SPEAKERS
Katrina Sawa, Janet Fish
Janet Fish 00:08
Hi, and welcome to the breakaway entrepreneur podcast where we explore the entrepreneur mindset and the characteristics and traits that lead to success. I’m your host, Janet Fish, and I’d like to introduce my guest for today, Katrina Sauer. Katrina helps entrepreneurs make more money doing what they love. She’s a speaker and an international best selling author. I sat down with Katrina and talked to her about her journey to becoming a successful entrepreneur. She shares her insights and thoughts on how it will all work out in the end. I hope you enjoy our chat. All right, Katrina, How are you this afternoon? Actually, it’s morning, isn’t it? No, it’s new. How are you doing?
Katrina Sawa 00:47
I’m good
Janet Fish 00:50
to go and it’s beautiful Monday morning. Guess the afternoon. So welcome to the podcast. I just want to start out by having you give me just some background on you. Your, your personal life, your business life, how you got into being an entrepreneur, how you got started, just give me some insights about you.
Katrina Sawa 01:10
Okay, well I was born and I’m just kidding I won’t go back that far. I’ve been in sales and marketing all my life from my very first job was an ice cream scooper at thrift ease if you know in it if you remember and I would always tell people up from one scoop to two or three so I’m always I was always born I was born for this. I don’t know my mom and dad have no idea how I came into making it easy to do sales and and market and talk like that just easy for me. So one of my last jobs though, in the real world was as a advertising rep for the local newspaper here in Sacramento, California. And that’s I would did it for two years. I was talking sales because I was really good at consulting people. What else they need to do besides run the ad, right? they’d want to just give me, you know, 500 bucks and their business card and say read this. And I’m like, no, that’s not gonna help you out. So I would have to teach them more about what to put me at what to say the marketing message, and then how you’re going to encounter the people when they come in and what you’re going to do to follow up and let it know that nobody else taught that and they didn’t know what they were doing. So that’s really what got me into doing my own business as a marketing or business consultant back then. And now coach, and it was because I saw so many small business owners that didn’t know what they were doing. And I would see them go out of business left and right, and it would break my heart. And you know, when someone’s really passionate, and this is their baby, you want it to work, whether it’s someone you know, well or not. So that’s really how I got started into the business and it’s just evolved. Oh, it’s evolved. Many are, you know, for the last 18 years now and just so many different fun things. I can’t even imagine doing anything different.
Janet Fish 03:01
So talk a little bit about that journey. Talk a little bit about what it’s looked like from when you got started. And then the successful 10 author that you are today. Yeah.
Katrina Sawa 03:14
Yeah. And two more books on the way this year. Awesome.
Janet Fish 03:17
Talk about that, for sure.
Katrina Sawa 03:19
Right. It’s just fun. It gets a big thing. Um, I, you know, I’ve done everything. I’ve had lots of mentors, lots of masterminds, you and I had similar mentor. In some cases, that’s where we met. And it’s just a constant learning journey. As an entrepreneur, you have to be open to learning new things and change and getting comfortable being uncomfortable. It’s so true. And, you know, I had to want to at first I was one of those who thought I knew what I knew, I thought I knew enough about you know, I was confident. I was very competent as again probably to the extensive Being a little overly confident. And then I got into this world of online marketing stuff, which I had no idea about the first three years of my business. And that was where I was like, Oh, I don’t know, at all look at this whole world, I can make that much money doing that instead of this. Well, wow, sign me up, you know, show me how to do that.
04:19
Um,
Katrina Sawa 04:20
and I just kept learning from one mentor and mastermind to another and live events and trainings and things like that. And, and that’s really what changed it for me is really just getting that education and getting a lot of friends and mastermind partners in the process. You know, people you can call that you haven’t talked to in six to 10 years and you’re like, Oh, my God, this is what’s happening to me. Can you believe this? And what are you up to? And it’s, it’s just, I can’t even it’s a great life. Great life.
Janet Fish 04:56
What do you like best about being an entrepreneur
Katrina Sawa 05:00
I get to do whatever the hell I want whatever the hell I want it.
Janet Fish 05:07
I like to say with whoever you want to do with
Katrina Sawa 05:09
Yes. And you know it’s true you you can you can design I’m all about designing the business around the kind of life you want to live not fitting your life in around your business. Yeah, because I’ve, I’ve been there too, where, like, Oh, I have to make a sale or I have to work all these hours. But for me, it was never a bad thing because I loved what I do. You know, there’s people that don’t love what they do. They’re in jobs that they hate or careers that they’re that they’re tired of, or, you know, frustrated with or they can’t make more money because they’re stuck here at a certain level. And, you know, being an entrepreneur means you can you can decide to raise your rates, you can decide to stop doing this service and add this service if you want to. I love it. Yeah,
Janet Fish 05:57
yeah. So I’m assuming you’ve worked With a lot of different kinds of entrepreneurs where’s where’s your market wish? Who’s your ideal client? Who do you like to work with the best?
