 Aloha, and welcome to another episode of the Savvy Chick Show on Think Tech, Hawaii. I'm your host, Chantel Seville. Welcome all. Thank you again for tuning in. I'm very excited to have our guest all the way from Melbourne in Australia. She's a personal brand and image expert, a red lipstick addict, and a keynote speaker who's doing and taking over the country by storm in Australia. Now today's topic is the power of authentic personal branding. If you don't know what that is, our wonderful, gorgeous, inspiring, and empowering guest, Collette Worden, is about to tell you how. Welcome Collette. Thank you so much for being on the show today. Thanks for having me. It's pretty neat. We've been wanting to have you on the show for ages, but with your recent tour and having you here, there, and everywhere, I mean, I know it's hard to get you in. So thank you so much for coming on. Now tell us, what's going on in Australia with this personal branding that we're hearing a lot about, especially when it comes to entrepreneurs and their businesses? Yeah. Personal branding is such a buzz term these days. It's so huge in America, massive in Europe. It's a movement where entrepreneurs are now stepping out from, you know, hiding behind a business name and stepping out as the face of their brand and putting themselves out there so they can make their difference. And then ideally having their market connect with them as people and their values. And it's such a powerful, powerful way of doing business authentically and powerfully, if you will. So do you think that then that attracts more customers that are more relevant for their business or how do you think that's sort of helping by them showing up and... Yeah. So if we think about America TV shows, for example, America is really well known for creating TV shows around a brand. In Australia, we create TV shows around a topic and then we slit the talent within that. Now if we think about it from a business perspective, if we think about Richard Branson, Richard Branson has developed such a strong personal brand that no matter what he does, we will buy from him if we are attracted to his values. So he started off the Virgin Airlines, music, finance. So the power of personal branding is that if we put ourselves out there and share ourselves authentically and our values consistently, then no matter what we're doing, our market will follow us and buy from us no matter what we do. That makes complete sense because basically you're building trust. Like if they understand who you are and you're just showing up authentically, then people are more likely to trust you and if they're more likely to trust you, then they're more likely to buy from you. But I guess if you can't see the face behind what you're buying, it makes it a little bit more not as personal perhaps? Absolutely. Absolutely. And it's a business owner themselves. I mean, it's such a liberating experience putting yourself out there as the face of your brand being only you rather than someone who you think you should be in business as such a sustainable way of creating a success in business. And is that like, is that for introverts and extroverts? Absolutely. I'm an introvert myself and I'm a highly anxious being. So I get all my energy from being by myself. So I structure my business around that that introverts and extroverts alike can be successful personal brands in business. Absolutely. Perfect. We're looking forward to hearing more about that. But before we start that, I just want a little snapshot of everything that you like you do, because it's not just the personal branding. There's much, you know, many other things with that. So what other services do you provide just in a little snapshot? We'll go into them further in the second segment, but just enough to give us an idea of what is, call it word in Australia, what's all about. So my team and I, what we do is we work with entrepreneurs and professionals who are great at what they do. We help them develop the confidence to put themselves out there authentically. So we do that through personal branding development, through image development and teaching how to present on camera and on stage. We shoot their headshot and website photography so that at every touch point of the brand, when it comes to a visual image perspective, it's all consistent. So do you find often people that create a brand are very similar to what that brand offers? Is that a tricky question, maybe? Not always. The art of authentic personal branding is being no one other than who you really are. So for a long time, the concept of personal branding was about creating a cookie cutter version of what a successful brand is. Our philosophy is that there is no cookie cutter version. The only successful version is you. And it's about enhancing that, packaging that and putting that out there confidently. Because it makes sense. I mean, I can't be your brand. I mean, we have different values and different things, even though a lot might be similar, we're still not the same. So if I tried to follow everything that it took to be your brand, I wouldn't be myself. So that's