Shining Your Light: Claim Your Expertise with Amanda Samoyloff

Women are real rock stars.

A woman of many talents and passions, Amanda Samoyloff, is an actor, writer, producer, poet, and the founder of SamoyloffPR, specializing in branding and PR. Amanda started her creative journey from acting as a kid, then continued in her college days through speech and debate, but working with musicians in Hollywood, gave her a specific view towards PR.

Combining her experience with rock stars, Amanda wanted to inject that Rock ‘n’ Roll vibe into clients’ branding while establishing women in the media landscape. As women are not being represented enough in the media, especially in male-dominated fields, women need to ensure diverse voices are heard out there. Women have the common issue of imposter syndrome, but we need to believe in ourselves and as soon as we pull from the backend into the spotlight it will significantly boost our businesses.

Today, Amanda shares strategies about personal branding, the best time to hire a PR, how to leverage your story, and how to prepare before a product launch. Women need to be recognized, but to achieve that, it's important to ditch perfectionism, find time for ourselves, and believe in our strength. Establishing a healthy reward system and finding time for creative activities is crucial for preventing burnout.

We need to shine our light, so let's just keep beating that drum and let’s get out there to rock!

Notes:
🧑‍🎤 National speech and debate award: after college, Amanda started doing PR for rock musicians in LA. 03:50
👩‍💼 In 2020, she applied this experience to female founders and startups. 06:32
🎭 Amanda has been acting since childhood, but her writing and poetry came in college. 09:47
⚡Steps for starts is getting to know your impact, and problems you are trying to solve: get to the podcast and then reverse engineer that to get a PR headline. 11:54
⚠️ Getting PR too late: get your PR campaign going at least 9 months before the product launch. 18:15
▶️ We have to claim our expertise: believe in yourself and stand in front of your company. 23:13
✍️ Poetry comes to Amanda usually when she's physically in motion: stories about relationships and growth. 28:17
🔥 If your reward system is only linked to work, you will become burnout. 32:30
🛑 If you don't work on yourself, your business isn't going to go anywhere: find time for yourself too. 34:14

Links:

Website: www.samoyloffpr.com

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/amanda-samoyloff-690448b5

Connect with Adrienne: https://www.sheleadsmedia.com

Listen to podcasts for women by women on the She Leads Podcast Network: https://www.sheleadspodcasts.com

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👩🏻‍⚖️ ⭐️ Adrienne Garland - She Leads® Podcast Network - 4 women X women ⭐️ 🎧 Sugar Coated Podcast Host| Leadership Conferences, Retreats #SheLeads #Women #entreprenuers

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Adrienne Garland (00:01.166)
Hello and welcome back to the She Leads Podcast. This episode is brought to you by the She Leads Podcast Network. It's the podcast network for women by women. So today we're welcoming Amanda Samoiloff to the She Leads Podcast. She is a woman of many talents and passions. She's an actor, a writer, a producer, and a poet who, by the way, recently won the

Ventura County Poetry Project, I guess, contest or, yeah. So congratulations, Amanda. That is amazing. She's also the founder and principal of Samoiloft PR and is a specialist in branding NPR. Welcome to the She Leads podcast, Amanda.

Amanda Samoyloff (00:52.68)
Thank you so much. I'm so happy to be here at so exciting I love your podcast and all of your guests are amazing. So thank you so much for having me

Adrienne Garland (01:02.03)
Well, thank you so much because many of the guests that have been on this show are clients of yours and they are all super incredible and amazing. And I always feel so honored when you reach out to me and pitch me these wonderful women that are doing incredible things in the world. And you are the person behind all of that. So of course, getting to know you a little bit and I see all the things that you do. I'm just so inspired by you.

And I said, you know what, not only should you be pitching other people, you need to pitch yourself. Come on the podcast. So I'm so happy that you're here. So Amanda, tell us a little bit about yourself. Like I said in the beginning, you're a multi -passionate, multi -talented person. Let's walk it back though. How did you sort of get into the whole world of PR in the first place?

