Earlier this year one of my businesses had a churn problem, and I kept trying to fix it with features. New onboarding. A new pricing page. Then I finally did the thing I'd been dodging for months and called five people who canceled to ask them why. Three of them said almost the same sentence. They liked the product but forgot it existed after the first week. That's it. No feature on my roadmap would have fixed that, and those two hours on the phone taught me more than six months of staring at analytics.

What bugs me is how long I put it off. I think a lot of us hide behind building because talking to people who walked away feels awful. Building feels productive. A call with someone who left feels like reading your own bad review out loud. I'm pretty convinced now that the uncomfortable conversation is usually where the real answer is hiding. So I'm curious. What's the one conversation you avoided way too long in your business, and what happened when you finally had it?

Basically the title 🙃 I am 22, no degree (yet), working in social media marketing/strategy and design. I live in a really small town in the rural Midwest - Reddit loves telling me to move asap when I mention this and it’ll happen, but not in this economy- and so far I’ve found success with my career as far as opportunity.
I have been moving up and doing bigger and bigger projects for local businesses, but have been feeling kind of lost lately with figuring out how to turn my skills that I have into a business people would trust (right now I’m kind of just that girl who will do your social media for you).

So, I took a risk and asked my boss to connect me with a business leader in the area who has done tons of work all over the country in terms of branding, marketing, and strategy. She owns the only marketing agency in town with a full team. What really sticks out to me is that she does not have a college degree. Getting one is in my plans, but I can’t just wait until I have my degree to start building my career, I don’t operate like that 😭 She responded and wanted to set up a meeting for tomorrow but now I am SOOO NERVOUS and panicking over how to handle it. I don’t know what to wear.. I’ve never had a meeting like this with someone before .. I don’t know how to introduce myself to her or how the meeting will go or what questions to ask. I’m the type of person that needs a concrete plan laid out for everything and this is going to be very new for me. My boss basically just told her that I do the (digital) marketing for our small business and I have a really unique skillset.

Just looking for tips on what you would talk about, how you would conduct yourself, what my goal going into this should be, things I should definitely not do, etc etc 😭😭 And good luck!!!!

Hi everyone! My name is Lauren Johnson. I run a design and technology firm that helps founders build the websites, branding, and systems that support their growth.

I’m working on a new website and branding offering made specifically for women founders, and I’d love to learn from this group. What’s been your biggest website or branding frustration, especially in the early stages of your business?

Thank you in advance for sharing your thoughts!

I feel like I am losing my mind!

I have two eCom brands - one is struggling and has been all year and one is doing pretty well but had some slow days which makes me feel like its failing.

I am working with new media buyers, its been about a week - I know they need time to get things rolling but I am making myself crazy!

I feel like I am just sitting around waiting to find out if things work - but me spending time doing random tasks may FEEL like im doing something but really I'm not - or i could be making things worse!

What do you do to feel productive but also BE productive while you are in limbo?

And also, how do you stay positive after months and months of things just going up and down?

I’m building Navparv, a women’s wellbeing brand focused on helping women navigate the changes that happen around perimenopause and menopause.

When I started researching the space, I expected to find women asking mostly about symptoms.

Instead, I kept seeing something else:

“Is this normal?”
“Why is this happening to me?”
“Why did nobody tell me?”

I went through 700+ Reddit posts and comments from women sharing their experiences.

A few patterns kept coming up:

• Women often didn’t realise perimenopause could start while they were still getting their periods.
• Brain fog and exhaustion were some of the most unsettling experiences.
• Sleep problems were often treated as an isolated issue.
• Anxiety, irritability and changes in relationships were rarely connected back to hormonal changes.
• And perhaps most importantly, many women simply didn’t know who to talk to.

That last point has changed how we’re building Navparv.

We initially thought we were building a product.

We realised we’re actually trying to build a place where women can first understand what’s happening to them — without feeling like something is wrong with them.

We’re starting with community, conversations and expert-backed guidance before asking women to buy anything.

I’d love to hear from other women building businesses:

What’s something your customer research completely changed about the business you thought you were going to build?

I am a single mother of two. Having worked in the logistics industry for many years, I've accumulated solid experience and resources in this field. Recently, an idea came to mind: I'm thinking about starting a non-profit organization.

The core mission would be providing logistics consulting and education, with a specific focus on empowering minorities and women in the supply chain workforce. For instance, launching career support programs for single mothers and women—offering skills training for remote-friendly roles like logistics customer service, documentation specialists, and customs brokerage assistants, helping women achieve financial independence.

Since I haven’t set up or run a non-profit organization before, I’d love to gather some thoughts and feedback from everyone: Do you think this is feasible?

I'm launching a U.S.-based skincare brand focused on melanin-rich/deeper skin tones, and I'm trying to learn from founders who have already gone through the early stages.

A few things I'm trying to figure out:

• First 100 customers: What actually worked for you when you were starting?
• UGC: Where do you find affordable, reliable UGC creators?
• Influencers: Have nano/micro-influencers worked for your skincare brand? Where do you find them and what budgets are realistic?
• Product liability insurance: Did you get insurance before your first sale? Who do you recommend for a small skincare business?
• Warehousing/fulfillment: Are there affordable U.S. 3PLs that can store skincare products, pick/pack orders and handle shipping without huge minimums? What companies have you had good experiences with?
• Networking: Where do you actually connect with other skincare founders, especially founders serving melanin-rich skin?

I'd especially love to connect with other small skincare brands/founders who are willing to share what worked, what didn't, and lessons they learned early on.

I'm in my first job out of college at a small startup. Everyone else on the team is American and has at least 10+ years of experience. I'm the youngest person here and culturally different, and I've been finding it hard to cope culturally. A lot of conversations revolve around shared references and humor that I don't have, and I often feel left out or unsure how to jump in.

I'm genuinely good at what I do, and I put in a lot of hours: evenings, weekends, whatever it takes. But I keep ending up in the shadows. People take credit for my work in meetings. Ex: a coworker put a bunch of my work on her slides and presented it with no mention of me. There have also been a few comments that felt racially loaded, which I've been trying to brush off but they stick with me.

The company has a flat structure and no HR, so there's no one to really go to. My manager knows the work that I do, but I am unsure if I should specifically tell him about some colleagues as they might have a better relation.

The part that's hitting me hardest: I used to be bold. I spoke up, I was confident, and I liked sharing ideas. Now I go quiet in meetings, lose my words, and get nervous in a way I never did before. Even casual conversations where I'm supposed to just be chill feel hard. It feels like I've lost a part of myself, and I don't know how to get it back.

For anyone who's been the only person from a different background on a team, or the most junior person in a room full of founders/senior professionals:

• How did you get credit for your work without seeming petty?
• How did you rebuild your confidence speaking up?
• How do you deal with this when there's no HR?
• Is it worth staying and pushing through, or did you eventually move on?

Any advice or similar experiences would really help. Thank you for reading.