Mental health is as important in the workplace as it is in every other arena of life. To help Santa Clarita business owners, managers, and their employees devise strategies that improve mental wellness at work, Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show, had a conversation with Kelly Kozlowski, executive program director of behavioral health services at Aspire Santa Clarita.

Aspire Counseling Services is a Santa Clarita business offering counseling and other services to men, women, adolescents, and families struggling with substance use disorders and behavioral health conditions.

Aspire offers 4 different tracks of programs that include:

• Partial hospitalizations
• Intensive outpatient (IOP)
• Individual therapy
• Group programs

What is Mental Wellness?

Mental Wellness is an internal resource that helps individuals think, feel, connect, and function. It is an active process that helps us build resilience, grow, and flourish.

It has multiple dimensions including:

• Mental dimension – thinking
• Emotional dimension – feeling
• Social dimension – connecting
• Psychological dimension – functioning

Professionals at Aspire use a set of guidelines entitled “10 Essential Emotional Needs.”

“Just like physical needs that we have – the connection, the support, the community, the purpose – there are so many things that go into that,” Kelly explained. “We call them ‘human givens,’ and if we’re not fulfilling ourselves emotionally, we’re going to struggle with what we do. Just like the physical body, if we’re not nurturing our body and taking care of ourselves, we’re not going to do well.”

Management and the Mental Wellbeing of Employees

Mental wellbeing in the workplace is a component of society that is often overlooked.

“I think that we’re not doing enough within the workforce as managers or directors or corporate leaders to help our young adults when they’re entering the workplace,” Kelly said. “We’re just expecting them to be ready and prepared, but at the same time, they’re still young adults who are learning about themselves and who they are, on top of these stressors and pressures of society to become an adult and to do well in this world.”

There are many reasons mental wellbeing should be talked about more in the workplace.

“Addressing mental health issues can help prevent absences, for instance. If you’re feeling fatigued, if you’re mentally struggling with something, it can have a physical impact on you,” Amanda said. “It also can help boost confidence and identity at work. When you’re stable and you’re feeling more confident, you have an identity and a purpose when you show up every day to your job.”

Belonging

Is management building a team that enables their employees to feel they belong?

“Are they allowing them to embrace their strengths and weaknesses? Or are they just fixating on their weaknesses, which is then affecting their mental wellbeing?” Kelly asked. “Are we finding out what are the strengths of this individual and where are they best suited and fitted?”

How Managers and Staff Members Can Foster a Sense of Belonging:

• Allow them to embrace their strengths and weaknesses
• Don’t fixate on the weaknesses of your employees
• Based on their strengths, find the most suitable position for the individual
• Help them find a purpose within the company

“As an employee, if you have that, you’re going to want to come in, you’re going to want to be there, you’re going to want to be a part of your company,” Kelly said. “Then these young kids are going to want to represent what they’re doing, they’re going to talk about it with their friends, and that’s free marketing within itself.”

It’s a win-win for staff members and business owners who want to improve company culture and it can even have a positive effect on the bottom line. “It can help these young adults, or anybody, manage stress and make them feel productive,” Amanda said. “You’ll really get the most out of your company’s employees when they show up to work.”

 Pressures Affecting Young Job Candidates

According to the American Psychiatric Association, a collaborative study conducted this year involving college graduates age 22 to 28 found that 51% of them reported needing help for emotional or mental health problems. More than one-third of young professionals find that their workplace erodes their sense of mental health and wellbeing.

“I run a gym in Burbank, and I employ the age group we’re talking about, from the ages of 18 to 24, and these are very young adults,” Amanda said. “I think this age group gets completely overlooked because they go from being considered children to immediate adulthood. We don’t address the transitioning — from the parents’ home into college or from the parents’ home into the workforce. Some get married or go into a roommate situation. We don’t really address it; we just think that they need to know everything because now they’re adults.”

Successfully launching young adults is a collaborative effort.

“Teachers and parents can only teach so much,” Kelly said. “That’s why having strong management to help with young adults is so important, because we all do play different roles in these young adults’ lives.”

Stress and the Job Hunt

Questions for Job Searchers to Ask Themselves:

• What do you stand for?
• What are the company’s values?
• Can you work for a company that doesn’t match your morals?
• Who is the manager?
• Who will be your boss?

“The reason why they jump into corporate America is because they have pressures to start paying for things and be on their own and build a retirement,” Amanda said. “I know that some young adults will look at a job and based on just the salary, they’ll plug in to Indeed or any job boards for the salary. Or they take a management position when maybe they’re not quite qualified, and then they feel a lot of pressure to live up to that title or what the expectations are.”

The financial component is a prominent piece that’s driving young adults in the hiring space.

“In the interviews that I conduct for the new employees that come into our facility, money is such a big factor,” Kelly said. “I’m the type of person who doesn’t really want to talk about money. Let me make sure you’re the right fit; let’s get to know each other and let’s have this conversation. At the end, if we’re vibing, we’re doing well together, then let’s talk about what we want. I would rather work for a company that I feel supports me and wants what’s best for me and make less money than to make the extra $10,000 a year or whatever it is. But for our younger kids, money talks to them.”

Money talks to young adults today due to:

• Post-COVID inflation
• Rise in wages
• Young people feel they deserve higher pay

“It can be dangerous because they can get into a role where they’re not feeling fulfilled inside,” Amanda said, “which can lead to other stresses that bring on so many other issues with their health and everything else – things that I think can break somebody down.”

Ghosting Employers

“Another thing I’ve been seeing when helping business owners with problems is that candidates end up ghosting their interviews or ghosting their first day on the job,” Amanda said. “This has happened to me numerous times, where I’ve set up an interview and we’ve had a great phone conversation. They sound excited, I’m excited, and they no-show. Then I text and there’s no response — nothing at all.”

According to Kelly, there are two possible explanations:

1. “What if I’m not enough?” They have anxiety and fear that they can’t live up to what is on paper. “I think a lot of times these younger adults are hiding behind their phones, so actually having to face someone is something that’s so different for them,” she said.
2. “I found something else that’s better, but I’m too afraid to tell you.” They just ghost you and act like nothing happened. “That kind of goes into the dating world of that generation too. A lot of things we’re seeing in the workplace people are seeing in the dating world as well,” she said.

The Effect of Boomeranging

“A lot of these young adults are still living at home,” Amanda said. “Even if they’ve gone to college, they’ve come back home because it’s very hard to afford to live on their own or even in a roommate situation. I think there are added stresses that come from their home life, probably by coming back and having to learn how to deal with that now at an older age.”

Kelly concurred. “Kids go off to college and they go get a degree within their major and they’re away at school, living in dorms and apartments and their parents are helping them with all of that,” she said. “But when college is over, they’re not going to keep paying for these dorms or these apartments for them to live in while they figure out what they’re going to do. Going from four years of being independent and now living under that roof – it’s definitely going to be an adaption that’s very hard.”

Imposter Syndrome

Imposter syndrome is the effect of self-doubt, when you question your success and abilities internally, even when your external performance is good.

“They don’t believe what they’re capable of,” Amanda said. “So, they feel like ‘I’m not going to apply for that job because I’m not really that.’ But, in reality, they’re very capable.”

Kelly asks her clients, “How do you know unless you try?”

“Maybe you don’t have the experience like someone else does when you apply for a specific position, but maybe you have the personality, that drive, the work ethic,” she said. “There’s so much more when we look at people coming in for a job interview. There are so many components we look at.”

In Amanda’s work with small business owners in Santa Clarita she advises job candidates in the same way. “I always tell people to just put themselves out there,” she said. “It doesn’t even matter if there are one or two things on the job description that you don’t fit. If you don’t get it, you’re practicing; you’re learning what people expect and then you can grow.”

Fear of failure can fuel imposter syndrome.

“How do you let go of that? You show up and you be your authentic self and be willing to learn,” Kelly said.

Interviewing as a Learning Experience

“They need to learn that it’s OK to go on a job interview and not get the job,” Kelly explained. “You can’t allow that one job interview to be the determining factor of your self-worth and your self-esteem. Those come from within. It doesn’t get to be decided by someone who didn’t want to hire you.”

We can’t have success without failure, and we can’t have strengths without weaknesses.

“The more job interviews we go on, the better we’re going to get at them,” Kelly said. “Then the higher position we’re going to find, or that job we’ve been looking for, we’re going to get with time.”

Be confident and proud about who you are and bring your authentic self into those interviews.

“I’ve learned that some people might not fit the position, but their internal work and the things they do while in the position really plays such an important factor,” Kelly said. “In my workplace that’s what I look for. We have so many different personalities, because in the therapy world we say that therapy is like an art form. We have different art forms, and every therapist isn’t going to be the same. We have different people and different dynamics, but when we come together, we create this, as I call it, the ‘dream team.’”

Take the interview even if you don’t meet all the requirements in the job description.

“If the person that’s interviewing you can see that you’re coachable or that you’re willing to learn and that you’re eager to know those things, or you’re reading a book that’s going to help you achieve, these experiences will level you up,” Amanda said. “You can’t just be expected to go into the job and know every single thing about it. That’s why internships are good, and mentorships are good, showing up and being willing to learn even if you take the lesser position first.”

Be willing to learn and adapt to the environment.

“I think that’s how you and I got to where we are today,” Amanda said. “Because we started somewhere and then we found a love or an interest or a passion in that, and then we explored more, and it created opportunity. I wish these young adults would let that go and just accept that that’s something you don’t know until you try.”

Tips for Executives and New Hires in the Onboarding Process

For Young Adults Entering the Workplace

There are a range of coping mechanisms new staffers can use to reduce stress and maximize mental wellness.

“The number one thing I see is time management,” Kelly said. “They’re constantly scrambled and anxious and overwhelmed and that anxiety is draining and it’s hard. By four hours into your eight-hour shift you’re so exhausted you don’t want to do anything anymore or you’re getting snippy and rude. But if you organize your time better, you walk into a workplace and you are prepared.”

Time management and organization are the two things that set you apart from any other employee.

Throughout her years in corporate work and business consulting in Los Angeles, Amanda has found some tools that help new employees with structure, including:

• Calendar To-Do List for each day
• Excel spreadsheets
• Scheduled meetings
• Proper nutrition
• Organizing your desk and workspace

For Leadership

When a business owner mentors new hires, they can set them up for success by becoming a role model.

“If you’re always rushing around and you’re late to work and your life is a mess – guess what? Your employees are going to do the same,” Amanda said. “If you’re a manager or a small business owner who wants success with staffers, but your life is chaotic and messy, you cannot be upset at the employees you hire if their life is chaotic and messy.”

Leadership sets the tone for their direct reports.

“So, it’s being a role model and not teaching them ‘do as I say, not as I do,’” Kelly said. “That doesn’t do anything for anyone, and a lot of these young adults learn by observing.”

Everything you say and do is seen by your staff members. “It also spreads to the whole culture of the company,” Amanda said.

Self-Care and Advocacy

Self-care is finding quiet time and space to do something for you.

“Sometimes people view self-care as, like, a nap,” Kelly said. “Getting your nails done or getting a facial or getting your hair done – these are things that should be happening. On top of that, you should be taking quiet time to reflect.”

Aspire staff members teach many forms of self-care including:

• Taking a walk outside
• Meditation
• Mindfulness
• Deep breathing

“You know where they teach that? In kindergarten!” Amanda said. “They want you to have quiet time on the rug.”

Burnout

You burn out when you put other people’s needs above your own.

Motives include trying to please:

• Your parents
• Your boss
• Your romantic partner
• Your friends

“We do see a lot of people in their young 20s who come into our mental health intensive outpatient and partial hospitalization program due to stress and burnout from the workplace,” Kelly said.

Use self-care and determine what’s best for you by taking breaks on the job. Ideas include:

• Lock the door and watch a show on your phone or laptop
• Take 30 minutes to turn off your brain
• Put your headphones on and listen to some music
• Put on a podcast
• Go to lunch
• Take a walk
• Bring a smoothie blender to work
• Find somebody to talk to

“If there are things going on in the workplace that you’re uncomfortable with, go talk to someone about it,” Kelly said. “That should always be something you can do, to say, ‘Hey, I noticed this.’ Or if you have an idea, bring it to somebody.”

Ask for help and reach out to mentors.

“When I used to work at Hyatt, we did a one-on-one meeting with our direct reports once a month,” Amanda said. “Even if you are a small business owner of five people, I highly recommend having a one-on-one with your team because it really does allow for conversation for them to express their ideas.”

It enables new recruits to connect.

