145: The Power of Collaboration featuring Bail Ansari and Liz Olson

See the show notes for this Episode here.

This transcript has been automatically generated.

Bonnie Christine [00:00:00]:
Hi, everyone. Welcome to this episode of The Professional Creative Podcast. I'm thrilled to introduce our 2 phenomenal guests today. I am here with Bail Ansari and Liz Olson. Now, Bail and Liz met recently, and they're both inside my coaching program. We call it PCBC, the Professional Creative Business Coaching Program. And they got my attention because of how they recently collaborated and really did a co launch, and their results were phenomenal. So I'm so excited to dive into that with you today.

Bonnie Christine [00:00:40]:
I'm excited to introduce you to Liz and Bail. I'm Bonnie Christine and this is where all things creativity, design, business, and marketing unite. I'm a mama living in a tiny town tucked right inside the Smoky Mountains running a multi 7 figure business, doing the most creative and impactful work of my life. But when I first set out to become an entrepreneur, I was struggling to make ends meet and wrestling with how to accomplish my biggest dream of becoming a fabric designer. Fast forward to today, I'm not only licensing my artwork all over the world, but also teaching others how to design their creative life and experience the same success. I'm here to help you spend your life doing something that lights you up. I'll help you build a creative business that also creates an impact, changes people's lives, gives you all of the freedom you want, and is wildly profitable. Welcome to the Professional Creative Podcast.

Bonnie Christine [00:01:50]:
Hi, everyone. I'm so excited to share with you 2 incredible women on the show today. I'm here with Bail Ansari and Liz Olson. Hello, ladies.

Bail Ansari [00:02:01]:
Hello, Bonnie. Hello, Bonnie. Hello, hello.

Bonnie Christine [00:02:05]:
And, I am incredibly excited to dive into your Stu, both individually and collaboratively today. You have both been up to some incredible things. So before we dive in, would you just take a moment to each tell us a little bit more about who you are and what you do? And, Bail, we'll start with you.

Bail Ansari [00:02:24]:
Alright. So I am Bail. I am the owner of Just One More Project where I sell digital files for laser owners. It's kinda dorky, but it's very cool. I now teach laser owners how to design their own files using Adobe Illustrator and, run a membership, and I'm doing all the things.

Bonnie Christine [00:02:47]:
Okay. So for everyone who's like, wait, what what what did you say? Tell us, what is a laser owner? What are we doing with these lasers?

Bail Ansari [00:02:57]:
So we, so I design files for people who own laser cutting machines. Laser cutting machines can cut, engrave, score a variety of different materials, and you can make really cool things with them, like products to sell, like gifts to give, all kinds of things. So in order to make them, though, you need to be able to design them. And so that's what I teach.

Bonnie Christine [00:03:21]:
So I won't ask you what your favorite one is, Bail, but when I think about laser machines, I think that there's 3 big ones. They're the Silhouette, the Cricut, and the Glowforge. Would you agree that those are the top 3?

Bail Ansari [00:03:34]:
Well, a Silhouette and a Cricut are blade cutting machines. That's right. Cutting is with a beam of light. It's so incredibly dorky, but so, so different. I know this.

Bonnie Christine [00:03:48]:
Okay. So Glowforge is probably at the top of your list for laser,

Bail Ansari [00:03:51]:
which we both own and we're both excited about. So yeah. Amazing. Alright.

Bonnie Christine [00:03:56]:
Now that we're all caught up to speed Yeah.

Bail Ansari [00:03:58]:
I love Everyone gets it.

Bonnie Christine [00:04:00]:
Let's go to you, Liz.

Liz Olson [00:04:02]:
Yeah. So I'm also in the laser world. I'm Liz of Bella Collective. I sell laser SVG files on Etsy and then teach other laser owners how to sell their own files on Etsy as well.

Bonnie Christine [00:04:14]:
So I have had the absolute privilege of getting to know both of you, especially over the last few months because you have been a part of the Professional Creative Coaching Program. And so this I kind of wanna dig into how you two met. I think you met before the coaching program, I think, but I'm not sure. And then also through this, you have decided to do a collaboration, which we're we'll get to. But first, I would like to know, how did you find out about the Professional Creative Coaching Program, and what prompted you to join us?

