#awinewith Jess Ruhfus
MEET JESS
Jess is the Founder of Collabosaurus.
Find Jess here:
Collabosaurus website or Instagram @collabosaurus
Transcript
Danielle Lewis (00:08):
Amazing. Well, thank you, Jess, for being here on Spark tv. I'm very excited to be sharing a wine with you today and talking all things biz related. So let's just kick straight into how on earth did you decide to start a business? What's your career backstory? What was the thing that made you take the leap? Tell us how you got here.
Jess Ruhfus (00:35):
Sure. Well, I actually originally really wanted to work in film, so that's funny how I did not know that things have panned out.
Danielle Lewis (00:44):
Yeah. Now is your moment, now is, I know
Jess Ruhfus (00:47):
We're on tv, but no, I started my university degree and everything really wanting to work in film. I got to work on some really great music video sets and I stuck my way onto the set of the Great Gatsby, which is a whole other
Danielle Lewis (01:03):
Story. Oh my God.
Jess Ruhfus (01:04):
Lied my way there, which was great. And then, yeah, I had a lot of people tell me that making it in the film industry is impossible in Australia and I need to move to la and I didn't really want to do that. So I kind of started looking around for other things and kind of fell into PR and ended up finishing up my degree with a major in public relations. And my first job was in a boutique fashion and lifestyle PR company in Sydney, which was my experience of that was Devil Wears Prada in real life wasn't Hathaway. So that was interesting. And I remember just having that moment of like, oh my gosh, I've been wanting to, I was in such a rush to get out of school and get out of uni and get my hands dirty and sunken into a career. And then I hated it and I was like, oh my gosh, this is what I've been working so hard for.
(02:00):
This was 13 hour days and really low pay. Of course, I was a graduate, so I was super, super low pay and I was working stupid hours. Yeah. But that job was interesting, but I learned a lot. And one of the biggest things that that started my brain turning with collab sous ideas was that we would pull together media launch events for fashion clients a lot. So we needed to find venue partners and goodie bag inclusions and make up brands to come in and do some kind of activation and make the whole event more engaging. And it was just such a scramble. And I found that as a junior publicist, this job was often lumped with me, but I didn't have a network, so I was constantly just cold pitching brands. And a lot of people were like, when it came to advice around doing that, well, there wasn't really anything around, and it was all about free stuff.
(02:55):
Let's get free coconut water for this event. Let's get free X, Y, Z. And I remember going to a Watson and Watson fashion show, which was just for the media, and they'd partnered with Victoria Coffee, and when you arrived you got handed a Victoria Coffee with your name on it. It was all just very well done. And this was, I feel like in the days when this wasn't such a norm at those media events, it was really cool. And influencers were just coming to the for just starting. It was the fashion editors and there were a couple of influencers there, and that was really cool. Whereas these days it's more influencers than there are, but God, I'm showing my age a bit. But yeah, so did that.
Danielle Lewis (03:35):
Yeah,
Jess Ruhfus (03:36):
And I need to touch that. But yeah, I remember thinking, wow, this is so cool. And when collaborations are done well and they're strategically leveraged, gosh, they can be so valuable for brands. Imagine if a beauty brand had gotten involved in this event and done something really awesome together. So that's kind of where it all started. And then I started working in small business marketing education, which is where we would take, and I sound like I'm in a hoodlum because there's sirens going now.
Danielle Lewis (04:04):
Sorry. That's right. It's very authentic. This is just B, don't worry
Jess Ruhfus (04:11):
The background noise. Sorry guys. But yeah, I've worked in small business marketing education where we would take small businesses through a 12 month course as to how to DIY. Their own marketing and partnerships were a huge part of that course, but I found that so many small businesses weren't doing them because they didn't know where to start. They'd been taken advantage of in the past, or they were sending out pitch emails that were absolutely terrible and not getting any responses, unsurprisingly. So it was kind of from that job, I was like, you know what? I was trying to find event partners I think for our own event. And Tinder was really popular at the time, and I was like, why doesn't something exist that is Tinder for brands that can connect brands together for cool events and social media partnerships and things like that. And that's when Calas was born many years ago.
