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Are you fed up with the corporate bullshit holding you back? Welcome to Invest in Yourself, the Digital Entrepreneur Podcast. The ultimate launchpad for entrepreneurs ready to seize control and unleash their creative genius. Hosted by Phil Better, the podcast mogul, each week he's breaking the chains of conventional work with bold strategies, raw insights and inspiring success stories from the entrepreneurs who took the risk and invested in themselves. This is your call to arms. Invest in yourself. Break free from someone else's rules and build the empire you deserve. Now, let's dive head first into today's explosive episode.

Welcome back to another transformative episode of Invest in Yourself, the Digital Entrepreneur Podcast. I am your host, Feel Better, the Podcast Mogul. And today we're going to be bringing you a guest who's a trailblazer in the marketing and sales. Blending her expertise with a heartfelt message to help women entrepreneurs embrace their fear of becoming visible. With an illustrious career spanning over three decades in journalism, communication and digital marketing, including roles at prestigious organizations like Radio France International, Le Figo and CBC Radio Canada, she now is making waves as the founder of Social Media Love. She's not only an online visibility strategist, she's also a best selling author, TEDx speaker, podcast host and paid media expert. Her unique approach combines her social media prowess with trauma informed coaching to empower women to shine online, transforming their mindset and identity and visible strategies from the inside out. Her groundbreaking visible method, that's V I S I B L e method, helps women face fears of rejection, heal old trauma and confidently share their stories.

One post, one video, one belief at a time. Whether she's amplifying voices, creating empowering content, or guiding women entrepreneurs to step into their full power, her work is a game changer. Ladies and gentlemen, podcast listeners, it is my honor to introduce the visionary, the powerhouse, the one, the only, Angelique Binet. Angelique, thank you so much for being here.

Wow. Thank you, Phil. That, yeah, I love your name by the way.

You are very welcome and thank you. I kind of do love it as well. It's. You know, my parents did bless me with a great name, so I feel blessed there. But this is not about my name. This is about how, how amazing you, Angelique, with what you do for women and also what you've done in your illustrious career spanning three decades. That's incredible. Working for some amazing organizations and very prestigious ones as well.

I'm going to ask the big question because it's the only question to ask to start this episode off is why? Why did you break the shackles of like a typical, maybe not a typical 9 to 5, because you were working in a, in that media world. So it's not typical 9 to 5, but it's still, it's not traditional 9 to 5, but it is a 9 to 5 role because you're not really entrepreneurial, you're working for someone, but in an entrepreneurial capacity. But you went full entrepreneur. Why, why did you leave the proto entrepreneur world, if you will, of media to go full entrepreneur?

Yeah, so I, I guess the very. I always go back to, you know, when we have our dreams. You were talking earlier about your nephew. 6. I think I was 10 when I had a big dream. I went to a concert, you know, for a kids singer in Paris. That was kind of. I'm from the farm in France, that's where I was born.

And then I think it was the very first ever concert of my life. At 10, going to Paris, it was a huge, you know, concert place. And what I could see was I was seeing the singer that was a famous singer. But what I was looking at is those people. And at the time it was mostly guys holding those huge cameras. And at the time they had like the cores, like, I don't know, three.

Kilometers, of course, or at least minimum three kilometers.

And then it was huge. And I remember sitting in the room and spending my time like, wow, this is for me. But that was kind like the best thing you could do in your life is to be a camera person. And I would have never, never guessed that I would become that camera person. And so that's when everything started for me around visibility. So if you fast forward, I cross the pond from France to Canada and I become a TV reporter for cbc and I was actually the first video journalist in Atlantic Canada. The first one who was filming, interviewing, editing, finding the stories, wrapping up the stories, publishing the stories. And that's kind of, I still believe very strongly that that day in Paris at The concert at 10 years old, that shaped who I became as a TV reporter and the power of holding a camera and a mic and going all over the place interviewing people.

And then after that, you know, life happens. I fell in love with a Canadian and he was a journalist.

