

1:00:43And then was it scary to do that? Or you just were like... No, when I was in the, well, listen, I, my background is I used to, my first real job was with the NBA, worked for the Toronto Raptors. And then I did that for a year. And then I went back to business school after that. So I had my undergrad and all that. Then I went to work for the Toronto Raptors, went back to school for my business. And then I got recruited to go to BMG Music. So I was going to go back to the Raptors actually, or go back in the sports world. I had a job, I had a job at Nike offer. I had a lot of different things I could have done.

1:01:15But I got this really good offer to do kind of do this for the for a record label. And then I'm Canadian, by the way. Okay. I was about to ask you. Yeah. And then I was working in Toronto and then I got a job to come to LA to work for another record label. Like they come, you know, that's how I got to LA. And I just hate it. Like, I mean, in a world of corporate, it wasn't even that corporate. I just had to like be somewhere at a certain time. Like you had to be there. I had to have meetings at a certain time. I had to do this at a certain time. And my ADD was not doing well with that. Like I wanted to do, I wanted to have autonomy.

1:01:49Like I was much better when I didn't have someone tell me where I had to be, what I had to do, what I had to do. Even in a record label environment, I was still running a marketing division or like very, I was like on a fast track. So my thing was, I didn't, and I had other jobs too that I went back and forth with, but bottom line is I just said, you know what, this is not, I can figure it out. And I'm going to like, I'm actually going to, I was on a visa, so I couldn't just work anywhere. So I had to become a personal trainer and make money on like under the table so I can then like basically survive and living in LA.

1:02:22I was very young. I quit my job and that's how I started in the fitness journey. I became a trainer for like five minutes. But what I did was I went back to all of my relationships in the, in the music world. Cause when I was working in the music space in Toronto and LA and New York, I was working with all the big labels. I created an opportunity for myself. So I went to these labels and I said, listen, I'm now a trainer, but I'm no longer a marketing person. I want you to pay me a retainer to train all of the different artists. So when they get ready for a tour or a video, I will train them. And they're like, what do you mean train them?

1:02:59Like how? I mean, like physically train them. And the first guy from MSCA was like, what are you talking about? And I'm like, no, this is what I'm doing. I know how the budgets work. And at the time they would give these people like huge budgets to do whatever they wanted to do. Right. And so I said, just give it to me, let's do it for, I'll do it for free for a month. Like I'll train whoever for a month, because if you go to a gym, you're capped, right? Like you just get like 50 bucks an hour, whoever you're training or 10 bucks an hour. And so I already had like, I kind of used my transferred skills of like what I had, went to the label and said, let's create this thing.

1:03:34Finally, someone gave me the opportunity. I did a good job. And then they're like, okay, hey, you're hired. So then I became a label trainer, which means I went to all the labels and trained a bunch of like artists and got paid retainers. So I wasn't getting paid hourly. So then I was able to like work in the States properly. So cause I was getting paid by a label anyway. Do you know what I'm saying? Does that make any sense? So I just took a chance on myself and I thought to myself, like, what's the worst that can happen? It doesn't work out. I'm no worse off now than I was, you know, a month ago.

1:04:04I knew I didn't want to like work at a label as a person who was like day in, day out doing something that wasn't like, didn't feel comfortable for me because I just, I can't sit still. Like even doing these podcasts for like hours on end is very difficult for me. That's why I have a treadmill beside me. So I have to move all the time. My brain does really well when I'm in movement. And if I'm stagnant too long, I get like, I'm like a caged animal. Don't do well. So I knew that about me. So I think a lot of this is self-awareness. I knew myself very young of like what I'm capable of, what I like, where I thrive and where I don't thrive.

1:04:43And then I leaned really into where I knew I can be okay. And I always like, and I tell this to people all the time that like, you got to like, the only difference between you and the person that is really successful is that they believed in themselves, like just a little bit more to try and like, just keep on going, you know, because like, I think we get really stuck in our own heads of self-doubt and we're scared of failing and rejection. But at the end of the day, like, that's what life is, right? Like it's more failing and more rejection than the positive. And if you kind of accept that to be what it is, you'll get, you know what I mean?

