Cemoh 140: Marketing strategy with Selina Donnelly from HSA Growth

Simon Dell (00:01) So welcome to the Cemoh Marketing Podcast. This is being live streamed on LinkedIn and also on TikTok up here as well. So Selina, you've been live streamed everywhere. And this is going to be the first of a different format for these episodes. And I've roped in my good friend Selina, which we'll talk to her in a second. But what we're gonna do is we're gonna try and help Selina build a marketing plan live as we talk here. So Selina and I have known each other for a long time. She's been to a lot of our events. She now runs a business called HSA Growth. So let's get that out of the way. Welcome to the show Selina Donnelly. How are you?

Selina (00:57) I'm good, thank you, and thank you for having me.

Simon Dell (00:59) My pleasure. Tell me what HSA growth do first up, because that's, I'll probably see it there.

Selina (01:05) Okay, so we are a finance brokerage, similar to how a mortgage broker works, but with a more of a focus on the commercial side. So what that means is I love working with business owners, small business owners, medium business owners. And I work similar to how a mortgage broker works when you're looking for a home loan, but I help people with business finance. So it's a big world out there. There's a lot of lenders and not everyone really knows where to go when their business needs money. So that's what I'm here for.

Simon Dell (01:10) Okay. Fair enough. Okay, so before we talk about the sort of marketing side of your business, let's talk about your background because it's not like you decided to go into finance last week. You've been involved with sort of finance one way or another for, I was gonna say a long time, but I don't wanna, I don't wanna, I don't wanna reveal that to people because you obviously look... you look a lot younger than you are. I don't know, is that the right thing to say? don't know. feel that's, anyway. Anyway, you've been doing this for a while, haven't you?

Selina (02:04) I do. Yes, I have. So yeah, I started my career in banking, kind of just on a whim, needed a job, got a job in the bank, fell in love with it, fell in love with the ability to be able to help people in ways that they weren't confident with, that I could become confident with and then provide solutions for them. So I started my career in retail, doing home loans very quickly learned that the self-employed side of it is much more exciting. Business owners are amazing because they always have these incredible ideas. Most business owners are highly skilled at what their business is, but when it comes to finance or running the other side of it, they need support, they need help. And it can be really difficult when your business needs something to help it grow and not really knowing where to go or having the time to do that. So I worked as a commercial banker between Westpac and ANZ for say 15 years and I loved it. I thought it was great, but I really just started to feel like I was hitting a point in my career where I was providing my customers with what the bank thought the solution was rather than what the client needed. commercial brokers aren't as common as mortgage brokers and it's a tough world out there. So, but what became more apparent and more important for me was being able to help my customers with what they need rather than what the bank's product is offering. the more I looked into it, the more I realized there were multiple lenders available and that a lot of my business owners were time poor. So I decided to start HSA Growth because I didn't want to just be a finance company. I wanted to be a partner in a small business to help them grow when it comes to the finance side. So I work with

Simon Dell (03:40) Yeah. Okay.

business owners that are either in that growth phase or wanting to acquire or wanting to just completely revamp or buy equipment and I help them do the finance so they can keep doing what they do best.

Simon Dell (04:13) Right, and HSA growth is how old today? Two years, okay, how time flies, when you're, and is it still just you? Do you have staff yet? We got to the point when it.

Selina (04:17) Two years, just over two years old. Yeah. No, we have some really amazing, like, I didn't do it on purpose, I swear, but I have ended up with quite a few women working around me. And yeah, look, it's, don't think of the girls as staff, I think of them as partners as well. So they've come in because they wanted to learn finance, or they were intrigued by what I was doing. And it's an opportunity for them to learn something different, grow and then support me in my endeavors and crazy ideas.

Simon Dell (04:33) Okay. Yeah. Okay, that sounds lots of fun. And so I guess probably obviously the first question I want to ask is when you go out on your own, there's this, you know, everyone sits there and goes, wouldn't it be great to your own business and things like that. But at the end of the day, it's a little bit daunting. that be a fair assessment?

Selina (05:16) Absolutely. think, I mean, it's probably a nice thing to share here would be I had my daughter, which most people know, but she's now 20 and the timing isn't by accident. So I started the business when Hannah turned 18 because I was a single mom for most of her life. Having that secure income, which I'm sure most people feel like just having that security was more important to me. So when she turned 18, I finally had the courage to take the leap and I wish...

Simon Dell (05:39) Yeah. Yeah. It's like piss off out of my house now, go and get your own job.

Selina (05:48) let's face it, she's still 100 % a financial burden and still lives with me, which I'm totally okay with. However, I don't feel that same amount of pressure. So I had that courage and look, it's worked out really well for me. I should have done it years ago, which I'm sure everyone says, but yeah, divine timing.

Simon Dell (06:05) That's the quote, when's the best time to start a business? 10 years ago or today, those are the only two options. Okay, so look, you obviously went into this though, I'm guessing with a network of contacts.

Selina (06:08) Yeah.

Simon Dell (06:24) That's obviously where we met through through networking events. You you knew people you knew enough people to potentially start having conversations was that Was it was is that a fair assumption that you sort of yes, it is daunting going out on your own But when you've done the sort of prep work and built a network of people around you that you can lean on I guess that makes it a little bit easier

Selina (06:50) Yeah. And I think that was definitely my thought process. everyone kept saying to me, like, you know, so many people you've worked so hard in this industry, you'll be fine. But it's never really as simple as that because even for the first 12 months, I lacked somewhat confidence. So I think that came across to my clients. I believe it's only been the last 12 months that I've a hundred percent known I can do this. And I think that's starting to rub off. So it's, it's coming back tenfold.

No matter what, no matter how many connections you have or how many people you know, there's still always that it's something new and you're still finding your feet. And the same as like I feel for my clients is you're good at what you do. I still had to run a business. I still had to think about marketing. I still had to do all these things that are not my forte as well as doing finance for people. So running your business means you're putting on four or five hats rather than just doing what you're good at. So that definitely was difficult for the first 12 months.

