On this episode of Forbes Talks, Forbes Associate Editor Alex York talks with Ali Kriegsman, cofounder of Bulletin and author of How to Build A Goddamn Empire. Kriegsman discusses her entrepreneurial journey, the challenges of scaling a business, and pivoting to adapt to market changes. She also talks about the sale of Bulletin, her move into writing and consulting, and her thoughts on the current state of influencer marketing.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00I'm going to look at the camera when I say this.
00:03Life is a game.
00:05You can change the character that you're playing or the costume that you're wearing at any
00:10time.
00:12Just because you've been, you know, Allie the entrepreneur for 10 years doesn't mean
00:19you can't become Allie the fiction writer.
00:27Hi everyone.
00:28It's Alex York.
00:29I'm here with Allie Kriegsman, who made the Under 30 list in 2018 for her work as a co-founder
00:33of Bulletin.
00:34Today, she is an author, a marketing consultant, and so much more.
00:37Thank you so much for joining me today, Allie.
00:39Thank you, Alex.
00:40Good to be with you.
00:41How are you doing?
00:42I'm good.
00:43I mean, we're freezing.
00:44Yes.
00:45Are we not?
00:46We definitely are.
00:47So you have been around the block in terms of entrepreneurship, business.
00:51Like I said, you made the list in 2018.
00:53So much has changed since then.
00:55How many years has that been?
00:56I feel like my brain is like broken.
00:58Like seven at this point, which is wild.
01:01So yeah, so much has happened in the past seven years, I feel.
01:04How do you feel like you have fared over the past seven years?
01:07Good and bad.
01:08Highs and lows.
01:09Let's see.
01:10I guess I made the list like two years before the pandemic.
01:16It was definitely really intense, and I'm sure a lot of entrepreneurs would say this,
01:20but like keeping your cool, continuing to scale your company, keeping your ish together,
01:26like keeping yourself in a good leadership mindset through the pandemic was really taxing.
01:33Also taking care of yourself and making sure you didn't lose your mind.
01:37Really proud that I got through that, that the company got through that.
01:42We ultimately sold the business in 2022.
01:45So two years out from the pandemic, which was really exciting.
01:50After many pivots, which I think you wrote about, right?
01:53You published a piece about Bulletin pivoting a zillion times and finally exiting.
02:00So yeah, the version of the business that we sold was a B2B wholesale marketplace.
02:05We still exist.
02:06We make it super easy for buyers of different retailers, big and small, like boutiques,
02:13apothecaries, gyms, to source inventory for their different retail locations.
02:18They can buy inventory directly through our site.
02:20It's all drop ship.
02:22And then for brands, we are a great resource for increasing your retail distribution.
02:26So if you're a D2C brand and you're like, I need to get on shelves, right?
02:31You can use Bulletin, among other tools, to get your stuff out there and kind of break
02:36off from just selling on your website.
02:38So that exit was really powerful for all of us, for the whole team.
02:43And then after that, I started working on a fiction book, which I'm sure we'll talk
02:48about in due time.
02:49And then I started consulting for other brands, which was a really nice mental health break
02:54for me, not managing a bunch of people.
02:58Anyone I managed, I love you.
03:00That's not saying anything negative, but I think just having a different pace was really
03:06refreshing.
03:08And continuing to support entrepreneurs and founders, but in this new capacity, has been
03:15really wonderful.
03:16And I just look at the life I've constructed on the other side of being Forbes 30 under
03:2130 and everything I was doing that year in 2018, and the lessons learned and the way
03:29that I've kind of rebuilt and repaced my life after all that.
03:33And yeah, I'm really happy where things are.
03:36Yeah, that's really great to hear.
03:37You have had so many lives in the past couple of years, for sure.
03:40Now as you mentioned, you're coming into a lot of these conversations as an expert in
03:44someone that's helping other young founders, other business owners grow, but at one point
03:47you were them.
03:48You were just starting up Bulletin.
03:50I want to talk a little bit about your founding story.
03:52You were in a different career before you became a founder.
03:55So can you walk me through what kind of those early years of like the ideation process behind
03:59Bulletin were and how you kind of came up with the idea in the first place?
04:02Yes.
04:03And I will try to keep this brief.
04:05You got a whole book about it.
04:06I know.
04:07It's really cool to talk about.
04:08I know.
04:09And I love to yap.
04:11So when I was 23, I was working at Conde Nast.
04:17That was my first job out of school.
04:19And they were all about like content and commerce.
04:22Like I think Refinery29 had either just or was about to like integrate e-commerce into
04:28their shopping experience.
04:29And all websites do this now, like all editorial sites.
04:33It's like you're reading an article and it's all affiliate, right?
