EP11: What does it take to be a Strong Brand Leader? – TOP 3 BRAND ADVICE W/ AVERY FRANCIS
(From a Business Owner’s perspective)
- Listen in on Avery Francis’s TOP 3 pieces of advice on Branding and Business. Always looking to what’s next, Avery Francis has spent her career working with leading startups to navigate the challenging world of talent, hiring, and building creative cultures worth being a part of. A champion of diversity, inclusion and belonging, she is a founder of the Bridge Program, a free code school for women identified and non-binary people in tech. Formerly the Head of Talent at League and Director of Talent at Rangle.io, Avery specializes in helping the world’s best startups and most talented people grow their teams and their careers through her company, Bloom.
- TOPICS WE DISCUSS: Building Inclusive and Relatable Communities, Confident Business Moves, Separating yourself from your Business, Reinvesting Back into the Team & Community, Long-Term Business Commitments, Moving from Plateau Moments, Transferring Bold Missions to Team Members, Life-changing Networking, Effective Instagram Tips
TRANSCRIPTION:
First tip: 0:05:05.0
Second tip: 0:28:14.4
Third tip: 0:34:59.4
[0:00:00.0] Avery: I think that there’s no real one-size-fits-all solution, and I think that what works for one person may not work for you because it’s just not your vibe. It’s not who you are. So I always challenge people to dig deep and do what you feel most comfortable with and most proud of, but also push yourself to get more comfortable with taking those risks and doing things that are a little bit outside that zone of what you already do.
[0:00:28.1] Peggy: You’re listening to the Branding Gems podcast, a podcast that’s not just interviews and conversations. It’s to bring you guys the best of the best women in branding and business to answer this question: What are your top three valuable tips and lessons that you learned along the way? And then, we discuss it. To fuel your passion-filled lifestyle business, I promise to bring you the best of the best women in branding and business and together, we can grow and learn from the extracted advice that they provide. I’m Peggy Bree, and let’s get growing!
Hi! Just a little introduction as usual. I just wanted to quickly mention that this episode is pretty long, not per usual, but it’s good anyways and I want you to listen to it and let me know what you think. Please, please, please screenshot this on Instagram and share it on your Twitter/Instagram and let me know what you think about it. That is so key. We want to grow this together and lift up more women in branding and business and to hear more from them and their brands and what they created and to also inspire your next branding project or just for you to listen about branding. It’s a little bit of that for anyone who is looking for that branding inspo to their next project. So, hi! And also, this guest, I just wanted to also mention how amazing she is, the patience of a saint. There were some technical difficulties. I had to get cut off in between, but this guest is so amazing. She stuck right to the end and honestly, I love her, so I can’t wait to share her and to share her tips. And let me know what you think. I will talk to you soon. Bye!
Hey! Welcome back to another episode of Branding Gems. I’m super excited to bring on the next guest. Make sure you stay tuned for the whole episode so that you can hear her top three advice and the gems she’s about to drop. So today, we have an amazing leader in the business world, Avery Francis. Always looking to what’s next, Avery Francis has spent her career working with leading start-ups to navigate the challenging world of talent, hiring, and building creative cultures worth being a part of. A champion of diversity, inclusion, and belonging, she’s the founder of the Bridge Program, a free code school for women identified and non-binary people in tech. Formerly the Head of Talent at League and Director of Talent at Rangle.io, Avery specializes in helping the world’s best startups and most talented people grow their teams and their careers through her company, Bloom. Welcome to this podcast, Avery!
[0:03:29.1] Avery: Thanks so much! I’m so happy to virtually be here. [Laughter]
[0:03:34.1] Peggy: No, it’s so great to have you. I remember the amazing Sunday Shower events that you held in Toronto and how great it was because you brought such amazing women onto that, and the decorations were amazing. You definitely know how to create a party. That’s for sure. [Laughter]
[0:03:52.8] Avery: Yeah, it’s one of my hidden talents. [Laughter]
[0:03:56.2] Peggy: So it’s so good! And yeah, I would definitely say that when it comes to, I would feel the top leaders in Canada and Toronto, you always come to mind because you’re such a builder of a great empire.
