Whether you’re an aspiring solopreneur or a service-based business owner ready for a revamp, an elevated brand will help you thrive in your professional journey! But creating a personal brand isn’t just about the pretty fonts & cute colors. It’s time we talk about branding with the expert.

Becca Ellison, brand strategist & photographer, joins me today to share how to create a lasting brand identity. Are you ready to discover the power of storytelling through visual imagery and purpose-driven messaging? Attract dream clients and make sales easily. And finally, how do we find balance in this chaotic world of parenthood and entrepreneurship? Don’t miss this episode!

In this episode, we cover:

• Do you need to be the face of your brand

• How to create connections with potential clients as a designer

• What information you must have on your website

• How our brains actually process what we see on a website

• How to determine what your target audience needs and wants

• Why brand strategy is important and what it includes

• How to impart the value of working with you (vs someone else)

• How Oreos played a huge part in Becca’s business success

• How to balance entrepreneurship and motherhood

Did this colorful conversation inspire you to think about revamping your personal brand? Find us and tell us on social!

More about Becca Ellison

Becca Ellison is the CEO of Rebecca Ellison Creative, helping service-based businesses stand out from the crowd by authentically building their personal brand. Attracting dream clients comes easily when you deeply understand your client's core needs, paired with messaging and visuals that tell the story of how you can help them reach their goals. With the right strategy, you can create a thriving business where sales feel easy.

Links and Mentioned Resources

Interior Design Resources: https://colorworks.design/resources-2/

The Psychology of Selling by Brian Tracy

FREE Personal Brand Checklist for Coaches and Service Pros from Becca

Connect with Becca Ellison

Website: https://rebeccaellison.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rebeccaellisoncreative/

Connect with Katie Decker-Erickson

Book Your Coaching Strategy Session with Katie!

Business Coaching for Interior Designers

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More about Colorful Conversations with Katie

Welcome to “Colorful Conversations with Katie”! Join us for a vibrant webcast where we seamlessly blend the realms of design and business in a fun and professional setting. Available on YouTube or any of your favorite podcast platforms!

Hosted by the dynamic Katie, a seasoned expert with nearly 20 years of experience in both fields, this engaging series promises to ignite your creative spark and sharpen your entrepreneurial acumen. From exploring the latest design trends to uncovering strategies for building successful ventures, we dive deep into the colorful world where aesthetics meet profitability.

Whether you’re a budding designer or a savvy entrepreneur, this webcast is your go-to source for inspiration, insights, and a dash of lively conversation. Tune in and let your imagination, business and life take flight!

This post may contain affiliate links, so I may earn a small commission when you make a purchase through links on my site at no additional cost to you. 

The unedited podcast transcript for this episode of the Colorful Conversations with Katie podcast follows

Katie Decker-Erickson

From exploring the latest design trends to uncovering strategies for building successful ventures. We dive into the colorful world where aesthetics meet profitability all while balancing work with life. It's a lot. Whether you're a budding designer or a savvy entrepreneur, this webcast is your go -to source for inspiration, insights, and a dash of lively conversation. And today's guest is Becca Allison.

She is the CEO of Rebecca Ellison creative, a brand strategist and photographer helping service -based businesses like ours, stand out from the crowd, building their personal brand in an authentic way. Attracting dream clients comes easily when you deeply understand your client's core needs paired with messaging and visuals that tell the story of how you can help them reach their goals. With the right strategy, you can create a thriving business where sales feel easy. Becca, welcome to the show.

Becca Ellison

Hello. Hello. Thanks for having me, Katie. I'm excited to be here.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Oh, we're so excited to have you and you make that sound so easy. And I feeling branding is kind of like nailing jello to a wall. Like everyone's like, yeah, like that's a good thing and we should have a brand and we should do that. And then it's like, but how the hell becomes a sticking point. And especially when it involves your personal brand, which to a lot of us in the design world, it really does, especially on the residential design side of things. So. We're so glad to have this conversation with you. Let me just start off by asking you, when we're talking about personal brand and building a business, especially in the design world, I know a lot of people go, oh, do I really have to show my face on my website and social media? And tell me why I have to do that if you're going to make me do that. And I'm just as guilty of it as the next person, but it's easy to want to hide behind the name of your company rather than being the brand. What is the value of being that brand and being out there?

