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Becoming an entrepreneur takes grit.
Deciding to do it solo takes courage.
This is 1,000 Routes, the podcast where we explore the stories of solopreneurs who have made the bet on themselves to build a business that serves their life. Every episode you'll hear about the lessons they've learned and the uncommon routes they've taken to stand out in a world that is purposefully trying to commoditize them.
Erin Balsa [00:00:00]:
The whole thing about business ownership is knowing how to ride the waves, get yourself back up there without just quitting and giving up. Because I think everyone hits a stage where they have some self doubt or they have a bad month or a bad quarter. Everyone. So it's just about your perseverance and your drive and I don't know, just whether or not you're. willing and strong enough to stick it out.
Nick Bennett [00:00:31]:
Hey, it's Nick and welcome to 1000 Routes, the podcast where I explore the stories of solopreneurs who have made the bet on themselves to build a business that serves their life. Every episode, you'll hear all about the lessons they've learned and the uncommon routes they've taken to stand out in a world that is purposefully trying to commoditize them.
Erin Balsa [00:00:40]:
I'm Erin Balsa and I help B2B SaaS companies build content strategies and content plans that incorporate their strategic narrative.
Nick Bennett [00:00:49]:
Somewhere along the way, I wrote a post and I was like, I am convinced that nobody has any clue what thought leadership is. I was like, I'm convinced that everyone thinks thought leadership is just like, post a lot and make a lot of noise and no one has actual leading thoughts. And someone tagged you you in my post, or I maybe commented on it and someone tagged you and was like, she knows what thought leadership is. I found your newsletter and your podcast and I kind of binged all that stuff and I was like, oh, someone finally does. And so it's kind of how I got into your orbit and you've been really beating this drum for a really long time. And I think what I'm most interested in your entire story right now is like, how long you've been at it. A lot of people have become solopreneurs very recently. Like today marks one year as a solopreneur for me personally, and a lot of people in this last year have made this the same switch.
Nick Bennett [00:01:35]:
But you've been at it a lot longer than most people, like three or four years now. And so what surprises you the most about becoming a solopreneur?
Erin Balsa [00:01:46]:
I didn't consider myself a solopreneur until I quit my job as a marketing director back in January 2022. So that is when I made the conscious decision to work alone, work for myself, and be a solopreneur. However, I started freelancing back in 2011 or 2012 as a freelance editor and writer. Back then I had experience as a magazine editor, so I freelanced at a bunch of different magazines, both writing and editing, while I was living in Portugal with my husband. At the time, he was my boyfriend, so it was the perfect way to get some income coming in so that I could, you know, go live in Portugal and have a good time. Fast forward many years. I had full time jobs, I had kids. My life was very busy, so I really freelanced here and there when someone would reach out to me and say, like, hey, you know, we used to work together.
Erin Balsa [00:02:41]:
My friend has this company, he needs a freelancer. And that's pretty much how I got most of my freelance experience over the next ten or so years. I never thought of myself as a solopreneur. I just thought of myself as a freelance writer for so long. And honestly, my income really showed that to be the case because I didn't treat my freelancing as a business. I always took the work serious and I always cared a lot about customer service and delivering business outcomes, but I didn't treat myself as a business owner. And so the second time that I decided to quit my job and go all in, it was totally different. I didn't do everything perfect, but it was still like leaps and bounds better than it had been ten years prior for multiple reasons.
Erin Balsa [00:03:28]:
And that's when I really started considering myself a solopreneur. So it's been a little bit more than two and a half years, almost three years.
Nick Bennett [00:03:34]:
What was the turning point for you? How did you decide even then whether it was being a solopreneur? Freelancing, fractional consulting? How did you decide that you wanted to do this for yourself and take a bet on yourself?
Erin Balsa [00:03:48]:
It kind of happened organically over time. So I started creating content on LinkedIn during COVID I think I started in April 2020. Randomly just lucked out. I think it was timing. I don't know. I was able to build a really big audience really fast, and before you know it, I was getting two, three inbound opportunities per week, and I had a full time job. So the more I kept creating content and just kind of sharing my personality and the things that I knew about content marketing, I was just building this business kind of naturally and organically. And when I started creating content, it wasn't with the goal of quitting my job.
