Brand Building

What the sessions actually say

1. Mine your sales calls for the line that actually activates buyers

   Dain's shortcut to a core message: rewind to the moment in a sales conversation where the prospect lit up and said yes. Ask what exactly you said just before that. That phrase, not a brainstormed tagline, is the emotional core of your messaging. His team opens strategic workshops with "take me through the sales process, what's the sales language, what activates people".

   Dain WalkerDain Walker: Brand Strategy That Actually Scales →

2. Treat trust as an output of relevancy plus credibility

   Dain argues you cannot chase trust directly. Trust is what happens when the market sees you as relevant (same language, same beliefs, same problem) and credible (proof that counts in your category). Credibility in financial services looks nothing like credibility in beauty, so define what proof your specific pool respects before you build assets.

   Dain WalkerDain Walker: Brand Strategy That Actually Scales →

3. Ask your audience what they want, then bucket the answers

   Before writing his book, Dain posted a mock-up cover on Instagram asking what people wanted to learn about personal branding. Over 1,000 comments came in. Cam sorted them into buckets and they collapsed into five problems: I'm scared to start, where do I start, is it worth the time, people will judge me, and I'm overwhelmed. Run the same exercise and let the buckets become your messaging pillars.

   Dain WalkerDain Walker: Brand Strategy That Actually Scales →

4. Raise capital instead of waiting to save the fit out cost

   Caitlin and her co-founder were 25 with about $1,000 in the bank and a shopfront concept that needed over half a million dollars. They stalled for months assuming they had to save it. The unlock was pitching venture capital with three things: the problem in the market, their business as the solution, and the addressable market and opportunity for the investor. That raise is the only reason Facechelle launched.

   Panel EventBoa Live Panel: Brand, Team and Staying Power →

5. Say the words 'what does that mean' in the investor room

   Once the raise closed, Caitlin sat in board meetings feeling like an idiot, too embarrassed to admit she did not know a term, so she went quiet and let the conversation run past her. Jules does the opposite: she stops the conversation and asks what a word means, even if it looks silly. The cost of looking uninformed for ten seconds is far lower than the cost of agreeing to something you did not understand.

   Panel EventBoa Live Panel: Brand, Team and Staying Power →

6. Cold DM the person one step ahead of you

   Before launching Figur, Jules messaged the owner of Budgy Smuggler, a person she had never met, and asked to meet up. He said yes and shared what he had learned building an Australian apparel brand overseas. Jake Jaggard hired someone who found her through LinkedIn DMs and hustled her into a coffee. Her rule: you will not get a yes unless you ask the question.

   Panel EventBoa Live Panel: Brand, Team and Staying Power →

7. Fix target market and messaging before any tactic

   Allan calls these foundational, which he defines bluntly: if you get this wrong, you are stuffed. SEO hacks, pay-per-click and content all fall flat on top of a bad message and wrong targeting. Treat marketing like building a house and get the architectural blueprint down before you lay bricks.

   Allan DibAllan Dib: get the message right before you amplify it →

8. Interview your clients instead of guessing why they buy

   The first thing Allan's accelerator makes people do is interview their customer base. He says he has never seen a business owner not be surprised by the real reason people buy. Owners think it is their technical skill, but Allan changed accountants three or four times and never because the next one was better at accounting, it was because they were more responsive and proactive.

   Allan DibAllan Dib: get the message right before you amplify it →

9. Mine three sources for the exact words customers use

   One, sales calls, which you should be recording and reviewing with AI transcripts to find the most common questions. Two, customer service and the help desk, for the most common complaints and sticking points. Three, client interviews. Capture the phrasing verbatim rather than paraphrasing it into your own jargon, then use those exact words back in your marketing.

   Allan DibAllan Dib: get the message right before you amplify it →

10. Treat your first podcast interview as an audition for the next ten

    Amanda's method: listen to a few podcasts you admire and write down the questions that come up every time (your backstory, a time you thought you'd lose everything, your proudest achievement). Workshop punchy, succinct answers with anecdotes before you pitch anyone. Then chase one interview and treat it as the audition that gets you on other shows. She calls it a concertina effect, and it started for her more than ten years ago as a guest.

    Amanda DelosaAmanda Delosa: PR and personal brand without a budget →

11. One podcast interview generated around $500,000 in revenue

    Amanda went on Mark Boris's show Mentored during COVID. Listeners who sat through an hour of her talking arrived already sold, doing ten minute discovery calls and paying large invoices to start a strategy. She estimates that single interview generated roughly $500,000 in revenue. That is why she calls long-form the bingeable content: an hour builds trust that a reel cannot.

    Amanda DelosaAmanda Delosa: PR and personal brand without a budget →

12. Cut one interview into three months of micro content

    Any podcast interview you do can be snipped into micro content. Amanda says some founders get about three months of posts from one recording. So go after the big pinnacle piece first and break it down, rather than trying to invent fresh short-form ideas from scratch every week.

