The Power of People Management and Processes with Colleen Taylor, Chief Operating Officer of BOOM! by Cindy Joseph

Colleen Taylor is the Chief Operating Officer at BOOM! by Cindy Joseph, the first pro-age cosmetic and skin care line for women of every generation. Colleen and her team are responsible for over $30 million in revenue in 2020 alone. She is also the creator of the Smart Project Management training course at SmartMarketer.com, where she helps project managers scale their businesses. Outside of work, Colleen is an avid snowboarder who has been practicing the sport since 1987.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

How Colleen Taylor built her decades-long digital marketing and project management career
Colleen’s experience working at DigitalMarketer and why she left to start her own consultancy
Colleen talks about joining Ezra Firestone at Smart Marketer
How Colleen’s digital journey first began
What Colleen looks for in a successful project manager and how she makes hiring decisions
The REAL strategy for leadership: recognize talent, elevate your team, bring your A-game, and be likable
Expert strategies for helping your company feel more in control
How to utilize customer feedback to successfully scale your business

In this episode…

What is the most critical factor for scaling ecommerce brands—or any business for that matter? According to today’s guest, Colleen Taylor, it all comes down to great people management and seamless processes.

When Colleen joined BOOM! By Cindy Joseph, the company was already experiencing success thanks to the team’s hard work and excitement. However, they were struggling to catch up with the demands of a growing brand and multiple product launches. This is where Colleen came in to help. Using her people and product management skills, she implemented the organized systems and processes necessary to scale the company to tens of millions of dollars in revenue. So, what are the strategies behind Colleen’s success?

Listen to this episode of the eCommerce Profits Podcast as Joshua Chin chats with Colleen Taylor, the Chief Operating Officer at BOOM! by Cindy Joseph, about the power of people management and processes. Colleen shares decades of wisdom in one value-packed episode—including the lessons she learned from her time working at Smart Marketer and her strategies for successful leadership. Stay tuned for more!

Resources Mentioned in this episode

Special Mentions:

Books Mentioned:

Related Episode:

Ezra Firestone on the eCommerce Profits Podcast

Sponsor for this episode

This episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency.

If you are a direct-to-consumer ecommerce brand that wants to unlock the optimum customer lifetime value through email marketing, then look no further than Chronos Agency!

Our team of passionate email marketing experts have helped hundreds of brands generate over $70 million in return from email alone, and our clients receive an average of 3500% ROI from our efforts.

Chronos Agency has worked with a variety of brands, including Truly Beauty, Alya Skin, and many more. Our mission is to help real businesses achieve real results.

If you want to take your revenue to the next level using email marketing, be sure to email our team at sales@chronos.agency or visit chronos.agency to learn more.

Episode Transcript

Intro 0:04

Welcome to the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top founders and experts in the e commerce industry and take an in depth look at their struggles and successes in growing e commerce brands profitably.

Joshua Chin 0:21

Josh Chin here, I’m the host of the eCommerce Profits Podcast where we feature top experts in the e commerce industry. And we go behind the scenes of the struggles and successes in growing a brand. Now this episode is brought to you by Chronos Agency. If you’re a direct to consumer ecommerce brand that is ready for next level growth and to unlock the optimal lifetime value of your customers through email marketing, Chronos is your company. Now we’ve helped over 100 300 brands get over $17 million in return from email alone, and our clients get an average of 3500% ROI from our efforts. We’ve worked with brands like Truly Beauty, The Udi, The Beard Struggle, and many more. So the next step is to email us at Sales@Chronos.Agency, you can go to Chronos.Agency to learn more. And today’s guests I have with me, Colleen Taylor, is the Chief Operating Officer at BOOM! by Cindy Joseph along with her team, she’s responsible for over $30 million in revenue in 2020 alone. She’s also the Co-author of Smart Project Management at SmartMarketer.com, go check that out SmartMarketer.com. She’s also a snowboarder, and has been the snowboard since the year 1987. Was it Colleen?

Colleen Taylor 1:43

1987 A long time.

Joshua Chin 1:47

That’s amazing. And

Colleen Taylor 1:49

I mean, that does not mean I’m super skilled at it. I’m good. But yeah, I’ve just been doing it for a really long time.

Joshua Chin 1:54

You know, there’s a thing that I say I believe that every every high performer has an obsession over something at every point in their lives. And in every interview that I conduct I always have. I always include this question like what are you currently obsessed about? If that person says I’m not obsessed about anything? That’s typically a bad sign? To me at least. That’s gonna be my first question to you, Colleen. So, do you agree with that statement?

