Amanda Rogaly — Baby Yum Yum South Africa's fastest growing baby and child portal
With Amanda Rogaly — Baby Yum Yum South Africa's fastest growing baby and child portal
In short
Amanda Rogaly, Chief Mom and Founder of Baby Yum Yum, traces the route from running one of Johannesburg's biggest event companies to shutting it down while pregnant, failing at a food verification start-up, and building a parenting portal on WordPress backed by expert-checked content. The lessons: passion, flexibility when something isn't working, and hiring people better than you.
How did Amanda Rogaly go from events to parenting content?
She trained at hotel school, interned with an event company and then founded Kadoro Events in Rosebank, which grew into one of Johannesburg's biggest event companies. Falling pregnant with her first baby changed things internally; she walked into newly bought offices one day, decided she no longer wanted to deal with suppliers and clients, sold what she could and closed.
Why did she start the blog that became Baby Yum Yum?
Because as a new mother she could not tell which online information was credible. She began writing about her pregnancy experiences, but every article and experience was backed and checked by experts who supplied information and confirmed the facts, which gave the site credibility in a space she felt was overloaded.
What did working in corporate South Africa teach her?
That she did not want to be in a corporate. She worked in the marketing division of a car manufacturer and describes it as not the most enjoyable experience of her life, but a stepping stone that pushed her out on her own. She does not regret it and says she had to do it.
What happened with her food verification business?
It hit a wall. A past client proposed verifying that a product's label matched its contents, but she describes an old boys' club in the food industry that resented a young woman checking their claims. They tested five top retailers' claimed 100 per cent beef boerewors; none came back as claimed, and one carrying a no-pork sticker was full of pork.
When did she realise Baby Yum Yum could be a business?
When a big nappy brand entering from India handed her its entire marketing budget rather than spending it on print, saying they believed in her credible following. Earlier, a dummy and bottle brand had paid her to review a product, after which other brands in that umbrella began taking adverts and advertorials.
How did she build the team around her?
She started with one person to manage social media, who also covered her food marketing accounts and taught her about algorithms. She then took an editor from a print publication to generate content and manage writers, bloggers and influencers, and a salesperson from another publication to handle clients.
What does she say about breastfeeding versus formula information?
That mothers have the right to choose how they feed their babies and need non-judgemental information. Infant formula companies cannot promote themselves publicly in South Africa, but she has seen three-day-old babies in rural communities being fed pap because the mother lacked milk and had no access to formula information.
What is next for Baby Yum Yum?
A Baby Yum Yum product range of baby items, plus expansion into an international market in another developing country where the need is great. She describes it becoming an empire in its own right, so that in six or seven years it could be moved on to something bigger with more resources behind it.
In their words
Most important thing, if you don't have passion get out. If you're sitting in a job and you're not happy and there's no passion, get out, go and do your own thing.
it's one thing to have tenacity and to carry on but when you see something's not working you need to be flexible and you need to change
your business may succeed it may not succeed but you are succeeding because you've grown from that whether it's a good or bad experience you're still growing from it
if your child's sick you know that your child's sick you don't have to look it up on the internet or phone your granny
I went to the top pediatric and the top childhood and pregnancy professionals I went I knocked on their door I said hi I'm Amanda this is what I'm starting I'd love you to contribute
Key takeaways
- Passion is the entry requirement — if there is no passion in a job, leave and do your own thing.
- Tenacity has limits: entrepreneurs most often fail because they are inflexible and will not change direction when something clearly is not working.
- Credibility came from having every article fact-checked by paediatric, childhood and pregnancy professionals, offered exposure in return.
- Likes count for little; engagement and reach are what matter, and Baby Yum Yum quotes an 18 per cent Facebook engagement rate against a single-digit average.
- A digital brand built on a founder's name has to keep the founder visible in the community, much like a successful restaurant is owner-run.
- Growth depends on hiring people better than you at their specialities while you hold the vision.
