Today’s guest is Crystal Porter, Ph.D. She is the founder of Mane Insights, a company that gives tailored hair care advice, from a scientific perspective, to women with hair problems. Dr. Porter spent the majority of her 14-year career at L’Oreal, USA where she managed the Physics Laboratory and Consumer Insights teams to study the biophysical characteristics of hair and pigmented skin within different ethnic groups around the world and to understand behaviors that are related to consumers’ experiences. During the past eleven years, she has shared knowledge about ethnic hair to fellow scientists and the public at national and international venues. She has also contributed to L’Oreal’s global classification of curl in hair and has authored numerous papers, presentations and book chapters on hair straightening and ethnic hair. Her conversation with Rosetta today is full of insights! [Tweet "What I’m doing now, I feel good about having my daughters watching." - Dr. Crystal Porter"] The road to becoming an entrepreneur was motivated by asking the deeper questions. Dr. Crystal Porter was working full time in a very intense role for a large company. Even though she often told her superiors that she couldn’t continue to put in the hours that she was being required to give, they didn’t seem to understand or even care. Her life continued to be a stressful and her time with family was getting more and more scarce. She had to ask herself the deeper questions about what she wanted from life and what was important to her. That time of questioning is what led her to move into her own business as a way to continue the income she’d become accustomed to but also allow her the time to be with family and do the things that were important to her. Sound familiar? Dr. Porter’s story could be a great encouragement to you, be sure to listen! A great example of niching-down to find a great opportunity. [Tweet "Finding a niche and serving it with great profit, on the Happy Black Woman Podcast"] It may not seem very probable that a company could be built purely on the need that Black Women have to have expert advice about how to deal with problems related to their hair. But Dr. Crystal Porter has discovered that not only does a relatively smaller niche such as that provide her ample opportunities for a great income, it also enables her to help many, many people with a very serious area of need. It’s an example of how there are many areas of need that nobody is servicing and how you can focus more narrowly to make even more income and meet more needs. Learn how Dr. Porter came to discover this great area of need on this episode. Asking questions as a way of serving her audience. Dr. Crystal Porter explains on this episode how she goes about helping a wide variety of clients who have very different needs, and it’s through the asking of good questions. She’s able to hone in on the specific needs an individual may have by asking the right questions. Her example is a lesson for any entrepreneur. You may have an idea of what your audience needs or wants but until you actually hear from them, you won’t really know. How can you ask better questions of your audience to discover the exact needs they have? Listen to this episode to hear how Dr. Porter does it and how you can take a similar approach in your business. Working consistently within your values is powerfully important for the longevity of your business. In her journey to becoming an entrepreneur, Dr. Crystal Porter was motivated by the disharmony she saw between the type of hours and drive she was required to put in at her place of employment and the inner beliefs she had about the priority her family should have in her life. She didn’t like that the sacrifices she was having to make in order to maintain her employment were at conflict with the needs she saw in her family. That’s why she made the switch to entrepreneurship. What are your values about life and work? What are you willing to do and what ar