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RACHEL HOLLIS: “You’re not doing research, guys. You're making an excuse because you're scared. All right? You’re not doing research. You're going to Google, you're going to Instagram, you're going to Pinterest because you're scared and you don't know what to do, or, if we’re being honest with ourselves, you know exactly what to do, but the thing you know how to do is freaking hard.”
INTRO: I’m Amy Porterfield, ex-corporate girl turned CEO of a multi-seven-figure business. But it wasn't all that long ago that I lacked the confidence, the budget, and the time to focus on growing my small–but–mighty business. Fast forward past many failed attempts and lessons learned, and you'll see the business I have today, one that changes lives and gives me more freedom than I ever thought possible, one that used to only exist as a daydream. I created the Online Marketing Made Easy podcast to give you simple, actionable, step–by–step strategies to help you do the same. If you're an ambitious entrepreneur, or one in the making, who's looking to create a business that makes an impact and a life you love, you're in the right place, friend. Let's get started.
AMY PORTERFIELD: So, guess what. Today's episode is so very special because I'm taking you behind the scenes and giving you a sneak peek at something that's slightly top secret.
Now, you may remember hearing about my live event in San Diego last October, 2019, where I had Rachel Hollis and Jasmine Star and Stu McLaren and Gina Gomez on stage. And let's just say it was epic. And my team and I got to thinking: because the insight that these brilliant entrepreneurs shared was so next level, we wanted to give you a little taste of all the phenomenal guidance and the tips and the tools that the audience received. And honestly, this just scrapes the surface, because those who were there, they know that they walked away with so much knowledge. I mean, the good stuff just didn't stop.
So what I've got for you today is a few audio clips from our amazing 2019 Entrepreneur Experience live–event lineup. Now, these tips from Rachel and Stu and Jasmine and Gina are tidbits that every entrepreneur should know, especially if you're just starting now or you're dreaming of creating a business and a life that you love.
Now, first, you're going to hear from Rachel Hollis. Now, she gets real. Imagine that, right? And she does something that I love the most about her: she gives you some tough love. She talks about competition and an excuse that might be holding you back. And then you'll hear from Stu McLaren. I can't even say his name without smiling; that's how much I love this guy. Now, he talks about building trust to attract your ideal–customer avatar and taking a stand for what you believe in. My girl, Jasmine Star, is up next, and she gives some practical social–media advice. And you know I think she's the best of the best in this area, right? So I want you to listen closely, especially when she gives you her take on third–party posting apps. I get questions about that all the time. So good, so listen up. And then I have Gina Gomez coming in with the secret to creating happy customers and true interactions.
Now, I want you to stick around until the very end because if you want to know how to get your hands on a free ticket to Entrepreneur Experience 2020, well, I'm going to tell you how to make that happen.
But before we get there, let's kick it off with Rachel Hollis.
RACHEL: We look outside ourselves, and we are trying to figure out the clues. We're trying to figure out, like, how do we get from here to there? And so there’s this old saying that if you're unsure how to do something, you should model behavior, right? Who gets that? You're, like, oh, I'll look and see how someone else does it. And I think that's an incredible piece of advice that someone came up with in, let's say, like, 1952. That was a piece of advice that existed before Instagram and before Pinterest and before everybody started creating these curated images of what a perfect life or a perfect business seems like it should be.
So all of a sudden, you're trying to get advice and you're trying to sort of claw your way through someone's feed to find clues. And what you're really getting is a very beautiful highlight reel, and you are comparing your very real, very messy life to someone else's best day ever. Right?
For example, who has taken a picture since they've been at this event? Thank you. Only those people are vain? Okay. Who's taken a selfie or a picture with friends since you got to this—great, okay. And just—okay, let's try this. Who's taken a selfie ever in their life? Thank you. And when you went to take the selfie, did you get down real low, right? because that's the best angle, just right up under the double chin, right? And you definitely went to where the lighting was the worst, right? You went to a dark room. You got down low, right? No, of course you didn’t. Did you take that selfie on the day where you looked like garbage? No. It was when you just got your roots done, and someone else made your hair look pretty in a way you will never be able to accomplish again, right? And you’re like, this is who I really am. Woke up like this. And not only did you get the right angle and you got the natural light, but now we got to filter it. We got to filter it. So when it's us, we know how much we are doctoring something to make it be the best it can possibly be. Yeah? But when it's her, when it's them, all of a sudden, all we see are the ways that we don't measure up.
