Elise is the CEO of EK Editorial & Coaching and EKPR, two communication companies that offer a range of dynamic business and creative writing services, including book coaching, ghostwriting, and non-fiction writing. On the public relations side, she specializes in crafting compelling narratives to elevate businesses, covering executive bios, content creation, and crisis communications. With over 35 years of international entrepreneurial experience across various B2C industries and non-profits, her expertise in storytelling effectively resonates with diverse audiences, enhancing messaging and customer response.

Her mission centers on empowering and transforming business leaders with a moral and social conscience, encouraging them to share their stories for lasting impact and legacy. As a book coach, ghostwriter, and editor, she leverages her emotional intelligence and domain knowledge to offer enthusiastic editorial guidance and tools for building personal and corporate brands. She is passionate about collaborating with individuals who have disruptive ideas, assisting them in crafting authentic and memorable narratives.

Elise is also a bestselling author, known for her memoir “Under My Skin – Drama, Trauma, & Rock n Roll,” the first in a trilogy series. She has ghostwritten numerous books and maintains an active presence as a blogger, reporter, and editorial expert.

Key Moments

[03:44] Established publishing agency promoting UK and US music.

[08:07] Developed into developmental editor, created courses.

[12:02] Carry determination, love of laughter, and humor.

Find Elise Online

https://elisekrentzel.com

https://ekpublicrelations.com

https://elisekrentzel.com/under-my-skin

https://youtube.com/@elisekrentzel-rebelwriter

https://facebook.com/OfficiallyElise

https://instagram.com/elisekrentzel

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Transcript Provided By CastMagic.io

Seth [00:00:00]:
Entrepreneur’s Enigma is a podcast for the ups and downs of entrepreneurship to the wins and the fails that we all face being entrepreneurs, how we learn from adversity. Every week I talk to a different entrepreneur with a story to tell. I’m Seth Goldstein. Come with me on the journey. This is Entrepreneurs Enigma. Let’s get started. Hey, everybody. Welcome to another edition of the Entrepreneur’s Enigma podcast.

Seth [00:00:35]:
I am your host as always, Seth. Today, I have a buddy of mine who I met on Alignable in one of the smart connects, the speed networking things. We hit it off, and Elise is a riot. She’s fun. She’s bubbly, and I’m like, I got and she’s an entrepreneur. So, like, I’ve gotta get you on the podcast. It made perfect sense. I’m like, this will be a fun 20 minutes, and let’s just rock and roll.

Seth [00:00:58]:
So Elise is the CEO of EK editorial and coaching and EKPR. So there’s 2 companies. One’s a PR company, and one is more of a creative writing directions company. You’ve written books. You help people write books. You’re a powerhouse. So that’s what matters. So, you know, you’re forced to be reckoned with.

Elise [00:01:21]:
Great.

Seth [00:01:21]:
So how’s it going, Elise? How are you doing?

Elise [00:01:23]:
Seth.

Seth [00:01:24]:
I’m doing great. So if I remember correctly, you well, first of all, you were a best your best you’re a best selling author of Under My Skin, drama, trauma, and rock and roll, which is your first memoir in in your trilogy series. Oh.

Elise [00:01:41]:
Yes.

Seth [00:01:41]:
Give me 3 of them. That’s awesome. But But if I remember correctly, you were in Japan for Billboard. Was it Billboard Magazine or was it Rolling

Elise [00:01:48]:
Stones? Ever bureau chief, in Tokyo. And the reason I got there was be in Tokyo. In Tokyo. The reason I got there was because I was a music journalist in high school. Think about, what do you call that film? Almost Famous. I tell people I was almost almost famous because I toured with kids.

Seth [00:02:13]:
Wild? Oh, wow. So you were weren’t quite a roadie or a groupie. You were actually a music journalist touring, but you had the fun of a row of a groupie.

Elise [00:02:21]:
No. I didn’t have the responsibility because I didn’t go to bed with any of the members.

Seth [00:02:27]:
Well, that’s

Elise [00:02:28]:
a lot

Seth [00:02:28]:
of the responsible one. You were the responsible one.