04:36It's like you can shop this right now, whether it's like a skincare product or fashion.
04:41But that was very brand new at the time, which is crazy to think about.
04:45And from there I went to Contently, which was a startup that helped brands basically
04:55editorialize themselves.
04:56So this was right when Red Bull had created like their magazine.
05:00And this was right as like Coca-Cola had started like a really big blog.
05:04Like all of these big brands and small brands, beauty brands were like we need to think of
05:09ourselves more as content creators.
05:12And so me and Alana, my co-founder and business partner, at that time we were just the best
05:18salespeople at that company, I think because we both really understood content.
05:23We really understood curation.
05:26And she had actually come up with the first idea of Bulletin, which was let's take Etsy
05:31and make it more curated and layer in this like editorial storytelling.
05:36So we're going to have a Squarespace site and you're going to be like the editor in
05:39chief.
05:40Like super lo-fi, low overhead, everything was drop ship.
05:44So she was just reaching out to like cool brands that she saw at like the Brooklyn flea
05:49markets and like stuff that she just was finding on Instagram.
05:53And I was like interviewing them and telling their life story.
05:57And you would get a news bulletin every other week or so.
06:01That's why it was called Bulletin.
06:03And you could shop their art or their jewelry or their wallpaper, whatever it was, throughout
06:08this like story that I had written about them.
06:11And she was really the one that had this bigger vision for the business.
06:15Like she was watching Into the Gloss become Glossier.
06:19We had both read Girlboss by Sofia Amoruso and we were watching these big DTC businesses
06:25at the time, like Outdoor Voices and Warby Parker, like just start to gain a lot of momentum.
06:32And she was very ambitious and I feel like her ambition was very infectious for me.
06:39And she was like, we're going to raise money, we're going to raise venture capital.
06:42And so we didn't, like we, you know, everyone's like, why would you try to?
06:48She did, like she would take meetings and stuff.
06:51I was only like editor in chief at that point.
06:54And people were like, what the hell is this?
06:56Like we're not giving you money for this.
06:59And then we eventually started doing pop up markets to market this like Squarespace
07:05site and this newsletter.
07:07And the pop up markets was the like big aha moment, the first one, where we were making
07:11like real cash money.
07:13We basically would rent out this like massive parking lot in Williamsburg.
07:18And now it's been fully developed on, which is like a crazy passage of time as a founder.
07:22You're like, this was empty, it was like asphalt on a swamp.
07:26And then like, you don't go to Williamsburg for a while because the pandemic and you come
07:30back and you're like, this is a massive apartment complex, like five years have passed.
07:36And we would charge like $300 per booth, we'd set everything up in the parking lot.
07:42And then we'd have like food trucks and stuff.
07:45And it was basically like a copycat, like Smorgasburg, it was just like a flea market.
07:50And we got into Y Combinator's fellowship program on the heels of that, which isn't
07:57their core program.
07:58They basically just gave you like $20,000.
08:01And we're like, let's see if you have a real business idea here.
08:04That then spiraled, we got into their core program.
08:08We started opening retail stores where brands would pay a flat fee to be in the store.
08:14We would take a certain percentage of sales, but it operated business model wise, similar
08:19to the pop up markets where it was like rent arbitrage, like how WeWork was or how the
08:25wing was where it's like, we're going to charge everyone rent on this space, have a slight
08:30markup on the rent that we're charging everyone, and then also make incremental sales on the
08:36retail that we're doing in store.
08:40And through Y Combinator, we got investment, venture capital investment for that model.
08:45So if WeWork was getting investment for like co-working as a service, and the wing was
08:50getting investment for co-working as a service, we got investment for retail as a service.
08:54And is that how you positioned it?
08:56Not as like a store itself, but as retail as a service in a way?
08:59Yes, exactly.
09:00We work for retail was our slogan.
09:03In venture, you always need like a this for that.
09:05Uber of whatever.
09:07Exactly.
09:08And we raised, I think, $2.2 million.
09:11Of course, I know the exact amount, even though this was like a zillion years ago.
09:16And that model was really hard to scale.
09:19And I think that's why you see companies like the wing and WeWork kind of failing to scale
09:26their models.
09:27You know, we had at least the bonus income of the retail sales and taking commission
09:31on the retail sales, but it was very difficult.
09:36And we had to pivot again.
09:38And so we realized that as retailers supporting these brands, the brand discovery process
09:45was very broken.
09:47You're going to trade shows, showrooms, you're scouring the internet, you're scouring Instagram
09:51as a retailer.
09:52And then for brands to manage all these multiple retailer accounts, you have to like hire an
09:57account manager or an intern.
