How to be Good at Networking? YOU may be Asking the Wrong Question...ft. CEO Melissa Moody

Building a massive following and building a valuable network are two completely different objectives. While many professionals focus on broadcasting their message to a wide audience through social media, true value often lies in one-to-one human connections. CEO Melissa Moody explains that a network built on authentic, no-agenda conversations yields long-term, compounding returns that outlast volume-based outbound tactics. To cultivate this kind of network, professionals must shift their mindset from immediate transactional gains to genuine relationship-building. By scheduling just one 30-minute 'no-agenda' meeting a week, individuals can uncover serendipitous opportunities. The key is simply asking people what they are currently working on and offering a small piece of actionable value based on your own expertise, without expecting an immediate sale in return. Furthermore, this focus on lifting others extends to broader leadership initiatives. Moody highlights the importance of amplifying female executives through platforms like 'Wednesday Women.' Instead of asking busy women leaders to take on the extra burden of self-promotion, the industry should act as a megaphone for their achievements, proving that meaningful networking is fundamentally about helping and elevating others.

Discussed in this episode

• The critical distinction between building a broadcast audience and cultivating a meaningful personal network.
• Why transactional networking fails and how adopting a 'help first' mindset builds stronger business relationships.
• How Matcha differentiates itself by focusing on high-intent, human-to-human matching within existing communities.
• The importance of scheduling at least one 'no-agenda' meeting per week to invite serendipity and organic partnerships.
• Using the 'Adam strategy' to network by asking what someone is working on and offering immediate, relevant value.
• The opportunity cost of high-volume, automated outbound sales compared to the compounding returns of relationship selling.
• Why the visibility of female executives is broken and how 'Wednesday Women' acts as a megaphone to amplify their presence.
• The necessity of presenting your 'whole self' in professional profiles, moving beyond just job titles to personal interests.

Episode highlights

1. 0:00 — Episode introduction and welcome
2. 1:30 — Melissa's criteria for joining Matcha
3. 3:00 — Audience building versus genuine networking
4. 7:00 — Connecting as a human, not a title
5. 10:30 — The power of no-agenda calendar meetings
6. 13:45 — Matcha's community-driven networking model
7. 18:00 — Changing the quick-win sales mindset
8. 20:30 — Offering value in 30-minute conversations
9. 24:00 — The compounding ROI of relationship selling
10. 27:15 — Wednesday Women and amplifying female leaders
11. 32:00 — Rapid fire questions with Melissa

Key takeaways

• Stop broadcasting to audiences and start connecting with your actual network.
• Book one 30-minute no-agenda meeting weekly to unlock serendipitous opportunities.
• Lead with human interests before discussing job titles or sales pitches.
• Ask connections what they are working on, then offer immediate value.
• Amplify female leaders' visibility without adding burdens to their busy schedules.

Transcript

When you think about how it really aligns to your goals, there's so much more value in one well-placed, you know, we both have overlap here, let's see where it goes conversation than there is in a hundred posts at the top of this level. Welcome back to another episode of the Revenue Reimagine Podcast. This is a special episode for so many reasons. Number one, I have Zachary with me, first appearance post-surgery, and I'm stoked that he's come to sit and hang out.

But more importantly, we have an incredible guest today with us who I met a long time ago, back in the days of Gated, which I want to talk about, which is one of the platforms that is still near and dear to my heart and I miss it so much. But Melissa Moody, who is the CEO of Matcha, which you may have heard of, that is sort of part of Comstore. We'll talk about that in a little bit. I wish I had a matcha latte here with me.

I don't. Shame on you for not getting me a matcha latte. Melissa, welcome to the show. Oh, I'm psyched to be here.

I can't We're going to dive into so many topics that if if y'all listeners weren't here, we would still be having this conversation. So, I'm glad somebody pushed record, and I'm extra glad to see Zachary here today. Yay! Yeah.

You need to talk. Oh. He suddenly is getting shy. Dale knows this child.

Is he ever shy? No. Yes. No, but he's shy today.

He just wants to sit here and look pretty with the curls for days. All right, let's let let let's let's dive in. Awesome. Melissa, thanks for joining.

