Good marketing is all about relationship-building, isn’t it?
On today’s episode, I had the opportunity to talk to Elaine Brewer, one of the founders of Humble Warrior Wellness Center, who reminded me that’s exactly what marketing is about.
The Wellness Center helps veterans and first responders with their mental and physical health, by offering resources, services, and classes.
Interestingly, Elaine’s organization just launched—so they’re addressing some daunting challenges. In a nutshell, they’re trying to raise money, navigate the pandemic, and build relationships and connections all at once. That’s been creating some real concerns about what to do first.
Our conversation focused primarily on creating strong connections with stakeholders and learning to lean on those authentic connections before you go for a big ask.
This led to a discussion about tactics—for example, how to find connections using Sales Navigator or break up projects into smaller bite-sized pieces. We also talked about ways to leverage different channels of communication and resources, like starting a podcast to get your message out there and build an enthusiastic and engaged audience.
Elaine is doing some important work. And we’re excited to follow her journey.
Hope you enjoy the show!
Links:
Humble Warrior Wellness Center
Colorado Nonprofit Association
Ask:
Take care of yourself and don’t be afraid to reach out.
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Listen to the podcast here
Creating Meaningful Relationships With Elaine Brewer From The Humble Warrior
This episode was fun. I had a great conversation with Elaine Brewer. She’s one of the founders of the Humble Warrior Wellness Center. They are in Colorado Springs, Colorado. They’re a great nonprofit looking to help veterans and first responders with mental health, physical health, etc. They’re up and coming, so they’re just getting started. They have a lot of interesting challenges in that they’re trying to raise money. They’re trying to navigate this global pandemic that we’re still in the midst of, and they’re trying to build relationships and make connections.
One of the things we talked about that was powerful is the idea of creating a relationship with somebody. Before you go and start asking them for donations or for business or whatever you’re trying to get from them, make sure that you’ve created an opportunity to connect with them. Lean on the commonality that you have to start those conversations and develop those authentic relationships before you even start to go for a big ask. I had a lot of fun talking with Elaine. They’re going to be doing some great, hard, important work. I hope you enjoy the show.
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Elaine, how are you?
I’m good. How are you, Stu?
I’m doing well. You’re coming from Colorado Springs. I went to school down there. I don’t spend much time in the Springs anymore, but I lived there for four years when I was in college way back in the day.
We’ve been here for a few years now, and I love it. I am a mountain mama.
It’s a great town in terms of mountain access. I rode bikes back in the day, so it was a fantastic place to train and enjoy all of the cool places around that area. Thank you so much for being on the show. I appreciate it. I’m excited to learn more about what you’re up to down there and see what kind of gold we can uncover for you.
Thank you for having me. It’s always great to have a platform like this to spread the word about what we are trying to create here. I’m very excited to be here. Thank you.
It’s my pleasure. Tee things off with a little description and an introduction to your project.
My name’s Elaine Brewer. I am the Founder of Humble Warrior Wellness Center. It is a facility that we’re trying to create here in Colorado Springs for our military and our first responders. At this center, we focus on healing, mindfulness, and mental health and wellness. We’d like to bring in sensory deprivation pods, yoga, meditation rooms, alpha stimulation, and steam in saunas.
We like to incorporate the beautiful environment we have out here in Colorado Springs with camping and hikes. We also want to bring in education, which we call our pillar seminars, and talk to our humble warriors about mental health, chronic pain, sleep hygiene, and financial piece. We want it to be this community of relaxation, recovery, and restoration for our nation’s warriors.
That sounds like good stuff. I know Colorado Springs is a big town in terms of the military. You’re certainly in the right spot. When I checked out your site, it looked to me that this is a project that’s just getting started.
It’s been interesting. This idea came to fruition over the summer. We got our 501(c)(3) at the end of July 2020. Now we’re in the process of our grant plan. We will receive a grant calendar on February 1st, 2021, and then we’re going to hit the ground running with that.
You’re certainly off to the races. I commend you for taking the leap any time, particularly during this crazy time that we’re living in now. I’m sure that you will be bringing a lot of good things to that community. Grants are on the agenda, and I saw that you were taking donations as well. Are there any other revenue streams that you guys are going to have in place?
We have the t-shirt apparel that we have on our Facebook and website that has pretty much helped us get the ball rolling on this. We’re doing donations and grants. Creating a facility is very challenging, and you need your community’s backing. You need people giving donations, and those grants are huge. We are taking on a huge endeavor here, creating an actual space.