    Amanda DelosaAmanda Delosa: PR and personal brand without a budget →

13. Audit your profile like a stranger with 10 seconds

    Divina runs the same check on every founder she meets. Land on the Instagram cold and ask: can I see who you are, what you do and who you serve in the first 10 seconds? Look for social proof in the highlight reel showing work with people in the visitor's sector, a bio that states the outcome and who it is for, and an obvious way to contact you (form, DM or email). If any of those are missing, the content is not the problem.

    Divina ArmuelaTurning content and personal brand into paying clients →

14. Put a CTA on every single post or you are leaking sales

    Divina's line: you can go viral for all sorts of things, but if you are not leading that audience to the next step you are just leaking. Every post needs to tell the viewer how to move to the next level. Do not expect people to figure out the next move themselves. Everyone needs to be led.

    Divina ArmuelaTurning content and personal brand into paying clients →

15. Run three posts a week across only three pillars

    The system a busy founder can actually stick to is a maximum of three posts a week, built on three pillars: who you are and your values, your offer, and social proof. Divina says if you only pick three pillars, pick those three. Nothing else is required to start.

    Divina ArmuelaTurning content and personal brand into paying clients →

16. Set a daily revenue number before anyone quits their job

    Don did not wait for a million dollar plan. The first milestone was a consistent $500 a day, enough to cover rent, before he left his job. Matilda's trigger was ten times that, roughly $5K a day, before she left recruitment. Pick a daily number tied to a real bill, hit it consistently, then make the leap.

    Don RobertsonSTAX: 10 Years of Building a Cult Activewear Brand →

17. Hire for demand, not for the org chart you want

    STAX's first meaningful hire was customer service, not marketing or brand. They had oversold a collection and were drowning in around 800 emails overnight on Outlook with no ticketing system. Matilda was answering them at 3am and giving things away for free. Hire into the place that is currently breaking, and hire someone who loves the brand but is not so emotionally invested that every angry email ruins them.

    Don RobertsonSTAX: 10 Years of Building a Cult Activewear Brand →

18. If you have to negotiate with yourself to hire someone, it is a no

    Don's rule after several bad hires. Matilda adds that every time they second-guessed their gut and hired anyway, it was a disaster. She also warns against treating interviews as a PR pitch: they used to run a PowerPoint on why you should work at STAX, and people arrived expecting the Instagram personalities rather than bosses. Make interviews an even exchange so both sides can test the fit honestly.

    Don RobertsonSTAX: 10 Years of Building a Cult Activewear Brand →

19. Test demand with a Photoshopped product and a $20 a day Google ad

    Anaita Sarkar validated Hero Packaging before manufacturing anything. She built a single landing page with a Photoshopped image of a compostable mailer, three fields (shipping address, email, business name) and the offer "do you want a free compostable mailer?". She spent $20 a day on Google Ads targeting searches like sustainable packaging, compostable packaging, eco packaging and green packaging. She hoped for 20 to 30 signups and got 1,000 in seven days.

    Dylan MullanCreating and selling products customers can't get enough of →

20. Free samples only count as proof when people come back and pay

    Sarkar's husband pushed back on the 1,000 signups because free is not a business. The samples cost about $7 each, so it was a real spend. She waited one to two months to see how many of those 1,000 would place a paid order. About 70 per cent did, giving her 700 paying customers and genuine evidence of demand.

    Dylan MullanCreating and selling products customers can't get enough of →

21. Take a service people already pay for and turn it into a DIY product

    Dylan Mullan modelled Happy Skin Co on HiSmile and Bondi Sands, both of which took something you used to book in for (dentist teeth whitening, spray tan) and made it a home product. Laser hair removal fitted the same pattern: expensive, inconvenient, painful, and strangers in your business. The technology already existed with Braun and Philips on the bottom shelf of shaver shops, but nobody had marketed it on social media.

    Dylan MullanCreating and selling products customers can't get enough of →

22. Cap the soft launch at three months, then go

    Grace still backs building in public because it holds founders accountable. But she would never stretch the coming-soon phase past three months. Beyond that, the audience loses interest and moves to whatever is trending next, and you have spent time and money on content that no one can buy from.

    Grace GarrickHard launching your brand with PR founder Grace Garrick →

23. Define a hard launch as a compressed window, not a big budget

    Grace clarified this mid-session: a hard launch does not mean a launch event, paid talent or a large-scale campaign. It means everything you would have drip fed over six months goes out in a very short window. Same content, same spend, far more impact, because the density of the messaging is what makes it feel big.

    Grace GarrickHard launching your brand with PR founder Grace Garrick →

24. Lift the embargo, post the content and open the site on the same day

    If you are launching by PR, set one embargo date so all media coverage goes live together, then repurpose and amplify that across your socials. Do the same for your key launch content, your website and your EDMs. One day, all channels, no staggering.