Simon Dell (07:45) What was the, what's the scariest part of doing it on your, on your own in terms of where you suddenly went, shit, I'm out of my depth here.

Selina (07:55) I believe, I think the scariest part is knowing what to prioritize. So you need to prioritize doing the deals to get the income, but then you also need to prioritize the business development side or the marketing side or the, you know, the meeting the lender's side. So I know what's happening in the market, but five of those six things don't produce income. So it's really hard to work out what's more important. And when I worked at the bank, all I needed to do was write the loans.

Simon Dell (08:24) Yeah.

Selina (08:25) I think that's something I didn't really consider before I started the business. And that's probably what I find hard is working out what hat to put on in the morning.

Simon Dell (08:32) Did you do the classic thing when you're starting a business which the first year you'll just take any fucking customer. I don't care who they are, if there's some revenue in it, if there's a bit of profit in it, I'll have them, I'll sign them. Even against your better judgment you take people that you you shouldn't. Look, you wouldn't do now.

Selina (08:39) Absolutely. Yeah. I was so, I was so confident when I was in the bank, like I knew what a deal was. was so comfortable to turn a client away if it was going to be work where I wasn't going to get any success from because I knew the next deal would be coming in the door. But when it's your own business, it's completely different and not even just that. And there'll be people who know me that are going to laugh because when I first started, I was very firm on, I will only be doing commercial finance. That's what I do. I'm only going to be doing small business finance. And everyone kept saying to me, no, no, you'll do home loans because you'll need the income. And I was like, absolutely not. I do home loans. I do quite a lot of them. And I enjoy it now. So yeah, you have to you have to take what you can get. And you have to build the relationships so you can get that next deal.

Simon Dell (09:26) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's scary. So all right, so let's sort of step back. Day one, you you've got a network of people and I think that's probably, you know, marketing lesson number one is that if you can move into a new job with a transitionary network, contacts, things like that, what did you do? Did you just kind of, they obviously all knew you were starting your own business, but did you have any restrictions of trade or what did you just pick up the phone and call them all or how did that how did you go?

Selina (10:08) Yeah. Yeah, it's a lot of back to the basics. think some of the really good structure I learned from working in a bank is do make 10 calls before 10am. So, and I kind of stuck with that. And it's interesting because when you're in a PAYG job, and you have these mark, these markers, you have to hit and your manager is watching you, you hate it. But I went straight into the business following the exact same structure, because that's what built my success.

Simon Dell (10:20) Alright, okay.

Selina (10:35) And I didn't just call like potential business owners, I would call potential referral partners, I would take people out to lunch, I would do all the things I did as a business development manager in a bank, or a finance company into my business. But it was different because you I think to a certain degree, I underestimated having a well established brand sitting behind my name in finance.

Simon Dell (10:59) Yes.

Selina (11:01) You're asking people for their financials, you're asking them for their ID, you're asking for very, very personal information. And say I have a Westpac or ANZ brand sitting behind me, that's a little bit different to, hey, here's my new company, can I please have all your personal information? So that was a barrier I had to overcome. And I think it came more from my own confidence in doing that as well. But yeah, it's, and I think on the top, coming from that, that's why internal referrals or word of mouth is so important because you're instantly trusted if someone said, Hey, helped me give her a call rather than you randomly cold calling or them coming to you through, you know, maybe a lead generation.

Simon Dell (11:41) Yeah, so let's sort of just sort of go into that a little bit more. So word of mouth, networking, is it still, that's still a core part of your business now? Is it, you know, how many of your maybe referrals or how much business do you think comes in via somebody saying, hey, you need to give Selena a call? Okay. And so my next question to you, which is one of those curve balls when I hear that because when I sort of do mentoring for the Queensland government, you get all these people going, know, my business was born out of referrals and word of mouth and all those kind of things. And I go, you know, hey, that's great, but what happens when that stops or what happens when that slows down? Because the danger of building a business and you're 80%. So we'll talk about the other 20 % in a minute, right? But the danger is that you become dependent on other people referring you.

Selina (12:50) You also become the key, the sole income earner, right? So the way I see that as well, and I work with businesses in this space is you don't want your income to be reliant on you as the owner because what if you want to take a step back or you want to bring in your business needs to be able to bring in leads that don't rely on you bringing them in. And you see it all the time. have massive companies who make a lot of money, but if they stepped out, the business wouldn't be there anymore. So they're very conscious of that.

Simon Dell (12:55) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Selina (13:16) Marketing has been like a very important thing to me for that reason, because I know your branding has to be recognizable. It has to be out there. It has to be done right. And it has to be done professionally. yeah, it's definitely something I'm conscious of. It's I'm in considerations at the moment, whether my next recruit is a BDM is just on the road going out and building those relationships. But it's that balance of when do you spend money to make money? And where do you put it? It's it's the big decisions that I never had to make on my own before.

Simon Dell (13:34) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, it's interesting because again, I've been working with a small law firm in the last couple of weeks where the principle is not necessarily... Not necessarily the one that they're all gravitating to because that business is actually built on SEO, which is, again, another conversation later. But the problem is when you're a small law firm and you're the principal, your reputation completely relies on you. Or the reputation is yours. So if you screw something up and you screw the reputation up, that's, and from a law firm, that can be...

Selina (14:06) Yeah.

Simon Dell (14:20) you know, that can be very destructive. So what was happening with her was that everyone wanted to talk to her. Like the first calls that were coming in going, you I wanna talk to a lawyer. So she was the roadblock. She was the roadblock at the start, which means like, cause she could only sort of see a certain amount of people. She was the roadblock at the end because all the jobs needed to be signed off by her. So she needed, they needed her approval. And whilst that approval might only take 15 minutes, it was, you know, it was her getting backed up and getting jobs backed up, which meant that if jobs were getting backed up, invoices weren't going out. So, you know, I think it's really important to have a somebody like yourself as a leader in the company who can sell.