“It allows them to build a relationship with the manager and to become more comfortable,” Kelly said. “These young kids want to feel heard, understood and supported. I know you did a podcast on active listening, which is such an important skill for a manager to have, as well as a worker to have.”

Meet the Experts

Kelly Kozlowski – Aspire Santa Clarita Executive Program Director of Behavioral Health Services

Kelly has been working with people struggling with addiction and mental health challenges for the past few years. She has a unique understanding and compassion for individuals needing assistance with mental health and substance abuse experiences. Her work involves a combination of complex, integrated issues that require ongoing support from not only a treatment team, but from family, friends, and loved ones.

Kelly graduated with two associate degrees from College of the Canyons and earned a bachelor’s degree from Brandman University in 2016. She continued her education at Brandman by obtaining a Master of Arts in psychology with an emphasis on marriage and family therapy and professional clinical counseling in 2018.

To reach out to Kelly, you can call her at 661-296-4444. You can also call the Aspire intake line at 888-585-7373 or go on the website at AspireCounselingService.com where there is an online chat available 24/7.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

 About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

Every small business owner has a backstory, and many times your life experiences play a big part in shaping the style and content of your entrepreneurial journey. On this month’s podcast, Amanda Benson-Tilch of Ask Amanda Consulting gives her audience a closer look at some of the circumstances that helped her develop strength and resilience as a female business owner while navigating life as a single mother. To get to the heart of it, and to see the impact she’s had on those around her, she had a conversation with the two people who know her best – her son and daughter, Miles and Audrey Benson.

Amanda As Mom

Because she is so active in the community, Amanda is recognized by philanthropic leaders, local officials, and Santa Clarita business owners, which means her children are often in the public eye.

“Going into a restaurant and getting recognized immediately by somebody I’ve never met before,” Miles said, “is always sweet and they’re always nice people. I think it’s a unique situation for both of us, compared to most. It’s like being a reverse celebrity.”

Now young adults, Miles and Audrey described their mother as a model of inspiration.

“Growing up with you as a mom has shown me so much strength and confidence,” Audrey said. “You’re motivated and you have so many opportunities … so many things going on in your head, and you’re always going, going, going. It’s something to look forward to and be inspired by.”

Miles appreciated years of learning how to form healthy bonds between himself and his mother, as well as other family relationships.

“I feel appreciation and gratitude from learning that relationship correctly, because there are a lot of troubled ones,” he said. “I think seeing that and coming to the realization that we have the relationship that we do, and with each other, it’s a place for gratitude for sure.”

Amanda described the first time she caught a young Miles lying to her. She told him: “I’m going to let you sit in here for a while and you’re going to think about what to say. If you choose to lie to me, then it’s going to change our relationship forever.”

A self-described non-mushy mom, when Amanda returned to the room, he told her the truth.

“I’ve thought about it a lot,” Miles said. “We’ve had a taste of being taught something, specifically and sternly – ONCE – and then that changes our mental chemistry and viewpoint for the rest of our lives.”

Children of Divorce

Amanda’s two grown children sometimes use the word “mentorship” to describe Amanda’s strictness, but they also refer to many positive changes they’ve seen from both of their parents over the years. The couple divorced when Audrey was 4 and Miles was 8 years old, at which point Amanda became a single mother.

“It’s really interesting to see that difference,” Miles said. “He’s changed also, but you are very different – both in the very best way possible. The growth of taking the reins – you grabbed the reins, and you got sweaty palms, but you figured it out.”

Audrey has fewer memories because she was young, but she did have a little advice to share.

“I do remember some big pinpoints that also I think made us grow up really quick,” she said. “I would just say, ‘Don’t use what has happened to you and hold onto it forever. Just learn from it and accept it and grow, because it’s going to happen to all of us.’ I think it makes you who you are as a person too. Now I know what I want to look for in someone to love, and because we have a good relationship, that’s what I want for me with my kids too.”

Because he was older, Miles was more conscious of the divorce and its impact.

“My one word of advice, or phrase, would be more narrow,” he said, “and it goes for all kinds of relationships: it’s OK to grieve somebody who’s still alive.”

He brought up a quote from an interview with Spiderman actor Andrew Garfield, who recently lost his mother: “Grief is all of the love you didn’t get to express.”

“It struck a chord with me, and I think it’s the most impactful thing I’ve ever heard,” Miles said. “It’s changed my outlook on a lot, especially divorce, but also relationships with friends and romantic ones. … When grieving somebody who’s alive – clearly, you’re going to see them now and then – it’s OK to still express that grief. Your parents are also, at the same time, at the end of a big term of their lives and it’s traumatic for them also. Everybody’s on the receiving end of that.”

Family Lessons Learned

Making your family a priority is one of the most significant messages Miles and Audrey metabolized as children of Amanda and members of their sizable family.

“You always put family first, because they’re always going to be there for you – no matter what,” Audrey said. “You’re going to go through a lot with them, but that’s your hard rock, your stone. That’s your home. You’re my home – you guys are my home.”

Birth order and proximity to family members, such as having grandparents in the house, have contributed to Audrey’s worldview.

“Being the youngest, it gives me so many people to look up to, especially having Nana and Papa in the house now,” she said. “Nana has become such a good role model for me. I spend a lot of time with her now. And you, Miles, growing up being the bigger brother, I always looked up to you. And, of course, Mom looked up to you. And now I have so many more people.”

Miles appreciated the kind of messaging that taught him to replace judgment with empathy.

“It’s not judgment, as in approaching a situation analytically, carefully, and cautiously,” he said, “but with a form of grace and empathy.”

Audrey concurred.

“You’ve taught both of us to just love people, to not be mean, but accepting with no judgment,” Audrey said. “You’ve taught me to always love, and I think that’s the best thing in a family – to always love.”

Amanda pointed out that family isn’t always limited to blood relatives.

“I think the concept of accepting a family that’s not blood is a very open concept and it’s preached a lot in media now, like movies and whatever else,” Miles said. “But experiencing that firsthand is definitely something that’s valuable, and more people need to, especially in the world we live in now.”

Audrey described Amanda’s openness.

“You’re always like, ‘Come on, let’s just be part of my family. I’m just going to take you in,” she said. “You just learn to love people so much, especially when they’re going through a lot.”

The Importance of Gratitude

Amanda described some of the challenges the three of them experienced as a family, which forged positive character qualities.

“We didn’t have a lot at all, and we struggled and went through some hard times, but we did that together,” she said. “I think that taught us – and then everything that I have built for us since then – it’s taught you to be grateful. I’m grateful for it.”

Miles agreed.

“I think gratitude is the most valuable thing to learn in life; it’s something that you should reach for,” he said. “Along the same lines as appreciation. Just be here now. Always being present.”

Miles underscored the importance of acceptance and appreciation.

“After you go through something or experience a moment, whatever it is – negative or positive – you think of it differently, replaying it in your head,” he said. “But I think accepting it, in terms of what it is, then you can appreciate it more and live it more richly and thoroughly in that moment. Going through so many different situations in the family, in life, I think I’ve learned to live it more richly. That appreciation – you have to see what it is fully and live by it actively.”

Miles and Audrey have shown a growing level of adaptability.

It’s good that you guys have the approach that you do about changes in life,” Amanda said. “It’s very admirable and I think that it’s something you could pass on to other people, which is helpful.”

“I think that’s the true lesson and I think that’s what your goal would be – either consciously or subconsciously,” Miles said. “That’s what you’ve passed, and it’s clearly stuck with both of us.”

Working with Mom

Both Miles and Audrey have worked with and for Amanda. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Miles worked as her assistant at an apartment complex in Burbank.

“We’ve always had a good relationship, so it wasn’t an eye-rolling event,” Miles said. “We had fun. I liked it a lot. There were a lot of things I learned there.”

The two of them spent nearly a half hour a day carpooling from Santa Clarita to Burbank.

“There were lots of laughs,” he said. “We listened to podcasts, but also, I got to spend a lot more time with you and I think I enjoyed that the most. Working with you is fun because, you know… your personality. And the workplace was pretty good.”

Miles learned a lot about how to deal with people by working alongside Amanda.

“You saw how I dealt with people, which was very different,” Amanda said. “I feel like that was really a good experience for you.”

Amanda’s people skills were one of many facets that impacted Miles in a positive way.

“You’re a people person; I’m not,” he said. “In my first really mature job, which had a lot of things I did not enjoy doing. But also, working with you set me up because I was able to handle it and I knew what I was doing. I was tossed into the deep end, and I stayed that way for the whole two years. I was self-managing the whole time. Having a model – that was you – but also in that industry. It was very valuable.”

Audrey worked for Amanda at Burbank Fitness Club at the front desk. COVID-19 restrictions were over and she had just finished high school through a homeschool program, so she was coming from several years without much social interaction.

“I just needed to meet new people and actually communicate, because I just didn’t really talk to anyone,” Audrey said. “I think mentally and physically, I just needed to go do something. And you were like, ‘Audrey come on, let’s go. You’re coming to work with me.’ The same as Miles, it got me very bonded with you, the more I talked to you, spending all day with you – three or four times a week. I loved it. I just made so many good friends and it taught me a lot about communicating with people and customer service. I loved that job. It was one of the best times of my life. It helped me grow up really quick and it taught me more about people and myself.”

Amanda said she’s grateful for the connections that provided her kids with workplace opportunities.

“I’m very fortunate that I have aligned myself with certain circumstances to be able to provide this for you guys,” she said. “But I’m also very thankful that both of you said yes to different types of jobs that were available at the time.”

There were many conversations between Amanda and her children during job transitions.

“Kids are scared, and they look to us adults who have been in the workforce for years,” she said. “If you’re not giving them proper advice, sound advice – leave your personal thoughts and feelings out of it and really try to set them up for success – then I think you’re doing these kids a disservice. Part of my relationship with both of you is to sort of be a mentor, and there’s a fine line between being somebody’s parent and being their mentor. If these were just young adults coming to me and asking me the same questions and they weren’t my kids, I would say the same thing. I think that more parents need to have that viewpoint and not just put what they think and feel onto the kids, because there’s no room for you guys to think and feel differently.”

Miles agreed wholeheartedly.

“That kind of mentorship is important, but the kind of mentorship when you’re holding their hands is very different,” he said, “because typically if you’re holding their hands, you’re going to naturally guide them to where you were, what you did, your experiences. It’s not productive for anybody; it doesn’t help anybody.”

For it to be effective, the job seeker needs to also have the desire to be mentored, Amanda pointed out.

Dreams, Aspirations and Budding Entrepreneurs

“Taking your dream and putting it into real life” is the way Audrey defines entrepreneurship. “Like you did with Ask Amanda. You took your dream and made it a reality.”

“Yours is a unique situation because you are like ‘the entrepreneur of entrepreneurs,’” Miles said. “With Ask Amanda, you’re somebody’s grindstone and you help not only give them the consultation part of it, but also, you’re providing the tools for them to hone in on their own entrepreneurial ideas. You’re helping guide them in the ways that they need most or that they may need to go about things a different way.”

Both Miles and Audrey can see themselves launching a small business someday, but they’re taking their time as they establish their plans.

“It’s so hard to know what you want to do with your life when you’re still a kid,” Audrey said. “There’s so much pressure and so many things you could choose from. Eighteen is so young to pick your whole life. It’s just crazy.”

Miles, who completed some courses at College of the Canyons, frowns on the practice of forcing kids to go to college without a real goal.

“Like Audrey said, when you’re younger there’s a lot of pressure and I feel like picking that while you’re young is hard,” he said. “It’s definitely changed a lot throughout my life, but I feel like I’ve found my actual passions to drive my motivations in times that I have to myself. I find appreciation for things that I like – and you don’t know until you try something.”

Miles, who Amanda describes as meticulous and good at tinkering, would like to launch a watch company, among other things.

“I’m determined and I’m going to do it,” he said. “Start with leather bands first … and possibly either write a book or film. I don’t know when that will be, if I’m 70 or 25 – something I can appreciate now and do then.”

It’s easy for Audrey to identify her greatest passion.

“Now that I’m 19 I’ve finally kind of pinpointed it, because since I was little, I’ve always wanted to bake,” she said. “It just stuck with me. I was always pretending to bake, and I had my own little kitchen. I’m going to go to college for it. I’m working in a coffee shop right now, but eventually I’ll work at a bakery. That’s my dream and my goal and my aspiration – I want to be a little baker. My true dream would be to own a bakery.”

When put in the hot seat by her kids, Amanda shared that she has small business goals of her own.