Erin Balsa [00:04:28]:
It was with the goal of connecting with people and just trying something different and seeing what happens. And it just kind of snowballed from there. Before I knew it, I had a pretty clear idea that if I was to quit my job, I would pretty quickly be able to replace my income as a marketing director at a tech company. I loved my work. I loved my team. It was a great place to work for the years that I was there. But it's kind of hard to turn away from the opportunity to have an unlimited income ceiling. And that's really kind of what drove me to take the leap.
Erin Balsa [00:05:00]:
At the beginning, I was very financially motivated.
Nick Bennett [00:05:03]:
The earning potential out of w two is what it is, especially as a marketer, you'll get your annual raises and kind of the basic stuff.
Erin Balsa [00:05:13]:
Got some promotions. But there comes a time where unless you're going to go up into that next VP level, if there is a VP level for content, you get kind of stuck.
Nick Bennett [00:05:22]:
Yeah, I remember being at a company a long time. I was like, the only way that I'm ever going to get past, like this level is if somebody dies or gets fired. Like, these people are not leaving. Like they're good at what they're doing. They're going to be there. The odds of them adding any more depth to this chart is pretty low. You either have to hop jobs or people see it as like, go out on your own. I think that's a big draw for people, but it's harder in reality to realize that earning potential.
Nick Bennett [00:05:54]:
So what was your process for acquiring those early customers?
Erin Balsa [00:06:00]:
I was lucky in the fact that LinkedIn liked me at the time. They just showed my post to a lot of people. A lot of people liked my posts and I just got traction a lot faster than I expected and I think a lot faster than some others do. Sometimes you're on the top, sometimes you're down low, and you just have to kind of ride those waves. It's like that with everything in business, right? So sometimes you're high, you're feeling like a king or a queen. You're just so positive and your vibes are so high and sometimes you're not. And I think the whole thing about business ownership is knowing how to ride the waves. Get yourself back up there without just quitting and giving up.
Erin Balsa [00:06:40]:
Because I think everyone hits a stage where they have some self doubt or they have a bad month or a bad quarter. So it's just about your perseverance and your drive, just whether or not you're willing and strong enough to stick it.
Nick Bennett [00:06:55]:
Out at it as a solo for as long as you have, I think proves a lot of those things. But what were some of those things for you? You said, like the highs and the lows and a lot of things, you end up basically second guessing for yourself. What were some of those things for you?
Erin Balsa [00:07:10]:
I'm someone who very strongly believes in the power of the universe, in the law of attraction. Positive energy is like a magnet, and just positive things can come to you if you are radiating that energy, that confidence and that self belief. Dream, believe, receive is kind of the mantra. And it's funny because I was never that person. I was always very skeptical, even sort of pessimistic. I think my friends used to call me a realist. Eventually, I landed myself in a couple roles that were really good for me. I increased my income.
Erin Balsa [00:07:44]:
I developed a network. I got a lot of raises. Things were just humming along, and I was feeling so good, so positive, so confident. And the more I started feeling that way, the more these great things just kept happening. It was almost like everything just kind of fell into place. And I realized it was because I was already thinking so positively. So I was a magnet for other positive things. I had a big change last year where my husband got an offer to take a promotion, which required us to move from Boston to the London area.
Erin Balsa [00:08:18]:
And at the time, I just found out that I was pregnant with my third child, and I was almost 43 years old. So I was going through a lot of emotions, a lot of huge life changes all at once, ever since I had the baby. I moved during my maternity leave to another country. My husband went straight to work. He travels all the time. And now I'm here alone a lot with my three kids. One's an infant crawling up and down all of our stairs all day long, and I'm tired, and it's hard. And a lot of that has really changed how I've just felt in general.
Erin Balsa [00:08:52]:
I've definitely been more down than in past years. Definitely been more lonely. As a solopreneur, you don't have a whole team to pump you up on calls all day. I mean, I have clients. I'll do a client call. I had a client call right before this call, and I'll have another one after this call, and I'm positive for that. But the rest of the day, I'm just by myself doing some work, and it's hard. You know, my vibes are just lower.
Erin Balsa [00:09:15]:
So I think that has impacted a lot of that magnet that I was talking about. And so I'm trying my best right now to use all of these tools here in my manifestation and mindfulness center to really help myself get back to how I used to be and how I used to feel. Because having all these life changes at once has been. It's been tough.
Nick Bennett [00:09:34]:
A lot of people would call your early success luck. They'd be like, Erin's really lucky. She started at LinkedIn at the right time. There wasn't a lot of competition, and she pulled in a lot of the right people at the right time. And now she's built this really amazing following in this really amazing business, and she's really known for her niche and all these things. And I love your whole lens on this, which is like, it's not luck. Like, you can make your own luck, basically. It's like you can draw that stuff to you.
