PODCAST SHOWNOTES

Nicole Otchy: Welcome to the Six Figure Personal Stylist Podcast, the ultimate no-BS business podcast for ambitious personal stylists ready to build a six-figure and beyond personal styling business.

You won't hear the typical snoozefest business advice that most personal stylists get told all of the time. Nope. Instead, I'll be sharing business-building strategies that will help you create a killer personal brand, a cult following of loyal personal styling clients, and make a ton of cash while creating lasting style transformations for your clients.

I'm Nicole Otchy, your host and a former personal stylist of 14 years who built a lucrative styling business in three major cities, but only after spending years trying to crack the six-figure styling business code without burning out. And now I'm here to tell you how to do exactly the same. Let's get into it.

I'm really excited about today's episode. Today we have on my very first guest, Bari, who is one of my clients. Bari is an example of one of the most magical things that can happen in your career where you keep showing up and you keep showing up but you're not really sure if your message is resonating and then you start to call in these clients who feel too good to be true. That's what happened with me when Bari came to me.

As the business was quite new, I was starting to get a lot of traction styling consultancies just a year old in like a week in April 2024, and she came to me. When I met her, I thought, “Oh, my gosh, she's exceptional. The way that she thinks about the world, the way she thinks about personal style, she's thoughtful, she's bright, she's positive, she's kind, and she's just really curious,” which means that her content is exceptionally interesting because she is interested in the world.

She was really going to be, in my mind, a world-class personal stylist. When she came to me and asked me if I would help her build her business, which is not something I do much of these days, I said yes because I knew that this woman was going to make an enormous impact on this industry, and I wanted to help her get there as quickly as possible.

Today you're going to hear a little bit of Bari's story. She's going to share how she started, what made her come to me, and decide that she wanted to launch this business, and what it's been like along the way.

As you're listening, I want you to notice that the way Bari talks about personal styling may sound a little different than a lot of the ways you hear people talking about personal styling. One of the reasons why I wanted her to be my first guest is because I wanted to show you there are a million ways to be a personal stylist.

She really keeps her blinders on, stays in her own lane. As a result of that, the content that she creates really has had her have a waitlist since the day she opened in January 2024. That is what happens when you go all in on your business so I wanted you to hear what that sounds like and I wanted you to meet Bari today. Enjoy.

Today I have a very special guest with me, one of my superstar clients, Bari. Bari, thank you for being here with me.

Bari Sholom: Thank you, I'm so excited. I love Nicole with all of my heart. Just, yeah, I want to start it off that way.

Nicole Otchy: The feeling is so mutual. You have a really interesting story. When I met you, I think I stumbled on you on TikTok, then we started following each other on Instagram, and you were a vintage curator when I met you. Tell us a little bit about how you went from that to personal styling.

Bari Sholom: Yeah, my goal actually in starting a vintage store was to always offer personal styling. In my mind, they weren't separate entities. I just didn't have the time to thoughtfully position myself.

There are so many things that I look back on that when I started this business I was so naive about. I had come from a background of buildings, startups, and small businesses with a small marketing agency and I was like, "I do this every day for other people. I could do it for myself," and I just did it.

Yeah, I called it Powder Blue Vintage. It was a vintage store more than a personal styling. But I did always have the aspiration to offer that. When it came time, I was a few months into operating as a vintage curator, I knew it was time that I could expand into the consulting side, and serendipitously, that's when we found each other. It was right at that time. So I definitely took that as a sign. I scheduled a discovery call with you, I think, that day. I was ready to get started pretty much immediately.

Nicole Otchy: Was it that fast?

Bari Sholom: Oh, yeah, it was instant. I mean, I was thinking about the consulting side for the three months leading up to it.

Nicole Otchy: Right. But I'm saying this, yeah.

Bari Sholom: Oh, yeah, it was that fast. I mean, your page brought me so much value immediately. I was like, “This is a godsend. This is exactly what I want because I didn't want to go in stumbling face first and that it was a brand new side of the business that I hadn't done on my own yet.”

I knew that there was going to be a lot of more one-to-one interaction, a lot more client follow-up and there's a whole different beast when it comes to that versus operating an e-commerce website and an Instagram profile. Yeah, I wanted to learn from an expert and there you were.

