How To Find Your Drive To Get Started: Success Journey with Samantha Cameron
In this episode of YouTube Success Podcast, I am inviting you on an inspiring journey alongside Samantha Cameron, a Social Media Alchemist, where you'll uncover invaluable insights on igniting your motivation and propelling yourself toward success.
Samantha shares her personal experiences and strategies for overcoming obstacles, finding purpose, and staying resilient in the face of challenges. From identifying your passions to harnessing the power of determination, this episode offers practical advice and actionable steps to kickstart your own success journey. Tune in and discover the keys to unlocking your inner drive with Samantha Cameron.
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Transcript
Matt Hughes - King of Video: Hello.
Speaker:Welcome to YouTube Success.
Speaker:The podcast where we're talking about YouTube success.
Speaker:And once again, I've got somebody who's not necessarily fully focused on YouTube,
Speaker:but she is a speaker at TubeFest and with the previous speakers that you've heard
Speaker:from so far, I wanted to bring Sam in and just talk about a journey, really.
Speaker:And I think actually from a YouTube Success point of view, this is going
Speaker:to be really interesting from you if you're looking for financial
Speaker:freedom and work based freedom, all of that kind of good stuff.
Speaker:But the first thing we should do is the most awkward thing for most people,
Speaker:unless you're super prepped with this is ask Sam to introduce herself.
Speaker:Over to you.
Samantha Cameron:Thanks you for having me on the session and also,
Samantha Cameron:yeah, really excited about TubeFest.
Samantha Cameron:It is going to be an incredible event.
Samantha Cameron:So I'm Samantha, Samantha Cameron.
Samantha Cameron:People know me as Sam.
Samantha Cameron:I'm the social media alchemist and I help businesses turn their content into gold.
Samantha Cameron:I'm a social media expert, social media psychologist and strategist.
Samantha Cameron:And what I do is I help businesses, entrepreneurs, people that are using
Samantha Cameron:the online space to build their business to actually look at selling
Samantha Cameron:and social media strategies to be more consistent and visible so that they
Samantha Cameron:can build the business that will give them that flexibility to work when
Samantha Cameron:they want to work, earn the income that they want to earn, and also
Samantha Cameron:choose who they want to work with.
Samantha Cameron:And, and that's what this is all about.
Samantha Cameron:This is why we work for ourselves, isn't it?
Samantha Cameron:This is why we quit the corporate role or that, you know, that really slog
Samantha Cameron:of the rat race to work for ourselves because we want something better.
Samantha Cameron:Um, and that's what I help businesses do.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Perfect.
Samantha Cameron:And I really want you to pay attention to that.
Samantha Cameron:If you're somebody that's just getting started in your YouTube journey and
Samantha Cameron:you're thinking, is it something that's possible for me to leave my corporate job?
Samantha Cameron:Maybe you're a part time YouTuber, something like that.
Samantha Cameron:This session is going to be really important.
Samantha Cameron:And I think, but I'll kind of preface it with just remember that we're a
Samantha Cameron:little bit further ahead than you.
Samantha Cameron:And so when Sam describes it, it takes a bit of time, takes a bit of strategic
Samantha Cameron:thinking, and we'll come to all of that as we talk about this stuff, I'm sure.
Samantha Cameron:So Sam, I guess whilst I'm talking about the time it takes, why don't
Samantha Cameron:we go back to where you were before?
Samantha Cameron:So what is it you started out doing?
Samantha Cameron:Where was you when you decided to make this leap..
Samantha Cameron:Oh my god.
Samantha Cameron:Okay, so I've been doing this for over 8 years now.
Samantha Cameron:So in the social media world, I'm a bit of a dinosaur.
Samantha Cameron:But, you know, it doesn't mean that I don't know what's happening, and what's
Samantha Cameron:going on in the social media world.
Samantha Cameron:How my journey kind of started out, so I had my own, I'm a mum of five,
Samantha Cameron:got five children, and I worked in the corporate world, very, very, you
Samantha Cameron:know, long hours, travelling, and 13 years ago decided that we would, after
Samantha Cameron:having a break from our older three, we would start having children again.
Samantha Cameron:So it was very, we had two small children together, very difficult
Samantha Cameron:to continue doing my corporate role.
Samantha Cameron:So I left, I was actually made redundant, which was really handy.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: What was the corporate role?
Samantha Cameron:What were you doing?
Samantha Cameron:A large bank, and I was an account relationship manager,
Samantha Cameron:so I was doing a lot of traveling.
Samantha Cameron:I was traveling all over the country, which is really difficult
Samantha Cameron:when you've got two small children that over a year, there's a year
Samantha Cameron:age gap between the two of them.
Samantha Cameron:So we made this decision that when redundancies came up, which they often
Samantha Cameron:did back then in the banks, and still does now, I don't think, I mean, a
Samantha Cameron:lot of people say to me, Oh, you know, running your own business is a bit risky.
Samantha Cameron:I think actually having a job these days is even more risky.
Samantha Cameron:At least if you've got your own business, you're in control of what happens.
Samantha Cameron:So I took the redundancy, but I've always been independent.
Samantha Cameron:I've worked since I was 16, you know, I had my own house
Samantha Cameron:and mortgage at the age of 18.