Katrina Sawa 06:09
The people that are hungry to make their business and life more happy, really for themselves more where they want to get more love in their life and money in their business. Those people it could I have people that have brick and mortar flooring companies that I’m working with right now. I have people that have spas and salons that are having to reimagine and discovering that they like to now do coaching and maybe let the spa salon go or something, you know, so it’s the entrepreneur that doesn’t hold themselves back from what else is possible. And being open to the evolution of themselves, which is why what I like about it, so the people that are really stuck, like I’m a therapist, I have to always be a therapist, I have to always charge $125 an hour I always have to do this and those people are not my people because they’re not they’re not thinking outside. In the box are not imagining what else is possible. And they’re not letting these ideas come in, you know, maybe when they they will. But until they are, it’s hard to actually, you know, work with someone like
Janet Fish 07:12
that. Well, and especially now that we’ve been sheltered in place for three months, and we A lot of us have had to figure out. I know a lot of my clients, I have salon owners and whatnot, and a lot of them have had, we’ve had to kind of figure out how we, how we shift and how they can continue to make money. And it’s interesting, a couple of my clients have changed their business model, one in particular videographer changed from in person to now coaching on videography, and all of that worldwide, right, because now we can’t just write across somebody, and he’ll probably never go back. I mean, he’ll still be a piece of his business, but he’s expanded in a way he never thought he would. And now, it’ll stay like that. So there’s a lot of things that’ll that’ll stay exactly that way as we get out of this.
Katrina Sawa 08:00
Yeah, a lot of people are saying I just got off the phone with somebody who teaches people how to get speaking gigs, right? We’re both speakers, and how to get more speaking gigs. And she had her virtual meetup once a month in her town. And she’s like, you know what, now we’ve done virtual. I don’t know if I want to go back and I’m like, don’t write you can catch up bigger, more flies with a bigger net more fish whenever you want to say it’s a it’s even serve more people.
Janet Fish 08:29
I think that online, virtual meetings or networking will stay not that we won’t go back and do it in person, but I absolutely think it’s going to stay
Katrina Sawa 08:38
100% I’ve been doing them for eight years already. Yeah, you know.
Janet Fish 08:43
So, talk a little I know you’re a huge speaker. How’d you get into that? And how’d you perfect it. I know a lot of clients are scared to death to get up and speak. So talking about debt journey.
Katrina Sawa 08:56
Well, first of all, I don’t think perfection is an order at all. whatsoever, there is no perfect thing. Um, I have been trained in different ways along the way I got started in speaking. I don’t even know like when I got started in speaking because in an in my jobs even when I would go networking, I was speaking, when you do stand up and you do your one minute commercial, frankly, that’s speaking, okay. So most people don’t think about it that way. But when I officially you know, took the stage and gave a presentation, and I’ve done it in my jobs before probably but it was early on in my business, I would probably when I was in the chamber, the first couple years of my business on that. It was just local. I know I was in four chambers of commerce back then, and a Leeds group and another Women’s Business organization. So I’m sure I don’t even recall but I’m sure that I said Hey, I’ll speak for your, you know, your meeting and I’ll share tips on that. I’m sure I did that back. Back then I was probably fumbling over it. You know, I still fumble over some things right now. I just think okay, what stories do I need to tell this group? And sometimes I don’t know until I even walk into the room with a story I’m going to tell because it really depends on the energy and the people in the vibe of the room. What stories Am I going to tell? What tips Am I going to share? Because I have a gazillion tips and which ones are going to be pertinent to these people. Because beginners for advanced people is not as bad. Advanced for beginners is also bad. So yeah, I don’t know. I certainly don’t think I’ve perfect
Janet Fish 10:36
you never did like a Toastmasters or anything. No, you just learned by doing it.
Katrina Sawa 10:41
Well, no, I took I had like three different master or mentors who I went through their programs, right. But they’ll have three different styles. Yeah, so I took little bits and pieces from each one, and then merged it into my own style because you have to do what’s authentic to you or you’re not gonna I’ve tried Trying to just using each person system separately. And it never really felt well. It never really felt like it fit. Right. I’ve also been a part of the public Speakers Association and the women Speakers Association for many years now. So I get glean tips from them, and they have trained for them, but also have learned by being in an organization.
Janet Fish 11:21
Yeah. So talk a little bit more about you said mastermind groups and mentors. You’ve always have them I’m assuming you still have them. We just changed them as we go through our journeys. Talk about your journey and how that has impacted you.