Becca Ellison

Well, when you're a small service based business, a small or even medium, because Katie, your business is relatively a medium size, but you are still the person. People connect with who you are and you are the reputation that people know about. They know that you run Colorworks, but it's your reputation. Your personal brand is more or less just that reputation. It's a lot easier when you're a small business to connect their reputation to who you are as a human than it is to try and create this like, marketing and brand monopoly attached to a name like Adidas does. Adidas can do that because they're a multi -billion dollar company. But as a personal brand, as a service -based business, especially, how you're coming to the experience, how you're coming and problem solving, how you're seeing the design space is very unique to who you are, to your personality, to the way you see the world. And so because of that, people want to, and you're going to succeed a lot better, a lot easier if people feel that connection to who you are. Now your personal brand really is just your reputation. And like if we jumped back in a time machine to 20 years ago when the internet was not quite what it is today, you had a personal brand in the same situations, but you had a very localized, like you would go to either conferences or you would go to networking meetings and you would be doing all of this personal brand work in person, more on a one -on -one relationship base. Still your personal brand. That's what you were attaching it to. Now, because we're online, you know, it opens it up the world. Like I can literally serve anybody in the world. I can help anyone with what I do and deliver online. But now that human connection, there's like a gap. Right? So when you're authentically and strategically building your personal brand online, it's just bringing that human connection back and saying, Hey, while you're technically staring at a screen, looking at information and data of my website, I want you to feel like you're talking to me, to the human behind it. And that's that connection of the personal brand and why like, yeah. having photos of you, like don't hide like one about me bio off in the corner, right? They wanna see and they wanna feel like they have an idea of who you are and the photos and the messaging, so the copy and the words and the way you say and what you talk about, pair it all together, brings your personality to life and makes people go, ooh, you are the person and that's what personal branding is.

Katie Decker-Erickson

That makes complete sense. And so if I'm hearing you correctly, it's not so much that we're changing what we've been doing. It's just the how. And so we've been doing this all the time, but now with the advent of yes, the souped up internet, all the socials, the, and now we have Twitter changing their branding threads is out there. Yeah, I know. Really? Like it's a different day, a different dollar. I feel like when it comes to social media right now, the field is changing so much, but being able to put your brand out there and create that personal connection, it's always been there. It's just how we're doing it.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. If you want to do it in a way that you can market to the entire world, you have to do it in a way that the entire world can consume. And social media has made that easy, but it makes us, instead of like what used to be an authentic, like, I'm just going to walk into this room and, oh, look, Katie's standing right there and let me grab a drink and some nibbles and go and just stand next to her and start chit chatting and we can have this conversation. Now it's a little bit more like, okay, I want to attract the people like Katie to my business because she would be the perfect clientele. What would she be interested in? What would align with her? What visuals and messaging would make her stop her scroll and go, uh -huh, interesting. And then. think through what it is that she might want, scry or two, and then cultivate it and put it on our website, put it in our socials, so that instead of it being you and I have to be one -on -one together in a room, learning about each other, you can literally learn the same things and start to feel like you get to know me while you're binge watching Suits at midnight with your husband while scrolling through the phone thinking about your business, right?

Katie Decker-Erickson

I don't know what goes on in your house, but that quite literally happened last night at my house.

Becca Ellison

Every night at my house.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Sure. Someone who says, I hear you, but I'm so afraid to put myself out there and I know I need to create the personal connection. I think especially for designers, those homeowners that are looking to connect with you, they're looking to connect with you. There's thousands of people that can design their home. Um, but why. why you, you have to be able to answer the why for them. And I think to your point, it is about putting yourself out there so they can say, I choose you. But that can be kind of unnerving as a designer and it kind of requires some guts and courage. How do you walk people through that to say, it's worth it, you should do it, it's gonna be okay.

Becca Ellison

So first off, like we all sit there and go. Oh, do I I don't I'm not a Kardashian. I don't want to be doing all this stuff, right?

Katie Decker-Erickson

Totally 100%. Nope, I do not have that body. Let's just get that away right now.

Becca Ellison

To be fair, without lots of dollar bills, I don't think they have that body either. The interesting thing and I think this is where a lot of people get overwhelmed is that They're like, oh, okay, I have to cultivate and I have to show my life. I have to do all of these things. I have to become this like internet personality to attract people. And I want to make sure it's very clear. You being a personal brand does not mean you are an influencer or have to be an influencer or have to share anything about your personal life that you don't want to share. An influencer is a personal brand, but a personal brand is not meaning you're an influencer.

Katie Decker-Erickson

So distinction I think a lot of people miss. I feel like it's very easy to look at it as an all or nothing. Like I'm either out there or I'm not out there. And those are my only options.