    Grace GarrickHard launching your brand with PR founder Grace Garrick →

25. Improve an existing daily habit rather than replace one

    Jaryd's starting question was "what's going to replace coffee?" He changed it to "why replace it when we can just improve it?" Coffee is the most widely consumed beverage behind water and people do not skip their morning cup, so adding vitamins and minerals means the customer gets the upside without changing behaviour. If you want a big brand, pick something already inside a daily habit or routine.

    Jaryd TerkelsenBefore You Speak Coffee: from one SKU to 1,500 retailers →

26. Launch with one product and one audience

    Before You Speak launched with a single performance coffee, still its number one seller today. With limited resources you are the marketing team and the customer service team, so pushing multiple messages to multiple audiences makes your own life harder. Get one product moving, then use customer feedback to guide what you build next. The unsweetened range and other SKUs came later.

    Jaryd TerkelsenBefore You Speak Coffee: from one SKU to 1,500 retailers →

27. Do not order 10,000 units on your first purchase order

    Their initial PO was 10,000 boxes. It took roughly nine months to sell through, which Jaryd calls not the smartest move on cash flow. Size your first order against a realistic sell-through window, not against your ambition, because that inventory is cash you cannot spend on acquiring customers.

    Jaryd TerkelsenBefore You Speak Coffee: from one SKU to 1,500 retailers →

28. Treat any ChatGPT draft as a 1 out of 10 and build from there

    Jeremy's point is that AI output is probably better than most of us could write, which is exactly the problem. If it takes one prompt, everyone has it. Ask what would make the same page a 10 out of 10, then do that work. Never publish straight from ChatGPT to the internet.

    Jeremy CabralFinder's Jeremy Cabral on SEO, AI search and Reddit →

29. Print the page and read it aloud before you publish

    A trick Finder used for years. Print out the content and read it out loud. If the words are embarrassing to say, the content is crappy. On screen you skim and skip sentences, so you miss the fluff. Then hand it to someone and ask directly whether it is useful.

    Jeremy CabralFinder's Jeremy Cabral on SEO, AI search and Reddit →

30. Build 6 to 8 guides as a cluster before moving to the next topic

    Do not write whatever interests you. Pick one topic, map the 6 to 8 guides your customer actually needs, link them to each other and keep overlap between them low. Each guide answers a distinct intent. The cluster has to be logical for your customers and make sense to Google.

    Jeremy CabralFinder's Jeremy Cabral on SEO, AI search and Reddit →

31. Reverse-engineer a headline from a brand you aspire to

    Jessy's method: pick the founder or brand you want to be like, search where they have been covered, then find the exact headline. Her example was "Jane Lu creates fashion empire selling $59 dresses". Then write your own version of that headline with your point of difference in it, such as a lower price point or the product going viral on TikTok, and pitch that to the same journalist.

    Jessy MarshallHow to pitch media and influencers without an agency →

32. Write to the publication, not to media in general

    Daily Mail and the Australian Financial Review do not speak the same language, so the same pitch will not work for both. Daily Mail leans into what is going viral on TikTok and what customers are saying. Marie Claire wants ingredients if you are beauty, or fabrics if you are fashion. Read a recent storey about a competitor in that masthead and bundle your storey up the same way.

    Jessy MarshallHow to pitch media and influencers without an agency →

33. Send one Dropbox link with every asset a journalist could need

    Jessy's asset pack: the correct live website link (state clearly that you want your own site linked, not Priceline or another stockist, or they will link the stockist), e-commerce imagery on white for magazines, lifestyle imagery for outlets like Daily Mail, and a press release with brand background in case they widen the storey. Do their job for them.

    Jessy MarshallHow to pitch media and influencers without an agency →

34. Fix the 5 Ps before you optimise a single ad dollar

    Jo argues small budgets get wasted because founders jump straight to ROI optimisation without the fundamentals. Start with proposition (what do you actually stand for, in the way The Iconic settled on "a better way for people to shop") and people (exactly who you are for). Getting those right is what drives the efficiency of every dollar afterwards. Trying to be all things to all people dilutes the brand, even on a large FMCG budget.

    Jo RobinsonThe Iconic's CMO on getting off the paid performance drug →

35. Watch for churn as the signal that paid performance has topped out

    The Iconic counts a customer as churned if they do not purchase again within 12 months of acquisition. Jo found they were spending heavily on paid performance, acquiring customers once, then losing them, which she describes as literally buying customers. Track first-purchase-to-repeat over a 12 month window. If acquisition spend keeps rising while repeat rate stays flat, more paid budget will not fix it.

    Jo RobinsonThe Iconic's CMO on getting off the paid performance drug →

36. Use unprompted brand awareness as the metric that justifies brand spend

    The Iconic's unprompted awareness was declining quarter on quarter because they had done nothing beyond Google, banner advertising and a little SEO. Jo used that decline as the board argument for shifting spend to the top of the funnel. She warned it could dent short-term sales and would take six months to a year to show. Awareness has since moved up 4 basis points against competitors who outspend them.

