Amanda Bucci started out as a fitness enthusiast who documented her lifestyle on the internet. She started gaining traction as an influencer, and as her interests and passions evolve, Amanda discovered other fantastic things that life has to offer. Today, this brilliant young woman has built a solid name for herself as an entrepreneur, content creator, business coach, podcast host, and among other things. Discover how Amanda’s life and career took off, and how she managed to fantastically deal with one transition to another in this eye-opening interview.
LIVING AND ROLE-MODELING A FITNESS-CENTERED LIFESTYLE
COACH JIMMY: Coach Jimmy here with the amazing Amanda Bucci and our stump, and we’re talking about beating the comparison game. You were amazing on stage.
AMANDA: Thank you.
COACH JIMMY: So, we’re here at Angie Lee’s event, It Pays To Be Brave. I think the people that watch my show the most want to know, how did you get here? What’s a bit of your story in a condensed version?
AMANDA: I started on YouTube and Instagram. I was just sharing about fitness. So, I started in the fitness industry. I did competitions. Eight of them, it was a whole journey, and it’s all documented on YouTube. I did daily vlogs for a while.
COACH JIMMY: Like in the prep?
AMANDA: Yeah, the whole prep thing. So, I went from 6,000 subscribers to 100,000 subscribers in six months for my prep series, and it was incredible. But what I was trying to transmit on stage was that when I was in that stage of my life, I was 22 years old. I just moved from Rhode Island to Los Angeles, I didn’t have a whole lot of friends, network, industry, whatever. All I wanted to do was share, and help, and teach, and show people what I was doing. And I was kind of introverted, but social media is really great for people that aren’t very extroverted. They don’t necessarily know how to be out there just yet because you’re literally talking to a camera and you get to not really be with people. But you get to discover yourself in the process. So, I didn’t know how to be anything else but authentic and that’s the one thing that everybody messages me about. “You’re so authentic, I feel like you’re the same in person as you are in your life.”
AMANDA ON AUTHENTICITY
COACH JIMMY: And I feel like it’s one of the biggest compliments when somebody comes up to me and says “Jimmy, it feels like I already know you.” And I’m like “aw, that’s so great.” And so, in sharing that, do you feel like you were authentic because you weren’t trying to copy anybody else? That all I know to be is me?
AMANDA: Honestly, that’s something that I try to teach now. Because when I did it, I had the luck of having a beginner’s mind and complete naivete. I didn’t know anything about other YouTubers; I didn’t know YouTube existed.
COACH JIMMY: So, there were no comparisons?
AMANDA: No comparison. Imagine if comparison was taken completely out of the picture, who would you be?
COACH JIMMY: Yourself.
AMANDA: Yourself. And you wouldn’t be worried about who already took this concept for a YouTube video, who already talked about this on their podcast, or who just made this post, or who’s doing it better than you. I had no concept of other entrepreneurs. I was being me over here. And that’s what I was trying to transmit on stage. How can you really tap into yourself and diminish all of the noise? And really, doing that is uncovering things people say that they love about you, what color nails do you like to put on or what is your favorite kind of coffee in the morning? All these little things that people will forcibly associate with you. Like for me when I prep every single morning, I had a waffle that I made with an egg and protein powder because I was trying to reduce all the calories and everything. I called it the one carb waffle and I can’t even tell you how many people tagged me in something like that. So, it created user-generated content.
COACH JIMMY: You were branding beautifully without even recognizing it.
AMANDA: No, all by accident.
COACH JIMMY: That’s the best when it’s by accident. But I also think because we live in this YouTube world, is that we can live in listening to a thousand podcasts, watching all the videos, and not taking action. Or feel we have to take action like somebody else. So, what do you tell those people now it’s easy to watch everybody? Do you tell them to stop watching everything and do your own thing? Or what would be a piece of advice?
AMANDA: To an extent, I think that everybody needs to go through that consumption phase. But I try to tell people to be careful with how they’re consuming and how much they’re consuming. There’s a lot of phases of your learning, and you’re just so excited, and it makes you feel good. But when you’re trying to create your own thing, too much consumption doesn’t make you feel good about it. It just makes you continuously compare how what you’re creating is sizing up to someone else’s creation. I do recommend to choose very specifically who you’re following, who’s posts you’re reading, who’s stories you’re watching, who’s podcasts you’re consuming. You’ll notice yourself start to do it less and less and less. And the more that you do that, the more that you can tap into what’s really true for you and how you’re actually being without the noise of what everyone else is doing.
