Fun Business Fun Money Podcast
EP 063 – Is that REALLY the problem you have?
Struggling with sales, marketing or client retention?
The problem you ‘think’ you have may not actually BE your problem. It could be something at a deeper, more basic level that’s much easier to resolve.
Lets get a clear diagnosis instead of a general ‘Dr Google’ version!
KEY MENTIONS
Ep 9 – Your ‘just right’ Goldilocks offer
Contact Deirdre via email, Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn
TRANSCRIPT
Hey there and welcome back to the Fun Business Fun Money podcast!
If this is your first time here, hey, hello! I’m so glad you’re here and I hope you decide to stick around because life is just better when more people are having fun in their business and making fun money!
What do I mean by fun money? Your take home pay and profit.
You’ll see plenty of people sharing their wins and talking about six figure launches, million dollar years, 10K months, 20K months… all of which are AWESOME! Kudos and celebrations all round!
But what they’re talking about is REVENUE. What do they ACTUALLY TAKE HOME? A whole lot less than that thanks to advertising, paying your team and all the other expenses that go into running a big business launch like that.
Thats why I focus on helping my clients go from $3K – $10K revenue months to $10K or more take home pay and profits.
That kind of ‘fun money’ is life changing for so many entrepreneurs, coaches, consultants, digital creatives and service providers.
For some it means they can leave their day job and go all in on their business because they’re more than able to cover their business costs AND their home expenses – mortgage, rent, groceries, utility bills, all the life stuff, and still have money left over at the end of the month.
Thats a pretty nice place to be, and I love helping clients get there!
Before that’s able to happen though, theres a bit of diagnosing required.
You know when you go to the doctor and list off a bunch of symptoms you’ve got, and you say “I think I have this condition because Dr Google said so”?
The doctor then runs some tests, looks at all the data and says “Nope, thats not it. The good news its something much simpler and easier to fix than that other thing you thought you had.”
You feel this HUGE sense of relief as you realise its just a few simple shifts, tweaks and changes that will get you back in the game, feeling awesome and working your magic.
Thats what we’re talking about today – the problem you ‘think’ you have may not actually BE your problem.
It could be something at a deeper, more basic level than you think and it could be much easier to resolve. Lets get a clear diagnosis instead of a general Google Search version.
There are 2 main challenges that clients usually come to me for help with, and BOTH of those are rooted in the same basic issue that they’ve either not done well, or not done at all.
1 – they want help with their offers and pricing. Nobody is buying what they’re putting out there, so there MUST be something wrong with their offers.
2 – they want to free up their time in some way, either adding more support or automating things.
They’re flat out 24/7, like those proverbial ducks legs under the surface of the water. They’re feeling the weight of the world on their shoulders, they want to have fun and actually enjoy life, business and making money again.
Let’s reverse engineer these and see if we can diagnose what the problem ACTUALLY is.
When people are looking for help with their offers and pricing, they think they’re doing something wrong.
They think…
🤔 They’re asking too much, or too little.
🤔 They’re not sharing enough about it on social media or to their email list.
🤔 Their sales process is missing an important step and thats why people aren’t booking calls, or if they are, they’re saying “Its not for me right now.” They can’t close the deal.
All of those are possible reasons, but they’re probably not the root cause – they’re symptoms.
In almost every case to date, its because they’re not being specific enough about who its for and what the results are. They’re not using clear enough language.
They’re using fluffy vague language, they’re playing it safe with a generic message aimed at serving everyone so nobody gets offended at being ‘excluded’.
You can say you’re a Pinterest strategist, which is great. But Pinterest is still a really broad platform filled with endless opportunities and millions of active users all searching for different things.
How do you help your clients stand out from the crowd? You have to be clear and specific about who its for and what you do for them.
You’re not just a Pinterest strategist – you’re a Pinterest strategist for a particular type of business, person, industry, niche area.
Thats also closely linked to the second reason people come to me.
They want to free up their time because they’re exhausted, on the verge of burn out, or recovering from it and they don’t want to make the same mistakes again.
They want to have more fun doing the work they truly enjoy and for it all to be easy. And profitable. And sustainable.
Which is the BEST kind of business if you ask me!
These clients are often thinking about adding support, outsourcing tasks or considering AI generated content as a way to take their content creation and marketing off their plate.
Firstly, can we all just acknowledge HOW DAMN HARD running a business by yourself can be?? Like, its not easy being your own boss, a lot of us are managing family and life stuff, juggling priorities with a full time job as well.
It can seem like an obvious solution to get support from a person – or a robot! – to free up some of your time and brain space.
But when we dig a little deeper into the nitty gritty of their business, its pretty obvious right away that they’ve overloaded themselves with a whole bunch of unnecessary things.
They might have been good and served you at some point, but as you grow and get further into your business you need to let go of old ways of doing things.
You don’t need to be marketing your offers on every available social media platform.
Especially if it means spending hours creating short form videos for reels that don’t generate enquiries, let alone paying clients. They’re cute and entertaining, but engagement doesn’t equal income or profit.
You don’t need to be pitching yourself in cold DMs to brand new connections, that may work for some – although its never worked on ME, so I don’t know who’s actually open to that style of approach!
Most people feel gross when that kind of message hits their inbox and they’ll ignore it! I don’t know about you, but I’m not in the business of pissing off 100 people to find 1 person who MIGHT be interested in my offer.
On the flip side, if you’re easily signing on new clients but you’re feeling burnt out and stressed actually delivering on it, there could well be an issue with your offer.
