Melanie Duncan – From One Embroidery Machine to Online Empire
Serial entrepreneuress, and Pinterest marketing expert – Melanie Duncan
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I have a girl crush on Melanie! We met at Ryan Lee’s conference back in October and I heard someone say that her and her husband were like business royalty. They seem to have it all! Which is also why I was so excited to have her on the show and have her talk about how it was before. The hours, the crazy work she did. She earned her success. When Melanie was growing up she never thought she would be an entrepreneur. Listen in to hear her amazing journey of online success. She gives MASSIVE value and advice for your online business. Learn her process for testing new products and the market, and how she bootstrapped her businesses without a ton of cash.
- The steps Melanie used to start each of her businesses
- The most common mistake (and Melanie’s advice to crush it!)
- Why confidence plays such a big role
- How she dealt with having a seasonal selling business
- The secret to getting on television that is easier than you think!! (how the Martha Stewart Show and Oprah contacted her!)
- Custom Greek Threads
This is in interview you will want to listen to twice!
Go to MelanieDuncan.com for more info!
Thanks so much for listening!
Transcript:
Tags: Beta Testing, business empire, business success, Idea Validation, Melanie Duncan, millionaire interview, online empire, Service Business, Service Industry
Categories: All, Business, Business Model, Entrepreneurship, Marketing, Millionaire Interviews, Relationships
27 responses
Great Interview Jaime and Melanie.
Thanks Peter! 🙂
Very solid, helpful info packed in here…awesome work ladies!
The key(and timeless) takeaway here is her application of the Lean Process w/ new products or exploring new channels(even though she did not call it that but what she’s doing is Lean…). Lean is a fundamental process(and mindset) for the development of a new product or service by minimizing one’s risk of the new product idea by incorporating ongoing feedback from your customers or prospects.
I’ve been using “Lean” inside my business in 2012 – and it works and Melanie has been doing it intuitively, making her accomplishments even more impressive.
Info on LEAN process you can find here:
http://startit.rs/wp-content/uploads/LeanCanvas.pdf
Fascinating point that Melanie makes about her belief that she feels women should be more successful online than men for the reasons that she laid out at the 34 minute mark. Never heard that before. Not only insightful and interesting but it makes a lot of solid, good sense for women to take hold of who are interesting in doing business online.
Yes Bruce! And thank you. I have the Lean startup sitting on my bedside actually.
I’ve been recognizing that most of my interviews have a similar approach to starting a business and that it’s very similar to lean! 🙂 Thanks for recognizing it.
Having visionary people around you to change your thinking is so important and I am glad that Melanie touched on that! (And why I love to have connected with you Jaime!) 🙂
Congrats on your Guy Kawasaki interview Rivka! You’ll have to tell me how you did it! (I’m writing a speech on getting successful people to say yes to interviews, and I’d love another example!)
I hope to be one of these Millionaires you interview one day! Awesome website.
Hi Jaime!
It’s so cool that you brought up the question of why you don’t have many women millionaires on the show. I thought the same thing about this show and Mixergy. I’m still trying to figure out why there’s not enough women millionaires, but agree that the ones I’ve met so far are analytical. I’m also very analytical, but do we really think that’s the main problem?
I have to believe that even right-brained creative women can still be millionaires or is that they don’t have the same goals? I really want to solve this one and can’t put my finger on what’s going on, but the numbers don’t lie.
I have an interview show starting in January and the first episode is with Moira Forbes, Forbes Woman. She’s interviewed over 200 successful women and haven’t seen that the challenges among men and women are all that different. So far, I wonder if it’s just fear holding women back or lack of a network.
My next interview is with MSNBC Host of Your Business…JJ Ramberg. I was inspired by this episode to discuss that with her, so I completely changed all of my questions to get her thoughts on how to solve this issue. She’s done over 1000 interviews in her 7 years of hosting the show, so I’m sure she would have some insight on this issue as well.
Keep up the good work. Just wanted to chime in since I listen to all of your shows each week, but never stop by.
Thanks for finally commenting Dee! And it sounds like you have an awesome line up!!
You’ll have to let me know what you find out. I’m really interested in it too. I don’t think successful business woman HAVE to be analytical to be successful, but I would love to see a study on it 🙂
This interview was awesome! I don’t think I had noticed the “lack” of women interviews, but I realized how much I absolutely love the energy I felt while watching this one. Like Melanie said…there’s just something about women and community online.
Lots of great insight! Definitely have to listen again!!!
I love that you could feel the energy too 🙂 And I rarely re-listen to any interviews but I think I’ll have to on this one too!
Thank you for doing this interview. Melanie, her relationship and her story are incredibly inspiring. She is such a great role model for young women.
She is ridiculously inspiring. (And one of the reasons I do this is because I have a 3 year old daughter. I want her to have all the tools she needs when she grows up!)
I have an awesome idea, but I would like to get some feedback on it before I proceed.
Sounds exactly like the process we talked about. Outline what information you need to know ahead of time, then find the right people to give you feedback. (would-be customers!) Don’t delay though, do it soon! 🙂
I loved this interview! So motivating! Thank you! I bought Melanie’s Pinterest training. She’s awesome!
Thanks Melanie for taking the time to teach us something and thanks Jaime for another great interview! I downloaded the video episode so I could share it with my secretary because I know she’ll be inspired by this story.
Hi Jaime,
Thanks for an amazing interview. It’s the first one I’ve watched and I can’t wait to get to the rest! Melanie is super sharp and her advice on starting lean/bootstrapping is spot-on. I’ve always taken that approach, especially now that I’m starting my own business, but it never hurts to be reminded!
That was an excellent interview. She was right on the money with everything from blogging to building your business slowly. She is definitely now one of my heroes.
This was a great interview. Melanie was truly inspiring.I used to wonder why some people who wanted to start online needed huge amounts of funding. If you run an e-commerce store, start small with drop shipping. Test the market and then scale up down the road. Melanie’s advice is spot-on.
By the way, on the comment by you about finding it hard to get women entrepreneurs, you could try to interview Jo Barnes of SOCIAL NETWORKING ACADEMY.I’m a member and she is my go to person for all things social media.
Once again,thanks
Yo! Jaime, maybe I am biased but I am saying Melanie D.’s EM interview is among the best so far. It was very energetic, not motivational but inspiring. I love her spirit, her tips on guest blogging and her view ‘PASSION plus (Analytic)PURPOSE = Business’ … Beyond cool stuffs!
Serious lover of your blog, a considerable number of your blog posts have really helped me out. Looking towards updates!
Melanie is insightful, inspiring and pragmatic. Great interview.
I just came across this interview and learned a lot. Melanie is very inspiring and clear about her approach.
I like your interviewing style. You take issues and question and explore and dissect the answers. You don’t take the obvious for granted. I just joined your blog and am looking forward to listening to more of your interviews. Thanks!
I am in the process of finding would-be customers to give me some feedback on my product. These people are not within my circle and it is hard to find them. I also need to create a story around the product and find this daunting. Can you direct me to sources that may give me some ideas and help in this area. I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you!
Fantastic Interview! I am going to have to watch/listen about 4 more times to extract all the great info! Thank You!
I loved listening to Melanie’s business story. She is my business mentor!
I loved this interview! So motivating! Thank you!