quite interesting and powerful. Is this something that you've always been good at? Like have you always been good at people and style and picking that? I've always been obsessed with people. I know that my favorite hobby, even to this day, is sitting at a cafe with a tea now, so I don't drink coffee anymore, and just people stalking. I just watch and obsess with people. I look at the pieces of fabric that they wear. I look at how they move, how they talk, how they communicate. And that interest in obsession has always been there. And I'm really, truly grateful that I've been in industry where I get to work with people so closely. And is it from when you were young age, is that what you did as well? Like, what did you want to be when you grew up? Oh, man, I had no idea. I was lost up until I was 28, to be honest. I thought I wanted to do interior design, advertising, marketing, I wanted to be a TV presenter, I wanted to be a graphic designer, I wanted to take over the corporate world. I had absolutely no idea. But the neatest thing is you're doing all those right now. You're doing them all. So that confusion has actually led to your success. So, you know, I hear the term, I fell into it. I fell into what I do. But I truly believe for me it was universal guidance that everything that I did up until that day like deciding this is it for me, helped me get to where I am today. Because they say even I've read something about Steve Jobs and how he did a calligraphy course and that is what made, you know, Mac have its different fonts which is something interesting. Like you never know what you're doing and how that's gonna enhance what you do later in life. So it's pretty interesting. What did you study after school though? What did you actually think you were doing first when you finished high school? Marketing and international trade. And I had tended about six classes before I decided the university wasn't for me. I was more interested in reading by myself than actually attending a class. And then so what did you do from there? Ah, so from, okay, so I went to university, tried to study marketing and international trade, started applying for marketing jobs anyway and started getting them. I thought, I don't need a degree. Ego got ahead of me. And then I just kept jumping, dropped a job. I mean, I went into retail and I started off as an assistant and then worked my out to an area manager. And then I was like, oh, I'm bored of this. I'll move on. Then I started running, sorry, TV presenting. I went for a job at a promotional agency and she said to me, oh, you don't get this job but we need a presenter for a campaign that we're doing. Would you be interested? And I went, TV presenting, what a shit that is. And then I came back to this later going, okay, I don't have a job, I'm interested in what I have to do. So she sent me to a TV presenting course. Long story really short, the first course that I ever did to learn how to TV present is the course that I ended up teaching for seven years and how to teach people to present to camera. And then within that organization, they also ran image development classes. And I started running that and I fell in love. So did you accidentally fell into this? Cause you're like, oh, it's a job, I'll get paid. I'll do this presenting thing if you want me to as long as you give me some money for it. We'll see how we go. And then, so was that a long course that you had to do or the presenting the camera? Presenting the camera course was about seven weeks. And from there, I went on to channel 31 and then Foxtel and then channel 10. So it was a great, a great stint. And TV presenting will always be a vehicle. I just now know that when I enter the TV industry, again, it'll be doing this, talking about this, what I'm doing now, personal running image development. Which is, yeah, exactly. It's a vehicle and that's what you use it for. But it's so interesting to see, like that you said that you worked in retail. And I mean, a lot of what you've done, especially in the past has really been, you know, you're known or you still are known as the real sort of style and image guru in Australia. So it's kind of neat how you just, you know, took it from the store and then the presenting and then, you know, watching people and, you know, molded it all up and created an empire from it. So that's pretty, pretty, pretty clever. Was it just an intuitive thing or did they just start matching? Yeah, enjoying things is a really good way of putting it. It just, I started doing what felt good. Started doing what I really, I don't know if I want to be doing what my soul knew I needed to be doing this. And for a long time I resisted it. That's how I've looked back and I guess summed it up as. And so when did you decide that you wanted to start a business? Or how did that exactly come about? So starting a business for me was, I was under the belief that I didn't have a skill set that anybody would employ. So I had no choice but to start a business. And I was- A true entrepreneur. I remember the first year of business, I was lying in my bed going, what the fuck, am I doing? I've