232 Ask Me Anything (AMA) - Social Media, Mountain Biking, My Education Background

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Sep 8

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In this episode, we are getting personal!

I am answering all your questions and nothing is off limit!

Tune into the episode…

Welcome to an Ask Me Anything!

In this question, I take questions from my Instagram Account and answer them.

The questions include:

What is my educational background?
How did I get into Mountain Biking?
What is my favourite Social Media Platform?
Why do I love camping and going on back-country canoe trips?
How to connect with more clients to grow your business
And more!

We are back this time with a dual recording. This is going out as an episode of the visionary life podcast. And it is also a YouTube video. As you guys know, I launched my YouTube channel, probably late August. It's something I've been kind of considering for the last, let's say four years. And just because I do so many other things I send out a two time weekly newsletter. I host a weekly podcast, I try to put out Instagram stories every single day. I do a weekly blog post. And then there's all the other social media platforms sometimes I just feel like where on earth am I gonna get the time for a YouTube channel.
However, I feel like I connect with so many amazing products and businesses and I learned so much and I am entertained by YouTube. Same way with podcasts Right? Like I am the type of person who listens to I guess on an average day, probably one to two hours of podcasts. I put them on while I am cleaning the kitchen in the morning, I will eat my lunch while listening to a podcast or walk my dog with earbuds in and then oftentimes I will fall asleep to a podcast. So is this healthy? I am not sure but I am podcast obsessed. Which is why I started the visionary life podcast. And I also love YouTube. There are so many moments in the day where I learn from YouTube, I am entertained by YouTube. And I see it as a social media channel. That's simply not going away. So if you're not following me on YouTube, please go ahead and do so.
I'm just under Kelsey Reidl on all social media platforms, including YouTube. And I hope to get better at creating content. And the same way that I have been consistent with the podcast. We've produced over 250 episodes of visionary life. And honestly listening back to maybe the first second 30th 50th 100th episode. I'm pretty much mortified. I'm like my voice sounded like that. I like I couldn't even form sentences.
I can't believe people agreed to be interviewed by me. I do not have a background in journalism, or in asking questions. I'm just a girl who started a business who's really curious about entrepreneurship, and learning success secrets and hearing the stories of other entrepreneurs. So you know, I learned by doing and that is what I feel with starting a YouTube channel to these first 10 or 50 videos. They're not going to be highly produced. I just want to prove to myself that I can do this, that I'm committed to the idea.
And I want to get the response from all of you guys to whether you're listening to this as a podcast or you know, following on YouTube. I really appreciate here Bring from my community and hearing from the entire visionary network people who have been around for many years since I started visionary life, or for those of you who are maybe newer to the channel and maybe just found me through looking for some marketing support, or you were looking for somebody to help you with their social media.
So, you know, wherever you are on that journey, feel free to leave a comment or to reach out to me on Instagram or wherever you can find me at Kelsey Rydell. Because I want to know what content is going to serve you guys and how can I be most helpful. So for today's episode, I am just going to be doing total q&a. And to give you some backstory, I spent the last four days in Algonquin Park here in Ontario, Canada, where I live. And when you go into Algonquin, you can go really interior. So this is a massive park with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of lakes on it. And when you go interior, what you're doing is you're Portage eating, so you're essentially renting a canoe, you're packing all of your food, your sleeping items, everything you would possibly need to survive in the wilderness. And you're going to find a random campsite that can only be accessed by canoeing, Portage, bring all your stuff on your back.
And then you know, there's nobody around, like there's literally nothing, and you're at least three hours into the woods in our case, so you have to be prepared. So anyways, we get so deep in the woods, of course, there's no cell reception there, which is the best possible thing ever. And I had a lot of time to think. And that left me with so many ideas and notes and things that I want to bring to you. And I'm also planning ahead for season 10 of the visionary life podcast kicking off with a live podcast recording mid September in Toronto, and all this to say I had a great weekend. But when I got back, I really didn't feel like editing and producing a typical podcast episode.
So I thought what can I do instead? Because I don't like to skip weeks. If you know me, you know that I am the most annoyingly consistent person on planet Earth. When I decide I'm going to do something, I stick to my word I always follow through on the promises that I make to myself or at least like 90% of the time. I am not perfect by any means. But when I commit to something, you better believe I'm going to be there unless there's an emergency. And so I want to get the podcast episode out and I wanted to film a YouTube video for all of you.
