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Leaping from Creative to Creative Educator with Laylee Emadi

About Laylee Emadi

Laylee is an educator, podcast host, and photographer with a heart for serving clients and fellow creatives. She believes in serving the creative industry with heartfelt encouragement, honest advice, and a shared pursuit of the ever-elusive “balance.” Laylee is passionate about her goal to help you feel confident in your ability to make a difference, create impact, and to build a life doing what you love.

When Is It the Right Time to Offer Education

First ask yourself, “Why are you pursuing education?” If the only answer is, “Well it feels like the next step,” then education actually might not be for you. Becoming an educator takes a lot of selfless work and only when you truly want to help others should you enter this field. If you do want to serve others and are feeling successful and profitable in your business or are a super talented craftsman and want to share your talent – the “when” is whenever you feel ready to take it on. The “why” behind education is the important question to ask.

The Different Types of Education

  • One-on-One
  • Small Group
  • Mastermind
  • Public Speaking
  • Online Education & Courses

What Makes a Good Educator

Wanting to spread your knowledge and share your expertise is great, but it’s important to make sure you are an actual expert in your field. Ask others if your content has actually helped them, always ask for feedback. Another good way to know is if people are asking you for help. Do they want to know how you do something? This is a great indicator that others want to actually learn from you. Put out free content first and gauge people’s interest, see if they want to continue learning from you.

Helpful Links Mentioned in This Episode:

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Podcast Transcript

Laylee Emadi 0:00
If I feel I want to become an educator, because I am killing it in my business, I’ve been in business for, you know, long enough for myself to feel established. I’m a profitable business owner, or I’m just a really talented you know, craftsmen like my I’m amazing at my craft. And I know that inside and out and my desire is to share it with my industry and my community, then I think the when is just kind of like whenever you can get yourself together enough to provide content, you know, to provide that really great quality content. I don’t think anything should hold you back after that.

Sarah Schrader 0:44
You’re listening to The Creative Legacy Podcast, a podcast for creative entrepreneurs to build their business while leading a life of intention, joy and adventure. I’m Sarah, a brand strategist and designer, helping entrepreneurs craft their brands to speak boldly and reach their ideal client. I’m joined by my friend and co host Shaune, a wedding photographer and educator that helps photographers, creatives and small business owners cultivate intentional lives and build their most abundant business.

Shaune Teske 1:13
If you don’t already know today’s guest, you are going to love her. She is such a light, so upbeat and inspiring. And it was so much fun chatting with her and learning about her journey to becoming an educator for creative educators. Yes, it’s a bit meta, but it’s exactly what you’re wanting to hear and we love her. Lily MADI joins us in this episode to share what is like shifting from a creator, to a creative educator. If it is a shift that is even right for you. When it seems like it’s just the next step that everyone is taking, and gives advice on how to step into this new role with grace and heart and balance it with the existing creator hat you are currently wearing. Are you just as excited as we are now? Let’s dive in.

Shaune Teske
If you are a creative business owner, or a small business owner, any type of person that has been doing their business for a few years, you start thinking about what are the next steps? Correct? You think, what do I want to move on from what do I want to go? Where do I want to go from here? And one of the biggest steps we hear about is education after owning a business for a portion of time? And does that make sense for you? Should you go into educating creatives or small business owners with what you’re doing. And today’s guest is pouring into us and sharing all about being a creative educator and if it’s the right step for business owners, and what you should do and how you can get started with that. So Laylee is here and we are super excited. Thank you for being here Laylee.

Laylee Emadi 2:59
Oh my gosh, thank you for having me.

Shaune Teske 3:01
So if you don’t know Laylee, she is an educator, a podcast host and a photographer with a heart for serving clients and fellow creatives. She believes in serving the creative industry with heartfelt encouragement, honest advice, and a shared pursuit of the ever elusive balance. Laylee is passionate about her goal to help you feel confident in your ability to make a difference, create impact and to build a life doing what you love. And that is so beautiful. And as just a very short part of who Laylee is. I’ve met her multiple times now. And I just love her heart and how she pours into people. We both got a chance to speak at the Rising Tide Leaders retreat last year. And I just love listening to her talk and speak and we’re so happy that she’s here to talk to us today.

Laylee Emadi 3:46
Thank you so much for that introduction. That was so sweet. I’m really excited to be here to chat with you guys, too. I love your podcast. So I was really excited to get a chance to hop on with you guys.