1:05:17The ratio will eventually even out somewhere if you just, the more chances you give yourself, the more chances you have at succeeding. And so I always live by a certain mentality is like rejection, always better than regret. Like, don't let that happen. So I will always put myself out there to a fault. And now I'm so desensitized to the word no, to rejection, to failure, because I'm so used to it. It doesn't bother me anymore. So I'm expecting to fail. I'm expecting for things not to work out. And if they do, great. And if they don't, I'm okay with it. I'm just going to keep it going, moving on, moving on, moving on.

1:05:54And so when I changed this whole thing to fitness and stuff like that, Like, it was scary, but what's my option? Then to just live in this myopic area of like, okay, I'm just going to do what everybody else does. Like, I'm here. I'm always looking for chasing what you want and not just accepting what you get. And so that's my, I like have certain things on like repeat in my head. Yeah, that's incredible. I'm jealous of you. What do you mean? You're doing it. I am, but it's like, that, your fearlessness and like, you're a hustler, you know? I know there's a whole big movement on sitting still and manifestation, thinking things are going to come to you and all these things.

1:06:38I'm a believer that if you want something to happen for yourself, you have to chase it and go after it and be relentless about it, not just be passive. There's so much competition. And I believe that there's room for everybody. But I believe that you also, no one's going to, like, no one's saving you. No one's going to give you that thing. If you want something, and if you're not someone who's born into a very rich family or a family with a lot of connections and nepotism and all this stuff, I wasn't. I had nobody to help me. I had to figure it out on my own. That worked to my advantage because it made me hungrier to do it.

1:07:19And that's also not a bad thing. I think that people have to just give themselves the, like have to be self-aware of what they're good at and then just go for it. And what, like just not even look back, like just prepare and expect to fail, prepare and expect to get no's, prepare and expect to like, you know, get the door slammed on you. And then you got to find another attempt somewhere else. No, I love it. It's so good. I agree. And you said something really important, which is, so what if it doesn't work out? I'm just going to be back where I say that all the time. Like you, what are you in the context of business too?

1:07:54Like if you go for it, if it fails, we're probably just, it's like the work wall. Yeah, exactly. You're just going to be back there. So why not even like, right. While you were talking and funnily enough, when I was watching your content, I was thinking to myself, what I was going to ask you, I'm going to ask you right now. Someone is, you're so smart, right? You know what all these other brands should be doing. You have all the information, you have all that in your brain. Why didn't you start your own thing, your own product, your own brand, your own whatever? Because you're the one who like you have, who have the knowledge base, right?

1:08:27Is it just something you're not interested in doing? You don't want to do it? Like what, why didn't you? Well, I did. And it was an ad agency. So when I was building... Oh, you're right. You did do the ad agency. That's true. Yeah. That's true, but not a product. But the reason... That's true. That's a service business versus a product business. I built a company in a way that I wanted. That's actually true, right? But I understand your question. And so I spent my 30s building other people's companies. Yeah. And it was miserable. It was just horrible in like every possible direction. Outside of like my teams, which I really loved.

1:09:02But I did not want to work with investors after that. After that decade of basically being in a board meeting every four weeks and all of the decision making, the way that decisions get made when something is heavily capitalized. and the dynamic and that 40 % of your time then goes to investor relationships and building your next round of funding. I just got very disillusioned with that. And that's not to say there are a lot of great investors out there who really are passionate about entrepreneurialism and funding the next wave of innovation. But for me, that was not a good match. So I kind of shoved my raft off that dock and I was like, I'm not building those types of companies anymore.

1:09:38And I want to take more of a portfolio approach with my time because I saw not the investors doing it. They were invested in a bunch of things. It didn't really matter if our thing worked out or not. But my whole life and my family and my livelihood were all in this one thing. And I couldn't control so much of the decision-making and the variables. So I just started doing consulting. I want to work on a bunch of stuff at once, to some degree, sell the shovels, you know, and that I don't want to raise money. So I need something that is immediately profitable. And that is a services business. There was no investment capital required.

1:10:11It was just me and my time. And I thought it really played into my own strengths because I was able to step back from things and see the patterns and develop frameworks that could be taught to people. Because that's one of the tricks with the services business is how do you make someone who's 23 years old and just graduated from college, they went to a good college, but they still just graduated from college. How do you teach them to do this? Because that's the only way to scale the business. So I thought it played into my strengths, and I liked working on all these brands. And then I do this deep dive advisory work when I really fall for something.