Um, you know, one of the biggest things and it says it right on the front of your website, like, you know, your your network is your net worth. And enjoy, like I think it's more important now than ever that we go through a process of finding your network to actually close more more business. So, what excited you about Matcha? What were you like when you were originally having conversations with Mac like, this is something I can like sink my teeth into and make sure that like it it becomes a product that everyone wants to use?

Mhm. Well, you know, throwing back to what Adam mentioned about Gated, I I choose to work on products. I choose to because, you know, as a as a mom and with a lot of going on, I really need to think about where I spend my time. And I like to work on products that I really truly feel have an impact on the end human.

So I love it if they have a bigger impact on the business or the world, but really like benefiting people in in their day job, helping people do something better. And so that's conceptually part of how Mac talked me into uh coming to work on Mana. Um the second piece of that is to go back to that phrase, I truly believe that um we we do a lot of networking activities. We're out there doing a lot, spraying a lot in the world of digital.

We're doing more of all of it. Push a button, it goes to millions of people, right? There's this huge amount of scale. But if you think of networking as we've always done it, there's a lot of noise and not a lot of real, real action.

There's a lot of I'm out here. I'm talking a lot of people. I'm yelling a lot of things. I'm sending a lot of messages.

That I don't really think is a true network. That is what I would call an audience. We're doing a lot of audience building. Um and so when I when we really think at Match about networking, great.

Go out and build your audience. Go to big events. Do all that loud, noisy stuff, but how do we turn that network? How does an individual turn that network into something that they can really activate to their goals?

How do how do we make it valuable? And we can talk about that from a sales perspective. You guys probably know that even more than I do, but also just talk about it from a fundamental you have a lot of people. How you've collected a lot of people?

How do you connect with them in a way that aligns with your goals? So that problem really excites me, and that's why I said, yeah, I'm in for Match, and that's what every day, you know, I'm I'm excited to build. I got a really cool, smart, fast-moving team. It's a tricky problem, and it's a loaded space, and apparently, that's what I really like signing on for.

So You you you you like those hyper-competitive, uh, we have to really differentiate to win spaces. Um, I love it. I I I love Matcha. I love the idea of go to network, and I think that you you just touched on something that's really important, the difference between an audience and a network, right?

And a lot of people don't realize that in like, I don't by any means consider myself like a content creator or an influencer or anything like that. There's other people who use that term when talking about me, and it makes me very uncomfortable and like very ick, if you will. Um, because I I I don't have a desire to like create content. I have a desire to help people, and I have a desire to build a network that can help people.

And nothing makes me happier than like when Dale and I can help someone, you know, get a job or, you know, transition into roles or, you know, find a mentor or any number of those things. But so many people are using their network wrong. To blast. Yeah, like an audience.

100%. So, how how do we start to change that? And whether that be, you know, matcha-related, which we can certainly talk about or not, like, where did this mindset get so ick of like, my goal today is to go post and I got to get 27,000 impressions? Like, that's great, but I mean, I think I think you just hit it by saying my goal today is, because I think as in all good things, it comes back to the why, right?

So if your why is to sell more of your product, there's there actually potentially two ways you could go with that, but one is probably to get a bigger audience. You want to be talking to as many people as you can to get your product out there, right? Like that is a good legitimate why. I would say that's not going to lead to deep, meaningful collaborations and partnerships and relationships.

But it can be valuable. So, having an audience is a super valuable thing. But I think the why determines when you start talking about And I just think network is a overly awful loaded term. Because you can think of networking kind of in that audience vein, but the way that I would like to build to that term of network is really to think about the network from the sense of my why is if I build foundationally strong relationships, those will have an impact on my business over time.

Now, maybe it will lead to sales, but maybe it will simply lead to referrals, or maybe it will lead to other things. The story I will tell you is the the person who is Matcha, I like to call them the Matcha Pro. The person who thinks this way, may be a hard-driving salesperson, but they will tell you, right up front, I never want to be salesy. I don't I don't ever want to come off as salesy, even when I'm having kind of a sales conversation, it shouldn't feel that way.

