The Visibility Impact Show: Marketing & Growth for Women Entrepreneurs

Why Visibility in a Niche Industry Changes Everything with Maryella Begley-Garmon

• Crissy Conner • Season 15 • Episode 582

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Maryella Begley-Garmon, an engineer and co-founder of Digital Stormwater, shares how she went from an unexpected layoff to leading a thriving niche marketing firm. We dive into stormwater marketing, the power of niching, AI in engineering industries, and how personal faith fuels business growth. This episode is packed with insights on visibility, leadership, and building a purpose-driven brand in even the most unique industries. 


Connect with Maryella:

DS Website: https://digitalstormwater.com/

AI Stormwater Website: https://aistormwater.com/

LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/maryella-begley-garmon-p-e-16772157/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/elle.begley

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/maryellabegley/

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Don't forget to share this episode and tag me @itscrissyconner on Instagram and @crissyconner on Facebook to be entered to win!

Welcome back to the visibility impact show. I'm super excited because today is we have a guest who is not a stranger to this show. I mean, she's probably been on here at least three times, maybe up to five times. She's been in my world for quite a while. And so I would like to reintroduce if you're new to the show, Mary Ella, Begley Garman and she is an amazing human being and I'm gonna let her just introduce herself. So Mariela, we are so excited to have you back to the show. Well, thank you, Chrissy. So hi, everyone. I am Mariela Begley-Garmon. I am a licensed professional engineer who owns a marketing firm and in a very specific niche, Stormwater. So Chrissy and I've had some lovely discussions about Stormwater and her getting to learn what that's all about. So I have 25 years experience. before we started the marketing firm or before I went full-time in the marketing firm doing drainage and stormwater design work and project management. And now I do this full-time, which is awesome. Piggybacking off of that, how many years has it been? Two, three? So actually yesterday was two years full time in the company. Okay. I want to start off talking about this a second because you had a full-time job. You did not expect to get laid off. None of that was expected. It was all a shock to you. And looking back, like, what has that been like? Because I know it went from shock to let's grow this freaking big company with my husband. Like, what is that? What has that journey been like? So. So first of all, Digital Stormwater, our company was started in the end of 2019. It's something that my husband, mostly my husband started. I mean, I was there, I was supporting him as I could, but I was working a full-time job and it wasn't a 40 hour a week job. It was sometimes 12 hour days. So the company, he, He also had a full-time job. So the company was nights and weekends and doing this to support our clients. And we had some concerns that he might lose his job. And so it was being built really to support him if he were to lose his job. And I lost my job. The company I worked for restructured and I was in complete shock. And they gave me, I forget what, two months, three months to transition all of my projects to other people. And when I started looking around trying to figure out what I wanted to do, because I love being an engineer, but. I definitely didn't want to go back to doing what I was, what I was doing right then, because like I said, sometimes it was 12 hour days, which is not what it was supposed to be. I was, um, working as a project manager and I had. If you, if you look up how many projects a project manager should be managing, it's 10 would be absolute most. I had 16. And I had meetings sometime starting at five o'clock in the morning, going to five o'clock in the afternoon. And it was just, you know, I had a list of tasks. And if you go back to my first podcast with Chrissy, I had a list of tasks. kept like, this is a five minute task. This is a 10 minute task. This is a 15 minute task to try to fit things in throughout the day, because I just literally had no time to do anything. So. Ty and I were walking one morning and he said, well, what do you think about going full time in our business? And it was just like, yes, it was, he jokes and said, I said yes to that faster than say yes to marrying him. I don't think I did, but it was close. So, because it was bringing me back, I had kind of gotten out of the exact niche area where my passion is and what I love doing. And it brings me back into that with a little bit different twist, but it's still, it's what I know it's what I love and it's doing it to support us and fast forward now two years and we're both working full time in this business. So it, it just felt so aligned. Like this is what I need to do. Yeah. And I know that there are people who have like a side hustle, right? And they have a full-time job. And I think sometimes people look down on that, but also it, it was a great thing for you. You had no idea this was what was going to happen, but it has been, it was a great, it was a great backup plan that has turned into planet, right? I love that. I love that. So if you are, ever worried about what am I going to do if I lose my job, you go head first right into your business. You go full on like full force and you completely create something that maybe a year ago you was not even on the agenda. And the great thing is too, and I just want to add this, Mariela didn't exactly say this, but she actually loves what she does, right? I do. I do love what I do. It's crazy because we she's in the visible inner circle. And so we all have become stormwater nerds because of Mariella and when she talks about what she does, and she talks about the