Danielle Lewis (05:01):
Oh my god, I love this. So it's kind of like the meshing, all the marrying of two jobs that you had with huge problems that no one had solved yet.
Jess Ruhfus (05:11):
Yeah, exactly. And it's actually really funny how so many things, both my parents met, they worked in radio, and so I ended up doing radio subjects and stuff at uni and doing a lot of stuff there. And you think that, oh, all that time is wasted. But I run two podcasts now and those radio subjects really helpful. And I don't know, storytelling and branding with film, there's so much tied to it. So it's funny. I think looking back it all makes a lot of sense, but at the time it really didn't.
Danielle Lewis (05:41):
Yeah, sometimes that's the best way though. So now I know what colus is, but for those tuning in at home, tell us exactly what the platform is, does who should be using it, what's it all about?
Jess Ruhfus (05:56):
Yes. So is a dating site for brands, essentially. So we have a platform that Match makes. There's just over eight and a half thousand brands on the platform now for really cool marketing collaborations that could cover social media products or events. So think of things like competitions and giveaways or social media content series, gift with purchase collaborations, limited edition product collaborations and beautiful events and activations. Collab source is that matchmaker that connects really aligned awesome brands together for those marketing projects. And we work with brands in a whole host of different industries. We do fashion, beauty, lifestyle, food and beverage probably predominantly. There's also B2B is an emerging category on there as well, like graphic designers and social media software platforms and stuff, for example, can team up and do something really cool together and reach business audiences too. So yeah, we work with brands like Marks and Spencer and Marley Spoon and Dermalogica, and a whole host of cool businesses and small businesses as well.
Danielle Lewis (07:01):
Amazing. I love it. And so this all sounds like highly technical. You have built a tech platform. How did you go from being PR Junior going, oh my god, my life sucks. I can't find all these people to launching a technology company?
Jess Ruhfus (07:20):
Oh know, it's just so easy as you would know.
Danielle Lewis (07:24):
That's right. We're not in therapy at all
Jess Ruhfus (07:27):
Know we could just turn this into a therapy session. Oh look, I think I've picked up a lot of technical stuff along the way. I would definitely say I'm no engineer because I kind of know how to code and stuff like that and basics, but I don't enjoy it when every time I go into that side of things I get a bit sort of stuck and it's just not where my zone of genius is. So it's been an interesting learning curve. What I have found though is I really love product design, like technical product design. I really, really love that. I'm a super visual person, so being able to map stuff out the way I want it to work, it's like who knew? I really liked that. And I've kind of fallen into doing that as part of my role in au. That's cool. Yeah, I really like that. But it's been interesting. It's definitely not an easy road. Being a solo non-technical female founder cap raising in the tech startup world is a massive thing, as you know.
Danielle Lewis (08:28):
No, you might say.
Jess Ruhfus (08:32):
So it just adds an extra layer of difficulty, unfortunately, because I think a lot of investors love the Facebook model where you have this technical and then a visionary and it all just And men as well.
Danielle Lewis (08:47):
Totally. Totally. One plus one plus one. There you go. Unicorns.
Jess Ruhfus (08:50):
Yeah, exactly. Equals unicorn. And it's like, oh, for goodness sake, there's so many other to be a unicorn.
Danielle Lewis (08:56):
Oh my God. Totally. Yeah, it was really interesting. We've just pivoted scrunch to be a $10 a month mass product rather than high-end product. And I've been second guessing myself ever since I made this decision and I'm like, oh my God, can we make this actually work? Do you know how many customers we need now? And I just read this article about Calendly. I dunno if you use that as a calendar
Jess Ruhfus (09:21):
Booking system. Love Calendly. Calendly amazing,
Danielle Lewis (09:24):
But they're like a billion dollar company now, and I'm like, oh, I just pay them 10 bucks a month. I'm like, surely can. So I love the idea of you don't have to go one model. There's something for everyone. And there's so many different capital raising avenues now, but I kind of like the idea of bootstrapping. I raised capital, but I'm turning my back on capital raising.