1:10:41Yeah. And that really feeds me. This is what you're passionate about. Yeah. I thought it was a good fit for me. I mean, listen, and also you get to like, it's always new, right? Because there's always a different problem that you need to solve or a different, like that would work. That's why that works good for my like monkey brain, right? Because the same thing, right? Because then you're not doing the same thing day in, day out, day in, day out, day in, day out, right? No, that's right. It's like your treadmill. I mean, and it's also, it's a way to become an expert. Because when you work, the amount of, we've spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the platform across probably at least 100 brands.

1:11:17You know what I mean? And you see all their reports and you see the repeat patterns and you see what happens with products and you develop true expertise. And that was a good fit for me because that is my strength is trying to access insights and bring them back in the form of frameworks. That's something I feel that I'm good at. You're really good at it. But how could I do that if I couldn't see this playing out across so many companies? That's 100 % true because you have so much perspective, right? Because you have all this data to choose from, from all these companies that you work with all the time.

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1:13:26Do you ever do personal brands like people? Or is it just companies, just consumer? It's just consumer. I mean, goop to some degree via personal brand. But it's, and so sometimes I think it's one in the same. But yeah, it's, we just, we work on companies. You work on companies. And like what, okay, so hold on. I haven't even looked at my thing. None of the questions I had written, I didn't even ask you one of them. And I wanted to talk about fitness. Oh, I'm obsessed with that too. I mean, like, I'm just curious, like what you've learned because you've got pattern recognition over a lot of people.

1:13:58You know, it's interesting. I just came back from Miami. I mean, I just did a TED Talk on the idea that I believe that what I learned on the gym floor was way more important than what I learned in college. And so I had this whole thing. It's not even out yet. It hasn't even been out yet. But basically, I said, like, you know, the whole thing is like why your GPA might not matter as much as your squat rack. because I think the life skills and soft skills you learn from doing, taking fitness seriously, like in any, like it doesn't have to be the gym. It could be something else. What it does in terms of it, not just your discipline, did not delayed, well, everything, discipline, delayed gratification, patience, self-confidence that, that, that to me, I'm going to talk, that's have propelled anything and everything I've ever done way more than my MBA, way more than anything else I've ever done.

1:14:50And so I lean really hard in it because that's why I'm like a drill sergeant with people. I think, especially young people, I think that they have to take that idea of like taking some form of fitness seriously will catapult their life in ways that they don't even know because they don't know what you don't know, right? And I think the self-confidence, like I think when you asked me earlier, like why you're like, well, aren't you scared or didn't that scare you? Because here I am, a Canadian in the U.S., you know, young girl coming to the U.S., had no family, nothing. And I took a chance on myself.

1:15:27I took a chance on myself because I built up my self-efficacy and my self-esteem and self-worth by seeing myself do things that I otherwise would never have thought I was capable of in my fitness space, in my fitness world. because I would lift heavier. I would run farther. I would wake up earlier. I would do all of these things that I would otherwise never have probably learned to do if I just never took that path of fitness at a young age. You know what I mean? Like that kind of took me on a whole thing. You should actually, you should watch my first TED Talk was on being bold and that went really viral.

1:16:11and it will explain to you a lot of like my whole thing if you're interested. But I think that fitness is a very important, that's why I think fitness is a microcosm of success in life. I think not just business, by the way, I'm talking about like personal life, professional life, everything. I think it's super important. I agree. I am gonna watch your TED Talk. That's on my list. I'm really excited to watch it. I think you'll see why it's a funny little pivot. But I just think that building these like keystone own habits are so much more important than where you go to school. I agree. You know what I mean?

1:16:46I agree. And what do you think? This is your podcast though, not mine. No, but I really was genuinely excited talking about this because I really agree. And that was a big unlock for me when I was 30. I was a huge runner. I was an addicted runner. And I hurt and I don't have - I can see that. Yeah. I mean, but I did not have the body type. Like when you see people who can run - I 100 % agree with you. By the way, it's so funny you just said that I had a runner on here. Do you know Nick Thompson? I saw that on Instagram, but no, yeah. I don't know who he is. I think it's – and I've had a lot of people on here talk about this, that you need to have a very specific body type, in my opinion, to do these long, distant runs or be like a real runner-runner, right?