Becca Ellison

Yes. Yeah. And it's like, okay, so think of, think of it this way. The reason why, so I'm going to, I'm going to lean us away from social media because social media is kind of a beast in its own and say, when you're starting your personal brand, start with your website. Your website is your digital storefront, right? It's where people are going to go. Oh, I, somebody told me about you or I saw something on social or I saw an article you were in somehow out in the world, somebody heard your name and they want to learn more and they come to your website, right? When you share your personality, share your interests, share your expertise, because as a designer, people are coming to you because they don't have your skillset. They want to know why you think. this color is the next color that should be happening in the living rooms of the world, right? And why this other color is the absolute worst and you should never do it because it's going to make you look real dated in five years. Whatever your expertise is, right? They don't know and they don't know what they don't know, right?

Katie Decker-Erickson

Very true.

Becca Ellison

So they want to hear your opinion and see if your opinion jives with what their opinion and their values and what's important to them. Now, why you need to share your face and share your face a decent amount on your website is because if you think of how prior to the internet, how human beings interacted with each other, let's say you and I had a consult and we met in person and you wanted to hire me as a brand photographer and we were chatting in person, you hadn't seen any of my portfolio, anything like that. you got a referral, whatever it is, we go to a Starbucks, we have a conversation. You and I are staring at each other more or less through an entire 30 minute conversation. You are looking at me and I'm looking at you. You might glance down at my portfolio to go through and basically just have that confirmation. Oh, yep, this aligns with what I was expecting. Yeah, this doesn't look like complete crap. Delightful. You know, the this aligns with what I want. But for the most part, other than glancing down every little while, we're looking at each other because we're human beings and we're gauging and we're doing and we're checking body language. Oh, she feels she keeps looking outside. It feels like she doesn't want to be here. Maybe she doesn't actually want me as a client. She feels really insecure. Oh, my God. She is so funny and she is so nice. And it felt like we were just old friends chatting. I absolutely want to work with her because that was so easy. Like those are all things that are happening in a one -on -one interaction that does not happen online. But the funny thing is about the human brain is the human brain is very advanced and also very basic. And it's like a little conundrum there and the human brain can't really decipher because photography and video and everything to like how old our brains are is. relatively new, like it's, you know, 150 years old. And so when I'm looking at a photo of you on your website, and I'm reading about the things of your values and your approach and how you do things and what matters to you and, and what the experience is going to be looking like while I'm seeing a photo of you, my brain makes it feel like I'm talking to you. And the more I see you, the more familiar you are and the more familiar you are, the more likely it is that I'm going to build trust with you.

Katie Decker-Erickson

It's almost like we've had these conversations. Our brain interprets them as, Oh, we've had all these conversations. When in reality, I may not have even heard the sound of your voice or I have only seen imagery of you. That's fascinating to think about. How do you think you drill down? Cause you're right. Your brain is constantly processing like, Oh, this person's funny. Or like you said, they're looking outside. Do they really want to be here? When it comes to building that client trust, How do you think we go about discovering what it is our target market is looking for? Because in marketing, we know we can't, if you're marketing to everyone, you're marketing to no one, right? We can't meet everybody's needs and wants in life. However, knowing our target market's needs and wants and what they're looking for is critical. How do you figure that out and how do you incorporate that into your brand? Do you feel like?

Becca Ellison

Yeah, that's a great question. So. When it comes down to it. So this is where a lot of small businesses skip over is the brand strategy. They go, oh, I need a brand. I need to pick my colors. I need to pick my font, my design. I need to make sure it looks pretty. And I have a logo. My brand is done. Right. Yeah,

Katie Decker-Erickson

I'm done. Sorry. I'm out.

Becca Ellison

And then people go, oh, you know, say you, you fast forward two to three years in your business and you're, you've got some traction, but things aren't quite right. You're trying all of these marketing tactics, but things feel like they're falling short. And all of a sudden they're like, Oh, I think it's because my, my brand, my brand needs a refresh. So I'm going to like change things up.

Katie Decker-Erickson

So you see people all the same things again, just five years later.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. Just five years later to give it a brand new fancy look. Well. That's like, yes, you can do that. But the thing is the strategy portion, the thing that I love is the why behind, right? So like so many people jump here onto the brand visuals, but really the foundations of your brand, why you're doing what you're doing, who you're doing it for, what it is that you're actually helping them with. Like as interior designers, you are...a vehicle to get somebody to their desire, but they're not hiring you because they want to hire a designer. The experience of working with you, they want it to be pleasant. They want it to be a good time. But if they could get their end goal without hiring you, they'd save a lot of money and do that. Right.

Katie Decker-Erickson

That's why the DIY world is so big. And it doesn't always work out very well. And then we get the phone call.