Adding in too many elements to justify the price you want to charge is a great way to learn what refund requests feel like. Someone signs up for your course, program or services and then realise the amount of work involved FOR THEM is way too much to handle or its not what they thought it was. That’s where you’re more likely to have refund requests.
Getting your offer ‘just right’ so Goldilocks would give you a high five as she dives into it and has the best time ever is essential. And of course it also has to be ‘just right’ for you, where you’re not running yourself ragged trying to deliver results and support your clients.
I went into more detail on this in episode 9, waaaaayyyyyy back at the start of this podcast! Its called “Your Goldilocks ‘just right’ offer”. Make sure you go check that out when you’re done here, you’ll find the link in the show notes.
What’s the solution that makes both of these ‘problems’ null and void?
Clear positioning.
How you present yourself to your audience isn’t all about selfies, or your brand, logo, fonts or colours for your website.
The words you use are honestly THE most important element in getting people to take notice of you and your offer.
Like I said earlier, most people are using vague and fluffy words to describe what they do, and its holding them back. Don’t be most people! Its not that hard to stand out from THAT crowd.
Get real about who you are, what you do and who its for. I talked about this in last week’s coaching episode, number 61 “Become easily referable with a specialised niche”. I mean, who doesn’t want to be the first name out of someone’s mouth when they’re asked for a recommendation in your field of expertise??
Your positioning is made up of:
Your niche – the people or industry you serve
Your specialty – the expertise you have that helps those people with a particular problem
You can niche and work with a specific type of person or industry.
You can specialise by the type of work you do, that solves a particular problem.
Or you can do both.
When you specialise AND niche, through the type of people or industry you serve AND what you do with or for them, your position becomes crystal clear and everything else gets easier.
You’re no longer saying you’re a web designer. You’re saying you’re a web designer for yoga teachers. Thats so clear that now I know EXACTLY who to talk about when my yoga teacher friends mention they need help with their website.
Having a specialised niche means your offers are a lot easier to sell. You don’t work with anyone and everyone, so your words become a lot more meaningful and direct.
You’re speaking to the exact problem that these people have, instead of being vague and general. No fluff here!
You’re also no longer burning yourself out trying to be everything to everyone. Think of the last business networking event you went to – how many of your ideal clients were there? One? Two if you’re lucky?
In all the networking events I went to before I decided no more, I’m done with this, I only ever found one client from countless hours of time invested to show up, make conversation and connect with people. ONE. One client!
I’m not saying you shouldn’t go to business networking events, if thats something you enjoy you absolutely should. But having a clear specialised niche that you’re talking to makes it easier for those people you meet to remember you AND refer you.
Can you see how having a specialised niche can help you free up your time, reduce burn out, make your marketing efforts and budget a lot easier AND increase sales of your offer?
There’s a flow on effect from this one important step of specialising and niching in the foundations of your business. That impacts almost every other aspect of what you do and how you do it.
You know exactly where those ideal clients are spending their time, so you can forget about all the social media platforms and focus YOUR time and energy on that social media platform, the podcasts you need to be guesting on, the work you do.
It streamlines your sales process, saving you time and energy there as well.
These people are already pre-sold on working with you because you’ve clearly communicated your expertise and the benefits of working with you over someone else. They know you’re the specialist!
It may mean no more sales calls, just a simple back and forth in the DMs or emails to clarify a few things and BAM! They’re in!
You’re more likely to have a wait list of people ready to work with you because they’re willing to wait to get the expert rather than the generic help.
As you bring on a team and grow your business, it makes training those people and passing on your knowledge so much easier. Many business owners know they NEED support but they don’t have the time to step back and train someone new.
When you’ve got a simplified focus in your business its a lot simpler to teach and train others to do what you do.
Its easier to put systems in place to support your clients – which ALSO makes it easier for training new team members. You don’t need a broad range of variations that cover all different scenarios because you’ve narrowed your niche so it all becomes clear, simple and easy.
Fun fact: I’m a HUGE fan of systems and writing things down as you learn and implement something new. It comes in handy for the next time you want to deliver the same process, whether its a launch or anything else.
Thats what I’ve got for you today!
When you think you know what the problem is in your business, take a step back and ask “Is this REALLY the problem? Or is it something deeper?”
Reverse engineer it and see what else under the surface.
You might not actually have a marketing or sales problem, your offer might be ‘just right’ already. It really could be as simple as a positioning problem, which is a relatively easy fix in the big scheme of things.
If you’d like my eyes on your business to speed up the process and spot these issues alongside you, reach out to me about IGNITE, my business and money coaching program.
IGNITE is for coaches, consultants and digital creatives – the fabulous copywriters, web designers and social media managers who make all our online businesses look and sound amazing!
You’re the support team for other businesses. I’m here to support YOU to grow and scale without burning out.
Send me a DM on Facebook or Instagram, I’m @funbusinessfunmoney, all one word.
Connect with me on LinkedIn and send me a DM there, just search for Deirdre Amies, I’m the only one in the world.
Or you can email hello@deirdreamies.com – you’ll find the links to all of those in the description of this episode, and in the show notes. Because thats not an easy name to spell, amiright??
Do you really have the problem you think you have? Maybe. Maybe not!
It could be something much easier and simpler to fix, that will free up your time AND make you the money you want.
Take care, have fun diagnosing yourself, and I’ll catch you in the next episode!
Want to make a BIG SHIFT in your business?
IGNITE private coaching could be the answer you’re looking for! Click here to check out the details, or send me a message for a quick chat about which option is the best one for you right now.
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