got no clients. I've got no money. I've got rent for the next week. And I was just like, come on, I've got to make this work. And so I just committed to consistency. I remember the first time I put, my very first Facebook post up, really publicly saying what it is that I was doing. And I was so nervous. And I just said to myself, collect, just commit to consistency. The next day, get up and post about it again. And just commit to that. And that's how it just took off. That's really catchy commit to consistency. Because I think often I talk a lot about like the healthy lifestyle. And that's what it is. It's committing to consistency. Even if you don't do it all the time, it's just consistency will pay off in the end as long as you're consistent. So you started just consistently doing it. And how long ago was that? That was really four and a half years ago now. And then from then it just sort of kept evolving and becoming, I guess, what you're doing today. So what was the first thing you did? What was the business? How did it exactly sort of start? Yeah. It started off as personal styling. And my very first client was a pro bono client. She was, I met her at a shopping center at a cafe. And she said, I need clothes for an art exhibition. I've been walking around not finding anything. And I'm like, oh, hey, luckily I know how to do this. How about I take you around and we find you an outfit. And then we found her an outfit. I went to her art exhibition and I remember looking at her in front of her media wall going, wow, she looks incredible. She's owning it. And I fell in love with using pieces of fabric to really elevate your self-confidence. And we're friends to this date. And from there, she just referred to people. They referred more people and it grew. And now there's a team of us. So when you were going to start this business and you weren't very good at school and kind of left out on your marketing degree, do people say, you're crazy. This is not possible. What do you think you're doing? Like, how are you gonna start a business? You know, it's really interesting. I had the opposite. I had people around me that were saying, you can do this. You can do whatever you set your mind to. It was me that was doubting myself. So I had to learn how to deal with my inner demons to get myself to do it. That's awesome. So it's actually, and that's the neat thing. And that's why I love sharing different stories on the Savvy Chick Show is because, you know, often people it's like, what are you doing? You can't do this. But I mean, you must have some cool people around you. You can do this. Yeah, everyone, you need to surround yourself with people like that who believe in you because there's something that's really empowering about people who believe in you more than you believe in yourself because we all know believing yourself is not easy. So when you can have people around you that believe in you, it's pretty special experience. So they obviously saw something in you that you didn't quite see at the time. And are they still all around you? Absolutely, yeah. That's, and are you loving having a business? Oh, I'm loving it. I, the whole concept of being able to create whatever I set my mind to, and with a team that loves it and supports me just as much, it's just so exciting. It really is. Because I don't want to get into it quite yet because we'll have a break just shortly here, but I do definitely want to hear more about like each of the services you provide so we can understand how they're helping people and how this has become such a big impact in Australia and globally, because I know that you do do some work overseas as well. But just like a couple other things, can you share sometimes when you've had an obstacle and how you overcame it? Like if you were mentioning, you don't believe in yourself sometimes like, how did you teach yourself to overcome that? Or how do you perhaps consistently teach yourself these days to overcome that? Yeah, my biggest obstacle is my mind. So I believe my mind, just like everyone else's mind is extremely powerful and has the power to create our own living hell. So it's powerful enough to do that. It's also powerful enough to create our own living dream. And so what I've, coming out of a really dark phase of my life, I knew that to be able to change everything that I was doing, I need to just first be conscious of the thoughts of creating my reality. So for me, what's super important is being really conscious of what I'm thinking and as a result of that, what I'm creating. So I know that I'm putting myself out there is nerve-wracking for me. I've had anxiety attacks around it, but I just know that my purpose is bigger than my fear and that's something that I consistently work on for myself and something that I help our clients do as well. The purpose is bigger than the fear. I like that. And we're just going to hold it on that note. Take you to a short break. We'll be back with you soon on The Savvy Chick Show with Colette Worden. Thanks for tuning in. Aloha, everyone. I hope you've been watching Think The Kauai. But I'm here to invite you to watch me