Creator of Session in Progress, Angus O’Loughlin
“Your ego gets crushed when you recognize how bad you are at business.”
No one likes feeling like a newb, and business will have you feeling like that over and over again, but it’s learning to get comfortable with being a learner that creates magic.
This chat with Angus O’Loughlin, Creator of Session in Progress is an honest perspective of transitioning from a fulfilling career, one you felt pretty good in, and dropping straight into the deep end of business.
You’ll hear about:
Starting by creating a job instead of a business
Learning the skills you need on the go
Finding inspiration through observation
Learning to become a salesperson over everything else
And hiring before the business is ready to
Knowing that all you struggle with in business is normal keeps you going, this chat will give you exactly what you need to grow and learn another day.
Check out Session in Progress online
Connect with Angus on IG @angus_ol
You can find more show notes and transcripts at unemployedandafraid.com.au/episodes.
And don’t forget to follow Unemployed & Afraid on IG , TikTok and LinkedIn
And show your support for this independent podcast and small business by shouting your host a cuppa at buymeacoffee.com/unemployedpod
You can reach your host on email kim@unemployedandafraid.com.au on IG and on LinkedIn
Keep scrolling for the conversation transcript…
Kim Kerton [00:00:00]:
Welcome to Unemployed and Afraid, a podcast that explores the glorious mess of building your own business with the people doing it. I'm your host and fellow business builder, Kim Kerton. Thank you for being here. Let's get into some good, honest small business chat.
Listener, I'm keen to keep this intro extra short for you today because I can't wait to get you into the learnings and insights contained within this conversation. I really enjoyed listening back and I know you're going to love this. It's an honest perspective of transitioning from a fulfilling career, one that you felt pretty good about your performance in, and dropping straight into the deep end and chaos of business.
Kim Kerton [00:00:41]:
Angus, who you'll hear all about in a moment, shares his experience of starting by creating a job instead of a business, learning the skills you need on the go, finding inspiration through observation, learning to become a salesperson over everything else, and hiring before the business is ready. Absolutely no one likes feeling like a noob, which is exactly how it feels to step into a business and into building a business of your own. But it's becoming that learner, and becoming that learner over and over again that creates absolute magic for yourself. So let's get you into it. I'm here with Angus O'Loughlin, creator of the podcasting business, previously known as from your pocket, recently relaunched as Session in Progress, which is a Melbourne based podcast studio and production agency. Session in progress works with creators on developing, producing and publishing accessible content. They don't just make podcasts, they build audiences and create communities through your stories. It's a business born after 15 years in the entertainment industry, covering radio, tv and of course, podcasting.
Kim Kerton [00:01:53]:
With Angus as co host of Listen Able, the podcast that challenges what do you think it's like to live with a disability? With his other co host, Dylan Alcott and GotSomme, the master sommelier wine podcast where you learn how to assess taste and make wine from a master sommelier. He is 10 million views and 3 million podcast downloads later and is now focusing on helping others bring their conversations to the front with professional studios, video podcasting, and of course, accessible content. Angus doesn't shy away from sharing the crazy details that go on behind the scenes while building a business. He's recently published a short form podcast series that details the key moments of his business building experience with a nice little reveal of a wholly revamped business execution which is so deeply relatable as we, you, me listener, totally understand the evolution that takes place once you get going in business. Knowing that we're up for some proper, good, honest small business chat from someone in the thick of it. I am very excited to hear more of your story. Angus, welcome to unemployed and afraid.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:02:54]:
Lovely introduction. Thank you very much, Kim. Very happy to be here.
Kim Kerton [00:02:58]:
It's good to have you. And I have, of course, listened to session in progress. And I enjoyed how much your partner, your lovely partner plays a part in this, because our partners are just so important in that experience of building our business, whether they're actively involved in it or not. So I'm going to kick us off with asking how you think she would describe you.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:03:18]:
Oh, we had a catch up yesterday. A wine and a piece of paper. An. A three piece of paper. We sort of write down how we're going. It's a mixture of business and personal. Sounds quite mature, but sometimes it's just drawing. Yeah.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:03:32]:
What would you say about me? I'm very loyal. I could be much more loving or at least pick up her. What are those things? They call it her love signals or whatever that is. I could be more of that love language. Love language. I could probably read a bit more into her love language, but, yeah, I think she would give me some. It would be nice, it'd be positive. She'd probably give you some kudos for giving this business a crack when I were pretty settled and stable.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:03:57]:
And yeah, I think she thinks I'm a pretty great dad.
Kim Kerton [00:03:59]:
I am smiling immensely at your piece of paper and your, what you called, very adult interaction. In a couple of weeks time, I have scheduled with my partner our half yearly whip, which is that very thing. We will be sitting down and talking about our goals and, you know, business goals, like professional goals, personal goals, and what we want for life and all those things. I actually think it's really healthy.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:04:21]:
Yeah, we. It's not an original idea. It was taken from, I think, the barefoot investor. I really, you know, I've always been really savvy with investing. You know, I was on a pretty good income for a good period of time, and I never really had any sort of vices that restricted me from putting money away, so I invested that pretty well. And I've sort of always taken this acumen of financial knowledge into the relationship, and Em wasn't in that space, but I could tell she was interested. And so when you start having kids together, you start got to kind of piece everything together. So it's just been a kind of a journey of conversation around what does today look like, what does next week look like, and what does the rest of the year look like? And beyond and, yeah, we're routine now, so what's mine is hers and hers is mine.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:05:04]:
So that's probably horrific to say on a podcast, but I think she'd have me via de facto rule anyway if we weren't engaged. But, um, yeah, no, so it's just about seeing where we're at and where we would have hoped to have been. And the business is a huge part of that. Cause it takes up not only a lot of time, but money.
