As a commercial photographer and product stylist, Shay’s clients span the globe (brands like Sugarfina, Pure Fiji, Truffle bags and Simplified Planner to name a few). But she is most well known for inadvertently kickstarting the "styled stock" industry with the creation of the SC Stockshop in 2013 which supplied beautiful stock imagery tailored specifically to female business owners. Today, powerhouse female entrepreneurs like Marie Forleo, Jenna Kutcher and thousands of others know and love her Social Squares Membership where she puts her years of work as a commercial stylist and photographer into a monthly subscription that supplies elevated brand imagery + visual marketing education for female-owned online brands. 

Thinking about starting a product or service: reach out to friends, family, connections and loose connections to get feedback. Because feedback is everything! I talk to Shay about her journey of starting a company, a membership and maintaining a fabulous work-life balance. She saw an opportunity to help small businesses and she seized it!

We talk about these wonderful concepts to help your business:

• customers/clients have pain points and your company can help alleviate them
• membership churn
• putting in as much effort on retaining as attaining new customers
• understand  the customer journey - how your membership product will get them where they want and need to be, essentially paint a picture of how your company will help them reach their goals
• how work can "swell" to fill the time and avoid that by working smarter and more efficient
• achieving flexibility with work time and maintaining a healthy personal life, while still running a successful and demanding business
• the 16 hour work week
• how to 80/20 your business
• find your niche
• always find creative ways to stay connected to your customer, especially in the memberships business
• social media is "renting" but newsletters are "owning"
• always ask yourself "does this scale?"

A favorite quote from the episode "some great ideas are born out of the limitations that you have in your business."

Links: Weekly Instagram Action Plan + 10 free SS images
How to Double Your Income By Working Less (80/20 Guide)
Social Squares Styled Stock Membership: www.socialsquares.com
@socialsquares on Instagram // @shaycochrane on Instagram