Show notes
On this episode we chat to Amanda Rogaly about starting up this amazing portal and what her plans are for the future. She certainly is a fire cracker
Frequently asked questions
What is her official job title?
Chief Mom and Founder of Baby Yum Yum.
Did she build the website herself?
Yes, she started it herself on WordPress, self-taught, and brought in help later as she needed more functionality. Strangers who liked the site also emailed her snippets of coding and suggestions for changes.
When did Baby Yum Yum become her sole focus?
At the end of 2017, when demand outgrew what she could handle alongside her food marketing brand Food Sure. She closed the other business, hired staff from competing print publications, and 2018 became her first commercial year.
What was her first business ever?
Packaging and selling flower crystals with her sister at about eight or nine years old — the jelly-like crystals florists use, which she marketed as an early kind of slime.
Where can people find Baby Yum Yum?
At babyyumyum.co.za or .com, and on Facebook, where there is a page, a community and a second-hand bargain box, plus Twitter and Instagram. Amanda's email is amanda@babyyumyum.co.za.
Transcript
David Watts on Mix 93.8. Mix 93.8 some legendary radio for you on a Monday night and it is proudly brought to you by the Cradle Boutique Hotel. My special guest is here and I wanted to have a chat to you. It's Amanda Rogali. Did I get right that time? Well done. Good practicing. Lots of practice went in there. Amanda is from Baby Yum Yum. Now you've no doubt heard the advertising on Mix about Baby Yum Yum. You've been in, they've chatted to you and in a nutshell, Baby Yum Yum has is now the the biggest. The fastest growing parenting platform. Is it a parenting platform? It's a parenting platform, yes, in South Africa. Yeah and it's kind of, when I heard this I was like all right seriously what did we used to do you know about this parenting thing. I think my, when I was when I was a toddler which was a long time ago, they just finished carving books in stone tablets. Dr Spock was the one, he was the one. So I was brought up in the Dr Spock with a with a whole bunch of sort of you know the plot a length of discipline in there you know spare the rods, build a child, children should be seen and not heard, those kind of things. Yeah I misunderstood. I thought it should be obscene and not heard. Well some people have that view. You can't imagine how much trouble I got into. Anyway Amanda let's, the reason I was fascinated because this seemed to be one of those overnight success stories came from nowhere, bang largest parenting portal in the country, fastest growing yada yada yada, everybody's lovely, but it hasn't. It's not always that, you know people often see the result and they go look at her, she fell with her bum in the butter. It's just like, it's just like, it's just like, it's not like it is very very hard work, blood sweat and tears and it's been many years of doing something and you know just for me something's always going to be a success if you have passion.
Most important thing, if you don't have passion get out. If you're sitting in a job and you're not happy and there's no passion, get out, go and do your own thing. And I think entrepreneurs are terrified, people who are not entrepreneurs are terrified to make that move. I think even entrepreneurs are terrified when they make the move. Absolutely, you know when you have to pay those salaries at the end of the month, have I done the right thing? So let's talk a little bit about you. I mean give us a bit of your background. Where were you born, what was life like and how did you you know get into the sort of market as it were? I am a Josie girl born and bred. I'm a real city girl although I do love the bush and I come from a family that both of my parents worked and they really were the ones I think that motivated me and inspired me to go out and be my best. And I went to hotel school actually believe it or not and as part of my third year on my internship I had to do something that was hospitality related and I started working for an event company. Phenomenal, phenomenal, I was there for a while and I then left and I started my own event company which grew to be one of Johannesburg's biggest event companies. What was it called? It was called Kadoro Events and it was based in Rosebank, very exciting. We did great stuff and we did a lot of work with a company called Imagineers.