Nicole Otchy: Oh, my gosh. I am putting that out because people think it can take a long time for clients to convert and it can, but sometimes it just doesn't. Honestly, those are always my clients that are soulmate clients I feel like when it happens like that.

When we started working together, you had the sort of online store, you were doing styling in that realm, you had the Instagram account. But we basically built the business from scratch, in terms of the personal styling side.

We started, I think in September of last year, we worked together for three months, and there was a little space because it was the holidays, and then you launched mid-January of 2024?

Bari Sholom: Yeah. I think the beginning of January officially launched, yeah.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, that's a weird limbo time to launch, and you did it, and it was just amazing. It was wild. She basically built a business from scratch in three months, and it was the wildest thing to see. The fastest I'd ever seen. It was so fast.

When you look back, obviously there's such a learning curve with this, what are the things that have surprised you the most about personal styling that you just wouldn't have known from the outside?

Bari Sholom: That's a good question. The business of personal styling, me as a stylist, or the idea of personal style?

Nicole Otchy: Anything.

Bari Sholom: I think from the business side, I didn't realize how much of an impact I would make, I guess. I knew that it was going to be significant. I knew that it was going to be something that brought people a lot more joy, but it was much more transformational and an intimate, emotional experience. Every time I receive feedback from one of my clients, I cry. I'm a crier as it is, but yeah, it's just really nice to know how much of an impact I'm making.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, it is by far the thing that keeps, I think, most of us in the game the longest because there's really nothing else like it.

When you were trying to figure out what kind of people you wanted to work with and how you wanted to be a stylist, what were the things that you were attracted to or wanted to do? Were there certain groups of people? Were there certain types of services? Has that changed or you didn't just go with the plan, have things changed at all?

Bari Sholom: Yeah, definitely. I mean, I like to surround myself with highly creative people, so that's how I want to niche myself if I have to because I just think that we're aligned in our philosophy, and personal style is a big part of my personal styling philosophy.

Personal styling is not dressing for a specific event, an occasion, or for a group of people. It's about fully expressing who you are from within. There are different reasons that people hire personal stylists.

Some people don't have that emotional connection with it, and there's nothing wrong with that. There's no invalid perspective. It's just some people, it's more of a means to an end. I have to go to a presentation or I have to go to a networking event or I have to do whatever, and I don't want to think about this. They're personal stylists, that's their bread and butter. They're perfect at that.

I take a much more complicated route, unfortunately, for myself, interpersonally, because I think that there's so much learning about ourselves that we have to go through in order to express ourselves, and for someone who wants to really express themselves from the inside out. Not everyone has that intention is essentially what I'm saying. I find that highly creative individuals have that same yearning.

Nicole Otchy: It's so interesting that you say that because what you're basically pointing out is something that I've started to define really throughout this podcast. As of right now, the podcast has not launched, so you don't know this yet, but there are episodes coming up about the difference between transactional and transformational styling.

What I think has not been discussed or not been illuminated in the industry, one of the reasons why I took Bari, even though I don't usually work with brand new stylists, is because she clearly came in with a deep understanding of the difference from the outside.

Not everybody understands that there are these two different types of stylists and lots of people are promising a transformation, but their system and the way that they work is a transaction. Quite frankly, their audience, the people that they best serve, want a transaction.

And there's nothing wrong with it, it's just they are two different types of working, but there's a weird cultural expectation within the industry that everybody's doing this soul-shattering, life-changing, and not everybody is. Some people just want to put clothes on their body.

Bari Sholom: Any service, if we're talking about something that, for me, is anything in the financial realm, I want to give you my money and you do it. I don't have to think about it twice. Everyone needs different things. Everyone wants to focus on different things. It's just a matter of what your desire is, your intention in hiring a personal stylist. There are so many out there that you're going to find one that can work with you.

Nicole Otchy: Right. It's the intention 100% on both sides. The intention has to be clear on both sides. The fact that you knew that meant that it was so easy to be like, “Okay, my niche is creative people,” which some stylists are going to think, “That's a pretty broad niche,” but it's not because she's not actually niching for creative people. She's niching for people that want a specific type of experience. I think it's clear.

Bari Sholom: I think the idea of creativity is not to be limiting. It's not to be restrictive and make rules for yourself. It's to be open and expansive. I don't want to work with just artists, just interior designers, or just people who work in fashion because I would love to work with everybody, but it's more again about that intention.

