Rebecca (00:01.62)
Welcome to another episode of the Champagne Lounge Podcast. Today I'm joined by the rather fabulous Leanne O'Sullivan. Welcome to the show, Leanne.
Leanne (00:09.434)
Thank you, it is so wonderful to be here. And as you can notice, I am wearing your signature pink, just for you.
Rebecca (00:13.14)
You're in pink. I love it. Today I'm not in pink, but I do have the pink nails. So there's always something on brand somewhere. Leanne, always kick off the episodes now by asking our guests to introduce themselves and where they are in the country. So who are you, what do you do and where are you located?
Leanne (00:33.666)
Okay, so my name, as you said, is Leanne O'Sullivan and I'm a digital marketer or digital strategist. And currently I'm coming to you today from the beautiful coastal city of
Rebecca (00:46.09)
Beautiful. What a gorgeous spot. Coastal retreat. Yeah. Now you and I were chatting offline before we hit the record button. You've been in business now for 25 years, which is no mean feat, particularly in today's climate. Have you always been in a digital space?
Leanne (00:49.464)
It is.
Leanne (01:00.27)
Yeah.
Leanne (01:06.736)
Well, yes, our business, not in the way that it looks now, because obviously we've been in the game for like 25 years. So we have seen significant change. And I remember and actually my husband and I were joking about this on the weekend. Our very first website or his very first website was called Propellerhead because back in the day when websites was all there was in the digital space, people who did those things were called Propellerheads. Yes, they
Rebecca (01:34.826)
Really?
Leanne (01:36.708)
They were, and we actually tried to register the business name Propellerhead, but at the time somebody else had pinched it, so we couldn't have that. So I have been there from the very beginning, you know, of developing websites. That's how we started. And then we started to build as the industry shifted and moved. And, you know, the next thing that we developed was email marketing tools. And this was all before we had social media. And then we started to have Twitter and LinkedIn and then Facebook
Instagram and then the whole thing about content marketing and the way that you nurture and message to your customer base, which is I suppose where I'm at now as like a digital marketer, digital strategist is that I do a lot in that holistic. We work across all those areas. I mean, I haven't even mentioned SEO. We've worked across, you know, web and social and content and search, all the things that you need to bring together.
And that's what I do now, but yeah, back in the day, none of those things
Rebecca (02:40.188)
Yeah, so that's been a shift in the way things have moved and a lot for you to keep on top of, but a lot for every business owner to stay across, given that you've got to have a nice even mix of everything. Well, not an even mix, just a mix, I should say. They're not equal portions in a golden bullet. But yeah, how have you stayed on top of the trends? Or not the trends, trends is the wrong word, Leanne, on top of the
Leanne (02:56.202)
that's exactly right, yeah.
Leanne (03:05.34)
okay. I think it's a really great, you know how lots of people do things like Sudoku or learn another language to keep their mind occupied? Well, I'm not one of those people that needs to do those things because literally, and it's just as well I love to learn stuff because I learn new things every single day. Like I literally learn new things every single day, whether it's a new approach to how you might market something or whether
a new software platform like there's been so many in terms of, know, web platforms, the amount of items that we've touched over the years, what we now focus on, email marketing tools, how many there are, you know, there's just the tools that you use to create your graphics, know, things like, you know, the Adobe Suite or now there's Canva or a whole range of groovy little animations. remember, about seven years ago, there was a tool that I loved from
software firm down in Tasmania called Biteable. And you might remember them. They're one of the first companies in the world to do little like animations that people could do themselves. And I revisited them the other day, which it's just a lot of things. And it's just as well I love to learn because I do. I learn something new every single
Rebecca (04:23.73)
I love that. And so that's probably why you haven't got bored in running your business, right? Because you're always learning and doing different things and keeping on top of things and having different conversations. Yeah.
Leanne (04:34.414)
Yeah, yeah, exactly. So different conversations with what the approach might be or how you might put something together. I suppose the thing, though, in terms of all that time where it's been different tech and different approaches and, you know, different social media stuff and, yes, different trends in terms of how you do stuff. A lot of the stuff that's always been consistent for us has been the kinds of clients that we work with, but the kinds of things that people are trying to achieve.
So whether, it doesn't matter whether it was quite simple, know, very static websites or whether we now have, you know, all singing or dancing, a whole range of things, the kinds of clients that we like to work with or I in particular like to work with and the kinds of stuff that they do hasn't really changed in all that time. Cause I just seek out those
Rebecca (05:22.344)
And how do you find those people? Or how do they find you?
