Today on the podcast we’re delving into the often highly underestimated area of the media which is LOCAL NEWS.

You could be forgiven for thinking that due to the decline of physical print editions of local papers and magazines over the years, that news media in the suburbs is dead.  But you’d be wrong.

No matter how many Facebook ads you take out, Google Ad words or social media posts, nothing quite replaces the power of a feature in the local news media..even now…and just because they might not sell as many physical copies, doesn’t mean nobodies reading them. 

My guest on the podcast today, Anna Usher has been a journo for more than 30 years. 

You may have seen Anna’s by line on mastheads like the Daily Mirror, the Daily Telegraph, and the Sunday Telegraph, she’s also worked as a reporter on the Today Show back in the day on Channel Nine, Channel 10 and Radio Station 2UE.

She's also the founder of Mosman Collective, the Number 1 place for local news on Sydney’s lower north shore....

If you're feeling like you're struggling to connect with your audience and be authentic with them, then this episode is for you!

"I back myself. I know I've launched the biggest brands into this market. I back myself."

Tory Archbold is a businesswoman, entrepreneur, and media personality from Australia. She is the CEO and founder of Powerful Steps, a brand and communications agency, and the host of the podcast Powerful Stories.

This is Tory Archbold's story...

Tory Archbold is a successful businesswoman who has worked with some of the world's most influential celebrities, entrepreneurs, and CEOs. She has a gift for connecting with people and making them feel special. At just 24 years old, she started her own brand and communications agency, Torstar. Through her hard work and dedication, she built Torstar into a successful business that attracted the world's top performing brands, celebrities, and influencers. In 2019, she shut down her agency and launched Powerful Steps, an online communit...

Spend just a few minutes with pencil artist Cathy Hamilton and you know you’re in the company of one of those iconic Aussie characters who just epitomises all the best bits of the bush.

Humble, humorous, happy, and pretty matter-of-fact about her success, she’s arguably one of Australia’s most well-known pencil artists and a very talented one at that.

Inspired by the farm animals in and around her home, a beef farm, just outside Cootamundra in rural NSW, Cathy initially started drawing again as a hobby after her adult children left home.

At a friend’s suggestion she turned some of her drawings into cards and began selling them, it was a small but enjoyable lifestyle business.  But low and behold, a drought, a couple of Covid lockdowns and a feature as one of the first artists on the famous Buy From the Bush website and Cathy’s “little” business exploded.

Cathy’s story has captured the attention of the rural media too, with features in Central West Living, The Land and Graziher, and...

Jane Cay, doesn't run her business like most entrepreneurs. 

She's like the anti-entrepreneur, doing the opposite of what most business owners do, which is spend a ton of time and money in parts of the business that traditionally don’t “make” money.

Ironically, it's precisely that laser focus on team, culture, customer experience and sustainability over the last 14 years that’s enabled Birdsnest, Jane's online and retail fashion business, to grow 30 times in size from it's infancy and employ 150 fabulous “nesters” (or team members to anyone who’s not familiar with the famous in-house Birdsnest terminology.)

But when Jane first purchased a retail business on the high-street of Cooma in 2008, then under a different name, she had no particular interest in fashion. 

The daughter of an accountant, Jane had a knack for numbers, but what she did discover, as she found herself in daily changeroom conversation with her customers, was that she was passionate about ‘inspiring confidence’ in h...

Buy from the Bush is arguably one of the biggest social movements and public buy-in campaigns Australians have witnessed in the last decade….and it all started on Canva from a kitchen table in a country farmhouse in Central West NSW.

Three years of no rain crippled rural Australia, both it’s farms and their families and the towns that held them together. The knock-on effects had a devastating impact on everything from small businesses in towns to the mental health of farmers and their families.

Grace Brennan, a city gal by birth, and more recently, a country girl by marriage, lived in the heart of drought country, just near a little town called Warren a little over an hour west of Dubbo. 

By her own admission she was pretty useless on the farm in a practical sense, even at the best of times, but watching the drought slowly bleed the soul of her local community dry and many farmers lose their will to live, one day in late 2019 Grace decided to do something about it.

Buy From The Bus...