Elise [00:02:31]:
Yeah. Okay.

Seth [00:02:31]:
Stories and had a good time.

Elise [00:02:33]:
Yes. And and 1 third of those stories is in my memoir in book number 1. Oh,

Seth [00:02:39]:
pick that up. Amazon. Yeah. Right. Your local bookseller. And if it’s not in your local bookseller, get that get on a lease so her links will be in the show notes, and get her to put it in the local bookseller because we wanna we wanna promote local booksellers if we can. But if you can’t, get it on Amazon because it’s gonna it’s gonna be a great read, I’m sure. So so how does this all get started? How does entrepreneurial journey get started?

Elise [00:03:02]:
So I started as a journalist and thought for the rest of my life, all I’m going to do is be a writer. However, once I was in Japan and then working the music industry for Billboard Magazine, And I realized that nobody’s a stranger, and I know how to communicate to different audiences something that was just innate. Having an imagination and yet putting those ideas to test, meaning, making sure that they were viable concrete wise and making a profit for others, I created my first business.

Seth [00:03:43]:
Yeah.

Elise [00:03:44]:
And it was I was 20 I was 22 years old. I’m a foreigner. You know, I’m a fish out of water in Japan, and I created a publishing agency where I bought the rights to music catalogs of British and American bands and then promoted that in Japan, including events, experiential marketing, negotiating record deals, and then launching the careers of everyone from and I’m gonna drop some names now. Elvis Costello. Elvis Costello. Graham Parker and the rumor. Generation x, Billy Idol, the whole music catalog from the UK called Stiff Records, Nick Lowe, all these punk, punk rock, The Cure, The Clash. So that was my first business.

Seth [00:04:56]:
Wow.

Elise [00:04:57]:
I was doing I was doing so

Seth [00:05:00]:
well wild.

Elise [00:05:01]:
That I sent my mother who hadn’t seen me in two and a half years because I was in Japan for 5 years. I sent her a first class round first class round trip at the time Pan Am ticket plus 5 k spending money. It’s like, hey, mom. Have a blast.

Seth [00:05:21]:
Oh, that’s awesome. Wow. What an amazing story. And so then so you let so you came back from Japan, and did you jump right back into your own thing? Did you do corporate? Did you do more journals, and what what what’s

Elise [00:05:36]:
the story there? Go corporate. No point, Will. Not for me. My the name of my second memoir is called a rogue entrepreneur and how she did it around the world. Yeah. So when I got back to the States, I decided that the need was Japanese companies in America. This was at a time when Sony bought Columbia Pictures. The Japanese purchased Rockefeller Center.

Elise [00:06:10]:
I was a liaison bridge between and introduced on the East Coast of America, Kieran Bier, Waco Lingerie, and Shiseido Cosmetics. That was what I did. Big brands.

Seth [00:06:29]:
Oh oh, that’s all. That’s all you did.

Elise [00:06:32]:
Okay. You know, to be impressive for the Japanese, I had an office in the Empire State Building on the 59th floor.

Seth [00:06:41]:
Great

Elise [00:06:41]:
view. Looking looking straight south at the at Sunset and, you know, Lady Liberty.

Seth [00:06:51]:
I love it. I love it. So after that, how’d you find your way into book coaching? I guess you I guess you have you have enough of a story. There’s more story.

Elise [00:07:00]:
There’s like, that was then. Okay. Let’s jump

Seth [00:07:04]:
to the

Elise [00:07:05]:
next present moment. So what happened was, like, about 2015, I already had my PR firm. I was doing local events. Like, I I’m living in Austin, Texas now for the last 13 years since 2,011. And it’s the first place outside of New York City I’ve ever lived in the United States because I’ve lived in 5 countries, but nowhere else in this. So, like, come in. What’s happening? Said countries. What I tell people, I’m in my 6th country.

Elise [00:07:34]:
Okay. So, anyway

Seth [00:07:35]:
There you go. And the Texans love you for it because you call it a country. Good to know.

