With a lifelong commitment to entrepreneurship, Holly’s career journey began in the dynamic world of social media. This early exposure sparked her interest in digital communication and marketing, leading me to delve deeper into the industry. Over the years, Holly’s honed my skills in media relations, interpersonal communication, corporate communications, lead generation, and direct marketing, all of which have been instrumental in her professional development.

Today, Holly channel my entrepreneurial spirit and industry expertise into running a successful social media agency. This venture is a testament to her dedication and passion for the digital marketing and communications sector. It’s here that Holly continue to apply her knowledge and skills, driving business growth and creating meaningful impact in the industry.

Holly’s journey is a testament to my unwavering dedication to innovation and growth. From her early days in social media to leading my own agency, each step has been guided by a desire to push boundaries within the digital landscape. This drive, coupled with Holly’s extensive experience and skills, fuels her commitment to making a meaningful impact in the industry.

Key Moments

[00:04:53] Generations of innovation led to family business.

[00:08:19] Paid to write, ignored professor, started career.

[00:12:50] Entrepreneurship: fulfilling, fast, rewarding, and fulfilling

[00:16:45] Presence of mind: key to seizing opportunities.

[00:18:26] Opinionated journalist turned strategist, active on social media.

Find Holly Online

https://www.monarchsocialmedia.com/

https://twitter.com/monarchxsocial

https://www.tiktok.com/@monarchsocialmedia

https://www.facebook.com/monarchsocialmedia/

https://www.instagram.com/monarchsocialmedia/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/holly-medwid/

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Transcript (Provided by CastMagic.io)

Seth [00:00:00]:

Entrepreneurs Enigma is a podcast for the ups and downs of entrepreneurship, 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, everyone. Welcome to another edition of the Entrepreneurs Enigma podcast. I am, as always, your host, Seth. Today I have an awesome guest, someone who actually likes to do social media for other people and businesses. And she does a great job of it, too. Holly Medwood has been a entrepreneur since seven, when she was, in her own words, hustling the women at church to buy her Avon products at age seven or eight. That’s incredible. That’s just awesome. So hustling is kind of not maybe the right word for it, but she’s been an entrepreneur from the very beginning and I think that’s awesome. And she now runs Monarch Social Media, and her content is fantastic and they do great work. They do the stuff for the client. They actually implement it. Whereas my stuff, I don’t implement it. I look at the strategy and give it to them and say, you implement it. They do the soup to nuts, which is really awesome and brave, maybe. So, Holly, how’s it going?

Holly [00:01:34]:

Good, thank you. I’ve never heard it described as brave, but I appreciate that a lot.

Seth [00:01:38]:

It’s brave because you put something out there, you then have to watch the news for the next three weeks making sure that what you put out there, you can put your foot up your backside for your client. It’s not for yourself, it’s for your client.

Holly [00:01:50]:

Oh, yes. There’s a lot of brand standards and reputation management that goes into what we do, that’s for sure.

Seth [00:01:55]:

And all the people on Instagram saying, put this on Reality Records, I’m like, no, I don’t even know how to put it on Reality Records. No, I don’t even know how to do that, number one. Number two. Why would I?

Holly [00:02:06]:

Yeah, that’s the right question to ask. Always when somebody says, do something, you.

Seth [00:02:10]:

Always ask why I gorapulse and hit check look that I love when they get saucy at you and they’re like, Why have you replied to me? I’m like, Because you’re a spammer.

Holly [00:02:24]:

You just touched on one of my favorite things that happens on Instagram is people think doing social media means copy and pasting messages to everybody who fits a criteria, which is wrong.

Seth [00:02:35]:

Oh, my God. And I love the ones the spammy ones are like, Hi, honey. And I’m like but then it’s Hi, honey to business and email. And I’m like, Honey does not go with business email. Clearly English is not your first language, no fault of yours. But I have a chuckle. Then I’ll delete because it’s or dear. Hi, dear.

Holly [00:02:59]:

Yeah, I do that with the bros that say, Yo, do you want this many leads, and I’m going if you’re going to address me with a Yo no.

Seth [00:03:10]:

Or how about yo, Holly?

Holly [00:03:12]:

At least no, they don’t even do that.

Seth [00:03:15]:

I know, but use your first name at least. Like not yo or yo. SUP? Yo. Yo. I got a few subs, too. We’re off the rails here. We’re commiserating about the pains of social media.