Yes I do know Imagineers, absolutely, absolutely. You know and I think eventings changed since then, then it used to be big budget, big lights, big you know big everything and now it's kind of like can you make a Miss World on a Miss Bononi budget. So things have really changed so I'm quite happy that I've moved on from that game and why did I move in from that game. I moved on from that game purely because I fell pregnant and you know I was always going to be one of those women that gave birth at my desk and back at work the next day and when I fell pregnant with my first baby things started changing inside of me and I know it sounds like a cliche like your life is going to change when you fall pregnant but it really did and I started writing about my experiences. I had a blog, I started writing about my experiences of being pregnant. When you say blog good old-fashioned proper good old-fashioned blog where I would write my own stories but the catch here and where I was so different was that every single article and experience that I wrote about was actually backed and checked by experts who would give me information and make sure that everything was true and that the facts were correct and it gave my my site my blog a lot of credibility because I had all these facts behind me and why did I actually start my blog I actually started it because I just found there was so much information out there on the internet as a new mother how did I know what I could trust what I couldn't trust what was credible it was just overloaded so I went away and I started writing all of these articles to help mothers with factual incredible information. Okay so but you've glossed over the bit about I mean you were in events. I was in events, I did and was very successful I had fantastic accounts and then you got pregnant and then what did you go did you go yeah okay no more I mean literally it was an overnight thing we had just bought new offices I moved into my new offices all ready to do everything and I just walked in one day and I was like I don't want this anymore I don't want to have to deal with suppliers and clients it's just too much for me at this point in my life right now so literally overnight sold off what I could did what I could close the doors.
And you mentioned earlier on before we were sort of on air we were chatting you said you've worked in corporate South Africa. I have absolutely I worked for a car manufacturer company and I worked in the marketing division there and can I'm allowed to say this I wonder it was it was it was not the most enjoyable experience of my life but it was a stepping stone to actually pushing me out and going on my own had I not have had that experience in a corporate I wouldn't have made up my mind that I didn't want to be in a corporate so I don't regret my decision and I had to do it and I learned from it but it was it was a stepping stone to actually getting me out there and taking the jump and opening up my own company. Were you always of an entrepreneurial bent I mean you know you generally I found that a strange entrepreneurial type people leave clues I mean I think from the age of 13 or 14 I was running my own little businesses and doing whatever I could to make extra money and negotiating with this and that and the next one. Absolutely I think my very first business I had with my sister and I think I must have been eight or nine at the time and what we did was we actually started packaging and selling flower crystals I don't know if you've seen some of the florists use them it's almost like jelly crystals that expand when you put water on them and they grow and then you can put your flowers in them and the flowers last longer but I can sell it as that I sold it as almost like the first type of slime back in those days. But that isn't that what people we went through another revival of that a little while ago called squishies or whatever. Similar similar concept similar contact I'll think but different but yes always looking for something different yeah and I think that's really where it started I think also watching my parents as well being business people as well I think it excited me and I've always wanted to get into the world of business but for me the most exciting thing about being an entrepreneur is how much you push yourself and how much you challenge yourself and how much you grow as an entrepreneur so your business may succeed it may not succeed but you are succeeding because you've grown from that whether it's a good or bad experience you're still growing from it. Fantastic stuff we are chatting to uh what do we call you the owner the CEO well my official title my official title is Chief Mom and Founder. Oh okay that was close Chief Mom and Founder Amanda Rogali and she is the Chief Mom and Founder of baby yum yum chatting to her and you are listening to what's involved that is proudly brought to you by the Cradle Boutique Hotel check them out they're a great bunch of guys and love their values I mentioned this before David Watts on the mix 93.8 you are listening to what's involved probably brought to you by the Cradle Boutique Hotel my special guest in the studio uh the Chief Mom at baby yum yum Amanda Rogali. Amanda so we were talking about businesses and and you kind of did you know from a very early age that that working for a boss and getting a traditional nine to five job was not for you? Absolutely I always knew that I wanted to come and go as I wanted to and I wanted to uh work late or start early and not have to answer to anyone I've never been the kind of person that takes instruction from other people well I think that was the deciding factor for me. I was told I don't play well in the sandpit with other children. There you go that's