Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
How to find the North Star of your brand with Ellette Studio with Lisa Aihara
71 Plays4 years ago
In today's episode, we speak to the amazing Lisa Aihara, owner of Ellette Branding Studio. With programs such as Canva and stock images, we are starting to live in a very copy and paste world. The same images and fonts are being used throughout social media and business websites. It's no wonder we have lost the beauty of handmade art. With her strategic marketing mindset and business background, Lisa started a strategic branding studio for ambitious entrepreneurs, coaches, and bosses who are tired of seeing the same old boring generic designs.
Lisa now uses her creativity and visual storytelling to create beautiful handmade designs for her clients. In today's episode, we will be talking about all things branding and the power it can have on your business.
Connect with Lisa
Website: Ellettestudio.com
Connect on IG: @ellettestudio
Connect with Carissa
Coaching IG: @Carissawoo
Photography IG: @carissawoophotography
Download a free guide on how to become a lead generating machine HERE
Master, the dreaded sales call with Carissa Woo:
https://carissawoo.samcart.com/products/7steps
Buy the Photo Booth
http://photoboothsupplyco.com/carissawoo
Download your free Canva template here: https://www.ellettestudio.com/heckyes
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Lisa Arihara and Alette Studio
00:00:01
Speaker
Hey guys, today's episode is with Lisa. Lisa Arihara is the owner and artist of Alette Studio, a strategic branding design studio for ambitious entrepreneurs, coaches and bosses who are done with that blah and generic. An MBA turned creative, Lisa creates handmade designs with purpose and is passionate for visual storytelling that has a clear strategic direction. She's a mom of two based in LA and when she's not working with her clients or running around with her kids,
00:00:27
Speaker
She's learning how to read astrological charts and tarot cards. In this episode, we are going to be talking about all things branding. And guess what? Lisa's on my team, so I'm proud to introduce Lisa. Enjoy.
Carissa Wu's Podcast and Lisa's Role
00:00:44
Speaker
Welcome to Get a Heck Yes with Carissa Wu. I'm your host, Carissa, and I've been a wedding photographer for over a decade. I've traveled the world and seen it all. I coach wedding photographers hit 10K a month and build a thriving business. In this podcast, we are going to deep dive into how top wedding creatives get that heck yes from their dream clients. We are not holding back on the struggles of the business and how to push through the noise. Some healthy hustle, mindset shifts, up-leveling your money story, time hacks,
00:01:12
Speaker
A little bit of woo woo, and most importantly, self love are just a few of the many things we will talk about. I want to give you a genuine thank you for following along my journey. I hope to inspire you every Woo Wednesday so that you say heck yes to listening to this podcast.
00:01:30
Speaker
Hey guys, it's Carissa and I'm here with my good friend Lisa from Alette Studio. She actually is one of my team members. She does all my designs, she's my virtual assistant, she did all my Carissa with photography branding, even do some copywriting for me, he do all my designs, he do all my sales pages, the list goes on and on and on. So here you go Lisa, tell us a little bit about yourself.
Lisa's Diverse Career Journey
00:01:54
Speaker
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. So like you said, I'm the owner and founder of Alette Studio, we're a
00:02:00
Speaker
Strategic Creative Studio, we really do branding and illustrations for entrepreneurs and ambitious creative females, essentially.
00:02:14
Speaker
have come from this sort of past life as a digital marketing specialist. And so I have this weird like eclectic resume where I can kind of do a lot of different things. I was a copywriter, I was a web designer, I was heading up marketing for Disney, all of that. So whether it's websites or setting up process or managing projects and also graphic design, I could kind of come in
00:02:42
Speaker
help folks out and love working with branding, I love working with graphic design, and yeah, just like making people's lives a little bit easier, essentially. So what would you call yourself now? I like to say that I'm like your designer friend, right? Like when you have that sort of designer friend who could do stuff for you, you don't need to call 500 different specialists, right?
00:03:05
Speaker
I think today it's very trendy almost to niche down and have that very specific thing that you're good at, which is amazing too. I think that it's fantastic to have specialties and sometimes you need a specialist for certain jobs, but there's a season of your life kind of like me right now where when I go grocery shopping,
00:03:27
Speaker
I wish I could go to the Japanese market for my meats and, you know, like whole foods for my produce or even for my produce and Trader Joe's for my snacks. But like, I don't have time for that. And honestly, I just need to go to one place, get all my stuff, like go to Target, like get everything from toilet paper to applesauce for my kid. And I'm kind of like that person to like a one stop shop, essentially, like if you need design, if you need help managing your project, if you need to design a workflow,
00:03:57
Speaker
I could sort of do beginning to end for you. That's actually a really good sum up for you. It's like it's my thing and I'm supposed to know what I'm doing. One stop shop Lisa. Yeah, come on down. I guess we'll back it up a little bit.