It’s so needed, and we are very passionate. We believe in it. We’ve had so many people reach out and say that this is a first-of-its-kind center bringing in all of these practices, techniques, and systems into one place to create this community-like environment. We’re hoping that people believe in it and want to pay it forward to us.
What are your targets now, and what’s the launch plan? Do you have a phase launch plan? Are you trying to get everything rolling to start and bring it all to fruition at once? What’s the future look like for you?
I would like to phase in because it’s going to take a while to get the structure, but we’re talking about sharing space possibly with Mt. Carmel, which is a huge veteran center out here, and having me tentatively hold some trauma-informed yoga classes and meditation classes. Once we get a space, we will probably start with meditation, our pillar seminars, and yoga. Alpha-Stim is very easy to bring in. Once we start acquiring more funding, we’re going to bring in the more expensive things like the sensory deprivation pods, the steam, and saunas.
We need to eradicate the stigma around mental health for first responders and the military. Self-care isn’t masculine, feminine, or selfish.
We’re also looking for companies that believe in the mission, who are patriotic, and love our first responders and military. Hopefully, have them sponsor a room, so whatever the sensory deprivation float room would cost for a year, they sponsor that. Their name is up on the door, and they have an option to renew that sponsor every year. If they don’t want to, we will open that room up to a different company or organization.
It sounds like you’re hitting on all the pillars that we would start to look out for. Have you started building your list? What are your donor base and email lists look like now?
We have a pretty extensive email list because we’re coming from a Special Forces community. We know a lot of people in the nonprofit sector. A lot of our friends have started different nonprofits. Now, it seems like a lot of people, unless it’s in their own backyard. If Humble Warrior is successful here, we would like to bring it to other regions in the U S, but we need Colorado Springs to get behind us on this. We’re pretty new to the area, and we’re doing this during a global pandemic. It’s been hard to fundraise, have events and do networking groups and all of that. That is something that we want to start doing. We want to do a Humble Warrior inclined hike and new things like it that bring out. I know there are a lot of military-owned restaurants and breweries out there. We’re hoping that once everything opens back up, they will be receptive to helping us get this thing rolling.
You’ve chosen a good area to start this endeavor. There are certainly a lot of militaries and retired military in the Colorado Springs area. It is a challenge during these times when we can’t get together. It makes it a lot more challenging to go to networking events and those types of things. One of the first things that I would throw out there as an option for you or something to consider is something that was told to me back in September 2020, which was that you have an opportunity to create your own network and community by starting a podcast. That’s what I did, and one of the reasons why we’re here is I committed to doing this for at least a year.
Also, I started to talk and have conversations with people in the community I was trying to serve, which is the nonprofit space. It does allow you to bring people in, particularly in a moment when we don’t have the resources and availability for in-person activities that we would normally rely upon for those networking opportunities.
What I would recommend you consider is thinking of doing something similar for your community and coming at it from the perspective of relationship-building and value exchange. Try to be incredibly empathetic in terms of what you’re providing. Give people information, build communities and be a real solid resource for those who potentially could become stakeholders at some point in terms of being donors or participants and beneficiaries of your upcoming service.
That’s a great idea in creating those relationships, not only for people who could possibly help support us but also for hearing these powerful and impactful stories from people who would benefit from a Humble Warrior Wellness Center too.
I didn’t serve in the military, but I have been in this entrepreneurial space for quite some time. One of the things that I’ve noticed is that we as people tend to think we’re the only people who have ever gone through a certain thing. We’re struggling with business or personal stuff or whatever it is, and we tend to hold up and start to feel sorry for ourselves and do some things that are not beneficial. Being able to create that community and knowing that it isn’t the first time that anyone has gone through this particular challenge is such valuable information.
That probably holds true in your community as well, where people start to have challenges and think, “I’m on an island here.” Having those resources and knowing that there are other people out there who are willing to share those stories is a great first step to creating and building those relationships and getting the help you guys will be providing for them.
One of the main missions is eradicating the stigma around mental health for first responders and the military. People hear of self-care, yoga, meditation, and all of this stuff, and it can be perceived as masculine or more feminine-based. Sometimes self-care can even be perceived as selfish. We’re trying to make that adaptable for our warriors, bring them into this wellness space, and show them that, “You’re not broken. Nothing’s wrong with you. This will make you better warriors. This will make you better operators. This will make you better wives, husbands, and partners in the long run when you can balance out these hypervigilant work environments.”