“There’s one dream that I do have that I’ve never really thought about fulfilling and I don’t know if I will or not,” she said. “I would love to host a conference. I have this whole vision in my head. I can see it in big lights, and I have these speakers in mind that would just benefit a certain group of people, around probably entrepreneurship and self-development, in the world of personal development and self-improvement, which I call ‘self-development.’ That’s on my bucket list if I could pull it off.”

Meet the Expert

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

When you’re launching a small business in Los Angeles or want to grow your customer base anywhere in the world, you need a guide with experience and inspiration. Finding a coach who’s been in your shoes will give you the support you need to reach those goals. To get the “cheat codes” to rapid success, Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show, talked with Elias Scarr, an entrepreneur who turned his years of experience in sales into a coaching business called Sell It Like Scarr.

How a Service Industry Background Prepares a Successful Entrepreneur

Whether it’s stocking shelves at Trader Joe’s (like Elias) or working on the Levi Wall at Miller’s Outpost (like Amanda), when you work in service to the public and interface with people, you learn a lot about communicating.

“I worked in restaurants, because I wanted to try that out to see what that was like, and then I became a bartender,” Elias said. “I learned how to sell and play and have fun with people, which is really my angle for selling. I really encourage the fun and joy of spending time with people and building relationships.”

He cut his teeth on small businesses in Santa Clarita including some Taekwondo schools. “You can learn a lot about communicating in studying martial arts and in sparring and fighting,” Elias said.

He later went to work for Results Fitness, another Santa Clarita small business.

From bartender to shelf stocker, jobs in retail stores, gyms, and restaurants help you develop relational skills.

“Being a people person, I think, is what makes you a good communicator and good at sales, and knowing how to leverage it,” Amanda said.

First Thing: Get a Business Coach

“If you want to fast track success, you’ve got to have a coach – for anything,” Elias said. “The best people, those at the very top of their game – in a sport or anything – have coaches, usually multiple coaches.”

A coach has the knowledge base to help you establish small business goals and motivate you toward that trajectory. In Elias’ case, the student became the master when he became a coach himself.

“Truly understanding the value of having my coaches – that was how I really understood where my passion is,” he said. “I love coaching, and I love teaching, and I like being super specific, because unlike most people, I love selling. I love sales and communication and all the challenges that come with that, and customer service. So, it just took off like a runaway train. I had great support, great coaches in my corner, and now I’m working with colleagues to help people make business a little bit easier than it can be.”

Elias’ first boss at Trader Joe’s was instrumental in teaching him how to take care of customers, an ethic that was imprinted on him. He then spent 10 years working for Results Fitness.

“That’s where Alan and Rachel Cosgrove, the current owners of Results Fitness, took me under their wing and put a tremendous amount of focus on continuing education for me,” he said. “They sent me from one training course to the next and really accelerated that learning process. Then, as we’d gotten through the hardest part of Covid, both of them pulled me aside and said, ‘It’s time to go. This is as much as you can grow here. It’s time for you to start your own thing.’”

The Freedom of Entrepreneurship

“The freedom is definitely, I would say, the biggest benefit of being an entrepreneur,” Elias said.

One of his greatest lessons came from an 11^th grade chemistry teacher at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita, who wrote in his yearbook: ‘Discipline is freedom.’

“Thinking of it in that way, of having my own business, being able to work from home and coach from home,” he said. “I can travel, I can work with people who are all the way on the other side of the country and across the world.”

With clients as far away as the United Kingdom, Elias has experienced the shift away from working with local businesses in Santa Clarita to wide-ranging expansion through remote communications.

“The freedom of being able to do what you want allows you to focus on what’s truly important,” he said. “Sometimes you don’t have the freedom to do that, to focus on what’s important, because you have to focus on what has to be done, what must be done, what everybody else wants you to do.”

Entrepreneurship enables you to singularly focus on:

• What you’re good at
• What you love to do
• What people need
• What you get paid for

The Art of Sales

Individuals with strong marketing skills sometimes refuse to be classified as salespersons. They have a fear, or a hangup, about sales.

Two Myths About Sales

1. You either have it or you don’t

“There’s a belief that either you’re personable and you’re charismatic and you’re fun and you’re an extrovert and all the aspects that make sales a little bit easier – or you don’t have it,” Elias said. “We can flip that switch and see sales and communication as a skill. And anything that’s a skill can be learned, practiced, and improved.”

Start seeing it as a skill and put time into it.

“If you want to become a better cook, you study and you try more things and you cook more often,” he said. “If you want to get good at a specific lifting technique, you practice that technique and you go up in weight and increase the challenge. It’s just like anything else – it’s not as difficult as it seems. It’s a skill, like anything else.”

2. You need to become skilled at everything

“People tend to feel like they have to balance out all their skills, as opposed to doubling down on what they’re good at,” Elias said. “The biggest trend right now in sales is authenticity. On social media, super filtered pictures are a lot less popular,” he said. “When people shoot videos there isn’t a lot of makeup and there’s not a lot of showmanship. It’s just organic – me to you.”

Authenticity is a business superpower right now.

“What that means in relationship to somebody who might have a fear of sales is to double down on what you’re really good at,” Elias explained. “If you are great at being diligent with follow-up and being organized and having the numbers and the data, then sell that way. If you’re good at building relationships and sitting down and having coffee and conversation, you can sell that way too. There isn’t just one way to do it — find out what you’re good at and find a good coach and then double down on that skill.”

Confidence in Sales

It’s hard to sell something that you yourself wouldn’t buy.

“Having confidence around what you’re selling — it doesn’t matter how you look and feel being in front of people or an audience or on social,” Amanda said. “If you truly believe in the product or the service that you’re selling, it’s going to come across no matter what.”

Believing in your products and services is an integral part of sales.

“If you think about high-level persuasion and selling techniques, and marketing and communication techniques, you can use those powers for evil. If you don’t believe in something, you can trick or you can manipulate somebody,” Elias said.  “The biggest difference between manipulation and persuasion is intent.”

Intent is where confidence comes from. To generate that confidence, it’s just like building muscle – get the reps in.

Consumer Trends

A lot has changed for consumers.

Data Safety

Consumers want control of their data now more than ever, so they’re not as inclined to sign up for offers and give out their personal information.

“People want to believe that their data is safe,” Elias said. “There are some baselines – bank data and credit card data is always something people worry about. But it really comes down to that one-on-one relationship. They want to know: ‘Is my data safe with you?’”

It’s not a new concept – it relates to sales in general.

“Trust theory has been around for years, and I don’t think it’s going anywhere,” Amanda said. “It’s just shifting the way that we look at it.”

 Convenient Shopping/Ease of Payment

Coming out of COVID, everybody wants everything delivered, using Alexa, Google, and Amazon, etc.

“We are in this this odd generation where we are living through the fastest acceleration of technology possible,” Elias said. “As much as people want Alexa and Amazon and all that to bring stuff to their doorstep, most businesses are still struggling with ‘we only take cash.’”

The younger generation uses digital wallets. Many don’t even carry cash, and everything is on their phones, so if you don’t accept Apple Pay or some form of digital wallet, then more than likely that consumer’s not going to shop there.

“There’s actually a restaurant down the street that only accepts credit cards,” Amanda said. “They don’t accept cash because they don’t want to count, they don’t want to be liable, having the banker’s truck come and pick up the cash drops, all the extra fees, and then human error with counting cash.”

Coaching Strategies to Help Business Owners

Finding the Friction

“As a coach, before we get into any kind of high-level sales skills or tactics, I look at where’s the friction?” Elias said. “What is making it difficult for your customer to find your product, buy your product, or understand what your product is supposed to be. Those are big things.”

A coach is a neutral third party who looks at such aspects as:

• Business operations
• Website quality
• Sales training

“I recently did some coaching for a Santa Clarita business and I evaluated their website and there was so much information on the product that I was overwhelmed,” Amanda said. “I asked, ‘What am I actually buying?’ I recommended that they dumb it down and just give me two points. I like to say, ‘My dad’s 78 – can he figure this out?’”

Provide bullet points and let the product sell itself.

“People look at improving sales as having a better closing or getting more leads,” Elias explained. “What we should be doing is improving sales through efficiency. Can I take an hourlong sales process and make it 15 minutes? Keep it simple. If you make it easy for people, people will do it.”

Referrals and Reviews

Birdeye is a business platform Amanda uses at Burbank Fitness Club that’s successfully improved the gym’s Google ratings and reviews. It’s a texting app that can help a business engage with customers.

“Referrals are essential,” Elias said.

People look at ratings as well as the number of reviews a business has.

“The number of reviews matters, because it’s become difficult to find trusted sources of information,” he said. “I don’t think reviews are something you can ignore. Data shows that 92% of happy customers are willing to give a review and a referral, but just 8% of the sales force asks for them. Your sales will get better if you ask.”

Customer Service

“In order to achieve a 5-star review it comes down to customer service,” Amanda said. “At the gym the number one priority is to greet everyone. In today’s self-checkout style, it’s a unique level of customer service.”

The front door is one of the most underrated points of service in any business.

“It’s ignored, and people tend to forget that enthusiasm exists on a timer,” Elias said. “The minute somebody comes into your business, enthusiasm is high because they’re excited about what they’re going to do or what they’re going to see or what they might find or what they’re going to buy. That’s the peak of enthusiasm and then it starts to wane. We have to constantly refill that meter.”

Refilling the meter is done by acknowledging that the customer exists.

“You need to communicate ‘I see you, you’re here, you exist, and I’m excited you’re here,’” Elias said. “That goes a long way in the customer experience.”

Walking in the door is going to set the tone for everything that happens in your business.

“And then as they’re leaving, you have the opportunity to set the tone for the rest of their day,” he said. “If they’re thinking about you while they’re gone that’s really the ultimate power of a customer experience.”

If you want referrals, your people must think about you when they’re not physically in your place of business. They have to have a reason to think about you and it’s best if it happens organically.

“Just treat somebody how you want to be treated in a relationship,” he said.

The Lost Art of Communication

There’s so much technology in our way, how do we overcome that?

“There’s an app that enables you to record a video message to your client, instead of just a QR code or asking for a review in an email. So, they’re seeing your expression and how passionate you are,” Elias said.

Technology is hurting us in our attempt to communicate.

“Sometimes when we implement or introduce new technology, we leave something behind,” Amanda said.

Business owners benefit most when they neither leave the old technology behind nor keep it intact, but instead combine the two.

“The ultimate goal is the blend,” Elias said. “Like reaching out to a customer by sending a video message if you get a lead online.”

You’re adding tools to your belt.

“We can’t refuse to communicate in the way that people want to communicate,” Elias said. “People want to communicate via text, so we’ve got to get good at it. You want to communicate via video, so we’ve got to get good at it. Other people want to communicate face to face or on the phone. Some tools we’re leaving behind, but now we’re just adding tools to our belts.”

Final Thoughts

Selling is just relationship building.

“If I was going to share one message with people it’s to understand that most people actually already know how to sell,” Elias said. “You have the skill set if you’ve ever convinced somebody to give you the last slice of pizza, if you’ve ever asked somebody to go on a date, if you’ve ever managed to convince somebody to stay and have dessert, or ever convinced somebody to look after your animals or house for you. If you’re talking, you’re selling. That’s literally all it is.”

The big secret behind getting anywhere fast is finding a coach.

“You won’t be able to keep up with Amanda’s R&D, her study on business, her study on communication, her study on sales, her study on growth in social media and tech,” Elias said. “But that’s a good thing, because instead of investing all that time, you invest in a coach.”

Your focus and abilities are different than a coach who helps your business thrive.

“You hire a coach that’s doing all this studying that you can’t possibly do because you’re too busy trying to sell cars or sell gym memberships, or sell tacos,” he said. “You don’t have time to study all this stuff. You’ve got to get the cheat code.”

The cheat code and the return on investment from coaching is probably one of the greatest ROIs there is.

“I got a business up and running in an extremely short time because I had great coaches,” Elias said.

Meet the Experts

 Elias Scarr – Sales Coach/Communications Expert

With more than 25 years of experience in sales and customer service, Elias Scarr launched his own coaching business, Sell It Like Scarr, teaching entrepreneurs, managers, and their teams how to sell with confidence and sincerity. His primary focus is empowering people with the communication skills they need to earn the income and influence they deserve.

Elias has learned how to see through customers’ eyes, allowing him to bring a fresh perspective and actionable plans to the table for businesses through a mix of easy-to-use implement strategies, simple systems, and techniques backed by empathy and tough love. He’s coached for Perform Better, Perform Better Brazil, IHRSA, Results University, and the NSCA.