Holly [00:03:29]:

Oh, that could be an hour long conversation.

Seth [00:03:32]:

We can have it. Absolutely. But so, Holly, you’re up in Toronto? Yes, right along the or. You say water or water?

Holly [00:03:41]:

We say water.

Seth [00:03:43]:

You say water.

Holly [00:03:44]:

I say water.

Seth [00:03:45]:

Yeah, I say water. Come from Philly. We say water.

Holly [00:03:47]:

Well, that’s okay.

Seth [00:03:49]:

It’s fine. No one knows why I said, what’s water? Exactly. So you have been hustling and doing the entrepreneur thing since you’re a small person?

Holly [00:04:02]:

Yes. I’m so lucky to have a family that it’s a lineage of entrepreneurship.

Seth [00:04:09]:

It really interests you.

Holly [00:04:11]:

Oh, no. In my family, it’s weird to work a corporate job.

Seth [00:04:16]:

Oh, nice.

Holly [00:04:17]:

Yeah. I remember when I got fired without cause from a job. Yeah, they have to package you out, and I can tell you why I got. Yeah. But I remember calling my dad and saying, I just got fired. And he goes, Good. And then I called my mom and I dad already.

Seth [00:04:36]:

Oh, I love your dad already.

Holly [00:04:38]:

I call my mom, I was just fired without cause. She goes, oh, I’m so happy to hear that. I don’t come from a normal family in any stretch of the imagination.

Seth [00:04:48]:

Yeah, that’s good. That’s like good. It sounds like a dad statement.

Holly [00:04:53]:

Good, good. You’re fine. Good. Now get to don’t. Yeah. Family business has been something that goes back generations. Yeah. It comes down a lot to innovation and needing to innovate because of the way that my family immigrated to Canada over five generations. You know, big thing with my family is seeing opportunities. So the seven year old thing I was in church, there was all these older ladies, know, had their lipsticks or Avon lipsticks and their hand creams and all that kind of stuff, and I somehow figured out that I can sell this to them and make money.

Seth [00:05:34]:

Most kids are doing lemonade stands. You’re selling Avon?

Holly [00:05:37]:

Hey, I cleaned up. I did well. I was profitable.

Seth [00:05:42]:

Did you get the beamer? Did you get the Mercedes? I don’t have a driver’s license yet.

Holly [00:05:48]:

No, I didn’t go that far. I worked to the whole network of the church. Everybody bought for me at least once, and then we actually moved churches, so that.

Seth [00:06:00]:

Okay. All right.

Holly [00:06:02]:

I started another hustle after that.

Seth [00:06:04]:

What did you do after that?

Holly [00:06:06]:

My parents had a window covering manufacturing business, so vertical blinds. We used to manufacture them in our basement.

Seth [00:06:15]:

Wow, that’s really entrepreneurial.

Holly [00:06:17]:

Oh, yeah. There used to be chains that go on the bottom to connect all the vertical blinds, and I used to make those chains, I would get paid $5 for a whole roll. It would take hours. So my parents got a really good deal of trouble. Yeah, definitely. But it just didn’t stop. It’s always been businesses of some sort.

Seth [00:06:38]:

And then you went off to college. I noticed you had a brief stint.

Holly [00:06:42]:

Yeah, well, digital TV. Not digital television, network, but yeah, online. Which videos did you find? That would have been at the beginning of my career.

Seth [00:06:52]:

It was more screenshots of you interviewing people.

Holly [00:06:55]:

Yes. Okay. So I used to work for that was when I was actually in university and I went to school for writing. I was never planned to be in marketing.

Seth [00:07:05]:

No one plans to be a marketer.

Holly [00:07:07]:

Nor should for six years.

Seth [00:07:09]:

Like, whatever.

Holly [00:07:09]:

Okay, so you get it. Yeah. I was in school for creative writing, and I had a blog to practice the craft of writing, just to get into that creativity of brand, voice, personality, all that. And I use social media to get traffic and promote the blog.

Seth [00:07:26]:

Foreshadow, foreshadow, foreshadow own.

Holly [00:07:29]:

Well done. So it doing really well. I started getting invited to events around Toronto, started getting small brand deals here and there. And then yeah, there was a company there’s a path that goes underground. Toronto, it’s like over 30 km long kilometers, not miles.

Seth [00:07:44]:

Well, I’ll let that pass. Not going to let you make you convert it. But it’s long.