So I thought why don't we do a q&a episode so you can kind of get to know me and to just learn a little bit more about my story. So I took questions from my Instagram stories. If you're not following me over on Instagram, I'm just at Kelsey Rydell. I create a lot of content there because I love Instagram. I haven't yet kind of dove off the Tick Tock diving platform or whatever. I don't even think that's an expression but I'm not I haven't taken the plunge into Tik Tok. However, I hope to one day do so. But for now I'm here on podcast and YouTube. I like the long form content better. I'm not here to dance and entertain you guys as you probably realized. Okay, so let's get into today's q&a. We got seven questions submitted, I am looking at my inbox right now where the questions have been forwarded to. So I'm excited to get into these. So question number one is from Roz mean, and she asks what is your educational background? So really good question. Roz mean my educational background. Immediately when I graduated high school, I went to a university here in Ontario, Canada, it's called The University of Western Ontario, go Mustangs.
It's funny how we always have that like university pride. Although I'm not like a super fan. Like I'm not the mascot for Western by any means I was involved, but not that involved. I loved university, but I wasn't obsessed with it. But anyways, I went to university here in Ontario, and I was in the business management and organizational studies program. So that's what I did for all four years of my studies. I specialized in human resources. And one of the reasons was because I didn't feel very confident with Financials, so I didn't want to go into accounting. And that was the other option. And there was one other option too, but anyways, I felt most interested in human resources. I got to take a lot of classes that truly did interest me and the organizational organizational studies part of it It was really interesting as well studying consumer behavior, a lot of psychology of business, which I appreciated. And then I did a minor in sociology. So I took a lot of sociology courses on top of that, in addition to things like data management and computer science, so I guess you could say I got a pretty holistic overview of business. And I had always been interested in business. The first book that I did a book report on was literally the story of how Starbucks became this multibillion dollar coffee franchise, I remember I would go to the bookstore with my parents. And instead of reading like, cool novels, or Lord of the Rings, or Harry Potter, I went straight to the business and marketing section. And that is what I picked out. Those are the types of books I read.
The second book I ever remember buying was called Smart Women in small business. So I feel like this has always been something that has bleeded out of me, for lack of a better term. Something else that is really notable from that time, this is like maybe, I don't know, back in 2007, when Dragon's Den was just becoming popular, it's kind of like the Canadian version of Shark Tank. And I remember lying in my bed watching Dragon's Den on my own thinking, does anybody else like these shows, I found a way to stream it. And so anyways, the through line of my, you know, from age 10 to 20, is that I was always obsessed with business.
And after I graduated with my degree in Human Resources, I kind of decided that HR was not how I wanted to spend my entire life. So what I did was I sorry, my screen just timed out with all the questions. So what I did was I took some time off with my now husband, and we ended up going traveling, and we went to Switzerland and ended up teaching at an English School and Camp there. And when I got back, I continued my studies at the Canadian School of Natural nutrition. So I decided to pivot a little bit and explore the world of holistic nutrition and what it would be to become a holistic nutritionist, so that I could start my own business, nutrition was always a passion of mine as well.
And my sister had become a naturopathic doctor, and she introduced the program of holistic nutrition to me. So after my human resource degree, I went to the Canadian School of Natural nutrition. And then on top of that, I have taken so many courses, both in person in Toronto, I studied at brain station I studied at the digital marketing, what is it called Digital Marketing Canada.
I took courses on Facebook and Instagram through camp tech. And then I've enrolled in like so many online courses. So that's not formal education, per se, but it is definitely the future of education or at least part of the direction that we are going. And so yeah, I hope that answers the question was mean of what my educational background is.
So the second question, Sarah asks, What or sorry, how was Algonquin Park? Okay, so I told you guys at the beginning of this podcast and this video that I just spent four days off the grid paddling into Algonquin Park, I went with eight of my family members. So there was 10 of us total plus Dave. And we brought our dog and there was a couple other dogs there.
And I'm not gonna go too much into this because I know not everyone cares about a camping trip in the back country. But gosh, to have four days without cell reception without Wi Fi with no devices and to literally just sit and watch a sunset. There's nothing else to do. You're either swimming, canoeing, fishing, cooking, sitting on what they call a thunder box, which is a box in the woods. You have to bring your own toilet paper, like you're just there and you're disconnected.
And it gives you so much space from the craziness of life and the chaos that we wake up to every day with horns honking and kids crying and emails buzzing so backcountry camping is truly one of the most enjoyable experiences that I've ever had in my life. I only got into it with Dave about four years ago. And I just love it so much. So, so much so that I would almost choose that these days over getting on an airplane and going on vacation. So that kind of says a lot.
And I love traveling. I used to travel once a month almost or just whenever there was a conference or a lot for work and enjoyment. And to me now camping in the back country is equally as rewarding and satisfying. So thank you Sarah for that question.
