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INTRO: I'm Amy Porterfield, and this is Online Marketing Made Easy.
AMY PORTERFIELD: Hey, there. Amy, here. Welcome back to another episode of the Online Marketing Made Easy podcast. Today we are doing a Shorty episode, and we're specifically talking about what happens when a launch isn't going as planned, like, during the actual launch, and how do you keep it together, and what do you do during that time?
And two things. It's been a long time since I've had a launch that didn't do well, until March of 2021. So, this year, I had a launch where I was not hitting my goals, and I didn't hit my goals. And we'll talk about that. I've talked about it a little on the podcast, but we'll get into that in a minute. But the reason why I wanted to talk to you about that is that I have—I don't know what else to call it—I'm going to call it a character trait. This is just, it's a way my mind thinks, that does not serve me, and it's something that I absolutely want to change. I was just on a walk with Hobie this morning, and I told him, “Babe, this is a part of my personality that I want to change drastically, and I'm on a mission to do so.” But I'm recording this episode at a time where I haven't changed it, but I'm going to start talking about it, and as I change it and as it starts to serve me to change this, I'll talk about that as well.
So, what the heck am I talking about? I have an all-or-nothing mentality. I have had it since I was really young. And sure, it might help me in some ways, and I'm not going to focus on the ways that it could help me. I'm very clear how it does not serve me. So an all-or-nothing mentality, how it does not serve me is that I can quickly look at how something is going wrong or not working, and in my head, kind of freak out and think, “Oh, my gosh. I'm not doing this right. I'm not going to hit my goal. This isn't going to work out.” The minute I see it not working, I can quickly jump in that direction, go on the dark side. And also, so it doesn't serve me well, things aren't working out as planned, but it also doesn't serve me to actually get started.
So, here's the point that I wanted to make, or the story I wanted to tell in order to make the point. So, I decided to do this thing called 29029. I don't even know if that's the right way to say it. And it's this climb that you do, and if you climb this mountain seventeen times, you will have climbed Everest, and you have something like thirty-six hours to do it. I actually talked about it on the podcast over a year ago. Hobie and I signed up for it. It was expensive, so we put down some cold, hard cash to do it. And Amy and Stu McLaren, our dear friends, were doing it with us. So the four of us were going to do it. And Hobie and I started training for it. I kind of hated the training for it. It was, like, we would go on these long walks, up tons of hills, for, like, three hours at a time. I’m like, I don't even enjoy this. But I said I was going to do it.
And then COVID hit, and they contacted us, let us know the climbs have been canceled this year. You can postpone until next year or get most of your money back. And my first thought was, “Oh, I’m getting most of my money back.” I didn't even care that they weren't going to give it all back, because in my mind, I thought, “I don't think I can make seventeen climbs. I don't think I could actually do this. And so I don't want to be a failure, so this is my way out.” Like, I'm embarrassed that I'm telling you this, but I'm telling you. So I was like, “Oh, I'm out.” So I told Hobie, “You cool if we get out of this? COVID, they're giving us our money back.” He's like, “Yeah, let's do it. I don't even like the training for it.” So we got out of it. So I call up Stu and Amy, and I was like, “Oh, my god. Are you guys so excited? It was canceled.” They're like, “No. We postponed until next year.” I'm like, “What?” And they’re like, “You postponed, right?” Like, “No! I was so excited to get out of it. I've been so nervous about this climb. I don't think I can make seventeen. I got in over my head. This is too much. I can't do it.” And they just laughed at me.
Well, fast forward a year later. And Amy and Stu, if you follow them, Stu McLaren is the creator of TRIBE and membership program. They did it this weekend. And I was texting them nonstop because I was really excited for them. And Amy, Stu’s wife, went into it like, “I'm going to do my very best. I want to hit seventeen climbs, but even if I don't, just, I'm going to show up for the experience. It’s going to be fun. There’s live music. There’s tons of people. It’s just an experience you could never get anywhere else. I’m just going to show up for that.” And Stu's like, “Yeah. My goal is to hit seventeen, for sure, but let's just see what we can do.”
And I watched them before they even went on the climb, and I thought, “I want that mentality. I want the mentality of, I'm just going to do my best. I'm going to train. I'm going to do what I can. I'm not going to obsess over it. I'm not going to make this mean something that it doesn't need to mean.”
That's another thing. How many times do we don't accomplish something, and we make it mean something that it doesn't need to mean, right?
And so anyway, fast forward, and both of them hit the climb, seventeen. They did it. They absolutely did it. They said it was the hardest thing they've ever done. Amy mentioned that she cried a few times, which I absolutely would cry a few times. But they did it. And they both said hardest thing they've ever done. At least I know Amy said that. I'm pretty sure Stu thought it was really hard as well. But they did it.
And I looked at Hobie today, and I said, “I want to start looking at things like I will do my very best, and I'm going to do it for the journey, for the process, not for the reward of actually accomplishing exactly what I set out to accomplish.”
So why do I tell you this story, and why am I going to share with you that that's my new mission, to get to that type of thinking? Well, I share this with you because when you're launching and you're in the middle of a launch and it's not going well—and I had that. So, in March of 2021, that was the first launch in a long time where I'm like, ooh, I don't know. Maybe we set a goal too high, but we're not hitting that goal.
Now, so much about that launch was so different than all my other launches. I didn't use affiliates. I didn't do a big pre-launch. I only had a four-day cart. I cut out so many of the bells and whistles, wanting to keep it like a mini launch. So I cut down my goal as well, but I still don't reach that big goal that I had set.