09:59You're sending orders over, purchase orders in PDFs over email, or you're using QuickBooks,
10:05or you're using Google Drive.
10:07Like everything was just, am I allowed to say shit show?
10:10Yeah.
10:11Everything was a shit show.
10:13And other models had cropped up.
10:15Like Etsy Wholesale existed, but then they folded it because they were focusing on their
10:19core business.
10:21Fair Wholesale had just started, which became a direct competitor of ours.
10:25Tundra was like starting to come up.
10:28And these were businesses that were basically taking the mechanics of discovering brands
10:33as a retailer and getting into retailers as a brand and streamlining the entire process.
10:39Think of it as like Amazon Wholesale.
10:43A quick question on that.
10:44When you guys were pulling these brands in and encouraging them to come sell at your
10:48pop-ups or ultimately your stores, were you then also like editorializing them in a way?
10:53Were you brand storytelling for them or was it really just like the rent space?
10:57Yes.
10:58So that was basically my role.
11:00Yeah.
11:01I was running sales of getting brands interested in being in the stores, being in the markets.
11:05I ran sales growth, everything for every iteration of the business until mid-2021 when I hired
11:11my replacement for that function, which was one of the best decisions I and the company
11:15has ever made.
11:16I will 100% attribute our exit to Rachel Krug.
11:21Love you.
11:22You're brilliant.
11:23You're a genius.
11:24Thank you for everything you did for us.
11:26So the other thing we did in the stores was we ran events in the store.
11:30Brands could do events in our retail locations.
11:32I also had a PR function where I was pitching these brands to like Nylon, Cosmo, Teen Vogue.
11:41If you were in a bulletin store, you were getting the benefit of everything I was doing
11:47to make bulletin big.
11:48We didn't have our own products for the most part.
11:50We had some merch sometimes, but you were basically getting your own little publicity
11:56engine.
11:57So we would do events with brands in the store.
12:00They could use the store for free to, you know, do workshops or like meet and greet
12:05nights with their customers, just community events of any kind.
12:10But then we would also have outside people do events in the store, like influencers or
12:15Comedy Central did a big event for Broad City.
12:18Showtime did a big event to launch a show there.
12:22And so there was just constant foot traffic getting like pummeled into the store.
12:26And that was the promise to the brands.
12:29It wasn't just like, oh, get shelf space here.
12:32I'm like, now you have a shelf.
12:33It was like you get shelf space, but you also get this marketing engine that we are all
12:38building together for you.
12:40And also we had this analytics dashboard where brands could log in and see their sales in
12:46real time in the store.
12:48And we had three stores running at once in our peak.
12:52So you could be in Nolita and Flatiron and Williamsburg, and you could log in and say,
12:59where am I selling the best this week?
13:01Where is my audience?
13:03What motif is selling the best on my t-shirts?
13:05Is it the cherry or the flower or the heart?
13:09And brands don't have that.
13:10They still don't have that, I think.
13:13They don't really have access to real time analytics when they're selling with these
13:18indie retailers.
13:19So there's just not a lot of visibility unless you're getting reorders from those retailers
13:24around like, what is my customer loving the most?
13:28And with that analytics dashboard, in addition to the publicity and marketing engine, in
13:33addition to the event space, I think they got so much from Bulletin.
13:39Why did you guys end up selling it and making the exit?
13:43I think it was a few reasons, candidly.
13:45Number one, I personally, I don't think I've said this out loud before, I was exhausted.
13:51And I think a lot of entrepreneurs hit that breaking point where they're like, I don't
13:59know if this business is going to benefit from me continuing to push this boulder up
14:03a hill.
14:04I can't speak for Alana and I can't speak for the rest of the team.
14:07I would never.
14:08I personally was exhausted.
14:11And so I shared that with the core decision makers on my team between COVID and just my
14:22overall mental health at that time for other reasons, building and pivoting as many times
14:27as we did.
14:28Running a retail concept like that and then building a two sided marketplace and suddenly
14:34becoming an engineering organization, hiring an engineering team, developing a product
14:39function within your organization, it was a lot of hard work, Alex.
14:45It's not an easy thing.
14:48You're not like, oh, we're a retail store that suddenly sells other products, but now
14:52we're going to sell our products.
14:53It's a completely different transition and I was spent.
14:58So that's one.
14:59I think two, I personally saw the writing on the wall.
15:03The market had gotten very competitive in the midst of our biggest growth period.
15:10We were growing 25% month over month as these acquisition conversations started happening.
15:15We weren't like a beleaguered business by any means, but our biggest competitor had
15:20just raised $400 million.
15:23And who was that at the time?
15:24Fair.
