Chase The Lion Podcast

Let be friends!

www.instagram.com/dylnow

If there is one thing that confusing coaches and holds them back from building a solid business, it’s technology. You struggle to figure out how your autoresponder connects to your website, and what page to send buyers to after they complete their purchase. You’re confused by the sheer volume of choices available for every aspect of your business. And you can’t even decide if you need a credit card processor, or if PayPal is enough.

You’re not alone. Every business owner goes through this. As a coach though, you really only need a few pieces, and they’re not that difficult to manage.

This is your home base online. It’s where potential clients will go to learn more about you. It’s where you’ll blog, post videos, maybe host a podcast, and create your sales and landing pages.

Sound complicated? It’s not. All you really need is WordPress, and any good VA can help you get that set up and running in just a few hours.

The next step is to begin building your mailing list, and for that you’ll need an autoresponder service such as AWeber or MailChimp. Ideally, you’ll want to create a series of follow-up emails that are sent on a pre-determined schedule. These are a part of your product funnel, and are designed to promote your products and services to your new subscriber.

You’ll need to create an opt-in offer—perhaps a free report or cheat sheet—then place a form on your website to collect email addresses.

Again, this is not something you must learn to do yourself (unless you really want to) as any good VA can quickly create an opt-in form and put it on your site.

Customers must have a way to pay you, whether for a product or private coaching. The simplest way to set this up is to simply create a PayPal button, then paste the code generated onto your sales page.

You’ll receive an email whenever someone buys, and then you can follow up with welcome packets or product delivery.

If you’re looking for a more automated system (and I highly recommend it as a massive time saver), then consider purchasing a shopping cart. These can be self hosted or a monthly service, but they all operate similarly. Your cart will take care of product delivery, add your new client to the appropriate mailing list, and even send follow up emails. You can even choose a cart that tracks affiliate sales, if you’d like to entice others to promote your products and services.

Happy Birthday DYL Podcast!!!!! WOW What a year and boy did it fly by. In this Episode I’m talking with Sarah Belleau with Pretty Simple Sarah Podcast. She interviewed me on her show we’re discussing all things startup and motivation.

In the episode I mention an opportunity to partner with me, join a luxury beauty brand, and become an influencer. Click the button below to learn more.

When it comes to the most commonly heard business advice, “The money is in the list” ranks right up there in the number one spot.

Whether you’re a coach, an information product seller, a top-notch service provider, or you’re selling a line of skin-care products, growing your mailing list must be a priority.

There’s plenty of strategies to help you add a steady stream of emails to you list, too. A downloadable resource guide prominently offered in your blog sidebar is a proven tactic, as is a training webinar that potential clients can attend live (or even pre-recorded). You’ve likely heard of—and tried—other strategies as well.

And while all of these ideas will produce a trickle of new opt-ins, or maybe more depending on your website’s traffic numbers, they won’t bring in a tidal wave of sign ups. But there is one technique that will.

The Beauty of Massive Giveaway Events

Imagine what would happen to your mailing list if you suddenly had 40 or 50 or even more super successful business owners—all with big lists of their own—promoting YOUR opt-in gift? You’d open your autoresponder account in the morning and see hundreds of new email addresses each and every day. You could easily double or even triple your list in no time at all.

And you know what all those emails mean—more eyes on your products and services, and more money in your pocket.

Giveaway events like this work because a group of business owners in similar niches all work together to drive massive amounts of traffic to a single page. It’s a simple technique that’s worked time and again in nearly every niche, and it can just as easily work for you.

Organization is Key

Here’s the thing, though. In order to make this (or really, any list-building strategy) work for you, you have to get organized and make the process as smooth as possible for all involved. You’ll need an infrastructure in place that includes:

·         A great looking landing page to collect email addresses

·         A website server that can handle lots of traffic

·         A hidden page where the offers can be presented, and participants can click each link to claim the freebies that appeal to them

·         A mailing list provider to follow up with both participants and your fellow business owners

·         A group of friends and colleagues who will commit to giving away some top-notch prizes and who will follow-through on mailings

You know it’s critical to your success, but are you doing it with forethought and a solid strategy in place, or do you just “wing it?”

Admittedly, most of us are squarely in the winging it category, but there are some quick and easy changes you can make that will put even your most important networking tasks on autopilot.

Outsource the research: First step, hire a VA who can find and connect you with potential JV partners, affiliates, guest interviews, and all the other marketing options at your disposal.

With a list of requirements at hand, he or she can spend an hour or two on Google and bring back a list of hundreds of people you can then reach out to. What would a list of 100—or even 10—new JV partners do for your business growth?

Automate the initial connection: Create a script or email template to use when you first reach out to potential partners. Your VA can send this in an email or make a call on your behalf, but having the script in place will accomplish two things:

1. The process will be much faster than if you have to think about what to say.

2. You’ll be able to tweak the script as you go to get better results. Just like you split test your emails, you can test your outreach process as well.