And every day of the launch felt hard. Every day of the launch, I felt disappointed in myself. Luckily, it was only a four-day launch, because I really beat myself up. Every day of the launch, I'm like, “Oh, god. We're not going to reach it. We're not going to reach it. What does this mean? Is my business not as viable anymore? Am I not as good as I once was? Does this mean my message is falling flat?” Like, oh, my gosh. To get into my head during that time was a very dark time. And then I felt guilty for all those thoughts because I'm like, oh, my gosh. I need to support my students. I need to know how to help them when things aren't going as planned.
So, the reason I wanted to share this with you is that imagine if we adopted the mindset of, I'm going to do the very best I can; I'm going to leave it all on the table; and I'm going to allow the experience, the process, the fact that I'm showing up, to be just as important as the goal that I set. I think it's great to set revenue goals for launches, but that cannot be the only thing that we bank our success on.
So the fact that in March, I showed up every day, the fact that my team and I did exactly what we said we were going to do, the fact that we welcomed new students into our program, all of that needs to matter just as much as the bottom line. And I didn't realize how far I had gotten from that type of mindset until there I was in a launch, where it wasn't going as planned. And I don't like where my mind went, because I had an all-or-nothing mentality. Either I hit that goal and I'm a success and I'm great at what I do and I deserve it, or I don't hit that goal, and then I got to think about all the things that I did wrong or that are wrong with me or what it means, even though I'm literally making up meanings.
When I go back to that March 2020 launch, and if I went into it with that same mentality that Amy, my friend, went into her big climb, like, I'm here for the experience. I'm here for the lessons. I'm here for the experience of what it feels like to push myself to reach a goal. I'm here for showing up for myself, doing what I said I was going to do. And God forbid—do I even mention?—I'm here to have fun. I'm here to have a good time. I get to do this. Whether it's I get to do the climb or I get to launch in my own business, I get to do this. I am not in a cubicle. I do not have a boss. I am calling the shots. Whether I'm hitting the goal or not, I am showing up, doing what I said I was going to do. I'm here for the experience. I'm here for the learning. I'm here for the growth. Imagine if we went into launches like that.
So, here's a way to make this a little bit more actionable. I don't know who needed to hear this message, but sometimes I just feel like if I share this, maybe somebody in a launch right now or going into a launch will have a different experience. And here's why a different experience is important, my friend, because you are in this for the long haul. You are in this to be here ten, twenty years from now. And if it's an all-or-nothing mentality, then when you don't hit those goals, it's really hard to show up the next time, because if you beat yourself down, beat yourself down, beat yourself down, you're going to get to the point that this is no fun, you're not learning, you don't feel like you're growing, and now you want to change direction. I want to change my entire business. I want to maybe go back to a nine to five or have someone hire me to do x, y, z. This isn't working.
But who says that a launch where you hit ten thousand dollars versus the twenty thousand dollars you had planned, who said that means it wasn't successful or wasn't working? You. You are the one who's saying that. I'm not saying that. No one else is saying that.
So that's one more thing I wanted to share with you is we're making up these goals. I have a coach that after the March launch, it was a multimillion-dollar launch, but I didn't hit my goal, so I felt like, okay, I failed on this one. And she’s like, boo hoo. You made great money, with an amazing profit margin on the launch. Too bad for you. And I was like, ooh, good point. And you don't need to make millions to be able to say that. If you make ten thousand dollars four days, let's say you did a four-day launch like I did and you made ten thousand dollars, do you know how many people would be like, “Holy cow. How did you do that? What?” And you also know my motto. If you can make ten thousand dollars, you can make twenty thousand dollars. You can make one hundred thousand dollars the next time. Like, I believe, proving to yourself to get to one point, you can always jump to the next point if you stay in the game and you keep showing up.
So, sometimes these Shorty episodes feel uncomfortable to me because I'm not going to teach you a step-by-step strategy, I'm not going to teach you exactly what to do, and I feel like that's what I'm known for and what I do best. But I also know that I'm on this journey with you. I'm building a business. I'm in the trenches. And although I might be some steps ahead of you, I know what it feels like not to hit goals. I know that, especially in the moment, when every day of the launch is happening, you don't have enough people showing up for your webinars; it's not converting at what you want it to; you're not going to hit your revenue goals; you're like, “I know my numbers. I'm not going to hit it;” in those times, where you can make yourself stronger, where you can grow, is if you ask yourself, what else is happening here that could be really good for me? This is happening for me, not against me. So what can I learn? Where can I grow? What else can I celebrate? What else is true? You're showing up. You're doing it. You're in it. That's all true and all very, very valuable to recognize.
Let's not have an all-or-nothing mentality around our launches, because it will not serve us. I'm very much living proof of that. The next launch I go into will not have an all-or-nothing mentality. And in fact, I'm going to practice moving away from that, and I've got to kind of figure out what does that look like instead? And I'll share that journey as I get there. But in all areas of my life, because I want to be here for the journey, not just the destination. Sounds so cliché, but think about it. What if you were always showing up for the journey and not just the destination, the rewards, the accolades, the success, but you're in it for the journey? I believe we'd have a much richer life. I know I will, and that's something I'm focusing on.
And if you like this episode and you want me to share my journey of how to move away from an all-or-nothing mentality, I’ll absolutely continue to share that. So DM me on Instagram. Let me know what you think. And if this resonated with you, let me know. I would love to know. And also, if there's somebody out there that you think, “Ooh, they need to hear this,” please share this episode with them. It could be the difference of them continuing and keep moving forward and giving up. It can literally make a difference for them in that way. So grab the link to this episode, share it with your friend, or post it on social. I would greatly appreciate it, and thanks for being here with me.
I'll see you on Thursday for more entrepreneurial goodness. Until then, take care.
