Professional Fundraiser Turned Revenue Coach with Jan Ditchield | #87

Ready to get real about how to grow your business? Meet professional fundraiser turned revenue coach and business educator Jan Ditchfield. Jan Ditchfield is on a mission to help real-world business owners and subject matter experts make more money online without losing their money or their minds in the process. Jan sits down with Shannon to discuss her second act success journey and how she managed to pivot to a new career on her own terms.

Jan is also the straight-talking host of the No BS Business School podcast. She decided to follow her dream of being her own boss after a 20-year career as an award-winning fundraising pro. Even with a toddler hanging around under her desk, she managed to build a 6-figure business during the pandemic lockdowns. 

Nowadays, Jan shares her knowledge with other experts to help them scale the online side of their business in a way that's tailored to their unique needs, instead of just following generic trends or advice using the power of relationship marketing. Dive into the full interview with Jan Ditchfield to learn how you can implement Jan's tips to grow your business too. It's all on Episode #87 of the Second Act Success Career Podcast.

SHOW NOTES

https://secondactsuccess.co/87

Connect with Jan Ditchfield:

Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1547495264 

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/janditchfield.co/ 

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/janditchfield.co 

Web: https://www.janditchfield.co/ 
---------

Book a FREE Call with host and career/business coach Shannon Russell - https://www.calendly.com/second-act-success/coaching-strategy

FREE Resources
https://secondactsuccess.co/resources

LISTEN to the How To Quit Your Job and Start A Business Podcast!
https://secondactsuccess.co/listen

LET’S CONNECT!
Instagram - https://instagram.com/secondactsuccess
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/secondactsuccess.co
TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@secondactsuccess
All the latest - https://secondactsuccess.co/links
FREE Resources - https://secondactsuccess.co/resources

REVIEW & SUBSCRIBE THE PODCAST!

Transcript

Second Act Success Career Podcast
Season 1 - ​​No BS Business Tips From Revenue Coach Jan Ditchield
Episode - #87
Host: Shannon Russell
Guest: Jan Ditchfield
Transcription (*created by Descript and may not be perfectly accurate)

[00:00:00] Jan Ditchfield: Really lean into what makes you different than other people in your niche and what is it that you can bring in here and find a gap that you can run through, which will help you to be able to accelerate that income and that potential instead of just trying to be like everything else that you see online, because there's a lot of beige.

Everybody shows up in the same way. And if you can come in and be different, if you're hot pink in the beige, you will move faster than anybody else will. 

[00:00:28] Shannon Russell: Hey, you. Are you feeling stuck, desperate for a career change or thinking of starting a business but you're just not sure how to make your first move? I'm television producer, turn Career coach Shannon Russell, and this is the second Act Success Career podcast. This is where you will not only get the career advice you've been craving, but you'll get tips from career and business experts along with inspiration from others who have made a career transition to find second act success.

Let's get 

[00:00:58] Jan Ditchfield: started. 

[00:00:59] Shannon Russell: [00:01:00] This is a no BS episode of the Second Act Success Career podcast because I will be joined by Jan Ditchfield, an award-winning business strategist and host of the NO BS Business School podcast. Jan turned her 20 year career as a professional fundraiser into a six figure online business, and she's never looked back.

We are going to learn from Jan today on the episode, so let's dive in. This is my friend, Jan Ditchfield. Jan Ditchfield, welcome to the show. I'm so 

[00:01:31] Jan Ditchfield: excited to have you here. I'm honored to be here. Thank you so much. 

[00:01:36] Shannon Russell: So Jan and I have met through a podcast coaching group that we are in with Adam Schaeble from Podcasting Business School, and it's been so great to get to know you through that group, and I'm excited to be able to dive into your story a little bit more here and share how you went from being a professional fundraiser to an online business coach.

So why don't you take me back to the beginning \ how do you decide to get into the fundraising 

[00:01:59] Jan Ditchfield: [00:02:00] space? That's an interesting question. I think I didn't so much decide to get into it. As I found myself, it found me maybe is the other way to say it. So I actually went to university for English literature.