Becca Ellison

Absolutely. The, but the thing is, is that so many small businesses come into how they approach their clients as a look at my service, look at my service. I'm like, your client really, your client's going to purchase your service to get their end result. But the, the, the service is not what you should be talking to them about and why your, um, messaging and your marketing and your brand visuals and things might fall flat. So like the strategy, the brand strategy portion is coming back and saying, okay, who is your ideal client? And like, like really diving in, like I have strategy clients with our strategy calls with my clients that are two hours long, that we're just talking about your ideal client. And I always tell them, I'm like, we're going to start with things like the size of their house and the type of car that they drive. And if they shop at Lululemon or they shop at Nordstrom and people always go, oh, but why does it matter? Well, it matters because it's building a person in your head that goes, okay, well, if you're shopping at Lululemon versus Nordstrom, you care about how you look, but you also care about functionality and comfort. And you care more about maybe fitness, but like functionality while looking put together more so than looking like fully to do, right? And that tells you what's where somebody's brain is at and what matters to them and their values. And then down, you keep on like peeling the onion away to get down to what I always tell my clients. I'm like, we're going to talk about these 15 to 20 different things to get down to the most important questions. What are their core desires, their core motivations and their core fears?

Katie Decker-Erickson

The why, the why.

Becca Ellison

And that's the strategy part that then you go, okay. I know how I want to show up in the world. I know what I want people to say and think about me. I know what matters to the people that I'm trying to attract. Now let's create the messaging and the visuals that will attract that type of person and convey that message. And when you do that, which is not easy work, I'll be frank, it's not simple.

Katie Decker-Erickson

But you have to do it or you're not going to have an audience and they're not going to write you a check...

Becca Ellison

They're not, yeah, they're not going to pay attention and then they're going to go, they're going to look and say, okay, you know, um, you're an interior designer and your interior designer, you know, they're also sitting, um, on their couch at 10 at 10 PM. The kids have gone to bed. They have five interior designers tabs open on their, on their, um, desk or their laptop. And they're trying to figure it out. Right. Yep. When you understand your messaging and your ideal client, and you've shown your face on your website, they're clicking between and they're seeing. to the layman different design portfolios that look probably in the vicinity of 95 % the same.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Yeah, yeah. They're well curated, they're polished, sure.

Becca Ellison

Yeah, they look good, but like to a client, they're going to be like, I don't know what makes this different from that, right? And if you don't explain it, then they're going to do what...we're all going to do because our brains are hardwired to make comparisons. Do you want a tick tack or a tick tock? A tick tack tick tock. Right.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Well, I'm there for tick tocks and tick tocks.

Becca Ellison

Do you want a tick tack or a gum, right? A piece of gum. Like your brain is making that which one works better for me. And they're doing that when they're like this designer, that designer. And if you don't give them something like your personality or talking about what matters to them, not your service, but like having a home that fully showcases their aesthetics and some place that they can have pride in and they can show off and they can really live their life in, in the way that they imagine being able to, that's what you're selling is that feeling of pride and joy. not the paint color. The paint color is just a tactic to get there. And if you're talking about that and they're looking at a human being via your photo and they go, okay, I get what Katie is saying here. And then I have this person and this person that look at the sites. The design looks good, but there's no like distinction of what makes them different or they don't know who the person is that they're learning about. Those two other sites, what they're going to do is say, okay, what's the best price? Because they look similar enough to me, but now if I'm happy with either options, let's go for who can either do it the fastest or the cheapest.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I know you don't get the best with either one of those, but yes.

Becca Ellison

No, no, no. And then if you then have a site where you have content that speaks to helping educate them, you have...photos of you and behind the scenes, like when you and I did your branding photos. So I did Katie's branding photos for her website. We thought through.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Which I would have never thought was actually going to be fun. Cause I'm one of those people that's like, Nope, just happy over here running my business. No need to look any further. So that's why I wanted to have this conversation because I was, I'm talking to myself and going, Oh yes, this is why I did what I did, but it was hard. You had to talk me into it.

Becca Ellison

Well, a good, brand photographer will sit there and go, okay, what are we doing? Why are we doing? And then like the focus, like what I strive for when I do brand photos with clients is to make it a fun experience, right? Because you remember the experience and if you're relaxed and having a good experience, then the pictures are going to be good too. And no matter how beautiful the photo is, if you had a crappy experience, you're not going to enjoy those photos and you're not going to want to put them out in the world, right?

