Episode 40: Positive Attitude & Opportunity With Tracie Hotchner

On this episode Bella spends time talking with Tracie Hotchner, author of The Dog Bible: Everything your dog wants you to know and The Cat Bible: Everything your cat expects you to know. Tracie Hotchner Tracie is the host of 10 pet talk radio podcast shows on her own Radio Pet Lady network, including her NPR show "Dog Talk (and Kitties, too)". She is also the founder of the NY Dog Film Festival which she travels with around the country after an annual premiere in NYC in November. Bella and Tracie discuss how Tracie's successes came about and the importance of positive attitude and a willingness to step through open doors. You can find out more about Tracie and listen to her shows at RadioPetLady.com. You can find out more at the NY Dog Film Festival, including a list of cities it is coming to, at DogFilmFestival.com. Subscribe To The Show: Transcript: This is episode 40 of Bella in Your Business. Welcome to Bella in Your Business, where Bella will discuss anything and everything about your pet sitting business to help you land on target. So get ready—Bella’s got your chute. Let’s jump. Welcome to Bella in Your Business. This is Bella Vasta, and I am here today with Tracy Hotchner. You guys, I don’t even know where to begin with Tracy. She first came into my life at the PSI conference years ago when it was here in Arizona, where we totally bonded. It was around the same time that she was coming out with one of her first books, The Dog Bible. And then she also had Dog Talk Radio going on then. But now, Tracy, you have to fill in these gaps for me because from then till now, you now have this conglomerate of Pet Lady Radio. You’ve got like twelve different shows on there. You’re not only doing that—because I don’t even know where you get this energy—but you’re also the founder and director for the New York Dog Film Festival. There’s just so much. Bella: Tracy, welcome to the show. Tracy: Thank you, Bella. It’s great to be here and so fun to have stayed in touch with you all these years. You’ve done great things as a businesswoman yourself, and I really admire you for that. The Dog Bible morphed into The Cat Bible, which morphed into the NPR show Dog Talk that now many people listen to on podcasts, but it’s still on the air in the Hamptons live on Saturdays—almost ten years. I had Cat Chat on Sirius XM for seven and a half years on the Martha Stewart Channel. And yes, I did add these other pet talk radio shows just because I could. So it is a little bit of a pet empire, because then I started the Dog Film Festival on a whim three years ago in New York. One of my sponsors said, “You’ve got to take this around America.” So I said, “Oh yeah, sure.” And it went from five cities to ten cities in 2016, and it’s already going to be seventeen cities in 2017. Soon, we’re starting to download the Netflix for dog lovers so that people can download specially curated hour-long versions, and a portion of it goes to a national animal welfare organization. That’s going to be launching soon. You’re the first one to hear about it. Bella: Oh my gosh. We got the exclusive! That’s awesome. Tracy, what I love about you is your can-do attitude, and you just blow past everything. You not only have incredible ideas, but what I find in life is that a lot of times people either have really great ideas but don’t do it, you know? And you’re a doer. And I want everyone and all our listeners to understand and hear about all these stories. Now, you guys, usually I do show notes, but for this show, because Tracy is so dynamic and exactly what you just said—building an empire—I knew we wouldn’t run out of topics to talk about. So let’s take it back to when I first met you, Tracy. You were doing Dog Talk on NPR, and then I didn’t even know you were on the Martha Stewart Channel. Tell me the evolution of everything and what drives you to do this. I’m just going to open up the whole microphone and let you go because this is totally your wheelhouse. Tracy: Well, I don’t want to make it just about me, because I have an unusually high threshold for work and very high energy. Often people throughout my life have said, “My God, I don’t do anything compared to you,” or “I wish I had your energy,” or “How do you bottle that?” But I want to inspire the people that follow you and listen to you, just as I did at the PSI conference, where I had the first and probably only standing ovation of my life—and pissed off the people that ran PSI tremendously. Bella: I love it. You’re going to talk about it—do it! Tracy: They were going to drive me out of town. What I loved about the members of PSI—the pet sitters who came—was they were as passionate about learning for themselves and teaching their clients and customers as I was about doing that for them. They weren’t just showing up at someone’s house, cleaning the litter, walking the dog once around the block, bagging a few bucks, and