Kim Kerton [00:05:20]:
Yeah, I wholly agree. And I think when we miss that opportunity to do that with our partners, we actually place a lot of unnecessary pressure on the business itself to kind of keep it separate and not, you know, work together as a bit of an entity in that. So, yeah, I actually think it's an inadvertent little learning just to kick us off. Yeah, definitely. Tell me about, I guess, making that moment, the switch from employee to self employed. What was your catalyst?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:05:44]:
Covid? I think I was doing a. I had the best shift in the world, to be perfectly honest. I had a great radio career, but my last role was I did three years of national breakfast at SCA, hosting it with Dylan Alcott, and that's how he launched listenable that we spoke about in the intro. And that shift was amazing for I'd gone from breakfast radio for the majority of time or nights radio where you've got a full time job plus, you know, you throw a lot into it. Weekend breakfast was a meeting on a Friday, like 01:00 till 02:00 on air from nine till twelve and then recording for an hour after that, which then I would spend an hour or so editing the content for Sunday, which is pre recorded. So I just had all this time and I've always loved working and content's sort of always been what I've done. So I just started to get a bit bored, especially during COVID where we couldn't leave the house and listen. Able just became more of a passion than the radio was for me.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:06:36]:
And, you know, I'd done 15 years on air at that point and I was sort of already probably looking for a pivot. And that was kind of the kick start of spending so much time to really think about what I wanted to see for the second part of my career. And I started to put some stuff on paper.
Kim Kerton [00:06:52]:
What did that paper look like at that stage?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:06:54]:
Yeah, well, I drew the logo from your pocket, which was the previous business for the last two and a bit years. I don't know where that came. The way that I sort of design is visually first and then work back from it. So I've always sort of started at the end and then work my way back to the start. So I didn't write down how is investments or what this could look like and how to start a company. I didn't know any of that. I just started with from your pocket as the name and the logo, and that's what the first thing on the page was. And I was like, I like that.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:07:22]:
And this is what it stands for. I wrote that down, and then I sort of started to write down how I was gonna make that work, what listenable looked like next to got some, which was already an idea with a demo, and I'd already had some interest from Dan Murphy's to sponsor that podcast, which they did. And so I was like, okay, well, here's how I'm making money out of this. And here's how I'm making money out of this. What if I did that three more times? There's a wage, a good wage. And so that's sort of the ideation of the idea. The piece of paper just looked like chicken scratch.
Kim Kerton [00:07:52]:
I love that. I'm gonna try my very best for the listener's sake because I do love to talk about this topic, as we all know. I'm going to try not to nerd out. I'm podcasting too much, but looking at that piece of paper at that stage and looking at the structure of, okay, I've got a couple of shows here, and I've got a couple of pieces of advertiser interest, which is a fantastic way to get started. How once you got started in that process, then has that advertiser landscape changed for you and how has that affected the business?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:08:20]:
Yeah, great question and something I think about often. I got. I've been very lucky in that I've always had. My timing has always been right. I bought a house at the right time. You know, the place in Adelaide boomed afterwards. I met Emily at a time when I just decided I was sick of being single. Now she's my fiance, and we've got two kids.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:08:39]:
I just feel like I've been very blessed with putting myself in the right position for the timing to make sense. And that's what this was. I was about halfway through my contract, so let's say it was June. My contract for weekend breakfast finished at the end of the year, and I'd started to write down that piece of paper and got some. I pitched to listener at the time, and they just said to me, and I got a great relationship with todders. And he just said to me, hey mate, we're just not doing food and wine or food and drink podcast. We've experimented with them before, it just didn't work for us. And I was like, cool, well, I think this is good.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:09:11]:
I've demoed this to people who I think is the audience. They've actually got a lot out of it. And like, people in the industry who gave me constructive feedback wasn't just like, yes, people around me. And anyway, so I just went out and pitched it, found a contact at Dan Murphy's and they were like, yeah, we'll take it on for twelve months and that doesn't happen. But that's the timing. They were looking to get into podcasting. I literally emailed the week after they'd had a conversation. The team, they were amazing to work with for that first year, and the same with listenable.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:09:41]:
I towards the end of that year, I'd already said that I was leaving sea and a client came on board like a DM's listenable, which is where most of our clients came from, businesses, and said, hey, look, we're interested in doing a long partnership. And I turned that around into a substantial three month partnership that paid the bills for a bit.
Kim Kerton [00:10:00]:
Fantastic. So tell me about then stepping into this business at that stage. So you out there by yourself, you've got a little bit of revenue coming in. What were your concerns at that stage, if you had any? Or what was the energy behind it?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:10:16]:
I was really naive in starting the business, that I could just pick it up, the business acumen quite quick, and that hasn't been the case. I found myself really busy starting out from realistically, September, October, starting to put it while I was still on air, starting to put some ideas together, and then hitting the ground running from January, I realized how much it took to edit a podcast full time, then edit a second podcast that was coming out weekly with daily Instagram reels. I was doing seven Instagram reels per day for got some sorry, per week and then listenable. And I was creating all of the socials, the transcription, the captioning, because we're accessible, you know, full length videos that went with the audio. And then I realized at the end of the week, I got all the work done, but I wasn't able to work on the business. I was just completely working in the business. Now. I know that's sort of terminology that I heard a bit, but I didn't recognize that until very recently that I shouldn't be in the business.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:11:13]:
I should be on the business. So I was working nonstop. And then once that three month partnership for listenable had ended, I lifted up my head and went, oh my God, I don't have another sponsorship past this. I should have been working on this for the last three months, and I wasn't. I was sort of resting on the laurels of the business starting out at that point. So, yeah, I learned pretty quickly that I needed to do more than just be a content creator.