Colleen Taylor 2:28

Yeah, I definitely think that and I am obsessed with something which I will really reveal to you. It may seem odd to you, but I don’t know. Um, but yeah, I agree with the statement as far as I think that, you know, high achievers really, like we just we, when we get into something we get into it, we get into a deep we get into it. Why? You know, we just want to know everything about it. And yeah, so my current obsession is it’s called Washi. So it’s Japanese papers. Oh, man, it’s Japanese paper. So it’s it’s handmade. It’s made out of made out of rice. You know, like a rice paper and then it’s hand silk screened with multiple layers of it’s like a handcrafted, the most beautiful, tactile, you know, just delicious. I don’t know how to describe it. But just the most amazing artisans that make this paper and I happen to make I have like a little just a little side hustle. I make a little stationery like little cards and greeting cards and blank cards and things just kind of give out to friends as gifts. And right now the paper that I am obsessed with hashtag paper obsessed. Is this Japanese Washi paper. Yeah, I’m into it. I’m into it.

Joshua Chin 3:52

That is so cool. That’s so cool. And for those for those who don’t really know who you are in your background, can you give us a quick brief kind of run through of your career up to this point? I know it’s a it’s a lot and you’ve worked with some incredible people including Ezra Firestone currently shout out to Ezra and SmartMarketer.com. And so yeah, give us a quick intro of who Colleen Taylor is.

Colleen Taylor 4:18

Yeah, so I’ll give you I’ll start way back in you know, my initially I went to college for fine art. So which is why I am currently obsessed with making stationery and little pieces of art. Like I’m all about creating little art. And stationery happens to be a nice neat little medium. I used to throw ceramics and not throwing them out. That’s what they call when you make it on a potter’s wheel. You know, you’re throwing strikes, I used to do that I did some painting. photography was actually my, my major in college. I had a minor in graphic design. So I came from very creative background and I Thought and this is I was living in Jersey at the time, right near New York City. And I got my degree. And I thought, the last thing I want to do is live in Jersey, and be what they call a bridge and tunnel rat, which basically means you work in the city, because that’s where all the good jobs are in the art field, right. And you either take the bridge, or you take the tunnel, so you are a bridge, and tunnel rat. So you’re going over there to work, and you’re coming back to Jersey to sleep, and you go back there. So that’s what they call them, at least back in that day. Hopefully, that’s not offensive to anyone, but that’s what they call them. And I was like, I don’t want to be a bridge and tunnel rat, I would like to enjoy my life and my existence. And, you know, I’m sure there’s, there’s some career that I can find or create for myself, that doesn’t involve me getting on a subway, or, you know, a bus every day and going into Manhattan. Even though I love Manhattan, I spent tons of time there during art school. So I moved to California, and I said, Alright, I’m gonna take my degree, and I’m going to move out to San Diego, which is where I moved and where I currently live. And basically, there was this thing, back then it was it was about 97, when I moved to San Diego, and there was this thing called the internet that was starting to get popular and like everybody was on the computer, and I was like, you know, I, I get it. But I don’t get it, I want to understand this a little bit more. So I came out to San Diego without a job and just sort of like ready to find my way. And I thought I have to get a job. I looked in the paper, the newspaper, you know, those big things like all these things, like we don’t even use the paper, opened up the newspaper to the classified section, kids like that. And looked for a job. And there was one there was a job opening for it was for a customer service rep for an internet startup. And I was like, oh, there’s that internet thing, again, startup, I’m gonna go find out what that’s all about. So I went to this interview. And I was like, show me what you know, like this internet thing. And basically, I was the customer service rep for this internet startup. And after hours, I would stay behind. And I would I asked the, you know, the owner of the company, and I said, You know, I have a graphic design degree. And like, I’m looking at your website, this website thing again, like, these were all new terms. And I was like, I think I could make it look better. You know, I’m a designer, I feel like I could make it look better. It looks kind of like, where do you find stuff. So it was really the beginnings of all say, you know, GUI, graphic user interface, like you want to make it so that it’s it’s user friendly. And I was like, you know, I think I could make it look better. But I have no idea how this works. I worked with, you know, pen and ink and, you know, had to like, had to like rent an hour on the computer when I was in college because there was only three computers in the art lab, you know, like, I don’t know, you know, I would have no idea how to make this webpage. So he said, Well stay after work today. And I’ll show you how, and then you can you know, I’ll take you up on it if you can make it look better. So he showed me how to right click on a webpage, right click View Source. So you know how you can view the source of pain? Well, back then it was like straight up. html, just super like basic HTML. He said, right click source, I viewed the source of this web page. And that was it. That was that was the beginning of my new life. And I was like this code HTML, what is this? How can I learn it? How can I and I essentially went from that day at work, I went to the library and another old foreign term, you know, like at the library, that building with the books in it, and I went in, I didn’t have a computer at home. I went into the library and I checked out books on all sorts of markup language like HTML, sgml, VR, ml, any kind of markup language, and I was like, open the books. I started writing code longhand in a notebook. And then then you know, the next day I would go back to work and work all day and then at the end of the workday, I would type in what I had studied in the books and and then view the page and see what I made. And I taught myself HTML that way. So I figured out how to like move things around and make tables and again, HTML all the you know, these these languages have all evolved so much. Now you got to know CSS and you got to know all these other things. But back then it was like, you could make us Little career out of, you know, building web pages in straight up HTML. And so I learned it, I taught myself HTML. And then I moved into you know, I got my first job in a real company, that company went under, and I got my job, but I could do coding, I could also do graphic design. So I was sort of like a double threat. I could do both. And, you know, just sort of moved up for the next couple years did freelancing and worked for a couple companies. And then I met Eben Pagan, who I don’t know if you know Eben Pagan, but Eben, is sort of like they call him the OG. Oh, yeah. You know, of, of Internet Information, Product Marketing. Yeah. So at the time, Evan had a book called Double Your Dating, and he was building, it was an Ebook. And he was building, you know, a back end library of products, so that you buy the E book, and now we upsell you to these other, you know, these other products. So I learned the business of how to market the E book at the time. I mean, we weren’t marketing on Facebook. I started working for him in 2005, maybe 2004 2005 or so, you know, there was no Facebook, there was no Instagram, there was no Skype, there was no zoom. It was just, you know, we did we did, I think it was Conferencecall.com. That’s how we all got on business meetings and stuff. But I got to see the technology arrived, you know, evolve over time. And essentially, you know, learned how he would film and cut and create these back end products at the time. We were printing them on DVDs and CDs, like old school man old school, and I worked for Eben for Wow, until 2013. So I worked for him for a good eight solid eight years. And learned everything. I mean, I owe him so much just for in terms of like, opening my eyes opening doors to like, just new technology and new meeting new people.