15:25They're still the market leader and God bless them.
15:28They're brilliant.
15:30I loved building in their shadow because it taught me what it meant to build product discipline,
15:37what it meant to build this like truly market defying technology and marketplace that like
15:47really did transform how these buyers and sellers interacted with each other.
15:52But I was just like, they're going to win, they're going to fucking win.
15:57And sometimes it just takes that real hard look to be like, is anyone going to give us
16:02the resources to really compete here?
16:05And given my experience in venture capital as a woman, as a non-technical founder, again,
16:13just speaking for myself, I am not speaking for anyone else on the team.
16:17My bet was I don't think that anyone's going to give us those resources.
16:21So that was the second thing.
16:24And I think the third thing is once you answer that question, you're like, okay, so where
16:32do we go from here?
16:34And you have to ask yourself, well, what could Bulletin become?
16:38And Bulletin was always so community driven.
16:42Like our brands knew each other and supported each other and we supported them.
16:48And when we did events, people showed up.
16:51We were an IRL business starting in 2015, we were doing these pop-up markets.
16:57And so Alana and I were very excited about the prospect of making Bulletin an IRL, in-person,
17:05community driven business again.
17:08We weren't that anymore.
17:09As soon as we became the B2B wholesale marketplace, the team was remote because of COVID.
17:15Everything was online through this marketplace and the stores were gone.
17:21And with Emerald and New York Now, the show that they also gave to us and kind of gave
17:25us creative and strategic control over, we could really resurrect that part of Bulletin,
17:30which was always the heart of Bulletin.
17:32So post-acquisition, Bulletin became its own brand within the trade show ecosystem at Emerald.
17:40We took New York Now over and really rejuvenated it post-pandemic and injected our sense of
17:48community and our love for small business and entrepreneurship into that show after
17:54those customers, those brands had been so beleaguered by the pandemic.
18:00And it just felt like a way to get back to our roots.
18:02And so I think a lot of times with selling or figuring out what the hell am I supposed
18:08to do here?
18:10Sometimes the answer is you just have to be really honest with yourself and really realistic
18:14when you're looking at the market and what's available to you and who's going to help you
18:19do what.
18:20And then you have to be like, what is the most authentic expression of this brand and
18:26who allows us to do that?
18:29And follow the answers that come from that question.
18:33For a lot of entrepreneurs, founders, the exit is like the end goal, something that's
18:38like maybe far in the future, something that they're working towards for so many years.
18:43Once you achieve that and then like you said, you decided you want to go in a more creative
18:47route with writing and you ultimately ended up writing a nonfiction book as well.
18:52Did you feel like you were like starting from zero again or what were your own...
18:59How did you wrap your head around like achieving this massive success of selling the company
19:03that you'd built and then deciding what was next in, you know, still a very young age?
19:09The exit was very meaningful to me.
19:16I still find it very meaningful because to start a business when you're 24 and go through
19:24the number of pivots that we went through.
19:26And as I said, I literally joke, I'm like, I pulled a two sided marketplace out of my
19:32ass.
19:33Like that's how it feels when it's happening.
19:36Like you can look at the results, like you can, you know, see it from the outside and
19:48be like, oh, like the website's so beautiful, it's merchandised so beautifully, like, you
19:52know, I was very successful in getting brands to join and in getting retailers to join.
19:57It's not as big as our competitors, but also a lot of the companies that started, like
20:04if you're not fair, you're dead.
20:06Abound, done.
20:07Tundra, done.
20:08Like every other company that came up with us that was competing with them shut down.
20:14We not only survived, we sold.
20:18And I think of it less as like, oh, this like financial gain for myself or the story.
20:25I just, it showed me who I was.
20:29And that is the most precious thing for me.
20:34And it also showed me who Alana was and it's, it was very, it's a very, very validating
20:41story of like, wow, I was 24 and I partnered up with this brilliant, amazing woman who
20:46I trusted with my career in my 20s and she crushed it.
20:52Like that was just such a good call on my part and I'm so proud of everything we did
20:56together.
20:59And then there's the other side of it that you're saying where you're like, wow, will
21:03I ever do anything like that again?
21:05Did you feel that pressure ever?
21:07I don't feel it as pressure.
21:10I feel it as like, okay, I did that.
21:15That was crazy.
21:16Like that was crazy.
21:17Like it's kind of like that.
21:21And it gives you this freedom of like, wow, I'm crazy.
21:23I can do crazy stuff.
21:24Like, what crazy thing do I want to do next?
21:27And I think if anything, what it does is it gives you this weight of like, wow, people
21:33perceive me as this successful person that did this like impossible thing.