Kim Kerton [00:11:39]:
It's amazing how often this happens. It certainly has even happened to me how we create a job for ourselves rather than create a business in those early stages, and it's kind of like a gateway drug into that actual business structure that comes along with it. It's like, okay, I'm real busy now all of a sudden, and I'm running a business, but I have just essentially created myself another full time job, which is actually quite a scary place to be, as you described, because then all of a sudden you can look around and go, oh, this isn't sustainable and this isn't going to be easy for me. How did you redirect at that stage? What did your marketing look like to get yourself out there? How did you start generating a little bit more revenue? Where did you go from there?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:12:23]:
I had no marketing, like zero. I didn't have a Google Ad placed, even if it was a dollar a day. I wasn't doing anything in the form of marketing because I was so busy. You know, once I stopped doing the edit, I would just work on sales for listenable and trying to outreach to people who had shown interest. And so I didn't have any sort of plan for the business. I was just creating podcasts. And then I get to Friday before 30 and I just upload the episode and I'd be like, cool week. Done.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:12:51]:
Let's start again on Monday. It wasn't until I started to really understand that I was so far behind the eight ball and working in a co working space was really helpful to see other people doing things differently. I could see other computer screens and see that these people were working on Mailchimp and HubSpot and I didn't know what the word CRM was for the first eight months. Like, no idea. And still to this day, my CRM is pretty rudimentary and could do a lot more with automation. But yeah, it was just, I started on my train rides to and from home to dedicate that 45 minutes each way to learning something new about business, whether that be listening to an audiobook or whether that be watching a YouTube video, and I would start to kind of piece how I should be doing things a little bit different. And then those small incremental changes over time led to, you know, me being able to call myself a little bit better at business. I'm not good at business, but I'm certainly better.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:13:50]:
And I laughable at where I was at the start of 2022.
Kim Kerton [00:13:54]:
What was it like to have to switch from creating to selling?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:13:59]:
Yeah, there was a piece that I read in a book, and it said, you're not the editor, you're not the production team, you're not the boss, you're the salesperson, because nobody knows your business better than you. And it kind of hit me between the eyes that I was like, no one can sell my business and what we do better than me. I truly believe in the products that we have, and we have the analytics to show that we do have an audience that could sell to somebody. And I know the ins and outs of what's possible. So I recognize that when a client asks you a question, I didn't need a third person to ask if that was possible. For one, I was the host of both of the shows, so I could say whether it was possible from a talent point of view. I could say from a production point of view, yeah, we can geo locate that ad. So it does just hit Sydney or New South Wales, wherever you want to be.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:14:44]:
So I was able to work on that, but I still, you know, it's. I am a salesperson to this day. You know, I'm sending a proposal out today to a client that came through our studio as the studio hire and kind of loved the process of it. And now it's my job to get them from a little bit warmer and. And try to bring them into the fold to create a series with it. So. Or, you know, maybe just some editing through the production suite. But, yeah, I'm a salesman, and it sucks because that's not who I wanted to be, but I recognize that's what the business needed me to be and needs me to be at this moment.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:15:16]:
And I say it sucks to be just because I'm not. Nothing against people in sales. I think it's an incredible talent to authentically sell ethical products for me. It's just not what I started this business thinking that I would do or be. And so I'm just a bit surprised that that's really the role that I need to play the biggest part in.
Kim Kerton [00:15:35]:
Yeah, I think learning to love the sell is painful for all of us, even if you've been. You've been doing it, and there's nothing more intimidating than selling yourself, really, because, I mean, in your business in particular. But for so many service based businesses, like, I've been a salesperson for years, and selling myself hurts so much. It's like, it's like I could only describe it as pain. Like, it's having to write the email, having to say the words. It's like, I fucking hate this. It's so uncomfortable, and you have to force yourself to do it and, you know, so that's. It's such a universal feeling that it's painful at best.