me too I'm not a friend person and I'm not a boss person. I want my own sandpit you're not going to hang out over there it's cool we can talk but I want my own sandpit where I know exactly where my toys are don't mess with my toys um so so events marketing even though you studied hospitality I can see there's a link okay um to this day there is still that link in terms of hospitality and eventing um eventing has gone down I actually used to own an event business in the Lofeld um and we also we used to do a lot of big well for the Lofeld big events um and a lot of corporates came down there we did events and it was wonderful but the bottom quite literally fell out of that it did absolutely lucky I got out of that just before it did I think it was my um intuition yeah intuition saying get out while the game's good but then you went from that into another you had another business going as well I did so um while I started off I had closed down my event company and I took a I was supposed to be taking a bit of a sabbatical I didn't really take it because I'm too entrepreneurial it was meant to be a maternity leave sabbatical didn't really happen um one of my past clients actually came to me and said I've got this amazing idea let's start a food verification business where we would verify that what is on the label of a product is actually inside of it and then go to the consumer and say Mr Consumer this product is exactly what it says it is go and buy this product and give products a competitive edge but unfortunately in this country it was a little bit too too forward thinking for this country this um we have a very much an old boys club who's involved in the food industry and they did not like this young female coming into the industry and wrapping them over the knuckles and saying if you're saying this is in your product is it really correct correct and you know it's something that really opened my eyes we took um five retailers of the top retailers we took what they claimed to be a hundred percent beef boulevard and we sent it off to our labs to run the tests not one of them came back as a hundred percent beef boulevard even the one that had the no pork sticker on it came back and it was full of pork and you know when you bring that to um these retailers attention they kind of just turn a blind eye they they not really interested they think that they the big boys they'll make they'll they'll it's not a problem they'll sort it out I think things are changing now but when you were doing this you very much I mean this was this was about four years ago and it was it was very disruptive for the industry they did not like me at all and everywhere I went I just kept on being hit I just hit a brick wall a brick wall a brick wall and it's one thing to have tenacity and to carry on but when you see something's not working you need to be flexible and you need to change and I think that that's the biggest thing that entrepreneurial that entrepreneurs fail with is the fact that they are not flexible and they don't allow for change when they see it so the food verification I could see it wasn't working so I twisted it around and I went back to my love of marketing and I used that brand called food sure to start marketing food products I had amazing food brands where we actually went and we did everything from social media to PR to the advertising campaigns and we marketed those products and as I said at the same time baby Yum Yum was running all the time and it was very small and it started to generate a little bit of income and then at the end of 2017 there was such demand for baby Yum Yum I actually couldn't keep up with it and I decided that's where my focus was that's where my love was that's where my passion was and big move to make shut down my other business and I purely focused on baby Yum Yum I'm skilled I brought in the best staff from you know competing publications print publications and we just grew and grew and last year was really our first commercial year fantastic year been a phenomenal year and yeah we we live to tell the tale now in 2018 and it's just I think it's that perseverance that one has where you have an idea and I think you just need to believe in your idea and yes we mentioned just now some people say it's all about timing and all about luck and yes there is a little bit of magic that needs to happen in your business idea but at the end of the day it's you you the one running it you the one that's making it happen but I mean this is you talk about this this passion and everything and I agree with you I mean when I've heard you on the radio I've heard the ads etc etc before you can hear it I mean I met you today for the first time and you are literally a dynamo powerhouse you come in you're excited you're happy and it's like yes and you know I've had a lot of different guests over the years on the show and a lot of them at the top of their fields but coming to talk on a radio show intimidated the life out of them you just sat down here like you were born behind a microphone and I love it you you know if there's one word that describes me I would have to say that the word that describes me is an inspiration I like to inspire people and for me it's very important to get up every day and find something that I can inspire myself with whether it's looking at my children whether it's looking at my garden whether it's thinking about the exciting things that are going to happen during the day I need to inspire myself and then I like to obviously project that type of energy to people and inspire them and in so many ways I mean you can inspire people by telling them they look awesome or you know reading amazing articles and sending it to other people and saying wow this is great I