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Button TextEver had a weird product idea and thought, “Now THAT would be a great invention?”
You could be sitting on the next mass-market phenomenon.
Seriously.
Today on MarieTV, multi-million dollar toy inventor Azhelle Wade will show you how to turn your creative ideas into real products — that sell like hotcakes.
Azhelle spent ten years climbing the ladder in the toy industry working for companies like Toys R Us, Party City, Madame Alexander, and more. She’s a three-time patented award-winning designer who’s led multi-million dollar toy lines as the VP of brand and product development.
When it comes to inventing and marketing new best-selling toys, Azhelle has literally done it all. Now, as The Toy Coach and founder of the Toy Creators Academy, she helps aspiring entrepreneurs and inventors make it to the big time.
Today she’s sharing her insider secrets — like the fact that big companies are actively searching for new faces and fresh ideas all the time.
What does that mean for you?
It’s time to take your weird (potentially genius) product idea off the creative shelf and into the real world… where people can BUY IT.
Watch now and learn:
- How to find your multipassionate sweet spot.
- 2 habits that’ll set you up for success as an entrepreneur.
- The biggest mistake people make when pitching new products.
- What to do if your idea gets rejected.
- The pricing secret you must get right if you want to sell physical products.
- A 4-word mantra to unleash your creative drive.
- How to get the right customers to find YOU.
If you've ever been curious what it takes to bring a fun new idea to life, this conversation is a must-watch.
listen to this episode on the marie forleo podcast
Subscribe to The Marie Forleo Podcast
View Transcript
In this episode of MarieTV, we do have some adult language. So if you do have little ones around, grab your headphones now.
Azhelle Wade: Those pieces of you is what makes you relatable. It’s what makes you an expert, because it’s not about being an expert in everything. It’s about being an expert in the specific life that you chose to lead.
Marie Forleo: Hey, it’s Marie Forleo and welcome to another episode of MarieTV, and The Marie Forleo Podcast. Now, if you’ve ever been curious what it takes to bring a really cool, fun idea to life, like for example, inventing your own toy or being a part of the toy industry, you are going to love my guest today. Azhelle Wade spent a decade climbing the ladder in the toy industry, from being a three-time patented award-winning designer, to the VP of brand and product development, where she built a creative team leading multi-million dollar toy lines.
She’s worked for companies like Toys “R” Us, Party City, Madame Alexander, and more. As the toy coach, she helps entrepreneurs and toy inventors make it big in the toy industry. Azhelle, thank you so much for making time today, and welcome to MarieTV.
Azhelle Wade: Thank you so much for having me, Marie. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Marie Forleo: So I want to hear about the path that brought you to the toy industry. Did you always know that this was the career you wanted to get into?
Azhelle Wade: Right. So I always knew I wanted to work with kids. That was always my, that’s where my baseline was at. So I told my grandmother, I was like, “I’m going to be a teacher.” Then I moved on to wanting to be a child psychologist. Then I saw the movie of, what was it, The Sixth Sense?
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: And I goto totally freaked out. And I thought, “Oh, if I do anything wrong, I’m going to get shot.” So that’s where my mind went. And then little by little, I started getting into the art world. And I met somebody who was actually doing exhibition design. So I just followed in her footsteps. And I ended up at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where I did study exhibition design and focused on children’s exhibitions, which one of my teachers said, “Hey, there’s a toy design program here, I think you should go for it.” And I did.
Marie Forleo: How cool. And so, did you, so, okay, you’re in the toy design program. When you were studying that, were you like, “This is my path in life.” Did you have that feeling in your heart? No.
Azhelle Wade: No. In my first podcast episode, I literally said there was a time when I started in toy design, I looked at my friend and I said, “Why did you let me go into this industry? I am not, I am not made for this.” It was so hard to come up with ideas. Oh my gosh. Like the idea phase is so hard. So I thought I wasn’t cut out for it. I had no idea why I did it to myself. I was going to go for a master’s in exhibition design, just as an exit plan.
