Podcast appearances and mentions of tony ferraiolo

Nurturing Healing Love for LGBTQ+ Guest Tony Ferraiolo This episode features Tony Ferraiolo who inspires people to live the life they always imagined. He is a motivating and thought provoking trainer, speaker, and advocate for  transgender youth across the country and world. His story is featured in a documentary called A Self-Made Man about his own personal story of finding his true self. To know Tony is to love Tony. He truly lives his life in what we call compassion in action - identifying with other's pain and then helping to ease that pain. I have many friends with kids that are struggling with their identities and I know you have been there for them. Thank you. Learn more About Scarlett here: https://chooselovemovement.org/

KC and Jamil talk about the power of using friendship to fuel activism. They are joined by Tony Ferraiolo and Dru Levasseur, who share the story of their friendship, which allowed their co-founding of the Jim Collins Foundation and has supported them through struggles with burn out so many of us face. Tony and Dru's dedication to uplifting the trans community will inspire anyone to create light even in the darkest places. Dru is currently the director of DEI for the National LGBTQ+ Bar, and previously directed Lambda Legal's Transgender Rights Project for ten years. He has served as counsel in landmark impact litigation cases and amicus briefs in federal courts, including the Supreme Court, and is a national and international spokesperson who has appeared in dozens of media outlets. Tony is the Director of Health Care Advocates International's Youth and Family Program, a long-time life coach, trainer, speaker, and facilitator of youth and family support groups. Tony is the subject of the award-winning documentary “A Self-Made Man” and the author of the book series Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth.

This episode features Tony Ferraiolo who inspires people to live the life they always imagined. He is a motivating and thought provoking trainer, speaker, and advocate for transgender youth across the country and world. His story is featured in a documentary called A Self-Made Man about his own personal story of finding his true self. To know Tony is to love Tony. He truly lives his life in what we call compassion in action - identifying with other's pain and then helping to ease that pain. I have many friends with kids that are struggling with their identities and I know you have been there for them. Thank you. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/jesse-lewis-choose-love-m/message

On today’s episode I speak to Tony Ferraiolo, author of Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth, volumes 1 and 2. Tony has dedicated himself to both promoting competent and respectful health care for the transgender community, by educating providers, and advocating on behalf of patients. He also trains educators on providing a safe and respectful space for transgender children in a school environment. In this episode we discuss: Stay in the moment. Mindfulness is a powerful tool.  Write a sentence a day, that’s how you start. Don’t worry about what anyone else thinks, just write for yourself. They are your words, and they matter.  You’re not in this alone, get a support system around you. It can be a mental health provider, a writing partner, or even a Zoom writing friend.  Enjoy the episode!

Lance talks with Tony Ferraiolo, Producer of the documentary 'Bench' about the career of Hall-of-Fame Reds catcher. Also, do you trust the what the Reds are doing? what are your expectations for them in 2019. Plus, the Bengals could be in a rough spot with Andy Dalton but that could be determined by what another AFC team does. And hear what Mick Cronin plans on doing with Jarron Cumberland, if he returns next season.

Host Melissa Loucks fills listeners in on the latest LGBT news around the country.

Jenn T. Grace – Episode 93 – How Are Your New Year’s Resolutions Holding Up As We Enter the 4th Quarter?     Jenn T Grace:              You are listening to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast, episode 93.   Introduction:              Welcome to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast; the podcast dedicated to helping LGBTQ professionals and business owners grow their business and careers through the power of leveraging their LGBTQ identities in their personal brand. You'll learn how to market your products and services both broadly, and within the LGBTQ community. You'll hear from incredible guests who are leveraging the power of their identity for good, as well as those who haven't yet started, and everyone in between. And now your host. She teaches straight people how to market to gay people, and gay people how to market themselves. Your professional lesbian, Jenn - with two N's - T Grace.   Jenn T Grace:              Well hello and welcome to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast. I am your host, Jenn Grace, and today we are in episode 93, and it is the middle of September of 2016. So I have a whole host of podcasts that I am about to record for you. So for the last I would say probably five, six, maybe even seven episodes I have had those kind of ready to roll for a while, and now I'm in the middle of batch recording a whole bunch of new awesome guests for you as well. However that is just about to begin as we're in the middle of September, so what I would like to do for you today is replay an episode from earlier this year which is episode number 75, and my intent here is to just give you an update on some of the things discussed in 75, then you can listen to episode 75 itself, and when you come back for a new podcast episode number 94, it will be a brand new interview. So I've really been trying to focus all of 2016 on bringing you amazing interviews with just really awesome people, and I want to continue that trend. So for the remainder of 2016 I really want to be bringing you interview after interview after interview of just really amazing people, and I have a whole awesome line-up of people to do just that for you.                                     So quickly in episode 75, which I believe was the first episode of 2016, I was talking about New Year's resolutions and essentially what things that I was up to, and I recently saw an article that said that people in September start to re-visit their New Year's resolutions essentially because now that the summer has long come and passed, people are going back to school, people are getting back into their work routine, that now's the time that people are starting to think about where they are in relation to accomplishing their New Year's resolutions or not. So for me, I had talked about three specific resolutions, two of which I thought were going to be fairly low-key if you will and not too difficult to achieve, and in reality I found out that it's a little bit harder than I thought. And then the third one just was difficult to begin with, and I'm actually still sticking to it quite well.                                     So the first one that I had mentioned publicly in January that my plan was, was to only have one cup of coffee per day for the entirety of 2016. I can tell you that I'm still doing pretty good on that, I was only having two cups a day so it was not a major crisis, and actually I'm trying to do half decaf now because I recognize that caffeine is a drug even though it's a common drug that we all use, and I'm just trying to be mindful of my health and all that fun stuff. But I'm doing pretty good. So the status update on that one is that I'm doing pretty good, I'm sure there's been a day or two here or there that I've had more than a cup but generally speaking I'm totally on track with that.                                     The second one that I talked about was not drinking in 2016, and I thought I was going to be a little bit better at this than I was. So I last had a beer on New Year's Eve, and I still haven't had any beer since, and we are in the middle of September. However I did fall off the wagon if you will in the middle of July. I fell off the wagon- and mind you when I say 'fell off the wagon' it's not like I started binge drinking because that's not the case, but I did start drinking gin and tonic again in July. So I did make it seven months before having a drink of any kind. So prior to that, from January through July, I did not have a single drink and I was really proud of myself on that, until one day my wife said to me, "Why are you doing this to yourself? It's not like you have a drinking problem, it's not like you needed to do this, I don't know why you continue to torture yourself over whether or not you should have a drink," and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And it hit me that she was so right. So thinking about it I'm like, 'She's right, why am I doing this to myself? Do I have a reason for not doing this one activity that wasn't a problem to begin with?' So I decided what the hell, it's really not a big issue, I'm just going to go back to my norm which is having like maybe a drink or two at most in a given week. So again it's not a real issue.                                     But anyway, I did want to share that with you that I indeed broke my own resolution. So not everyone is perfect, and despite your best intentions sometimes your resolutions aren't really aligned well and they're not really helpful, and I think that goes for business as well. Sometimes we make goals that aren't in our best interest, and we stick to them out of ego and not necessarily because of any other reason. So I think this was one of those things that I had this resolution based on ego, based on just being able to say that I have done it, and in reality it was kind of stupid to do to being with. So I just threw that one aside.                                     Anyway the third one that I wanted to mention to you is that I declared publicly in January that I would be training for a full marathon, and that full marathon is on January 8th of 2017. So I am about four months away from running a full 26.2 miles, and that training is still going really, really well. At the time of this recording which is just a few days before the 15th- actually you'll be listening to this on September 15th which is Thursday, I just finished another half marathon on Sunday, and obviously I haven't run it yet so I don't know what my time is but I'm hoping it's better than the last one I did.                                     So I wanted to just kind of share that with you, especially for people who've been listening to this podcast for a really long time now, because I remember specifically when I decided I was going to start running, and that was August of 2013, on a whim I just decided randomly that I was going to start running, and I really was talking a lot about that journey, and that process, and how related it is to business, and kind of entrepreneurship, and all that stuff when I started doing that. So all of those old podcast episodes definitely have snippets of me kind of talking about the progress, and what I'm up to, and I still have people asking me about it. I was just at a conference a few weeks ago and I had people asking me like what the status of my running was. So I appreciate that you do pay attention to those things, and it is of continued interest to you. So as long as you are still interested, I will keep sharing.                                     So now you'll listen to the previous episode and hear me rambling on and on about all my reasons why I decided to put these two- these three resolutions in place, and now you at least hear the reality of what actually happened for them.                                     So one other thing I want to mention before I just hop into episode 75, is that I am still going gangbusters on helping people write their books in 2016 and beyond. So a lot of what's talked about in 75 is around the benefits of writing a book, what it can do for your brand, how it can help build your business, why today is the best day to just kind of start and get it done. So I wanted to just kind of share that with you because as of right now on September 15th I have helped twelve more people since January. So when I first recorded this in January I had already worked with a bunch of people previously, but as of this time now nine months into the year, I've helped twelve new people with their books. One person has already published hers, and that is Lindsay Felderman, and her book is referenced in the interview I did with her in episode number 87. Her book is titled 'Walking through Walls: Finding the Courage to be Your True Self.' So in episode 87 I kind of interview her on what it was like to put her book together, and really it was actually a really fun episode to produce.                                     And then I have another author who is about to publish her book in the beginning of October, so she will be one of the interviews that is to come in probably October or maybe even November, we will be hearing from her specifically on her experience with publishing a book, and what that's doing for her personal brand and all that great stuff.                                     So I'm really happy that I have helped twelve new people in the last nine months get their stories out into the world, at least get them started on the path of helping them write their books. So I bring this up because on October 3rd, that is when I am launching the third session of this year of the Purpose Driven Author's Academy. You've certainly heard me talk about it on the show, on previous shows, in my social media, if you're on my mailing list you've certainly seen it there too. So the Purpose Driven Author's Academy is really my online program that walks you through the entirety of getting your book concept narrowed down, to writing the book, to publishing it, to marketing it. So the whole gamut. It's a fourteen week program and the next session starts on October 3rd. So this will be the third one that I have done in 2016. All people who've participated in it are doing amazing, kicking some ass, it's really awesome. So if you're interested in that you can certainly go to www.PurposeDrivenAuthors.com, www.PurposeDrivenAuthor.com, or you can just go to www.JennTGrace.com and there's a button right on the homepage that will bring you to information about the program itself.                                     So that is all I wanted to share with you in today's episode, so if any of this is interesting, please feel free to reach out to me via email, Facebook, any social media, you name it I am there, and I am here to serve you. So please enjoy this repeat of episode number 75, and I will see you in a brand new episode in number 94 at the end of the month. Thank you so much and I'll talk to you soon.   