Automate the follow-up: At the risk of sounding like a broken record, create an email or phone script to help speed the process. You or your VA (or your email autoresponder series) can send out a series of emails to follow up on that initial connection.

Automate your scheduling: Using a service such as TimeTrade or ScheduleOnce, you can easily set up your calendar with your preferred times for interviews, webinars and such. Give your JV partners links to book time with you, and the meetings will automatically appear on your calendar. No more endless back and forth to discuss potential meeting times, just a single click, and your partner can choose the time that works for both of you.

Here’s a hint though: be sure to use your calendar diligently, because if you don’t you run the risk of someone scheduling time with you when you already have another commitment.

Will it take a bit of work to get these systems in place? Sure. But once you do, you’ll find that attracting and working with JV partners, guest experts and others is much easier and more streamlined. Not only that, but with the time you save, you’ll be able to concentrate on creating new programs and services. Or maybe just hang out with the kids a bit. You deserve some time off.

The web pages that make up your sales or opt-in funnel are only the beginning. To truly encourage sales, you need to stay in contact with your readers. The easiest way to do that is through your email manager, by sending periodic emails with various related offers.

Let’s take a look at a typical follow-up sequence for a free opt-in series. In this case, your reader has attended a free webinar that promoted a high-ticket training program. In the days that follow, you’ll want to stay in contact with an autoresponder sequence that automatically sends email at specific intervals.

Email 1: This is going to be the first email that goes out after they confirm. It should give the reader access to your free webinar, so that can be a link to the replay, or that instructions to join you for the live event. You will likely also want to include a couple of reminder emails if they event is live.

Email 2: This is the replay email for a live event, or the first follow-up if the original was a replay. In this email, it’s a good idea to offer few bullet points of what they learned, encouragement to watch the replay (if you can legitimately say it’s only available for the next XX days, even better), plus an offer to purchase the training program.

Email 3: A few days later, you’ll want to follow-up again. This time, consider including a case study of someone who used your training program. When combined with a great offer, reading about the results someone else achieved can be a powerful motivator.

Email 4: Use this follow-up message to remind readers that the replay is going away (if it is), and also to answer any objections. For example, you might list some FAQs or even questions you’ve received about your refund policy, who the program is for, or payment options. Remind them about the offer.

Email 5: This is your final reminder that the offer is going away soon. At this point, you may want to encourage the reader to email you with questions (if you have the systems in place to manage a lot of email, that is).

Email 6 and beyond: If your reader reaches this point without buying, then it may be that your product is just not right for her. From this point forward, you should continue to stay in contact by offering great information, case studies, tips and other interesting content, but also to offer other products that might be of interest.

One important thing to remember about this email sequence: if your reader buys your program at any point, you must remove her from this sequence. It will make no sense for her to get email #5 with that final offer reminder if she purchased your program after email #3. Most autoresponder services, such as AWeber, have automation built in that allows you to move subscribers from one list to another based on their actions, so be sure to set that up as you’re building your funnel emails.

This kind of hand’s off approach to email marketing is what will help you build a true passive sales funnel, so look for opportunities to use this system as you build your business.

What’s missing from your funnel that could help you bring in more subscribers and sales? Listen to find out.

Ready to take your funnel to the next level? Enroll in my new course Funnel to Funds

www.dylnow.com/funneltofunds

Lets be friends!

www.instagram.com/femalecoachingsociety

Feeling overwhelmed at the thought of setting up your sales funnel? You’re not alone. Many online business owners fail to properly plan out their funnel, and it shows.

They have an opt-in incentive that doesn’t appeal to their audience.

Their follow-up emails don’t flow naturally from the opt-in.

Messages are unbalanced—either too many sales pitches or not enough. Even worse, the offers don’t match the market.

Making these mistakes is common, so if you recognize yourself here, don’t feel bad. The good news? There’s an easy fix.

All too often we think we know what our readers and potential buyers want, but in reality, we’re simply guessing. We make the mistake of believing that we are our market, but that usually is not the case.

The only way to know for sure what your market truly wants and needs is to ask them. Set up a simple survey (even a Google form will work) and ask your blog readers, social media followers, and email list to give their opinion.

Do this right, and you’ll know exactly what you should be offering your audience, plus, you’ll know that language to use on your opt-in page.

Now that you know what your market needs, it’s time to create your opt-in incentive. Keep in mind that readers today seem to prefer simple, easy-to-digest offers rather than 200-page eBooks or 7-part video series. This makes your job a bit easier, too.

Some popular choices for opt-in incentives include:

·         Checklists

·         Worksheets

·         Resource guides

·         Video training

·         Webinars

·         Audio downloads

Every good opt-in incentive should be followed up with a series of emails that build on the material. If you’ve offered a resource guide, for example, then your follow-up emails might include usage tips for each of the resources, or case studies that show how others have benefited from using the tools.

Arguably the most important part of your funnel, your offer must be the logical next step for readers to take. They’ve worked through your opt-in incentive, read and acted on your emails, and they’re hungry for more. Time to make your offer.

Just like the othe