That was my whole goal was I wanted to be a writer for the Rolling Stone. I wanted to go on tour and I wanted to write and about music. And as close I got to that as was marrying a musician. So that was about where my career ambitions ended from there, because I realized I had to pay the bills. And writing for me wasn't something that was actually working out the way I had hoped once I graduated from school.

So I started my career actually in hospitality and I worked in some of the largest restaurants in Toronto and from Canada. And I found really quickly that I was good at budgets and I was really good at money and generating money and thinking about marketing in different ways. And that's what led me actually into fundraising, cuz we started to do projects in the bars to raise money for other causes.

And I just felt a calling that I wanted to do something different with [00:03:00] my life and something that was more intentional and I could give back, and that really was what led me into professional fundraising. Okay. So then that's 

[00:03:08] Shannon Russell: so interesting to me cuz it's not a career that you hear all that often or you know that it happens, but you don't know the people behind the fundraising and really what you do.

So when you decided you wanted to pursue that, what were the avenues you took to do that as a full-time position? 

[00:03:25] Jan Ditchfield: It was a reference, actually. I think everything happens in life through referrals. And it was somebody that I knew who said, I think you'd be really good at this, and I wanna introduce you to somebody who's hiring.

And I went in and interviewed and got the job. And my very first project that I worked on was an 8 million campaign, and they came to me and said, we are missing 8 million. We need you to find it. And handed me a stack of papers and said, good luck. And that's how my career started. And I think I became known for the person that could fix the impossible problems.

why I was a professional fundraiser for years. And then I went on to actually [00:04:00] moving even further into the industry and started going in as a gun for hire and helping charities be able to write the ship. So I would come in, redo operations, raise money, do a lot of marketing campaigns, fix things and leave.

And I would just go from project to project after that. That must have been really 

[00:04:16] Shannon Russell: fun though. It's like the freelance writer lifestyle, but you're going through these different charities and helping them and wow, how fulfilling that 

[00:04:24] Jan Ditchfield: must have been for you. Yes, and also very stressful. To be honest. I think a lot of people don't realize the stress that goes along with being a professional fundraiser because we are the ones who are responsible for the safety of that organization.

So while the CEOs run it, and there's the people who do the service provision, we are the ones responsible for the money. And if the money doesn't come in, then the charity doesn't function and then people get laid off and there's just a lot of pressure that comes along with. Fundraising and we have very tight deadlines.

We have very large expectations placed on our shoulders, and it could be a really [00:05:00] stressful profession. Wow. Yeah, I can see that. 

[00:05:02] Shannon Russell: That's definitely a lot of pressure. How long were you in that world before you decided to 

[00:05:06] Jan Ditchfield: pivot? I was 15 years into my career. I think at that time I was somewhere in that range, 12 to 15 years before I was like, I think this is, it's time for something different. I also had founded two of my own nonprofits along the way.

So I have that background as well of being the person that was responsible for running my own. And, uh, I ran one for close to 10 years and then very successfully across Canada and the other organizations still exist, but there's a c e O in place and I sit as the chair of the board, but they have, so we have a team now that runs everything for us.

What is that 

[00:05:39] Shannon Russell: one? Do you wanna share that with us in case anyone wants to check it out and support. 

[00:05:44] Jan Ditchfield: Yeah, for sure. It's called Bridge C 14, and it's an organization that helps people who are going through the medical assistant dying process in Canada through all stages of grief. So from the beginning process to navigating a, asking for assistance to after the procedure, and being able to grieve in a place [00:06:00] where they feel supported by peers and understanding, uh, how it's a different process for those who experience maid than it is for people who experience death in a different way.

Oh, what a 

[00:06:10] Shannon Russell: great Cause that's nice to still be involved with it now. Yeah. Yeah. So what brought you to the time where you decided, okay, I've checked this off my list. I've been successful and now I'm thinking about 

[00:06:22] Jan Ditchfield: something different. I became a mom. I think it's like everybody else, right?

Yeah. Where you, yeah. So I know your story as well, and I think motherhood and career, it changes things dramatically. And so for me, I took some time off to to raise my daughter and I was lucky to be able to be home with her for 17 months and just really sink into being a mom. And when I decided I was gonna go back to work, I swore, I was like, I'm not going back to the industry.