Amanda Samoyloff (01:58.664)
Well, so I went to Cal State Long Beach and my sophomore year I was like kind of lost. I didn't know what I needed to do. I didn't have like, I wasn't as part of a sorority or anything like that. So I was looking for clubs or something to kind of join. And so I found Speech and Debate. And I ended up actually being really good at it. My senior year, I was a national champion in Speech and Debate. I know, it was wild.

Adrienne Garland (02:25.166)
Oh my God.

Amanda Samoyloff (02:26.92)
It was like kind of competitive acting. I was on the speech side of things, right? And so I won prose interpretation and just, I was like fourth place in persuasion of something that I wrote and second place in poetry and a bunch of different things. And when I came out of college, I went right into Hollywood. I was like, I'm going to be an actress, like let's go. But as you know, being an actress also comes with, you know,

tryouts or not tryouts, auditions, constantly going in front of people and being rejected. But also just up against so many people. So I was also bartending, right? And I was working on the Sunset Strip. So with all the rock and rollers and a few of them I dated, but I was a very nice girlfriend and got people to their shows, right? Like I helped with flyers, I helped with promotions and.

Adrienne Garland (03:00.974)
Oh.

Amanda Samoyloff (03:23.08)
I just wanted to be just, it was a form of love and I just wanted to make sure that they had a good showing. And then throughout those years, I started to realize that obviously bartending and late nights were not conducive to being a actress and filming. And I needed a side gig just so that I could supplement income and be able to create my own films, write, do all those things and not be like home at four in the morning.

Adrienne Garland (03:27.118)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (03:52.68)
So I started kind of just doing social media stuff and things like that for people, created an events firm with my friends and it started kind of trickling from there. And then kind of like jumped over into kind of like the beverages world and then events a little bit. And then finally I was like, I'm just gonna do some more LFPR because all of my credit is being taken by all these men that were.

Adrienne Garland (03:52.814)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (04:20.136)
my bosses, right? And they were getting all the money that I was making. And I was going everywhere and doing all the things. So I was like, I'm going to just go out on a limb and create smile, PR. So I did. And I just started small, I, you know, was working with musicians. And I look back and I think about like, you know, my retainers, which are like, so little, like, I think about it, you're like, how was I getting asking people for like, $300 to do like,

Adrienne Garland (04:29.966)
I love it.

Amanda Samoyloff (04:49.16)
a whole month's work. It was wild. Yeah, you're like, Oh my gosh, but I mean, I had to I didn't have a name yet. Right. And so it went from there. And then kind of segue into 2020 happened. And the pandemic and everything got shut down and entertainment and all of that stuff completely wiped out like really the entertainment world. And I actually got contacted by Kellyanne Wendgett who's been on your show.

Adrienne Garland (04:49.71)
Yeah, a whole campaign. Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (05:17.064)
about helping her with PR for her private equity fund. And I was like, what is finance? What is private equity? I'm like, I don't know. But she's like, no, I have like a book. I'm gonna do this. I'm like, okay. So it really kind of evolved from that point to be like, well, why don't I give the rock and roll experience to these female founders that she was working so hard.

Adrienne Garland (05:17.326)
Mm -hmm.

Adrienne Garland (05:21.326)
Hmm.

Haha.

Adrienne Garland (05:39.726)
Mmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (05:40.84)
with, right, and investing in. And she was introducing me to and then I, you know, it kind of steamrolled into where it is now today, where it's a lot of founders, startups, and just really helping women and and making them the rock stars and their brands a rock star brand outside of their business. So that's it.

Adrienne Garland (05:49.55)
Hmm.

Adrienne Garland (05:59.15)
Mmm.

Adrienne Garland (06:03.79)
Love that so much. And you know, it's so funny. I don't know if I knew the rock star component of it. And I just love it so much because truly women are rock stars. Like we just do it all and we don't often do a good job of promoting ourselves and tooting our own horn. And we do need people like you that are going to sort of push us maybe outside of our comfort zone. Kelly is...

a force to be reckoned with so she probably realized what she needed to do in order to get visibility, but not all women sort of have that level of confidence. But we all do, I think, have an impact to make. And so I really love what you do and how you help women. I actually also recently saw that you are sort of...

asking people to speak to them, right? You're sort of putting it out there like, hey, I'm willing to sort of talk to you. And I love that you're doing that because I think women do need to get started in just talking about themselves, even planting that seed. So when I saw that, I was like, oh, I love that you're doing that. So good.

