THE SMALL BUSINESS OWNER PODCAST with Rachel Klaver

“Before we start work you need to see this video” she said. My client Shelly Davies and I were about to start work for the day, but first, she wanted me to see the video version of Caroline May’s bio “Switchblade Lemonade.” (I’ve linked to it in the podcast notes)

Caroline is creative writer, brand developer, the author of Bio Like Beyoncé, and the owner of Switchblade Lemonade, a vitally unorthodox image crafting and bio salon, fueled by the dogma: Your biography should be so good -- you could make a movie out of it. Which… is exactly what she did. 

Since then, Shelly went on to work with Caroline one-on-one, and I went on to buy her book Bio Like Beyonce which I now recommend to many of our clients. 

My own story of writing, and then sharing, my epic credential made me understand jost how powerful the process and delivery is. I had full plans to produce a movie myself, but with Covid, it’s still relegated to a read version from Lockdown 2020. (Also in the show notes!)

The power of writing your own history, and weaving it through what you offer and who you offer it to is a powerful tool so many do not even attempt.

Listen to Caroline explain why it’s so important and give you some simple tips to help you write your own epic bio people will choose you for. 

As Caroline says, “The story of your life is too strange/beautiful/cut-throat to be wrapped in formality and cliché. And professional biography at its best is micro art that captures the spirit of its subject, while supplying the backbone to its brand.”

What we’ll cover:

• Why you need an epic credential


• What happens when we start using our whole experience to get clients


• Why the boring bio doesn’t get you the right customers


• Where to start with creating your bio


• How a traditional bio doesn’t stack up


• How your bio should be used in your content. 

Important Links

Caroline’s BIO (video)

Caroline’s Free Bio Checklist

Bio Like Beyonce

Rachel’s Bio (video)

Become part of The Content Masterweb

Become a part of our Facebook group

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Samir Harith is not your typical accountant. In his commitment to help small businesses understand accountancy Sam creates cartoons and writes blogs in plain language to help small business owners feel confident when it comes to finances.

Sam built his business around helping small business owners, using a percentage of sales model to allow his clients to get strategic business and financial advice at an affordable rate. He came to New Zealand to complete his PhD in Finance from the University of Waikato, and stayed, now running his firm in the Waikato area. (as a completely online accountancy firm)

In this podcast we also talk about how Sam came to launch a business in NZ. I completely threw a curveball to Sam when I asked him about what it’s like as an immigrant working in professional roles, and we had some very real talk about some of the hurdles new New Zealanders can sometimes come across when trying to both get jobs, and start something of their own.

Sam uses his intellect, creativity and energetic personality to help his clients grow their businesses with confidence. He’s made important decisions around the growth of his business through identifying the “hedgehog” that ties everything together (and explains it in the podcast!)

What we’ll cover:

• Why Sam started creating cartoons


• What is a Hedgehog business 


• Why this’ is important for small businesses to embrace


• Why it’s important to show personality in your business


• Why Sam uses the 1% model for payment. 

Important Links

Contact Sam

The Comic Accountant on Facebook

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I had a seriously bad attitude to selling when I first started out in business. When I thought of sales people I thought “slimy” Imaging my horror when I discovered I would have to sell to get clients!

I’m now the primary sales person of our business, and can’t imagine not ever having that role. I now love connecting with people, helping them (and me) work out if we’re the right fit for them, and offering them the right services for their needs.

I now see sales as a service. 

In this podcast we’re going to look at the different areas you need to consider when setting yourself up for selling, what you need to think about before a sales meeting, how to make the meeting work for both sides, and how to bring the meeting to a close. I’m also going to share one of the most important parts of sales, no matter what industry you are in. 

If you’ve got a service based business, you’re getting marketing leads, but they are not translating to clients, this is a podcast you can’t afford to miss. 

What we’ll cover:

• Why so many of us have a block to selling


• What you can do to set yourself up for sales success


• The mantra I use before a sales meeting


• What you need to do before a meeting


• How to start a sales call


• How to sell during the session


• Why you need two objectives


• The one action you can take to increase your sales. 

Important Links

The Sales Planner Pad

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Need help with converting sales from your marketing leads? Chris James is the person to help you. 

With all the focus on marketing, it’s easy to forget exactly why we’re putting in all this effort. For eCommerce the key is to have a strong converting website to help people buy products. A converting website is also super important for Service Based business, but equally important is your ability to close the deal on sales calls and processes.