    Jo RobinsonThe Iconic's CMO on getting off the paid performance drug →

37. Build the brand pyramid from the bottom, not from the tagline

    Start at points of parity (tangible ones like 'safe to use', 'delivered on time', 'servers up 99.9%', and intangible ones like 'I feel smart making this choice'). Then purpose or central organising idea, then rational benefits, then emotional benefits, then values, then persona, and only then promise. Josh's point is that promise is impossible to write in a sentence until you have answered everything under it. Promise is a North Star, not a tagline like 'Just Do It'.

    Josh SparksJosh Sparks: the brand pyramid, archetypes and the WHAC exercise →

38. Swap points of difference for reasons to believe

    Josh argues most products and services have very few genuine points of difference once you strip out price and speed. Instead of hunting for a POD, ask what reason you give someone to believe your promise. Rational RTBs are price, service, delivery speed, returns policy, warranty, organic versus conventional cotton. Emotional RTBs are the ones that pay: will they feel smarter, freer, more creative, more beautiful, higher status.

    Josh SparksJosh Sparks: the brand pyramid, archetypes and the WHAC exercise →

39. Aim for the unfair advantage as your top emotional benefit

    The highest emotional benefit, per Josh, is that buying from you confers what the customer perceives as an unfair advantage. Something others do not have. It can be internal confidence and certainty, or an outward symbol of status, or both, in the same way that working with Goldman Sachs on an IPO or McKinsey on growth makes an executive show up with more certainty. If you can distil your emotional RTB down to an unfair advantage, you are in a very strong position.

    Josh SparksJosh Sparks: the brand pyramid, archetypes and the WHAC exercise →

40. Build up to your promise, do not start with it

    Sparks runs a brand pyramid workshop that takes roughly a day or two, and it works bottom up. Start with the central organising idea (your reason for being), then points of parity (the rational hygiene factors that get you on the field but never win the game), then points of difference (both rational and emotional), then your value set, then a single archetype, and only then the promise. Asked cold, most founders describe their offer ("we sell supplements", "we own hair salons") rather than a promise.

    Joshua SparksBuilding a brand promise that lifts company value →

41. Write the promise as two words you can build product against

    For MJ Bale the promise landed on "rugged elegance". The tailoring and knitwear could have drifted towards a soft English or Ralph Lauren feel, but founder Matt Jensen is the son of a sheep farmer with a farm in Barrow, so a tougher, functional element was authentic to him. Find the phrase that sits at the intersection of the category and the founder's real story, then make product decisions against it.

    Joshua SparksBuilding a brand promise that lifts company value →

42. Audit every touchpoint against the promise

    Once the promise is set, break it down across product, in-store experience, online experience, wholesale accounts, third party e-com platforms, all marketing, ambassadors and influencers. Every point where you touch the consumer either honours the promise or breaks it. Inconsistency is what fractures trust fastest, in brands the same as in personal relationships.

    Joshua SparksBuilding a brand promise that lifts company value →

43. Hire to take jobs off the founder, not to fill a job title

    Kirstin-Lee pushes back on the standard advice to hire a head of marketing or an e-commerce manager. Instead, open your calendar and ask what is clogging your focus, then employ someone to take those specific jobs away. Her reasoning: the most valuable person in the business is the founder, and buying back headspace is what lets the vision grow.

    Kirstin-Lee KeysersKivari's founder on delegation, brand filters and saying no →

44. Use the 80 per cent rule to force yourself to delegate

    The rule she keeps coming back to: if someone else can do the job at 80 per cent, that beats it being done at 100 per cent by you. She still catches herself wanting to jump back in and repeats the rule to stop herself. It works as a live filter every time you are tempted to take a task back off a team member.

    Kirstin-Lee KeysersKivari's founder on delegation, brand filters and saying no →

45. Audit your week on paper, then circle the two or three jobs only you can do

    Write down everything you did this week, including gym, cleaning the house and the school drop-off, not just work tasks. Then circle the jobs only the founder can do. Kirstin-Lee guarantees there will be two or three. Everything else gets delegated, systemised or deleted, and she says deleting is her favourite of the three.

    Kirstin-Lee KeysersKivari's founder on delegation, brand filters and saying no →

46. Compress your two to five year plan when a shock hits

    When COVID arrived, Kristy had just launched and already had the infrastructure in place. Rather than freeze, the team executed everything in their two to five year plan inside two weeks so they could handle the volume, reaching 50,000 doughnuts a week. Her mentor's line when she thought she had lost everything: "it's not an adventure if you know where you're going, so get on with it."

