Show transcription
Natalie Franke: how can I learn from someone who's been there and done that, and then take that in and apply my spin to it, take that in and figure out how that really uniquely fits in my business model or my own definition of success.
[00:01:00] Natalie. Frank is a mother author photographer, business, founder, and speaker. She has a keen passion for community building and a fascinating background in neuroscience. Not only is she an advocate for small businesses, but she also serves as the head of community. At Flodesk, supporting thousands of independent businesses, many of which are photographers.
Her books built to belong and gutsy might literally change your life.
They are incredible books that I strongly recommend you read or listen to. For those in search of a true entrepreneurial champion. Look no further than my friend, Natalie Frank. Let's get right into this conversation because. It is. A fantastic one.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Hello, Natalie.
Natalie Franke: Hi.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I am gonna just [00:02:00] start out right away with. Question for you about, so we're, we're not doing our typical workflows episode. I got a whole bunch of questions for you because first of all, I have loved you for many, many, many years. We met briefly in person 'cause you were headed somewhere and I was headed in and you were headed out at WPPI last year.
but I look forward to really like. It's sitting down and chatting one day because, I have loved you from afar for many years and I'm glad that we finally met briefly in person and now we're chatting for reals and it's no longer January. We're, well this episode's coming out I think in like March or April, but it's no longer January.
Natalie Franke: It's now February when we're recording this. So, thanks for chatting with me. First of all. Thanks for asking. I'm honored and excited.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. and, and my first question to you, I got to listen to you speak into my ear while I listen to both of your audio books.
Journey into Photography and Community Building
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Scott Wyden Kivowitz: How does it feel to be working with your besties now?
Natalie Franke: Great. You know, [00:03:00] I, so for folks who don't know, I, I am the head of community at Flodesks and, for anyone that read built to belong, you know that the two, two of the three Co-founders are two of my closest friends. Martha Batar is Flodesk's, CEO, and she's the godmother of my son. If that tells you, you know, just how close, we are and
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: besties. Yes.
Natalie Franke: like actual. Yeah. And then, our other co-founder is our Chief brand officer, Rebecca. And she came up with the concept for the entire company in my kitchen over a lot of wine and pizza, many years ago. And so I've, I, you know, I've been, what, here's the best way to describe it. It feels like going from cheering loudly on the sidelines for people that you love who are doing work you believe in to actually getting on the field.
It's like, imagine you're in the Super Bowl and you're on the bench and you're watching, you know, Taylor Swift up in the suite and we've got, you know, Travis Kelsey running down the field, and you wanna be on the field with Travis, but you're sitting [00:04:00] on the bench and then they're like, all right. Coach Putin, get on the field.
That's what it feels like, right? Like it, it's high stakes. It's yes, a lot of pressure because I care so deeply, not just about the company and not just about my friends, but like I said, I care deeply about small business and I believe that in a world where. So many small business owners are spending so much time focusing on, dare I say it with my mama, bear Love, tough love, the wrong things, like overwhelming themselves by focusing on social media algorithms rather than focusing on like, I love workflows, I focusing on the things that in their business are actually moving the needle.
And I believe wholeheartedly that email is one of those things. It's actually a revenue generator of an audience. You. Own rather than building land on somebody else's turf, right? Territory you're renting from Instagram or renting from Facebook or TikTok or you name it, but actually creating something that you own, and nurturing a [00:05:00] community and an audience that wants to hear from you, that wants to buy from you.
there's a lot of pressure. I don't wanna let them down. I don't wanna let the small business owners down. And so, it's exciting and exhilarating and stretching and challenging me in the best ways.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. That's amazing. It's amazing. I know when I, when I. Listened to your book, and I was like, you said straight up one day you're gonna be working with your best friends. You said it in the book. And I'm like, when is she leaving? HoneyBook? Like,
Natalie Franke: I know.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: like, they knew it was coming. You knew it was coming. It was just a matter of time.
And, you know, it's, it's, you, you foreshadowed to it and now you're in a place where you dreamt of being. literally put it out into the universe and it, it happened. And, as a photographer, as somebody in the industry, you know, on the, on the, you know, business to consumer side of the photography business as well, and somebody who actually [00:06:00] does
pay Flodesks as a customer. I, I know I'm, I'm glad to see you there as well because I know this, I, I, I recognize the potential of that Flodesks has to make a, an impact on every photographer and I can't wait to see, you know, what, what you all do over there. So we're, I'm sure we're gonna be shifting in and outta Flodesk and HoneyBook and rising tide throughout this conversation.
and a lot of what I'm gonna be asking you, I am sure. You have mentioned in your books, but we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna get right into it all.
The Impact of Psychology and Science
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Natalie Franke: so you have a background in psychology, correct? Like, that was, that was your original direction in the world. yes. Yeah. I really thought I'd be a therapist. I genuinely did for a long time. But yes, small business ownership kind of yanked me from that path. And, you know, I've been on this road ever since. Yeah.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. And your father was a scientist. His
Natalie Franke: Yeah. Yeah. So my dad is a nuclear engineer. If you've [00:07:00] watched Oppenheimer, that's in the region, which he works. That's all I will say. grandfather is a rocket scientist, so he worked for NASA for 30 years, was an aeronautical engineer. Mom is nurse practitioner, so for most intense and purposes a doctor, you can think of it like that.
