Elly Klein is a professional humour writer, author, entertainer and entrepreneur. She‘s the author of Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates, the most delicious relationship advice book ever, which is now a live hen‘s night / bachelorette party event running in multiple cities. She also writes a funny, cheeky and fearlessly honest weekly column, with video intro, entitled Elly is a Four-Letter Word, which is published on her website, ellyklein.com. And she has more exciting book projects in the pipeline.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Franziska: Hi and welcome to another episode of Basic Bananas Radio.
Christo: Good day, guys. Welcome to the radio show today. We have something very cool happening.
Franziska: We do. We‘re going to talk about different chocolates and why men are like a box of chocolates and also what sort of chocolate you might be in terms of who you are, and also how it relates to business and how somebody has built a business around chocolates and men.
Christo: Yes, very interesting.
Franziska: Two of my favorite things.
Christo: So today our guest who managed to do this, combined chocolate with business is Ellie Klein. She‘s a professional humor writer. She‘s an author, an entertainer and an entrepreneur. She‘s the Author of Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates. Very interesting indeed. The most delicious relationship advice book every written, and in an interesting way, too, to describe it. Now, she‘s actually turned this book into a hen‘s night. It‘s like an activity that happens on hen‘s nights or bachelorette parties, whatever we want to call them.
So Ellie Klein, she‘s now running in multiple cities. She also writes a funny, cheeky and fearlessly honest weekly column with a video intro. And that‘s published on her website which is EllieKlein.com which we‘ll hear more about later.
Franziska: Hi, Ellie. Welcome to the Basic Bananas Show today. Thank you so much for being here.
Ellie: You‘re welcome. I‘m very excited. Thank you.
Franziska: Me too. And I read all about you and what you have been up to. I thought I need to have this girl on this show. So take the suspense away. Can you tell us a little bit about you and also what you‘re up to in terms of your business?
Christo: We‘re looking forward to this.
Ellie: Well, it‘s been quite a long journey. I started out as an advertising copy writer in 2001 I actually won this program called Awards. And I got a job with Simon Reynolds; he was fantastic. I only stayed in the industry for a few years because I really wanted to work for myself. It only took a few years to realize that the corporate environment just wasn‘t right for me. I wanted to do my own thing, so I actually branched out and freelanced as a copywriter for ten years. I didn‘t want to write ads for the rest of my life. I had lots of creative ideas and I really wanted to write a book.
So I had this idea, I actually got this idea from my sister. I‘m still single… She‘s married now. But when we were both single we would come home from dates and we‘d use chocolate as a metaphor for men. So we‘d say something like, “Oh, he‘s a caramel chew. Such hard work. Or he‘s a chocolate covered marshmallow, a bit chubby, but very sweet. Or he‘s a chocolate bullet, get out of the firing line.”
I just thought there‘s definitely a book in that. So in between my freelance copywriting I worked up this little book. I actually published through the Messenger Group with Lisa Messenger. That‘s a nontraditional publisher and they were absolutely fantastic… So that was great. Then the book came out and I went to have a meeting with them. I was going to talk to them about doing some speaking in book stores and chocolate stores around the tracks and they said, ‘Oh we think you should do a Hen‘s Night.” I‘m like, “Oh, that was a good idea. So do you think I should do videos and images and music?” “No, we think you‘re entertaining enough on your own.” Oh! Sorry, that‘s not quite true.
So I thought, no I don‘t think I‘m entertaining enough on my own, although that was very sweet of them to say that. And I thought, no I‘m going to put a whole show together.
So I basically took the content of my book, Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates. Well, just to quickly explain, each chapter, the way it works is each chapter is very short. It‘s a little gift book. Each chapter is about 350 words. There are 34 characters. And they‘re all illustrated by an image of chocolate. So there‘s a rum ball is a drunken American and a coconut chocolate is a surfy beach bum and a honeycomb chocolate has a heart of gold. So I had all these images. So I put all the images in to the show and I added funny videos and music. I wanted to be interactive so everyone would eat chocolate through it and I‘d get them up singing and dancing. And I‘d want to embarrass the hen and all that sort of stuff.