Samantha Cameron:So I've always had money.
Samantha Cameron:I've always been independent and I wanted to do something, but I wanted
Samantha Cameron:to be able to be at home with the two smaller ones, but then be there at home
Samantha Cameron:so that when the older ones came home,
Samantha Cameron:I could be around.
Samantha Cameron:So I qualified as a childminder and it, you know, I got a couple of, I
Samantha Cameron:got a family that had two children themselves, started looking after them.
Samantha Cameron:But me being me, I've always been an entrepreneur.
Samantha Cameron:My dad always said to me as a, you know, as a kid, I could sell ice to an Eskimo.
Samantha Cameron:I've always been an entrepreneur and I've, you know, I had like three jobs
Samantha Cameron:at one point and it's, it was like, actually, how can we make this bigger?
Samantha Cameron:And within 3 months, we turned my little child mind in business from two
Samantha Cameron:children to 48 children on the books.
Samantha Cameron:We turned the whole downstairs of our house into like a nursery.
Samantha Cameron:I had two staff members working for me as well.
Samantha Cameron:And it was great.
Samantha Cameron:It was brilliant, you know, it was having this business and the dream
Samantha Cameron:was to then find premises to really take it to the next level with a big
Samantha Cameron:massive nursery and after school care.
Samantha Cameron:But what happened was I was finding that my children were starting to get
Samantha Cameron:neglected because I would be, you know, playing with another child or looking
Samantha Cameron:after another child and I couldn't sort out my own, and I think the day that
Samantha Cameron:reality hit was when I couldn't actually take my kids to the dentist because
Samantha Cameron:they were like, oh no, our appointments are 9 to 5, or school holidays.
Samantha Cameron:And it's like, but I'm working constantly.
Samantha Cameron:I can't leave the children that I'm looking after to take my
Samantha Cameron:own children to the dentist.
Samantha Cameron:And it was, it started to really take its toll on me, the family and the house.
Samantha Cameron:So 6 months before all of this, I'd been introduced to network marketing when
Samantha Cameron:network marketing was at its high, massive high, and I thought, you know what?
Samantha Cameron:This is an opportunity for me to earn a bit of extra money.
Samantha Cameron:Maybe I can reduce what I'm doing with the child minding.
Samantha Cameron:And it would be a nice little side hustle.
Samantha Cameron:So I started doing that and then within 3 months of the network marketing,
Samantha Cameron:I'd made manager position, which normally takes people around 2 years.
Samantha Cameron:And I've done it all, I did it all through social media because having the
Samantha Cameron:two small children and actually having a full time business, I couldn't go out
Samantha Cameron:and do what was traditional with network marketing, which was basically going to
Samantha Cameron:people's houses, doing parties, speaking to people in the street, going to, you
Samantha Cameron:know, to networking, that kind of thing.
Samantha Cameron:I just couldn't do it.
Samantha Cameron:So I started building my network business within social media.
Samantha Cameron:Then because of the success I had, head office said, would you mind coming
Samantha Cameron:and do some social media training just to show others how it's done?
Samantha Cameron:Yep, not a problem.
Samantha Cameron:Started doing that.
Samantha Cameron:Then other network marketing companies heard and were like, Could
Samantha Cameron:you come and do training for us?
Samantha Cameron:Would you mind doing it for us?
Samantha Cameron:Yeah, not a problem.
Samantha Cameron:So the company that I worked for, the head office knew what I was
Samantha Cameron:doing and they were fine with it.
Samantha Cameron:But unfortunately, the people at the top within the network marketing,
Samantha Cameron:unfortunately, you know, they think that they can do whatever they want, weren't
Samantha Cameron:happy, put a complaint in with head office and said that I needed to stop.
Samantha Cameron:And it was like, hold on a minute, I'm a grown woman, I pay my own
Samantha Cameron:bills, I shouldn't be, no one should dictate to me what I do.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: You're kind of independent, aren't you?
Samantha Cameron:It's sold as like an independent run business, but actually the
Samantha Cameron:hierarchy of corporate still exists.
Samantha Cameron:It was this witch hunt and it was awful.
Samantha Cameron:So I spoke to head office and said, look, well, head office gave me an ultimatum.
Samantha Cameron:You either, you know, stop doing the social media training or,
Samantha Cameron:you know, you need to, you know, you're going to lose your business.
Samantha Cameron:So I made the decision to walk away.
Samantha Cameron:I love the business that, I love the products that the business do.
Samantha Cameron:I still use the products and I still have my managers discount, which is great.
Samantha Cameron:But then what happened was I then became a freelancer for all the
Samantha Cameron:other network marketing companies and was doing the training for them.
Samantha Cameron:And then my husband said to me, look, if you're doing it for them, why
Samantha Cameron:don't you do it for other people?
Samantha Cameron:But I had this mindset of, no, that's my comfort zone.
Samantha Cameron:I can't do, I can only do that for these people.
Samantha Cameron:I can't go out and do it for Joe Bloggs, who's a plumber, or that big
Samantha Cameron:company, you know, computer company.
Samantha Cameron:No way.
Samantha Cameron:This is my comfort zone.
Samantha Cameron:This is what I know.