Marie Forleo: Yep.
Azhelle Wade: And eventually I learned how to think, and how to come up with ideas, and how to see the world differently so that I could be creative, but also mass. Because in the toy industry, it’s all about selling to mass market predominantly. And then there’s the hobby sector where you can sell the hobby products. But yeah, not at first. No.
Marie Forleo: That’s so fascinating. And I’m so happy that you brought that up because I feel like there are many times in our lives where we may want to start something new, or get into a new field, and we can have that narrative that says, ‘Well, I’m not that creative,” or “I can’t come up with ideas this fast.” And I think what you’re sharing is so inspiring, because it was like you were in that position, you stuck with it. And you’re like, “Oh, I can learn how to do this. Oh, I can unlock my creativity and see how to apply it in all of these new directions.”
Azhelle Wade: Yeah. That is the name of my very first episode, “Unlocking Your Creativity.” It’s so true. I was always a creative, but unlocking that toy creativity is a whole other experience. Yeah.
Marie Forleo: I love this. So what inspired you then to make the leap? Because you had this incredible career within the industry of being a toy designer, and then the VP of brand and product development, and then that’s another leap to then entrepreneurship. Tell us about that.
Azhelle Wade: So I never wanted to be an entrepreneur. I grew up watching my mom come home at 12 o’clock in the morning, 2 o’clock in the morning, working her butt off as an entrepreneur in her own right. So I said, “Nope, not for me. I will always stay in corporate.” And then the pandemic hit, and I started reassessing life. And I said, “You know what? I can’t even believe how much time I don’t spend at home.” And now having this time at home with my partner and imagining our future, I just, you know, I started to see this future where I would never see him. I would never see my potential children in the future. And I just didn’t like that. What’s the point? So I just said, “You know what, maybe now is the time. Maybe I’ll take the leap.” And I did it.
Marie Forleo: So before COVID hit, did you have rumblings inside? Were there little seeds of going like, “Wow, there’s all these aspiring toy people, all these aspiring inventors, all these aspiring toy entrepreneurs, and I have all this knowledge in my head and my heart that I could pass on to them.” Or was it really like COVID hit and boom. It was another creative breakthrough of like, “Oh, I’m going to make the leap.”
Azhelle Wade: Okay. So that’s a good point. Let me bridge that because there was, I was very entrepreneurial outside of my full-time job. But I have, I have a costume company on the side. It’s a whole thing. So I would do that on the side of my job, because I legally couldn’t do toys, right?
Marie Forleo: Yep.
Azhelle Wade: So I would do, I was entrepreneurial in that way.
Marie Forleo: Yeah.
Azhelle Wade: So then, you know, Amy Porterfield?
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: She was always in my ear. I was always listening to her podcast and I was trying to apply what she was teaching to my costume company. And it didn’t really fit. Right? I could use some things, but it didn’t really fit because that was a physical business. And then one day I went to a toy industry event, and I met this woman who had a game. And she was so passionate about this game and I really wanted to help her. I wanted to pitch her to my boss and share her product. And maybe we could license it, maybe big things could happen for her. But she just didn’t know what I needed to know in order to pitch to him.
She didn’t have the tools. She didn’t know what to say. She couldn’t communicate it, but I could see it. Like, you know, you can just sense it?
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: I could, I could see it. So one day I was just driving, listening to the same podcast and all of a sudden it just hit me and I was like, “Wait a second. Why am I trying to reinvent the wheel and teach myself something I know very little about,” being fashion design, doing my costume company, “Instead of trying to do something with all of this knowledge I have for 10 years of being in the toy industry?” And it was just kind of the timing. I think the pandemic, those feelings coming up, realizing I didn’t need as much as I thought I did, to just get by, day by day. Where I got to the point where I’m like, “I can do this.” I took my savings and I was like, “I can do this. Let me do it.”
