{PODCAST} How girlhood experiences shape your business with author Rachel Simmons

Hi! You’re here because you’re a woman who runs a consulting business, and you want to learn how to make it more profitable, more stable, and more fulfilling. In our world, that means being able to get more of the right kind of clients into your business and get paid on your value, not your time, so you can build a business that supports your life, not the other way around.

If you’re like a lot of women consultants, you’re so good at the work you do, but the process of getting new clients feels a bit like unfamiliar territory. You’ve gotten this far with referrals or word of mouth, but you know you should be doing something more proactive (but you don’t want to be salesy). You also know that what got you here won’t get you to the next level in your business.

If that’s you, you’re in the right place.

Here you’ll learn strategies you can use to attract more of the right kinds of consulting clients and get paid more for your consulting contracts, in a way that doesn’t even feel like selling.

Along the way, you’ll discover that you aren’t “bad at sales.” (I promise.) You simply haven’t learned yet. But you can learn how, feel comfortable, and actually be good at it.

We’ll cover the three critical areas to master in order to get higher-paying consulting clients:

Attract (attracting more of the right clients and filling your client pipeline)

Guide (leading a sales process and keeping clients engaged)

Close (helping clients say yes and getting paid more than you ever thought you could).

I'm glad you're here! Let's dive in.

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TL;DR - In this episode, I’m talking to bestselling author Rachel Simmons about how all of our girlhood experiences show up in, and shape, our businesses today. Listen to the episode here.

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One Saturday night in the 90s, around midnight, a group of girls snuck out of the house at a sleepover. They walked a few blocks in the moonlit night, trying not to make too much noise until they arrived at their destination...

My front yard.

Carefully, they poured salt onto the lush green grass.?

A few days later that grass died, leaving a message in yellow, a few feet tall, on my front lawn. It said:

FUCK LEAH

It’s just one of the incidents that happened to me in Middle School when I was bullied by a group of girls who had once been my friends.

Eventually, I formed a new group of friends, and the rest of my Middle and High School years were great, but those years of being bullied stuck with me for a very long time. (And really, they still do.)

Later on, in my 20’s, I came across? Rachel Simmons’ book, Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls. Her bestselling book unlocked a lot for me because it answers the question: Why are girls so terrible to each other?? (If you haven’t read it, you should!)

Since then, I’ve followed Rachel’s work closely. In her more recent books, she continues her scholarship to answer a few key questions:

What are the expectations placed on girls and young women?

How do the lessons we learn as girls affect us at the moment?

How do they affect us long term?

And the topic I’m thrilled to chat with her about in this podcast episode:

How do our girlhood experiences show up in – and shape – our businesses??

I’m thrilled to share this episode with you.

Rachel Simmons is the author of the New York Times bestsellers Odd Girl Out, The Curse of the Good Girl, and Enough As She Is: How to Help Girls Move Beyond

Impossible Standards of Success to Live Healthy, Happy and Fulfilling Lives.

She is co-founder of the national nonprofit Girls Leadership. Her writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Atlantic, Slate, and The New York Times, and she is an ABC News Contributor for Good Morning America.

So if you’ve ever had or have a fear of making mistakes, if you’re a perfectionist or, like me, a recovering perfectionist,

If you were raised with an idea of success and achievement and that you had to be good at everything,

If you’ve ever felt like you can’t do something or say something because it’s not considered nice…

You’ll recognize yourself in Rachel’s book and in our conversation.

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Hi! I'm Leah Neaderthal. I'm a sales coach for women consultants and the founder of Smart Gets Paid.

When I left my corporate career and started my first consulting business, I learned three things very quickly:

1- It’s 1000x harder to sell your own stuff than to sell someone else’s.

2- Marketing is not selling.

3- I had no idea how to sell.

I needed clients, but I didn’t know how to actually get them, and I was terrified of coming off like a used car salesman. It made me doubt whether I was even cut out to run a business.

So I taught myself how to get new clients in a way that feels authentic, allows me to be myself, and that works, consistently. I now teach these techniques to others. Because I know it’s possible to learn how to land clients, and actually feel comfortable doing it, once you know how.

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Whenever you’re ready to start landing higher-paying clients, here are three ways I can help you.

1. Listen to the Smart Gets Paid Podcast

You’ll hear me chat with my actual clients as we tackle their biggest challenges in getting new clients, and you’ll learn sales strategies you can use today in your own business. It's the only podcast that can help you land higher-paying clients in your B2B consulting business. Listen on Apple Podcasts or your favorite podcast platform.

2. Get your copy of the One-Page Sales Strategy

If you’re looking for a clear, easy-to-follow sales strategy for your B2B consulting business, get your copy of the One-Page Sales Strategy, and create a customized, focused strategy for your business, today: onepagesalesstrategy.com

3. Land higher-paying consulting clients with help from my team and me.?

Learn the proven, step-by-step system women like you are using to start landing the clients they really want, get more Yes’s, and get paid dramatically more for every contract, with help every step of the way. Send me a message here on LinkedIn with "Clients" in the first line and I’ll get you the details.

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