Kim Kerton [00:16:14]:
You so want to do the work, but having to get over your ego, your fear of not being liked, of looking like a wanker, particularly in this market in Australia that's so rife with tall poppy syndrome. It's a real challenge to put yourself out there publicly or even put yourself out there privately with a client. So I can completely understand that aspect of it. How has that side of it, that ego, changed that so many of us experience? When you do become that salesperson of yourself, you do become that frustrated business owner looking at all, you know, learning what bass is and doing all of that sort of shit. How has that experience of dealing with some of your own personal tendencies been?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:16:53]:
Yeah, I think, once again, lucky that it happened when it did. I started a business when I was 33. It's not 23 year old me, and I can tell this by Facebook memories. It's not the same as 33 year old me. And I started to get a kick in my lady years of radio, of mentoring the young producers that would come through, and I really enjoyed that. I sort of did that all the way through because, you know, when you're hosting nights, you have the young radio announcers coming through that want to be in the shift that you are. And I did work closely with a couple of them, but, you know, I. I really enjoyed the behind the scenes more than the on air side of things towards the end of being on air full time.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:17:29]:
And I know I still host these podcasts, but that's just a skill set that I have. And so that made sense for me to sit in that seat. And I'm the cheapest talent to do it so I don't have to pay myself, and I didn't pay myself a lot. But, um, if I was to get somebody with my skillset into a show that I was creating, it would cost me tens of thousands of dollars. So I was the cheapest option. And so the ego side of things if you saw me, like, 27 years old, you know, running a team of, like, eight people in Sydney, doing nights, radio, chatting to these big celebs, I did have that ego, and I did, but not in the form of. I'm really sort of, like, reflective on being sort of proud of that ego because I needed it to shield myself from bad ratings. And when you're getting rated across 56 radio stations, you know, you have good books and you have bad books.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:18:16]:
But I needed that to protect myself from tens of thousands of tweets some nights coming through, of people that wanted to win Justin Bieber tickets or whatever, and they're all going, when they lose, you're a fucking idiot. I'm gonna find you. You're the worst. I only listen to smallsy, and so you needed to have some level of protection, and that's what ego was for me, was putting a wall up to protect myself, to go, no, I am hosting a cool show. I am good at this job. I do have a great team who love working with me. You know, f you back. Now, I necessarily wouldn't tweet that all the time, but that's where that ego came from.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:18:47]:
So it dulled out over time when I just recognized that my priority was my friendship and family. And so recognizing that, I think, was a big part of my personal development. And then your ego gets crushed when you recognize how bad you are at business, when you thought you would be like a duck to water in this world, I recognized I really wasn't, and that was a bit of a hit to the ego of what I expected to be starting a business.
Kim Kerton [00:19:13]:
Yeah, ego in the traditional sense is a very useful tool sometimes to be able to separate yourself from the work that you do. But, yeah, then when you have to put yourself out there in new ways, feeling totally out of depth, it's a really challenging thing. It does break you down internally very quickly. And, yeah, selling yourself and getting crickets is brutal. It's really hard. What has been your experience like, getting the business to a phase where you recognized you needed to bring someone else in, someone, an employee in to help you manage that? Talk to me a little bit about that process and the experience and how it's changed things for you.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:19:50]:
Accidental hire. So, Amelia Stamos is our full time producer. She was actually our producer at radio, our weekend show. So she came through as a intern through the Fox. And, like I kind of alluded to, I loved mentoring people who were into it, and she was interested in radio, and she wanted to be better. And sometimes I'd had a lot of producers that would come through that thought they would be better served behind the microphone, and those are not great producers, people who are just looking for the in to get on air, and you'd see a lot of those people. And Amelia just shied away from the microphone and wanted to make great behind the scenes work. And so after I'd left radio, she continued at the Fox and we would just catch up like she loved Dylan as well.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:20:35]:
Cause we did the show together, and I found some spots to try and ease that workflow up for listen, able for her to come in and do some transcribing and captioning of our content, and that freed up like two, 3 hours a week. And so she would come into our co share office and we would sit down and we would just catch up, and there was a natural sort of inclination to do more. So all of a sudden I was like, oh, that two, 3 hours was beneficial. I hired a client, I got somebody new in because I was able to kind of lift my head up. And then, you know, amelia's like, oh, I'm really interested in video production. Can I just have a shot at doing some socials? And then she would make a social, and we would work back and forth on what this could look like. And every time she went to do a social, she would just get better at it. And I was like, oh, that's really interesting.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:21:13]:
And then after probably a month, I was probably paying her like ten or 15 hours a week. And then Amelia said, why don't you just take me on full time? And the work was there to do that, or at least if the work wasn't there to do that, the experience needed for me to become a salesperson and look for more work was the opportunity. And so, yeah, I just, I made her write down her dream for the role. She wrote down what she wanted, her wage, her conditions, new laptop, and I made everything happen, was very reasonable, her requests, and, yeah, so she started in like April, so within four months, but I couldn't. I'd spoke to friends who had businesses, and I told them the conditions of what she would be starting with, and they said it would be a detriment to your business not to hire her for what she can help the business become. So, yeah, she's been here the last two years. She's got a pay rise every year. She gets a pay rise next month.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:22:01]:
And the development of her is probably the proudest thing in the whole business. She's better at video editing than I am. And I came into with a fair bit of experience. The audio stuff, she's getting so much better at. I still overlook all of the audio production, but she's about to tick that past me. And, yeah, she's eclipsing anything that I could have hoped for in such a short amount of time. So it was a right time again, and the right person and the right wage. And, yeah, she's the celebration of the company.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:22:27]:
She's the real highlight of this business.
