Episode 358: Anita Siek of Wordfetti
Ever wondered how the right words can make all the difference? In this episode, Fiona chats with Anita Siek, the founder of Wordfetti. They chat about how to gracefully decline opportunities, Anita's journey in learning to lead a team and so much more. Tune in!
Topics discussed in this episode:
Introduction
The importance of acknowledging and thanking individuals for reaching out
Handling rejections gracefully and honestly, without feeling the need to over-justify
The importance of surrendering control and embracing the flow in business and personal life
Anita's experiences with burnout and the importance of self-reflection and redefining success
Building a successful team and the journey of evolving as a leader
The importance of effective communication
Conclusion
Get in touch with My Daily Business
Resources and Recommendations mentioned in this episode:
“I lost my dad quite suddenly and that moment was my watermelon-to-the-head moment. Both my parents were entrepreneurs and business owners, ironically, but they were like, “You must get a corporate job.” The watermelon-to-the-head moment had me think, first of all, how precious life is. The second of all, if life can simply change like that, do I want to be in a cubicle for the rest of my life? Am I going to be happy about that?”
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Welcome to episode 358 of the My Daily Business podcast. In this episode, we are talking to a small business owner and she's a lovely one at that. You're going to enjoy this conversation. Before we do, I wanted to mention two things quickly and the first is to acknowledge the traditional owners and custodians on the land on which I meet these lovely people and recorded this podcast and that is the Wurrung and Wurundjeri people of the Kulin nation. I pay my respects to their elders, past and present, and acknowledge that sovereignty has never been ceded.
The other thing I wanted to highlight is that it's around about this time of year, pretty much from late October onwards, that we will always get people contacting us to book in an emergency session because maybe their marketing and campaign aren’t working the way that they wanted to. For a lot of retail and eCommerce businesses, this is your hardcore crunch period and the money needs to be coming in at this time of year. If that is you, we do hold a few emergency one-on-one spots open. If that is you, please book in ASAP. If you would like to do this before the end of the year, you can find all our coaching options over at MyDailyBusiness.com/shop.
The other thing is that we get people telling us, “I worked with this agency,” or, “I did XYZ and I don't feel like my marketing is working and I want to invest more in that in next year. What can I do? Which course would you suggest or how is best to work with you?” If that is you and you want to work on your marketing, for sure, I would invest in Marketing for Your Small Business, an online self-paced course.
However, once you invest in it and a part of it, you have lifetime access. Plus, you can always upgrade for a small fee into the nine-week coaching program. We are running that right now so it's too late for this year but if you're keen, you could get the course now, start going through it at your own pace, and then upgrade for a small fee into the nine-week live coaching program, which will kick off in February or March 2024. That way, you'll get a better understanding of your marketing and be able to make a strategic quality marketing plan for next year so you do not find yourself in the same position when it comes to the silly season and gifting season this time, 2024.
Get on it early, I would say, and don't be in the same situation and feeling like you're rushing and doing ad hoc scattergun marketing right now. You don't want to be doing that next year. Either get in touch and do a one-on-one coaching or check out MarketingForYourSmallBusiness.com and you'll find all the information about our course there. If you've got any questions, email us at Hello@MyDailyBusiness.com. Let's get into our business interview.
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It is my absolute pleasure to bring you this chat that I had a little while ago with Anita Siek, who many people will know, as the founder of Wordfetti. She also has her own podcast, Brandfetti, which I have been on. I wanted to chat to Anita about what it has taken for her to create a business that she's super proud of and to even travel through things like burnout, expectations, imposter syndrome, and all the things.
Anita started as a lawyer and quickly realized that even though she loved it and she loved helping people and loved words in particular, she didn't get that level of passion and excitement that she does get now from helping small business owners and brands communicate in a way that genuinely brings them, their passion, and their personality to life through words.
As somebody who's worked in content myself for a long time, I know that many business owners can get this stiffness or this feeling that they have to be quite vanilla and safe when it comes to their content and Wordfetti helps people create content that they're proud of that sounds like them and also takes away the fear of creating written content in particular.
In this episode, we talk all about how Anita moved from being a lawyer through to creating her own business and also what she would do maybe differently now that she's been in business for some time and also the idea of forging your own path and not feeling like you have to do it in a certain way that perhaps maybe somebody else has told you or someone else is out there preaching but to do it in a way that feels in alignment with your values, your beliefs, and the way that you want to live.