That's like Matcha thinking, which is I want to talk to the human. It's what you're saying. I don't want to blast people out news. I want to help people.

It's just a different way of thinking. And so I I do think the why matters it matters to my target IICP. Like, who am I building the product for? I'm building people with a why that is I actually want to help and understand and connect with people, not my first why is I gotta sell more stuff.

Now, they can be tied. Every professional has goals, right? Sure. Sure.

Um How many people How many people do you think really think like that? Like, I I I'm totally aligned with you and I we interview a lot of sales people. We interview a lot of go-to-market people. I look at their Like, the first thing, don't send me your resume.

I want to look at your LinkedIn profile. I want to see not only do you have connections, are you engaging in a meaningful way to people in network? So, like, what kind of posts are you putting together? Is it like company posts?

Are you really trying to connect of a of a sample size of like 100, for example, or a 1,000, like, what percentage of people really do think that way? I mean, if we had 100, like, just to give you a hard number, I would probably guess, you know, I'd probably guess 25 to 30% of people are thinking that way. That's higher than I would think. I was gonna say.

I I was gonna think like 10 to 15. So that makes me happy. Here's the Here's the reason I'll say that is because it it depends on the type of people too, right? But a lot, and it depends on the phase of like where they are in their career.

Like, can they afford to have conversations that don't have an immediate impact? So there's a lot of narrowing, Yeah, maybe okay, let's call it 15 to 20%. But where I think it gets interesting is um well, and to be very clear, I don't want to be in the position of convincing those people why they should think this way. That's a really hard thing to do.

100%. That's super hard. And and actually, it may it may even start above them. Like, it may it's probably more at the leadership level because you're going to only do like it's their like call, dial, call, like don't make connections.

Like you got to have leadership that supports this this mentality. The other thing I think is important is if it's just for their particular um role, it's probably a lot lower than that. 5% of people are like, well, I'm in my day job. I don't have time to connect.

But when you start talking to the whole human, and you're talking to them as someone who is not just a GTM leader but also a dad, right? They start realizing, well, I don't just need to connect about driving revenue. I need to connect because I'm burning out and I need to rely on other people. Or I have an interest a side interest, or maybe I host a podcast.

There might be other reasons why they want to connect on a on a more less transactional level if you get outside of just the day job. So I think when we start talking to uh humans as humans versus humans as their title, the percentage probably goes up, right? There's probably a lot more people who are willing to just see where it leads and if you have enough mutual connection, I think something's going to come out of this, you know, I I have um we like to call it serendipity, you know, like to um there there are people I I say, are you someone who looks at your calendar, and you have at least one meeting during the week that does not have an agenda? Now, some people will immediately go, oh, god, why would I have a meeting with no agenda?

And other people go, yeah, I've got five or ten of those. And it's just such a clear dichotomy between the people that everything needs to be driven to a specific goal, and the people where it's like, I I'm driving to goals, but I'm I'm open to seeing where interesting things come from, creativity comes from, potential partnerships come from. It's very clear. There's um people are either thinking that way or they're not.

Interesting. It's so it's funny we talk about agendas, right? Because I have a a whole mindset of agenda versus not agenda, but I think it's a very different type of call, right? Like, when we're talking about networking calls and helping people calls, it's very different.

But what what you said about people, you know, thinking about them versus, you know, company and like there there's just these there's these different mindsets, right? And when you start posting or talking in general. Like, I would say, Dale, what do you think? Less than 10% of our posts are anything that have the word revenue reimagined in it.

Um, it's fundamentally just not how we we drive. Now, does everything we post have to do with what we do? Sure. Um, and do we get business out of it?

Sure. But the goal, at least my goal, every time I post, is how can I help another? How could how could whatever story I'm sharing or whatever anecdote I'm sharing provide someone value? Um, and I think when I look at those that I love to network with, Um, it's those that get on the phone and all they want to do is like, how can I help you?

How can I help your network? How can I help others? And it it's something that I think has gotten lost in this era of content creation, if you will. Um, where everyone's goal is turned into how many followers can I get and how many, you know, interactions can I get?