Amanda Samoyloff (07:18.696)
Thank you. Yeah, I mean, I think it's just that yeah, the seed needs to be planted I feel like we think so small and then we don't realize that we can be so much larger and it doesn't mean that you have to take up space in a loud way you could be quietly you can have a slow burn but it still is like here I am and I'm not green like I Deserve to be in the room, but you don't have the screen

Adrienne Garland (07:41.646)
Yeah. Now.

Amanda Samoyloff (07:42.92)
Some people, yeah, it works for their brand. Yell, be loud, but some people can quietly walk into the room and still have that same powerful presence. It's just about finding what feels the best. And it's nice to do that with people.

Adrienne Garland (07:50.734)
Mmm.

Yeah.

So you have such a creative background and you've kept that going as well, which is super cool. Were you always someone who was creative, writing, you wanted to be an actor, but you also, you're a writer, a producer, a poet. When did that all kind of come out? Because that just inspires me so much.

Amanda Samoyloff (08:22.344)
Um, ever since I was a little kid, I always had such an imagination. Like I would make up, I had like these like window, these closet doors that were like mirrors. And I remember when I was like five or six, I would make up these whole plays and like, I would just be like, oh, and they were always so romantic, right? Like they were always like, here's the prince and the dragon. And I'm like, oh, you know, like my whole like life, I was just very animated, right? Um, and so I did do the acting bit.

The writing part didn't come until after or within the college circuit, like when I was in speech and debate, that's when it really kind of took its finesse and me finding my words. And then, you know, poetry just became kind of like my journal. Like I didn't even know, I discovered a lot about myself and what came through the pen. And so it was a diary, a journal and.

Adrienne Garland (09:12.782)
Mmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (09:16.584)
It's really got me through a lot and also helped me discover what I was going through at certain places in my life. And so it's just creatively just being vulnerable. And I never was expected to share it. And then I got encouraged by my best friend to send it out and it was well received. But yeah, creatively, always, I always have had that creative side of me.

Adrienne Garland (09:32.238)
Aww.

Adrienne Garland (09:41.582)
I feel like so many women have all of the, we are so multi -dimensional, you know, and I don't know if the world sort of sees us like that. So many women that are entrepreneurs, you ask them, what do they do? And they tell you about their business. And then they tell you about the five other things that they do as well, or the three other businesses that they have on top of it. So when it comes to,

getting visibility, when women are multi -passionate like that, there are so many different ways to go. How do you sort of help women to figure out what's the right path to be going down?

Amanda Samoyloff (10:26.696)
Yeah, I mean, I like when we first work with somebody and like, I mean, you could DIY this yourself, you know, or DIY it, right? And it's really figuring out a 360 review of yourself, right? And so we tend to interview everyone around, like we asked like three or four people around our clients to have a conversation with them.

to talk about their experiences with them or any kind of stories, whether it's familial or if it's somebody that's worked with them or their partner or whoever. And it's a way to see the back of your head. And you could do this by creating a Google form and be like, here's some questions and ask some people that you know. What did you experience? What is one of the craziest stories that you know about our relationship with?

with regards to my business or not regards to my business. And then really kind of like, like, like making this full circle like approach to like, who am I and what kind of impacts have I made, even in my own circle, right? Because that's where it starts. It's always innately, whatever you are, you're doing towards the people that you love mostly, right? Or the people that you've worked with, they see it. And you might not even see some of the things that you do. So that's like a first start. And then from there, you can go, okay, well, what is my business and what how is those?

Adrienne Garland (11:26.126)
Mmm.

Adrienne Garland (11:30.542)
Mmm.