Marie Forleo: I’m so happy. Thank you for sharing all of that detail because there’s a few things I just want to underscore for our audience. One, the value of continuing to feed yourself, inspiring, educational information, just like what we’re doing right here, where you hear different people’s stories, you’re focused on entrepreneurship. And even if you don’t expect to be an entrepreneur, there’s going to come a time, perhaps, when you’re like, “Whoa, I have something that I can give to the world and I want to do it in a new way.” So that’s number one.
Number two, I loved that you just said, and again, I’m going to highlight this, is that you took a look at the numbers and you said to yourself, “Oh, I don’t necessarily need to spend X amount of dollars every month. I can actually do something, not put myself in a position where it’s scary.” But really go, “Wow, I can take a leap towards my big dream.” So that’s another thing I just want to acknowledge, respect, and appreciate you for. And thank you for sharing that.
Azhelle Wade: Thank you.
Marie Forleo: So on your podcast, you’ve talked about this idea called “the puzzle of you.” And because we have so many multipassionate entrepreneurs like myself in this audience, tell us about that concept and how maybe it can help our listeners find their own path.
Azhelle Wade: You are such a good example of this. I mean, I follow you as well, obviously. And watching your webinars and your lead in to B-School, and seeing you on social and stuff, you integrate your personality so well into your business. Right?
Marie Forleo: Thank you.
Azhelle Wade: Yeah. So well. And those pieces of you is what makes you relatable. It’s what makes you an expert, because it’s not about being an expert in everything. It’s about being an expert in the specific life that you chose to lead. Right? And what I talked about in that podcast episode was just teaching my students like, “Hey, you don’t have to know exactly what your, what your goal is, what your end goal is, how you’re going to, you know, wrap all this toy industry knowledge you’re getting from this podcast up into a pretty bow of a toy business.” But what you do have to know is what you love.
You have to know what you’re skilled at. You have to know who you’re connected to, and you have to want to put all that stuff together into something. So the best example of this, I think for me, is my podcast. For the longest time, I actually wanted to be a voice actor. I was like, “That would be a great side gig. How cool would that be?” And then I had all this toy knowledge. And literally one day I realized, oh, my voice can combine with this toy knowledge, these pieces of me, and turn into something that people resonate with because they enjoy listening to me, and I’m giving them valuable information. And that is what you do with those pieces of you. You just have to figure out how they fit together.
Marie Forleo: That’s right. It is like a puzzle. And I often love to talk about that part of my journey when I was in my mid 20s, and I’m like, “Okay, I love this coaching thing. I love marketing. I love hip hop and dance, and spirituality.” I felt like I was all over the place and I was. But that was what needed to happen at that particular stage. And people will be like, “Oh, did you have the vision for MarieTV?” I’m like, “Hell no.” I did not have any vision, right, what so ever. I was like, I couldn’t see five feet in front of me.
But what I did do, again, echoing exactly what you’re talking about, was I’m identifying these different pieces that currently feel so disparate. They currently feel so disconnected. But if you continue to lean into those passions, or those interests, or those talents, and give yourself just a little bit of permission to explore them without an attachment to a particular outcome, I find for most of us convergence happens, just like your podcast happened. And you’re like, “Whoa, voice actor.” It’s just awesome.
So again, thank you for sharing that. I want to move on to the mantra that your mom gave you. Because you know, my mama gave me a mantra. And I love the mantra that your mama gave you. Can you tell us what that mantra is and any story that comes to mind, or your heart, about how it’s supported you in this journey?
Azhelle Wade: Yeah, my mother’s mantra is, “Azhelle, never say you can’t.” And I have a very distinct memory of the first time I remember hearing it actually. And I remember what I was wearing, which is the weirdest thing. I was wearing this plaid tartan skirt that was blue and lime green. It was so bizarre and very 90s, with a black, like a black turtleneck top. And I remember coming up to her, I don’t even know what I was doing, and I just said, “Mom, I can’t do it.” And she just looked at me from her computer so seriously and calmly. And she was just, “Azhelle, never say you can’t.”