Katrina Sawa 11:37
Read it. Yes. Well, I was lucky enough to be smart enough to have hired a business coach before I quit my last job. Right and to help me because I was I was like many entrepreneurs were where they’re like, I don’t I want to I want to have my own business, but I don’t want I want to do and so she had me do these like, quiz type exercises, I guess you want to call them to narrow down what I was really good at, like more of a career, I guess a career assessment or some kind of assessment, right? Because it was either going to be a marketing consultant or a gift basket company. Because I loved putting gifts together right and buying stuff. I’ve loved shopping back then. And thank God she got me over to the marketing. No offense to the people who are in gift basket companies, that is a lot of money out in inventory. And if you don’t sell it, well, there’s very small profit margin. So thank God I’m not doing that. Right. It’s just a lot more work to make a lot more money that way. So that was the first thing and then I didn’t hire a business coach for the first few years of my business because I thought I knew what I was doing. Somebody right, I did go to score though. I did go to like the spdc. And they did the 26 page business plan that I stuck in the door and I never like that again, right? So I did do that. And I did that initial business coaching which led me in the right path. But then it wasn’t until one of my friends invited me to this workshop in LA, where, you know, had to fly, there was the first experience of flying to a conference, I’m like, and it was $3,000 conference, which now those people type charge, like a couple hundred bucks, right? Or they give you a free ticket because they really just want to sell you on their program. But I paid $3,000 for this workshop back then. So and that was like, that was everything. I had to do two different credit cards and move money around just to pay that back then. And when I went there, that when my mind was just blown, and so that was the beginning of the understanding of this new model. And that was back in 2005. Okay, so then in 2008, I had made it to a second mentor, and he basically said, I’m gonna I’m gonna show you how to make millions and I’m gonna the money like it was this millionaire compensation and I’m like, Okay, well, I’m not even Make 100,000 yet but if you want to tell me how to make millions great, right I was drinking the Kool Aid and and so I did this mastermind with him this whole year and the whole year actually it was horrible because all year long I was like just tell me what I need to do to make you know get to the hundred grand or whatever it was my goal ended up being like 100 grand at the time and just don’t know what to do Tell me what to do Tell me what to do is all I kept saying and the only thing that any of them in my mastermind or him was telling me was just beat and I was like, what he’s just be, be love. And I’m like, Look, people come on that
Janet Fish 14:43
I gotta do some work. I can’t just be right.
Katrina Sawa 14:46
I’m like, I’ve already got this in place. I’m doing this on email. I’m doing this on the hair. I’m doing this What else can I do? Or how much more like how do I build my lips? Hi. I wanted to do and they were telling me to be and so I cried pretty much All year long because I was so frustrated that that was the advice I was given. And I didn’t know how to be. And by the end of the year though, I hit 100,000. And I found that love of my life at that at the time. So I had love and money at the end of that year, where I cried myself all year long. And I didn’t really do anything different, although I guess I was trying to be and I didn’t know what I was doing. I was just kind of being there instead of being, you know, assertive and aggressive at events, I was just going to hanging out and being open to whoever, which was the key and that’s really what I’ve been doing ever since. And I’m still pretty assertive and blunt and, you know, in your face and about business and marketing and stuff, but I’m also I also be I be love and it works. And so I’m very grateful for that year. That was horrible. It it really was a big turning point for me.
15:54
When did you start writing books?
Katrina Sawa 15:57
Um, back in 2006 that first year events that I went to, with the mentor that led that she did a compilation book. And so there was 20 of us or so in that book or 40, I forget. And so that was my first experience. And that was scary all in itself, just writing a chapter, but it was it was relatively easy. And what’s funny is the chapter that I wrote that it was entitled it’ll all work out in the end. And I didn’t realize that I thought that way, but that’s what came out of me at the time, I’d allow work out in the end. And then years later, like probably six years later, I realized, oh my god, that is like my mantra. That is what I believe, to my core and I say now to almost every single person that I teach or at my events. It’s just that it’s the thing that I say, but I didn’t realize it but it came out initially in that first chapter which is really weird that it did that but you know Cuz it just kind of comes out you and you’re ready. Yep.
Janet Fish 17:03
Yep. That’s it absolutely does. Yeah. So, um, I know that you mentioned something about automation, because I read your bio. So talk about the role that that has played because it sounds like it plays play. I typically asked the question, are there any apps or any software that you use as an entrepreneur that helps you with your business? But it sounds to me when you use the word automation, it sounds a little bit more complex, or I wouldn’t use a complex a little bit more encompassing than than just what apps do you use?
Katrina Sawa 17:37
Yeah, so I have a cell phone just an FYI like but when you talk apps on my eyes glaze over, because I’m really not an app person at all. So when someone says an app I’m like, No, I don’t want an app. I don’t want anything on my phone. I actually don’t have any I don’t get emails on my phone on a on my phone. I use it for texting friends and that’s it pretty much am I had fun. So when it comes to my business, though, so I use a landline, first of all, and people need to realize that not everybody uses their cell phone for business these days because they tried to text me and it drives me crazy. It’s like this is not a tech summer anyway. So yes, systems and technology are the key to getting more done meeting more people, getting more people in your pipeline, getting more people to buy things from you and get into your sales and marketing systems. You know, this, I know this, but not everybody focuses on this stuff. And thank God I knew to do this. In the beginning and well towards the beginning, even in the beginning, I had systems for what I would do at networking events and for follow up. And so I created this great follow up system that I still stopped today that I still use today as well. But the the technology that I use now is actually old technology. I don’t I’m Not an early adopter when it comes to technology at all. Like, when Infusionsoft came out, I was like, man, give it some time, I’m not gonna switch over. Whereas a lot of people are like, who uses stuff I’m gonna switch, right and then they convince all their friends to switch so they would make a whole bunch of money for referrals. I just waited and waited and waited and waited. And actually, I did change over to Infusionsoft. But I was there for three years, I lost a lot of my subscribers because they ended up being tagged as spammers and they’re in their links and stuff. You know, they can say what they want, but that’s my experience. And it was so complicated, even though I have a marketing brain and I can think about all these things like Click here to upsell and one click add on and all this kind of thing. I didn’t take the time to actually set all that up. So then I was paying for this really Pro, this platform that I didn’t use fully right so then out started pissing me off and so then I got out of that window. clickfunnels which is pretty much the same thing, but that was like the Kool Aid at the time. And so I got sucked into that. And lo and behold, and I spent probably 20 grand, paying my team to keep moving my systems and my people around and all my pages and all my links and all my database and everything for like, probably five years, in and out of those two systems, and then back to one shopping cart, which is what I started with in the first place. And I could have saved myself so much heartache, and money and time, and confusion and overwhelm if I would just have stayed and not gotten bright, shiny object and gone off on all the things and I probably would have had a 14,000 person list too. Yeah.