I have several friends who are first responders in both the medical field as well as firefighters. I was an EMT at one point. It’s funny because one of the things that they tell you is don’t become another victim. That group tends to have a little bit of a hard time feeling that they can turn things off, take a breath, and do some self-care. It’s important to work. I’m glad to hear that you’re down there, putting something together. That’s going to bring a lot of benefits to people’s lives.
That’s the goal, and we’re going for it. It’s been very challenging. We came into this. As I said, I was a military wife. I have a high school degree. That’s it. My husband was a twenty-year Naval Special Forces. This became a passion, and now it has become a purpose. Learning how to create a website on my own was a challenge, but we got through that, and then going through the 501(c)(3) was a huge challenge. Doing all of this and figuring out how to get donors and funding in a global pandemic when everybody is financially hurting has been very interesting to go through. We’re people who love a challenge.
You’re tackling it head-on. A couple of things there. One is there are some great resources available that you might consider looking into. The first one is Energize Colorado. I’m a mentor at Energize Colorado, but it was put in place this past 2020, specifically in response to the pandemic and the economic crisis that was following on the heels of the onset of the pandemic. It’s a state-wide program that has quite a few different resources that you might be able to tap into and get some assistance.
This is where my participation is. You can tap into mentors who will help guide you through some of the hurdles that every new organization or new business faces. That would be a great resource. The Small Business Development Center is a program that I’ve been somewhat involved with in terms of I’ve been doing some teaching there in the weekly seminars that they run. I’m not teaching weekly, but they have them every week. Those are good resources for information and connections. Those would be two places where you might be able to find some additional assistance, particularly when you’re wearing all the hats for your organization.
I’m familiar with the Small Business Development Center. My husband did a few things through them when creating his LLC. I can get on board with that, and I’ll look up Energize Colorado because everyone needs a mentor.
It’s nice to make sure you’re on the right track. What a mentor can do is not necessarily do the work for you but at least keep you from tacking too far off the path you’re trying to move down. Those could be two good resources for you.
In talking with other nonprofits in the area, I’m sure you know, but for the people reading, the nonprofit sector, to my surprise, can be extremely competitive. A lot of people don’t want to share resources or don’t want to help you out. For me, this isn’t about making money. It’s not about hoarding resources or networking opportunities. It’s about saving lives and making sure that our warriors are living their best lives, not just surviving but thriving. I’m always down to shared connections and be an open book to anybody. That’s great that they have people there to help you through this. I like people like that. Those are my people.
A good friend of mine always says that a rising tide lifts all ships. That’s a good way to look at things. It’s unfortunate that some people out there don’t share that particular idea, but for those who do, you can tap into those resources and get a lot done and get a lot of good shared information.
The nonprofit sector can be extremely competitive and a lot of them don’t want to share resources.
Thank you for sharing that with me.
What are your revenue goals for 2021? What gets you up and running and gets that engine turning over?
It’s a little hard to give a full guesstimate because it’s like, “What type of space can we secure?” When we did full first-year funding, it was around $500,000. That is to secure the space, get everything, create a yoga room and meditation rooms, and all of that. After that, I can’t remember the full amount, but it would be sustaining. It wouldn’t be the full $500. It would be probably more like $100,000 to $200,000 in a year. It’s a 4,000-square-foot building.
It sounds like there was, perhaps which was a first step, a shared space at the VA center. Is that on the table or not?
To start a Humble Warrior yoga and meditation class and spread the word out there, what we’re looking at for our center is it’s all other than our seminar room, which is probably going to be shared as the yoga room. It’s the only thing that is a communal practice. The sauna and steam rooms are individual. You would go in there, hit the iPad, turn on a guided meditation, or sit in there in quietness.
It’s the same with the low-sensory meditation rooms. Our structure would look like an old chiropractic practice with individual treatment rooms and then a large area that can be used for a yoga studio. We’d like to have some type of lobbying aspect where we can have coffee and tea and have some chairs and a community place where people can talk or chat.
It sounds like you’ve done some thinking about how to get in touch with veteran-owned businesses and things of that nature in the Colorado Springs area. Have you started that outreach? Are you doing anything in particular now to kickstart donations?