Anita has an incredible lifestyle, she travels a lot, does all these things, and is able to do it because she's built a business that has been designed around the life that she wants to have rather than the other way around. It's such a pleasure to talk to Anita. Here is my interview with Anita Siek from Wordfetti.
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Welcome, Anita, to the podcast.
I'm excited. This is going to be fun.
I can't believe that you have just got off the plane. Well done for being here and doing this and having this amount of energy. How are you feeling right now?
This is a timely question since I've got off the plane. We were chatting before and I'm feeling great. I can sleep anywhere so I'm feeling great. Overall, as a human being and business owner, I'm equally mixed excited. Maybe it's nerve excited.
Where is the nerve coming from?
We’re launching a few things. We launched a new offer, which had been nerve excited. It's when you start or launch something that is slightly different or new, the scary feels, and the nervous feels, but equally exciting as well. Nerve excited.
I love this. You are good with words because words are your thing. Tell us about Wordfetti. For anyone who is reading who doesn't know, what is it and why did it start? This wasn't your first career, you had something else entirely. Tell us all about Wordfetti.
I'll share a little bit about the non-linear paths to land where I am today and then I'll share a little bit about Wordfetti.
I had a different career path before Wordfetti. I always joke about the fact that I used to write things people don't read until things go wrong as a lawyer. Let's be honest, no one reads terms and conditions, legislations, and policies until things go wrong. I did the traditional corporate thing and pleased what I call my tiger Asian parents. It’s traditional in the sense that it was very much a doctor or lawyer. Anita does not like blood.
I've always been told, my mum was always like, “You should be a lawyer one day because you're so good at persuasive arguments as a child. You would always get what you want, that happy meal or whatever.” I did the traditional thing, studied law and psychology, and landed in a corporate job, in government, and in policy. I worked as a lawyer. Policy and Legislation was the last role I was in. It was fulfilling work and I climbed the corporate ladder like you're supposed to but I felt empty.
When I reached the role that I thought I would dream of, landed it, and I'm like, “Okay. Cool. Where is confetti cannon? What happens now?” I started to dabble in a lot of different side creative projects. For me, I had what I call a watermelon-to-the-head moment or sliding-door moment, it depends on how good you want to see it. I lost my dad quite suddenly and that moment was my watermelon-to-the-head moment.
Both my parents were entrepreneurs and business owners, ironically, but they were like, “You must get a corporate job.” The watermelon-to-the-head moment had me think, first of all, how precious life is. The second of all, if life can simply change like that, do I want to be in a cubicle for the rest of my life? Am I going to be happy about that? Probably not.
I started these creative side projects. I had two failed side hustles before Wordfetti and one was in photography, I always loved photography. My parents loved traveling and I would be the one holding the camera. I still love photography but I don't think my zing factor was there. The second one was a little succulent business with my mum. My mum loves plants and her house is a rainforest. I kill plants. I kill cacti. I kill terrariums.
Succulents are supposed to be pretty.
You're telling me, Fiona. It still dies. I kill plants. When we used to have people inquiring being like, “What do I do with this thing that's happening to my plant?” I'm like, “I don't know.” The third was Wordfetti. To be honest, when I come to think of it, I wish I could say, “It just landed to me and it was exactly what I thought it would be. This is what I was meant to do.” It was not as clear as that. I asked myself, “What is something that I'm hearing everyone around me mention? What is something I could do continuously and love doing it?”
I am that weirdo that used to love writing essays and assignments in uni. My friends, my family, and even my husband now would come to me and be like, “Can you write my cover letter?” I was like, “Okay.” Even our CEO back at that stage was like, “Can you write my CEO message?” I'm like, “Okay.” I was like, “Maybe I have a thing with words.”
I started to blog. I started to write for the sake of writing and just to share thoughts and ideas. Under Wordfetti, it was crickets for eight months so I created the website, put out consistent content for around 8 or 9 months, it was crickets, and then I had my first lead come around nine months in and it was from a wonderful lady, Holly, who was an artist, being like, “I've been following you for the last 6 or 7 months. I love your stuff. Could you write my website?” I'm like, “What? You want me to write your website?” That was it. That was over six and a half years ago, Fiona.