Connection and Collaboration in the Wedding Industry
00:04:15
Speaker
How do we meet me and you?
00:04:17
Speaker
Me and you met back in, I think like three, four years ago, I think. I started out this whole sort of creative journey within the wedding industry. So I was doing greeting cards as well as invitation design, stationeries, and then also chalkboard art and stuff. So still doing design stuff, but specifically within the wedding space.
00:04:41
Speaker
Did we like at a style shoot or like, or like rising tide Tuesday together, right, right. The local wedding pros sort of meet up. And yeah, that's still who I like to work with. Personally, the wedding industry folks, I think
00:04:59
Speaker
Not only are they one passionate, they're also crazy talented usually. And they have a design eye. Even if they're not a designer, whether it's your photographer or your event planner, you need to know what looks good. And you would be surprised how big of a difference that makes when you're working with a designer. If I'm working with someone who I need to explain design to, that's really, really difficult.
00:05:28
Speaker
So I love that wedding pros already come pre-qualified with that design muscle already because they already know what they like, they already know what looks good and what they're looking for. Is there other people that you used to work with that were just clueless?
00:05:45
Speaker
Some of the small businesses who are not visually oriented, like the mom and pop shops or an accounting office, for example, is a good one. Yeah, exactly. It's not their forte. They're very good at other stuff, obviously. I don't trust me with my taxes, but they bought that number.
00:06:08
Speaker
Yeah, I was very impressed by when I met you at Tuesdays together, you actually were there was a spotlight on you and you were just describing like the branding process where where you are going to get into a little bit later after I asked you a couple quick questions. So your viewers, the viewers are gonna should be excited for this one coming up because your brand is your everything, right? Yeah, I mean, I like to talk about branding almost like
00:06:34
Speaker
personification of you. If you're talking about the logo, the logo is almost a person's face and then the messaging is the things that you say and even what you wear, the way that you carry yourself. That's what branding is.
00:06:48
Speaker
So it really is your everything.
Understanding Branding with Lisa
00:06:50
Speaker
It's your business personified. And that having something that's professional, cohesive, it's easy to understand, I think makes a difference between looking ready to rock and roll to, oh, do they even know what they're doing?
00:07:05
Speaker
Yeah, I mean a question good question for you is how would you describe your brand? My brand is definitely me like put into the personification of the business. So I don't try to pretend like I'm this super professional, you know, like expert, I mean, like teach you something because I'm so like smart.
00:07:27
Speaker
I can only talk the way I talk. I only interact the way I interact. I think that really helps to get the point across that this is what you're going to get. I try to be consistent with that and knowing that my clients are looking for someone who could be their friend. The whole designer friend thing is even part of my branding too.
00:07:50
Speaker
You're professional. I'm not like, you know, this specialist is going to come in and like fix stuff for you, but I'm going to be here right here with you next to you and doing the work together and we're going to make something together. Yeah. I mean, you've been there for me every step of the way. You were super quick and just super to the point and you get stuff back to me quick style and you have two kids just like me. So.
00:08:15
Speaker
I don't know, I think kudos to us. Yeah, I mean, I think once you once you get a kid, like you have to figure out how to time manage or you'll just not get anything done ever. Yeah, do you have a certain time management tip that you could give me or the viewers?
00:08:31
Speaker
Yeah I mean you know I don't know if it's a tip because I well the one tip that I can give is keep trying different things and figuring out what works best for you and not just for you but for you at that time because you know kids change every single day where a tip that I could have given last week is not going to apply today because my son he is going to be three in September but he is a different person every day I feel like he's into different things he's
00:09:00
Speaker
changing all the time, like the time of day that he needs me or wants me.
Time Management Strategies for Busy Moms
00:09:05
Speaker
So I think being flexible, understanding that this is a phase in your life and that you're just going to get you done where you can get done. But one thing that I will say that always helps me is making lists, physical lists. I have a planner.
00:09:24
Speaker
a real paper and pen planner and I write down like brain dump every week of what I want done that week both professionally and personally and I kind of just use that as my brain in real life because my brain in my head is just so all over the place.
