Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Ashton Smith. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Ashton, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
Some of my fondest memories growing up revolve around listening to family stories. From an early age, I became acquainted with the power of legacy. I learned about how my great-great-great grandpa was a brick mason, my papaw worked with his father to build major highways, my great grandmother baked cakes with her sisters, my dad partnered with his father to build their company, and my mom and dad built something from nothing.
Hearing these stories – over and over again – never got old. And it gave me such a deep appreciation for those who went before me. Learning about people I will never meet on this earth and discovering the heart, soul, and energy they put into their family, their businesses, and their visions inspired me to the core.
It showed me that the actions of today have generational impact.
At The Awakening, a coaching and education platform for soul-led founders, our mission is simple. We aim to help women in business build intentionally so they can leave a powerful legacy behind. We deeply believe in building a life and business that has impact well beyond our lives and present day. We are building something far greater than ourselves.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers
I entered the entrepreneurial space in 2017. I had no idea what I truly wanted to build, but I knew I wanted to build SOMETHING. Over the coming years, I would go on to build a blog, co-found an Agency, and run a Print Publication before the inception of our current company. Running our Print Publication, The Authentic Woman, was absolutely foundational for me as a Founder. Our Publication featured raw, real stories from women all over the world on topics ranging from postpartum depression and miscarriages to self-doubt and self-worth. We traveled around the States to meet with some of these women in person and capture photography to be featured in a non-retouch format. This is where I learned how to build a true community and movement.
At the beginning of 2019, I pivoted big time and launched our current company, The Awakening. Although running a Print Publication was fulfilling, it came with its own set of challenges. And I found myself both craving more intimacy and impact on the women before me as well as greater profitability for the company. So, we began building our coaching and education platform. And let me tell you, it was humble beginnings, but I knew it was more aligned than ever before.
Over the last few years, The Awakening has grown to serve over 300 women in 13 countries around the world. At the surface, we are known for helping Founders design profitable and sustainable companies that stand the test of time. Many of our clients come to us to increase profitability, elevate their marketing, expand their companies with new divisions, integrate passive income, and even found new companies – to name a few. And we are proud to offer a variety of support options that can accommodate Founders from the startup stage all the way to the scaling stage.
This work lights us up, but if we go even deeper beyond the surface, we ultimately help Founders proactively build their legacy, shift generational patterns, and change the trajectory of their family line forever. We’re all about holistic, long-lasting transformation.
As a coach, I love working with highly passionate, extremely visionary women that have about 100 ideas at any given point in time. One of the things that differentiates my coaching style is my ability to see the larger vision and hold space for it (even when it logistically makes zero sense in the present) and then reverse engineer in order to create a tactical strategy to get us there. Along the way, I fuse soul AND strategy with our clients – because I care just as much about their life and their health as I do the success of their business. I care less about quick success and much more about LASTING success that prioritizes inner peace and joy.
One of the things I am most proud of about our company is simply our clients. It continues to be my greatest honor to support such visionary, powerhouse women. Just this month, we are celebrating clients approaching the 1 million dollar mark, surpassing $500k, successfully pivoting their companies, growing passive income divisions, purchasing a Lake House rental property, landing features in big time publications, and so much more. I am truly, deeply so proud of them and grateful to do this work alongside them.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Upon the inception of our company, I was so eager and committed to get it off the ground and build our initial client and revenue base. So, fairly quickly I decided to invest a little over $20,000 in an ads and funnels specialist to do so. Keep in mind that we were a startup at this stage, so $20,000 was a lot of money. But we were not to worry because we were promised to make our investment back plus more.
Spoiler alert: we didn’t. And even further, we didn’t make one penny.
At the time, this was devastating. And all of the questions began flooding into my mind: how will I make this back? Am I cut out for this? Should I quit now? What if I can’t figure this out? I was hit hard with imposter syndrome, fear, anxiety, you name it. But the worst of all: I felt like I’d lost all hope.
I’ve always said that I don’t want to quit while I’m down. If I’m to walk away from anything, I want it to be on my own terms when things are working well. So, I kept going. I picked up the pieces, went back to the drawing board, and revised my strategy in order to create different results.
In the coming 5-6 months, I worked my butt off, consistently tweaked my actions and measured my efforts, and I was able to not only make that $20,000 back, but I stabilized our revenue, replaced my full time income, and officially went full time in the business.
I always look back at this moment and think: “I would do it all over again. Again and again and again.” It was painful, I won’t lie. It hurt my ego big time. But it was absolutely instrumental in the success, both short and long term, of our company. This moment increased my strength and expanded my resilience more than ever before.
Moral of the story: keep going. You never know what lies on the other side of your resiliency.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
Just like everyone else, we started with 0 people and built from the ground up. But even in the early days, I always knew that quality of relationships would outweigh the quantity of audience members. And this belief is what has helped us not only grow on social media, but it has helped us grow a multiple six figure company.
More than anything, we prioritized establishing deep relationships with the people in front of us. Plain and simple. What that tangibly looked like was keeping an intentional engagement list, going out of my way to talk to people and support people, and show them that I genuinely cared for them – their lives, their families, their goals, their businesses. This type of connection creates a ripple effect of growth – not just for your social media but for your word of mouth marketing for your brand.
This approach is what has led to some of our clients growing to six figures with less than 1,000 followers and even for us, generating $40,000 just from ONE client. When you prioritize genuine, deep, authentic relationships, it goes far. For the person seeking to grow and build a loyal audience, I recommend the following:
1. Consistently provide value: I always tell my clients that presence is better than perfection. You want to be a source of value, inspiration, and more for your community. You want to remain top of mind for them. How do you do that? By consistently showing up. Go above and beyond to share truly valuable content (less fluff here) that people learn from and want to share with others.
2. Proactively connect with your people: Content is NOT enough on its own. This is one of the biggest misconceptions in the online space. Although stand out content will attract some people, you don’t want to bet 100% on this. You want to be in control of your connection process. Create an engagement tracker or even a lead list that allows you to document key information about the people in front of you. Seek to connect, ask questions, serve, and you will establish a loyal audience.
3. Prioritize depth: Again, quality relationships will take you much farther than a large quantity of audience members. Go deep with the people in your community now. Ask how you can support them, what they need help with, send them fun resources, and be generous every step of the way.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://myawakening.co
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/myawakeningco/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myawakeningco
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashton-smith-545294a5/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCThIh7Yio-20DaeNZlrNybQ
- Podcast: https://myawakening.
co/podcast