Holly [00:07:49]:

It’s a long it’s a big underground space, and there’s shopping and retailers.

Seth [00:07:55]:

Montreal has big underground up there.

Holly [00:08:02]:

Yeah, exactly. So these approached me and they said, hey, we noticed you’re doing this for your blog. Can you do this for us? We’ll pay you. And I said yes, obviously. Of course. Why would you say no? I was putting myself through school, working three jobs. Like, I wanted the money.

Seth [00:08:17]:

One more job. Why not?

Holly [00:08:19]:

Why not? And I was in class one day and writing tweets for this company, and my professor goes, holly, if you don’t pay attention in class, you’re never going to get paid as a writer. I looked up at him and I went, I’m being paid to write right now. And that was the last semester. Oh, he’s nothing. What can you say to that? What do you say to that? You can’t. And that was the last continue. Yeah. And so at that moment, I kind of had this light bulb moment of, why am I going to spend the next four years paying for a degree when I could just jump into this career? And then that’s how the social media and marketing side of things took off.

Seth [00:08:56]:

I just dove headfirst into it.

Holly [00:08:59]:

Yeah. I mean, opportunity, it was a brand.

Seth [00:09:02]:

If you have it, go for it. And more and more now, people are saying, if you have the opportunity, go for the opportunity. Don’t feel like you get to follow that same old stupid path that everyone did before.

Holly [00:09:13]:

I think now we’re starting to realize that path is not one that leads to security or profitability. It actually leads not all the time for some people. Absolutely. But we’re dealing with it right now, especially my generation with student loans are almost unbearable.

Seth [00:09:28]:

Yeah.

Holly [00:09:30]:

There’s a better way of doing things.

Seth [00:09:32]:

So then when did you start Monarch?

Holly [00:09:34]:

I started just over two years ago. Yeah. So a few things happened. One, naturally, my father bought another company.

Seth [00:09:43]:

Of course. He’s definitely an entrepreneur.

Holly [00:09:47]:

Talk to somebody interesting. You should get my father on this podcast.

Seth [00:09:49]:

I will get him on, absolutely.

Holly [00:09:51]:

Yeah.

Seth [00:09:52]:

Is he as public as you?

Holly [00:09:55]:

No.

Seth [00:09:58]:

More straight lacing. Well, you did say like, one word. I got fired. Good.

Holly [00:10:05]:

Yeah.

Seth [00:10:06]:

We’re going to take a quick break here from our sponsors and get right back to the show. My dad, he goes to a point and he just stops and leaves you hanging. And you have any more? He’s like, I have things to say. I’m not going to make stuff up.

Holly [00:10:18]:

I’m like, you know, I appreciate that level of directness. There’s no fluffy words. It’s just information communicated.

Seth [00:10:25]:

Absolutely. The true entrepreneur. So he started up a rice processing plant in Manitoba.

Holly [00:10:30]:

He bought it. Yeah, it was already in existence. One of his best friends was running it before then. He’s always been involved. And I don’t know if you’ve ever had like, authentic wild rice. Have you ever tried it? Eaten?

Seth [00:10:41]:

I’m not sure if it’s authentic. I mean, it’s wild rice.

Holly [00:10:44]:

Well, there’s some that’s actually grown in the wild and then there’s some that’s grown in patties and most of the stuff. So we get access to the best quality in the world because it’s in lakes in northern Manitoba and Saskatchewan where there’s no pollution, there’s no boats.

Seth [00:11:00]:

There’s also no humans.

Holly [00:11:02]:

Barely any we’re talking about Canada here.

Seth [00:11:05]:

It’s like Canada. And Australia. Everyone’s around. Well, Australia is around the coast and Canada is on the bottom. You go farther north.

Holly [00:11:13]:

Freezer took us, so well, exactly. That’s where the plant is. Very good. There’s again, an opportunity to bring this amazing product to a retail market. So that I decided, okay, I need to focus a lot of effort on here. So I was ahead of growth, marketing manager, so head of growth at a startup for the mortgage space. And yeah, it was a great job, great position, loved my boss, all that kind of stuff.

Seth [00:11:37]:

But you saw opportunity knocking again.

Holly [00:11:40]:

I saw opportunity knocking. And at the same time, it was like first year into the Pandemic and I had so many business owners reach out for advice and I tracked my time like it’s a religion because I need to know where to optimize. And I did the calculations. I gave over $30,000 away for free of all thing and realized, oh, there’s a need here. Quit the job and started an agency and building both. Yeah. No, I haven’t. It’s been quite the ride, that’s for sure.

