Authentic Strategy

Authentic Strategy For Introverts in Business | Episode 16: Inga Fay

welcome to the heart centered entrepreneurs series my name is Jody Maley and I've been an entrepreneur and business owner for over 27 years now thanks for joining the podcast and I can't wait to share with you tips and ideas on how to grow your heart-centered entrepreneur business as a personality Dimensions coach I help entrepreneurs discover who they are at their core so they can have real and authentic sales conversations with their ideal clients we all started or joined a business so that we can make an income on our terms whether you're just starting out in your entrepreneur Journey or have been in sales for a while the key to any business is sales and nurturing the sales relationship so I invite you to sit back relax maybe even have your favorite drink and take some notes as we have fun delving in to learn more from the top one to two percent income earners who are making such a difference in Impact for themselves and their beautiful teams their tips and ideas will uplift and inspire you in a heart centered authentic way to help lift you up move you forwards towards your perfect dream and goal so stay tuned to the end of each podcast as I will share a little gift from me that I know will get you inspired in your beautiful business everyone we're glad that you've joined us today and my special guest here Inga and I'm going to let Inga introduce herself shortly here but one of the reasons that I love doing what I'm doing and to be on point with it is to be reaching other humans who have similar stories as us and especially for people starting out in their entrepreneur Journey it is so nice to be with other amazing women who can lift each other up give inspiration where it's needed and the stories of other people usually somewhere where you may be right now and these amazing women have already been about their 10 15 years ago is what I'm kind of finding and by sharing our stories it can help and Enlighten someone today so I'm gonna let Inga here introduce herself and tell us a little bit about you where you're from and what started you on this entrepreneur Journey awesome well my name is Inga face and Cavett I go by Inga Faye I'm an authenticity strategist and I help female entrepreneurs with introverted Tendencies level up their business to whatever goal or desire they have and I started this about three years ago however I've been in direct sales for 19 years and have had my little twists and turns trials and tribulations of many as many of us have and have really been able to build a business that I'm proud of that I have earned uh four diamond rings in my company as well as a couple of cars and just continuing to build my leadership as well as my team to help them Reach their desired goals even if it's not what I want even if it's not where I am I'll say not what I want them to do because what they do is great and I'm sure many of you have discovered that in building your business especially in a direct sales space that you know you just love them where they are so yeah so super excited to be here with you today and I am hail from Mobile Alabama today so Ah that's the accent yeah someone knowing someone someone said to me the other day they were from Maryland and I was speaking to them and they're like oh I love your accent I'm like I have an accent oh that's kind of cool thank you yeah and I didn't think I had an accent either because I'm originally from Virginia so there you go so so you said that you've been in in direct sales um for how many years over 19 19 years well congratulations on that that's pretty big yes it's up to 19 years let's hear from from the younger younger younger you can go there um see I blended your name there yeah um but yeah tell us a little bit about when you did start 19 years ago like where were you at and why did you choose direct sales because I have this question with a lot of people like why why did someone actually choose to go into direct sales well when I started my business I was working as a mechanical engineer so as many of you know mechanical engineering is a very male dominated type of feel so when I started it was an opportunity for me to be around some power powerful empowering girlfriends that I didn't have at work that's first and foremost I was already using the product that I was about to sell that was another reason so I was looking at it for the girlfriends and then for the discount and initially when I started I just kind of dabbled I can just tell you just I really dabbled really didn't tell many people about what I was doing did a lot of arts and crafts so if there was some kind of um Trend that I wanted to look at that I could do that on a page because I mean that's just my wheelhouse from being an engineer but when it came down to talking to people and actually working my business I don't know for whatever reason that kind of went over my head so um I changed I guess my my whole business just kind of changed when my husband got sick and I had to figure out another way for us to make an income because he had stopped working and the things that we had come accustomed to doing because he wasn't working we couldn't do so that was when I kind of was like okay I'm gonna have to figure this thing out because if I don't figure it out I don't want to go walking at a mall for 10 bucks an hour um when I could be doing the things that I want to do when I want to do it and if I just worked my business the way it should be worked so at that particular point I sought out a mentor because unfortunately I was one of those folks that had an MIA upline but I knew that at this particular point in my life that it was my business and one of my other mentors told me that I was an independent contractor with the right to control my own business so once I got that permission to really realize that this is