[00:00:45] Embracing Competition
Hey badass, so before I dive into this juicy, juicy episode, can I just say how normal it is and how human it is to hate competition? It is so normal that you look at your competition on the internet, which we have access to, to be able to consume and observe and people watch and compare.
And it's just so normal to sit there feeling, big feels like jealousy, like fear, like helplessness and get stuck in that comparison trap of, why did I ever think that I was cut out to do something like this person can do? I don't have this quality or that trait. And who do I think I am to actually be able to make my own mark in this area?
And become the next big thing in my niche, like who am I to think that given all of the selection that already exists, anyone would ever come to me? I have been there 100%. I have had really negative thoughts around. Why would anyone ever bother working for me when someone so cool exists, or someone so chill and authentic exists, or someone so successful exists, or someone who's done these shiny things exists?
What do I have to offer the world? And the answer is so much, but it's really hard to see it when you're stuck in the comparison game. So I want to put it out there that this is completely normal. We are building personal brand-based leveraged expertise-based businesses, which puts ourselves at the centre and puts ourselves out there.
And it feels very personal in that way. And I wanted to reassure you that it's completely legitimate to feel that way and be it gets better we need to commit to that feeling better as we realize why we should love competition or at least learn to fall in love with competition because we can actually use it for so many reasons, but absolutely to our advantage when it comes to things like honing in on our unique messaging and personal brand, because hey, you are your niche as well.
Remember that. And for so many other data-informed market informed decisions that we can take in our business competition is a great thing. It helps us to separate from the pack and become that visionary and become that thought leader and become that next big thing in our area, in our industry, in our own niche.
And so we're going to talk about why we need to love competition and how we can start to look at it and leverage it in order to stand out in order for our competition to actually fuel our business, not detract from it.
[00:03:42] The Birth of Badass Careers
Now I can tell you when I designed. Badass careers. I did so in such a bubble. I was completely naive about the concept of competition.
So it really slapped me in the face. So Badass Careers were something that was born on a coaching program actually at L'Oreal. So I was at L'Oreal and I was selected. Did as part of, I was on what they called the talent list and being on the talent list meant that we had access to these really incredible training and experiences, development and leadership development experiences for high achievers.
And I know that some of, a little bit about my story. I actually ended up. Running these kinds of trainings and designing them and working with the top achievers and high flyers at L'Oreal all around the world and upskilling them and their potential and their leadership development and all sorts of cool stuff.
But this is actually a moment where I was a participant on one of these programs. We did this work that's very similar to personal development frameworks about clarity, purpose, and what you want to do with your life. And it was all about becoming a change agent at L'Oreal. And so it was figuring out what kind of impact or what kind of change you wanted to make on the organization.
But to do that, we went through a lot of self-awareness, upskilling, strengths, upskilling, figuring out who we are and, our unique sweet spot and how we want to change the company with those kinds of skills in mind. And for me, what kept coming up over and over again in this program was. This concept of coaching of being the kind of person who would facilitate the success of others.
So I'm behind the scenes facilitating that success, coaching for that success, mentoring for that success, but really allowing other people to shine. Okay. So it was very much understanding who people were seeing their potential, helping them to step into that potential, develop that potential and take it wherever they wanted to take it.
And I wanted to do so with a career development lens, because of course, what I realized in working with human resources is that I was always at the service of the company and the strategy of the company, and I really wanted to put the person back at the center of my work and help them to realize their career dreams and help them to see how incredible they were and how to package that up and go after what they wanted.
And this was a really incredible moment for me. I was so energized. I was so excited about packaging up my experience, my skills and my talents and helping people in this way. And so I went back to work and I applied for particular programs around coaching, becoming a certified coach, becoming an in house coach.
There were all sorts of great training and development opportunities on offer because it's a very wealthy company, obviously being the number one beauty company in the world. And I was at the headquarters in Paris and so big budgets working at the international level. And I got rejected for these trainings that I was applying for literally solely based on my age.
And they said, you need more experience. It's something that you'll do at a later stage of your career. And I just want to shout out Emma, who is the coach who was facilitating the program that I was on when I was figuring out what I wanted to do, because she is someone who works external to L'Oreal.
She doesn't work at L'Oreal. She was facilitating a program for them. And she's the most incredible person and coach ever. And.