1:17:31Like if you're like a woman who has hips and this and that, it's very – like that's been a real challenge for me, and I love running. Yep. But if your body type is not that way, I think there's – yes, you can do it, but it's not going to be as easy as if you are someone who is more of like an ectomorph. Do you know what an ectomorph is? No. So an ectomorph is someone who's really narrow. They don't have the hips. They're not someone who puts on weight easily. You know what I mean? They're more lean and more lean and mean. Yep. like a mesomorph, like you and I, I think are more mesomorph, but you're a smaller mesomorph, is more someone who's athletic built, right?

1:18:15Like we can, we have muscle, we have more of a hips and we're like more of a curvature, but we're more like fit, like we're more like strong fit in the middle. Then you have like the endomorphs who are more of the very voluptuous, they're more curvy people. So those people, the running will be very difficult, I think, when you're doing these long runs. People like us, we can do runs, but it's not as... I can't run 30 miles every day. I'll hurt myself. Yeah. The injuries is what got me. So yeah, I was complaining to my older brother one time about being short because every room I walk in, people are like, I thought you're me 5 '10".

1:18:58And he was like, he was like, Neanderthal jeans, I'm short and strong. I was like, you're right. That's our, that's our anatomy. So I mean, I carry my weight between here and here. So my knees just got pounded from all the running. But so I just stop. And that was very hard. But it was because I had this injury. And that's how I learned how to eat, though. I read Dr. Weil's book, Spontaneous Feeling, which totally changed my approach. I like him. He's incredible. He was He's kind of the OG. He is. I think he still is the OG. He's the OG. Yeah. He's the OG. He called all of this, you know. Totally agree.

1:19:30I mean, the whole thing. And, but that approach to cellular health, that was the first time I understood nutrition. And it flipped my, I had this horrible, which I think most women in our generation do because it was how we were raised and because culturally and through most people's moms is that you're like the weight pressure on women growing up was so negative. And that was a real fight for me was that relationship with food and with weight and that clouds your self-image. What you're talking about is taking that and making it be empowered, whether you did that deliberately or not. But for me, that was the moment where the weight narrative really changed to be more about self-care and self-love versus self-hatred and all the food negativity.

1:20:14Because when you think about optimizing your cellular health, it's the length that straightens out the chain. That really helped me. And so what you're saying makes a lot – it just really resonates with me. That's been a really – that was a positive thing for you to focus on. I also think, yeah, because you don't know my history, I wrote a book called Strong is the New Skinny many years ago. Yeah, I read about that. And the thing is, I think life is about reframes, right? Like you've got to reframe for something that you can achieve versus something that is like, I think anyone could be strong.

1:20:48Anyone could get stronger. But not everybody can be skinny. Let's just be honest. Yeah. It's a real struggle for a lot of people. like I believe there's a baseline that people have and you can kind of go up and down like you know a little bit here and there but you're always going to like meet your baseline again that's why these GLP ones are very interesting to me right I was just going to say that yeah yeah it's a very interesting I'm like very curious about how it's like at the beginning kind of stages what happens in five or ten years from now because what I've noticed with these GLP ones and again this is my opinion everyone so I don't want anyone to come after me but what I what I have noticed is that it flatlines eventually.

1:21:25And I find that people who I know have been on it for a long time, their appetites are back because you do, like your body acclimates to anything and everything you do all the time. So yes, you can cycle it and you can maybe microdose it and all these other things, but still like that's not, that to me is not a solution long-term and you can, and people can say, Oh, but there's all these other benefits, uh, inflammation and brain and this and that and the other. Okay. Maybe, maybe, you know, does it help with diabetes? Yes. We know that to be true. Right. But I think that shortcuts for your, for your weight and for that type of lifestyle, there is no shortcut.

1:22:09People need to do the hard work. You need to eat properly and you need to exercise. And so I think that this has thrown a real, real kind of curve ball into a lot of these things, right? Like even like the idea of even, we talked about self-acceptance. This is proving that this whole body positivity movement was a bunch of nonsense, right? Because the second that someone can shoot themselves with an injection to lose weight, body positivity went right out the window and everyone's now 11 pounds wandering around town, right? So there's a real interesting, I think, interesting thing about that in itself.