Chris James learned how to sell as a survival technique in a cut throat cold call centre. If you didn’t do a great job, you’d get fired. The three best takeaways from the job was meeting his wife, his best friend and learning to never be afraid of rejection.

In this podcast, Chris shares with us his GRO method, using social media to attract the right clients for you, and then gives us some powerful tips to help you convert those people into sales. 

What we’ll cover:

• Why we don’t need to be afraid of rejection


• How to launch your business, or a new offer


• Why you don’t always need to know the end goal of a side hustle


• What the GRO method is and how you can use it


• How to manage timewasters


• Why the sales process can be how you want it to be


• How your marketing and sales need to fit together 

Important Links

Chris’ Free Discovery Call Guide

Chris James Instagram

The Content Masterweb

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Should you put your pricing on your website as a service provider business? Won’t it turn people off? 

Expert copywriter Hayley Maxwell focuses on helping coaches, and other service-based business owners write copy that converts on their websites.

Hayley Maxwell is a brand clarity, messaging coach, copywriter, ferocious ice cream eater, and leopard print lover… (and not necessarily in that order.) 

She’s been honing her skills since the early 2000s. Helping Government entities, charities, global corporations, small businesses, and talented business women to master their message, and then bring it to rip-roaring life with compelling, respectful copywriting that inspires action.  After a career in corporate comms, creating in-depth strategies, and communication plans, Hayley now works with women in business to help them create copy that increases leads and helps make sales simpler. 

Hayley has strong feelings about the importance of Pricing, and shares why it’s super important to have it on your website. She also explains why we shouldn’t be afraid of the word “I”, walks through some of the common barriers we can put up when writing our website copy, and what we need to do to get it working better

We often spend so much time focussed on our social media posts, and attracting the eye of people who haven't met us yet. Hayley shows why it’s so important to get the website messaging right first, to make all that hard marketing work really get you dividends. 

What we’ll cover:

• Why you should put your prices on your website


• How to manage it as a business with multiple variables


• The benefits of niching down your message 


• Whether you should use “we” as a solopreneur


• Tips for a converting website

Important Links

Get in touch with Hayley

The Content Masterweb

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

Other Episodes

The seven elements of a brand story

Creating content captions/scripts

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Tik Tok can be an incredible timesucker. It can also be incredible for your business. We often suggest the addition to Tik tok to our clients, especially those who sell products, or those wanting to build a personal brand. 

Part of Tik tok’s charm is its ability to help you quickly learn what content works, and what doesn’t. The video content you make is easily sharable or can be published on other platforms. This was a key reason I decided to jump all in this year, as part of my goal to grow my Youtube channel (Marketing with Rachel Klaver), to one thousand subscribers this year. I have over six hundred to go, so it may become a two year goal!

Tiktok is a powerful tool for small business owners. But I know it’s scary when you aren’t sure what to do, and how to do it - so this podcast is a beginners guide to all things Tiktok strategy. 

Last year I did a podcast with Tash from Jubly-Umph about Tiktok. At the time it all felt a bit hard to add to everything else I was doing. After that podcast I jumped in, applied some of her wisdom and started to find my space.

This took a while. And it felt weird, hard and uncomfortable to be on there. Now - I love it. It’s one of my favourite places, and I’ve loved growing a community on there of people I love interacting with, and learning with. 

If there was one piece of advice I’d give, whether you listen this week, or skip to an episode where I’m not tell you to do video it’s this, “Don’t underestimate the power of Tik tok “

(PS: The notes I referred to as I worked through this podcast weren’t numbered, and halfway through I discovered the pages were out of order. So also enjoy my hope that I’m numbering correctly throughout the podcast. If I did miss a number - I apologize. We can make it “13 tips” instead!

What we’ll cover:

• Why you need to consider TIktok


• What you can do beyond tiktok with your content


• How to set up your profile


• Why you need to do as a locally based business


• How the algorithm works


• What sort of content to create


• Whether you should use trends


• How to see your content creation


• How to build a community. 

Important Links

CAP CUT

The Content Masterweb

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

Other Episodes

Hooks to use

Creating content captions/scripts

Jubly-Umph’s Tik Tok story

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Yes it’s true. Email marketing can make a dramatic difference to your sales with an e-commerce business. But if you think sending out a monthly email to everyone on your list is going to get you the results you deserve, then this podcast will help you change your mind.

I’m thrilled to have team member, and fellow marketing strategist at Identify, Tracey Smith with us today. Tracey specializes in ECommerce marketing, and teaches what she herself applied to her own successful and thriving ecommerce business.  

