If I ever publish an autobiography, this would be the tagline.
Jackie Colmar, impact entrepreneur, lover of Thai food, and forever Texan.
You are based in Melbourne, Australia, what do you love about the social impact community there?
I’m a bit in love with the social impact community here – although that is probably just me being a bit biased! While small, it often feels large due to the energy and passion that the people in this space bring to everything that they do. I also love how young people are very switched on in Melbourne when it comes to social and environmental issues, and to them social enterprise and for-purpose business is simply a no-brainer.
Tell us more about your vision for Tilt and why you started this magazine.
We originally started Tilt Magazine to create a hub where anyone regardless of what stage they were at in their journey, could access the tools and support they need to get active in social enterprise. However, now it is much more than that. As we have grown, we have noticed the lack of opportunities for social enterprises to market themselves, as social enterprise is still such a niche sector there is a lack of media platforms and online hubs where people passionate about social innovation and impact entrepreneurship can go to learn more and connect with each other.
If those of us who are passionate about social enterprise want to see this movement grow we need to have a place where we can talk about the issues that we are facing as social entrepreneurs, and connect with each other so that we can learn, and grow our impact, as well as a way to get the concept of social enterprise out to more people. In Australia, only 3% of Australians know what social enterprise is. Tilt is here to change that.
Was there a certain moment when you decided, that you wanted to build something from scratch?
No actually. I avoided this idea for a really long time and it was out of pure frustration that there was nothing out there where I could learn about social enterprise, and hear from real, live social entrepreneurs that Tilt came about. And it got to a point where I thought “You know what? Fine. Here we go!” I have no experience in journalism and I wouldn’t say I am particularly tech savvy either, however this idea and thought that there needed to be something out there to help those who were struggling to do something to make the world a better place, kept nagging at me until I was hooked!
Who inspires you personally?
I am inspired each and every day by the people that I am lucky enough to meet and talk with, who believe that there is a better way for business to be doing things, and who are risking it all to create change and to make the world a better place.
Do you measure your impact?
Yes! Although, while we have been tracking our reach, and the impact on the community, we aren’t measuring our impact in the way that we intend to once we have everything up and running. We are still in our early stages and are working on perfecting our business and impact models, so I wouldn’t say that we have nailed it just yet.
As cause-driven individuals, we often want to be making a substantial difference on the issues we are focusing on right from the beginning, and sometimes you just have to get started and then as your organization grows, so will your impact.
It has been hard for us at the moment not to focus all of our energy on making an impact, but for Tilt we know we need to give a little extra attention on how to make our business model sustainable right now so that we can, over the long-term, make deeper and more sustainable impact, than we would if we just focused all of our time and resources on making impact right now.
What do you wish you would have known before starting out?
I was actually joking with my Co-Founder the other day about how running a startup is about constantly putting out fires, and while this is something I wish I knew a bit more when we were first starting out, I don’t think you can really visualize it until your in the midst of the mayhem!
I also wish I knew a bit more about marketing before starting out. It’s been great learning about it on the go, but I think even small things like how to develop a launch strategy, and learning about the 40% creating and 60% promoting stat earlier would have been incredibly helpful. Sometimes you get so focused on creating a product that once you do, you think “Alright, I’ve done that, so now let’s promote it!”, while in reality those things often should be happening at the same time.
Furthermore, marketing prior to launching your product can help you build up a strong base to launch to once you have your product completed, and often floating the idea of what you are making to people who are interested can provide you with valuable feedback that you can use to guide product development, pricing strategies, communications strategies and heaps of other crucial aspects, that will in the end make your product more successful.
What is the craziest thing you did so far to market your business?
At the moment we have been pretty tame when it comes to our marketing, as we have been focused on testing our messaging and marketing channels. In the next six months though, I will probably have a crazy marketing story for you, so check back in then! Haha!
How will you sustain your business?
As we are a for-purpose social enterprise, we have been putting a lot of work into our business model to find the sweet spot between impact and financial sustainability, but it will take time to figure out the best way to serve our community and provide value, while being self-sustaining and revenue generating. We are currently reaching out to experts for help with this, at this point in our journey.
What gives you the worst sleepless nights right now?
What I have been thinking about the most at the moment (aside from all of the emails I need to reply to – sorry guys!) is how can we better be sharing the amazing stories of individuals who are risking it all to do something they believe in with their heart and soul. As a digital magazine, we have the opportunity to get creative with how we tell our stories more so than print magazines, and I think there is so much potential to tell each story in a dynamic way, so we are working hard at the moment to find the best way to do this. I would also say I often worry about how to better get this magazine and other resources to the changemakers and social innovators who need it most.
What was the most memorable moment working with Tilt?
There have been so many amazing moments on my journey with Tilt, but one of my favorites was when we were just getting started.
One of the first things we did once we got our name and website set up, was reach out to social entrepreneurs and leaders in this space to interview, and for a good month we didn’t hear back from anyone, not even a “no”. At that point, all types of things were going through our heads, “Do people even want to share their stories? Is this space even big enough? What if our idea is complete rubbish? What are we even doing!?!”
I still remember the first ‘yes’ we got.
I was working full-time at an amazing nonprofit here in Melbourne, working on Tilt in the evenings and on the weekend, and when I heard back from our first interviewee, I literally did a little dance in the office. I was so excited! And in the end, this first interviewee, who was Brett Seychell from Social Cycles, completely blew us away with his story, so we couldn’t help but have him as our first ever cover story and Featured Impact Entrepreneur for Issue 1 of Tilt Magazine.
If you could give one piece of advice to aspiring social entrepreneurs, what would that be?
I’m bad at giving general advice so I would say for those who are looking to start a social enterprise, my piece of advice would be to do what I call an “internal and external survey”. Start with the “internal survey” and write down what it is that makes you feel like you have had a few too many cups of coffee in the morning, what it is that you naturally excel at, and what it is that you think you would love to learn about. Then do an “external survey” writing down who your connections are, and what they do and what they are good at, what the biggest issues in your local community are, and a few social and environmental challenges that you know a lot about and are passionate about.
Take a good look at what you have written down. Is there a way to make them all fit? Do a lot of people in your community lack access to health care services? Do you love being creative, and do you have a talent for making beautiful necklaces? Do a few of your friends work at retail stores? Could you make necklaces, then get a few of your friends to sell them through their stores, and use some of the profits to help provide access to health care to those in your community without? That is a fairly uncreative example, but you get the idea!
It’s sometimes hard to know where you fit as an aspiring social entrepreneur, but if you do this, and then start talking to people about your ideas, you’ll start getting closer to finding what it is that you can do to make a difference, that also makes you feel fulfilled.
Where can we follow you?
You can follow us on:
•Insta: tilt_magazine
•Twitter: @Tilt_mag
•FB: www.facebook.com/tiltmag.org
•Website: www.tiltmag.org
Listen to Episode #20 when Regina Larko, host of #impact Podcast, shares how she discovered Tilt.
Find out why Regina is such a big fan and hear her read from an article of Tilt Magazine Issue 1. “Five Mistakes That Social Entrepreneurs Make When Crafting Their Brands”.