Creative people are creative people and people who are not in creative fields are also creative people. It's just whoever identifies and whoever resonates is who I want to be there for. I think that this is where the vintage stepped in too weirdly enough because I also want to work with people who don't necessarily think that shopping is the end-all-be-all to stepping into the next version of themselves because there's so much potential in what we have that we completely disregard.

I'm an expert in sifting through old things, finding what works, finding what has potential, going to the tailor, altering what you have, obviously styling things in millions of ways. But I really like to find what's already of use in your home, in your wardrobe already, or borrow something from your boyfriend. I don't know. I don't think that shopping is the main answer. So I'm also for someone who wants to work with what they have.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, and wants to source super, super intentionally. I just want a whole season of overhauling. That's not really your vibe. But I think also what you were just saying as you were talking made me realize is that you want to, not just creative people, it's people that want to use their style creatively.

Bari Sholom: Exactly.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, but often those people are creative. Often, they get that versus the mass consumer who's like, “Oh, well, it's a new season. I have to buy new clothes.” That's not what you're marketing off of.

You’re marketing off of yes, there is a change in your clothes and how you do that creatively but not like now we shop because it's spring, and that is really quite unique honestly in the industry.

I actually want to circle back to this idea of creativity but more with respect to you, but I want to hear a little bit about what did you find to be the most surprisingly easy and the most surprisingly difficult part of launching the business side.

Bari Sholom: I thought about this too. I think it's hard. Like I had mentioned before, I just dove in headfirst and I assumed everything was going to be easy because I'm naive like that.

I assume everything is going to be easy and then whatever is not easy, I pick up along the way. Going into the business, everything felt easy. I knew how to position myself on social media because I grew up in social media.

I mean, I'm not a baby, I'm almost 27 years old, but I knew the power of a personal brand and I knew that the power of personal style was similar to the power of a personal brand. So I knew how to position myself on the internet.

I knew how to operate a website. I just had a really good experience, I think, leading up to this because I worked in lead generation. I knew how to follow up with clients. I knew how to create a sales funnel. I felt very properly educated to independently run a business before I started. So everything felt possible. I wouldn't say easy. Everything felt possible. I'm now learning that everything is so hard.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, and you're doing amazing, which is the wild part. Your business is doing really well for a brand-new stylist. It's very rare and it still can feel hard and you can be doing well. Isn't that a wild thing?

Bari Sholom: Very. I think what's hardest and it's very on-brand for me is just doing the things that I don't want to do. Having the talk, the serious sit down with myself, and needing to get things done that I've been procrastinating. I think any entrepreneur can relate to that.

I am writing a list of things when I'm finally ready to pull the trigger on hiring an assistant of all the things that I'm already going to be delegating and creating systems and processes for that. Because I think that's the next step for me. In doing it by myself right now, that's the biggest challenge.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, it's that weird learning curve that you have. It's the discomfort phase that you have to go through because you have to know your business well enough to hand it over because nobody can just come in and fix it for you.

You have to know your messaging good enough to hire a good marketing. You have to know everything and it's just cumbersome and tricky. It just is, but you're getting there really quickly.

One of the things I was thinking too is that you were actually marketing yourself, meaning showing up on social media before we even had services for you. That was one of the things that for me, I was like, “I mean, this is going to be a slam dunk, this business,” because you were absolutely showing up as if you had a full business when we were still building it out behind the scenes.

We had a waitlist for you for your services when they launched. But I mean, we're talking August, September, you're out there talking about your personal-- How did that feel to you? Did that feel like a risk? Did that feel like this is just what you do? You had such a savviness behind it that I was in awe of it.

Bari Sholom: Yeah, I didn't think it was a risk. This is what I'm saying. I think that there's a certain level of ballsiness or naivete that you need to have because everyone's saying delulu. I think that's just a little bit what it is, is just you just got to do it as if you're doing it and then you'll start doing it.

Nicole Otchy: Well, you didn't come to me having been thinking about it for three years, having followed 95 stylists, having had all these ideas of what other stylists were doing. That was, well, again, another reason why I was like, "Okay, I'll take this one from scratch," because I don't think it's delusional, I think it's like, “Why create problems for yourself and decide it's going to be hard based on other people's experience, you're not them?”