21:39Like Forbes 30 under 30, like, you know, fast company this, like press that, like exit,
21:46blah, blah, blah.
21:47And it's like, you know, I didn't sell my fiction book, for example, which I worked
21:52so hard on and which is really good.
21:54Sorry, it's really good.
21:56And when it didn't sell, I was like, wow, like that's embarrassing.
22:02Like L, like I'm a flop, I'm a loser.
22:05Like I've lost that magic spark, whatever.
22:09Like you kind of get down on yourself a little easier, but then the thing that happened after
22:16is that voice that's like, no girl, you're a magician.
22:21You're crazy.
22:22Look at this crazy stuff you've done.
22:23So it's more of a conversation with yourself that goes, that ping pongs back and forth
22:28more so than it is like, oh, I did that.
22:31I'm on top of the world.
22:32I'm perfect.
22:33Like I'm always going to be successful or like, oh no, I did this successful thing when
22:38I was so young.
22:39I'm never going to do anything successful ever again.
22:41It's like, it's actually both things talking to each other all the time.
22:46I think that totally makes sense.
22:47And I think a lot of like young creatives, founders or otherwise, like once you do one
22:52of your things, there's still more creativity flowing and then more that you are either
22:56excited about or that you want to pursue.
22:58One of the things that you pursued is writing a nonfiction book.
23:00Yes.
23:01Why did you decide to write that?
23:02My first book.
23:03Yes.
23:04So I actually didn't decide to write it.
23:07I Bulletin was in the New York Times in 2017 and the headline was like feminist flea market
23:14opens in Nolita or something.
23:16And I was like, number one, this isn't a flea market.
23:19Number two, like what is a feminist flea market?
23:23But whatever.
23:24It was the New York Times.
23:25So like, what are you going to do?
23:27And a literary agent, my first literary agent, one of two, Elias, saw it and reached out
23:34to me and was like, I think this story is really compelling.
23:38Like I think you have a book in you or something like that.
23:41And him and my other agent at the time, Becky, took me out to lunch and they were like, you
23:47know, female entrepreneurship is like really growing.
23:51It seems like you'll have a really interesting voice and take on this.
23:54And then they kind of gave me an assignment.
23:56They were like, if you were to write a book about this, like what would you write?
23:59And I was like, okay.
24:01And I had wanted to be a writer since I was six.
24:03I'm a writer.
24:04That's like how I identify.
24:06Like I can do entrepreneurship.
24:08I can do marketing consulting.
24:09But like on my deathbed, if someone was like, and what were you?
24:13I would be like, a writer, you know?
24:16And I was just like, okay.
24:18I just felt like the version of entrepreneurship that women specifically were being fed at
24:23the time was very glamorized.
24:26It was very like picture perfect Instagram square.
24:30And it was very driven by media that was kind of fetishizing this like glamorous, beautiful,
24:36you know, she can do it all female founder.
24:39But the lived experience was not that.
24:41I was like, I don't know what I'm doing.
24:43Like I'm messing up all the time.
24:45Like I'm disappointing myself.
24:47I'm sometimes disappointing my team.
24:49I'm like spending money I shouldn't have spent.
24:51I'm making mistakes.
24:53And I wake up sometimes and I'm like, I don't deserve this.
24:56And I go to bed sometimes and I feel like I'm a genius.
25:00And it's this very volatile experience.
25:03And I felt like because the realities of the experience weren't being talked about or portrayed,
25:09when women were running into roadblocks, I would hear it all the time from my friends
25:13and from the literal founders selling in my store.
25:18They felt like they were absolute like failure gremlins.
25:22Like they were like something's wrong with me.
25:24And I was like, I need to write a book that really talks about entrepreneurship from the
25:28trenches that delves into the psychological side and the emotional side and isn't written
25:34on high after the fact.
25:36Like Girlboss, I love Sofia Amoruso.
25:40She continues to be so inspirational to me.
25:44She doesn't care what people think.
25:45She's on her own journey.
25:46She just sold her house and just like moved to London because she was like, I don't care,
25:50whatever.
25:51Like I love people like that.
25:54But she wrote that book after Girlboss was like a multi, multi, multi, multi-million
25:57dollar business.
25:58Lean In, Sheryl Sandberg, another book that was put out like in the years leading up to
26:03my book.
26:04Another like very, very wealthy woman like telling us all what to do.
26:08And I was like, I'm going to write the rat girl, scrappy, like don't know what I'm doing
26:13version of this.
26:14And what I hear now from people is the fact that I sold the business actually makes the
26:20book even more powerful because you're like, wait, that's me.
26:24I also don't know what I'm doing.
26:26I also have all this self-doubt.