Canadians.

And he was a journalist too. And then just. I'm going to make it short, but I had to kind of resign from the TV role that I had because we had a little boy. And as you said, it's not a 9 to 5 when you are a reporter.

No, it's not that traditional. Nine to five.

Yes. And, and Then I'm like, I was missing, you know, I went to other position, I went on the other side of the camera. I was like a PR person, communication person in the political. But I was missing, you know, the power of asking questions to people.

So.

I think this is when I uncover that more than that I was missing not sharing my voice. I was always, you know, taking care of others voice, the politicians, the people I was interviewing. When you do a news story, you're supposed to bring, you know, the full scope of the story. And I wanted to say, say what I wanted to say and that's how I think I shifted to become an entrepreneur. It didn't came clearly like this, but that's what happened. And I fell in a bucket of called the social media world. That was 12 years ago where I realized that you don't need a big camera anymore. You can just have a Facebook channel and have your own TV or YouTube channel.

And then that's how I started my online visibility journey for myself, but also for the women now entrepreneurs that I, I guide through the online world. You are your own broadcaster.

Oh, you're, you're someone after my own heart. Because I have that same idea that when you, every person can be their own little media empire because we have the tools. It's, we have YouTube so we have the, the broadcasting capabilities. We have podcasts, so we can be our own radio channel, you know, our own station. And it's, I love that we, we've connected so we can share that kind of like that little thing. Because it's true. Every business needs to have their little media empire inside of it. And every person, if they're not an, if they're not a full business, need to have their little entrepreneurial media empire to grow.

Yeah. And the only thing you need is a connection. I always say that a phone and a lot of courage.

Loads of courage. Loads of courage. Or just being very, very naive about how much work it takes to become your own little media empire. When you started transitioning from, you know, going from the, the more, you know, nine to five with the this, your, your child and then coming into the entrepreneurial world. Because going into the entrepreneurial world isn't a 9 to 5 either. Because it can be 12 to 12, you know, eight 18 hour days, 24 hour days sometimes, you know, because problems are, fires are everywhere. When you did that transfer, transfer over from going, okay, I'm, I'm going in, you started, did you start it as a side hustle or did you clear cut, go okay, one Day you just cut and went.

And I'm still not fully cut because my, my journey is a little. So I started a first business in the food industry because my. At the time I had a lot of health issues with food allergies and I, I was missing my French food from France. So I started to run bistros at my place and then do farmer's market making like bistro style sandwiches with no gluten, no nuts, no dairy. I was really good, I promise you.

I believe you. I'm just like, this is. I did not expect this coming from you. So this is why, like the look of surprise is not like, oh my God, gluten. I don't mind that because if I'm a foodie, I love food. Like, just put food in front of me, I'll try it. So, like the lack of gluten and all that, I can just put some hot sauce on it, it's fine, you know, But I didn't expect you to be a chef as well.

Well, yeah, people call me a chef. I was not officially a chef, but I was making supper, like dinners and meals at people's house or at my place. And it was always festive and other things. But that was my side hustle. And then at some point, I lost that job twice, actually, in a row. My position was cut. And I realized that, you know, nobody has the right to cut the water for you. Like this is that.

That was a kicker for me that, you know, going from a side hustle to building a thing that will never stop again to provide money and what I need to grow and eat and all the things. So this is when I decided, okay, I'm. I have this height also. And I wanted to do kind of, I think at the time it was a loan at the CBDC organization around where I live in New Brunswick here. And then when I was filling up the form, it was saying, you know, what is your. It was like a business plan. What is your marketing strategy? And at the time, I had no idea about marketing. And I was like, oh my God, another thing to learn.

Like my clients say all the time, another thing to learn. And. And that very same day, there is a past colleague of mine who said, angelique, there is, there is a job for you that is so you. I'm like, what is it? She said, so it's social media. Social media expert for the. For a large organization. I'm like, I don't know. I don't even have a Facebook profile at the time, right? I'm like, she said, yes, but you have everything else.