Seth [00:12:11]:

It’s definitely a ride. Ups and downs and during the pandemic. So you started this during the pandemic? Oh, my God. That is brave. But I started a ghost to me in 2008 at the banking crisis. So that’s when most people do stuff. So I can’t knock you for it.

Holly [00:12:28]:

Yeah. No. And every time it’s hard not to get sucked in by the doom and despair of upcoming recession at the same time. I think that if you’re the kind of person that can see the opportunity, then, man, you’re in a good position.

Seth [00:12:43]:

Amen. Since you’ve been an entrepreneur your whole life, you have had some stints in corporate North America. What’s the best thing about being an entrepreneur?

Holly [00:12:50]:

I would say probably the fulfillment. I’ve done corporate the corporate world. I’ve done the startup world. Things move very slow in those, and yeah, it’s very painful. And my experience of the corporate world was the people that are doing the work usually just they’re not executives, they’re the people that actually do the work. They move the needle, and then the credit is taken by the executives and the directors and all that kind of stuff. And at the end of the day, a lot of those positions are not qualified to do those jobs, and they don’t have the understanding. At least that’s been my experience and a lot of experiences of people my age. And my brain doesn’t like that. It doesn’t like the slowness, the games and bureaucracy of those organizations. So I would say the reward that comes with entrepreneurship, I can say the upside is like, every result that happens is so deeply fulfilling. And if you’re somebody who likes to build things, then entrepreneurship gives me that constant hit of dopamine when I build something and it works. Yeah.

Seth [00:14:00]:

So much fun.

Holly [00:14:01]:

So much fun. It’s exciting.

Seth [00:14:03]:

What keeps you up at night, then? What’s the scariest part about being entrepreneur? If you can name one or two.

Holly [00:14:08]:

Things, it’s always more one or two things. I would say the uncertainty. There’s no in the corporate world either.

Seth [00:14:19]:

Especially now.

Holly [00:14:20]:

No, especially. You can get fired like this.

Seth [00:14:25]:

At least in Canada you get severance.

Holly [00:14:27]:

You do. You don’t get that in the States.

Seth [00:14:29]:

Not always. It’s rough down here. It’s rough down south. Usually you get a Severance, but it can be shit canned without well.

Holly [00:14:41]:

I guess the risk is on both sides is there’s not a lot of security there. You kind of have to create your own security. It’s not really being certain of the outcome. A client could decide any day that they want to go in a different direction, and there’s not a lot that you can do to be like, well, okay, you don’t want to neglect this part of your business because it’s like your mouthpiece. All right, no problem. The other thing that keeps me out well, I mean, I work in social.

Seth [00:15:10]:

Media if it’s a crisis, you got to be like, are my clients affected by this? Shall you take things down?

Holly [00:15:17]:

Yeah, there’s a lot of especially during the pandemic when you’re dealing with a little bit of controversial subject matter. Like in Canada, we were locked down really hard. We had to have a vaccine passport to go to certain businesses. Like if I wanted to go to a fitness class, I had to be double vaccine to go there.

Seth [00:15:37]:

Wow.

Holly [00:15:37]:

And it was that way here for.

Seth [00:15:39]:

A little bit, but then it’s America. It’s not even America. It’s America.

Holly [00:15:44]:

It’s America.

Seth [00:15:45]:

It’s America.

Holly [00:15:46]:

And Americans do not put up with that.

Seth [00:15:49]:

Oh God. We know Canadians a lot more. Well, they at least appear to be more agreeable. Except for those truck drivers in Ottawa. I was like, well, that’s very American of them. I was like, wow, that’s very American of them.

Holly [00:16:00]:

Well, that’s the thing is when you tell somebody they can’t come to your business, that can turn into a storm on social media. Regardless of your own personal because that’s the thing. You can’t have personal opinions in this job. You want to be good at this job. You have to be completely not biased one way or the other.

Seth [00:16:18]:

So hard. Yeah, same thing in journals. It’s very hard. You got to keep your shit to yourself.

Holly [00:16:23]:

Exactly. And you can’t let it affect you. So I think it’s really just the hardest part is the mental battle that goes on constantly with this work.

Seth [00:16:33]:

So what is the most important thing to carry with you all the time?

Holly [00:16:36]:

It’s just going to say thing that’s attached to my hand at all times.