So I just turned it into a whole extravaganza or hen extravaganza as I call it. And now it‘s in two cities. It‘s in Sydney and it‘s in Melbourne and we‘re going to keep rolling it out next year and I‘m going to go off to New York and we‘re going to roll it out to other cities and that‘s how it‘s all going.
Christo: Wow, what an interesting business. What a cool journey.
Franziska: And what a great idea, too. And when you say New York, I can so see this work in New York, like with the New Yorkers and the chicks all getting together. I love it. How small is this world, too? You know, Simon Reynolds is one of our friends and we had him on the show. It‘s just so funny that the world is so small. We‘re actually going to meet up with him in LA where he is living now or the week after I think. It‘s such a small world.
Ellie: Yes, I caught up with him in LA about five months ago. Yeah, he‘s really thriving over there. Great.
Franziska: Yeah, he‘s fantastic. So back to Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates. I just love that. I love how you went from writing this gift book to then turning the whole book into a whole business model and now you have a couple of cities where you run your hen extravaganza. I love that. So how do you run the shows in different cities? Do you have people that run it for you or do you have to be everywhere all the time?
Ellie: No, I‘ve trained up some host in Melbourne in my first city from Sydney. I‘m originally from Sydney. So I was doing it in Sydney. I‘ve got a couple of girls now in Melbourne who run the show. Yeah, it‘s great.
Franziska: That‘s fantastic. And how do you make sure that they run it how you want it to be run? Did you put together some training videos or did you train them? How do you make sure that it‘s actually your business that‘s replicated in each city?
Ellie: Yeah, they come along to a few Hen‘s Nights. So I had a few bookings in Melbourne and I would go down. They first came along just to see it and see if it‘s something that they would want to do. Then they came along to a second one and they audition. So they did five chocolates each, which taught them maybe seven minutes or something. That was an audition. Then they just stayed on and watched the rest of the show. So they‘ve seen it twice now with two different groups and every group is slightly different. And now they‘re going down to Melbourne this weekend actually and they‘re going to do the whole show themselves and I‘m just going to be completely hands off and let them do it. But they‘re great.
Christo: Nice. Very cool. This is making me feel like getting chocolate, but I don‘t think I‘m going to look at it the same again. Those little guys.
Franziska: That little sentence is making me feel like chocolate. You pretty much hear that regardless. Christo‘s a little bit of a chocolate addict… I was actually thinking when you were describing all these men that you saw out when you were with your sister and the caramel and the marshmallow and the chocolate coating. I was just thinking, “What would Christo be if I had to describe him?”
Ellie: I don’t know. I‘d have to know a little bit more about him.
Franziska: I haven‘t given him…
Christo: The heart of gold one was pretty good. I‘m golden on the inside.
Franziska: No, you know what I was thinking, like a smooth white chocolate with a little bit of caramel splinters inside, like little surprises and a bit edgy.
Ellie: Maybe you‘re a chocolate kiss. That‘s a good kiss up.
Christo: There we go. I‘ll go with that. I‘m pretty happy with that one.
Ellie: Yeah, you‘ll go with that one?
Christo: Yeah. So look, prior to the show I was going through the notes and it said you always act on a good idea. So how do you know what‘s a good idea? What‘s a good idea in terms of business? What‘s your definition of how do you know what a good idea is to act on it?
Ellie: You know, I think it‘s just gut instinct. I mean it‘s funny, when the book came out, I just thought I was going to write more books. It wasn‘t in the plan to become an entrepreneur and all that. That wasn‘t the initial plan. But when that idea came up and I just went, “Yeah, that is a great idea,” and I could really envision it. I think when you can really see it and you also feel as though you’re capable of doing it, just run with it. I don‘t sort of say I‘m going to do something. If I say I‘m going to do something I will do it.
Christo: Yeah. It‘s an interesting journey. So your original plans were just to publish a book and probably was to write a few more, be an author.