1:22:45I think that we have to be accepting things that we can do and then work towards those goals because everything I think is like a ripple effect, right? Like if you proved to yourself that you can do the thing, that will build your self-confidence and you'll do it more and more and more. And like maybe you may not be a size zero, but you can be a size four or six and eight and be happy with that because you're strong and you're capable and you have muscle and you have strength and physical strength correlates with mental strength and vice versa, right? Like it it works everything together. So I don't know.

1:23:22These GLP-1s are very interesting to me, and I think they're being over—they're being taking too much. People are prescribing them too often, and I'm really concerned about what the fallout's going to be. Well, I—so I have an opinion on this. I could talk to you about this all day. I know, we can. Oh, we should actually—hold on, should we—okay, keep on going. Okay. So quickly on GLP-1s. So I've been knee-deep in this with Weight Watchers because Because not only do they prescribe GLP-1s, but they have this companion program that does everything that you're saying, which is like, here's how you optimize nutrition.

1:23:53Because it isn't just – it's meant to be used in the context of a lifestyle. But it's been interesting learning about it because my perception of it was, oh, they're just going to be skinny for the rest. That's actually not true. It's what you're saying. You lose 20 % to 30 % of your body weight. Yeah. And then your body set points. But what's interesting – and then from there, you have to diet. You know, you've got to fight it with behavior. It just makes it easier because it quiets down the food nose. I think it's great. But the interesting thing about it that I think is really nice is that I've talked to multiple people on these.

1:24:25And when they hit that set point, they're content. They're like, you know, that's where my body wants to be. And I'm good with it. I feel better. My macros are better. My lab work is better. And I think it allows you emotionally to be content. Whereas when you – I've talked to a lot of people about this in the context of the work. A lot of people will lose 100 pounds and still look in the mirror and say, I know the scale tells me I lost that, but I don't see it. And I think with GLP-1s, it almost externalizes and makes it an objective conversation with themselves so that when they hit that set point, they're like, you know, I'm good.

1:24:57Feel better. Look better. That's what I hear from people, and I think that's nice. What I find interesting about the GLP-1 and Weight Watchers is Weight Watchers' foundation was based on these in-person meetings where people are showing accountability for doing the work. There's a disconnect between the GLP-1s and they took out the meetings and now they're doing the GLP-1s? They still do the meetings and that's all getting – Julie Rice is going to be really doing some really cool stuff. But it's interesting about GLP-1s. The reason they acquired Julie's company is because she was doing GLP-1 in-person workshops.

1:25:33Because when you get prescribed those things, you're going through it pretty much alone. Because most doctors don't have time or even like the learning patterns to understand. And you're feeling all these side effects. You hit plateau points. So the first thing you hit is side effects. Like feeling super nauseous or whatever it is. And really the only way to get answers around that is to ask the 50 people in that workshop who are going through it at the exact same time as you. There's no one else who has the information. So those workshops become, I think, even more valuable on a GLP-1 journey.

1:26:05And then you hit a plateau point. Then the question is, how do you get past that? And you're like most – I think some percentage of doctors probably be right there with you, but a lot of them just don't have time. Right. And it's not their core. So I think actually the workshops have a lot of relevance in that journey too. Do they wean people? I mean, you probably don't know this question, but is there a process of weaning people off of them once they're on it for a while? Yeah, it's called microdosing. And so what they do is they start to stretch out the doses. So I don't know, can you ever get off them?

1:26:33That's my question. I don't think so. Because, I mean, maybe. But I think for most people, the hunger will come roaring back. Right. It will be hard. So I think that, and I'm not speaking for Weight Watchers. No, no, no. This is not about it. Yeah, I'm just speaking personally from what I understand to be true. That's what I was saying earlier. People who I know in the fitness space, longevity space, health space, I know people who are doing the GLP-1s who are, there's no weight problem. It's just they're now doing it for all the other added benefits or because they want to fine-tune. And so they do this microdosing.