He has an “abundance mindset” and answers every Direct Message he receives. His website is Sellitlikescarr.com.

Keep up with Elias on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn.  

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped small businesses in Los Angeles increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without small business support, clarity, or the feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts in Los Angeles and beyond, acquire nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

The release of ChatGPT has opened up a new world in content creation using AI technology. By harnessing the power of artificial intelligence, everyone from an entrepreneur building a business in Santa Clarita to a national franchisee can improve their marketing strategy and reach more customers. To find out more about what’s unfolding in real time, Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show, recently sat down with Santa Clarita’s savviest digital marketing consultant, Alison Lindemann of WSI Internet Consulting in Valencia.

AI, or artificial intelligence, describes the ability of machines to perform tasks that are typically generated through human intelligence. Using algorithms and statistical models, new technology provides business owners and individuals access to programs that use skills such as learning, reasoning, problem solving, and various forms of perception to make decisions and execute tasks.

“I know it sounds overwhelming to analyze data and make predictions, and it applies to a wide range of applications,” Alison said. “That’s the overarching artificial intelligence you hear about and see everywhere.”

What is ChatGPT?

A phenomenon that was released to the public in November of 2022, ChatGPT is a tool developed by an artificial intelligence research organization called OpenAI. Elon Musk was one of the cofounders of OpenAI and it is backed by Microsoft and LinkedIn.

“The first week it came out it had one million registered users, so it exploded,” Alison said. “Even now a lot of people still get a message saying, ‘Resources unavailable,’ because it’s pounded so much.”

In January it logged approximately 15 million searches per day. It’s widely considered a revolutionary technology, and many compare it to the iPhone.

What’s going to happen with these different AI pieces of technology?

“Everyday use, even as a consumer,” Alison said. “It’s capable of understanding and generating text. It can answer a wide array of questions. It can generate creative writing, professional writing, summaries, and all kinds of things that are mind blowing.”

ChatGPT is a website – not yet an app. You create an account with a username and a login, then you type the information you’re requesting.

“I used it recently to decline an invitation,” Amanda said. “I wanted to do it very tastefully and professionally. I just typed in ‘write a letter to decline an invitation’ and I put some parameters around it … and it literally drafted an entire letter.”

There is a free version and a paid version of ChatGPT, which is still in the beta phase.

“In digital marketing and in content creation – what I do for a living – it’s just life-changing for us and our clients, so we want access to this as fast as we can. What they promised with the paid version is that we would have 24/7 access to it,” Alison said. “There are still flaws and things are still, you know, it’s not perfect. They’re learning from all of us using it.”

What does ChatGPT do?

It crunches data,” Alison said. “You can put in data that you have and ask it to analyze it and give you recommendations. You could put in, for instance, every customer feedback post you’ve ever gotten and have it tell you the common issues or the things you need to do.”

You can command the tool to write formulas for Excel, create an original image, or you can tell it to create a video.

“I mean, I could keep going,” Alison added. “It’s well beyond just plain old content creation and that’s already amazing. Its uses span way beyond that. The whole idea of the chatbot and what we think about chat – this is it on massive, insane steroids.” 

Live Chat/Chatbots – Then and Now

The live chat that often pops up in the corner window on a website with “Hi, how can I help?” is AI – it’s not a live customer service representative. These old school chatbots have been used by millions of people over the years.

“I don’t know about you, but those were annoying, and for the most part you didn’t feel confident,” Alison said. “Even now, we like live chat and we mostly like it with a live agent, because no one wants to call anyone. A customer support phone call is really crappy. I just want to go on and get the live chat agent and see if they can help me.”

The early models of the chatbot, which were not developed using the superior technology of ChatGPT, were only as good as the programming by the organization using them, and they couldn’t understand the semantics of what you said versus what you meant. You would type in your questions, but if they were different from the standard, you couldn’t get an accurate answer.

By contrast, “ChatGPT understands all that,” Alison said.

As a small business owner wanting to build a better customer experience through AI, you can load:

• User guides
• Product information
• Every question anyone has ever asked you
• All the FAQ’s on your site
• Third party data and information

“It’s going to use all that to actually have a conversation with the user,” Alison said. “The amount of information, the semantics, what it understands, how it helps, and how it learns is completely different from those early versions of chat.”

ChatGPT for Small Business Growth

Like any piece of technology, you create an account, input the information, and save it. You can refine it, but it really isn’t integrated with anything, so you may get the output and ask, “Now what?”

“Now they have opened what’s called API’s (Application Programming Interface) and they’ve given the code, open to the world,” Alison explained. “You need to find a developer and say, ‘I want to use ChatGPT technology and apply it in my business in X, Y and Z. I want to be able to do all these customer support things. I want to be able to answer support emails’ – which it can do nearly perfectly.”

You see how it will interface with your business process and how it integrates into your CRM (Customer Relationship Management) such as your database or a third-party mechanism you use. A lot of third-party tools used by business owners in L.A. and across the globe already have an integrated version, or they’re building one. Since this code is available to anyone, many businesses will develop their own chatbots or other ChatGPT technology.

You communicate with the AI tool:

• What you want
• What it is
• How long you want it to be
• Your basic tone

“Start from there and then understand that it will take feedback, so you can keep optimizing it and giving it feedback and it’ll keep working on it,” Alison said. “The same thing with giving it supporting materials. You can give it background to start with, to say ‘look at all this to understand my niche and the way I write things and understand the technical terminology, and now write for me blankety blank.”

You can give it questions you want answered, or give it keywords for search engine optimization.

“One of the questions I get asked a lot from clients is: ‘How do I respond to negative reviews?’” Amanda said. “You could just plug that in and then copy and paste the negative review into this website and it will come out with an answer on how to respond.”

Building Your Brand with ChatGPT

New business owners needing help with the application of ChatGPT are advised to be sure the content matches the voice of their brand.

“You can tell it what you want,” Alison said. “You can say, ‘Look at my website and get my voice, read my branding guide, here are other things I’ve written. This is who I am and the tones that I use. This is how I want you to communicate all the rest of everything I do under that account.’”

If you’re creating organic content, such as a new web page, you can go online and look at your competitors to provide ChatGPT with examples on the topic. You say, “Here’s my website so you understand my tone. Write my own web page on this topic.”

One example is to upload a white paper on a topic and tell the AI tool that you want:

• Three choices for a great title
• Action steps in bullets
• A concise summary and a call to action

“I had to rewrite a mission statement because it’s been years since we’ve had this one,” Amanda said. “I plugged in the mission statement and said, ‘Write a version of this mission statement including these three words.’ They’re new words that I’ve developed for this brand’s voice. It did that and it gave me something beautiful, but it was too long, so I just said, ‘Write a shorter version’ and it came up with it. Then I said, ‘Break it down into two sentences.’ I kept on the same thread and then I had a lot to choose from to go over with the client.”

How to Improve Your Business with AI Technology

ChatGPT technology is another tool to help your business succeed by trimming costs or improving your business reputation with better communication. There are various applications that would benefit a small business in Santa Clarita or a larger, nationwide enterprise.

Customer Service Representatives

Certain businesses, such as a Santa Clarita insurance company, could use AI to replace human service at the level one position. So, a customer service rep might be fine using AI, but a level two position might be better served by personal interaction with the client base.

Research

Baby boomers did research in libraries with physical books. That system has become more efficient with the internet, and AI saves even more steps. But the research acquired through ChatGPT shouldn’t be used verbatim.

“You’re still responsible,” Alison said. “I’m not speaking as an expert on education or anything, but it’s a tool. Nobody should be publishing straight up out of it.”

Creating Images

AI can create images for you without technically withholding royalties, because it doesn’t take images from Getty, iStock (or any other stock sharing site) and give it to the end user. Its computer, the algorithm, “learns from” all of those sites.

“Even though it creates an image that it only gives to you, those Photoshop sites are already taking exception, because it’s going to affect them when we’re not buying the images from them,” Alison said. “They’re saying you still don’t have the rights to give away these images that your AI model learned from looking at all the images that are royalty-based images. It’s not clear where this is going to go. We should be editing those pieces of content.”

ChatGPT for Content Creation

“Now that this can create photos for you, it can also create blog posts for you, it can create your newsletter topics, it can create your YouTube content, like titles and things,” Amanda said. “It’s really going to change the way that we work with some of these other vendors in our lives.”

Is it still beneficial to use a content writer?

“They say that programming, content creation, and even some law research – these are some of the three emerging areas where it’s going to impact us,” Alison said. “They even say in the creative field the impact is minimal right now because it’s not a human, it’s not a brain. I think it’s more of an operational efficiency. If I’m a writer, I’m going to use it as a tool because it’s going to help me be more efficient in creating content for you. If I was a copywriter and you gave me an outline and wanted me to write 1,000 words, I could input that outline.”

Blogging/Publishing

If you generate a newsletter or do any other publishing, a digital blog or a physical ad, AI can help you.

A business owner wanting to use AI needs to ask:

• What kind of content do I need?
• How often do I need it?
• What do I struggle with?
• Do I have content that needs reformatting or summarizing?

Press Releases

If you contract with a copywriter to produce a press release, your turnaround time may be several days, while AI can get it done right away so you can check it off your list. You also don’t have to know proper formatting for press releases. 

Creative Ideas and Brainstorming

If you don’t know where to start with a project and you need help developing your business content, AI can provide that. If you just come up with an outline or bullet points, it can go from there. You can give it feedback, telling it to rewrite a certain paragraph or add something.

It’s helpful with writing ad content and promotions. “The more time you put in, the more that comes out,” Alison said. “Let’s say you have a topic which is complex. You can say, ‘Please rewrite this at the 13-year-old level.’ It could be even a social topic, like a political one. You could say, ‘Rewrite this whole website for kids.’”

Language Translation

Instead of creating a literal interpretation, ChatGPT uses the language sentiment. Google Translate is more literal.

“Creating a version in another language is really hard, because to do it right you really need someone in that native language to rewrite it the way it should be – not a literal interpretation,” Alison said. “It sounds like this technology is going to explode in language.”

Problems with ChatGPT

ChatGPT is imperfect right now.

“It has some limitations in the back end where, I don’t know if it’s 1,000 words or whatever, but it’ll kind of end abruptly,” Alison said. “You can tell it to keep going, or if you don’t like what you got from it, you can just say, ‘Try again.’”

ChatGPT is currently frozen in time – at the end of 2021 – because that’s when OpenAI built it.

“It’s not cloud-based where it understands the world every single day and everything that’s happened since then,” Alison said. “Everything that’s loaded in there, basically, is back from that time. So, if you want to talk about the last Super Bowl, it doesn’t necessarily know that it exists. That will change, I’m sure. But that’s in the model. Who knows how perfect this stuff is?”

Amanda emphasized the need to read the content created by AI.

“One of my biggest pet peeves is when somebody sends an email out and they haven’t proofread and personalized it,” she said. “It will be very generic unless you have it understand your brand and your personality. I would definitely proofread it to make it your own a little bit.”

Amanda admitted to feeling nervous about the consequences of the new technology: “I feel like it’s going to make us all dumber or it’s going to make us all really smart, really professional, much more on point.”

Alison’s advice to business owners is to embrace the newest AI technology.

“It’s going to change our lives as business owners and content people and those who are in advertising and media – any business, anything, even your internal communication – just knowing that it’s part of the process,” Alison said. “It’s important that you wordsmith it, you edit it, and you maybe add your own flavor to it before you publish it and then you can feel good, that it’s yours and you’re not going to have issues with that.”

Meet the Experts

 Alison Lindemann – Digital Marketing

After 17 years in the corporate management world, Alison joined WSI Internet Consulting in 2004. She has a strong business background including 17 years with Farmers Insurance as the Director of Service Operations as well as Director of Sales in their corporate office in Los Angeles. She completed the Farmers Executive Training Program and was the recipient of their Management Excellence Award. Alison has expertise in both traditional and digital media, as well as strategic planning, competitor analysis, personal development, social media, customer experience, conversion optimization and search engine optimization. Alison holds a BSBA degree from the Washington University in St. Louis Olin Business School, and she holds the CPCU Designation, ARP Designation, and numerous digital marketing certifications. She has co-authored two books with WSI entitled Digital Minds. She is the recipient of three Web Marketing Association Awards, and she speaks regularly on digital marketing best practices and strategies.

Need a digital marketing consultant who can help you design and execute an effective new strategy? Contact Alison at WSI Internet Consulting for a consultation.