Seth [00:16:39]:

Because you’re in social media, you can definitely say your phone and you can pass. That’s one of probably the most important things that have with you.

Holly [00:16:45]:

I think the most important thing besides my phone carry with me is the ability to see things for what they are and not to look to the past or the future. Really? I know as cheesy as that sounds, being in the present moment and aware of what’s happening around you is really important. Because if you’re too future thinking, then you’re missing the opportunities that exist in that space. If you’re looking back too much, you’re missing the opportunities that exist in that space. So I would say presence of mind is the most important thing.

Seth [00:17:12]:

Yeah. Even just walking down the street. But you’re having presence of mind even in Toronto. Be aware of what’s going on.

Holly [00:17:17]:

Yes, definitely in Toronto right now.

Seth [00:17:19]:

So where can people find you online? Monarch. Social media most places, right?

Holly [00:17:23]:

Yeah, across all platforms. Monarch Social Media as Holly Medwood I am not active on social media. I left busy enough. That’s exactly it. But what makes a good social media marketer is not somebody who’s a social media consumer.

Seth [00:17:39]:

That’s to drop the mic moment right there. I love that passively consuming as you do your work, so you get your fix anyhow.

Holly [00:17:49]:

Well, we’re in so many different equity chambers on behalf of our clients, right? Because every client has a different target demographic. So again, our personal bias cannot come into it or our personal interests not come into it if I’m engaging on very diverse and again, that’s what makes a good social media marketer is the ability to immerse yourself into any world and not be personally affected or have personal opinions play into what you’re doing.

Seth [00:18:19]:

Personal opinions. I mean, telling a human not to have any personal opinions is baloney.

Holly [00:18:24]:

Don’t have any personal opinions publicly.

Seth [00:18:26]:

Yeah, kind of keep it on the deal. And that’s kind of another reason why I’m not an implementer. I’m more of a strategist. Because you can find me everywhere and I have an opinion because for those six years as a journalist, I wasn’t allowed to have an opinion. And I’m like, well, I was allowed to have an opinion just to keep it quiet. And then especially I worked out on South Central Pennsylvania, which I can say is probably like Manitoba. It’s very cow, very not many humans. And the humans you come across definitely don’t align with me. So you had a human, so oh, I have stories that’s for another day, but definitely tomorrow’s. Social media on the socials you can follow mean you are on LinkedIn as yourself, LinkedIn, and you kind of have to be because you are the figurehead.

Holly [00:19:12]:

You have to have some that’s the only platform. Oh, 100%. And that’s probably if you want to connect with me directly, go to LinkedIn. That’s the easiest place. You can also email me directly. Holly Atmonicsocialmedia.com. That’s also a quick way to get spammer people.

Seth [00:19:26]:

Don’t spam her.

Holly [00:19:28]:

I’ve got software.

Seth [00:19:30]:

You actually had a really good reel on social media about how trolls are actually complimenters. I love that. And I commented, I was like, it’s still not nice, but still.

Holly [00:19:43]:

Well, first of all, you need to have a good communication crisis plan in place to deal with that when it comes. But what I’ll tell everybody, because you’re going to get attacked by trolls at some point, it’s a good thing.

Seth [00:19:53]:

You can be a race and they’ll find something about they’ll find something about rice to troll you about, trust me.

Holly [00:20:00]:

Oh, they have. One of my best viral happened because I offended people about the way I cooked rice. Oh my God, it was wonderful. I want it to happen again, I’m serious, because it brings all this other engagement.

Seth [00:20:23]:

You went viral on cooking rice. Love it.

Holly [00:20:26]:

Yeah, they were upset. They were like, that’s not rice, because a lot of people have wild rice. Whatever. Everybody has their opinions. And what it did was it got this video seen so many times and then it caused a bunch of people on this side to say, yes, it is. And so all these conversations are happening back and forth.

Seth [00:20:45]:

No news is bad news. That’s wonderful.

Holly [00:20:48]:

It drives engagement rate like nothing else.

Seth [00:20:51]:

Love it. And guess what? That’s a great place to end. Holly, thank you for being on the show and we’ll see everyone next time.

Holly [00:20:59]:

Thanks for having me.

Seth [00:21:00]:

That was a great show. If you’re enjoying entrepreneurs 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 Marketingpodcast Network. Goldstein Media hopes you have enjoyed this episode. This podcast is one of the many great shows on the MPN Marketing Podcast Network.