And sister is a doctor. My sister's a psychiatrist. who's coming? Back here to my hometown. I'm really excited in a couple of weeks, but yeah, I know we were going with it. Science nerds,
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yes you
Natalie Franke: generations of nerds.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Science is hereditary in your family.
Natalie Franke: Yes. Yes
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: in some ways what you're doing now has some science to it. Of course. I mean, you're using your, everything that you, you have trained in with your psychology. In what you do. Right. so can you share how this shift, from psychology photogra to photography and community management to everything that you're doing, how, how that occurred and how this sort of scientific background influences how you approach or approached when you were shooting?[00:08:00]
You know, primarily how it, how it, it you, how you used it to approach your photography.
Natalie Franke: Yeah, absolutely. So a little bit of background that's important here is, you know, I, in undergrad I, at UPenn I was studying the science of seeing, so my, my degree is visual studies, but my track was, you know, the neuroscience and psychology of vision. How we see meaning like from the photon through the retina to the optic chiasm, all the way to the back of the visual cortex.
And what happens in our brain to produce an image that we just take for granted every day when most of us, those who have vision open their eyes, right? And see the world around them. And I also study the psychology of the mind. How do we know that what we're seeing is truth? Which is a very important conversation as we know in this current era of Editing and AI and new technologies emerging.
And, and it's just, it's always been a conversation. My, my thesis was on the psychological impact of digitally manipulated Imageners for, for young [00:09:00] women on the young female mind, and that was back when I was talking about Photoshop on for Sports Illustrated magazines, right? I wasn't talking about what exists today.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Right. Yep.
Natalie Franke: And so, you know. To answer the question of how did it impact me then and how does it impact me now? It truly transformed the way that I viewed the world around me. It made it very clear that. Although we are told, seeing is believing both in our own physical, tangible space and in the media that we consume, that's not the truth.
the world I see is not the same world. You see, even if the same photons hit my retina that hit yours because the mind is actually. The mechanism that allows us to see not the eyes and the moment, you know, I uncovered that and really started to understand the gravity of it, meaning I can walk into a room and witness the same conversation, the same interaction at Imagen, at WPPI at any event, but take away an entirely different, [00:10:00] interpretation.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah.
Natalie Franke: Maybe that will even help it to resonate more, right? You go into a networking space, you're chatting with people, and you and your best friend are there together. You walk out and she or he, or they might say, you know, that person was really a jerk. You're like, what are you talking about? Or, I really didn't like X, Y, Z, or, no one likes me.
Or I could go on and on and on. We can observe the exact same scenario and take away very different versions of that reality. That changed everything because one, I realized on the community side of my brain, that, you know, knowing what I know about humans need for one another. I also recognize that we are entering into a workforce era where.
Entrepreneurship has been democratized. We're gonna see a future that is more entrepreneurial than ever before. I felt it back in 2010 when I was running that business, my photography business, full-time, while I think a sophomore or junior at Penn. you know, I saw it then and I sur sure as heck see it now.
Even in my son who's turning five. I mean, you [00:11:00] ask my son, what do you wanna be? He says, A YouTuber. And you know what's wild about that is if you had asked me at his age, I would've said a doctor.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Right.
Natalie Franke: So to show you the shift, like we are seeing this change in how humans are gonna make a living. We're seeing this change in the ability to monetize creative passions.
We're seeing incredible tools like ImagenAI, like HoneyBook, like Float Desk, come along and actually make it possible for these creatives to build profitable businesses doing what they love. We're seeing all of this occur and we're living through it, and a lot of us are doing it alone. A lot of us are doing it and feeling this weight of this loneliness, of this isolation, of this pressure and responsibility on our shoulders because we're either, you know, stepping beyond, like I said, generations of science nerds.
What, what success was deemed to look like for us. I have tons of friends that are first gen, first gen Americans, you know, and they were told, you're an engineer, you're a doctor or nothing else. I don't wanna hear anything else. And here they've [00:12:00] had to create small business for the businesses, for themselves that have forced them to challenge everything that they thought was expected of them.
And in gutsy, I talk about this, like be making themselves proud before making others proud. All of us have our own version of that story in the photography world and the small business world, and. Yet in learning about how we see and how we view the space around us, it became really clear that all of our journeys are unique, and yet there are these intersections that unite us, our desire for community and connection.
It is. Woven into our DNA, the need to know how others feel about us and what they see in us, either positive or negative. Like I talk about in gutsy, it's a feature, not a bug. It's how we are wired. There is nothing wrong with you. And, and there are sort of like, again, like these threads, right, that are so intertwined into the human experience that I started to see the ways in which those elements fit [00:13:00] into.
Who I was as a photographer, who I was as a small business owner, and then when the loneliness sparked the co-founding of Rising Tide, how I could use my understanding of, of those characteristics to help other people to find their place. And in doing so, hopefully, whether the storms that all business owners are going to face so that hopefully the next generation has it a little bit easier than we did.
