Attorney Marketing Lessons to Build Trust and Avoid Costly Mistakes
In the world of parenting, few challenges are as daunting as sleepless nights with a newborn. Enter Anna Baker, an Australian celebrity baby whisperer who turned her passion for helping families into a thriving business. Starting her journey in the midst of COVID-19, Anna has shared invaluable insights and experiences that can guide aspiring entrepreneurs on their path to success.
1. Taking the Leap
Anna’s story begins with a decision to take risks. She admits that starting her business during the pandemic came with its challenges, including balancing her professional ambitions with the responsibilities of motherhood.
“I should have started sooner, but I was too scared,” she reflects.
This sentiment resonates with many aspiring entrepreneurs who often hesitate to take that crucial first step.
2. The Importance of Guidance
While Anna excelled in her role as a sleep consultant, she faced hurdles when it came to the business side of things.
“I kind of wish I had somebody to guide me,” she shares.
Her early missteps included overspending on ineffective marketing strategies, highlighting the need for a solid business foundation and expert guidance outside one’s core skill set.
3. Understanding the Service Offered
As a sleep consultant, Anna’s work focuses on creating healthy routines for children and addressing the mental health of parents.
“We want to prevent sleep deprivation,” she explains.
This clarity around who she serves and how she helps is essential for building trust and shaping effective marketing.
4. Investing Wisely
Anna learned that cutting corners often leads to bigger expenses later.
“Don’t just go with the cheapest… you end up paying more in the long run to fix their mistakes.”
This lesson is especially relevant for entrepreneurs deciding where to invest limited resources.
5. The Role of Social Media
At first, Anna approached social media without a clear plan.
“I was just posting things on Instagram and paying for boosts.”
Only after working with a professional marketing team did she see meaningful engagement and conversions—demonstrating the power of strategy over activity.
6. Navigating Challenges
A communication breakdown with her phone provider disrupted her business operations. Instead of reacting emotionally, Anna pivoted and hired a PR firm to raise awareness of her services. This strategic response helped her overcome the setback and grow.
7. Continuous Learning
Anna stresses the importance of adapting to how people now find information.
“People are no longer Googling; they’re using AI to ask questions.”
Her insight reflects a broader shift in consumer behavior—and the need for businesses to evolve alongside it.
Conclusion
Anna Baker’s journey is a testament to the resilience and adaptability required in entrepreneurship. Her story reminds us that success often comes from taking risks, seeking proper guidance, and learning continuously from both triumphs and failures. For aspiring business owners, her experience reinforces the importance of investing wisely, understanding your audience, and being willing to pivot when challenges arise.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Who is Anna Baker?
Anna Baker is an Australian baby sleep consultant—often referred to as a “baby whisperer”—who built a successful parenting-focused business during the COVID-19 pandemic.
What does a baby sleep consultant do?
A baby sleep consultant helps families establish healthy sleep routines for children while also supporting parental wellbeing and mental health.
What challenges did Anna Baker face when starting her business?
She faced fear around starting, lack of early business guidance, ineffective marketing investments, and operational disruptions during the pandemic.
What business lessons can entrepreneurs learn from Anna Baker?
Key lessons include starting before you feel ready, seeking expert guidance, investing in quality support, and staying adaptable when challenges arise.
Why is guidance important when starting a service-based business?
Even experts in their field may lack experience in marketing, operations, or scaling. Guidance helps avoid costly mistakes and accelerates growth.
How has AI changed how businesses attract clients?
People increasingly use AI tools to ask questions instead of traditional search engines, making clear, question-based content more important than ever.
Is social media marketing enough to grow a business?
Not without strategy. Anna’s experience shows that professional planning and targeting matter more than simply posting or boosting content.
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Tags:
#Entrepreneurship #BusinessSuccess #SleepConsultant #ParentingTips #SocialMediaMarketing #MentalHealth #StartupJourney #BusinessGrowth #AnnaBaker #BabyWhisperer
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Andrew Colsky (00:12)
Welcome to Be -Picked, the podcast for professional service providers who are looking to grow their business. Today we have Anna Baker and she is an Australian celebrity baby whisperer. She built her business starting in 2021 in the middle of COVID and she's got a successful thriving business today and she's going to share her tips and tricks with all of us. So Anna, welcome to the show.