Shaune Teske 3:55
Well, thank you so much. And I know our listeners are going to absolutely love this. And I shared a little bit about you. I would love you to tell our listeners more about yourself and your story.

Laylee Emadi 4:07
Yeah, definitely. I have like kind of the opposite story of most creative entrepreneurs who are kind of like building up their business and then heading toward education. I was actually an educator first so I was a high school teacher for just short of a decade I was in education. And then part time I was also a photographer and that kind of just fell into my lap in a weird way. It was always like something I enjoyed and then you know pursued as a, you know, just side hustle the way that we do. And then as my business grew, I kind of made the decision to go full time into business, but I love teaching so much. And so that was just kind of always part of what I did. And over the past seven or eight years now of having my photography business. I was also teaching you know starting with teaching people how to use their cameras, and then doing mentoring sessions that we people do and speaking, and then I realized, there’s this huge gap of knowledge for people who are experts in their field, but want to kind of offer education and don’t really know how to do it. And I was like, oh well, I actually was trained on how to do this. And I thought it was just common knowledge at that point. So anyway, long story short, I went full circle. And now I focus on educating creative educators. So it’s all very meta and confusing. But it’s fun, and I love it. And I love getting to focus on helping helping entrepreneurs just kind of spread their expertise and their knowledge in a really impactful and effective way. So that’s like my story in a nutshell.

Shaune Teske 5:50
So fun. Can you tell us a few people that you have been helping if people are very new to the idea of creative education? Who are some of the people that you’re helping become educators?

Laylee Emadi 6:02
Yeah, definitely, I have helped people kind of across the board, there are, obviously as a photographer, I still do shoot occasionally. And so as a photographer, a lot of my surrounding community is made up of photographers. So I’ve helped a lot of photographers kind of come up with different forms of education. I’ve also helped some amazing artists who offer you know, like, online courses, and in person workshops and things like that. I’ve helped podcast hosts kind of come up with again, so meta, because we’re on your podcast, I have a podcast, like helping other podcast owners kind of come up with their content and their actual like, podcast strategy. So yeah, I kind of It’s weird. I help people across the board of the creative industry. There’s no, I feel like if you have something you want to teach, I can help you figure out how to teach it.

Sarah Schrader 6:58
When you’re working with people who are in this space of wanting to move to the next step and become an educator. Is there anything that you look for to see like, this is a good space for them to be offering it? Or should they maybe be looking into another bouts? Like, when is it a good time for somebody? Like start educate? Is that anytime? is it now? Is it a year from now?

Laylee Emadi 7:22
I love that. I feel like that’s kind of like a very nicely loaded question. Like I’m not, I don’t want to shy away from it. Because I think it’s such an important question to ask of like, kind of like, when are people ready? Is that is that right?

Sarah Schrader 7:37
Yeah.

Laylee Emadi 7:39
Yeah, so I feel like it is it’s a hard question, because I think that there are several different types of creatives who are thinking about approaching education for different reasons. And so I think the first thing that is important for people to do is to be really self aware about why they are pursuing and pursuing growing into the role of creative educator. And so what I like to do is pose a couple of questions, you know, back, and that would be kind of like, why, if you’re looking into your heart of hearts, like why are you pursuing this route? And if it’s just because you feel like it’s the next step, kind of like what Shaune was saying, at the beginning, like, we all kind of consider education because we think like, oh, maybe this is the next step for us. That’s not necessarily on its own a really great indicator that you should be pursuing this. I always like to say, like, everybody can be an educator, but that doesn’t mean that everybody should be an educator. And so, um, I would just kind of pose to anybody who’s thinking about, is this the next step? Why do you want to pursue it, and then from there, you can kind of better decide on the when, if that makes sense. So like, if I feel I want to become an educator, because I am killing it in my business, I’ve been in business for, you know, long enough for myself to feel established. I’m a profitable business owner, or I’m just a really talented, you know, craftsmen like my I’m amazing at my craft. And I know that inside and out, and my desire is to share it with with my industry and my community, then I think the when is just kind of like whenever you can get yourself together enough to provide content, you know, to provide that really great quality content. I don’t think anything should hold you back after that. I think it’s kind of more so for the people who are thinking like, Oh, this is the next step because I don’t really know where else to go from here. That’s probably not a good indicator that it’s time for you to like step into the role of educator, you should probably take a step back and like think a little deeper, you know?