Katie Decker-Erickson

Very fair point.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. So it's the education of your client and letting them know and saying, Hey, okay, this is what this means, or this is what to expect. Or they're like, I've never hired a designer before. What? I don't have any idea what the process is. And then you're like, Hey, book a call. And then they're like, Oh, if I book a call with you, does that mean that I'm definitely booking you? I don't, I'm not ready. Like even that simple thing of you're like, it's a free consultation. They're like, does that mean I have to? So. when you think through your client and say, okay, you're a novice, how can I help hold your hand through this? Well, showing you photos of myself, because then you know who's holding your hand, it makes you stand apart. And then all of a sudden they're comparing the other people and they go, okay, well, their stuff looks good, but her stuff looks good. And she looks like she knows how to help me through this process. And say you're 20 % more expensive, 50 % more expensive. They go, oh, but the experience here is gonna be better. think this is a better value for my money.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Yeah, I understand. And all of a sudden, I'm not just pie in the sky or I have a.what I'm getting, there's a process, there's a why, and this looks like a lovely person I can connect with.

Becca Ellison

Exactly. Exactly. And then, one extra bonus part is that you are doing all of that work currently, I'm going to assume your listeners are doing all of that work on the sales call. And that's why the sales call is painful because they feel like they're like a broken record. They have to say the same thing. They don't know. if they said it right or they're trying to connect, but they're also trying to convey all of this information. And then, yeah, which is a lot. And then the clients overwhelmed, they ingested a small portion of it because not everybody's an auditory learner. They're like, I don't know exactly what's going on. And then you're like, oh, I got nothing. Like I don't have a large, I don't have a high enough conversion rate for my sales calls. For me, especially with my brand photography side of things, I've conveyed so much on my website and helped walk people through so much that by the time that they have said, yes, let's have a call, it is a, are you what I thought, think you are, because like, I'm convinced you are this person from your website. I'm going to get on the phone with you. Yeah. And say, okay, okay. Now are we, are we available? Can we make this work in our timeframes? And where do I sign? So like my sales calls, rarely are sales, it's more of a like, get to know you and when can we do this?

Katie Decker-Erickson

Yep, that's exactly how ours went. And I think that's such smart strategy from a business perspective to put it out there. I think there's a lot of designers too that are afraid of giving away their secret sauce. The reality is there's plenty of business for everybody. You do you boo as I tell my kids, you do you and. the right people will show up for it. The right clients are going to show up that are going to have this connection with you that are going to think like you think and feel like you feel. And I think to put that out there and to say, and to be bold about this is who I am. This is what I have to offer you and not worry about the revelation of the secret sauce or whatnot actually is a huge confidence builder and your potential client on the other side feels that. Okay. So speaking of kids. Let's talk about kids. You have a couple of kids. How have you gathered this body of knowledge and become this juggernaut for all things brand while running a family and doing all the things I, this is the conversation I love to have because I think it's so easy as women to differentiate our personal and our professional lives. And the reality is I feel like it's a big pile of spaghetti and meatballs. It's all blending together. It's sloppy. It's saucy. especially if you ask my nine -year -old, I can be real sassy and saucy, but tell us how is it working for you and what have you found works for you in this stage of life when it comes to marrying those two worlds together?

Becca Ellison

Yeah, it's interesting because I know there's a lot of women who start their business post -motherhood, and then trying to figure it out. how to run a business at the same time as trying to figure out how to be a mom. Because like, let's be real, none of us, it's all like a dark room with a flashlight being like, how do I get out?

Katie Decker-Erickson

I know they don't send you home from the hospital with an instruction manual. It's the darndest thing. Walk out with a live human and no direction. This is epic. And no directions.

Becca Ellison

I don't even know how to get them in the seat.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Yeah, totally.

Becca Ellison

So it's been a journey. I feel I've got a slightly different story in that I actually like, I got a degree in commercial photography and started my photography business in 2005 directly out of college. So I knew right off the bat, I was like, I'm either going to get a nine to five. This is pre -kids. I'm either gonna get a nine to five and get real comfortable with this constant paycheck, or I need to jump in the deep end and learn how to swim. And that's, I think jumping in the deep end and learning how to swim is a good motto of my entire life. I'm -

Katie Decker-Erickson

I love that. I think everyone's brave enough to say so, for sure.