And for some reason that sat with me so hard, and I went and I did that thing, and I went and did many more things from that. So I hear her and I made a TikTok about it. It’s hilarious. She loved it for Mother’s Day. Just doing that whole, never say you can’t, because she literally would say it to me every time. So when people ask me, “Azhelle, how do you get so much done?” And it’s because I literally believe I can do it. So there is no, nothing worrying me about, “What if I do it wrong?” I assume I’ll do it wrong. But I can do it.
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: So.
Marie Forleo: That’s the same, that is the power of our beliefs, and how they really do drive, not only how we perceive ourselves in the world, but how we then live into and form into reality. That’s, when people ask me about anything and they’re like, “But you didn’t know how to…” You know, anything around the book or I did my crazy book launch concert. I was like, “I don’t know…”
Azhelle Wade: I know that’s…
Marie Forleo: Yeah. It’s like everything is figureoutable. I’m not just saying this shit. I believe it. I literally live it and…
Azhelle Wade: I have your book. And I love it.
Marie Forleo: Thank you.
Azhelle Wade: And I bought it because of that reason. It’s the same mantra.
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: I love it. Yeah.
Marie Forleo: Yeah. And it, so, it’s like, people may think these things are like, “Woo, woo.” Or it’s just affirmations or like positive pop psychology that is just fluff. But it’s like, “No, this is real.” The most important conversations in the world are the conversations that you have with yourself. And if they are encouraging and, again, it’s not all going to go right. So much stuff that I’m trying to figure out, it goes wrong. It gets messy. It gets real messy. The ugly cries, the frustration, all that’s great. But eventually I’m going to figure it out.
Azhelle Wade: And that’s how you become a trailblazer. With your concert, who’d done that before? You know? That…
Marie Forleo: I’m telling you, Azhelle, can I just tell you, I was thinking, because I’m like, “Okay, we’re kind of coming out of this pandemic thing. Right? We got this light at the end of the tunnel, really excited about it.” And I was thinking to myself, “When can I do something like that again?” Because, and I’m sure you have this experience too, when your mom gave you that incredible mantra, “Never say you can’t,” it kind of awakens a superpower within you where you’re like, “Oh!” Right? You get hungry then…
Azhelle Wade: So true. Yes.
Marie Forleo: …to take an adventure. Or if someone tells you and you’ve probably experienced this, right, so many times in your business and so many times in the toy industry, or you see it in other people, where somebody’s telling them they can’t and you’re like, “Don’t listen. Don’t listen. You can.” And then you get excited to take on those challenges.
Azhelle Wade: Yes. Right before our call, I had jumped into my Facebook group, because my students just got off pitch meetings with toy companies. And we got a lot of maybes, but we did get some nos. And I went in to tell them, “Guys, I know you’re discouraged by these nos.” And I brought a little toy from my side of my thing, this little random turtle I got from Puerto Rico. And I was like, “If you pitch this turtle to someone and they say, ‘I really don’t like that his head moves.’ You can’t go into the next pitch meeting thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, his head moves. I should not show this to anyone.’ You have to go into that meeting thinking, ‘I made his head move for a reason.’”
Marie Forleo: Yeah.
Azhelle Wade: And instead of defending with your why, lead with your why. And I just talked to them about that. So I love that you brought that up. Yeah.
Marie Forleo: So I want to talk about some mistakes because I suspect we may have some aspiring toy entrepreneurs or toy makers or toy inventors in the audience. And plus too, entrepreneurship, mistakes are mistakes are mistakes. But we can totally get granular and talk about the toy industry here for a second. I read in something you wrote that there’s one particular mistake about not considering the price before you put in a ton. And I feel like this is one of those universal things. Again, I have made this mistake before. I think we’ve all made this mistake before. So this is not about shaming anybody. But it, but we want to highlight it so you can learn from our pain and not do it. Can you explain this from your industry standpoint? What happens?
