Your reputation can build your business

- [Interviewer] So, okay, you're at this firm, you get this great network. - [interviewee] Yeah. - And then how long after that did you just kind of, you know, you put your shingle out there? - Yes, so I met my husband, my soon-to-be husband. And he's like, you should do this for a living. You're working 80 hour weeks, I never see you, You should do this for a living. I'm like, oh, I don't know if I could do that. I'm like, I can't. I can't remember what it was but I said something like, I can't communicate with them at night. So he got me a fax machine. His gift was like a fax machine and it opened up my life. - Really? - Because I was able to communicate. I don't know what it was about the fax machine but it made me start my own firm. I literally got the fax machine and then like three weeks later I started, - I mean, if you have a fax machine, You had to have a business. Obviously, right? Yeah, so he created, he got, that was his gift to me, super romantic, got me a fax machine. And he was the one who said you should start this, you should do this, you know. And I was like, okay, I'll do this. It was before we got married, we were just dating. I'm like, okay. - I should know this. So if you've been in business for over 20 years - Oh yeah, longer than, yeah. Like probably over 25, yeah. - Congratulations. - Yeah, and I also already had clients, so I already started with a bunch of clients freelancing and they were like, all encouraging me, and they were like, we'll give you tons of clients you know, and the word spread because everybody knows everybody else in our profession. - Yeah. - And so, you know, and then I started just in New York and then my New York clients moved to LA or to San Francisco or wherever they moved and they brought me along and then they would recommend me to people and now I'm all over the country, cuz it's just the network of things. - You're obviously doing something right, or you're not going to get referred. - Yeah. - That's one of the things, you know, - Same with you too right? - You're at this conference, you know I'll be sitting and I'm going to talk about this later too. You'll sit in a restaurant later or a bar or at a meeting. And that's really when the true conversations happen, right? - Yes. - And you'll be hearing these thoughts and I'm just like, and that's really what inspired me to get into talk to speaking and writing and all that sort of thing is like that really in a lot of ways I don't think is that hard to figure out we just don't have these conversations? - No. - Because we just feel like at this thing we should just talk about the work. - Yeah. - Versus the making the how, the what, of doing all that sort of thing. - And the relationships, like just building those relationships and focusing on those kinds of things. - Yeah. - You know, I always tell people to me, I just love meeting people - A trait I think anyone needs to have to impact the world around them, especially an entrepreneur is that you have to be great with relationships and making connections. For Emily, this seems to just come naturally - On the Amtrak, on the way to the conference, and the guy takes out his computer sitting next to me and he's working on in design. I'm like, hey you a designer. He goes, yeah. And then we go to the conference. Yeah, I mean, he's sitting next to me and it turns out he was a speaker at the conference, getting ready for presentation. - You know, it's just, - Who was it? It was the guy from Collins, not Brian. - Oh, Brian's art director, right? - Yeah, well, Brian owns the company. So it's Collins, but it's his art director. - Yeah, and I met him yesterday. - Yeah, and he just spoke, - I can't remember his name either. I just met him. - Yeah, and he was awesome and you know he was working so we didn't get to talk that much but then we walked through the, you know but it was just such a small world that we just run on the Amtrak. You know, I sit next to another speaker, you know? - Yeah but you're also, I would say you're an extrovert. - Yeah. - You also, you know, instantly get to that conversation, right? - Exactly - Which is key to what you do. - Yeah.