1:27:11But even if you're doing that, you need to wean off. of it. How do you stay on a medication forever? That's just what people do. You space out the dosing. And so what happens is the hunger starts to come back. So let's say you're on like - I've seen it. Yeah. Many times. But they get used to surfing that. So like the first, I don't know the exact, but when they first start their dosage cycle, they have like no hunger. And then by the end of it, they can feel the hunger and then it hits again, they redose. So it's just managing the doses. You downshift it kind of. But when you do like three weeks of not doing it, I mean, I don't know.

1:27:48But I mean, from what I've seen with people, I've seen people really, the pendulum swing really far back when they got off and they gained their weight back fast because your appetite comes back with a vengeance. Yeah, I think that's right. I think it's a net positive. I think it really helps people get through kind of that breakthrough period of need. I think so too. What I think it's good for is getting you through the hump. Yeah. Right? Like getting or like kind of like just like getting the kind of like starting you, like kind of just igniting the fire. But the problem is people don't just do that for that.

1:28:22I know. That's reality. Well, yeah. Now there's all the, yeah. But I think it is so hard to lose weight. It really is. Like it's not hard for you. But it's hard for you. Are you insane? It's very hard for me. It's hard. It's very hard. And by the way, I'm one of these people you said or asked me earlier, I have a lot of food noise. I think about food 24 hours a day, 24 hours a day. I'm hungry all the time. And let me tell you, working out has done me no favors in that way. I bet. Because I get starving, you know? I know. But I think that I've accepted that about myself, but that's my neurosis.

1:29:01It just is. I'm not going to lie. It is. And I work out more. By the way, now I work out more for my mental situation because it keeps me more in check. I'm not doing it to lose weight, the fitness stuff. I'm really not. I just accept the fact that I work out because I have to work out for my brain. Agreed. Yeah, for me too. It's mental health. But yeah, I think it kills. It's just very enabling. It's a helpful tool. And what is like, it's a core pillar of all of our lives is your weight and your health. 100%. Have you tried any of these? No, no. No. Okay, so let's just wrap up this GLP one because we could talk about it afterwards.

1:29:39I have all these other questions, but now we've got to go. But you're going to have to come back here. I'd love to come back, Jen. Okay. Because literally, I was talking to you. None of my questions were answered. Not one. Not one. Except I read co-founder and CEO of Chief Detective. That's the only thing I read off of this page. So guys, please follow Emily. She is so knowledgeable. Like I said, if you're interested in any type of scaling, business, growth marketing, performance marketing, influencer marketing, anything else? Brand. Brand marketing, obviously. Brand marketing. I forgot the biggest one.

1:30:13And the combined journey of life and work. That to me is a big one. One question for you. What is your daily routine? What do you do? So I wake up early. I set my alarm for 5.30. So if I actually sleep that night, I wake up at 5.30. I meditate most days. I drink coffee and do my eye masks. I eat a salad for breakfast every single morning. You do? I do, yeah. I do a diet called metabolic balance. Now I do Weight Watchers too. What is this metabolic? It's this weird old German health diet that manages your metabolic system. Basically, it's a health diet. So it's eat five hours apart. It's one protein at every meal.

1:30:52There's this rule set that's just really worked. I like routine. I like being in a straitjacket. I like not having – it helps. It's like I don't even think about it. It's my – So tell me what it is. So you have for breakfast, you have a salad? So I have a salad with pear and nuts and seeds and flax oil. And it's this very healthy salad. Okay. And then I don't snack, no snacking. So five hours between meals. And then for lunch, I have another salad and then five hours. And then I have dinner, which is some form of like a protein, a vegetable and a fruit. And that's what I eat every single day. And then the weekends are a disaster.

1:31:28So then I eat like a 10-year-old and then I make up for it. So that's why, you know, sometimes like going on Weight Watchers was great. I peeled off the five pounds that over time with holiday and spring break, I'll gain. By the way, I still think to this day, Weight Watchers is the most effective, best program out there bar none. The point system actually works. It works. It works. It works because everything is about portions. Yeah. And then that's how you lose weight. And I think it's like still the most effective. It's like, it's like the tried and shrewd one. So anyway, and that was not, I'm not getting paid by you Weight Watchers.

1:32:04I should be. But anyway, Emily, it was wonderful meeting you. Same, Jen. Thank you for having me. Thank you for being here. Follow Emily. Bye, everybody.