Well hello and welcome to the New Year. I am looking forward to a great 2016, and I hope you are too. Now that we're in the new year, you're probably thinking of all the new year resolutions you could be focused on, or should be focused on, and today I want to share with you a couple of the resolutions that I'm working on, but actually how that's going to parlay into my new business focus for 2016, and basically how the podcast ducktails into that focus in 2016. So for my loyal listeners, what I'm going to be doing in 2016 is slightly different than previously in the last four years that I've been doing this podcast, but it really still kind of falls in line with much of what I've been doing.                                     But what I want to start with today is talking to you about a couple of the resolutions that I have for 2016, and none of them are too far of a stretch if you will from what I'm already doing. So I'm feeling pretty confident that I'll have a fairly high success rate. But what I've noticed is that unfortunately a lot of people create these monster resolutions; like just completely out of any realm of possibility, and when you do that, you're creating this wildly unattainable goal, and you're likely not going to hit it, and that's not what I want to share with you. What I want to be sharing with you are ways in which you can attain your goal. And I've noticed that people create these really unattainable goals for just a couple of different reasons. Most of the time it's because they aren't in the right frame of mind to achieve them, so when they create this goal it's not even something that they can really achieve, and sometimes this is done intentionally and sometimes not. And then a lot of times it's because people don't really have the right skillsets to pull it off, and they're not really committed to developing those skillsets to pull it off. So this is absolutely going to kind of fall into place with what I am going to be doing in 2016, and what I'm going to share with you.                                     But to start, here are just a couple of my non-business New Year resolutions if you will.                                     So for example, one of them is to drink only one cup of coffee a day versus two. Like I said, I'm not stretching too much with most of mine, and I'm only going to share three of them because the third one is going to be what really kind of plays into what I'm up to. But going down from one cup of coffee- I mean from two cups of coffee to one isn't much of a stretch, although I say this now and I'm not really sure how the caffeine withdrawals will go down. But as of right now it doesn't seem like it's that much of a stretch. I've already had my one cup of the day and I'm on to green tea, so I'm feeling confident that for the last four days- because today is January 4th as I'm recording this, I've been able to achieve that goal. So fingers crossed, goal number one, resolution number one should be attainable.                                     Now resolution number two on the other hand is to not have- this is going to sound crazy- not have a single drop of alcohol in 2016. And I've been hemming and hawing over whether or not I wanted to do this resolution for a couple of weeks thinking it's really not that difficult for me to not drink, because I'm not a heavy drinker in any way, so I might have a drink, maybe two, three at most in any given week, and I know people who drink that on a daily basis. So to me, it's not really- I don't think it's that difficult to not have any, however I don't know that for certain. So I've been thinking and hemming and hawing saying, "Is this really worth having a resolution over because what am I going to gain from this?" It's not like drinking is a problem in my life that I need to tackle or handle, but at the same time I'm really focused on my health and I know that extra sugar from alcohol is really not helping me, so why am I going to take in additional calories over something that I'm not even really enjoying so to speak? So that is another goal. And again, it's pretty much for purely health reasons, not because I have a problem that I'm trying to curb or anything like that, but really I just want to keep continuing on the path of getting healthier as I go. And 2015 I did I think a really good job continuing my health, et cetera, that I had previously been doing since back in 2012, 2013. So I'm still on a really good path in terms of my health.                                     Now this is where the third resolution comes in, and it's much more of a beast, and I have not publicly shared this information with anyone yet, so you my loyal listener are the first one to hear it other than my poor wife who deals with my random ramblings, and then a couple of close friends. But 2016 is going to be the year that I actually train for a full marathon. And now for you who may have been listening since the early beginnings of this podcast, you may recall that I started running mid-way through the first year of this podcast. And I was scared out of my mind, I had no idea what I was doing. I willingly shared all of my fears, and my trepidations with 'should I be doing this? Should I not be doing this?' And the reason I started running, and the same reason why I'm going to try not to drink in 2016, is for health reasons. So I had lost a lot of weight in 2012 and 2013, and it was about fifty pounds, and I just wanted to make sure that I could keep the weight off, and I've had no trouble doing that since 2012. So I feel fortunate that I'm going on a fourth and into a fifth year of keeping weight loss off, but a lot of it has to do with running because it's just a great activity, it's a solo activity or you can make it a group activity if you choose to. But I prefer to run solo because it gives me time to think about what I need to be doing, how to prioritize my business, and I think the best thing is that you're only competing against yourself, you're not worried about other people's time. So it's really kind of a solo 'let me try to see how good I can be and not compare myself to other people,' which I find to be really kind of peaceful in a lot of ways; and I am a very, very competitive person, as is my wife so it's a good thing she doesn't run because she would be the one person on this earth that I would be trying to compete against. So fortunately for me she does not. So anyway- a little tangent.                                     So tying this into the business, and tying this into today's episode, I wanted to share with you a little bit about this third resolution on my list, and it's not to run the marathon this year, which is 26.2 miles for those of you not familiar with marathon distance. But it's how I'm going about breaking down this really BHAG- as people call it in the business world, the Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal. That big monster of a goal, how I'm breaking it down to come up with a very clear plan that is attainable for me to achieve this goal. And now I won't be doing this until this time- almost exactly this time in 2017. So the race itself is on January 8th of 2017, and this is being released on January 7th. So I had to break down this goal into a variety of bite-sized chunks, and it really just started with picking a couple of races that I wanted to run this year which were half marathons; so that's 13.1 miles. And I ran two half marathons last year, and I'm planning on doing two more this year. So going back to the whole resolutions being attainable, running two this year should be no problem whatsoever, because I did two already last year. But what I'm trying to do is increase my speed just a little bit. So I'm not trying to go nuts, and I'm not going completely haywire, I'm really just focused on something that I think is attainable to me personally.                                     So for me this goal is something that I have to work on the entire year in order to be successful in doing it. If I do not stick to my plan, it's going to go rogue- I'm going to go rogue and it will go off the rails really quickly. So I spent about three hours over the weekend and I put together my plan. I started off with where I'm going to be racing, when I'll be racing, how many miles I have to do every week, how many times I have to run a week, and I went to my Google calendar and I put every single one of those in there, and I time blocked every single spot. So I know that every Sunday morning at or around 9:30 in the morning, that's when I'll be doing my 'long run,' which is usually seven to 26 miles at this point. It could be anywhere in between. So I have my plan super clear, super focused for what I want to achieve for my physical fitness in 2016.                                     Now it's a matter of figuring out what your goal is going to be for 2016 and how you could be laser focused on it too. Because I swear to you if you asked anybody in my life, and you can still ask them now, if they think Jenn plus running equals a good idea, I'm convinced that the vast majority of them would say, "You're out of your mind. Jenn will never run, Jenn has never run," et cetera. Like I had a pretty good reputation growing up as an athlete, but I was a pitcher for fast pitch softball, therefore I spent most of my time on the mound and helping control the game rather than physically running. And my softball coach happened to also be the track coach, therefore he had us doing running exercises that I felt were irrelevant to the game of softball, and I was terrible at it at all times. So my point being, if I can run a full marathon, I swear to you there is nothing in your life that you cannot physically do, or mentally tackle, or emotionally tackle, if I can do this. I am hell bent convinced of that, and I would love to talk with you if there's something that's really kind of blocking you, and you feel like you can't achieve it. Because if you break it down into bite-sized, manageable, day-to-day tasks, you can totally do it. In the case of running, it's honestly a matter of putting one foot in front of another for 26.2 miles. Of course there's a lot of other things that go into it, but basically speaking it's one foot in front of another.                                     With your goal, I don't know what that goal might look like at this moment, but what I want to talk to you about is authorship, and how writing a book can be your goal for 2016. And if it is your goal in 2016, how writing a book and running a marathon are identical processes. It might sound completely strange at this moment and so early in this podcast, but I can assure you that doing both of them are very, very similar processes. And my goal in 2016 is to help figure it out for you, and make your life a hell of a lot easier in writing your first book.                                     So now hopefully I have your interest piqued in this whole authorship thing, and how this kind of ties back into my business and the podcast. So just for a little bit of a recap, this podcast is going into its fourth year; so I did it all of 2013, all of 2014, all of 2015, and now we're entering into the fourth year. And I have done 74 previous episodes as we are in our 75th episode right now. Each of them, they're 45 minutes to an hour long. I also had another thirty episodes that were about a half an hour each that were part of a special series I did back in 2013 called '30 Days, 30 Voices: Stories from America's LGBT Business Leaders." So this is really kind of the 105th episode if you will of content around what my business does. And my tagline is that I teach straight people how to market to gay people, and gay people how to market themselves. Much of this podcast, and much of my business has really focused on the former, with really helping straight allies market to the LGBT community in an appropriate way, in a proper way, in an authentic way being genuine. So I really focus on helping people communicate better and market better. And most often I'm working with individuals who are in some kind of service-based business. So they are an attorney, or they're an accountant, or a financial advisor; a lot of people that have longer sales cycles. So it takes longer to build a relationship, therefore it also makes- it gives you more of a window of opportunity to kind of stick your foot in your mouth, and get yourself in trouble. So I have spent a lot of time really focusing on that aspect of my business, and that's really what my two- actually three. The two print books that I have, and then the eBook that I have, all three of them really focus on communications, marketing, really tactical stuff for how to avoid putting yourself into situations that is uncomfortable, makes you uneasy, et cetera.                                     Now while the focus has been to help straight allies in this, I've also helped LGBT people in this process as well, because there's a lot of things that even LGBT people are doing that weren't the most ideal thing. So while the focus has kind of been on the former of I teach straight people how to market to gay people, I've really been teaching gay people how to market themselves as well in very similar ways that I've been teaching the straight allies too. So the previous 74, or 104 if you're counting the Thirty Days series. They've all really been focused on kind of a combination, and it's all been around marketing, it's all been around how to get to your target audience, how to talk to them the right way, how to communicate to them in the right way, et cetera. So in early 2015, I think it was in February actually, I made a conscious effort in my business to say, "You know what? I'm want to focus a little bit more of my time on coaching individuals, coaching LGBT people, and working on the second half of that tagline, of teaching gay people how to market themselves more specifically than my advice that kind of crosses over to the ally community as well."                                     Now with that being said, I realized that there's a very clear pattern with who I work with. With the type of business owner, or the type of entrepreneur, or LGBT person that I work with. It seems like there's a very clear commonality that took me a little bit too long to see the pattern in all of them. But now that I have seen the pattern, it's very clear to me anyway that this is where I need to focus my business in 2016, and focus this podcast as well in 2016. And for allies listening to this, that does not mean in any way that you will not find really good, relevant information that is designed for you. You will absolutely still find a lot of value, I assure you of that. However I am focusing on story telling. And guess what? LGBT people or not, everyone has a story to share. Everyone has some kind of message that they want to get out to the world, and a lot of people are dreaming of being authors but they are frozen in fear with all that comes with being an author.                                     