We did grant research. They do this mass spread of all of the organizations that meet and fall in line with your mission. I should get that back on February 1st, and then we start throwing the grant writing out there. In a lot of organizations, you can’t reach out to a company. They have specific, separate grants or nonprofits that align with your mission. I know there are a lot of restaurants and breweries. 5.11 Tactical is big in Colorado Springs. I’d like to reach out to them. I haven’t done that yet because we’re creating our sponsorship/grant writing plan and package now.
There is an event that’s put on through the Colorado Nonprofit Association. Colorado Nonprofit Association is a great resource. It’s at ColoradoNonprofits.org. It might be worth taking a peek at that. That might help with that grant writing process. It’s a little bit of a head-scratcher if you’ve never done it before. There are some tricks to that trade.
I know that they have a center in Denver, but I was also seeing that they had one here in Colorado Springs. As far as I know and as far as I researched for the one in Colorado Springs, are they not operating anymore?
I know that the Denver office is up and running. I’m not sure about the Colorado Springs office, but they have an online presence. Pretty much everything now is virtual anyway. That might be a resource to look into. I was aware that they had this upcoming event, so I thought I’d mention it to you in case that sounded like it might be helpful.
Because I’m navigating grants, you have to know how to put your best foot forward without it. It’s such a competitive process. We’re enlisting everything that we can get to help us with that. Thanks. I appreciate that.
It’s my pleasure. One of the things that might be helpful is the consideration that you have a fundraising goal of $500,000, but you don’t necessarily have to come up with that full amount to get things rolling. A trap that a lot of organizations and business leaders fall into is thinking of the entire salary or the entire investment that they need to make in order to make that year happen. Reframing that thought process a little bit can be helpful. I know it’s been helpful for me to reconsider that you want to do hire or you need to get a space, and that’s going to be this fairly large chunk of change. However, you don’t have to come up with all of that at once.
You’re able to pay that down either every couple of weeks or every month, depending upon the terms of your arrangement. That can be a nice mental reset in terms of this idea of eating the whole elephant. We tend to get paralyzed when we think of the entirety of the mission, but rarely do we have to overcome that entire thing at once. Even climbing Everest or doing something gigantic is one step at a time if we can break things down and do two things.
1) It breaks it down, so those little summits seem more surmountable. 2) It gives us the opportunity to set little milestones that we can tick off to mark progress and get that little positive feedback in our brain that we accomplished something. Those would be two mindset shifts that could be helpful for you guys as you’re looking at, “How do we get this thing rolling?”
Having small attainable goals is so important. We’re trying to do these shows where we’re hoping that once we start doing community outreach and fundraisers, there’s somebody in the area with COVID-19, and there are so many of these structures that are laying unattended and have nobody that is occupying them and people are eating that mortgage or that link or whatnot. We’re hoping that maybe somebody would be able to donate a lease for a year or help us out with a lease agreement if they like our mission or whatnot. This is the biggest headache we have now. You see the full picture and yourself summiting Everest, and we fall trap of what’s along the way.
I’m not super well-versed in the commercial real estate market, but I cannot imagine that things are going swimmingly in a lot of respects in terms of people getting used to working from home. Companies are getting used to their entire staff working from home. That does open up some interesting opportunities. I would imagine that this is a pretty great time to start to explore that. I don’t know any real estate people in Colorado Springs. I do know a few people in Denver. It’s an interesting time. There’s probably some opportunity to negotiate a sweetheart deal or get somebody who’s able or willing to donate some space for some period of time. That chips away at that $500,000 mark.
The challenge is getting a commercial realtor to even talk to you because if space is donated or there’s a lease agreement, does that cut in on their commission? Do they even want to entertain that idea? That’s the whole thing about being competitive in sharing the network.
When navigating grants, you have to know how to put your best foot forward with that.
If the next thing on your list of things to do is to secure a location, I would suggest starting to ask those questions and making calls to some realtors and leasing agents. Look at co-working spaces and see if there’s excess capacity. This is another great saying that someone told me on the show, “The answer is always no if you don’t ask.”
I was going to say that. What’s the worst they can say? If you’re working in a nonprofit, you have to get over that fear pretty quickly.
We get better at it the more we do it. The more times you put yourself out there, it hurts a little less every time that you don’t get the answer that you’re looking for. Certainly, not asking is not going to get you any closer to the answer that you’re interested in either. Continue to hammer those connections. We met on LinkedIn. I know that there are a lot of ways to leverage LinkedIn to get not only veteran information but very location-based information. LinkedIn has Sales Navigator, and it’s $80 a month. You can turn it on and off. If you hopped into Sales Navigator, hammered on it for a month, and then turned it off, you’d probably be able to get a lot of potential leads and connections that you could make there.
