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JAMIE TRULL: “It is 100 percent ‘do it anyway.’ That for me, when I finally just said, ‘You know what, what's the worst that can happen?’ and I think we're so afraid to put ourselves out there. I'm a perfectionist. I want everything to be completely buttoned up. But when I finally just started showing up all the time, every single week, I would show up in my Facebook group, I just started being there and listening to people, just start doing. I just think it's so, so important. Even if it's not perfect, it's not going to be perfect, you just have to start somewhere. So even if that's starting to build a list, starting to do some content on the side while you build that list while you're still in corporate and kind of building that up and getting that experience and the momentum. I look back at even just the Lives that I started last July, and I kind of laugh because they're kind of terrible.”
AMY PORTERFIELD: “We all do that. We look back, and we're like, ooh, yikes.”
JAMIE: “I know. But I still, I keep them up there, and I still even share them sometimes when somebody asks a question that I'll go back and share an old Live of mine. But just doing, I got so much better, and I got so much more confident. And nobody was sitting there, criticizing me. Nobody—I mean, and the people that did, who cares, right? Who cares what the people, who you're friends with on Facebook from high school think. Think about the person that you want to connect with, that you can help, and just focus on them, and don't worry about the rest, and just do it. Just start.”
INTRO: I’m Amy Porterfield, ex-corporate girl turned CEO of a multi-million-dollar business. But it wasn't all that long ago that I lacked the confidence, money, and 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 helps you create a life you love, you're in the right place. Let's get started.
AMY: My guest on today's episode was a corporate girl-turned-overwhelmed entrepreneur-turned entrepreneur with a thriving online business, a lucrative digital course, and the time and freedom to prioritize her family—like vacations—and make an impact far beyond what she had ever imagined. Her name is Jamie Trull. Her business is called Balance CFO, and you may remember her from episode 280, where I taught you how to do a course-validation call, with Jamie, and she was my ideal-customer avatar,
Okay, so, just to set the stage. Back in 280, episode 280, Jamie wasn't a customer of mine. She hadn't yet joined Digital Course Academy®️. I had seen her post a few times in a Facebook group of mine, and I thought, she is a perfect avatar for me. She's working one on one with clients. She's just starting her online business. But she wants to create courses. Like, she is a great avatar. Let's do a course-validation call with her to teach my podcast listeners how to validate an idea via a phone call with someone you think is perfect for your product, program, or service. So that's how this all came about. Well, on that episode, Jamie had said, hey, check back with me when I actually have success, because she knew she wanted to go through Digital Course Academy®️.
So here we are. I’m checking back in. And let me tell you, I'm very impressed. This is a brand-new woman, to say the least. So, again, when I had first talked to her a while back, she had left her corporate job to become an entrepreneur so that she could have the time and flexibility to be with her little ones. She's got young kids. But what she realized was that working one on one with clients only left her feeling more overwhelmed. She was attached to her phone, and she was frustrated that she didn't have the time and energy for her family. She hoped she'd have more freedom when she left the corporate world, but she didn't. So after using the practices she learned in Digital Course Academy®️, DCA, Jamie launched her five-week course called Financial Fitness Formula, which help solopreneurs take control of their business finances so they could make more profit and pay themselves more. Can I get in amen on that one?
Now, I don't want to give too much away, because I want Jamie to share her own successes with you. But I'll just give you a hint that in Jamie's very first launch of an online course, she made five figures. So incredible. She has some fantastic tangible advice for those of you just starting out and some unique approaches that you can use to launch at any point in your business, whether you've been at it for a while or if you're brand new to all of this. So I won't make you wait any longer. Let's go ahead and welcome Jamie to the show.
Hey, there, Jamie. Welcome back to the show.
JAMIE: Hey, I'm so glad to be back.
AMY: I am so excited for this. I mean, like I said in the intro, I was not thinking that you were going to be back with a success story, at least, like, it wasn't really on my radar. I was excited when I heard you had success, but I'm like, how cool is this, that when she came on the show, she wasn't even a student of DCA; now she's kicking butt. So I couldn't resist but to bring you back. So thanks again.
JAMIE: Of course. I’m excited to be back. I told you that we needed to reconnect in six months.
AMY: You did! You did! So, here we are. So very cool.
Okay, so one thing I’d love for you to talk a little bit about is some of the lessons you've learned along the journey. So you went from corporate to being an entrepreneur with one-on-one clients, and then you found yourself completely overwhelmed. And we have a lot of listeners who are on that path, if not already there. So what would you say is your biggest piece of advice to those entrepreneurs to avoid ending up overwhelmed and further away from what they dreamed of creating?
JAMIE: Yeah, I mean, I think for me, like you said, I mean, I left corporate, with these big dreams that I was going to kind of take control of my own schedule and be in charge of my own time and have flexibility and get to spend more time with my family and do all of those things that we think in our head that self-employment looks like. And for me, the reality of the situation became, as I got busier and busier and got more clients, which was amazing, I just, instead of feeling like I had one boss, I felt like I had a bunch of bosses.
AMY: I can relate.