Kim Kerton [00:22:30]:
How did that change things for you in terms of the ability to forecast what's coming in, the unknowns, the responsibility that you then have for another individual and their livelihood? And I think that's something that's quite terrifying, like, quite deeply terrifying for a lot of business owners. But I'm interested in your experience of how it felt for you and how you've managed through it to be able to keep your eyes on growing the business and changing.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:22:58]:
Kim. I suck at business. I don't forecast. I don't. I have zero. I don't know what the cash flow in, cash flow out still looks like. I have an accountant who sort of helps me out a little bit with that. And I know that sounds ridiculous, but I know the payments that are due this month and what's due next month, and I know the workload, like, Amelia's work is booked for the next, like, ten days.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:23:21]:
So I sort of forecast in that way. I do need to get a. Some business help in the FA in trying to find somebody who might want to take on a bit of this role. But, yeah, no, I suck at that. But, you know, I speak of that in session, in progress, and I'm pretty open with the financial side of things. But I did get a bit of a golden parachute on my way out of radio. Cause I was there for over ten years. I think it was 13 years with sea.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:23:43]:
I got a pretty good long service lead payout, and I had some annual leave owing. So I think I had, like, $65,000 in savings. And so I wasn't paying myself that first year. And I don't think I paid myself up until, like, halfway through last year, which was a mistake. I should have been, like, drip feeding, you know, some money through to at least start to prepare myself for that or just pay the rent or something like that. It was just business expenses and Amelia. And that kind of hit me in the head with my savings. I literally have $0 in savings, and we are living paycheck to paycheck, which is not even a guaranteed paycheck.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:24:14]:
I wish I had prepared a little bit better for that, but that's how I was able to afford a million. And I do have this sort of, oh, I agree with this mentality because it's happening to me, is that once you start spending more, you somehow just get out there and get more. Now, not to say that if I started to spend $100,000 every month, I would find $100,000, but I just started to find what was needed to keep going and build what we needed next. So, you know, we've got a bunch of equipment that is, you know, I won't need to look into, but it's probably, like $35,000 of outlay of spend to get everything that we need. Studio and I kind of got all that done while the savings was there, but forecasting beyond a few months, no good. And need to get much better. But at least I know what's coming in this month and what's coming in next month. So, yeah, I do.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:24:57]:
I know what I need to pay, and I know that I've got enough to pay for it for this month and next, but I definitely need to get better at forecasting. But I just knew that I wouldn't be in any sort of position if I didn't have Amelia as part of the team. And now she's worth her weight in gold.
Kim Kerton [00:25:12]:
Is it scary to have so much respect for an employee and so much love for an employee and know that, like, how important that is to get that money in, to be able to help, like, keep her and retain her?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:25:24]:
Yeah, definitely. And, you know, it's sort of ironic thing is, I paid for her learnings in a way. You know, Amelia came in super green to radio, and she came in super green to podcast production, and now she would be a huge asset to any company, and that would pay her more than I can pay her. But how do I. That relationship that we have, this is incredibly strong. And Amelia sees where the company is going. She's part of all of the processes. She knows the money coming in.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:25:53]:
So I've been really transparent with Amelia the whole way of this is where we're at this month. We had a really brutal chat in December last year, which is we'll come up on an episode of session in progress where we both cried because I realized the business wouldn't last if things didn't change. And so she, you know, I had to go into my new role, and Amelia had to take on a lot more responsibility in the edits, and we both kind of flourished on the other side of that in 2024. But yeah, it is. I don't even know if Amelia left what I would do. Be proud of her next step, of course, and encouraging. But yeah, it's. There's been a huge growth there for me that fostering that relationship and still being that mentor to her now moving into content creation and how to pitch ideas, how to come up with ideas and why this should be moved here and why that should be the choice for this reel is our next step together.
Kim Kerton [00:26:41]:
So your business is quite naturally creative and content creation. Coming up with ideas for whether it's a brand or a client or a creator, an individual, like being creative is such an important part of your business here. That doesn't necessarily bode very well with where is the revenue coming from, what is happening with this process here or some other thing that we don't enjoy doing necessarily in business. So how do you manage and support yourself through that experience and that tension to be able to show up creatively?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:27:15]:
I don't do as good a job as I could, and sometimes I will release an episode of a podcast and know we probably have drained 70% of that juice from that orange, and that 30% would be really beneficial to building that audience and growing it. But we are time poor. And, you know, I would love to sit down and really go through. Got some. Got a 10,000 subscriber base on YouTube and I know we could make better content and really, you know, listen to a Mister Beast podcast the other day, and he's a, you know, a different beast, ironically, but, you know, the stuff that he does a b testing and, you know, working through different thumbnails and working through different titles, and he's the reason why they chose this color for this mood and what that does for our psyche. I wish I had time to sit down and really get into that creative because I would really enjoy it. But, you know, we've got an episode coming out Friday that we're starting edits tomorrow on. So it's just a bit time precious.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:28:09]:
And then we also do five clients at the moment with podcasts with us that are in edit, and they're our priority. So, yeah, it's really tough to foster creativity when you're in this role. And some days, you know, my partner Emily, her family's in Sydney, and I had this huge week two weeks ago, and Emily said, should I just go to Sydney? And I was like, I would actually love it if you went to Sydney. And I just came in and knocked out 1230. Nowadays, unhealthy relationship with work, but to just get us to a point where we're still. We're good. Like, I jumped in the business again and helped out with edits and tried to foster relationships and get out some leads and proposals. But, yeah, I grinded and I recorded an episode, the podcast, which will come out soon, where I was here at 1130, and I was like, what am I doing? Like, I just press record.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:28:53]:
I was like, why am I here? What am I doing? My kids. I don't even have my kids to go home to. And I chose this. I chose to push them away so I could nurture this baby that is business. So I do find myself at my, you know, my creativity is the reason that we get work in, but sometimes I'm not able to foster that for myself personally and also to the neglect of our own products in house. Sometimes. Sometimes I can rest on the laurels of the existing audience.
Kim Kerton [00:29:18]:
It's such a frustrating conversation sometimes within the business circles of, like, hustle culture versus lifestyle business or, like, taking care of yourself, and it becomes a very binary conversation. So, you know, you'll see times where everyone's like, you know, hustle 04:00 a.m. club. You know, we do everything before eight, and then we sit down, and that's what it takes to grow a business. And then you see the flip side of that, where it's a, you know, you have to pace yourself. You've got to take care of yourself. You can do more in 2 hours than you can do in this. And I find myself overthinking this cultural phenomena of this binary position, because I think the experience of business is so much that.