Ellie: Yeah. I wanted to be Bradley… I still do want to be Bradley. He‘s the king of gift books, he wrote the… and I actually met him through Simon. So that was the connection there. That book has sold millions of copies and then he went on and wrote more gift books in the same style; I just loved them. And I just think they‘re great to obviously give as gifts and I like buying them myself; they‘re inexpensive. I just wanted to write more and more books. And I have got more books in the pipeline, but the Men Are Like A Box of Chocolates extravaganza kind of stole my attention.
Franziska: Also when I looked at your notes, you had some really good business tips for business owners. Can you share some of them with our listeners?
Ellie: Sure. So my first tip was chase your dreams in an un-dreamlike state. I actually recently wrote something about this on my website. I have a weekly column and I like writing about…I like being seriously honest. So I really say what I mean. I just think that there are a lot of motivational speakers and a lot of people out there saying, “Chase your dreams. Chase your dreams. Chase your dreams.” I think you need to be a bit careful with that. I think sure, chase your dreams, but do it in an un-dreamlike state. Meaning, be very careful and strategic, like don‘t go and quit your job and start your cupcake shop or whatever. I mean you could, but if you have bills to pay and a family to feed and stuff you might think, okay, this is my dream -the cupcake shop or whatever it might be. I‘m going to stay in my job for another 12 to 24 months like I would for a house deposit or a big trip overseas or something. Then so when you do go and chase your dream, you just do it very carefully and strategically and in a way that‘s not going to hurt you or your family too much if it doesn‘t work out. So that‘s the first one.
Franziska: That‘s really good advice. I like that. It‘s really about being realistic and strategic about it, still going after your dreams, but not blindfolded.
Ellie: Yeah. And you can be worked up into a frenzy when you read all those magazine articles or you see something on TV and someone had this incredible success. They‘re exception, not the rule.
Franziska: And usually we don‘t even know the backstory. Somebody had this crazy success but we don‘t read that they spent 20 years working hard to get to that success.
Ellie: No, you often don‘t know the backstory. And there can be other little, they may have had a little bit of an inheritance or something that helped prop them up financially while they worked on this. I would never begrudge anyone their success. I don‘t care how much money they have. I think if you have achieved success, good on you. I think it‘s brilliant. You can have all the money in the world and still not be successful. There is back story and little things that you don‘t know about. And everyone‘s situation is different. So you have to decide for yourself. For me, I‘m single and I‘m childless so no one‘s depending on me, and I had some savings. So I could just run out and do this and there wouldn‘t be too much fallout. So that might be the first tip.
Franziska: What‘s the second one?
Ellie: The second one is do everything, expect nothing. What I mean by that is that in business, you will do things where you get nothing in return. You just have no idea. So you need to go and send out those press releases and contact that person and go to that networking event and just do everything, but expect nothing. Because you don‘t really know what‘s going to work and what isn‘t. So you need to do it, but if you have expectations then you‘ll probably be disappointed. And then in that you‘ll do something where your expectations might be a little low and something amazing happens and you go, “oh wow.” Things can surprise you.
Franziska: And what you say I like it, because it‘s about being open minded… So give stuff a go. Obviously if it doesn‘t work in the end you‘re welcome to start something and to take something on, instead of saying setting out press releases doesn‘t work for me, or whatever strategies, unless you have tried it, you cannot judge it.
Ellie: Yeah, you just don‘t know. For instance, I have a few different ways that I‘m promoting the Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates extravaganza. And some are working better than others. I recently purchased a whole heap of promotional chocolates, little chocolates with something written on it so people can go to the website. And I thought I‘d go around and give them to bridesmaids dress stores because bridesmaids are usually the ones that organize the Hen‘s Night and they can hand them out. Long story short, it just didn‘t really work. I don’t know why, I think people just probably ate the chocolate and threw the wrapper away. I don’t know, it just didn‘t work. But then I‘m advertising on a Hen‘s website and that worked beautifully. And I also put promotional French magnets, a really fun little French magnets in your bag, and that‘s good as well. But yeah, until you do things you just don‘t know what‘s going to happen. So do everything, expect nothing.
Franziska: Excellent and do you have third one? I think you had another one, too.