JAMIE: Yeah. So it was just kind of trading in one boss to go to a situation where I felt like I had to answer to multiple different people who had different timelines and different ideas of what they needed. And even with that, even with working as hard as I could and pouring everything into it, I felt like my earning potential wasn't—I wasn't even going to be able to get back to where I was in the corporate world. And that kind of started to really get me down when I realized I was working harder than ever, but yet the path to making the amount of money that I wanted to make and the path even to making the impact that I wanted to make was going to be really hard, working just one on one with clients. So that's exactly where I was when we talked, which was just in this overwhelm stage of how do I keep up with all of this? How do I actually scale my business in a way that it actually is for me and doesn't feel like it's keeping me down? And I think we just connected right at that kind of right time, I feel like. It was one of those divine-intervention things, where it was kind of like I needed to make a decision. I needed to do some kind of pivot to figure out where I was going to go in my business. And then all of a sudden, you and DCA were in front of me, and it was like, this is it. This is 100 percent what I need to do.
AMY: I love that. And I know you've talked about leading with intention to scale early. Talk to me about what you mean by that.
JAMIE: Yeah. And so I think that that was one thing. When I started getting into this, I realized pretty quickly that scaling was critical. So that was something that I had to figure out, because I think what happens to a lot of people is they get into this self-employment and then they're years into it, and they're just feeling this crunch of they don't feel like they have the freedom that they wanted. And they haven't really thought about, how are they going to scale this? How are they going to make this work? How are they actually going to be able to get out from under it, to stop kind of that trading-dollars-for-hours thing? And I think that that's something you really have to start thinking about early. Even as you're starting to have clients and take on more clients, how do you build your business in the background so that eventually you can actually really scale it when you get to that point? And so I think that is so critical to be thinking about.
I think for me, it went back to—even with list building. At the very beginning, when I first started list building, I didn't know what I was going to do with it. I had no idea what I would end up doing with the list. And I almost didn't feel like I should list build because I didn't have really anything to sell that list because I couldn't serve 500 people at the same time. So I held back for a little while, even in list building. And it wasn't until I got to the point where I was like, I just need to start this. And then later on, I will have something that I can offer them, hopefully.
AMY: Okay. That is such a great lesson. If you are listening right now and the only thing you walk away with from this episode, and there will be many things, but the only thing you walk away with is one thing, I want it to be that you can start an email list without knowing what you're going to sell to them. You can start an email list and say, I don't even know. When I get 500 people on my email list, I don't even know what I would do with 500 people because I can't serve 500 people because I work one on one with people. I still want you to make the effort to grow your email list, because when you hear what Jamie did with that list, you will then realize, holy cow, if I start it now, it's going to pay off for me in the future. So let's talk about what happened.
So we're going to talk numbers. My audience has been patiently waiting to hear how your first launch went. So, like I said in the intro, Jamie was on the show. She was my ICA call. And she said, all right, check back with me because I'm going to make this happen. And you did, my friend. You did. So I'd love for you to give us a brief recap of where you were before DCA, and where you are after DCA, and your first launch.
JAMIE: Yeah, sure. Of course. So before DCA, I was kind of in that spot where I was working through with several different one-on-one clients. I was exhausted. I was probably making half of what I wanted to be making, honestly. I could only service, really, like, ten clients at a time. That was my max. I could not, I could not do more than that. But I really, actually, probably needed to be at about twenty to be able to make what I made even just in the corporate world. And so that was kind of a difficult reality to sit with.
So kind of flash forward. I took DCA. I started it in the fall. And I did a pre-sale for my course in December. And in December, I sold $17,000 worth of the course in one week of just a soft pre-sale, a couple of Facebook Lives, and some emails. And I sold $17,000. I hadn't even recorded a thing. I had an outline and a sales page, and that was it.
AMY: Okay. So cool. And guys, don’t worry. I’m going to have her break down her pre-sell strategy in a moment, but keep going.
JAMIE: Yeah. And so then, about maybe five, six weeks later was when I did the full launch. And I did the full DCA style, two-week launch, with webinars and all the things. And during that launch, I generated another $27,000 in revenue. So in total it was $44,000 in revenue that I generated.
AMY: So incredible. Congratulations. That is just—
JAMIE: It was amazing.
AMY: That is so amazing. I always ask this, and I ask this of men and women, so this isn’t a sexist thing, like what does your husband think? But if it’s a man, I’ll say, what does your wife think? But what did your husband think when you made $44,000 in an online launch?
JAMIE: Well, I think it's so funny because they are so far from this world, so it just like almost doesn't compute. But at the same time, my husband believes in me more than anybody. And he's like, yeah, I can see that.
AMY: Oh, I love it. He's like, of course you did.
JAMIE: Yeah. He was like, I don’t know if I fully get it, but if somebody’s going to do it, it's going to be you. So that was kind of a nice thing. But he definitely—it's such a different world. I think people who are outside of this whole life don't really understand how exactly it works. But he's fully supportive, regardless, of course, even more now than he was before.
AMY: Oh, I bet. That's so cool. We both are very fortunate to have spouses that support us. I believe you can do it without a supportive spouse, but I know it's tougher. So we are very fortunate in that sense.