Leanne (05:26.744)
A lot of different ways of finding us. there's the usual ways that you would expect a digital marketer to say, you want to have good SEO, you need to have a solid social media footprint, you need to be doing outbound stuff, you need to be doing paid stuff, all of those things. Yes, we do all of those things. But as we were mentioning offline, I think the thing over the years that I've come back to time and time again has been
those good referral networks that you have where you've bothered still, even in the game that I'm in, you've bothered to go to that event. You've bothered to put yourself in front of those people. You've bothered to go and be in the, you know, the term that people have, you've got to be where your people play. You've got to be in that playground. And being in that playground sometimes means that you've got to actually go to their event, go to that lunch, go to that, that coffee thing, go to that at the end of the day. And I know
Rebecca (06:16.34)
Yep.
Leanne (06:25.936)
you know, people might have thought, COVID's changed everything for, you know, for good. No, it didn't. The thing that I know after 25 years in business and the people that still refer business to me and are still clients of mine have been clients of mine and referrers of mine for nearly 15 years.
Rebecca (06:45.502)
That's amazing, isn't it? It's just another testament to the power of connection and conversation and human connection. Like it's, it's got to have the human factor into it. And with that comes the care factor. You and I were talking offline around, you know, how the state of affairs right now, given the current economic climate, things are really tough for business owners. They're closing, small businesses are closing left, right and center. They're in dire straits behind the scenes. What are you?
Leanne (06:46.67)
Yeah.
Rebecca (07:13.308)
seeing through the conversations that you're having, the networks that we're in, because you and I are both active networkers and active event goers, what are you seeing people not doing that they should be doing given what's going on in the world right now and the tools that we have available to
Leanne (07:31.458)
Okay, so the thing, as you would expect me to say, is you never stop marketing. Okay, so you never stop marketing, either when you're busy or when you're quiet and you don't have the cash, you've got to find something, some way to market. And when you're busy, you'd never want to turn that tap off. You want to always find the resources to service the stuff. So that's one thing I just want to get out there because it's so important. And I do see people pulling back right now and you know, and
It's a mistake because the people that win in times like this when it is tough, when it is lean, are the people that stay on the ground, that stay in the space and remain visible. So that's super important. I think the other thing right now that I'm seeing people that have that long -term resilience. Now, obviously I can't when I'm advising people or you you yourself, when you're talking to people, we don't necessarily see into the books or the financial structures
people's businesses. So clearly that's something that's super important that people never need to take their eyes off. know, am I actually a going concern when things are okay? Because if you're not going well when things are okay, you haven't got to hope when things are tight.
Rebecca (08:46.581)
no. Yeah, you've got to keep your eyes on those numbers. Yeah.
Leanne (08:49.008)
Yeah, 100%. So assuming that's the case, the thing that I think is so important that people need to work their network. They need to reach out and talk to the people that they trust right now to see what, how can we work together? Don't forget about the things that I do, you know, make sure that they know and also listen to what's going on with them. Like it's a two way kind of thing. And I know
Collaboration is such an overused wanky term, I think. And people don't understand, lots of times I think people see it as like a real short term approach. if you do this thing with me, whatever the thing might be, then I'll do this other thing. And it's like a one -off transactional kind of experience rather than a long -term deep understanding of what people, know, understanding another
Rebecca (09:31.134)
Mm -hmm.
Leanne (09:47.63)
business and them understanding yours and what makes you tick and you then get those really rich long -term leads that pay dividends. And I mean, I see it in my business, I see it in other people's businesses that I've worked with for a long time. It's those deep relationships that have stood the test of time, you know, withstood whims and trends and stuff like that. You've got to work those.
And if you don't have those channels, you need to start building
Rebecca (10:19.22)
Build them. Yeah. And it's, you know, you and I do this innately. It's why the champagne lounge exists from a connection perspective, because I know there are other people out there who want to connect with like -minded people, but the conversations aren't always around business, are they? not always a sales conversation. And I think that's where people trip themselves up, because they'll start a new conversation or a new connection request with, this is what I sell. What do you sell? How do we work? And it's a real, a transactional way of talking to each other.