Right.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: you brought up something interesting, and I'm, I'm gonna come back to another question related to. shift of photography. But, so hopefully I remember that in a second. But, I, I, last night, so I just got back from Imagen, USA, right before I left, my wife accidentally dropped her, her iPhone, cracked the screen and I'm like, I can't help right now.
so I had to manage all that when I got back. and we went to the Apple store, which happens to be in our local mall. Like so many Apple stores and we noticed something last night. She mentioned it. I didn't mention it. [00:14:00] She's not like a business-minded person. So, it's interesting that she mentioned it.
A lot of the large chains have gone out of the mall. A lot of 'em have closed from big department stores to smaller stores, but still chains. Right. Small boutiques are going in that are family owned businesses.
Natalie Franke: Mm-Hmm.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Now whether they last in a mall that charges ridiculous rent is, I don't know. We'll, we'll see what happens.
Hopefully they do. But that is so interesting that they're going into these giant malls where they would've never lasted before, next to a huge chain that is all over the world. So that's really interesting. So that relates back to just what you said, the shift. Same thing when my daughter wants to be a YouTuber.
Same exact thing. Right. It's all the same, you know? going back to though your shift into photography, could you share like the story about your first photo session? Like how'd that come to be, a thing for you?
Natalie Franke: Yeah, I mean, I was a very [00:15:00] angsty, very depressed teenager. It's not the sexiest story in the world, but it's the truest one. And so I really struggled with my mental health. it's been a unfortunately common theme in my life journey, and I don't shy away from talking about it because again, I, anything I do, it's, it's think of my kids, like what world do I want them to live in?
Well, one where we can talk about the hard stuff and not pretend like it doesn't exist. So the truth is I really struggled with my. Mental health back then, and my mom ultimately was the one who gave me a camera and encouraged me to start. Using it in order to, express myself creatively. And that turned into friends asking for portraits.
Like it's a tale as old as time, right? I was just doing it for fun to find a creative outlet, improve my mental wellbeing, and then suddenly, people saw value in it and wanted me to take their photos. And so I was a senior in high school, photographing other seniors in high school. That's when the business really took shape.
And I was yes, very young back then, although I felt very old. [00:16:00] 17 years old, 18 years old. And from that, doing portraits, I started to explore other avenues in photography and I just really was drawn to weddings. I loved so much about it. Like yes, I could talk about the emotional side, but from a business angle, I really loved one, the lucrative nature of that particular type of photography.
I loved that. I saw other photographers, wedding photographers charging. Significantly for their work, and it was well deserved. But also, and I know wedding folks can relate to this, there is a different level of cashflow visibility. Wedding work where you know your cash flow months to almost a year plus in advance for some professionals.
And knowing what I, what I knew about my own, and I talk about this a little bit and guess, like I can be very risk averse. I'm very financially risk averse, being the daughter of a single mom, and the thought of being a small business owner was terrifying as it is to all of us. But with weddings, I [00:17:00] said, oh, but I'll know.
I'll have contracts and I'll know what will be coming down the pipeline. I will know where, you know, where and when my income is going to come in, and therefore it won't be, such a terrifying uncertainty. Whereas with portraits, people booked out, you know, with much shorter time spans. And so that drew me in.
It drew me in. I started apprenticing for other wedding photographers. the summer after senior year, photographed my first wedding. I believe my freshman year of college and then just continued improving my skills and growing and you know, growing the business along the way in the years that followed.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Amazing. Amazing. That's so great. so. We've talked, we've now mentioned both of your books, but you've written two books in the past couple of years, built to Belong and Gutsy, both of which, as I mentioned, I spent hours listening to your voice in my ears. Typically, when I'm on my ride-on Mower doing the lawn, I.
which is, so you were mowing the lawn with me. probably strange for you to hear when somebody says, you know, you [00:18:00] were listening to your audiobook, but it's also so true. the books are both very inspiring. One. I mean, I'm a community manager for Imagen, so, you know, I relate to it from that perspective very much plus small business.
you and you, I was on your previous podcast, which you have passed on to Akua. and actually. Small business stuff came up, like different small businesses I experimented with over time. But, anyway, so I related to every, both books really. and can you just share like how those books came to be?
Like, you, you mentioned this in, in it where you, you know, you wanted to do it for a long time, but never actually pull the plug. So like, how, how'd they, how'd they come to be?
Natalie Franke: So the short answer is that I finally did the thing. The long answer is that before I ever wanted to be a photographer, I wanted to be a writer. You know, and I think I talk about this in gutsy, but I, you know, co-founded my high school newspaper, like [00:19:00] that level of wanting to be a writer. There wasn't a newspaper.
So I created one with my, my dear friend Christina Ross, and, you know. When I discovered photography, though, it really took my career in that direction. And I express, I started to express myself creatively in that way. And as the photography business, you know, wound down because rising Tide, you know, ramped up and HoneyBook acquired Rising Tide.