Nick Bennett [00:10:04]:
It still requires work. Like, you still went out there and put in the effort to write all the posts and think interesting things. But I don't think I'm particularly lucky in that sense. And I don't think like anyone is. It's you're identifying opportunities and you know which ones to take and you kind of know when to, when to apply force. I think you've done a really great job at just kind of seeing the opportunity. And then part of it is the universe gave you an opportunity and you knew to take it.
Erin Balsa [00:10:34]:
I knew to take it. It was like no choice. Like I said, left a great job, a great team, a great boss. Yeah, it's been great. You know, other than this past, like I said, nine months has been a tough time. Not necessarily like the business. The business is fine. It's definitely not as strong of a inbound motion as I had the first two years.
Erin Balsa [00:10:55]:
Like I said, I used to have like two, three leads coming in a week. Organically, it was just nuts. The lead volume has dropped. There are some other factors. A lot more people have quit their job. A lot of people that are friends of mine, friends of yours that are kind of at a similar level and experience as me. So now there's just more options to choose from, which is fine, but that's just a reality. As well.
Erin Balsa [00:11:17]:
As companies are still doing layoffs, budgets are still tighter. So this year, one thing happened that never happened last year or the year before. When I started this year, coming back from maternity leave, I said, I'm going to work with just one of my former clients for Q one, and then in Q two, I said, I'm going to add a second former client. They had already contractually signed up back in 2023. So I was like, good to go. What ended up happening was that second client, the business, did a riff and he got his budget frozen. And hes like, youre in my budget, but I dont have my budget yet. And their budget started mid year in the spring.
Erin Balsa [00:11:54]:
Thats when their fiscal year starts. Lets just take a pause. This is obviously meant to be. This pause is something that I must have needed because the universe is giving this to me right now. How can I use this pause? Im not going to worry about finding a replacement. Im not going to worry about any of that. What else can I do that I wanted to do this whole time? But I've always been just so booked up with clients, I was always booked, like six, eight months out the whole time. So now I'm finally not.
Erin Balsa [00:12:19]:
I finally, like, have this extra space. What am I going to do with that? And that's the question that I asked myself a few months ago. And I made the decision to build my second course, which is something I wanted to do for a while. I have a whole plan in mind for that. And then I decided I was going to take off July. So I'm finishing up a second engagement with another one of my long term clients, and I'm taking July to do nothing but go heads down and work on my business and do a lot of this stuff that I've wanted to do for a long time. And I'm very blessed that I have the ability to do that.
Nick Bennett [00:12:51]:
I had Renee Froyo on recently and she was like, I just rolled off all my services, clients, and I'm taking the summer to go into build mode. And she's like, I'm blessed that I can. I have the opportunity to do that. Max trailer told me that. He's like, I purposefully take every third month off. He's like, I build this into my schedule intentionally, and I think we tell ourselves, and I'm guilty of this, of not doing those things intentionally. I haven't quite figured out how to take time off as a sole opener quite yet to take that extended period and try to work all that stuff out. But I think what you're saying, and especially as it relates to, like, the evolution of the business and other ways that you're trying to earn money that's outside of just professional or private coaching and consulting services.
Nick Bennett [00:13:39]:
The thread that I'm pulling here is like, this move, having another baby is like, the importance of the tribe. Like, one of the things that I realized that I was missing in the first few months of going out on my own was just the group of people. Like your work best friends, right?
Erin Balsa [00:13:58]:
Yeah.
Nick Bennett [00:13:59]:
Like, there's. There's a lot of people that you would talk with at work, like, on slack every day where it's like you just kind of have your people and all of a sudden one day that's gone and it's not such a big deal. But then, like, a few weeks in, like you said, you're just like, very alone. And then you take into account the fact that you uprooted your whole family and you moved across the pond, which now you're in a totally new place with a new baby, a young family. Your husband went work right away after your leave ended.
Erin Balsa [00:14:29]:
So it's like, he's been in Spain all week. I'm just, like, slugging along. It's not easy just running a business.