Janet Fish 20:45
So what I’m hearing you say is you absolutely need systems, but you don’t need the, the Cadillac of systems. I mean, I I I use MailChimp as my main CRM, build In amongst other thing, I still use Pay Pal. I mean, I’m with you, it’s like you don’t need the most expensive thing, because then you got to learn how to use all of those things. And sometimes we don’t necessarily need them. But you need to have one.
Katrina Sawa 21:15
And now the big thing is Cartwright and kajabi. And everybody wants you to switch to those. And my advice is like, please don’t keep switching technologies. Yes, go do more marketing and make more sales. I’m with you, right? Get this simple system set up to where you know what that works. And honestly, I mean, I pay 69 bucks a month for my shopping cart, which is my database, my email, my everything, all in one place. And then I have my WordPress website, and I don’t use anything else. Nothing else.
Janet Fish 21:44
Yeah. Or you go something. I have my website. Yeah, I have PayPal and I have MailChimp and they all integrate. And they integrate. Yeah, I have to say that. I do. Have a few more apps probably online. Solomons, you do, we won’t.
Katrina Sawa 22:05
Yeah, I mean, I love zoom. Don’t get me wrong, I love zoom. I love Canva there’s certain technologies that are that I’ll pay for I’m pay for a few, but one time, gosh, it was probably the year after that hundred thousand dollars a year is where I realized I was paying like 1000 or a little over $1,000 a month for all these little tools and technologies. And so I realized, and I wasn’t even using half of them. And I was in some like, some of them are 50 bucks a month for a webinar thing. And it’s like, you don’t need that then so I really thought of like, what do I need to run the business like cuz I really at that time, I had to cut expenses because things went like I was really not in a good financial place. I was making 100 grand in the year. That doesn’t mean I was taking home. 100 grand. I never had an expensive team. I had lots of software. And I had a new house with a boyfriend at the time. And oh my god, my expenses were through the roof. Yeah, so I was not making good money, even though you think, Oh, my goal is make 100,000 like, Whoa, yeah, just make sure you cut your expenses and level out some of it. You’re not keeping an eye or profit, you know, and
Janet Fish 23:21
I, I actually go to go back to, like, at least every six months, I’ll go back to and I’ll go look at my, my bank statement. I look at them. But I mean, I’ll go look at the subscriptions that I have, because they all come through my business credit card, and be like, do I need that? Do I need that? Am I using knife because I probably have four or $500 worth of $20 here $50 here that I do every month just to run the business. But
23:48
yeah,
Janet Fish 23:50
business is supposed to do a business like this.
Katrina Sawa 23:52
You gotta keep certain things and some people are like, well, I can’t pay my shopping cart anymore. I can’t pay for my this anymore. I’m like, Well, how you gonna run this part? Your business, that’s just silly. You didn’t have to make more money to pay for the cost of doing business and the things that you have to have otherwise, just go get a job because you’re not going to be serious about running your business. You’re not going to get to a place where you have a smooth, consistent revenue for yourself and profit.
Janet Fish 24:17
Yeah, yeah. I couldn’t, couldn’t agree with you more. So you mentioned or you alluded to the ups and downs that we all have as entrepreneurs, especially at the beginning, talk about some of that, as your experiences you can be vague or you can be real specific, but talk about some of the challenges that you have had, and has worked through them to be better on the other side.