So I, you know, started moving out. I moved out to San Francisco. I started moving into the tech space. I, I missed. That creative outlet. And so I took it out on social media. I started writing more on Instagram and in other places, and simultaneously went through some really difficult personal life scenarios.
I, had brain surgery to remove a benign brain tumor. And I shared about that journey, like I said, like pouring out my writing into social in short form. But it caught the eye of, a major publisher and they came to me with an offer and I ultimately decided to turn them down. To be really honest was one of the most [00:20:00] terrifying things I've ever done professionally because I felt like an idiot.
I'm like, here is this fantastic book deal just sitting here. It came into the inbox
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Mm-Hmm.
Natalie Franke: and it's still in the back of my mind. I know. It's like the, it's not the book I wanna write. Like they came to me like, we want you to write this story, right? And I'm like, ah. I know that's a part of my story, but that is not the story that I think.
I'm ready or want to write. And so I turned down that book offer and then I went back to an empty blank page and I wrote out a proposal for Bill to Belong. I wrote out a proposal to make a case for this idea of community over competition in a world that continued to tell us, right, that there's never enough and we are never enough and we can't trust others, and we have to guard what is ours and we can't support each other.
Like I just was like, look. I'm gonna make, if I'm gonna get to write one thing, this is the thing I wanna write. 'cause even if no one buys the book, if one person though one day picks it up and reads it, I know it's the message that's, that's most important that I'm really being led to [00:21:00] put out there. So I wrote a, I think it, I think it was like a 30 to 40 page book proposal included several chapters pre-written.
And a significant marketing plan, like took every bit of entrepreneurial knowledge I had, threw it into a marketing plan and, and went out with it and submitted it through an agent to, any publisher that would entertain the idea. Um. You know, one thing led to another, several publishers wanted it, and I landed at an imprint that I really loved working with for a two book deal.
So, built a belonging, gutsy were the result of, turning something. So turning something down that was good, and believing that perhaps there was still something uncovered that could be even better. And in this case, there was.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: One of my favorite things when you first rolled out, when you're doing like the book launch, and again this goes back to small businesses, is that the book launch was heavily, Go buy the [00:22:00] book from a small business bookstore, not from the majors. I mean, they're available everywhere, you know? But I loved that.
I'm like, that's like just again, knowing you from afar, that was, you
Natalie Franke: And. Can I, can I tell you a little secret that you will never hear anyone else other or anywhere else other than on this podcast? I had to fight for that. So in the book
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: have to,
Natalie Franke: I know, but in the book world, every single book retailer looks at Amazon numbers to decide whether to put you on the shelf or not. So in the book world, it is in your best interest in the early stages, especially to sell as much on Amazon as you can. And so. It is really a fascinating dynamic where, you know, I felt like, and I've talked about this so many times with author friends, but everyone was like, why is Amazon not the only link you're sharing?
Like, why are you doing this? And I really had to fight for it. I really had to fight for [00:23:00] it. But again, it was just this feeling of, I mean, I even to the point where I, like, they had to tell me I had to include Amazon because I wanted to just not on my landing page. But I got that chip off my shoulder and I be says, if you're listening, don't blacklist me.
Like I put it on there. I, I, I included it. but I had to fight for that, right? It was, it was in my best interest not to, it was in my best interest to really prioritize Amazon from an author perspective. but at the end of the day, I recognized that. One book sale to my local bookstore meant a heck of a lot more than one book sale back into Amazon's pocket, who owns over 97% of the market or something Absolutely outrageous like that.
so yeah. Yeah. But that's, again,
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: what? I think it was from my, from, from, again, outsider perspective, I think it was, definitely still a good move to have Amazon on there. There's gonna be people no matter what, no matter how, how hard you try that, we'll just buy it from Amazon for the convenience.
Natalie Franke: Mm-hmm.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: But the fact that you showed, and made it easy for, for people to buy from smaller businesses, I think connects [00:24:00] it back to what the Books mission was about in many ways too.
Natalie Franke: So, I, I, you know, huge, huge kudos for, for doing that. like the story that I shared with Akua was a very similar. Thing, sort of, and the business failed. But I tried, I tried doing this and I could tell you all about it another time, instead of taking up your time on this. But, or you can listen to that episode with a K and you should, can we include it in the show notes of this? If y'all do show notes, like please listen to Scott's interview with Kuah because it is incredible. I love, I, I loved it. It was amazing.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: And that was the awesome, it was the first episode of the current season of, of the show. So,
Natalie Franke: Yeah. You kicked off season two.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: I did. I did. I wasn't expecting to do that,
Natalie Franke: I know, I
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: it to be you,
Natalie Franke: I know. Yeah.
Transitioning from HoneyBook to Flodesk
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Natalie Franke: Like behind the scenes for folks that don't know, so. Um, I used to be the host of Honey Book's podcast independent business, like what Scott does here. And, it was so much fun. Gosh, I loved it. But as I decided, made that decision to leave HoneyBook and go to Flodesk [00:25:00] transitioned in one of my dear friends who is just phenomenal.