You came to this business with a level of business experience that was unusual, to be honest. Also, I think a lot of the stylists who work within their 20s have better business skills than myself and other stylists that are older because we didn't grow up with social media and there weren't funnels.

This just wasn't how life worked. There was a separate set of skills. You guys are coming at this from a very different angle and if you had any jobs, corporate jobs, you have this understanding. I mean, that's huge.

How do you specifically keep your creative edge, which is something I believe you are very known for? Just as a side note, Bari is an exceptional writer. She writes one of the best Substacks I have ever read in my life.

Bari Sholom: Oh, my goodness. Thank you.

Nicole Otchy: I read a lot of Substacks. Her content is absolutely next-level. Whenever I see it come up, I'm ecstatic and I see a lot of content. She really just is not afraid to, she might be afraid, I don't know, I’ll ask her that, but she shows up, she gets an idea, she gets an angle, she gets an interest, and she basically takes things from the outside world and relates them to styling.

She doesn't just sit in the styling world and regurgitate more of the same. It's something that's almost difficult to teach a person because the person has to be curious to be able to pull that off. But I often wondered with you, because you are such a hard worker, how do you keep that creativity going when you are doing all the things?

Bari Sholom: I spend a lot of time alone. I don't like to socialize. My biggest investment is in my time, and I spend a lot of time recharging and investing in my mental health. I wake up two hours earlier than I need to, so I can meditate and journal and do it.

There are a lot of boxes that need to be checked. I'm very high maintenance spiritually. But this is my priority right now is growing my personal brand and evolving myself into the next iteration of myself so I'm taking the time to do that.

But if I'm at a point of leverage, I don't have children, I don't have a family to take care of, I have my fiancee and I who are equal partners. He helps take a lot of the weight off of just having a roommate, essentially, who could pick up stuff. I'm in a very blessed position to be operating with this much time and I'm using it to my advantage.

Nicole Otchy: Yes, you're just at a phase of life that's like that, but lots of people are at that phase of life and don't use it that way. I mean, yes, of course, lots of us have had a lot of privileges and it's what you do with them that matters.

Bari Sholom: Yeah, well, also, it's the time that I'm in that time, what I think the actual question was. I'm sorry to--

Nicole Otchy: No, no, no, no, I appreciate it, but I'm actually pointing out because I think a lot of people dismiss it like, “Well, I'm young and I don't have a family.” It's like, you can waste your time with or without one.

Bari Sholom: I think of everything as currency. I think of time as currency and obviously money, love, health connections, networking, and whatever you're gifted, whatever type of currency you're gifted with at that moment of your life, I think you should use it to your advantage. So I'm spending a lot of time and energy in building this.

But in that downtime when I'm trying to get into a creative zone, I just try to be as open-minded as possible and try to really break the rules and limitations of how I need to believe I need to show up or what I need to talk about.

I try to let it come to me and through me to resonate. The goal is to resonate, not to get a following or to hit a certain sales goal or something for me. I mean, obviously, all those goals are great and important, but just really trying to come to it with a creative perspective of what's going to resonate, what's going to provide the most impact here, and being open to whatever I receive there. I think it's a lot about reconditioning the limiting thoughts and beliefs you have about yourself and how you need to show up.

Nicole Otchy: Absolutely. Speaking of which, one of the things that was really interesting is that you came out the gate with services that were pretty healthily priced, I would say, I wasn't trying to convince you that it should be $100 an hour or something. It was just like, “Yeah, obviously,” I want to make six figures, I want to make what I want to make.

Was that something you had to overcome was the pricing? Or did you find that once you started getting clients, because you launched with a waitlist, so once you did start getting clients and they were signing, we didn't have to raise your prices right away because you started out at a rate that was very, very generous and healthy in terms of you knew your business expenses, you knew how to do all that, that was handled and we knew where you wanted to go. Talk a little bit about what it was like coming out that way because some people just inch their way up. They don't come out--

Bari Sholom: Totally. I think that if you're doing this for yourself, if you're really doing this for yourself, you have to realize that you're your employer. Whatever financial ceiling you're placing on yourself as your employer, that's what you're going to get. You can't ask for a raise because you give yourself a raise.

You have to want it and accept it, accept that you deserve it, accept that you're going to be providing people with a service. You're not just asking people for money and then running away with it. You're going to be helping them with something. Yeah, position yourself from a point of authority and from a point of “I know what I'm doing,” and confidence.

