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Community isn’t a channel—it’s an operating system. Shraddha Varma, Co-Founder of Fuzia, shares how a women-centered platform turns creators into contributors, and contributors into careers. We map the community → credibility → opportunity flywheel, plus a pragmatic view of paid media once audience and offer are proven.
You’ll learn:
- How to build a values-driven community that compounds trust
- Converting community energy into a talent + partnerships pipeline
- The right (and wrong) moments to use paid ads
- Activation ideas: storytelling, spotlights, and service
- Metrics that matter beyond impressions
Connect with Shraddha
• Fuzia: https://www.fuzia.com/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shraddhavarma/
• Email: shraddha@fuzia.com
Work with Adam
👉 Book your 20-min Exploration Call: https://calendly.com/adamwbarney/explorationplugin-20min
Creators and Guests
What is Is Anything Real In Paid Advertising??
What’s actually working in marketing — and what’s just noise?
Hosted by Adam W. Barney, author of Make Your Own Glass Half Full and founder of Scale Smarter, this podcast brings honest, high-energy conversations with the operators, creators, and founders redefining how business growth really works.
From agency leaders and AI innovators to storytellers and strategists, Adam dives into what drives sustainable success — not vanity metrics. Together, they unpack the systems, creativity, and human energy behind $100M+ in advertising experience, real campaigns, and the lessons learned along the way.
🎧 No fluff. No funnels. Just what’s real — and how to scale smarter.
⚡ Ready to install your Energy-Driven Leadership OS?
Book your 20-minute exploration → https://calendly.com/adamwbarney/explorationplugin-20min
[00:05.5]
Welcome back to "Is Anything Real In Paid Advertising?", the show where we gut-check the gurus and pull back the curtain on what's actually working in marketing today. I'm your host, Adam W. Barney, and today we're stepping on a few toes because we're talking about why paid ads might be the worst move early stage founders can make.
[00:25.1]
With me is Shraddha Varma, co-founder of Fuzia; a global platform that's helped thousands of women and non-binary coaches, small business owners, and solopreneurs scale up and grow without dumping cash into Meta's ad machine.
[00:40.4]
Her take: most founders are starting in the wrong place. Shraddha, welcome to the show. Thank you for having me here, Adam, it's lovely here. I'm excited for a fun conversation here. Same, yeah, I'm looking forward to it. Awesome.
[00:55.9]
I know you've worked with hundreds of founders of all sorts of different stripes across Fuzia, and you said 95% of them stick to organic. What's driving that guidance? What's driving that choice within, within your clients? I think one of the things that people know, and you know, it's also about the fact that everywhere there is ad fatigue along with, people are bored with templated ads, they know about it, it's boring to see the generic funnels going out.
[01:28.6]
So I think it's very obvious that it's the fatigue from seeing multiple ads out there, plus low trust viable a person despite seeing multiple ads, like they are not going to react to you if you are not building that trust and value. Right.
[01:44.0]
That's critical. And I know you've also told me before, tribe before traffic; what does that mean to you, and how do you actually build that tribe before you touch ads, or how do the founders that you've worked with, how do you execute on helping them do that?
[02:00.6]
So I think the entire conversation or perhaps this theme would stem from the fact that you know, it's a human psychology, people will want to see what's the value that we are bringing in despite running ads.
[02:17.9]
So I know it for sure that something that is really working and this is from my lens is one of the best ad, you know, best performing campaigns are the ones that's providing upfront value whether it is through a trial offer, whether it is through some you know, resources to test it out, etc, but once a person you know, gets a sneak peek of it, they realize the value that they can get and that's when they can decide to invest because ultimately everything is about the money.
[02:55.3]
They don't want to spend money blindly anywhere where they are unsure of the outcome. Right. So this is the actual context and the reason why it's important to have a mix of the value that you're providing and then couple it with you know, spending on ads.
[03:18.2]
So for instance, if a founder told you, know, hey, I've got a thousand dollars for a test ad campaign, where would you tell them to put that? Or what's your honest reaction? So honestly, I wouldn't spend it all on ads right away.
[03:34.6]
I'd split it. Perhaps, you know, maybe half of it would go towards a super targeted campaign, you know, with a clear message and a real pain point, perhaps. And the other half I would, you know, invest in setting up a back end, because you know, if we are running ads, we need to be prepared with having a good robust system to nurture the leads that we are going to get.