Adrienne Garland (11:42.158)
Hmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (11:45.576)
those impacts going to help this audience or that audience? What is the problem that I'm trying to solve? Why and like, what does the future look like once this business does actually go forward, you know, as far as startups, like, what does it look like? And then that's kind of when you go and then you reverse engineer it, right? Go, okay, this is what it looks like. And if you had like the opportunity to be in the article or the media outlet of your dreams, right? What would your headline be?

Adrienne Garland (11:52.27)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (12:15.496)
Like what would it be? And you can take time to think about this, you know, and like, okay, what would it be? Like, what would it say? And then again, reverse engineer that how do I get to that headline based off of all the people I contact? And then you start from, if you're in the beginning, you start low, right? You start with like some really, really low seated, like podcast, I would say, like things, and I wouldn't say low seated. I would just say like things that are like easier to get onto just so that you can get visibility, get comfortable having a conversation.

Adrienne Garland (12:15.79)
Hmm.

Adrienne Garland (12:27.662)
Hmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (12:44.52)
on like, you know, a zoom or whatever, right? Start kind of there. There's a lot of different aspects like there, like there's Canvas Rebel, there's like Voyage, LA, Dallas, I think it's in New York too. There's Authority Magazine. These things you can actually apply to yourself. If you look, you can submit and there's like a 99 % chance that you're gonna get on that. And then you go ahead and you write all this stuff out, again, visibility. So now,

Adrienne Garland (12:48.302)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (13:13.384)
You have these articles out there, you're getting podcasts, people can hear you as evergreen, they can hear your personality, wonderful. And so now you're starting to build presence. And from there, I would say, especially for business women, LinkedIn is so important. It's so important. It's like connect with everybody, start going on the networking site, like where it goes, grow your network, and look and connect with people that...

Adrienne Garland (13:21.518)
Mmm.

Adrienne Garland (13:31.118)
Mmm. Mmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (13:39.72)
are in your circles or would be beneficial to your business and start growing from there. I think that's kind of where you should really start is like figuring out what your brand voice is your story and then doing those kind of lower level media placements.

Adrienne Garland (13:56.75)
love that. It's such great advice because I think what happens is there's this disconnect from where you are to where you want to be. I want to be quoted in the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal or get on the Today Show. And you eventually can get there, right? And especially if you do develop your network and you build relationships with the producers for those publications and shows and all that.

But I love this advice of sort of starting small, starting even local, right? I mean, you can be in local publications and let people know what it is that you're doing. Establish yourself as a go -to expert when it comes to whatever the area is. And I think a lot of times people want to step over that part of it. They don't want to...

do these local smaller things because it's not that big splash. But the advice to do that, to also find your voice, refine your voice, figure out how you say certain things, what the impact. Then when you get to the Today Show, you're going to know better what to say and how to show up.

Amanda Samoyloff (15:10.6)
Mm -hmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (15:15.048)
Exactly. Yeah, it's basically like you're like, okay, let me practice. Like, it's almost like, you know, I would like put it back to like speech. These are all the prelims, right? Like get in there, get noticed, and then you get to finals. And when you're in finals, you're going to be so good that you're going to get the national championship, right? You're going to get it. But you have to do the practice. And that's a great way to start, I think, you know, it's a great way to kind of finesse and figure out what your story is. And

Adrienne Garland (15:25.006)
Yup.

Adrienne Garland (15:32.846)
Oh my god.

Amanda Samoyloff (15:43.816)
When people ask you questions, you start to discover a lot more things about yourself as well and like how you want to say it. So. Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (15:48.206)
Yeah, yeah, I love that. So do you exclusively work with women entrepreneurs or do you have a whole set of clients from all different areas?

Amanda Samoyloff (15:59.432)
all different areas. Yeah, obviously, like right now, I feel like that's kind of like the wave that's happening. And I love it. And you know, please let it keep coming. But yes, we work with everyone. Yeah, we we are not in a niche of anything, which I love. I think that's also my ADHD. That's like, I want to learn about this other business. Let's go here. Like, yes, bring it on. You know, so yeah.

Adrienne Garland (16:08.11)
Yes.

Adrienne Garland (16:19.566)
Yeah.