Liz Olson [00:04:52]:
So, Bonnie, I took Immersion last year in 2023, and it was at a time that I you you know, the laser industry is so new. We don't really have anybody teaching business skills, and so I got to the point where I needed some advice. And I found you. And even though I had never heard of surface design before, all of your business advice was so transferable to my world. I I was just so excited. You were the perfect fit. It was exactly what I needed. So I've just been following along with all of your classes, your podcast, And then when you offered coaching last fall, it was just such a perfect next step for me.

Bail Ansari [00:05:28]:
It was that easy yes, for sure. And I think I think, I I had been following along with your professional creative podcast for a while. And as a busy business owner, I just really appreciated that you would give us, like, snippets of the important things that we needed to know as business owners instead of having to dive in and read an entire book. It was like you kind of, like, gave us the bullet points, and you could roll with it with that. So when you, talked about the the your coaching program, I was like, oh my god. There's just gonna be more of and it absolutely 100% is.

Bonnie Christine [00:06:05]:
Okay. I love that. So you each have courses individually, and then you came together to collaborate on your course launch. So, Liz, let's start with you. Can you tell us a little bit about your course and then what how did it kind of transpire to collaborate on a launch?

Liz Olson [00:06:25]:
Yeah. So my course is all about how to scale your SVG file stores. So it's taking laser file designers, teaching them how to run their business for the long haul. So it was actually, Immersion, Bonnie, that inspired us both to start thinking about courses. After taking Immersion, it was just like we had such a realization that there is nothing like this in our world. So could we be the people to offer both, like, the Illustrator design aspect, which is Bail, and then also the business, how to scale, how to grow, and sustain things over the long term. So it was really the combination of those two things and taking your course that got us thinking.

Bail Ansari [00:07:05]:
Yes. Both of our courses really complement each other. Like, I teach the beginner basics, you know, everything you need to learn about file design for lasers, and then Liz takes it up a notch and teaches you the next step. Because once you know how to design, you can actually create a business with it. So they really, really work together.

Bonnie Christine [00:07:23]:
So did you always know that you were building these courses in order to collaborate, or did you build them and then decide?

Liz Olson [00:07:31]:
I kind of I would say I always knew. It took a little while for Bail to get on board.

Bail Ansari [00:07:36]:
I'm still here. Yeah. I think that we had been talking about this for a while, Liz. And the like, every couple of months, we came up with a really cool idea and then sat on it. And then every couple of months, it came up again and sat on it. And this was like finally, we were like, okay. This is it. Let this this makes sense.

Bail Ansari [00:07:54]:
Let's do this one.

Liz Olson [00:07:55]:
Yeah. And it made sense because we really wanted to launch after an event to kinda capture on that momentum. So, Bail, you knew you were gonna be hosting a summit in March. So we had that coming up on our radar, and that's kinda what really got us the push to actually do this.

Bail Ansari [00:08:12]:
Yeah. So one of the big the big aspects of Just One More Project is I host annual summits, for laser owners, and we kinda bring together a whole bunch of users and makers and teach a variety of different things. And so after that event, we knew that it was probably a really good good time to launch it, and we did.

Bonnie Christine [00:08:35]:
So I think when I think about our listeners, one of the things that holds people back from collaborating is as soon as you have the idea, you think about all the, like, little details of actually launching together. How do you do it? What's the what's the back end look like and all of that. So can you walk us through what the planning process was, for the collaboration? And then, also, I would love to know, like, what popped up as a challenge for you along the way, and how did you kind of overcome them? Yeah.

Liz Olson [00:09:09]:
You know, I think something that works really well for us is Bail and I are very different people. And sometimes that can be, you know, rub people the wrong way, but for us, it works so well. So I love the planning. I love, like, let's take the next step. And I love that Bail is just all in. She will take suggestions and run with them. So we started off pretty early on with an Asana document that we just, you know, we put all of our ideas there, all of our to dos and tasks. And that really helped give us some clarity at the beginning for, okay, can we accomplish this on our timeline? Who do we need to hire? Where do we you know, how do we get help along the way? So it was really helpful for us to actually hire out a lot of work, you know, where our weaknesses overlapped or things that, you know, we both didn't enjoy doing.

Liz Olson [00:09:53]:
We cleared that out, and that was really a game changer for us.