We stumbled across nonprofit loans. How do you feel about that? How did those work out? Is that another trap that you’re falling into?
Any organization has the opportunity to tap into loans. There are quite a few government opportunities available or starting to become available now. In any loan situation, there’s some risk involved. It sounds like you have done some good things to tee things up from a liability standpoint. My guess is that you need to have a good understanding of what your personal risk tolerance is.
There’s some opportunity, and that might be a good question for the team over at Colorado Nonprofit Association and get into that network. Not only are there a lot of businesses in that network that serve nonprofits like mine, but there are also tons of nonprofits in there. That might be a good place to go to start asking questions. I also know that there are lots of groups on LinkedIn. There are some nonprofit groups on Reddit as well.
They’re available. They’re out there. Dig a little bit. I would start asking those questions because you’re not the first person who’s traveled this particular path. There are lots of people out there who are willing to share information, pitfalls, and mistakes that they made that they wish they had known about before they made them that are completely thrilled to death to help someone else navigate those waters without having to make the same mistakes.
That’s great. I will have to attach myself to some of those pages and gain some knowledge from people who’ve done it before me. That’s very good advice. I will check that out.
One thing that’s awesome about Colorado is that we are steeped in people trying to do philanthropic things. It has a huge nonprofit community. There are lots of other organizations like B corps and benefit corporations trying to do some nice things in the world. It seems like it’s very easy to rub elbows with somebody who has started a nonprofit, is on the board of the nonprofit or has worked with one.
There’s a lot of information out there that’s readily accessible. That proximity piece becomes a way to get in the door. It’s looking for other veteran-based nonprofit organizations out there and reaching out to those people and saying, “We’re doing this too.” Their beneficiary base is your beneficiary base. If your services aren’t competing or complementary, then there’s very little reason why those groups wouldn’t want to bring you into their network.
I also feel like the world is moving to this realization of mental health and wellness. With the pandemic, we’ve all gone through our own little source of trauma and everything that’s going on in the culture of first responders now. The military mental health issue has been an issue for the last many years. People are moving into this space where the whole, “Let’s throw some medication at it,” hasn’t been working. Bringing in the types of methods and modalities that we want to use at Humble Warrior is starting to pique the interest of people. It’s becoming more and more evidence-based every day. We’re hoping that that helps us grow quickly and gain a lot of support.
The stigma of mental health challenges has started to go away. I’m sure that there are people with experiences that would shed light on that haven’t fully gone away, which is unfortunate. It does feel that it has changed.
There has been a shift, for sure.
There’s just a better awareness of that. This isn’t something to be embarrassed about. It’s part of being a person. We need to help take care of people who are struggling, particularly those who’ve put everything on the line for the rest of us. All the people that you are serving certainly fit that model. As you get up and running, have you considered doing any mobile work as an option to go to places as opposed to having people come to you?
Specifically, with yoga and meditation, we have thought about doing a mobile, like going to different police stations or firehouses. Fort Carson is huge here. We’re going down there, even possibly going out to Denver. We’re also talking about doing some virtual staff. That’s all come up very much, and we are working diligently to get some of that going.
What I need with that initially is reaching out to some local sponsors or donors for yoga equipment. A lot of these guys and girls who do these jobs are not doing these crazy yoga moves. They’re doing a deep stretch. They need the bolsters. They need a block to help them. My husband, when he does yoga, he’s not so mobile anymore. Lululemon and Athleta are out here. They like doing huge community sponsorships and projects like this. They were a few people that I would like to reach out to.
Usually, I try and break that down to set a goal in terms of how many people you are going to reach out to every week, create a list, and make sure that you are working toward that goal. One of the biggest things that a good friend of mine who was gracious enough to help me achieve was to dedicate the time, put it on my schedule, and stick to it. When you do that, it starts to become a habit. It starts to feel a lot less daunting. That dedicated time on your calendar, whether you say, “I’m going to do this for 3 hours a week, 5 hours a week, or 1 hour a week.” Carve out the time and make sure you commit and execute on that.