Do you have any like, like hacks or things that you do when you're meeting someone new that sparks conversation or that allows you to remember key details for next
Leanne (10:58.864)
Okay, so things that I do is I obviously ask a lot of questions about them. And I think also that might be a tip if you are a shy person who maybe or, you know, you don't like to sort of brag about what you do, a way to get around that is to ask questions of the other person. So that's a really great opener at, you know, strange events. The other thing that I like to do is in addition to asking questions is I am an online
I am gonna put my hands up and say that. If I know that I'm going to something and I already know some of the people that might be in the room or if I meet some people, I very soon after that event will follow them on social media. It could be that I might follow them on Instagram, depending on the kind of business that they are. I definitely go and I look them up on LinkedIn and I wanna build that connection straight away and send them a little message saying, it was great to meet you today at X thing. And I look forward to learning more about
Rebecca (11:29.316)
Love it.
Leanne (11:56.676)
blah, blah. I always do those things, always, always, always. But I just think some of it is about researching where you are and where they are. Like when you ask those questions, I always, I don't know whether it's from, you know, my university experience is like from years ago, clearly, but it's economics. So I was trained to do a lot of reading and to pull a lot of information together from a variety of sources.
in my career as a digital marketer, I am still doing a lot of reading and pulling together information from a million sources. So if I'm going to be in an event, I'd bother to find out about the people, their industry, you know, what it is that they do so that I can be interested in their actual industry and their market. And you learn so much stuff. Like, I think people forget to ask some of those questions, you know.
Rebecca (12:46.622)
Profession,
Leanne (12:55.502)
Genuine questions because it could be, who do you sell to? You know, not necessarily what do you do, but who do you sell to? What's it going? You know, how's it going? Who are the people? Like it clearly depends on, you know, the environment that you're in. You're not going to dive deep into some big long thing, but I think people really appreciate when you've bothered to research a little bit about their industry and what they do, and then they can share their knowledge. And I think people always appreciate opportunities.
to share their knowledge with others and then they feel validated. And I think that opens up trust with you because you've bothered to research their industry and they go, cool. You know, they get a chance to like shine in a group of people, which.
Rebecca (13:40.358)
Yeah, it's so fascinating that people don't think to do that. I'm a little bit of an online stalker myself, not to probably the same extent, but I do send those little messages out to people or even down to when people start following me online. I'll send them a little message to say, thanks for following me. Most business owners don't have tens of hundreds of thousands of followers that are joining them and engaging with them all the time.
Two or three minutes out of your day to say hi to the person that's chosen to follow you can make all the difference. It's all the little personal touches that you add into
Leanne (14:12.784)
100%. Yeah, that's exactly right. And you may, that's a good point about, you know, people, most businesses don't have like tens of thousands of people. Exactly, we don't. And if you do, you're kind of going to question, how did you buy them? So it's, you're right. It's not that difficult, but it's, these are important things that I think sometimes people forget. And these are so important right now, you know, that you work those...
opportunities that you follow through and you take those opportunities seriously like you would, you know, any other thing that people might, how they might reach out to you. And I just think it's at these higher levels when we're in that awareness phase that I can just come to know you as a nice person in business.
Rebecca (15:02.75)
I was going to lead into that one, right? The person side, because we've talked a lot about understanding their industry and getting them to their profession and making sure you're aware of what they're going to be talking about so you can talk about them in a professional sense or talk with them in a professional sense. But what about the personal side? Where do you sort of play in that space? Where do you start? I know what I do, but where do you bring in that personal side so that you're not what every time you're connecting with them, you you can be asking, how was that trip to Plough?
How was the kids doing that and how often do you touch base with
Leanne (15:35.022)
Yeah, I communicate with my, when I communicate with my list, for example, I always do a bit of storytelling. Like I like to share a little bit about what I've been doing. And I think as well as, you know, reaching out to the people like clients that I actually have, one of the things that I think super important is to understand a little bit about their personal lives, you know, are
Do have a partner? Do they have children? Are they traveling? You know, did they win something? Are they on a fitness kick? Like they're just simple questions that I like to like put either in our CRM or bank away in a memory file so that I'm just a little bit across the actual life because it just makes working with people so much more enjoyable at every level when you you care about them and they care about you, especially when...
especially when things can be tough and go wrong, know, if something's late, if you did something wrong, or when you understand their personal circumstances, it's, you know, there's a bit of give in terms of say the money side of things. Like all those things are so important and so many of them are common sense, but I do think sometimes people forget, but there's a person that I follow and she shared this the other week. You may know of her, her name's Mia Fildman and
A while ago, she's on this like 12 months sabbatical and she's traveling around the world and sharing gritty places that she's been. But one of the things that she shared along this line of, you know, the personal and if you share opportunities about your own life, you know, not every single person needs to be like that. But if you open up about what you're doing, people pay attention to that and they can see a kindred spirit.
And she was sharing stories of this big overseas adventure. And she said, you know, if you want, if you want people to be interested in you and your business, then do some interesting things.