on Viva Hawaii every Monday at 3 p.m. I'm waiting for you. Mahalo. Aloha, my name is Danelia, D-A-N-E-L-I-A. And I'm the other half of the duo, John Newman. We are the co-hosts of Keys to Success, which is live on Think Tech Live Streaming Network series weekly on Thursdays at 11 a.m. Aloha. Aloha. Aloha, I am Reg Baker and I am the host of Business in Hawaii with Reg Baker. We broadcast live every Thursday from 2 to 2.30 in the Think Tech studios in downtown Alululu. We highlight successful stories about businesses and individuals and learn their secrets to success. I hope you can join us on our next show on Thursday at 2 o'clock. Until then, aloha. Aloha and welcome back to The Savvy Chick Show on Think Tech Hawaii. We're back for the second segment of the show, with Colette Warden, who is a personal image and brand expert, as well as a keynote speaker and a red lipstick addict. Now, before we continue, what is this red lipstick addict all about? Where did it come from, Colette? Well, when I was going through my last period of I don't know what I'm doing, one of the roles that I fell into was the power marketing manager for Alana Hill. Remember the very first day that I walked into Ralph where she said, we wear red lipstick here? And so I was so resistant against putting red lipstick on, so I never wanted it for my life. I'm like, oh, this feels disgusting. Yet as soon as I put it on and looked myself in the mirror, I went, oh, I actually really like this. And it became this ritual thing that I do every single day that became a getting into the zone, getting ready, and I felt really powerful. So I just committed to it. Oh, I like that. So getting into the zone and like, that's where you get your power from. Is that something that you teach people as well? Because that seems, I like that. Yeah, we teach style point of difference. So using pieces of fabric or your image as your biggest marketing tool, and finding one thing that you can commit to consistently that you become known for. So for me, a really strong part of my brand is the red lipstick and the fringe. For some clients, it's their glasses. For others, it's really interesting shoes. If we think of Nome, since I'm a red balloon, she's taken that to a whole other level and all she wears is red. And in an interview, she said that's her easiest way for her market to connect with her. Because they know it too. I've never seen you without red lipstick. Sometimes I wonder if you even wear it to sleep. And it's always perfect. Not to, it's not just red, it's just perfect. That you're very consistent on that and I've never seen you falter. So definitely keep it up. But can you share, as I said in the first segment, I wanna hear more about each of the services you provide because I think it's so unique the way you and your business provide and deliver them. And yeah, I'll leave it to you to sort of share. And of course, I'm gonna interrupt and ask some questions along the way. But can you start sharing the different services you provide and how they're transforming lives and businesses? Sure. So overall, I'll start with the overall concept. We use image development, personal branding, stage and presence training, stage and camera training and shoot head shot and photography, website photography. The overarching thing that we do is, we know we've done a great job and our clients say to us, I believe in myself again. My self-confidence has increased. I'm speaking with certainty and I'm walking with an elevated presence. I'm also saying yes to more opportunities. And by that, they mean yes. I'm saying yes to that interview. I'm saying yes to getting my photo taken. Yes to stepping up on stage. Yes to that promotion. Yes to attracting a tribe of clients. And the best thing about it is they're dressing, walking and talking like they deserve those opportunities. So for example, when a client comes to us and says, you know what? I'm looking at myself in the mirror and I know that I'm not the living version of the person that I'm really working hard to become. So they do the image development process and we sit down with them and we say, okay, tell us your story. Where have you been? Where are you at now and where are you going? And how can we create the visual representation of that person now that's running that empire? What do they look like? How do they walk? How do they talk? What are they wearing? So we create a personal brand brief. We get really clear on their strengths, personality traits and how it's really important for them to be perceived. We then jump into the wardrobe and we go, all right, what are the missing links? The weakest links in here. You know, when we say we want to lose weight, you know, we go into our pantry and we remove everything that would be our weakness. You know, the talagos, the chocolate goes, the wine, the teas. So that even when we're starving, we don't even have that to rely on anymore. So the wardrobe we look at, you know, it's a place where we create ourselves every single day. Everything in there needs to be earning its place. Can it be different though? Like, can it be, does it have to be