Let me ask you this. If you’re doing a community sponsorship with somebody in your community, how do you suggest the best way to approach that? Is that an email? Is that a handwritten letter with your sponsorship package? Should I go to the store and speak with the manager of the store like do it face to face? How would you approach getting these community sponsorship opportunities?
If you’re working in a nonprofit, you have to get over that fear of rejection quickly.
That is a good question because the answer is yes. The first thing I would do is try to develop a relationship. Before you send somebody something that they haven’t asked for, simply ask the question if that is something that they’d be interested in. There are a few reasons to do that. One is people tend to be more receptive and excited to get something that they’ve requested as opposed to something that randomly shows up. The opportunity there to capture that attention and get somebody to take some action is a little bit higher if they’ve raised their hand to that.
The second thing is creating and establishing a relationship prior to asking people for a favor. If you think about how relationships work in the real world, we don’t typically rush up to somebody and ask them to do us a favor. We have some back and forth. We’ve gone to coffee. We’ve maybe gone on a hike together and met each other’s spouses or whatever, but there’s a relationship. In sales, which is essentially a way to think about what you’re trying to do, those relationships and opportunities to nurture those relationships can go a long way. It’s a lot easier to ask your buddy to float you $10 than it is to ask a stranger to do that.
Depending upon who you’re trying to reach, there are a variety of different tactics that you could deploy to get in front of A) Right people, B) Right message, and C) The thing that makes it all come together is doing that at the right time. That’s why we like to think of sales opportunities as pure relationship building and how we can nurture that relationship and create opportunities for giving and taking within that relationship, as opposed to constantly asking for something all the time.
In some aspect, we, or I, Humble Warrior, the Founder, and the Cofounder, a lot of the people we want to reach out to in the community we have a relationship with. That’s where my family goes to eat. They don’t know us yet. Some of the tactical apparel or tactical gear places, that’s what my husband wore to war. He has a friendship with that company. They don’t know us yet. We’ve invested a lot in the companies we would like to reach out to. We have to get them to invest in us. That’s what you’re getting at.
The first step there is to look for commonality. I’m assuming they have some sort of veteran capacity at their organization. That’s something in common that you have with them. That’s a door opener. That’s a way to start that conversation. I would say that thinking about how to have small offers and small asks as you build that relationship would be the way to approach that.
Start that relationship by, “We love your equipment. We’ve used it ourselves in both combat and non-combat situations because we’re veterans. We would love to connect with you.” For example, if your first outreach is on LinkedIn, try to create a sense of commonality as you’re developing that relationship and allow that to build and grow organically instead of having the instincts to jump into, “Would you be willing to give us $100,000 as a room sponsor?”
That is the way to go. In terms of how to get in front of them, what we usually talk about is a persona creation mechanism where we’re trying to help you establish who your target audiences are or who the people are who will be part of your crew. These might be corporate sponsors, individual donors, etc. Where do they go to get information? Make sure that you are swimming in that same pool, so you’re active if it’s on LinkedIn, Facebook, or wherever these people go to connect with others and get questions answered.
Be there and be consistent in your activities on those platforms. Be willing to and consistently be altruistic about sharing information. Maybe that’s the yoga pose of the day, what to expect when you get acupuncture for the first time, what to bring with you when you come to use a sauna, or what the sensory deprivation tank is like.
Those are the top five questions that people ask when they’re trying to explore this new experience, and being there and being willing to share that information and consistent about putting that information out there tends to be one of the things that’s powerful in terms of making sure that you are there at the right time. A lot of times, you can put the same message out there a whole bunch of times, and it’s the wrong timing. That fifth time that you put it out there, that was the day that they were looking for that assistance or that information. That’s how you can start to kickstart that relationship.
I’m the only one running all of our social media pages and content. I started a blog on the website, and it’s so hard when you’re doing all of this other stuff. Being a mom of two little boys, it’s hard to stay consistent with content. I will try and be more intentional with that. Sunday is my day to load up content for the week. This is what I’m putting out on Monday, and this is what I’m putting out on Tuesday. I take a couple of hours on Sunday to have a coordinated plan for the week instead of talking to find something Wednesday night, Thursday morning, or something.
There are a few things to consider. The first one is I would much rather see you get consistent base hits in one game than be trying to play multiple games at the same time and striking out everywhere. That’s why professional athletes tend to be single sports people. They can be great at a bunch of different things. These people are amazing athletes. However, they can only excel if they put their attention on one thing at a time. I’d like to encourage all of our clients and connections to figure out where their biggest opportunities are.