Nick Bennett [00:14:35]:
Three kids, like, the whole thing. And I learned this one not in such an obvious way. It's like my whole family is in the northeast and my wife and I and our kid were in South Carolina. And we realized, like, when our son was probably almost a year old, we were like, we really miss the tribe. What I'm trying to get to with all of this is this idea that, like, how you and I really started to talk and get connected was this slack group that we're in. And it was like a few people came together and they're like, you know what's, we're all kind of alone, but let's be alone together. Like, we're all solopreneurs trying to do our thing and let's build this little camp for all of us to be alone together. And that really changed things.
Nick Bennett [00:15:17]:
It's wonderful. And I think it's been the greatest thing to happen to me as a solopreneur, just to be around more people and be able to talk about the work things with people in just that context and be able to talk really openly about what's going great and what's not going not so great and just the normal things of life. But all that to say is, like, I saw that make an impact on your own business because one of the things, and you had posted it about this as it relates to your course, you were like, I really wanted to do this course thing. And you had some questions about it. It was like the access to the tribe and you would. You had even mentioned Erica Schneider in your post. You're like, yeah, she really gave you the kick that you needed and wanted to get that thing out the door. And so it's like, just having that tribe is so, so crucial.
Nick Bennett [00:16:02]:
And I'm curious, like, have you had that before? How did you kind of fill that gap or that void in all of it beforehand, before this stuff?
Erin Balsa [00:16:12]:
Two primary ways. Number one, like I mentioned, I've had really wonderful long term clients that I've extended. Even if I'm just doing, like, consulting. They've hired a content lead and I'm doing, like, just some consulting, coaching, ongoing work, and I've developed really close friendships. I'm actually really good friends with my former client who left the company. And now, you know, we're both moms of three. We had kids, our third kid around the same time. So we do Zoom calls.
Erin Balsa [00:16:37]:
We slack each other all the time. So that kind of filled the gap. Like, yes, you were my client, but you were also a friend, so we could really talk about real things, which was really great. And that's happened with a couple of my clients that I've worked with for, like, a year and a half to two years. So that was one way that I got that interaction in the same feel that you would if you were in house. You know, it's a client relationship, but you can be friends with your clients. If you make their life easier and you're there for them, you can actually become friends. That's something that I would have never thought when I was younger, when I was freelancing, I was like, oh, my client is like some mystery robot.
Erin Balsa [00:17:10]:
I have to be stiff and performative. Like, no, you don't. You can just be yourself, and it'll be better. Number two, I did have a few friends that I was in kind of like, this mastermind group with, and we would meet once a month, share problems, advice, tips, and it was really great. And we were talking about potentially doing, like, an in person meetup. We got busy. I was going on maternity leave. The group just kind of dissolved.
Erin Balsa [00:17:33]:
So that was too bad, because that was a nice group of just women. It was great. So now I'm happy that I have this new solopreneur community, especially now I don't have, like, my neighbor who I could just pop out and take walks with during the day.
Nick Bennett [00:17:46]:
I feel you that feel you there. Like, I'm in the same boat with not a ton of friends around. Cause I'm working a lot.
Erin Balsa [00:17:53]:
Yeah.
Nick Bennett [00:17:53]:
And having that connection is 100% crucial. So talk to me about how you created House of bold. Where along this whole journey did you go from, okay, I'm out of my own. I'm doing this thing. Thought leadership is the thing I want to be known for. House of bold becomes into existence. How many iterations did you get through before you kind of realize thought leaderships, where im going to plant my flag. And House of Bold is kind of the core of what this business is going to be.
Erin Balsa [00:18:22]:
So I really felt like I wanted to tie myself to thought leadership because I didnt want to tie myself to SEO. And I think a lot of times when marketing leaders are looking to hire, they have specific needs, and they might either want programmatic SEO, like, large quantities of content. I've had people reach out to me, hey, are you available to write, like, 50 blog posts in the next month? And I'm like, no, no, that's not me. So I really wanted to push those people away. So I just didn't even entertain those requests. Like, I wanted people to know, like, that's not what I do now. It's not to say I am anti SEO. I'm definitely not.
Erin Balsa [00:18:59]:
It's not to say that the strategies I build cannot incorporate SEO because they definitely can and do depending on that client's specific needs. But I'm not SEO centric. That's not like, the center of my strategy. I'm not that kind of person who says content strategy when what I really am talking about is an SEO or keyword strategy. So when I first started content marketing, I was like old school agency leader, all about SEO. So I did enjoy that for a period. And I think I went through, like, that natural evolution for a lot of us who were like, okay, nailed it. Cool.