00:09:43
Speaker
Yeah, it was creative. I need to be able to see that and go, okay. And then I have this system of moving things over, prioritizing the top five and not being too greedy about what to get done that day. And yeah, just starting everything with that paper and pen list. And I gotta say, you and people have vouched this for, as for you to talk about you, is that you seem very stress-free.
00:10:08
Speaker
Yeah, you're very easy going. You're down to earth. You know, Lucas could be running around naked and hitting you. Don't bet a eye, like roll with the punches. So yeah, a lot of people have said that about you in the industry, and I feel the same way.
00:10:27
Speaker
Oh, that is so nice. That's so funny and also such a great compliment because that's definitely something that I strive for. That doesn't come supernaturally for me and it is something that I've had to work at to keep my anxiety or my perfectionism and all these controlling tendencies in check. Yeah. It's really nice to hear that it's manifesting and at least other people think that
00:10:53
Speaker
about me, even though I still don't really catch up with that myself. I'm like, oh, I could be a little better. No, totally. And I hope it manifests to me as your friend. So I wanted to ask you this question. I ask it to all my interviewees, but I call it my woo factor. What makes me stand out? So what is your Lisa Let's Studio factor about you? What makes you stand out?
00:11:20
Speaker
Yeah, I love this question also. I don't know if I've ever told you, but I love that you call it the woo factor. It's so cute. Anyways, so I think that I come from a kind of unique perspective because I am this weird sort of left brain, right brain hybrid.
00:11:38
Speaker
Okay, where, you know, in my past career, I was, you know, doing the whole digital marketing thing. And so I was, I had to be very strategic at to be very analytical, like data driven, you know, like, you don't get to be that sort of creative in that job, you kind of just need to make sure that things get done. And
00:11:56
Speaker
you know, as a result, like Excel spreadsheets are my love language. I love making reports and, you know, like the good Asian, nerdy math thing. But at the same time, you know, I'm an artist and I love my office looks like a paper tornado hit it. At all times, it's so messy. And we were just talking about my brain that's all over the place too.
00:12:20
Speaker
So I get to sort of approach a project with both of those hats on. Yeah, so I kind of get to see, you know, okay, well, what's, what's the strategy here? Like, how can we make it pretty, but also smart? And I think that that's something that is that not everyone sort of does, I feel like, you know,
00:12:39
Speaker
we lean in a little bit more to one side or the other. And I just can't let go of either because I'm too greedy. Yeah. I mean, why does your brain still work after two little kids? Because mine doesn't. Yeah, it's just for work. I think we were talking about this one time too. When it's work mode, it turns on. And other than that, I'm just like, I think I asked my husband the other day something like,
00:13:01
Speaker
Wait, are tortilla chips made out of tortillas? Like, do you fry tortillas to make that? She was like, oh my God, she's just like, yeah, but I'm like, oh, I just never really thought about it. Like my brain doesn't have capacity to think about trivial things like tortilla chips. Do you think edible? No, I still breastfeed and I am not high at the moment. You just chill.
00:13:29
Speaker
Anyways, I wanted to ask you one more question before we get into our hot topic of the day. What was your favorite job? Oh, that's a good one. It's one of those really cliche answers, I think, where I'm going to say, oh, every project I do is
00:13:46
Speaker
my new favorite. But this last project that I worked on with Go Little Tokyo, it was an activation for a community initiative to get people to come to Little Tokyo because they got really hit pretty badly with COVID, like the small businesses, the restaurant industry, what have you. And
00:14:05
Speaker
My friend works there and she asked me to do their branding essentially. So from illustrations to merchandise design, we did enamel pins, we did tote bags, and we did all of these illustrations that went on a bus, banners, you know. And so I went to one of the events this past weekend and
Favorite Projects and Design Philosophy
00:14:26
Speaker
Little Tokyo had a bunch of my illustrations on it, which was
00:14:29
Speaker
really, really cool to see it in real life. I love seeing my stuff in the digital space too. Anytime one of my past clients posts the stories with their sticker that I made them or their branding, I'm like, oh, and get a little giddy. But it was something really special to see it actually tangible in real life.
00:14:49
Speaker
What did they print it on? Yeah, so one of them was a bus. It's a bus decal that's on one of the buses that are roaming around in downtown LA. And then they had a banner, like a big one that goes on the street. They also, because it was this sort of event, Delicious Little Tokyo, which is this summer event that they do every year to try and get people to come out and eat all the delicious food in Little Tokyo.