Ellie: I do. I have practice the three P’s. Perspiration, persistence and patience. Perspiration just means work hard. Persistence means keep going. And patience means hang in there because success often takes a lot longer than you think it will.
Christo: Agreed. I think a lot of business owners, it‘s kind of like almost having no ego…I see in a business they know they need to do a bit of extra work on the side. They know they need to keep pushing on, keep perspiring to make things happen. And you always see there is that background story like Franziska mentioned, too, they‘ve had to do a lot of hard work – 20 years of hard work, not overnight success.
Ellie: Absolutely.
Christo: So what are some of your favorite marketing strategies that you, and you’re using at the moment or you enjoy, you get a good return. But some of your kind of favorite ones for Henstravaganza?
Ellie: Yeah, well the Henstravaganza, with that I do advertise on a hen‘s website. It‘s actually hens.com.au and that‘s great. I put promotional French magnets in goodie bags and I find those opportunities through source bubble. And I know that you‘ve interviewed Beck of Source Bubble, so that‘s great. And I also call out, I‘ve had a little bit of press. I send press releases out to wedding magazines and blogs. I also sent a slightly different press release out to a few business publications, because I think the book to business things that my journey is quite interesting. So I thought that was a different angle. So there‘s just some of the things I‘ve been doing.
I‘m also trying to work a little bit with venues that already run hens nights. So they also have a hens night package with the room and food and drink and stuff. But they don‘t have any entertainment. So I‘m contacting them and seeing if they‘d like to have a package that includes me. That‘s just for the hens nights.
But I have a marketing strategy just for me in general as a writer, because I primarily see myself as a writer and I want to come out with more books and I want to have an audience for those books. So one of the things I‘ve learned, I‘ve studied, I‘ve found three courses on it this year, it‘s called content marketing. And it‘s about just putting great content out into the world and building a subscriber list and email subscriber list, social media followers, but more so your email subscribers. And my content, everyone has different kind of content, it can be a blog post or podcast or video. I actually do a weekly column. I try and write like I would a Sunday newspaper column. So it‘s fun and it‘s light and it‘s interesting. I brand it as Funny, Cheeky and Fearlessly Honest.
Franziska: I love that.
Christo: Nice.
Ellie: This is something that I made up because I didn‘t really see anyone else doing this. I also do a video intro. I think it helps people from all around the world to land on your website, just to put a face to the name. It‘s not just always columns or blog posts or all this writing on a website. You‘re also a human being and they can see you and hear you. So it‘s literally like one minute and I just say, “Hey, it‘s Ellie, duh-duh-duh. This is what this week‘s columns about and I hope you enjoy it,” that kind of thing.
I‘ve only been doing this now for, I‘m not even up to 20 columns yet. But yeah, it‘s going really well and I‘m building my subscriber list and I love writing, so I like producing columns and I‘ve got an absolute killer one coming up tomorrow.
Franziska: I love that you shared this lesson because content marketing we are big fans here at Basic Bananas. We run with the Clever Bunch guys and we always tell them, you got to use content marketing in today‘s economy and you got to grow your followers, grow your social media fans, also your database subscribers. You got to grow your network because it will be the most valuable thing in your business. When you do launch a new product or say if you write a book, the problem is that they write a book and then they have nobody who wants it. But if you, as you do, if you already grow your database right now and through content marketing and being the expert in a certain area, when you launch a new book it will be much easier to get it out there and get people to read it.
Ellie: Absolutely. It‘s about building that now, like and trust factor. I kind of based what I do on my favorite column. Like I have Sunday columnist that I run off and read every Sunday. I look forward to it. I know that if they come out with a book or something, I‘m going to buy it straightaway… I already like them.
Franziska: I was just thinking I‘ve got a hens night in Alaska next July. Have you got some people over there running it for you?
Ellie: I could share that from Portland, because I‘m going to the World Domination Summit.
Franziska: Fantastic. It‘s in July in Portland.
Ellie: Yeah, that‘s in July in Portland.
Franziska: Alright, come up.
Christo: There you go. You just got a gig in Alaska.
