Episode 317: From Idea to Impact: Building a SaaS Platform for Women Tech Founders | Nomiki Petrolla | Founder & CEO of Theanna, a Female Founder Network for Tech Entrepreneurs
Nomiki Petrolla is on a mission to close the access gap for women in tech. As founder and CEO of Theanna, a SaaS platform helping women turn ideas into scalable companies, she’s changing what it means to be a startup founder. In this episode, Kara and Nomiki talk about why mindset matters more than perfection, how to build in public, and why some communities fail while others thrive. You’ll hear how a family crisis changed Nomiki’s entire trajectory, the difference between “idea people” and “doer people,” and why getting customers matters more than just pitching. This episode explores women in tech, startup mindset, and community-led growth.
“My mission is to close the access gap—because before you talk about funding, you need access.”
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Follow along using the Transcript
(00:00:00) - Introducing Nomiki Petrolla and Theanna’s mission
(00:01:00) - Leaving corporate tech to build something new
(00:03:00) - Solving access gaps in women-led startups
(00:06:00) - From consulting to productizing a solution
(00:08:00) - Women in tech: gaps, patterns, and market insights
(00:10:00) - How AI is reshaping startup access and MVPs
(00:14:00) - A family emergency and a life-changing decision
(00:18:00) - Theanna’s curated community and what makes it work
(00:22:00) - Founder mindset: why fear is the real blocker
(00:27:00) - Routines, rituals, and support at home
(00:31:00) - Building from Columbus, Ohio, not Silicon Valley
(00:34:00) - Talking to customers and selling like a founder
(00:37:00) - Final thoughts on community, courage, and growth
A broader segmentation that I started to realize was we have idea people and we actually have doer people, and I need the people that are doing the darn thing every day, show up every day that are like, I need help. I wanna do this. I wanna reach these goals with all those other action oriented people.
That's Nomiki Petrolla founder of Theanna. I'm Kara Duffy, and this is The Powerful Ladies podcast. Welcome to The Powerful Ladies Podcast. Hi. Thanks so much for having me, Kara. Let's begin by telling everyone your name, where you are in the world, and what you're up to.
Yes. My name is Nomiki Petrolla. I'm in Columbus, Ohio, a Midwestern, and I am the
founder of ,Theanna a tech platform that's SaaS enabled for women tech founders from zero to a million.
Being someone who is a business coach, in addition to having powerful ladies, there was so much that I saw from both your TikTok and your Instagram that I was like, guys, I wanna have a conversation with her. We have, I think, so many shared values of empowering women and knowing that every woman is so capable.
It's more about access and even knowing what's available or possible than capability. How, when did you have that aha moment for yourself?
So I thrive. But once you get to a certain point of lose interest simply because it's not as messy anymore, you don't have as much freedom to mess up. And you lose. Control of multiple hats, and I like wearing all the hats. A couple years ago I went out all on my own. I was the head of product at an AI company and I love that job.
But I basically hit a growth point. We had a family event that sort of pushed me to say, okay, now is time. So I quit my job and I decided to go all in on building product or helping other women build product. The reason why I niched down early on is because once I left that role, I. I had women tech founders in my inbox asking like, Hey, do you consult?
Do you do X, Y and z? I need help. And they couldn't afford my rate, and I'm like, this is so strange what's going on? I had never had any issues with. People are, now, I know were all men that had funding or money to be able to afford my rate for what I was doing, and that caused me to go down a rabbit hole of data.
So I got about a hundred people in a survey of women tech founders that. Maybe just launched or had some traction. And I asked them all these questions around like, how did you get started? Did you have a technical background? Where did you learn how to do this? How long did it take you to go from this idea to launch?
And on average, it took people between six and 12 months for an MVP, which is way too long. Like it shouldn't take that long to get an idea out, but it's because the access was inaccessible to them, to all the things they needed. So I started my first company that's now. Sun sunset into Theanna, but it's called PDS lab.
And it was an accelerator to support women at the idea stage to build their first MVPs in a four month program. And what I did was I basically productized myself. I took all my skills out. Fine, if you can't afford my rate for me to help you do that, let me build an A system that I can teach anyone how to do that.
It doesn't matter if you're a woman or not, it just happens to be the sector that I wanted to support. That went really well shockingly well to the point where I was like, oh my gosh, this is way bigger than what I thought it was going to be. I thought it was gonna be a nice service size business, and it blew up.