Azhelle Wade: Oh, this is so challenged because I come from the physical product industry, where this is, this is like gold, my gold. This is my gold standard. Moving into the coaching industry, you know, everybody’s so opposite. They’re like, “Charge what you’re worth.” And all this. And it’s true. You want to be paid for what you’re worth. But when you’re developing physical product, people have preset ideas of how much something should cost. You know? They have preset values in their head and it’s usually based around how a product makes them feel, or how it will make their family members feel, or the prestige. When you get into prestige, when you get into Louis Vuitton, then you get into, get into prestige. Right? That’s a whole different category.
But you have to look at the majority of your market and what is the majority of your market doing? And I hate it. It breaks my heart when I see inventors develop and invest their life savings in something that is not manufacturable for a reasonable price. So I’ve really pushed my students, and all you have to do is go out and look at product, existing product that is similar to what your idea is. And don’t get your ego involved and get all like, “There’s nothing like what I have.” There is something.
And if there is really nothing like it, you find the two things that are similar, that if they came together would be like your idea. And you look at the price of those two things. And you assume that these prices are the sustainable prices. So you have to be able to cost reduce your item so that it’s a quarter of that price is what your factory price will be. So I just encourage my students, look at your item, look at competitor items. If you have, let’s say a game that you’re making, and it has five plastic pieces. And most games of that price point have two, you’ve gone too far. You’ve got to rework your game play. You’ve got to rework your product to drop that price point or no one will accept it.
I have one example. I literally just pitched an item today with a student. And the first thing they said was, “Oh, we love this plastic feature that you guys incorporated, but it’s too expensive.” And I said, “I know, but I have a solution.” So the solution was just to use a vac tray. It’s a part of packaging that’s really affordable. You can have them made in mass for 10 cents a piece. And as soon as we had that answer, they became more interested. They wanted to see more. So it’s, you just have to prepare and think cost-wise.
Marie Forleo: Yeah. And I’ll apply this in a different realm, because sometimes through B-School when I’ve worked with people and I’m trying, and I get so fired up. Right? I love helping, especially women, get really wealthy and however they define that for themselves. And so when we’re looking at their business plans or we’re talking, and we’re coaching, and working through things, and I’m like, “Okay, so you’ve got this clear financial goals, but then you’re pricing product down here. But then you want to spend like, you know, $25,000 on development.” I’m like, “These numbers aren’t adding up.” And so, I just, it’s such an important thing for anyone out there who is entrepreneurial. It’s like getting these numbers right from the onset, before you’re putting in all of this creative work, before you’re investing, right, a ton of money into a prototype, or a ton of money into technology, or even a ton of your thought capital into like, “This is where I’m going, and this is how it’s got to turn out,” when your numbers don’t actually make sense.
So thank you for, thank you for sharing that. I loved this other thing too, that you said, especially in the world we’re in right now where everyone doesn’t necessarily have to go into a boardroom or a physical location to pitch, that there are certain pitching mistakes that you’ve noticed aspiring toy entrepreneurs are making in this new digital format. And I love you shared that it’s never been easier to get in front of toy buyers, but you gotta do it right. So can we talk about the power of a killer sizzle video and not using virtual backdrops?
Azhelle Wade: Oh my gosh. Do you, do you not like them as well? Am I?
Marie Forleo: I mean, people, they’re like, “Oh, Marie you’re such a nice visual.” I’m like, “Dude, this like, my house. This is real. This is a real thing.” I don’t, you know, I personally don’t care, but I thought it was just so absolutely…
Azhelle Wade: Yeah.
Marie Forleo: …valuable for you as The Toy Coach to go like, “Hey look, here’s what’s wrong. And here’s what you gotta switch up.” So the sizzle reel, I feel like…
Azhelle Wade: Okay.
Marie Forleo: …I see that people get this wrong in every industry, but tell us about it.