Selina (15:03) Correct.

Simon Dell (15:15) You know, and again, I've known you for a long time. If you put you in front of a client, you know, you're probably talking shit for 55 minutes and about whatever it is that you're talking about. And then five minutes of business and you'll get their signature on the bottom of contract because, because that's how you are. Right. And that's not a bad thing. That's a really good thing because it means that you can, you can build rapport with the, with the client. when 80 % of that business is, is reliant on you.

Your job obviously now in the next year, two years is to get that 80 % down to 70 % down to 60 % down to 50 % and eventually zero. So let's talk about the other 20 % because you know, networking is important and we might come back to that in a minute but that other 20%, where do you think that's coming from? Do you know where that's coming from or are you?

Selina (16:08) Yeah, look, there was a lot of social media posting when I first started, which I did have someone that was doing it for me. We kind of slowed down on that because I got busy. So again, it's that, it's that.

Simon Dell (16:12) Yeah. Yeah, that's gonna be, that's right. That's a black, that's a red cross against your name. Slowing down on your marketing when you're getting busy is the worst thing that you can do. It's like, as soon as you see a fire, it's like, go, yeah, let's just watch the fire for a bit and warm our hands. You go, no, fucking chuck petrol on it, Selina.

Selina (16:23) Yeah, I know, but I don't have time. So yeah, look, that was probably the space I needed to engage some some assistance. But again, it's that deciding, do I focus on the portion of the business that's going to bring in the money? Or do I post? Or do I focus on other portions? So that that is the biggest challenge I find. And when I get caught up with it, if I do have a really big deal sitting on my desk, because commercial again, is different to mortgage broking, I could, you know, I'm working on one at the moment, that's $8 million, it could take me six months.

But a home loan would only take six to eight weeks. So it's that it's bigger, there's more work, there's bigger reward, but it takes a lot longer. And when you're consumed in something like that, you've got a customer that needs to be updated regularly. It needs to be a priority. You need to follow the lenders up every single day. yeah, marketing or thinking about what my next social media posts becomes the bottom of the run, unfortunately.

Simon Dell (17:14) Yeah. Yeah. Okay, so social media, where else do you see it?

Selina (17:34) Um, email, do a lot of email marketing. have a telemarketer as well. So I have somebody. we, we, yeah. Yep. Um, I have a couple of, I have a couple of sources of how I've gotten that database, but yeah, I probably, my database is probably up to 10,000 if I wanted to. So I worked between 1500 to 5,000. So not to overwhelm and then get a feel for what works.

Simon Dell (17:37) Okay. So let's all right, let's just talk about those two things. Email marketing. How big is the database?

Selina (18:00) But again, I'm not a marketing person, there's a lot of work that needs to go into that as well.

Simon Dell (18:05) Yeah, so you could be, I mean, again, that's a good, that's a healthy, that's a healthy number of people on a database. I assume is that coming through sort of a third party supply or provider or things like that? So yeah, yeah, yeah. But I mean, but that seems to be relatively common in the finance world is that, you know, that that's how these things work. Okay, so, so email marketing, what was the other one you said? What?

Selina (18:11) Yeah. Ali Makarov.

Simon Dell (18:32) Telemarketing. Okay, so tell me about that. So is that somebody just picking up the phone calling people on your behalf, right? Okay. And explain to me what they're saying on the phone because telemarketing gets a that's a really bad rap, but we've all had this thing where people call us up and we just go, just fuck off with you. I don't want to talk to you.

Selina (18:40) Yep. I'm the worst for it. That's why when it was suggested to me, I was like, okay. But he, he's great. He's an, he's Australian. I'm just, just to bias that, but yeah, he, he, he does approximately six hours of calling a week. And out of that, I get maybe two to three appointments scheduled. So he, he, he brings a lot of people. That's a really load, but that's how it works in tele marketing.

Simon Dell (19:02) Right. Yep. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Selina (19:21) None of the deals, none of the leads he's provided have turned into an actual transaction yet, but that's how finance works. So he builds rapport and trust with them around what my business does. A lot of them will be like, look, you know what, I don't need any, I don't have any immediate finance needs, I'd love to still talk to Selena. So then I book a teams of that. And we just have a little face to face, build some rapport, explain what I offer, maybe point out some gaps they might have in their cashflow or other things in their business that they could potentially need help with, chuck them into a database and keep them warm.

Simon Dell (19:55) And is that database that you're calling coming from the same source as your email list or like, how are you finding these people to call?

Selina (20:06) Just Apollo AI. I want to get one.

Simon Dell (20:07) Right, so yeah, so you're using like some sort of data enrichment or data mining tool. Okay, I I use a team in India actually, and sort of go away and get them to populate, you know, I'll say, hey, me every business owner in a particular postcode.

Selina (20:21) Wow, yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (20:31) and they'll go and do that for me.

Selina (20:32) Yeah.

Simon Dell (20:33) but yeah, I mean, there's AI tools that do that. There's little Indian teams that do that. You you can find the right people to do that. Okay, so, all right, so you've got your outbound sales, I mean, they're effectively outbound sales calls, all right, outbound marketing calls, whichever one you wanna call them really. What are they saying? What's the pitch?

Selina (20:58) Well, I've not actually heard him talk, but the feedback I get is really positive that, you know, they think it's great, really easy to talk to. But I think it's along the lines of, you know, Selena's finance broker. She helps business owners with finance. You know, where's your business at? Do you need some help? Like, you know, she's I think he sells it more like a wholesome, like an all round pitch of, know, not just there to make money off a deal. She doesn't charge you anything. She does a review. And if she can help, she charges the lender. So it's that.