I think that we compare ourselves because we feel lost, and I think what happens is that we get distracted. Who has ever gone to do a little Internet research? And four hours go by, and you don’t even know what happened, but you are totally up today on The Rock’s wedding. It was beautiful. You checked in on Kevin Hart. Is he doing okay since the crash? What’s going on? You go down a deep rabbit hole. All of a sudden, you’re like, oh, my—Becky’s pregnant? I had no idea Becky— When did she get married? Oh, she married him. And you follow the wedding hashtag. It’s insane.
And here’s the thing. I assume that you're like me and you don't have a ton of extra time. Who is doing this business while working somewhere else? Yes. Who is doing this business while raising kids? Right. Who really needs some freaking traction in this business because you don’t even know what’s going to happen, right? Thank you for being real.
We do not have time to waste. And every single second that you look outside yourself to find the answer, you are wasting time. You’re not doing research, guys. You're making an excuse because you're scared. All right? You’re not doing research. You're going to Google, you're going to Instagram, you're going to Pinterest because you're scared and you don't know what to do, or, if we’re being honest with ourselves, you know exactly what to do, but the thing you know how to do is freaking hard.
STU MCLAREN: Another video that I created was around money. I struggled a long time with money. I don't know if any of you have ever struggled with money. I did. I struggled with the guilt of making money. So my mid–twenties, I was doing pretty well, and I had a business. It was mid–six–figure range. But every time I would get to—it would balloon between $250,000 to $400,000 a year. Every time I’d get up to $400,000 a year, my subconscious would kick in. It would be like, “Whoa, Stewie. Too much, buddy. You're making too much money, because you're not working anywhere near as hard as your parents.”
My parents worked two full-time jobs from the time that I can remember. My dad worked in a high school from nine in the morning until three in the afternoon, with people with special needs. And then four nights a week, he would work in a group home from eight at night until eight in the morning. I don’t know when he slept. But yet, he was at every basketball, soccer game that I played.
My mom was the same way. My mom worked in an elementary school with kids with autism from nine in the morning until three in the afternoon. And the three nights that my dad wasn't working, she worked in a fine–dining restaurant.
So I was earning more money than both my parents combined in my mid-twenties, and I wasn't working anywhere near as hard as they were. I used to feel really guilty about that.
And so what would happen is my subconscious would kick in, and it would squash something, because I wouldn't call clients back, I wouldn't do the marketing campaigns that I knew would work and that my income would come down, and my subconscious would be like, “Okay. That's good. Now we can get back to normal.” And it would come back up and back down and back up and back down.
The time that it changed was the very first time that we were in Kenya. When Amy—my Amy—and I were in Kenya, we were looking to build our very first school, and we don't know the cost of anything. And I'm talking to the chairman of the community. I'm trying to find out what things cost. And he said to me, he said—I asked him, I said, “How much does it cost to fund the full–time salary of a teacher?” He said, “It's about a hundred dollars a month.”
And at the time, I was selling our Wishlist Member software, and I thought, “Oh, my goodness. That's, like, one more sale.” And I made this connection. If I make one more sale, I could fund the full–time salary of a teacher. Imagine the impact that could have on those kids. And then the real light bulb went off, which was, well, what if I make a whole lot more money? And I just dedicate a whole lot more to the people and causes I’m passionate about? Imagine the impact I could have then. And, my friends, guilt was gone. I love making money now. Woo, do I love it, because what I realize is the more money we make, the more impact we can have.
So I created a video about this. And you see these topics. How many resonate with those two topics? Look at the hands in the air. That creates trust. It creates a connection. So the key when you are thinking about creating this type of content is to think about, what kind of customer do you want to attract? What kind of culture do you want to create? Values, beliefs, philosophy, opinions, causes you’re passionate about. What do you stand for? What is important to you? The key with this is to create consistent messaging around it so that people get to know you and build trust with you.
Now, here’s what I’m going to tell you, though. Some of you are going to resist this. I know this. Some of you are going to say, “Ooh, but if I share what I'm really thinking, people may not like me. I'm really going to divide people.” But I heard a great quote in my early career from Jim Edwards. He said, “Love me or hate me. There's no money in the middle.” And I'm here to tell you, when you take a stand, when you take a side, there will be people who do not agree with you. But the people that do will be celebrating you because, for the first time, somebody is giving voice to the very things that they are thinking, feeling, and wanting to do. And they are drawn to you like a magnet. When they finally have somebody who’s thinking and feeling the same way, they're drawn to you. So take a stand because you will attract people way faster when you take a stand.