Katrina Sawa 24:41
Yeah, probably. But besides the ones I’ve already mentioned, the one other thing that really affected my business was my love life. And so it was my starter marriage. I started her husband’s I like to say he was a great guy and and when we were together, it was great, but then We were together, what, eight and a half years. But the last two years were is when I was in my own business, I started my own business in the marriage. And he i thought was a go getter like that, because we met doing door to door sales. So I thought, well, he’s a, he’s an entrepreneur type because he was out there knocking on doors trying to make money, right? And But lo and behold, once he got into a job and security with regular paychecks, and, you know, get up, go to work, come home, drink beer, eat dinner, go to bed, get up and get a paycheck, right? He all of a sudden became a very security minded person, a very frugal kind of person, and even taking $2,000 and put it on a credit card so we can actually have a vacation and connect was not going to happen. Whereas I was like, well, we ever have to do that or we’re going to get divorced because we need to connect and you know, so We just ended up growing apart. And we’re living like roommates. And that was that took a really big drain on my business because it was my energy. It was my love energy. And I’m the type of person that really needs to be supported. And in a loving environment and relationship. Even if I’m single, I just need to be around loving people. But I was in a roommate situation that was supposed to be a marriage. And so it was hard. It was hard to keep up the look, so to speak of being it, you know, that was before I was really more vulnerable and public, I think and before I could really be my authentic self about what I was going through, and I would just say, oh, everything’s great. Yeah. And then we would go home and cry myself to sleep. And so until we actually got a divorce, and I got out on my own and I could really take charge of who I would surround myself with and make sure I was surrounded with Part of people until that happened. I think that was that was a hard time. Yeah.
Janet Fish 27:07
And now you so I’m assuming that was the impetus behind the love and business connection that you talk about. And obviously right about, I can see some of the books.
Katrina Sawa 27:18
Yeah, it was the beginning of that.
Janet Fish 27:21
Talk about that. And we talked about your angle. I mean, I was strictly marketing sales business coach, you’ve added that love component, talk about how you weave it in. And yeah,
Katrina Sawa 27:34
it is. It’s so important. And it’s, and I didn’t realize what was going on with me in the moment. Of course, we can’t see what’s going on with ourselves usually until a few years later, when you reflect back and go, Oh, isn’t that interesting? Right. And so then when I was coaching with my clients a few years later, and I would wonder, like, I was like you like, just do the doing, right? Like, why aren’t you doing this? Why aren’t you making the phone calls? You met 10 people, why didn’t you do your 10? Follow up? I don’t know that and people would be like, Oh, I don’t know. And I’m like, okay, so I finally realized, oh, what’s going on in your personal life, right? Like, and I would ask, and about 60% of the time that I would ask in those situations, they were not happy in our personal lives either. Like, either were in an unhappy marriage or an abusive marriage, verbally abusive, or they were not married and wanted to be in relationship, but they were so busy trying to make money that they didn’t spend any time on their love life. Or it was the other kind of love which is like love for yourself and feeling worthy feeling worth the money and, or, like, you know, who am I to write this book? Or who am I to do this when there’s a gazillion other people doing it right? So all of those love things, or they were in a job that they hated. So there’s the love for yourself, the love for what you’re doing, the love in the relationship that you have or don’t have, and the Love your environment, if there’s any toxic people, so there was always something in the love side of someone’s life that was blocking them from doing the stuff that we needed to do to make money. And so that’s I put that together, you know, probably around 2008, probably the year that I had that horrible year because I was like, Oh, I have to be. So it really was that whole year, that where I was being more instead of doing more, and I was evaluating my clients afterwards, and I’m like, wow, this is huge. It plays a huge part, which is why we have mindset coaches and love coaches and all that. But it’s hard to find someone who really does a lot with both. And I think it’s important because we have to be in that good energy in order to be able to promote ourselves and ask people to work with us and spit out the number of what we what our program costs, and then actually take the credit card, right. So that takes a look. Lot of internal energy
Janet Fish 30:03
Yeah. So So you’ve written 10 books and soon to be 12 It sounds like so you got two books you’re writing this year how do you
30:15
how do you write your books?
Katrina Sawa 30:17
Well many of them are compilation books and ologies right so you know let’s not this is not saying that I’m the super book writer person to entire books myself the love yourself successful one is the one that talks about the story with the love and money and then I have the jumpstart your new business now book which is basically my system on how to really start making money and start a business. The The others are all compilation and all anthologies where I wrote a chapter or more now I I published my own anthology books which are the jumpstart your blank books and those ones this Was 2018 there was 26 authors. And then I realized that was a lot of work. So I cut it down to 12 authors in 2019. And this year, I have 14 authors signed up so far and always willing to take one or two more. But that’s, that’s a good number for a good sized book. And so I write, you know, like three chapters in each one of those and I get to help other people get published. And so that’s really fun. Awesome.
31:31
So what’s your favorite? So you speak? You coach? You write books. What do you what do you what do you love to do the most or is it
31:42
that passion?
Katrina Sawa 31:44
I also hold live events, live events, I know you’re gonna events. I think the thing that I get really in the zone is when I’m teaching something or working with somebody one on one or teaching it in an event or call or something And people are like, Oh, that’s a great idea. Oh, I see now how I can make a bunch of money at that or now I finally understand this thing that I’ve been confused about whatever it is, whether it’s a business strategy and marketing tactic or something technology wise, you know, when the light bulb goes off for the other person is where I’m like, Yay, I succeeded in helping them learn something or do something or accomplish something get unstuck, or
Janet Fish 32:28
Yeah, yeah, I totally. I totally see that. Um, so I like to always ask the question about how intuition plays a role in being an entrepreneur. Can you talk a little bit about the role intuition is played for you in your journey?