Next question is from V f. And they asked what which social media platform are you most excited about right now? And my answer is YouTube. I know it's like, yeah, I guess we consider YouTube social media. But I'm really excited at the opportunity here. I would love to have teammates, people that I can bring on board to help me film, YouTube videos, edit YouTube videos, enhance the quality of the content, setup, lighting, all that stuff. Right now, as you see, it's just me in my home. But I'm really excited about the potential of YouTube. And like I said, I don't think it's going anywhere. I think all ages and demographics are on YouTube. In fact, I was talking to my uncle who was in Algonquin this weekend with us. And he wants to start a YouTube channel about outdoorsman stuff and fishing and literally like, here's the fish I just caught. And I'm like, Yes. Like, there's such a need for that, which is the cool thing about YouTube. So really excited about YouTube.
And I'm always excited about Instagram stories I have been for the last five or six years but the excitement still remains for IG. That's how I love connecting with people. I love DMing you all back and forth. So I'm not given the traditional answer of oh my gosh, I'm so excited for Tik Tok, because honestly, I haven't got there yet. I do post on Tik Tok maybe once a week. But right now, I don't know guys, I just I'm not a tech talker quite yet. So thank you V F for the question. I hope that answers it. So I'm most excited about the youtubes. And I'm always excited about the podcast, the visionary life podcast is my baby.
And we're launching season 10 In September, so make sure you're subscribed to the visionary life podcast. Okay, another question came in. And it is tips on finding clients in a really specific niche. This is such a great question. And to this, I would send you over to my website to download a tool called the visionary relationships matrix. Now, what I want you to do, even if you don't download this tool is think about people from your past.
Peer industry peers from your past and potential strategic partners from your past. So this would be so say your niche is that you make vegan birthday cakes. So that's pretty specific, right? So I want you to think about people from your past who are interested in veganism, who maybe have a community of people who are vegan. And of course, everybody has a birthday. So everyone needs birthday cakes, then I want you to think about your present. Think about do you have any people presently in front of you who are interested in vegan birthday cakes? And then think in the future? Like where will you meet people who are interested in vegan birthday cakes, then I want you to do the same with industry peers.
So if you're a baker, I want you to think who are the people from my past? Who would be interested, like maybe they are a kitchen supply company, and you know, someone from the past who owns a kitchen supply company, because that could be a good industry, Pierre, the kitchen supply company refers to your vegan baking. And then you do the same for them. You say, Hey, if you want to make this cake yourself, go get all the supplies. Maybe there's someone in your present. Maybe there is like a YouTuber who has a big channel. And you guys could shout each other out just as like Goodwill, right? So somebody who's an industry peer? And same thing for the future, like, is there anyone you'd like to connect with? Who could potentially shout you out who's on a similar level? And then think about people who are bigger than you further along the path have a greater following a greater audience? These are what I call strategic partners.
So maybe think of your past. Maybe you were a volunteer at an elementary school and they order birthday cakes every time there is a teacher's birthday. And you're like, well, some teachers are gluten free vegan, so they should be ordering from me. So maybe you want to contact that old school presently, do you work somewhere that could benefit from your vegan birthday cakes? So maybe you work at an office downtown? Well, why not pitch the office? And then in the future? Is there any strategic organization that you want to reach out to so maybe you want to reach out to the local BIA or maybe you want to reach out to city hall or to the fun zone that is where all the kids have their birthday parties. These will be strategic partners where they have the audience, the specific niche audience that you want, and you just need to get in front of them.
So again, that tool is called the visionary relationships matrix. You can get it on my website. So in answering that question, tips for finding clients, I would just fill in that nine three by three grid, so it's nine quadrants total.
And then you're gonna have all of these potential clients and all these potential connections, and then you reach out, you have to start conversations, you're never going to find clients. If you just sit behind a computer screen, you have to network, you got to talk you got to create, you have to invite, you have to get on sales calls. I know this is hard work. But this is how we find clients. And I actually have a brand new blog post at Kelseyreidl.com 10 ways to find 10 new clients in as little as 10 days. So you can go to Kelseyreidl.com, and read that blog.
Alright, next question. Shannon asks, being an entrepreneur without health benefits is scary. Any thoughts? Yes, it is, that is one of the biggest risks, right? Because things go wrong, people need to go on disability, the unpredictable may happen to you. So of course, if you are in a relationship, and your partner has health benefits, that is definitely a privilege. Otherwise, I would look into paying for benefits. Because like I said, and this is something I've been learning, it's been in my face over the last few months, that life can take major turns at the drop of a button, you as a service provider, could get hit by a car and lose all your income and your ability to work, in which case you need to be on disability and so to not have any insurance is very scary. And I know I never like to think on the dark side that like bad things will happen. But it's just the reality. So be cautious.