Keep up with Alison on Facebook and LinkedIn.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped small businesses in Los Angeles increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without small business support, clarity, or the feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts in Los Angeles and beyond, acquire nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

Whether you’re head of marketing for a national brand or a small business owner in Santa Clarita, you need to employ the next generation of marketing tools to succeed in your industry. AI-powered data is the latest strategy to enable businesses of all sizes and stripes to expand their reach, and most companies need an expert to put it in place. Jason Renno, owner of Definitive Edge Marketing, talked with Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show, to share the success of his data-driven research, particularly in the addiction recovery space.

Digital Marketing

Taking a hard look at your marketing strategy is as important for a startup founder as it is for an established L.A. business owner who wants to scale their company. The same is true for your marketplace – every industry needs to get in front of potential customers.

“Whether you’re selling insurance or whether you’re a roofing contractor, at the end of the day, you have to have some sort of marketing and sales tactics that you should be able to pick up and transplant into another profession if you want to,” Jason said.

Working in the digital marketplace enables a business expert in Santa Clarita to have a worldwide reach and work from anywhere, which increases their freedom and flexibility.

Refining/Distilling Your Niche

As a new marketing professional, you may think you can succeed with any client – a small retail business in Los Angeles or a B2B powerhouse in New York City. Experts find that you often hit your stride after homing in on a smaller target. When you launch a company as a new entrepreneur, it typically looks different in year one than it does a few years down the line.

In the case of Jason Renno, who left the mortgage business to launch a marketing company, he started as a social media planning agency serving a wide range of clientele. Six years later, his company is now more targeted and Definitive Edge Marketing works primarily with addiction recovery centers.

“I thought, ‘I can be a little bit different, and I can serve local businesses and national businesses – I can serve everybody,’” Jason said. “We did that for about five years, and we did okay, but there is always this ceiling that we kept smashing our heads into. Finally, about a year ago, when we were able to license and get access to all of these AI-powered data tools and market data and everything else, we landed our first addiction treatment client.”

The addiction treatment space has become a successful niche for Jason’s company.

“Good for you for not giving up and pressing forward, but also, as you hit the ceiling you realized you needed to try something else,” Amanda said. “That is a block for a lot of people, when you hit the ceiling and ask, ‘What am I going to do?’ You know, you can’t just live here forever.”

Finding that niche was a game-changer for Definitive Edge Marketing. “Once we found success in that, and then we started niching down in that, over the last six months our business has doubled, and clients are lining up. It’s just been such an amazing experience,” Jason said. “We focused on one thing and got really good at that one thing.”

AI-Powered Data Tools

Definitive Edge Marketing serves clients by leveraging AI-powered data tools and omnichannel trust-building campaigns through platforms from Facebook and Instagram to Google and TikTok. Two main aspects of their services include:

1. In-Market Data

For a small business looking for new clients, it’s easy to overspend on Google clicks or any of the well-known online advertising platforms. The Definitive Edge strategy uses in-market data to maximize the success of their clients’ campaigns. The process involves sifting out the online masses to center in on people who have already searched for the client’s business, their products, or services. They apply the data to boost the client’s Facebook, Google, and YouTube campaigns.

How they acquire it:

“We go and we bid on anywhere from 12 to 15 ad platforms – Google, Yahoo, Bing, all of the major ones – and we bid on anonymous data,” Jason explained. “We’re buying a hash form of an email address that doesn’t look like anything to anybody else and we purchase it for pennies, fractions of a penny, on the dollar. We’ve purchased millions upon millions of these. Over the last 12 years, this data and this software has compiled public data where we can match the hash forms and provide what we call in-market data.”

What they do with it:

The in-market data can be used to:

• Warm up Facebook campaigns
• Provide a warmer audience at the top end of your sales funnel on YouTube, Google, and email campaigns
• Add traffic to your landing page

2. Facebook Pixel

A piece of code for your website that lets you measure, optimize, and build audiences for your ad campaigns, a Facebook pixel is an analytics tool to measure the effectiveness of your advertising.

“Facebook tracks people hitting your website, captures 20-30% of them, and if you feed more money into Facebook, it allows you to retarget them,” Jason explained. “We have our own pixel, so we take that data, and we capture 50-60% of those bounce visitors.”

By creating the same omnichannel retargeting approach, a Facebook lead can be retargeted not just on Facebook, but on YouTube, Google Display, Google Discovery, etc. “We create not just an omnichannel top-of-funnel approach, but an omnichannel retargeting approach,” Jason said.

Consulting

Data collected by Definitive Edge Marketing isn’t just handed over to a business owner looking for marketing help. The marketing content created for various platforms needs to be customized, because whether it’s YouTube or TikTok, they each have their own set of requirements for posting.

Also, targeting requires oversight to be sure it’s successful and to make changes over time. “Part of the consulting is we’ll get access to the client’s ads manager, so either myself or my partner, Alvin, will poke in a couple times a week and make sure, to see if the ads that we set up using our data are performing,” Jason said.

Facebook, YouTube, Google Display, and Google Discovery ads are all tracked in real time. “It’s real-time results and the client never thinks we’re hiding; we’re trying to be as transparent as possible,” Jason said. “So, every week, every day the end-market data is constantly being updated and the numbers fluctuate. Assuming they’re constantly running traffic and driving people to their website, every day that’s more people they could be putting into their database and capturing their name, email address, and phone number and sending out retargeting campaigns.”

Some of Jason’s favorite tools and platforms for his work with addiction and treatment center clients are:

• A 60-question survey for new clients
• Google Docs – Different folders for each client, where video footage can be stored
• Loom – A screen recording software: “I use Loom almost every single day. I don’t even try to type emails to my team anymore. I just record a Loom video and say, ‘Hey, do this.’”
• Slack – A game-changing platform, because you can pin things to channels and you can link it to Loom and Google Drive for the whole team
• HighLevel (GoHighLevel.com) – The main software used by Definitive Edge Marketing because it allows them to do anything such as building landing pages and websites: “It’s a full CRM (customer relationship management platform) with email text capability. There’s a full back-end workflow process to build out multiple landing pages, link them together, set up workflows from landing pages, and you can track ads through it.”

Definitive Edge Marketing is beta testing a new software that’s a dashboard. Every client gets a URL where they can see:

• How much money was spent
• If leads came in
• Cost per lead

Marketing Advice

If you’re an L.A. entrepreneur looking for help launching a new company or a business owner wanting to build a better following, it’s helpful to learn from the experiences of others. Jason shared some advice from his journey from startup to finding a niche in the addiction and treatment center marketplace.

Ethics/Best Practices

Developing a more personal, targeted marketing campaign doesn’t have to be unethical or infringe on your audience’s rights to privacy. You maintain the integrity of your brand that way.

Honor “Do Not Call” lists and registries, and when an emailer unsubscribes, drop them from your system. “You can get in trouble calling people who don’t want to be called,” Jason said.

Use an email drip campaign – Send a limited number of emails to your audience based on actions they take or changes in their status. For instance, if you have an eCommerce business, you can reach out to people who abandon a virtual cart on your website.

Scrub all email lists before sending anything out – Remove unengaged subscribers from your email list so you’re only marketing to people who want to receive your emails. “It goes back to tracking,” Jason explained. “You hear, ‘I sent out 10,000 emails.’ How many got delivered? How many clicks? Did you get any spam complaints? “Sending out 10,000 emails is great, but if I could send out 10 and get 5 deals from it, that’s better than your 10,000 that got no deals.”

Spending money on streamlining your campaign can be compared to buying insurance. “It’s not an extra cost, it’s preventative,” Jason said. “You don’t want to have to deal with attorneys. You don’t want to deal with a domain that doesn’t work. You don’t want to start emailing your clients that everything’s going into spam.”

Streamlining Operations by Documenting Procedures

“Everything my team is doing is being documented and we’re creating what we call SOP – service operating procedures – so, as my teams are doing daily tasks they’re recording videos,” Jason said. “That way when we start hiring, I have trainings and procedures. Every single thing is documented and we’re ready to go.”

Jason finds it easy to document using Loom video messaging software. “That’s how I assign all my tasks, and that’s how we record and document,” Jason said. “Next time I hire a campaign manager or my workflow expert, or God forbid, somebody gets sick or quits on me or something, they can spend their first two days watching all these videos, learning how we do things here.”

Marketing Boost

Jason recently hired a virtual assistant, which he calls a homerun. “I have an assistant who acts as myself online and organically outreaches to addiction treatment centers – CEO’s, decisionmakers,” he said. “We’ve gotten more out of her organic outreach in 45 days than the 50 grand I spent on ads last year.”

One tip that’s proving successful with clients is a guaranteed ROI. Jason offers to waive his company’s retainer if they don’t get marketing results for the client.

“That’s a great little incentive for both of you,” Amanda said. “You’re getting their buy-in and they’re getting your commitment.”

Meet the Experts

Jason Renno – Data-Driven Marketer

Jason is the owner of Definitive Edge Marketing, a company combining senior strategists, data engineers, and in-house tech with AI to create impactful campaigns for addiction treatment centers. They build and implement systems to help clients reach more individuals through AI-powered data marketing tools and omnichannel retargeting. Jason is passionate about supporting the important work of addiction treatment and committed to using data-driven insights and the latest technology to maximize their outreach.

An accomplished marketing entrepreneur with years of proven results in the industry, Jason and his partner built Definitive Edge Marketing into a six-figure monthly agency specializing in consulting across multiple nations with a particular focus on addiction treatment. Jason’s previous background in the mortgage and finance industry spanning more than 20 years has equipped him with a deep understanding of both the financial and marketing worlds. He’s a strategic thinker who excels in client communication enabling him to connect and deliver quality work on time and within budget.

Jason specializes in leveraging AI-powered data tools and Omnichannel trust-building campaigns through platforms such as Google, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. If you would like to start a conversation or ask him questions about improving your marketing results, you can text him at 661-513-3112. You can also find him on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

POWERFUL AND PERSONAL – YOUR BRAND IS YOU

WHAT IS PERSONAL BRANDING?

It’s the work you do to make who you are – and what you do – known to potential clients and customers. It’s who you are personally and professionally. It’s the process of establishing a reputation as an influencer so people seek you out for your expertise.
Building your Personal Brand involves showcasing your greatest skills and qualities, defining what makes you incomparable and indispensable. Thanks to social media we now have a much easier way to communicate those aspects.

Back when I worked with Hyatt, I attended a sales conference in Chicago where one of the speakers was Sally Hogshead, the creator of a training program called “How to Fascinate.” It’s a personality assessment that helps uncover your superpower.

The questionnaire asks, “How do people describe you?” but limits you to just three words. This tool enables you to succinctly define how you are naturally suited to add value.

When I first took her assessment test, I discovered my three words were: Ambitious, Focused, and Confident. A few peers reminded me that I’m also Resourceful, Ethical, and Collaborative.

For defining your business, the benefit of this test is not to reveal how you see the world, but the exact opposite, because how the world sees you is your Brand.

At one conference where I was training with a group of other business travel sales managers, the moderator asked us, “What makes a business traveler choose your hotel over the one next door?” That is, if location wasn’t an issue. All our hotels offered free Wi-Fi, complimentary breakfast, welcome receptions, free parking, etc. Some people said, “We have a Starbucks in the lobby” and others added, “We have a newly renovated gym.” I raised my hand and simply stated: “Me. They get me.”

And what does that look like? A handwritten thank you note, tips on the town’s best happy hour to meet with clients, dry cleaning service setup, etc. They got all my knowledge and resources of the area. They got me.

BRAND AWARENESS

WAYS TO CREATE BRAND AWARENESS

Be a Person, not a Company. When you get to know someone new, what do you like to explore with them? I like to discover their hobbies, passions, likes and dislikes, and more. I also pay attention to how they speak, the subjects they choose to talk about, and which topics raise their excitement level.

These are the traits your brand should determine and promote about itself. To leave an impact with your audience you’ve got to define yourself as more than a company that sells stuff. How else would you define yourself? What words would you use if you had to introduce your brand to a new friend?

Be Social. Post on social media about things unrelated to your product or services. Interact with your audience by asking questions, commenting on posts, or retweeting and sharing content you like. Treat your social accounts as if you were a person trying to make friends, not a business trying to make money.

Over 50% of brand reputation comes from online sociability. Being social leads to greater awareness and simply being known.
Tell Your Story. This offers something real for your audience to latch onto.