[00:07:12] Overcoming Self-Doubt
This was one of my biggest fears. I said, I can't do this kind of work. I can't be a coach. I'm too young. And I was in my late twenties at the time. I'm too young. I need more experience.
That's what everyone says. And she turned around and said to me I became a coach at 30. Why not you? What is the right age for coaching? What you can't at 34, but you can at 35, make it make sense. A coach helps people to get results. A coach helps people to have mindset shifts. A coach holds people accountable.
A coach has empathy. A coach can listen. You can absolutely be a coach at any age. And so thankfully I had her in mind because when I got rejected within the corporate system, it was one of the triggers that made me think, Hey, I might have to do this on my own. I might have to create my own thing. Now, my point of the story is getting to the point where I have this beautiful idea and I started designing based on who I was and what I wanted to do, my dream business, and what would it look like if I could coach people?
And Badass Careers essentially was born the very early stages of my dreaming up Badass Careers. And I was so excited by this concept that I knew I was going to start as a side hustle. And I knew that I was going to leverage my experience and HR and working for these incredible companies all around the world, but I was going to work with the candidates and I was going to help them to thrive and I went on LinkedIn so like I was so naive.
I was so fresh. I was so green. And I typed career coach into the search bar and career coach for millennials and things like that to see if anyone had already thought of it. I'm just laughing at myself now because yeah, people had thought of it. There were 150, 000 search results when I put career coach into the search bar.
And then I looked on Instagram and I looked on YouTube and I was looking around and I was like, okay, there are a lot of career coaches and of course there are right career coaching is probably one of the fields where there's the lowest barrier to entry in some ways as a coach, because the only thing you need to have done to qualify you is to be a coach.
To have had a job there are so many career coaches that have never ever worked in HR and their unique angle is I haven't worked in HR I've had promotions and become a manager on my own terms and I'm going to help you do the same so you know whether you've just had a six month internship in tech you can be this career coach who helps you get it you know internship in tech or whatever.
If you just had a job doing anything like you've had a great career in sales, you can be the sales career coach. So it really is a very easy and low barrier to entry in that way. And that in terms of qualifications, you just need to have been employed in some capacity. And I remember looking around and being completely, it was like a punch in my gut because there were people with 1 million followers, 2 million followers, 3 million followers over on TikTok.
And there were people who were, Absolutely beautiful influencer style like fashionable like just had this whole like lifestyle brand and then there were other people who, had been working in the top tier companies in Silicon Valley and there were other, and everyone had been doing these incredible things and I suddenly felt so small and I was incredibly inspired.
Absolutely. Just hurt almost by the idea that I had this purpose driven idea that was just going to fulfill me and be this incredible mission and help people and be my impact on the world and then it just in front, like in that moment, I remember saying to myself Oh, it's too late. It's too late and it's not possible for me.
But luckily, ya girl knows a thing or two about mindset and a thing about moving into action when you feel frozen by fear.
[00:10:59] Finding Your Unique Niche
I'm a big geek around psychology, neuroscience, understanding behavioral science, understanding how to unravel those fears and move past them to get into that action mode. And so that combined with just my sheer.
Driver of fulfillment and my big why and my big purpose to get it done, I made the decision that I was going to make this work for me because there are over 8 billion people on this planet and surely my people will find me. And I remember thinking and doing the math and thinking to myself, to make a hundred K in a year, if your coaching package is 1, 500, that's only 67 people.
You don't need a million people. You can't work with a million people. I just, I needed the 67, right? And so I remember thinking I can find 67 people. I can have a slice of the pie and it took a while, but I eventually got to the place where you should be, which is knowing that seeing this competition and seeing this amount of people out there making a living off doing your thing.
That is proof of market profitability. That is proof that people are making money in this niche, and if it's possible for them, it is absolutely possible for you too. And surprise, my people found me. And just because I grew my audience, Of my people doesn't mean that the career coaches with 1, 000, 000 followers and 3, 000, 000 followers and, 20, 000 followers, whatever that's still out there.
They still exist and they still have their people in their clients. And that's amazing. The pie is big enough. The hundreds of millions, billions of people on social media, the pie is big enough for everyone to take a slice and your people will find you. I still laugh about it because in the career glow up.
So my personality type is INFJ. And it's one of the like hundreds of things we do to help people raise in self awareness. One of the things we do is we get them to do the MBTI personality test and get some insights from that. And through that, we saw the data that. 90 percent of my clients were either INFJ like me or INFP, which is a very similar personality type, introverted, intuitive, feelings based.
