Christina Frei  
We all have many facets to our humanity but to me, in marketing in particular, it's around like the human that is offering the service like what do they bring to the table as a human first?

Jeff Ma  
Hello, and welcome to love as a business strategy, the podcast that brings humanity to the workplace. We're here to talk about business, but we want to tackle topics that most business leaders shy away from. We believe that humanity and love should be at the center of every successful business. I'm your host, Jeff Ma. And as always, we're here to have conversations and hear stories about how real people real businesses in real life operate. My guest today is Christina Frei and Christina runs a boutique marketing practice, where she helps solo business owners win at marketing by becoming authorities in their fields with content rich strategies. Holistic her holistic marketing approach grew out of a lonely chaotic time when she moved to Boston to start her business. Out of this was born her marketing archetype system. Her 2022 TEDx Talk includes some of this journey. Outside of her work, Christina cold plunges like Wim Hof, which I'm going to ask you about in a little bit. All year long with a large community of knuckleheads she sings and plays in a local band chases her dog around with a stuffed animal snake meditates on a pink couch, and obsesses over the perfect cup of green tea on a seaside town just north of Boston. I love that in your bio. So with that, I'd love to welcome Christina fried to the show. Christina How are you today?

Christina Frei  
I'm pretty groovy Jeff Good to be here.

Jeff Ma  
Groovy. Love it. Wim Hof. What is that?

Christina Frei  
Yeah, let's go there. So if you ever listened to I don't know, people like Rich Roll, and David Goggins and just that whole world of extreme athletes. You might have come across this right. So it's like thermogenesis. And the benefit of going into cold weather. It's you know, that 

Jeff Ma  
The name sounded familiar, but I didn't connect it. Now I get it cold plunges like Wim Hof. Yet. Brilliant. So about you, though. I want to know, what are you passionate about? And why are you passionate about that? Where did it come from?

Christina Frei  
Yeah, I, what am I passionate about? In this Hot Minute, I'm really passionate about this strange dynamic of where it just seems like humans are drawn to things that are lonely edges. That's the term I've given it. I actually have a podcast called The Lonely edges. I didn't need to go here. But But like, really, that's the true answer. When I really just sit and listen to myself. Like we're there's this interesting tendency of us to just go off on our own journey, I feel as humans, and that can be really confronted that to me, just to be really specific about what I'm talking about. It's more like, we all have our own inner truth, around a lot of things. It could be like your path, it could be something you want to express creatively, it could be the way you have a relationship, it doesn't matter. But it's your own. And as lovely as that is to be unique. It can also be unbelievably lonely, and separating, if you're part of a comfortable tribe, or you have a lot of comfortable habits or just so to me, what I'm fascinated about and passionate about is the courage it takes to do it and the value that it brings when you actually go off on your own in a healthy way. And that it connects you ultimately, to the people you need to be connecting with and the part of life that means something to you like it's incredibly connecting and lonely at the same time. It's just like a paradox. Well, I've

Jeff Ma  
heard, I've heard amazing things about people who take, like solo wilderness, or like adventurous hikes out, like spending a night under the stars, coming back and actually finding that that, you know, that isolation and that loneliness comes back and reconnects you in strange and unexpected ways. Is that kind of the analogy that works?

Christina Frei  
Yeah, and one thing just to, really, I don't know, there's something that I'm called to share, which I don't usually share when I was really studying energy dynamics back in Berkeley, California at a place called the Berkeley psychic Institute, and, you know, is basically closing my eyes and living in my sixth chakra, just like looking at energy, your third eye, if we want to nerd out on that side of things. I know that's probably not where you thought we were going to anyway, one of the things I learned there that I think is really challenging is the value of disconnecting chords. And what I mean by that is, let's say you're super close to somebody, and you have this agreement between you, you're going to do this, and I'm going to do that, and we'll stay locked in that agreement forever. And that's, that's like an energy cord. And there's conditions in there. Right? And just like, the healthiest way to be, is not to have any of those chords. And just to be of the moment, it was really confronting when I took that on, it was like, Oh, my gosh, is that really? I mean, I want chords, because our chords connections, those like, no, it's actually codependency. And when you let go of expectations, conditions of like beliefs that you have lodged in place, rigidly, that's where you can be free to be who you are. And I just mentioned this to some friends the other night, and they're like, yeah, no, we're not interested in that. Like, you have to have cords to people. It's like, you can have agreements with people. That's not the same thing.