topic like she lights up. And so when somebody does that, you know that they're in love with what they do. So it just it just we enjoy listening to her and I know she enjoys sharing with us. I very much do. Yeah. So I just wanted to share that cause I thought it would help people that may have that side hustle and wonder what do you do, but let's get into the topic. So you are you own part own, I don't know how, how you guys classify it, but the storm water agency, right? You help, market clients that are in the storm water industry. So what helped you realize that this was your place? to lead and make an impact. So first of all, as I said, that's where my background is, drainage and stormwater. And the side of stormwater I'm on now is not the drainage side. is the, don't actually want to know what's in your stormwater. Just trust me that it's yucky and it needs to be cleaned up. So in this industry, there are a lot of people who create something that's really neat, works really well, they put their heart and soul into making something that is going to clean up our water. And we all want clean water. And then they have this amazing thing, whatever it is, they created this amazing thing and no one knows about it. And so they go to all these different conferences. trying to show people, hey, I made this amazing thing. You need this thing. It's really great and it's going to help. And if you're at the conference, then you see it. And if you're not at the conference, then you've never heard of it, even if you're in the industry. And not everybody gets to go to these conferences. And so what we do is we put more stormwater people in front of your stormwater products and services so that people know about your thing. It's kind of like being a realtor because When, when somebody wants to buy a house or sell a house, it's not something you do every day, but when you, when you're ready to do that, the realtor wants you to be the person that you think of like, Susie is a realtor. I'm calling Susie to do this transaction. Well, in our business, it's got such a long sales cycle. There is no such thing as like an emotional or an impulse buy. because products have to be they have to go through approval processes for all the government entities to allow them to be put in products and then they have to the engineers have to know about them and they have to put them in the plans and then you have to get the contractors on board so they don't try to substitute something else in in its place and so it's like this really long drawn out sales cycle but the first step of that is they have to know you exist or none of that happens. Yeah. How different do you feel like it is between working and clients you believe in and working with clients that pay the bills? So if we don't believe in a client, we don't work with them, first of all. So that's step one. And we were very selective both in who we work with and then choosing, making sure that we're not, we don't have clients who do the exact same thing. So we are not trying to support people who compete with each other. Mm-hmm. So, and that's part of the passion of the industry is you want to find the people who have the best ideas and then support them. And we had a situation and it's not that we don't support the client. It's not that we don't love the product, but we had a situation where there was a there was a transition in the client's team. Let's put it that way. And. the person that was brought in was not someone that we felt we could work with easily and we ended up in ending that relationship. So you have to have alignment in the people on the team as well as the products that you're supporting. Yeah. Yeah, well, you want it to be a cohesive working relationship too, especially with people you're gonna touch base with on a regular basis. If there's something that we're going to put our name, if we're going to associate ourselves with them, then we want quality products and quality people. So a lot of people have this mentality. If I create it or I pick a niche that I can't help everyone and so therefore I'm going to they go into the scarcity the lack mindset right? Do you feel like picking a niche and sticking with a niche even though I know you help people outside of the stormwater industry and you probably attract more people but I'd love to know like your thoughts on that when it comes to niching when it comes to I help everyone versus we focus on marketing to the stormwater industry. So I think there's a couple different parts to that question. So first of all, in any industry, there are enough people to support multiple marketing firms. You may think your industry is really small, and then when you start digging into it, you find out there's a whole lot more companies out there. And so that's the first thing. There's enough. There's enough to go around for everybody. I've here repeat that question. Yeah. So well, because people think of they don't want to niche, there's a lot of resistance against picking a niche is what where I'm basically going with this. And so how did you guys obviously decide this, I'm assuming it's because your background, but do you think you would be in a different scenario if you said we help everyone versus I think I'm asking a totally different question now, but do we help everyone or we focus on this specific niche? So when you have a broader agency and you don't specialize, first of all, it almost becomes like a commodity where there's like a race to the bottom with price. If you help everybody, then they're going to go with whoever's cheaper. And so that's the biggest thing with our agency is that we specialize in the stormwater industry. Ty and I have both been in the industry, Ty for 13 years, me for 25 years. We know this industry. So there's not a learning curve of trying to teach us what stormwater is. And so one of the things that I do whenever we get a client is I go through and I read their entire website