[0:04:10.3] Avery: Aw, thank you! That’s so nice to hear. And I mean, I think that there are so many amazing women in particular that are building a lot of really awesome things in the Toronto ecosystem. I just think that it’s such a creative space. You see a lot of people that are founders and CEOs or even CTOs at growing and budding tech companies, or even fantastic freelance business owners, I don’t know, just really shifting and doing things differently and taking a new approach to building and designing their career. So I think that I take a lot of inspiration from the women around me and the network that you and I both are in.
[0:04:51.5] Peggy: So good. Yeah, Toronto’s such a great space for that, that’s for sure. [Laughter]
[0:04:56.3] Avery: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
[0:04:57.7] Peggy: So let’s get going. What are your top three tips and advice in branding and business? And we’ll start with number one.
[0:05:05.0] Avery: So number one would be to focus on your own personal brand. So not who you are with the company that you’re currently working at or even specifically the company that you may own. I think that it’s important to have your identity out of your business entity, and that goes for people that work full-time as well. One thing that I did when I worked full-time was I actually never used, of course I loved the companies that I worked for and I would get really embedded in the culture and everything, but when I did my external-facing information and content and when I would share stories, I would always center the conversation around that entity, and that goes for folks that work full-time for other folks or for individuals that run and have their own business. I think it’s so important to have your own personal brand. As cliche and as icky as that may sound, there’s a lot of value in focusing on telling your own personal stories outside the stories of your business or the role that you have at a company that you work at.
[0:06:12.5] Peggy: Yeah, so can you define that value in having it be separated and what the benefits are for that?
[0:06:23.8] Avery: To set you apart, and it’s necessarily just about competition. It’s so people better understand who you are, where you’re coming from, why you’re building or creating what you’re doing, and then helping to attract the right people your way. So for me, personal branding, it’s a way to describe it but really, for me, I consider it storytelling. So I tell a lot of my own personal stories and experiences as a way to attract folks that either have those same experiences or are looking to learn more about folks that have those experiences as a way to connect. And I think that now, more than ever, as we spend more time online and we’re connecting more digitally and virtually than we ever have before, it’s important that folks step a little bit outside of their comfort zone and share more about their personal stories, whether it be their failures or their successes. I want to see more women being loud and proud about number one, their accomplishments, but then also how they do what they do, but then also why they do it and what their process looks like, and what led them to working in the way that they do.
[0:07:36.7] Peggy: Mm-hmm. That’s good! So essentially, when separating yourself from your business brand, you’ll be able to connect with folks on a more personal level and be able to build a community within that as well because you’ll be meeting with like-minded people who are connected to you on that level. So actually, what are your tips in terms of community-building for your brand?
[0:08:05.6] Avery: Oh, one thing that I would say around building community is just like, there’s something to be said about actually just sharing your own story and being okay with not necessarily getting responses back, being okay with not necessarily hearing back from folks, but just sharing it out there for the folks that it does resonate but may not necessarily feel inclined or totally, I guess, attracted to reach back out to you. It’s just like, I don’t know, I think that for me, a lot of what I do around community-building, again, not intentional, I just understand and know that there are a lot of people, in particular women and women that identify as Black women, that have had a lot of similar experiences to what I’ve had. And I know that I have a lot of power and privilege in a unique way as someone that’s self-employed, as someone that is financially in a relatively decent position. I know that if I talk about my experiences of sexual assault in the workplace, I won’t get fired. I know that I’ll have my job tomorrow. And I know that it will likely attract the right kind of companies to work with Bloom and potentially detract the companies that don’t necessarily agree with my views. So it’s been an awesome self-selecting process as well. Folks that usually reach out to Bloom are so values-aligned because I’m so vocal about my stance and my perspective and my thoughts on whether it be something from politics from harassment in the workplace to what you shouldn’t say to a Black woman at work.
[0:09:40.1] Peggy: Mm-hmm. That’s amazing. I love how interconnected your personal brand and your business brand is in terms of the overall mission and I love that you’re able to use storytelling as part of your personal brand to amplify the mission behind both brands, so that’s awesome. And it makes so much sense too because you’ll be able to create multiple brand extensions based off your personal brand and create many multiplications of that and from it, so that’s so cool.