It's transferable. And at the time I was learning from, I don't know if you know, Brandon Burchard. He was my, yeah, my coach at the time. And it was about the art of influence and how to influence others. So I went to the interview and I applied what I was learning and I got the job at the social media expert, which I wasn't, but I was, you know, I showed them that I would become that in no time. So not only I did, but I fell in love with the power of social media and I became an advertiser, digital advertiser. And I'm still three a week serving. They're my employer, but I see them as my clients because everything I do for them is what I do for my solopreneurs, which is another story when you are a big organization with millions of dollars versus, you know, a solopreneur who's trying to build a brand online.

So I still have that aspect which keeps me very up to date to anything, you know, advertising, which I love. It's so fun when you have money to spend in advertising.

Wait, wait, but it's not your money to spend.

Well, if it's. It is. That means you're at a stage of your business that you can do this without wasting your money. Like that's the mistake. I see a lot like running ads. When your system is not built in a way that is meant to work, then you amplify your problem with ads. So that's why I'm always saying like, just run ads when you're ready for it. But that's another story.

But that's still part of my life right now. So I'm a full time entrepreneur and with a side hustle job.

I love it. No, because it's. It.

I've never said that before.

I love, I think it's great because if you, you're giving hope to other entrepreneurs that are somewhat fearful of embracing the full risk of being an entrepreneur, you're like, hey, you can have a 9 to 5 slowly build up your solopreneur building until it comes to a point where it's your full business. And the nine to five like you, you're working three days a week, two days a week, one day a week. And then you're like, okay, well I can't work any more days a week here. Hire me as your. I'll work as a client. You're my now client. That's why I can work five days a week for you. And do all the work you need.

For me, I think that's genius.

Yeah. Because, you know, I know that there are a lot of stories about people who are burnt out by their job, and so they're trying to build a business to get out of something and escape. This is not my case, but that's a so. And it works so well. It's the same. It's hand in hand. I'm not saying that I'm gonna be in that position all the time because my business is growing and growing. I will have to make choices, as you, as you mentioned.

But, yeah, it's possible and it's, you know, that's one thing I've learned with entrepreneurship. You don't have to figure it out right from the get go. Like you, you got to learn how to surf with the wave.

It's, it's. It's school for people. It's the school that you choose to be. Because if you're passionate about anything and you want to turn it into a business, you have to go through. You have to go through it. You have to learn by doing it. Getting knocked down, getting back up and looking at each, okay, how do I make sure that this doesn't happen again? And you've been lucky because with your role at the company you work for, you get to learn with a safety net in inference because you get to learn from a brand that's already relatively big, and you're learning to spend the money that they have efficiently so that then you can take into your clients and help them do it so that they end up being at the same level. That's amazing.

I love what you're doing.

Actually, it kind of went the reverse. I'm the one who brought advertising to the team and we grew so big. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So, because I was. I always, you know, you, you, you. I know you're very interested in the learning aspect where you. When you become an entrepreneur, but I was, when I started to get interested in social media and the digital world, I've, I've learned so much and I still do.

Like, I'm a. I have to stop myself because I take courses after courses. So it's like I'm unstoppable that way.

You just have so much knowledge going. This is why I love podcasting because it gives me talk with amazing entrepreneurs like yourself. And like, if you h. You say something that I want to learn more about, I know I have an expert that I can follow and figure out more stuff from them because I've talked to you. I Can trust. I. I get that trust from you. And if I'm going down paid advertising, I'm following you because you seem to.

Know everything there is, it changes every day, remember? Yes. Yeah. So that's part of the nature of our world, of the online world. You have to keep up. But at the same time there are some basics. You know, it's always the same. Marketing is marketing. Trust is the factor, number one factor in everything.

Right? That's why podcasting is amazing. Because, you know, by hearing people, their voice and how they have conversation, it really build that trust. I believe that very strongly.

Speaking of podcasting, how. Let's talk about your podcast for a bit. How long have you had your podcast and what made you decide to launch your podcast?