00:15:15
Speaker
They had this, like, backdrop, like a step and repeat. And so I took a picture in front of it with my babies saying, like, oh, I made all of these. Yeah, that's really your, like, 1D team. I'm famous in little Tokyo, guys. Yeah, I'm a people. Yeah, so that was really cool, since it was not only in real life, but also being able to be a part of community and being able to get back in that way.
00:15:44
Speaker
No, I saw that on Instagram. I wish I could have made it, but I had to work. Yeah. I really wanted to attend. Yeah. Well, next time. And any time, go to a little Tokyo. So this is a little plug. There's lots of good food places, lots of good shopping. Stop on by. Yeah. And my husband's Japanese, so the in-laws. We go there every year for New Year's, and it's very special to my heart, too.
00:16:05
Speaker
Cool. Okay. Let's get into our hot topic of the day. You could kind of segue into that. I know you have some really fun tips that are very exciting. So what do we have today? Yeah. So I thought we'd talk about branding. You know, it's like I do that for a living. Surprise, surprise, guys. One thing
00:16:27
Speaker
that I always like to say about branding that I hope everyone takes away is that branding is not easy obviously and that's why everyone talks about it and there's all these people who will take your money to help you with it but it's simple right like branding is just about setting rules for yourself and following them so take you know color for example like you set the rule to say this is my color palette and make sure those are the only colors that you use predominantly
00:16:56
Speaker
Same with fonts, same with photo style, and then of course the logo. I think a little while ago, maybe even now, it was kind of trendy to have various logos, if you've seen those. They call it different versions of the logo, but they just look like completely different logos for different formats.
00:17:18
Speaker
I don't personally subscribe to that because I think that consistency is really key with branding and so you know I do offer a logo suite for my clients too but that's really just about format like having a rectangle logo and a square logo and you know a brand mark that's just a monogram but they're not different right they're just different formats of it resized and so I think that consistency cohesiveness keeping it simple is really the key with branding.
00:17:46
Speaker
Yeah. Did you get my branding book yet? It's coming to you actually directly. So yeah. Cool. Yeah. So I'm going to use that as like my branding book. Yeah. Branding book. I love the brand book because it's sort of a play off of the style guide that a lot of corporations use for their branding's guide essentially. So it's pretty much your rule book, right? It's follow these directions, make sure you're using a logo in these ways, use these colors. Like this is your,
00:18:13
Speaker
positioning your messaging and what's really nice that I've heard past clients do with it is they can pass it on to say they're like VA or you know when they're onboarding a new person. I think that it's becoming a lot more affordable and also realistic for entrepreneurs to hire on help and so as we have multiple hands touching the brand it gets even more critical that we're making sure everyone's stepping to
00:18:42
Speaker
and marching to the same drum beat, and we're all kind of telling the same story together. Totally. I think you said, if I'm correct, the North Star. The North Star, yeah. I love the brand new North Star. The brand new North Star. It's kind of like, you look at this, brand new could actually get confusing. Like, oh, I like this. I like this. I saw this on Pinterest. I saw this on Instagram. I want to do this. I want to do that.
00:19:09
Speaker
But you really have to hone in your brand and make it as consistent as possible. And I think what I asked you a question during one of our calls, what's your favorite brand? And you said Sephora, right? Sephora is one of my favorite. They are so consistent.
00:19:27
Speaker
have ever shopped there or have their app or go online. You know what I mean? Their color is black and white. Their positioning is always the same. They always come with the same expert messaging that's still friendly. I think that's why I want to be that designer friend. Sephora feels like that chic makeup friend and that's their branding too. I love that consistency.
00:19:55
Speaker
hit that nail on the head with the hammer and that's essentially what successful branding is.
00:20:02
Speaker
to your point of like seeing all these things and wanting all these things. Like sometimes our eyes are bigger than what our brand can handle. And that's why I like using Northstar as a way to describe it because there's all these different paths that you can take and they're not necessarily wrong, right? And that's what makes branding and design so difficult because it's subjective. It's like, I like it and that's okay. Like you can like all of these things too. But if you have these sort of guidelines in place, you at least know
00:20:30
Speaker
What to choose that's right for you not necessarily the right path because there's no such thing But what's the right option for what you're trying to do with your brand? Yes, I love that. Okay, so that was tip number one. It's pretty low then I call it. Let's just call it. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's not easy, but it's simple just follow the North Star
00:20:52
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, totally. Okay, so that brings us to tip number two. I know a lot of the folks that are going to be listening are wedding pros. And I think what wedding pros have as a huge advantage over other sort of service industries is that a lot of your work is photography based, right? Like whatever you do within a wedding space, like there's always a photographer on site.