26:27I also just like hired the first person and they were the wrong person.
26:31I also like, you know, bled like my savings on this thing that was the wrong thing.
26:37And then they're like, but she did that too.
26:39And she still exited.
26:40And she still made it.
26:42And that was the motivation behind my book.
26:44I just, I think a big part of my life for whatever reason is like I want people to feel
26:50like acceptance and like it's all going to be okay.
26:52And I just, I try to take away this like negative self-talk and this self-judgment from people.
26:57And I wanted to write a business book that was very practical and educational, but like
27:02made you feel more confident in yourself with the realities of entrepreneurship being laid
27:08bare versus reading a book that made you feel like, oh, I'm not doing this and I'm
27:12not doing this and I'm not doing this and I'm not enough.
27:14Yeah.
27:15You then also throughout all of this have gone on to consult other companies and you
27:19built a pretty significant consulting practice for yourself, probably sharing a lot of those
27:22bits of advice that you wrote about now with your clients.
27:26What are some of the biggest issues that founders run into or some of the, you know, just biggest
27:30challenges or things that you are trying to help people deal with on a day-to-day basis
27:34from the consultant point of view?
27:37I think one of the biggest psychological things I see or mental things I see, and I write
27:42about this in my nonfiction book, is people don't realize, people not realizing that they
27:50really need to be like loud and proud about everything that they're doing.
27:54There's this sense of insecurity or just perfectionism that leads people to not post about their
28:02business on their own social media or on LinkedIn or send the email or want to make
28:07the connection.
28:09I tell the founders I work with all the time, you need to be your biggest fan and you need
28:13to take this insanely seriously or other people aren't going to take you seriously.
28:17So that's one.
28:18Is that through social media that you primarily encourage people to do stuff like that?
28:22It's through social media, but it's also just feeling like you deserve to connect with people
28:29that are elevated and at the top of their craft and asking for introductions, asking
28:35for help, asking for them to be advisors, whatever it is.
28:39The second thing I would say is kind of just foundational brand story, like why does this
28:44matter stuff.
28:46The market is oversaturated with everything, clothes, skincare, makeup.
28:51If you're launching in an oversaturated category, you need to do the foundational work of like
28:58why are your ingredients special?
28:59Why is the science behind what you're making special?
29:02Why is the materiality different?
29:04Why are you the right person to be doing this?
29:08And so that's a lot of the work that I love, like story architecting, crafting like a larger
29:16pitch for why the world and why creators, why influencers, why customers are going to
29:20care about what you're bringing to market.
29:22How do you see the difference between building like a personal brand versus a business brand?
29:27Because I think a lot of people, like you said, maybe are sharing their business on
29:30their personal social media accounts or vice versa.
29:32How do you see the two going hand in hand today?
29:36I think it's essential and I wish I didn't feel that way.
29:40I don't know.
29:41I go back and forth.
29:42I'm like, it's essential.
29:43I'm like, nevermind.
29:44I'm not sure.
29:46I think that it can only help you.
29:47I think if you have a strong personal brand that is confident and interconnected with
29:52the values of the brand you're launching, it's only going to help your brand become
29:57bigger and more successful.
29:59If you don't want to be public in that way, that's totally fine.
30:02And I can give examples of brands that have founders that don't do that.
30:06But then you need to invest a lot in other people acting as ambassadors for the values
30:12that your brand is bringing to the table.
30:14Maybe it's not you, but then you kind of need an army of like creators and influencers that
30:19aren't just one-off like, thank you for sending this to me.
30:22I like it.
30:23But it's like, who are the recurring faces and people, whether it's your employees or
30:26certain creators that you're paying on a monthly basis to tell the story of your brand to their
30:31audience and to your audience every month in place of you being that person.
30:37But I just don't think brands can get away anymore with like having faceless brands.
30:43We want to connect with people.
30:45Do you think that the social media influencer bubble is going to pop at any point?
30:49I feel like a lot of, especially young consumers today are kind of like over putting influencers
30:53on pedestals or just following the products that they are having.
30:56I think it's popping.
30:57And so what's next?
30:59I think that people that are like interesting and experts and multi-hyphenates are like
31:05the next thing.
31:06Like all the brands I'm working with, I'm obviously like leading them to water, but
31:11I don't even really need to because they're like, oh, I'm doing a launch dinner.
31:15I don't want like archetypal influencer person there that's like hawking five brands on their
31:21stories in a day.
31:23I want like so-and-so who's like a DJ and a poet and like works at MoMA during the day,
31:31like even if they're just like administrative there, but they have these cool side hustles.
31:36Like I want that person with like 7,200 Instagram followers and 10,000 TikTok followers like
31:42at my dinner and then like multiply that person by 15.