Katrina Sawa 32:50
Yeah. Interesting. So I think AI plays a huge role now compared to way back when way back when I didn’t even think I don’t even think I knew the word. When I first started, like, I was not in a spiritual space, or I was like negative blue. You know, like, I was not in that space at all. I had no idea. I have no experience with it. And I didn’t know anybody in that space. So it wasn’t until I started going to some live events and workshops and working with mentors that I really was able to hear them talking about intuition and going okay, well, I guess I talked about my gut a lot my guts telling me to do this. My gut is telling me that in the years like 2008, nine and 10 is when I invested a lot in my business. And I don’t think it was my intuition. I think it was my ego at the time, frankly, that did that. Which I wish I could have just just like shut up my ego because that was an expensive few years man taught me lots of lessons about investing but it was all good because it got me where I am today. Right with be thankful. For that,
Janet Fish 34:00
we’ll look at the end
Katrina Sawa 34:03
cattle our gun the end Oh great. There goes my savings and my inheritance. And but then Okay, so then I had a lot of spiritual friends in those circles and and started getting into the woowoo stuff not getting into it the farthest I go with woo woo, I was just looking at him today is my angel cards. That’s about as woowoo as I get is I actually do my my card today was prioritize. So, um, yeah.
Janet Fish 34:35
These angel cards and you pick one every day.
Katrina Sawa 34:38
I don’t pick one every day, but I felt I needed to have an energy shift this morning. So I did pick pick one, but they’re on my desk for a reason because I needed them more often. That’s the being right. That’s the being stuff and I need to be reminded often, because otherwise my brain will just go to the doing. But they and I forgot what I was saying. What the intuition, intuition. So then today I do I feel like I’ve been all along and I am even more now more of an empath even because I just take I don’t. I’ve taken on energy before other people and it literally has crippled my body. Right? And so I don’t do that anymore. Or I’m just careful now how I do it. Make sure some healers are standing by so they can go Oh, my body when I do that. I know it’s happened. Um, but yeah, I just feel like I really do. I am really good with my intuition these days. And I don’t know what other, there’s nothing really big that shifted it. It’s just a lot of little things along the way. And a lot of introducing myself and hanging around a lot of people that were in that conversation. Yeah. Yeah.
Janet Fish 35:51
I mean, I don’t think any of us really grew. We, I don’t think they teach that or they really talk about that. So the older you get The smarter you get from listening to your intuition because you get knocked down so many times not listening. I mean, we have experiences of, I knew I shouldn’t do that, but I did it anyway. I mean, that’s intuition saying, that’s not the right time to do and the older you get, I think or the more times you experience that, the more times you stop and say, I think I want something niggling it doesn’t feel right. I need to explore that.
Katrina Sawa 36:27
Yeah, a friend of mine. Glenn Marsh, our He’s an actor in Hollywood. He calls them whispers you have to? Yeah, I look at these whispers sound awesome.
Janet Fish 36:39
So what would be your advice for somebody who is thinking about becoming an entrepreneur or is starting out and stuck?
Katrina Sawa 36:51
Well, first, make sure you are the entrepreneurial type. A lot of people think they are. But Mark, being an entrepreneur means you have to be a marketer and you have to be a salesperson. Whether you choose to use those words to call yourself that or you choose other words, you still have to do those activities, period, end of story. There’s no way around it. You can hire some sales team perhaps but not as a solopreneur. You’re not going to be hiring sales team, right? If you run one of them. If you run a service business, maybe like I had a roofing company one time we hired him a sales person but he was a salesperson, right? So the that’s the biggest thing. I see people getting into their own business and then not realizing how much marketing and sales they actually had to do. And not being comfortable with it nor being comfortable being uncomfortable learning how to do it better and more authentic for them. They just don’t embrace it, they deny it, they embrace it, and they push it over here and think they’re still gonna make good money over here. Are they? Are they better yet? They could like go and invest in another Training Program or certification, they get another certification, they get more letters behind their name and they think oh, wow, the customers will come. No, they will not until you market and somewhere, it doesn’t matter. So that’s a reality check. I’m kind of a blunt reality kind of gal. So are you I think
Janet Fish 38:18
and it’s all about, it’s all about marketing, marketing and sales. Yeah. So what other characteristics first thing takes to be? I mean, I totally agree. And, and I also agree that you don’t need to, you don’t necessarily need to already know how to do those things, no willing to figure it to hire somebody to help you. Or you’ve got to be open to it. But what other characteristics Do you think it takes to be an entrepreneur?
Katrina Sawa 38:47
You cannot go into it with the mindset that you’re going to do everything. You’re gonna you’re gonna get burnout, you’re gonna drowned. You’re going to drown and you’re going to see very little income. Yeah, because you You’re trying to learn it all you’re trying to learn how to design your website how to do social media, how to become a speaker Adda whatever how to do your technology. You You have to embrace it early on and know that it’s the cost of doing business.