Erin Balsa [00:19:33]:
Like, what else can I do? And in my last full time role, we did SEO. We had an SEO agency. Come on. So they were helping us with keyword selection and briefs so that we could be more focused on the thought leadership side. And we were doing really cool stuff, like doing a lot of proprietary research and putting out a lot of original insights. We built an interactive learning center with a lot of courses. We made our blogs interactive. We have certifications.
Erin Balsa [00:20:01]:
Our CEO put out a book. So we were doing a lot of thought leadership plus events, virtual events, live events, webinars, documentaries that did not involve keyword research. And it was awesome and I loved it and I saw how impactful it was for certain types of companies and I wanted to keep doing that. So that's kind of why I decided to just be kind of known for thought leadership, to attract the right clients so that I could do the work. That brings me joy.
Nick Bennett [00:20:29]:
It seems like it just clicked into place. Did it just unfold for you in that way?
Erin Balsa [00:20:33]:
Yeah, I just got kind of tired of the formulaic constraints of SEO years back. As I was still writing some content that was designed to rank for keywords, I didn't want to do the traditional and instead I want to do things different. So I really started thinking about how I could tell more data stories inside SEO content or content designed to rank for a keyword. And that's part of what I teach people to do, because I feel like you can't control whether or not your content's going to rank. You can have a good idea if it might, but you honestly have no control. So at the end of the day, the most important thing is to have a good story on that page because you can always deliver it to your ideal audience in other ways. There's other ways to deliver that content, even if it's not served up in the search engine. So the story is the most important.
Nick Bennett [00:21:22]:
Piece, especially when you're looking at what are the needs of other businesses as you're trying to sell a service, right? Like the core of your business today is professional, like private consulting services. And trying to look at it through the lens of, well, what do other people need to buy? There's a lot of people out there that will help you show up on Google. There'd be a lot of people who can claim this one, but it's really hard to prove this one, which is how do we help lead thoughts? Who can come here and help me codify the things that we think and present them to the world in a way that galvanizes us as a company or me as a business owner or leader in this business with that idea and package it up and talk about it in ways that are interesting and compelling.
Erin Balsa [00:22:15]:
And it can be hard, you know? So one thing that's really important, I think any solopreneur should be doing a is talking to your audience and, like actually talking to them, not just like sending a survey, hopping on a call. So one thing I've been doing the last couple of weeks, I've been on a magical interview tour, and I've spoken with about so far, maybe like 15 folks that are leading marketing teams and trying to understand what their biggest pain points are with content and how exactly they talk about their content, how they talk about their challenges, like what specific gaps that they want filled. How important is it that, that you fill this gap? And talking a lot about the thought leadership and, you know, some people are like, well, I don't know. I can't get anything out of my executives. Like, they're really bright. They don't know how to have these leading thoughts. And that's a really common challenge when working with really, really bright, often technical subject matter experts and executives. So how can you get this stuff out of their brain that's not 100% tied to the product? Because, no, it's not that kind of content.
Erin Balsa [00:23:15]:
This is not like bottom of the funnel or in sales opportunities. We're just trying to talk about more top of funnel. They're not quite ready for that product yet. So how do we pull this stuff out of them? And so I'm able to kind of give some things to try. It's not foolproof solution, but here's one thing you could try. I'll tell someone, ask a question, and if you don't get the answer you want, ask it in a different way. And then if they give you some sort of answer, ask why. Ask why five times until you finally get to the heart of something interesting.
Erin Balsa [00:23:47]:
And sometimes it actually takes that perseverance to actually get something interesting. One of the examples that I used in my course was, let's say somebody says, I want help to create content on LinkedIn marketers. Our first instinct is to say, okay, cool, let me go write a blog post. And it'll be generic. It's going to be like, here's how to create content on LinkedIn. Step one, that content already exists. How can you come up with a better story? Treat it like a sales call. Like, what do you think needs probing and needs discovery is on a sales call.
Erin Balsa [00:24:18]:
They're really trying to understand the true issue so that they can align on the true problem, empathize, and then start to joint solution. And I think that a lot of solopreneurs, a lot of marketers, they don't have a sales background. Maybe they don't work with companies that have a sales team. They don't quite know how these things work. So they take what people say at face value. And I don't think you should take what people say at face value because people withhold information or they might not even know what they really need. So the better you can get with really probing and getting them a level down. Okay, so why is your lead volume down? And then eventually we'll get there and we'll say, ah, so that's the true problem.