And then the JLP relates to your sense of time and planning and whether you're more spontaneous or more sort of future planner, but basically it's a very similar personality type. And there's a vibe, right? You just can see yourself in other people, who you can relate to, who you feel like you can trust.
There's an energy that is intangible. And so you start to realize as well, that actually you are your niche as well. And. As cheesy as it is, no one is you, no one can be you, no one can imitate you, even if they steal your content, they don't have your tone of voice, they don't have your education style, they don't have your personality, they don't have your humour no one can replicate you.
And inherently, there is no real competition. And that's a beautiful place to get to as well, especially when you have the confidence and the self-assuredness that when, and this happened to me, someone reaches out to you and says, Hey Rosie, I'm hesitating between you and this career coach over here because she's Latina.
I'm Latina. She's a Spanish speaker and she's really gone from. A place of coming from my home country to making it in the U.S and, she's done a lot of things that, I would love to achieve myself and I really love your content, but I'm hesitating between you two. And you can have a chat with them and check for that alignment.
And see where, what's inspiring the most and where their values sit and saying to them, you know what, go for that person, go for them, they're your person, I think they're your human, that's going to lead you through this transformation in your life. And that's when it feels so good and you know that competition is no longer affecting you.
So that's a little bit about The mindset side of competition and how we can grow into it. And it's totally okay if you're not there yet, but it's absolutely a good place to get to now.
[00:15:20] Market Analysis and Competitor Research
Let's talk about how you can start looking at your competition and leveraging that today to help you build out your business concept.
Refine your messaging and refine that personal brand of yours so that you inherently do stand out. On the market and you have that coach client fit, which means that you're bringing in your ideal people who are your people, and you're going to have so much fun working with them because when you're building your business around who you are, again, The competition be damned.
It honestly doesn't matter. So what we're going to do, I'm going to send you on a little bit of a mission this week is I want you to find competition. I want you to do a big market analysis and look into some existing business models out there in your space. So I want you to jump onto Google and see if you can find people already solving the kinds of problems that you want to help people solve.
So if you want to help people get a job and change careers. We're not looking for the careers, communications coaches. We're not looking for the careers, leadership development coaches. We're not looking for the careers, get a promotion coaches. If you're about getting a new job, it's about getting a new job.
Okay. If you're about completely pivoting careers and doing, something completely different with your career, it's about finding those people. Okay. So we need to get quite specific and targeted. And we also want to avoid huge organizations or famous people. Websites we want to find real human beings real people because it's a very different business model looking at massive bodies of work or organizations such as like the school of life, that would be an example of, it's almost like a media company at this point, even big players in the careers world, like career Contessa, they are essentially.
A careers blog and media company, same thing for the muse. So they connect people with careers mentors, or they might sell like workshops and things like that, but they're not really a personal brand based business anymore. They've become a very different kind of scalable business that could be sold.
It's not so much like a lifestyle personal brand business. And while you might want to get there at some point, it's not really, Worth comparing yourself with that kind of business model because either a it's not relevant to you or be it's, several years away. So we want to find the people making money off this and they appear to be either solopreneurs or they have a small team behind them, right?
And I want you to find the big players. I want you to find the people who have obviously made quite a decent living off this. And I want you to look at things like their website, their offers, what they're priced at, and see how many views their most popular videos and content formats are getting. And try to have a look at a few of their free trainings and freebies, just to understand how they're making their money.
Now, again, as we go through this, we are not here to compare and say, Oh my gosh, that's so good. I want to copy that. I want to do something similar to this because they look successful doing it. No. We build businesses that feel like you, that look like you, that sound like you. Like we do not. We do not do that.
However, this is interesting from a perspective of who is this person? How do they make their money? And what is that activating to me? What is that telling me? What are, what does my gut telling me when I'm looking at this information? Because it helps you whether you are drawn into it and feeling wow, like almost jealous and having that desire, having That admiration or having that inspiration feeling or you're having that Oh, I would never say that like that.
Oh, I don't want to do it that way. Both of those are interesting pieces of information. Okay. And I want you to refine it to five people that you really want to focus on. And they can be because they are massive players in your world and they've got a lot of followers and their content gets hundreds of thousands of views, or it can be because the person's messaging or branding It really excites you and it's representative of something that you would like to achieve.