Becca Ellison

Right. So by the time, you know, I had already been running my business for, let me do some quick math. 2005, my son was born in 2011. So six years. So like I had, I understood what I was doing. before I brought children into the mix. But I've done quite a bit of pivots in my business. And the balance, there's no real balance.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I love that statement. I still love that statement because I feel like everyone thinks if I'm doing this right as a parent running a business or a career, this should be easy. Because when things are balanced, they feel good, right? I often feel like a rabbit squirrel straddling a really uncomfortable wood fence. Like there are things that fall off on both sides on any given day, right? Which is why I am so thankful for our team and we have a great bevy of people, but there's times the laundry is piling up, and the kids are like, what's for dinner? And I'm like, well, if we steam some broccoli, does it make the goldfish not look so damning? Because that might be what you're getting today. I mean, I think it is. It's a hustle and a juggle and I, I don't know anyone who's perfectly balancing it. Um, but there's definitely

Becca Ellison

anyone on Instagram who says they are is blowing smoke up your rear.

Katie Decker-Erickson

They're lying and we can not be friends. Right. Right. We can not be, but I think picking your priorities and knowing when to hold them and when to fold them is a huge thing. Business and a personal perspective. Like how did you prioritize? Like. Yeah, the laundry may fall apart, but I'm going to make sure my kids get tucked in tonight or what, how has that worked for you personally?

Becca Ellison

Yeah. You know, I, um, I actually made a large pivot in my business. I, when I started my business, I was wedding photographer is where I landed originally. Um, before I understood anything about personal branding, I can go a little bit into like actually how I fell into that and shifted to brand photography and then added brand strategy to bring me into this world. But as a wedding photographer, I had a very successful business. There are peaks and valleys. And it was a great, I was a full time, I always laugh because when people are like, oh yeah, someone says I'm a photographer too. I was like, oh no, legitimately I made six figures. It was my only income. Legit, this was my entire business. As a wedding photographer, and then I hit a point where my son was just under five and my daughter was just about two. And I was realizing that because summers are insane, I live in the Pacific Northwest, so like wedding season is summer season, that I was missing all of my family's momentous moments so that I could be at other people's momentous moments capturing theirs. And I hit a point where I was like, I only have a limited amount of summers. and that time with my children. And, you know, I'm a super available during the day, during the week, because the way that my business was structured, but nights and weekends, I was always away. And I was like, that's when that's when that's family time happening. So I recognized it. And I realized I was like, I need to make a change. I need to make a pivot. And. because I wanted to be here and available for my family. I wanted to bring my business into more of a, cause like my kids were about to go to school full time. I was like, I want to be able to get most of my work done in the hours that they're at school and be available on weekends. And if I back up just a little bit, before I had made this decision a couple of years prior, I had kind of fallen into building a personal brand in my photography business. So I'll go into that to kind of, give a little context, which is what made me say, oh, maybe brand photography is the direction I want to go in. So I was a wedding photographer and I was doing the things that I was just saying not to do. All of my advice, I was doing all of the things where I was like, oh, you know, my website, you know, I had a picture of me on my about page, but I didn't have a lot of like content or a lot of context on my website. I just have really beautiful photos. Cause like, not to toot my own horn, but I'm a good photographer. I can put really good pictures up on the website. And then brides and grooms would go and I would get inquiries and they'd go to my website, they'd get inquiries, but I'm also not an inexpensive photographer. So I would get responses back from people saying, oh, well, thanks so much, but we went a different route. And it always came back to money. And I started diving in and I'm a...what's my problem? What's my roadblock? How do I get past the roadblock? And so like, I read like all of the marketing books, all of the psychology books, all the sales books to be like, what's missing? And I recognize it's like me, because like, if I talk to all of my clients, at the end of the day, after their wedding, they'd be like, Becca, like the experience of working with you is like, unlike anything else, like you were our best vendor, you feel like you're like friends, like I'm still friends with friends, people I photographed their wedding 15 years ago. Right. And, and I was like, okay, if every one of my clients that had hired me and in the past said that you are the difference. I looked at my website and I was like, I don't show up at all.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I'm not the difference anyway of my marketing. So how would anyone ever know that until after the fact? And that's not what I need them to know. I mean, it's green, but I need them to know on the front end. Yeah. Right.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. So I started making shifts and I started putting pictures of myself on my website, which as a photographer felt a little funny because I'm like, aren't I supposed to be showing you the beautiful pictures I can take of you? But again, when it comes down to just like how I was telling you, you know, for a design portfolio, like your clients, you're looking at two different design portfolios and unless they're drastically different styles, they're not going to notice the difference between one person to the other. So I started adding more of my personality, more of my like, this is what the experience will be like working with me. This is what it means, like, you know, you want family photos and this is what like a reality of family photos. Like I was educating, I was blogging, I was doing things to be like, how can I help you understand this process? Cause I've been to 500 of these things and this is your first one for a bride, right? And then I changed my...But shortly after having Scarlett and I was breastfeeding and I, you know, you're like ravenous when you're breastfeeding and I was eating entirely way too many Oreos. I was like, don't care nutrition knockout, like give me like, I'm hungry.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Double stuff is my friend. Yeah.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. So everyone who knows me well was always laughing because I was like, she's like, Oh, back on the Oreos. I was like, I can eat entire sleeve of Oreos while like a day. It's fine. I'm breastfeeding. Everything's fine. I decided to change my, my.package names to different kinds of Oreos. It was like Oreos, Oreos and milk, Oreo milkshake or whatever, which made it different than the silver gold and like whatever that everyone else is doing. And I stopped getting the, are you available for my date? And oh, you're too expensive for me to, oh my God, Becca, you have to be available for me. Here's my date. I cannot wait to talk with you. And everyone was booking. And I sit there and I was like,