Jess Ruhfus (09:48):
It's a balling starring experience. My whole experience was absolutely terrible and atrocious. So yeah, I don't really go back into that very willingly, I suppose, because it wasn't very fun. But yeah, there's so many different ways to build. I mean, if you can build a profitable, at the end of the day, if your business can be self-sustaining and grow itself, to me that is the best business model ever. It's like you don't have to answer to anybody how good. And I mean I looked at
Danielle Lewis (10:21):
Ironically, that's what investors like now as well. It used to be this kind of weird thing, but now they want these already successful, profitable businesses as well. So it's kind of like you almost have to go down that road these days.
Jess Ruhfus (10:35):
And I tell you what, if I'd raised capital back in 2016 when I started, I would have massively misspent the money I think. And now fast forward, we've learned the hard lessons on our own dime and being backed into a corner financially and needing to come up with creative solutions and that are the most cost effective and not just splashing cash all over the place. So I actually think it's put us in a really good position because now we're not running out of runway and need to raise capital. The business will close. It's a different mindset. It's like, no, this company holds its own. If we were to go after capital, which may be the case down the track, I'm not completely ruling it out. I'm just resistant to do it. We've both bootstrapped so far, not by choice, but so far. But if we did go after it, now it's a different story because we don't smell of desperation. It's like a well, if you want in, then it's in and if not, no worries if you want all
Danielle Lewis (11:36):
The rockets.
Jess Ruhfus (11:37):
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
Danielle Lewis (11:39):
And it's interesting. I think it's stressful whatever way you choose if you choose to raise capital. Raising capital is really stressful if you choose to Bootstrap. Bootstrap is really stressful. So I don't know if there's the right choice
Jess Ruhfus (11:55):
Ever. I feel like the grass is always greener as well. Whatever do use, you always think, oh, but what about that? What about done?
Danielle Lewis (12:04):
Yeah. So then what were your early tactics, if you will, to get new customers? So we've got people that are listening in that are kind of early in their small business or startup journey, and they're kind of in that place of, they're going, oh my God, how do I find my first customers? What are your thoughts?
Jess Ruhfus (12:24):
Strap yourself in. There's so much to cover
Danielle Lewis (12:26):
Here. Welcome to Marketing 1 0 1.
Jess Ruhfus (12:29):
I know. Oh my gosh, interestingly, so when I worked in that small business marketing education company, their entire marketing strategy was Facebook ads. And I remember getting massive exposure to that and go deep diving into what they were doing and stuff. So when I started collab, I just thought, oh yeah, you just run ads and make money and build customers. And it's like, it's a machine. It's so funny. That's not how it works at all. And you definitely can't rely on Facebook ads. It's getting more and more and more expensive as well. So I would say what worked really well for us was the good old fashioned hustle. And I used to do things, I mean, events are fantastic. Going to events and networking, it's super underrated. You can meet some incredible people that way. But what I would do is I was a startup and couldn't afford to go to all of these events is I'd find the event hashtag for the collective hub and stuff used to run events back then. And I spent two hours a day chatting with people on Instagram who would be potential customers. I'd find the event hashtag, I'd comment on their staff being like, it was so great to meet you today.
Danielle Lewis (13:38):
Oh my God, get out.
Jess Ruhfus (13:40):
And they've met a million people. They go, oh no, I completely forgot this girl. And then we end up in this conversation and it's really funny. So that is actually how I met and met a lot of great people. That's cool. So yeah, going to events for short partnerships, absolutely, it's one of the most cost effective strategies to grow. It's up to 25 times less expensive than digital advertising. So if you're just starting out wanting to reach new people, collabs and partnerships are totally where it's at. Teaming up with another brand gives you access in a cross promotional sense to an entirely new pool of potential customers without any monetary spend. So it's not just Instagram, it's on their email list, it's on their website, it's on their podcast. You can do lots of stuff together to really leverage an awesome multichannel collaboration campaign that's a little bit longer term than a one post thing or a Facebook ad that you just flick past.