So while I'm talking specifically about wanting to help LGBT people share their stories, if you're an ally and you're listening to this, and you have a story that you want to share too, and you want to be an author to benefit your business, you listening to this podcast shows me that you are open-minded, that you're an ally, that you are someone who likely has a really good story to share, and I want to help you too. I'm not excluding you in any way, shape, or form, so please don't take this as feeling exclusionary because that's not my intention at all. And as I start talking about some of the books that I've been working on, helping people with, you'll see that it's been a really good mix of helping LGBT people and allies. So there's really no exclusion there by any means, because I do love you and I adore you.                                     So now what I've noticed is that I have been working with a lot of authors, and it kind of happened in a very unintentional way. And I've always realized that I work with a lot of creative people. So I really like working with creative people because I personally feel like I'm a pretty good balance of right brain and left brain, so while I can get on these paths of shiny-object-itis if you will, and really excited about something, and want to try all these new things and be really creative, I'm also equal parts logical, and reasonable, and rational, and think, 'Okay is this something that I should really be doing right now?' So I've managed to kind of tap into being able to use both sides of my brain, and it's benefited- I think, and I'm sure they would say too, it's benefitted the people that I've worked with individually a great deal because I can connect with them as the creatives that they want to be, but I can also say, "Alright let's be realistic about this and figure out how you can actually do any of what you're talking about doing right now." And writing a book is one of those things that's just- it seems like a really incredibly daunting task, and you might even be thinking right now, 'Why would I want to put myself through the hell of writing a book?' And I say you should absolutely do it because it will be a life-changer and a game-changer in your business, I can attest to that personally. But I also know that to be true for those that I've worked with.                                     So let me just share with you a couple of the projects that I've worked on, and you'll see very quickly the patterns and the commonalities here, even though it took me a little bit longer to recognize that this is absolutely where I should be focusing my attention. So like I said in early 2015 I had reached out and said, "Hey I would love to work on some more one-on-one coaching," and as a result of just sending an email to my list I had a handful of people say, "Yes I would love to work with you one-on-one." Out of that handful of people, about 30% of them were thinking about writing a book. So I don't know if it's because I have written a book that others have just trusted in me that I can help them write a book, but somehow that's kind of evolved over time. And in 2013 I wrote my first book, and that one is, 'But You Don't Look Gay,' and I'm sure you picked up on the humor and the sarcastic things that come out of my mouth, so I really kind of started that one off strong with, 'But You Don't Look Gay.' And there is reason for why I titled it that, it's written about in the book, and I've certainly talked about it on the podcast at great length. But it's really the six steps to creating your LGBT marketing strategy. And again it's designed for allies, but it's really applicable to LGBT people too. That was the first time that I had written a book, and I had not a single clue as to what I was doing. Literally no clue whatsoever. I've always enjoyed writing, and when I started this iteration of my business if you will, I started in November of 2012 writing blogs. And I was writing blogs addressed to people that I knew who had questions who needed answers, and I knew if I could answer their one question in email, why not throw it on the blog and educate some other people in the process? So that's really how my whole business started.                                     So I started writing this book when I started blogging basically. So I put all of the blogs aside, and I started to just kind of create this library of content, and then after I had probably- I want to say it was at least over 100 blog posts, I said, "Let me kind of organize this, add to it, take things away, and make a book out of it." And that was really the first book in 2013. Now I still had no idea what I was doing in terms of organizing the content, in terms of how do I get it on Amazon, how do I get a book cover designed, how do I get an ISBN number, how do I market this? Marketing is my background so the marketing piece actually was the easier piece, but everything else I honestly had no idea what I was doing.                                     So fast forward to 2014 when I write my second book. That one was a breeze comparatively, and it's also- it's not quite twice the length, but it's significantly larger than the first book. So it's just knowing what I know now, and knowing what I did in 2013, all of the mistakes I made because I made every mistake you can possibly hit, I think I did. But when I went to do it again in 2014 it was so easy; so, so easy. Now the hard part is actually writing the book. That to me is the harder part. So physically writing is what you need to focus on. So if you want to write a book, I can help you, I can shortcut everything but the actual physical writing part. However I do have some tips and tricks around that, too. But in 2013 I was working with a small group of other marketers, and just kind of a Mastermind group if you will, where we get together once a month, and we still do, and this goes back to about 2013. We still get together, and we just brainstorm ideas and I had shown them that I had written my first book, and one of the people in my group- or it's a couple, so the husband and wife, two people that I work very closely with, they decided that they also wanted to write a book. So when I began helping them, it was in a very informal way, and it was really just me wanting to help peers of mine shortcut the process. So I provided my template that I used for my first book, I said, "Here it is, it's in a Word document, here's the font I chose, here's the heading font, here's the paragraph font." I had very specific reasons for why I chose those based on design principles, and I just said, "Here. Take it, use it as a template, make your own book out of it." And then of course as they were going through it, I was one of the proof-readers for it, I gave them a testimonial; like we really just kind of worked together, again in a very informal way. So their book has been out for going on three years. I think they put it out in 2013, I could get up from my desk and walk over to it and tell you exactly, but I will put a link to their book in the show notes on today's podcast episode which you can get by going to www.JennTGrace.com/75 because we're in episode number 75. So if you want to check out that book you could certainly do so by clicking on that link, and it's on Amazon. So that was kind of the first time that I helped somebody else, and it was really just me helping friends get their stories out there.                                     So this happened a second time within that same group, but it wasn't until earlier in this last year, in 2015. So somebody else in my group who is also a marketer; he was working on his book and we basically did the same thing. So it's the same two people in that group and him, so now it's the three of us teaching this one other person in our group what we did. So I shared my stuff with Mike and Maria; they're the ones that did the first book. And then myself, Mike, and Maria showed the other Mike in our group how to do his book. And now his learning curve was shortened dramatically as well because Maria and Mike had gone through all of the same kind of hiccups and failures and successes of what they used from my starting point when I gave them my book information.                                     So as you can see, the more times this kind of happens, the easier it really becomes for everybody involved. So Mike- the other Mike was very grateful and acknowledging me as helping him in getting that book done, I did a good proofread of it, I edited a little bit, and that came out in early or mid-2015 I want to say. So that book also available on Amazon which I will include in the show notes.                                     So now I had my two books, and their two books already, so that's four we're already at. And then I had a third eBook that I'd released in 2015 earlier this year about marriage equality. So five books already kind of under the belt.                                     Now the process for all five books was a little bit different, and it really just kind of varied based on the size of book, what the intention of the book was, so am I writing this to get more business? Am I writing this to become a well-known authority in my space? Am I writing this to give it to my clients to just give them something to hold them over between coaching sessions? Or between projects? So there's a lot of different reasons you might want a book, and it's a matter of kind of identifying what those are, and then creating the best book that's going to get you that end result.                                     So now if we talk about 2015 a little bit more, I have been working with three people in particular throughout all of 2015, and we'll be going into 2016 on books of theirs. So one of theirs was previously a guest on this podcast, Ann Townsend. She has written a book called 'LGBTQ: Outing My Christianity." She and I have been working together for about going on I think a year and a half or so, so we've been working together for a while. She already has one book written, she's working on a couple of others, and we work in a one-on-one capacity, and just helping her just kind of shortcut the process where possible, making introductions to her to people in my network that could be good contributors. So it's again, while it's in a formal coaching capacity, I'm really kind of just sharing my knowledge and wisdom to a friend, and just trying to help as much as I can just make the process a little bit easier for her. And since she's already done one book, it's made life a little bit easier for her because she kind of already knows how the process works.                                     So that's just one person that I have been helping in a somewhat informal capacity. But then the two people- the two books that I have worked on in 2015 have been in a very, very, very formal capacity. And one of them just launched in November, so just a couple of months ago, and it's by Tony Ferraiolo and his book is called 'Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth.' And his book is on Amazon now, and I helped him with the entirety of this book. From choosing a book cover, to figuring out what stock and weight of paper that we wanted to use, what size, what printer we wanted to go with, how we were going to get it on Amazon, how we were going to market it, who the end audience is; you name it, we have worked on it together, including putting together a book signing that was in December of 2015. So his book has been really, really hands on, very, very tactical, here's how I shortcutted the process for me, but what we learned in the process is that Amazon does not print hard cover books. So if you want to go use CreateSpace which is an Amazon book creation tool, there are no hard cover options; or at least when we were looking for him, or the size that we were looking for. So we had to go print separately which just creates a whole other level of chaos, complications, et cetera. It's also more expensive, but we've been going through that process for much of 2015, and now that is down to a science. So he is going to be working on volumes two, three, and I think a fourth one; all of which are going to be as easy as can be because we've already learned from doing the first one of that type of style- that style of a book if you will.                                     Now it was at Tony's book signing that I knew for a fact that I needed to focus on helping people share their stories in 2016. There is no two ways around it. If I could identify an epiphany or an 'ah-ha' type of moment, it was absolutely at his book signing. So his book- and he's also been a guest on this podcast as well, so I'll put a link into that in the show notes too, and the book. But his book is a picture book, and it is art drawn by transgender children who range from as young as six to as old as I think 21. And he asks them a question, "If you had all the money in the world, what would you buy?" And they're kids, they're young people, so they just draw what they feel. And then they write what their drawing means on the back of it. So we compiled all of this into a picture book. So I think a good marketing play for us would be to be packaging the book with tissues because it is a tear jerker, I assure you of this. And it's so good, so if you're doing anything in the transgender space of the LGBT community, this book is seriously amazing, and I don't say that because I had any part of it. It's just the content of it is amazing.                                     