    Kristy ValentineBuilding Dr. Dough and preparing a business for sale →

47. Hire a real accountant, not a cowboy, from the start

    Kristy is blunt that finances must be in order from day one: compliant, up to date, ATO happy, payroll never skipping a beat. Her point is that this is not something you can switch on later when you want to sell. An acquirer turns over every stone in due diligence, and if something is not right you will not even be considered.

    Kristy ValentineBuilding Dr. Dough and preparing a business for sale →

48. Pay for a CFO earlier than feels sensible

    A doughnut shop with a CFO sounds absurd, and Kristy admits it was very expensive and a heavy line on the P&L. She invested anyway. Without it, Dr. Dough would not have been in a position years later to be considered for acquisition at all.

    Kristy ValentineBuilding Dr. Dough and preparing a business for sale →

49. Define your target value before you record anything

    Kyle uses a who, what, how framework. Who am I creating value for, what specific value am I creating, and how do I create it. For his own show the who was business owners in years one to three, and the what was education and inspiration. The how is the part you keep iterating on.

    Kyle TraynorPodcasting, content research and personal brand with Kyle Traynor →

50. Give your show a mission specific enough to guide every episode

    Kyle's mission was to eradicate the need for a paid course for people in their first three years of business. That is why he refused to skip over detail. When a guest says "we raised $10 million and then went to market", that is the moment to stop and pull the string rather than move on.

    Kyle TraynorPodcasting, content research and personal brand with Kyle Traynor →

51. Go hyper-detailed on one subject per episode to stand out

    Kyle knew he was competing with Diary of a CEO and the Hormozis of the world for the one to three podcasts a person listens to each week. Stephen Bartlett went emotional, so Kyle went the opposite way. If the guest's genius is marketing, spend 60 minutes on marketing in detail.

    Kyle TraynorPodcasting, content research and personal brand with Kyle Traynor →

52. Run your feed on a Monday to Friday pillar timetable

    Lexi's core method: five posts a week, one pillar per weekday, no more. Monday is founder content, Tuesday is customer-centric, Wednesday is aspirational, Thursday is promotional, Friday is influencer content. Post more than five and you lose interest, post less and you do not grow. Once the days are fixed you stop asking what to post and just fill the slot.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic social that grows a brand without ad spend →

53. Batch a month of founder content in one filming session

    The Monday founder pillar only needs four pieces a month, so film all four in one sitting. Meet the founder, your why, a founder highlight or journey story, and something honest about what you are working through. Lexi ran her own founder pillar solo for six years before hiring a content person two weeks before this session.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic social that grows a brand without ad spend →

54. Pick polished over raw when the brand is premium

    Lexi has changed her view on building in public. Crying on the internet can cheapen a brand that is trying to enter the market poised and professional, and she notes Uber and Airbnb never launched raw and real. Aim for elevated, chic, real and honest, but not unfiltered. If you are client-facing you also cannot post about client problems without legal risk.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic social that grows a brand without ad spend →

55. Build a service business account on four pillars, not random posts

    For a styling business Lexie mapped four posts a week: an expert pillar (a styling tip with no sell attached), a promotional pillar that spells out packages, pricing structure, onboarding and timelines, a customer pillar of testimonials and value, and an aspirational industry pillar. She stopped hiding her own package details years ago because being copied happens anyway and the delivery is never the same. Ambiguity loses the client who swipes on to someone clearer.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic content pillars, founder storey and getting engagement →

56. Use the aspirational pillar as your Vogue for free

    Lexie calls the fourth pillar the Vogue or Forbes for free: you place yourself alongside the level you want to be at by commenting on it. Her example for a stylist was posting the four Vogue articles you liked from Australian Fashion Week and your takeaways, then three predicted trends ahead of Paris Fashion Week in September. Keep it to your genuine expertise and avoid making claims you cannot back.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic content pillars, founder storey and getting engagement →

57. Treat Instagram as people who know you and TikTok as people who do not

    Lexie frames Instagram like the Facebook algorithm, distributing mostly to friends and family, which is why an account under 300 followers stays capped. TikTok pushes to strangers, closer to a TV commercial or a YouTube pre-roll. That difference should change what you post where, not just where you cross-post the same file.

    Lexie MurrayOrganic content pillars, founder storey and getting engagement →

58. Show the same outfit on two different body types

    Leah's highest-converting format is her and Renee, a size 6 and a size 12, wearing similar outfits and showing how each looks on both bodies. She has run this format consistently for close to four years, first with Ella and now with Renee. It is the content that reliably cuts through, and it is also what pulls new customers into the brand in the first place.

    Lia GeorgantisLeah, Girls with Gems: daily content that converts →

59. Lock the posting frequency, not the outfits

    Girls with Gems fixes how many times it posts across each channel every day, but only plans the actual content one to two days out. A Monday trade and creative meeting maps what is coming, then it changes constantly. If it is pouring rain the Hunza G swim launch gets pushed, because it will fall on deaf ears.