I refused to do it. I'm gonna find something else. And I went right back in. So I was right back into work FaceTiming her at bedtime because I was at a gala and running those long days [00:07:00] and driving home through traffic, trying to get home to make sure I could feed her, maybe get a few minutes of playtime in.

And it just wasn't working. And it wasn't so much. I think sometimes we hear stories of women who walk away from their careers because they want a different balance in their life as a negative thing. But for me it was really important to be able to say, I'm present for her, but also more to be the role model that I wanted her to see me be, which wasn't going to be somebody that was driving themselves into the ground doing something that just wasn't satisfying anymore.

Mm-hmm. That I thought it was time to do something different and I was burnt out. I'll be really honest, I was just, I was tired of being number two and I was tired of. Trying to fix problems that were seemingly unfixable. So it was time for a change just hearing you 

[00:07:43] Shannon Russell: say FaceTiming from a gala that makes me think of the fundraising aspect of your job to be so in person, so face-to-face, you can't just email and say, Hey, can you donate?

You're putting in the time and that's really hard 

[00:07:57] Jan Ditchfield: when you have a little one. It is, and [00:08:00] it's a lot of hours. And because it's such an intensive process and my specialty was doing major giving, so it was focusing on building really big relationships with really big people and asking for really big money.

So that takes time. And that's a lot of cultivations. That's a lot of coffees, that's a lot of dinners, that's a lot of working the room, as I would say. And doing that with a little person becomes very challenging. 

[00:08:23] Shannon Russell: Priorities change. Your values shift a little, and so you're realizing, okay, this isn't going to work.

And what was the catalyst to make you 

[00:08:32] Jan Ditchfield: step away? I think it was really just having a really strong disagreement about the future and the direction of a project I was working on, and just being like, this isn't actually my problem. To be very blunt, I think it just came down to that. I was like, all right, I'm coming in with this much experience, this much knowledge, this much clout, and providing you with the information that I know is the right information.

But if you choose not to listen, Maybe it's time for [00:09:00] someone to actually listen. Maybe there is an opportunity for me to be heard in a different way and not feel as though I'm always, again, second in the decisions that are being made professionally in my life. Good for you. 

[00:09:11] Shannon Russell: Yeah. Yes. And so did you have any idea what the next step would be?

[00:09:16] Jan Ditchfield: None because it was very sudden. I would say I right. I think some people do better exit plans than I did. I'm done and out I went. And so I didn't know what to do. I thought for a little bit, I was like, I can freelance, I can do some other things. I have, I've been doing this for so long, I can find a side project to do it.

said, okay, I'm gonna start my own business and we'll go from there and see what happens. And I originally started a business where I was helping women be able to return to work after having children. And so I was doing a lot of consultation about HR because I had worked in that side of things for so long.

And specifically, I worked in the, almost mainly within human rights organizations in Canada. So I knew the laws inside and out. And I've worked on The Hill and I've worked on big projects. So I was able to provide information to a lot of women about what the [00:10:00] statue says and what we're allowed to do and what employers are not allowed to say to us.

And then the pandemic happened and that changed things for me in everybody else. It was just a complete change of my life and, and the catalyst actually of where, why I'm here now. 

[00:10:16] Shannon Russell: So you're sitting here at home now with your little one and you are figuring out there's a lot of women who aren't going back into the office right now.

So how do I pivot this yet again and still have it be my business that I am creating? And what led you to decide to be a business 

[00:10:31] Jan Ditchfield: coach? So my daughter was literally under my desk during this whole time it was the same. So it's exactly that women were no longer going back to work. Canada was hit very hard by that.

And we had, we regressed actually went back to unemployment rates from the 1960s for women. Uh, it was a huge slide for us backwards. And what I was getting from a lot of the women I was working with was, I need to make income. I have to make money. It has to come in [00:11:00] somehow. I know that you used to run business.

Can you teach me how to start a business? And I was like, yeah, that's easy. That's what I did. Yes, it was in charity, but it's the same principles. It doesn't matter. We just can't give tax receipts. That's really the only difference. Right between it at the end. Yeah. So I started doing that online and I started a course and teaching a course and relaunched my business in the fall of 2020 as to what it is now.