There's so much in that and the fact that you kept going even. You hear many stories all the time where people are like, “I did this and I launched it. It just hit this in the first month.” It's good that you talked about that. You did say you came from a family where they were like, “Lawyer or doctor.” I get it, I have three siblings, one is a lawyer, one is a doctor, and one is a psychologist. I'm the creative one.
I'm sorry about your father. I've lost both of my parents too so I understand that. I also had that exact thing sitting in Mimco where I used to be Head of Marketing and being like, “I don't want to do this for the rest of my life.” I get it. How did you practically do it? When you said, “I started the side hustle,” were you still working at the time? When you got that first person, Holly, were you like, “It's working. I'm going to quit.” How did you work there?
This is a great question. The usual answer that people are looking for are like, “You had a business plan. Your side hustle was making as much as you did your corporate job.” That was not what happened. For me, there were three things that were in consideration. in my corporate job, I was in the government. I had a great manager-director who let me compress my hours. What that meant is I compressed my full-time hours into four days.
I was working Monday to Thursday but early, 7:00 AM to 5:30 so that I would have one day completely off on Friday. That was massive for me. Friday, Saturday, and Sunday are when I worked 30 days. That was the first thing. In between lunchtime and after work as well. The second thing was I also had my now husband but I want to be transparent and say we sat down and had a hard conversation. We wanted to start a business back then too. He's got his own business now but I was like, “Me first.”
We had a hard conversation being like, “I think this is what I want to do but, honestly, I'm not sure. It could completely flop.” We also had the conversation of if it did flop, what would it look like? Let's say I give it my all for 3 or 4 months and if it flops, I could always go back to a job, maybe not the same one, but a role. If all else fails, I could go to McDonald's and get a job as well. We talked about that, me and him. I'm lucky enough to also say the fact that I had him to lean on.
The third element, it’s going to sound weird but an event that happened in the corporate job. I got a promotion probably a month before I left. As soon as I left and graduated and became a lawyer, I was like, “I want that role. That would be it,” and I got it. I got that role. I was excited but then I was like, “This is it.” At that moment, there were also a few other things in the work environment that didn't give me a good feeling.
If I was to be transparent, there was a bit of feeling of, “Who is Anita who has come along and has now gotten this role?” I get it. I'm also Asian. I was also in my 20s. For me to have gotten a role and tapped on the shoulder, I also understand that it probably would have left people feeling uneasy. That was the trifecta for me.
The third element was that uneasy feeling of, “I thought I wanted this role. It felt nothing.” I then could see the people around me look at me and treat me differently as well. I decided to leave. For me, it wasn't leaving like handing in my resignation. I took leave because I had so much leave. I never took annual leave. I had so much leave banks up that I had enough leave to go 2 or 3 months. I also didn't tell my mom I quit my job until a year later.
Before we hit record, you were like, “I've just got off a plane. It's all good. I'm ready to go. I'm going to go have these meetings afterwards.” You've got a lot of energy and that comes forward in the whole brand like your website, it's all exciting and fun. Where did that come from? Even before when you said, “I started a plant business. I started another business.”
There's a lot of innate ambition that comes forward through all the stuff that you put out. Has that just always been there when your mum said before, “You get your way because you're going to try and try.” Where does that come from? Your parents were entrepreneurial, maybe that is what brought on that zest. Most people will be like, “I got that job. I'm in a law firm. I'm high up. Lawyers get paid well. Even if it doesn't feel great right now, it can afford me the nice house.” A lot of people just stay in that position. A lot of people don't jump out.
That is a good question for you to reflect back on me. There are two things that come to mind for me as to how I might have got the zest. The first part, if I'm to be real, honest, and vulnerable, growing up, how I saw love was whenever I achieved. I mentioned both my parents were business owners and they traveled a lot.
The one moment that they would always be at the assembly and they would be there was when I got an academic award, when I was house captain, and when I achieved something. I know they're not intentionally doing it. For me, I have recognized the fact that the more I achieve the unthinkable and extraordinary, the more I get this love and attention from my parents and my loved ones. That was when they were at the assembly. That was when they would finish work early and come and pick me up and take me and get happy meals. That is one thing.
Even though now I have this level of awareness, it's interesting because as soon as I'm saying it, and this leads me to the second part, I love a good challenge. It’s led me to burnout a few times but I love the momentum, I love the challenge, and I love problem solving. I love it when things aren't right so that I can go in and be like, “Why? What are some other ways we can explore?” The second element is I'm obsessed with business and problem solving but to my detriment, it's led me to burn out.