[0:10:20.1] Avery: Yeah, absolutely, and I think that it becomes addictive because what happens is as you continue to share your story, of course there are going to be people that judge your for it, there are going to be people that disagree with you, there are people that are close to you that will think that you may be a narcissist or self-indulgent or self-obsessed, for that matter, if you are spending a lot of time on social media talking about whether it be your successes or your failures or sharing a day in the life, there are folks that will criticize you for that. But for every single person that has something negative to say about you taking that approach to building your business, building your personal brand, there’s going to be a handful of people that will celebrate it, that will resonate with what you’re sharing, that will feel less alone because of the story that you shared, or that will get more clarity on a specific situation or challenge that they’re navigating right now because of what you shared. So for me, the value in putting myself out there and taking that risk, because it is a risk to take any specific position or to share yourself or your life so openly because you’re opening yourself up for more judgment. So with that, I think that it outweighs the cons. I think that literally, I spoke once at a networking event, and this was around the time that I was doing a few speaking engagements around sexual harassment in the workplace, and I’d shared my own personal experience with that. And there was a woman that came up to me at the end of one of my talks and she didn’t look like someone that was within the tech ecosystem. She was an older woman and she was definitely a mom, and she had come up and shared with me that she had three kids and she has no idea what tech is or what it stands for at the time. The talk was actually at Shopify. That’s where we hosted the event. And when I was doing this talk, she said, “I’d never been to a tech office, never had been in this industry.” She’s like, “I drove from three hours away to hear you speak because my daughter was assaulted at school and I want to understand what she’s going through.” And I’m trying to reconcile that and she was holding both sides of my arms and was sobbing while sharing this story, this heartbreaking and horrific story with me and experience. And she had travelled so far to a completely new space with unfamiliar people to learn more about my experience so she could get clarity on her daughter’s, so she could learn and understand how she could help her, how she could support her. And in that moment, it was an illuminating experience for me because it made me realize that when I go and speak at a networking event, it’s not just an opportunity for me to gain some street cred or meet some good people or rally up some biz dev for my company. It can be life-changing for some people, and I think that everyone has a unique story to tell and share with the world. I just wish that more people would do it and more people would feel more confident and more comfortable with sharing their experiences. Because I think that as we share more as we’ve seen with uprising of the Black Lives Matter movement, with the Me Too movement, with all the social media culture that’s taking place right now, people are becoming more and more vulnerable online than ever, and in building community that way, I think that I’d love to see more people feel confident with doing that.
[0:14:09.3] Peggy: Mm-hmm. It is interesting that when you connect on a personal level in a vulnerable way, it allows for that conversation to be out in the open so that people can relate and talk about it from their point of view as well and to create that conversation and community in that. And you’re so good at being able to say those bold statements and being able to open up about bold parts of your life to the community, so that’s awesome that you’re able to be so bold in that.
[0:14:48.7] Avery: Thank you. I really appreciate that. [Laughter] It’s not something that has been super intentional. I’ve always been a big, big sharer. I’ve also been relatively, from a young age, and I actually told this story to someone that I work with, Ashley. She’s our ops manager at Bloom. And I was trying to give her an insight in terms of who Avery was before Bloom, before work, just as an adolescent, as a young girl in high school. I was enrolled in an Arts program and in that program, I was, at that time, fascinated with artists like Barbara Kruger, who was an influential feminist and creator and artist at that time. Billie Eilish actually has a song recently that came out called Therefore, I am, and Barbara Kruger’s most well-known for the work that she did around “I think, therefore I am” and it was all around misogyny and privilege and power and capitalism, and I was just fascinated with her work at a really young age. And I also was fascinated with Andy Warhol. So I did an Andy Warhol and Barbara Kruger inspired piece of art. At that time, a peer of mine at school, when I was in Grade 11, take photos of me in a pink Victoria’s Secret bra at school, which I don’t know how that slid but it happened, and then what I did was I transferred those photos and created silkscreen prints of myself in the bra in multiple different poses. And [laughter] what it resulted was like a grid format of nine different