Um, and as someone who was blessed or cursed to have a post that did go quote-unquote viral, um, I could tell you it's not all that it's cracked up to be and the amount of inauthentic networking connections that that caused me was hours of wasted time that I would much rather spend with the authentic people. And this idea of time. So, um, the story is, you know, I talk to people and I say, well, like, do you you have goals? Yes, I have goals.

Do you know who would help you achieve those goals within your network? Yeah, I probably do. I probably know. And then I say, are you actually meeting with those people?

And they go, no, I'm not. Because we're spending all this time shouting. And it does have a role. I'm not downplaying it.

It has a purpose. Sure. But we're when you think about how it really aligns to your goals, there's so much more value in one well-placed, you know, we both have overlap here, let's see where it goes conversation than there is in a hundred posts at the top of this level. So, but it it it is a shift.

I mean, it's or a balance. Yeah, so, talk to talk to us a little bit about how Matcha differentiates that from like all the noise that's out there. So people on LinkedIn just trying to like get likes, views. Uh, what's different with the Matcha way and how you guys execute the go to market?

Well, the whole second piece of how we execute the go to market is a whole another barrel of monkeys that I may tap into, but I think and and just to be, you know, candid too, we are also we're still very much in the startup zone. So we're feeling out where does the product that we build fit in with the brand promise? I will say to date, what when I came on board in January, we inherited a product that was really focused on the one-to-one matching. So, I mean, I'll flat out say, we do a much more better job, more enjoyable job of the one-to-one matching programs that you may have seen elsewhere.

And frankly, a lot of people got burned by companies that I won't name. You know, these lazy introductions with no real connection, and then you're supposed to go juggle calendar links and meet with each other because your company told you to. Nobody needs to do that. Nobody wants to do that.

So, from a one-to-one standpoint, I think the messaging is you're already in communities and teams and things that you're aligned with. Why not start getting value out of the individuals in those communities? Right? Like, you've already picked.

I want to be in CMO Coffee Talk. I want to be aligned with Wednesday Women. So, of course, I'm already potentially going to be getting value from meeting with those people one-to-one. So, all Matcha does is unlock the value that's already in your community.

Pretty straightforward. As we've been building into the product, we're doubling down on the value of that connection for the individual. So, not only should you be able more empowered to connect with people in groups and communities you're a part of, but think about your network. How do you start bringing together small groups of your network?

How do you start building better one-to-one with people you know you should be meeting? Um, one thing I'm excited that's somewhere on the soon road map is building little lightweight personal board management. I know these five people are going to drive my business. Am I meeting with them?

Nope. Okay, like, let's make that happen in an easy, fun way. The only other thing I would add is that if you've ever been on a Matcha chat, we lean into the casual and authentic. We try I had someone tell me, going to an event and posting on LinkedIn feel like I'm talking to business cards.

And said, when I come to Matcha, it feels like I'm talking to the real person. Now, that is honestly, that is That's that's powerful. It is, but it's really just a brand feeling. Like, there's not too much that we do besides a little bit of, you know, really breaking down those barriers.

So from a GTM perspective, I'm leading hard into that. I'm talking about the joy of connecting. I'm uh the profile pages you can build on Matcha are showing your whole self. Like, don't talk to me as a CEO.

Talk to me about what I actually want to talk about. Here are the three things I want to talk about. And one of them is my new puppy. You mean you mean be be a human being?

I mean, I I I feel like we teach this not just in sales, but I I feel like every AE BDR, C, whatever, whatever that Dale and I talk to, I feel like almost every conversation starts with you have to be a human first. Yes. Like, you're not just the CEO of Matcha. Like, Dale's not just the CGTM of R.

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com. Right? Like, But unfortunately, would you not agree though that we've also kind of broken the system in the sense that right now we are brackets into which the human element is inserted, right? 100%, but that's that's the entire sorry fucking problem.

Yes. With the world. Like, you and I, like, we were on this recording before we started, and it was a very human-to-human connection. And I I and even before this recording, you and I have spoken on like I've I've known you for a while, and it's always been a very human-to-human connection.