Shaune Teske 9:48
So true, I feel like we see that a lot. Where it is is just oh first you get really good at this you go full time and then now you start teaching it and that is does not have to be the case. Everybody. So what would you say? Do you have, like a test? or some kind of quiz you can do where you figure out if this is right for you? Or if it’s just something that you have to know in your heart of hearts.

Laylee Emadi 10:15
Yeah no, I definitely I don’t remember if I ever actually published, I have a couple of quizzes out there like floating around that I could send to you guys for your show notes. But you know, one of them is kind of like what type of educator you meant to be. And that kind of like sneakily guides you in now that I’m saying, if you take the quiz, you’re going to be like, “Oh, she’s so sneaky.” It does kind of it kind of like sneakily guides you into being like, Oh, these are really reflective questions, like, I need to answer them in a way that’s really honest with myself, it’s kind of like, the whole concept of the enneagram. Like, you can’t, you shouldn’t be lying to yourself in order to get to one result. And so I think a couple of just questions right off the bat would be the why I mean, just continually asking yourself why and it’s I almost like, equated to, like a three year old who, who is kind of trying to be combative. And who’s like, Why? Well, why I want you to do that to yourself, you know and think. Okay, so this is my, this is what I want to do I want to be a speaker. Okay. Why? Because I feel like speakers are really established, and they have really great reputations. And I want to be that way. Okay, well, why? And if the answer is like, for my own ego, or to inflate my own self image, that’s probably an, you know, an indicator that you shouldn’t be doing it. But if the next answer is because I want to be able to, like impact my community, great, okay, so why and how, and then kind of dig through in that way. And so I think it just takes a lot of self reflection. But, Shaune, I do think that we do see it a lot, especially in the speaking realm, I work with a lot of public speakers, and a lot of them come in just with an image that isn’t accurate of what that world looks like. And it’s really just because they may have gone to something educational, seen a speaker been impacted or moved by them. And then they want to do the same, but they haven’t really thought through the how or the why.

Shaune Teske 12:13
So true. I mean, I know I have, and I’ve spoken at things I’ve been asked to speak. And I think though that fire is lit, when you see someone that is so passionate or speaking or educating you go, Oh, I want to be able to impact people that way. And then you start getting into it and realizing that it’s not, there’s a grand thing that you just step onto a stage and it comes it’s a lot of work. And it’s a lot of behind the scenes, things you don’t see. So I really appreciate you talking about that. That has to be more than just I want to be on the stage. And I want to be famous, you know. It’s, that’s great. Sure if you get there, but it really has to be about impacting people and being really great at what you’re doing. And you you just want to pour into people no matter what. So you talked about, though, when we talked about quizzes are figuring out what type of educator you could be. I think that jumped out at me, is there a different types of educators? Are there? Or should they be doing it in different ways?

Laylee Emadi 13:12
Oh, absolutely. I think that’s also kind of just one of those common misconceptions is that I just want to be an educator period. And people don’t really think about oh, there are so many different ways you could be offering education, I will say just spoiler alert, like to get ahead of myself. If you do pursue a career in creative education or an education at all, you will likely do almost every single type of education at some point. But in terms of kind of like placing your focus in the beginning. I mean, there’s one on one, there’s small group, there’s peer to peer, which is like kind of like a mastermind situation. There’s public speaking, when you’re on the stage there, you know, there’s just the sky’s the limit. There’s online courses and online education, online summits, even if you want to be a speaker, but you want to do it from your home. There’s just so many ways that you could so many routes that you can take as an educator and I think that so often, people like we talked about that spark is lit and they just think, Oh, I just want to I just want to get on a stage or, oh, I just want to make a lot of money doing an online course because these course these course owners and these course educators are clearly making bank like I want to make bank to and so I don’t think there’s anything wrong with one type of motivator versus another. I just think it’s important to know what your motivators are so that you can figure out kind of like what route you need to, you need to be focusing on.

Sarah Schrader 14:47
That’s awesome from what you’re saying. I feel like it’s safe to say that one of the things that makes a good educator is having the heart and wanting to truly help people to learn whatever it is that they’re teaching. Is there anything else that like you feel really makes a good educator like a good indicators?