going. They wanted to do more than that. They wanted to use their hearts and minds. And I think part of what has gotten me so far is just that positive energy. Every time one of your listeners meets somebody new, especially in a related business, they should just put out this positive “can-do” energy and say, “What would you want more from me? How can I do more for you?” Bella: Or if they hear of an opportunity locally, like someone singing guitar in the local coffeehouse, there’s nothing wrong with saying, “You know what, I’m going to go to that coffeehouse and bring cards for my show, but I’m also going to ask the owner if I can give a free dog walk if they’ll let me say hi to everyone and hand out a card.” You just look at every potential opportunity that someone else wouldn’t even see as an opportunity. Tracy: Exactly—but you have to add value. Notice where you are when you’re doing it. The gym’s not the place to do it. The gym’s the place to push Arbonne if you want to. You have to be in the dog park or at a local Halloween dress-up for dogs. That’s the place to find the people that might be interested in what you’re doing and want to help you further your business. In my case, things seem to come to me magically—but of course, that’s not exactly how it happens. I think I’ve had a lot of good luck and timing. But you make your own luck, right? I was being interviewed for five minutes—actually three minutes—live in the Hamptons when The Dog Bible first came out. The station manager of the NPR show was there, and I started talking about how I could do a show like Car Talk and call it Dog Talk. And because of my positive energy, he said, “Okay, we can give that a try.” He gave me an engineer, a studio, and a microphone. Before I even got there, I got an email saying, “How would you like to join Martha Stewart’s universe?” I didn’t even know what that meant. I met someone who said her boss had heard me on that NPR station. I said, “Oh, I could do another show called Cat Chat because I have a book coming out called The Cat Bible.” She said, “No, we want you to be our morning anchor on the Martha Stewart Channel of Sirius.” I said, “You mean not pets?” “No, just that.” I said, “7 to 11, live every morning? I’m sorry, but I’m a country mouse. I don’t want to live in the city again.” So instead, I proposed a pet show. And they didn’t have a Wednesday night show, so they gave me a weekly slot, an engineer, and a live open mic. I had never listened to talk radio in my life, so I just made it what I thought it should be—and the phone rang a lot! People wanted answers. Having researched my books, I was able to give real, genuine answers, just like when I gave the talk at PSI. People are so eager for the truth and something genuine. Bella: I remember that conference because we met in the lobby and you were in tears. You were really affected by it. That’s what sparked our relationship. You provided so much value to my own pet company at the time—you gave me topics that helped me blog, talk to clients, and understand pet health better. But going off what you were saying, I think that many doors open in your life and you’ve become a good walk-thru-er. Tracy: I like that phrase. Yes. Bella: You never let fear stop you. You said you never listened to talk radio, you weren’t applying for it, maybe weren’t even ready for it—but you were connected to your “why.” And that’s what guided your decisions. Tracy: It’s good to know what you won’t do. People say “bottom line,” but they don’t really have one. The real “bottom line” is the line in the sand—what you won’t tolerate. If you know what you won’t put up with or don’t want to do, it’s easy to find what makes you feel good, valued, or challenged. If you know one side of it, you’re free to explore the other. For example, a pet sitter might think, “I only want to deal with pets, not people.” But maybe an opportunity arises that involves people, not pets, and that’s the door to something greater. Don’t close yourself off. Let things happen. Stay open to possibility. Bella: I love that, Tracy. We’re going to take a short break here, but when we come back, I want to hear about the door that opened this film festival and what that’s evolved into. Commercial break – ProPet Hero CPR ad Bella: And we’re back! Tell me about the New York Dog Film Festival—how did it start? Tracy: It’s funny, people say I’m magical, and maybe I am a little bit. I had an idea and made it happen against all logic. My late husband was dying of a rare cancer, and it was an awful time. I had my twelve radio shows, sponsors, bills—everything. To cheer myself up, I thought, “What if I had a dog film festival? Not silly videos—short films.” I looked up how to start a film festival, had no experience, no money, no clue. But I didn’t let that stop me. Bella: And that’s why people follow you—you have this contagious energy. Tracy: Thank you. It’s true, people get caught up in it. To cheer myself up,