Unlock Business Growth and Scaling Your Opportunities by Leveraging Your Network

Speaker A: Past couple of years, Dear Founder has grown into something bigger than I ever expected.

Speaker B: What started as a podcast has become

Speaker A: a movement for women business owners over the age of 40. These women are looking for support, partnerships, advice, mentorship, and even new clients. All of which can be very hard to find. But that's what Dear Found her is about. It's about community. It's about building together, and not alone. To help support our rapidly growing community and to give you everything that you're looking for as you build your business grow. We created a private space, the Dear Found her forum. If Dear Found her has been meaningful to you and you want to be a part of what we're building as you build your own business, I hope that you'll join us inside. You can join the Dear Found her forum@dearfoundher.com or through the link that's linked in the show notes. And to those who are already inside, thank you. We love having you there, and we couldn't do it without you.

Speaker B: I want to ask you something. How many people do you know? Not followers, not your email list, but, uh, people. Real people who know your name, who you've worked with, who've built something alongside of you, who respect what you've done. I want you to take a second and actually think about it. If you've been building for 10, 15, 20 years, you know hundreds of people, maybe thousands. People from your first career, your second career, your community, your. Your kids, school, your former clients, your former colleagues, people who watched you build something once and would absolutely show up for you if you asked again. Most of you are not using that at all. You're spending your time trying to reach strangers on the Internet while sitting on a decade or two of genuine human capital that you built before you ever posted on Instagram. This month, we're changing that. Welcome to July. Your network is your net worth, and we are going to spend this entire month showing you exactly what to do with it.

Speaker C: Welcome to Dear Found Her. I'm Lindsay Pinchuk, founder, acquired entrepreneur, and part of the less than 1% of female founders who have led a company through acquisition. I built my first business from just $500 to seven figures without a marketing budget, simply using community, smart publicity, partnerships, and clear messaging. Now I host this show for women over 40 stepping into their next chapter, whether that's launching, pivoting, or scaling. Each week, you'll hear real founder stories about growing an audience, getting press, leading teams, navigating, scaling challenges, and becoming more

Speaker B: visible in the right ways.

Speaker A: No fluff, no gatekeeping.

Speaker C: Just what works around here. We build businesses that actually work with strategy, visibility, and each other.