And when I look at networking and I look at the most successful people in any role, it's those who start with a human-to-human connection. There's nothing worse than you I'm sure you get it a million times. Hey, Melissa, my name's Adam. I'm so-and-so from whatever lead generation agency, and because you're the CEO of Matcha, you must struggle with ABC.

Absolute You don't know You don't know me. But, and I'm I'm not pitching the profiles because that's not like for product, but if you go to my Like, if we go lived in a world where someone went to my Matcha profile first, they would actually see here are the specific things I want to talk about. I want to help other people with. Like, these are the things I can offer.

Do you want to chat about unstuckng your GTM strategy? Give me a call. Like, it's stuff that I'd actually want to start with. It's very um what I like to call it high-intent conversation.

Which means we're not starting from you It's there's like the power dynamic, right? Like, I literally am giving you the power to engage with me. Um, it's not just you saying, here I am. Um, it's it's it's an interesting nuanced shift, but I do think it's two-part.

We have to be more proactive with what we actually care about because right now, like, my LinkedIn page, I know, if you're trying to prospect me, like, you're not going to come up with my much. Um, but then we also have to actually care to your point. We have to actually care. And you can't fake that shit.

Mhm. Sorry. It's gotta be genuine. Yeah, you got to have some genuineness.

You got to like really understand like, good, you went to my college, or great, you like, you know, whatever, whatever that looks like. That doesn't want that doesn't make me want to have a conversation with you. Um, and I get a lot of people reaching out to me just for like mentorship, conversations and like, I'll go through and I and and I like to do it. I like to do it How how much are you paying them to reach out to you to ask for you to mentor them?

It was me, Adam. I asked, I was like, ah, all right. Now I understand. I I I Dale and I have barely spoken today, so I haven't had a chance to give him as much shit as I do in a normal day.

Well, it's cuz I got in at 2:00 in the morning, so Too bad. You were sleeping when I was getting home. So, um, Melissa, where how can people change their mindset? Because like, when I'm when I'm looking to hire people, like, where do they start with their mindset shifts?

And maybe it's not even that they can do it because within their organization, they're not like given that time, like, because this is a long-tail strategy, right? This isn't something like you pick up and you just start doing. But if you never start, you never get to where you want to be, is kind of like what I think about. So, how can how can sellers, people that want to do this, like, change that mindset instead of like trying to get the quick win.

Like, no easy button. Yeah, I mean, you guys would know better, you know, I'm, you know, 20-year marketer versus a seller. So, I always show up with a marketer idea, and it's a very different world. So, you guys would know best, but I would say one of the things to do would be to even if you're not getting incentivized to do this for your company, even if you've just got your list, and you got to hammer on it, find the time for yourself to start building those connections.

Like, even if you can't do it for work, do it for yourself. Because if you're not job searching now, what you will be doing at some point is looking for that network. So you need to start building your network now. So, let's say one meeting a week you I in actually in September, we're going to do 30 days of tips to better connections.

So, I guess number one is people should just we're going to do a lot of tips. But I would say, find one meet one half an hour a week, like, start small, and think of um, you know, someone you used to work with you haven't talked to in a while. Someone you follow online that you'd really love to you have a point of conversation you want to dig in with them. Um, someone, you know, ask a friend to recommend someone else you should meet.

And then just put on half an hour and go the Adam strategy, which is there's two questions. One, tell me what you're working on, what are you like ask them what they're doing. And then, whatever you're good at, selling, marketing, give them a little value, give them an idea, give them um, a little bit of a peek of what you do. Because then when a job comes up, and they go, oh, you know what?

Dale had some really great perspective on go to market sales strategy when I talked to him a month ago, you're on their mind. So, I would say that you're never going to regret a solid half-hour conversation where you show your value to someone else because you're building a better relationship, you're strengthening your network for when you need it. Like, don't just do it when you're job searching. Um, and then honestly, you can bring those principles into the day job too, right?

Like, you're going to get better at asking and relational selling then maybe you apply to your sales job. So that's my non-salesy idea for But it I I love that. I think when you look at I don't want to call it donating your time, but opening up time to have real authentic conversations. Um, you know, there's there's someone who immediately comes to mind who does this really well.