Franziska: We‘ll be in touch. Maybe we can organize something. She would love that, my friend over in Alaska. She would enjoy the Men Are Like a Box of Chocolates. That would be really funny.
Ellie: Where in Alaska is she?
Franziska: I don’t know. I think an hour outside of Anchorage.
Ellie: Okay. I used to live up near there.
Franziska: Really? I think near Big Lake area.
Ellie: I actually lived in Canada. I lived in White Horse which is in the Yukon Territory which borders Alaska. So I‘ve been up there.
Franziska: Well, we‘ll get in touch. Maybe you want to come up for a little visit. I‘d love to know a little bit about what…and this might be big question, what‘s your mission with all this? What‘s your mission with Henstravaganza? With your books? What‘s your mission? Why are you doing this stuff?
Ellie: I like to make people laugh. That‘s part of the mission. I also like to be very honest about things. So whenever…for instance the book is really all my dating experience put in a funny way. But at the heart of every chapter is a real experience that I‘ve had and things that I‘ve learned over the years. And because I‘m not a psychologist or expert in that way, I can‘t run off and rant a dating and relationship book serious one.
Franziska: Well, some people do.
Ellie: Well, some people do. That‘s true. He‘s Just Not That Into You was written by a comedian and a writer and I actually think it‘s brilliant. But it‘s an opportunity for me to actually impart some things that I‘ve learnt over the years in a funny way. That‘s why I like gift books. They always have little lessons and it just cuts to the heart of the matter. Yeah, and it‘s always nice to make people laugh and create a fun bonding experience for the girls when they have a hens night and do something unique. Yeah, so that‘s all part of the mission.
Franziska: And something I have to ask you, being an author, what are you reading right now? And what‘s one of your favorite books?
Ellie: Oh my goodness. To be honest, I have to declare book bankruptcy because I have so many pages online bookmarked that I just cannot get through them in a lifetime. So unfortunately that‘s kind of derailed my book reading a little bit. One of my favorite books… I actually just wrote a column about my favorite dating and relationship advice books. So I‘m just thinking, I could probably pick something out of those. I really like He‘s Just Not That Into You. I do. It‘s one of those, we used to say in advertising, it‘s the why didn‘t I think of that factor. It‘s like that, ugh. It‘s that ridiculously simple human truth that you just why didn‘t I think of that.
Franziska: Yeah, and they made a movie out of the book obviously. He‘s Just Not That Into You.
Ellie: Yeah, they did make a movie out of it. I don‘t think the movie did the book justice. It was a fun movie, but the book just…I‘m not saying it‘s flawless like meaning that someone‘s not always not into you or whatever. But I think like nine out of ten times he kind of hits the nail on the head. But the whole idea of it really is just to get women to move on quicker from men who aren‘t giving them what they want. That‘s basically what it‘s about.
Franziska: You know what? I think we should write one that says, she‘s just not that into you. And then just make it a little bit different and all the different signals that the women give out when they‘re not into boys.
Ellie: Greg Barron who wrote it with Liz Tuccillo, he did this video, you could probably find it on YouTube. It‘s called the Moth in New York. People come and tell stories and he tells the story of how that book came about. And he basically said that he is every girl in the book. So he has been on the bad side of a relationship and this girl wasn‘t into him. And he just kept chasing and pushing and pushing and chasing. It‘s absolutely fantastic. It‘s really, really worth watching. I don‘t want to give it away. It‘s really good. If you looked up Greg Barron the moth, if you put that in Google or YouTube you‘ll find it. It‘s just a really great story. It‘s really worth watching. But there was a follow-up…
Franziska: Tonight‘s entertainment sorted.
Christo: Sorted. Now, what about, because I‘m sure you‘ve had some funny encounters in terms of business, one question we like to often ask people is what‘s one of the funniest or weirdest things that have happened in relation to business or relation to a client or…
Franziska: I reckon you‘ve got some hens nights stories that you want to share.
Christo: People testing the kind of chocolate they want.