(14:35):
It's more meaningful and adds value to your audience. So yeah, networking partnerships. And then last but not least, I would just say go out and add value to create valuable content and stuff. If you go out looking for the sale before you've nailed the value you can bring, I would be asking a lot of questions instead of going after the sale to begin with, just to understand where the pain points are and things like that. That's something I didn't do. And I started collab source with the view that, oh, this is a platform for publicists initially. So the whole platform, because that was my experience, the whole platform was full of PR jargon. And then for the first two and a half years, not a single publicist use the platform. Now we have a lot of publicists use the platform, but back then it was all small businesses who signed up, which was super interesting. And I just wasn't listening to the customer, I suppose back then. And it took a while to completely overhaul our messaging and actually serve the customer who was coming to us quite organically and resonating with what we had to say. So yeah, listen a lot and add value.
Danielle Lewis (15:43):
And I think that that's good advice though. I think that people kind of go, well, I made this theme, I've just got to go out there and flog it. But it's like I kind of think it should change all of the time. As you hear your potential customers or your customers say different words than what you say on your website or explain things in a different way, I think it's okay to change your messaging and refine and refine and refine instead of getting stuck into, I thought I had the brilliant idea first up. Of
Jess Ruhfus (16:12):
Course. And I mean, I'm still learning. I'm seven years in, I'm still learning. We have changed the name of On Collab Source, you create a listing which you would list your brand and get matched up with other brands that has been called about 10 different things over the years. It's been called a project, it's been called a campaign. And now we've landed on listing for the last three years. And I'm really happy with listing. But it's funny how little things like that can completely change someone's perception of you and how they would use your software.
Danielle Lewis (16:42):
And I think just their ability to understand what you do. That's the biggest thing for me is I go, Hey, look at this thing we have. And then someone comes back and says, what is it? And I'm like, okay. So I've not done a very good job explaining it, or it's either I'm like, either you haven't read it or I have not explained it very well. Let me take the objective view that I have not explained it very well and try and explain it to people until I get to the point where I'm like, oh, that's what it took to make them understand what it is I need to change my staff.
Jess Ruhfus (17:09):
And what's a really valuable thing to do? Very time consuming, but so worthwhile at the beginning especially is about two years into collab sous, I set up Zoom meetings, 20 minute Zoom meetings with I think there was 10 people all up, five of which were existing customers, and the other five were people I really wanted to work with who some were, some kind of in the community, some weren't. And I just asked them questions, how would you describe sous to a friend? Things like that. And they even said, dating site for brands or Tinder for brands or matchmaking platform brands. And I'm going, great, that messaging resonates. But I asked them all if they'd run Facebook ads before. And seriously, maybe one out of the 10 had been running Facebook ads, which I was like, wow, I assumed that our whole customer base would be running Facebook ads and therefore be familiar with terms campaign and cost per Click and things like that weren't actually as familiar as I imagined them to be. So that completely changed and stuff. So taking the time to ask a lot of questions and build friendships as well.
Danielle Lewis (18:18):
And I just like the idea of you don't always have to ask for the sale every time. It can actually be a relationship building exercise, a get feedback on your brand. That means it's going to convert better to somebody else later. It doesn't have to be your please buy my thing, please buy my thing.