And I'm like, okay, how do I help this at help people at scale now? So I started Thena, which just launched a couple months ago, where almost three months in. And the point of it is to bring together all women tech founders from zero to a million to close that access gap. I saw systemic issues. When I was building the accelerator that I otherwise would not have seen if I wasn't in it every single day, 40 plus hours a week.
And it dawned on me the different things that I needed to build. So Theanna was born from, okay, there's a bigger problem than people learning how to do MVPs. How do I do that at scale? And that's what the is intended to do. And hope. And so far it's been great honestly.
I'm gonna break down a couple of those things. I think what you just shared is juicy. There's so much in there. My background prior to being entrepreneur was also in the product space, but for tangible products like footwear, apparel, like whatever you wanted to make, I can help you make. But there's a lot of the same thought processes of what are budget and what is timeline and how is this gonna actually work and will anyone care?
And are we testing it like. It's so interesting to me, and I think that's what I love about getting to help other people with their businesses is if you can make a product, you can make a business because it's just, that's at a different level. Yep. And I think that so many business women in particular are overwhelmed about the concept of a tech company.
Because they don't know what that totally entails. Like my business is 90%. Online digital apps. Yeah. So it was like, is that a tech company or do you need to be Facebook or Meta to be a tech company? Like where does something become and get defined as a tech company versus something else?
Yeah, so there's a difference in my mind between Tech enabled and a true software company. My majority is focusing on software companies where you're building a component of software that actually serves a need less than strapping together, Zapier connections that give you tools and access to other things.
I definitely have founders that are in that space because that's a definite MVP to test out if you can build the software. So I encourage people to start there because you start to learn systems, how things work together. Software in general, what are the different capabilities that they have before you go spend on building a true software company?
But generally the goal is how do we empower more women who are building the next Facebook at the very beginning stages to get them where they need to be or to build a quote unquote lifestyle business or a venture backed, it doesn't matter to me. But give, bringing the access to them so they can make, reasonable choices for their lives in the moment.
I, and I see so often I've been in a lot of operational roles as well, and we're constantly creating new systems and I think someone to what you just said, I tell people, start it in a spreadsheet that we can move it into an app, that we can move it somewhere else. It seems like there is an endless amount of software applications that are needed to solve things because there isn't a one size fits all for anything.
Yeah. Do you think it's also endless what especially female founders are seeing where there are gaps in where things are broken, in what the current technology that's available?
So what's really interesting about solely working with women now is that you see CER hubs start to form in different sectors. Family technology, women's health tech, the, those are two really big ones that are in my community. We also have some beauty in fashion tech, like where they are experts in the space because women, in my experience. Experience. Again, this is generalizing based on my experience, but what I've seen is that women wanna solve problems that they've had, that they've seen in their lives that impact a lot of people that look and look like them, that have had those similar experiences.
Oftentimes, our gender is left to the wayside simply because, generational changes systemically that have impacted us like. We didn't work 50 years ago, so now all these things are coming to fruition. We're playing catch up, and so more issues are coming to rise. I saw an article a couple months ago that there's over a billion dollars that the government is allocating to women's health finally.
And I think things are starting to come to fruition where everyone's I can solve that in this way. I'm gonna go build that thing because they're so passionate about it. Yeah. So what's really interesting too, about women is that. I primarily worked with men prior to this, right? Women both have great ideas, right?
But what I've seen about women, which gets me so excited and inspired is that not only do they wanna make money. Make a business, build something that they're proud of. They also wanna have an impact. They really care. And not that men generally don't care, but the way that we make decisions is very empathetic.
The nature versus nurture thing. And I've seen that, that they care more about if I don't leave with millions, fine. If I did good, I'd be really proud of that, right? So I think that's a difference too, in how we make decisions and kinda the products that I'm starting to see come to light.
I think too when there, I think there's an excess right now of both marketing concepts and businesses that are lacking soul. Like, why do we need this? Who cares? Where's this gonna, is this gonna exist in six months, let alone five years? And I do think that when I see the same thing like women putting impact, first being heart led, the soul of the company gets to shine through, which makes everyone fall in love with it so much faster.
Like it's a completely different community building, feeling a completely D like you want to support them and. I am hoping like the VC shift is starting to move into supporting them when they're ready. Yeah. I'm glad that there are some female founded VCs that are happening. But I also think that there is so much, 98% of businesses are bootstrapped.