Kim Kerton [00:29:54]:
That it is two weeks, two months. Hardcore hustle, hardcore grind to the point where you're definitely not making choices that are, quote unquote right for you or for your family in order to get through to the other side, to get to that time where you can go, okay, pull back, take a rest. You know, get the exercise back in, get the meditation back in, get the good food. Like the family type, whatever. It's an ebb and a flow. It's not one or the other. And I don't believe that it can be one or the other, like, all the time. It has to be a little bit of an experience of both.
Kim Kerton [00:30:24]:
And I think it trips up a lot of us in that phase because, I mean, look at, you know, a week like that, where you have to be in 13, 14 hours a day every day, and go, I didn't sign up for this this isn't what this is meant to be for me, but sometimes it is for a time. And, you know, everything is a season in business that we go through. You know, it's like, push hard, chill later. Push hard, chill later. And it's like, think if we knew that that was going to be the case and we could approach that with a little bit more kindness, you know, having a partner who can say, I see you need space, like I need support, like, how about we make a little bit of a change? Here is an important way to be able to work through that. But it's an important point that you raised because it isn't one or the other. It's gonna be both all the time. For a really long time.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:31:03]:
Yeah. And luckily, I've got a partner that understands it and believes, like, I truly believes that this is, this business will be what I in my heart, know will be and can be and that I can get it to. So that is key to the success so far of the business. Any success that has come through has been because I felt loved and supported by my partner at home. The stress of it is, you know, it's one income with a business that you started because we keep popping out kids. But I think you bring up a great point, Kim, and it's something that I love, would love to speak on with you is, which is you got one instagram reel that'll pop up in your feed saying, put your head down, work hard, grind. How many hours did you work today? Twelve. What could you have done with 13? Cold plunge at 04:00 a.m.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:31:46]:
you got all that sort of work mentality, which might be fine for somebody who's 20 and they're single. But then I also have this other side of me where parent content comes up and it's like the most important years, the first three years of your kid's life, and everyone on their dying bed says, I wish I were to list. So this juxtaposition of where I feel my personal life and my business life is because they're both relationships that need incredible amounts of time to foster. Amelia needs time with me every single day to go through, like, which I would sit next to each other. We look over work and we collaborate on how we're going to get this to the client and work off feedback, and that's amazing. But then I'm spending 10 hours here and only I get these small windows with my kids. My kids are awake by seven. I'm at the door by 815, like an hour and 15 minutes there, and then I get home at 536, and then there's an hour before bed, and I only get 2 hours there.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:32:41]:
And I'm a piece of shit. Some days when I'm, like, still on my phone trying to upload a reel, you know, we've got five different accounts that we upload across. And then really being hard on myself because I wasn't the most present in those moments, I catch myself even this morning, my daughter's having porridge next to me. My son's being fed by Emily in the high chair. And I was just, like, looking at my phone on Instagram, and I was like, put it down. Like, I had to catch myself to go. This isn't. Cause I can justify looking at Instagram because that's where I feed content and find collaboration and go, this idea is great.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:33:16]:
And so this. I'm stuck in the balance of mindfulness, of recognizing the perfect balance between both and making sure my family feels nurtured as much as session in progress does.
Kim Kerton [00:33:27]:
This is very timely to have this conversation, and I'll just kind of say it exactly how it is because I'm very honest about these sorts of things. But this is something I talk to my therapist about all the time. This exact behavior of, I've got a minute to do something that's important to me, that's outside of my business, but somehow, without me even knowing, my hand is on the phone, and I have opened the app, and I am scrolling, and this, like, foundational experience that we have where we're just, like, constantly plugged in and feeling like we need to look into it. And I've really, really looked at what this behavior is. Cause it might be helpful for you, but certainly for other people. But it's so, like, where we feel so much danger in. In business, you know, everything's on the edge all the time. Like, fuck, I'm about to go broke.
Kim Kerton [00:34:13]:
Like shit. That client needs something. Like, I've got to. You know, I haven't done enough of this. I don't have enough of this. So there's something about being, like, hyper connected in socials as well that's, like, almost looking for danger and, like, let me be aware of everything that's going on and think about it. But there is also this side of us as entrepreneurs where it's very, very difficult for us to grant ourselves a break. Like, a true break.
Kim Kerton [00:34:34]:
Like, we feel like we don't deserve it. And that's certainly been my experience, is that, you know, when I'm in that moment, I know I so desperately either need to be spending time with my partner or be having a break, like, having a breath and, you know, just, like, chill and listen to some music or something. And it's almost like a punishment, like a self punishment. I'm not working on the business. You know, I'm not being successful enough. I'm not meeting all these expectations societally or for myself. And so you're in the socials, you know, beating yourself up, essentially, not giving yourself a break, comparing yourself to others unconsciously, all of those things. And it's like, it's so normal.