31:46Like I think that there's a larger movement toward who actually represents the customer
31:53that is going to be shopping my product versus like who has the most followers and is the
31:58loudest person in the room.
32:00And brands are on board with that as well.
32:02They're understanding the push.
32:04They're saying it to me.
32:07Like it's kind of a mutual agreement.
32:09And then how are consumers reacting to that?
32:11Have you seen that move sales with the customer or clients that you're working with or what's
32:15been like the biggest push to really get people?
32:17Like you said, in such saturated industries today, what's making people buy?
32:21It's kind of doing what I just said, but in high volume.
32:25So if let's say your product like really makes sense for the, you know, Midwestern college
32:33girly that's wearing Uggs and using like a Stanley cup or something like that.
32:37I'm just pulling something out of thin air.
32:41And she's using like an e.l.f. lip gloss and like investing in road when like she gets,
32:47you know, some extra babysitting money in like that she babysits on the weekend in college.
32:52Like you have to get very specific about like who's your customer.
32:56It's not just working with like 15 of her a month on TikTok.
33:01It's like 150.
33:03It's like figure out who your customer is and then figure out in super high volume how
33:08do you get someone that really, really represents that customer in a high volume way talking
33:15about your brand on Instagram and TikTok in an organic way on a monthly basis.
33:21And then I also think like Reddit.
33:23Like I think really hyper specialized communities that do deep dives and are hyper passionate
33:29about certain categories, whether it's like mid size or plus size apparel that is also
33:35sustainable or swimwear or, you know, skin care for hypersensitive skin for women that
33:42used to be on Accutane.
33:43It's like people are going to Reddit threads more and more to figure out like what makes
33:49sense for me.
33:50I want to hear about it from someone that's in my exact identical position.
33:55So I think that lateral community trust and agreement is like motivating sales for sure.
34:02How do you see in-person community impacting how brands are building today?
34:05You mentioned, you know, when you guys were building Bulletin, that was kind of what you
34:08felt the core of the business was.
34:10Bulletin aside, like in today's businesses, how important are those like IRL experiences
34:15do you think?
34:16I think very important once you have almost like minimum viable community established.
34:23Because I think until you have that established through digital channels or just digital fandom,
34:30I don't know what like the number would be or what the marker of that would be.
34:35Events can be expensive and time consuming and like they're good at like showing and
34:40making it seem like you have community, but I think they only work if you're like getting
34:48your actual community together to like deepen loyalty and then showcase on social and through
34:55word of mouth that like the customer that like looks like this and likes these things
35:00like is attached to this brand.
35:02So like you should like it and attach to.
35:05So I think it works if you have kind of a baseline of fandom, but if you're like a net
35:10new brand that's just kind of coming into the market or cresting into market, it could
35:15be too expensive and time consuming of an investment to see it pay off.
35:20Yeah, that totally makes sense.
35:22Having had experience in the consumer space for most of your career, if not all of your
35:26career, what has been the biggest change in how brands are interacting with customers
35:31or what customers are engaging with over those past, you know, seven, like we said, years?
35:36What I love is that like brands now it's like you have to have personality and I love that.
35:44Like I think that brands now need to feel a little bit like people.
35:47It's like Duolingo I think is such a good example where it's like you're applying to
35:51everything.
35:52You're applying in the brand voice, like everything you post, it feels like it's coming from that
35:58archetypal person we just mentioned.
36:00You know?
36:01It's like the customer is the brand in a way and sounds like the brand and the brand sounds
36:05like the customer.
36:07And so I think that expectation of like every caption, every moment of engagement, every
36:12reply, everything is so personality driven.
36:18I think that's been a really big shift and I think this era of like blanding as they
36:23call it and like kind of being really like PC and safe and careful, I don't know.
36:30I feel like that's coming to a close in Gen Z, especially whatever, just the consumer
36:34in general is craving a lot of realness and authenticity.
36:37Yeah, definitely.
36:38I want to talk about your most recent pivot as well.
36:41You, like we said, have built many businesses, helped other people build their own businesses,
36:46but you at heart are a writer.
36:49Can you let me know a little bit about your upcoming fiction book and your experience
36:52kind of pivoting from this, in a lot of ways, like a hardcore business background now into
36:57more of a creative side of things?
36:59Yes.
37:00Well, it's interesting because the first phase of writing is always very creative, but then
37:04the second phase of bringing it to market does require hardcore business skills for
37:09any writer.
37:10And I think that's a big chunk of it that's not often talked about.
37:15Yeah.
37:16So I came up with the idea for The Raise, my fiction book, while I was still at Bulletin.