And I think it's like 99.9 of women's are. Yeah. And when you are leading with the, this heart and soul component of like how you're changing things for people that you care about. It's so much easier to get other people on board. And it also feels better to me knowing that I. People like you and I are capable of making whatever needs to be made.
I wanna rewind from something you just said first. In that conversation you mentioned that there's so many products out there. The main, for the first thing I wanna call out is the main reason for that, which is a pro and a con, is that now AI has made it possible for anyone to build an MVP without a technical background.
Yep. Another stat to end. I haven't done a true data dive on this, but something to be weary of is that 75% of engineers are men. So building product, making it easier to put out into the ether. Just testing things just to testing. 'cause you can't, doesn't mean you should. But now the barrier to entry is so low, so anyone can start to build.
I'm hosting a hackathon next week for 150 women. That most of them are non-technical, like probably 90% of them don't have a technical background. So the barrier to entry is a lot lower. However to that comment too, is that the entrance or like the ability to succeed now, the competition is so much higher.
So we have to rely to bring that to the second half of what you were just saying. We have to rely on how are we leading, how are we making decisions? Is that MVP? That's not beautiful. Doing something to help someone else or is it just junk in this, in the air. So I think they all kind of relate.
Again, I haven't done like a true correlative data study, but from what I've seen, generalizing, I think they all are related.
If we go back to 8-year-old, you would she have imagined that this is your life and this is what you're doing today?
No, I have four brothers. I'm a Greek family. My mom is actually a badass.
She is an entrepreneur of over 30 years. So I never knew anything different, but with four brothers, you you are the black sheep of the family. I didn't know what I was gonna do. I was always competitive 'cause you have to be, but I never, I didn't really find like my true fire until college.
Where I was like, no, I'm gonna make a name for myself. I'm gonna do what I wanna do and stick up for myself. I'm okay with being the black sheep like. Before I used to be sad about that or my brothers would be like, you can't say that out loud. And I'd be like, why not? I'm very like black and white.
I say things out loud that, they used to be embarrassed of. And I used to shudder that self. When I was younger I did, and I didn't really lean into it until, college time where I started to figure out who I was. And then I loved my work and I would say really until my thirties and.
Really didn't lean into my true self, like wholly after being a mom, building confidence that I could be a mom, have a business, have a wonderful spouse, and make decisions and not what people thought. Like it really took until my thirties that I fully leaned into that where I was responsible for myself and only myself.
And in terms of work and leaning into that. And ever since I started making those decisions for like my life and my career and what I wanted to do, magic happened. And now I'm like I'm just gonna say fuck all the time and just be happy with it.
No it's such a core part of my personal philosophy and how I am supporting other women because we make business and life so hard. When we really choose what is for us and aligned to us and actually choose the easier path.
Yeah.
The one that we don't have to constantly feel exhausted on. Things just start to fall into place and it's when you hear other people talking I know there's people listening, being like, oh, another one.
Another one who's just figured it out and so for you, like how did you get into that alignment space? Was it, yeah. Were you going through things and realizing I just don't have the energy anymore. Was there a major pivot for you? Yeah. When did you choose? I'm going to, I'm gonna be me.
Honestly, it was a family traumatic event. My youngest who's now two and a half at the time, before I talk about that, I. I was the head of product at an AI company a true AI company, not like some gen ai, like on top of it, like a true, we're building models for enterprise businesses, like insane tools, multiple patents, like very big.
And I loved my work. It was very. Hard and very challenging. I was not the founder. I was the first employee, had a lot of decision making, but I started to hit friction when I was getting to a growth point where I would run the business a little bit different and make, and, but it's not mine.
How, who am I to say I can't do those things? And I was starting to get frustrated probably the last six months I was there. 'cause I was hitting that growth point. I had my fourth child and at six weeks. She got RSV and was on a ventilator, and my husband and I lived in the hospital for two weeks. On day eight of her being on the ventilator, they tried to extubate her three times and it failed.
And that was a moment where I was positive the whole time, like very data, tell me everything that's going on so I can understand what's happening. But that moment when it failed the third time and within six hours I was like, we might not leave with our daughter what's happening. And in that moment, my husband and I sat down after a lot of tears and the doctor coming to calm me down all the things.