my business and if if this person is not helping me so what I'm gonna figure it out anyway and that's essentially what I did I sought out a person on Facebook that I knew was a rock star in my company and she was gracious with me and allowed me to go to her training because I just basically called her and told her my story look my upline is not helping me I really want to do big things in this company but I need help and I need somebody to help me figure this thing out and like I said she was gracious to me I I went to her trainings um I drove probably seven eight hours to participate in in her trainings that she offered and I would oftentimes have people say you drove up here or you drove down here all by yourself and your upline is not here no I my upline is not here but I know this is my business and if I wanna if I want to make it happen I'm gonna have to figure that out myself I'm not gonna wait on my upline to figure it out so that's essentially what I did I love that and I love that you took the initiative to do that I went on a similar Journey when I I call it accidental leadership because I was doing a home party one day and uh one of the guests came up and like I want to join your team and I'm like oh I know I could have a team this is new and so I went to my upline and she was like your dreams are bigger than my dreams and vision you need to go to who signed me up so I was gracious enough that I was allowed into the Inner Circle fairly quickly with with our company but same thing I live in a small little Community I also had to drive eight hours and the people yeah they were like amazed I remember when one evening I showed up at that she was like if you're serious about this you'll be here tonight and I'm like okay and this was like at six a.m in the morning and I remember saying to my ex-husband at the time I'm like hey I need to go here you're watching the kids today I'll be back some I may even stay down there uh it was in Vancouver I'm like I might even stay down there and Shop a day or two but whatever you and the kids are on your own see ya then I drove and I got there um I so I left her around like nine-ish got there in the evening the meeting was starting at seven and she was like oh you like actually showed up and I'm like you told me to be here exactly I made the commitment to be in leadership and it was funny because I didn't really have a chance to eat and she was so gracious it made me a beautiful salad and and whatever and use me as an example because those those who want to create the most are willing to sacrifice at the beginning for the more later yep for sure right sure I totally agree totally agree yeah and so with that Journey so you've won um diamond rings and cars and that's awesome and and amazing and I love that but talk a little bit about what that Journey took like what was your mindset going on in like what was Inga feeling and going through at that time was it all what I'm getting at was it was it instant or did you have to learn and grow no no it was not instant and and for anyone out here that thinks it's instant they're telling you a tale Journey that I had to go through um and I can one of the things that comes to mind is I remember when I first started my business I am an introvert through and through so when I first started my business you know after talking to my friends and family it was like okay so now what because now that means I'm gonna have to talk to people that I don't know which I don't like doing so I used to have to just really get in the mindset I would just kind of force myself okay I'm gonna go talk to five people today just out and about so I would go and talk to five people and I had somebody just tell me okay well Inga today when you go and talk to these five people I just want you to smile at them to smile we're going to do this in a process you're just going to go out and just smile okay so I'll go out and smile okay I love it I can do that I can smile I could smile okay so now the next thing you're going to do is you're going to smile and then you're going to tell them hi my name is Inga what's your name and you know if they smile at you more than likely they're going to tell you their name because because they are a happy person and they're not going to be snotty about it so that's what I did and then after that I started then it became a point okay now Inga you're gonna talk to them you're gonna ask them their name are you just going to go and give them a genuine compliment it could be about their shoes their uh hair their clothing um their kid whatever you see that you are something you can actually relate to them that you have got you have something in common that you can talk about that's what you're gonna go do yeah so I gradually did this and I remember my husband was just like wow you've really come out of yourself because you didn't used to talk to people you didn't know at all I mean because I didn't but at that particular time and really now if I if I feel the need I can pretty much talk to anybody if they're willing to talk to me I'll I'll have that disclaimer um but it was because of that process that I was able to evolved out of my shell to really be able to talk to people that I didn't know and for those of you that are listening or watching you know that as you build your direct sales business and you move outside of your friends and family that you got to talk to people that you don't know that's really going to be how you continue to expand your business now I'm talking I had already told you I've done this for 19 years so this is way before Facebook or social media like they're kind of doing now so it was either I did that or it wasn't going to happen basically so that's what I did but the whole time that I did that it never really felt good to me I it just didn't resonate with me because that wasn't me me going out and talking to people and