Thank you for being open and honest. They always say that a lot of your stuff comes from childhood. My parents were immigrants to this country and they were very much like, “Look how much we've given up.”
Same.
It was that whole thing. Even with my siblings and I, it used to be like, “She got this report on her report card and you only got this.”
Because I'm only a child, it wouldn't be about me and my siblings. It would be me and my friends or my cousins.
I'm a parent to two children and I notice I have to check myself. Especially with my 10-year-old, if he gets an award, I'm like, “That's amazing.” I also have to be like, “Someone told me that you were kind to that kid who’s new and that's amazing.” I’m celebrating those things as well, “You did this,” or, “You won in basketball.” It's real work to stop that generational thing.
It’s celebrating the behaviour and that as opposed to the actual tangible achievement.
That somebody else has told you that you're great versus you had that innate, “I want to be kind to this person.” That's more important to me. You've been vulnerable and real there and you're the face of your brand. If anyone follows Wordfetti, they know who you are. How have you done that? I have two family members who are lawyers, they have to get up, they have to talk, and they have to be there.
A lot of the time, being a lawyer is quite understated. You are behind the scenes or you're writing contract information or you're doing these other things. It's not even celebrated in many law firms besides maybe Nest Legal are doing a good job of being colourful and legal. A lot of legal places are dark in what they wear. It’s the opposite. When you started your business and you had come from this law stuff, were you always outgoing and like, “I'm going to be the face of my brand and people are going to know me. I'm going to be colourful and bold,” or did that come later? Do you have advice for anyone who's in that position right now?
It was not like that. I was the person hiding behind the W. There were no pictures of me for at least a good year and a bit. I was like, “It's all good. I don't need you to help me. I don't need you to do that.” The first photo shoot I had, I even wore sunglasses. Who wears sunglasses on their photo shoot? It’s so cringe.
I wouldn't say I was shy, I just didn't want to be the face. When I started to slowly share my story, it admitted the fact that it feels uncomfortable for me to show up and say, “This feels weird for me to put a picture of me up here.” That has slowly started to peel the layers out of it. I've always been, what I like to say, a bit of an inner weirdo.
I know even in my old corporate job, I'd call my CFO, G-Money, his name was Gary. I called him G-Money and everyone will be like, “Don't do that.” I'll be like, “Let's have some fun.” That’s what I learned with Wordfetti, the brand. When I started to think about the business name, I was like, “I love words but words are overwhelming for people.” I want it to be fun, potentially empowering, flowy, and confetti came to mind because I was like, “Yay.” I was like, “Why call it word and confetti? Why not call it Wordfetti?”
A lot of what has come about has been me and my creative expression. What's been beautiful is the team has started to grow. We started to grow the digital arm and service arm and all of our three arms, shop, studio, and school as it's the people we've also attracted into the team. The clients have all been good humans, good people. The more we are able to humanize a brand, and, at the end of the day, we are human beings and not business beings, the more we can have good, deep, and genuine connections. That's what we all inherently crave.
I come from a background in content, words, and journalism. I understand the power of wording. For anyone who's reading this thinking, maybe they've googled it now or they've known about the business, why would somebody in the age of AI and ChatGPT hire or work with an agency about copywriting and content and messaging? Can you explain the importance of these?
That's a good question and I love this question. Three things come to mind. There is a big misconception of what copywriting is. When we dial into the thick of what copywriting is, it's also different to just writing in general. What we were taught in school when it came to writing versus what copywriting is, is very different. Writing back in school, you're describing, and it's about you. Copywriting is about your audience and it's not about you.
If you write an About Us page, it's not about you, it's about your audience. The whole point of copywriting is to persuade instead of to describe. When it comes to business and when it comes to copywriting, it's worded in a way that sits at the core of communication. I've shared this before and it sounds controversial but I've said you can technically start a business without a logo, I'm not suggesting it, but you cannot start a business without words. It's how we communicate, it's how we connect with one another, and it's how we convey ideas, information, and have a voice. There's the one part that's that.
Your second element was about AI and I'm a big advocate and champion for AI. It's fricking awesome when you know how to use it. ChatGPT, AI, or Bard are only as good as what you put as input. If you give it a vanilla prompt, it will give you a vanilla piece of content. I see AI as a baby, you can teach it things. The more you can teach it things, the more you can be specific with what you want it to do and teach it certain frameworks or systems that you've developed, and the easier that it can help you do things faster.