shots of me in different poses, looking quite smug and, in some cases, I would say kind of sexy and free. And it was for my end-of-year project and it was something that we worked on for months, and at that time, my Art teacher was like, “This is great, but you’re missing something. There needs to be something more than just these nine photos.” And what I had come up with, she was more alluding to like a frame, because at that time, it was just on this big piece of canvas, and I had interpreted it as like, “Oh, I need to add a message.” And that was where the Barbara Kruger aspect of it, because Barbara Kruger would take cut-outs of newspaper articles and everything and she did this collage-type art, and I was like, “You know what? That Barbara Kruger influence is here, it’s implied, but it’s not actually here in your face.” So [laughter] what I decided to do was I went to Dollarama, I bought big block letters from Dollarama that were in black, and at the bottom of this piece of art, I put “Go ahead, judge me.” [Laughter] That piece of art was literally [laughter], and I was at that time, I think 14, 15, maybe 16, that hung in the school for two years in the hallway, and sometimes I think about that version of Avery because I was so fearless and so bold and so brave. To do something like that in high school, it’s wild, and it makes me think a lot about what I do now. And I think that as through my teen years and especially through my 20s, I lost a lot of that confidence for multiple different reasons – due to men and dating and subscribing too heavily to the media and what I thought I should look like – and it wasn’t until I entered my 30s, being okay with not being liked, being okay with people maybe not necessarily resonating with something I say, and being comfortable with asking for more and putting myself out there. And it’s been a transformative experience both for me and for my business. It’s been fantastic. It supports a group of, at the top rate now, nine women in different capacities of employment, and that extends many different opportunities for them. So that’s what fuels me now, is seeing them rise and seeing them do really great work and seeing them succeed.
[0:19:05.3] Peggy: Mm-hmm. I love that. I love how bold you are in being able to create that space where other folks can also share their uncomfortable experiences or even just their bold statements and be able to, in itself, create a huge community for that and for those statements, so I love that. You’re really good at building communities.
[0:19:30.4] Avery: Yeah, and there are going to be women after me that will do things completely different, only I think that at the end of the day, there are so many different books and guides and articles and blog posts and Instagram Reels and carousels that will give you advice on how to up your branding game. But I do think that the best branding oftentimes is bold in your way. You know what I mean? Fun in your way and has a persona to it and it has personality and tells stories. And I think that people need to, specifically service-based business owners and especially women that are wanting to build their own business or their career as a full-time employee that helps to build companies, these are all things that you can do in your own way. I think that there’s no real one-size-fits-all solution, and I think that what works for one person may not work for you because it’s just not your vibe. It’s not who you are. So I always challenge people to dig deep and do what you feel most comfortable with and most proud of, but also push yourself to get more comfortable with taking those risks and doing things that are a little bit outside that zone of what you already do.
[0:20:44.9] Peggy: Oh, so good! So just be unique to you and to use that to leverage off of that and to really own it. I love that.
[0:20:54.4] Avery: Totally. Now that I’m an entrepreneur and I have a business, we hit a huge milestone of hitting 1 million in revenue this past year, which is wild, a year in. Yeah, thank you! And during a pandemic, pretty outstanding. And I’m learning everyday. I’m still learning, but I can say that a lot of what’s out there, a lot of some of the most simple business advice is so true, like being your authentic self, not trying to replicate what other people are doing, doing what works for you, giving yourself time to grow, being patient with yourself, being patient with your business. Not everyone has the privilege of time and flexibility, but if you do have it, be patient with yourself. I think that big change happens with small actions over time, and nothing blooms all year round, and that’s so true for people and their careers and with their companies and with their businesses and with highs and lows and triumphs and failures. It’s a bit of a rollercoaster, but some of the most simplistic and obvious business advice that I thought was just white men sharing business jargon, a lot of it’s really true. [Laughter]
[0:22:24.6] Peggy: Mm-hmm. So yeah, thank you so much for really passing down that wisdom, especially from someone that it’s tried and true advice that works, and that is so great to hear and to help other women in that because it is a long-term game after all, so that tip is solid. And actually, you are really good on growing on Instagram for your community. Any bonus tip in effectively growing on Instagram?