really think you'd enjoy this small things small things that make a difference in people's lives now talk to me about this let's go back to baby yum yum um you said you started it you discovered you were pregnant and there was a lot of information you wanted to know more so I mean you didn't just sit down at your desk and write which is what I suppose a lot of people would have done but you went to experts in the various fields and you said listen I want to know correct and to me in a sense I'm like she's okay that takes some guts to do that I did I was fearless I went door to door I went to the top pediatric and the top childhood and pregnancy professionals I went I knocked on their door I said hi I'm Amanda this is what I'm starting I'd love you to contribute and help me get everything up and running and in return I'll give you exposure and I did and people came on board because they felt that there was a need for what I was doing in terms of providing correct and factual information to parents out there but I mean at that time you had nothing but an idea to offer these people exposure they were going to go okay well who are you and you know I mean okay and a big one when that when they talk about anything online um and it's gotten worse these days but I mean there you were starting a blog so did you I mean was it something that you did you do it through WordPress spy yourself or did you actually get somebody to set it up for you I started it myself on WordPress
self-taught yeah absolutely and then obviously as as I as I um needed more functionality obviously I brought in people who could assist me with with the necessary I have a love-hate relationship with WordPress gosh there's a lot of my digital stuff I do in is sort of based around WordPress and even if you do not work yourself in WordPress if you're not a developer I think you've got a need to know what you're doing and you've got to need to know how it works because there's a lot of people where bull baffles brains there and they will give you a big long story so you walk that route absolutely and you know also I a lot of people actually wanted to help me and give me input I think that because you know they believed in me as a person and often people would be uh like people I didn't even know people would send me a mail saying hi we've been on your site we love this why don't you do this why don't you do this this is a little bit of coding to add in here a little bit of something to change over there so people were really into it and that gave me a good feeling knowing that people as opposed to the company that I had before with the food verification people wanted this product and for me as I said I'm an inspiration I want to give people I want to give back the joy of parenting and you know you said what did we do before in the olden days when there weren't such things as maybe yum yum parents made mistakes and it was the hard way but I think life's pressures have changed so much and life has changed so much where there's so many more options out there and we're so time driven and we're so money driven as well that we lose sight of the basic things of parenting and particularly when I speak to a lot of our mothers on our community platform um I feel that they've lost a sense of like their intuition and they don't trust themselves anymore because they are so concerned about what social media says and what the internet says and what their granny says and their friends say and that they've lost their intuition to make the right to make the right decision if your child's sick you know that your child's sick you don't have to look it up on the internet or phone your granny you know and I think it's very sad that women have lost touch with that gut feel but I think this yeah I mean the definitely is a is a social sort of thing so your your sort of website statistics did you used to sort of obsessively look every day and go how many visitors did I have yesterday as opposed to today the only way I knew how I was growing was I used to have my facebook site started and for me it used to all up a bee about how many people like my facebook page and you know I think that's how facebook was done in the olden days so to speak and I mean five years ago but that is the olden days for facebook where you used to track it on how many people liked your page and today when I try and explain to clients that how many people like your campaign or like your page means nothing it's all about the engagements and about the reach that you have on your page the amount of likes that you get that really an engagement and reach is a is a big thing it's a very very big and it's very complicated and a lot unfortunately a lot of people don't understand it and I think it's something that should be taught at school listen with with with where social media is going I mean I was I work in it now but I mean when it all started I was one of those like very late adopters of facebook and then it was like okay fine whatever I'll just put something up there you know just got to do it you know whatever you know he has a picture of me eating a pizza yay kind of thing um and then you know then we got twitter and I'm like what do you do with this it's like it's like twitter it's like sms but for no I don't know it's never going to take off well yeah that and instagram look at me well now instagram and I must I really do believe that it is a I think it's important to stay abreast of current trends but I do believe that it is a um an age thing as well you know I come from the facebook era and twitter era and now instagram's out so I'm on instagram because my staff tell me I have to have an instagram page and because we have to be on instagram I really don't know much about