#63 The Michelle Warner Route

In this episode, Michelle Warner, a business strategist and designer, shares her transition from building venture-backed startups to creating a smaller, more sustainable business. After ıexperiencing intense burnout, she stepped away from the traditional growth-at-all-costs model and began designing a business that aligned with her life. She reflects on how working with single mothers in a social impact startup revealed a growing wave of online entrepreneurship and inspired her consulting work. Michelle also breaks down her core philosophy of relationship marketing vs traffic marketing, explaining why most service-based businesses struggle when they rely on audience growth alone. She shares how building intentional relationships, instead of chasing scale, leads to better clients, more aligned growth, and a more sustainable business model. (00:00) Intro (00:39) Leaving startups after burnout (02:46) Shift to a smaller business (02:56) Discovering online entrepreneurs (06:59) Offers evolve over time (12:32) Relationship vs traffic marketing (28:00) Real vs transactional networking (29:37) Connection avatars strategy (32:59) Using a podcast to network (35:23) Small, specific asks (46:12) Defining what’s enough Follow Michelle on LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/warnermichelle/⁠ Check out Networking that Pays: ⁠https://www.themichellewarner.com/⁠  – Build a repeatable inbound motion and stabilize your revenue:⁠ ⁠https://duoconsulting.co/⁠⁠ Each week, we share a new framework, concept, or example of how solopreneurs are scaling from $25,000 to $60,000+ per month: ​​⁠⁠https://www.howsolosscale.com/⁠⁠