Speaker B: Welcome back to Dear Founder. I'm your host, Lindsay Pinchuk. And if you're new here, I've been building businesses for 25 years. My first company, Bump Club and Beyond, started in 2010. With $500 and no marketing budget, I built it to seven figures. I never ran a paid ad for the first seven years. I want to say that again because I think people gloss over it. No paid ads for the first seven years. Seven figures. Three million people per month at our peak. You're probably asking how? And the answer to that question is relationships. Relationships, community, partnerships, my network. Uh, when I sold that company and started Dear found her the podcast and then the community and this whole ecosystem, I did the same thing. I didn't start from zero. I started from a network that I'd spent a decade building. Everything that we're talking about. This month, I've lived, not theorized, not read in a book, but lived in 10 years in corporate, in two businesses all. All across 25 plus years of building. This month, I have three incredible women joining me on the podcast. Liz Lang, who built the largest maternity brand in America before the Internet existed entirely through celebrity relationships. Steph Wybring from Joy Creative Shop, who went from $8,000 in a year to millions by leveraging other people's audiences. And Christine Dwindle, co founder of Sunday App, uh, who raised $145 million starting at age 40 through her network. Three different businesses, three different industries, the same strategy underneath all of it. I want to name something that almost nobody in the entrepreneur space is talking about. Women over 40 are the best networked people in business and you don't even know it. Think about what you've built over the last 20 years. Not your business, but your relationships. You have former colleagues who went on to run companies, former clients who now have budgets and needs and problems that you can solve. Former mentors who have reach and credibility and platforms. Former collaborators who trust your work. Producers who have taken your calls. Event organizers who have featured you. Journalists who have written about you. A 25 year old entrepreneur starting from scratch is spending years trying to build what you already have. Your network isn't a nice to have. It is the single most valuable business asset that you own. And, um, unlike your follower count, no algorithm can ever take it away from you. The research backs this up. The average age of the most successful entrepreneur isn't 26. It's 45. And one of the primary reasons is network depth by 45. You know enough people in enough places with enough trust built to make things happen that a 25 year old simply cannot. But here's where the mistake happens. Women take that network, that extraordinary hard built, decades deep network and they put it in a box marked my old life. When they pivot, they start over. They start from scratch on Instagram, they. They try to find new audiences when their best audience is already people who know and trust them. And trust me, that Instagram audience is important too, but for a different reason than your network is. So stop starting over. Start where you are, the people who already know you are your first market, your first partners, your first advocates. So work them. Let me tell you how I launched Dear Found her because I think it's the best proof I have of everything that I just said. First, when I sold Bump Club and Beyond, I worked for the new company for over two years. I worked there until it was simply no longer tolerable. And that's another story for another time. I still had a non compete so I couldn't work in the parenting space. But I knew I wanted to start something new. My mission was simple. I really just wanted to help other women build and grow their businesses using the simple marketing strategies that I had used to build mine. I had an idea for a podcast and a community for women business owners that but I had no existing audience for it. I didn't have a substack list, I didn't have an Instagram following under the Dear Found her name. But what I had was 10 years of relationships built at Bump um Club and 10 years of relationships built prior in corporate America. In that group of relationships I had TV producers who trusted me, partners who worked with me, and a community of women founders I'd been building alongside four for a decade. I didn't launch Dear Found her to strangers. I launched it to my network. The very first thing that I did is what I tell all of you to do when you are starting over, starting something new or making a change in your business. And that is I sent an email to everyone I knew. An email, not a newsletter, an email from my email address letting them know what it is that I was up to and what it is that I was doing. I'm going to link a substack article in the show notes of this episode that I that talks all about that email and what it actually said. That email is very important for everyone and you can utilize it even if you have already launched your business or are uh, even multiple years in so in any event, I sent that email. But before I even dropped an episode, I used one of my tried and true strategies to drive awareness and visibility to what I was building. And that was I created a holiday gift guide. Now, holiday gift guides are genius because they're content that feature other brands. And so all of a sudden, I built a gift guide. It was holiday gifts for her, by her. And I was talking about all of these other female founded products from the Dear Found her account. Now, I called the producer that I'd worked with at WGN and also at stations where I'd done other TV segments for years, and I pitched them a segment on a holiday gift guide, and it was for her by her female founded brands. My WGN contact and a contact at a station in Austin where I had done regular segments for years both immediately said yes. Before this podcast had a single live episode, Dear Found her had television coverage. Next, I reached out to the founders and it basically said, here's what I'm building, here's who I'm building it for. Here's how you can be a part of it. If it sounds right, I was also reaching out to them and booking them as guests on the show before an episode even dropped. I leaned on every relationship I had spent a day decade building. And because I'd built