Akua Candu. Yes. And so Scott was the first transitional episode, so we had scheduled it and I was going to be the host, and then it just ended up working out that I, you know, when we looked at the, the calendar, it. It was
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: And the funny thing is you were there. You were
Natalie Franke: yeah, she did it here in this room. and I was sitting off to the side, like hyping her up and, you know, teaching her about the equipment and all of that.
But, yeah. Yeah. Mm-Hmm.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. All right.
Overcoming Loneliness and Isolation in Entrepreneurship
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Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Now I've, I've heard you mention, and you actually even just mentioned it earlier in this conversation, that entrepreneurship can be lonely, isolating, right? I think you briefly snuck that in there earlier in this conversation. what strategies would you recommend for photographers with their own businesses to overcome that challenge of, of feeling lonely or isolated?
Natalie Franke: Okay, so there's two bits of advice I'm gonna give you. one is uncomfortable hard, and you're not gonna like it, but the other. [00:26:00] With the exception of some of you who are severely introverted and the sheer thought of working with others terrifies you, that, that cohort I'll address maybe at the end, but you'll love the second bit of advice.
So the first bit of advice is loneliness is something that you both have to confront within you, and you have to take steps externally, right? To, to navigate and, overcome. And so it's that internal work that I think is particularly hard for us because, you know. When you are dealing with it, whether you recognize that you're dealing with loneliness or not, because it can manifest in other ways.
You know, you have to be willing to have those hard conversations with yourself about maybe why you have a treated community or connection like a nice to have and not a requirement in your life, or maybe why you know you have allowed the comfort of being alone. I. To push you further from the discomfort of leaning to environments where others are present or where you might be more vulnerable, right when you are amongst others.
And we, we know that, we know that both personally and professionally, we feel and [00:27:00] experience different levels of fear and and vulnerability when we're alongside other people. So. I think that's where you start. You have to have an honest conversation with yourself. This is hard, but it is a life that we have chosen and it is a, it is a like to be a small business owner, we made that choice, which means, well, we can't control everything that happens.
We can't control external factors. The market, you know, we can't control Gmail coming out with new email compliance regulations or a competitor popping up down the street,
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: just happened.
Natalie Franke: Literally, probably both of those things for all of you. you know, I, we can't control those things, but we can control our reaction to it, and we can control how we craft our perception of ourselves and others.
That goes back to that visual studies degree, right? Like, I am who I am, but the story I tell myself about who I am. Dictates what happens next. And so that's where I want you to start. What is a story that you tell yourself about yourself? Who are you into that? And really evaluate whether you are your greatest cheerleader and champion, or whether you are someone who is standing in your own way.
Whether you are [00:28:00] someone that reminds yourself that you are worthy, that you are enough, that you are deserving a connection and success in your life, that you are doing something extraordinary and impactful every single day that you pick up that camera, because honestly, you are. But yet that voice of fear can sometimes tell us that we're not enough.
That voice of fear can be the limiting belief that keeps us, us from embracing that our work is work that matters. That our voice is one that's needed, that our opinions are are important, both to ourselves and to and to other people. And so that's where you start Now, once you start to do that inner work, which is never comfortable and never fun for any of us, right?
Then you get to take that. You take care of yourself first. It's that famous oxygen Mask scenario, right? Like put it on your, your own face first before you go and help other people. Then it comes down to getting yourself into a position where you can really welcome community into your space. And there is no shortage of, you know, advice, tactics that I could give [00:29:00] you.
But to sum it up quickly, for the sake of a podcast, what I would say is start small. So if you're feeling lonely, don't feel the need to suddenly become the most popular community, builder in the room. Right? Community is built one person at a time. That is a truth. I will stand by until my last breath.
It is one conversation, one relationship at a time. So that is where you begin, you know, look for either existing relationships that you want to rekindle and maybe you've let kind of pass you by, or new relationships that you are interested in forming. Start digitally. If that's the most convenient way I've been in seasons of life, whether during the pandemic new mom, two toddlers at home, I can't get out to as many events as I used to.
I can't, you know, go to as many conferences as I used to. That's the reality. But I can still be deeply connected. I can still be checking in on people. I say, you know, use social media not to, to scroll and to consume, but use it to connect and to create [00:30:00] That is one of the. First things and easiest things you can do if you are just scrolling.
I need you to stop. Your time is too valuable. And if you have five minutes to scroll, you have five minutes to make a friend, right? So you start there and it's good for your business too. We didn't talk about this, but like I, I say friend, I say relationship and sometimes people think, okay, great, but what's the ROI of that?
And you know, Scott being a community manager, reading built to belong, it's the ROI of Connection and community is so massive, I argue you cannot truly quantify it.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yep.
Natalie Franke: Both professionally and personally. It is the only reason I am where I am in my own career today. It's not what I know. It's not even who I know, right?
But it's like how I've made people feel and how I've learned to fall in love with the art of being kind and supporting others and finding that in doing that doors open that never would've opened otherwise, both for me and for them. And so. I'll stop there out all of it to say you start with you and then from there you look outward.