I just said I'm changing my life. If I don't leave with my child here, I have three healthy kids at home. I have to be everything that I know I can be. And I quit my job the day I got home. I said, thank you. I'm so grateful for them. They're wonderful leaders. It just wasn't a good fit for me anymore.
Quit my job when I got home at six weeks. My husband quit his job. He was like, what am I doing? And he got a vasectomy. But that moment. I've, I was able to finally turn what I was meant to be and it took that moment of like perspective on life to change how I operated as a human. And ever since then there's been, I.
It's so much clarity. I don't care if I mess up anymore and I make decisions because I wanna make them, and I'm willing to be risky and test things and, do all the things. 'cause I have high conviction I can do it. Thankfully I've had a career that gave me that conviction. It's not like I'm coming out of a different industry and coming into this, and I'm very grateful for that.
But it really took a moment and I hope no one goes through that, but a moment to say no, what the f are you doing with your life?
Entrepreneurship is also a constant rollercoaster. It can be by the hour, by the week. Pivoting from being focused on the product and making, all those challenges that are in there to not just thinking about the product, but also thinking about being, CEO, which often includes a lot of really annoying tasks.
Yeah. How has that perspective shifted you further? And I imagine it's made you more compassionate for the women that you're supporting as well, too. Yeah.
What's beautiful about leading this company is that I am one of them. So I don't feel like I'm above them, like I feel like I am one of them.
I'm going through the shit storm with them. The things that I want I'm building, and the only reason I'm building them is because people have said, I want what you have. How did you do that? I'm like, oh, I never. Considered the tools that make me challenge myself every month are something that you also want.
So the more conviction I get from, women saying I love what you're doing. How do I do that too? I'm like, all right let's just try it. And so it's really, I think it really helps that I'm not leading from a. A pedestal. Like I'm in the mud too, and like today we had a meeting.
Prior to this every Friday we have a challenge collaboration session where we talk about, we separate by stage of business and then we talk about what are we needing help with. It's a very curated community. The people there very personal. They're willing to share what happens in Theanna stays in Theanna.
We say that all the time. And I'm able to be like, I'm struggling with this, and even though I've built this for them and I brought them there, I'm also like, F me right now. I'm struggling here. Who has thoughts on this? I think honestly, because I come into it with that lens of I don't feel like I'm better than you.
I'm in the same stage. I'm just trying to figure it out. Let's just build this. S together. It helps. I do in product. I've always, I think in life, I've always felt this is like whatever I'm doing, it's not just mine, it's someone else's. And. Just literally the other day I posted in Theanna, I was like, I'm designing this new feature set and I've never done this before.
I was like, but would anyone be interested in joining a town hall and ripping it to shreds with me and telling me like, that's stupid, or I like this idea, and within minutes I had 19 people, but like I'll be there. I'm like, okay. And and I said to them, I was like, this product is yours is just as much as mine.
Like I wanna build it so everyone can succeed and take the nuggets from everyone and curate an experience that we all get value from. So I think, I never really thought of myself as a CEO. I've actually never called myself that. So that's interesting. I dunno.
I think it speaks to being oriented towards the product and the people. There's anyone who's been on dating apps recently, there's all these jokes about how like everyone's a CEO suddenly and you're like, of what? What do you have? Yeah, exactly. And I think there's a lot of times of, I believe so much in San Arizona genius, so how are we delegating, automating, getting all the things that you shouldn't touch off your plate.
But there's a lot of things that are in the CEO bucket that. You can probably delegate majority of it or just actually have a separate CEO for your own company. Yeah. But there are some things that I think like force you to step into that leadership space of, oh yes, I do need to be able to understand this legal document.
Oh, I do need to be able to look at these numbers and yeah. Nothing makes me more proud than having someone who's like afraid of a spreadsheet. Love a spreadsheet because it's empowering. Yeah, and I think, I'm sure you see it too, when people like understand a tech stack and you're like that light bulb moment you can see in their eyes you're like, yeah, you can understand this.
It's a, that failing. Yeah.
One of the things that we've been working on in our communities is this conversation about accessible versus exclusive. And it's been a really interesting conversation this year. I've been working on like our, I think 4.0 at this point, version of our group, our digital assets. And it's been really interesting because I'm the type of person who wants to invite everyone to the party. Yeah. And then I also wanna protect the people who are in the community and the level that you're at. Yep. And you just mentioned how you break out by phase of business. What is your opinion on being accessible, but honoring where different community tiers are at?