Elise [00:07:41]:
Well, it took me a while, you know, to get into the twang and to say y’all y’all and all that. But, I do because I like to adapt. Right? So yeah. So Yeah. While I was doing PR for musicians, film festivals, nonprofits, and health care, all types of businesses, people came to me and said, listen. You’re a writer. Hey. Could you take a look at my book? Tell me what’s what I have to do.

Elise [00:08:07]:
And it just happened organically. Well, not only did I tell them what it had to do, but I edited it, and then I became, by default, a developmental editor, which means somebody that will take the helicopter view, look at the text, and determine what the areas of, where is their synergy? Where is their lack? Where is it repetitive? What do you have to do to expound on characters or themes, etcetera, etcetera. It’s really, like, more than an editor behind the author. So I started doing this and not really making a lot of money at it. It was just like, oh, I’m gonna help a friend kinda thing. And then that built and it built and it built. And then I said, you know what? I have this all down. I’m gonna create some courses.

Elise [00:08:59]:
So there’s online book writing courses, which I offer, as well as coaching, and I coach online or in person. I’m also a ghost.

Seth [00:09:12]:
Well, obviously obviously, it’s in Austin

Elise [00:09:14]:
Tech’s in person. Zoom. So So that’s

Seth [00:09:17]:
Yeah.

Elise [00:09:18]:
That’s face to face

Seth [00:09:19]:
to me.

Elise [00:09:21]:
It is actually face

Seth [00:09:22]:
It’s face. Yeah.

Elise [00:09:23]:
Face. Alright. In it, I should call it in your face coaching.

Seth [00:09:28]:
It’s more in your face, you know, consultation. I love it.

Elise [00:09:32]:
And so there’s there’s that side of it

Seth [00:09:35]:
Love it. Love it.

Elise [00:09:36]:
Plus ghostwriting. Right? I’ve written management books. I’ve written

Seth [00:09:40]:
Oh, yeah.

Elise [00:09:41]:
How to books. I’ve memoir. I’ve written fictionalized versions of somebody’s story. And so

Seth [00:09:50]:
Oh, so you so to to say you like to write a truth statement. You’re clearly a writer, and you’ve cultivated that into a career, which is awesome.

Elise [00:10:00]:
The other side of the writing, equation is the EK Public Relations where I write the words to make business fly. Bring that to Barry Manilow. Like, I write the words to make the young girls cry. Nope. I write the words to make the business fly.

Seth [00:10:18]:
There we go. We move. We go, man. It’s just Barry Nalo into the podcast. I love it.

Elise [00:10:23]:
Yeah. We’re

Seth [00:10:24]:
gonna take a quick break, hear from our sponsors, and get right back to the show. Love it. So what’s your favorite thing about being a journal not being a journal, So being a being an entrepreneur?

Elise [00:10:33]:
My free time. You know? I get to choose when I work

Seth [00:10:38]:
Yeah.

Elise [00:10:38]:
How long I work, how smart I work, and nobody telling me. Like, okay. My clients, in a way, are my bosses. Of course, they are. But it’s not the same.

Seth [00:10:49]:
It’s speed walk. Yeah.

Elise [00:10:51]:
It’s it’s relationship.

Seth [00:10:53]:
Not the same.

Elise [00:10:54]:
You know? So that’s very different than if you have a boss who’s a complete ass. You know?

Seth [00:11:01]:
Manager. Exactly. Then what on the flip side, what keeps you up at night is being an entrepreneur.

Elise [00:11:07]:
What keeps

Seth [00:11:07]:
you up at night?

Elise [00:11:09]:
I guess cash flow because listen.

Seth [00:11:12]:
It’s a big one.

Elise [00:11:12]:
You could be doing great, you know, for 1 year, and then you better invest and be smart about your money because you don’t know what’s coming down the pipeline. So never never rest on your laurels. Never think, oh, this is it. It’s not it. There is no it. It’s a rollercoaster.

Seth [00:11:34]:
Absolutely not.

Elise [00:11:35]:
It’s a rollercoaster. COVID coming. And it’s a or or, you know, there could be smooth sailing. But, anyway, be smart about it.