Rebecca (17:35.89)
I love that. So important. It is because I think, you know, we've lost the art of showing our true selves because we're all trying to be something else online and just show certain things or we overthink what we're sharing or how we're sharing stories because, no one's going to really find that interesting. But actually being able to have that authentic, vulnerable, if it needs to be way of communicating or sharing with people, it does bring out, know, that person seems like my person.
Leanne (17:37.092)
Ha ha
Leanne (18:05.776)
Exactly, exactly. And it's also realising that, you know, when you're trying to secure clients, most of us aren't trying to score tens of thousands of clients either. We want, you know, if I just got that one more person on my retainer list, if I could get 10 more people to buy my stuff, like often the numbers are much smaller when you think about what they are. So it's
Rebecca (18:27.156)
me.
Leanne (18:30.39)
something that has real value when you share those personal things about you because you do want an opportunity for your people to be attracted to
Rebecca (18:39.176)
Definitely and how are they going to know or be attracted to you if you don't share who you are and share a little bit about you?
Leanne (18:45.169)
That's right. That's exactly right. And also they just, you know, they are sussing you out a little bit. They want to know like, you know, use someone that likes cocktails or use someone that goes to the gym. When I say, you know, do something interesting, it's not like the world's expecting that you're going to go on glamorous trips around the world. But sometimes sharing, I did my first, you know, sourdough loaf this week and who's had difficulty trying to make a starter and here's my fail at
There's so many things in our everyday life that are genuinely interesting to other people, not in this like weird voyeuristic way, but genuine connection. And I think that you, you know, it happens really naturally. And I mean, you're probably doing things behind the scenes, Rebecca, but in the champagne lounge, it happens a lot. You really do get to see people as people and then as business people. And then you wanna, actually you're one of my people. I think I'd like to have a chat to you about something.
Rebecca (19:42.634)
Yeah, you almost took my last question away from me there because it is about that. It's people buy from people and you want to chat with a friend and you don't want to be sold to all the time. And just because you're a business owner doesn't mean you want to talk business 24 seven. So just having those conversations and sharing a little bit more about you and your life without having to share everything and bare your soul is definitely possible. But talking about finding people and you have sort of
just mentioned that I don't let people leave the podcast without sharing why they love being part of the community that we're building. What is it about being part of the Champagne Lounge that has sparked your interest to join, but also that keeps you in and enjoying it and being part of
Leanne (20:29.858)
Okay, so I went to one of the initial launch drinks parties in Sydney, which was really nice because, you when you go into a room and you feel the vibe of a room, sometimes it's a bit hard to describe, you know, but it just felt good. And there were the things that I care about in that room. There was a bunch of really smart women. It was a bunch of business women, but it was a bunch of different business women, you
willing to like chat to different people, which I found very welcoming. And that's what I liked, that I was made feel welcome without anybody looking like they went to this big effort to welcome me. It was just because we're a nice people. So, hey, I loved that from that. And then what I also loved is I've been in millions of groups over the years.
And sometimes I don't want to be taught anything more. Like I really don't. I know a lot and my brain is probably exploding with the amount of stuff that I know about what I know. But what I love is listening to other people share things just because we can about a whole range of things in a whole lot of different industries. And that's really good because
in all the networking things over the years, the things that I've always valued the most is when you've got a real mix of people, when you like chuck everything in the bottle and you shake it up and it's very different. And I really
Rebecca (22:04.2)
I love that. Put them all in the bottle and shake them up and just have a different conversation with different things. That's phenomenal. I might have to take that one, Leanne. I love that you summed it up so well. And you know what, when you find your people and you do that, it is a way of... It's an effort. It's effortless. It's an effortless conversation, effortless way of meeting people, and it's really enjoyable. So, yeah, I'm glad you found your people.
Leanne (22:32.368)
And it's fun. I love it. mean, you know, it is, it's just, it's fun. It's just nice people, your people, like it's good. When you, there's nothing beats a room of great women. They're really, nothing does. And if you know, if you've got a glass in your hand sometimes, well, hey, better.
Rebecca (22:49.428)
It just makes it even better.
Leanne, thank you so much for coming on the show and sharing your journey and your insights with me. I think there's a lot there that lots of us can learn from in terms of keeping those conversations flowing and staying interested in others and being really authentic. So thank you so much for coming on the show. Thanks for being part of the community and cheers to another few years in business.
Leanne (23:14.96)
Absolutely, thank you.
Rebecca (23:18.238)
Perfect.