like one consistent style? Or can there be like a variety of styles as long as the person feels confident in presenting themselves in that style? Absolutely. So a really great question. So it depends on the brand. So some brands, their brand is diversity. So they're all about diversity. So having eclectic and different looks is the consistent part of their brand. Really, there is no fashion dictator. We hate fashion. We think it's the quickest way to manufacture a brand. We're all about personal branding. And that means, you know, is your brand about change, diversity? Then let's create a lot of looks that look inconsistent, but that's the consistent thread, if that makes sense. Perfect. Yeah. So we remove anything from the wardrobe. We remove everything from the wardrobe first. Do people like stop you and go, what are you doing? Don't get rid of that. I've had that for 20 years. Don't touch my sweater. You know, we do talk about that. By the time we get to that stage, the clients, they've already built up the trust and we've built the rapport and they are looking at their clothes going, oh, shit, I can't believe this is still in here. We talk about how the wardrobe, you know, there are parts of the wardrobe that has us holding on to the past. IE, you know, when I was 18, I looked great in this and I loved it. This is the outfit that my husband said I looked skinny in. You know, this is the outfit that I wore my very first date. So we're holding on to the past and then there's a part of it that's in fear of what might happen in the future. You know, one day I might need this pink tutu again. That's one. Did you, you haven't been in my closet, have you? And I will need that tutu when I have my little girl and we walk around the malls together. I'm just kidding. Well, that's actually something though. You'd be surprised what we do find in the wardrobe and that's the most fascinating part of the process. You know, there's also this, one day we're gonna lose 18 kilograms and fit into this again. But the thing is, we're not actually dressing for the present. There's 20% of the wardrobe that is the part that we rely on that, you know, that'll do. I've worn that before, that'll do. And we know that what we do in one area of our life, we do in every other. So if we're settling for that'll do, then in the wardrobe then we're settling for that'll do in so many other areas of our life too. So once we've created the blank canvas, we moved all the weakest links, only put back in the things that are representation of the brand now. We hit the stores, create the new visual and then we photograph all the outfits. So that, you know, our clients are busy. They have no, they're thriving professionals who do not wanna be wasting time on choosing what to wear each day or rushing out to the shops to find something. So they get a catalog of all their outfits. They flix it on their iPad. They choose it, they put it on and they go. And that's a big part of our process. So do you, like, so do you look at the client? You've obviously spent time with them or you or your team have been to their home, looked through their closet, heard their story, found out a bit more about them and then you choose what stores you're gonna take them to. So is that when your expertise comes in or do they suggest to a store that they liked? How does that work? Yeah, they just say, hey, this is the budget I'm willing to play with. We call it the investment I'm willing to play with. And then our responsibility is to fill all the gaps in their wardrobe so it supports their lifestyle and their mission really effectively. And we need to shop. We need to create a full wardrobe by full meaning, dual season, autumn, winter, spring, summer or only shopping twice a year. And if you're in Hawaii, it's just summer, summer, summer, summer, summer. So... Yeah, so our responsibility is to create the wardrobe and the looks that's gonna support their brand. And so people who wanna take it further from there. So basically anyone could do that, just even if it's a stay at home mom, essentially they could do that with you just to improve confidence. But I know that you focus a lot on entrepreneur. So entrepreneurs usually take it to the next step, I believe, which is like whether it be the website or the photo shoots and what do you do there? Yeah, so our market are entrepreneurs and professionals. The content that we deliver within the sessions, because we're not talking about fashion, we are talking about personal branding and business, doesn't really suit the stay at home moms, but there are so many other businesses in Australia that are perfect for that. So the entrepreneurs are on a really big journey. And so we've revamped the pieces of fabric, if you will. And now they're jumping up in front of audiences on stage or presenting it to camera to produce their online course material or do interviews like this. So we teach them how to be on brand on stage. And what I mean by that is we're not creating a cookie cutter version of what our presenter talks and walks like. It's about how can we get your authentic essence on brand confidently so