Nicole said this to me all the time too, that people who are up to the caliber of hiring you as a personal stylist, people who you want to work with, want to hire someone who's an expert. They want to hire someone who is of value. Not that lower prices don't mean you don't provide value, but it looks like you provide more value if you charge a little bit more. So it helps you out in both capacities.

Nicole Otchy: Well, one of the things that you said earlier, and I think this is a really important thing when I said, "How do you keep your creativity?" We tend to think of that as if it's separate from the client world, it's separate and it's not.

When you're pricing yourself in a way that means you don't need 9 to 10 to 12 clients a month, what does that mean? It means the clients that you get and the clients that you serve when you have a higher price point truly get a transformational experience because you have the time to wake up two hours early and meditate and journal and walk and do whatever and not have to wake up two hours early just so you can finish your client load.

Those are two very different ways of interacting with your business and pricing is what allows people to give someone a certain experience. It's part of the cost.

Bari Sholom: Exactly. [inaudible] with yourself, with your time, and your money, you're transacting that too. It's not just their time and their money. I just like to think of everything in life as a balancing act, and my career is not one circle in a Venn diagram that makes up my life.

I am one circle, and my career is a little bit of it, and then my sleep is a little bit of it, and my diet is a little bit of it, and everything makes up one circle that is me, and everything needs to be in balance. If I need enough time to take care of myself, I need enough money to compensate for the time that I need to take care of myself.

Nicole Otchy: And as we're talking about that, it's not like you never had a moment where you were like, “Oh, wow, this is overwhelming,” and like, “Oh my gosh, I'm really going to come out and do this. I'm really going to charge you as much.” Then when you rip the Band-Aid off, it was like, “Oh, people are going to pay? Okay, let's keep it going.”

I want to make a clear that it wasn't like she had no insecurity or wasn't like, “Hey, I'm not sure,” because when you really do something new, your brain's going to tell you it's scary. But why do you raise your prices $500 when you really need to raise them $2,500 and then keep torturing yourself?

Rip the Band-Aid off, sell it, and then be able to live your life the way you're living it, less than a year in. You could just do that. Here you go guys, here's an example. This actually works.

Bari Sholom: I give you permission, because that's one thing I talked about a little bit with Nicole, too, is I needed permission to make changes in my business. Anytime, even after my work had wrapped up with Nicole, I would reach out to her just very professionally, obviously, I was not bombarding her by any means, but I needed permission to make changes. So, yeah, if you need to raise your prices, raise your prices.

Nicole Otchy: Well, let's talk about that. We talked through the type of person you wanted to work with in the psychographics. We then looked through what the bare bones of the services would be, because before you fully launched, we had you work with some clients on the side that were test clients, and some of them paid, some of them didn't.

We went through different iterations of that to get the service where you mostly wanted it, knowing that it was not set in stone, which surprised, I think, you a bit that there were a lot of adjustments.

But I really wanted you and I want all my clients to listen to their gut because if they all have the same service, it's boring. What I'll say about your services is they're not everybody else's. How did you decide what changes to make and what changes maybe needed a little bit more time?

Bari Sholom: That's a good question. I'm still figuring that out. I still don't have the answer for that. But I do know when something is still a question, it's probably not the right time to make a drastic change. Maybe it's time to make little changes.

I like to talk about iteration a lot, little iterations, and see what feels better, almost wiggling into a different position instead of taking a whole different leap and completely repositioning something.

Maybe it is increasing, not to go back to the same issue, but if you're scared to increase it by $2,000, maybe it is starting off with $500. Then the next month or the next week, you increase it another $500. Making little tiny changes, I think, when you're unsure, but it doesn't mean you don't make the change.

Because if something is not working, it needs change. You know what I'm saying? The option is not to not change. It's just at what rate to do it.

Nicole Otchy: At what speed?

Bari Sholom: Exactly. I think things that you're really confident about, things that you could see longevity in maintaining, you can feel free to take action. Because I mean, I did this, and I almost regret it a little bit, but I don't because it's keeping me accountable. But I announced that I'm launching a podcast a month or two ago, and I haven't had any updates on it.

I'm working on it behind the scenes. I'm marinating, working, and figuring out exactly what I'm doing with it, but I haven't updated anyone yet. People might be curious if they remember, but it is a risk of me to just announce that and then have nothing prepared.