I started with a free tier. And I shut it off about a month after. And the reason I did that, I had so many people that were coming in, I had almost 500 and it was amazing. But the people that were paying. That wanted the additional support. They were trying, they were getting caught between the mess of people just coming in and it was causing bloat essentially.
Where there was too many inactivity me, like metrics that were happening in inside and then there was like one that was getting lost that really needed it. And I'm like, if you can, I want to help everyone. I genuinely wanna help everyone, but I shouldn't be helping everyone like.
It's just like choosing a pair of shoes where, yeah, anyone can wear those Nike running shoes, but are they the right fit for you? I don't know. I just got a pair of Reeboks because the front thing wasn't working. And maybe that's a bad Theannalogy, but the point is, what I found was that truly making it an accessible for everyone, not everyone's a good fit or a true founder or like really in the weeds and.
I started to segment, I saided based on those four stages. Business always, but a broader segmentation that I started to realize was we have idea people and we actually have doer people. And this community is all about action. And I need the people that are doing the darn thing every day, show up every day that are like, I need help.
I wanna do this. I wanna reach these goals with all those other action oriented people, everyone starts at this idea stage everyone. But there is a very big difference between idea and execution. And I want execution. I want everyone that's no, I'm building an empire. Let's do this. So I ended up turning it off because I'm not helpful for the idea people.
I had a churn this morning. From a woman who's great, no, there's nothing against her, but she was like, I didn't get the ROI. And I'm like, okay, let me dive into that. I went into her data. She never signed in. She never came to any of the events. And I'm like, our workshops are badass. Like I bring in insane experts.
She didn't come to one of 'em, so I'm like. Yes, you should turn. And then I realized, I saw that she was at the idea phase. 'cause I'm I'm tracking that data. And I did some more deeper. She's never, she hasn't, she's not building actively. So I'm like, okay, that makes sense. This is probably not a good stage for you.
Maybe in six months come back. So I think I am trying to close that access gap for, but I'm doing it for a very specific group of people that are ready for access. And that's different.
It is totally different. And when you're providing all this opportunity for people, you want people who are playing back.
Yes. Yes. Community's all about Yes. And you. You as the holder of this space, you're working so hard to be there for people. Give them new tools, find new experts. And you want to, there has to be that, at least feeling of appreciating it, doing something with it, taking down, running with it. It's been one of the hardest things for me in this process has been separating myself from the businesses I'm working with.
Yeah.
Because I'm so good at seeing possibility. And I, and if I start to feel like, oh, just gimme your business, I'll make it for you. I'm like, Nope, you gotta, you crossed the line. I have to step back. Because if I believe in their business more than they do, if I see more possibilities than they do, it's different.
If it's 10% more, or oh, did you think about this yet? But I can't carry. A thousand businesses for other people. It's not how it works. So it's been a really interesting dialogue about this space because when you first start to turn levels off. It feels gross. At least
it has for me. It feels did I do the right thing?
Is that appropriate? But immediately when I did it, I got 66 signups in that month. Yeah. And then the next month I got another 40 or something. And I was like, okay, the people that want they are ready and that's who I'm attracting. And ultimately, if we're gonna build stable businesses. We have to remove the people that are there to lurk and, all the things like we, we need the people that are ready to contribute, to support the other members.
Like genuinely care about success for everyone, not, the give first mentality. And since doing that I've seen a major change and I'm really glad I did it. I've had people say you should have waited another 60 days. I'm like, Y. You don't know what, you're not seeing what I'm seeing, like
I can't because then I degrade the opportunity for the people that really want it and I need to pay attention to them. I can't send a DM to people that are just there. So I've, I found it to be, yes. I was nervous as all hell. I did it on April 15th, I was freaking the F out. And I'm so glad I did. I'm not looking back.
Yeah. I, the big this year for me, I've been, I just keep thinking about who do I want at my table?
Yeah.
It's such a family community feeling for me. And my rule for especially private coaching clients is I want dream clients only, which to me mean people who I would go on vacation with. Yeah. And the bar is that high because. Like it's pretty easy to actually go on vacation with people, but are they people you wanna have a conversation with for multiple days? Are they people who you're gonna be able to go through different types of conversations.