Jess Ruhfus (18:35):
Yeah. I think as well at the beginning, I was very upset. I'm a bit of a perfectionist, so I was a bit of obsessed with the whole build it and they will come and have it be perfect straight off when you can actually build incredible loyalty and brand affinity and stuff like that by bringing people along on the journey with you. You don't have to have it all together. You can be scrappy, you can be vocal about the fact that you're just starting out. And people love that and love to connect with you at the early stages. I've got people who now have been in the collab Oras community for seven years and they hear from them every now and again. Or they'll come to an event and they'll be like, I remember when blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it's like people love that stuff. It's part of that's so good brand building. It's like I remember using Canva when they first started and that's like a badge of honor.
Danielle Lewis (19:26):
And it's so cool though, because then you recommend it to other people. So those people are your biggest advocates if you do take them on that journey and make them feel part of the process.
Jess Ruhfus (19:35):
Exactly. Yes,
Danielle Lewis (19:37):
Definitely. I love that. That's so good. So in the last seven years, has there been any challenge that you wish somebody had have told you before you got into this business stuff?
Jess Ruhfus (19:51):
Take your pick. Oh look,
Danielle Lewis (19:56):
And I asked the question cause I'm like, I know we all know that businesses RIFed with challenges, but are there any other, a couple that you're like, I wish I was more prepared for that, or I wish someone had told me that the world's not going to end because that thing happened.
Jess Ruhfus (20:14):
Yeah, I mean some of those things. I am really glad I went in naive because if I had known, for example, the revenues and everything we're doing now, my original projections back in 2014 was that we would hit these revenues at year one. Oh
Danielle Lewis (20:33):
God known
Jess Ruhfus (20:34):
It would take seven years. I probably,
Danielle Lewis (20:36):
I have an Excel spreadsheet similar to that.
Jess Ruhfus (20:39):
It's so funny looking back, but it's like I probably wouldn't have done it if I had known those things. So it's like, and then also there's other pieces of advice where people are like, oh, managing people, people's the hardest thing. And I remember thinking, yeah, how great will it be to have people? And then you get there and you realize, oh, okay, I know what they mean. Now 90% of my time is spent on developing great people and hiring people and performance managing and all of those things that I just didn't expect my role to become. So I don't know, it's just learning along the way I suppose. But probably the biggest thing I wish someone had really shook me over was that cap raising thing. I thought I needed to raise capital because it's what everyone around me was doing. I wasn't really doing it for the right reasons.
(21:28):
And I thought the only way to succeed and the only way to grow was capital raising. And so I let that whole experience get so tied to my own personal self-worth and ego that when it all didn't work out over a two year plan, I was left absolutely broken from it all and thinking, was this idea even worth it? No one believes in it. Is it shit, do I need to just close it down? I'm out of money, this isn't going to work, blah, blah, blah, all the negative. And then it's like little things happen along the way that it's actually, if you are growing and your customers are laughing you, it's like to hell with's thing, ex banker who has never been in the situation where they would need CoLab or no marketing at all. I was listening to people's feedback and input and advice when they were coming from the wrong lens.
(22:20):
And I shouldn't have paid so much to those opinions. I remember someone saying to me, or if you can turn Berau into a platform that's really valuable for insurance brokers and do it for the insurance sector, I remember taking that feedback on board going, okay, how can I workshop this for the insurance? And it's like, no, it's just the wrong person and I need to just go, no worries, move on and try and find someone good. So I think that whole cap raising thing, you don't have to do it. Definitely don't have to do it. Don't feel like it's that or nothing. There's so many other, and do you think
Danielle Lewis (22:57):
About the time that you spent, the two years that you ever kind of go, what if I had spent the energy on just keeping on going and keeping on building?
Jess Ruhfus (23:07):
I know, but it would've been a seismic mindset shift because my whole view of how collab sous was going to grow was dependent on raising a ton of capital. I hadn't actually considered, okay, how can we get cash in the bank now to help X, Y, z sort of thing. So yeah, once that changed and it took years and years and years to change that mindset, I think. And there's still definitely moments where I think, oh, if I ever look to exit Collabo sous in years and years' time, it's like I'd want revenue to be at a certain point so that it's all been worthwhile for me. And to do that, maybe I do need to raise capital. I go back and forth with
Danielle Lewis (23:48):
Flip Flo
Jess Ruhfus (23:50):
With that all the time. So I don't think I've got it all worked out. Definitely not.