instagram but everyone tells me that's where we've got to be and that's where we are and that's where we're growing ourselves as well but I mean I I imagine yeah that and things change but this is part of this entrepreneurial journey because you did this you measured the sort of likes you had on on facebook etc etc when did it suddenly struck you was it did people come to you and go listen your site's doing quite well could you could I please pay you to have a banner on the side is that how it happened that's exactly how it happened my first brand was actually one of um it was actually a dummy and bottle brand in south africa um who makes other things as well and they came to me and they said we love your following we love what you're doing please can you review our product for us and that's actually how it started out I've reviewed their product for them and they paid me to review it and I was very honest and I said what I liked and what I didn't like um and after that the rest of their brands under their umbrella started taking a little bit of an advert here or a little advertorial there and it literally grew from there and it's it's fantastic to see another way that I measure my success now is to see how the tables have turned and how the power is turned so yes there have been stages where I've gone and I've knocked on people's doors and I've said please will you advertise with us and we're now at a stage where the table has turned and people are coming to us to say we want to advertise with you because there's value they see value in the brand they do and you know they see they see that um they're getting the best exposure and I think what people tend to forget as well is that with digital and online stuff it's great you can change campaigns from day to day something's not working change it fix it for tomorrow as opposed to print media where it's set in stone you can't change it that's the way it is the people like it or they don't and for me digital is the most exciting space to be in but having said that the most important thing behind any business digital or not is interpersonal relationships but this is the big thing this is the thing where and I spend a lot of time in this digital space that people are now talking about a lot it's it's not about just smashing information at people it's about engagement it's about talking and building trust and in today's the times it's become even harder to build trust it is and there's so much brand clutter out there everyone wants you to try and buy their things and again it's actually tapping into your followers into that market and communicating very specific messages for them and when advertisers come to us and say we want to do it this is in this way we always push back and say that's not going to work for our community it's not going to work for our market we need to take the information that you are giving us and almost translate it into what our community is expecting wonderful stuff we are chatting to the chief mom at baby yum yum uh amanda regali and it's fascinating love chatting to you
this uh what's involved proudly brought to you by the cradle boutique hotel so uh chatting back with the chief mom from baby yum yum we got amanda in studio with us so you started this off you went you knocked on doors and you said okay you did your own website you did the whole lot when did you suddenly go okay hang on now because people were coming to you and saying will you review my product and when i when i first sort of was listening to a couple of things you're saying and your advertising i thought okay it's not really that far i mean you know what do you need bottles dummies you know can't be that much i'm not a biological dad so i haven't been through the biological dad oh and and and disposable nappies oh yes that i know a lot about could gravy but that costs a lot of money well it is and i mean even formula it's one of the most uh stolen items from stores i mean they put them behind the shelves they put security tags around them it's one of the most popular items still well you can you can imagine i mean if you if you've got a baby that you've got in this world and you're not working or whatever formula is going to be right up there if you need it so there was there were people that came to you they asked you to review products etc etc when did it sort of strike you that hang on now maybe there is something here i think it was when one of the big nappy brands actually came to me well there was a big nappy brand that was coming in from india um and basically they gave me their entire marketing budget and i was like wow but why aren't you putting it into print and why aren't you putting it here they're in everywhere and they said to me because we believe in you unique you have a a very credible following we can actually see who your who your followers and who your community are and we believe that you can help us launch this product and i think that that was really a turning point for me and and also as i said before you kind of have to you kind of i think as an entrepreneur you have that sense about when to get out of other things and when to launch into into other other entrepreneurial successes and um i really i just felt i think it was someone someone actually had sms me a question as well and it was a ridiculous question and i just felt wow if this is what the majority of south african women are learning about pregnancy and child care then we're in serious trouble and that's when i suppose my mission of yes i love making money i'm a scorpio i'm an entrepreneur you're also a scorpio hmm and i think it's very much education driven for me as well so every single thing whether it's a product review whether it's an advert whether it's a campaign