And I'll be aligned and Yeah. And respect each other in that whole time. Yeah.
Yeah. So I keep coming back to this idea of who do I wanna sit at this table? If I'm bringing people together, are they gonna enjoy talking to each other? It's much more of a curated moment and. I was watching Anna Wintour giving an interview after the Met Gala, and she was talking about that thought process that goes into who she's inviting every year.
Yeah. Yes. And it's such an example of the pinnacle of Curated and the impact it has and. She was even being interviewed by somebody who's been invited before, but not this year. And they totally got it. They're like, yeah, it wasn't a fit this year. And I can't wait to be invited again, and I'm still supporting it no matter what. And it was just such a. It was such a rewarding thing to see, to be like, oh yeah, no, we are doing the right thing.
Yeah, a hundred percent. I agree with that too. I think ultimately you, you wanna build what like in the future as well, and what makes you feel good at night. Like I go to bed very cozily happy and enjoying the process. Like I don't have the ick. And ultimately you have to enjoy it. And if you're curating the wrong people.
Yeah.
Yeah.
How has stepping into this business changed how you relate to your husband and your kids?
Oh my God, I love this question. Okay, so I am a control freak, a very big control freak. So I have four kids, they're 2, 4, 6, and eight. When I had my first two kids, I wouldn't let my husband do anything. I just was like, no, I'm doing everything. I'm mom. I have to do it all, which is totally unhealthy, what the F was I thinking, I don't know. Then third come around, I'm like, all right, now we're playing. We, I need help.
But when I started going all in, we had a conversation in December because I was like, listen, life is about to change, like I'm launching in a couple months. Life is changing. He just stepped the fuck up. He is a 50 50 partner. He works his ass off. He does everything. I don't even have to ask.
And I used to have to ask, but once I we had that alignment, I'm like, dude, you're the best husband ever. I'm, what are we gonna do? I don't know. It's just, I feel like a lot of people at that opposite experiences, but we were really intentional about this is, I'm only doing this if we can do this as a family because I refuse to break the family, like family first always, no matter what. And we have to be aligned. And of course not every week is the best week. Like sometimes I'm more in business and not totally present. And then other times I'm like, totally on, just depends what's going on. And he's just been so like, I don't even, I don't know, I just, I never saw that happen and it was just so nice.
So our relationship was tough at first, but then once we aligned, it's been wonderful. I'm so grateful that he is like. Wasn't one of those guys that was like, no or just made me stress, like he reduces stress and that's great. The kids. They're awesome. It's so fun raising kids, not having kids anymore, like not being pregnant, but actually like focusing on them.
And I, I don't know what stage you're in life you're at, but it's very different when you move out of being a total incubator for babies and then actually raising the babies. Like I can take care of myself better now. And leaning into let's go to the park and I don't feel like I have to bring a bottle with me.
And. It's been really nice. They're still young, but they see me, my mom, my daughter who's eight, she plays business and like she sees what I'm doing. She literally has her own thing. She's so tell me about the startups that you work. I'm like, I'm gonna make, I told her, I was like, I'm gonna teach you how to use lovable.
Let's build a product. 'cause she likes doing makeup tutorials. She can do that at home and we should teach you how to build a product. So I'm like, is it too early to do that? I don't know. But I feel like I'm an anomaly here, that I'm very lucky. Very lucky. But it, not without hard conversations and some falling on our faces For sure.
What are some things that are must do from a ritual perspective or a habit perspective for you to. Keep all the plates spinning that you're mTheannaging on a regular basis.
Yeah. One example is my husband and I go to the gym every morning. I go Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday, Sunday.
He goes Monday through Friday. Tuesday, Thursday I wake up at five 30 and I do the lunches. And then Monday, Wednesday, Friday he does them. Then we flip. So things like that are really important because it makes the house go round rather than oh shit, who needs what? That's one example.
I'm a night owl so I stay up late. After the kids go to bed, I close out 'cause I'm on calls a lot. I don't get to have freeform thinking very frequent. Like I have to make time for that. And that usually is around eight 30 when they go to bed. So I spend a couple hours, spending time with my husband or watching something.
And then also. What emails do I need to send? What are top of mind that I didn't do? How do I plan for next week? So I reduce the amount of things I have to do, and I've finally gotten this routine where I don't have to work every night, which is really nice. Like I figured that out. So I'm not, like tonight we're like, let's take the kids to the market.