Samantha Cameron:So I bit the bullet and I went to a networking event that I, because I used
Samantha Cameron:to network quite a lot when I was working in corporate and then I did a little bit
Samantha Cameron:networking with my, you know, when I was in the network marketing business and I
Samantha Cameron:went along and explained what I was doing and it was incredible because people
Samantha Cameron:were like, well, do you do training?
Samantha Cameron:Yeah, I can do training.
Samantha Cameron:Do you do social media management?
Samantha Cameron:Well, I do my own so I could do it for other people and within 2 months,
Samantha Cameron:I had 30 clients, where I was doing social media management for them.
Samantha Cameron:And oh my god, that was burnout.
Samantha Cameron:Massive burnout.
Samantha Cameron:And I was charging pittance.
Samantha Cameron:I was working all hours.
Samantha Cameron:And I was like, I can't do this, can't maintain this.
Samantha Cameron:It's just not healthy.
Samantha Cameron:So we went away over Christmas and New Year and I decided to put my prices
Samantha Cameron:up, emailed all my clients and said to them from the 1st of February,
Samantha Cameron:these are going to be my prices.
Samantha Cameron:Thank you for being with me at the start, but I'm now have a,
Samantha Cameron:you know, I have a proper agency.
Samantha Cameron:This is what the prices are going to be and..
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: When was that?
Samantha Cameron:8 years ago.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: When was that?
Samantha Cameron:Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: So it's eight years ago today, actually.
Samantha Cameron:Cause at the time of recording, it's the 1st of February.
Samantha Cameron:That's amazing.
Samantha Cameron:What happened was out of those 30 clients, 10 stayed,
Samantha Cameron:the rest left, which I knew that's what would happen, because I knew that
Samantha Cameron:there were people that would value me and know that what they were going to
Samantha Cameron:pay going forward would be of value.
Samantha Cameron:So that's how,
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Do you remember what, just, sorry to
Samantha Cameron:interrupt you, but just do you remember what you were charging before and.
Samantha Cameron:Oh my god, so this is really going to scare you.
Samantha Cameron:So for social media management, for doing a post every single day to one
Samantha Cameron:platform, I was charging £99 a month.
Samantha Cameron:And I put, and I put the prices up to £250.
Samantha Cameron:We now charge £400 a month for one platform, and for a post every single day.
Samantha Cameron:So we have, you know, we've kind of scaled, but it was, in
Samantha Cameron:a way, it was, I had no mentor.
Samantha Cameron:I had nobody telling me, this is what I needed to do.
Samantha Cameron:So it was figure it, go on Sam, you've got to figure this out yourself.
Samantha Cameron:So it was a really interesting one.
Samantha Cameron:And then I started doing a lot of training.
Samantha Cameron:A lot of the stuff I did from a training element, I did for free in the
Samantha Cameron:first kind of 6 months of that year.
Samantha Cameron:I remember running a training.
Samantha Cameron:There was a solicitors in Milton Keynes for new businesses because I
Samantha Cameron:applied for grants and startups and everything else to help me get going.
Samantha Cameron:And one of the things I could do is I could use the function
Samantha Cameron:room of a solicitors in Milton Keynes, which was great.
Samantha Cameron:So I ran all my trainings there and my trainings for 6 months were free.
Samantha Cameron:And I would have 100 people in on these trainings at any one time.
Samantha Cameron:But I do feel that that was the foundation to getting my name out
Samantha Cameron:there, to building up my pipeline.
Samantha Cameron:And it's kind of, I then started doing things in the right way because
Samantha Cameron:then my trainings became paid for.
Samantha Cameron:Anytime I worked for somebody, I would charge.
Samantha Cameron:I started to learn my worth and my value.
Samantha Cameron:And that's
Samantha Cameron:important what we need to do.
Samantha Cameron:So yeah, so moving forward, now 8 years, I have my yeah
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Can I just, can I just dig in?
Samantha Cameron:Can I dig in?
Samantha Cameron:Sorry again to interrupt you because I'm finding this fascinating.
Samantha Cameron:I just want to dig into some of this stuff because I was writing
Samantha Cameron:it down as you're talking about it.
Samantha Cameron:And I think this is really important because you're flying through this stuff
Samantha Cameron:and there's so many important things here.
Samantha Cameron:Like even going back to the child money thing, like in a small period of time
Samantha Cameron:you've gone from a couple of clients to 48 or whatever the numbers that you
Samantha Cameron:said exactly, which is huge, right?
Samantha Cameron:And then you went into the network marketing and you took something
Samantha Cameron:that should have taken a long time.
Samantha Cameron:You did it in a quick time.
Samantha Cameron:So you're obviously very self-motivated, very driven to get the results
Samantha Cameron:that you're trying to get to.
Samantha Cameron:And I think part of the, we shouldn't ignore that because you
Samantha Cameron:say it so almost passively and blasé, but actually that's huge.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah, yeah, it's blasé.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah, but it's huge, right?
Samantha Cameron:Because you, you need that actually when you're starting, when you, and I
Samantha Cameron:would wonder, and I will come back to this question in a second but I wonder
Samantha Cameron:what was your main driver at that point.
Samantha Cameron:But I just want to come to these numbers before I asked you that question.