Crafting a narrative around your brand humanizes it and gives it depth. And weaving this narrative into your marketing inherently promotes your brand alongside your products or services.

What subject creates the best narrative? Anything … as long as it’s true. It can be the founder’s backstory, how your business hatched its first product idea, or a little-engine- that-could story about how your small business made it in this big world.

People are stimulated by storytelling and attracted to authenticity. It’s a combo that can lead to a big boost in brand awareness.

BRAND AWARENESS

HOW DO YOU INCREASE BRAND AWARENESS?

Sponsor Events – Engage with your community by getting involved in local fundraisers and celebrations. Even if you are not a formal sponsor, volunteer time, announce it on your website, or interview charity officials for your newsletter.

Offer Free Services – You score points in positivity when you reach out to your neighborhood with complimentary services. You can develop a home improvement directory with free listings to boost marketing opportunities, for instance.

Offer Free Content – Collaborating with others is a form of cross-pollination. Create compelling content that lives on both brands’ websites. Start a podcast or a blog for maximum exposure.

BONUS TIP

WHEN YOU’RE STUCK, ASK AMANDA!

Not just with your brand – but in business, too!

Even with all these tips, sometimes you just need a little help to get started. Maybe you have specific questions about your brand, or ideas you need to run by someone on increasing brand awareness. Regardless of what’s standing in your way, it’s time to solve that problem – because an entire audience is waiting to discover you!

Remember, I’m always just a phone call away. With a simple consultation, we can develop your personal brand together, so you can build an audience that gets to know, like and trust you more every single day.

MEET AMANDA

While you may notice her first by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools and network it takes to get the job done – no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement systems, and execute tasks. And if she can’t do it herself, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after a buyout. And she’s helped local small businesses double their revenue within a year. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up.

Money.  We are always looking for a way to make more, right?  A side hustle is a way to do just that!

Side Hustle: (sahyd-huhs uhl)

noun
A job or occupation that brings in extra money beyond one’s regular job and main source of income.
Source: Dictionary.com

If you’ve been in the business world long enough, you know it’s not your grandfather’s job market anymore. There are very few people sticking it out with a single company, putting in 40 years of 8-hour days and retiring with a gold watch.

According to a chart by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the younger you are, the greater the number of jobs you will hold in your lifetime. Side hustles offer you a means to juggle more than one of those career moves at the same time.

Why Get a Side Hustle?

Cold, Hard Cash

This may be obvious because making extra money is on nearly everyone’s list, whether you own a small business or work for somebody else, but the reasons for it range from gaining a little security to making a huge purchase. The value of your talents will determine the amount of side money you can bring in, but don’t forget the cumulative impact that even a small income can have on your budget.

Many of the biggest companies began as side hustles, says an article in the Business Insider. Sara Blakely, founder of Spanx was selling fax machines door-to-door when she launched her company. Yankee Candle was a teenager’s side hustle when founder Michael Kittredge melted crayons to make a gift for his mom.

You can pick up side gigs to pay off student debt and gain some peace of mind, or use the funds to purchase anything imaginable. Some of the most common uses for side hustle income include:

• Home improvement
• Vacation
• Programs for your kids
• Vehicle upgrade
• Concerts/events
• Beauty enhancement
• Recreation
• Self-care

Establish Your Own Company

Extra money means you can follow your dreams and expand your goals as you go. A side hustle is a great way to see if your idea has legs to stand on. Maybe you envision this to be your full-time gig one day and you need to test the waters first. Don’t give up your day job and you can maintain some security while you set the stage for the future.

This is exactly how I started my business in Santa Clarita. Ask Amanda Consulting began as a side hustle.  Once I saw I was getting busier and busier, I took the jump and quit my full-time job to go all in, so my side hustle became my main hustle.

Personal Enjoyment

According to Entrepreneur Magazine, a side hustle is “a way to make some extra cash that allows you flexibility to pursue what you’re most interested in.”

Whether you love woodworking, travel, or ballet, nearly every avocation costs money to fully engage in it. A side hustle can help pay for your favorite hobby, or even better – your favorite hobby can pay you when it becomes a side hustle.

Perhaps you’re already working in your field of choice. For instance, if you work on a dock but long to sail, you can use your contacts to access a boat and give harbor tours on the side. Or if you’re a fashion fan who’s always worked retail, you can leverage your experience to go on Market Week buying trips or work weekends to purchase amazing clothes (which you can then wear to work!).

Whatever you find captivating, doing what you love, being good at it, and making money through it is the side hustle trifecta.

Choosing a Side Hustle

There’s a growing list of options when looking into side hustles, and some are already established, so you just need to jump in and sign on. If you’re more entrepreneurial, however, you have two choices. You can create a business model with an original idea or offer the same services as an established business, but develop a small business model that’s convenient for you.

For instance, anyone can deliver food for a huge grocery chain or a restaurant, but instead you can create your own business with a bespoke delivery service where you offer to shop at a variety of local sources.

The list of side hustle ideas includes numerous options that have proven to be profitable, including:

Local buying and reselling
E-commerce such as Etsy
Starting a blog
Food/grocery delivery
Freelancing
Ridesharing service
Handyman
Babysitter
Pet sitter
Virtual assistant
Real estate
Social media manager
Notary public
Wedding officiant
Tutor
Competitive gamer
T-shirt designer
Transcriptionist
Customer support

There are certain skills you need to access to maintain a profitable side hustle: You need to be self-motivating. You need to have patience. You need to be willing to learn something new. You need to be okay with failure. Expand on each one of these and accept that not all side hustles work out.

Benefits of a Side Hustle

Aside from the obvious (making money), when you begin the side hustle experience you’ll find some added benefits.

Expand your network – The more you do, the more people you meet. For instance, if you work as a virtual assistant you create a connection with people you wouldn’t have met otherwise.

Increase your skillset – After working at your side hustle your abilities will only grow. Most people are pretty green their first day on the job but get faster and more skillful with time.

Achieve financial goals quicker – For people whose jobs don’t offer overtime pay or routine pay raises, a side hustle is a fast track for extra cash.

Build your personal brand – Whether you’re a small business in Santa Clarita or a billionaire’s blockbuster organization, you need a brand for your company.

Achieve other unrelated goals – Some of the benefits are unrelated to money. For instance, you can do deliveries on your bike and get some exercise while working on your side hustle.

Get Started with your Side Hustle

If you’re sold on the idea of launching your first side hustle but don’t know where to start, ask yourself these questions:

1. What are my interests?

By narrowing down your ideas you can home in on the big one. Strip away every constraint. If money was no object, if you could ignore the opinions of your parents/partners/friends, what would you spend your time doing?

2. Are there any conflicts of interest with my current job?

Your side hustle won’t be sustainable if you’re constantly locking horns with your boss or cutting corners on things like sleep.

3. How much extra time a week do I have?

A demanding day job makes it more challenging to get started on your side hustle. Determine what you can cut out if your calendar is already full.

4. Will I need to invest money?

Financial support is, of course, an essential ingredient in any small business development. There are few side hustles that have no cost involved, but some are less expensive than others. Assess whether or not you have the capital to give it a go.

If you remember doing “The Hustle” at your last dance party you know there are moves to the side and several steps forward, but some moves take you backwards too. By keeping in mind there will probably be some setbacks and your first idea may not make you rich, you’ll never know until you fill your dance card and get out there. If you need advice, you can always Ask Amanda!

You’re a business owner who keeps a lot of balls in the air, but no one can successfully master every aspect of service from marketing to bookkeeping while managing a happy, healthy personal life. A financial advisement team makes sure you have a plan that maximizes your options and protects your future, so you have the bandwidth to move your business forward. Chris Ingram, Owner and CEO of Prosperitas Financial, sat down with Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show to share how hiring a financial advisor is a winning strategy for your small business.

 Hiring a Financial Advisement Team for Your Small Business

The skills that you need to launch a small business in Santa Clarita or anywhere else in the world are wide-ranging and many are unique to your industry. It’s helpful to know your strengths, but it’s equally important to recognize your weaknesses so you can build a team to cover those areas of responsibility where you may not have adequate tools. Reaching out to professionals you can trust for help with the financial aspects of your company frees you up from micromanaging every detail, so you can focus on building your business while also having enough time to spend with your family.

Small business owners don’t always see the benefits of bringing in financial advisement, especially in the early stages when they cover nearly everything themselves.

“They’re trying to wear too many hats and they don’t know how to build the right team,” Chris said. “There are a lot of things that we can do to help them put the right pieces in place so they can focus on the things that they do best, but also get away from the business occasionally and go on vacation and live life at the same time.”

Whether you are still branding your startup company or you’re currently in the midst of running a business – or even if you want to talk about retirement – a financial advisor can help you plan for the future.

Financial Advisement in the Startup Phase

If you’re just launching your small business, a financial advisor can put systems in place that improve your financial position while mitigating organizational problems that sometimes crop up later. To develop a customized system your advisor needs to ask a series of questions through each step of the process:

Helping You Lay the Groundwork

• What type of entity should you form?
• What are the legal aspects you need to take into account?
• How are you planning to fund the business? (i.e., loans vs. a partnership)

Helping You Structure Your Business

• What is your mission statement?
• What products are you trying to sell?
• What is the market you’re looking at?
• What type of marketing will get the product out there?
• What do the financials look like going forward?
• Is this business viable?

Helping You Create Financial Projections

• Do you have financial projections?
• What are the goals you’re trying to accomplish?

“Financial projections are part of your business plan,” Amanda said. “If you’re in the startup phase, I can help you and there are other people that can help you with your mission statement, your logo, your photography or marketing, but for the financial projections – which are crucial to your business when you’re starting up –  a financial advisor is somebody you want to reach out to. Don’t just think about your CPA.”

If your business startup ideas look good, a small business financial planner can help you construct a sound, viable business plan and explain such features as:

• Setting up business checking accounts
• Creating a personal checking account
• Opening a business credit card
• Putting a tracking system in place
• Making sure records are clean from day one

“Set it up right from the beginning and your life is going to be a lot easier,” Chris said. “A lot of business owners love their idea, they’re passionate about what it is that they want to do, but they don’t understand all these pieces that need to be put into place. It isn’t until about the time they do that first tax return that they find they don’t know what’s going on, their accountant is mad at them because they have no records, and they blame the accountant. I’ve seen that spiral out of control, so we really want to help them set it up right from the startup phase.”

Financial Advisement for an Existing Business

If you set up a small business and it’s running smoothly, you’ll eventually evolve and consider new goals, such as a possible expansion or adding a new service. Your financial advisement team can assess the situation and develop a plan going forward by looking at where your company is today and what it will take to get to the next level.

“That may be bringing in loans or bringing in a partner; again, it goes back to financial projections,” Chris said. “So, what kind of an impact is this growth phase going to have on your existing business? We don’t want it to kill off the existing business, what’s paying the bills, in order to expand and then have it all blow up in your face. You’ve worked really hard for this part back here – we don’t want the expansion to destroy everything you’ve worked for the last couple of decades to build.”

The main questions involved in a financial analysis for taking your small business to the next level include:

• What does the growth phase look like?
• What kind of impact will it have on the existing business?
• What do you need to put in place to be able to take on this next layer of responsibility?

For a financial advisor this phase begins with a litmus test – looking at where the company is today, including an examination of the financials. If the books and records are disorganized and incomplete, you need to clean them up and sometimes it means finding a new accountant.

“You can be in a phase of your business where you outgrow your professional advisors,” Amanda said.

Your financial advisement professional will check to see if you have contracts in place, to be sure they’re comprehensive and protect the partners involved. Existing business support includes identifying and addressing issues within the business.

“Trying to uncover all of what is currently wrong with the business and clean it up,” Chris said, “to help you be able to either manage the existing business better going forward or now be able to grow and expand and do all the things that you need to do.”

Financial Advisement for Succession

An effective financial advisor knows how to position you for a successful exit strategy, whether you have a small business in Santa Clarita you are planning to sell, or you have a global enterprise that you’re passing to the next generation.

“If you’re really serious about selling it you need a true business valuation that you can show to people,” Chris said. “We will help you figure out how to get a business valuation, who you’re going to sell it to and what it’s going to look like.”

Financial professionals can maximize your position for retirement, and they understand the tax efficiency of passing your company to the next generation as well as the steps in a buyout structure. Your small business exit strategy involves getting the parties on the same page and mapping out what your company will look like without you.

“Even though it may be 15 to 20 years off into the future, we look at what we should be doing today in order to position them properly because it takes planning and thought to get there,” Chris said. “We just want people to think about it earlier because people typically wait until the last second.”