I would definitely set up some calls and meetings to discuss your options and pricing. But err on the side of caution. I wouldn't go too long without health benefits, because we just don't know what tomorrow brings.
Sam asks, When did you get into mountain biking, and love how all over the place? These questions are mountain biking, my goodness. So I started road cycling about I don't know, 10 years ago, we'll say and before that I was a spin teacher for the last 15 years. So to take you guys way back, I started taking spin classes. I loved it. I became a spin instructor in 2008. And then after a few years of exclusively teaching spin, someone came up to me and said, Hey, have you ever been on a bike outside? Like, have you ever tried road cycling? And I was like, what? Like I teach spin. I don't do this whole like outdoor biking thing. And they said, Well, come on. Let's try it. Like I'll take you shopping for your first bike. And this was actually the manager of the studio I worked with and the seed got planted, I assess my finances. I was like, Okay, I have $1,300 to spend on a bike them. So and I saw all of the other instructors going out on group rides together, and I was definitely jealous.
So long story short, I went and bought my first road bike, got obsessed with it. I started messaging everyone from the spinster Damn, like, who wants to ride 5:45am I lived in Toronto at the time, that was the only time we could ride safely without traffic. And I was probably riding like couple 100 kilometers per week, I was obsessed. And then I did that for about eight years.
And then we moved out of Toronto two years ago. And I live in a smaller town now. And there are a lot of country roads, and there's a lot of forest. Which is why this is why you don't film 21 minute videos and record 21 minute podcast without a break or some water. But anyways, there's lots of gravel roads, there's lots of mountain biking trails, and I met new people who were planning mountain bike rides together who are going on gravel rides together. And I was really curious, like, if you've ever heard the phrase follow your curiosity. That's what I did. I was like, hey, like, what do you guys do on your gravel rides? What route would you take? And I would open up Strava and I would literally look at their routes and I would ask them questions, what bike would I get? What if I want to do an intro, I'd go into the bike shop and talk to the bike owner at Branford cycle path. And I'd say, hey, like what would it cost me to get a gravel bike? Do you sell mountain bikes? And slowly but surely, my interest became so great that I just couldn't ignore it anymore. And I started putting the funds aside and I paid for my mountain bike by myself and I decided that it was a hobby that I wanted to invest in. I felt very strongly about it. I was really excited about it. And so I got into mountain biking because I saw others doing it. I tried it I had such an adrenaline rush that I just couldn't ignore it and I put the money aside and jumped all in.
So I really am an advocate for spending money on things that bring you joy and that's exactly what I did.
And last question Here What are your favorite podcasts? So I like to shuffle I listened to business and marketing podcast so Marketing School, the art of newsletters, I listened to the gold digger podcast. I listened to my first million that's probably my favorite most consistent one. A whole lot of other business and marketing ones. I also love Girl Talk podcast. So I listened to off the vine with Kaitlyn Bristow I listened to call her daddy.
I listened to almost 30 which is a nice wellness focused podcast. So those and probably my original favorite is the Rich Roll podcast. So I have been a consumer of Rich Roll really admire what he does. And I listen pretty religiously to the ritual podcast, sometimes I will dabble into Joe Rogan, if he has a guests on that I like and hot tip, what I often do is find a guest I love and then binge, every podcast they've ever recorded. So what I'll do is I'll type in their name to the podcast, like I use Spotify for my podcast, type in their name download, like eight episodes that they've been featured on. And I'll just totally binge on their stories. Right now I'm super into Alex Hormoz Z and Leila Hormoz II, they're just absolute rock stars. And I'm learning so much about business and scaling a business from them. And yeah, like I said, my first million if you are into business and entrepreneurship, that is one that like I would say is a no brainer. They make me laugh out loud all of the time. And I would highly recommend it. So there you have it.
I think that is enough for this AMA.
I just wanted to remind you guys, if you are interested in growing your business, launching your business, finding more clients or becoming fully booked, I work with private business and marketing coaching clients, and I've got all the tools and templates that you need, plus the accountability to help you to grow your business. So if you go to Kelsey rattle.com, we do have a cohort of the visionary method.
Starting soon it is a 90 day accelerator, it's going to help you and it is the fastest way to launch and grow your service based business. So if you are a coach, or a consultant, or a service provider who would like to become fully booked, increase your income, or finally get the whole foundation of your business setup so that you can bring in an influx of clients. I would love to see you inside of that cohort. It starts September 13.
And we're really excited to get started. So that's it for today. And I hope you guys have an amazing rest of your day. Be sure to subscribe to podcast, the Youtube channel and to follow me on Instagram. And let me know what you think of this video. And if you want more amas if you have a question, ask below DM me, and I promise to answer it in the next one. All right. That's it. That's all I will see you guys soon.