So I started it in 2020. I was missing interviewing people like from my TV reporter era, so I said I'm just gonna do my own show. So I started. So it's called the social Media Love Podcast, but the series that I had been running for many years called the story behind the Real Story behind. So I was bringing, you know, women entrepreneur to share, you know, how they started all the, you know, as you said, like the go down, go up, rise up, fall again and start again and all that message around, like how I feel like, you know, entrepreneurship is really the personal growth on steroids. Right. If you want to learn who you are from inside out, become an entrepreneur.

Oh yes. All your flaws will come late bared and you're going to be like, okay, I have to fix this. I got to fix that. I got to fix this. Let's do this. I have to figure out that. So much fun.

So that was the first kind of launch of my, my podcast. And then when I reach launched my book in May, last May, I started a series called Stepping into the Light. So this is more having guests and interviewing them on how did this shift from I don't want to talk to anyone, I don't want to show my face. I don't want to talk to the Facebook of this world to. Yeah, I want to do it. So this is a journey. What happened? What has changed? What are the shifts and where it's coming from and what was the impact in the business? So that's where we are at with Stepping into the Light.

I love that. With your podcast, what has been one of the benefits that you have seen being able to either do your solo episodes or do the interviews? Like what. What has been a benefit that you've seen that you were un unaware of?

Sometimes I have people who Tell me. Oh, my God. I just hire your guests because they were exactly the person that they were looking for. So that those type of feedback, I'm like, wow. Or someone's gonna be like, hiring me because they hear my podcast. So there is the trust factors, or what I use it for a lot is to. If someone wants to really kind of the Netflix effects and they want to learn more about, you know, how I speak, what I stand for or against, I will send them kind of the podcast. And that's kind of my social proof around what I.

What is, what are my values, my core values, and how I stand in the world of marketing. So I use that more as a get to know me tool.

Oh, I love that. That's a very genius idea. I know a different way of looking at a podcast to help grow your business with your podcast. What is one of the main goals you have with it? And then we'll get back to your entrepreneurial journey. I'm a podcast. I have to ask at least a couple.

Yes. Yeah. So for me, I love the podcast because I take the time to share my ideas or have conversation around ideas with others, and taking the time to do that, I think is a luxury that we don't allow ourselves. So it's like, you know, I write a lot of posts. I love voices. The voice is powerful. I listen to a lot of podcasts. So for me, it's my favorite way of getting into someone's ear, and I use it mostly for awareness so that people, when they want to really hear me more, this is the best way to get at me.

I love that. Okay. Going back to the entrepreneurial world because it's somewhat. I'm going to try and do a segue here. It's because it's a different identity of who you are along with the entrepreneurial, you know, the daughter, the mother, the son. Wife. No, you have a son and you have a husband. You are the wife and mother.

With all these shifting identities that you have to juggle, how does your friends and family handle you having multiple identities and not only seeing you as this one role that they normally do see you in life?

Ooh, that's an interesting question. I get a lot of, you know, okay, what's next, angel? Why you come up with next? They're always like, you know, I think I have this figure in the family that I am the one who's like, the crazy dreamer that does really go after her dreams, and I get a lot of support with that. The other side of the thing is, you Know, I work a lot. Like, no doubt I work a lot. So, you know, where is Angelique? She's in our office. Right. She works a lot. So there is.

I had to learn to let go of the guilt and shame kind of shame, because I really believe. And I find even more when you're an entrepreneur, there are faces where you are in full creation mode. And it's not a 9 to 5. It's like, I am in it. It's a vortex. I'm going, boom, it's done. And then after that, I'm going to play hard. But so I've learned to really respect those cycles of creation that are how I work.

And maybe it's hormonal. I don't know.

I don't think it's hormonal. But yes.