and I'm like, okay, this is the technical information about their product, their service, so that I can understand it, so that I can represent them. But if I didn't have the technical background that I have, then I wouldn't be able to understand it. to be able to represent them, to be able to, because one of the things it's not like specifically a service we offer, but if we're at a conference and some of our clients are at conferences, I'll step into their booth and I'll help them if they get a crowd of people. And because I know their product and I can speak to the technicalities of their product, I have the ability to do that and to answer questions for people. And if you are, a marketer who doesn't understand the specifics and especially like I was talking about the long sales cycle in our industry. you're not going to know how to market their products and you're going to be looking for KPIs that are not realistic in this industry. Did that answer it? Yeah, absolutely. And I think one of the things that I find fascinating about you, obviously, you're very passionate about what you what you do, you understand it, because you have a background, you have the engineering background. But also, one of things I also love is that you have shared so many of what your clients do, right? And technically, if you're talking about the technical aspect of things, you may think, that's great. but I love how you break it down to literally show us how, I mean, lot of your clients are changing lives. Like they're transforming water. They're doing different things like this. They're saving water. There are, there's so many nuances in that. And so I would love for you to talk a little bit about the life changers, because I think a lot of your clients are. but they wouldn't necessarily say that in their specs. We change lives, we clean, like they wouldn't necessarily say the things that us everyday people that don't understand the industry would understand. So like I said earlier, you think of stormwater, which is rainwater that falls on the ground and then travels over the ground into a drainage system. That's what stormwater is. And you think about rainwater being clean, but rainwater is not really clean because anything that's on the ground, anything that's on the roof of your house, anything that's on any card surface, when that rain falls on it, it picks all of that up. and carries that pollution with it. And stormwater is not treated like, like sewages. It just goes straight out into our natural waterways, our lakes, our, rivers. And so that's where we go, you know, for recreation. And that's the main source for a lot of drinking water. which is, which was the first thing that I tell Chrissy and she, like our stormwater is gross. Yeah. so if you have, if you have this stormwater runoff that's got all of this stuff in it, what our clients do is they have products that will go in a manhole. So I don't know if you want to talk brands or if you just want to talk about what they do. But we have, we have one of our clients is called the snout. And so you have you have a manhole and it's got a pipe in and it's got a pipe out. And what it does is it fits over the pipe out so that as the water comes up and the trash floats to the top to get into the pipe, the water has to go under it. And so the trash is still here in the manhole and the water can leave. And so it's just taking it keeps that trash from going out and getting into the natural waterways. And it's just it's a simple concept device, but it's hugely game changing in the way it affects water quality. And it's also got something that can absorb hydrocarbons, is nearly if you have an oil leak. Last time I was in Columbus to see Chrissy, somebody had poured oil into there's this beautiful waterfall and stringing that went into a lake and somebody had poured oil into a a storm drain and then they had all these booms set up to catch that that's hydrocarbons. That's also like if there's a gas leak or and so there's there's an attachment that will catch those hydrocarbons in a manhole so that they don't make it out into the waterways. We have another client who has a product that floats on top of the detention pond so one thing that a lot of places require is that if you have development that you have to put a pond in so that the water goes to that pond and it's released more slowly so it matches the natural rate that it would have it would have left if there was no development there. And it also lets debris settle out. So the cleaner water is on the top. Well, the way most of these are designed, the exit is on the bottom. So you're letting this stuff settle out and then you're letting the water out at the bottom. So you're still letting the dirtier water out. And so one of our clients has a surface water skimmer. So it floats on the top and it takes the water off of the top and lets it exit there. So you get the cleaner water leaving the pond. So, and that's. That's something that can. It depends, state to state has different regulations, so these are usually required during construction. Like if somebody is building a subdivision, they're required to have the surface water. Skimmer, but if you leave that in place after construction, you get the same effect and so they're working to get those regulations changed on a state to state. basis to try to get this cleaner water to discharge, which is, you know, just keeping things cleaner. So, and then we also have our client number one. So if you look at everything we do, like, so we have, we have a podcast, it's a stormwater world podcast, and we have, we've done several different things and, and Doug. was client number one and he is, he says yes to everything. So he's usually the first person to do each, anything we, we come up with. I call it Doug and Doug's like, yeah, I met. And so he has this really, really cool product. I nerd out on engineering stuff and building stuff. And so he has this cool product