And I've been doing it ever since. And I don't, people call me a business coach a lot, I get that name quite often. But I don't really consider myself to be a business coach. I'm more of a business educator. I'm a revenue coach. I'm actually the person who teaches how to make money, I think more than anything else that, my skillset was.

Let's make a lot of money. And so now I get to spend my time teaching women how to do the same thing. Oh, Dan, 

[00:11:47] Shannon Russell: that is so great. Because you're right, there's such a distinction. Everyone can create a business, right? But you can't always get the revenue that you think that business deserves. So someone like you can come in and say, okay, I like what you have [00:12:00] set up.

Let's figure out how to bring that revenue in. Exactly. Is that kind of how you 

[00:12:04] Jan Ditchfield: work with women? Yeah, very much. And really focusing again on working with subject matter experts. So I work with women like us who came from traditional industry and, and we're known and with what we did, and we, but we have the clout, we have the background behind it, and then we've now pivoted into the online space.

And it's like starting over where you walk into the online space. And I know I, you felt the same way, Shannon, but I was just like, I don't know what I'm doing and I have like over 20 years experience doing this. And I was like, what's Instagram and what am I supposed to do with this? And so I help women like us be able to figure out the right path and navigate the online space in a way that's intentional instead of having to get stuck in following trends and pointing at air bubbles.

And. Doing all of the things that people say we have to do, but we don't. And so I focus on being able to find a different path that's unique to your gifts and your abilities that's gonna generate more money for you. And 

[00:12:59] Shannon Russell: you've [00:13:00] been so successful. Talk about the growth from, I guess, 2020 until now in your business.

[00:13:06] Jan Ditchfield: It's been crazy. There's no other way to describe it. It started out and we start businesses and you always hope it's going to work. And the first year was tough. I, I did okay. It wasn't like I was like walking around being like, woo. All the money started rolling in. But it really was year two and I really saw the changes happen.

And then 20 21, 20 22, and moving now into 2023, I went from, I went to six figures in 17 months, and this year I'll become a multi six figure business. And that's just me. That's not, there's no team behind it. There's no Facebook ads, there's no, it's all organic strategy. I think it was just the ability to really tap in and understand my women.

And because I am the same, like I understand it, I've lived it, I've navigated it, I've got caught in the same traps that everybody else gets caught in. I just happen to have that ability to understand business in a way that's [00:14:00] a bit different. Mm-hmm. And know how to tap into people for money, for generation of revenue.

So I get to spend all my time now working with women in completely different fields. Everybody does different things, but really focusing on how can we make you different from everybody else in your niche, and how can we really scale your revenue quickly? Wow. Congratulations on 

[00:14:21] Shannon Russell: that growth. That's really unheard of.

That's amazing. Yeah. These women that you work with, are they coming to you just with an idea or do they have businesses that are already set up and 

[00:14:30] Jan Ditchfield: they just want to grow them? It's a bit of both. What I have mainly are a lot of women who are coming in and have, again, existing experience from the real world.

And so whether that be they work for someone else or whether that is that they have their own bricks and mortar or an in-person business, and now they're trying to understand how can I get that revenue line coming from the online space. So I wanna scale, I wanna add something new, and we say, let's look at what you have that is really unique and really different, and let's [00:15:00] wrap that into an online package and sell it so that, again, either a full transfer online or.

We can just get that six figure income coming from the online space. So I'm really trying to help women get into, again, the six figure and deep side of the world because there's so few of us who make six figures as women in business. So only 12% of us ever get there. Mm-hmm. So I'd like to see that number change because I think it's really important, again, that we lean into doing business differently.

We look at business differently. And we navigate the online space differently than what is typically taught to, because I think women we're always marketed to is follow your passion and the money will come believe in your dreams. You don't need a plan, you don't need to do any of those things. Just get out there and show your stuff and people will love you and it doesn't work that way.