When you know how to translate the thoughts in your mind into words and you can input it into AI or ChatGPT, that's when it can catapult your efforts by tenfold. The third reason why I feel like writing and copywriting are important, especially in the world of AI and a lot of quantity in content and a lot of stuff in the digital noise, our ability to actually share our insight and perspective is the one thing that has the ability to help you stand out.
If we cannot translate what's in our minds, our ideas, and our thoughts, it's just going to stay in there. Whether or not that is you as a business owner, you being able to translate your ideas and thoughts out there into words is the bridge between an idea. It'll stay an idea until you translate it out into words and that's when it becomes a reality. It's important that we learn how to communicate and verbalize what we think and what we feel about a particular situation or scenario.
I couldn't agree more with you. You said before you have three arms to your business, studio, school, and shop. In your shop, I was looking, you had templates on emails. You are about trying to help people feel more confident to get out what's in their head out and connect with people through those words.
One of the things that you sell is a Say No email template. It's great in terms of this is something that a lot of small business owners struggle with. When you are starting a business, whether you're a service or product, you're trying to get a bigger audience, you're trying to get out there, and you're trying to do heaps of brand awareness. The greater your brand becomes, the more suddenly you'll get all of these pictures, you'll get people trying to collaborate, or you get things that you have to say no to.
At the start, it's all, “Yes.” It's then like, “I don't want to do that.” Most business owners, especially creative small business owners, that's whom I predominantly work with, also have an element of people pleasing to them because saying no can feel a contrast to that. How do people say no? What are some tactics for saying no in a way that doesn't upset someone or eliminate the idea of future collaborations or brand partnerships with that personal brand who's contacting you?
Three things come to mind. This can come from a lot of different scenarios, maybe a podcast pitch, maybe a collaboration with someone else in your industry, maybe you don't have the capacity, or maybe it's just not a good fit. This is what I'd suggest in an email format. The first thing when someone pitches is they've taken the time with the exception of people who copy and paste it and send it to everyone and it's not personalized, that's different.
When someone has taken the time to pitch and share or connect with you, it is important to take a moment to recognize and be human and be like, “Jess, thank you so much for thinking of me. I'm completely humbled,” or, “I'm grateful, or whatever.” Be human about it and share how you feel. The first part is that, “Thank you,” and share how you feel. Maybe you already know them or maybe you don't.
The second element is to be honest but also do it in a way that isn't like, “It's a no. Bye.” When we can get a bit of a context of what that might look like, “Jess, thank you so much for taking the time to send me this podcast pitch. I appreciate you for taking the time. It seems as though you've looked at the podcast and what we're all about.”
The second part is where you want to be like, “With respect, I will have to respectfully say no to this podcast request right now.” It depends on the nature of the relationship or connection. You don't always have to give a justification. It could be like, “With respect, I have to say no at this stage.” If you feel like there is a bit of a feeling that you do want to share, it could be the fact that, “At this stage, we're not booking any more guests until XYZ. Maybe we can reconnect about this later.”
The second bit is to mention to them why it is a no but do it in a way that is respectful. I usually like to say words like, “Respectfully, I have to say no at this time because…” Or, “Respectfully, I will have to say no because I do not have the capacity. I have to be honest.” Often, when I tell people to address a no email based on that, they're like, “That's going to have them being like, ‘I'm never going to connect with you again.’”
I'm always learning how we can be more real and empathetic and honest in our communications. As humans, for someone to respond to me and be like, “No, I do not have a capacity at the moment but maybe we can reconnect in 3 or 4 months.” I'll put that date in my calendar and I'll reconnect with them. The second element is a respectful no. The third, and this is optional, depending on the nature of the relationship, is to explore how you could potentially connect them with someone else or maybe another connection.
It’s like, “I thought of Steph. You might be a great fit for this podcast. Let me connect you both.” When I say it out loud, if there's no secret formula to it, to be honest, it's just, “Hello, thank you.” It's a respectful no, maybe a justification if you feel the need to.” Three, if you feel called to, maybe connect them to some support.