Jeff Ma  
Yeah, I mean, I can think of times in my life where that's definitely held true, where when you're actually able to do the kind of uncomfortable thing of disconnecting and undoing some of the things that feels safe. It's the only way to kind of actually reach new potential. So very, very, very profound for me to hear you say that. And I think it's something worth thinking about for everybody. But I know we're having it, we're having an interesting talk today, because we're on a podcast called love as a business strategy, where we want to talk about marketing, which there's that cord that we can connect, let's do that. And then there's all these other these pieces around that that mindset in this in this, this this kind of approach you have. So I want to start connecting those dots. I know you have a talk marketing for humans. What does that mean? Do you? Are you talking about marketing at humans or marketing for the humans that are doing the marketing? What is marketing for humans?

Christina Frei  
Okay, marketing for humans, it points to two different things, I think it's just too. So the first thing is that each human has this fundamental way of connecting and serving and coming alive with just helping people. To me that's like this rich humanity. I mean, we all have many facets to our humanity. But to me, in marketing, in particular, it's around like the human that is offering the service, like, what do they bring to the table as a human first. So that's, you know, we'll probably talk about marketing archetypes, but that's what I point to when somebody discovers their own marketing archetype. It's like, how do you love helping humans. So that's one aspect of the human. The other aspect is, you know, as a, let's see, consultative or coachee, kind of expert professional, which is who I usually work with, you only have so many hours in the day. And so let's establish you as an authority by choosing one really appropriate. And there's many different can, you know, criteria for that, but one great strategy that establishes your expertise, your care, your message, your method, everything that you can just do consistently to get great clients. So it's, it's like a human workload. Let's call it that.

Jeff Ma  
I love it. And I think what drew me to this conversation beginning is that like, I, we all understand, you know, we are humans, obviously, at a very literal level. But we don't always think of ourselves as humans in the business world anymore. We're entities and businesses and target audiences and things like that. And I think anytime I see a business function tied with humans or humanity. I mean, we talked, we talked about love as a business strategy. tying these two when I see marketing for humans, I'm always instantly intrigued at hearing how to draw that, that element out. And so would you mind diving in that a little bit? For me? I know you said there's two facets, maybe you can pick one? And can we start diving into what the humanity here around marketing?

Christina Frei  
Let's start with the first one. And that is your, I'll call it your marketing archetype, because that's the terminology I use. And there was, there's this process that I walk people through, and it's a little bit of a sneaky process, because what I'm trying to tease out is their natural way of serving, like again without their professional moniker. So let's say I were to walk you through this guided journey, Jeff, where you, you basically go to a location in your mind that represents how you want to feel when you're actually in connection with the people that you want to do business with. So a lot of people will Go to like, you know, a beautiful mountaintop where they're just offering something really inspiring. They're like, I know, I'm connect, there's probably a lot of dots that I would need to connect, but it's just sort of the vibe, how do you want to feel when you're connecting with people, and helping them make good decisions, ie to work with you? So like, where is that place? Where would you go, so then you go to that place. And then when you're there, I have you invite three people to share that experience. And you basically share of yourself in the most generous, beautiful way, like, you're exactly where you want to be, you're experiencing exactly what you want. And now you're going to turn around and offer that to other people. And it's almost like one of the most rich, beautiful, impactful gifts ever. And I think as a business owner and marketer, it is just imbued with trial error and failure. So this is kind of an opportunity to step back from all that, and just be like, Oh, my God, what if I could give something that really meant a lot to me that I was, you know, I created that. And now, you know, here's people who are ready to receive it. And when I have people do that, number one, the place they go is always unique to them. And number two, the way they offer the gift is always unique to them. Like, yeah, there's some similarities, but like, one person will share the gift by just giving people a big old hug, and like making them super cozy. And another person will be like, I'm just gonna beam it out to you, and you have your own experience with it, I don't need to be involved. Or then there's another person who's like, Yeah, let's go on an adventure. Let's do this. And like, just get in there and, and hash it out. So but there are all these fineries that come through, and it's my sneak attack way of being like, Alright, let's talk about what just happened when you close your eyes. And guess what, all of that points to an archetype. It's like, if you're the one who, like a current client is a loving witness. And in her journey, that's exactly how she appeared in her location, she would just let people do their thing. And be this like loving presence. And that became her her archetype is that the work we're doing is figuring out ways that she can show up that way as much as possible in her business, so that that's how I, that's sort of step one is like, what is your deepest, most satisfying, consistently, like energy giving way of serving other humans, I mean, I've said this, like 3000 times, but, and that turns into an archetype, which then turns into messaging, because that archetype is gonna speak a certain language, it's gonna say certain things, right, you can kind of play with it. And it just clarifies a lot, I will tell you right now that that is the hard work right there that I just described to you. It's just being honest about it. Because if you're in a service based profession, you just want to be all things to all people, it's totally natural to want to help everyone and solve all their problems. And it's really tough sometimes to be like, This is my lane. This is how I want to make a difference. This is what's going to sustain me over years of time. So that's what I'm, like, obsessed with helping someone nail that down and have the courage to claim it.