I am a bit more of the pragmatic, maybe I think would be a good word, pragmatic coach or pragmatic educator, which is about. No fluff, no bs. Let's get down to brass tack. What do you can you do and what that's people will pay you for? [00:16:00] And now how can we scale it? And if no one will pay you for it, don't waste your time.

Figure out something else. 

[00:16:05] Shannon Russell: I love that. No bs. I see both sides. Yes. Follow your passion, go into it, but have those steps and those skills and those techniques. To make it grow. To make it happen. So I see where that's where you come in to really say, okay, I see what your idea is.

I see what you have outlined here. Let's really make it so that you can be one of that 12% that now is making six figures. And honestly, that stat is astoundingly sad. 

[00:16:33] Jan Ditchfield: Yeah. And it gets worse, the higher up we go. So, mm-hmm. It's now this 1% of women actually hit seven figures in business online.

And it's remarkable because again, women are so powerful in so many ways, especially in mainstream industry, where we come out of it, and I came from, again, charity, where the majority of the people in charity are women. Mm-hmm. Except for at the top or at the boardroom. And then that's where the shift starts happening.

And I think it's like that in a lot of industry where when you look at the boardroom or you look at [00:17:00] who the C-suite is, very few women are there. And. I think it's time for us to step into that more, but as the owners of our own business, because I do believe very strongly that our passions matter. I'm very passionate about what I do, but if we don't have that balance between understanding profit, it doesn't matter how passionate you are, you're also not doing yourself any favors or, and you're not honoring your talents or your gift by knowing how to monetize them effectively.

Because that's what's gonna set you up to be able to be a better parent, to be a better spouse, to be able to be independent, to be able to make your own decisions in life is because you can financially do that. And that's gonna come through really smart career choices, really smart entrepreneurial choices, being a smart woman and leaning into that.

Leaning 

[00:17:45] Shannon Russell: When you and I were both in our professional corporate careers, we could achieve that success going up that ladder. Then the pandemic comes. Now we're home and we've got the kids, and it just makes sense for women to be their own [00:18:00] bosses online, because going back into that office, those FaceTime calls late at night, all of those moments make it that much harder for women to get into the boardroom and just stay at that level, making that revenue that we deserve when we're balancing everything else.

[00:18:16] Jan Ditchfield: Of all the things that came from the pandemic of how it really did set us back, it also opened up opportunities for us that we never would've had before, which was we got scrappy.

Women got scrappy, we leaned into. Setting boundaries far more than we ever did before. Mm-hmm. We were able to say, I'm not going to go back. I'm not doing this anymore. I am going to establish my own roots, my own history, my own legacy, and I'm gonna build a business That's really important to me.

But's also helping people around me, and that's all the women I work with are that they're all focused on legacy and generation of wealth, but how we define wealth, not necessarily how corporate defines wealth. Yes. 

[00:18:57] Shannon Russell: Oh, I love that. [00:19:00] Hey there, my friend Shannon here. Just popping in quickly because I'm wondering, is this episode getting you thinking?

Are you starting to come up with ideas for your second act? Maybe it's changing careers, writing a book, starting a business, whatever it is, I am here to help. You can book a free discovery call with me so that we can chat about your next steps. So head over to second act, success.co/coaching. Now, let's get back to the episode.

I love talking about the threads of how we got from our first act to our second act. What are some of the techniques that maybe you've taken from the fundraising aspect of your act one and what you use in your teaching with your clients now to really build revenue in their 

[00:19:43] Jan Ditchfield: online businesses?

It's everything. To be honest, my entire program that I run has built off of how to raise money in charity, and I've just transferred those skills into the online space. So I'm teaching how to generate money in the online space by building [00:20:00] relationships. So it's very relationship marketing driven. It's understanding how to sell to people in a very condensed timeline to get the largest return possible.

It's about understanding touchpoints and how to. Really listen and make people feel connected to you in a way that's deeper than just what a Facebook ad would do or typical online marketing will do. Because I think there's a lot of the time we get that idea in online marketing that we just show up and let's do a webinar and everybody's just gonna buy from you.