    Lia GeorgantisLeah, Girls with Gems: daily content that converts →

60. Give one day of the week a fixed identity

    Every Saturday is Sexy Saturdays, the hot going-out dresses, and it has run for years. The team deliberately holds back the strongest party pieces for that slot. A repeating named day gives you a reason to save your best stock and gives the audience a reason to check in.

    Lia GeorgantisLeah, Girls with Gems: daily content that converts →

61. Be the boob doctor, not the general practitioner

    Lisa coached electricians, carpet layers and any small business that came her way, and it satisfied nobody. A mentor asked her whether she had ever seen the cars a boob doctor drives, because specialists get paid like specialists. She niched entirely into women running DTC brands and the business took off, because she could speak to one group's pain points intimately instead of applying general logic to everyone.

    Lisa JonesLisa Jones: pick one lane and let customers write your copy →

62. Choose a market you have already been part of

    Daniel Hakim quotes Mark Bouris: make your market someone you are, or someone you have been before. Lisa agrees, adding that most women build a product because they solved their own problem, whether that is skin, gut health or a baby product. You need a real story attached to the business, because people sniff out inauthenticity and do not buy.

    Lisa JonesLisa Jones: pick one lane and let customers write your copy →

63. Check the market is big enough to pay your price

    Passion is only half the test. Lisa's second filter is whether thousands of people will pay the price you need to make money. If only about 1,000 people in Australia need the product, and they need it once, you will always be doing a hard sell. Premium pricing is fine, cheap is not the point, but there has to be real appetite so the product is easy to sell rather than a grind.

    Lisa JonesLisa Jones: pick one lane and let customers write your copy →

64. Sell the idea before you build it, then underwrite the build

    Lisa calls it selling vaporware. She comes up with a concept, pre-sells it, and only creates it once the market has shown it will eat it up. She has done this with all 40 of her books and with the magazine itself, which gave her both confidence and speed to market. She has never borrowed money for a business in 23 years.

    Lisa MessengerLisa Messenger: pre-sell it, value stack it, then build it →

65. Value stack one big sponsor instead of selling small ads

    The industry model was a flat ad on a page for $10,000. The first issue of Collective Hub cost $350,000, so she would have needed 35 pre-sold ads just to break even. Instead she asked CommBank's CMO Andy Lark for $200,000 and stacked physical copies, advertorial, editorial, speaking and written articles on top, roughly $600,000 of value for his $200,000. It was sponsorship and advertising dollars, not a loan.

    Lisa MessengerLisa Messenger: pre-sell it, value stack it, then build it →

66. Make 79 calls and stalk the one person who fits your thesis

    Lisa made around 79 phone calls before she got to Andy Lark, chosen because people told her he loved entrepreneurs and still liked print. She chased him for about three months through multiple angles, then sent a tweet at 10pm and got a 2pm meeting the next day. She almost did not go. Go to the knife-edge meeting.

    Lisa MessengerLisa Messenger: pre-sell it, value stack it, then build it →

67. Cut cost relative to revenue, then hunt the efficiencies that fall out

    Bouris says he does this in his own business: cut the cloth to suit, then use the process to discover where efficiencies actually sit. When money is loose everyone adds subscriptions, six more employees, across the board increases. A tight cycle exposes all of it. His framing is not "cut costs" for its own sake, it is keeping costs proportionate to revenue and then looking for what the exercise reveals.

    Mark BourisMark Bouris on branding, networking and surviving the down cycle →

68. Market hard now because everyone else has pulled up stumps

    Bouris expects the tough conditions to run at least another six to eight months. His point is that when the cycle turns next year it is too late to start marketing, because everyone will be doing it then. Use digital channels through the quiet period and make the content genuinely valuable, so the audience finishes it thinking that was good information about my industry.

    Mark BourisMark Bouris on branding, networking and surviving the down cycle →

69. Improve everything, not just sales, while demand is low

    When there is huge demand you spend every day just doing. Bouris says the down cycle is the time to work on the business: sales processes, employment processes, inductions, annual conferences. Fewer clients means more hours available to rebuild the machine rather than run it.

    Mark BourisMark Bouris on branding, networking and surviving the down cycle →

70. Ask your youngest customers for a feed tour

    Milly hosted two 15-year-old work experience students for two days and used the time to ask a million questions, listen to how they spoke, and get a tour of what was actually showing up on their algorithm. Her rule: if you are targeting young people, hire young people, and if you are targeting new mums, hire a mum. There is no point guessing when your customer is sitting right there and usually happy to tell you.

    Milly BannisterMilly Bannister: storytelling, Gen Z and founder burnout →

71. Run customer calls about the brand, not just the product

    Milly pointed to Davey from Boring Without You Skincare, who runs calls with customers who want to give feedback. Not about the formulations, which are already sorted, but about the brand and the way it speaks to people. Ask questions you cannot guess the answer to, like whether they want the newsletter the day before a launch or on launch day.