all the information that i put out there is 100 neutral so people have the facts and they can make their own choices one of the other big things that we very very big on as well is i very much believe in that it's your right as a mother and as a woman to choose how you want to feed your baby whether you want to breastfeed or bottle feed formula feed whatever you want to do and there are certain um guidelines and legal guidelines in this country where you cannot be um the infant formula companies cannot promote themselves to the public because breast is best and yes we know that breast is best but there are many situations where women have not been given information on formula feeding and i've seen it with my own eyes where i've been into rural communities and there's three-day old babies sitting and eating pup because their mother hasn't got enough milk to feed them and the mother has no access or information to infant formula and um yes we all like to time with the world health organization but in south africa we have our own set of challenges and i believe that women should be able to make up their own minds in a non-judgmental environment about how they choose to feed their children so that's another big thing that i started was actually putting out education and information on formula feeding and um people always laugh you know i have my my bread and my bag of oranges ready for when i get thrown off to jail but i'm there and i'm serving a purpose by letting people take responsibility for their own rights no that they're educating people they are sort of options so how did it go you sort of go okay this thing is bigger than i thought it was one staff member two st how did it go one staff member i bought in someone to help me manage all the social media and at the same time when she was running baby yum yum she was running my food marketing social media side as well and um nicole's just amazing she really helped give me insight into growing my business and in terms of the social media i mean i really didn't know anything about the different you know about the algorithms and all those sorts of things and she really brought me up to speed with that and you know 24/7 365 it's that kind of thing when you've got a facebook page you need to be available and accessible at any time night or day to answer people who are asking you for advice and opinions and she was there and it then grew on where we needed more content so we went to one of the print publications and took one of their editors and brought her on board to generate content and to deal with the writers and the bloggers and the influencers and then we brought on a salesperson to help manage the clients and she came from one of the other publications and it's really grown and grown and grown and you know we've we've tried different ways to do things different people to do things and we've had our successes and our failures but i definitely believe that your success is obviously complemented by the people around you very important that it's a team effort but it is i mean that's one of the things i was always taught is that you need to get you know if you want to be very successful surround yourself with people that are better than you at certain aspects you can be the visionary but you need your troops need to be better than you they are and and as i was saying to you i mean i really am a visionary i send my staff emails in the middle of the night and i know every time i walk in the office and i say guys i've got a new idea they just roll their eyes because they know it's going to be something insane but i always carry out my vision and they always help me and support me to carry out my vision which is amazing so i wanted a giant baby yum yum teddy bms got made we got it now it's all over the place we wanted bumper stickers we got them whenever we wanted we've always um they've always supported me and backed me in terms of getting it which has been fantastic and your team really is important and you know you've grown it to to the size that it is now which is and i gotta say it's it's impressive the growth is impressive um it's been a long time coming so you know it's not as though it was an overnight success you didn't start blogging because i need to say there's so many people they they go out and they look on the internet and they go how to make money online and it comes up with start your own blog yeah brilliant brilliant idea start your own blog and and whether you're into watch making or building ships in bottles or whatever but it takes work it's long hard slug and i fall for the blogs that i do um you don't just kind of go okay maybe i'll do one blog now another in a month or there's got to be consistency you're going to be out there you got to make sure you got to build credibility and uh you got to market it but a lot of people are still scared i mean look at south africa's economy today we we're now on the verge of what people are calling the fourth industrial revolution so people sort of i would guess now in their in their 40s and up um they may not have jobs in five to ten years time because of this this fourth industrial revolution so now's the time to start planning on doing something else absolutely whether it's for yourself or for someone else and so you can make more money essentially for yourself to take away at the end of the day to look after yourself people definitely need to start looking at that and i think that people need to be abreast of trends you know you need to know it's coming in the future i mean you look at some of these amazing futurists and they speak about new technology that's happening and the new way the things that the way the things are going to run and it's not just pie in the sky it's actual