Anna (00:37)
Wow, thank you so much for having me.
Andrew Colsky (00:40)
We're very fortunate to have you on. We're trying to learn from people like you in terms of someone starting out or trying to grow their business and they need to know where do I focus my time? Where do I focus my money? What do I avoid so I don't waste my time and money? And we'd love to hear your story.
Anna (01:03)
And I wish I had you about four years ago because I made a lot of mistakes and I wasted a lot of time but I finally got there.
Andrew Colsky (01:10)
Great, great. Well, tell us how you did it.
Anna (01:14)
Look, I think it's one of those things where it's all about taking risks, right? Like I was on a podcast recently and you know, she said, what's one thing that you would have done differently? And I think I should have started sooner, but I was too scared. I started during the middle of COVID and I had two kids at home. So I feel like when I first started my business, not that I wasted a year of my life without my kids, but I just felt like I sadly had to put them kind of on the back burner and I just had to jump for it, right?
Andrew Colsky (01:42)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (01:43)
And you, I guess my biggest problem was I'm really good at my job. I'm really good at the service that I provide. But when it comes to the business side of things, I kind of wish I had somebody to guide me. Whereas that's where I spent a lot of money making mistakes.
Andrew Colsky (02:01)
Well, let me stop
you real quick and just have you clarify for the audience what exactly is your business that you're doing.
Anna (02:08)
It's quite fabulous. Parents love me. So I'm a sleep consultant. So we go inside parents' house and we let them sleep. So we take over with their baby. We help put them in healthy routines and we really focus on mental health. So I try to say to parents, call us before there's an issue. So we want to prevent sleep deprivation. We want to help your mental health before it spirals out of control. So we are there
Andrew Colsky (02:31)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (02:31)
for newborns all the way to age eight.
Andrew Colsky (02:35)
Fantastic, So before you got into opening this business, had you ever been in business before or were you learning all this from scratch?
Anna (02:45)
look, you know, like when I was at uni, you take some business classes, right? But when it's your own money that you're risking, like I emptied my savings account. And the most the hardest thing for me is what if I empty my savings account and my kids are at the age where they will know if I fail? So I didn't care about if my friends and family knew, but it was more like I couldn't fail in front of my kids. You know, they have I didn't want them to feel that if I failed, it would affect their life. So I think that was really motivating for me. But
I remember taking like going to the bank and taking 20 grand out of the bank and the guy at the bank said to me, so what are you doing with this money? Like he was quite curious and I was like, oh, well, let me tell you sweating. I was doing everything right, but it's just scary. So I just remember going to the bank, taking my money out and thinking like, I hope to God I'm doing the right thing. And yeah, it's just the mistakes that I made were mistakes that you just don't know. Right. I think that
What I have learned is hire people and don't just go with the cheapest because sometimes when you go with the cheapest, you end up paying more in the long run to fix their mistakes. And
Andrew Colsky (03:53)
yeah.
Anna (03:53)
that is the biggest mistake I've learned that, you know, people will sell you everything. Well, that's why they're clearly good at their job. And then, you know, like, for instance, my biggest problem that I had was social media. I didn't I don't really know how to do TikTok and make reels. I'm OK now, but I still have people that I've hired for that. But it's like
I wish somebody would have said to me, Anna, you need to have a marketing strategy. Anna, you need to have ABCD. I didn't know any of that. Right? So I was just posting things on Instagram and I was paying for, you know, what you can boost a post, but
Andrew Colsky (04:28)
yeah.
Anna (04:28)
it wasn't actually getting to where I needed to go, but I
had no problem spending the $500 a week. yeah, I think it's just coming up with a strategic plan that I wish that I would have paid somebody for.
And now that I'm four years into my business, now I actually have paid somebody for that plan. I have paid somebody to show me how to do ABCD. And I've hired the right people, and they weren't cheap, but they're efficient. And I'm actually seeing conversion for my money.
Andrew Colsky (05:02)
So when you talk about social media today, now that you've done all of this, are you filming your own videos? Are you hiring someone to do videos for you? How are you actually doing it?