Oh my gosh. So, wow. So you haven't had the PR business for all that long. It's sort of a pre and post pandemic type. And I mean, I just, I am so impressed with all of the different clients that you have. If somebody wants to hire a PR person because they know that their business is growing, at what point do you sort of recommend people to?

hire or bring on a PR person? Because like you said, there's stuff that you can do on your own, but then there's going to come a certain point where you need that extra help from an expert. So when should someone sort of look to hire a PR person?

Amanda Samoyloff (17:09.608)
Yeah, I mean, I think that it's like we do also branding aspects. So like a lot of people will come to us that might not be quite ready. But like, so if this was so like we would be like, okay, so this is what I would say, like what that part looks like until we're ready for PR. It's is your website look great? You need to have a website for sure. What are your social medias look like? Do you have your logos ready? Which we I mean, we can create all those two, but it's

logo website. Are you like having cells is your product launched or is it about launch and if it is about to launch, please get a PR person at least nine weeks before at least nine weeks before just so that they can get it ready. I mean, people think about PR way too late. That's the problem. They like I'm going to launch this in three weeks and it's like, well, this is going to be really tough. But yeah, so it's it's just about getting like

Adrienne Garland (17:48.718)
Hmm.

Adrienne Garland (17:54.606)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (17:59.694)
Yeah, yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (18:03.496)
just being prepared and like also having the time and the budget for it because PR is not cheap, but it's because of all the work that goes into it. And it is collaborative, which means the more you work and meet us in the middle, the better your campaign's gonna go. So that's kind of where this time.

Adrienne Garland (18:08.43)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (18:21.87)
Yeah. That's so important. And I know a lot of times women entrepreneurs that come to the She Leads Conference and everything, they ask a lot of these questions about hiring a PR agency. And you mentioned before doing all of this stuff for $350 a month or something. A lot of the women entrepreneurs are sort of in that mindset of like,

Amanda Samoyloff (18:41.544)
Oh fuck.

Adrienne Garland (18:47.726)
hey, I've got $500 a month and it's just sort of not enough. I think there needs to be a little bit more education around everything that does go on because you are out there constantly building relationships with all these different publications. You are always scanning the environment for opportunities and where can your clients fit into that? That's not like an

hourly thing that you do. And people don't necessarily understand that. And I always try to educate people like, listen, you need to set aside a certain amount of money and you need to know that, you know, it's going to take a while for things to bake and get going. You're not going to, you're not getting into, you know, New York Times when you hire an agency a week before. It's just not happening. Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (19:18.6)
Mm -mm.

Amanda Samoyloff (19:41.352)
No, it's not. No. And it's like, there's also the publications, like they take a while to, you know, publish, right? Like some of them take three to four months, like you'll do an interview and then they'll put it out. So it's like, that's also important to realize that like, if you have a launch coming out and you want to be in the like, you could get Forbes, but it might not come until after the launch. So it's just those things that like need to be thought of. And it's like, also like for us, it's like, yeah, again, we're like,

Adrienne Garland (19:48.974)
Of course.

Amanda Samoyloff (20:09.992)
We're every day emailing, we're researching every journalist, we're looking at what the news is, like what's happening. We're like not only like submitting to podcasts, we're spending to radio, to media outlets, to speaking engagements, to networking events. Like it's all the time constant. So there's, it's, and also you think about it, especially with like a boutique agency, you get who you get to meet. Like that is your team, right? You're not gonna get like in a big PR firm,

Adrienne Garland (20:26.062)
Yes.

Adrienne Garland (20:35.918)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (20:37.96)
where you're gonna get there like a new assistant, something, you know, you're gonna get the entire boutique. And if you think about it, you get four people working for you for that. And so it's like, wait a minute, now I got four employees. So if you think about it in those terms, it kind of like makes that money seem a little bit less like intense.

Adrienne Garland (20:44.014)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (20:51.502)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (20:57.87)
Right, it has a lot of value. There's a lot of impact there. And a lot of times what we talk about at the She Leads conferences and even on this podcast is like, you know, women do need to do a lot to get visibility. I always say like, I try to help women get the visibility that they deserve. And I really do. And I know that word can be triggering, but I really do believe that women do deserve more visibility than we.