called pave drain, which is, it's a paving block, which doesn't sound super exciting. I know, but. I have okay, Ty has a 3D printer and so I have a model of it here. So I'm just so it looks like a little a little face here, but it's got this little arch in it. So in engineering, the arch is one of the strongest geometric straight shapes. So this block, which is miniature, they're like 12 by 12, but it's rated where 18 wheelers can drive over it. but it's got this channel underneath it and you put it on top of a rock bed with geotextile fabric of some kind to hold the rock in place. so the water goes in the cracks between the paved stones, ah the paved rain stones, and then it lets it infiltrate directly into the ground. So it's not even running off. And so it keeps your roadways or your driveway or your walkways from flooding. And then it lets that water recharge your groundwater. That's three different types of products, the type of stuff that we represent. Yeah, absolutely. So what would you say to someone and I'm sure there's a lot of these types of businesses in your industry. So there we're going to see them in any industry, but they're they're going to say I'm so niche down, like I have a product that no one else has. There's no reason I need to worry about visibility because I'm the only person or the only company that creates this so they have to find me and come to me. What would you say to someone? who said that. again, I'm sure you come up against this. So I haven't come up exactly against that. But what I say is you're the only one who does this. Tell me what your what makes your product so special that they want that they have to come to you to do it. And does everybody know that because if they don't know it, then they're not coming to you. What is it? What is that quote? Best known beats best every day. Yeah. If you have the absolute best product in the world and nobody knows it exists, nobody's going to buy it. So true, so true. And I think too, some people can be very niche down and have a very specialized product, but if you don't actually know it's a possibility, why would you think to even look for it? And in our industry, is, like I said, you have to get regulators to approve it. You have to get engineers to know about it and trusted enough to put it in their plans and put their name on that plan. And then you have to get contractors to be willing to install it. So there's lots of levels to overcome to get your stuff bought and installed. before you could even build those case studies to prove to everybody else. Yeah. So true. So true. So good. Like I love this conversation. Okay, so you as a brand like you and tie your company, you have really embraced many forms of visibility books, podcasts, video, social media, conferences, stages, like what is surprised you most about getting visible in all these many different ways? I think what surprises me most is the lurkers who never say anything like I so I have this little short video series that I've been doing is my stormwater minute where I just googled and I was like, what are the questions people want to know? And then I started answering them and I don't get comments. I don't get a lot of comments. I don't get likes. I see the impressions, but I don't know who those people are. And then I've had people come up to me a conference that said, I love what you're doing. I love your videos. And I'm like, where are you? But, but at least I know I'm reaching people and, the people at the conferences are not actually the people that I'm making those for because in stormwater, we kind of talk in an echo chamber because if you know about it, you know about it. And if you don't, you know, the general public in general doesn't. And so that's who I'm making those for is to. to kind of inform those, the general public of what this is and why you should care about it. But it's getting the feedback, just like randomly, I love watching this or people who have seen me on stage talking about how you can use social media for informing people, informing the public. and asking me questions about that afterwards because you don't get questions during presentations. People sit in the audience, but they don't necessarily ask, but they'll come up to you one-on-one afterwards and ask questions about it. Yeah. So you have obviously the business the business has social media, the business has so many parts of it right as far as marketing goes. And then you've taken your personal brand. And you've shown up as you right as Mariella. So we'd love to know how has that helped you open doors outside the expected like obviously you know when you market your business the brand the name of the business, it's going to do what it's supposed to do. But you also stepping out as Mariella, as this extension of the face of the brand, how has that supported you? And is there anything maybe that wasn't expected that's happened from it? I don't know that there's anything that wasn't expected that's happening from it, but I am getting more recognition. Ty has been going to these conferences for the whole time he's been in stormwater. So for 13 years, he's been going to all of these conferences all over the country. And so everyone knows him. And... I've gone to a few of them with him here or there, but it wasn't my full-time job. And then over the last two years, I've been going to them. And as I have been doing more, people are recognizing me and not just as Ty's wife, but as Mariella. there actually, I've had a few people who come up to me and I'm like, you know Ty. And they're like, who's Ty? Like, wait a minute. I love this because he's been like basically the face right because he's been going to these events and now you are too and like how how unexpected is this because I'm guessing and I'm making assumption I could be wrong. I'm assuming that stormwater is probably a more male dominated industry. Is that correct? It is. It's an offshoot of civil