Erin Balsa [00:24:57]:
Maybe what I should be helping you with is this, not that. And I think that's a skill that the more you can develop that whether or not you're a marketer, I think the better off you'll be.
Nick Bennett [00:25:07]:
It's okay that it evolves over time. I've had solo preneurs tell me I don't want to niche hop. I don't want to be seen. Like I'm changing too much. And I'm like, people pay you to learn things. People pay you to figure stuff out so they don't have to. The fact that you learn something and have updated or refined or iterated on what you're doing is the point.
Erin Balsa [00:25:33]:
When I started off b, two B SaaS sales led companies that sell complex technology to large buying teams. That's a pretty small niche to a lot of people. But the services I deliver within that niche are so broad. Everything that I would do as a director level head of content inside that type of company, I can do for you. I help you hire full time content marketers. I onboard them, I train them, I build your content strategy. I build your content plan and roadmap. I build your processes, I put it into your project management software.
Erin Balsa [00:26:06]:
I support execution to make sure that the plan actually gets done and it gets done right. So how do you describe all of that on sales calls? So, one of the first things that I did when I started my business was went through the process of figuring out how to even talk about that, because that's a lot I pulled from a framework that I knew that a lot of my audience would know, which is the people process technology framework. Like that Venn diagram, where there's the overlap. Like, you have your people, you have your process, you have your technology, the things that you need to be working in a company. What I said was, I help with people, process and strategy, and then I support execution. So if you could imagine a visual, the three circles with kind of like a flywheel going around, and that made it really easy for me to explain to people on sales calls, like, this is what I do, and they get it. Oh, I get it. I know that framework that resonates, and that's why at the start of this call, I said, you know, I help sales led B2B SaaS companies create content strategies and content plans that incorporate their strategic narrative.
Erin Balsa [00:27:07]:
The reason why is because on my magical interview tour, that's what everybody needs right now. That's what everybody wants. Everyone is either actively working on building a narrative or improving their narrative, or they just got done hiring a consultant to give them a narrative. So my belief as a marketer is that it's really hard to create really good content for a company on behalf of a brand without that story. And that's why by saying that now, I'm showing companies who I'm for and who I'm not. So if you're the type of company that just wants programmatic SEO, you're not worried about a company narrative. I'm probably not the right fit for you. So I think the more I can just be really clear with the services and the types of companies I work with, I think the easier it will be to draw those right people in.
Nick Bennett [00:27:56]:
I think what makes this special and what makes things pretty easy for you to kind of get through this whole process is something that's very obvious in this conversation, but not so obvious probably, when it's happening, which is the thing that you do for people is the thing that you did when you worked inside of a company. It was well within your wheelhouse. You didn't leave and go, I'm going to be a CMO coach. Like, I am going to become a ghost writer. There's a million things that you probably could have tried to do, but you're like, this is the problem that I intimately understand because I had to solve it myself and I understand how the mechanics of solving it. I want to know how other people perceive this problem. You go on your magical interview tour. You understand how people talk about the problem, how they perceive it, how it shows up in their business, and how its a little different from how it showed up in the businesses that youve already helped.
Nick Bennett [00:28:50]:
And then you begin to shape this entire thing. And the way that I define niche just to frame all this up is like, different problem, different person, different process. So you were like, heres the different problem. And youve listed this out very clearly, the process. You were like, well, theres a thousand ways people can solve this problem. I can help them hire, I can help them execute, I can help them plantain operationally. I can help them. There's a million ways that you can help someone solve that no one cares about the things that we think problem where we don't know how to say the things that we think in a way that people understand.
Nick Bennett [00:29:21]:
And so you have a bunch of different ways to do it. How has that evolved over time? Did it slowly become more consultative over time where you're doing less of the work and helping train up or guide internal teams to becoming a proficient? Because you and I both know this is important enough to own in house. I think that is something that solos struggle with. They're trying to figure out, am I most valuable doing the work for people? Am I most valuable teaching other people how to do the thing? I have my opinion, but I'm curious, like, how have you, how have you evolved and how do you see that?
Erin Balsa [00:29:55]:
I think that the way that I serve my clients is based on my own values and what I would want if I was still in house. And that would be an in house content lead. Maybe not a whole team like I've had in past companies, but a content lead, someone that is 100% competent and capable and has the time and bandwidth to oversee the content function as content serves. Content's so important. It fuels so many activities and initiatives across the company. I'm not talking about blog posts. That's not content. Right.