Anna (05:16)
No, I've actually paid someone because my problem is I think that I've got these really great ideas. And then when you talk to people about them, it might look great from where I'm coming from. But then it's not actually hitting the audience of what they want to hear. Right. So my biggest issue was I kept telling people about my service, just telling them you can have a night nanny, you can have a day consultant, you can have this.
people don't want to hear about that. want to see how does it work? And I honestly didn't think like that. I was just
Andrew Colsky (05:47)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (05:48)
sitting in front of the camera and talking, but I was talking up all the wrong points. Like my main focus is mental health, but at the time I wasn't even talking about mental health. I was talking about what the night looks like. So I was honestly just going down the wrong path. And when I say I've wasted money, I think I calculated with my accountant and I probably wasted almost $19,000.
on hiring different social media people that promised me the world, that I ended up walking away with disaster and embarrassment. So.
Andrew Colsky (06:20)
Right. You know,
it's kind of like the
common mistake is exactly what you're describing where people are describing to the listener how a parking meter works and the listener
Anna (06:33)
Hmm.
Andrew Colsky (06:34)
just wants to find a parking space. They don't care how it works. Solve my problem.
Anna (06:36)
Yep, that's right.
that's right. I also learned about, with my product, it's my service, it's very emotional, right? Like you
Andrew Colsky (06:47)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (06:48)
are going into people's houses to provide a service and it's really raw and emotions are everywhere. Mental health is at a high. That's what my followers needed to see. And that's what I didn't know. So
I remember I had this one lady that had this great idea and her marketing strategy was it sounded fantastic to me because again, I was really good at my job. I'm not good at everything else. And I just remember paying all this money and she promised me the world and I walked away and I felt like I had to start completely over. And I just think that money could have been used, A, towards my kids or B, towards something different. So I think, you know, do your research. If I could give you any advice.
do your research and find people that want to help you thrive. I have learned really quickly that the people that are successful, they want to help you thrive. And also don't be around people who are slightly jealous of you because they actually don't want to see you thrive. And I've also
Andrew Colsky (07:47)
Right.
Anna (07:48)
learned that as well.
Andrew Colsky (07:49)
Right. So, so of all the things that you tried and all the things that you've done, and now you're able to kind of look back, what would you say beyond what you just shared? What would you say is the most
effective thing that you've done? Meaning, is it social media? Is it networking? Is it something else? What's the most effective thing that you did?
Anna (08:14)
look, this might be off the charts a little bit. I'm going to steer away and then come back to it. But when I launched sleep Baker, I remember I launched on a Friday and then the Saturday I was going to the U S and I was, I had some jobs there. And when I landed from Australia to the USA, my phone didn't turn on and I thought that's really weird. So I thought maybe it was the SIM card. So I reached back to Australia and I was speaking to the company on a different phone and they couldn't figure out what it was. And
Then it was three weeks later, I was still there and my phone wasn't working and we weren't getting any calls for Sleep Baker. And then people were saying, like emailing us saying, hey, I'm really sorry that your business didn't last. I see that you've closed down because when people would call the phone, there was no answer. And I remember I was telling everyone about this story because I was in America trying to get back home and they're like, well, did you pay your bill? Well, of course I paid my bill, right?
And then the phone company came back to me and said, look, we don't know what's going on, but we're going to give you a new number. And I was like, I don't want a new number because
Andrew Colsky (09:16)
Hey!
Anna (09:17)
I wake up in the morning with messages from all over the world. I need this phone turned back on. So I got back to Australia. went into the phone company and I went in there every single day. And I sat there for four or five hours. I recorded myself sitting in there. I reached out to who I thought was like going to help me. And I got nowhere. And then one day,
I was walking home and I was telling my neighbor and my neighbor is really big on social media. She does a lot of like marketing strategies. And at this time in my life, when I first found out what she did, I couldn't afford her rates. Well, I thought that I couldn't, right? I should have gotten in touch with her before. And I said to her about my phone and she was so disappointed because she saw before I opened to where I was now, to what happened. Good old social media. She got onto LinkedIn and posted something about this phone company. Within one day, my phone was turned on.
But do you know how long
Andrew Colsky (10:08)
Hahaha
Anna (10:09)
that took? It took nine and a half weeks. So I was
Andrew Colsky (10:13)
my gosh.
