The Do Different Board is a monthly online working session for business owners in Canada and the United States, created by Debi of Prowl Communications as the next version of the Business Accelerator Advisory Board (BAAB). It is built around choosing The One Thing that will move your business forward the most, using marketing and business principles that have held up for decades, and the first session, Gather. Review. Reflect: Strategic Foundations for 2027, runs Wednesday, November 18, 2026 from 10:30 am to 1:30 pm ET with your first session free.
Introducing The Do Different Board: One Thing at a Time, Built on Marketing Principles That Last
Most business owners I talk to reach a point, usually around the end of the year, where their list of things to do to grow has become so long that they stop choosing any of them. They stay busy with whatever lands in front of them that day, and after more than forty years in marketing I have watched that same pattern repeat itself many times, which is a big part of why I built The Do Different Board and why I’m so excited to tell you about it.
Why The One Thing
I started in marketing before the internet and before computers were on anyone’s desk, so I have watched every new platform and tactic arrive with a promise to change everything. What has stayed with me through all of it is how little the fundamentals have moved, because knowing who you’re talking to, saying something worth listening to and looking after the customers who already trust you worked then and still works now. The challenge for most business owners is that they try to do everything at once, which spreads their energy so thin that nothing gets the attention it needs to work. The Do Different Board is built around One Different Thing at a time, where you choose the single change that will make the biggest difference, put your effort behind it until it’s working and then choose the next one with a lot more confidence and momentum.
Why we chose the name
The name comes from the line that sums up how we approach marketing and business, “Be Bold. Do Different. See Results.”, which reflects what I have seen work over more than forty years in marketing. Being bold means being willing to question the way you’ve always done things, doing different means choosing one change and committing to it instead of following the crowd, and seeing results is what happens when that change is built on marketing and business principles that have always worked. The Do Different Board puts the middle of that line front and centre, with “Do” reminding us that these are working sessions where things get done, “Different” challenging the assumptions that can quietly keep a business stuck, and “Board” saying you deserve a group of people around the table with your business at the centre. I also promised myself that if we were going to carry that name, the sessions had to live up to it, so every month we work on One Different Thing at a time, we challenge what we think we know about the business, and we judge success by the results you can see in your own numbers.
Why we moved on from BAAB
The Business Accelerator Advisory Board started almost two years ago with a simple idea, which was to give business owners affordable access to the kind of marketing and business guidance that usually comes with a consulting-sized price tag. That idea hasn’t changed, but the name was a mouthful of letters that was hard to remember and even harder to get excited about, and the format deserved a rethink too, so I rebuilt the whole thing and gave it a name that says what it stands for. Instead of shorter sessions spread through the month, you now get one focused three-hour working session each month, plus drop-in office hours for the questions that come up in between. Joining is a simple sign-up instead of an application, because I would rather have you in the room working on your business than filling out forms about it.
What a session actually looks like
The word working is there on purpose, since these sessions are for doing the work on your business alongside other owners who understand what you’re dealing with. We also challenge the assumptions that have quietly been running things for years, like how you price, who you sell to and why you do things the way you do, because those are usually the places where the biggest breakthroughs are hiding. You’re welcome whether you’re a solopreneur or running a team, and whether you sell to other businesses or to consumers. The goal is that you leave every session with something decided, something done and a clear next step, instead of another notebook full of ideas that never get acted on.
Your first session is free
Our first session is Gather. Review. Reflect: Strategic Foundations for 2027 on Wednesday, November 18, 2026, from 10:30 am to 1:30 pm ET, and it’s held online so you can join from anywhere. We’ll pull together the real numbers and results from this past year, review what worked and what has only been habit, and reflect on the assumptions worth challenging, so you walk out with a clear foundation for 2027 and the One Thing that will matter most. Your first session is free, and you can attend the free session once. If you want to keep going, membership is $197 a month (the same price in Canadian or US dollars), which includes the monthly working session and the drop-in office hours.
What comes next
December is Business Plan Month, so on December 16 we’ll build your business and marketing plan for 2027 together. In January we’ll launch that plan by choosing your One Different Thing and mapping out your first ninety days, which means that if you join us in November you’ll have a plan in place and a head start before most business owners have even thought about theirs. If you’ve been waiting for the right time to stop spinning your wheels and do something different, this is it, and you can save your spot for the free November session at thedodifferentboard.com.