Seth [00:11:50]:
You have to. You have to be smart about it and whatever the cash flow and all that. So what is the most important thing that you carry with you all the time? This could be physical. It could be a pencil for all we know, or it could be something you can go as woo as you wanna go.

Elise [00:12:02]:
With me all the time is a determination and a love of laughter. You need a sense of humor and you need to deflect that about yourself and not take yourself too seriously. Because if you do, I’m sorry. Like, you’re not that important. But on the other hand, if you can laugh at yourself and laugh at life, even during the so called bad times, right, or down times, you never lose your spirit. And that’s that spirit is what I carry with me all the time, and it’s one of humor, determination, and a zest for life.

Seth [00:12:57]:
You have to. You have to. And especially when you’re a quirky city like Austin, there’s definitely a a best for life in that town. But you but you’re but you’re originally a New Yorker. Right? Yeah. So that’s a zest for life. I mean, you grab grab the bull by

Elise [00:13:13]:
its horns and run them.

Seth [00:13:18]:
That’s wild. So if people wanna find out more about this crazy Elise and her amazing life, Obviously, look you up on Amazon. Buy the book. But, like, where else where else where do you hang out the most? I mean, I know we met our alignable, which is which is, like, the local business

Elise [00:13:37]:
version

Seth [00:13:38]:
of LinkedIn only much better.

Elise [00:13:39]:
No. That’s okay.

Seth [00:13:40]:
I’m a little biased, but you know?

Elise [00:13:42]:
Well, I Where else do you know what I’m working on? LinkedIn. You know, and I send out a newsletter, and you can reach me on Instagram, on Facebook, on on YouTube. You never have a channel that I need some followers, so it’s just starting out. You know?

Seth [00:14:04]:
Yeah. I have people.

Elise [00:14:05]:
So yeah. Yeah. I mean or but, again or on Calendly, like so we can have a Zoom meeting if you’re interested in any of my services.

Seth [00:14:14]:
Amen. In your face networking event. There you go.

Elise [00:14:17]:
In your face editorial and coaching.

Seth [00:14:20]:
I love it. And so if people wanna check you out online, it’s, literally it’s your name.com, which is easy.

Elise [00:14:28]:
Yeah. If they know how to spell it, it’s easy.

Seth [00:14:31]:
Well, it’ll be in the show notes so they don’t have to spell it.

Elise [00:14:33]:
Well, what That’s

Seth [00:14:34]:
the beauty of show notes.

Elise [00:14:35]:
A genius, sir.

Seth [00:14:35]:
Be in the show notes. Why, thank you. I I wish I could say I came up with this idea of show notes in the first place. No. I didn’t. And it’s part of podcasting. But, you know, we’ll have all the links in the show notes. So check it out.

Seth [00:14:46]:
Be sure to like Elise’s YouTube channel. It’ll help her get the following that she needs to monetize it. I think you need a 1,000 followers to monetize your channel. So

Elise [00:14:54]:
to go. Oh my god. I don’t even have 25 followers yet.

Seth [00:14:59]:
Oh, let’s get on it, folks. Let’s get on it. Absolutely. But this has been so much fun. Like I said, this is always of a quick podcast. It always flies by really quickly. It’s been 16 minutes already. I’m like

Elise [00:15:09]:
No more questions, Seth?

Seth [00:15:10]:
No. It’s simple. To the point. You know, maybe this is made made for a small commute for people. I like to make it so because

Elise [00:15:17]:
I think

Seth [00:15:17]:
it’s worse than these 2 hour long podcasts that are like it’s literally in the Sunday Times. It’s like, I own you know, I love them, but takes me, like, 2 or 3 days to listen to them. And I’m like, yeah. I’m short and sweet, get people in front people that are interested in front of other people, and that’s what matters. So guess what? We’ll see everyone

Elise [00:15:35]:
Bye. Next time. Thank you, Steph.

Seth [00:15:37]:
That was a great show. If you’re enjoying Entrepreneur’s Enigma, please view us in the podcast directory of your choice. Every review helps other podcast listeners find our show. If you’re looking for other podcasts in the marketing space, look no further than the marketing podcast network at marketing podcasts.net. Goldstein, I hope you have enjoyed this episode.