I always say, do not do a webinar. Show up differently for how you sell. Learn to sell to the person, learn to sell a room. Learn how to be able to walk in and work your space and learn to build really deep, authentic relationships because that's what's gonna generate more money for you. And the women I work with are seeing conversion rates anywhere from 15 to, I just personally recently just finished a launch and I had a 45% conversion rate.

In the online space, which is unheard of, it's usually one to 3%. And all of that is from using charity techniques because [00:21:00] that's how we got so much money was by selling differently. And I always joke, if you wanna learn how to sell, learn from a fundraiser cuz we are the best at it. No one ever knows we're selling.

That's the thing. So everyone's there, we was like, I feel so great. And you're like, yay, so do I. So it's, it's all about building that relationship that's gonna lead to revenue. So 

[00:21:19] Shannon Russell: it's not about posting videos of us dancing. It's about really who you are and a lot more of value rather than just showing up and 

[00:21:28] Jan Ditchfield: keeping your fingers crossed.

Exactly, really understanding too where to put your time and your efforts because we need social media. Absolutely. I think it's a very important part of what we do, but it isn't the only channel. And when we move from the real world into the online space, when we've come in here, what we're getting taught to do all the time is.

Just do you know Instagram? Just do TikTok. Just do reels. Just do this. Lean more into it cuz that's what's gonna sell. And so we do, because you must be the expert. I'm not the expert at this, but we forget about all the talents that we actually already possess [00:22:00] from knowing how to build relationships. In real time, in real life, right?

And that skillset works here just as well. You just have to make your own a virtual room. So it's all about manipulating the situation than it is having to not use the skills you already possess. So that's why with my women, we really lean into, you already know how to do this. Let's just create a virtual room for you to work and lean into networking far more and which is why podcasting to me is always like, Podcast.

Podcast all the time. I think this is like one of the best platforms for networking and business growth. Oh yeah. Let's talk about 

[00:22:33] Shannon Russell: your podcast then. No BS Business School. It's such an incredible name. You have such great content. I absolutely love it. Tell me all about it and where you were in the process of deciding, okay, I'm gonna go down the podcasting 

[00:22:45] Jan Ditchfield: route as well.

I launched the podcast in, it was, I think it was December of 2020, and I had no idea what I was doing. I think all of us are like, I was like, they said I need a podcast, so I'll start a podcast. 

It became the side of my desk thing where I was like, I'll get to it when I get [00:23:00] to it. Instead of really taking time to understand how to make this part of my overall business funnel. And really, like for me now what it is, it's where I start. Like it's the most important thing in my business. But it took time to get there and it was actually Adam, it was working with Adam Shibly, who helped me be able to really reframe the entire process of the podcast and.

Know how to use it in a way that was more effective, but also in a way that I could show up more authentically on it. Because I felt that was always something with me where I was like, I don't know what to talk about and I don't know what to say and I don't wanna offend anybody and I don't, so why? What do I do once the microphone gets in front of me?

Mm-hmm. And finding that platform with No BS Business School changed everything for me. And now I'm up to three episodes a week. , having great conversations with guests and really wanting to move the show by vision of where I want it to be is in the top one person and it's, we're getting there.

It's coming. Yeah. But is, I love my show so much. I, it's just, it's really important to me. I always say it's the love letter to the women I work with is what my podcast is. [00:24:00] And it's that amazing 

[00:24:01] Shannon Russell: free content, right? Even if you can't afford to work with you, you can get this content from Jan here on the podcast.

And it's just also giving people a way to know about you and your personality and if you're a good fit to work 

[00:24:14] Jan Ditchfield: together. It is, and I like experimenting with it. I think there's a creativity that comes along with podcasting that I really appreciate where I can try new things and I can experiment. I run a lot of workshops off of my podcast where I'll just do five episodes in one week and drop something where I'm like, here, you can learn all about this.

Go do it now. Yeah. And I enjoy it. It just in the conversations I can have with guests who come on. And I'm naturally curious. I think that's one of the things I love so much is being able to just say, I wanna know about you and tell me how you got here, and tell people what your mistakes were and tell people what the things you're proud of, and let's just have an inspiring conversation that's gonna help other people be able to do the same as you.