Bonnie Christine [00:09:56]:
Give me an example of some things that you hired out. I love that.

Bail Ansari [00:10:01]:
Yes. Well, we both, as much as we nerd out on it, the tech and the setup and the systems, you know, the payment processors, all that kind of stuff that, like, we just didn't really wanna mess with. We hired out for that. We ended up hiring a support team, during the whole customer service and just making sure that, you know, the needs were met of our students.

Liz Olson [00:10:23]:
And we shared this routine too. Yeah.

Bail Ansari [00:10:25]:
We shared them. We, split their hours and just sort of that was a whole ordeal, but we sorted out. I think we'll definitely do things differently next time, I think, a little bit. And we kinda learned what worked and what didn't work. And yeah.

Bonnie Christine [00:10:38]:
So talk to me about some of those challenges that popped up, and how did you overcome them?

Liz Olson [00:10:44]:
So Bail was in the midst of running her summit. That was just such an incredibly busy time. So I think for us, what popped up were more like just the amount of tasks were too much for us to both handle at that time. So really, again, it was the hiring out piece. Bonnie, we heard you in the back of our brains in coaching, you emphasize this all the time, like delegate, hire out, so that you can work in your own zone of genius. Right? So, I think that really just the hiring piece. Whenever we would come up to something that we didn't know how to handle or what to do, we actually ended up hiring a launch coach as well, and that was hugely helpful to get us organized, and help us strategize, and see the bigger picture.

Bail Ansari [00:11:25]:
You know, as a business as a business owner, it is really hard to make decisions when you don't know if they're the right ones. And it's really helpful to be able to throw decisions around and decide, you know, is this good? Is this not good? It's it's just I mean, it's so good. So, yeah, we were able to make a couple of choices there that we wouldn't have made normally.

Bonnie Christine [00:11:48]:
Yeah. You know, this is such a simple concept, but one that I love so much. I recently read Who Not How, which is a book by Ben Hardy and, I believe, Dan Sullivan. And the concept, right, is like you don't have to figure out how to do everything. You just have to figure out who your who's who can do it for you. And that is a great way to look at it as well. I love that you, integrated that into everything. So one of the things that I think I immediately go to is the pricing strategy.

Bonnie Christine [00:12:21]:
So are your courses, were they already the same price? Are they different? Did you have to change? How did you kind of figure out the pricing of the individual courses? And then also, how did you collaborate? I think you did a bundle. So talk me through that part of the can we call it like a co-launch?

Liz Olson [00:12:40]:
Yeah. I like that.

Bonnie Christine [00:12:41]:
Talk to me about the collaunch.

Liz Olson [00:12:44]:
Yeah. You know? So we did not have our courses created at the time we decided to bundle them. So Love it. We, you know, we chat we got to chat with you, Bonnie, actually, during coaching, ask our questions. And one of the things you said was the price of your offer needs to correlate with how much contact people have with you. So that was always in our mind, you know, how many live calls do we want to have? How much can people interact with us? And that really informed the prices of our offers. So we landed together on the price of $497 for our individual courses, and we structured them exactly the same. So we had the same timeline, schedule, number of modules.

Bail Ansari [00:13:23]:
So So that on the same platform also?

Liz Olson [00:13:26]:
Yeah. So everything really lined up. And then when we combined them together, what we wanted was just a really easy yes for people. So our bundle price was $697, which was a really steep discount. But what we found was actually over 90% of our enrollees opted for the bundle. So it was just really surprising to us, honestly, but, was great. We loved that.

Bonnie Christine [00:13:50]:
Yeah. Like and it was such a no brainer, a no brainer offer for everyone. What I love about the 2 of you so much is that, theoretically, you're competitors. And, in practicality, you decided to complement each other instead. And that just leads to, like, community is so much more important than competition and what you are able to do together. So let's get to that. Tell me, what did you what were your initial expectations? This is the the first time you're doing this particular class. So what were your initial expectations, and then what were the results?

Bail Ansari [00:14:29]:
Well, I thought it was gonna be incredibly easy, but it was challenging. I think the results, though, we it it exceeded my expectations. We initially did not think we were gonna have such a huge turnout with the launch. It was the first time we'd ever done it together. The do you want me to go into some numbers? Would you like that?