I didn't have branding. I have a mic actually, but I didn't have the mic on me at the time. I was not prepared, but I did it because I know that it's an important way that I need to use my voice and it's something that's going to keep nagging at me. It's something that I can easily maintain once I get into the habit of it because I know how important it's going to be for my business. I think just understanding what your gut's telling you too.

Nicole Otchy: Well, and the big difference between going with your gut and regretting it and going with your gut and being like, “Ooh, that felt a little bit edgy.” You're not making announcements, you're not coming through on every day. I think that's an important thing.

There are some people that are very impulsive in how they use their marketing, which you are not. So that decision, we had actually talked about that. It may have just been felt impulsive to tell the public, but that was something that was always on the books. Maybe just you said it a little earlier.

What I love about that is it was your true inner self I believe getting ahead of you and saying, "Come on, I know you don't feel ready, but it feels ready." You didn't feel ready to launch a business and you launched it.

Bari Sholom: Oh, you're right. Yeah. I rarely felt ready for any decision I've ever made, ever.

Nicole Otchy: Right, and here we are. Because you made a really big investment in your business before you even had one, how do you think about investments? Because you're someone who really used the investment well, the way you showed up, you did the work, you asked the questions, you did the brainstorming, you came at it, I felt like you took pretty much full advantage of it, and got a lot. How do you think about investments? Because so few people invest before they're ready.

Bari Sholom: Yeah. I think this comes down to money-ness and worthiness again, a little bit. There's always going to be that block at the end of the day. Let's talk about the investment first.

I think that if I want to have a successful business, I'm willing to make investments for it. Period. I know that that's going to happen. I know how much learning that I need. I think that mentorship is one of the most important methods in which I learn because I'm a very one-to-one hands-on learner.

I want someone to tell me what I need to do. I want to do it, and I want feedback on it, and that's the way that I learn. I think that I know that I need to learn, and I know that I want a successful business, so investing in mentorship is non-negotiable for me.

That's just how I approached it from the jump, and I also knew that I was going to make mistakes, and I wanted to trade currency. I wanted to trade some money for some knowledge.

I didn't lose money. I gained knowledge and I gained perspective. It gave me the confidence to make decisions for myself. Everything is a trade. You're not losing anything. That's, I think, where the money mindset stuff comes into.

But high-earning businesses have high expenses. That's just the way that I approach it. I, again, have a background of not only having a business sense personally, but my parents are both entrepreneurs. That's another point of leverage for me that can't be denied. Really, really thankful to have that background and upbringing.

But yeah, I'm not afraid to make investments in my business because that's an investment in myself and I want to live a nice life. So, yeah.

Nicole Otchy: I think the ownership over that piece was also very impressive to me. Like, “Well, I just want to help people.” You're like, “No, I want a nice life and I want to help people. Those two things are going to go together in my life. How are we going to make that happen?” I was like, “Done, we are done. This is perfect.”

Yeah, it was very cool to work with someone that had really decided ahead of time, which is something that took me a really long time, that I just will make my money back because I say so. I just will make my investment back, not necessarily just money, but this will be successful because I say so. That doesn't mean it won't be hard. It means that in the long run, it will be successful. Those two things can work together.

Bari Sholom: Totally. And understanding that any lesson can be applied to any topic. My mentorship with you isn't just something that I apply to running a personal styling business online. I've taken bits and pieces of the things that I've learned and applied them into other areas of my life.

That's how I approach my content too is like, if I see a solvable problem somewhere in the world, that also somehow applies to styling in some way. All of our problems as human beings are universal and can be internalized and digested in millions of different ways.

But my investment in you wasn't just for one-on-one mentorship for personal styling. It was also in how to run a business by myself. If I ever wanted to change this, I know how to run a consulting business online now. That's the biggest thing. Do you know what I’m saying?

Nicole Otchy: Yeah. This is not just personal styling.

Bari Sholom: It's not just personal styling.

Nicole Otchy: People often style as if they get stuck or get caught. I will say though, that I do think that having somebody that knows, not just me, but anyone that knows the industry is very helpful because it doesn't look like a lot of other coaching and consulting things. There's stuff behind, consultants and coaches have calls, maybe they write notes and then they call it their day.