00:21:18
Speaker
So you don't have an excuse to not have good photos of your stuff, which means that your photos can be your starting point for your visual identity direction,
Visual Branding Tips for Wedding Professionals
00:21:29
Speaker
right? Like, so say someone's like, oh, well, you know, I don't know what colors I should pick or, you know, should I just pick my favorite colors? Like you should look at all the photos that you have of your work, your face, right? The ones that you're going to slap on as a hero image of your website and see what colors look good with that, whether it's,
00:21:47
Speaker
colors that are always present or colors that will complement the colors that are always present. So I think we talked about this with your branding too, Carissa. One of the colors that we have is that teal, right? And I picked that out specifically from one of the hero photos that you have. It's amazing. I tried to slap it onto everything, like the veil, the door. Yeah, it's so pretty. And so that's one of your colors.
00:22:12
Speaker
I use pink as the main sort of signature color for you because your style is so bright and so light and has this sort of like delightful, you know, happy feeling associated to it. And it looks good with the skin tone that you edit with. So, you know, whether you're a photographer who understands, you know, the color mixes, like think about how you're editing your photos and what colors you're, you know, punching up or toning down.
00:22:39
Speaker
those could be places that you start as you think about what you want your visual identity to look like. That's a great point because sometimes I coach a lot of wedding photographers and we want to come up with, you know, help them with their branding. And I actually just say, like, you don't even have to go out and shoot right now. Like, just show me your galleries, what you already have. And let's see, like, what colors are you drawn to?
00:23:06
Speaker
Are you drawn to very bright poppy patterns? Or are you drawn to all neutrals and that more like boho brownish tint? And yeah, it's kind of like what their eye likes, that's what they're going to be shooting. And then you could develop, you know, your North Star and then
00:23:24
Speaker
give these color palettes to your couples so your brand is just gonna look cohesive in the future. Yeah, so then no matter what photo you use on your website, what photos you have on your Instagram grid, they're all gonna look good together because you kind of have this tailored, curated color palette going.
00:23:52
Speaker
This season's podcast is sponsored by Photobooth Supply. Photobooth Supply helps entrepreneurs start and scale their businesses by creating meaningful experiences with a photobooth. Living in the digital age, anywhere people gather is an opportunity for experience. And what better way to capture those memories than with a photobooth?
00:24:09
Speaker
There has never been an easier way for photographers to scale their businesses, increase their marketing efforts, and maintain cash flow during off-season than with a photo booth like the Salsa booth. Increase revenue 600 to 800 per event by adding a photo booth to your services so you can make more money and work less. If you don't provide a photo booth, someone else will, so stop leaving money on the table and get yourself a Salsa booth today.
00:24:36
Speaker
I love that. Okay, so you could do tip number three. Tip number three is actually a perfect segue from what you were saying of looking at your own work and sort of trying to go from there to understand what you like. I think that a lot of times when people talk about branding, the conversation becomes about, oh, who's your ideal client, right? And that's like the whole customer avatar thing is like the big thing.
00:25:00
Speaker
But I kind of want to challenge people to, instead of looking outward at who you're serving, start with yourself and really get a handle on what it is about you that you want to tell in the branding, right? Because it's definitely important to understand who you're talking to because that would tailor the way that you talk. But at the same time, you're not going to be able to fake being a different person, you know what I mean? So just because maybe your ideal client is, say,
00:25:30
Speaker
someone who is going to love astrology and somehow that's like in your Customer avatar like description where they make you write down all these characteristics But if you don't like astrology, like there's no way to talk to that person, right? Like you can't geek out about oh your Sun sign in your moon sign like none of that is gonna like you
00:25:50
Speaker
So I think a lot of that sort of self-awareness, self-understanding, knowing how you want to show up into the space is going to be what's first and foremost needs to be reflected in your branding. Do you have any exercises for that? Yeah.
00:26:07
Speaker
you know, one thing that I've loved seeing people do is they talk to past clients of theirs and sort of like ask them, you know, like, hey, like do as part of maybe your test collecting testimonials or collecting, you know, reviews or doing surveys, like kind of ask them, like, what is it about me that you enjoyed working with me on this? Or like, what,
00:26:30
Speaker
or like what was, why were you drawn to me? Why were you drawn to me? What was the thing that made you book me? You know, what did you enjoy most about working with me? Another thing that I think is really cool to see is look at all of your email correspondences that you've had with your client and kind of try, I know it's hard, so maybe like start from clients that are a long time ago that maybe you don't remember all of the correspondences with and just read through and like get an idea of like this sort of tone and this
00:27:00
Speaker
um relationship that you have with your clients and sort of understand like how they see you how you treat them you know because there isn't any right way to speak to your clients or to interact with the clients like for some people it's being friends with them and that works really well other times it's having that very clear professional outline um like
00:27:20
Speaker
line in the sand and that doesn't make you cold, it just makes you a professional and some people appreciate that. My sister is one of those types of people too where for certain professionals, she doesn't want someone who's her friend, she wants an authoritative person.