Janet Fish 39:13
Well and there’s a lot of ways that you can hire people inexpensively. Oh yeah. I mean you don’t need to spend tons and tons thousands and thousands no
Katrina Sawa 39:22
and you don’t need an employee and ah, yeah. For most people these days
Janet Fish 39:28
have the fiber the up work tackle on and there’s so many places you can find people for for not that much money. I totally agree hiring team is really super important. What’s Katrina do for fun
39:41
besides work because I love
Katrina Sawa 39:43
because it’s fun. My husband’s an entrepreneur terrorist. He works from home as a voiceover artists. So he if he has a project, he wants to go do his thing. If I have a project like a book authors, web pages are great. I want to do my thing. And then we’ll meet the middle for dinner. You We eat we breakfast and dinner together and almost every day and hang out on the weekends. And you know, like, with COVID it’s it. I’m very thankful that I love my family and I enjoy them, right because some people don’t. And that would suck. No, I have my husband and I have my stepdaughter, which we have half the time. So, and my mom has been here for a couple months. living with us interim. She’s in limbo. And so we’ve been playing games we’ve been I like, I’m a homebody, I’ve been doing yard work just like everybody else. My yard looks great. And barbecuing and bringing friends over when we can and playing games watching movies. I’m pretty casual, but we were dying for our vacation. Let me tell you, I’m ready to push the button. Yeah, ye opens up, I’m there. I want vacation without restrictions. I don’t want to Like if someone were like, yeah, you can come to Hawaii, but then you have to have two weeks, two weeks, like warranty, and it’s like, okay, I’ll just wait. Thank you open.
Janet Fish 41:10
So I also work from home. So the COVID thing has been not that big of a change. Right. But it’s but it’s certainly shifted some of the things that I’m doing my business and and I think there’s some things that will shift as we move forward that I’m still open to, what is the experience been for you? And are there certain things that you’re you found that you’re doing that you’ll continue to do? Or a big learning that you’ve had hadn’t gone through the last couple of months?
41:40
Well,
41:42
the big shift is I’m
Katrina Sawa 41:45
not happy with the way that things are being run. And I’m feeling like I have less voice and not sure what to do about it more than ever before. It was just like, okay, who’s the president? Me, I vote for whoever and I don’t usually get political at All I don’t want to be getting political. Yeah, but I feel like we have less of a control and boys now for our entire lives. I’m just thinking of my 11 year old, right? Like she may not even have recess anymore ever in her school like, Oh my god, I can’t imagine going to school without recess or any kind of socialization. So, for me and our family, those are the biggest changes. It’s not a business thing. It’s those are the biggest changes that are on our minds, and how she’s going to be affected and how we’re all affected that way. Our business goes, it’s fun because I get to see a lot of my clients creating new things and finally getting the systems in place that I’ve been telling them to do for months or years. And so it’s fun to finally get them get their shit done basically.
Janet Fish 42:58
Have you done any Virtual speaking, which means which I kind of mean like, typically you go and you have 10 to 200 people in a room. I don’t know how many. But you know, you’ve got 50. So you got 50 to 100 people in a room, you’re standing in front of the room, you do a 90 minute presentation. And at the end of that presentation, you sell them a program or a book or whatever it is. Have you done any of that online?
43:29
Well, yeah,
Janet Fish 43:31
but like, I mean, I’m just curious because I all I’ve done is like zoomy kind of things. I haven’t done anything like big. And I’m just curious. What’s that like?
Katrina Sawa 43:40
Well, I haven’t done a I found some small conferences like one day conferences. I haven’t done a big conference on zoom at this point. And I certainly haven’t had a 90 minute presentation. There’s I don’t think there’s a lot of those out there. Frankly,
Janet Fish 43:56
I don’t know I’m just curious.
Katrina Sawa 43:58
Um, but I I also don’t go to the big conferences where there’s multi speakers. So I am cuz I want to be interactive, right as a participant. So I don’t actually go to the events where it’s just speaker, speaker, speaker, speaker, Speaker speaker and we can’t communicate in the chat or there’s no way to really network with the people there. And you just have to kind of watch the speakers. That’s not for me. Now what I speak on, yes, of course. But when I attend one No, so I can’t tell you what those are like, or if those people are getting 90 minutes or whatever. I don’t know what those are like. But I know from the hundreds, if hundreds of people that I’ve been talking to in the last 6090 days on zoom calls, is that they love the interactive part of it. They love to network in the chat. They love to do little commercials, even if they’re just a few seconds and then they can follow up in the chat with people and then take them off to a phone call. That’s what I you know how you do it. That’s it. Do the networking and how you can get clients that way. So even if I do speak at events, which I’ve spoken a 30 minute presentation at an event that you and I both know this gal, and it was an all day thing, and I was one of the six speakers or whatever. And I got some great clients out of it. So and it was a 30 minute talk. So I don’t First of all, I don’t think you need 90 minutes if you know what you’re doing. Second of all, I was not power pointing people to that where somebody other people were, you know, I made like 30 grand on that event where somebody else made $97 Yeah, yeah, that was PowerPoint thing. I’m an I’m a connector. I’m interactor. So I think what makes a difference speaking in this format is you have to be interactive. The the days of closing off the audience and just doing your presentation. I don’t think people want that anymore. So either.