It's just, it's a freeing platform and I appreciate that very much. [00:25:00] Yes. Oh, 

[00:25:01] Shannon Russell: And really to get back to what we were talking about with taking your real life experience and how having that real life experience is a major advantage to starting an online 

[00:25:11] Jan Ditchfield: business.

How so? One of the things that we do not lean into enough is how in the real world women are excellent networkers, especially women who co, who are subject matter experts, and they come out of knowing how to stand up in their space with authority and command attention. And when we try to shift that into the online world, the it's not met the same way.

Especially women, I would say, of my generation. And I'm in my forties now and creeping toward 50 and showing up in the online space as an, I don't wanna wanna say older cuz I'm not old at all, but. As a woman with a few more years under her belt, it was challenging because what was greeted with was a lot of the imagery about if you wanna be successful online, you need to be of this age and you have to have this body type and you need to be on the front of a [00:26:00] boat and you need to be bringing in all of the passive income while you're drinking champagne on a beach in the Caribbean.

And I would sit in my kitchen where I'm like, I've got my girdle on, my nail polish is chipped. I just did school drop off. I'm trying to figure out what I'm gonna do for dinner while I'm still running a six figure business. And this just does not line up for me at all. So when I stopped trying to present as what the online space that I had to present as a woman, and I went back to leaning into this is how I did it there.

Why don't I try it that way? Things changed my business overnight, and that's why I always say, We already have that gift within us networking, knowing how to be able to say the right things to close a sale. Mm-hmm. Knowing that we are true experts and understanding that the influence that we carry from the real world will go further here than false influence will.

Yeah. And so I, it's a lot of it's confidence. Yes. A lot of it's understanding, again, how to tap into the things that other people don't [00:27:00] possess, and a lot of it's then setting yourself up with a very smart, laid out, critical path that you're not wasting your time doing things that are not gonna generate ru money for you, but you're focused on things that actually are moving the needle of your business.

All comes from knowing how to work a room, knowing how to deal with HR and knowing how to deal with difficult people in the real world. Knowing how to go and do a massive shoot and deal with that, your child's at home, and the feelings of that and having to still balance it. All of those things play off in this space.

If we lean into the more 

[00:27:31] Shannon Russell: I think a lot of that identity kind of imposter syndrome that, I don't like that phrase, but I feel like that really does identify that you can have all this experience and be this big wig, and when you're trying something new, you just shrink a little bit at first.

[00:27:45] Jan Ditchfield: And you try 

to 

[00:27:47] Shannon Russell: convince yourself first that you can do this. And it takes that confidence that you mentioned earlier of just finally leaning into it and saying, no, I know that I did this, so therefore I can [00:28:00] succeed here. And maybe a lot of my listeners right now are saying, I know I can do it.

I'm just a little scared. Do you have a couple of tips on how maybe they can. Either start creating their online business from scratch or lean in to really help it grow a 

[00:28:15] Jan Ditchfield: little bit more. I think the first one is understanding that you already are an expert. I think that is the most important thing. And for me it was because I really battled imposter syndrome when I, and I agree with you too.

I'm not a big fan of the word, but it's the commonly used one. Yeah. But when I moved into this space, and I remember having someone tell me once, you're never gonna be anyone because of the size of your social media following. And I was so impactful. Like I remember standing in the kitchen crying, and my husband said to me, you already are an expert.

And I was like, that's right, I am. Yeah. Why should I allow my social media following to negate everything that I've done in my career? And so having that mindset, I think is the most important thing to walk in is come in with a success [00:29:00] mindset. Mm-hmm. You already are an expert. You already know what you're talking about.

More about what you're talking about than most people in the online space do. They've just been here longer. That's the only thing. It has nothing to do with us starting from scratch. It's just us having to learn to navigate a different space. So I would say that would be the first thing. And then the second thing would be to really lean into what makes you different than other people in your niche and what is it that you can bring in here and find a gap that you can run through, which will help you to be able to accelerate that income and that potential instead of just trying to be like everything else that you see online, because there's a lot of beige.