The reason why we feel sick about saying no is we love people please. We love to make sure everyone is okay and everyone loves us. At the end of the day, it also wouldn't make sense for me or anyone to show up 80% or 70% not wanting to do the thing. It's just not going to do good service to anyone. It's like saying yes to events when secretly you mean no. You go and you're like, “I have to put on my makeup.”
It’s better to be like, “I’m not going to come. Sorry.” I remember a mutual friend of both of us had invited us both to dinner and she couldn't come. Look at the message she sent and it said something like, “Love, it's just not going to work for me right now.” There was no justification and I was like, “I'm just going to take that from now on.” You don't need to have this, “Because…” and trying to justify everything. I love that. You touched very lightly that you had a few rounds of burnout. I'm putting you on the spot so if you don't want to talk about it, it’s fine.
I'm happy to.
Lots of people go through this in business. Sometimes, it's a breakdown to have a breakthrough. You have to then go, “Something's not working here. Let me rearrange things.” On those occasions that you have, how do you work through that? If someone is reading who's like, “I'm there right now.”
There have been two moments where this has happened and I'll share the biggest lesson I've learned from these two separate moments. The first moment was when we were probably three years into the business. Three years into the business, everything externally looks fantastic. We were getting leads, we had a waitlist and all of that. We were growing the agency. The studio was growing organically. I felt so confused as to why we were doing so well but I still felt something was missing.
The best way for me to put it was I should be happy but I'm not. Why have I created almost a jail for myself? I'm being honest here. I had those thoughts in my mind, like, “I feel like I've created a job for myself.” If I'm, to be honest, in that first instance, I had grown the business based on what externally I thought was a success. In other words, getting a studio space because that's what I thought successful businesses do, you get a physical space. You then have a boardroom. That's what I thought it was but that is not what I want.
We’re remote now. I've always wanted complete freedom on remote and I want that for my team members too. The first episode was when I was running the business based on everyone else's definition of success instead of mine. I don't want anyone to go through burnout to have to realize this but I had to sit myself down and ask, “What does success actually mean for me? It’s not Anita's mom. It’s not Anita's XYZ and not this person. Anita, what does it mean for me? What does it feel like for me?”
I did this life-changing exercise, I don't know whether you've heard of it, called Designing Your Life. It's a design thinking methodology through Stanford University. I'll give the readers a 30-second spiel about it. In short, it leans on a design thinking methodology through Stanford University, which is focused on designing your life.
It looked at three things and one is your work view. In other words, it got deep asking you questions like, “What is work? Why do we work? What is work without money? What is work with money? What is work with people?” It got almost philosophical as to what work means. Why do we, as humans, work? We spent so much time working. That was one. The second pillar to that was life and it gets deep. It's like, “What is life? What is life when it comes to death? Is there an afterlife?”
It got granular with what my definition of life is and what my definition of work is. What I did was then I looked at the two and saw the underpinnings and there were 2 or 3 things and learning was a big part of both. In other words, I love learning, and absorbing like a sponge. The second thing was freedom and I did not have this freedom. Freedom is easy to say. Specifically, what freedom was for me was location freedom. It was the ability to make creative decisions and ideas and getting so clear on what freedom means was important.
The third element was an element of adventure. It was a bit of fun but also being able to play around and do something completely differently. I noticed that there were a lot of these that wasn't aligned for me. That was the first part and that helped me a lot to get out of that rut. The more recent was probably two-and-a-bit years ago when I had my second burnout episode when I was working and juggling a million balls at once and was working fifteen-hour days. That was when all our arms were buns and burners high.
I am also someone who used to be someone who's like, “I will do it. I will do it all.” For me, it took me a long time to start celebrating and embracing the fact that because I don't do something, it doesn't mean the business is anything less. For me, that was a massive self-internal introspective work that I had to look at.
I love an element of control but there is also so much beauty in surrendering and letting go and so much more fun that way too. That was probably the second element. I learned to surrender and let go a little bit. We love control but how much more fun is life when you go with the flow a little bit? I'm embracing that a lot more the last year or two.
Thank you for sharing all of that. It's important to remember to just surrender. I have to say to people, when we talk about staff, a lot of the time people will say, “They haven't done this. They haven't done that.” Sometimes I'll be like, “Are they set up for success?” Sometimes you ask yourself, “Am I still micromanaging? Am I still checking every single thing?” They're never going to get the confidence to just try it for themselves. Bring in something that you would never have thought of, it's completely amazing for your business.