Janet Fish 45:56
It’s been really curious and interesting to me. I’m on As you are a number of zoom networking, and they send you off to Well, some of them do send you off to rooms. And for you to get get to network people, some of them have been small enough that you know, there’s 1520 people on you can actually get to know people. I have gotten easily 25 meetings out of just doing that in the last couple of, I’d say the last six weeks. Yeah. I mean, it’s, it’s, and then that’s obviously turns into into business. So I think it’s, I think it’s here to stay. I think we’ll still go back to face to face networking. But I actually think if people are at all shy when they go to networking events, which I think a lot of people are and then they’ll just talk to the person that they know or stand in the corner and not talk to anybody. These networking things, I think a much more effective.
Katrina Sawa 46:56
They totally offer introverts for sure, because you can’t just go in and sit it Your table and be quiet until the meeting starts and then get up and leave when it’s over and maybe meet the people next to you, right? That’s what you’re talking about. Now, a lot of the meetings and especially the ones I’ve run, everybody gets to do an introduction. So you’re gonna get an introduction and we’re all looking at you. It’s not like your way across the room and I can’t see you so I’m on my phone. It’s like we’re looking at you. I think it’s more attentive, like people think it’s less personal, but besides the hugging, like, you know, and hugging and touching aspect of the in person, I think it’s more personal. If you’re like, under 60 people in a call, you know, I’ve been on somewhere there’s been a couple hundred and that’s a crazy amount to manage, but 40 to 60 people or less is very intimate.
Janet Fish 47:50
Yeah, I agree. So what do you want your legacy to be? So my last question for you.
Katrina Sawa 47:58
You know, I just I legacy for myself and my family or for for people to think of me as a GPA.
48:07
Either one can be.
Katrina Sawa 48:09
Yeah, I don’t know, I just thought that there was two different ways to go there on that.
Janet Fish 48:14
Pick ones you want to which one of those you want to answer.
Katrina Sawa 48:18
Yeah, I want to live the life of my dreams, I want to be happy. I want to have a happy marriage, happy family life. Happy home life. I want to have a great business with clients that I love making a lot of money doing what I want to do and just serving a lot of people. And I don’t know how to encapsulate that into a legacy. But that’s what I want for everybody else. I want everybody to live their happiest life ever. Literally. Yep. And whatever that means to them. That’s my ideal. And everybody can have a different ideal about it, but I want I want that for people. I want you to stop settling. And yeah
Janet Fish 49:00
So we talked to you talks about a couple of your books which I will put a link to the books in the show notes, is there anything that you’ve got like a special offer or anything that you want people can follow up with you and learn more about your brilliance and how cool you are there so I could put in the show notes that I can make sure people can follow up with you.
Katrina Sawa 49:26
Sure, well, I have a lot of free stuff on my website there’s a whole free trainings web page I could put in there because that has its forward slash free training. And I’m gonna have has a call or webinar about how to become an author and get published how to what to do on your website so it gets more people and as a call about getting started speaking it has call about your purpose and has a need number worksheet, which is amazing if you don’t know how much money you really need to make and the cost of doing business and what you need to invest. Great little work. To fill out. So there’s a bunch of free stuff. I do happen to have a virtual event coming up end of June. So I don’t know when this is being posted, but it is going to happen live
50:15
next Monday.
Katrina Sawa 50:17
So then June 30. And July 1 is love and money live a virtual experience
Janet Fish 50:24
it is there information in the email that you sent me about that.
Katrina Sawa 50:28
I don’t know, because I just created it.
Janet Fish 50:34
shoot me an email with it with a mission. I’ll make sure I include that.
Katrina Sawa 50:38
Yeah, so that would be fun to get people there. It’s 197 bucks. And we’re going to talk about how to get more love in your life and money in your business.
50:47
Danny, what’s up
Katrina Sawa 50:49
love in money live a virtual experience because my normal event is called loving money live in April, but I got canceled by that. Well, people need more love right now. So I brought it back for us.
Janet Fish 51:00
All right, perfect. So thank you very much. I really appreciate it. This has been great. I mean, I’ve been meaning to connect with you. I haven’t we haven’t really connected since for a long time. So it’s great to kind of you’ll stay on we’ll have a little chat. But I really appreciate your awesome and I can’t remember when people go check out all your cool stuff.
Katrina Sawa 51:20
Well, likewise, Janet, so I know what you’re doing is just amazing.
Janet Fish 51:24
Thanks. It’s my pleasure. Appreciate I will have a great rest of your day. And we’ll, I’m sure we’ll see you on one of those zoom calls.
51:35
Alright, thanks so much.
Janet Fish 51:37
Thank you for listening to the breakaway entrepreneur with Janet Fish. If you liked our show and want more, check us out at www dot breakaway entrepreneur.com. If you have any questions, please email me at coach at breakaway business coaching. com. I’ll answer your questions in an upcoming podcast. If you’re enjoying our podcast, please share it with your friends and colleagues. I hope you’ll join us next week.