Laylee Emadi 15:08
Yeah, absolutely. I there are a few things, I think one is, of course, wanting to come from it at a place of, I really want to spread my knowledge, I want to share my area of expertise, kind of digging a little deeper into that, I would say, it’s really important that you are an actual expert in what you do. I think a lot of times, again, self awareness is just so key here. I’ve seen it go both ways. I’ve seen people who are really incredibly gifted and incredibly talented, not have the confidence and not be able to recognize their expertise. And then I’ve seen people who have a lot of room for growth, call themselves experts before they’re ready. And so I just think knowing for sure that you are an expert, how do you know that? I would say making sure that you are getting feedback, that you’re actually giving people the opportunity to answer your questions when you’re done talking to them in terms of like, let me follow up, make sure did this information help you? Was I effective in my communication? Was my content truly helpful and impactful? And if so, how? And asking those questions, and then in that way, making sure that your content is really tried and true. And that your education and your ability to communicate that education is also being effective. So I think that’s obviously like one or two really good ways to kind of gauge if you’re going to be a great educator or not. We don’t all start out great, you know, putting in that time is really important. And then I would also just say, Are people asking you for help? Are people taking in your content? Are they are they actually like utilizing the things that you’re putting out there? And if you’ve never put anything out there, that’s obviously going to be step one?

Shaune Teske 16:53
Right? Yeah. That’s where my question comes from. If you’re feeling like, okay, I feel an expert in this people have said I am or I feel it in my heart I have this need and this passion for helping others. How do I pull from what all these things I think I know, how do I pull that into education into content that people actually want to pursue and dive into? What’s the first step into creating the content for education?

Laylee Emadi 17:26
That’s a great question. I feel like a lot of times as experts, when you get to that point, and you feel like I am an expert, people are asking me for advice, we have already gotten to the point of having this mindset of like, free is bad. And so I say that, because when I was a photographer full time, like just a photographer, and I didn’t offer education, you know, a few years ago, if you had been like put out some free information, like put out some free content, I personally would have been like, um, no things, I don’t even put my pants on for less than this amount of money to go on a shoot, like, I’m not going to give my my best stuff for free. And that’s like the worst mentality to have. Because you have to remember that the amount of time it took you to become an expert in your field, you should give yourself that amount of time to become an expert educator, you don’t wake up an expert educator. In fact, some of the most incredibly gifted and talented people out there and experts in their fields are terrible teachers. It’s not mutually exclusive. Just because you’re good at one thing doesn’t mean you’re going to be good at teaching it. And so putting out that free content, I think is the first place to start to answer your question. And just kind of figuring out obviously, what kind of platform and how you want to put that information out there, whether it’s through your blog, whether it’s like, like we do through a podcast, whether it’s through podcasts interviews, and just getting to be a guest on them. Maybe it’s providing free downloads, or maybe it’s doing you know, IG TVs or Facebook Lives or Instagram Live. However you can get yourself out there, get your content out there, into the hands of your audience in order to see if it’s effective, I think is like the number one step you want to take when you’re first putting together all of that information.

Shaune Teske 19:14
That’s perfect. I think that’s a great start is how do you know if people are going to like this if you don’t just offer it to them? And my question from that then is, okay, what do I start with? Okay, maybe if it’s out for a lot of people listening, if they’re photographers, okay, I’m really good at being a photographer. How do I offer other photographers this what I know this gift? How would you have them break that down to pull from to create content free content from?

Laylee Emadi 19:46
I would say honestly, you just kind of want to start brainstorming if you know, your zone of genius, if you know your area of expertise and and you’re like confident in it, then I would really, really just start brainstorming like content areas. You know, developing them out writing out a lot of content and then breaking that down into kind of like bite sized information. I would also advise anybody who’s kind of hesitant about, I don’t really know how, how high level to teach this stuff, I would say start really low level, you know, like, write something out, read it to someone who has no idea what you’re talking about, and see if they understand it. And if they don’t, you probably need to break it down, and then break it down again, from there.

Shaune Teske 20:26
So true. I love that.

Sarah Schrader 20:28
Yeah. So I mean, I love to say like when you’re writing or sharing anything, there’s a like, the idea of kind of like, the fifth grader, a fourth grader understand it. So breaking it down to that level?

Laylee Emadi 20:41
Yeah, definitely.

Sarah Schrader 20:43
As you’re moving into this education space, have you noticed, like anything that has become consistently difficult for people who are beginning to move into that creative education space?