And then once you've selected these five people, I really want you to, create a table where you've got competitor one, two, three, four, and five across the top. And then down the side, you obviously have their name and their website and their social media links. And then you want to capture some information like what is their combined social media following?
We want what we want an understanding of their footprint of their digital impact and audience size. Then it's really interesting to list out things like their popular content topics. Now, this is really interesting because you're going to see that. Very quickly just eyeball it that they have a sort of average view count on certain videos or content pieces And then you're going to see Content that has a lot more views than that So just say someone has 200, 000 followers and typically their videos get about 25, 000 views Look at the videos that have 150, 000 views, 300, 000 views, a million views.
List them out because this is market intel. This is showing that content piece has very likely been seen by a lot more people. Then just the current followers, because the algorithm works in a way where your followers only see a specific portion of the content that you put out, which is why there's a disproportionate gap between how many followers someone has and how many views their content typically gets.
So if we're getting up to the point where the views are representative of, half of their followers, three quarters of their followers, more people have seen the content then followers that they have, then obviously. It has been pushed out on social media, and that will be because the algorithm has understood that it's a piece of content that people are interested in, and it can put that content out there more globally.
So that's really interesting to look at as well. What do they speak about? How do they speak about it? And. Audit their services and their offers as well. What are they offering? What are they selling? What are the price points of that? In another row on your table, you might want to put something like, what makes them stand out?
What is this person's thing? Or what is it about their personal branding or style that makes them unique? And then another row, what do you like about their business model and the way they approach what they're doing? And then in addition to that, what do you think you could do better or differently? And so it's this analysis of what exists out there.
And by doing that, you're going to have a reaction to their business model, to their price points, to the kinds of topics that they speak about, the content that they create, whether you see yourself creating things that are similar or not at all like that. And in which ways can you learn from this person and be inspired by them?
What can your reaction to them tell you about yourself and what you want? And then what is at least one thing that you would do differently? And it could be as simple as, they've got very soft and calm and cozy energy. And I would be bold and polarizing and share my opinions in big ways.
[00:22:32] Building Your Personal Brand
Start thinking about that at this point, and then a really cool follow up exercise to do here is really journaling on your personal brand and how you want to show up and how you want to be perceived by your people. And again, this has to feel real and it has to be, parts of you that already exist and are real.
You're not going to be faking it. You're not going to be wearing some kind of mask, but understanding which parts of you are going to be highlighted in your personal brand. Because it's not just about the information you deliver, it's how you deliver it, because information is so accessible these days, right?
And so it's very likely that as a career coach, you might do a reel, let's say, or a TikTok that says, here are three resume tips. To ensure that your resume stands out and career coach number one could do that in a way that is very professional and clean and comes from a place of experience and authority and about 20 years into the, to their journey as a career coach.
And they have a very trustworthy, sleek, conservative brand. That appeals to a certain kind of person, a certain kind of demographic, a certain kind of whatever. And then exactly the same three tips could be delivered by a different career coach who is super young and funny and using humor and talking about how these three tips helped her land her internship at a fortune 500 and.
She can be using storytelling and voiceovers and laughing about it and showing a lot of humility Oh, I thought it was going to be like this, but actually I did this and yeah, it worked. And so they can be the same kind of tips, but a completely different energy and they will each appeal to a completely different kind of client demographic looking for the same results.
Ultimately, they. Different people in the market want to work with career coaches and they will vibe with one over the other. So when you're thinking about your personal brand, let's elaborate on this question of how will you do it differently? So what you can think about and what you can journal on are things like, what are my big convictions and values?
When it comes to my topic, what are the kind of stories I can share and experiences that I've had in life that set me apart? Because when you create a real giving a tip, there's a big difference between saying, here's my number one tip when it comes to networking. And here's the number one lesson that I've learned in networking my way into working for Louis Vuitton in Paris, right?
So there are stories and experiences that you have that other people don't have. Thinking about things like that will already start having you acknowledge that you are different and that you've got a different angle. You've got different opinions. You've got different convictions. Think about the energy.
What will the energy be in your content? How do you want people to feel consuming your content? And how do you want to feel when you're creating it? Think about things like what is your natural tone of voice. Are you soothing and calm? Are you high energy and quick? Does it sound like you're speaking on two times speed at all times?