    Milly BannisterMilly Bannister: storytelling, Gen Z and founder burnout →

72. Co-create the joke instead of borrowing it

    Big brands come off cringe when they use Gen Z language without knowing where the meme came from or being in on the joke. Milly's point: young people are marketing machines who create culture themselves, so the brands that land are co-creating culture with their demographic rather than tapping into it after the fact. She named Rhode by Hailey Bieber as the extreme example of a brand creating culture rather than chasing it.

    Milly BannisterMilly Bannister: storytelling, Gen Z and founder burnout →

73. Gift your entire first production run before you spend on ads

    Priscilla gave away all 500 units of Bangn Body's first shipment to anyone who would take it, and did not run Meta or Facebook ads for over 12 months. The logic was recognition: by the time ads ran, she wanted roughly one in ten people to already know the brand so the ad worked harder. Naked Sundays did the same, running no paid media for the first two or three years and relying on seeding, press and events.

    Priscilla HajiantoniThree beauty and wellness founders on getting product into hands →

74. Test whether a manufacturer will say yes by calling until number 13

    Samantha Brett had no manufacturing background. She Googled every sunscreen manufacturer and called them all, working on the assumption that twelve nos get you to a yes on the thirteenth. She then repeated the process with bottle manufacturers across China, India and elsewhere until she found one that could build a bespoke mister that would not spray into eyes. That bottle is now the reason the product ranks number one on Amazon US and Ulta US.

    Priscilla HajiantoniThree beauty and wellness founders on getting product into hands →

75. Recognise that a media profile does not convert to sales

    Sally Obermeder is blunt that a following does not mean add to cart. People already have a box they put you in, and if you push a product at them they get annoyed. Because SWIISH started with smoothies rather than a product, the habit was show and share rather than sell, and that removed the selling pressure from the content. Consistency over the long game builds the tribe, not the profile.

    Priscilla HajiantoniThree beauty and wellness founders on getting product into hands →

76. Film the work, then voice over it if the camera scares you

    Raquel could not talk to camera in the early years, so she filmed herself filling perfume bottles in her garage and lounge room, then recorded voiceovers explaining what she was doing. That behind-the-scenes footage of moving warehouse to warehouse became what the brand got known for. If you are not confident yet, shoot first and narrate later, then let practice build the on-camera confidence.

    Raquel BourisRaquel Bouris: guerrilla marketing and founder-led brand →

77. Turn a retailer rejection into a sampling stunt out the front of their stores

    Boots rejected Who Is Elijah with the line "you've got no brand awareness here, no one knows who you are". Raquel booked a flight five days later, took 500 discovery sets and her content girl, and stood out the front of three Boots locations handing samples to customers going in and out. She asked each person to go inside and ask staff if they stocked Who Is Elijah. Nine months later Boots emailed and agreed to stock the brand.

    Raquel BourisRaquel Bouris: guerrilla marketing and founder-led brand →

78. Use RocketReach to get buyer emails and post samples until they answer

    Raquel calls getting a retailer's attention the easy part. Take out a RocketReach membership, pull the buyer's email and office address, post them samples and keep emailing until they reply. She also landed David Jones at about 18 months in by DMing their fragrance buyer on LinkedIn.

    Raquel BourisRaquel Bouris: guerrilla marketing and founder-led brand →

79. Use "show and share" instead of telling and selling

    Sally's rule for the SWIISH team is "we don't tell and we don't sell". When they launched green powders nobody knew what they were, so every post explained what the product is, why they made it, why they chose that ingredient and not another, and how she personally uses it. People can then ask questions in the comments. Her reasoning: everyone is smart enough to decide for themselves, and when a customer chooses you, they stay.

    Sally ObermederSally Obermeder: show and share your way to a loyal community →

80. Withhold one thing on socials so people cross over to your database

    Sally treats social platforms as a database she does not own. So she shows and shares generously on social, then deliberately holds one thing back for the EDM: "this week there are 5 recipes for how you can use super greens", or a 21-day smoothie challenge. The lead magnet cost SWIISH a lot to make and cost the customer nothing, but the customer has to come through Shopify and leave an email to get it.

    Sally ObermederSally Obermeder: show and share your way to a loyal community →

81. Give value five times before you ask for the email

    Sally warns against opening with a free guide. "Give value, give value, give value, give value, give value. Then here there's even more value." Lead with the freebie and it reads as intense and suspicious, because people assume you want their email and their phone number. Accept that some people will take the free guide and leave, and that is fine.

    Sally ObermederSally Obermeder: show and share your way to a loyal community →

82. Use a future regret test to make the big, scary calls

    Sarah calls it her future regret management matrix. When Urban Outfitters placed an order she could only fill by leaving her legal job to pack for roughly seven days straight, she asked what 80-year-old her and 10-years-from-now her would regret more. Trying and failing while first to market, or staying safe and watching the window close. Law would still be there a year later, the retailer would not.