COACH JIMMY: I think it’s one of the reasons I appreciate female entrepreneurs like yourself. And I enjoy the content so much of listening to Angie or somebody because I can be inspired, but I know just being a dude, I am going to execute differently. And of course, there are different guys. Everybody watches Gary Boehner Chucker. What’s Grant Cardone doing. Those dudes got to be them, you know. For me, it was giving myself permission to like “hey Jimmy you’re a performer.” There can be this entertainment element, or there can be this song and dance part to that. So, I love the fact that you were just naïve. So, one more question is you started in fitness. Was the shift scary? And what made you decide to make the move? Especially if “I’m really successful right here, what happens if I do this other thing and people don’t follow me?”
MAKING THE SHIFT: SCARY BUT WORTH IT
AMANDA: Yeah, the shift was terrible. It was also the best thing I’ve ever done. What was happening was that as you grow and as you’re in this kind of thing, personal development is a necessity. You can’t not choose to do it because you have to grow more into a leader and you have to grow more into yourself. As I was learning and growing more, I was just stepping more into more of myself. You don’t become someone new, you just become more of you. You become the next version. And because of that, it felt way more painful for me to keep doing what I was doing, even though that was me. I still love fitness, but the version of me that was obsessed with fitness, that was just so excited about it, that wasn’t my excitement anymore. And I had to teach what was my highest excitement. My favorite thing is learning, and mastering, and teaching. Learning, mastering, teaching, that’s the flow.
COACH JIMMY: And that’s gonna continue to shift from what it is. So, it was fitness one time, and then maybe it’s branding, and then we continue to evolve. Every time you shift you also have the opportunity to serve new people. You may leave some people behind and that’s okay, because maybe they got from you what they needed.
AMANDA: Totally. And there’s always gonna be new people coming into your market. There’s always a new fitness person that’s coming in — a new trainer, a new coach, that has their own gifts to share. And I can create a space for them. And then me coming into a different market. I can create a space for me to be in that. And it’s not something to apologize for or be upset about. I had so many people that were so upset that with my 450 videos on my YouTube channel documenting my workouts, my nutrition, and my meal prepping and my life, and now I’m not doing any of that.
COACH JIMMY: They were upset that you moved.
AMANDA: Yeah, it’s almost like I turned off their favorite TV show. It’s just a new TV show and a new opportunity for them to grow. And it can be triggering for people if someone is pivoting.
COACH JIMMY: And that’s why there are reruns, syndication.
GETTING OUT OF THE BOX
AMANDA: Totally, exactly. People still go rewatch it. They’re like “I still re-watch your workout videos.” I’m like “cool, that’s awesome.” But I want people to understand who are watching this to not be boxed in by what they’ve already created for themselves. Because as humans we need to evolve and grow, and if we don’t do that, we stay stagnant. And you need to keep feeling into what’s good, and if what feels good is pivoting, that’s fine. There is something to be said about keeping to focus to focus.
COACH JIMMY: And if you’re not excited about it anymore, people smell that. They just know, “oh she’s just phoning this.” I feel like I’m getting my own little private coaching session because I feel like I’m in that part of my career right now. Because I was a fitness coach, working into high performance coach and storytelling coach. It’s like “oh this is what excites me.” And sometimes you want to say, “oh I’m sorry guys. I know you followed because of this, but the people that need to come along are gonna come along as well.”
AMANDA: And they do, and that’s great. You feel great about the people that you’re serving and new opportunities come in line. Otherwise you and I wouldn’t be here speaking today in front of all these people that were impacted by us. The right things just tend to happen and it all just works cohesively that way.
COACH JIMMY: And we’re friends now because of it.
AMANDA: And we’re friends now, yeah. And we had a stump conversation to share with you.
COACH JIMMY: If you’ve really liked this stump conversation like the video and subscribe.
AMANDA: And you guys can follow me if you want to learn more. You can follow me on Instagram @amandabucci. I have a YouTube channel, but I don’t post on it. But if you guys want more of my business stuff, I do have a podcast. Business, mindset, personal development, Bucci Radio. So you guys can follow me there.