We were lucky to catch up with Devon Brown recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Devon, thanks for joining us today. One of the things we most admire about small businesses is their ability to diverge from the corporate/industry standard. Is there something that you or your brand do that differs from the industry standard? We’d love to hear about it as well as any stories you might have that illustrate how or why this difference matters.

Social media has long been understood as a forum for polished images and personas. It is demonized for creating unrealistic expectations and damaging the mental health of everyone, even more so, vulnerable populations such as young women. It is universally accepted that perfection and external validation are the keys to success.

We champion authenticity above all else. We teach our clients to focus on building true communities. We askew the idea that you must amass thousands of followers in order to be granted validation from institutions such as brands and media outlets in order to claim success.

Our clients build a real audience, connect with them and build products for them cutting out the middle man that requires us to engage in the toxic elements of social media in order to be successful.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

For the longest time, I thought social media was this gross place where people went and wasted their time. Ew.

But in 2016 I went on Instagram and started telling my story. I was talking about being a Black woman traveling literally around the world solo. On this journey at the age of 35 I met the man I would eventually marry. The audience I attracted telling this story were people who wanted that for themselves or didn’t realize that it was possible for them too. I started to build and inspire a real community of people who needed to hear my story.
I learned if you are honest, authentic and real on social media, what happens is the people who need to hear your story the most, the people who are going to be inspired by it, are the people that become attracted to you.

And I came to realize that maybe I didn’t like social media, but I recognized it as one of the greatest tools I could ever have to change the world and change the way people think.

Perhaps you’re thinking, Devon wasn’t this YEARS ago, hasn’t social media changed since then?

Well, we just had a client who last week, went viral twice on TikTok.

And it wasn’t from becoming someone else. It wasn’t from doing weird hacky, choreography. It wasn’t from hashtags and other “hacks”. Because that’s not what I do. Instead, I go inside of who you are. I help you tell your authentic story. And that’s what she did. She told two stories about her own life and then received hundreds of comments of people saying, me too, thank you. Just like I did back in the day.

We teach people how to use social media to change the way people think. If democracies can be revolutionized using this tool, we believe it can be used to spread the messages from individual people who can change the world.

For an even deeper understanding of what we do, check out our mission statement, it even had fancy GIFs to keep you entertained: https://www.letswriteyourfuture.com/not-a-boring-mission-statement

How do you keep your team’s morale high?

In my experience, there are three big mistakes business owners make when hiring someone to work for them.

#1 Micromanaging
Part of the service I provide for my clients is helping them hire and train a marketing manager and one of the biggest hurdles I’ve seen is overcoming the fear of letting go of control and the idea that you can do every part of your business better than anyone else because you started it. Instead of creating an environment where a person can use their own intellect to help you achieve your goals, you’re actually making it impossible for that person to work independently.
My top tip: Never go in and fix their mistakes, take the time to coach them through it.

#2 You hire for skillset vs. personality
Aside from jobs like a doctor or a therapist the majority of roles can be taught on the job so I find the most successful candidates are not always the ones with the most experience or relevant education but the person that aligns with your mission and personality most.
My top tip: Think about your weaknesses, are you someone who struggles to keep time, try hiring someone who is punctual, creating a balance in the business

#3 You don’t create a safe environment for mistakes to happen
This is a big one. Mistakes are going to happen, including by you! When you create unnecessary stress and pressure around making mistakes you inadvertently create the perfect storm for more mistakes.
My top tip: Focus on empowering that person to find the solution rather than punishing for the mistake.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

It is not my job to solve all of my clients problems and it’s important to understand the other factors in their life that may have an effect on how they interact with me and my product. I once had a client who was dissatisfied with the results of my coaching Program: The Social Media Accelerator.

This was extremely distressing to me because I am so heavily invested in the results of my clients. In order to relieve my own pain, I quickly went into “fix it” mode offering a multi-point recovery plan that would double down on the efforts of everyone involved. What I failed to take into account is that my client had many things going on in her personal life and business that made it impossible for her to take all of this on. She was in survival mode and I was adding more work to the pile.

Our relationship ended civilly, but badly as I am accustomed to maintaining long-term relationships with my clients even after they stopped working with us. From this experience, I built something called the client distress principle, a series of questions I ask myself and my client to assess their current reality. From now on, if a client expresses displeasure, I find out where they are coming from and what other factors may effect their decision-making capabilities. This allows me to offer solutions that are more in-line with where they are and stop taking responsibilities for things outside my control.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.letswriteyourfuture.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/letswriteyourfuture/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Letswriteyourfuture/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/devonlbrown/