Simon Dell (21:00) Okay.

Selina (21:28) We're not trying to scam you or get money out of you, we're just trying to see if we can help you, essentially.

Simon Dell (21:31) Yeah, so my piece of advice with that would be I think what you're doing is completely right. But I would perhaps get him to call a couple of people you know, some friends or something like that and get them to give you some feedback. And by all means, tell him that you're calling, that he's calling a plant or a spy or something like that.

Selina (21:43) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, so they're prepared for them. Yeah.

Simon Dell (21:54) But just say, I wanna understand, I wanna get feedback. I'm not being critical of what you're doing, but I wanna understand what you're saying. Totally, totally. I mean, we've got a girl in New South Wales called Kate, who we literally started working with two, three weeks ago. And we're start doing, I think next week, something like 500,000 calls or something for her over the course of maybe a couple of weeks.

Selina (22:02) Because everything can be improved, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Wow. Yeah.

Simon Dell (22:22) and she's done two lots of calls for us. And I kind of sat there yesterday and went, when I talked to her, she seemed lovely. We talk on video, she's in New South Wales, but I'm like, I really need her, I really need to get her to call some people that I know. So what I'm gonna do next week is go, Kate, here's three people. You've got the script, I want you to test the script out on these three people. And they will be willing to listen to you, but they're also gonna be critical of...

Selina (22:37) Yep. Yep. Yeah.

Simon Dell (22:50) your capacity to present to them. yeah, yeah, I think that's, you know, because if that can work, yeah, I mean, look, you're completely right with what you said earlier on about the emails is that, is that the conversion rate can be really, really low. But if you're doing it consistently in two or three new leads a week, totaling that up over 50 weeks of the year is like,

Selina (22:53) Yeah, so that's great. That's a great idea. Mm.

This makes a warmer database, right? Like if you receive an email from someone that you've never spoken to, you're more likely to just unsubscribe or delete it. But if, you know, they've had that conversation with the caller and then I've had a Teams meeting with them and they're getting those warm follow up emails and then a finance need pops up, they want a new car or they need some cash flow. I feel like I'm hoping they'd be more likely to pick up the phone and call me.

Simon Dell (23:19) Yes, yes. So here would be my suggestion for you because where are all these people? Where are you targeting them? Are they all in Brisbane? Are they all across Queensland? Okay.

Selina (23:48) The first round we've done has been Queensland because I thought that was the easiest way. Basically, we filtered it down to like people in certain industries. So importing, exporting, manufacturing, that sort of thing, just to try and give the call up more of a focus. Directors, owners, founders share like that sort of thing. So we're hopefully targeting business owners, but this, yeah, but from what I'm getting, the success rate's pretty good.

Simon Dell (24:16) Yeah, so here's the challenge that I would see from a balanced perspective. And I have to say, I'm going through this same, I was gonna call it a moral conundrum. It's conundrum, it's not particularly moral, but it's a business conundrum, right? The question for me is what you said, do I put a business development manager on for, let's say 70, 80K a year plus bonuses etc, superannuation, which is going up to 12 % in a few months time or whatever, right? So you sit there and then plus they're want a car and you've got to pay for the petrol and the insurance and mileage and...

Selina (24:56) And then I have to do performance reviews, which I hate. Yeah.

Simon Dell (24:59) blah, blah. Look, you can subcontract that out to an HR external HR person. That's the easiest way to do that. or do you sit there and go, throw that all together, right? And you go, that could be 10 grand a month. Right, at least. Okay. My challenge to you would be what if you got your database out and you sat and went, all right, well, here's my top 50 prospects in a particular postcode.

Selina (25:02) Yeah.

Simon Dell (25:28) Right? And you did something that cost $10,000 to put them all in a room with you. Right? I would say to you, knowing you and your personality, and I'm not saying you're like you're a party booze hound or anything like that because we don't want that recorded on the pod.

Selina (25:44) Well... We don't want that on my recommendation.

Simon Dell (25:51) No, not at all. But my point being is that if I, you put, and maybe 50 is too many because you can't get around to 50, right? But if I put you in a room with 20 key prospects and you sat there and went, okay, well, I'm gonna, I'm gonna do something with them. I'm gonna buy them lunch. I'm gonna, whatever it is, right? So maybe you put them in a room with 20, maybe, maybe not even 20 key prospects. So let's say 15 key prospects, five existing customers who you know really well that will talk about how great Selena is, right? And then a couple of your team members as well, right? Because again, what...

Selina (26:32) Yep. See, I'm not marketing. wouldn't have even thought of that. Yeah.

Simon Dell (26:40) Back to one of your early points is you don't want everyone coming to the business just because of you. want, you know, maybe you've got a couple of senior team members that you think, okay, well they need to start building their own customer database, things like that. And you put those people all in a room and go, hey, I'm gonna feed you a really nice meal and I'm gonna get you some nice wine and we're gonna have a great time and I'm not getting up, you know, maybe you get up and make a PowerPoint presentation with five slides in it.

Right? And maybe there's another educational element to it. So maybe you're bringing along someone who's, you know.

Selina (27:15) Yeah, lenders would be interested in that as well. If there's a particular lender that suits that network of clients, that would be brilliant because they have a solution sitting in front of them. And it's also you get to learn something at the same time.

Simon Dell (27:21) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's just it's a case of doing it with with discipline, because you have to make these people turn up, which is hard because you got to drag them out of the office kicking and screaming, right? So you know, that's that's number that's challenge number one. You know, and if they well, as you know, I've done events with me, they all fucking cancel like within the you know, 24 hours beforehand.

Selina (27:34) Hmm. Even when you make them pay, they still get it.