Azhelle Wade: So a sizzle video in the toy industry is usually a 30 to 60 second video that explains your product concept. It shows, you know, what it is, why kids will love it, and why a buyer should buy it. Right? So it usually shows some of the marketing features. The biggest mistake that people make with the sizzle video is they wait until halfway through the video to actually show you all the good stuff about the product, because they’re thinking they’re doing a buildup. They’ll do an intro of themselves as an inventor. They’ll have a logo and a jingle for a minute. And that is, that is not what you want to do, because I know having been a toy industry executive, you are so busy.
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: You want to look at these ideas, but you have zero time. In the time that you hit the download button for that video, you could be called into a meeting. So we don’t have time. I tell people, keep everything good before the 45 second mark, but honestly, in 30 seconds in, if you haven’t said something to catch their attention, like, “This rocket shoots 150 feet in the air,” you’re at a loss.
Marie Forleo: Yeah.
Azhelle Wade: So. So…
Marie Forleo: Sorry, I didn’t mean to you off, but I, again, this is something that I’ve seen. And I even noticed it too. I remember some of my earliest videos, I’m like, “Oh God, Marie, the intro. Your intro’s so long.” And now I’m just like, “Get to the point. Get to the point. Let’s get to the point.” Right? It’s like…
Azhelle Wade: I love your intros by the way. I was watching one…
Marie Forleo: Thank you.
Azhelle Wade: …the other day and you wrote, “Oh, headphones, this episode contains explicit content.” I was like, “Oh, that’s so nice. I should have that.” I was like, “That’s so well done.”
Marie Forleo: Thank you. But like, early days, again, because I have all my stuff up, I always tell people, they’re like, “Oh it’s…” I’m like, “Y’all got to go and look back at like 2011, go look at…”
Azhelle Wade: Oh, my gosh.
Marie Forleo: …and look at the stuff from my webcam when I just had a puppy and I don’t know what the hells going on. I’m like, “All right, I’m going to do a Q&A Tuesday.” There’s nothing. But point is, thank you for sharing that, because I get video pitches a lot for different things, even people for jobs. And it’s like teaching anyone, all of us, all of us need this reminder. I need this reminder too.
Azhelle Wade: Yeah.
Marie Forleo: It’s like getting to the point. I was, it was the other day. I have an herb garden. It’s a very small herb garden, but I was short on time, and I needed to trim my parsley. And I’m one of those humans who, I’m like, “I just want to do it right.” And I’m going on YouTube. Right? And this one guy, it’s just, it’s a whole intro. It was like he went on Fiverr and he got this whole logo that spins. And I’m like, “Nope, can’t even deal with it.”
Azhelle Wade: Nope.
Marie Forleo: Somebody else, “I’m going to teach you how to, how to, you know, harvest your parsley, right now.” And it was like boom. And I’m like, “Done.”
Azhelle Wade: Yes.
Marie Forleo: Yes. Just another angle.
Azhelle Wade: We can learn from TikTok, right?
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: We can learn from TikTok. It’s, yeah, 100%. Yeah, no, I agree. That is the most important thing. And other than that, the file size of your video, I’m sure you experienced that when they send these massive files, and you don’t even want to download it. Put it in a Google Drive link so that I can just view it. Make sure it’s link-shareable to all, keep it simple. Am I right?
Marie Forleo: Yeah. No, it’s just thinking through the details and you’re helping people so much with that. Okay. So this may be our last question…
Azhelle Wade: Okay.
Marie Forleo: …but I want to hear more about your vision. I think you have such incredible passion. I’m so excited for you because one of the other things that I read that really, it’s so warmed my heart that you were saying, “Hey, this audience that I am serving, this audience that I am cultivating,” and correct me if I’m wrong here, if I didn’t get this right, but it was like, “This is not, these folks are like harder to reach. They’re harder to find.” And, but you have such a heart connection to them and you want to help them be successful. So I want to hear more. So it sounds like I got that right.
Azhelle Wade: Oh my gosh. Yes.
Marie Forleo: Tell me more about your vision, where it is right now. And what’s really getting you excited as you’re coaching these new toy entrepreneurs, and where you kind of want to see this go. Whether six months, 12 months, whatever feels true to your heart.