What kind of humour do you have? Are you quite explicit, and do you use a lot of puns and plays on words, or do you have a subtle kind of dark humour that people pick up on over time? What makes you weird? Are there any things about you that make you a bit quirky, make you a bit kooky, make you a bit different in some way?
What are the things that humanize you and could enhance connection? With the people in your community. So this doesn't have to be major. It can be as small as being obsessed with cats. A really, being really into great skincare and fashion, being a tea drinker, having ADHD. Now, you don't have to share about these things if you don't want to, and you don't have to share about them explicitly, but these are things that could be woven into your content somehow and could make people relate to you because you create your content in a certain way.
Or you use certain examples, if you were a career coach talking about negotiating a 10k salary increase, you might say imagine how many ragdoll kittens you could buy with 10, 000. Like it's funny and it's a little bit about you. So there are things that can make you stand out in that way.
And think about the characteristics and personality traits that are important to you when it comes to who you are and what you'd like to highlight when it comes to your brand. Is it your playfulness? Is it your energy? Is it your sense of community? Is it your transparency? Is it your helpfulness? Is it your sense of excellence?
Is it how candid you are? Is it how vibrant you are? Is it how kind you are? All of these things allow you to understand, in response to your competition, how you can carve out your own way, with your own flavor, your own vibe, your own energy. Because again, at the end of the day, information is information, but what's your flavor going to be?
Because if there are a hundred thousand of you selling cakes, you want to make sure that your ingredients are different, your flavors are fresh, and you are doing it in your way. Now from here, when you've had these incredible insights and you've been able to get this data and information and have these reactions to your competition that allow you to figure out Why you are so deserving of a space in this niche and how you're going to do it in your way, because no one's ever heard it from you and no one's ever heard it from your perspective.
[00:28:45] Final Thoughts and Homework
From this point, I do recommend that you unfollow your competition for a couple of reasons. Firstly, your algorithm will show you what you engage with and what you look at. And so if you're always looking at your competition, it's going to be in your face all the time, which, you know. Isn't particularly helpful, unless you find some competitors who you're like, wow, I am so aligned with this human.
I would love to develop a relationship with them. They are so cool. Then of course, follow them, interact with them, make friends. But what I don't want happening for you is getting into a toxic relationship with following these people, especially if you see that they copy some of your things and it gets you really upset or.
They went viral for some reason and you didn't and you made a video about that last week. Why didn't yours take off? Like any of those unhelpful thoughts aren't going to be building your business and making an impact for you. They are distractions and they are taking you away from the focus you need to have on staying in your lane, doing it your way and creating a community of people who adore you and the way you do it and the way you deliver it.
Because at the end of the day, no amount of success that your competitors have will take away from the success that you're able to achieve. Nothing that happens to them or happens for them will take that opportunity away from you. And so if your mindset isn't at that pure place where you're just like, Oh my gosh, look at them winning.
I'm so happy for them. If they can win, I can win too. If unless you were there and you know that seeing them. Thrive and succeed will have zero impact on you, and you won't make it mean anything. Just unfollow them. It's really not going to be super helpful for your business watching what other people are doing.
And in fact, more times than not, it creates comparison, self doubt, and things that take time to work through. You'll get there, but if you're not there right now, that's totally cool. So my better as always would love to chat would love to hear from you come and see me a DM. I would love to hear from you particularly in terms of how you're going to do it differently.
Do your market analysis, look at your competition, do your journaling about your personal branding and come and let me know. Why you are so deserving of your place in your niche, and you were so excited to do it differently. How are you going to do it differently? How is it going to feel? So you, because building an empire is all about building a business that feels good, that suits your lifestyle, that helps you achieve your dreams, achieve your impact, change people's lives.
And it gets to be on your terms and no one, especially not your competitors should have a single damn say in that. Okay. So you've got homework, get on with your missions, keep taking that messy action. And until next week, happy empire building my friends. You can do it. A shit ton of income, crazy impact, a business that you love.
Just by listening to this episode, you are one step closer to your very own badass empire. Now, I want to hear from you. Tag me in your stories or send me a DM over on Instagram so I can learn what resonated with you most. Oh, and if you're the kind of badass who is willing to help us out big time and take a few minutes to rate and review this podcast, make sure you send us a screenshot of that review at hello at badass empires dot com So I can send you a juicy freebie to say thank you until next time.
Keep showing up for your future and we'll keep smashing goals in the next episode.