those relationships the right way, generosity with genuine interest without keeping score, these people showed up. Uh, Dear Found her didn't start with a marketing strategy. It started with a phone call to someone who already knew me. Actually, it started with multiple phone calls to people who already knew me and an email to everyone I knew. And this model, this model of reaching out and connecting with people in your network, it's one that I put into practice every single day. I'm constantly tapping into past relationships. Later this week on Substack, you'll hear how a former contact from my prior company helped me land Peloton's Jen Sherman on this show. Jen Sherman, who became not only my most downloaded guest, but also one of my closest friends and now my client. Very similarly to how Dear Found her started Rua Contact, another former TV producer of mine recently reached out to me to bring our uh Dear founder on tour with Sunny and Jen event to their organization for a one night engagement. More on that, but I share it because this is an example of tapping into contacts and contacts tapping into me is too good. Not to mention, this is the model I want you to take into July. Not how do I reach new people, but first, who already knows me and how do I Activate that. Here's how I want you to think about your network this month. There are five types of people. Every business owner needs all five. Number one, the first type. They're called the openers. These are the people who can open doors, you can't open yourself. They have platforms, audiences, communities, relationships, reach. They're not necessarily going to do the work with you, but one introduction from them changes everything. A producer, a podcast, a podcast host, a connector who knows everyone in the room. Think about who your openers are. The second type are, uh, the collaborators. These are the people you can build things with, co host an event, create a product together, co author a piece of content, refer each other's clients. These are the people who you want to be in real partnership with, where both of you walk away with something you couldn't have built alone. The third type of person in your network are the amplifiers. These are the people who talk about your work, not because you paid them, but because they genuinely believe in what you're doing. And they're connected to exactly the people you want to reach. A happy client who recommends you to everyone she knows. A podcast guest who shares the episode with her huge community. An early member of your community who tells every woman she meets that she needs to be in the community. These are the amplifiers. The fourth type of person in your network are the anchors. These are the people in your corner, regardless of what you're building. They've seen you through multiple iterations. They know your work, your character, your track record. When you are doubting yourself, which every founder does. These are the people that you call. They're not just your business network, they're your foundation. And the last type of person in your network are the students. These are the people who are coming up behind you, the ones you can learn from as much as teach to. They're connected to audiences and communities you're not in yet. They bring energy and ideas and perspective you need. Don't underestimate this category. When you look at your network through these five lenses, openers, collaborators, amplifiers, anchors, students, you stop seeing it as a list of names and you start seeing it as strategy. Who do you have? Who are you missing? Who do you need to reconnect with? Here's what's coming this month, and I want you to clear your Tuesday mornings because you are not going to want to miss any of it. On July 14, we have Liz Lang. You know the name Liz Lang. Maternity. She built a brand that dressed every pregnant celebrity in the 1990s, before there was an Internet to help her. She landed a co brand with Nike, the first non athlete Nike had ever co branded with. She went into Target when everyone told her it would destroy her brand and it became the largest maternity brand in America. She did all of it through relationships. On July 21st we have Steph Wybring from the Joy Creative shop. Steph made $8,000 in a whole year selling on Etsy. Then she paid two friends with audiences to feature her in their holiday gift guides. She made $8,000 in one month and now she's at multi Millions. The strategy was leveraging other people's networks and it's still one that she uses today. And on July 28th we will have Christine De Wendell, Co Founder of Sunday App Sunday App ah is an app that you use at checkout at restaurants which we're going to talk all about on the episode and you likely have probably used it already. But Christine left a seat level role in Paris, moved back to her hometown in the US feeling invisible, and then raised $145 million starting at age 40 through her network. Three different businesses, three different industries, one strategy. Your network is the asset and this month we are going to learn how to use it. And this Thursday on July 9th, I'm hosting a live workshop with the amazing Emily Claire Hughes on exactly how to use your email list to deepen and monetize the relationships that you're building through networking. Email is the bridge between your network and your revenue. If you want to be there live, you're going to want to register through the link in the Show Notes before I let you go. If you want to go deeper on everything we're covering this month, the Found her files on Substack is where I write. Free subscribers get a quick win every Tuesday. It's sharp. It's short, sharp and actionable. Premium subscribers get the Thursday Deep Dive, which is where I go all the way in. You can click the link in the Show Notes to subscribe. If you're building something and you've been building it alone without a community of women who get it, the Dear Founder forum is exactly what it sounds like. It's the room I built so you don't have to build alone. Again, the link is in the Show Notes with all the details. I'll be back next Tuesday with Liz Lang. You don't want to miss it. She told me things in that conversation that I was not expecting and I think that they're going to stop you dead in your tracks. Thank you so much for being here. Have a great week and I will see you next Tuesday.