Samantha Cameron:So you went from £99 for 30 posts, 30, 31 posts, you know what I mean, a
Samantha Cameron:monthly, a daily post for a month, right?
Samantha Cameron:And was it, did you do it
Samantha Cameron:We, I would do a week at a time, so I had 30, like, 30 clients.
Samantha Cameron:Oh
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: it 7 days or did you just do it working
Samantha Cameron:like doing like 7, 8 clients a day.
Samantha Cameron:Ridiculous, I was working ridiculous hours.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: So at that point, so I worked it out.
Samantha Cameron:You had 30 clients charging a hundred pound.
Samantha Cameron:You were about three grand and then you upped that to £250, you said, right?
Samantha Cameron:And you went to 10 clients and you were getting two and a half grand.
Samantha Cameron:So you shared 20 clients of work that must've been killing you at that point
Samantha Cameron:to do 10 and you only were £500 less.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: It's £3 a post up to £13 a post, like that's
Samantha Cameron:a huge lesson in itself about, you said about knowing your value and
Samantha Cameron:you know taking that, I'm so overwhelmed because a lot of people
Samantha Cameron:as well when I speak to them and I say, oh you should do YouTube.
Samantha Cameron:They say I'm just so overwhelmed.
Samantha Cameron:How can I add this over platform into what I'm already doing?
Samantha Cameron:I'm already so busy.
Samantha Cameron:I'm already doing all the things.
Samantha Cameron:And it's like, well, actually, if you just re-evaluated why you're so busy in what
Samantha Cameron:you're doing, perhaps the price increases the thing that you should be doing.
Samantha Cameron:That's the thing you should consider.
Samantha Cameron:And you've proven that, that you've cut down your work by
Samantha Cameron:a third or two thirds, sorry.
Samantha Cameron:And you've about at the same amount of income.
Samantha Cameron:That's..
Samantha Cameron:If anything, the income drop because the time that I
Samantha Cameron:had back, it enabled me to then go and do 1-to-1 training with clients.
Samantha Cameron:And I think at the time, I was like, at that time I was doing, I would do a
Samantha Cameron:2-hour training session for like £149.
Samantha Cameron:So I would have one of those a week.
Samantha Cameron:So actually I was working less hours.
Samantha Cameron:I had nicer clients.
Samantha Cameron:I had less clients.
Samantha Cameron:I had more free time.
Samantha Cameron:And I was earning around the same kind of income.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: So, and also, you know, when you started and you
Samantha Cameron:got those 30 clients, as much as that was difficult, actually, I would imagine
Samantha Cameron:that the pressure of all of that probably made you far more efficient than a lot
Samantha Cameron:of people that maybe go straight away and get the high ticket clients because
Samantha Cameron:you were forced to be more efficient.
Samantha Cameron:And so you were forced to find the ways and the strategic ways to do these things.
Samantha Cameron:So then, yeah, it must've been a dream then moving to 10 in that way.
Samantha Cameron:So yeah, I want to dig into that.
Samantha Cameron:We'll come back to what happened after that, but I want to dig into the driver
Samantha Cameron:of all of this because you said you were made redundant, you've got two young kids.
Samantha Cameron:What do you think?
Samantha Cameron:And you said also that your dad said you could sell ice to Eskimos.
Samantha Cameron:Do you think you've always been driven then as a kid?
Samantha Cameron:Because there's a lot to be said from like somebody saying you can do something as
Samantha Cameron:a parent, you know, you always think that your kids can do everything, don't you?
Samantha Cameron:And you want them to be able to do everything, to actually
Samantha Cameron:go in and living up to that.
Samantha Cameron:So what do you think was..
Samantha Cameron:I think for me, it was always, I always wanted
Samantha Cameron:to have the nice things in life.
Samantha Cameron:So, you know, as soon as I turned 18, it was like, I'm buying my own house.
Samantha Cameron:And that's what I did.
Samantha Cameron:As soon as I turned 18, I knew I could get a mortgage.
Samantha Cameron:It was like, right, what does my deposit need to be?
Samantha Cameron:And I remember my deposit was £2,303 for my first house.
Samantha Cameron:I mean, God, you wouldn't even be able to buy a car for that these days.
Samantha Cameron:I was like, right, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to make sure I've got that money.
Samantha Cameron:So I was working as an estate agent at the time.
Samantha Cameron:And then I went, I went and found a job in a pub.
Samantha Cameron:Um, and it was like, right, I'm going to work the hour, I'm going to work in the
Samantha Cameron:estate agents during the day, I lived at home, and then in the evening, I'd
Samantha Cameron:work in the pub, and it was that drive to go, right, I need to get that money.
Samantha Cameron:But then, my mortgage, I bought my first house for £32,000.
Samantha Cameron:And it was like, right, I've got a mortgage to pay now.
Samantha Cameron:I only pay my parents five quid a week rent.
Samantha Cameron:I've now got to pay a mortgage.
Samantha Cameron:I've got nothing to put in my house.
Samantha Cameron:So I had to buy furniture.
Samantha Cameron:So it was this drive to actually have that independence, to have that house.
Samantha Cameron:And that's what I've always, always kind of strived for.
Samantha Cameron:And it's, I think it's, I think money is a great motivator, but
Samantha Cameron:it's also having the nice, it's being able to have those choices.