Amanda Samoyloff (20:59.784)
Mm -hmm. Right.

Adrienne Garland (21:26.158)
get. A lot of the media, you know, focuses in on a certain, you know, group of people or they turn to a certain, you know, handful of people as experts. And there's so many other women and diverse voices out there that they could be turning to. But unless you put yourself out there, you're not going to get those opportunities.

Amanda Samoyloff (21:49.48)
Yeah, exactly. And it's like, you know, just stepping out there is like the first, like, that's the thing, right? They want to know. And right now, like you could also go on Haro and Quoted, which are both free, but those are places that you can find, you can be like, oh, I'm an expert in this and pitch yourself there and start really putting yourself out there just as a quote. Like those are quotes, right? Like someone's writing an article, they ask for an expert quote. Now you have all of this stuff to show people like, hey, I was in this.

Adrienne Garland (21:59.918)
Yes.

Amanda Samoyloff (22:19.048)
They interviewed me, right? So.

Adrienne Garland (22:21.518)
And I think we have to first and foremost also claim our expertise. So forget about pitching, right? Like first and foremost, we have to believe it for ourselves that we actually do have something to say and something to contribute. Is that something that you find sometimes when clients come to you, especially because we're talking women entrepreneurs, do you feel like that that's something that...

women have to do some work on, like do some internal work about claiming their expertise.

Amanda Samoyloff (22:51.912)
Yes, absolutely. I mean, I have worked with a lot of women that because we pull the people, the founders outside of their brand and make them sit on top and they're like the horse and the chariots behind them that their business they're in front. A lot of them were safe, felt comfortable behind the scenes. But once we put them forward, it like it blew up like their company. It's like, okay, because now people see you and they do trust you. However, it took a long time.

It's scary, it's imposter syndrome. Like, why am I the one to say this? And I'm like, why are you not the one? It's like, I think instead of saying, why am I, like, why am I the person? It's like, why are you not? Like, what are you not, like, there's only one of you, right? And that's going to contribute so much to the world. And if you like dim your light, right? Like Marianne Williams says, you know, it's like, you know, when you like let your light shine, you get like unconsciously give everyone a reason to do the same.

Adrienne Garland (23:28.302)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (23:50.504)
I'm obviously butchering this, but Marianne Williams, if you guys want to look it up, check it out is beautiful. But basically it means like shine your lights that it like encourages other women to and I think we're in a really cool place right now with all of these like women's networks, like she leads, you know, live that it's just empowering women and you know, obviously some people are

Adrienne Garland (23:50.894)
Yeah. No, you're not.

Adrienne Garland (23:59.758)
Yes!

Amanda Samoyloff (24:19.72)
weird about empowerment because we already have power, but like, you know, showing up and being supported and showing our light, right? And I think a lot more women are starting to do that. So that's good.

Adrienne Garland (24:32.686)
Yeah, I really hope so. And I do hope that some of the more established publications also do a better job of seeking out other types of voices. I think I read something the other day. It was about the AI industry. And an article was written in the New York Times. And every single expert that was quoted on AI in that New York Times article was a man.

And it just doesn't represent all of the people that are behind this AI movement. And yet, people aren't reading the New York Times like they used to. Let's start there. But when they do read something like that, it's an established publication, it has high credibility. All of a sudden you think to yourself, well, the people that are in the AI industry, they're just guys. And if you're a woman reading that or you hear,

Amanda Samoyloff (25:04.104)
of course.

Adrienne Garland (25:31.534)
people talking about that, you start to feel like you don't belong. And I feel like that has been something that we as women, women, and then women entrepreneurs have really got to overcome. And putting yourself out there in the media, even if it's, you know, even if you're not getting the biggest splash or whatever, it doesn't matter. It's like, let's just keep beating that drum so that, you know, if you see me,

And I'm quoted in the media, well, if I can do it, then you can too. And that's why I love your quote from Marianne Williamson, because we do need to shine our light so much brighter. We really do.