But stylists have a call with a client and they do all the work, then they come back, there's a lot that doesn't happen face-to-face with the client that they don't see. There can be a lot of times where I see stylists, especially that are new, which is why I was so impressed that you were like, “Nope, tell me how to do this properly from the beginning, I don't want to mess around,” it was like, lots of stylists are like, “Well, okay, I guess I'll just charge for the front of the house stuff, not the back of that.”

People don't realize all the nuance of the business. In some ways, that can really elongate someone's processes. Someone could tell you how to be a consultant, but that doesn't mean that you know how to refine your styling process.

Bari Sholom: Totally. You have the niche expertise as well. I didn't think, “Oh, if I decide to not be a personal stylist one day, this was a waste of money.” You know what I'm saying?

Nicole Otchy: Yeah.

Bari Sholom: Yeah, oh, my God. Even down to the littlest things, all of my processes were outlined, all of my intake forms, everything that would take hours and hours and hours of development and trial and error for years of experience, I learned in the span of four months with you. I mean, I just took years off my life. I started with a really nice understanding of the industry and of just how to do the operations.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, I always say, “I don't want to take away stylist problems. I just want them to focus on the right ones.” I can't fix everyone's problem, but I would like my stylist, any stylist, to not wake up every day being like, “I'm not sure what the right thing to do today is.”

I want to just like, “Here's the path, go down the path, and then there'll be problems on the path. Let's focus on those once you're on it.” Not like, “Hmm, I might get started.” That's such a wasted space to be in.

Some of us have been doing it, just take the information and roll and make it your own, of course, which you're great at. But I was like, “Oh, it’s so refreshing to see someone come out the gate. I'm doing this right, or I'm not interested.”

Bari Sholom: Yeah. I don't know. I love my time. I think that's the thing. I hate wasting time.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah. There's a lot there too. When you think back, how long has it been now? Seven months?

Bari Sholom: Oh, wow.

Nicole Otchy: Seven months since we started working together. Almost four months since you launched.

Bari Sholom: Yes.

Nicole Otchy: Isn't that wild?

Bari Sholom: Yeah.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, that's crazy. Four months since you launched. What things are you most excited about in the business?

Bari Sholom: Oh, oh, my God. I think I'm most excited about waking up whenever I want every day and organizing my life in whatever way that I want. The freedom is just incredible and I'm excited to see how life unfolds the more freedom that I have because I think that you don't really know how powerful it is until you have it. I've never felt this alive. I'm excited about that. Yeah. Is that a good answer? I don't know.

Nicole Otchy: No, it's a great answer. I'm just thinking about how interesting it is because before we got on this call, Bari was like, "Oh, I'm going to change up my services and give myself some more space." I was so impressed. I was like, "Yeah, let's do it. Let's change things up and give me more space, whatever that looks like."

I'm saying that because I think so many stylists or so many people get into business to have the freedom, then they forget that they wanted freedom, and they run themselves into the ground. I hate to keep bringing it back to money because I think it is and it isn't about money, it's about currency as you said, but it's all because they're not willing to charge a rate that allows that to them because there's so much fear in the way.

Bari Sholom: This is a very serious offer. If you need me to call you and bully you into raising your prices, I will literally do it.

Nicole Otchy: It's crazy to me how many stylists are struggling and it's not necessary. It's just not, it's not. You're such a great example of that as someone that just launched and obviously, you have goals you want to hit that you haven't hit yet, but again, it's only been four months in April.

Bari Sholom: Yeah. Thanks for the reminder because I'm pretty hard on myself.

Nicole Otchy: You are very hard on yourself and you're a really hard worker. What's interesting is I think a lot of people think that freedom thing comes from like, “Oh, I don't want to work that hard.” Not that there's anything wrong with that. I'm fine with that. But you're actually a really hard worker. So that's what's interesting. Yeah.

Bari Sholom: I know. It is interesting. I don't actually don't want to be as hard worker, but we could talk about that a different day. That's a different conversation. But yeah, but it's a work hard, play hard type of thing. That's the way we operate in today's world. We have to make money somehow but it is really so that we feel free. It's not so that we have money.

Nicole Otchy: Yeah, 100%. But I think a lot of people don't think about this that much. That's why I was really excited to have a conversation with you because I think that these are inner dialogues. I want more people to even begin to consider, as they're building personal styling businesses.