Danielle Lewis (23:54):
Well, and I guess though as well, I mean we've talked about growth and the fact that there are different options and that bootstrapping is a very real option for growing a business. But interesting about exiting, I kind of sparked the thought as well that it's like that means you have the majority ownership in a business and you think about other people who have raised capital who are diluted and diluted and diluted are working for shareholders, me and you kind of look and you're like, okay, well the amount that we need to exit for now based on what shareholding I have, it sort of starts to change your view and perception of how hard you're working, how big it needs to be. And I kind of think to myself whether having a majority ownership would be, I dunno, a little bit more palatable for the amount of time and effort that I've put in.
Jess Ruhfus (24:48):
Grass is always greener though. I look and I go, oh, wouldn't it be great to raise capital and have a board of people I can lean on and stuff? And so I've tried to find other ways that I can get advisors involved and things like that. But yeah, look, I think I am really happy that I'm in a position right now that it's like I have 99% ownership of my company and 1% is with our senior developer who I adore and he's been with me for ages. So yeah, I don't know, but you never know what's going to happen and the market changes all the time. So
Danielle Lewis (25:25):
Yes, I love it. Okay, so we talked a lot about Invis life and we had a giant chuckle at the start of the call about how we care aside and self-care hashtag self-care. I guess the thing is a lot of the people that are listening are business owners, so burnout is a real thing, and the last two plus years has been incredibly stressful for a lot of people. Do you have any, and look, it's going to be different for everybody, but do you have any words of wisdom or insights into how you kind of step away from the business and look after you so that you can potentially be better in the business?
Jess Ruhfus (26:08):
Yeah, I mean the first one's really boring, but it's sleep. Sleep is my number one thing. If I don't get enough sleep, I'm no used to anybody. I'm cranky. So if there's one thing I do know I am good at, it's making sure that I just sleep if I need it. So this morning for example, I slept in because I did not sleep at all last night. Sometimes I'll work really, really late as well. Sometimes I'll work through 1:00 AM, 2:00 AM but then that means that I need to pay for that later with sleep, otherwise I'm useless. So prioritizing that. Something I've also done, I kind of do at regular intervals is have a look at what my role is in the business and what I'm doing day to day. And toggles a really, really good tool for this actually, just to see on a piece of paper what you're spending time on, because sometimes what you feel you are spending time on is actually not what you are spending time on.
(27:03):
Remember ages ago me going, oh my God, I need to outsource financials. I hate bookkeeping, I hate this stuff. And when I actually looked at Toggle, I was spending 10 minutes a week on that. It would actually take that much time. It's just that I didn't enjoy it. But I think looking at what you spend your time on and then reassessing what you enjoy, you build a business so that you can actually work on stuff you really love doing. And I mean the admin stuff side of things kills my soul. So I'm often stepping back and going, okay, what's killing my soul and making me drag my feet and procrastinate on things and is there any opportunity to rejig things or outsource a particular task or take on something else and then swap that out so that I can spend more time working on stuff I actually really enjoy because when I do work on stuff I enjoy, the business grows shock horror, even though you think that it has to be you and no one else and letting go of stuff is hard.
Danielle Lewis (28:00):
Yeah. Well, and I mean it's really good advice because I also think sometimes we do spend time on the wrong things. It's kind of like, okay, what do I love and what is important for the growth of the business? And hopefully sometimes both of those things go hand in hand. But there are a lot of things that are easy tasks sometimes that make you feel productive, that are actually useless. I must have all
Jess Ruhfus (28:24):
Of my
Danielle Lewis (28:25):
Emails responded to, but it's like, well that may be no money, but you have a clear inbox. I
Jess Ruhfus (28:32):
Need a clear inbox. So otherwise I have an anxiety attack. Oh my God,
Danielle Lewis (28:35):
I have 500 emails in my inbox right now. I'm dying. Oh my God. Oh my God. I know. It's like anxiety inducing. Oh my gosh. But I'm also giving myself a bit of grace. We're launching a couple of things and I'm like, the only thing that matters right now is getting that stuff right that will wait. Your filing or your responding to things that are not important will wait. Those are the things that matter.