Joshua Chin 12:10

And are you still in contact with with Eben?

Colleen Taylor 12:14

I mean, I on just Facebook, I see him here and there comment on things. The last time I saw him was at an event called Genius Network with Joe Polish. It’s Joe Polish’s. Yeah. It’s his event. And it was in Arizona, I want to say it was like, I was already working full time with Ezra. So it wasn’t that long ago, I want to say two or three years ago, and Eben was there and I got to see him. And so yeah, I mean, you know, we know each other very well, but I don’t really keep in close contact with them. But yeah, so I worked there till 2013. And then I you know, I was just ready to move on ready to take my knowledge, I felt like I had learned so much. I want to go you know, and and bring it somewhere else and see what else I can do. And I went to work for Ryan Deiss. And Perry Belcher and, you know, the the guise of DigitalMarketer. So Roland Frasier,

Joshua Chin 13:17

DigitalMarketer.com

Colleen Taylor 13:18

Yeah, nice. Yeah, DigitalMarketer. And I didn’t work there for a long time, maybe about six months or so. But this was like, pivotal in where, you know, in my career, and really where I’m at right now, I owe a lot of it to DigitalMarketer, and of course, Eben, but I, you know, and, by the way, a little side story here. I thought, I know, everybody, you know, I know so many people in the industry, because working with Evan and but when I was ready to kind of like look for something else. You know, I was like, I’ll just put my feelers out when I’m ready. So I had told my husband like, kind of, you know, I think I’m ready to like move to the next stage of my career. I think I’m going to start looking around and he said, Oh, my friend. Again, we live in San Diego. He said, Oh, my friend, Roland. I was telling him about you and that you work for Eben Pagan. He was like, Oh, I must meet your wife right away. And then it’s like legendary in you know, in this industry. And so my husband said, my friend Roland wants you to meet them for coffee. So I went and met Roland Frasier for coffee in Sydney. Wow. And I didn’t know I knew who Ryan Deiss was. And Perry Belcher because they were sort of like the, the outward facing now of course, Roland is like, you know, he’s, he’s customer for he’s out out there on stages and all that but at the time, he was not he was kind of like the, I’ll say the silent genius behind, you know, what was going on at DigitalMarketer. And so I didn’t know who Roland Frasier was, I just knew my husband knew him. So I went and had coffee with Roland one day and you know, you know, we Talk about what I did for Eben. And he said, you know, why don’t you come and do that for my company? And I was like, I mean, sure, I’m entertaining ideas like, you know, I’m definitely looking to go, you know, move on. And I said, so what is your company? And he’s like, Oh, well, I’m with DigitalMarketer, you know, Ryan Deiss. And Perry Belcher, and all of a sudden, I went from like, you know, oh, cool, meeting this guy role into like, Oh, my gosh, like, your DigitalMarketer? You know, I was, I was a little bit starstruck, I have to say, and, you know, Roland is an amazing person and basically said, Come on down, you know, come on down to Austin, we’ll do a little interview. And, you know, basically, I think this will work out. So I did go down to Austin, I met with Ryan and Richard and Perry and Roland. And essentially, they hired me. And at that time, they were all in an office, I think they might say, I’m not sure with COVID what’s happening with their office situation, but I was used to eight years of working from my house with Eben, like, I never there was never any office to go into or anything. So I was like, Okay, I will, you know, I will go to the office, but like, I’m not moving to Austin, Texas, like I will. I’ll go there to meet everybody. And then I’m going to work from home. Is that cool? And they were like, yeah, yeah, in fact, we’re moving into potentially, you know, having virtual workers anyway. So like, that’ll be great. We’ll see how it works. And, you know, I think because they were still at the beginning stages of, of evolving their business into a virtual or even like, a part time virtual. They were used to

Joshua Chin 16:42

have a remote kind of thing. Yeah.

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