Brett teaches to a global audience where her classes are streamed for over 4 million minutes each month. She offers yoga and meditation as a tool to ignite your best life and open into your full potential. Her students hail her precise cues, compassionate support and warm sense of humor. She has twenty-five years of ballet and modern dance training, and is Ballet Barre certified. Brett is also a Massage Therapist specializing in myofascial release and unwinding. In her IT career, Brett created movement and dance video games. She co-founded and sold two successful health & wellness businesses before developing Uplifted™ Yoga. She’s taught yoga in studios and at Silicon Valley’s hottest companies. In 2016, she won Youtube’s NextUp award as one of the top emerging yoga channels on Youtube. She holds a BFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts.
Where did the idea for Uplifted Yoga come from?
It started out as a passion project. I just loved yoga, and started to make YouTube videos so I could remember the sequences (series of poses) that I did. It never occurred to me that people would actually want to watch them and follow along! As the channel gained traction, more ideas flooded in on how to make more/ different types of content and reach more people. It’s always a work in progress!
What does your typical day look like and how do you make it productive?
Now that I have kids, I’m pretty rigid about waking up early (5:30) so I can get some yoga in before my toddler wakes up. Then I prioritize morning family time before settling in to work between 9 and 10am. The work day could include anything from filming videos to a slew of meetings, to drafting copy, to studying key metrics. Using tools like Slack and Asana, I’m clued into what my priorities are each day. Then I make sure to shut down work at 7:00pm!
How do you bring ideas to life?
Just try. Just do something. When you have an idea, don’t wait long enough for those nasty voices in your head to come around and tell you all the reasons why it won’t work. Don’t feel like you have to wait for the perfect setup, the perfect equipment, the perfect time – just get started. The level of professionalism in your content is meant to grow with you, not be perfect from the get go!
What’s one trend that excites you?
New tech in live video calls! The pandemic has supercharged growth in the virtual communication world which is hugely exciting for me, since I started doing live calls before Zoom was even a verb. The more tools that come into existence for virtual learning, the more we can offer our students!
What is one habit of yours that makes you more productive as an entrepreneur?
Checking in on the pain points with my community and adjusting accordingly. Your audience is the best source you have when deciding which direction to steer your business. By engaging and determining what they need and want, you’ll be able to deliver a transformational experience and drive sales.
What advice would you give your younger self?
Don’t not do something or take action because you’re afraid that you’re too late, or that too many other people are already doing it. You’re not too late, and no one is doing it like you will.
Tell us something that’s true that almost nobody agrees with you on.
It’s not “normal” to feel unfulfilled in your job. You should love what you’re doing at your job so much that you would try to continue to do it even if you weren’t getting paid.
As an entrepreneur, what is the one thing you do over and over and recommend everyone else do?
I take a look at what tasks on my plate will impact growth and revenue the most, and I always tackle those first. These are all typically outward facing, engagement type items such as going live on social media, sending client facing emails, uploading videos to YouTube, etc. Sometimes I have to remind myself at the last minute to quickly tackle those other things like managing Quickbooks!
What is one strategy that has helped you grow your business?
Delegation. The transition from going from a solopreneur to a CEO has been challenging for me, because of my super strong urge to have a hold on everything that happens within the company. But as it continues to grow, it’s simply not realistic. It’s become hugely important for me to learn how to hire a team and let the expertise of those around me handle a lot of the day to day issues of the company so I’m free to focus on what’s next.
What is one failure you had as an entrepreneur, and how did you overcome it?
I’ve had so many “failures” – but at the end of the day I’m more grateful for them than anything else, because that’s when I’ve learned the most! At one point, I tried creating a yoga wedding course that was meant to help brides deal with the stress of their big day. It was a massive flop! But I didn’t let that failure stop me – I had no shortage of ideas. I just kept trying them, sticking with the ones that worked and letting go of the ones that didn’t.
What is one business idea that you’re willing to give away to our readers?
Don’t underestimate the power of email marketing, especially in terms of getting personal with your audience. They want to get to know you, and they want to hear from you. Will you get unsubscribes? Absolutely. With every email. But you will also build strength and trust in your community, and in your die hard fans. And those are the people you need to put your energy towards.
What is the best $100 you recently spent? What and why?
A really fancy iPad stand. Now I can read the newspaper ergonomically and it’s great for Zooming in the grandparents to family dinner.
What is one piece of software or a web service that helps you be productive?
Slack! It’s my go to productivity tool that I use with my all remote team. The tagging and notification structure of the platform allows me to stay on top of priority tasks.
What is the one book that you recommend our community should read and why?
The Miracle Morning by Hal Elrod. It’s a fantastic way to get into the right mindset for optimal productivity. By starting with taking care of yourself and your day, everything else begins to fall into place! We all have more than enough time (hiding from us!) to accomplish the things that we want, and this book shows us how to get that time back.
What is your favorite quote?
“Whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re right.” -Henry Ford
Key Learnings:
- Take action. Don’t wait for the perfect storm to hit, because it never will.
- Connect with your audience — ask them what they need from you.
- Learn to delegate and trust your support system.
Carlyn runs the day-to-day publishing operation here at ideamensch and interacts with our awesome customers and entrepreneurs. She is likely editing this with a cat on her lap.