Amanda Samoyloff (26:13.672)
Yes. Well, and that's the thing, right? Like it's like it change happens like in small increments. It doesn't happen in a big thing. So like the more that women are like stepping up and showing up and it is true. It's like even like listening to you. It's like when I think even AI and maybe it's just even program, I do think very masculine, very male like centered, centered, but I've talked to about three women last week even that are all in AI and doing stuff within tech and stuff. And so.

But it's like, that's why I'm like, let's get out there. Like, let's get ahead of this. And it's not just this male, you know, centric new development. And it wasn't because of women, it was because of men. It's not. So I totally agree. And yeah.

Adrienne Garland (26:52.11)
It's not. Yeah. So if you're an AI expert listening in, get yourself out there. Hi, Amanda. So that we can do, yes, yes. Oh my gosh. For just a quick couple of seconds, I want to shift gears a tiny bit because I want to focus in on your just creativity and your poetry. Can you just share with us what your...

Amanda Samoyloff (27:02.472)
I really love team boys!

Adrienne Garland (27:19.662)
what you like to sort of express in your creative, you know, from your creative side, not that PR branding, not that that's not completely creative because it is, but this other more personal, I think, aspect of you. Can you talk to us just a little bit about the things you think about and the things that you sort of express?

Amanda Samoyloff (27:42.216)
Sure, yeah. I honestly, most of the poetry came to me when I was on like a hiking trail or when I was like trail running here in California. There's a lot of trails by me. So I like kind of grew up in that. So like once my body was in motion, my brain was able to focus. And it came from like, I think a lot of the stuff was...

you know, things that came up while I was going through it, like trying to explain like what, but like, you know, like within a scene, right? A lot of my stuff is very like lyrical and like, it's like almost like a set, right? Like, like it's set in a place, you know, it's not as, I guess like, it's not as, I don't know what the word is and I'm not going to say it. I don't know what it is, but like, it really, it sets you up. Like you feel like you're in a bar.

Adrienne Garland (28:25.486)
Hmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (28:36.584)
like, okay, I'm in a bar, I am this person, this is what's going on. So it was a lot of breakups. It was a lot about like the, you know, the struggles with my father when he was alive. It's a lot of like relationship things. And also just a lot of growth. There was a lot of times and chapters. So like, it's interesting, like each chapter of my life, you can see like the poems kind of shifting, like there's a lot of really happy poems in one like time. And then there's,

Adrienne Garland (28:51.31)
Hmm.

Mmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (29:05.96)
kind of like these like really sad, like emotional ones, like, I'm never gonna find you know, when I was younger, like, you know, all that angst, you know. And it really just comes from here, like my heart, like, I don't technically sit down and go, I'm just gonna like start writing. It like usually comes to me. But I did do an exercise that did help.

Adrienne Garland (29:10.126)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (29:28.622)
Hmm.

Amanda Samoyloff (29:33.128)
where I had all these people vote for three, I gave nine words and I said, vote for which words you want. And in 24 hours, I'll write a poem. And so they would vote for it and I would pick the three. So there'd be like canvas, blue and vote. And then I would write a poem around that. And so that was a really cool, it was stressful because I put this 24 hours on myself, but it forced.

Adrienne Garland (29:51.438)
Wow.

Adrienne Garland (30:00.462)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (30:01.8)
non -perfection because I was in a perfectionist state. So I like had to produce something and whatever it was, it was. And it really ended up like kind of breaking open another level of writing for me, I think. So that was, that was cool too.

Adrienne Garland (30:18.158)
I love, I just love to show different aspects of people because we aren't just one thing. And I do think that that other creative aspect of ourselves, I do think that we need to talk about that more because no matter what it is that you're doing, it's informing your work and then your work is also informing your creativity, your poetry, your writing, all of it. And you know,

I just sort of think that sometimes, especially women entrepreneurs, we get so hyper focused on our business and growing our business. As much as we want to make an impact and move our business forward, sometimes we forget about who we are. I hope that just by listening to you that other people are also encouraged to really honor those other.

parts of themselves because they can't do anything but help you be a more fully formed human being.