Buy from the Bush is arguably one of the biggest social movements and public buy-in campaigns Australians have witnessed in the last decade….and it all started on Canva from a kitchen table in a country farmhouse in Central West NSW.

Three years of no rain crippled rural Australia, both it’s farms and their families and the towns that held them together. The knock-on effects had a devastating impact on everything from small businesses in towns to the mental health of farmers and their families.

Grace Brennan, a city gal by birth, and more recently, a country girl by marriage, lived in the heart of drought country, just near a little town called Warren a little over an hour west of Dubbo. 

By her own admission she was pretty useless on the farm in a practical sense, even at the best of times, but watching the drought slowly bleed the soul of her local community dry and many farmers lose their will to live, one day in late 2019 Grace decided to do something about it.

Buy From The Bus...

Meet Jemima Aldridge, the country style icon and co-founder of Dubbo Institution Saddler & Co and luxury accommodation home, The Repose.  She's so self-deprecating about her success it's silly.

But Jemima's clearly no fool...bubbling with country charm, talkative and ambitious, Jemima is one half of a dynamic husband and wife duo who started their business 12 years ago on a whim after her partner, Bede, lost his job as a saddle maker in Dubbo.   

Ask anyone who lives within a 500 kilometre radius of Dubbo to recommend a great country business, any business and 9 times out of 10 Saddler and Co will get a mention.  I know because I did exactly that for this podcast series.

Jemima is whole heartedly invested in every aspect of the leather goods business and creating a lasting legacy for her family, both in the products she sells and the service she gives back to the community

And, not surprisingly her eye for style doesn’t stop at long-lasting leather bags and wallets, despite Jemima’...

Ever heard of a business growing consistently by more than 200% year on year?

Yeah, neither had I until I met freshwater pearl craftswomen, Emily Quigley.

You see, amongst all the pain and heartbreak in rural and regional Australia during the worst drought in a century, good things were happening.

Rural community support initiatives were popping up everywhere, but perhaps none so explosively successfully or more popular than the Buy From The Bush campaign.

Buy From The Bush is essentially a website that showcases small businesses and their wares from across rural and regional Australia. 

(We're actually chatting to Grace Brennan, the Founder of BFTB in our new few episodes - so watch out for that!)

You know when you purchase from BFTB that you’re directly supporting local, small businesses from country towns, and back in 2019, every Australian wanted to do their bit to do just that.  

So, it’s safe to say Buy From The Bush had a “phenomenon” effect on so many small businesses in...

For the next handful of episodes, Nable My Business is going on tour.

We're on the road, visiting with and chatting to some incredible women kicking ass in business in rural and regional NSW.

Our first stop is far west NSW and our first guest, PR Maven Georgie Quigley is one of this region's home grown success stories.

Born in Warren (about and hour north west of Dubbo), population 1,530 according to Google, Georgie spent her high school years at boarding school in Orange before eventually settling in Sydney. But Georgie’s strong ties to the land have seen her gravitate back to her roots over and over again to help small business owners in rural and remote areas doing incredible things get the PR exposure they deserve.

Her clients include, Lady Kate Women’s Knitwear, Incy Interiors, The Design Paddock, Marg Studio, Barney & Jacq, Fetched Bahru

This episode is chock full of tips and tricks from Georgie on all the hacks to getting the best PR when you’re in small biz, whether you ha...

You cannot get more practical than this blog post of Nable My Business!

There’s so much business and self-development talk out there, so many books, podcasts and courses, conferences, and summits.  But what I’ve realised since starting Nable My Business is that so many leaders and experts talk about the why, the inspiration, the challenges, and the problem, but not many actually grab you by hand and say THIS IS HOW.  This is how you do the thing, fix the problem, grow you business, make more sales.

That’s what I want to do with Nable My Business and that’s exactly the ethos behind Episode 7 of the podcast.

I’ll still bring you loads of journalists, PR people, successful entrepreneurs, courageous leaders and inspirational episodes.  But this is episode is about the doing.

Pitching the Media and building your business as an industry expert is prime for procrastination in any small business.  You’re too busy just getting through the day to day.  Dealing with supply chain issues, astro...