So for his book we did a book signing in New Haven, Connecticut, and one of the kids who is in the book showed up with their mother, and we had a special stack of books waiting for the kids who were in the book to come and get a special signed copy of the book. Additionally Tony had his own copy where he wanted the kids that were in the book to sign their page of the book. So for Tony, this is a life changing experience to produce this book, because it's so much of his hard work, and so much of his story, and the kids that he works with and their journey, put in a very neat package for the outside world to understand. However, it didn't occur to me- and I guess it did but it wasn't as profound as the actual physically being there for this to happen. I guess it didn't really hit me of how impactful the books would have on those who are included in them. So there are dozens of children whose artwork are in this book that is really deep and meaningful to them, and one of them as I had mentioned- actually more than one, there was a handful of them that were all there for the book signing. One of them was kind enough to be helping me swipe credit cards to sell the books which was really cute because I think he's nine. So yeah, so fun, had a great time. And one of the kids came in- and mind you they're walking behind their mother, a little bit timid, a little bit shy, I don't know this kid at all. I've run into them at a couple of Tony's events that we've thrown, et cetera. And I was sitting behind the table with all of the books, and I was watching them interact with Tony, just kind of seeing everybody's crying, everybody's teary eyed because the book is so emotional. And then I am watching them go out of the small book cafe that we were at. And as they were turning the corner to go out the front door, kind of walking a couple steps behind their mother, they had put the book which is just this very nice, hard cover- you know like a children's picture book landscape. They put it up to their chest, and I could see the biggest sigh, like you could just see their body, kind of their shoulders rise up and then exhale, like it was the biggest, deepest breath that I could see from about ten feet away, that no one else caught because no one's paying attention to people leaving, everyone's chatting. And I knew in that moment, my hair on my arms stood up, I had chills, I had tears in my eyes thinking, 'Holy shit, this book has changed that person's life.' There is no doubt in my mind that that book is a game changer for that one individual child.                                     Now knowing that all of the blood, sweat, and many tears that Tony and I put into getting his story out there; there is not a single dollar amount in this world that could replace the experience of seeing that one kid who's featured in that book, and how much that's changing their life. Like there is just no way of counting how incredible that experience is.                                     It was in that moment, like truly in that moment, that I realized, 'Holy hell, I need to use my process oriented, operationally focused brain in helping people like Tony, and like others that I've worked with like Ann, and Mike and Maria, and the other Mike, and helping them get their stories out to the world. Because I've done this as many times as I have at this point, that to me the actual logistics, the nuts and bolts, the BS of it, the stuff that makes people want to bang their head against the wall and pull their hair out; that's the stuff that I love doing, that's where I thrive. So knowing that I have that skillset, and somebody with such an incredible story has something to share, and it's that lack of skillset that's stopping them, it was truly that 'ah-ha' moment where I was like I have to do this. I have to focus 2016 on helping you get your story out. So there's a couple of other things that kind of dovetail into this epiphany, and like I said I didn't realize how many authors I was already kind of working with. And I have another author who I am not mentioning by name yet because I'm waiting specifically for when her book is out, I cannot wait. I really- just like with Tony's book, I felt just as proud of having Tony's book released as I did my own. Like I honestly felt that much pride for his work as I do my own work, and it's going to be the same thing for this other book that I'm working on. And this one's been really different because it's equal parts manifesto, it's kind of corporate focused. There's a lot of interesting nuances to this book, and one of them being is that this particular author isn't really a fan of writing- or she's a really, really good writer actually, but she just doesn't have the time or the focus to sit down and write. And just that thought of having to write just really kind of stressed her out for a long time that she kept putting it off, and putting it off. So we found a really good solution to have her basically be interviewed by somebody, which is then the basis of ghost writing that we can use to put into a book. And now this book is being more traditionally published if you will. So everyone else that I've worked with has been down the self-published road, which at this point you're much better off going self-published because the royalties of a traditionally published book are so high that if you're trying to make money off of publishing a book, it's certainly not going to be going down a traditionally published path, or at least in my experience. I'm sure there's many people who would debate me on that, but in my experience it's just- it's really costly. So with her, we found a way to really kind of navigate her busy lifestyle, and get somebody else to write the meat of the book, but in her voice because she's actually spoken it to somebody who's recorded it, and now they're using the transcripts to write the basis of the book.                                     So there's that one that I will be talking much more about on this podcast as it progresses. But I think what I would say that my toughest- yeah I would probably say my toughest hurdle to cross in 2016 as it relates to book writing is that I started writing a fourth book in early 2016. It's around LGBT, around how to leverage your LGBT status as a business owner, and really finding new opportunities, all that kind of stuff. It's probably 70% written I would say, but it hasn't been a strong enough priority for me to get it through that last 30%. So it's just kind of sitting shelved for right now, that I'll get back to it at some point. What book it ends up being, I have no idea, but it'll end up being- it'll end up coming out at some point.                                     However what I did have is another epiphany over the Thanksgiving holiday, and I realized during Thanksgiving that I needed to write a book that has nothing to do with LGBT, and co-author it with my wife, who has no desire to be an author really because she's an educator. She works in special education, she's a behavioral specialist, and we realized that we needed to write a book about the trials and tribulations and judgment that we face as two people trying to raise a child with mental health needs. And this was truly an epiphany, and it was more of an 'I have to write this book for my own well-being,' like 'I need this book in the world because it doesn't exist.' So my wife and I are working on that, and I think that it's not really challenging so to speak for the book writing aspect because we're collecting stories from twenty to thirty other families in similar situations to ours, so I'm going to be getting a lot of content from other places. But we've been talking about how are we going to use this book to help position my wife in more of an authoritative space so she can use this as somewhat of a launching pad into potential new opportunities for her. We have no idea what that looks like right now, none whatsoever. However, we're constantly talking about it, we're just going to keep kind of ruminating on it and figuring out where that's going to bring her, but that's going to be getting her to have the status of being an author, which will be a game changer for her in her community, because authors in her community are likely far less than in the business community where- I don't want to say everybody has a book, but a lot of people have books now, so it's not that uncommon to have a book. It's almost- it's becoming more common to have books, or to feel the need to have a book, to just basically stay afloat and keep up with a lot of people, of course depending on what niche you're in. So this is going to be definitely more challenging to figure out how to get her brain to wrap her head around how we're going to do this. So that's something that I'm focusing on in 2016 around authoring and doing more in this space.                                     So I tell you all of this, and I don't mean to over-simplify and try to pretend that writing a book is not a total pain, and I'm not going to try to sugarcoat it, because it really still is a pain. It totally, totally is. And even for me who I've done- I've been involved in a handful of them at this point, almost a dozen of them at this point. There's nuance in all of these basically. So what I want to emphasize I guess is there are ways to shortcut this process, and what I've realized is that I only have a limited amount of time because I am working with people one-on-one, I have Fortune sized clients, I have some larger consulting contracts; so I'm kind of a little bit all over the map in terms of what it is that I'm doing, but it's all still around LGBT; that's totally the core of what I do.                                     Now what I wanted to do, and what I am doing, is on February 1st I am launching a group program, and it's only for twelve people at most. Twelve people, that's it. And I've chosen twelve people specifically so I can make sure that everyone's getting enough one-on-one attention. But it's going to be in a group format, and it's going to go for ninety days, and my goal is to walk twelve individuals through the process of becoming an author in ninety days. Now the end goal for some people is to have a book done and launched by the end of those ninety days. For others it's a matter of getting them organized, and giving them the information that they need to then write their book at the end of the ninety days, and use that information to take it across the finish line. So everyone has a different goal, and I'm not trying to force people in saying, "If you're part of this program you have to have a book in ninety days." I know that's not realistic, I know that's not attainable, and I'm not going to put pressure on people in that way. So a couple of weeks ago before the holiday chaos kind of hit us, I had sent a quick email to my list, and five people responded within like a matter of an hour. And of those five people I have four of them who've already committed to the group, and I have a fifth person who is like a 95%. So I already have five people committed to this group that starts on February 1st. It's going to go regardless of the number of people who end up in it, but twelve is the cut-off. So I have room for seven more individuals who want to put a book out there in 2016.                                     Now I'll tell you a little bit about what the course looks like, just so you have a general idea. And I don't have a name for it even, it's that new of an idea, and just talking with five people and all five of them saying, "Yes, for the love of God, yes I need to do this. I need to get my story out there." That validates everything to me. It validates absolutely everything, and that this is the right path to go on. So it's so new that I do not have a name for it. I'm calling it the Author Program Live right now, because it is a live program. It's not a, 'Here, log into here and just watch some videos.' It's really- it's me, it's you, and it's eleven other people learning how to do this at the same time you are. So the benefit to that is everyone's kind of at a different stage of what they're doing. So one person I talked to has about 85% of her book written, and she just needs to figure out how to get that last 15% written, and then how to do all of the dirty details of 'how do I actually publish it? Where do I go? How do I get registered with the Library of Congress? How do I get an ISBN number? How do I market it?' Et cetera, et cetera. So there's just a ton of weedy details that people hate that I already have figured out that I can just completely shortcut, you don't have to stress about.                                     So it'll be ninety days, so from February 1st to April 30th. It will be a good kind of first quarter, going into the second quarter project. And it's going to be kind of sharing things like the tools of the trade, how to re-purpose your existing content if you have it, deciding on what you're going to write, how to position yourself as an expert if that's what you want to do, deciding if traditional publishing is better than self-publishing for you, although much of it will focus on the self-published road. And working with an editor, how to figure out your publication date; all of these really kind of annoying details, in a lot of ways, very annoying details. And the more I guess the one-on-one component of it, is that it's going to have twelve sessions- so it's really about twelve weeks, and they're going to be sixty minutes, maybe up to ninety minutes via a webinar on Tuesday nights at 8:30 Eastern time. And I have chosen that time based on the availability of the five other people who've committed to this, and I would love for you to be able to attend live. But if you can't it's not a big deal because I am going to record it and make it available to you after the fact. It will be available the following morning, if not that night. And each week is going to discuss some kind of topic in detail, it's going to have open Q&A so if you have specific needs that you need answers to right then, bring them to the table, we'll talk about it. We'll also do some laser coaching to get you over any particular humps and hurdles that you have. And then occasionally we're going to have some guest speakers thrown in who have already been where you are, and need that extra push to- you need that extra push from them to kind of help you get through this. So it's not just the live webinars once a week, it's also a Facebook group. And I chose Facebook because everyone's there, I'm not going to try to set up some separate site that you have to remember the log-in info for, completely forget it, and then have to be a total pain. So Facebook is a likely source that you're already on, so I'm doing a private Facebook group that will be with me, my assistant, and the up to twelve participants that you can ask questions at any time. You don't have to wait until we connect on Tuesday nights, you can just ask your peers what they think. So if you're in the process of designing your cover for example, why wait? Throw it up there and say, "Hey everyone, here's cover A, here's cover B, which one do you like?" So you can do a lot of stuff like that, or "Hey I really need somebody to look at my intro and tell me if this makes sense." Or "I just wrote the book outline, I don't think the chapters are in the right order, but I don't know how to put them in the right order. Can you help look at this?" So really it's a matter of having this- and not just me because I don't have all of the answers, I just happened to have done it enough times that I know where to find the answers. But now you have eleven other peers who are in this group, who can totally help you shortcut the process too.                                     