engineering. m That's not, that's not entirely correct, but it's, it's related. And so anytime you get into the heavy science and heavy engineering related fields, it is more male dominated. There are more women in stormwater and environmental, circles than there are in a lot of other science circles. Um, and I am seeing that growing. I had a, I had an interesting conversation with a friend of ours who is getting forming this group called Women in Water. And she's on the board of some of the organizations within our fields. And so she had been talking to some younger women who are coming up and trying to get them to come on the board, because there's some open seats coming and they're like, I'm looking at this board. and there's no one up there that looks like me so I don't even think I want to be part of this organization. And so trying to get that message out that if you want that the way that board looks to change then you need to pull up your seat and be present because that's the only way it's going to change. Yeah, it's not by sitting on the sidelines hiding. And it's not by walking away going, you don't look like me. I'm not going to be here at all. Yeah. Absolutely. So good. So good. So you, as someone who is an introvert like me, when you started getting visible, what was the most uncomfortable form of visibility? And also which one do you love the most now? Hmm. So the most uncomfortable forms of visibility for me, I video and, and, and talking in front of people, having a live audience. Which one do I love now? What's your favorite? Like, what is your favorite? It doesn't have to be either one of those, but I'm just curious. I will say I am a lot more comfortable being on video now. I appreciate having an example of you don't have to be perfect, you just need to do it. And so that's helped me a lot. So because my tendency would be, This isn't perfect, so I don't want anybody to see it. So just the repetition of pick up the camera, push record, say what you need to say. If you mess up, delete it, and then start over and just do it. And having time set in my schedule to do that is huge for me. um And I know I shared this with you personally, but the last time I was on stage, was the first time I've ever done that and, and not been nervous at all. I just got up and I talked and yeah. And, and I felt good about it. I felt good about it before I felt good about it during, and I felt good about it after. So I got some great B roll from that because my microphone wasn't working. So we got some great B roll of me talking. That's okay. You were up there like the pictures we saw were like, Mariela is like a powerhouse, like look at her up there. So it was so good to see. And you know, I know you'll you'll you'll make it with great you'll use great b roll with that. So it'll it'll go over really well. Okay, so let's go ahead. Good. gonna say I numbers afterwards and there were like a hundred people in the room. That's a lot of people to talk when you don't do it all the time. Like that's a lot of people to talk in front of. That's powerful. I love that. So good. So good. Okay, so let's shift a little bit from visibility to AI. I know that that AI is starting to enter the marketing world everywhere. And I would love to talk about how is that working? in stormwater and in your industry and what are you guys doing with AI I would love to talk more about that and get a little deep with you on that. So first, let me preface this by saying out of the two of us, I am not the AI expert. This is something that Ty has done a real deep dive in and I am cheering him every step of the way and I am learning a lot. But he is the one leading that effort. But it is amazing to watch day to day how much things change. So AI is a tool. First and foremost, AI is a tool and it is a very, very powerful tool, but you have to learn how to use it. Just like you can't pick up an electric drill if you've never used one before and use it correctly the first time. You have to learn how to use it and you have to learn how to use it correctly. I use, we use chat GPT more than other platforms, but we do use some other platforms. I think it is really first you have to learn how to communicate with it and prompt it to get the best results. I personally use it a lot for research. And as it has progressed, you get better results. And I appreciate the fact that now it cites sources so I can go back and double check everything. So it definitely helps. cut down the amount of time it takes to do some of the deeper research if I, if I want to write articles. So Ty has been using it for some, everybody's seen the little baby stuff that's, that's super popular right now. So there is a little baby version of him with his headphones on. There's a couple that said, like, hi, welcome back to the stormwater world podcast or you. There's another where he did an intro for one of the specific episodes, which is adorable. uh And there's some other stuff he's been putting stuff up on his LinkedIn, like as he is, I'm going to say playing with, but working and learning different things. He'll put up what the results were, what the prompts were. And then we are launching AI stormwater to help teach people in our industry how to use it and how to use it correctly. So one of the last couple of conferences we went to last month, did a presentation on AI and there was literally standing room only in that room. You never know. how people are going to respond to something new and something different. And so their standing room only in the room when he did his presentation, excuse me, and they had cut it from an hour back to 30 minutes. So he didn't have long to talk. And so he talked about prompting, like, these are the things that you can do to get better results. And if you're not getting good results, look at what you're asking and tweak that. And so that was how we introduced the concept of AI stormwater. And so we have this little guy that we