granted I did it because I felt like that was what I had to do and then the people that were around me that had were achieving the goals that I wanted to achieve that's what I knew that they were doing as well so what the saying is you gotta you gotta copycat but you got to make sure you copy the right cap is what I would say because in that period I was basically being someone that I wasn't and I wasn't feeling very good about it and then I was trying to teach other folks to do what I was doing and I noticed they didn't really feel too good about it either so some did so I bet you some did feel good about it because with the four different personalities oh yeah so yeah so some would lean into that and go mm-hmm but then you know there's only out of the four personalities there's only two that are actually very comfortable doing what you described the other two personalities but for them it's a man this is tough this is not me right yeah yeah so it was it was it was something to that kind of weighed on me yeah and I I kind of questions okay so do I really want to do this do I want to continue to do this kind of thing because this doesn't feel good to me so it became then okay so if I don't do it this way yeah then how am I gonna how am I gonna do it then so um at that point I transitioned to what we call um what do you call it uh the Name Escapes Me fish bowls where you would go out and put it in kind of a local business that you could still get leads and be able to interact with people that you didn't know but when you did it it was like you knew that the person that put their name in that bowl was somebody that you would want you so for those who don't know what Fishbowl is so a lot of businesses have very generously over the years they have a fishbowl literally in yeah literally counter and they encourage people to drop in your business card take a business card drop in so that you can Network and meet with people and again really big back in the day but if ever those who don't know this if ever you're out of business and you see the Fishbowl there a lot of people are still using this strategy by the way so they are fun and effective way of they encourage you you put in your name you take one note you connect with that person and that person wants to connect with you which is fun right and and I guess mine had a little twist a little bit different than that it was kind of like a it was a little sheet of paper that was a survey that you had kind of asked a couple of questions and then based on those questions you could determine if that was your person too another way I did it was I went to uh shows I guess like craft shows or um Expos where they would have tables where you could set up and you basically would wrap up something really pretty and tell people if they entered they could enter to win this particular gift and then um when you did that you'd have all these leads and then you would tell them okay you didn't you would actually pick a winner so I'm you were legitimately picking a winner but then you made everybody a winner and offered them an opportunity to try your product um based on them putting their name in so I did that I did that part of it too I also made the little I guess this was before QR codes it was the text number I'm sure you guys remember that the number you put a little code in and it takes it takes their name and number and it forgot about that that was a really really great strategy actually yeah and I actually like that one too because then I didn't have to physically go to the place all I mean I would go and check and make sure that it was still there but it wasn't as often as I had to go to pick up the little papers when the people dropped their little surveys in because then it was like okay I gotta make sure I go there to get them because unfortunately you had some people that were in the same company as me that would take your leads yeah you would have them yeah imagine that right so that was one of the things that I kind of did a little twist was I I dropped the leads I I made up I think I had like three pieces of paper in there that had my name on it well I changed the I would change the name I would say Susie Q and then I would put my phone number on it and then I would have Billy Bob or something I would just make up names so if somebody actually took the leads out and they called me then I would know okay so you took my leads but yeah that was just a little trick of the thing but I mean hey the the the engineer reverse engineering I love it exactly exactly what you did yeah so you I mean and that's and that's how I and that's basically how I did it um until you know we had the coveted we had to figure out again how we were going to do it and then I it was like well Revelation came to me was like oh Inga you used surveys before why don't you why don't you do that again so now I've made it in a digital type of form that Stills allows me to um still get leads and be authentically me where I don't necessarily have to go out and talk to people like I used to and uh well I felt like I used to I'll say like I felt like that was the only way that I could do it but I can still grow my business and do the kind of the same thing but from a digital point of view so that's that's really how I evolved to really kind of be true to myself and and grow my business the way that felt good to me with growth strategies that felt good to me I love this and this is a great great call that we're having because as a leader who has been an introvert you've used strategies but being true to your authentic self that I think is this is going to someone listening to this today because both of us have you know you you're probably doing it more naturally because it's your it's your strategy it's your personality it's your profile that usually within your your personality profile you naturally are attracting those who are