Samantha Cameron:And I'm not saying money brings you happiness, because I don't think it is,
Samantha Cameron:it isn't the whole thing for happiness, but what it does give you, it does
Samantha Cameron:give you those options to decide.
Samantha Cameron:Okay, do we want to go away this weekend?
Samantha Cameron:Yes, we can, because we've got the money to do it.
Samantha Cameron:And, or do we want to go out for a meal, or should we order a takeaway tonight, or
Samantha Cameron:shall we move, or should we buy a new car, or should we go on holiday, or shall we
Samantha Cameron:give back and do something for charity, or, you know, and things like that.
Samantha Cameron:So, I think having money is a, or money is a great motivator, and it
Samantha Cameron:is for me, but also has that sense of achieving, and I'm now, I think my
Samantha Cameron:motivator now, like where I'm taking the business moving forward, it's not
Samantha Cameron:just about me, it's about what, how I can do that for other people as well.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:It's really funny when you say like,
Samantha Cameron:I wouldn't say money buys you happiness.
Samantha Cameron:I don't know where that comes from, whether it was a film or whether
Samantha Cameron:it's a line in a book or something, but like, I just don't buy that.
Samantha Cameron:Like for me, I'm finding it financially driven and I'm far
Samantha Cameron:happier when I've got money.
Samantha Cameron:Like I make no bones about that but money makes me feel more safe.
Samantha Cameron:It makes me feel like I can go and do the things I want.
Samantha Cameron:All the things you've described, like, would I prefer to eat at McDonald's
Samantha Cameron:or go to a five star restaurant, Michelin restaurant or whatever?
Samantha Cameron:I know which one I choose.
Samantha Cameron:Sometimes you want to McDonald's, but sometimes you want to eat, you know,
Samantha Cameron:and have a gourmet meal or whatever.
Samantha Cameron:I just, I don't know why people seem to be so negative about money.
Samantha Cameron:And I think there's a, the saying money is the root of all evil.
Samantha Cameron:And again, I just think that's, it's probably a control thing from people
Samantha Cameron:that have money to try and control the people that, that want the money to
Samantha Cameron:make it sound like it's a bad thing, but
Samantha Cameron:it's not.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: thing at all.
Samantha Cameron:I think it's just having that balance to understand
Samantha Cameron:that not everybody has money and there are people, you know, and I
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: yeah, yeah, totally.
Samantha Cameron:having, it's not going around swanning around saying
Samantha Cameron:that this is, you know, you do, but we all have lives and we shouldn't have
Samantha Cameron:to justify what we do in our lives just because somebody, somebody can't,
Samantha Cameron:because we all have choices and it's the choices that we make, isn't it?
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: And actually, although I'd imagine the job that you took
Samantha Cameron:redundancy from, the account manager job was a reasonably well paid job, probably
Samantha Cameron:not when you consider it now to what you're doing now as your own business.
Samantha Cameron:But, you still then have to fill that hole, don't you, when you've not got that.
Samantha Cameron:And again, I see like,
Samantha Cameron:No, and that's, that was a difficult situation because you're
Samantha Cameron:kind of, you've got two wages coming in.
Samantha Cameron:No, two good wages because my husband worked at the same company, so
Samantha Cameron:we've got two good wages coming in.
Samantha Cameron:And then all of a sudden you have these two kids and go, well I don't
Samantha Cameron:really want to go back to work.
Samantha Cameron:And he's like, I've now got to pay all the bills.
Samantha Cameron:I can't do that, Sam, because, you know, we're not going to have the holidays,
Samantha Cameron:and we can't have the nice things.
Samantha Cameron:And we did, you know, we had to move house because we couldn't fit five kids
Samantha Cameron:in the three bedroom house that we had.
Samantha Cameron:Well, three straight four bedroom house, so we had to move.
Samantha Cameron:And we moved to a seven bedroom house.
Samantha Cameron:So we had, we went from a mortgage to a mortgage and then I decide to leave
Samantha Cameron:work and it's like, you know, putting that pressure on my husband was just
Samantha Cameron:incredible and that was the other motivation because it was this thing
Samantha Cameron:of, I never wanted to be a kept person.
Samantha Cameron:I wanted to continue paying my way.
Samantha Cameron:I wanted to continue,
Samantha Cameron:you know, still paying my half of the bills and everything.
Samantha Cameron:So it was right.
Samantha Cameron:It was about how do I make that work?
Samantha Cameron:How do we make it work?
Samantha Cameron:We actually went down to one car at one point because we didn't need, and it was
Samantha Cameron:because we didn't need two cars anymore.
Samantha Cameron:And you do, you'd look and say, okay, where can you cut back, and what
Samantha Cameron:makes life more flexible for you, not from, you know, even financially.
Samantha Cameron:So, yeah, there is that motivation as well of where you,
Samantha Cameron:you know, of bringing that in.
Samantha Cameron:And it's always been the same.
Samantha Cameron:It's a 50, our relationship is very 50 50.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:And, and I think we're very fortunate.
Samantha Cameron:I know we talk about money in that way and we're very fortunate to be
Samantha Cameron:in the UK and, and what benefit that we have in the UK is that making
Samantha Cameron:money is a straightforward thing.