So- and one of I guess the really exciting things I'm personally excited about, and this actually came as an idea from one of the people who've already decided that- 'sign me up,' is you're basically forming your own tribe of people. So now if you have eleven other people in this group with you, and your mailing list has maybe 200 people; so it's not a lot of people, but for your business it's a healthy size and it's great. But you also have somebody in your group who has a mailing list of 20,000 people for example. And they're really excited, and engaged in what you're doing, that they can- when you're doing your book launch, you can reach out to them and say, "Hey can you share my book with your list?" And you can figure out a whole bunch of different affiliate marketing types of things, and commission, and there's a lot of things that I'll go into in this course. But just from a general standpoint, you now have eleven people who have audiences who may have a connection to what you're writing about, that can then amplify and magnify your reach exponentially, and to me that is so amazing. So you're getting actual support in the weeds of getting it done, but then when it comes time to launch the book, you can shoot yourself to best-seller status on Amazon very, very, very easy by having this amplification of other people's tribes to help you get there. And I'm really excited about that, because I got both of my books to Amazon best-seller status, and it was not an easy feat, there are ways to do it I think more efficiently than I did it, and I know this is one of those ways. So it's just a lot of stuff like this that I'm just really, really excited about, and this is why I know that doing this is the right path for me personally.                                     So I do want to point out really quickly who the program is not for. Honestly, because there's a couple of types of people in here that I don't want part of the group, and I do want to have a conversation with you first prior to you joining. So if you're looking for a magic pill to just snap your fingers and all of a sudden you have a book, it's not going to work. I assure you of this. Or if you're resistant to changing your ways, it's also not going to work. So we're really going to- you have to be willing to shake things up. You want to be reaching outside of your comfort zone, and say, "This is a priority for me, I can make these certain changes in my life to accommodate this priority." And then if you're just comfortable and complacent, and you don't really have any drive or desire to be kind of reaching higher heights and peaks in your business, this probably isn't going to be for you. So I wanted to point that out because I'm not allowing people who don't have the right chops if you will to be in the program. Because having somebody who's kind of lackluster about it, it's just going to kind of be a wet blanket on the rest of the group, and I really want to protect the sanctity of what we're out to accomplish here in this particular group.                                     So if any of this sounds interesting to you, the only website I need you to remember other than you can just go to my website and contact me there, is going to www.MeetWithJenn.com, and that brings you to my calendar, and you can schedule a time to talk to me between now and February 1st and tell me if you would like to participate in this program. And it's just really a matter of me- for you and I getting to know each other, just for thirty minutes or so, to find out if you're a right for this program. And if you are then hop on in and we will make sure that you get your book in 2016.                                     So that my friend is the lay of the land for 2016. So really my commitment to running a marathon is going to be similar to your commitment to writing a book if that's what you so choose. So if that is one of your goals, I want to help you achieve that goal. If writing a book is not part of your goals, there are plenty of things in this podcast throughout this year that are still going to absolutely be relevant to you. For example one of the- actually the next podcast on January 21st is going to be with Dorie Clark. So if you don't know Dorie Clark, she is a marketing strategy consultant. She writes for the Harvard Business Review, Time, Entrepreneur, the World Economic Forum; she's kind of all over the place, and she's a recognized branding expert. So she has two books. One is called 'Reinventing You,' and then she has a second one which is called 'Stand Out,' and it was named the number one leadership book of 2015 by Inc. Magazine. And I don't know about you but I love Inc. Magazine, and I love Entrepreneur, they're two of my absolute favorite magazines. And she also happens to be an out lesbian who's making a huge impact on the world. So she's the first interview that I have in 2016, and it's very kind of my standard interview format that if you're a listener of this podcast you are very familiar with. But we talk a little bit about her book and writing content. So to me a book is just one more form of content creation, and that's the one I'm going to focus on, for me helping people in 2016. But all other forms of content creation are absolutely going to be coming up in this podcast, so don't think that I'm only going to talk about book creation on this podcast, because that is likely not going to be the case. It's going to be likely similar to what's been going on in the past, where I bring to you information that I think is going to be relevant to helping you market to the LGBT community, or market yourself within the LGBT community. So either way there's going to be plenty of information for you, I promise.                                     So as I mentioned, all of the things that I talked about, links to certain places, links to my calendar, past interviewees that have been on the show; you can go to www.JennTGrace.com/75 or you can just go to the website and click on the free podcast link in the navigation bar. Either way, you will find yourself to the page with all of the information. So if you are looking to share your story, and you think what I've been talking about makes sense for you, please reach out to me. For me personally, having a tangible outcome from somebody that I'm working with is honestly the best feeling, reflecting back on that experience with Tony at his book signing. If I can be the conduit to creating more opportunities like that in 2016, it would be an honor, truly an honor to be part of that journey no matter how big or small, part of that journey with you. Honestly, seriously can't wait. Cannot wait for 2016, I'm really excited about this.                                     So anyway, until the next episode, I hope you have a great week, keep your head held high, and go out and just kick some ass in your business, will you? Have a great one, I'll talk to you soon.  

#84 - Build Your Personal Brand by Learning from the Experts   Jenn T Grace:              You are listening to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast, episode 84.   Introduction:              Welcome to the Personal Branding for the LGBTQ Professional Podcast; the podcast dedicated to helping LGBTQ professionals and business owners grow their business and careers through the power of leveraging their LGBTQ identities in their personal brand. You'll learn how to market your products and services both broadly, and within the LGBTQ community. You'll hear from incredible guests who are leveraging the power of their identity for good, as well as those who haven't yet started, and everyone in between. And now your host. She teaches straight people how to market to gay people, and gay people how to market themselves. Your professional lesbian, Jenn - with two N's - T Grace.   Jenn T Grace:              Well hello and welcome to episode 84 of the podcast. I am your host, Jenn with two N's T. Grace, and today is going to be a much shorter episode than usual, and the reason for that is that I am in a transitionary period, if you will, of lining up a lot of interviews for you over the next coming couple of months.   So at this moment I have a lot of interviews planned, but I don't have them recorded to bring to you yet. So we are in the second week of May at this point, and I have interviews lined up that will bring us all the way through the end of August. So it's going to be an action packed end of spring and into the summer, in terms of talking to really, really amazing people. So I figured in this episode, like I said it will be really short, but I want to at least give you a preview of who is to come on the podcast, so that way you can make note to tune in to one of these many guests that are going to be really awesome for you to listen to.   And yeah, so let's just go through the lineup I have so far of planned recorded interviews.   So I have one, two, three four, five, six, seven- so I have seven interviews planned, and it's a great mix of people doing different things, and personally branding themselves in really different and interesting ways. So I'm not going to tell you all about them, because that's going to be their job to tell you how awesome they are and what they're up to. But at least I'd love to give you a preview of who's to come.   So the first, and this doesn't necessarily mean this is the order in which they will come out, but the first on my list is Jacob Tobia. So Jacob is a genderqueer advocate, writer, speaker, and artist dedicated to justice for the transgender, gender nonconforming, and LGBTQ communities. So Jacob and I were introduced to one another through a mutual friend, and just the conversations that we've had together, I've been so excited to have him on the podcast. So that will be happening soon.   Also we will be having Gloria Brame who is an American Board Certified Sexologist, a writer, a sex therapist, and I believe she's still based in Georgia. So I'm excited about this one as well. She's written a lot of books and we're connected on LinkedIn, and since a lot of what I'm doing lately is helping individuals with their personal branding, but through creating a book, she's just a perfect fit to have since she's written so many things. So we'll talk to her.   Also we have Jonathan Lovitz who is regularly speaking at conferences, and to the media about LGBT economic empowerment, and the vital roles that businesses play in creating equity for the LGBT community. So he's regularly commenting, or being interviewed on MSNBC, CNBC, NPR, The Advocate, Out Magazine; so he is a very strong advocate and champion for LGBT equality from a business economic level. So it's going to be really interesting to hear his thoughts on kind of the lay of the land of what we're looking at in our country today, and just all the great things of how much advancement we're making in terms of moving forward from an economic standpoint. So I'm excited to have him as well.   And then we will be talking to Michaela Mendelsohn, I believe that's how she says her last name, I'm not 100%. And she is a transgender activist and the founder of the California Transgender Workplace Program. So I'm really excited to talk to her, especially having founded a workplace program, I think that's going to be really interesting. And she, like all of the others, has a strong personal brand within the space that she works in.   And then we will be talking to Jag Beckford who is the founder and producer of Rainbow Fashion Week, which is tied to New York City Pride, and if I'm not mistaken, Rainbow Fashion Week has a lot of people who come to it in terms of- like you would any other type of fashion week. So this should be really interesting, and both Michaela and Jag I do not know personally, whereas the other few I know at the very least through emails, and some of them I've actually- I know much better. So these two folks came from Mona Elyafi if you remember her from- I don't even remember what episode she was on, but she was on one of the episodes quite a while ago, and she's a PR person in Los Angeles. So she sends me amazing people on a regular basis that she thinks I should connect with. So both Michaela and Jag were both great finds from Mona, so I'm really excited about that.   And then we have two others to go. So we have Robbie Samuels who is a speaker and a consultant, in addition to doing a whole bunch of other things. One of his known things is the Art of the Schmooze which is an interactive fast-paced and fun training that helps hundreds of people yearly gain the confidence they need for networking, and raising their consciousness, and basically just helping them be better networkers. So I'm really excited because he's really done a good job building his personal brand, the Art of the Schmooze, and he has a podcast as well, and I think he'll be really great to talk to, especially if you're listening to this and you haven't really built your personal brand yet. So you'll be getting there but you might need a little bit of help, and you might need somebody to kind of push you out of the nest, and I feel like what Robbie will talk about will help kind of push you out of your nest if you will.   And then finally, I don't want to say I'm more excited about one versus the others because I'm really excited actually about talking to all of these folks. But the last one on my list is Lindsay Felderman, and the reason I am so excited to have Lindsay as a guest- and hers will definitely be airing sometime in June would be my guess, it's probably going to be the latter half of June, and Lindsay is one of the graduates from my recent author program which is now called the Purpose Driven Authors Academy. So she and six other amazing people started working with me in February of this year, 2016, and she is the first of the seven individuals to have a book created from this program. So the program is called the Purpose Driven Authors Academy, and you can go to www.PurposeDrivenAuthorsAcademy.com, you can go to www.PurposeDrivenAuthors.com, www.PurposeDrivenAuthor.com, or you can go to my website and click on the button on the home page.   So regardless of how you get there, you'll see what the program entails, and so Lindsay and six others just went through this program, and I seriously feel like a mother hen, or some kind of like mama bird who is just so excited to see her babies fly, and Lindsay is the first of seven who is having her book fly out into the world, and I cannot be happier. So her book is really- so the way she describes it is that she wrote this book because she wishes she had had this book when she was coming out. So that's kind of a good teaser of what this book is all about. And oddly enough I actually have the proof copy sitting on my desk right now. I just read it for her and made some thoughts, and changes, and just giving her a little bit of feedback which I will be recording after I'm done recording this podcast.   