It doesn’t mean there's going to be mistakes. I've had people send emails out but I'm like, “That is so awful. Never say that.” At the same time, I'm thinking about every little thing because someone else is taking care of it. The percentage of them making mistakes is so much tinier than the percentage of them doing amazing things. What or who has helped you with your business? You are helping lots of businesses with their words and messaging. Have there been any particular books or anything that you've come across in your journey so far that you're like, “That was so helpful to me.”
The first one is that book called Designing Your Life.
I heard Mel Robbins. That's what I was thinking. She mentioned that book and then I've downloaded it.
It’s game changing for me personally. I've also referred that book to everyone. It's not often that we pause and sit down and consider, “Why do we work?” My definition is going to be different to my husband's, yours, my mom's, and all of that. We just never take the time to consider what that is like for us and what we want it to be like for us. It sounds so obvious for us to ask ourselves but we don't do it. We just conform and let everyone else around us say to us, “Seven figures. Eight figures.” We jump straight to that definition. I work with someone. It's important to take the time to consider it. That was definitely one of them. There was another book. I listened to a lot of the books. The second book that is coming straight to mind, this might not be your traditional business book but it's Greenlights from Matthew McConaughey.
I've been trying to listen to that. I have an Audible subscription in the UK because I used to work for them in the UK and one of the perks is books but I can't download it. Every time I’m going to get it, “It's not available in your area.”
The reason why I really liked that book is just so much of what his lessons and learning are applicable to business. Two things stand out to me, which I'll share quickly. He shared in one bit, “I'd rather make As in three things and B's in five things.” For him, I won't ruin the book, we all know that he started to not do comedy and he stopped doing that for a good 5 or 6 years. He had his eyeballs on Oscar winning roles. It took for him to be like, “No,” to create more of that. There's so much to learn. The conviction that he had and his determination was inspiring.
The second thing too is how much love and adoration he has to his family in addition to his ambition to do great work. Often, we're like, “It has to be this or that.” It was nice to see the narrative of him absolutely loving his family, his wife, and all of that, but still being like, “I'm going to jump at that Oscar winning movie or role.” That was nice to see.
I'm going to read that because he’s this hot comedic thing to a serious actor and you're like, “If he's in it, that'll be a good show.”
It’s one to listen.
Anything else? Do you have any mantras or anything that you like? “I live by this…”
I have so many at any given stage. The one that I would love to share with the readers is if you wobble, your audience is going to wobble. What I mean by that is often, whether it's on stories or whether it is talking to someone or you're trying to talk about your offer, if you wobble and you're not feeling confident about it, your audience is going to wobble. If you're going to start off a story and be like, “Hi, everyone. Quickly, I want to let you know that we have just launched a new offer.” Already, it's a little bit wobbly.
Whereas if you jump straight in and be like, “You guys cannot miss what we're about to launch. This has been five months in the making and millions of copies consumed that this is going to completely change the way.” A completely different feeling. It's such a subtle tweak in how you convey your verbal language and what you say. It's the same with written too. When you wobble writing what you're saying or communicating what you're saying, how can you expect your audience to trust and have confidence in what you're saying? I always go back to that. Sometimes I get nervous too so I always lean back into that motto.
There used to be this tool, I don't know if it still is, called Not Sorry, and it was like a Chrome plug in or something. It would look at your emails and it would take out anything where you're saying, “I'm just getting in touch. I'm just following up.”
I like that.
It was predominantly pitched at women in particular. When I talk to people and they’re like, “That client still hasn’t paid.” I’m like, “You’ve done the work.” “Do you reckon I'm chasing them too much?” It's like, “No. Do the work.” If I went into a lawyer's office and they did the work, they would charge me. A dentist would charge me.
Have five-minute increments.
What are you proud of most from your business so far?
Fiona, I have to say my team, truly. It's taken me a long time to be able to say that. Years ago, if I'm to be honest, I wasn't the best leader. You don't start a business and you automatically become a great leader. I wish that was the case. It's taken me a little bit to see my team and understand the individualistic characteristics of who they are, understand their strengths, and understand what motivates them. I wouldn't say it's like completely a walk in the park but it's been something that I am proud of because it's taken me and me personally too to embrace that a lot.
What a nice thing. What is next for you? What's next for Wordfetti? If people are reading this and they're thinking, “I want to check out what she does,” how can they connect best with you?