Anna (10:13)
so angry because my business declined by 80 % because people were emailing us saying, I'm really sorry that you closed down. We loved your business. So I reached out to a PR firm and I wanted
to attack this phone company because they offered me, they said, oh, look, we're really sorry what happened. We're going to give you a $35 credit a week. $35? I lost 80 % of my business.
So the PR firm said to me, Anna, we don't really want to go after a big phone company. We want to get your name out there and tell people what you do. I never thought of that. So, okay, so I paid this PR firm and he's like, we want, it's not even about making it about me. It was about telling the world that sleep baker exists, telling the world that we focus on mental health, that we focus on sleep deprivation. And honestly, it was worth all of my money because all of a sudden,
We didn't say anything about the phone company, whereas that would have been the path that I would have gone down. He's like, we don't care about them. And it's about your business and about your families. And then so yeah, so we hit some media outlets. And next thing I know, we were back in business again. So that was probably one of my biggest factors for sleep bagger. Because to be honest, I think if I didn't reach out, I don't know where I'd be today.
Andrew Colsky (11:26)
Wow. So, all right, so let me get some follow up on this. So you found a firm that was successful and helped to make you successful, but prior to finding them, did you have experience with other firms who promised you the same thing and didn't deliver?
Anna (11:44)
I guess, yes, when it came to social media and marketing, right? PR was something that I never thought about. Like, I was thinking, who would want to interview me? Why would I? Why would I'm not a name? Do you know what I mean? So I didn't think of myself like that. And when I spoke to Drew Combs, who does my PR now, I've been at them since that issue. He made me feel so good about myself. Like, Anna, you have a service that's really rare. You have a service that you're going to help people.
And when he actually wrote about me and what I did, that is how I based all my marketing strategies off what he wrote. So he saw sleep, the way that he saw Sleep Baker was different to how I saw it, right? Oops, sorry. So I saw Sleep Baker differently. And then he was like, look, let's go down this path of doing A, B and C. And even from today, that is how we do all of our media outlets.
Andrew Colsky (12:40)
So it sounds like really once you kind of hit your stride, it was more about getting your credibility out there as someone who was a professional who knew an area that other people didn't know and you were able
to solve unique problems that people had,
Anna (12:56)
Absolutely.
Andrew Colsky (12:56)
you know, which is so different from just, you know, a generic statement of, you know, I do this type of work. Well, that's
Anna (13:04)
Yeah.
Andrew Colsky (13:05)
wonderful. But can you solve my problem?
Anna (13:08)
Absolutely. I think the other thing is, to be honest, I was really bitter. Right. I was super bitter with this phone company. All I wanted to do was to smash them. Whereas I'm really thankful that I found Drew because it was he was like, no, we're not going to go down that path. We're going to go ABCD. And then it just made me think differently. So the one thing that I learned from him is when your business is slow, you have more time to think about ways.
that you can drive your business, right? Whereas if you're thriving, if your business is thriving, you don't think about it. You just keep going, going, going. So when we, when I did hit my slow peak, which let me tell you all new businesses do, you want to then find the direction to come out of that hole because it's hard and you cry. Like, you know, people say to me now, you're so lucky. You look at your business lucky. That is definitely not the word. I still cry at 2am sometimes wondering if I'm going to even get a wage this week because that's
Andrew Colsky (14:02)
Right.
Anna (14:03)
the reality of owning a business.
Everything might look smooth sailing, like January can be my worst time for business because in Australia, a lot of businesses close down, so families go away on holidays, right? Whereas I know now that's my slow time, so I take time off them. But my first year, I wasn't aware of that. So
there's
Andrew Colsky (14:23)
Right.
Anna (14:24)
a lot of patterns, but there's a lot of inconsistent patterns as well. So I definitely think as a business owner, we're not really lucky. You put in the time and efforts.
You are you're working without a paycheck. You're working around the clock and you're working to pay your staff because you can't let them down because they're going to go find someone else to work for. So definitely
Andrew Colsky (14:44)
Yeah.
Anna (14:45)
people don't consider yourself lucky. is a lot of hard work.