And Melissa, you you may or may not be shocked at the answer I'm going to give, but Andy, um, our our our our our good friend Andy Moat, Um, it is probably the best at this uh going back to Gated and now Carda. But like I met Andy through a conversation just like this. It was literally like, hey, like we seem to have some like ideas like let let's just shoot the shit for half an hour and just chat. Um, and I can tell you there's been numerous times he's reached out to me, like, we don't work together, but he's reached out to me about things, I've reached out to him about things, and it's an authentic connection that if I need something in that realm of area of his expertise, like, I know that we're gonna have a great great conversation there.

Arguably, and and not to make this the Adam and Dale show, because I very want this to much want this to continue about you and Matcha, but like, Dale, look at how we met. Like, very similar, right? We were introduced. We were both competing for the same job.

Like, we had no business being on a Zoom together. Um, and and here we are, where most people would have been like, I'm not going to talk to you. Like, you're gonna take everything I'm gonna say and go use it to go get this job. It was like, hey, let's let's stay in touch and see what happens.

So, I love that mindset of just have the conversations, be authentic. And the giving of value is actually like, such a great strategy. Uh there's a wonderful book called The Introvert's Edge to Networking. I'm talking with the author um about maybe writing a guest thing.

But he talks about the power of the introvert is asking what are you working on? How can I help you? Like and that doesn't thrive in a huge, loud conference center, right? But it is a superpower on a call when you're trying to build a solid, real network, not an audience, but like a network.

And so hopping on a call and letting people talk. I mean, if it's only 30 minutes, somebody will talk about themselves for 30 minutes every day, and then they feel great about it. Um, but ask them what they're working on, maybe ask a one or two really thoughtful questions, maybe showcase some ideas that you have from your perspective that help them, and bingo, there's already value there. You've you've got some connection, and that value will come back to you.

When you're looking for a partnership, looking for a job, looking to get feedback on a product, looking to potentially sell a product. It'll come back. I mean, Andy's network, because he's just a helper. Andy's network has got Gated off the ground and helps him help other people find jobs.

He's a master of helping other people find jobs. The best. The best at it that I've ever seen. He's That's that's amazing.

Yeah. I have a I have a kind of an interesting question. Since we're talking about go to market, we all kind of are in sales in one way or the other. What do you project the return on investment would be for someone doing this type of work?

Like, is it that you can generate 25% more sales? Like, what's the what's the Yeah, I mean, I will say there it doesn't turn on tomorrow, right? So I think there's a little bit of a leap. You have to and and and it's like any good sales process, if you're doing it wrong, it probably hurts you, right?

Um, if you know, I could go on all all about that. I'm sure you could as well. Um, I will before I I mean before I just throw in like a random revenue impact number, Mac could probably come up with something cuz he thinks more about the sales implications of the personal relationship versus Sure. I'm kind of thinking more about the individual.

But I will say there's also just the like, um, actually Mac has a great metaphor about like the Thelma and Louise driving to the cliff. I I often say and I said this with with Gated, um, email isn't broken, marketers broke email. And I and I might throw sales in that too. Um, Marketers break everything.

Yeah, we do. We break everything. We're like, that's great. Let's do a lot of it.

Um, until people hate it. Uh, so I guess what I'm getting at is what is your other option? If you're doing a bad process and you're just hammering people and you're all outbound or you're all um, you know, volume, volume, volume, sequences, sequences, sequences, you're you're market is even if it starts massive and you have maybe you got another few years of being able to email a whole lot of people. It is going there's going to be a cliff where you literally can't do that anymore.

Right. Now, the thing you can always do more of is relationship-driven selling, right? But you will and in fact, you're probably getting more out of it. You invest more, then they tell people and this is a good company to work with and so and so it's compounding but I would I was raised by an accountant.

So like what's the opportunity cost of like the other side? What are, you know, if you're only doing the outbound, you're you're going to be shrinking your market. So that's a little philosophical, I suppose. And I probably brought in too many metaphors in ones, but um, yeah.