Jeff Ma  
And Christina, that is very impactful in the sense that when I think of what you just described, and doing that exercise, being able being able to successfully find that for myself, I find it almost disconnected, in a good way from marketing, or in a sense. We're constantly marketing ourselves, we're constantly selling ourselves in every context with our friends, family, colleagues, everything. And so it's almost like if I were to be able to find that for myself, I see benefits just for me as a human, and how I want to bring myself to the table in any contexts. And that gets me kind of excited, because I know, I know, the end outcome is to like help build the marketing strategy and things like that. But at the same time, it feels like this is a step that's worth taking, for our own personal growth.

Christina Frei  
I wait, yeah, it's definitely a leadership tool. I'm kind of coming around to that. Like this is not just a marketing tool. And it's not just a fun self help quiz. It's a leadership tool.

Jeff Ma  
So I think I heard you say that this is rooted in like how you the archetype is rooted, rooted in how you love or maybe serve other people. Can you talk a little bit about that? Because I think again, I'm starting to broaden my my thought process here around from marketing, but also to if you're just like you said, leading a leadership tool, where, how what does it look like to kind of apply this against how you serve others or lead others in different

Christina Frei  
I think the easiest way to answer that is to to share with you the five main archetypes I've identified that people can just take an assessment and find out what they are. So that five types and then what their motivations are and how they how they actually do to serve so, nurtures you know, you're a nurturer if you absolutely love making it safe for others to thrive. I'm a nurturer. By the way. It's like, all day long. You just want to bring that sanctuary. It just feels you. So that's number one. Number two is adventure guides. Adventure guides are people who again did a dead giveaway is you just want people to go for it on every level. A lot of times you can see what's possible for people way before they do. And it's all about boldness. So that's adventure guides. And you need to be modeling it just saying, okay, door openers, door openers are the third category. And that's, I call them the diamond mind because they absolutely love having different facets and perspectives on everything they ever talk about their whole, why is opening up possibilities just in perspective change. So it's like your new worlds open up just by changing your viewpoint. So that's a door opener, and they're natural educators, obviously and natural learners, obviously, study presence is the fourth category. And this these are the people who usually hate marketing the most. And this is sort of the pillar, the common the store and kind of person who has a very deep treasure trove of expertise, resources, people that they know and their Why is to assure people that they can get from here to there like they can get through the storm or get where they need to go with all the stuff that they can help them with. So they're very calming. And then the last category is celebrators, and celebrators are, I think what a lot of people wish they were, but it's, you want to bring the good life to your people. And you do it with your own special flair. So you know, whether it's you're a walking party, you're really funny, you have a design sense, like there's a lot of different kinds of flair people bring to that table. So those are the five main categories. And as you can see, they're pretty darn distinct from each other as far as like, what they love the transformation they love to enact in others.

Jeff Ma  
Yeah, but it seems Can you talk a little bit about what manifests in these different archetypes in terms of when they engage with people when they are loving and serving? What does that look like for these different archetypes and how they how they're different?