00:27:37
Speaker
I think there's those two vectors that you want to look at. How close you want to be with your clients? Is it friendly? Is it more expert? Also, how you connect with them. Are you someone that they're going to try to aspire to or someone who they're going to connect with?
00:27:57
Speaker
Um, a way that I sort of differentiate that is like Beyonce. I know I'm not going to be able to be friends with her, right? Like that's, oh, yeah. I'm like, who do I think I am? The audacity, but I look adore her. Right. And so that's sort of the relationship. She's a queen. Yeah. Don't talk to the queen. Um, and so obviously a very extreme example, but you know, maybe some people thrive in that kind of relationship with the client and those are the types of clients that they attract.
00:28:27
Speaker
So understanding how they see you, how you treat them, how you talk to them is a really good start to understand what kind of positioning you might use and the language that you use. That's almost like your business approach, too. Yeah, totally. So I think that it's all connected, which is what makes it so hard, I think, to try to
00:28:50
Speaker
Pick out just the one bit of it. It's one of those things I think where you're not gonna get it for a really long time to be honest with you like you're just gonna keep like inching up at knowing yourself and then knowing the business and knowing what you like and you know trying to get a feel for the industry and like as you sort of Climb these different towers to stack these different towers with blocks. They're all gonna get to a level one day where it all clicks and
00:29:17
Speaker
And I think people get either frustrated on their pursuit of that or think that they're not good enough because they're not getting there or that they're in the wrong industry because they're not getting it. But I think that it takes people two, three years at least.
00:29:36
Speaker
to get to a place after launching their business to be able to say, okay, this is who I am, and this is what I want to do, and this is the way that I want to show up for the world. Yeah, it's more like, am I a hey girl, hey, hey Boston lady, or am I a hello there friend? You're not going to know that when you're a baby in your business. You have to come to your own first.
00:29:58
Speaker
Yeah, it definitely feels more comfortable as you keep going. So how many more tips do you have? I mean, I've got tips for days. But yeah, I think, yeah, I mean, look, I am here for all the free tips, whatever you need. But yeah, I think what we're kind of talking about with knowing yourself within that first
00:30:20
Speaker
bit of it takes a little while. I'll also share that most of the clients that I work with are people who's been in business for two, three, even five years before they think about branding and that's totally okay because I think that first bit is definitely an exercise in understanding yourself and getting a better idea of which one your North Star is and that's totally, totally fine.
00:30:44
Speaker
Be yourself and just do your thing first. I think that there's a point in your business where you're too busy doing your business to work on your business. I think that you have to go through that. Kids have to go through the tantrum phase before they become adults. I wish that my son doesn't scream at me every time I tell him to put pants on, but this is the rite of passage and one day he'll wear underwear and I have to believe it.
00:31:14
Speaker
I wanted to ask you one powerful question before we get into the rapid fire questions. But Lisa, what is your biggest accomplishment? Like in life or in business? Well, I guess life, like business life. Business life. In business life, my biggest accomplishment is exactly what I was just talking about, like understanding myself.
00:31:36
Speaker
and knowing that the way that I am is perfectly fine to serve the people who need a person like me.
00:31:45
Speaker
A lot of times, even within the entrepreneur space, there's trends, there's the best practices. I always sort of felt like I was outside of that because one, I had a corporate life before. Two, I was this weird hybrid. And three, I didn't want to niche down. I wanted to be able to do different things. I felt like maybe I didn't belong in this space for a really long time.
00:32:12
Speaker
I just kept kind of, I was like, okay, well, you know, I'll just keep trucking along and I've been trucking along into the day. I think now we're coming up to five years that I've been doing the business. And I finally feel like, oh, actually like this is all of those past stuff has been sort of a scavenger hunt in getting all of these pieces that I need to be
00:32:35
Speaker
you know, this one-stop shop, like the thing that no one else can really do the way that I do it, and that's amazing, right? And I think being able to say that about myself and being proud of the work that I do is kind of a big accomplishment for me.