One conversation, one [00:31:00] relationship at a time. You can go digitally change the way you're engaging on social media. You can find your local rising Tide group, which is now a 5 0 1 C3 nonprofit. It's having a huge comeback this year, like they're popping up everywhere again. And you can find a creative mornings.
You can pick one event you're gonna go to this year and start researching who else is going there and meet up with them in advance or carve out time, right? There's no, no shortage of ways. It's just a matter of making the decision to prioritize that in your day to day, in your business and in your life.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah, just to, just to also give a little bit of a plug for both of us here. Flodesks does have the Flodesks Insider's Facebook group, which, you know, if you're looking into using Flodesks, you know. Or if you are using your business, there are going to be like-minded photographers right alongside you in there.
And same thing with Imagen, you know, we have the Imagen community that there's a lot of other Imageners in there with the same questions and same problems that you might have. in fact, I [00:32:00] took one thing. I think you'll appreciate this, that we've been experimenting with and they've been growing and growing.
I'm doing a monthly Imageners meet. If you're in the community, you're invited to join a Google meet, and it's a one hour call where you just hop on and hang out and an ask a question, and maybe there's another Imagener face to face that has an answer for you where it's just you stop, you know, working on business at that moment and just have a nice conversation with a group of others in the same boat.
so you know, there's. Looking at virtual, there's so many options, obviously in person, as you said, much more difficult, especially have as you have families and, you know, photo sessions and events and whatever it might be. But, there's, there's that.
Natalie Franke: Yes.
Exploring New Creative Outlets and Future Aspirations
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Scott Wyden Kivowitz: so we, again, we've mentioned this multiple times, but you've written books.
you used to start, you started a successful business photography business. you started. A successful business podcast [00:33:00] now, which Akua has Lorraines of and is doing a fantastic job. what advice would you give photographers who are interested in exploring other creative outlets, whether it's writing or podcasting or other passive income opportunities, courses and so on, like that?
Natalie Franke: Yeah, the, the biggest place to start here with advice is something that I just personally really strongly. Struggled with as a photographer, which is, you know, well, it's a lot of things. I'm just gonna start throwing it at you. So first, you are not your business. Your business is not you. And I don't mean that in a negative way.
What I mean is your business is an extension of your genius and your creativity, but if it were to go away tomorrow, it does not detract from your identity, as a person. And I think I really struggled with that because I had spent eight years building this photography identity that I, at the time felt like, but if I do other things.
Then who am I? Because I'm, I'm a photographer that that's [00:34:00] who I am, and I clung so tightly to that. And so the first thing I would just say in encouragement is, you know, all that you have learned in the pursuit of this business thus far, you know, is incredibly applicable and very much in line with a multitude of paths forward should you choose them.
And so if you decide for anyone listening that's like, I don't wanna do more, I love being a photographer. That is a phenomenal path to success and that is great. But for those who maybe have looked elsewhere or just wanna experiment or wanna see what else could be, a possibility for them, know that every year you've spent building a photography business has tell, taught you the necessary skills that can be transferred to nearly anything.
I remember I was sitting in, a meeting at HoneyBook amongst some incredible folks, you know, early on in the. My career early, early on, and arguably you could have said I was the most junior one in the room, but I was also the only one in the room who had ever run a [00:35:00] profitable business because we were a VC-backed startup.
And at the time, early on, right it, I remember kind of feeling inadequate, feeling like, who am I to sit in this room full of Silicon Valley? Silicon Valley geniuses? Like half these people graduated from Harvard Business School and. Again, like that limiting belief, that voice of fear and scarcity. But who am I?
And I, I don't remember who it was, but someone pulled me aside after that meeting and said, I didn't hear your voice enough, like, you're in here 'cause I want your voice. You're in here because you've run a profitable small business. You know, not just one function of how a company operates, you know, the entirety.
And more importantly than that, you know the community. I need you to speak up, right? Like, be loud, make noise. And I needed that reminder, but be gutsy. But I needed that reminder. And it, it was, you know, again, like I absorbed so much of that external criticism of our industry and we've, all of us, all of us [00:36:00] have fought it, right?
All the photographers who were listening to this have heard the, oh, how's that little creative business of yours doing? Is that a real job? Are you ever gonna get a real job? I could go on and on. You know, we start to absorb it after a while. So what I would say is that's where you, that's where you start.
You start by acknowledging that if you're interested in it, there's a reason and you already know far more than you realize. You are already far more qualified than you think you are, and there are people out there doing those things who are half as qualified than you right now without any sort of additional education and skills development.
So just begin there. But then the other thing I would say is experiment. Be willing to try new things. Be willing to try and fail. Reframe your relationship with failure in these sorts of revenue streams such that you are willing. To take risks, take chances, fail quickly, and iterate on top of it. I tell the story in gutsy about going back to HoneyBook, but about the first time that I met the most, impactful manager and [00:37:00] internal leader that I've ever had in my entire career, Dan Nik, and he's listening to this, he, I, I don't report to him anymore, so this is proof that I am not.