Andrew Colsky (14:49)
Right. Well, so now you're about roughly five years into it or so. What would you say is the breakdown in terms of the percentage of your time that you spend doing your business and the percentage of your time that you focus on marketing and building the business?
Anna (15:07)
Well, that's actually a good question. I'm, look, I think I'm at the stage now where I can't afford my marketing team. Right. So I think every week I have to spend six hours with them, filming content and answering questions. And then the rest is left up to them. And let me tell you when I don't do it, like if I'm traveling and I miss a week or we don't add in a week, my business declines.
Andrew Colsky (15:38)
Wow, interesting.
Anna (15:38)
So people
like the engagement. So I didn't realize how important TikTok was. I haven't had it. We recently got it. And then people call like, we saw you on TikTok. And I'm like, my goodness, we've only had four posts. But people are calling off TikTok where I honestly thought people, I mean, I'm 39. I thought, I didn't realize how many people were on TikTok because I wasn't on it. But yeah,
Andrew Colsky (15:59)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (15:59)
it absolutely, it's the social media that people are, people are scrolling. are.
Sitting there on our phones, scrolling, we're not going to Google.com asking questions. We're using AI now. So
Andrew Colsky (16:10)
Mm-hmm, right?
Anna (16:11)
the other advice I'm finding is that I was spending all this money on Google Ads. And
nowadays, that's dropped because people are on either chat GPT or AI asking questions. Because when my girls answer the phone, they're how did you hear about SleepHack? And they're like, AI.
Andrew Colsky (16:28)
Yeah.
Anna (16:28)
So,
and you know, I think the other thing is being really active on LinkedIn because that's also where you're getting a different group of professionals.
Andrew Colsky (16:36)
So that's a great statement, but let me get some clarification on that one. When you say active on LinkedIn, what does active mean? What types of things are you doing?
Anna (16:46)
So active means a lot of work. So I have learned
Andrew Colsky (16:49)
Hahaha!
Anna (16:50)
that when you post anything, you need to be present at least an hour after. Because if you're, there's a lot of active people also on LinkedIn and they want you to respond back quite quickly. They're not gonna wait two weeks, right? So what I used to do is I used to go in there, post something and I would never check comments. I didn't think people were actually caring. And then when I...
when I sat down with a firm and they're like, no, Anna, you need to sit there for an hour after you post. that's prepare yourself. If you don't have an hour, it's a waste of your time for a conversion rate because people send me messages. They might not want to post because they're too embarrassed to talk about maybe their four year old is still sleeping, but it's about being there. That first hour that they read is like your raw time. So whenever you whenever I post on LinkedIn, I make sure that I have an hour to respond back to any messages or comments.
Andrew Colsky (17:41)
Wow. And so when you're posting, are you just posting in your feed or do you belong to different groups? Like where are you putting your posts?
Anna (17:51)
So I really need to belong to different groups.
Andrew Colsky (17:54)
hahahaha
Anna (17:55)
But at this time, I've just been posting right on my feed. And
Andrew Colsky (18:00)
Okay.
Anna (18:01)
I recently launched in Dubai. So we've opened up SleepBaker there. And it's quite funny. mean, the internet is such an interesting thing, and it's really hard to keep up with. And that is why you find someone that specializes. So I did a post.
And I don't really know at the time, I didn't know anyone in Dubai. And I did this post on that we're opening up in Dubai. All of a sudden, people in Dubai were commenting on it. And I found it really interesting that it came in the algorithm of people over there. And
Andrew Colsky (18:28)
Right?
Anna (18:29)
again, at this time, I didn't know, so I wasn't commenting on it. And then I realized when I posted another post, nobody commented. So you really do have to stay active.
Andrew Colsky (18:38)
Hmm. So when you're posting, are you posting text? Are you posting video? Are you posting pictures? What does a post look like?
Anna (18:48)
So I've done a bit of both. mean, if you would have asked me, I would have just posted like writing, but no people want to see content. want to see videos. They want to see photos and because it's a service base, they want to feel it emotion, you know, that they want to feel the emotions. And that's, think where I thought, why would people want to read about that? And you know, my agent's like, because that's raw. That's what people are feeling. They don't want to know how much the services.
They want to know long-term what you're providing. And I think that's where I had to learn the difference of selling my service versus selling it on an emotional side.