So the Purpose Drive Authors Academy is really for a specific type of person, and I changed the title- it was actually just called Group Author Program before, which is so blah and doesn't really say much, but I still had seven amazing people come through it. And when I started to really look at the seven people who were in the group, and figure out what they were all trying to accomplish, and what they were trying to do, some of them are writing about LGBT specific stuff, some of them are writing about overcoming cancer, and overcoming obstacles, and working in the disability rights movement; so there's a big kind of spectrum of what everyone is writing about, but the commonality is that they are all so incredibly purpose-driven. So I feel like a lot of people hear the phrase of mission-driven, but purpose-driven I think is even more important. So it's great to be driven by a mission, so my mission is to help LGBT people, it's just really at the core of what I'm trying to do. But I feel like saying that I'm purpose-driven is a much better descriptor of that, because I want to help more people. So in the last- no it wasn't the last episode, it was one prior to this so it must have been episode 82, I spoke specifically about how to impact a million people, and how that's my goal, is to impact a million people. And I recognized not that long ago that my way of doing that is to help the people who are helping the people. So if we look at the seven people who were recently in this author program that ended on April 30th, all of them are people who are helping the people. They are all super purpose-driven, they are all trying to make an impact in this world, they are all trying to make a difference, they're all trying to make the world a better place, and it just gives me so much joy and excitement because of all of the authors that I've worked with in the past, most of them have had a purpose-driven component to it.   So you probably remember me talking about Tony Ferraiolo, and his book, and which is called Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth. And he and I worked really closely on that book together, and I cannot express how much joy I get knowing that every child who picks up that book, or every parent who picks up that book, that almost everyone's reaction is some form of tears. Just some form of tears, whether they're happy tears or sad tears, there's definitely tears always involved. And it just means that it's making an impact. So if I can help more people like Tony, and more people like Lindsay who's all about making an impact, and the other people in my group, then why wouldn't I, right?   So I bring that up because I do have a second round of this program starting, which starts on June 6th, which is a Monday. The first class technically is on June 7th which is a Tuesday, and it really is going to be an action packed thirteen week program, as it was this first time, that really is the soup to nuts of personal branding, writing a book, and marketing the book. So it is not one dimensional where it's just here's ninety days, let's put words on a page. It's great to put words on a page, but ultimately you have to know exactly what your plan is for the book. So what is your vision? What are you trying to accomplish? If you want to write a book because you want to have best seller status, that's one type of way of going about it. Or if you want to write a book because you want to save one young person from committing suicide, that's another type of approach. And both of those goals are amazing, but you have to have a really clear strategy of how you're going to market your book, and how you're going to position it, and all that great stuff. So this program really dives deep into all of that, and also gives a good amount of spotlight time. I don't really have a good name for it, but we'll call it spotlight time where it's laser coaching. It's hey, alright we have ten minutes live in front of everybody, let's laser focus on what your particular problem is. Is it writing, are you blocked on the title, are you blocked on your outline? Whatever it happens to be. And there's a lot of that kind of built in throughout the program.   So I know that when I had talked about this program, I don't think it was the last episode, it must have been episode 82 when I was talking about it, I had a handful of people actually reach out to me which is always exciting. So if you're listening to this, please reach out to me, I love hearing from you. I just had a Twitter conversation with a fellow professional lesbian the other day and I was super excited about it, who said that she listened to this. So please, always reach out to me, I know that you're probably- you're a silent participant just listening to this maybe at the gym or in the car, but I always love to hear from you, and I always try to adapt my materials to be in alignment for what you're looking for. So please, if you have any thoughts or questions, hit me up.   So a couple of you have reached out to me, as I mentioned, and wanted a tentative outline if you will, of what this program entails. So I want to run through week by week, and just give you kind of a high level overview of what you can expect to see if this program is a right fit for you.   So the program title is Purpose Driven Authors Academy. I can tell you that one out of the seven people in the current group- or actually the recently graduated group if you will, that one of the seven people wasn't necessarily 'purpose-driven.' Her book is around communications tips and helping people who- I'm trying to think what her tagline is. Helping smart people sound as smart as they are. It's some kind of catchy tagline like that. So hers isn't about overcoming cancer, or working with the disability rights movement, or any LGBT focus. But the value that her book is going to bring to the world is equally as important because there are a lot of people, especially corporate people, that she works with and trains on helping them sound as smart as they are, and really kind of prepping them for presentations, and all that kind of stuff. So while the title is called Purpose Driven Authors, and it certainly attracts a certain type of individual, if you're a financial advisor, or a lawyer, or a travel agent, or anyone who has a business that's looking to write a nonfiction book to help increase their business; so whether or not you're trying to use it to increase sales, or to give it away to your customers, or to use it to build your platform which is what I usually recommend, so that way you can charge more for speaking engagements. All of those things are 100% still relevant to what's covered in this course. So while I'm trying to draw in purpose-driven people, it's really my way of weeding people out, and I think I've said this in the past as far as even calling myself a professional lesbian, it really weeds out the type of individual who would want to work with me, or give me the time of day. And that just saves me time, it saves them time. So it's kind of the same thing with this purpose-driven title.   So even if you don't consider yourself to be purpose-driven, I don't want the title to scare you away from considering this if you really are looking to write a book. So let me explain the course outline, and I'm just going to go week by week, and if you have questions, reach out and ask. Like I said I'm going through this lineup because I had a couple people reach out after episode 82 asking me if they could have more details. So it occurred to me that when you have thousands of people listening to something, usually only a couple of people are the ones that raise their hand and send an email. And I know I'm guilty of this too, I listen to a lot of podcasts and I've never once tweeted, never once gone on Facebook, never once reached out. But yet I love their podcasts, and I listen to every single one. So I am just as bad as the next person in terms of not following the 'call to action' on a podcast, but regardless I'm doing this because it was requested and I'm sure other people out there are interested too. We'll just go through this for a couple of minutes and then we'll get back on topic, and probably close out because again, this shouldn't be too long of an episode.   So the tentative schedule begins on June 7th as I had said, and that is a Tuesday night, and it goes through August 30th which is also a Tuesday night. So each Tuesday evening at 8:30 Eastern Standard Time, we will be doing a live webinar presentation. And if for some reason you are not able to make the webinar presentations live, that's actually not too big of a deal because I do have them recorded and they are available within an hour after the session has ended, so you can certainly catch up at a later date. One of the participants in this last go-around missed the entire first month and didn't skip a beat. So she just followed along in the Facebook group, she watched the recording the next day, she was perfectly caught up to speed by the time I think the fifth or sixth week when she finally joined us, she was still completely in the loop with everyone. So it's not really a big deal if for some reason Tuesday evenings or a couple of your Tuesday evenings over the next three months are a little bit screwy.   Additionally I recognize that this is in Eastern Standard Time, so if you're in the UK this would not be an ideal time either, or maybe if you're in Australia, so I know I have a good amount of Australian listeners, so I know that the timing may not be ideal. So if that's a concern of yours, please just let me know and we can certainly talk about what we could arrange to make it easier for you.   So week one, which would be June 7th, and the theme of this one is vision and writing. So it's introductions, making sure everybody knows who each other are, and the group will not contain more than twenty participants. It's probably going to be closer to ten, but I have a cap at twenty. And even if I have- I already have four people ready to roll so even if it were just those four people, then I would just roll with those four people. So it really- the size doesn't matter too much, I had seven in this last group, I know that we could fit in more without it messing up the group dynamic at all, and I think the more we end up having eventually is just going to help everybody else because one of the big benefits is that we're building a community here. So the seven people who've gone through this already, they now have each other to lean on, so when they do launch their book- so when Lindsay launches her book in June, she has six other cheerleaders and me, so she's got seven people who are all going to send emails out on her behalf, going to put social media out on her behalf to say, 'Hey Lindsay wrote this book, I really believe in it, you have to check it out.' So it's almost like you get this built in cheerleading crowd for you, and built in sales force if you want to call it that too, because it's going to be- the people in your group are going to help you because they want to help you succeed. So I have a whole structure set up as well for the alumni’s as well. So we have seven alums of the current group will be helping the people who are in this next group as well when it comes to launch time. So it's kind of cool and I want to make sure that everybody really builds a relationship outside of me facilitating it, which seems to have worked this first go-around.   So okay, back to the topic, introductions. And then we go through a program structure just explaining what to focus on, what the homework is going to be, things to remember kind of going forward. We'll talk about action items and how many we have to have per week to make sure we stay on schedule. We talk about having a contract with yourself. So I literally make you print out a contract with yourself and sign it and put it somewhere where it's visible, so when the going gets really rough, you know that you made this commitment to yourself, and that you'll keep on moving forward. And then talking about your vision. So what is your vision and how does that actually dovetail into writing a book.   So that's week one. Week two is June 14th and the theme for that is also vision and writing; you'll see that vision and writing is the theme for the first five weeks. So week two is all about starting with the end in mind, knowing what your goals are, narrowing in on your idea. So you might have a dozen different ideas of what your book is going to be, it's a matter of like really narrowing in and picking a pony and riding that pony. Understanding how long your book should be, that's a big- that was a big kind of topic last time. And then mind mapping a book outline. My mapping is the hands down best way to figure out what should be in your book.   So we go into that in a good amount of detail in the second week, but then the third week we actually do a live laser coaching for everybody on what their mind map looks like, and helping them kind of dissect it, and figure out what to keep and what to get rid of. So that's all of what week three covers.   Week four ends up putting us at June 28th and it's all about writing techniques, and what to be working on while you're writing. So this is only a thirteen week program, and we want to make sure that everything that you're doing, every day that you're focused on writing in some regard, which we identify how much you should be writing based on what you want your book to look like and all that kind of stuff. But while that's happening there are a lot of other things that you should be working on at the same time, so we cover that in week four.   Week five is themed vision and writing still, and this is individual spotlight. So at this point we are going into our second month together, and people are in various stages of the writing process. So in this last round I had someone who had 50,000 words written before we even started on the first day, and I had someone who didn't start writing until like the second to the last week. So if you are listening to this and you're thinking, 'Jeez I don't even have anything written yet, I have an idea but I don't really know what to do with it,' you would fit right in. So there will be somebody like yourself and then there's going to be somebody who comes to the table with a lot of words but no organization for what to do with those words. So regardless of where you are in that process, this program can totally work for you.   So week six which is July 12th, it's all about marketing and personal branding, and that is understanding your personal brand, assessing your existing marketing. So we go into really deep detail on how to understand what you stand for, and I give a lot of exercises, and worksheets, and some kind of peer accountability of building your personal brand. And again, some people come to the table really clear on what their personal brand stands for, and others aren't entirely sure, or they want to transition or change the focus of their current brand. Again, regardless you'll totally fit in so it works out really well.   