Ellie: I‘ve got a couple. There was something that happened at one of these events a couple of weeks ago which was just really embarrassing. I bring boxes of chocolates for all the ladies and it‘s interactive. So when we‘re talking about the particular chocolate, they can eat it. One of the boxes of chocolates must have been left out in the sun or something because they opened it and all the chocolates were white. I was like oh my God. I almost died of embarrassment. And then it was kind of funny because there is a chocolate or character in the book called Out of Date Chocolate. And he‘s the guy where…the relationship has come to an end. He‘s reached his expiry date. And I make a joke about how don‘t worry, this isn‘t an edible chapter. That cut a little bit too close to home because I had to stock the chocolate. It was white and disgusting. That joke‘s just not as funny today.
Christo: Oops, the whole party is out of date.
Ellie: Exactly. That was embarrassing. It‘s kind of funny, being a writer, having this weekly column and being a writer of books, I just turn any funny experience or negative experience or anything into material. Part of my content marketing is to have an opt in to encourage people to opt into my email list. I have to offer them something enticing. So they receive a bonus column if they subscribe. The bonus column is very on brand, meaning funny, fearlessly honest. Especially the fearlessly honest part. I turn something very embarrassing and risqué and intimate into a whole story for the world to read if they opt in. Yes, it‘s kind of funny. I would never have thought that experience would end up being a part of my business.
Christo: Part of your marketing.
Franziska: You‘re a really good teaser. So where can the listeners go to read that embarrassing story?
Ellie: Well, you go to EllyKlein.com.
Franziska: Excellent. And that‘s where people can find out more about you and your business I assume on that website.
Ellie: Yeah. They can find out more about me than they ever wanted to know.
Christo: I like it. That‘s irresistible.
Franziska: Alright. Well, if you were a chocolate, what would you be? You did not think that would come just last minute did you?
Ellie: I hate to toot my own horn, but I would like to think I‘m a chocolate kiss.
Christo: Chocolate kiss, they‘re popular today.
Ellie: I‘m also a honeycomb chocolate. A honeycomb chocolate is a heart of gold, do-gooder and I‘m in for underprivileged teenage girls, so I‘m a bit of a do-gooder.
Franziska: Awe, that‘s fantastic. Thank you so much for today, Ellie. I can‘t wait to read your book and read your secret embarrassing story and see you in Alaska.
Ellie: Sounds good. I‘ll see you there.
Franziska: Sounds great. Thanks, Ellie.
Christo: Thanks, Ellie.
Ellie: Thank you.
Franziska: That was such a great entry; I really enjoyed talking to Ellie.
Christo: Yeah, that was a really cool interview. So I think there‘s a lot of great insights in there for our business.
Franziska: I think one of my key learning, key takeaways that I love our listeners to takeaway and take action on is that it‘s great to be open to things that happen and be adaptable. So if an opportunity comes along assess if it‘s a great opportunity. Then sometimes you end up somewhere else than where you thought you would end up. But it might be even better. So keeping your eyes open for opportunities than go along if your gut instinct says this is the right way to go, embrace it.
Christo: Yes, very much. And it might be a lucrative path that you can go down, but it might not be what you‘d expect in the first place. So very cool interview… Shared a lot of cool insights. Chocolate – I‘m never going to look at it the same again. And also sounds like a real cool opt in eBook that she‘s got on her site. Nice little marketing there. That sounds like a great thing to go and check out.
So us, in the future, things to look out for as listeners we have some very exciting things coming up. We won the young entrepreneur award last week or a couple of weeks back. Franziska is now Young Entrepreneur of the World for New South Wales. So that‘s cool.
Franziska: Yeah, and we‘ve got the experience coming up which is a two day summit which we are hosting in April. It will be a really amazing experience for small businesses who are getting together and we haven‘t…we keep the program a secret, but there will be a lot of activities and interactions and speakers and it will be just a completely different way of running a seminar. We are running in April. Beginning of April we will launch it and announce the dates and also the website link very shortly, so keep an eye out for that. Also, get excited for next episode of Basic Bananas Radio because we have got a guy we speak to about apps and how apps can be a good marketing tool for your business or can be a waste of time. So get excited about the next episode and we look forward to seeing you again in about a week.
Christo: See you soon, guys. Bye for now.