Bonnie Christine [00:14:52]:
I would love. Like, did you have number in mind at the beginning? And what was that?

Liz Olson [00:14:58]:
It's my first time for everything. So I was hoping for let's get 30 to 50 students in here. Let's see if we could do that.

Bail Ansari [00:15:06]:
Yeah. And I was like, okay. We'll try. It was I was really skeptical on it because I hadn't even created the course. I was initially running my course as a self paced course, and it was it was not revamped as much as it is now. And so I wasn't I I was like, yeah. Okay. We'll see.

Bail Ansari [00:15:27]:
So how many students did you get? So the bundle, we had a 108 people purchase it. Wow. Individually, we had 26 people purchase mine, 21 people purchase Liz. And what is that? What was our total then?

Liz Olson [00:15:41]:
Mine is, like, 129. Yeah.

Bail Ansari [00:15:43]:
Yeah. It was a lot.

Bonnie Christine [00:15:46]:
Okay. So would you share the revenue numbers with us too?

Bail Ansari [00:15:51]:
Yes. I think we both walked away with about $45,000 from the launch.

Bonnie Christine [00:15:57]:
Incredible. It was more than double what you had thought, Liz. And I love how almost identical numbers for individual sales as well. And so $45,000, do you think that you did better because you co launched?

Liz Olson [00:16:14]:
Yeah. We've talked about this so much that we both really think that we just we pulled in way more numbers together than we ever could have alone. But then beyond that, it was just the fact that we had each other to lean on during the launch. Like, that is so valuable, and was able to, like, pull us through the whole way. So it just over that was the hugest highlight for me was, like, collaborating together brought us way further than we could have gone separately.

Bail Ansari [00:16:40]:
I can't say how many nights there were where I like, I would Marco Polo Liz and be, like, did you write this email? Did you put this in here? I did this too. Is this the same thing? Okay. Go. And it was, like, it was really nice to be able to, you know, go back and forth like that because we're both in it together.

Bonnie Christine [00:16:57]:
Because you don't live in the same town.

Bail Ansari [00:16:59]:
Oh, we haven't even met each other in person. Let's have we? No. We have not.

Liz Olson [00:17:02]:
Well, this is Bail, I just realized this is our 1 year anniversary this week of being friends. Yeah. Okay.

Bonnie Christine [00:17:09]:
You've never even met in person.

Bail Ansari [00:17:11]:
We're going to. This is the year we will.

Bonnie Christine [00:17:17]:
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Liz Olson [00:20:07]:
No. They all So Bail ran summits, and that has been really great for building her email list and audience. I am much smaller, so I think my email list size is about 3,000, and my Instagram following is about the same.

Bail Ansari [00:20:21]:
When you run summits, you grow your email list very quickly. So I think I'm at about 20,000, folks on the email list.

Bonnie Christine [00:20:29]:
Did you try to wait? Like, who were these people coming from, or you just said we're splitting it because it's both courses?

Bail Ansari [00:20:38]:
In on the back end, we did set up the tech to just be able to track it. It wasn't as it wasn't a big deal to us to know where they were coming from because we knew we were sending it to the same people. So but we did track it, and it wasn't it it was cool to know the numbers, but it was what it what it was.

Liz Olson [00:20:57]:
We set it up to be a 50% affiliate system. So anytime someone purchased from Bail, the bundle, I would get 50% of that same thing for me. So Bail did draw in more customers, but we just kind of decided that the front ends, like, we know we are marketing the same people. We're just gonna split it. And I feel good about it, Bail.

Bail Ansari [00:21:16]:
Yeah. I feel good about it too. And I know that, like, initially, whatever our opt ins are and things, they're ultimately leading to the same bundle offer down the road. So it really doesn't matter to us too much.

Bonnie Christine [00:21:29]:
Okay. Alright. So you walk away with 45 grand. Tell me, what did you do? Like, was this the biggest launch chunk chunk of income that you had? And then yeah. Like, how do you even process that? What do you do the night of? Like, you celebrate

Bail Ansari [00:21:46]:
What did we do? I think we were so exhausted. Like, Bonnie, we were exhausted. And I think that after the course ended, we were both we both spent an entire day of, like, exhaustion. We were like, don't talk to me. Goodbye. And it was and we could tell, like, it was we were both exhausted, but it was we were exhausted together. It was really nice. It was

Liz Olson [00:22:10]:
still the camaraderie piece.