Simon Dell (27:51) So there's some logistical challenges there, right? So that's, they're solvable logistical challenges. It sounds like, you you've got people within the business, you could sit there and go, hey, let's find a decent restaurant, someone nice that we can do this. Yeah, it's all doable, those kind of things. I think the trick that people miss is that at the end of it, when the...

Selina (27:54) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we could do that definitely.

Simon Dell (28:16) you know, when it's all done and dusted, and let's say you did this on a Thursday lunchtime or a Friday lunchtime, whatever, it's Monday morning, you've then got to do your 10 phone calls, right? And pick up to everyone who went to the event, maybe the Tuesday or the Wednesday, go, hey, Selena, thank you so much for coming along to the event, it was lovely to see you, can you and I catch up for a coffee next week? Right? And then you're in, and then they've met you in a social environment, they're willing to meet you for coffee.

Selina (28:24) Yeah.

Simon Dell (28:43) And even if they're not signing a, I want to work with you today, you're on their radar for six months time or nine months time.

Selina (28:47) No, it's relationships. And I think the key to that, the second part of that, and again, it's something I learned in banking was even if these particular people that you've now built some rapport with don't have an immediate need, ask them. They know someone else who runs a business, business owners know business owners. When you're talking to your friends, if they need finance, give them my card. Like it's that next step of asking for a referral, which I think I do well because that's kind of what was ingrained into me but yeah.

Simon Dell (29:17) Yeah, drummed into you in the banking world. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So look, that's the challenge that I see, do I put 50 CEOs in a room and offer them something? Or do I spend 10 grand a month on a business development manager? And to me, I go, look, give me an hour in front of 50 CEOs. But again, then the challenge for me is that I then question my own follow-up.

Selina (29:27) Mmm. Mmm.

Simon Dell (29:47) Right? So what I've done is get myself a VA and Jess, and I'll say to Jess, call them all for me. Yeah, call them all for me. And the week after I've met them, let's organize a time to, you know, so.

Selina (29:55) make these calls. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm similar in that sense. I need someone to do that side because you're good. You've got to know what you're good at. You've got to know what you're not good at. And one of the girls that works with me, she says it all the time. You're not good at the admin. Just go out and talk to people. And I love her honesty.

Simon Dell (30:17) I was going to say exactly the same thing. One of the greatest revelations that you can make in business is to accept how shit you are at certain things.

Selina (30:26) And employ people who are good at what you're not good at. That's the best way to do it. Yeah.

Simon Dell (30:31) I've said many times in the last two years, if I'm left involved at any point in the production of a podcast, for example, if I'm left at any point to organise anything, it won't happen. The only thing I'm good at is being on the podcast.

Selina (30:51) Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (30:53) and maybe doing some initial outreach emails to people that I know like yourself and going, Hey, can he be on my podcast? But even when someone says, yeah, I love to, go, right. Other Jess, sort that out for me. You know,

Selina (31:04) Yeah, here's the details.

Can you fix that? Yeah.

Simon Dell (31:06) Yeah, sort this, yeah, go away, sort that out. I've done the deal, you go and sort it out. So the moment this is done, this gets downloaded, it gets sent to someone overseas, they do all the editing, they put loads of graphics on it, et cetera, et cetera, and then it comes back and then just posts it everywhere. So I'm not involved anywhere, right? The only thing I'm then involved with is making sure I post it on my own LinkedIn profile. And I can probably handle that.

Simon Dell (31:36) You know, so yeah, so it's that interesting thing about where you acknowledge your own ineptness. And I would probably say a lot of business owners are very inept at a lot of things. And if they're left to their own devices, things will go completely pear shaped.

Selina (31:36) Yeah, hopefully. But it's why you exist in your business and it's why I exist in my business. And if we all just say, hey, I'm really good engineer and can you do the finance side? That's why I had the idea of the partnerships with businesses. it's, we need to, we need to all do what we're really good at.

Simon Dell (31:56) Yeah, yeah, Yeah. Yeah. So look, think what you're doing from a marketing perspective, you know, is ticking a lot of boxes. You're doing all the right stuff. I think your email list is a great opportunity, obviously, you know, but again, email, think consistency trumps creativity. making sure that email's going out on a regular basis. Yeah, totally.

Selina (32:24) Yeah. Which I lack on, yeah. And even the social media side, like I said, that's dropped off completely because I don't have the time. And in all honesty, the girls I have, they create great, like create creativity. They need me for the content. And if I don't have time to give them that information, it doesn't happen.

Simon Dell (32:32) Yeah. Yeah, yeah, totally, totally. So I guess probably then the next thing is then have you experimented anywhere in terms of other digital advertising? you, I mean, again, you're a finance, you I know fuck all about finance, you don't know as much about marketing. So my question to you would be when people say to you, hey, because you probably get all the emails going, hey, you should have an SEO strategy or you should do Google ads or something like that.

Selina (33:06) Yes, let me bring your website to number one. get it every day. Yep.

Simon Dell (33:09) Yeah, it's hellish. It's hellish, yeah. But do you, have you looked at any of those? Have you had that? Okay, so, you know, I think there is, to me there is a couple of opportunities for you that doesn't involve you sinking huge amounts of cash, right? And again, I would be going business development or.

Selina (33:12) Yeah, the leads.

Simon Dell (33:33) Marketing advertising that kind of stuff right so I go first things first. I think with it with a massive database like you have Remarketing so that anyone that's coming on to Google or to Facebook or meta whatever sees your adverts because they recognize the email Is just brand awareness brand awareness brand awareness it is it?

Selina (33:33) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, and you're so out of my realm of expertise or understanding now. But yes, it happens to me. If I look at something when I log into my computer, it pops up somewhere else. So yeah.

Simon Dell (33:57) So, sorry. Yeah. And so you've got those paid ads and I would go, yeah, definitely, you know, definitely be sort of looking at that. Right. The other thing is search engine optimization. And I go, that's going through this weird, it's going through a weird time at the moment because AI is becoming so prevalent. And people are asking chat, GPT and all those others. So people are going, who's the best finance broker in Brisbane to chat GPT.