Think about where your audiences are going to go to get information and where they are active and get good at swimming in that space. Get lots of base hits because sometimes the base hit turns into a double, triple, or a home run. You never know exactly what’s going to work. That’s why being consistent is the other piece of the equation there. You’re onto something in terms of carving out time in your week. I was trying to take a peek at your site.
Your site is built on Wix. Wix might have the ability to do this. I’m not a Wix specialist, so I’m not sure. You might be able to load up your blog posts and schedule them for publication. Instead of having to feel like you need to go in every week, you can get four done and then schedule them to release so you don’t have to go back in and monkey with it. They’ll release on a schedule.
I think you can schedule them.
There are services like Hootsuite that allow you to do the same thing for social media. Try to get consistent in a single space or a couple of spaces, as you might have a couple of different personas. I’d rather you got good at 1 or 2 things as opposed to trying to be awesome in a whole bunch of things. The other piece is you don’t have to come up with all the ideas yourself. What you can do is find information. I can’t remember who coined this phrase, but basically, it’s being the maven.
Being able to supply people with information is almost, if not as good as being able to come up with the information yourself. As you’re sitting on the couch and maybe surfing the web, as you’re watching TV or whatever, start to collect articles and information that you can point to. We recommend adding a little bit of flavor to it like, “Here’s a great article from Lululemon that talks about how to start practicing yoga. We think this is super important because it’s about the same kind of stuff we teach when we bring new people into yoga classes. Enjoy the article.”
I’ve been trying to join, especially on LinkedIn or health and wellness groups or book journal, so that I’m being fed content, and all I have to do is save it and put a title on it. You’re right about not having that anxiety of having to come up with the content yourself. That’s important to do it a little bit and show what your authentic idea of something is. Sharing content can also be cool too.
It can help because it’s a lot easier to share and add a little flavor to something than to come up with a recipe on your own. As you get consistent with it, you’ll start to get your own blog ideas. Certainly, it’s something to something to think about. This has been such a cool conversation. What are your takeaways from our conversation?
Don’t have that anxiety of having to come up with the content yourself. Share other people’s content.
There are a couple of the different groups you told me about, like Colorado Non-Profit, Energize Colorado and Small Business Development Center. I’m going to look into those. I’m curious about the podcast idea because I have a lot of people in my realm and in my network that could be great. I like asking questions. I’m very curious about people in general.
That could be an interesting thing to ponder. Those are some good takeaways. The grant thing and creating organic relationships with your supporters and donors are great advice. Coming at it from a relationship in a point of commonality is a good approach to that because when you see the whole thing come into place, it can make you want to go full force and come on too strongly. That’s great advice. That’s probably one of the biggest takeaways from this episode.
I’m glad that you found there to be a few things that you can act upon. How can people find you? What’s the best place for them to find you online?
Our website is www.HumbleWarriorWellnessCenter.org. That has a little link at the top that will link you to our LinkedIn, Instagram, and Facebook accounts. Also, our apparel shop is on there as well, which is a great way to donate. You get a little present back. We appreciate you checking it out. At this moment, I’m running everything. If you have a question or want to know more about what we’re doing or us in general, or you’re struggling and want to talk to my husband, we answer messages very quickly.
I love having these conversations. I also enjoy it when people can take action. If you had our readers take any action after reading this, what would you have them do?
After reading and taking action, our mission at Humble Warrior is to take care of yourself. If you’re doing anything with your mental health, be intentional about it. Don’t be scared to reach out. There’s no judgment in between having gone through something traumatic. If you read anything from this, know that there are organizations out there that stand by, ready and willing to help our service members.
I encourage everyone to check out the HumbleWarriorWellnessCenter.org. I’m sure that you guys are going to have some great things on the horizon. Let’s keep in touch so I can learn how we can continue to help you.
Thank you so much for having me on. It was so much fun. You gave me some great stuff to help us grow. I appreciate it so much.
Thanks, Elaine. I’ll talk to you soon.
Thank you.
Important Links
- Humble Warrior Wellness Center
- Mt. Carmel
- Energize Colorado
- Small Business Development Center
- ColoradoNonprofits.org
- Sales Navigator
- Hootsuite
- LinkedIn – Humble Warrior Wellness Center
- Instagram – Humble Warrior Wellness Center
- Facebook – Humble Warrior Wellness Center
- Website – Humble Warrior Wellness Center Official Merchandise