created for digital stormwater, whose name is Lil Drip. He's adorable. He's a little water droplet. And so Ty took Lil Drip, and he took a robot, and he combined them and made the icon for AI stormwater. Yeah. So it's the AI version of Little Drip. Anyway, so. He if you go to the stormwater.com, you can get a list of 100 prompts to use to help you learn and help you help you better. Use the tool and then there's also a section where there's like daily news, there's new stuff coming out constantly. So there's a section on that website as well where it pulls. the news reports that you can sort by AI platforms and look up what's new and what's changing. And so there's there's so much opportunity. You can you can use it to help you write. You can use it to help you research. You can use it to help you make videos and images. If you are someone who's trying to do some of this stuff. So one of the things like what I was speaking about using social media for public information, that's something that's actually written into the requirements of the Clean Water Act and the national permit that all these cities have to meet is they have to do public education. And so you have one person at the city who gets tasked with this. Like, you're the stormwater person. You've never done stormwater before. That's fine. You're still the stormwater person. So you have to learn stormwater. You have to learn this permit and you have to implement all these things. And you've got three other responsibilities on your plate as well. And so it's a tool that can help you use your time more efficiently to get done the things that you need to get done. You know, here's the thing, cause I think this is so important to note too, like you guys have a great business. You have a great agency, right? You can help with so many things and you don't, I'm going to air quote here. You don't have to necessarily learn AI and take that in your business too. But also, you know that it's going to benefit the end user at the same time. So, you know, when we talk about serving and supporting, our clients, our audience, this is like the ultimate way to serve them because everybody wants more time. Everybody needs more time. And that's the one thing we can't buy, right? We can't buy a movie can buy back our time, but we can't necessarily we can't extend the time that we have here. So I love that this is an opportunity to not only serve the clients that you have now, but future clients and and help them in a different way in a different modality. And it's also a way to serve people who can't work with us. If they don't have budget and there's no way they're ever gonna have budget, we can still serve them by giving them tools to help them help themselves. Yeah. Yeah, so good. So good. I feel like this has been the podcast that we have covered so many topics and we're not done. So you guys are learning a lot in this podcast episode. And even if you're not in the stormwater industry, like there's so much to learn from this episode. But I want to talk to you about something. So Mariela is obviously my client. We are also very good friends. We met in a mastermind together that we were both in. And so our relationship has so many layers, beautiful layers. And one of the things that Mary LL and I love doing is sending each other faith based tic tocs, faith based YouTube videos, typically normally Myron golden. And so I want to talk a little bit about your faith and how open you are about it. And how does your relationship with God show up and how you lead, you lead yourself in your business and how you grow. So when I was in my corporate job, I'm going to start, I'm going to kind of go different places with us, but I probably never would have just quit and walked away from that. was not necessarily comfortable with the amount that I was working and the mental load, but it was a very comfortable paycheck to have. And you have this false sense of stability from that. And I 100 % believe that because I wouldn't make that move, God made it for me. He's like, this is not where you were supposed to be. And this is not your field. And this is not just your work field. This is not your mission field. You're not reaching people. And you're not showing up the way I want you to show up. So I'm taking this away from you. And I'm going to put you where I want you to be. And I have seen that happen in different ways throughout my life where they say, if you want to make God laugh, tell him your plan for your life. I don't know if you've heard that or not, but I had a plan for my life. I was going to get my degree. I was going to move back to Georgia. I'm originally from right out by the Savannah. I have never moved back to Georgia. live in Texas. Um, you know, I, I, I wasn't going to have kids. have two beautiful children and a wonderful stepson. They're all adult. Um, you know, there have been so many things in my life where God was like, Nope, that's not the way you're going. You're going here and I'm going to equip you because this is not what you planned. So you never, you never prepared for it. Cause if I know I'm doing something, I'm going to prepare for it. Right. But so he equips me as he shows me where to go. And so. You know, that's one of the themes every day. It's like, you thank you for today. Show me the steps you would have me take. Lead me where you would have me go. Open the doors that are for me and close the doors that are not for me. to. It's so good. So good. I have this sticky note on my desk that says, is this my will or God's? Because we as business owners, as powerful women, we love to control things, right? So I would love for you to share, is there a moment, and maybe it was when you were laid off, where you really had to trust deeply in your faith? and in God to get through. I'm going to get back further than that. I'm going to get back to the very first time I was laid off. It was way before we met each other. And I was married to