Brown-nosing. I am not sucking up to Dan. but I can genuinely say he changed everything about, how I view leadership. Because his first day he walks in, he had just joined Tiny Book and he'd come from companies you might have heard of, like Google change.org. Barack Obama follows this guy on Twitter.
Like I just wanna set the tone for. For Dan and how, you know, who, big deal comes walking in the door. And we were intimidated. We were terrified. I, at least I should say I was. He sits down at the table and the whole marketing team is around him and we're having this first marketing call. And again, community under that org falls under marketing.
And so, this is my new boss and he sits down at the table and he says, I'll never forget it. Do you know how many swings on average it takes a major league baseball player to hit a home run? And the room goes silent. 'cause here I am thinking this is some sort of test, like I'm gonna fail because I [00:38:00] don't know, I don't watch baseball.
I know nothing about the sport, but I, but I'm, I'm terrified. I'm like, okay, trying to do quick math. Like is he trying to see how we can rationally think or quantify something and or, you know, all of that. And he kind of stops us 'cause we're all spiraling and he can tell and he goes, look, the number is not even important.
What I'm trying to convey is that, you know, even the best baseball players in the world. Get up to the bat and swing multiple times before they hit the ball. And even when they hit the ball, the majority of those times, it never ends in a home run. So if you wanna hit a home run in your life, in your career, you have to be willing to get up and swing the bat knowing.
That the odds are not in your favor, and knowing that you're gonna miss more than you're gonna hit, and when you hit, it's not always gonna end in success. And that just shook things for me. He called it the batter's box. And every single week he would have our team come to the table with experiments we had run and learnings where [00:39:00] we failed.
He wanted us to report in on our failures. He made failure a almost like a cultural, you know, friend.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: It's, it's, yeah.
Natalie Franke: and it changed everything because how often in your photography business do you feel like if you make even, but a tiny mistake that it's just horrific and unacceptable and you can't stop thinking about it, and it's all that you focus on and you let yourself spiral into that doomsday scenario over one mistake.
I'm here to tell you. Get comfortable with it. Like you want to launch a course, you wanna write a bestselling book, you wanna launch a startup, you want to become an advisor, you wanna invest in something that takes off and changes the trajectory of your legacy. Great. Do it. Do it. Knowing that steps along the way are more likely to teach you things when they don't end in success.
But when they actually end in failure. And if you shift your perspective and you start looking for those learnings, you start, you know, taking steps and mitigated risks, knowing that you'll likely fail, but knowing that you're gonna learn along the way. [00:40:00] You'll look back five years from now and see a very different path.
There's a reason why in my own career progression, you see someone that's difficult to define. Like people say, what do you do? And I say, well, I've been a photographer. I've led a community, I've sold a company. I've worked at HoneyBook in a tech startup in a multitude of different positions, leading community.
I've created a podcast, written two books, one of which is A USA Today bestseller. I'm leading community now at Flodesks, which I'm actually, I'm running our marketing communications team. And what am I gonna do five years from now? No idea because. I am willing and always excited about learning what else I'm capable of and how I can help people along the way.
And I know that all of those highlights I just mentioned are built on a foundation of countless and infinite failures that never saw the light of day drafts of my book. That [00:41:00] if you had read, you would've laughed like. Horrible, horrible first drafts, right? Photographs I took early on in my career that, you know, all photographers can relate to that, right?
Like your first photo shoot, you know what it looked like, but you did it anyway, didn't you?
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Christine, you know, Christine, Christine had the last class at Imagen. so we all, we pat, we, we broke down the booth as fast as we could to get to her class. she kicks off the, her class, showing her one of her first wedding photos. How blurry it was and whatnot. But she shared this story behind it and like she, she talked a lot of the class was about story and then how to incorporate AI into your story and things like that.
But, talking about why that, why that photo was so important and how it also actually made her $50,000 in wedding clients as well from that one photo. so like. Just to, not to like completely interrupt what you were just saying, but like sometimes it is worth sharing
Natalie Franke: Yes. Yes, do it. Do [00:42:00] it imperfect, right? Like do it imperfectly and learn along the way and be willing to hold yourself to a standard of progress, right? A standard of of learning and curiosity, and not one in which the first sight of failure leads you to stop entirely. That's what I'm trying to say.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah. so you, you mentioned that my last question to you was going to be actually, asking about the future, but because you, because you already mentioned this, I'm gonna sneak this question in now. are there any. or aspirations that you do have, in the works that you can share that US fans of yours, can, can look forward to seeing in the near future?
Something that you can share? I.
Natalie Franke: Yes. So, you know, I've been brought into Flodesk to do something very, specific, which is, and, and this ties to the fact that my title is not Head of Marketing, not Head of Marketing Communications, not Head of Communications. It is head of Community and there is a reason for this. More specifically, I am [00:43:00] here to prove that Flodesks, by investing in our community, will grow our business far better than if we marketed ourselves.