No, cuz I always think when we talk to reps or we talk to people in go-to-market, like, we can ask them to like, here's the best practice, but here's why you want to do the best practice. And I think I think people don't start a lot, one because of fear maybe, um, a little bit, but also because like, they don't truly understand the why and they have to understand the time horizon of the why. Like, the time horizon isn't like a month. The time horizon could be 12 months, could be 18 months.

Like, you don't know what that time horizon looks like. So that uncertainty. I think I think that's a killer. Yeah, I think the killer is the the built-in processes that we're stuck in right now.

I have a good friend who's an absolute gangbuster seller because he understands relationship selling and how to do it. And he basically was pulled in to do something on contract with and he was like, they were like, for six months. He was like, well, your sales cycle's four months minimum. And then they were like, oh, three months.

You know, everybody wants it faster, faster, faster, and as long as the system is built for that, it's hard to be an individual seller who's trying to do it differently. Impossible, I would say. So, I I have one other thing I want to slightly dig into. We're going to go a couple minutes over.

Uh, before we go into rapid fire. Dale Dale's going to kill me. Um, but I know something that you're super passionate about is helping, um, what I'll call solid, extraordinary, amazing, incredible, um, executive women leaders. There's not enough of them, um, in revenue.

Uh, Wednesday women, talk to me a little bit about other than just being a female revenue leader, like, where did the passion come for that? And how can we amplify that even more? Cuz one of the things that I think Dale and I try to do a really good job at is kind of this balanced hiring. Um, when I look at those who have been really great on my team, um, man, like, and I'm going to take shit for saying this cuz it's I just am.

But like, the best revenue leaders I have had probably 95% skew towards the female side, and every single one that I've hired has told me in some way, shape, or form like, thank you for giving me this chance. No one else would have. And like, that pains my heart because that's a disgusting thing to even have to say that like you gave me this chance. Um, cuz you were qualified.

Talk to me a little bit about that. Yeah, I'll shorten the story of how it came about. But, um, uh, a woman, wonderful woman Leslie Greenwood had asked on social media, I need more CEO women in my feed. Yeah.

Leslie's great. She collected a ton of names. She made an amazing spreadsheet. And then she would like, when people said, I need a speaker, she would kind of send them something.

I then at some point, probably a few months later, said, I need more women founders in my feed. And really thinking about like, why is this not happening? Um, we decided after basically a Matcha chat. It was not on Matcha, but that's still it was still a Matcha chat, um, that we were so interested in this, but we were too busy, so we would do one small thing.

So, once a week, we took one of these women and we would like an extraordinary executive, and we would just feature her. And the thinking behind this is women do not need more things to be asked to spend their time on. We don't need another community that we have to spend hours on. We don't have the time in our day.

These women are out there kicking ass, but they're so, so, so busy. Um, what we really need is someone to be the megaphone to point out all these amazing women. Cuz you'll find and we did a really interesting research report with Kickstand on this. The difference in how women think about going and sharing their success, right?

So, saying what I did on LinkedIn is not as natural for women as it is for men. I mean, we have all sorts of things about this. So the women that you do see on LinkedIn, I mean, I will tell you honestly, I hate it. I would be off LinkedIn if I could because I don't like talking about myself or anything.

I am there because I need other women to know that people like me exist. So, there's this uh the visibility is really the problem. It's not that the women aren't doing great things. It's not that there are tons of them in revenue.

It's that they're not talking about it, and they're not as visible. And so what Wednesday Women was created to do is not to be a community you have to belong to, a thing you have to pay money to, a thing to help you be a better executive. No, they've there's plenty of that out there. We are purely created to help everybody see more examples of these women.

I mean, there's nothing more frustrating to me when someone goes, oh, I'm having an event in New York for sales and I don't know any women to speak on the panel. I'm like, are you kidding me? There are so many women. But they just don't know them.

Now, I want people to be able to say that. I don't want people to be embarrassed that they don't and just they don't know who to ask and they don't So we're really trying to be almost honestly a resource for folks to be like, wow, look at all those amazing women. I could have them on my podcast. I could have them on my panels.