That's how I always say the online space is just a sea of beige. Everyone says the same thing. Yeah, everybody shows up in the same way. Everybody has the same influencer hat, and if you can come in and be different, if you're hot pink in the beige, you will move faster than anybody else will. And that comes from leaning into what you already know how to do from the [00:30:00] real world, 

And again, we know the things that we need to do, we just, no one's ever taught us how to do it in this 

[00:30:05] Shannon Russell: zone. 

Alright, it's time for our five fast cues of the week.

Here we go. Name one thing that these different chapters in your life have 

[00:30:15] Jan Ditchfield: taught you how to be resilient. I think that more than anything else, if I would come out and say, what has life taught me going through what I've gone through is resiliency. And how important that is. If you want to be an entrepreneur, or if you wanna make a midlife change or create your second act, you need to be resilient because not everything is gonna go the way that you plan it.

You're going to encounter things and people that are going to say, you've lost your mind. What are you doing? And you need to be able to stand in your own two feet and keep working through it, because otherwise no one's gonna do it for you. So I think for me, that's the biggest one. 

[00:30:53] Shannon Russell: Would you recommend taking a leap into a big life change to your best friend?

[00:30:58] Jan Ditchfield: I would, very definitely, [00:31:00] but I also would say to do it planned, so I think that would be my learning lesson of jumping without the plan in place that I think if I had planned it a bit better, I would've, it would've been an easier landing than it was when it first started, but I definitely, I don't regret this at all.

I'm very glad I did what I did. 

[00:31:17] Shannon Russell: What is one piece of advice that you would give to someone who is trying to start their second act? 

[00:31:22] Jan Ditchfield: Be unapologetically confident in the decisions you're making because again, it's going to go back to that, that not everyone is going to agree with what you're doing. And also, if you're making a second act, usually we're doing it at a stage of our life where we need to do it, and our runway is shorter and we are going to encounter different things than other people do and who are earlier on in their career choices.

And. Don't give up on what your own dreams are because they matter to you and therefore they matter to everyone else around you. But again, you are the person who's in control of making them come true. Nobody else will do it for you, so lean into it unapologetically. 

[00:31:59] Shannon Russell: So what [00:32:00] does the next 

[00:32:00] Jan Ditchfield: act look like for you?

Growing this business and for me, really is starting to focus quite honestly on exit strategies and down the road. I think the next plan is I would really love to be full-time mom and I'll end up, I'll have a teenager at that point. I think when I'm getting to that retirement stage, I had her later in life, so I would like to be able to.

My final act be just be there for her and be able to travel and see the world and give her amazing opportunities and memories and me be able to sit back and say it was all worth it. 

[00:32:33] Shannon Russell: I love that answer. So Jan, where can our audience connect 

[00:32:37] Jan Ditchfield: with you? You can find me at No BS Business School for my podcast, and you can find me also online on instagram @janditchfield.co.

And then on the web at janditchfield.co as well. 

[00:32:49] Shannon Russell: Jan, this was so lovely. I'm so excited to have had a chance to share you with my audience, I just love being in the same circle with you in our podcasting group, and I just thank you so [00:33:00] much. 

[00:33:01] Jan Ditchfield: Thank you so much for having me. This was such a pleasure.

Thank you. 

[00:33:06] Shannon Russell: Jan, thank you so much for all of your business advice today. I feel like this was a masterclass in learning about growing an online business and how to make the most sales, how to market, and just how to grow the business in a faster and more efficient way. So thank you so much. If you wanna connect with Jan, head over to janditchfield.co, and I will link to all the ways you can connect with her in the show notes for this episode below.

Before we leave, I just wanna thank you for spending some time with me today. I hope you gained a lot of inspiration from this conversation. And if you wanna catch up on all past episodes, just subscribe to the Second Act Success Career Podcast. Go over to Apple Podcast and leave me a review. I'd love to know what you think of the show and I will be back next time for an all new episode.

Thank you again and make it a great day, my friend. Thank you for joining [00:34:00] us. I hope you've found some gems of inspiration and some takeaways to help you on your path to second act, success. To view show notes from this episode, visit secondactsuccess.co. Before you go, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss a single episode.

Reviews only take a few moments and they really do mean so much. Thank you again for listening. I'm Shannon Russell and this is Second Act success.