Jess Ruhfus (28:59):
And I think sometimes you need to allow yourself some time to be creative. I can't be creative if I'm burnt out. I can't be creative if I'm exhausted. It's just so I remember over Christmas 2020, we were in lockdown. I was really burning out after one hell of a year, and then I only had I think eight days off sort of. And then I was like, you know what? I want to do something I want to do. And then of course I started another business as it's,
Danielle Lewis (29:34):
That's the problem with taking time off as an entrepreneur.
Jess Ruhfus (29:39):
I know. But that weird little creative freedom on something that wasn't collab sous, which is just all consuming of me and my energy over the last seven years. So it was really nice to take a couple of days and be like, what else? Let's do a product business. Why not? And explore some stuff. And I've learned so much and I just find it really fun and interesting because it's not a heavy weight because it's just entirely a little new side project that's just for fun. It's not for paying rent. Well, I'm
Danielle Lewis (30:09):
Currently being targeted by number two ads.
Jess Ruhfus (30:13):
Are
Danielle Lewis (30:13):
You? Yeah,
Jess Ruhfus (30:14):
Sorry.
Danielle Lewis (30:15):
I think, no, I think as a customer, so your advertising targeting is probably working very well. Good on you. Excellent. So if anybody doesn't know number two, product-based business post, post
Jess Ruhfus (30:27):
BL perfume drops,
Danielle Lewis (30:30):
And they're absolutely amazing. I can confirm
Jess Ruhfus (30:34):
Who knew I'd started a toilet product company, but hey, why not?
Danielle Lewis (30:38):
But it's also, I love, remember in the early days when you were planning it and you weren't telling anybody what it was, but you've made that comment, you're like, there's literally one, two products in the market that solve this problem right now. I love the fact that you did actually do the research and the planning. It wasn't kind of going into something where there was a thousand different options and then going, I wonder why my thing didn't work. Yeah,
Jess Ruhfus (31:04):
It's actually amazing having built collab sous and learning lessons through collab sous how much faster I was able to get new product off the ground with the contacts and learnings and experiences and everything that I've actually done through collab Urus. It was actually amazing. I think we don't give ourselves enough credit for the hats we wear. You just have so many hats and you learn everything the hard way building a business. But it's like the skillset you come out with the side
Danielle Lewis (31:34):
And even that self-reflection on how far you've actually come. I know this morning I sat down and I just wrote this a three pads paper worth of to-dos for the week. And it's like, if all of you do, that's
Jess Ruhfus (31:46):
Me as well.
Danielle Lewis (31:48):
Yeah. It's like if all that you look at is all the crap we haven't done yet, it is so easy not to celebrate, oh my God, I launched this thing. I now know how to edit videos. I now know how to do Facebook ads. I now know how to do this. And yes, ultimately you probably don't want to be the one person that does everything in your business forever, but it also doesn't hurt to actually experience all of those things so that when you do get to the stage where you want to outsource a few things, you know what to expect and you know how to hand over a task as well.
Jess Ruhfus (32:24):
Yeah. You also kind of know what is reasonable in terms of a timeframe to get things done. And on the flip side as well, I mean I know my boyfriend he worked in, he has an air conditioning mechanic when he first came to Australia and he is like the owners of that business came to one job that was a really easy job and timed everyone and was like, oh, awesome. That was a 30 minute install.
Danielle Lewis (32:46):
Oh
Jess Ruhfus (32:46):
No. So they assumed that every job was a 30 minute install and that everyone was dragging their feet if it wasn't. But some you are in the roof and underground and it was like this whole thing. But it's funny, I think if you've done the job, then realistically how much time it takes and also impact what's the ROI of that task and that job and is it actually worth then investing in outsourcing it? You've got to test and measure that stuff.