Kim Kerton [00:35:07]:
And that's the thing, is, like, it's just so normal to do and to go through that cycle of feeling terrible about ourselves in that moment as well and justifying it because we're like, well, I'm a marketer as well. Like, you know, I got to know what's going on, got to know the cultural tone, you know, got to know how my brand's doing. Got to communicate with people in the comments. But social media is such a great thing for our businesses to thrive, but it's also such an asshole in terms of what it does to us mentally in that experience. So you're most certainly not alone in that.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:35:34]:
Well, and then, ironically, I'm creating content that's trying to get people to look at their screens longer. You know, I'm affecting, you know, people's headspaces. I'm making fathers and mothers look at the phones. You know, I I'm trying to get eyeballs on my content. I'm trying to look into the retention to make sure that people watch the full 52nd reel. And, you know, I've learned the psychology of how to get people to look at Instagram longer. Like, I know how to create and curate content that gets people to watch longer. I know how to make people share content.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:36:08]:
I know how to get them to interact with the comments. Look, you know, just to say that, I know it makes it sound like some sort of guru, but I can put everything in sort of place for our content, for ourselves and our clients that makes people stick around as long as possible for the content that's being put in. We can try our hardest with bad content, but when you got good content, I know how to best serve it, and I'm responsible for those eyeballs for other people and putting them in that position. And that 50 seconds could have been potentially better spent with their families. I don't know. And I justify it by going, you know, we're making great educational content that matters. Our podcast is about disability and accessibility and. But at the same time, that time could have been looked up at family and friends.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:36:47]:
It's hard.
Kim Kerton [00:36:48]:
Yeah, it is very hard. And, you know, I take some comfort in knowing that there are people much smarter than all of us, designing these very apps to be the most engaging as they possibly can be. And us, as humans, we haven't really evolved much past the way we were created in terms of the way our brain works, we haven't evolved very much so that, you know, it's like keeping ourselves safe and sense of, you know, community and all of those things play into this. So, yeah, it's a frustrating experience that I think a lot of people would have. And that ability, inability to switch off in business is so real. Like, you think you're going to have more time, you think you're going to have more flexibility in your life to be working for yourself. And the fact is you actually get none. You get no breaks, no mental breaks whatsoever.
Kim Kerton [00:37:32]:
Has there been anything that you have done for yourself that you've shown yourself through the journey so far, though, that has allowed you to give yourself a bit of a break every now and then?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:37:41]:
Oh, I don't think so. Even when we spoke, you know, previously, I was in Noosa on a family holiday. I'd still justified that trip by booking 4 hours a day, three to 4 hours a day with time spent on work, just to make myself feel better about the holiday. Isn't that weird? But also, the business wasn't in a position that I could step away from it for the point of time. I look forward to switching off. So don't get me wrong, I'm not like I wait for the day that the automation and structures are in their place, that I can just go and have a week or two away. At the moment, it's just not in that position. I'm okay with that because I do forecast my own life to see a sunnier disposition.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:38:19]:
But yeah, I can't switch off. And sometimes I don't want to because I love thinking about business. I like thinking about how I can make this new brand that we launch better. I love getting in and fixing up little mistakes that I pick up across language or tech mistakes, or going back in and re editing a podcast because I listened to it while I was in the gym and the experience was different to listening to it in the studio and going, oh, this didn't actually translate, and I'll just go in and edit it and re upload it. So I enjoy it as well. So, yeah, one day, Kim, one day I will have a holiday that will be a non email holiday. But I've never, to answer your question succinctly, I've never put on a out.
Kim Kerton [00:38:57]:
Of office an experience. I think many of us will understand it. It's just going to be like that for some years for many of us. But you mentioned there the revamp and the reposition of the business as session in progress, which I mentioned up from why the pivot and how has it been and how have you managed the change experience, both from an investment perspective and also just recentering the business?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:39:23]:
I got lucky with meeting Studio white noise. They did our rebrand they in the offices here, and we formed a friendship first just being around each other and like Amelia's friends with the young girls and the team, and I was friends with the founders of their team and that sort of like mindedness in understanding where people are at in their journey. And then they came and booked a podcast series, a paid series of ten episodes, which is releasing at the moment. And then the idea of them wanting to extend past those first ten episodes was there. And they sort of put it to me, would you do a sweat equity deal? It wasn't even a rebrand. We'll pressure test your brand from your pocket. Your canvas sketch for a logo is terrible. We can do better and we would love to work on that.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:40:06]:
And also for them, it was like working on a podcast. Studio and production hub was different to what helped expand the scope of work they were doing outside of property, which was their main pillar of business. So that just worked. And I loved the process of branding and I realized how bad my brand was, embarrassingly so. Like, I didn't realize that the language about, well, the inconsistency of the language we're using, the inconsistency of the imagery we were using. I had like seven different fonts across all of our bits and pieces, like, across our socials, our website, our podcasts. And I would use one terminology here, one terminology there. There was no consistency across the language.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:40:46]:
And so I really leant into letting them just do what they would do as professionals, and they came to me with session in progress. It made sense. I wasn't strong enough to understand that I wasn't getting the brand from your pocket across, you know, the idea from your pocket was that everything that we create is available from your phone, and majority of podcast listening is in the pocket. I wasn't smart enough to get that branding out, and I didn't have enough time to lift my head to do that. And so a professional team came in, and I love the way session in progress looks and sounds, and, you know, we're about to launch our studio as well. And so it all intertwines with session in progress. So typography, the color scheme, it's intent, is all lovely and cohesive, whereas from your pocket wasn't.
Kim Kerton [00:41:28]:
It's one of those journeys. I'm in a huge brand nerd, and I love this stuff. And even being a brand nerd, trying to deal with developing your own brand is painful at best. Like, it's really, really challenging. So it's quite a gift to have a look at that and get that perspective and also not be afraid to change and not to worry about. You know, there's a sunk cost fallacy in whatever you create at the beginning of your business that can carry you on for way, way, way too long with the same thing. So to be able to push past, that's really quite a credit to get something new out there. So here we are.
Kim Kerton [00:41:59]:
You're facing now, then the studio launch, the rebrand launch, things are happening. You've got your team around you. Things are growing. What's keeping you up at night? At the moment?