Let's go do something fun together. And then after they go to bed, do you wanna go downstairs and watch a movie? 'Cause we have a theater down there and that doesn't happen very frequently. So I have to make time to be able to do that. By reducing the things I need to do. So those are just a couple examples.
Are you from Columbus originally?
Youngstown. Which is, are you from Midwest? I lived for a little while in Dublin. Oh, amazing. I'm from Youngstown, Ohio, which is three hours northeast. We moved here three years ago, almost to the day before my oldest went to kindergarten because there was nothing in Youngstown.
And we wanted opportunity for our kids. We love. Yeah, it's so fun. We can bike anywhere. We're very, we're a very active family, so we do all the sports, we take them everywhere, and I can bike with the two behind me and we love it. It's so family friendly here. Yeah, it's really fun.
I ask because I think that there is such a pull or a thought process that if you're gonna start a business, no matter what kind it is, you need to be in la, New York, San Francisco, somewhere where Yes, the other entrepreneurs are and all the businesses, and I don't think enough entrepreneurs, especially female entrepreneurs, are thinking about, what do I need around me so that I can do this business?
Yeah. That's a valid thought. I think a lot of people that are not in tech only think of like big tech, so they don't actually. Consider, the day-to-day businesses that are running. I'm ref referencing tech specifically. When I moved here, I didn't really go out. I had a baby, so I didn't really go out and go to events and things.
But about a year ago I started to, and I realized there was actually a big tech scene. I just did it even though not knowing. But now that I do know, I'm trying to inject a little bit, on the Techstars ecosystem and with Columbus and Ohio State. Some other tech summits that they have.
You do need to be around like some of that so that you're immersing yourself though. I do think some people put too much weight into that and less into building the business. Like I call them, like I call these types of business people that they love to pitch, but they won't actually go get their customers.
Yeah. I'm like, you gotta do the groundwork pitching and talking. Only gets you so far, but it's never gonna, it's not gonna work if you don't actually get the people to come along with you. So yes, it's important, but I try not to put too much weight into it. 'cause ultimately you need to get customers to make a successful business.
That's one of the requirements that are on the new checklist for entry. Have you sold anything? Yeah. Unless it's truly a startup concept, which is a different kind of track in my world. Yeah. Have you sold anything? Because it's the hardest thing to get pe The hurdle that I've seen is to convince people to pick up the phone, have the conversations, do the selling, not the, to your point, not the pitching and.
We can do everything else. We can make all these beautiful businesses. But if you're too scared and intimidated Yeah. And stopped in the selling process I, I really can't help you. Yeah. And I don't know who can.
I think a lot of people are afraid of rejection and that's where it stems from and feeling stupid or that they don't know what they're talking about.
And I tell people that I work with, 'cause I still run the accelerator under Theanna and. Half of the, when they join, I'm like, half of this is mental. Yeah, I can give you any tool, like I can give you all the things and you can, I can tell you. I was like, but if you don't get outta your head, and if you don't like.
Care less about what people think about you and don't take yourself so seriously, then you're not going to be able to make it. Because it's all about your mindset. And if your mind is not right, you're not gonna be able to get to that next stage. You can build behind a screen all day, but if you can't talk to someone, no one's going to buy it.
So the first couple, the first month of our accelerator is all about validation. And I'm like, you're not allowed to touch a survey. You're only allowed to have conversations. I'm like, and those 10 conversations you start with, you're gonna string them along for four months. I'm like, because you need to get comfortable being uncomfortable and talking to these people and getting data from them and changing things because they're gonna tell you, your baby's ugly.
It is ugly. Like all of our babies are ugly. Like we know that right Out the womb. So we have to be okay with that and keep going.
I love that idea. 'cause it's when you switch to thinking about your business as a project that has different phases and it's going to evolve one, I think that weed some people out who are like, no, I just want it to be one and done.
And you're like, that will never happen. This is a living, breathing, like I always say that. Product or business creation isn't a linear line. It's a spiral. Yep. And people get so frustrat like, why are we talking about the customer again? Or why are we talking about this component again? I'm like, because it's, we're at a new level.
Yeah. Does it still work? Has it evolved? Has it changed? And this year in particular, have had quite a few clients who have had radical shifts in who their clients actually are. Oh. And it, I think it has to do a little bit about where they are in their. Like lifecycle annual journey of, oh, we've been around for seven years.