10 of the Most Common Mistakes Small Business Owners Make

1. Sloppy records
   1. Mistakes on the legal side of things
      1. Conducting employee reviews without taking notes
      2. No records of client engagement

• Meetings with partners with no minutes

1. Mistakes on the financial side of things
   1. Not tracking business expenses
   2. Failing to keep clean records

• Not using effective systems

2. Mixing business and personal finances
   1. Keep your accounts separate

3. Sitting on cash
   1. Do keep extra cash for emergencies or expansion
   2. You can invest it and maintain access to it

4. Not taking advantage of leverage
   1. You can expand or move to the next level with low interest rates.

“I hate debt, but when you give me debt at 3% per year, I kind of love that, because I can make that money earn way more than the interest it’s going to cost me to get that debt,” Chris said. “So, taking advantage of that leverage, maybe it comes with having a financial advisor that can help guide you, so you don’t make a mistake, but using and taking advantage of that leverage right now is more important than ever.”

5. Not having financial projections for the future

A business plan isn’t just meant for your startup. It’s a working document for your business that you should be looking at no less than once a year. Ask the following: Is your mission still the same? Are your employees still the same? Are your financial projections still the same?

“It is something we preach even on the personal financial planning side,” Chris said. “Financial planning is a living, breathing document you need to be on top of all the time. It’s always evolving, it’s always changing. You need to be updating it, understanding it, making sure it’s current. Those financial projections are important. Most people have no clue. They’re just flying by the seat of their pants doing business every day.”

Business owners need to be able to put the numbers on paper and understand what they’re doing and how it’s going to affect the future growth or profitability of

the business.

6. No retirement plan or a poorly managed one
   1. No retirement plan at all is almost better than a poorly managed retirement plan
   2. If you’re going to have a retirement plan in your business, be sure the people in your organization understand whose responsibility it is to carry out each task associated with the plan

7. Not having insurance risk management
   1. You need risk mitigation in place
      1. Buy-sell agreements
      2. Include insurance to protect partners
      3. They need to be official
      4. Key managed policies

• Disability insurance

“If something happens and there’s no income if you’re not there, without a disability insurance policy you’re at risk and your family is at risk,” Chris said. “It’s there to keep the business alive and pay the expenses of the business if something were to happen to you, to make sure that when you return your business is still standing and that you can go back into it and be able to continue.”

8. Not having a financial planning team in place

Small business owners can be intimidated and sometimes they don’t think they’re big enough yet. Reach out to a financial advisement team that gives you the opportunity to get advice regardless of size.

9. Operating without a business coach
   1. Reach outside your own expertise
   2. The biggest CEOs and brightest executives have coaches to lean on

10. Not paying yourself enough or at all
    1. Pay yourself a reasonable wage
    2. Balance between not paying enough and paying yourself too much 

Meet the Experts

Chris Ingram – Financial Advisor

When CEO and founder Christopher Ingram established Prosperitas Financial, he envisioned a more comprehensive style of wealth management, offering the expertise of professionals in multiple capacities to meet the wide-ranging needs of their clients. This unique collaboration of financial service providers offers advisement in financial planning, wealth management, life insurance, long-term care insurance, disability insurance, corporate benefits, employer retirement plans, health insurance, estate planning and trust services, tax preparation and planning, college guidance, lending, business succession planning, and more. It is a holistic version of financial planning, guidance, and advice provided by elite advisors who are supported by a team of financial specialists and staff.

Chris has spent more than 22 years as an Investment Advisor Representative/Fiduciary and has built his entire career on the uncompromising commitment to provide financial advice and services where the primary focus is helping clients achieve their goals and financial success. The first 5 years of his career he worked with PaineWebber, now UBS, and Morgan Stanley. In March of 2003 he left Morgan Stanley to start his own firm and become an independent financial advisor. Chris’ goal in launching Prosperitas Financial in 2020 was to be able to focus more on the client and less on corporate quotas and other aspects of a big firm.

To get a comprehensive financial plan, contact Brooke Coffey at 661-255-9555 ext. 120 or visit ProsperitasFin.com. You can also find the company on LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business-level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

 About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

Women in Business

When a woman takes the helm of a small business or a large corporation for the first time, she needs strength and tenacity to face the challenges of shifting into her new position of power and making necessary adjustments in personnel. Lora Dana, the owner of Country Club RV in Yuma, Arizona, is a strong female and a second cousin to another strong female – Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show. In this episode of the podcast, she talks with Amanda about the transition from co-owning the business with her husband to becoming sole owner when he passed away. She can attest to the need for a succession plan and offers suggestions for women in male-dominated industries.

Transferring Ownership – Lora’s Story

Lora Dana became a solopreneur in the 1990s when she stepped away from her job working in marketing and advertising at a TV station to launch her own small business. By forming an advertising company, she could become more involved in the Honda-Mitsubishi car dealership she owned with her husband, Brent. Lora worked within their community in Yuma, Arizona, handling all the dealership’s advertising, including radio and TV commercials, which made her the face of the company. Though Brent served as president and she was secretary treasurer, customers who asked to talk to the owner were surprised to see Brent come out because they thought she was in the top spot.

“It worked out really well,” she said. “It was just a perfect blend of businesses, and I did that for quite a few years until it just became a little bit too much with the growth in the community.”

They sold the business, and after a brief retirement the couple opened Country Club RV in Yuma. Their partnership was important, as Lora’s knowledge and participation in running the business paved the way for a smoother transition when he passed away two years later. It is still a successful, thriving business today, in part because they had established a succession plan.

Succession Plan

Many small businesses are not prepared for the inevitable – at some point the enterprise will need to belong to someone else. Every business needs to put a succession plan in place in preparation for possibilities such as:

• Medical issues
• Death
• Retirement
• Selling the business
• Moving away

“Not a lot of people talk about or plan for succession,” Amanda said. “Especially if you’re a married couple or if you are in a partnership – determine what’s going to happen to the business, to the accounts, to the clients that you serve if something did happen to one person or the other. That is a big part of really mapping out your business properly.”

Lora had been involved in all aspects of the business before her husband died and when she became the president of the company, they developed another succession plan and put it in place. Her daughter serves as Lora’s right hand in the business, and they have taken the time to form a management team that is reliable and compatible.

Shifting to Female Ownership

Employees don’t always have positive reactions to changes in management. There are times when they lack the flexibility to accept a shift in power within the company’s hierarchy which means issues arise among your team members. Whether you’re a small business in Santa Clarita or a global giant, they need to be addressed before the problems get bigger and harder to handle.

“The team, the employees were great; it was my upper management that I had the issues with,” Lora said. “General manager, sales manager, service manager, primarily in my situation it was my general manager, who was there when Brent was alive. When Brent passed, he just kind of started taking the reins and doing what he wanted. So, I brought in a business consultant, which shocked him, to assess the business.”

Get a Neutral Assessment

A consultant from outside the area can serve as a neutral source of feedback about the effectiveness and compatibility of your personnel. In the case of a small community, such as managing a business in Santa Clarita or Yuma, it’s a good idea to choose someone from outside your area because you’re better informed when you’re open to different viewpoints.

The consultant Lora hired to assess Country Club RV met with each of the employees. “He looked at everything, he looked at the books, payroll, he looked at everything from top to bottom,” she said. “At the end of the first day he came to me, and he said, ‘You know, you’ve got poison here and it’s your general manager.’ I kind of had a feeling, but I needed that reassurance. I knew I was moving in the right direction. … We fired him that afternoon.”

Lora’s proactive stance in getting an outside assessment was the best small business management decision at the time, because she became more aware of problems affecting her employees. “I didn’t see what they were seeing, and it was harming them,” she explained. “I was going to start losing employees, so I think it was really important that I made some moves right away.”

Reaching out for someone to evaluate your business involves setting your ego aside because vulnerability is part of the process, but it reinforces your confidence in making changes to your company.

The Importance of Trust

One of the most important features of your business when it undergoes changes at the top is to establish and fortify trust. The transition is easier when employees already trust the outgoing executives; new leaders need to earn their trust in order to move forward.

“The majority of my employees were very, very faithful and I think I had their trust,” Lora said. “I think the problem I came up against was with management that worked under me but thought that I worked for them. So, we had a little bit of a struggle with that, lost a few employees, but normally it went into such a more positive direction.”

Even associates such as your suppliers and manufacturers may be unaccustomed to dealing with a lady boss – particularly in certain industries. Gaining widespread trust in Lora’s expertise took time because there are very few RV dealers run by females.

“You just stick to your horses, and you go forward, and you have a vision, and you follow through with it. I think that’s the most important thing,” she said. “Just letting people know that we’re still here. It may be me running it by myself instead of my husband and myself, but we’re still here. Our customers are what make us, so that’s our focus.”

Your Business and the Community

The community, including your customer base, can have mixed reactions to a woman in a position of power, so a female who is rising to leadership within a company should be fully engaged rather than taking a backseat to their partner. Lora’s previous involvement in the business gave her an advantage. Surprised responses to Lora’s role began when she and her husband had their car dealership because a woman empowered to make decisions is rare in her field.

Within a small community you see a unique level of pride as they care about their reputation and place among other entrepreneurs. Getting involved with local nonprofits is foundational for Santa Clarita business owners because it’s such an effective way to connect and support each other. Through philanthropy you can earn trust and gain mutual respect with other small business owners and colleagues.

Staying consistent in your community engagement is key to developing a positive reputation. If you can’t support local organizations with a financial donation, you can still get involved by taking your staff to clean up the roadside or serve at an event (it’s a great corporate teambuilding idea too). Lora is a talented artist, so she donates her paintings to benefit local causes from hospice services to the Humane Society.

A positive byproduct of donating time or money is that your company gains exposure, which is important for a new small business owner who needs help getting traction.

“It’s a lot of work, getting your business off the ground, there’s no question,” Amanda said. “But it does make such a difference to feel and know you are giving back to the community that you are asking to support your business.”

The RV business in Yuma gets approximately 100,000 winter visitors, many who are retired, and interfacing with them is Lora’s strong suit. She knows the positive effects of the owner personally connecting with customers by introducing herself and listening to their stories.

“They really appreciate that, and I think it brings us closer,” she said. “In a small community you work off referrals and they’re more likely to go refer you to their friends.”

Advice for Women in Business

Research from 2021 shows that women hold only about 30 of the CEO positions at S&P 500 companies. There are many reasons that so few females get to the top spot of corporations, including issues with confidence and boundaries. Successful businesswomen have identified effective strategies for females who get the opportunity to move into a leadership position or start a small business.

Find Trustworthy Childcare

Particularly when you have young kids, it’s important to find someone you trust, whether it’s a nanny, a neighbor, or a cousin. Determine who will do childcare and put a backup in place. Whether or not you have a husband who is flexible and supportive, you need to feel confident about both your work and the care of your children, relationship with your partner, and status of your household.

Design a Workable Schedule

Even with the best personnel, the structure of your calendar can determine whether your lifestyle is distracting or smooth sailing. From kids to husbands to pets, when you set up a system for their food, activities and care you’re better prepared to handle the unknown occurrences within your business. It helps to have a mindset that’s committed to maintaining the details of your scheduling – both at home and at work. To minimize chaos, make sure that housekeepers, sitters, dog walkers, and family members are all on the same page.

Put systems in place that free you from being tied to the hands-on responsibilities at the workplace. With today’s technology you can access your business from anywhere. There are many web applications that you can utilize to manage your company from a distance – such as your home – at any time.

“It makes such a difference,” Lora said. “I can look at all the deals they’re working, I can look at all the financial statements – everything is right there at my fingertips.”

Ask for Help

Women often feel they can play every role and “do it all,” but it’s time to move past that roadblock and reach out for support. Nothing outweighs the importance of your children, spouse, or other loved ones, but there are going to be times when you need to have someone else help you with responsibilities related to them. Your kids may need to get from point A to point B, for instance.

Every business owner struggles, particularly women who feel responsible for handling both a business and domestic life. Sometimes you can find a better way, and sometimes you sacrifice sleep.

Ask other women how they’re doing and find out from successful female founders how they have been able to manage a business and a family. Reach out to those who have made it through the phase you’re currently struggling to survive.

Consider outside help such as a good accountant to help you handle your finances and consider a righthand person for both work and home.

Supportive people were essential for Amanda to become an entrepreneur. “Their help allowed me to do other things that made me feel that I was being successful at home,” she said. “It allowed me to work to bring home the money to get us to the next phase of life.”