JASMINE STAR: If you got a phone, you can create an ad. And just in case you doubt what I have to say, yo, I have to tell you, we split test.
We recently launched a Halloween opt-in for Halloween stock photos. I made these all with a filter in less than four minutes. I asked my ads team to put five dollars behind each ad. We tested the click-through rate, and then we doubled down on the one that worked.
Testing. And here’s the thing. What this took me—truth, four minutes—what it cost me to test—fifteen dollars. Everybody in this room, by God’s good grace, can probably do that.
So what is the makeover tip? Test, test, test.
AUDIENCE MEMBER: So, what are your thoughts on third-party posting apps, like Planoly, those kind of things?
JASMINE: I love them for the planning component. I am not an advocate of the automatic pushing out. Because Facebook and Instagram is owned by Mark Zuckerberg, and Mark Zuckerberg likes the attention, I have noticed and tested that when I use a third–party app, I don't get as much organic reach. I have not pressed or tested the automatic push out. But let me just tell you, if I had a party, and I invited you, and you sent your cousin to me instead, I'd have a feeling about you. This is all a platform. Mark Zuckerberg says I give you this free highway to drive, and you don’t even have the courtesy to come up and press the Send button. I am a fan of scheduling posts on Facebook, scheduling them, and then going in and manually publishing them. It makes a difference. This is—y’all, I sound like I'm wearing a tin hat, all this conspiracy theory. I just test. That's just it. I just test.
GINA GOMEZ: The secret to landing and keeping your greatest dream clients is to treat everyone you work with—not just clients, everyone—as if they are those clients now. So think about it this way. What would it feel like if all of your clients that you have now, you started treating them like they were who they want to be, who they're meant to be, and who they're capable of becoming? And all of us here are clients in some form or another, right? So imagine what it would feel like if you had someone that you give your money to, where you’re a client, treat you like you're the person they've been waiting their whole life to work with. It would probably feel a little weird at first. Why are they being so nice to me? Why are they going over the top? But then we'd probably get used to it pretty quickly because it would feel good. So imagine, not just as a customer or a client, but as a business owner, if you started implementing that, just that one practice, every single day in your business, how that would change their experience, your experience, your business. If we do it all together, how it could change an industry. And if we really do it right and we teach others to do it, we could change the world. That's how powerful this is.
AMY: Okay. That was pretty amazing, right? I loved every single presentation at Entrepreneur Experience. And I was in awe that these amazing entrepreneurs were on my stage and sharing so much knowledge and insight and strategies and lessons. It was just epic. Like I said, these little snippets just scratch the surface.
So if you're curious about Entrepreneur Experience 2020, here's something kind of cool. Right now, B-School, Marie Forleo’s B-School, is officially open for enrollment. And as you likely already know, I am a proud partner with B–School, and we promote it every single year because it literally was how I got my start in the online world. Everything that's in B-School I followed to a T over and over again to create the business I have today. And so I credit B-School for much of my—especially initial—success, and so that’s why I promote it to all of my students who are looking to build their online businesses, scale their online businesses, and go big with their big dreams and create the business and the life that they’ve always wanted. And so I've been talking about B–School a lot, and I put together an entire B-School bonus package for anybody who enrolls in B-School through, of course, my official affiliate link. And so if you become part of my B-School bonus experience, you get a free ticket to Entrepreneur Experience 2020. And again, it's in July, it's in San Diego, and it’s going to be amazing.
And so to get all the details of B-School and my B-School bonus experience, all you need to do is go to amyporterfield.com/bschool. B stands for business. I’ve got a lot of great bonuses. The live event is just one of them, so make sure to go check that out.
All right. The last thing I want you to know is that did you hear that we are doing tons of bonus episodes like this? We're shaking things up, we're changing things around, and we're doing bonus episodes that you will not hear about unless you are subscribed to the podcast. So if you haven’t clicked that Subscribe button on whatever platform you listen from, make sure to do so, so you’ll get a notification when my next bonus episode comes out.
All right. Thanks so much for tuning in. I can’t wait to talk to you again soon. Bye for now.