Laylee Emadi 20:55
Yeah, I mean, I think honestly, there’s two ways I can answer this question. The one, the first thing that I see most often than not is just like, the confidence comparison, self doubt factor. That can be taken in a really like, fluffy kind of way. That’s not really how I am as a person, but it is very real. I mean, it does stand in the way of a lot of amazing, a lot of amazing potential in people. And so I didn’t want to bring that up. Yeah, I mean, like, I’m not going to sit here and be like, you know, I’m not going to throw inspirational quotes at people. But at the same time, I think it’s important that we recognize it like that is a real thing that holds people back is like, she’s doing it, he’s doing it, I can’t do it too. Or I can’t do it as well, or whatever. So self doubt, definitely for sure is like the one thing that I see increasingly over time, especially as more people step into the role of educator, there’s more room for comparison. And so I think that that’s something I see over and over again. And the other thing I see is people just kind of like jumping in without preparing first. Then it doesn’t go well and then they kind of crash and burn and then they kind of can’t recover from there. Or they feel like they can’t recover from there. And so I would just say lack of preparation is probably like, the other the other side of what I see a lot in terms of things that get in the way or that make it increasingly difficult for people to provide really great education is just like, jump in now plan it leader and I know that we kind of live in like the society of, you know, just done is better than perfect. And just jump in. And like while I agree with that, to an extent for certain things, this is definitely not one of those things.

Shaune Teske 22:41
I am glad he talks about both of those things. So I literally wrote down a question, what do you what advice do you have for people that feel that comparison? That thing? Oh, well, everyone’s already doing it? What do I have to offer? So two questions, I want to talk about the second part where you said, okay, you should have some preparation. I want to get into that. But my first question is about that what advice you have for people that think that everyone is doing it, I’m really good at what I do. And I feel this, calling to share my knowledge with you. But everyone’s doing it. I’m just another voice out in the, you know, the endless abyss out there. What’s your advice to those people?

Laylee Emadi 23:21
I get this question, at least twice a day, it is so common, even with people who are like in my academy, they’re in there, they’re in my Facebook Group, and like they’ve been working on it for months. And they’re like, “Oh, I just saw that somebody put this out. And it’s like the same content areas me and like, maybe I should rethink my content area.” And I’m like, “Listen, hold up.” Unless you are some kind of an incredibly unique, like, right place, right time person that comes up with something out of the blue that nobody has ever done before. Knowledge and information have been, I mean, it’s a very slim chance that what you’re teaching has never been taught before in the first place. So I would just put that out there as an encouragement of like, almost every piece of content that we take in and that we absorb has been taught in some way, shape or form before like, no, none of these concepts are going to be new to anybody. However, what makes it unique is the spin that you put on it the way that you teach it the way that you deliver it, you as an individual, there is no replicating that. And so I would just encourage anybody who feels like this stuff is already being done or like I can’t do it as well as she can or he can or whatever. That’s just not true. There’s an audience for everybody and there’s a reason that your people will come to you. And again, I know that that can sound really fluffy but I’m just I’m speaking from experience and the fact that like almost every, I like to use photography workshops because photography is such a flooded industry. And it’s, it’s high volume, there’s a ton of people out there. And there’s a lot of people putting on workshops. And we see every day some people really struggle to sell tickets, some people sell out in five minutes. The why I think is in the messaging in the audience and the way that they are being unique to themselves. And so I would just encourage anybody, be nice to yourself, lean into your strength, lean into your zone of genius, lean into your personality, and the way that you’re delivering your content to ensure that you can kind of just use your unique gifts and stand out from the crowd, if that makes sense.

Shaune Teske 25:34
Oh, beautiful. I think everyone feels like that when they start their business. And you know, even if you’re not an educator, you want to become another photographer. I talked to photographers about that, you know, you hear that all the time. Why do we need another photographer? Well, because we need another you what you’re doing is unique and different just by being who you are. So I’m glad you said that. The second part that you had mentioned was then when you are starting something that you don’t just wing this, you don’t just go into education, and you’re just okay, let’s just try some stuff. And you can try it. But what’s the preparation behind it?