[0:23:00.4] Avery: I’d say that, specifically from a strategic perspective, the carousels that I have put out with information about stuff. I’ve been doing diversity, equity, and inclusion training and talks and conferences since probably about 2015. It wasn’t until this past year that I, actually in 2020, I had made a commitment to sharing more tangible and more specific things that people could learn from on the ‘Gram. And once I started putting those things out there, I built a broader and bigger community and folks that I’d always dreamed of working with started reaching out for my support and for Bloom’s help and for my help. And I tried the whole posting pictures of me travelling with an inspirational quote at the bottom or life lesson in the blurb, I think that simplifying some of the things you know very best and some of your opinions and some of the things that you’ve learned and sharing that with the world, especially if you’re looking to build your business, that’s a great way to drive more activity and more interest and, of course, leads. I love talking about numbers and tangible data. Last year alone, Instagram led to about $500,000 worth of revenue to Bloom. I mean, it’s not just about the money. I mean, revenue’s so much different than profit, but at the end of the day, that was able to help me and support Bloom in hiring and employing more people to join our team during a pandemic. It helped me to avoid doing painful layoffs during a pandemic, and it also helped us to educate and support our community of people that are wanting to learn and do better and also just to grow in general, whether it be in their careers or personally or collectively with their friends and family. So yeah, Instagram is awesome, but the things that I’ve found most effective has been actually talking about tangible, real life, growth-centered things, versus posting photos of me travelling or with my family or looking cute in my Glossier hoodie. [Laughter]
[0:25:25.4] Peggy: So good, and I love that you reinvested it back to what you do and to also help other people in that and giving them jobs. That’s amazing, so I applaud you for that.
[0:25:38.4] Avery: Yeah. You know what I do? Now, I’ve been having a lot of companies reaching out to do brand partnerships with us, and I had a company recently reach out that wanted to do a brand partnership, and I love the company, love the business, and I’ve actually worked with them in the past as a coach. And I actually decided to forgo the money that they were going to pay me that would go directly in my pocket and would probably help me to renovate my house, and I actually asked if I could have my entire team participate in their program instead of me taking the money, and they were like, “That’s amazing. That actually makes so much more sense.” So there’s not going to be any money exchange. It’s more so like I am helping my team grow and build skills in an area that they would all benefit from, whether it’s at Bloom or in the future as they continue to grow in their careers, and I’ve been trying to do the same. I personally don’t love doing brand partnerships, but there’s a lot of value for me as a Black woman, showing representation, being represented with some of these big brands that are reaching out, so I understand that and that’s one of the reasons why I do it, but then also it offers a great opportunity for me to have extra income to reinvest, whether it be into my team or into the community. So that’s what I do. I take that money, I put it into a little pocket, and when we are donating or when someone needs support or in the past, I saw a person that, this was a while ago, they were nominated for this Forbes Top 30 Under 30 and there was this big meeting that was going on in Tel Aviv. And it was amazing because they got nominated for this thing and they could go and do it, but they weren’t actually compensating and paying for everyone’s flight, so I actually paid for a portion of that individual’s flight so she could go. So that’s the kind of stuff that I like to do with that brand partnership money [laughter], is invest in other people’s growth and I’d love to do more of that and have more structure around it once I actually have time to think and breathe and actually build a framework as to how that would work.
[0:27:56.7] Peggy: Oh, let me tell you. You are such a leader, Avery. You’re absolutely amazing. [Laughter]
[0:28:02.6] Avery: Thanks.
[0:28:03.3] Peggy: And speaking of, let’s go to tip number two. I know we still have two tips and I’m like, “Oh, what you’re saying is so good already!”