Andrew Colsky (19:26)
Right, right. And another question I wanted to ask when you were talking about the social media videos that you were putting out. You said you spend a good amount of time recording videos. Are you doing shorts? Are you doing some shorts in some long form? If you're doing shorts, what is the average length of a short? Tell us more details about
Anna (19:48)
So creating content in itself is exhausting. Like I have to take a nap when I've done two hours, right? Like it's hard work. So all those influencers out there, I have so much respect for them because it is a lot of work. But my content creator knows like I'm high functioning ADHD. So sometimes I have really good days where I can do two hours of filming and other days it only might be a half an hour because mentally I'm not prepared for it, right?
So what we do, it's actually quite incredible how they work, because this is like what they do. She'll film me for about maybe two or three minutes or maybe sometimes 30 minutes straight, just talking like this. And then she just cuts out little pieces that we use. And I think that has been our best content
because she's asking me questions. I don't really know what she's even going to talk about. I do better getting questions just asked right then and there. If I'm reading
Andrew Colsky (20:42)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (20:42)
a script,
I just, can't read the script and function it because I like things in my own words because nobody
Andrew Colsky (20:48)
Right.
Anna (20:49)
knows your business better than you. So if you get onto chat, you can be teen, you ask them questions about baby sleeping. Yeah, it's very generic. People want to know, okay, what happens besides the generic answers, right? And I think that's where, you know, we'll shoot for two or three hours. She goes home. I write all the descriptions so that she knows what path I want to go down. And then she'll just.
kind of change it and she just drops it in an app and then we post.
Andrew Colsky (21:17)
Right, right. Wonderful. Yeah, actually this, it is. And
Anna (21:20)
And that's a lot of work.
Andrew Colsky (21:22)
I was going to say, you know, this podcast itself, when we're done, I will generate little clips that I will share with you and I'll put out as well. And those are, those are really meaningful because like you said, it's part of a conversation. It's not this fake thing, you know, that you
Anna (21:39)
Mmm.
Andrew Colsky (21:39)
created. And, you know, I'm just going to put in a little plug here, myself.
I spent, and I still spend, hours, just like you said,
Anna (21:51)
you
Andrew Colsky (21:52)
generating content, editing, you gotta make sure you're using the right SEO terms, you gotta have it in a way that people are gonna be interested in watching. There's so much that goes into even just a short little clip. And I literally don't have the time to do it and run a business. You just, can't do everything these days. And if you can't afford a large...
you know, bill for a marketing company like you're fortunate to be able to do. That's where I developed the credibility generator product that my company has, which is we basically do it all for you. Videos of
Anna (22:28)
Yeah.
Andrew Colsky (22:28)
you, your face, your voice. You don't
have to be there because we use AI to make all that happen and we post
Anna (22:34)
Yeah.
Andrew Colsky (22:34)
it for you. So it's all done behind the scenes. You take a few minutes to, you know, approve the content and then it's
Anna (22:42)
Yep.
Andrew Colsky (22:42)
done.
Anna (22:43)
See, that's going
to save so much time and money for a lot of businesses, because if you're starting out really small, you don't have the overheads to pay for that. Right. And
Andrew Colsky (22:52)
Right? Right?
Anna (22:53)
you actually need that. You need to have a presence on social media.
Andrew Colsky (22:58)
Yeah, yeah. So,
Anna (23:00)
Mmm.
Andrew Colsky (23:01)
you know, it's... I feel sorry or I feel bad for people who...
You know are struggling because they don't know which direction to go because they haven't
Anna (23:12)
Yeah.
Andrew Colsky (23:12)
had any opportunity to be Educated on this and they're floundering and they're throwing money at this person throwing money at that person and nobody's producing and Just like you said you fell into I fell into that trap too plenty I could give you plenty of examples where I paid good money to people who promised me the world and delivered absolutely nothing and
Anna (23:33)
and they become amateurs.
Andrew Colsky (23:35)
Yeah, yeah
And it's just, I got to a point, it's like, I just need to do this myself, and I did, but I don't have the time to do it myself.
Anna (23:43)
No.
Andrew Colsky (23:46)
It's a real challenge.