my children's father and I was the breadwinner. And I got laid off at a time when there were not a lot of jobs available. And I had to get really quiet. And it took me almost a month to find another job. And I had just started a Bible study with a group of ladies from church. And it was a study of King David and it was called A Heart Like His. And so I spent time every single day delving into that. at studying scripture praying writing out in this work but doing the deep work and then after I finished that. going through calling engineering firms, sending out resumes. And through all of that, was put me where I'm meant to be. And the job that I found, which was absolutely where I was meant to be, was an hour and a half drive from my house. and my ex was not willing to move. So that gave me a three hour commute every day. But it, it put me in with the people that I needed to be with to grow into the next steps for my life. And it surrounded me with the people who became my support system when that marriage failed so that I had I had a friend who said, I have a house come, you know, your kids are safe. And I had the people around me who helped me completely rebuild from the ground up. And then later years later, after I had been divorced, that's actually where I met Ty because he was hired to work for that same company. So there are, there are ways that God moves us in our lives that we. have no idea what's happening. I read something last week that says he's building and he's preparing things for generations in the future with what he's doing in our lives now. And it's all about trusting him that he knows what he's doing even when I don't and letting him move me. That's so good. So good. So good. Like you were truly like almost transplanted where he wanted you to go. Cause that was not in the plan. And then look where it led you. So this little thing, if you're watching the video part of this, God's will not mine. Even though sometimes ours sounds really good in the moment and it sounds like the best idea in the moment, God knows best, you know, he knows. One of my former pastors had this quote and I have it written down on a sticky note in my bathroom, but it says, You will know it's God's will when you are planted where you did not intend to grow. Yep. So true. So true. I feel like we can talk about this all day. That's why we're always sending each other these videos and and Myron golden things. So this has been a pleasure having you on again, because I feel like we've went so deep. We went so deep on so many topics. this is the, we went deeper than we ever have. Yeah, 100%, 100%. So I wanna do some fun, quick rapid fire questions before we end our time together today. So are you ready? Okay. What is a hype song that helps you remember who you are? Okay, so right after we talk about God planting us and so I'm just gonna give it to you. I listened to DMX to hype me up. No, that's good. That's good. That's fine. It's fine. We're like human. We have many dualities. What is the most ridiculous thing that you believed as a kid? my goodness. most ridiculous thing I believed as a kid. I feel like I've always been an adult. It's the oldest daughter thing. Like I was always left in charge since like my sister called me mama when she was learning to talk and I'm only two years older than her. I've always been in this talk. So I don't know. So you could see through all the things that people told you is what you're saying. If you could give a TED talk on something completely unrelated to your work, what would it be? Per se. Yes, I love it. I love it. Is there a unpopular opinion or do you have an unpopular opinion in life or business? Um, we're not for everyone. We, um, you know, we're choosy about who we work with. We have, uh, and, not just who we work with in life, you know, I'm not for everyone and I'm okay with that. You know, I, um, I used to try to be more of a people pleaser or, you know, blend in a little. I'm not for everyone. have quirk and I'm okay with them. And if you're not okay with them, you're not my people. If I'm going to, I'm going to have the difficult order when we sit down because I want my water with no ice and sparkling water if you have it. And I'm a vegetarian. Can you make this without me? Yes, I love it. So good. So good. Well, Mariela, thank you for coming on the show again and sharing so much knowledge and so much value and so much variety. I feel like I pulled out all the questions this time and and really tried to stump you. So you successfully made it through another 47 minute podcast episode with me. Is there anything that you would like to promote or share with my audience or any final thoughts you'd love to share with them before we go? So if you know anyone in Stormwater who has an amazing product, who's looking for someone to do their marketing, our company is Digital Stormwater. It's digitalstormwater.com. You can jump on our calendar. If you are interested in learning about AI, whether you're Stormwater or not, check out aistormwater.com. You can get the list of prompts. They may be tailored to Stormwater, but you can definitely tailor them to whatever you need them for. That's a good idea. I love that. Okay. We'll drop all of these links in the show notes. And if you want to connect with Mariela, make sure you reach out to her. We'll put all the things in the show notes and then connect with her and follow her like on social media because she shares so much knowledge. You're going to learn so much. If you like are learning junkie, like you will learn so much about stormwater, things that you didn't know that you needed to know, but you actually do need to know these things. And so thank you again, Mariela. Make sure that you share this episode with someone who you think would enjoy it. connect someone with Mary Ella and we appreciate you listening to the Visibility Impact Show. Thank you so much.

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