[0:28:14.4] Avery: There are a couple of tips in there already, but I think that the second tip around branding would be to, in my personal opinion, I think that Canva can take you a long way, but it doesn’t hurt to actually work with someone that understands branding. As someone that fancies themselves as quite the creative, I went to school for marketing and advertising, I can work my way around the latest version of Photoshop and InDesign. I think there’s so much value in actually working with someone that understands the psychology, as well as the behaviors behind design. And that’s something that I just simply don’t know about. And I built and designed our first website and the brand for Bloom and it took us to a certain point in our growth story, but at one point, it just plateaued and we weren’t getting the interest on our website. We weren’t getting people reaching out. People didn’t really truly understand what Bloom stood for, what kind of company we were, what our persona was as a collective. And I invested in working with a designer at a time where I didn’t have the type of money to do so, but it was something that I felt was really important, and her name’s Andrea, she’s fantastic. She actually rebuilt the Build with Bloom website and designed it and helped us with our brand identity. And let me tell you, the process that she took us through to actually land on what our brand identity was, what kind of company we were, it has translated into how we talk, how we communicate with people via email, on our website, what kind of clients we work with, it helped put so much more into perspective, so I think that there is a lot more behind branding than just having a high-res logo. So I think that that would be my second tip, is to, if you can and when you can, invest in someone.
[0:30:15.8] Peggy: So good, so good! Yeah, you’re right. When it comes to the psychology behind communication design and when you just, I guess, put that into the hands of an expert who knows how to hone it, it’s so good to rely on them for that. And it’s so true because as business owners and entrepreneurs, it’s so easy to want to do everything by yourself, right? But when you’re letting go of certain aspects, like for example, design to somebody else, it’s a little bit of a thought process behind it, right? It’s like, “Oh, I have to let it go and I kind of wanted to still keep it!” So what is that process like, when it comes to really handing over your baby to someone else’s hands?
[0:31:01.1] Avery: It’s remarkable. It’s such a freeing and empowering experience. Number one, if you have the means to do so, that’s a pretty awesome experience in itself, getting yourself to the point where you are able to invest back into your business, and in some way, back into yourself. But I’m the kind of person that’s a Type A personality. I like to have control. This was a piece of advice that I saw from Casey Neistat. Long ago, I was watching one of his YouTube videos and he was talking about one of the key recipes for success, and he’s not the first person I’ve heard say this, it definitely won’t be the last, he just said that, “Hire people, employ people, connect with people that are better at doing the things you’re not that great at so you can focus your energy, that high-value work that serves your company that will let it grow.” It doesn’t serve me or my business or my team to be focusing on administrative duties, and it’s not something I like to do, so I don’t do it well. I’m not the most ops-savvy person, and that’s one of the reasons why I hired Ashley Gibson to join our team at Bloom. I moved away from doing a lot of recruiting, so I’ve hired two or three recruiters. I would probably earn a lot more money if I was doing all the things, which would be awesome, but I wouldn’t have the same amount of time that I have, that Bloom wouldn’t have blossomed the way that it has over the last year because what I have now is more time to focus on the things that I love doing within my business and the things that I’m actually really good at. So the quality of work that the clients that partner with Bloom are getting is top-notch because there’s a team of people that are focusing on different aspects of the business that makes sense. And some people are full-time, some people are part-time, some people are freelance. I’m very thoughtful in terms of, there are certain things, like for example, I’m not the best long-form writer when it comes to blog content, so I work with a man by the name of Stefan Palios. He helps me with crafting and putting out all of our blog content for Bloom. I essentially talk to him like you and I are doing right now, and he transcribes that into a blog post. And there’s no shame in doing that, right? It’s something that if I were to do it, I would spend about a month crafting each piece of content, and then nothing would basically see the light of day. And it’s important content that our clients need to see, that people that are searching for jobs need to see, people that are weathering this shitstorm of a pandemic, so that’s why I invest in people that do things that are just better at it than I am. And I think that the way that I work this out is I created a mindmap, a column of things that I like to do that I was good at, and then things that I didn’t enjoy doing that I wanted someone else to do that were really important for the business, and it was those areas where I highlighted that I need to find some folks to join the Bloom Collective and help us grow. So yeah, it’s a really, really fantastic experience. It’s so hard to let go, but if you are able to and if you have the means to do so, and once you do let go, it will be one of the most empowering experiences as an entrepreneur and as a business owner.
[0:34:26.0] Peggy: Oh, everything that you said is so true! If you can propel everyone and put their best foot forward, why not, right? And it’s so good that you really put that all together and really helped raise people up through that. All in all, building other people within your company and making their best skills and growing in their field, it’s so good that you provide all that as well. Well, let’s go to the last tip. What’s your final most, I guess, valuable tip that you have to give to everyone?