Selina (34:19) Because chat GPT is the new Google. Yeah. And yeah, I do it.

Simon Dell (34:27) Yeah, well. And you want to make sure that he somehow you go, how the fuck do I get chat GP to tell them it's me? You know, and what's happening is chat GPT and chat cheap GPT and largely the other platforms are all pulling data off Google and you know, all the other. Yeah, yeah. There's ways and means of not necessarily gaming it because no, they don't like you gaming it. But there's ways and means of encouraging.

Selina (34:44) Yeah, like I find it's review driven. I've noticed a little bit. Yeah.

Simon Dell (34:56) the AI to say this is anyway, my point being is that again, taking it all the way back to the law firm that I sort of mentioned earlier on is she's been running for four years now. I think this week alone on one day and this is the challenge she's been facing. She received 15 inquiries. She literally cannot handle the volume of work coming in, which is an amazing position that everyone would like to be in.

Selina (35:14) Wow, from Google.

None, yeah.

Simon Dell (35:24) Hers is very SEO driven and it's been four years in the making. And this is the thing I think with SEO is that people sign up to these, know, 600 bucks a month or 800 bucks a month or whatever, thinking they're gonna get a result in the first month or second month and those kind of things. I think there's a lot of stuff that you could probably do within the existing framework of your business to go, okay, I'm gonna start doing some stuff here now with a view that...

Selina (35:51) Yeah.

Simon Dell (35:53) in three to four years time, I've got 10 leads a week, the website itself is generating me 10 leads a week. And you go, how does that then sit with the business development person? You go, what if I did this? The challenge is SEO is such a long game.

Selina (36:13) Yeah. And you need to, yeah. And I think, I think from my experience in the past, I've spoken to marketing firms about it and they're like, yep, just give me your credit card. We'll set it up. They don't explain how or why. And because I'm so big on explaining what, how and why in my business, that doesn't sit right with me. I'm like, not giving you money unless I can see a result. What's my ROI? And yeah. And instead of explaining it like you just did that it's, it can be a three to four year turnaround. But, and we're going to be making sure all the things are done in the background.

Simon Dell (36:31) Yeah, I'll tell you. Yeah.

Selina (36:43) I'm not going to be comfortable otherwise, so.

Simon Dell (36:44) Yeah, I met and we'll have to do an introduction outside this but one of the one of my consultants teams, whatever you want to call them, they don't work for me, they're all consultants. She's the ex head of SEO for American Express. So you need to talk to her because she knows finance, she knows finance.

Selina (37:07) Wow. Yes, correct. It's the exact market I'd like to be. Yeah, amazing.

Simon Dell (37:15) Absolutely. but just she's so knowledgeable and so helpful. And that's all she's done. That's that's her core skill set. And she operates in a couple of ways where she's like, Hey, look, give me access to your website, I'll start making some changes on pages. You know, and just again,

Selina (37:23) Yeah. Wow.

Simon Dell (37:37) She's down in Sydney. It's an Australian based person. She's got the credentials that she's worked for a bigger company. You've got an option of spending money on something like that or someone like that, or some dodgy SEO company that have just emailed you out of the blue and you've no idea where they've come from. It's a no brainer for me really as to which one you would pick.

Selina (37:46) Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I agree.

Simon Dell (38:01) So, all right, so let's just sort of winding this up. So I think there's a lot of stuff you're doing really well. Obviously, I think there's some gaps there that I think we've spoken about and things that you could do better. I'm still on the fence about a business development manager for someone like you. I actually don't think it's a bad idea. It's a cost thing and of course, how quickly are they gonna get results?

Selina (38:24) Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (38:26) I would probably argue if you do it, want to do it like in the next couple of months because you don't want to be doing it in October because I'd imagine your industry dies a little bit in December and January. Yeah, so you don't want to be carrying a business development cost over those two months of the year without them having already produced income in the first, you know, you know, the first eight months of the year or something like that. So I think that's that's one factor to think about.

Selina (38:36) You can, yes, yeah, yeah. without income in the pipeline. Yeah.

Simon Dell (38:55) And then I guess probably from a brand perspective, I would probably argue it's just about making more people aware of who you are. Which there's so many things that you could do. But like, mean, do you highlight the rest of the team much on, you know, in anything that you do?

Selina (39:04) Yeah. We did when we were like, you know, on top of it, but again, everything's kind of dropped off. There's such an opportunity there because we do attend events. We do go to things. We are a part of other industry community events, but yeah, we don't, we don't do it enough. I need someone that can do that side of it for me because that's not my forte. I like finance.

Simon Dell (39:31) Now, it's not strictly true. You don't mind a glass of wine and a lunch. But yeah, but no, you're right. mean, and that's the challenge as well. take, you know, going all the way back to the start, that networking thing where you go, if I have to go to another networking, boring networking thing, I'm going to stab myself in the head. I just, you don't want to do that. But that's when I then go create your own, you know, create the things...

Selina (39:42) I was networking, yeah. Yeah. Yes, I love that idea to be honest.Yeah.

Simon Dell (40:05) create the things that you like to do and that you want to do and bring along the people that you want to convince to work with you. And I think that's one of those ones where they then see the real brand, the real who you are. It's the fine line between presenting your brand and your company versus presenting Selina.

Selina (40:16) Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Yes.

Simon Dell (40:36) And I think obviously what you need to make sure you're doing is presenting the brand.

Selina (40:42) Yep, I 100 % agree because that is a big mistake. see so many successful businesses make and I see how it affects them at the end of their tenure or when they're ready to sell. It can have a detrimental effect on that end price.