like-minded to you simply because right not so much in common but exactly with four different personalities there's 75 percent that you're like oh how do I speak to them and so this is great because I'm not your personality Style by the way so I'm pretty sure I know what your profiles are because that's what I love to do and that's my giving better things all moments like that's my exactly that that's my genius my point of Genius um and how I've been able to relate to all four personalities all the time but I love what what you're sharing because this is for those introverted green personalities that really don't it's not that they don't like people never mistake that because Inga loves people she just doesn't you know she doesn't gain energy by having those that type of communication yeah the cold calling or the cold conversation right that yes there is one personality absolutely loves that and loves it thrive on this I'm meeting a new person I'm so excited thank you and another personality the blue personality loves relationship building and they will just actually stay in relationship mode they have different work to do they have to get out of relationship mode and actually do the ask um but I love in your personality that you just you know you've found ways that are authentic to you and systems to do that like right your Ace is up Congratulations by the way you do a really really great job thank you but but it definitely it was not something that happened I want to let people know this is not something that happened overnight this was a lot of trial and tribulation and then I often sometimes think I was like I almost really wanted this because you know so many times when people come up to a trial they'll say okay well obviously this is not for me and I guess my driving force was I was I was in a position at work that you know I had the degree I was making the money but I just didn't like what I was doing and I really wanted out so I looked at my direct sales business as my way out of corporate because that I mean that's what I could see I saw these people you know being able to go on vacation being able to set up their day the way they wanted to at the time my son was a little bit younger and he wanted me to be the class mom that was just like his big ass mom can you be the class Mom I'm like there's no way I can be the class mom and first of all I worked 30 minutes 40 minutes away from your school so I would literally have to take a half a day to go do something for the for the class and then come back and it used to hurt my heart that I couldn't do that because of the type of position that I was in but it was just you know how do I how do I make that happen how do I transition into something like that where I could be the class mom um so that was my driver and that was what was really um driving me to kind of figure this thing out because I didn't want to be there I knew corporate was not my thing at all and you you've actually hit it right on the head for your personality too um for your color group and your personality that is that is essentially what you have to do to make the move and because you give yourself a bigger picture and the overall why which was awesome right all right well um we just have a couple more minutes here so let's talk a little bit about maybe a strategy that you've been using that you maybe want to share with everyone um that has been helping you okay let me let me cut off my phone wait a second I'm sure you hear that in the background yes no you don't oh okay well then I'll just roll all right so because it's not probably not going to be quiet until I cut it off but anyway if you don't hear it it's all good it's all right so uh so a strategy that I've been using is to basically like I said instead of using this paper survey that I used to have right I transitioned the paper survey into a digital form that I can now use pretty much I'll say anywhere because what I've done is I made the the code a QRC a QR code so I can have somebody scan it if I'm seeing them in person if I'm doing something on social media I can also have them I can send them the link if I'm or if I can send them an email if I am doing something like this I can send them to a website which again still allows them to have access so that was the main thing that I wanted to do and that I was able to do is to transition this paper copy um survey to actually be something that was digital and then in addition to that I tweaked the questions because what I was realizing is the initial survey that I had I was basically asking them what I wanted to hear and you may be thinking what do you mean by that well I was asking them about the benefits of my products that I already knew but I never was trying to find out well what is their real struggle if they told me their struggle then I could kind of figure out well how can I help them I mean really to be of service to them more so than just trying to sell a product so it was a different mind it was kind of a mindset switch for me that I was able to do that and I started getting amazing answers that I never thought that I would get because of that just little tweak and I could tell that by the people that I was that was coming and I guess I would call it a funnel were coming into my funnel they were more I guess opt to really want to talk to me about the product or service because I asked them what their issue was more so than me trying to just sell them a product and that and there's a different it's a different energy when it came to that so the conversations that we're having especially as an introvert introvert I'm outgoing I love to talk about my product and I'm passionate about my product and service it was just the cold Outreach that I struggled with but now with this survey because they were telling me what they needed I was really felt like I was being of service to them to really be able