Angus O'Loughlin [00:42:09]:
Just money. The studio is costing a lot of money, and to the point that I can't even get the studio to the point that our designer wanted it because I didn't have the funds to get it across. There was a point where a table was going to cost $21,000, and I was like, I'm gonna have to put my head up and say, I can't afford that.
Kim Kerton [00:42:26]:
That's a lot.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:42:27]:
Yeah, that's a lot. I mean, nobody said there's not a lot, but my design table is it, like, it's a custom made burl veneer table of a design. And it was beautiful. But the justification of that spend could be this is going to be seen by millions of eyeballs. And then. And they'll be going, this space is considered and beautiful because it was part of the bigger picture and very deliberate. But money is the biggest problem. And just making sure, like, trying to get over the.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:42:53]:
I keep everything just. Emily said this by partner the other day. I'm always talking about the next hump. We just got to get over this. And, you know, it was just getting over the new roles at the start of the year, you know, me going, working on the business, not in it. And that was that hump. And now the next hump was finding next. Couple of clients got that.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:43:11]:
And the next hump is getting the studio launched. Next hump is the rebrand and I just seem to be going up and down and money is the only thing that keeps me up and just being able to pay myself. I'm very transparent with my money. We are so close to the edge every single month, it's ridiculous. But I also have point out the privilege of being. I own an investment property, so I'm asset rich in cash poor. We've got supportive families that would never let us be homeless. But the ego of me and the pride of me wants me to run this myself.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:43:44]:
I don't want to ask for a handout. I just want to maybe a hand up from other people who can help in the business. But just finances is really the only thing I struggle with trying to get a consistent cash flow every month and consistent pillars, you know, trying to find benchmark clients that are consistent month to month rather than buying ten episode series. So I'm starting to get that sort of retain an idea just so I can have that base level of cost. And that's where I'm at at the moment. We're there, but it's just so not consistent to get to. I know how much we need just to pay for the business, the rent, the lights, the Internet, the equipment, you know, all of that stuff and Amelia. But then I also need myself, so that's the thing.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:44:25]:
Sure, it's no surprise to most businesses, but just finding consistent money is the most difficult and it's hard as well when you just. My biggest thing that I keep up myself up in ideas, I look at other business like we just do really good work and I just, like, I just want to shake myself and just go, we're really good at what we do and our clients love working with us and we make great products and like, it's just good. And I, up until this rebrand, really, I've been able to convey that out, that this is our output and this is our cost and this is how it makes sense if you break it down into this. I don't know, I've just got to get better at that. I'm a guy who likes to be on the mic, but behind the mic. But once again, I guess my email signature shouldn't say studio director, it should probably just say salesman.
Kim Kerton [00:45:06]:
Absolutely. There's a lot of power in owning that director role, the managing director role, the founder role, the person that's seeing this business forward and not an easy jump when you are somebody so passionate about the creative and about the product that you're making as well. I think there's plenty of people that can relate to that in a service based industry. Well, you constantly share a lot of really important insight about the experience of building a business, which is so, so, so valuable to so many people out there. As you know, as we talked about before, this podcast is all about keeping people in business because the statistics around this are awful. And you know, that is because we often don't know what we're getting ourselves into, not just from a financial sense, but from a personal growth sense and from a challenge and a living on the edge in every sense of the word. And what you have shared today is so valuable for those listening who might be on the journey and, you know, might be pushing themselves to grow. So thank you for all that you've shared today and for putting yourself out there like this.
Kim Kerton [00:46:04]:
Shit is hard. It takes brave humans to be in business for themselves, and I am consistently in awe of people who do it. So congratulations. But to continue to support you, what can we do for you? How can we help you grow? You've given so much to us.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:46:17]:
Well, thanks to this podcast. Like I said, I've listened to a few episodes so far and have subscribed and followed, and we'll continue to do so because.
Kim Kerton [00:46:23]:
Thank you.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:46:24]:
You know, it is unlucky to be in the space I keep bringing up, but I'm lucky to be surrounded by people who are in the struggle of it. And that's a nice feeling to understand. You're not alone. And this podcast that you do, is that so. Thank you for the platform. It's really appreciated. Yeah, if you're in Melbourne or Sydney, we are a production company, so we have a studio in Melbourne and we have clients in Sydney that we fly up for and studio up there. But we've got a permanent space in Melbourne.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:46:49]:
It's pretty beautiful. Sessioninprogress.com dot au and yeah, if you need studio Hirever, I know because I did the competitor analysis. We are very well priced in the market. If you need a podcast studio, we would love to host you, everyone. We've got three pillars, accessibility, adaptability and acceptability. So we welcome every single person, people from all walks of life. So yeah, we'd love to see anybody.
Kim Kerton [00:47:14]:
I love that. And listener knows from listening to these podcasts how much I bang on about how good a podcast is and how there is not enough podcasts in the world and every show deserves to be published and everyone has something to say. As long as you plan it well and execute it better hopefully we have some people keen to get theirs off the ground. Angus, such a pleasure to talk to you, as always. Thank you so much for sharing your story with me today.
Angus O'Loughlin [00:47:37]:
I appreciate you. Kim, thanks so much for having me.
Kim Kerton [00:47:39]:
Thank you for listening to unemployed and afraid, the podcast for small business builders with your host, me, Kim Kerton. If you love it, you can say thanks with a star rating and a review. And of course, join the community on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and LinkedIn. Find us at unemployed and afraid wherever you're hanging out, and I'll see you there.