Erin Balsa [00:30:29]:
So content are, is the idea that you're trying to communicate and you're delivering it in all these different methods. So you're, you know, enabling the sales team. Full funnel content is what I'm talking about. And it's really important. I believe truly that you need to have at least a content lead in house because long term it's not financially sustainable to have someone like me overseeing your content strategy, overseeing all these freelancers, it's just not cost effective. In the long run. You would be better off paying what you would pay me and having someone there 40 hours a week. You just get more done.
Erin Balsa [00:31:03]:
So I believe that companies really should have a full time content lead. So I built my business that way in that you either have someone in house that could be great, but do they have enough potential? Could they be coached? Because they're not currently a content employee, but they love to write, they know the product in and out of. And what we've learned over the years is that our product is very, very complex. Most freelance writers don't just onboard and get it, this person gets it. So what I do a lot is I help take someone internal who wants to kind of experiment or try a marketing role, and I teach them everything they need to know to manage the content function. I help them understand contextually where content exists within the business and within marketing. So I love doing that. It's actually really rewarding and really fun to see someone coached up and see them build their confidence and get on calls.
Erin Balsa [00:31:55]:
And now instead of them just sitting there listening, now they're leading calls. And that's a really great way to end an engagement. It feels great sometimes I'm helping them source from my network. So you want a great content lead, but you don't have a budget of hire someone super senior. So let's hire someone more early to mid career and let's coach them up so that they're really effective and impactful. So it's all about helping them have what I truly believe that they need for the best chances of success. So that's an in house content lead. So even though now I'm changing kind of my messaging, so that I'm helping you with the strategy and the execution, it works.
Erin Balsa [00:32:33]:
Even if you already have someone in house, if you have someone and you like them and they're a great employee, they just need some development, I can help you and we will take care of that. Also if you need to hire someone, but I'm not going to necessarily lead with that because some people they might want to hire, but maybe they're not ready today. Maybe they'll be ready in six months, so I can still help you. By the time we build the strategy and the processes and the plan, then we'll get someone on board. The less that I'm doing hands on writing, the better.
Nick Bennett [00:33:02]:
Most people come to me and tell me a lot that, like, I am buried in work because I'm writing all of the articles, I'm writing all the posts like, they're selling their time in the deliverable or the tactic. And what I'm hearing here is, like, you've built this thing in a way that it phases you out over time by design, because that's the way that the clients most successful. But also, it's like, the most valuable way to do this work is for you, me not to do it. It's to teach other people how to do it. That's where the most value is created for the client. That's where you can charge the most. Like, there's. There's so much to.
Nick Bennett [00:33:38]:
And I try to advocate for as many people as possible to really, like, back off of just selling the tactic. So there's a lot to be said there. And I think just from a way of just building this or evolving a service arm over time, I think it's a super, super important lesson to highlight here. All right, two final things for you before we wrap today. One, why is this word meaningful to you at all?
Erin Balsa [00:34:04]:
Cause I know what it's like to be in house and how stressful it is and how much you have this vision and you know what needs to get done, and you're just so busy and there's so many balls and things that are taking your time and your priority. So I know what that feels like, and I know that I have a solution to help people. So that feels good. I like being able to kind of help old me in terms of coaching, too. I'm also helping old me like baby Erin coming up in content marketing and not knowing everything. And it took so long to learn because I didn't have a coach. I didn't have someone who met with me once a week and taught me everything I needed to know. I just kind of learned it by default over time.
Erin Balsa [00:34:42]:
So I think it's also pretty rewarding to be able to give back and to train someone up in that way. And then, for me, selfishly, I like nice things. I like fancy vacations. I was actually on a friendly call with Erica the other day, and we were both like, yo, like, when I travel, I want to stay in a bougie hotel. And I want you to hand me a cocktail the second I walk in the door and treat me like royalty. Like, I need that. Because in my day to day life, I do not have that. I'm just, like, washing dishes, kids are, like, fighting, and someone's hanging on my leg.
Erin Balsa [00:35:13]:
So, no, I need to at least make enough money that I can go on my bougie vacations. And I do love to travel. I'm definitely motivated by some certain level of money. That said, this year especially, I'm all about finding my zen and trying to really not overwork myself. So finding the balance, even if that means not making as much as I could have made. For example, someone just asked me just this week if I would work on a project with them starting in July. I said, no. I'm off July and August, but I'm happy to start in September.