    Sarah DavidsonSarah Davidson: going global, partnerships and knowing when to stop →

83. Split your list into today, tomorrow and later, and only work today

    Sarah physically writes a list every day and sorts every item into three buckets. If it is not a today job, it moves off the page so she does not carry it. Her rule against distraction came from her husband: she was worrying about shipping matcha to Afghanistan when they could not yet ship to Caulfield North. Be discerning about what is genuinely urgent, because busy work like fixing the font on a post going out in two weeks gives you the tick without the progress.

    Sarah DavidsonSarah Davidson: going global, partnerships and knowing when to stop →

84. Partner with brands that own the other moments in your customer's day

    Matcha Maiden stopped marketing as though matcha was the customer's whole identity. They mapped the rest of that person's day: fitness, activewear, plant-based milk. Then they ran joint giveaways, events and goodie bags with those brands, including repeated activations with Lululemon. Ten businesses running one competition could each pick up around 15,000 new email addresses off a shared consumer.

    Sarah DavidsonSarah Davidson: going global, partnerships and knowing when to stop →

85. Narrow to one demographic and watch the floodgates open

    Leah's biggest trajectory change with Kaya was drawing a line in the sand: women only, over 40. Before that she was trying to be everything to everyone. Jessy backed this from the agency side, saying the brands Hive HQ works with see takeoff at the moment they get really specific about their demo. Pick the customer you can serve better than anyone, then say no to the rest.

    Talitha CumminsBeyond the Logo: Building Brands That Last →

86. Post one titled reel every night, no scheduling, no exceptions

    Talitha has released one 30-second video a night for close to two years. Each one carries a big blunt title on the front, like "Diamonds Are Not an Investment", rather than the moodboard aesthetic the rest of the jewellery category uses. Some hit 3 million views, some get 20,000. That single habit drives all website traffic, leads and appointment bookings, and she only started Meta ads about six months ago.

    Talitha CumminsBeyond the Logo: Building Brands That Last →

87. Get someone to interview you on camera instead of talking to yourself

    Talitha's first videos took a thousand takes filming alone in her bedroom. The format only clicked when another journalist offered to ask her questions off camera while filming. Answering a real question is easier than performing a monologue. If solo pieces to camera stall you, book a friend for an hour and film ten answers.

    Talitha CumminsBeyond the Logo: Building Brands That Last →

88. Use every new platform feature the week it drops

    Taryn says LinkedIn, Instagram and TikTok penalise accounts that ignore new features. When Reels launched, non-users saw the rest of their content suppressed. LinkedIn currently wants video, so post video even if it feels awkward. The platform reads you as a good user and amplifies your other content for free.

    Taryn WilliamsTaryn Williams: maximising brand reach on a small budget →

89. Chase niche creators, not follower counts

    Instagram's algorithm is shifting towards TikTok's model, where the content itself is classified and served to people interested in that niche rather than to your existing followers. So stop paying lifestyle influencers with what Taryn calls vanity metrics. Find creators making very specific content (parenting, vegan food) that matches your category, because that content now gets the bigger reach.

    Taryn WilliamsTaryn Williams: maximising brand reach on a small budget →

90. Book one networking coffee every Friday at 8am

    Taryn ran a standing rule of an 8am Friday coffee with someone new, went to every event she could, and joined clubs. She also cold messaged people on LinkedIn. She kept that up for roughly two years before the inbound enquiries started, so treat it as a two-year build, not a quick win.

    Taryn WilliamsTaryn Williams: maximising brand reach on a small budget →

91. Do five things at 100 percent instead of 20 things at 20 percent

    Thu says the brands that scale well pick a strict strategy and stick to it with conviction, while the ones that plateau chase 20 different ideas at once. Her advice to visionary founders who arrive with 10 ideas is to filter down to three, execute those fully, then move to the next. Also know when to quit a strategy that clearly is not working rather than staying fixated on it.

    Thu NguyenThu Nguyen on Profit, Focus and Going Global →

92. Judge growth on EBITDA, not the revenue headline

    Founders proudly report 100 percent year on year revenue growth while their spend has gone up 400 percent. Thu's framing: there is no point making an extra dollar if it costs you two dollars to do it. Protect profit as the number, and treat revenue growth as meaningless without the margin behind it.

    Thu NguyenThu Nguyen on Profit, Focus and Going Global →

93. Bank a few quarters of profitability before you scale

    Thu's test for readiness is several consecutive quarters of stable profitability, not appetite or ambition. She sees founders raise capital during a plateau and then use that money to survive rather than grow. Before you take investment, ask honestly whether the capital funds growth or just keeps the lights on.

    Thu NguyenThu Nguyen on Profit, Focus and Going Global →