Laylee Emadi 26:10
Yeah, absolutely. This is like so not a fake it till you make it situation, it like it just won’t work. The preparation, I would say, obviously, we talked a little bit about providing that free content. The number one piece of advice I give to anybody is what happens after you put out content, whether it’s free or paid. And that is following up and assessing if what you’re putting out there is impactful. A lot of times people will kind of like jump in, even if they prepare a little bit, they’ll jump in, they’ll throw things out whatever they take people’s money, people are unhappy about it. And it kind of spirals and it’s really hard to bounce back from that. And so what I always suggest is kind of the same process that I would tell anybody who is trying to grow in their craft, like you do something for free, or for a lower price point, you follow up, make sure you’re following up with specific questions, and then follow up again, after some time has passed and ask even more specific questions. Did you apply x? And how did it help you? What results did you see from applying X, Y and Z that we worked on together or that you took out of this content piece? And so that’s kind of what I would always suggest is make sure that you’re not leaving things on the table, make sure that you’re not leaving things open ended and you are aware of how things are actually being perceived and applied into other people’s lives.

Sarah Schrader 27:38
I love that advice. I do want to jump back once I can we just like please have some way to plastered everywhere that like you are unique. And your voice matters. And your perspective matters. I feel like that’s a common thing.

Laylee Emadi 27:52
Yes, for sure. I just think it’s really needed. And like, I know that even when you guys mentioned, you know, we say this to other, you know, other business owners no matter what you’re doing, that really is at the end of the day, the one thing that I think lets people succeed long term is just leaning into their uniqueness and not trying to just be like another voice in the crowd and another replication or duplicate of what we think somebody who is successful is doing.

Shaune Teske 28:23
I yes, I 100% agree. Like I just want to, I don’t know, high five, you you’re not here, but I could high five you but because that is the thing, right? Like we want this, this new thing to be a creative educator to be if we’re starting out to have this business. And so we go, okay, how do I do it, I’m going to copy what this person is doing, or I’m going to you know, emulate what they’re doing. And we start losing our uniqueness, right. And that’s where that comes from, of, well, then you start feeling like, Okay, I’m just doing what everyone else is doing. So how can we pull that uniqueness out? And that’s what my question with educating is, then, how do you find that unique is how do you find your your unique voice in educating? Is it just through trial and error? Is it through you something you are already doing in your other business? How can you bring that uniqueness into creative education?

Laylee Emadi 29:19
That’s a great question. I mean, I think that it can be kind of a myriad of things in finding your unique voice and your unique teaching style. I think that a lot of times, like I said, we see something and then we try to do that thing. So especially in education, a lot of people a lot of my students that come to me, they come to me from the standpoint of I think I want to say maybe like 70% of people who come over to me are wanting to eventually become stage speakers. And through working with me, I’d say about maybe 40% of those people find that they actually never want to get on the stage, like they want to actually be small group teachers or event hosts, or course educators. And so I think just kind of being aware of, of what you’re putting out there and why is step one. So in terms of finding your uniqueness, and in terms of becoming an educator, I would say, when you are putting out content and when you are deciding what kind of what your zone of genius is, and how to lean into that, a lot of times we think we know what we’re best at. And then we have people asking us things that maybe don’t align. And so I think making sure that you’re taking the two of those things, seeing where that overlap is seeing where the content is that you feel strongest in, and that you’re being asked about, match up, I think that’s kind of the sweet spot and, and developing content. And then in terms of finding unique voice, and making sure you’re leaning into, your unique capabilities. I think my biggest piece of advice is keep your head down, keep your blinders on and stop watching other people who are doing the same thing as you. Sometimes we feel like we’re researching and that research really quickly develops into drawing inspiration. And that inspiration really quickly develops into duplication or copying. And, and that just, that’s not going to help you in the long run.

Shaune Teske 31:22
Yes, totally agree.

Sarah Schrader 31:24
I feel like this question is gonna be a little bit throwing it to a new, a new spin here. But I am curious. So somebody is stepping into the education game? How do you balance both of those identities then? Because you don’t have to say like, okay, I’m done with what I was doing. I’m just an educator. Now. How do you balance like that and talking to two different audiences?