Samantha Cameron:People make it out to not be a straightforward thing, but you proved it.
Samantha Cameron:You had 30 clients, a hundred pounds, and that gave you a good amount of
Samantha Cameron:money, arguably not valuing what you should have been valuing at the time,
Samantha Cameron:but you realise that and move, you know, change the goalposts a bit, but
Samantha Cameron:actually the fact that you were able to, in this society, start a business,
Samantha Cameron:charge an amount of money and find 30 people that would give you that
Samantha Cameron:means that it is available to you.
Samantha Cameron:I think the hardest thing probably is being in this mindset that you go to work
Samantha Cameron:and someone else pays you wages and then all of a sudden going, I've got to go
Samantha Cameron:and find these people to pay my wages.
Samantha Cameron:It's a very different way of thinking.
Samantha Cameron:Okay.
Samantha Cameron:So you've done that, so good.
Samantha Cameron:took a major tangent into that.
Samantha Cameron:I think it's so important though, these conversations.
Samantha Cameron:So you, you did that, you moved to these 10 clients.
Samantha Cameron:Then what, how have you got that from there to then the agency that,
Samantha Cameron:So I've got
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: are working
Samantha Cameron:in the team that work within the agency.
Samantha Cameron:So when I, so I got to a point within the business that actually I realised
Samantha Cameron:that my passion was the kind of social media coaching and training.
Samantha Cameron:But then when we go back about 5 years ago, I start, because I started having a
Samantha Cameron:really successful social media agency and a social media business, I started having
Samantha Cameron:other social media managers, specialists come to me and saying, you know, Sam,
Samantha Cameron:I'm really struggling to get clients.
Samantha Cameron:Do you offer mentoring?
Samantha Cameron:And it was like, yeah, I can do that.
Samantha Cameron:I can show you how I've grown my business and what you should be doing
Samantha Cameron:and what you shouldn't be doing, learning from all of my mistakes.
Samantha Cameron:So I started doing that on a 1-to-1 basis and then COVID hit.
Samantha Cameron:I was mega busy during the first part of COVID because all of these
Samantha Cameron:business realised that they had to go online but didn't know how to do it.
Samantha Cameron:So I literally had to stop doing everything I was doing because I was kind
Samantha Cameron:of helping all of these business and I had to, I hate using the word, but I had
Samantha Cameron:to pivot what I was doing and there was this big panic of, Oh my God, I'm going
Samantha Cameron:to lose all my social media management clients because COVID, you know, as
Samantha Cameron:soon as COVID hit, we thought that the world was financially going to end.
Samantha Cameron:And I thought all my clients would leave because it would affect their business.
Samantha Cameron:We only lost, I only lost one social media management client.
Samantha Cameron:And at the time, I think I had about 8 to 9 clients that I
Samantha Cameron:was doing the management for.
Samantha Cameron:But because I started getting really busy, it was this juggling act of
Samantha Cameron:helping businesses turn online, still doing the mentoring, still doing the
Samantha Cameron:training and the social media management.
Samantha Cameron:So what I decided to do was set up the Social Media Academy, which is
Samantha Cameron:a credited, certified program now that not just mentors, social media
Samantha Cameron:managers and specialists, but also takes somebody from having no social media
Samantha Cameron:knowledge or experience, to becoming a qualified social media specialist.
Samantha Cameron:And the idea around that, when I started that four years ago, because
Samantha Cameron:it was in COVID that I started it, was everybody that came through the programme
Samantha Cameron:would be given an opportunity to then become a specialist within my agency.
Samantha Cameron:And that's how it's kind of grown.
Samantha Cameron:It's kind of been this chicken and egg situation, you know.
Samantha Cameron:I see gems that come through my academy and go, you would
Samantha Cameron:be amazing working for me.
Samantha Cameron:Do you want to come and work for me?
Samantha Cameron:Exactly.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:And then getting the client.
Samantha Cameron:And then what I did, the clients I was looking after, I transitioned
Samantha Cameron:over to them because I kind of fell out of love of doing the social media
Samantha Cameron:management because I fell in love with doing the mentoring and the coaching.
Samantha Cameron:And then it just got to a point where we were getting more inquiries and
Samantha Cameron:then having to take more people on.
Samantha Cameron:And then when we kind of look at today, we've got, yeah, eight in the
Samantha Cameron:team that all look after different social media clients on a daily basis.
Samantha Cameron:And that's what I love.
Samantha Cameron:And then like with the Academy now that's kind of merging, I'm going to
Samantha Cameron:be building a foundation this year because the idea around it is I want
Samantha Cameron:the Academy to be a place where parents with special needs children or children
Samantha Cameron:with complex issues, those parents can't work, they can't have a full time job
Samantha Cameron:and they feel that they're not a person.
Samantha Cameron:They feel that they're just there for their child.
Samantha Cameron:So the idea around the academy and the foundation will be to give them the option
Samantha Cameron:to go, look, there is this option for you to have your own business or the option
Samantha Cameron:to come and work within my business.
Samantha Cameron:But I know that the money's tight.
Samantha Cameron:So what we will then do, we'll use the foundation to help fund the academy
Samantha Cameron:for those families that, you know, want to do it, but they financially can't.