Christina Frei  
Yeah. So with nurtures, a lot of times nurturers are this calming presence, and they don't even realize it, all they have to do is walk into a room. And it's like, even before they open their mouth to give their talk or whatever, people are starting to calm down. I, I worked with a coach for a couple of years. And I actually attended her talks because they were talks we worked on together, and I want to see her in action. And I would watch the room change entirely. And people could really connect into their own inner truths, as far as I could see, just by her being there. I mean, she really didn't have to work that hard. She just had to be her. Alright, so that's nurturers. Adventure guides, you connect by a kind of being a pain in the butt. Meaning, like, Dude, you could do so much better than this. And guess what I'm doing it. Like, that's how you connect and serve. It's like, make sure you're going for your bold stuff. So that you can then turn around and be like, Hey, I'm living by example. And then people feed off that and it's like, Oh, my God, she's doing it. Right. You know, he's doing it. I'm in like, I want to do that, too. I'm on board. And I think of a lot of the athletic, you know, like podcasts or whatever, like you hear from people like Rich Roll or ultra marathoners like they're doing it, I want to do it. That, okay, door openers, connect by just offering amazing innovation that's relevant. And door openers are never, they never not have ideas. They usually have way too many, as far as like how to help and how to solve problems. And it's just like, just slow it down and give us one little nugget at a time and you will change lives just because they're just natural innovators. And then like I think of Leonardo da Vinci. It's like the quintessential door opener. Steady presence is the way that they truly help and I will just share with you that I I just brought on a financial advisor in my own life and he is a quintessential steady presence. And what he brings to the table and I see this with all steady presences that I work with is total calm around things that people are really stressed out about like for me to make financial decisions. I cannot begin to describe to you how just his being in the room sometimes is enough for me to for me they'd be like, Oh, this is what matters to me. And this is what I need to do to move forward. Like he doesn't have to just stay much. That is a steady presence on their game. And also, they need to nerd out. They're the ones who should geek out and, and write the long emails and go against all the marketing. You know, advice about keep it short and sweet. Nope, not if you're a safe residence. Like we want to see you nerd out. And even if we don't understand what the heck you're talking about, we see that you do so we're gonna, like, reach out to you and be like, okay, they know their stuff. We need them. And then the last one celebrator is. I mean, celebrators are just like magnetic in a way, like, people just they can enjoy life so much more easily than the rest of us are just bring a certain flair. And so all they have to do is share it. And people are like, I want to be part of that party. I just want to go to that party. And once that party vibe, I mean, I'm sort of being I'm generalizing not every celebrators a huge party, or, but I'm just saying, like, just metaphoric party of that person, then that people just want to be around that. And they'll be like, Okay, I'll just, you know, whatever you're, you're selling, I'm buying. Because they want that experience of like the good life.

Jeff Ma  
As you explain each of these, I'm already picturing people in my life, people I know that fit squarely into some of these. But I'm also curious, is this something that typically has a single dominant archetype for people? Are there 50-50s People span across three different ones? Is that common? Or is it more like no, if you feel like you're more than one, you probably aren't digging deep enough to find your one,

Christina Frei  
I have found that I myself, I'm actually too I'm mostly nurturer with a side of door opener, a lot of people get two. And sometimes they're equal, and sometimes they're not. So when people get more than two, that's when I kind of stepped back. And I wonder to myself, or I just sort of remind them, because again, all these we have all five of these going on. Like if I were to ask you, you know, you pick one, great, you could pick one, but I know that all five of those who are operating you as they would operate in any of us, I offer this model so that the natural, crazy expansive nature of marketing that makes us so scattered in our attention, and our ability to choose, and to have energy at all, is needs to be counterbalanced with a very strong anchor of knowing what your deepest Why is, and this is what that does. So it's just like, don't worry about it, I'm not trying to put you in a limiting box or anything. So if you are three, or four or five, it's like, okay, we should talk like, sign up to me with me, I'll help you.

Jeff Ma  
So if I'm marketing, like everything you're saying strikes a really, really good spot for me in my mind around when I think about how I want to introspect about myself how I want to consider my own leadership strengths, and, and how I bring my energy to the space of my team and those around me. And I know that in the context of marketing, you're trying to bring this forward into like, what's put out into the world and what's presented to others, right? If I'm working for, you know, a marketing team, or a larger organization, if I'm working with others, and we're looking to find this human kind of archetype. Whose archetype should we be using? Where should that start?

Christina Frei  
So I actually have been approached by a few businesses as far as like, how can we use this on our team? And what I've come around to so far, because I have not, I have not gone into that too much. Is that even I mean, no matter who you are, you have one of these, right? So if you're a receptionist, if you are a scientist, if you are, you know, a CEO, you have a marketing archetype. And what, even though marketing is in the title, it's, it is also a communication archetype and a service archetype. Like, if that matters to you, obviously, those things are huge in organizations, like how do we, you know, it's interesting, just like with any of these models, whether it's, you know, there's so many great assessments, whether it's disk or Enneagram, or whatever, it's really nice to know who's who, you know, like, just, if this person is driving you crazy, and you can't get past a communication wall, like just understanding, oh, they're an adventure guide, like, those are the strengths that they bring to the table as far as serving others. That's helping me understand why they're so adamant about like, only dealing with division instead of letting me geek out as a steady presence because I just want to go into the details of it all and go deep. So it can kind of ease conversations like any self awareness tool would. Sure, right. And I would also say that for Probably a healthy organization is one with a healthy mix of all of them.