That is what I'm here to do. So what that allows me to do as well is to invest in things that this audience might find exciting. Like a conference and not just a conference. We're going to do it better than, I mean, I am, I will. I can't reveal too much all is to say 2025. You can expect to see something really exciting coming out of our community.
we're actively working on it now behind the scenes, building out a partnership program, building out, just opportunities to elevate and support small business owners along the way. that is near future, that is next one to two years. Beyond that, no idea. I could be writing. High fantasy romance in three years, and my husband would not be surprised.
So we'll see. We'll see.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Well, that's, that's exciting. That's exciting. one more question for you, and then if we have enough [00:44:00] time, I'm gonna sneak one, one more tiny thing in, but, something come up while chatting with newer photographers at our booth at Culling USA. I'm curious to your take on this, how important do you think now 2024 is four formal, formal school training and photography versus business or marketing as a focus?
Natalie Franke: Ooh. Or business or marketing as a focus. This is a great, I, I.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Or anything else other than photography if knowing you wanna be a photographer?
Natalie Franke: Yeah, I mean, again, I think my first sort of thing that I would clarify is formal education doesn't have to be a college degree. By any means, because again, even my husband and I are having these convos about our kids, and I am not convinced that either of my kids will go to college, like we're putting money away so they could put it into a business, not just an education.
So at a higher level, I do think things are shifting. Now you go into the photography industry. How important is it? First, I would say I think each photographer is different. How we all learn is different. We all learned this back way back in elementary school. Some are tactile, some are visual, some are auditory.
We all learn differently. So I think that. [00:45:00] Education will always have a significant place in how we grow professionally and personally. The way in which you best learn from that education, I think is unique to you. But what I will say is that if you can spend time, 30 minutes to learn from someone that can teach you things that you won't have to learn in five years of mistakes.
It is in your best interest to listen up because that is where I really see the ROI of education in 2024. It is, how can I learn from someone who's been there and done that, and then take that in and apply my spin to it, take that in and figure out how that really uniquely fits in my business model or my own definition of success.
I also think that with how fast technology is changing, not just in our industry but more broadly. You don't have the luxury of pretending that what worked last year will work this year. Okay? The way that you marketed a photography business when I [00:46:00] ran the business would literally get you nowhere today, right?
Like I would never advise you to do the things that I did to hit $250,000 in annual revenue by the end of that business. As a solo wedding photographer, I would never encourage you to do those things, but I think because of that, what I'm really saying is learn from people. Who are staying on top of what trends are working for your industry at this moment in time.
Learn from people that are testing these new AI tools that aren't just pretending that the entire technological foundation that we built our small businesses on isn't changing overnight because it is. And look at all of these things, not through a lens of fear. Not through a lens of worry and concern, but through a lens of excitement and curiosity, an applicable opportunity for you today.
If you do that and you stay on top of it and you're willing to grow and adapt, you will still have a business a year from now. You'll still have a business five years from now. It's those who I think are fearful. [00:47:00] Hesitant to accept new information into their sort of, SOP for how they run their business, right?
Their standard operating procedures for how they run their business that are ultimately the ones that are at a disadvantage. And the last thing I'll say. Is that education and community are tightly linked and it's one of the reasons I love that you are doing what you are doing at Imagen. It's one of the reasons why I'm excited about some of the more private plans I have for our Flodesks community, that anyone who's in it will start to see over the next coming months.
Because when you learn from your peers in an environment where sharing is encouraged, we don't gatekeep, we don't hide information. We're not afraid of telling the photographer next to us what's working to bring leads to the door. But we're, we're embracing the fact that if I give to you, I know if not today, in the future, you'll give to me and we create a stronger community together.
We rise together. That's the whole premise of rising tide. When you do that, education becomes woven with active in the field, experiment, experience, and support. And that support can be just as powerful, right? That support can be the [00:48:00] thing that keeps you from throwing in the towel when things get hard. So I'm a big fan of it.
I would say where I stay flexible is in the how and where and when and from whom. But education is perhaps even more important today than it has ever been before, because of the speed at which things are changing.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Yeah, well said. Okay. quick, rapid fire. You ready for this?
Natalie Franke: Let's do it.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Pick a color.
Natalie Franke: green
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Okay.
Natalie Franke: 'cause it's
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: You want me to pick a random card or you want me to shuffle through it and you tell me when to
Natalie Franke: Pick a random card
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Okay, here we
Natalie Franke: I picked green for
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: last
Natalie Franke: by the way. 'cause Minecraft is my son's favorite game at the moment, so I'm planning a green Minecraft birthday.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: nice. This is actually the perfect question for you. So, um, what do you consider yourself an expert at?
Natalie Franke: People.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Well done.
Natalie Franke: People. Mm-Hmm.[00:49:00]
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: One word answer. I love it. I love it. Thank you so much for, for chatting with me, Natalie. I, I, I'm glad we were able to do this. I love getting to hear from you and learn from you, and I can't wait to, see you in person again soon. So, so I, I hope I wasn't fanning out too much, but, you know, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta say what's what I, what, what's, what's in here.
So I appreciate
Natalie Franke: you're amazing. Scott. Thank you for asking me to be on the show. I love you. I love Imagen. I just am honored through and through, so thank you for having me.
Scott Wyden Kivowitz: Thank you.