And then week seven which is July 19th is also personal branding. So there's a lot of homework that I assign in week six, and so week seven, part of that is an update and explaining how people did, coming up with the three ways to describe yourself, and then we go into a marketing audit about and around your website and your blog if you have a blog. This is a really big one because as a writer or as somebody who's building a personal brand, your website is the most critical resource to make sure is in check. So that is covered in detail as well.   And then week eight which is July 26th, it will be how to choose a title and a subtitle that work. And now this is a really fun- I think it was a really fun week within the program, because picking a title and subtitle that work is actually really hard. You might think you know your title, and then as you start talking about it, all bets are off and it's like, 'Wow I really need to change that.' So it's really interesting for sure.   So week nine is August 2nd, and that is choosing a launch date, reviewing our titles and subtitles, and then how to acquire testimonials and get a forward written by somebody that you admire that would make sense to write the forward of your book. So it's very tactical, very hands on, and I should have mentioned that the theme of these weeks are all publishing logistics. So this is all the logistical stuff that is a pain in the ass, that no one tells you about before you decide to write a book, and then all of a sudden all of these things start to fall out of the sky and you have no idea what to do with them. So the whole program is just trying to make all of that overwhelm, less overwhelm.   Week ten which is August 9th is also publishing and logistics. This goes into deep detail on the cover, as well as print and eBook formatting. So there's a lot of different nuance around the print and eBook formatting, and the differences, and we cover this in good detail as well.   And then week eleven is more publishing and logistics, which is August 16th, and this is harkening back to your number one goal, making sure that we're staying on track here. It also goes into finding your ISBN number and your Library of Congress number. So that is a beastly pain that a lot of people overlook, so we talk about that. Pricing your- retail versus wholesale, pricing strategy and how to price yourself properly. Learning how to leverage your network of people when you come to the time of launching. Getting advanced readers lined up and ready to roll to help you when your book is finally available. And then generating buzz, which is kind of a preview for the final week.   And then week twelve which brings us to August 23rd is an individual spotlight week where we go in- this is the second to the last week, everyone's nerves are a little bit on high, and we just want to make sure that everything is squared away and covered. So we'll go into detail on everyone's kind of consensus the lay of the land. And mind you each week starts off with kind of a quick check-in as well, and there's a very active Facebook group where people are asking questions, and getting answers from each other as well as me. So you never have to wait an entire week to get your question answered, but it really helps to come prepared on the Tuesday nights with your questions.   And then the final week, which I was told was the most exciting week by a few of the participants in this last go-around, is marketing and your launch. So it's all well and good to have your personal brand platform built-ish and then having a book written, but if you don't know how to market or launch your book properly, it might become a paperweight and that's the last thing we want. We want your book to impact the audience in which you're serving, so we want to make sure that the launch is really carefully thought out. So in this one, it's going through kind of an inventory checklist which we cover in a previous week, and just making sure that you have all your ducks in a row for when you actually do the launch.   And then ways to generate buzz. So this was also kind of previewed in week eleven and it goes into more detail as well. And then the theme of the whole thing is getting comfortable with being uncomfortable, because when you launch anything, even including this course for me, launching it, there are plenty of times where it's just uncomfortable. Like there's no two ways around it, it's just uncomfortable. So it's a matter of being okay with that and making peace with that. And then the big part of this is the ten day book launch strategy. So pre-launch, launch, and post-launch.   So I know that that was a lot of information, but that is the lineup for the thirteen week Purpose Drive Authors Academy program, and I know that there's probably a ton of you that this makes perfect sense for, and I truly want to help you bring your message to the world, because I feel like it's so important and such a missed opportunity for you to be sitting on your story that could be really impacting others. So I wanted to go into detail on that because it was asked for, and because I think it's helpful for you to understand. So again if you're interested you can go to www.PurposeDrivenAuthors.com or go to my website, www.JennTGrace.com and on the left hand side there's something to the effect of Become an Author Today, or something like that.   That I believe wraps up episode 84. So we're probably about 30- less than 35 minutes and these episodes are usually 45 to an hour, so it's a little bit shorter than usual. So I hope you're excited for all of the guests that I have lined up through at least the end of August, and of course I'll be working on getting other guests as well. So if you're listening to this and you think that you would be a good guest, please feel free to reach out to me. Just go to my website and you can go through the contact form, just give me a couple sentences on why you think that you would be great, and your website, and I'll go check you out and see if you'd be a good fit. But you can see that it's all about personal branding, and how to take your brand to the next level, and sometimes that has to do with writing a book, sometimes it doesn't.   One other thing before I let you go, is that I am working on a new webinar which is about personal branding specifically. So I will let you know when that happens. It's going to be probably any time soon, sometime in May is my guess that I will have this webinar up and running, and it's going to be just a ton of information on some of the foundational things to be thinking about when building your personal brand. And again, a book may or may not be part of your future. But if it is, of course I have this program that I can help you with, and if it's not I have tons of free information regardless.   So that is that my friends, I so greatly appreciate you continuing to listen to this podcast. I feel like I've been doing this podcast for a very long time at this point, and I genuinely, genuinely, genuinely appreciate you listening. And I love that I'm getting new listeners every day, and that some of you are reaching out to me. So even though I said I'm just as bad as anyone else, I would love to hear from you if you are listening to this for the first time, if you're looking for advice or information on anything, please let me know. I try to go out of my way to be accessible and I don't ever want to lose sight of that. So if you need something, don't be a stranger, feel free to reach out to me, and I will talk to you in episode 85 where we will have one of the guests that I mentioned. I don't know who yet, but we shall see. Thank you so much and I'll talk to you in 85. Have a great one.   Thank you for listening to today's podcast. If there are any links from today's show that you are interested in finding, save yourself a step and head on over to www.JennTGrace.com/thepodcast. And there you will find a backlog of all of the past podcast episodes including transcripts, links to articles, reviews, books, you name it. It is all there on the website for your convenience. Additionally if you would like to get in touch with me for any reason, you can head on over to the website and click the contact form, send me a message, you can find me on Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter all at JennTGrace. And as always I really appreciate you as a listener, and I highly encourage you to reach out to me whenever you can. Have a great one, and I will talk to you in the next episode.    

Welcome to the New Year - I'm looking forward to a great 2016, I hope you are as well. Now that we are in the New Year you are probably thinking of all of the New Year resolutions you could be focused on or should be focused on. I have a whole list of resolutions I am working on but none of them are too far of a stretch from what I am already doing so I'm feeling good I will have a fairly high success rate in these. Unfortunately, a lot of people create these monster resolutions and that are just wildly unattainable for a number of reasons - 1) they aren't in the right frame of mind to achieve them 2) they don't have the right skill sets to pull it off and 3) they aren't really committed to getting the results they want.A few of my non-business New Year resolutions are - to drink only 1 coffee a day versus 2 - like I said not stretching too much with most of mine. By having attainable goals you will be more motivated to stick with them. Another is to 'attempt' to go all of 2016 without having a single drop of alcohol. Now if you know me, I'm not a heavy drinker in any way so going from maybe 1-3 drinks a week to 0, also isn't too much of a stretch, but I think it's just enough of a challenge. I am doing this purely for health reasons as I am trying to eat more clean - I'm already pretty healthy, but I want to take it a step further this year. Which leads into my 3rd personal resolution - by this time next year - on Jan. 8th of 2017 I intend on running my 1st marathon. Now, this is where my goals get a little tougher - so as you can see of my top 3 resolutions - I started off with something pretty easy 2-1 for coffee, then a little bit harder, cutting alcohol out of my diet, now the 3rd being - be in the proper physical fitness to run a full 26.2 miles this time next year. This will all tie back into business and what I want to share with you on today's episode - I promise. So in resolution number 3 of being physically fit enough to run a marathon I had to break this down into smaller or manageable parts. I've had this podcast now going into my 4th year and I started running mid-way through year 1, so loyal listeners have heard the journey of getting into running, but for new listeners - it was inspired by a desire to feel better about myself and to have goals to keep up weight that I lost. Due to making significant changes in where I was spending my time, who with and what I wanted to do with my business I lost 50lbs over the course of 2012+2013 - I had to figure out a way to keep off the weight loss, so I started running. Running is a great activity because you only compete against yourself - which is good because you aren't trying to beat someone elses time or personal best. So this year I've committed to two half marathons, which isn't too big of a deal since I ran two last year - a half marathon is 13.1 for those who don't know. But what I did this year was created a full calendar for all of 2016 for how many miles and when I am going to run for the entire year - yes, the entire year. There is no way I can get lost on my plan because I spent several hours on New Years Day to figure out my roadmap. Running a full marathon is a BHAG, a big hairy audacious goal, but with a very clear plan - anything is attainable. This is the first place I'm actually talking about running a full marathon - outside of my immediate friends and family - so now I'm setting my intention to the universe and have no choice but to get my legs a movin' and start training - which officially begins on Jan. 17th.So how does this tie into the business you might be asking yourself? In many ways actually. For the last 4 years of my business I've worked with amazing people and done some pretty amazing things - each year I say yes to a lot of new opportunities - sometimes easy and sometimes really scary - but I'm always inclined to say yes. I serve two audiences in similar but different ways - as my tagline says 'I teach straight people how to market to gay people and gay people how to market themselves' - this podcast has really focused on the former - really teaching straight people (and gay people too) how to market their goods and/or services to the LGBT community. I have 74 previous episodes that are beneficial to either a straight ally or an LGBT person - but this is the beginning of a slight change in the podcast. It will still be the same format you've come to know and love, but it is going to take a slight different focus - and focus on the latter half of my tag line - teaching gay people how to market themselves - but this is going to go even deeper niche in helping LGBT people craft and share their messages with the world through becoming authors.Early in 2015 I announced that I was going to focus more of my time on coaching individuals and I really enjoy doing that - I love working with people one-on-one - which I will continue to be doing in 2016, but when I did make that shift in focus I noticed that I attracted a lot of people who wanted to write books and needed some guidance. Since 2013 I've written and published 2 printed books and 1 ebook of my own, and I've helped 4 other people in some form or another publish their books as well - for the record 2 are LGBT and 2 are straight from that group of 4 books that I've helped with. My assistance has ranged from providing inspiration and keeping people focused on the right path to picking out the paper weights and cover designs - so it ranges from a small role to a fairly large role.In 2016 I am already working with 3 authors, 2 who have already published once before and a 3rd who is going to be a first-time author this year - her book is due in the Spring and I seriously cannot wait! I will be talking more about her book down the road when there's something concrete to show you.A 4th author-to-be this year is my wife, which is probably going to be my hardest challenge this year. She is an educator and writing is not something that she's overly drawn too but she and I jointly have a message to get out around raising a child with mental health challenges, so we are co-authoring a book right now that