Amanda Samoyloff (31:19.816)
Oh, absolutely. Well, and you know, to say like to piggyback off of that, like I was so like for a year and a half, I kind of I didn't write any poem, right? Like I was so in my business, like this is it. And my reward system was only if I succeeded in a client placement or like what was happening. And like, so then when I went to try to write like my reward system, didn't it wouldn't reward me, right? Because like my dopamine hits were only coming from work.

because I was so in. So like I had to stop and I had to be like, you have to stop work at this time. Like this is, this is your end of day and like go and like shut it down. Like how you like, you know, your end of day like routine and like go outside and go write and like do the things that you want so that you can like rearrange your like reward system. Because if your reward system is only linked to work, you're going to hit burnout.

Adrienne Garland (31:49.934)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (31:57.87)
Yeah.

Amanda Samoyloff (32:17.608)
you're gonna hit depression, you're going to feel like everything sucks and you don't have great relationships. It's just so about work. So I will say like I've been there for sure, absolutely. So if anybody listening, I can totally relate.

Adrienne Garland (32:17.774)
Yep. Yep.

Adrienne Garland (32:29.934)
Yeah, I can.

Yeah, I mean, I definitely fall into that trap and it because it is addictive, right? It's like you want to help people. You want to get the placements. You want to, you know, accomplish the work, make, you know, check all the boxes and do all of that. But, you know, at the end of the day, if you're not then filling yourself back up, then you're not you're not going to be a good business person. And I definitely have over the last, you know, months, years, I don't know, been

trying to be a lot more conscious about doing things like practicing art. Like I go to an art class and you know, it's frustrating though, because it's like, you know, I'm terrible, but I know I'm not terrible, but I'm terrible in the moment. And I'm like, gosh, it's so frustrating, but I love it at the same time. And it's almost like it doesn't even matter what it turns out to be.

It's just the practice of it, which I think is so filling for my soul. And it's something that I got away from for a really long time. And I'm like, that's part of who I am. And I think so many women, I think we're talking about this just because I think so many women can relate to this because we're so pressured to be like this super incredible, successful entrepreneur. And it's like, we want that.

but we can't also turn our backs on who we are, like inside. So.

Amanda Samoyloff (34:04.552)
Exactly. I mean, there's just so much pressure to be like perfect. Like if you're a CEO founder, like you're supposed to have it all, like you've got it figured out. And it's like, so then you feel guilt and there's shame like, Oh, why am I ending work early to go do this other thing for me? Because I need to work on my business. Right. And it's like, but if you work on yourself, your business isn't going to go anywhere. It's just going to, it's just going to stop, um, because you're not growing. So then your business can't grow. So that's this kind of thing.

Adrienne Garland (34:20.43)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (34:25.998)
Yeah.

Adrienne Garland (34:29.422)
Yes. Oh, so good. Shine the light. You can't grow if your business doesn't grow. I think there's a lot of golden nuggets in this conversation. Amanda, I just love talking to you. Please keep sending me the incredible women that you are working with. I love having them on the show. I love talking to them and learning about them and by extension also learning about you.

and everything that you're doing. So just thank you so much for spending your time with me today. How can people get in touch with you, hire you, have you help them with branding and PR and all the things?

Amanda Samoyloff (35:03.048)
Yeah, of course. Thank you for having me. You're incredible. You're phenomenal. You can find me at www .samoyloffpr .com. You can also find Samoyloffpr on LinkedIn, Instagram, all the social media. So you can contact us there. And also, yeah, we're going to have a lot of templates that are going to be for sale so that you could do DIY stuff yourself.

So a lot of different things about PR that are going to be more manageable within the next couple of weeks. So hopefully it'll be out by the time you guys hear this. And yeah, that's where you can find us.

Adrienne Garland (35:41.774)
Oh, I love that so much. I'm going to actually, when I see that, I'm going to put a link on my website too, because so many people ask me about PR. So I will link over to your sites as an amazing resource because we do need to start this stuff on our own. And then when we get to a point, we need to hire you. So yes. Thank you so much. This was so much fun.

Amanda Samoyloff (36:00.232)
Yes, perfect. That's amazing. So much fun. Thank you so, so much.