Simon Dell (40:56) Yeah, and I tell you what's a funny thing is I do some stuff with the wealth management company based in South Brisbane. And they've actually, funnily enough, they've gone, they went the wrong way. They went so far in the other direction because it's led by three women. And again, you should, well, hopefully you'll meet them soon, but it's led by three women. There's other people running other parts of the business, but the women are what I would call, they've got such great personalities. They're so engaging and fun and knowledgeable about their marketplace, right? And when I sort of walked in there six months ago, I looked at the brand and just went, God, this brand is depressing. another fucking, it's another financial, yeah, but it's another financial, you know, wealth management company of which there's so many of them out there, you know, and largely probably the same with finance, right? It's it's men in gray suits selling to men in gray suits. that sort of thing. And one of the things we've tried to do, which might be an interesting thing for you as well is to go how do we how do we bring our personality out a bit more?

Selina (42:12) Yeah.

Simon Dell (42:12) you know, the personality of Selina, but also the personality of the whole team. You said it's women, you know, you don't want to alienate too many people. don't want alienate male customers, but at the same time, you guys, there's probably a personality within your organization. Would that be fair to say that there's a sort of distinct personality?

Selina (42:16) No. Yeah, for now. Absolutely not. Perhaps, yeah, there's not one distinct personality. And I think that's the powerful thing, right? Like there's this, like this, we would bring people in for who they are, not to make them the same as us. So you want that dynamic, fun environment, but then also people who are really good at the things they do and they can bring that to the team or to the day, to the attitude. So I encourage all the girls to speak up. If they don't agree with something, say it out loud, even if it sounds aggressive, I'd rather hear it.

Simon Dell (42:43) Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Selina (43:01) Bring it all to the table. Let's talk about everything. Let's bring out who you are.

Simon Dell (43:06) Yeah, so that's the thing I would then go, we talk about content and production, social media content, we talk about meta ads and search engine, optimisation, all of these things and events as well, right? So all of these things need to be done with an underlining current of who you are as a brand and a company. Because if you're just sitting there going, I'm just gonna regurgitate the same things that other...

Selina (43:17) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (43:34) finance companies are regurgitating, know, no, no, absolutely, absolutely. So, you know, so I'd be going, let's try and define that personality. You know, yes, we have multiple personalities here, but let's try and define it as a, as a company. And then let's make sure that everything we do is goes out there and then is really, is really helping people understand who they're dealing with and the brand they're dealing with. And again, I saw, had this conversation last week again with someone else and he was saying, he started off with this brand that he thought was funky and cool and they did these things and they did this and they said this and all this stuff. But as he got bigger and bigger and tried to be all things to more people, all things to all people, all of a sudden they kept pulling these kind of quirky... quirky personality parts of the brand out and throwing them away. And he said, now I've just got this boring brand. He said, we don't do anything fun. We don't communicate in a fun way. We don't have any personality. We're just a functional marketplace. And I think that's a massive shame.

Selina (44:29) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, because then again, it comes down to that's money in versus right, like why you're doing it. You've got to kind of, yeah, I see what you're saying. I want to find my balance as to why and then also be able to help people like it's a catch 22.

Simon Dell (44:54) Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. mean, again, another law firm I've been working with on the Gold Coast, that their three principles have been very much insistent on a common brand. And it's really served them well. It's really the brand is identifiable. You know, they look so much better. They look so much different to other law firms, but different without appearing. Shit. Do you know what I mean? That's the wrong word.

Selina (45:04) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Without appearing scary. for me, a lawyer is like a dentist. You use them because you have to and they're Yeah. Even worse.

Simon Dell (45:25) Yeah, well, these guys are these guys. Yeah, these guys are family lawyers as well. So it's, you know, they've got a really appeal to, you know, families and they've got to appear friendly. So. All right, look, last question for you today. What's the long term plan? Do you see yourself doing this forever until you retire until you eliminate the burden of a 22 year old?

Selina (45:36) Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Simon Dell (45:54) or 20 year old.

Selina (45:56) She's telling me she's at uni for eight years, so it could be a while. She better be good. No, I guess that's a really good question, because I ask a lot of my business owners that. So it's interesting that I'm struggling to answer it. I don't know. I think for me, I have no immediate plans for it to ever end. don't really see retirement for myself. yeah, for me, it would be to create and...

Simon Dell (46:00) Yeah, she sounds like a freeloader, Selina, like it's...

Selina (46:25) a really strong business that would be saleable one day. But right now it's my career. It's what I enjoy. And yeah, making my career something that I own, that I have the power to build as big as I want.

Simon Dell (46:37) I think the important thing for that, way to answer that business, I think there is only one way to answer that business with anyone who has got an ounce of business common sense is that I'm building a business to sell it, right? And I say that with the sort of point of saying, we don't have to sell it, right? But you need to build a business that can be sold.

Selina (46:56) No, but it needs to be saleable. Yeah. All right. Yeah.

Simon Dell (47:01) because anything could happen in terms of your health, your family, all those kind of things. If there is a point when you sit there and go, do you know what, I need to pull the plug on the business, I need to take myself out of it, I can cash in, there's $2 million if I sold it tomorrow, and I'm gone. Mortgage paid off, superannuation done, whatever it is. But I think everything you do should be sitting there going, how do I sell this business?

Selina (47:17) Yeah.

Simon Dell (47:30) or how do I make this attractive enough that someone's gonna walk in and go, hey, we'll give you six times earnings or eight times earnings. don't know what the multiple.

Selina (47:37) 100%. Otherwise, you're just you're essentially working to pay yourself a wage. And that's not the reason you run a business. Yeah. Yeah, correct. With extra headaches. Yeah.

Simon Dell (47:42) Otherwise you've created a job. You've created yourself a job. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And with the worst boss in the world. You know, that's what I always say. I've started myself a job with the worst boss in the world.

Selina (47:52) Yeah. Yeah, and you'll leave. You don't get to have holidays, ever.