Samantha Cameron:And then of course the academy's open to everybody else as well.
Samantha Cameron:So, because that part, the part where everyone pays for the academy,
Samantha Cameron:is going to fund the foundation.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Yeah, which is funny, right?
Samantha Cameron:Because you can only be altruistic in that way if you have your fees covered,
Samantha Cameron:you know, if you're being paid a good amount for what you do, you can then
Samantha Cameron:decide how can I distribute some of this wealth, whether you call it wealth
Samantha Cameron:or not, depending on where it's at.
Samantha Cameron:But you can just distribute them the money and decide that you can support
Samantha Cameron:other people in whichever way you see fit.
Samantha Cameron:And I think that's the other part of people say it's like just earning
Samantha Cameron:loads of money means you go and get a private jet or do whatever.
Samantha Cameron:And actually, a lot of the time when you get to that point, you sit and
Samantha Cameron:think, well, I know where I was.
Samantha Cameron:I know what I struggled with.
Samantha Cameron:I know how difficult it was for me to make that step.
Samantha Cameron:How can I help people?
Samantha Cameron:No, what I think is the best thing for them to do to go and
Samantha Cameron:start their own social media management agency or whatever,
Samantha Cameron:whatever it is they want, you know.
Samantha Cameron:So you said like you support people with special needs, additional
Samantha Cameron:needs, whatever you want to call it.
Samantha Cameron:How did it, was that, how did that come about?
Samantha Cameron:Why?
Samantha Cameron:Why did you choose that?
Samantha Cameron:I think it kind of happened naturally.
Samantha Cameron:So last year, the business had incredible, we tripled the
Samantha Cameron:business turnover last year.
Samantha Cameron:We had an incredible year last year, and the growth was absolutely outstanding.
Samantha Cameron:But for me, that's what I wanted to do.
Samantha Cameron:So if I take you back to 18 months ago, I, so I only came back, I had to take
Samantha Cameron:18 months out of my business and only actually came back into my business
Samantha Cameron:in September 2022, because my son, our fourth child Beau was became really,
Samantha Cameron:really poorly in October 2020 to the point that I became his full time carer.
Samantha Cameron:And I couldn't work, couldn't look after my clients.
Samantha Cameron:Thankfully, I did have, I had a couple of social media management clients that I
Samantha Cameron:was looking after that gave me that kind of income you know, just so I was kind of
Samantha Cameron:having something coming, but I had this 18 month gap where I was very, very backseat
Samantha Cameron:in my business, but because I built the foundations of having residual income,
Samantha Cameron:passive income, and also the people knowing exactly what I did and who I was,
Samantha Cameron:not only did it give me an income in those 18 months while I was off with Beau, it
Samantha Cameron:meant that when I came back in September,
Samantha Cameron:I didn't have to think to myself, I've now got to pick everything up.
Samantha Cameron:I came back and everybody knew what it was that I did.
Samantha Cameron:So I think that's why the growth last year was incredible, because
Samantha Cameron:I kind of knew what I wanted to do.
Samantha Cameron:I knew where I wanted to take the business.
Samantha Cameron:And it was like, nothing's stopping me now.
Samantha Cameron:We've got to go with this and what's the worst that can happen?
Samantha Cameron:And how it's kind of worked out.
Samantha Cameron:So Beau has, Beau's had special needs since he was two.
Samantha Cameron:And Beau goes to a special needs school.
Samantha Cameron:But when he was poorly, he was later diagnosed with a rare mental health
Samantha Cameron:condition called PAWS, which is Pervasive Arousal Withdrawal Syndrome.
Samantha Cameron:It's when a child suffers a trauma and the body, the subconscious part
Samantha Cameron:of the brain shuts the body down.
Samantha Cameron:So it stops them from walking, talking, eating and drinking independently and
Samantha Cameron:it shuts them away from the world.
Samantha Cameron:So we went from having a fun loving boy who loved his lego, loved playing
Samantha Cameron:on his playstation, his gaming, to watching TV programs, to playing jokes,
Samantha Cameron:to literally, in theory, being in a coma, where I would feed him, I'd
Samantha Cameron:have to bathe him, the whole works.
Samantha Cameron:And that was a massive shock, you know, not just for the
Samantha Cameron:family, but for everything.
Samantha Cameron:And we didn't know what the outcome was, because we were, when we got the
Samantha Cameron:diagnosis, we were told that recovery and rehab was 12 to 18 months, but
Samantha Cameron:we wouldn't get a bed in a mental health facility for at least a year.
Samantha Cameron:So we had this kind of thing of, well, Beau could be 14, 15 before
Samantha Cameron:he's even on the road to recovery.
Samantha Cameron:So I didn't at that time know what was going to happen with my business and
Samantha Cameron:the business was just put on hold, you know, I was earning 1500 quid a month
Samantha Cameron:and that was fine because that kind of meant that I could still be financially
Samantha Cameron:contributing to the household and that was fine for what we needed to.
Samantha Cameron:So when I came back into the business, it was like, right, Beau's back in school.
Samantha Cameron:Bo's now better because we spent six months in a rehab hospital.
Samantha Cameron:And it was like, come on, you've got to do this now.