[04:01.3]
If we don't have a system, we don't have the back end. Everything is just sketchy and we are just investing everything on ads without even making sure that we are able to handle that many leads and outcome. It's a waste of money.
[04:16.6]
Plus it's loss of trust. People will really, you know, think about it that, hey, you know, what the hell is happening? So I would rather spend something in building that trust. Half of the amount in building that trust and system and half of the amount in actually running some you know, real targeted campaign.
[04:36.9]
It's being more strategic. Right? It's more strategic with using those dollars, making sure that your systems can handle what, what you get. Absolutely. Because see, it's, you know, there's a myth. It's not about chasing the impressions, it's about really, you know, I'll say it's about seeing the value that you're bringing, which lets people convert.
[05:03.7]
And that's a mental shift I think that scrappy founders need to make, also. Double clicking in on some of the organic strategies that are driving results across the Fuzia community right now, what's working best?
[05:20.8]
The best thing in organic specifically are you asking? Yeah, without, without spending the paid dollars and that's kind of what I'm picking up on here is the best move for scrappy founders, where in the organic and what's working?
[05:38.1]
For us, I think it's the tailored content approach. So the one thing for sure is when you know your target audience, it means that you understand their pain points. It means that you really resonate with their challenges, you resonate with their bottlenecks or perhaps even their fears and desires.
[06:01.5]
Now put that entire knowledge in custom targeted campaign. I'll say messaging. You know, let's say you create three, four specific messaging templates around those fears, desires, challenges, of your target audience.
[06:23.7]
Now when people start resonating with this kind of content and there's a story built up, that's when people will, now you'll have the eyeballs, you'll have the visibility. So something that is really working for us organically is starting with the awareness stage of grabbing the eyeballs and the visibility.
[06:42.6]
Because, hey, no one is going to directly convert without you building that kind of an environment and trust. So the idea is to first build the trust. The second is then shifting towards building that credibility and value that you're going to provide by your offering.
[06:59.1]
So you really have to be strategic, step wise. And I think that's what has been working for our clients as well. It makes so much sense. And I know you've talked a lot about how content and community are so critical to build first.
[07:14.3]
Why does skipping that from your perspective, lead to what I would call paid ad heartbreak? Is it because we haven't validated what we've built? Is it because we don't have that tribe? Or is it even more complex than that?
[07:33.9]
I'm not sure I got your question clearly. But is it about understanding when to, you know, step into a paid ad thing, or is it something else? It's more around if so many people jump right into paid ads.
[07:52.1]
Yes, yes. Why is it such an even more so at a tactical level, so important to build that tribe, build that content, build that community first? So I'll tell you why people just go into paid ads directly.
[08:08.5]
Does it even go beyond just the trust that you talked about before, building that trust? So there's this myth that, go into paid ads, you'll see volume of people reaching, you know, that you'll reach out to, and you'll get a lot of conversions. And even today, this is the understanding of people and entrepreneurs regarding paid ads.
[08:29.9]
You know, they just haste, they just rush towards spending thousands of dollars just in paid ads, thinking that that's going to bring them a lot of visitors. Traffic. Yes, that's a fact. It will give you the traffic and the eyeballs, but that doesn't really mean that they are going to convert.
[08:48.8]
Yeah, that's one second for all the founders out there, perhaps, you know, maybe this is something that, you know, all of them can keep in mind that when we are talking about scaling, I think that's the air. That's the time when people switch to thinking about ads.
[09:06.9]
Right now, paid ads don't work in a vacuum. You know, if you don't have a backend support, if you don't have a system, you don't have the capacity to deliver, your leads will go nowhere. There's nothing that you'll be able to do with the leads, in fact, that will burn you out.
[09:23.6]
That's one second that's gonna break your trust. That's going to break the audience's trust in a way. so if someone tells me and, you know, asks me to go and do paid ads for thousand dollars, the very first thing is I'm going to do an audit myself to understand the brand, where is it currently standing, what's the offers, what's the current perception of your target audience about you?
[09:54.1]
You know, based on that, I'm going to create a plan and give it to you that hey, this is how I feel the thousand dollars should be allocated. And that's how I'll be, you know, going ahead with the next steps. Because I don't want to promise I'm happy to use your thousand dollars and spend everything on ads.
[10:13.9]
But you know, if we have an unhappy, dissatisfied customer experience that tarnishes your brand, and this is not something that people would really want, and I think that's important.