Laylee Emadi 31:47
that’s such a great question. I actually like, I’m really glad you asked that. I don’t think many people ask me that one, like interview. So I’m excited to chat about it. Because I think it is so important. I always tell my client, it really, it can be a difficult balance, I’ll just put that out there to start, I don’t want to kind of give an answer that’s, that seems really simple, and then move on without acknowledging that that is going to be a little bit difficult, and there will likely be growing pains. If you are finding success in this second route that you’re taking, there are definitely going to be growing pains, you’re definitely going to lose some audience members who were there for one thing and don’t really want to see the other thing. And that’s okay. So I just want to start with throwing out that encouragement that like, it’s not going to be a walk in the park in the beginning. I think that the key in terms of speaking to multiple audiences, is to just kind of make sure that you’re not neglecting one audience to grow another. I think thatmeans being really intentional about what you’re putting out. And when you’re putting it out there, I do think it’s really easy to kind of focus on the thing that you’re excited about, or the new thing. And I think that that is where you kind of like lose a lot of people who have been there with you from the beginning in in the first offering that you had. And in that way, you really could be losing income, you could be losing things that are really important to you while you’re trying to grow something else. So what I always suggest is kind of just slowly dropping in little tips and tricks here and there like I was, we always talk about Instagram first because this is kind of like where our world is right now. So like, if I’m looking at my Instagram, I want to be able to kind of put in like, a few tips for my new audience. And then making sure that I’m like padding it with something for my current audience. So like current work, your example is photography. So like, using myself as an example here, I still work with dancers, that’s what I primarily photograph is dancers in high school seniors and so all kind of like, pat it with, you know, here’s an image of a senior, here’s like a tip for my seniors, I’m still educating them. And then I switch the next post into educating my business owners, it does get a little difficult because you are going to end up being a lot more transparent than you normal than you normally would be with your clients. Because if you’re depending on what you’re teaching, you might be letting people into your processes and into our mindset. And so I think being really thoughtful about what information you put out into the public versus what you put into like a newsletter, or an educational podcasts are something that someone has to leave your marketing platform, your social platform. If they have to leave that platform to get to your content, then you can be a little bit more transparent. I think in the beginning, it’s really important to be thoughtful about how you phrase things on your social. I have one student who is um, she does one on one mentoring and she does photography workshops and we’re working on kind of building out her trainings on in person sales. But if she still has a lot of the majority of her following his her clients and her clients are paying a lot of money for prints in person and products. And so I told her, you know, you need to be really cautious about how you put out, you know, triple, quadruple your income photographers, but then you have clients looking at you being like you’re charging me triple or quadruple like, what is he don’t want to make them mad. And so we talked a lot about let’s use verbiage like how can you serve your clients better while increasing your income as well and supporting your family? Like, you know, just coming at it from a really strategic standpoint, as opposed to just kind of like throwing out a ton of information and hoping that it lands somewhere?

Shaune Teske 35:45
I think that’s a great answer to it of being very open and honest. And then being cautious of it. Something that maybe people haven’t thought about that if you’re selling you know, your secret sauce that your clients are going to figure it out that way. This isn’t, I’m not unique to you. So that’s really interesting. But that brings me to another thing that I’ve heard people ask me about, if I’ve given out education for free or trainings for free. I’ve had people ask me, well, aren’t you worried then that your competitors are going to in your area are going to have your like, again, using that same analogy, your secret sauce to then go and do the same thing in your community in your location? What do you say to people that are afraid that if they start giving away free trainings are start educating for free that their competitors are going to do the same thing in their area?

Laylee Emadi 36:37
Whoo, girl. I have so many thoughts. And just like, I know that probably your listeners are like this girls is very opinionated. I’m just one of those people if you will, where I’m like, this is my opinion, take it or leave it like it’s cool if we don’t agree. I have seen so many people kind of approach this in a way that I disagree with. I see a lot of educators are not really as much anymore, but especially in the beginning be like, I’ll use we keep using photography as an example. But I know that there was a photography workshop and you could not take it if you were in, you know, a certain amount of miles surrounding that person. And that really rubbed me the wrong way. Like I get it. Listen, I get it. Like I get the fear. I get the scarcity mindset. I think I don’t agree with it. I think it’s gonna hold you back in the long run. But I understand where the fear is coming from, I would just encourage anybody who has that fear, I would say ‘A’ don’t operate from a mindset of scarcity. There are too many people in this world, you cannot serve all of them, there is enough to go around. First of all. Secondly, I would just encourage people, if you are worried about that, or if you have a concern that like, okay, so I’m teaching other people how to book what I’m booking, what if they book something that should have in mine, then you probably shouldn’t be an educator, point blank, unpopular opinion, take it or leave it. But if that’s your mindset, then education might not be for you.

Shaune Teske 38:09
Yeah, I like the way you raise the hands. Yeah.