Simon Dell (48:01) No, but that's, there's those five stages and I've got a sort of little infographic on that, but it's like, you know, job, I think it goes something like job, job with staff, job with more staff, job with more staff and profit, and then business, right? So the first four stages are still job, job, job, job, right? Yes, I've now got staff and yes, I'm now making profit.

Selina (48:16) Yeah.

Simon Dell (48:28) But unless you can extract yourself out of it, you still just have a job. Once you've got more staff and profit, you sit there and go, okay, how do I now turn that into a business that I'm not?

Selina (48:33) Correct. Yes. Can I make profit without being in the business? That's the question. And that's how I would like to see it. Yeah. Correct.

Simon Dell (48:46) Who's making the profit now? it me or is it the staff? Because if 80 % of it is still you, you've still got a job. If 10 % of it is you, you've got a business. You can extract yourself out. You could potentially take a 10 % drop in revenue and you can sit there and go, hey, I'm now the chairperson of the board and I now come in for a better retirement fund. Or much better ones in superannuation.

Simon Dell (49:21) Yeah. So that's what I I often then say, now model that out. So go and look at what that looks like over there and then work your steps back. Because if you can do that, you can then, cause if you look at that, you look at it, how do I get to there from here? You can't see the path.

Selina (49:28) Yeah. Yeah. You need those core functionalities, right? Like, yeah, even just having this conversation with you, I knew the gaps were there, but sometimes saying them out loud, I can start to see where the little things I need to work on now so I can focus on other things.

Simon Dell (49:46) Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we did it on Wednesday. It's Friday today, we're recording this, but I did it on Wednesday, my business partner and I and we had another guy, Michael sitting in for two hours with the both of us. And Michael doesn't know our business, not intimately anyway, he understands what we do because he has a background in advertising and marketing and recruitment. But he just sat and asked us questions. And we're both sitting there, he goes, right, what do you think, Matt? And what do you think, Simon? And sometimes we're both in complete agreement. Sometimes we're off in this dichotomy of opinions. But it really then brings you back to go, okay, what do you need to be doing to achieve what it is you guys want to achieve? And we're very much about, we'd like to sell the business.

Selina (50:38) Yeah. Yeah, but that's when your branding needs to be right from the start. And if SEO works and if my brand is strong, that's sellable. That's something someone's going to want to take ownership of. Yeah.

Simon Dell (50:53) Absolutely. And even if it isn't sellable, the next question you have to ask yourself is, if you opened your business in Sydney tomorrow, how would it go? And if you're saying 80 % of that your business is referrals or you know, people that know you, you can guarantee that if you put this business in Sydney next week, it just nothing would happen.

Selina (51:12) Mm-hmm. It would have worked now because I'd need to be there and start from scratch again, but that's not how I want the business to function. Yeah.

Simon Dell (51:23) No, or you then have to employ someone that you sit there and go, well, I'm going to have to put them in Sydney. But if they're going to be a principal, why are they going to do it for me? Why wouldn't they just do it for themselves?

Selina (51:35) Correct. If they're good enough to do that, they should have their own business. Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (51:37) They should have their own business, you know, so you end up in this kind of horrible vicious cycle and going, fuck, how am going to open something in Sydney? And then you have these conversations about licensing and whatever. On a complete side note, though, I would say if you're going to go into a new territory, you need to be starting thinking about that territory 12 months in advance, and you need to be starting to create demand there.

Selina (51:42) Right. Yeah. And even brand awareness. Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (52:08) brand awareness demand, and you do have to get on a plane. It's not like the UK where you could drive between London and Birmingham, you've got to get on a plane, you've got to go to Sydney. And then what you do is you grow it in Sydney with that painful backwards and forwards, you you going backwards and forwards all the time. But then you need to be able to go, but I'm comfortable now that I can leave Brisbane alone. I don't need to be...

Selina (52:11) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It can still run like the sales aren't going to drop off here because I'm down there. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. There's a lot of work to do.

Simon Dell (52:38) Yeah, yeah, yeah. So there is a lot of work to do. again, I testimony to the, again, like the law firm I mentioned earlier on, she's been doing it for four years. And now is the time when I'm sort of saying to her, right, now we're going to get you out of the business, we're going to extract you from this part. And the key thing is, it isn't extracting her overnight from one part, from all of the business, it's extracting her from small parts of it, right?

Selina (52:46) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (53:05) Let's take you out of that part first now. Let's take you out of that part and let's take you out of that part, right? And now she may then reassess and use her time elsewhere To do the things that she's good at Or she might just go actually, you know what? I'm gonna take Friday afternoons off now

Selina (53:11) Yeah. Yeah. might want to go play golf that's what a lot of men do.

Simon Dell (53:25) she's not a golf person. Absolutely not a golf person.

Simon Dell (53:31) All right, look, that's been great catching up with you again. yeah, look, we obviously we need to chat about stuff and, and hopefully see you for lunch in May. And yeah, that was the worst week of my life because not only do we have all those things moving about, I happened to then get influenza A for about two weeks and I was just, actually it was because there was no way on earth I would have been able to go to that event in the state I was in. So it was...

Selina (53:35) Thank you so much. Yeah. Yeah.

Simon Dell (54:01) Couldn't get out of bed. It was just horrific. That's what happens when you get old, isn't it? But not that you know, you don't know. So was it 20 year old daughter, 22 year old, was it 20 year old daughter? So what did you have her when she were what, maybe 16? 16? Absolutely, yeah, Yeah, everyone's got... Anyway, thank you very much for being on the show. Really appreciate your time.

Selina (54:07) I don't know. I don't know. when I was 20. But I'm still only 35, just in case you're wondering. Yeah. Hey, yeah. So welcome.

Simon Dell (54:31) And lovely to see you again. Yeah.

Selina (54:31) Thank you for having me. You too. I'll talk to you soon.