Erin Balsa [00:35:44]:
So, saying no means that I'm not going to be able to meet my full potential of income from client work. But I'm okay with that because I also prioritize my mental health and my wellbeing and my zen, my time off. So it's finding that right balance.
Nick Bennett [00:36:01]:
It's hard to say no. It's hard to turn down opportunity and money, but it's a skill.
Erin Balsa [00:36:07]:
Yeah.
Nick Bennett [00:36:07]:
And I say that in all honesty. It's like being able to say no to things and really stay true to the plans that you've made. To say no and to stay true to that and to be free and do the things that you're planning is huge. And it's something that I still struggle with.
Erin Balsa [00:36:25]:
Took me a few years to get here, because year one, I worked like 50 hours a week. I wrote about it. I have some articles on my website where I chronicle year one in review, and I have year two in review. And you get all the numbers of how many hours I worked per week, how much vacation I took. So if anyone's curious, click over to my website and check it out. I tried to be as transparent as possible about my wins, my losses, my learnings, my biggest regrets. Just so, hopefully it'll help someone else.
Nick Bennett [00:36:52]:
Yeah, absolutely. All right, last thing for you. What do you want to build that you haven't built yet?
Erin Balsa [00:36:59]:
Yeah. So I kind of started hinting at the fact that I released my second course. What I think would be really cool and valuable for the folks that I serve would be my complete system, available in a modular way. Right. So imagine if I had resources, like a course on my hiring process, a course on content strategy, a course on how I do content planning, a course on research reports, which I do have. I just have this whole entire content process so that if somebody, you know, they weren't going to hire me, but they had a need to improve their processes. Okay, cool. So I have this course.
Erin Balsa [00:37:42]:
You're going to get my whole entire library of on demand courses, resources, examples, templates, all these things all in one place. So right now I have a lot of it. It's kind of disorganized. It's definitely not as organized as I would like it to be. That's something I'll be working on, is really this whole system. I will say that's my way. It's not like my way is the only one right way. But I think people do want to know how I do things.
Erin Balsa [00:38:06]:
They seem curious to know my approach. And I like to teach people because I think the best weapon you can have as a marketer is a few different approaches in your back pocket that you can try as well as some skills. So if you're trying to build a skill in content planning, maybe learn a few different approaches. And that way you can experiment and find the one that works the best for you.
Nick Bennett [00:38:29]:
There's a thousand ways to do it. And the beauty is that people can learn all the different ways and smash them together and make a new and different way that works for them. That's kind of how we all figured it out. I think that's really what we're all doing at the end of the day, and we call it our way. But it's not that it's the only way. There are a thousand routes. As someone once said, Erin, this has been a ton of fun. I appreciate you coming on and sharing your story with me.
Nick Bennett [00:38:56]:
It's been. It's been a blast to just chat it up with you and hear what you're doing and what you're building. I'm excited for your course catalog because I am one for sure. Curious how you do what you do.
Erin Balsa [00:39:09]:
Cool. Well, thank you so much for having me on. It's been fun.
Nick Bennett [00:39:17]:
Hey, Nick again. And thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed this episode, you can sign up for the 1000 Routes newsletter, where I process the insights and stories you hear on this show into frameworks and lessons to help you build a new and different future for your own business. You can sign up at 1000routes.com or check the link in the show notes. All right, here's the hardest hitting question I'm gonna ask you all day throughout this entire conversation. What would be your last meal on.
Erin Balsa [00:39:51]:
Her God, sweet bread. And I'm Portuguese, you know, I always thought I was much more portuguese than I actually am, but I grew up being really cared for by my grandparents and my godparents, who watched me almost every weekend my whole life. And every weekend, they would grill up some big, thick slice of sweet bread from cornerstone bakery in the town that they're from, and it was just the most delicious thing on earth.
Nick Bennett [00:40:16]:
I haven't had this kind of sweet bread. I feel like I've had, like, southern sweet bread. Like, it's not even close to the same thing you're describing, but what you're saying sounds way better.
Erin Balsa [00:40:27]:
Yeah. It's from the Azores, the azorean islands, which are in the middle of the ocean, kind of between Portugal and Boston. And they have a specific type of sweet bread. You gotta have it.
Nick Bennett [00:40:36]:
All right, that's, like, bucket list level thing right there. I'll have to find this island, find the bakery, and we're on it. Cool. Perfect.