00:32:51
Speaker
Oh, I love that.
Lisa's Path to Self-awareness and Business Success
00:32:52
Speaker
And just like Steve Jobs says, like you can't connect the dots forward, but you could connect the dots looking back. That's kind of just amazing. Yeah. So when you said the scavenger hunt, I was like, Ooh, I got chills because it is kind of like the scavenger hunt. Like some days you're like, what am I doing? Like, is it even worth that? But then you look back and you're like, Oh, I so needed that day to happen. And like that failure to happen or that pitfall or that
00:33:17
Speaker
day of crying because something bad happened because it catapulted me or propelled me to this moment right now or taught me a very important lesson. 100%. Yeah, everything happens for a reason as long as you give it a reason. Yes. Okay, so let's do some more fun rapid fire questions. I don't want to start negative, but I was going to say, what was your biggest perceived failure and how did you overcome it?
00:33:44
Speaker
I had such a shitty 2020, which is I think everyone's story too, but I was literally like, oh my God, I'm like making negative money right now. And that was also all the subscriptions, all of like, I'm paying for all this stuff. And like, I have nothing, like my weddings got canceled. And also like I had shifted my business a little bit where I was like, Oh, I want to like license artwork and only focus on that. Because again, like, you know, thinking I have to niche down on stuff.
00:34:13
Speaker
And I had like, I sent out so many cold pitches, no one said anything. I wasn't getting any gigs. And I was like, oh, like crap. Um, I need to like get a job or something. Um, and it really, really sucked for me. And the way that I got out of it was I was talking to my husband about it and I was like, like,
00:34:36
Speaker
this is really shitty, like, I'm so sorry, you know, and he's just like, why are you like, why are you sorry? Like, it's fine. Like, we're fine. We're alive. And I was like, Oh, yeah, we are alive, which is, you know, in this post pandemic era, like we real, we really sort of
00:34:52
Speaker
realize that health is our number one thing and if we have family and if we're healthy like there's always a next time and a tomorrow that you can kind of get through and And then I also was like who cares like no one has to know that I had a really shitty year Well now everyone does because I'm talking about it But you know I I had this weird shame about it as if like everyone knew this and was like super like oh look at Lisa like trying to do this like
00:35:21
Speaker
business thing and she's failing, but it's like no one cares, you know, and in a both good and bad way. So you get to do whatever you want because no one fucking cares. Like they're all too busy with their own lives, you know, and that sort of.
00:35:33
Speaker
got me out of my funk and say like, okay, well, you know, we're just gonna keep on trucking. We're gonna rebrand. We're gonna relaunch the website and, you know, just be me. And here I am. And now you're crushing it and you're working for me and a bunch of other people. I've been working with Chris, so it was literally like the highlight of the career. So I've made it guys. You have to say that. I'm paying you to say that. But you blew up like my business, like
00:35:56
Speaker
You know, Gabby, because we can't avenge, is our friend and her branding just spot on. So you did that for her many years ago. I love her branding. She's just adorable. She is a really good example too of she knows herself or I think it's intuitive too, because like she doesn't try to calculate or anything. She just is Gabby everywhere all the time. And so it's really easy to sort of put in a branding that works with that. And she is very consistent because she doesn't front anything.
00:36:24
Speaker
Totally, we love her. Okay, so on a positive note, what are you most excited about for 2021, which is kind of midway over or 2022? This coming year, I'm really excited about, you know, again, sort of repositioning myself in this space of going back to working with entrepreneurs. I was taking that sort of
00:36:49
Speaker
stepping away thinking that I wanted to do something else specifically, but I realize now that I can do whatever I want and everything that I want to do. And so I'm really excited to come back to space because
00:37:04
Speaker
Working with entrepreneurs really energized me. When I'm feeling really funky about my own business, when I'm talking to someone who's so good at what they do and so passionate about it and just so excited at this new place in their business where they're understanding their branding and wanting to take that next step, it makes me feel happy again. I'm like, oh yeah, this is awesome. Having your own business is awesome and showing up in this space is awesome and being vulnerable and
00:37:32
Speaker
you know, like doing this thing, even though it's so hard is really, really cool. And I have this sense of camaraderie again with people. So I'm really excited for this. I think that means like you're in the right place. I think so too. Yeah. They say like follow like you, where you feel energized, right?