In this episode we cover how to best cater for different audiences at each stage of the customer journey, what Tracey uses to keep people buying without sending out mass emails, how to get more sales from new subscribers, how often we can email people and how to use marketing automation to improve customer satisfaction. 

We’ll also cover the different types of customers you need to talk to, and what you need to have in your emails. 

What we’ll cover:

• Why Tracey loves email marketing


• How often you should email your list


• How to get the best results from your list


• How to use marketing automation for easy sales


• What to do to get better reviews from customers


• How to cater for people at different stages of the customer journey with email marketing

Important Links

Get in touch with Rachel and Tracey

Try ActiveCampaign

Survicate

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

SEO. We all know we need it, but many of us don’t know what it is exactly, and how we make it all happen.

(We also know many people spam us with SEO warnings and offers in our inbox all the time, promising big things if we pay them money to fix it - but that’s another matter entirely! Please do feel free to ignore them!)

Marketing strategist Ben Male loves SEO. Almost as much as he loves his dogs and Crossfit. (and that’s saying something!)  What is great about Ben Male is he loves SEO from a people's point of view, rather than from the technical side that many business owners get tied up in.

As another people-y marketer, this episode made me fall a little bit in love with SEO. I’m sure that it will help you do exactly the same thing. 

Walk with us as Ben explains what you can do today to improve your marketing and how to keep working at it to help people find you more easily when they need your products or services. 

(For anyone with SEO phobia or blocks, I promise you this episode is not a scary one!)

Today we cover

• What is SEO 


• Why it’s important


• The difference between SEO and Adwords


• What you need to do to be found on Google


• Why every business needs a Google Business page


• How to optimise your Google Business Page

Important Links

Get in contact with Ben

Rachel’s free training events in March

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

Other recommended Episodes

Marketing tools that save you time and money

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

With the internet getting noisier and noisier, the quest to get people’s attention is getting harder and harder. We now have three seconds to help people make the call - slow and take a look, or move right along.

What we need is a hook. 

Join your MAP IT Marketing host Rachel Klaver as she explains what a hook is, why we need it, and what the three core types of hooks are.

She’ll then take you through eight common hook ideas, and give you a few hooks you can use right away with your content.

If you know your awesome content isn’t getting the attention it deserves and you know you need that to change, then this episode will help you.

It’s time to get hooked!

Today we cover

• What a hook is


• How hooks have changed over the years


• Where you should use hooks in your content


• The three main types of hooks


• The eight kinds of hooks you can use with any content


• A selection of hooks any business can use. 

Important Links

Rachel’s free training events in March

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

Other recommended Episodes

Getting over video fears

Marketing tools that save you time and money

Writing engaging captions for social media

How I repurpose content

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hashtags are used on every social media platform, but the queen of hashtags has got to be Instagram. But they’ve been getting a bad rap recently and it’s either using none, use five, use eight-twelve, or use all thirty. 

My first relationship with hashtags with on Twitter. I was never really one to use them as they were designed-  as search tools and a way to file information. Instead, I preferred to use them ironically, as part of my tweets. A little like a sarcastic aside. Apparently this is a very “kiwi” use of hashtags.

I was so pleased to have Matthew Pierce on the show to talk though hashtags and their use coming into 2022. His app Hashtag Slayer has become one of my favourite tools for Instagram (and he’s given us a promo code to try the app free for a month - use the code MAP IT and the link in the notes below)

Matthew Pierce is a full-stack web designer and developer who’s been making websites since he could still count his age on his fingers. He is the developer of HashtagSlayer.com, which he co-founded with his wife, Danica Pierce, on the day she showed him her "really cool spreadsheet". Working together they took the concept from its initial spreadsheet roots to an advanced web platform that's helped thousands of businesses.

I’ve used a lot of tools, but Hashtag Slayer gives me the best overview of which hashtags are working and which ones aren’t.

Matthew walks us through what’s happening with hashtags this year, what we need to think about and where they fit in your Instagram strategy. 

Today we cover

• Are Hashtags dead or dying?


• How they’ve changed over the years


• Why some hashtags are better to use than others


• What to look out for when selecting hashtags


• How Hashtag Slayer works

Important Links

Hashtag Slayer

Rachel’s YouTube Channel

Join the My MAP IT Marketing Strategy School

Become a part of our Facebook group

Other recommended Episodes

Marketing tools that save you time and money

How Lucas O’Keefe grew 150k followers on Instagram in a year 

Writing engaging captions for social media

How I repurpose content

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.