that the market is really connecting with you genuinely and also on camera. I mean, there are so many people that, as soon as I step up in front of this piece of metal, they freeze. That was me over the first time. I forgot my name. I was like, shit, I don't know how old I am. I don't know what my name is. It is a piece of metal that we can literally pick up and smash. So it's about how can we deliver these content authentically in a way that will connect with our market. So do you think that people automatically feel better or their posture is better when they're dressed in something that, would you ever see, I guess you probably would do the process first, but someone that you kind of put on camera and what they're wearing and who they're being and then put them on camera again once they've had their sort of personal brand developed. There must be just such a world of difference. Absolutely. I'm actually obsessed with the link between self-confidence and pieces of fabric that I employed called Data Australia. And we ran a survey and interviewed over 550 professional women across Australia to find out how the pieces of fabric are affecting the way that they communicate and how they walk and how their confidence levels. 94% of women said that when they like what they are wearing, their confidence increases. 74.5% said that when they like what they're wearing, the way that they walk is different. They walk with a lot more confidence. And 54.5% said that they communicate poorly when they don't like what they're wearing. So it's amazing how much of an impact these pieces of fabric have. That's incredible. And it must also be like everything right from your lot, like what you're wearing under your clothes to your shoes to everything. So it's not just the one thing. And I find that, I find that fascinating because I definitely know sometimes you go through wardrobe and you're just gonna pick a kind of thing and you feel a million times better when you pick no. I'll wear this again, even though I've worn it before, it makes me feel great. And I'll wear that again. So that's my own personal take on it. But do you have some like a really good piece of advice that those savvy chicks watching today could implement straight away on any of the levels of your business or what you do or just from a personal point of view? Yeah, so the very first thing that came to mind was such a big thing, but representing who you really are and not who you think you should be. So the quickest way to smash down and destroy self-confidence is when we look at how other people are doing it and doing it the way that we think it should be done rather than going, you know, who am I? Starting back at us. Who am I? What do I really want? Who do I really want to be working with? How do I really want to be working with them? And then, you know, playing on that, going all in on that. So it doesn't have to be fancy or look super professional. It's just really who you are. Is that? Yes, and that's actually what, you know, the process really isn't about building upon. It's really unraveling, removing the things that aren't us. It really is a removing process rather than a building process. That's, I mean, it's been fantastic advice and I love, you know, just sharing what you're doing because it's incredible and it can help so many entrepreneurs who are, you know, hiding behind a shadow of themselves as you often say, to really step out. But something that, as you know, is very important in my heart is the young women out there who are watching, even if the girls or the teenage girls out there who lack self-confidence. What's that piece of advice you can give those girls to help with their self-confidence? Again, something they can do today. Probably similar to what you just said, but if you have some different advice, that'd be great too. Absolutely. You know, I worked for teenagers for seven years at the Susan Johnson Australia course where we ran through image development. And I noticed that the girls that were coming there were under the pretense that it's not okay to feel nervous or scared before you do anything. So my piece of advice would be, you know, the fear's never gonna go away. It's okay that you're feeling scared or nervous about putting yourself out there or doing what it is that you really wanna do. Just create a really strong support network around you and learn first and foremost, you know, the sorts that you really are thinking that are creating your reality. That's perfect. That is so beautiful. I need to put that in a little clip and reshare just that wonderful piece of wisdom. Thank you so much, Collette. You've been amazing today and always, you know, really look forward to continuing to see what you do in this empire you build, which I know is mainly in Australia, but no doubt going global and very soon. So those of you in Hawaii, feel free to connect with her because she is global. And yeah, thank you again for being on the show. For those of you who've been watching, make sure you check out Call That World and we put our website up throughout the show as well. And Aloha from us over here. Go.