Anna (23:46)
It's hard. And
you know what? I think also like small little things like find yourself a good bookkeeper. You don't need them full time. Find a contractor for four or five hours because that is going to save you in the long run of having an
Andrew Colsky (23:59)
Ahem.
Anna (23:59)
accountant. So it was little things
like I didn't even think about that, right? Because in my mind, when you start a business, I mean, maybe this is me personally, but I already thought that I was big in terms of
I was like, this is going to grow overnight. Now I've got this PR agent. I'm going to have to hire ABCD. So I kind of jumped the gun. And
Andrew Colsky (24:20)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (24:20)
then I was like, actually, I can't afford this. But then I had to take a step back and realize, OK, realistically, I only need a bookkeeper for five hours a week. Right. My biggest support now is my assistant. So I
Andrew Colsky (24:33)
Right.
Anna (24:33)
can't be the ones on the phone. I, you know, I sleep during the day. So I didn't want, you know, Sleep Baker to be closed because I was sleeping. So I hired an assistant and
You know, she manages both Sleep Baker and Dream with Baker, our clothing line. And also, if you are if people know that you're working night and you're answering the phone, they'll be like, well, when do you sleep? Right.
Andrew Colsky (24:55)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (24:56)
So I had to be like, yeah, that's actually a really good point, because even though I wasn't tired, people are like, well, we want, know, the best version of yourself. So you should be sleeping. So that's where I was like, OK, so I really had to focus on my sleep, which is really funny because I'm catering to everyone else.
Andrew Colsky (25:12)
Right.
Anna (25:12)
So, you
know, I basically I work from about 6 p.m. I finish work at 5 a.m. I go home, I get my kids ready for school and then I go to sleep and then
Andrew Colsky (25:21)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (25:21)
I wake up and I catch up on things with my assistant or we'll do a filming day for like that two hour period. But it's not every single day. But I work every single night. And right
Andrew Colsky (25:31)
Yeah.
Anna (25:31)
now, you know, what's really funny is I thought to myself as my business manager said to me, Anna, let's our prices. We haven't done it in four years.
I want to have a price difference between you and your girls so that they hire your girls more. Right. OK. So we raised my prices and I don't know what happened, but we thought that if I raised my personal prices that people would hire the girls more. No, no. I got the most bookings that month for myself.
Andrew Colsky (25:59)
Yep.
Anna (26:00)
And I couldn't comprehend how that happened. But when you put a value on yourself, people value you.
Andrew Colsky (26:07)
Yes, absolutely. That is such an important lesson and it's so misunderstood because so many times when someone is trying to build a practice, trying to get out there and they're not getting conversion, the first thing they think, oh, well, let me cut my price. Let me offer a discount.
Anna (26:24)
Yep. Yep.
Andrew Colsky (26:25)
me... And that's the wrong way to go because now you have no value.
Anna (26:29)
Do not
Andrew Colsky (26:32)
Yeah. So it's just really hard for people to...
understand that because their logical mind says, well, if I charge less, then I'll get more customers. And it's like, well, not really.
Anna (26:48)
No.
Andrew Colsky (26:49)
So that's an important piece.
So I'm curious of all the social media and other things that you've put out there to date. Is there...
one particular piece or one particular video or one particular thing that really stood out and made its mark for you?
Anna (27:15)
or during a slow time. I wasn't depressed because I'm not a depressed person. I like to find a solution. And my issue is I want to find it now. I hate
Andrew Colsky (27:26)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (27:26)
sitting at home thinking about things. was Googling things and I came across something on Instagram about this business seminar that you could go to. And it was $50. You got champagne and a lesson. And I went to about two or three of those. And it was really odd because it helped me in a different way. People were getting up there and
telling about how they failed. And at that point of my life, was like, my god, that's so embarrassing. Like they're talking about how they failed and the mistakes that they made. But then I came home and I felt so motivated to go off how they failed versus how I failed. And then I was I just feel I was able to move forward from like, it's okay to fail, but you got to pick yourself up and keep going again. So I think that
Even though people are like, what you went to these business classes, that's so tacky. They were just trying to lure you in. Absolutely. They were, oh my gosh, they called me for like two weeks after like, hey, do want to go in our
Andrew Colsky (28:17)
Hahaha
Anna (28:18)
club? It's like $3,000. I'm like, I don't even have $500. But I must say for 90 minutes of what they gave me was valuable. So if you have $50 or however much it costs to go to these things, you don't have to fully sign up. But sometimes you walk away with two life lessons out of there.