And, you know, I think it's old belief that if you don't spend all your time with your kids, then you're a bad mom. Right. I had to come at peace with those old beliefs because I have my own way to be a mom. And the proof of this right now is I see my. My son, how he is so entrepreneurial. And I never told him to be an entrepreneur, but, like, guess where he got that from? And he's wonder. Yeah, he's so independent at 19. Like, he's like, you know, and I'm like, wow.

So that's what happened. And that was the intangible. You know, years of putting in place my dream, giving him permission to go after his dream. And, yeah, I was working a lot. We were going a lot of coffee shops, right? So I would take him at 5, 5 years old, we would go to a coffee shop. I would have my laptop, he would have his Lego, and then we would spend like five hours there. And I was creating the thing and he was playing. We would have hot chocolate.

You know, I have amazing memories of that. But I was a working mom. Like, my passion was feeling me. And I. I don't want to say that I sacrifice any of it because I think you can do everything you want. The thing is, how do you judge yourself when you do it is where the. This is where, you know, when you look back at your life, you regret it or you are so proud of it. Does that make sense?

It does. It does. It. It. You have to. There is sacrifices to be made, but those sacrifices necessarily won't be the sacrifices you think they will, because like you said, your son seeing you working when he was five years old on a computer made him entrepreneurial. Now, at 19 and willing to take the risk. Because he saw that, hey, mom took the risk and look where she's now.

She has. She's happy, she's doing the things she loves. And that's what I want in my life. If I had, I think I would be just as entrepreneurial if I saw my mother doing that at five years old. Unfortunately, she had three kids to deal with, so it was a little more difficult to wrangle three kids at a coffee shop. So she did her best, love her, but I don't think she could have handled being an entrepreneur with three kids.

It's an entrepreneur. Yeah. It's an enterprise in itself to have three kids.

Yeah. So she was an entrepreneur in a different way. She did great at her job, at her, her business. She did moving with that. I, I want to know, because you have so many different identities and you've done so many things and you mentioned before that you have this desire and un. Unyielding desire to learn. What else do you do to invest in yourself to become a better version of yourself.

Yeah. So right now I'm teaching myself that in the doing less, you get more. And so it's a new iteration of me because it's so counterintuitive. I was always the one working, working, working. So that's what I've been doing in the last four years to really be more spacious in. For example, if I do a big thing in my business rather than just starting the next big thing, to really take time to bathe in what just happened. So that's, that's really game changer for me, like to stop collecting the metals, you know, and really come from. From another perspective to really be in the moment of, you know, I was dreaming of making this happen to help those women do this.

And then I put that in place. They came and we did it and look at where they are rather than just right away say, okay, what can I do next? I. I intentionally stop in it and I listen to my body way more because I had a lot of health scares. And it's because when we are helping others as coaches, consultant or, you know, even podcasters, we are helping others. We're giving our energy and it is an actual thing is very intangible. When you, when you give of yourself every day, you need to nurture yourself to rejuvenate that energy that going to be kind of received as lotion on a dry skin on the other side of the mic or of the video or the workshop, whatever.

I love that I'm enjoying this episode and I will be thoroughly looking forward to rereading the transcript so that I can get all the goal that you've dropped down. Angelique, I do want to touch on your visible method because it is interesting and I want the audience to take something away from it. So I'm wondering, because it's designed to help women embrace their fear of being seen. What's the first step women entrepreneurs should take to reframe their fear of visibility into a tool for empowerment?

Yes. Out of this question. Something that is always the first thing that I had to learn for myself is actually when. When you fear of being seen or becoming visible, how do you feel? How does that feel that fear and really feel those feelings and really feel those emotions? Because they are. They are the emotions that are keeping you from exactly where you want to go. And so we've never been told how to feel our feelings, especially as girls. You know, if you are crying too much, why she's still always crying or she's too loud and all the things. So we repress and suppress and oppress a lot of emotions.

And I. That's what I find with the women I work with. They're between, you know, 35 and 65. A lot of oppressed emotion from decades of I need to be tough. I am superwoman. I can do it all. I don't need your help. Look at me.