real things so get on that boat and be one step ahead and you need to just surround yourself with what's happening all the time keep your eyes open i think that in today's time people are so in their little boxes that they you know they get in their car they drive to work they do their work they get in their car they drive home and the world is bigger than that open your eyes start looking at different things different opportunities see what people are doing so that you can be on that ship when it sets sail well the big thing in in my opinion the big thing that's coming now is the the whole artificial intelligence across websites and social media chat bots chat bots are going to be monster big um i've i've sort of i've seen that as a trend it's something that i'm currently doing and i mean as as much as i think i got into that curve fairly early already there are chat bots in the states where you cannot distinguish between whether you're talking to a real person or not correct correct and it's not just where you see on some sites it says communicate with us and you start the chat and then it says sorry so-and-so is off line and we'll respond to you when you get questions answered absolutely it's amazing that sort of technology and you know you ask me just now like what are my numbers um where do we go with the site you know it's it's that's what i have my team for my team to manage the numbers to see the growth as long as i see growth from a profit perspective and also from a community perspective i'm happy we set very strict targets my team need to achieve that but one thing that i have obviously come to learn and it's part of the sales campaign when i go and see potential clients is that you know the average um facebook social the facebook interaction the average standard i think it's low it's something it could be eight nine percent and we sitting on an eight percent engagement rate on facebook which shows eighteen didn't you say eighteen percent yes one eight eighteen percent so you know people asking that they're getting more bang for their buck in terms of you know coming to do stuff online with us and that's just the that's just the way of the world at the moment everything's online are you still involved in in terms of the actual content i am so i do have an editor who puts together our features and our lists but every now and again i like to go in and check the articles and look at things from a different angle and suggest different things um different type of topics that that people would love to read about um coming from you know a mother's point of view but i like to say i'll leave it to my team in terms of most of the content but yes i'm still very much involved and i think as soon as you take your finger off the pulse yeah i was going to say that that could be a problem because i mean it's a huge problem the baby amium is based on amanda i mean i am the face of the business and if i want to talk to somebody as a parent i want to talk to amanda absolutely 100 and that's why i mean i'm very open my emails are you know i get emails from people i happily put out my information i also on our facebook community on our actual community page i'm often putting comments and giving people advice and i'm really there in the community and i think when you step away from that you know it's like a good restaurant you know if you if you're not there all the time that restaurant's not going to survive for very long you're either going to be rubbed blind or or the service is just going to get so appalling and successful uh restaurants and successful businesses are owner run owner managed owner's got the flavor in there and that's the same thing for digital as me it will always have my flavor in it yeah uh quick question what have you got a next yet i've always got a next what is are we allowed to know what the next is so i'm working on many many things we're working on launching a baby yum yum uh product range of baby items which is very exciting and um where are we going next we are trying to where will we are at the moment tapping it into an international market to take it through to another developing country um and where the need is great and literally it's just growing and growing and it will become an empire on its own so that in six or seven years time essentially we can move it on to something bigger and better because we'll have the more more backup behind it from all different senses and all different resources to to yeah i suppose take it to the rest of the world wonderful stuff so website to go to baby yum yum dot co dot za or dot com or dot com yes because you know some people have no idea whether it's co dot za or dot com so we cater for both needs or onto our facebook page there's a facebook page a facebook community a facebook secondhand bargain box where you can get rid of all your baby things so we're really catering for everyone and of course twitter and instagram for those motivational things that we need in the day um and just watch the space and if people want to get hold of you they may email me at amanda at baby yum yum dot co dot za lots of whys quick easy and simple amanda at baby yum yum dot co dot za amanda thanks so much for coming and having a chat to us it's nice to kind of get the nuts and bolts behind the successful business we wish you all the best and uh i'll be dying to hear what the next is so when next gets watch this space when next gets launched let us know i will there we go that it is it's almost time for us to say goodbye an hour up again until next week uh i'm david what's thanks for listening and what's involved probably brought to you by the cradle boutique hotel david watts on the mix 93.8
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