I could It's it's there's something broken with the incentives for why and how women toot their own horn. Like, talk about the great things we're doing. And if we can be one small part to shout out for them, I think that's the thing that that can actually help them. Um it's it's not a big help when someone looks at you and says, great.

You're awesome. Now you should be posting on LinkedIn too. You're like, I'm busy. I'm building businesses.

I'm raising a family, whatever you're up to. Like it's one more thing. Women don't need one more thing. They need a champion to be like, that person's awesome.

That's awesome. 100%. 100%. There's there's one other well, yeah.

That'll be episode two. We'll bring I was going to say, we'll we'll bring you back for episode two on that. Yeah. I always say I always say like if you have one bad male boss, you don't judge him because you've had ten other male bosses.

But if you have one bad female boss, every woman boss has like a negative connotation to it. And that's that's where we need to up the examples of awesomeness. Um, just the volume of wow. There's 100 CEOs I could put on my panel.

Not, well, I know that one woman CEO. Like, no, they're out there. You just don't see them. So, gotta figure that out.

Valid point. All right, let's let's go into some rapid fire. Um, here are the rules. 10 words or less.

Um, otherwise, Dale has a gong that comes out through the the the platform and like will will bop himself in the head. Um, 10 words or less. Okay. Early bird or night owl?

Afternoon worm. Ooh, all right. All right. I like it.

I'll play along. Caffeine drink of choice. Where the hell did that one come from? I don't I don't do caffeine.

Actually, decaf matcha latte. We're talking about matcha, so matcha Serendipity. Mhm. You catch me with a cup of matcha, you will catch me cleaning the house.

It matcha is so caffeinated. I'll go all day on the matcha. I I'm decaf. So you went from the behemoth of Google, um, to startup world.

What is one word to describe your startup journey so far? One word? You said ten. Okay, I'll give you ten.

The question is supposed to be one word. In ten words or less, describe your startup journey so far. And I'm particularly interested cuz you come from like the behemoth that is Google. Soul-fillingly chaotic.

Mmm. I like it. And Google was very startup-y when I started there. So that's the justification.

The reason I chose to leave was because it was a behemoth. I can't imagine. I can't imagine. What's the first app you check when you wake up in the morning?

Oh. Probably Slack. Oh. Just to see like any issues with the product.

Honestly, that's my main. I thought it would have been Matcha. Well, we don't actually have an app right now. Ah.

She she she said right now. She didn't say we don't have an app. She said we don't have an app right now. Teaser, teaser.

Uh, Melissa, what's your favorite guilty pleasure snack? Snack? Ooh. Yeah.

Guilty pleasure. Nutella. Nutella. Mmm.

Yum. On anything. Yes. Yeah.

Just right out of the jar. There uh, have you been have you ever been to Turkey? The country? So, we were in Istanbul a couple months ago, and they have what they call their version of Nutella, but it's literally it's like white, and it is pure hazelnuts, and it doesn't have any of the crap that Nutella has in it.

And I'm a huge Nutella fan, Um, it is absolutely incredible. I might have a fresh bottle in my pantry, and if I do, it is headed to Anchorage, Alaska. Oh, well, I can also mind the internet to see where I can get one to go. No, it's much much more fun when when when we send it.

Let's wrap up. Uh, dream vacation destination. Turkey. Um, I gotta pick somewhere I haven't been yet.

I think high on the list that I haven't been yet is um Patagonia. Like, the Torres del Paine. I like it. Very cool.

Very cool. Very cool. Melissa, thank you so much for joining, for geeking out on all things network, on all things women in revenue. Um, we have a whole lot more that we'll need to get into in a second episode.

But for now, people can find you begrudgingly on LinkedIn, but where can they find you on Matcha? How do they find you on Matcha? Matcha.so.

Yes. Don't don't get me started about domains. Matcha.so, and I'm just /moody.

So, there you go. Yeah. And uh that's a fun one too cuz you compare your custom domain with it, so I need to do that. I haven't done that yet.

But I I think I own Melissa M Moody.com. So I need to I like it. Awesome.

Melissa, thank you so much. Yeah, thanks for having me guys.