I can do this. So when it's time to become visible, there is like, when you're visible, they see you. There is no hiding. It's either you are seen or you are not. And then this is where it's key for the person who wants to become visible. You got to process all those fears, like literally in your body. Because emotions are the language of your body. Your thoughts are the language of your mind, and they work together.

So as soon as you think that you're not enough to show up, that you don't belong to the game of digital media because you're not techie enough, and that people won't understand what you mean. Then you're going to start to feel like you know that you're going to be rejected, abandoned. Judge judging is a big thing. So the first step is what does it mean to feel your emotions? Is literally sit on your chair and feel it. How does that feel inside of you if you close your eyes? Feel it all without judging it. And then that's kind of like a first cleanup before you take your next move of doing a Facebook Live or whatever you want to do, write the blog or post the post Right now, a lot of the women I work with, they're crying when they write their first post. They've been resisting, resisting. And then because we do the work of feeling how we feel our fears, they let go so much that your fears, like your mission with your business, is way bigger than your fear.

And then so there is a lot of crying. And crying is releasing your emotion so everybody knows it's not. Doesn't mean anything else. Crying is releasing your emotions so that you can move on to, to do the things that you say you want to do. So that's, that's my first step. Feeling your feelings all the way without judging them for how, for how long you need to feel them. And that's my. What I had to learn five years ago.

That was game changer.

That is game changer. I can, I know that would be feeling. And the fact that you kind of reinforce that, it doesn't. Crying doesn't mean anything other than just releasing and feeling your feelings because I know there's some men out there going, oh, men don't cry because that relates to being sad and men aren't sad when it's. Men has the whole range of emotions. And crying, like you said, can be happy because you can cry when you're happy and you can cry when you're sad and you can cry when you're laughing. So it is a, it's a way of showing emotion and it's just feeling the feelings. We're coming near to the end of the episode, which I hate because, Angelique, you're having a great time.

I'm thoroughly enjoying my time. I don't know about you.

Me too. Good. Thank you so much.

You're very welcome. I thank you for coming on the show. But we're gonna go to the last question and it's the most selfish question I could ask. I have your 10 year old self here. Angelic. She's amazing. She's awesome. What is a piece of advice you would love to be able to hand back to your 10 year old self to help them in the, in, in life.

The sky is the limit. And it's true. It's not just a saying. And you belong to whatever you want to belong. There is no rules.

I love it. Simple, straight to the point. Angelica, I love it. I'm going to jump off stage here. Please let my audience know where they can find you, how they connect with you. If they're interested in the visibly visible method, the floor is yours.

All right, so the best way is to go in the show notes. And I gave Phil the links to the TEDx talk that I did recently, as well as the books that I published and the podcast. So I'm always, you know, a big fan of inviting people who discover me, like, to see if they're gonna like me, like, does that speak to you when I speak? And so the best way is to go on YouTube, watch a TEDx, read the book, and then reach out to me because I love talking. I love to have a chat with you. So that's kind of how we can get introduced to each other. Grab the book, grab the TEDx, and join the podcast.

I love it. Straight to the point. And of course, you know, she's an expert podcaster. She told you, go check the show notes. That's how you know she's one of the best. Angelique, I want to thank you so much for being here. You were an exceptional guest and you provided so much value. Thank you so much.

Thank you for giving me the time and space to share this so much, Phil.

You're very welcome to my audience. Check out those show notes. Like Angelique said, all the way to find the TEDx, the podcast, and the books that she has for you guys. Check out those show notes. Remember to subscribe to the podcasts, and as always, remember to invest in yourself.

Thanks for joining us on Invest in Yourself, the digital entrepreneur podcast. The podcast mogul reminds you that your journey to freedom and success starts with with one powerful move. Investing in yourself. If today's episode sparked your fire, hit that follow button on Spotify and drop us a comment. Share your wins, your challenges, and what drives you to break free from the corporate grind. Remember, you're your best investment. Always invest in yourself because your potential is limitless. Until next time, keep hustling and take control of your destiny.

Sam.