It is an effective part of taking over a business or starting a new venture. While it is difficult for many women to ask for help, you set yourself up for failure by not proactively seeking assistance or refusing to accept it when it’s offered.

Build a Balanced Team

When you’re rebuilding a business or launching a new company, bring a diverse group of people onboard.

Building a team of individuals with strengths you don’t have will maximize your success, according to Rachel Cosgrove, owner of Santa Clarita business Results Fitness and a guest on the Ask Amanda Show last season. Choose people who are experts in your weakest areas, whether it’s proficiency with social media or accounting.

“You have a special trade, you have a special skill set,” Amanda said, “but you don’t have ALL the trades and all of the skill sets, so reach out to other people to fill in those gaps.”

When Lora took over the business she brought in her daughter as a corporate officer and hired a strong and independent female controller. Two of her managers are very different from each other but work together smoothly. “One is great at fixing problems because he’s very calm,” she said. “And the other one is a go-getter. He takes charge and it’s such a great balance.”

This is Lora’s “dream team.”

“It makes such a difference, and it doesn’t always happen overnight,” she said. “It takes a while to find the right people, so don’t be afraid to kind of find your way as I’ve had to do.”

Meet the Experts

Lora Dana – Lady Boss

Lora is the owner and president of Country Club RV located in Yuma, Arizona, a business she and her husband launched in 2013. The company’s motto is “Best people, best product, best place” and she works very hard to live up to that in every way. She has worked for a TV station and launched her own advertising business, but when her husband passed away, Lora shifted into a new role as sole owner of Country Club RV.

A third generation Yuman, Lora expresses her creativity through painting on canvas. Lori is a mother and a grandmother who enjoys raising a number of rescue dogs. A self-proclaimed “people person,” she is happy to connect with others. If you would like to start a conversation or ask her questions about women in business, you can reach out through CCMotorsRV.com or find her on Facebook and Instagram.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

 About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!

Whether you’re a small business owner or a corporate executive, it is essential to have a skilled, competent human resources specialist in place. To find out how your company can build a stronger infrastructure through an independent HR practitioner, Amanda Benson-Tilch, host of The Ask Amanda Show, invited Selina Thomas of 6 Degrees HR Consulting into the studio. Known as “SCV’s HR Guru,” Selina joins Amanda to discuss everything from creating a comprehensive, updated employee handbook to mandates involving employee perks and diversity training.

Benefits of Hiring an Outside HR Company

From small SCV businesses to global corporations, there are circumstances where it’s more beneficial to turn to an outside HR expert.

Expense

A small business such as a physician’s private practice may not need an HR expert on site, but they still need human resources infrastructure. That includes an employee handbook, employee files, and ongoing training to maintain a company culture that aligns with their mission statement. It is the skeletal building block of your small business. Contracting with an outside HR professional on a case-by-case basis is much more affordable than forming a permanent department in-house.

Even large companies with a human resources department on site can benefit from outsourcing certain services. In some cases, it can be a means of saving money for a corporate business owner, but there are other reasons to use an outside practitioner as well.

Neutrality

At times, sizable companies with an in-house HR department of their own need a neutral, outsourced person to handle policies involving employees or issues with clients. The benefit of using an HR professional who is not on their payroll is “they don’t have the people or the politics,” Selina explained. “Someone who doesn’t have a dog in the fight or skin in the game.”

Circumstances where a company owner may outsource HR services include:

• Serving a client who wants to have the perspective of a third party from a trusted professional – for example, attorney Brian Koegle sometimes reaches out to Selina for this purpose
• Conducting a workplace investigation as a third party
• Handling recruiting and hiring off-site to maintain a discreet process

Recruiting

With the current workforce shortage, business owners needing help with turnover rates can reach out to a human resources specialist to fill gaps by connecting them to top talent.

When searching for new hires, business owners in Santa Clarita benefit from Selina’s connections. She regularly receives resumes from job candidates who are qualified for positions that become available. She posts job opportunities on various platforms such as the College of the Canyons job board, where interested parties respond to 6 Degrees HR Consulting instead of directly to her client. By using a third party instead of conducting a search internally, executives can have their query handled below the radar.

“I have people in the pipeline all the time – especially right now coming back into the workforce – that really rely on that connection,” Selina said, “and I’m glad to be that for everybody.”

New Trainings and Initiatives from Your HR Expert

The latest call for a new training program is sometimes the result of larger social issues. Emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic there were certain matters that came to the forefront for business owners.

“Those things collided for me, which is what I specialize in,” Selina said. “So, you now have all of these things that were maybe not as prevalent being very prevalent in the workplace. Think about trying to be profitable and productive with these things happening.”

There are new mandates and initiatives that companies want to introduce and Selina has been hired by businesses in SCV to help them in the development process. She recently helped develop an initiative for Scorpion in Valencia to create a training for diversity, inclusion and belonging.

Harassment and Cyberbullying

Among the issues that business owners need to begin addressing are sexual harassment and a hostile work environment.

There needs to be change in conduct when it comes to communicating in a way that is appropriate at work. Using Jon Gruden, who resigned from the Las Vegas Raiders, as a recent example, she said that a similar scandal could be fatal to the branding for a small business in SCV without support from an expert. But the resulting culture shock can also be damaging for a large organization like the Raiders. An international brand needs to pivot and not just recover, but ultimately create policy changes.

Selina works with clients to develop new reporting processes and adopting a zero tolerance for inappropriate behavior.  “We have a communication process that allows everyone to feel psychologically safe,” she said. “You really need that when you’re working with people, that they feel psychologically safe at work.”

One of the problems with being lax around questionable behavior is that it segues into consequential actions such as cyberbullying, which increased 3000% during the pandemic. “Because people were comfortable behind the keyboard, behind the phone,” Selina explained, “they were comfortable in their home – they were relaxed, they were loosely dressed or not dressed at all. These are the types of things that people don’t realize – you’re still at work, you’re still accountable and you’re still impactful to someone else that you work with.”

Employees who are shuttered and lose sight of appropriate boundaries will ultimately burden the company when their actions result in a sexual harassment claim. That’s the type of pattern that emerged over the crisis.

Developing Preventative Policies

Your HR specialist needs to train staff members to develop a mindset and incorporate accountability – first on the individual level. When employees personally adopt that mindset, they can extend it to their colleagues and ultimately affect the company culture.

The mindset comes from an infrastructure created through policy, training, protocols, and process. The goal is to create a campaign of awareness that makes a difference, not just put a policy in place and hope it works. An ongoing strategic partnership with an HR expert provides the collaboration and support for your business that makes the changes sustainable.

“Some of it is truly just processing the crisis and helping the owner realize ‘how did it evolve?’” Selina explained. “So, we’re doing a little bit of debriefing, too, so we can avoid it happening.”

To survive and thrive, an international corporation or small SCV business needs to update its policies and procedures. You’re mitigating risk when you have these training programs, but it’s not enough. You need to have a mindset, a company culture that ascribes to that training in real life.

“Compliance with the people part is essential because there has to be the buy-in for that to really emerge in action,” Selina said.

The Employee Handbook

An outsourced HR professional can help you create or update your employee handbook. One of the handbook’s most important features is the definition it provides new hires.

“When you’re orienting them to who you are and what your standards are, what your expectations are – it’s in that book,” Selina explained. “It truly is your company bible.”

The introduction to your company is essential – the new employee is getting to know you and vice versa. For HR best practices, the employee handbook should include such content as:

• Sick pay
• Holiday scheduling
• Policy for extended leave
• Discipline
• Attendance
• Medical/dental benefits
• Maternity leave
• Code of conduct
• Dress code
• Policy on use of cell phones
• Policy regarding use of Internet and email

The rules and guidelines in your employee handbook reflect your company’s expectations – you don’t want a cookie cutter guide. In heavily litigious states such as California, defending your company really does come back to what you provided the employee as a guide to who you are and what the rules are.

Every new hire should receive a full copy, digital if possible, so they can refer to policies even when they aren’t at work. With attrition rates and employment turnovers, you don’t need to print a hard copy for everyone; but keeping one on site is a good idea.

You should update the handbook once a year, typically January 1, because mandates change annually. An outside HR professional can offer you an overall assessment of your current handbook to see where you are and provide a trajectory to make it current.

If you’re a growing SCV business that’s evolved as a company, there may be regulations that are no longer applicable. And the reverse is true as well.

“You could be shrinking your business and you need things to be tighter,” Amanda pointed out. “And maybe roles have changed.”

Throughout the COVID epidemic, many companies instituted remote employment options. “The whole process of accessing your employees and expectations is different, so they had to restructure their handbook for the remote worker,” Selina said. “There are different guidelines for that.”

Questions that employers now need to consider include:

• Are you required to be on camera when you’re on a meeting?
• What are you allowed to say?
• What access does the business owner have to your home office?
• Can they tap into your computer when you work remotely?

“We’ve evolved, so your handbook has to evolve,” Selina said. “These are things that people don’t think about, but that I specialize in.”

The process of incorporating an outside HR practitioner is organic. You may reach out for changes to the handbook, then realize they can help your small business grow more inclusive by training staff, or prevent labor lawsuits with proper recruitment practices.

“I have so many different types of companies, but the common denominator in each one is that there are people,” Selina said. “Whether it’s a different industry or not, I just love being around people. I love helping companies grow. I love seeing owners who are coming out of recovery at this point saying, ‘Our company is in a comfortable place, in terms of the company culture.’”

Meet the Experts

Selina Thomas – SCV’s HR Guru

As the owner and founder of 6 Degrees HR Consulting, Selina Thomas is a strategic partner working with businesses in Santa Clarita as well as others in California and across the country. A seasoned professional with 15 years of human resource experience, she’s a proven compliance and safety specialist with an emphasis on human resources infrastructure and business development. She offers support for business owners, managing the company’s day-to-day HR needs including offer letters, background checks, on-boarding, employee records management, employee relations and more.

With PHR (Professional in Human Resources) certification and as a SHRM-CP (Society for Human Resources Management Certified Professional), Selina is committed to lifelong learning which includes earning a minimum of 80 continuing education units annually. This enables her to be updated on new mandates, both in and out of California.

Selina launched the company in 2014 working out of a local Starbucks, choosing the name 6 Degrees which refers to the global concept that everyone on the planet is connected by six people. An advocate for the business community, employers, and their employees, she brings the voices of the community to the public in a bi-weekly podcast show for the SCV Signal, providing the latest information and stories about the people behind the businesses of SCV.

She can be reached through her website, 6degreesHRconsulting.com. Keep up with Selina through her video podcast  and on Facebook and LinkedIn.

Amanda Benson-Tilch – Small Business Consulting

While you may notice her first by her wit and second by her infectious sense of humor, the next thing you’ll learn about Amanda Benson-Tilch is: She’s a problem-solver. Owner and Growth Strategist of Ask Amanda Consulting, she offers the skills, tools, and network it takes to get the job done — no matter the task.

Working with each client differently, she helps identify blocks, present solutions, implement them, and execute. And if she can’t execute, she’ll connect you to someone who can. She’s helped past clients improve their branding, operations, customer service, marketing, company culture, and more. She’s organized a company-wide rebranding and restructuring after it was bought out. And she’s helped local small businesses increase their growth without increasing the headache. From consulting to full-scale project management, Amanda steps in to help your business level up with ease.

In addition to her work with Ask Amanda, she’s also the Director of Business Development for Thomas Realty Co., a property management company in Burbank, where she oversees the growth of select tenants. Currently, she’s serving as the Managing Director of both Burbank Fitness Club and Burbank Center Apartments. Over the last year, she helped completely rebrand, renovate, and rebuild the gym, and she recently started the same process with their luxury apartments.

Follow Amanda on Facebook and Instagram.

 About The Ask Amanda Show

On any given day, small business owners and entrepreneurs spend most of their time putting out fires, solving problems and asking themselves questions like: “How do I brand this? How do I reach more people online? Why can’t I break through my revenue ceiling and reach the next level of business?” They often feel like an island – holding it all together without the support, clarity, or feedback they need to finally achieve their vision. That’s exactly why Amanda Benson-Tilch created The Ask Amanda Show. As a small business consultant, not only does she have the answers to the questions you keep asking, but she’s also created a podcast community that reminds you: You’re not alone in this journey.

Tune in once a month to get access to small business experts, nuggets of inspiration and answers to those burning questions preventing you from growth. Enjoy powerful guest interviews as Santa Clarita small business experts share their stories and provide actionable steps to help you grow your business. Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, or someone looking to get more involved in your community, this is your show!