Laylee Emadi 38:16
I mean, it’s just at that point, I’m like, okay, then you’re obviously educating for the wrong reasons. First of all, and second of all, like, your whole point, if you’re trying to put out information for free to start, you’re going to hopefully, eventually monetize on that, like girls gotta eat, you’ve got to make the money, right. So you will eventually be charging for that education. And you should, you would hope that like it would even out or work in your benefit. And but honestly, even if it doesn’t, again, it’s just probably not not the right path for you.

Shaune Teske 38:49
Yes, I agree. I love it all emoji hands.

Sarah Schrader 38:55
Yeah, I’m with her as well.

Laylee Emadi 38:58
Thanks for letting me get a little sassy guys.

Sarah Schrader 39:04
This has been amazing information. I would love. If you have any other advice you’d love to share. We want to give you that space to do that right now.

Laylee Emadi 39:11
Oh my gosh, you guys are so sweet. I really don’t have a ton. I would just if you guys want to connect with me, you can find me on Instagram primarily. It’s just @laylee_emadi. There’s not a lot of Laylee’s out there. So you can probably easily find me. And then of course, if you are interested in kind of growing along the path of creative educator, visit thecreativeeducatoracademy.com and you can kind of get more information there along with some free resources. So hopefully that can that can help you guys along your path.

Shaune Teske 39:42
I’ve heard some amazing things about your Creative Educator Academy course it sounds incredible. You have so many great pieces in there and then you have like guests, people that come and speak and talk about what they’re really good at and how they you have them pour into your students too. It’s really cool.

Laylee Emadi 40:00
Oh, thank you so much. Yeah, absolutely. I’m of the belief that if that we cannot all be experts in everything. And so I think it’s really important to know if you’re not an expert in something, you should find an expert to help you educate your students a little bit better.

Sarah Schrader 40:15
Awesome. Well, before we wrap up this episode, we love to ask our guests a few rapid fire questions at the end. Are you game for that?

Shaune Teske 40:23
Oh my gosh, absolutely.

Sarah Schrader 40:25
Okay, the first one, are you a morning person or a night owl?

Laylee Emadi 40:31
Can I be neither? I’m like a mid afternoon pigeon.

Sarah Schrader 40:34
All right. Maybe we should add that to our questions.

Shaune Teske 40:37
Good afternoon, pigeon. I like.

Sarah Schrader 40:41
Number two. Question number two. How do you take your coffee or your tea?

Laylee Emadi 40:47
Milk and sugar. Well, for the coffee tea is just black.

Sarah Schrader 40:53
Alright, favorite way to give yourself that extra self care?

Laylee Emadi 40:57
I love getting a monthly massage. It’s like life changing.

Shaune Teske 41:02
I agree. What is your go to book recommendation?

Laylee Emadi 41:09
Anything Bernie Brown?

Sarah Schrader 41:11
Yes love her. All right, favorite indulgent treat.

Laylee Emadi 41:16
Oh, gosh. I love all of the treats. Maybe like Reese’s, I love me some good like chocolate peanut butter combo.

Sarah Schrader 41:27
What is one place you’d like to travel next?

Laylee Emadi 41:30
I’d love to go to the Amalfi Coast.

Sarah Schrader 41:33
And the last one. What do you consider to be your legacy?

Laylee Emadi 41:39
My legacy, I think I’m hopeful that my legacy will just be somebody who has made her life about serving others and helping others succeed in a really open and honest way.

Shaune Teske 41:54
I think you already do that. So I think this you are I think you’ve always been very open honest with everyone you serve, you are going to share from your heart and you can tell that you really want to pour into people and that’s rare. I think you know, so I’m so thankful your hearing could speak to our listeners. I hope I know what I say. I hope I know they learned something today. So thank you so much for being here.

Laylee Emadi 42:19
Oh my gosh, thank you guys so much. That means the world to me.

Sarah Schrader 42:38
This episode may be over but we want to keep the conversation going. Find us hanging out over on our Instagram account @thecreativelegacypodcast and interact with us there to let us know your perspective and questions on today’s topic. All the show notes and links to resources from this episode can be found at thecreativelegacypodcast.com/episodes.

Shaune Teske 43:00
Thanks for listening to the show. As always, we really appreciate your thoughts and feedback. You can reach out to us on Instagram @thecreativelegacypodcast or leave a review on Apple podcasts and we might include yours in an upcoming episode.

 

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