They're aging out. They're like, I'm like, you can't be the customer anymore. Or maybe you are. And that means your whole target customer. Oh, business is gonna change now. Yes. So do you have the energy to pivot? Yeah. Have you talked to anyone who's bought anything in the past six months and, yeah.
I'm always laughing like the, my group and clients will ask me like, what do I need to do? And the answer is usually make a list and make a phone call.
Yeah.
And they're always like why can't I send an email? I'm like, no, it's not the, yeah.
You have to talk, you have to get in front of your I'm obsessed with my, I'm obsessed with my customers. Again, I am them, but like people and TikTok, I post all the time and someone today was like. Did you, do you have an AI note taker that's synthesizing your data? And I was like, yeah, I do have that. I was like, but I'm in the community talking to them every day. Like I'm in everyone's dms, like I'm sending voice notes.
I'm get after everyone that signs up. A week later, you get an onboarding call with me. I want to know everyone. Yeah, like today I had a churn and I just talked. I talked about that earlier. I'm like, I wanna know why. I wanna know everything so that I can build a good product and I.
I think that is a muscle that you have to build over time, but the only way you start is by starting it. Like just pick up the darn bone, like you said, and call someone and learn from them. Not be afraid to ask them questions like, majority of people are not gonna be mean to you. They're going to tell you like it is or be kinder.
Like no one wants to be mean in those things. They wanna give you real feedback 'cause you're being genuine. So as long as you lean into that, I think. You'll get more, you catch more bees with honey, like I said. But you'll get more feedback that way.
And I think you get to leapfrog through your own leadership, your own communication skills, but also your business when you aren't, when you're willing to ask the scary question.
Yeah. Because the scary question, usually we make it so much bigger in her head than it actually is. But the scary question is what has all the juicy answers that can. Level up everything we're doing if we're willing to ask it. A hundred percent. So be powerful or stay small. Yes, exactly. I love that.
As we're wrapping up today, a few rapid fire questions for you. The first one we ask everybody where you put yourself on the powerful lady scale. If zero is average everyday human and 10 is the most powerful lady you can imagine, where would you rank yourself today and on an average day? I honestly, 10 every day.
I have a lot of energy. I talk, I do a lot of self-talk and I talk myself into being a badass every day. I do that at the gym. I do it in my office. I tell, I talk to myself about goals. I have a thing over there, so I'm constantly amping myself up as well as I amp everyone else up. So a 10, no, no joke. Yeah.
This is a pretty powerful community. So what is something on your wishes or to-do list that you would like to send out to this group? How can we help you? What do you need?
I think I'm bootstrapping and everything right now is organic. I'm in this weird phase of deciding do I wanna raise or not, and I don't know the answer to that. So I am relying on my community to spread the word of Theanna for any woman tech founder that is a doer at the idea to launch stage. So spread the word.
I'm here for people who are excited to connect with you. Theanna, where can they find and follow everything?
I am on every platform. I'm obnoxiously visible. TikTok, LinkedIn, Instagram threads. You can email me. I'm everywhere, so whatever you message me, I'll find you.
Are you doing your own marketing or do you have a team?
I do all my own.
And then how many hours do you think a week you're putting into your own marketing? Marketing specifically?
I build in public, so 20. I do a lot. I do a lot. Yeah.
It has been such a pleasure to talk to you today and meet you. I've loved our conversation. So thank you so much being a yes to me and powerful ladies, and thank you for the space you're creating it. Thank you. There's so much work that is to be done and so many people who are just waiting for someone like you to find them.
So just thank you for being who you are, and I appreciate you.
Thank you, Kara. This was awesome. Thank you. I thank you for your time.
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and share it with a friend. Head to the powerful ladies.com where you can find all the links to connect with Nomiki and Theanna, as well as learn more about powerful ladies. Come hang out with us on Instagram at Powerful Ladies, and you can find me and all my socials@karaduffy.com.
I'll be back next week with a brand new episode. Until then, I hope you're taking on being powerful in your life. Go be awesome and up to something you love.
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Created and hosted by Kara Duffy
Audio Engineering & Editing by Jordan Duffy
Production by Amanda Kass
Graphic design by Anna Olinova
Music by Joakim Karud