Danielle Lewis (33:14):
Yeah. Yeah. So good. Alright, last question for you. Since you've started two successful businesses, if somebody was tuning in and they were on the fence, they've got an idea and they're just struggling to take the leap into starting their business, would there be any last words of advice for somebody like that?
Jess Ruhfus (33:39):
Okay, because I've had a champagne, the weirdest thing has popped into my marketing
Danielle Lewis (33:46):
Where I was like, oh,
Jess Ruhfus (33:49):
There's this funny TV show. Gosh, I'm going to regret giving this piece of advice after. Afterwards. No,
Danielle Lewis (33:54):
I'm so happy about this. This
Jess Ruhfus (33:55):
Is fun. There's a funny TV show you can find on YouTube and I think it's called Undercover Billionaire or something like that. I'll send you the link afterwards if you want to share it in the show
Danielle Lewis (34:07):
Notes.
Jess Ruhfus (34:07):
Yeah. They basically have this billionaire guy, they put him in the middle of America somewhere, he's not familiar with a hundred dollars and a truck, and they go, you've got three months to build a million dollar business. And he reckons he can do it. And it's actually so fascinating to watch him do it. It's just crazy. But one of his things that he really brought into my mind was this quote that he says, he's like, find your buyer first. Find who you actually want to sell before spending all that time developing a product. And that's definitely something I didn't do with Calor. I built it and then was like, had to iterate later afterwards rather than iterating as I built. So I think finding your buyers, and if you have a little idea, just prototype it out. It doesn't have to be perfect. Just do everything you possibly can to hand make it first or build a little landing page first and see if you can get some signups. If it's a tech thing, you can use ClickFunnels or something to just design Squarespace or Shopify anything to design a little coming soon page, get people to sign up and just test it first to see if anything comes back. And you might find some really interesting feedback that will how my cat's meowing. I love that. The background. She wants to get let out and she's like,
Danielle Lewis (35:29):
Let me out. The time is up, mom.
Jess Ruhfus (35:33):
So yeah, MVP minimum viable product. Get that up. I mean, with number two, I was ordering samples from everywhere to get sample bottles and sample everything, and I mixed the first batches myself. That's so cool. With essential oils, it's not like I just instantly went with a manufacturer because that would've been a $50,000 exercise. So doing it myself first on a couple hundred bucks, best thing ever
Danielle Lewis (35:57):
Learn. Yeah, I could not agree with you more. I have spent and wasted so much money on highly technical things and custom built websites and blah, blah, blah, and that you can't change because somebody with an engineering degree build it. There's nothing like, yeah, literally in a day you can set up a whole Squarespace website and contact somebody and say, will you buy my thing without invest more? Squarespace subscription is like 30 bucks. So with $30 or whatever it is, you can literally get up a brand, get up a business and find out if someone will pay you money. I love it. That's the best advice ever. You're amazing.
Jess Ruhfus (36:37):
Thanks. You sure you don't want to stay? Keep giving
Danielle Lewis (36:41):
The next hour. If cats come involved, get involved.
Jess Ruhfus (36:45):
She's so loud over there. I hope you can't hear her.
Danielle Lewis (36:48):
No, I only the, it's so funny, the food.
Jess Ruhfus (36:52):
I love it. She wants to be involved.
Danielle Lewis (36:54):
Well, she is a celebr as well. She has a
Jess Ruhfus (36:56):
Lot to say
Danielle Lewis (36:57):
She takes after her mom, so. Oh my God, that's so good. Well, thank you for sharing your infinite wisdom with the Spark community. I'm sure that everyone would've got a lot of value, so I appreciate you spending your time and cheers.
Plus, the fabulous Jess has generously shared a 10% discount on any paid Collabosaurus plan for SPARK members 👇