00:37:49
Speaker
Yeah, so, you know, this podcast or my podcast is called Heck Yes with Carissa Wu. It's about getting that heck yes from your dream client dream, dream person. So do you have any tips on how you get a heck yes to landing your clients? You know, the easiest way that I've gotten heck yeses are always referrals.
00:38:10
Speaker
which is not something that you can always design and it's something that I've been very fortunate to be able to have, but it's just doing your thing, right? It's how you get referrals. You do your thing with the people that you love and then they will point you to all of the people that they love who are gonna love you too. And so I think being authentic with yourself, being authentically you, being a unique weirdo of a you,
00:38:38
Speaker
is what is going to attract those ideal clients who are going to say, you're not like anybody else that I've worked with because you shouldn't be. You are you. There's no one else like you in the world. Unless you're trying to be someone else, then you're going to come off as this template person which no one wants to work with. Well, actually, some people probably do want to work with that too, but that's not your ideal client. Your ideal client
00:39:00
Speaker
Yeah, it's exhausting too. If someone else tells me to not put exclamation marks on my email, I'm going to like barf because it's just going to be like five times. And that would be so exhausting to try to edit that out. And yeah, I think it's just being yourself and understanding what that is and being unabashedly, shamelessly like you.
00:39:25
Speaker
I love that. I totally agree. I think when people ask me what's the best part of my job or my business is I get to be myself. I could say very inappropriate stories about myself and just word vomit whatever I want and just be me. Corporate's a little bit different. It's very political.
00:39:48
Speaker
sometimes it could be you, but for the most part, you should probably not be you. I was actually famous at Disney for always dropping F-bombs at my meetings when I run, but I did have some decorum when I was at someone else's meeting.
00:40:02
Speaker
See, it's my house, I have to be. It's my meeting, so fuck y'all. That's awesome. That's so you. I can totally imagine you. They're like, um, okay. This email is fucking important. Yeah. I'm going to ask you like where everyone could find you and about the freebie that you're generously offering to our viewers, listeners, but
00:40:24
Speaker
I'll ask you one more question, but yeah, tell us where to find you. Yeah, so you can find me at Alette Studio. That's E-L-L-E-T-T-E, studio.com. That's the same for my Instagram handle too. And the freebie that I have is because we're our wedding pros and
00:40:42
Speaker
You guys have all these beautiful photos that you get to work with. I have a free Canva template that you can use where you can pop in all the photos that sort of represents who you are and build a color palette off of that. So you could build your mood board and then from the Canva sort of functionality, pick out the colors that you like and then you'll have your sort of color guide. And there's a little instruction in there too on how to use it. So you can grab that from alettestudio.com slash heck yes.
00:41:10
Speaker
That's so generous of you. Hopefully it'll be fun. And if you have any questions about it too, like, you know where to find me now. I'm your new designer friend. Like I love talking to people and answering any questions. Um, so yeah, let me know. Yeah. And I highly, highly, highly recommend using working with Lisa or your branding designs, everything. One, one shop stop Lisa. I branded you. Yeah.
00:41:38
Speaker
Okay, so yes, last question is, what advice do you have for either wedding designers or wedding creatives or wedding photographers? You're one advice in the business. One advice I think as you're going in your business is don't take it too seriously, which I think, you know, it is amazing to sort of
00:42:01
Speaker
Treat it like a grind, hustle, and get in there. But you lose a little bit of the magic, I think, of who you are. Unless that is your brand, the always busy, running on coffee fuel. And if that's what you want to run with, definitely go with it. But you're going to get touched out, and you're going to feel burnt out if you can't stop and laugh at yourself for
00:42:28
Speaker
posting a reel that only got 163 views, which is mine. I have no idea why that reel is not doing so well. I think no one likes my glasses or something. I have no idea. But being able to laugh about that and not beating yourself up over it, I think will work with any business where, yeah, just have fun. It's so fun to run your own business. You are very playful and have that kind of
00:42:56
Speaker
childlike spirit in your business. And you know, life is a game, right? It's a game. Yeah. I think it's because I'm married to a child. It's like you're losing. I have a large child and two small children. That's probably why. He's pretty playful too. He's such a goose guy.
00:43:19
Speaker
It was so great chatting. I think this is very informative to all the listeners out there and even to me I learned a lot. Thank you so much for having me.
00:43:33
Speaker
Thanks for joining me this week on Get a Heck Yes with Carissa Wu. Make sure to follow, subscribe, leave a review, or tell a friend about the show. Take a screenshot and post to IG. Tag me. Also, don't forget to download my free guide on how to become a lead generating machine. See you next time, wedding pros.