37:22I was very overwhelmed by the demands of the business and yeah, I felt like it was like
37:29just pulling me apart at the seams.
37:31And I know I'm very blessed and privileged to have raised money and built my own business
37:37and built my own team and I just want to call that out because I don't take any of that
37:42for granted.
37:43That said, it also does wear on you and sometimes you can feel like a victim of your own choices
37:51and that was the mindset I was in when The Raise came to me.
37:55I was like, oh my God, what if like something happened to Alana and I had to like run this
38:01business all by myself?
38:04And that's where the germ of the idea came from.
38:07And building out the plot and architecting it and figuring out the twists and the turns,
38:12it's a formula.
38:13It's a science.
38:14And I hired a book coach for the first three months to help me figure it out and it was
38:21just like the most fun I've ever had doing anything.
38:25And that transition was just such a nice break for my brain.
38:28Like leaving Emerald and dedicating some time to, yeah, just focusing on that and zoning
38:36in on that was wonderful.
38:39And ultimately, I got incredible agents at CAA.
38:43Like I was like, I'm going to get my favorite author's agent, Patricia Lockwood's agent,
38:47and I did it because that's the business side of me.
38:50I'm like, I'm going to get it.
38:54We weren't able to sell the book, unfortunately, and I think it's the confluence of a bunch
38:58of different factors.
38:59It's not their fault.
39:00It's not my fault.
39:01Well, it's kind of my fault.
39:03Whatever.
39:04And I sometimes just don't get it and it took me a year to really get over that depression.
39:10And then I was like, I'm going to self-publish this book.
39:13Like I have this asset here and why would I let it wither away?
39:16All the editors loved it.
39:19They just didn't know how to market it.
39:20And I was like, I'm a marketer.
39:23So that's my focus this year and that's where the business side comes in.
39:27I mean, even when you're with a traditional publisher, you have to market your own book.
39:32You have to spend your own money marketing your own book.
39:34No one's going to do it for you and no one talks about that.
39:37You have to get it publicity.
39:40You have to get people promoting it.
39:41You have to make people want to read it.
39:43And if you don't put the work in, no one's going to find it.
39:47And so I'm super excited.
39:49I'm going to publish it in September.
39:53And hopefully by the time this comes out, my announcement about all of this should be
39:56live.
39:57Last question for you, knowing that one, this is a, you know, our audience for under 30
40:03projects are young, ambitious people who might be in a hardcore business realm, might
40:08be in the creative realm.
40:10As you have made these pivots in your own career and are finding more footing in the
40:15creative side of things now, going down a path that you have wanted to for so many years,
40:20I think a lot of young people, despite still being young and in their early careers, feel
40:25so stuck in maybe a path that they've set on or, you know, something that they have
40:29done for, you know, the first couple of years of their career.
40:32How do you think about making pivots in your life to achieve whatever it is you want next?
40:38What are those things that people can either see as like a beacon that they can follow
40:42or things that they can keep in mind to feel confident in making those pivots like you
40:46have?
40:47I'm going to look at the camera when I say this.
40:50Life is a game.
40:51You can change the character that you're playing or the costume that you're wearing at any
40:57time.
40:58Just because you've been, you know, Allie the entrepreneur for 10 years doesn't mean
41:06you can't become Allie the fiction writer.
41:10You know, just because you've been Alex the illustrious journalist, you know, doesn't
41:15mean you can't become Alex the programmer.
41:18And I think that so many people, regardless of what generation they're in, they have this
41:25psychological block of not wanting to go backwards and of not wanting to be cringe and of not
41:32wanting to seem embarrassing and of not wanting to fail.
41:37And I felt all of that.
41:39But at the end of the day, number one, no one is thinking about you as much as you think
41:45they are.
41:46So get over yourself.
41:49Number two, your life is so precious.
41:52It is so precious and you only have one of them.
41:55And if you're spending your day holding yourself back from who you want to be or working on
42:01the thing that you're working on because of all these things I just said, because of how
42:05you're perceived or not wanting to be cringe or whatever, like, come on, like, let's get
42:12over it, you know?
42:14And I think the third thing is like, you're just going to feel so yummy and juicy and
42:19relieved and less stressed once you take the step in the direction of the life you
42:26actually want to be living.
42:28Like, the way you want to feel on the inside, the relief you want to feel is actually on
42:34the other side of just like five baby steps toward the version of you that you want to
42:38be.
42:40So those are my parting words.
42:41Yeah.
42:42Well, thank you so much for joining me today.
42:43This was so fun to talk about your whole career journey and I'm so excited to see all that's
42:46next for you.
42:47Thank you, Alex.
42:48Thank you, Forbes.