to solve or or really help them get their desired outcome because they were telling me what they wanted so it was a completely different mind shift that I was able to pass on to my team members as well like Hey we're we are problem solvers we need to think of ourselves like problem solvers more so than just I'm I'm a seller I'm a direct seller no you're a problem solver and as a result of being that problem solver once you figure out what they want to do or what they're trying what goal they're trying to reach then you can say oh by the way we have this product and this product that will probably help you meet yours and help you meet your need and get your desired results so that shift in itself was just amazing yeah and that you use technology yeah exactly so so for those who are in that personality the greens who like technology yeah you know I know some of my leaders are going to be eating this episode up because there's a couple technology leaders who are like I don't know what to do whatever I need a I need a way and I need the overall and like oh this episode is going to be for them all right yeah so as we wrap up here I love your story I love your journey um I want to ask you one other quick question before we wrap up and I love asking this question because um tough leadership gives similar Answers by the way and so this is this is always what it's a it's like an everyone kind of has this very very similar answer to this question that I find from Top leaders and it's key which is why I love asking it over and over if you were to go back 19 years and tell younger Inga give her one piece of advice to move her forward what would you give her I think the first thing that I would tell her is to trust the journey I think oftentimes and I know this is something that I've I've reflected on many a times when I was growing up I was told that I needed to go to school get my degree work for XYZ company for 30 plus years and get my gold watch that path was laid out for me so I knew exactly what I was doing and how I was going to do it but entrepreneurship is no way shape or form like that and what often times people have difficulty with is they're so used to knowing all of the steps in their Journey when in entrepreneurship what happens is we we know the step that we're supposed to take today and people for whatever reason don't want to take that step they want to know well if I I don't I don't really want to do that I want to know what company you're not going to know what comes next because the only way you're going to know what comes next is if you do what you're supposed to do today and I can just tell in all of the times that I've been working or trying to go through go to a next level or make a big breakthrough it has always been that okay Inga this is what you need to do today and then once I did that it was just like okay so now that you've done that this is what you need to do next but if I would have sat on my hands and didn't do that at all I would have never seen that next step and that's often what holds people back because they're not willing to take that action and then they'll they may blame their upline they may say it's the wrong company they may even switch companies and think for whatever reason it's going to magically be different but if you didn't do it in company a you're probably not going to do it in Company B and it's not the company oh by the way it's you that's the common denominator in here we don't know whatever reason yeah but yeah we don't yeah we don't well I didn't I sure didn't like hearing it I remember having conversations exact same thing and I'm like oh man then I'm like it really is me I gotta change me before I could change you gotta change me that's right I love it and I love that you um know that trust the journey because we're all on we're all basically actually on the same journey and that's the other thing too I'm like you don't need to reinvent the wheel invented out there somewhere but you do need to find the wheel that fits for you right with your personality fit it with your style fight with your leadership learn how you can mentor um those are all different things that we can definitely find within us but I guarantee someone else has probably already done that Journey you just have to kind of find which which wheel aligns with you so exactly exactly and I love that you gave yourself permission to trust that journey and I'm so glad that you were with me today I loved it awesome well thanks for having me all right so we're gonna wrap up here and thank everyone for joining us today if you want to reach out to Inga we are going to give a link here as well um we'll take tag her into the heart-centered entrepreneur series group so if you guys want to ask questions learn more about Inga and being an authentic strategist and you're that type of Personality that you need the strategy laid out before you um for you all right yes well thanks for having me thank you for joining me today goodbye everyone I hope you enjoyed today's episode and learned a lot each one of my guests have a special and unique spot in my heart as they have shared what they love about their business and how they truly have grown in their entrepreneur Journey thanks for sticking around to the end and I would love to give to you a fun and easy quiz that you can take right now that will help you assess how you feel about the sales process in your beautiful business building relationships lifting each other up so we can all gain more in our lives and our business is what is truly important to me and my hope is that in some small way I've been able to do that for you today so again this is Jody Maley with the heart centered entrepreneurs series here in beautiful BC Canada truly have a great and inspired rest of your day the link to the quiz will be attached below and please like follow and share this podcast it inspired you today