Bail Ansari [00:22:12]:
Yes. It was it was good. And it was like, okay, I'll talk to you tomorrow when you're in a good mood. Alright. Great. You know? It it was nice. But I definitely think that with the launch, it definitely for me personally, it definitely changed my mindset in how I run my business because I I I'm a social worker. I graduated with a social work degree.

Bail Ansari [00:22:33]:
I worked as a social worker. And when I had kids, I kind of decided to take a short break and stay home with the kids and kinda wait until they're a little bit older. So that's when this business kinda came about. And as the business came about, it was always a temporary thing in my mind. It was always a, this is on the side. And I think this was the first time for me that I was like, well, this isn't really temporary. I don't think I'm gonna go back to work. And so I think that was this is probably the first time that I've really, really taken that seriously, I think, and kinda set up my business the right way.

Bail Ansari [00:23:10]:
So that's what's happening now.

Liz Olson [00:23:12]:
Yeah. And I think similarly for me, it just really helped me feel grounded, I guess, in my business and able to look forward and plan ahead knowing that, okay, we're gonna do this again. Education is something that I really enjoy. I had never done it before, so I needed to go through to know this is the direction I want to head. And it just gives me so much freedom, I guess, for my future business decisions to know that that's a huge chunk of income that I can kind of rely on for future launches, and just opens up so much potential for me.

Bonnie Christine [00:23:48]:
I wanna know what it made possible for you. Like, you get this kind of surprising amount. And do you put some back in the business? Do you pay off debt? Do you spend it? Like, what what does it what does it change, and how does it feel?

Liz Olson [00:24:05]:
You know, the first thing I did was to hire somebody to look over my course material. So I wanted to invest back in my business and make it even better make the course even better for the next time I launch. So that was my first thing. And then I got to pay off some debt that I've been wanting to pay off for a long time. So it just felt so good to be able to do that and also invest back into my business. Amazing. Loved it.

Bail Ansari [00:24:30]:
For my family, my husband's always been the sole earner, right, for since we've had kids. And this was the first time where he was like, okay. Well, we gotta take her a little seriously. And so it was like, hey. I gotta work today. You guys have to take the day off. She's sick. You know? And it's like, okay.

Bail Ansari [00:24:49]:
Like, it it's it's actually it's actually nice. It's it's good.

Bonnie Christine [00:24:54]:
Huge. Okay. So, Bail, how old are your children?

Bail Ansari [00:24:59]:
I have a 6 year old and a 10 year old. And I quit my job when my 10 year old was 2 and never went back.

Bonnie Christine [00:25:08]:
You have children. Is that right, Liz?

Liz Olson [00:25:11]:
No. I'm single. No kids. It's just me.

Bonnie Christine [00:25:13]:
Okay. Alright. So tell me, what, if any, role did the coaching program play in this? I know we got to talk at one point about, like, right in the middle of all of it. But I'd love to know, was it helpful? What did you get from the coaching program during all of this?

Bail Ansari [00:25:34]:
Oh my gosh. I can say so many things. Shall I say them? Yes. You shall. Yeah. Okay. I will like I would like I mentioned earlier, the snippets of information of, you know, Bonnie, you're a big reader, and I am not. I am an a a audio book person.

Bail Ansari [00:25:52]:
And so for me to know that this is what she recommends, here's the big picture. Like, you gave us so many things like that of, here's the concept. If you wanna learn more, here's your resources. And it really, really helped me take, you know, things for how to launch something, how to work with a team, how to be a good leader. All the things that I've never really learned about, You just gave us in bite sized chunks, and if I wanted to know more about it, I knew exactly where to do it. So, I know that there was a point where you had talked about the, the launch book by Jeff Walker. And Liz and I both got it at the same time, I think, and we were highlighting the parts in there that we were like, okay. Is this did you do this part? Did you do this part? And it was just it like, you gave us the the framework of what it was, and then we just rolled with it.

Bail Ansari [00:26:45]:
So had we not been in the coaching program, I wouldn't have known where to start. I wouldn't have known where to look. I mean, it was just so helpful for us.