[0:34:59.4] Avery: So my final tip when it comes to branding, whether it be your personal brand or the branding for your business, and of course, I’m saying this as someone that’s not an expert in branding, but aside from actually hiring an expert to do the work is to actually have fun with it. I think that branding can be such a really fun and exciting process, and I think that if you have fun while it’s aligning your branding strategy with your core values, a lot of really great things will come out of it. It almost can be like a personality in itself, aside from who you are as a person. For example, my go-to, like I wear black, beige, [laughter] or neutrals pretty much everyday, and when I was thinking about the personality for Bloom or even for Sunday Showers, like the branding, I wanted something to be bold because that’s the work that we do. I want it to be friendly, I want to be approachable, and I want to be classic in a certain way. And although my heart always leans towards very neutral black on black, beiges, monotone approach, it just isn’t necessarily totally the personality or the tone or even the vibe that Bloom really offers when we’re working with organizations, or even Sunday Showers as a business that’s centered around celebrating women’s and non-binary folks’ professional achievements, aside from the accomplishments that they have with their family or with having kids, with getting married. I was thinking about like, “What does that feel like?” And I wanted to have fun with it and with that, that means not necessarily doing something that mirrors my fashion sense or the way that I would design my home, it’s meant to actually mirror and really show the personality that we have, and that was the really fun part for me.
[0:36:52.9] Peggy: Mm-hmm. I love that, and I love how authentically it translates, not just visually but overall in your brand and business. And it is obvious that you have fun with it and it attracts the right people who want to have fun with branding and business as well. So it really creates that attraction for people and it’s awesome when you can have it be so fun in your way as well. And what’s next for you? What’s coming up?
[0:37:21.7] Avery: We have lots of things going on. I’ve been trying to keep my head down and focus as much as possible on Bloom. We’ve been actually pretty much really busy at the front lines, to a certain extent of doing this work, educating organizations on all things diversity, equity, and inclusion, and then helping more companies build in a more inclusive and thoughtful way. So we’re doing a lot of internal stuff, not the fun stuff that people see outside of the organization. But right now, our company’s primarily focused on a business to business model as it serves this organization. What I’ve been thinking a lot about is like B2C, what does that look like? And I wouldn’t consider it as B2C as like emphasis consumer, I would almost consider it as like business to community, so how we’re going to be supporting and enriching and contributing to the community of folks that we look to serve and support, and not necessarily just through organizations. So that’s what we have, what we’re working on, this B2C, business to community model, how we can serve and support and help to grow, whether it be through our diversity, equity, and inclusion learning experiences or through coaching and mentorship. So that’s been a big focus. We also have a really fun branding thing that we did, that we’re going to be putting out very soon. It’s been six months in the making, but I’m really, really pumped to have that see the community and for folks to be able to interact with it. It will be the first physical thing that we’ll actually put out there, so yeah.
[0:38:58.9] Peggy: That’s exciting! And knowing how Avery is, I know that she’s all about community-building. It really is so much in the core, so I really am so excited to see that and to really support all those endeavors, so I’m excited!
[0:39:13.0] Avery: Yeah, awesome!
[0:39:15.2] Peggy: Where could people find you?
[0:39:17.2] Avery: Avery Francis on both Twitter and Instagram, @averyfrancis on Instagram. Again, it’s Avery Francis, Instagram and Twitter.
[0:39:29.1] Peggy: Awesome, awesome! Well, thank you so much and we are going to sign off now.
Hey, welcome to the end of this episode. You are literally sticking to the end. Thank you! I appreciate you. I love people who stick to the end on the highs and lows. I appreciate you for that. And so, I just wanted to quickly say please rate it on Apple and Spotify or whatever podcast you are listening from. That would be really appreciated and helpful. And yeah, thank you again, and this is my bye-for-now-I’ll-talk-to-you-soon note, but also my thank-you note! I appreciate you, so bye!
JOIN THE DISCUSSION:
- INSTAGRAM/FACEBOOK: @blankroomdesign
- WEB: brandinggems.com
- GUEST: AVERY FRANCIS
Business: Web / Instagram – @averyfrancis - HOST: Peggy Bree
Instagram – @peggybree / Clubhouse: @peggybree