Katie Decker-Erickson

Oreos. Really?

Becca Ellison

Oreos and my face, right? It was, they were, they felt like they knew me, but it was probably the Oreos.

Katie Decker-Erickson

No, I think it was both. You know, it's interesting. It's like Malcolm Gladwell talks about in his book, Tipping Point, but there's just those moments where it's just this teeniest little shift and it just literally becomes the tipping point. I mean, to put yourself out there, reading your package, that really is reflective of your personality and who you are. And people get an insight into you and then boom, you're there.

Becca Ellison

Right. And then, then it made me, they're like, oh, the Oreo girl. And like, she seems like she's a lot of fun, which was the whole premise. Cause my whole approach to weddings was like, we're going to make sure you have a great day. I was like, at the end of the day, as long as both of you show up and both of you say yes and sign a piece of paper, everything else is icing on the cake. Let's have a good time. Like it doesn't matter if something goes wrong. Like it's about the experience. And so like I cultivated that. so that they would have a great time. So in that shift, yeah. And people, yeah. People were, I, all of a sudden I was like crazy booked and, and things. And I was like, Oh my God, there's something to this. Like, I didn't know it was personal branding at the time. I learned it after a while, but I was like, there is something to this because this became really easy. And then we fast forward, you know, a short period of time. forward when I was like, I don't want to do weddings anymore. I've done this for 12 years. I'm ready to like pivot back. Yeah.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Have my evenings back, but I still want to have fun because that's who I am. I just need to do it for it. Yeah.

Becca Ellison

Yeah. And so I pivoted into brand photography mostly because a, I was like, I understood it. I started realizing and recognizing the strategy behind how it works, but I did it because people want photos during. business like normal business hours. If you're a company, you usually want me to show up between nine and five. And that allows me to have time for my kids.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Yeah. So cause they're how old now?

Becca Ellison

Now we are. So Scarlett is nine. My daughter is nine. She's about to go into fourth grade and my son is, um, is 12 and a half about to go into seventh grade. He's like almost as tall as me and I am not ready for that. I am not having it.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I am so not having it. So not having it. Oh, so looking back, like, well, I want to get to that. And that's one of our rapid fire questions. We're going to get to it in just a hot minute, but looking back, are you glad that you made that transition and has it yielded what you thought you would yield in that you can say, yes, I'm really glad I embraced my brand, figured out who I was. It was unashamed and unabashedly put that forward. Yeah.

Becca Ellison

Yeah, absolutely. It. It changed, it made sales easy. It allowed me to pivot because I was still just putting my personality out there. No longer am I talking to brides. Now I'm talking to small businesses. But I took that knowledge of like, okay, how can I help them? How can I convey to them why these images matter? Why good photos matter? And then I would start doing the strategy behind it. And that's kind of like COVID made it real easy because COVID hit and like you didn't take, I didn't take pictures for a couple of years because COVID. And that's what allowed me to develop the brand strategy, Portia. And now I ate a lot of Oreos, ate a lot of card games. But now I do a lot of brand strategy helping people because the other big pivotal part was I took a course on copywriting because I didn't understand prior to like, how messaging and stuff mattered. And I took a course and that's another like when a door opened where I was like, oh my God, I have one half of this down pat, but like understanding how to share your personality, how to share your perspective, how to use words to then align with your visuals. So people look at your stuff and go, oh my God, I have to have you. It's a beautiful and powerful thing. And when I learned how to put them together, I was laughing because I'm like, I'm not a copywriter because I am too fucking wordy, excuse. but to put that out. But I'm really good at messaging saying this is what we're talking about, why we're talking about, and this is what you want to say and now you need to take it to a copywriter so they use less words. And so here we, yes,

Katie Decker-Erickson

I appreciate that. Oh, this is such a good conversation. Okay, are you ready for our lightning round as we wrap up?