Personally, come and be friends. Over on Instagram, I am @AnitaSiek. Wordfetti is @Wordfetti. I also have a podcast, which Fiona is going to be on as well, called Brandfetti. What's next? We’re at an exciting stage at the moment. It's taken us a bit to build the three arms of the business. Now, it's about refining and making it even better and better for our clients and our students. This year, we launched a new offer so that was a membership, and we've never done anything like it. It's about refining it and making everything we've got even better instead of adding more refining. That's what we're doing.
There are three As that you talked about with Matthew McConaughey. You're doing it.
Good pick up. I'm making A's and three things as opposed to five D's.
I love this. Thank you so much for taking the time out, especially when you've just got back to Australia. It's appreciated.
Absolutely. I love to do this. Fiona, thank you.
Bye.
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How lovely is Anita? It's funny because Anita and I have seen each other and been around the same circles and been Instagram friends for a long time but this is the first time that we chatted. It was lovely to meet her. As much as you can meet on Zoom, but still, it was lovely to chat with her. Thanks so much, Anita, for coming on.
I would love to know what you took away from this. As usual, I'm going to highlight two things that stood out for me amongst so many others. I'd love to hear from you so you can always send us a DM, @MyDailyBusiness_. You can find us on TikTok, @MyDailyBusiness, or email, at Hello@MyDailyBusiness.com. We always love hearing what people thought of each episode and what they took away from it.
I'm going to highlight two aspects of what Anita said that stood out to me and the first is when she was talking about saying no to people coming on the podcast or even maybe working with them. I love that she said you can say respectfully no and you don't have to justify it. You don't have to have this big and long justification. I know because I work with so many female business owners in particular where I feel like we have to justify things or be overly polite or be people-pleasing all the time as opposed to just saying, “Thank you so much, this isn't going to work for me.”
I love that she said you can just say respectfully it's a no, full stop, and no justification. Anita also did give ideas if you wanted to go down the justification path. I love that she said, “You don't have to. You can just say it's a no and thank you and that's it.” You can be polite and you're not burning bridges. We have so much patriarchal legacy of thinking, particularly for women, that we have to always apologize, firstly, for even saying no, and then justify why we're saying no with a million different reasons as opposed to just saying, “No. It's a no. Thank you.” That's it, politely done, and no burnt bridges. I love that Anita brought that up.
The second thing that I wanted to touch on that Anita brought up was she called it her watermelon moment and she talked about her father passing, especially at such a young age. My heart goes out to Anita and anyone who has gone through that at such a young age. As somebody who's also lost both of my parents, I feel totally what she was saying when it was like, “Do you want to keep going down this path and potentially make good money and have a great bice title and all the reputation and all of the status that comes with that? Do you want to try this other thing that might be more passionate and more exciting and more fulfilling long term?”
I feel like it sounds so harsh, especially when you haven't experienced death, but that is powerful in a way. As horrible as death is, the powerful moment that comes afterwards when you realize like, “Life is bloody short. What do I want to do with my time?” It was brave for Anita to make that decision and start the business that she started. Obviously, it's gone well and she did the right thing for her and for all these people that she's helped through that business. Sometimes it can be scary to do that.
If you haven't been impacted by the death of a close person, it sometimes feels like, “I can do that later. I've got all the time in the world.” Unfortunately, we just don't. Anita and I have seen that in our own families and lives. Many other people reading this have gone through that and whether it is a death, whether it is cancer, or whether it is something else that is huge and shifts you and makes you realize, “I only have this life, what am I going to do with it?” I love that she was brave enough to share that and, and vulnerable and open up all about that. Thank you so much, Anita. I hope it gives anyone reading food for thought.
That is my chat with Anita. If you are keen to check out everything that Wordfetti and Anita are doing, you can find all the information on their website, which is Wordfettigroup.com. You can also connect with them on Instagram, @Wordfetti. You can find Anita herself at @AnitaSiek and on her website, which is AnitaSiek.com. You can find Anita and all the information about Brandfetti, the work podcast as well that she has on her Instagram, which is Anita Siek.
There are so many places to find Anita. She also has a podcast called Brandfetti. If you look that up or look up Anita Siek on your Apple Podcast, Spotify, or wherever you listen, you'll be able to find it. Thank you again, Anita. Thank you so much for reading.