will come out in the Spring. My previous 3 books have all been about LGBT so this one is definitely in a world of its own.Back in December I had a handful of experiences that lead me to my current conclusion and my focus for 2016 and how this relates to you. As I mentioned I am working with an author now who's book is due in the Spring. She and I have been working together on this book for over a year in a one-on-one capacity - and to date has been quite challenging but in really interesting and positive ways. With a solid focus on helping her last year authorship has been on the brain. Additionally, I work with an amazing trans advocate, Tony Ferraiolo, who launched a book in November and we had a book launch for him in December. Tony was a guest very early on in this podcast journey in June 2013, his interview can be found here:http://jenntgrace.com/tony-ferraiolo/. His book is titled "Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth" and if you have anything to do with the T of the LGBT community you should absolutely go get a copy of his book on Amazon - it is honestly amazing.Additionally, I belong to a mastermind group - which I've been talking about since the beginning of this podcast. One of the women in this group was talking about what she is going to work on for her marketing in 2016 and after 30 minutes of brainstorming we realized a book is the way to go for her, so we spent an additional 30 minutes talking about all of the ways she could do the book and how she could use it to market her business and now she's planning on working on that in 2016.Another author I work with, Ann Townsend, who has been a guest on this show in episode 66 (http://jenntgrace.com/66-storytelling-with-ann-townsend-author-of-lgbtq-out…) is also working on 2 more books. She has already written one and we began working together formally shortly after that was released. We work together one-on-one discussing her book as well as other things in her business and life.Then the finale straw was when I had an epiphany that my wife and I should write this book on mental health awareness and erasing the stigma parents face when they struggle with raising a child with mental health challenges.So with all of this mounting book excitement and it so clearly being something I am entrenched in, my 2016 focus is going to be on helping you write your story. I won't write your story for you but I will help you with all other facets of the process.With the half dozen plus people I've worked with so far everyone has needed help in a different area. Some have had their covers designed and content written - just needed a proof reader and someone to give a blessing on the stories content - is this good enough that the market will take to it? Others have been helping from the very beginning and going through the very end, like Tony's book 'Artistic Expressions of Transgender Youth' - I was by his side for the entire thing. Then there are others like this one that will be launched in the Spring - I've been working by her side for over a year finding the best way to publish her book that works for her busy lifestyle - which happened to be working with a ghost writer who has interviewed her by phone - so she doesn't have to physically write because it really isn't where she shines - the spoken word is what gets her ignited. So needless to say with this many accomplishments of helping authors to be get their stories out - I can help you get your story out too. A few weeks before the holiday chaos hit us I sent an email to my mailing list saying hey I'm starting this group program, let's chat if you are interested. Within 24 hours of sending that email I had 5 people interested in talking with me and since then I've had everyone I've spoke to sign up for my new group program that I want to tell you about today.This podcast is going to morph a bit over 2016 to become more focused on this component of the business - helping you tell your story. Writing a book is one of the best things you can do for your personal brand and personal branding is something that comes up on this podcast quite a bit. The process for writing a book doesn't have to be painful. You just have to be committed to doing it. So like I said in the beginning about planning for a marathon - writing a book is your marathon. At the end of the day all you need to do is put one foot in front of the other with a very strategic and solid plan and you will do it. In your case, put your pen to paper or your fingers to the keyboard and put one word after the other - in time you'll have your book written.Of course I am over simplifying because writing a book can be a total bear - I'm not going to totally sugar coat it for you. But what I can tell you is that once you can say you are a published author many new doors open for you and your business. Doors you didn't realize were closed will now be open. In my effort to serve more people than I can accommodate privately one-on-one I will be launching a group coaching program that starts on Feb. 1st - yes - less than one month away (if you are listening to this after Feb. 1st - don't sweat it, I'll have another iteration of this program launching on June 1st.)The program will only have a max. of 12 people in it. At the time of this recording which is Jan. 4th I have 5 people already committed, so there's only room for 7 more.So, are you ready to tell your story in 2016? If yes, go to www.meetwithjenn.comand schedule time for us to talk to see if you are a right fit for the program?This podcast will morph into discussing more topics around being an author and sharing a story or a message with the world. The first interview of 2016 will be on Jan. 21st with Dorie Clark who is amazing in addition to be an author -She is a marketing strategy consultant, professional speaker, and frequent contributor to the Harvard Business Review, TIME, Entrepreneur, and the World Economic Forum blog. Recognized as a “branding expert” by the Associated Press, Fortune, and Inc.magazine, she is the author ofReinventing You (Harvard Business Review Press, 2013), which has been translated into Russian, Chinese, Arabic, French, Polish, and Thai. Her most recent book, Stand Out, was named the #1 Leadership Book of 2015 by Inc. magazine.She also happens to be an out lesbian who is making an amazing impact on the world. She is the first interview I bring to you in 2016 to help inspire you on this journey. You'll be able to find Dorie's podcast on Jan. 21st at jenntgrace.com/76 for episode 76.All of the things I spoke about in todays episode, in addition to a transcript, will be available on my website at jenntgrace.com/75, for episode #75. You can also just go to the website and click 'Free podcast' and find it that way too.I would love to hear from you and see if helping you share your story this year makes sense for you. For me personally, having a tangible outcome from working with someone, is the best feeling. Knowing I can help you get the book out that you've always dreamed about and thought about - and also knowing that book will help someone else is so inspiring and amazing - if I can be even a small part of that journey it would be my honor.Until the next episode - have a great week, keep your head held high and kick some ass in your business!

Storytelling with Tony Ferraiolo of  Tony Ferraiolo Coaching New Haven, Connecticut  Links mentioned in the show: The Genderbread Person What is Cisgender? IPEC Coaching But You Don’t Look Gay… The Dalai Lama’s Book of Wisdom If I’m not lesbianed you can’t be transgendered… http://tonyferraiolo.com/  Listen to the episode by clicking the play button below! Would you prefer to read the transcript than listen to the episode? No problem! Read the transcript below. AUDIO TITLE: 30 Days, 30 Voices – Tony Ferraiolo Jenn T Grace: Welcome to 30 Days, 30 Voices: Stories from America's LGBT business leaders. Intro: You are listening to a special edition of the Gay Business and Marketing Made Easy Podcast. Tune in for the next thirty days as we interview one business leader per day each day in June to celebrate LGBT Pride Month. That's lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender pride month. You'll learn insights around business and marketing from those who know it best. And now, your host. She's an entrepreneur, a marketing maven, and an advocate for the LGBT business community - Jenn, with two N's, T. Grace. Jenn T Grace: Hello and welcome. Thank you for tuning in to this special Pride Month episode of the Gay Business and Marketing Made Easy Podcast. Information about today's guest and links mentioned in the show will be available on the website at www.JennTGrace.com/30days-30voices. If you like what you hear in this interview, please be sure to tell a friend. And now, without further ado, let's dive into the interview. I am pleased to be talking with Tony Ferraiolo today. Tony is a certified life coach, a speaker, a trainer and an advocate for transgender youth and their families. He is the founder of several organizations that support transgender youth as well as the cofounder of the Jim Collins Foundation. Most recently he is the subject of the new documentary A Self Made Man. Tony, I've given the listeners a really brief overview of who you are, but why don't you tell us a little bit more about yourself and what your path looked like that led you to where you are today. Tony Ferraiolo: Absolutely. But first, thanks for having me on the show. Jenn T Grace: You are welcome. Tony Ferraiolo: It's great to be here. So this is what really happened to me. I'm transgender and I just turned 50, so back in the early 70s when I was a teenager, or actually an adolescent and I was growing up knowing that something was different about me, I didn't have any support from anyone. And that led me down a really dark path; it led me down a path of suicidal thought, it led me down a path of self-harming. It led me down the path of drug use and alcohol use. And when I realized at a very late age, like 41 years old that I was transgender, it was a celebration for about I would have to say a day and a half and then I got really, really scared. And I went down to a beach, a local beach, and I sat there with every intention to end my life. I could not imagine being transgender and having people support me and having people love me and having friends. I didn't know anybody who was transgender at that time. But something happened to me in the moment that I was crying and ready to end my life, that something inside of me said, 'Stop. Wait a minute. You have all the power to create yourself.' And I shifted instantly. Like I took my power back. And I started going down the path of transition for me, and I always say 'for me' because this is my story and everybody's transition is different. But my transition started off really trying to work on not being angry anymore and being able to face life with a positive thought, not a negative thought. And to do that I had to let go of a lot of the anger that I held for people who were abusive to me in the past. So I did that,

Today's episode of the Gay Business & Marketing Made Easy Podcast covers the topic of knowing, liking and trusting someone. A recent plumbing snafu in my house made me realize how important this and even further how important it is for someone within the LGBT community. My experience can help you adapt your LGBT marketing message to attract more LGBT customers. Find out about this topic and more in this monumental 50th episode of the podcast! Links mentioned in today's podcast. Gay Sales 101: How to Sell to the $830 Billion LGBT Market #45: Expert Interview with Amy Mayes of Amy Mayes Photography [Podcast] #48: How to be an ally to a community you don't belong to [Podcast] My first book: But You Don't Look Gay... Tutorial on how to create your 'why' Visit the online store! The Trevor Project Check out Tony Ferraiolo's inspiring website! Listen to the podcast by clicking the play button below! Would you prefer to read the transcript than listen to the episode? No problem! Read the transcript below! AUDIO TITLE: Episode #50 – Why Know, Like & Trust is Important for LGBT People You are listening to episode number fifty of the Gay Business and Marketing Made Easy Podcast Welcome to the Gay Business and Marketing Made Easy Podcast where you'll learn how to do business with and market to the LGBT community in an authentic and transparent way. We're talking about the $790 billion lesbian, gay, bi-sexual and transgender community. We'll help you grow your business, gain market share and impact your bottom line. And now your host - she's an entrepreneur, a marketing maven and an advocate for the LGBT business community. Jenn, with two N's, T. Grace. Welcome to Episode Number 50! Well hello and welcome to episode number 50 of the podcast. I am your host, Jenn Grace, and I am delighted to ring in the New Year with you. Today is the first podcast of the New Year, and it is episode number fifty, which I consider to be quite monumental. I started this podcast back in January of 2013, and now here we are in January of 2015. And I can certainly say that a lot has changed in two years for me personally and for my business and for the LGBT community and movement. And it's really been I think a very fast moving two years that we've just had. So I would encourage you if you are interested to check back at some of the past episodes that I've done. There's at least the fifty from this particular podcast; but then I also did a special interview series where there is another thirty interviews. All of which are available on the website at www.JennTGrace.com/thepodcast. So definitely go check it out. In today's podcast... Today's podcast I want to cover four topics really, and I'm trying to bucket out some of my thoughts here and a lot of times I just kind of hit record and just run off of a pretty general outline. But today I have some really concrete thoughts that I want to share with you, and some links that I want to share, and all that kind of great stuff. So generally speaking the first thing that I want to cover is going back to something that I talk about a lot, a favorite topic of mine, about knowing your 'why' and being an ally to a community that you're not part of. So I'll get into a little bit of detail there. #LeelahAlcorn I also want to talk about the recent tragic story of a transgender Ohio teen, and what this means for you as a business person, as a person, as an ally to the community or possibly somebody within the community. And it's just a terribly tragic story and it's certainly worth bringing up on today's show. Our first webinar of the new year... The third thing that I'm going to cover briefly is what to expect from the first webinar of the new year, which is, if you are listening to this live- or not live but as it came out, it is next week on January 13th.