Liz Olson [00:26:55]:
Yeah. And I think there's a couple things that come to mind, but one is just access to you, Bonnie. Like, I felt like we we would come up with questions, Bail and I, each week, and we'd be like, okay. Let's just ask Bonnie. So we we got to talk to you so many times and bring our questions and get really good advice and good answers. So that was huge. I think also so our accountability pods, just were so great for making connections. So, you know, our launch coach comes from my accountability pod, the relationships that were there.

Liz Olson [00:27:26]:
It's Colleen Underwood. So Yes. It's Colleen. Of course it is. Yeah. And then also just your transparency with walking through all of your launches and what you would do differently and how it went, that was so valuable for us to be able to model after. It it was just huge.

Bail Ansari [00:27:44]:
Yeah. And the honesty of, like, you know, you sharing parts of your business that, you know, not many people share, it's just refreshing, because you can see really the nitty gritty things that no one really thinks about, no one really thinks about to share or talk about. I mean, it's just so helpful for people who are, like, right in it. And I mean, just so helpful for people who are like right in it. And one of the things that I really, really appreciated though was that it was not a beginner level, like, coaching program. It was like someone who has already done the beginner basic kind of stuff and is at a point that really needs to move forward. And, like, I was at a point where I was, like, in the middle, and I was stuck, and I didn't know what steps I needed to take to move forward. I, you know, I was kinda lingering in the spot of my business, and there was just so many things in there that pushed me forward to take it to that next level, and that was what I needed. Yeah.

Bonnie Christine [00:28:39]:
Well, I just think the 2 of you, like, are just such the perfect fit. It's like, let me just see you soar, see you take off, and to see you take off together. And this, you know, capacity was so fun as well. So I'm imagining someone listening who feels like, oh my goodness, I could co-launch with this person or or this type of product. So if someone was interested, what advice would you give someone else who is considering collaborating on a launch?

Bail Ansari [00:29:11]:
We talked about this. Just make sure that your your audience aligns well together. Your offers align well together. In our case, it was just an easy yes. It was like, here's the first part you learn, and here's the second part you learn. And it just really meshed well together. One of the things that I enjoyed doing was, showcasing our friendship a little bit more. It helped our audience, build trust, like, knowing that we worked so well together and we were we were both kind of had the same goal in mind.

Bail Ansari [00:29:46]:
Obviously, like you even mentioned, we we are, like, basically competitors. You know, we both sell files to the same audience. And, yeah. But just knowing that we're willing to collaborate together and have a similar goal, I think that builds trust... what was the other one we said? Oh, the nerdy one. Project management tool. Like, make sure you set it all up so that you guys do it correctly.

Bonnie Christine [00:30:11]:
And you use Asana. Is that right?

Bail Ansari [00:30:14]:
Yeah. Like, we use Asana, but there's so many. There's like Trello, Notion, all of the ones. And just setting up the task for each other makes it where you can hold each other accountable. You know, I'll be like, Liz, you gotta work on the graphics for this while I work on this. Well, it was mostly it was I think it was the opposite. It was Liz always worked on that that that copy, and I worked on the graphic. But it was I I think it was just setting up those tasks, knowing what they were, and knowing that each of us had those specific things that was out written down, you can yeah.

Bail Ansari [00:30:45]:
It was like no questions. Just boom.

Liz Olson [00:30:47]:
Yeah. And for me, it's something, Bonnie, you say all the time, clear is kind. And so I would say start off your collaboration with getting all the details on the table. So we discuss payments right away, we discuss, you know, splitting up tasks. So come up with your systems for how you're gonna divide those things or write them down so that you can refer back to them. But as much clarity as you can have in the beginning, I think it's only gonna be helpful. And then another thing that was great for us was we chose to focus on marketing the bundle as the highest value. So we had the most bonuses.

Liz Olson [00:31:22]:
We had, you know, we were directing everybody to purchase the bundle by highlighting like, I would say things like, this is what I love about Bail's course, and she would say the same things about mine so that we were trying to get the bundle to be the highest offer that was bought. And it worked.

Bonnie Christine [00:31:38]:
Yeah. So what advice would you give someone when it comes to, like, finding the collab the other person to collaborate? I would love to hear how you 2 met, and if someone was ready to kind of make that connection or pitch the idea, right, what advice would you give?