Becca Ellison

I am, I am.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Just because I think it's just fun to be able to hear other people's perspective on things. Okay, so tell us, what is a book that has most changed your life or your business or both?

Becca Ellison

Um, I actually have it right here. It's an old school one, but it's called the psychology of selling. Um, so much of the work that I do comes down roots down to psychology of like, that's what brand strategy and everything is, is why people make the actions they do and understanding why, what makes people want to take, make a selling action or a purchasing action and understanding how the brain works through it was like eye opening.

Katie Decker-Erickson

And why again, when we can answer the why we have a way to move forward, I feel like. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. Yeah. Beautiful. So what piece of advice would you have told yourself when you were 20?

Becca Ellison

Mm hmm. So I started my business when I was 22. So I've kind of been in this world a long time, but I just I'm just about to turn 40 and I just recently got diagnosed with ADHD and it has made my entire life make sense. So if I were to go back, I would say go figure that portion out because your life will be a lot easier for you if you connect those dots.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Absolutely. And I think mental health in general. I love that we are taking the shame and the hide out of mental health and how our brains work. Everyone's brains work differently, whether you have a diagnosis or not. We all have eccentricities. The more we can learn about ourselves,

Becca Ellison

The more you understand how your brain works, right? So it's not like, oh, I'm bad because or I'm failing because it's like, oh, my brain doesn't really work really great here. So like, let's stop trying to go from A to B. Maybe I need to go to A to B to C to get to the same spot. And then I'm there and it works just fine. Right. It's it's that compassion and that understanding. And that's probably like to go back to the the parenting struggle. Like I realized I had ADHD when all of a sudden the structures I'd built around myself and my business collapsed when all of a sudden I was now kids virtually schooling and trying to work and trying to change my business. Like all of that happening at the same time in my brain basically like leaked out my ear.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I can so relate to that undiagnosed, but there were so many pressures all at once coming in from all sides that to keep any wheels on. Not all the wheels. No, no, that for sure wasn't going to happen. But any of the wheels on the bus, what a thing. I mean, what a thing. Speaking of keeping wheels on the bus, what is your best time management?

Becca Ellison

So I have, I'm a bit, one of the things I learned about my ADHD, I get time blind when I'm like really into what I'm doing. So I have this little thing. So like it sits on my desk and I go, okay. And I, all the time, it's usually to the 30 minute, I say, I just flip it. And it starts going and I can't see how much time is left, but then it will, it will start beeping at me 30 minutes later. And it just lets me be aware of the time passing and go, Oh, I spent 30 minutes on this. I was meaning to spend 10. I need to wrap it up and move to the next thing. Um, because if I don't do that, I will get into a rabbit hole. And I'm like, Oh, I just spent three hours on something that I meant to spend 20 minutes on.

Katie Decker-Erickson

I feel like all creatives can do that. When I'm in my sweet spot, my husband has. walking with me like even there for two hours. I'm like, you don't say, yeah, just right by like,

Becca Ellison

my husband always laughs when I'm like, Oh yeah, just one more minute. He goes, uh huh. Can you turn your little purple thing for the five minute? Maybe I'm like, a little purple cube timer thing. Yeah. And then the five minutes go and I go, how did that happen? So fast? What's what? So, um, that, and then, um, as I'm, continuing to grow my team, utilizing Slack and ClickUp and then automations. I just added a bunch, but those are the things that I'm like.

Katie Decker-Erickson

Automations and systems, because systems work when you don't. People get sick. Systems don't get sick. These types of things, like, yes, I hear you 100 % for that. I think they're so incredibly valuable and it's going to be so interesting to see where AI takes all of that. I'm just so intrigued. It's going to be fascinating.

Becca Ellison

Yes. Agreed.

Katie Decker-Erickson

All right, folks, that's a wrap. Thank you for joining us for another insightful episode of Colorful Conversations with Katie. I hope you enjoyed our discussion today with Becca and found valuable insights to help you thrive in your design business and life as we merge them together here. To all of our listeners, thank you for joining us on this journey of learning and growth and your enthusiasm and dedication to honing your business skills as design professionals. It inspires me to keep bringing you valuable content.

So remember to describe, or describe, yes, we love to describe in the world of design, but we want you to subscribe, rather, to our podcast so you never miss an episode. If you have any questions or topics you'd like me to cover in the future, please let me know. I want to make sure we're getting the content out that does help you. If you would like one -on -one time with me, I would love to discuss your firm and plan intentional steps for growth and success. You can book a call with me on our website at www .colorworks .com. We'll see you next time. Bye -bye.