Samantha Cameron:There's no COVID.
Samantha Cameron:Beau's not ill.
Samantha Cameron:Let's get going.
Samantha Cameron:And that's why, you know, I decided that we needed to, you know,
Samantha Cameron:really move the business over.
Samantha Cameron:And from March last year, up until the end of, we had this humongous growth.
Samantha Cameron:Absolutely incredible.
Samantha Cameron:I mean, I'm happy to share the figures if you want me to, but I was And
Samantha Cameron:that's because of the hard work.
Samantha Cameron:I had a plan, I knew what I wanted to do and I just started bringing team
Samantha Cameron:on because I do believe that if you want to grow your business, you need
Samantha Cameron:to have that team supporting you.
Samantha Cameron:You can't do it on your own.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah.
Samantha Cameron:I, and so what I'm hearing you say is, so it's partly that you had the personal
Samantha Cameron:issues go on that, that highlighted the need for this residual income, this,
Samantha Cameron:it allowed you to take a back seat, but keep things going enough that you, we're
Samantha Cameron:able to continue bringing an income in, which I think is why it's important,
Samantha Cameron:you know, bring it back to YouTube as a general thing, but really any kind
Samantha Cameron:of social media platform where you can bring an income in is having that
Samantha Cameron:residual income, knowing that it's going to come in regardless of what happens.
Samantha Cameron:I know that would have meant it slowed your growth down at that
Samantha Cameron:point, but again, you were able to then 18 months later, just go and
Samantha Cameron:pick it up again, which is brilliant.
Samantha Cameron:Okay, we're kind of running out of time and so, we don't need to know your
Samantha Cameron:numbers, although if anybody wants to speak to Sam, like me, she's very open.
Samantha Cameron:I'm sure she'd love to have a conversation with you about it.
Samantha Cameron:And of course, Sammy is at TubeFest, so you can come and hang
Samantha Cameron:out with us both on May the 23rd.
Samantha Cameron:Sam, can we just talk about your session quickly at TubeFest?
Samantha Cameron:What are you going to be talking about in that session?
Samantha Cameron:The session is called The Alchemy of Social Media Psychology.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah, so I'm going to be showing you and talking to you,
Samantha Cameron:or telling you, or talking to you, not telling you that, you know, I'm not
Samantha Cameron:going to tell you off, but I'm going to be sharing with you how, you know, you
Samantha Cameron:can implement social media psychology strategies and social media strategies
Samantha Cameron:into your kind of business to really help you get your content out there and
Samantha Cameron:make sure that your content is actually turned, you know, creating those sales,
Samantha Cameron:because so many businesses put content out there and it's just tumbleweed.
Samantha Cameron:It's not working.
Samantha Cameron:It's not getting engagement.
Samantha Cameron:It's not telling people what you're trying to achieve.
Samantha Cameron:It's not bringing the sales in and that's what I'm going to be doing.
Samantha Cameron:And I'm going to be sharing lots of tips and advice on how you can do that as well.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Wicked.
Samantha Cameron:And I think that's the thing that I think a lot of people miss is the, they
Samantha Cameron:do all the marketing and they do all the content that they put in together,
Samantha Cameron:but they're not making any money.
Samantha Cameron:And I'm like, how have you not got a call to action or moving an audience
Samantha Cameron:into an email list or something?
Samantha Cameron:This seems mad to me.
Samantha Cameron:And you've got to start thinking strategically, you know, you can generate
Samantha Cameron:this huge audience on these platforms, but you've got to actually do something.
Samantha Cameron:But if that's your driver, maybe it's not your driver and you just
Samantha Cameron:love the, you know, you're doing it for you as a passion project.
Samantha Cameron:But for most of us, I think financially, we need to be secure and hopefully what
Samantha Cameron:you're going to be sharing is going to help them with that kind of thing.
Samantha Cameron:Thanks so much, Sam.
Samantha Cameron:I really appreciate it.
Samantha Cameron:I could talk to you forever.
Samantha Cameron:I feel like your story is so fascinating.
Samantha Cameron:And definitely digging into those numbers and looking at how you've
Samantha Cameron:managed to do that in such a small, small amount of time is probably
Samantha Cameron:something we should do as a follow up.
Samantha Cameron:You're welcome.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Thanks so much for your time.
Samantha Cameron:Really appreciate it.
Samantha Cameron:Oh, I should..
Samantha Cameron:Oh, I'm everywhere.
Samantha Cameron:I'm on social media, so you can find me on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok.
Samantha Cameron:I do have a YouTube account, but I'm gonna be honest with you, I
Samantha Cameron:don't use it as I should be, but Matt's gonna change that for me.
Samantha Cameron:We are gonna
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: We're going to change that.
Samantha Cameron:Yeah Yeah, you can find me.
Samantha Cameron:It's Samantha Cameron.
Samantha Cameron:If you search Samantha Cameron's social on your internet browser, you'll find
Samantha Cameron:all my social media and my website.
Samantha Cameron:Welcome.
Samantha Cameron:Thanks for having me.
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Really appreciate it.
Samantha Cameron:Bye!
Samantha Cameron:Matt Hughes - King of Video: Bye bye.
Samantha Cameron:See you in May.