One of the last things I want to talk about is you've done really, really well on TikTok. You've done very well on TikTok. I'm just curious what your experience has been because you've been creating content longer than September because you had a vintage business, but in that platform very consistently, I as someone who's watched from the outside have seen just the growth there be exponential in terms of just your own technique, how you deliver, how you show up your own personal brand involvement.

You've had some moments of feeling like, “Wow, this is a lot,” but you always get back up. You always show back up. Can you share a little bit about just what that whole journey has been like? Because you've been so consistent.

Bari Sholom: Yeah. I will say TikTok is the thing I have the most beef with. It's not my favorite way to express myself. I said this once in a video, I find the idea of talking into the camera very disorienting. I know I'm talking to someone who doesn't feel like I'm talking to someone so then I just feel like I'm talking to myself and it makes me very self-conscious.

But I know I need to be on TikTok. It's really that balance of like, “TikTok is work for me. TikTok is not fun, where the writing is work, but it's also fun for me.” I think just understanding that there are some interpersonal things that I need to work through there, that's not a reflection on the platform or the potential that it holds. It's a reflection on, "All right, maybe this is something you need to unblock and understand this is another leverage point for your business."

There's so much discoverability here. There's a viral component to TikTok that is unmatched by any other platform. It's silly to not play into it. It's free to do. So doing that, but also leveraging it to refer back to the platforms that you really love.

My main call to action on my TikTok is not to schedule a discovery call with me, it's to go to my Substack. Because that's where I really want to talk to you. That's where the conversation gets more interesting. That's why I want to have a podcast over there too.

But yeah, you don't have to make a TikTok video in the same way that everyone else does. If you don't want to give styling tips, you don't have to. You can do anything to get them over to the place that you do want to give them some advice. You'll have to give little bits and pieces, but also understand that TikTok is for the short attention span.

You don't need to be on there making 10-minute videos. You can make a little catchy quick thing with a funny caption and that could go viral and bring a lot of attention to your page if positioned correctly. You don't want to just be throwing random ideas to the wall.

But that's what Nicole helps you do is understand “This is what your audience wants to hear,” and then when it comes to TikTok, “Okay, how do I deliver it to them on TikTok in the silliest, most lighthearted, but impactful way possible? Then provide them a little bit more depth elsewhere.”

Nicole Otchy: Yeah. Also knowing that it's not like, “Oh, I'm just going to be on TikTok and be great at TikTok.” It's the awareness that every platform has a different one and you're not trying to be on all of them. Yes, you're on Instagram, but I wouldn't say it's your most primary. You're doing great.

All it is is going all in. If you go all in on two, one that's the Attract and then one that's the Nurture, whatever that looks like, then you win the game. It's not about being in all of them. I mean, yeah, sure, you can have an Instagram account and have a presence so someone could cross-check to make sure you're legit. But there's no need to do that.

That's part of the reason why I think you are able to stay creative, not have this incredible amount of burnout, and the fact that you have services that support you in not doing that. But yeah, I think that watching you grow on TikTok and watching you really hit your stride there has been one of the coolest things I've ever seen. So, I'm honored to watch.

Bari Sholom: Yeah, it's still a struggle for me. It's my greatest struggle still to this day.

Nicole Otchy: Still doing it though. I love it. I know other people love it because I've been in the comment section and there's a lot of love for you there. I'm really proud of you.

All right, as we wrap up, what would you leave with, what would you share with a stylist or someone who really either wanted to take their styling business to the next level and felt a little stuck or someone that you left their corporate job and thought, “I'm going all in”? What would your high-level bottom-line piece of advice be for someone that just did it?

Bari Sholom: I would say have systems in place to keep yourself healthy-minded and accountable and have as much fun with it as possible and raise your prices.

Nicole Otchy: Right, good, girl. Thank you so much for hanging out with me today.

Bari Sholom: Thank you. Oh, I love you so much.

Nicole Otchy: Thank you so much for hanging out with me. It turns out that social proof is actually pretty important. So if you could help me out, I'd so appreciate it. If you just had a quick free moment and could leave me a rating or review on the podcast app, that would be killer. And even better, if you wanted to share this episode on Instagram and tag me, that would totally make my day and it would bring so much more awareness to the podcast and would help other stylists just like you who are looking to build lucrative styling business because the better each of us does, the better all of us do. Thanks for hanging out with me and I'll chat with you next time.