And I remember that they were talking about how to write things out. Like it sounds tacky in a circle, right? What you'd like, what you don't like, what, like what your goals are. And I'm not one to write things down like that. I don't write journals and things, but when I started doing it, then I started remembering it. And
I
Andrew Colsky (28:57)
Mm-hmm.
Anna (28:58)
then would talk to people about that on things that I would have never talked about. And I started talking about how I failed. And I think that also motivated me to work harder.
But yeah, I think the
Andrew Colsky (29:09)
Right.
Anna (29:09)
seminars are great. Even if you don't sign up, just walk away with two life lessons or two things that you can thrive with your business.
Andrew Colsky (29:16)
Yeah, and you know, for me personally, I love to learn about failure because that's where the real learning comes for me. And I, I'm all about fail as often as I can, because that's where I'm going to learn what not to do. And then I'm going to hit a home run eventually. So, you know, to me, it's really important to understand that. And so I am curious and I'm to ask you.
What would you say was the biggest flop that you had and what did you learn from
Anna (29:51)
biggest flop. I think that when I had a really good idea and I would tell my friends and family
I guess it's not jumping the gun and telling things to people, right? It's about keeping a small, tighter circle and not mentioning things until they're either done or until they're like progressing. So I'd get really excited with things and then it didn't either go down that path or we changed up and it was disappointing, right? So I kind of learned like from a business perspective to my circle became smaller. I was
I was with people that actually wanted to help my business and as you probably know as well, as soon as you start to have a name for yourself, people do get a bit jealous. So I found that a lot of my friends were like, you're working all the time, you know, it's just not
Andrew Colsky (30:44)
You
Anna (30:44)
all
about work. And I was like, well, it's hard to start a business and then take a step back. You know, so
Andrew Colsky (30:50)
Right.
Anna (30:51)
my friends were all going on holidays and I couldn't come. So I found my circle becoming smaller.
It just doesn't work like that for a business owner. Maybe after five years, you can take a step back because it's manageable, but it's just impossible. So I did lose a lot of friends. And yeah, it's interesting how I felt like I had a lot of friends and my circle is smaller, but the quality is fantastic. So I've
Andrew Colsky (31:15)
Right.
Anna (31:15)
got a lot of like networking peers, know, people that want to help you. If you've got questions, I know who to call, whereas I've never had that before. I was always told like,
You know, don't get your friends and families involved in business, but it's about finding the quality people.
Andrew Colsky (31:30)
Right, absolutely.
Anna (31:32)
Yeah, my biggest block
would be getting too excited and oversharing, think I would call it.
Andrew Colsky (31:38)
Great, great. Well, I hate to say this, but we're out of time. So that, yeah,
Anna (31:45)
I mean, I could talk for hours.
Andrew Colsky (31:47)
that flew by, but I really appreciate you being willing to share the lessons learned and the things that you found that helped you be successful.
I'm very glad to hear that you are successful and you're expanding and that's wonderful news. Congratulations on that. And, you know, to those of you who are listening to the show,
You can do exactly what Anna did. It's hard work, like she said in the beginning. Initially, you start spending a lot of time and effort and money and you see no return and then you have to stick with it. And eventually, you start to get traction and then it picks up and snowballs from there. So.
Anna (32:28)
Yep, and
you will cry and you will have lots of tears and they're going to be happy and sad, but they're all worth it.
Andrew Colsky (32:34)
Right, right.
Okay, so tell others about this podcast if you think it will help them. We've got just a whole host of wonderful shows and all sorts of wonderful things coming up. We have a blog that features information from these shows. We have little clips on LinkedIn. So just join us at www.bbe-picked.com and you can listen to the show. You can find our YouTube channel.
watch this show, can read all the information you need to help you start. There's no cost for any of that, but we hope you succeed in your own businesses and Anna Baker, thank you for your time.
Anna (33:17)
Thank you for having me.