[10:29.7]
I think we need to focus on paid ads that actually convert and this can happen when we have everything in place strategically. I mean, it's incredible. Trust takes years to build, and it can take seconds to destroy it with that wrong move.
[10:50.6]
With that inauthentic move. One area that I think has an impact in the space also that's important to touch on is AI. You know, AI is impacting, especially I would argue, solopreneurs, small business owners, founders, even more than it is the wider world, and in so many different ways.
[11:11.2]
I think you can fall into traps there. How are you guiding the Fuzia community to use AI to support personalization along with community, without compromising that level of authenticity that's so critical. Absolutely.
[11:27.6]
So I think AI is all about, you know, I won't say that AI gives us a wrong direction or a very wrong approach of doing things. In fact, AI is all about garbage in, garbage out.
[11:43.8]
If you're not going to give the right kind of prompts, you're not going to get the right kind of responses. So you really have to maneuver the steering or perhaps use the steering wheel in a way in the direction that you want to go. So AI is really something that's very helpful, that can save you a lot of time.
[12:02.7]
But at the same time, if you're not using it wisely, it can be really crappy.
[12:13.1]
And you know, and at Fuzia Talent itself, you know, I've seen this with clients, they run ads, leads pour in, but without having the bandwidth, nothing converts. So what's my approach, typically is, start small.
[12:29.9]
Test message. Now, when we are giving the prompts to AI, it's very easy to instruct AI with the right kind of tone, voice, giving the backdrop of what exactly you want, what's the target audience that you want, giving the entire context and then taking its support to get ideas on test messages.
[12:51.4]
Like what kind of test messages would work. So test messages are something that we should start off, and then I think we should invest a part of the amount to make sure the experience, the funnel, the follow up, the delivery. That is sorted.
[13:08.7]
So if that is in place, then automatically everything will definitely fall in place, especially taking AI support. And that's what we have been doing even at Fuzia Talent, where every team member, we know for sure that AI is here to stay.
[13:28.4]
So what will help us, and what will make us stand out from the crowd, is how we can really leverage AI to its best capacity. I love it. It's not about being basic, but it's also about being very customized, and the knack of giving the right prompts.
[13:49.4]
I think that's the magic. I appreciate that guidance. Where would you say, just quickly, where do you think organic visibility is headed in 2026 and beyond, knowing that AI is going to continue to impact the world, but what are the things behind that might be coming in the forefront?
[14:09.7]
I think organic growth is shifting from posting consistently, to building trust ecosystem. I feel, I think over the last few months I have seen a lot of stress and emphasis on building community.
[14:27.7]
And that's exactly the reason why, because people know that it's about building real, you know, conversations, it's about building real community. It's about really being out there, you know, being out there and understanding, talking to people, you know, and resonating with the kind of challenges and you know, work that they are doing.
[14:51.1]
In fact, for founders and small businesses, this means doubling down on your content that speaks directly to the pain point. That is something that's, you know, where I see organic growth heading. It also means creating community moments like I mentioned, you know, so personalized outreaches, DMs, replies, behind the scenes.
[15:13.7]
I think this is where the story is built up
[15:20.5]
and investing in collaboration, co-creation, broadcasting. So yeah, that's the magic. Shraddha, you brought the fire here today, and I think this episode is going to save a lot of founders from blowing their first $1,000 on the wrong lever.
[15:38.9]
Where can folks connect with you and explore more of what Fuzia and Fuzia Talent are building? For anyone who would want to explore more about how we can be of some help to them, and how I can be of some help to them, they can directly reach out to me, shraddha@fuzia.com, and they can reach out to me on LinkedIn.
[16:01.8]
I'm there on LinkedIn with Shraddha Varma. And in fact they can also visit our website, that's www.fuziatalent.com, where they can just drop their inquiry or what they are struggling with, and I connect with them.
[16:20.1]
So that's how I've been getting in touch. I have to say firsthand, I know the incredible impact that Fuzia Talent is making on the world, and the Fuzia community brings together with empowering women and non-binary founders. We'll link to all of that below, and I really can't wait for people to check it out and explore it more.
[16:42.2]
Thank you so much, Adam. Awesome. Well, thanks for tuning in to "Is Anything Real In Paid Advertising?", the show where we cut through the hype and find the signal behind the noise. I'm Adam W. Barney. Subscribe, leave a review, and send this to a founder who's one Facebook ad away from burnout.
[16:58.8]
Thank you so much, Shraddha.