Jeff Ma  
Yeah. So when it comes to our listeners right now, hearing these archetypes, they're like, that's really interesting. What did they do with it? Once they find the archetype? Like, what's the, what's the next step? What's the ending? What's the end goal with with the work to be done here.

Christina Frei  
So to be really practical for a second, I will just, I'm sure you'll put this in the show notes, but it's just any marketinggenius.com/assessment, and you will actually go to archetype, it's probably better just to go to archetype because it introduces it a little bit. So in a marketing genius.com, forward slash archetype. So once you find what that is, takes about seven minutes, then you as a, I don't know celebrator door opener have very specific ways of communicating that are unique to you, that I draw out with very specific activation questions. And just knowing your strengths, and knowing what drives you, helps you to narrow down how you want to talk about whatever it is you want to talk about. So for example, if you know your celebrator, look around your world, what is it you want to what is it about serving your clients and working on your team? Do you most appreciate what is the most fun? What is all that and then share that however you see fit? Like, you know, if you're somebody who loves to get out there and network and you know, like, take tons of photos of those networking, like, just bring the joy, bring the fun, bring that life and flair, I don't care how you do it, that's another conversation is like deciding on the medium. But that's that's how you come through. So there's a definite art form in knowing your own archetype. And then how to draw that out and to create content and to just communicate with the wider world. That's why I have a job is just to draw, you know, connect those dots. And if you take the assessment, like there are some tools that you'll get invited to try. And so there's all that stuff. Yeah. Does that answer your question?

Jeff Ma  
Yeah, absolutely. I think as we kind of reached the end of the conversation here, I'm curious if you have any kind of tips, advice, a saying a quote, anything that is for the audience to kind of, it doesn't have to be practical, I guess, but the sense of something to kind of take from this that can instantly add some value for people?

Christina Frei  
Yeah. Well, okay, I'll just, I'll do a short one, and then a slightly longer one. So the short line is, your voice has transformative powers, you probably don't know, exist, just the way you when you open your mouth to speak, you're doing something with that mechanism, on a very deep level, a lot of times that, you know, you probably haven't nailed down yet. So there's that you've got some magic that you could probably access more of. That's number one. And number two, is if you have any resignation, or or feelings of failure, or whatever, like we tried this Facebook ad and it didn't work, we did, you know, an email campaign, and we got a really low open rate we, you know, launched a program and it just didn't go anywhere. Here's my question to you, if you could close your eyes and pretend you have all the money in the world. And you could give anything you want to lots of people that would be truly impacted by that gift. Okay, what I mean, honestly, just even asking that I feel better. I haven't even answered the question yet. So just like, let something drop in as like the gift that would be truly delightful, and fulfilling to you. And then see yourself giving it out and see how it changes your your day and see how it changes how you feel about your marketing, you can just get back up again, I can tell you that and try something else.

Jeff Ma  
I love it. I feel like this has been a very roundabout in my head way of like, in a good way. It's connecting so much of what we talk about around humanity and love and and bring that to the workplace. And I know that you come from a marketing century kind of approach. But I've been consistently connected to the larger picture this whole time, kind of talking about there's just so much humanity and like how you divide these archetypes up in just a very real way that I can instantly see humanity in all five and how it really makes a difference understanding which one is ours. It connects for me and I really I was drawn as conversation because he said marketing for humans. I wasn't honestly sure how it would connect to love As a business strategy at first, but I'm really really glad we had this conversation because it really does. It really fits 100% perfectly. And I'm really excited to kind of take that assessment of myself and see where it lands me. So

Christina Frei  
yeah, see which one you are.

Jeff Ma  
 I have, I have some guesses, and I'm gonna write that down and see where I land. So I'm gonna do that right after this. So, Christina, thank you so much for taking the time today and chatting with me. Yeah, it was fun. Thanks, Jeff. to the audience. Appreciate you as always, thank you for sticking with us and tuning in. Hope you've checked out our book love as a business strategy. You can check out more at love as a business strategy.com Be sure to check out the innate marketinggenius.com/archetype link that we will put in the show notes to take that free assessment. Correct, Christina? Yeah, so I think that'll be a fun little exercise we can all do. Hopefully, we'd love to hear how it turns out for you all with that. Thank you, everybody. We'll see you next week. Have a great day.