Liz Olson [00:31:59]:
I think first and foremost, you need to put yourself in a room with people who are headed the same direction as you are. So that's what coaching did for us. You know, we are both in your coaching program. We met beforehand, but for us to both be learning the same things together was so, so helpful. So

Bail Ansari [00:32:16]:
put yourself on the same level, basically, of where we were at, like Right. Everywhere. Yeah.

Liz Olson [00:32:22]:
Yeah. So that's first and foremost. Get yourself in the room with other people who are doing the same things. Yeah.

Bail Ansari [00:32:28]:
You know, as it's always been like a temporary thing in my mind, I've never really invested in my business very much, and I think this was one of the big investments of my business was I'm gonna invest in coaching. I think this is kind of important, you know. And so I've now I'm like a firm believer. If you invest in yourself, it's gonna it's it's gonna be good. You know? And so now every time, I've definitely seen returns and all the things I'm investing in in myself, which is what it's it's just so important. There's so much growth.

Bonnie Christine [00:32:58]:
It's a lesson that I learned, right, over the years as well. And so I especially as I am moving into the coaching space, I always wanna make sure that I'm sandwiched in in the coaching relationship. Right? So I'm also getting coached from multiple places as well. And then it I think it just is so important to do both be coached and coach. And you 2 are also, you know, coaching your students as well. And it's it's really beautiful. My friends, well, this is amazing. I'd love for you to both so to be clear.

Bonnie Christine [00:33:34]:
Right? You're not business partners. You're running your own completely separate businesses, and you came together just to do a single co-launch, which I think is just so incredible. So I wanna give you both a chance to say a little bit more about where people can find you. And then ahead of that, I'll just go ahead and let everybody know that we'll link Bail and Liz up over on the show notes at professionalcreative.com. If you wanna go dive into their worlds, Bail, why don't you start?

Bail Ansari [00:34:02]:
Yes. I can be found, at justonemoreproject.com. I am usually on Instagram @justonemoreproject. Yeah. You can find all of my offers there, digital files for lasers, courses for laser owners, a membership for laser owners. Just all kinds of fun stuff on there. So you can find me there.

Bonnie Christine [00:34:23]:
Perfect. And what about you, Liz?

Liz Olson [00:34:25]:
You can find me at bellacollective.com, and my course is all about how to scale your SVG file store on Etsy. And I also have a free class on my website for how surface designers can start just really easily translating their designs for SVG files. So I just I would love to, you know, bring this collaboration piece into the laser world more. So if you're interested in if you have a creative business and would love to collaborate with us, with laser owners, we have put together a little resource too that we'll have linked where you can, you know, learn how you can collaborate better with people like us.

Bonnie Christine [00:35:02]:
Yeah. I love that. Say a little bit more about that because we wanna link that up for everybody as well.

Liz Olson [00:35:07]:
Yeah. So we have put together a resource for, you know, 3 different ways that you could collaborate with laser owners. So that is, you know, through licensing, through small batch manufacturing. There's just a lot of different ways a creative business could utilize people like us, like laser owners. And then we've also put together our top ten tips for collaborating on a course. So if you're interested in learning more about, you know, how we would recommend going about doing that, we'll have that resource linked down in the show notes for you.

Bonnie Christine [00:35:38]:
Amazing. Thank you so much. I can't wait to see what you do next.

Bail Ansari [00:35:42]:
Thank you, Bonnie. Thanks for having us.

Bonnie Christine [00:35:46]:
So I hope that you found that conversation with Bail and Liz as inspiring as I did. I think that it truly shows what happens when creativity meets collaboration. And such a great example of how collaboration and community is so much more important than competition. Together, we can just do so much more than we could ever do alone. Now we also talked about PCBC, my coaching program called the Professional Creative Business Coaching Program. And I'm so excited that we have opened it to the public for the very first time. So before this, it was by invitation only, and we're opening it now to you. And so if you want to find out more about this program, you can visit bonniechristine.com/coach.

Bonnie Christine [00:36:37]:
I would love to have you consider joining us. It's where I really get to pour into creative entrepreneurs, and I would love it if you were there. My friends, create the beauty that you want to see come alive in the world. And remember, there's room for you.