Azhelle Wade: Oh, so much, I’m excited about so much. What I’m realizing in these pitch events is the toy companies are really appreciating that I’m bringing new people to them in the industry to pitch product. Finding those people is now my secret sauce. And I will tell no one. But it is so, so challenging. And I’m sure I’m going to have to keep tweaking how I’m finding them throughout the life of my business. It’s not easy. They’re all so different. Like I had a clown in my class. I had a cake entrepreneur. I have people working as doctors, psychiatrist. I have industrial designers, people working in animation. They are all over the map. You can’t put in one specific Facebook anything, into Facebook ads and find these people. It is all over the map.
But I think when I get specific about my messaging, I’m going to help you do children’s product toys, games. It’s a little bit easier to get the right people to find me.
Marie Forleo: Yeah.
Azhelle Wade: And I’ve been doing that a lot. And that’s why I love being on platforms like this, because it’s just kind of a megaphone out there. Like, “Where are you?”
Marie Forleo: Yes.
Azhelle Wade: You know, I am here and I’m using my connections and taking a step back from being a toy creator myself, to nurture, and educate, and help other people create better products. And I call them my mission-driven toy creators. That’s who I help.
Marie Forleo: I love it. And so speaking of that, are you most active on TikTok or Insta, or tell everyone where they can find you. Because I know that there are people in our audience, whether it’s them, or it’s their sister, or their husband, or their cousin, or somebody that they know who they’ve had this conversation with, like “Oh, I have this idea for a toy.” But they just don’t know how to get started. So where’s the best places for people to find you?
Azhelle Wade: Yeah. I’m on Instagram the most, @thetoycoach. I’m trying for TikTok, but not there yet. So Instagram is where I’m at right now. I’d love to connect with you.
Marie Forleo: Awesome. Azhelle, you are just such a gift. I’m so excited. I’m so happy that you listened to that call in your heart, and you took advantage of this massively changing world to say, “You know what? Now is the time for me to go out and leap on my own.” And I’m just excited for how you’re helping people bring these incredible dreams that they have to life, because it’s so unusual. I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone who’s been a toy designer before, and I’ve certainly never met a toy coach. And I’m just really honored to know you.
Azhelle Wade: Oh, thank you. It is amazing. All of my students have real desires to teach, and educate, and better the lives of children, which, I, you know, that’s just the best job ever. I’m so happy to be a part of it.
Marie Forleo: Well, I can’t wait to continue to watch you soar. Thank you for making the time for us today.
Azhelle Wade: Thank you for having me, Marie. It was great to get to know you.
Marie Forleo: Wasn’t that a good time? Now I want to hear from you. So what’s the biggest insight that you’re taking away from this conversation, and most important, how can you put it into action starting right now? As always, the best conversations happen over at the land of MarieForleo.com. So head on over there and leave a comment now. While you’re there, if you’re not yet already, you need to subscribe to our email list and become an MF Insider. Every single week I send amazing emails, on Tuesdays, that will keep you inspired and motivated and feeling great. And I don’t want you to miss out.
Now until next time, stay on your game and keep going for your big dreams, because the world really does need that very special gift that only you have. Thank you so much for tuning in and I’ll catch you next time.
Hey. Are you ready to bring your dream business to life? Is it finally time to make the difference you were born to make? Good. Because we can help. Get started now at JoinBSchool.com.
DIVE DEEPER: Too many product ideas? Follow these 5 steps to figure out what business to start. Then learn how to make time for creativity with Morgan Harper Nichols.
Now Azhelle and I would love to hear from you.
Do you have a favorite moment or insight from today’s MarieTV? Leave a comment below and let us know.
Whether you’re a business owner, aspiring entrepreneur, work a day job, or are between gigs — your creative ideas deserve to be born. You already have what it takes to bring them to life.
As Azhelle would say, “Never say you can’t.” Every product you see, use, and enjoy every day started out as someone’s great idea.
Everything really is figureoutable.
XO