Okay, so you made $44,000. Break down for me, how much did you spend on Facebook ads, and what did it look like in terms of total profit, and what did your email list look like, and all that good stuff?
JAMIE: And this is important to me because I'm a finance person. So a lot of what I teach is revenue doesn't matter; it's profit that matters. So whenever I hear success stories, not from you but just in the grand scheme of people talking about success stories, oftentimes they only quote their revenue numbers. And my question in my head is always, yeah, but how much did you really make? How much did you actually make?
And so that's a really good question, and I'm glad you asked because I only spent $2,000 on Facebook ads. I had never run a Facebook ad in my life until six days before my first webinar. And I started kind of tinkering around with it, probably fairly poorly. But what helped so much, though, was in DCA, there was a Facebook ads training that I didn't even know I needed, and that ended up being so helpful for me to even figure out what to do. But I spent $2,000 total in ads. And then when I added up all the tech and my virtual assistant, who, Sarah, she kept me sane during all of this. So you have to have a virtual assistant, you guys. It was only—my total with ads, plus the tech and my V.A., was $4,000. So I netted $40,000, which was my goal. My stretch goal, actually, in this whole thing was to get to a $40,000 profit. So $44,000 in revenue, $40,000 profit. I think next time I'll probably do a little bit more in ads, but I kind of wanted to test it out a little bit before I went full force into it. I think I have a little bit of a better feel on how it works now.
AMY: For sure. I love when I hear my new students launching, having a five-figure launch, and not putting tons of money toward their Facebook ads. Like, to me, I want you to definitely invest more in Facebook ads in your second launch. But starting small in your first one, 100 percent. That's so important.
So if you only spent $2,000 on ads, and then, of course, you had your VA and some technology as well, what did your email list look like?
JAMIE: So I'm trying to remember exactly. I think when I first launched in December, it was at about 2500. And then in my regular launch, I had gotten to about maybe 3500 or so—
AMY: Great.
JAMIE: —on my email list. Yep. And then I had a Facebook group as well, which a lot of the people from my email list are from my Facebook group. But it hit about 4,000, a little over 4,000, at the same time. So that's where most of my list ends up coming from.
AMY: So this is what I love. She grew her list over time and also a Facebook group, which is such a great way to build engagement and community and find your tribe, so that when she did launch, she had an audience to launch to. And so a few thousand people on her email list, plus a little bit of money with Facebook ads, and here she is having a $44,000 launch her first time out.
So I want all of you listening now, if you plan to create a digital course, if you plan to launch down the road, the email list, like right now, do it now. Now, I want you to know you do not have to have 3,000 people on your email list to make $44,000 with a launch. There's people that have had a lot less and a lot more. Don't get stuck on the number. I'd rather you focus and get obsessed with taking action in this area. And so that's why we're always like list building, list building, list building. In fact, I've got a free training on it—amyporterfield.com/listbuilding. Go watch that free training. It's definitely going to get you moving in the right direction.
JAMIE: And I think one thing I'd love to add, too, that I didn't even have—for people who are sitting there wondering, well, that's a lot of people, not everybody on my list was my ICA. That's one of the things I'm starting to hone in on a little bit more now.
AMY: Great point.
JAMIE: But part of it, too, is I didn't actually start my list. I had a list of zero on July 1, 2019. So in six months, I had gotten to that point. It is possible. And now, again, honing in on my ICA, it's gotten even easier to add people onto my list. But I think for people who think, oh my gosh, I can't get there, you can. It's just you can start now. Start now and have something. I think that was one of the biggest misconceptions I had in all of this, is that I needed to have a list or I needed to have a product before I had a list. I talked about that in the beginning. But that was something I had to shift that mindset. And that is what helped me. List building first and then launching was what made all the difference, I think.
AMY: Oh, I love that.
JAMIE: Focusing on having an audience to launch to, and it doesn't need to be a big audience. It really doesn't. A small, engaged audience does a great job, but just kind of giving that content for a long time, I felt like I'm giving and I'm giving content and I'm creating all this stuff for free, but where is it going? And then it quickly paid off as soon as I had something to offer. There were people—the very first day that I offered my pre-sale, I had people jump in immediately because they were just waiting for me to have something to sell.
AMY: Yes, exactly. That's exactly what I want people to experience, so I love your story so much.
Now we're going to talk about that pre-sell strategy you did to generate the $17,000 before you had even created the course. But before we get there, how do you feel, or how did you feel, before taking DCA, and then after, doing your first launch?
JAMIE: Yeah. So I think it's night and day, honestly. I mean, it almost feels like a lifetime ago now because I feel like my world is now this. Most of what I've shifted away in large part from doing one to one, I have a few that I've kept of my clients, but for the most part, I am now focusing on online because the impact is so much greater there. I feel like the scalability is so much more there than what it is when I am spending my time just working one to one.
And I think that's been the biggest thing for me is just the impact that I can have. And seeing so many people have success stories versus just those small, being able to work just one on one, it's great to see those people succeed. But when you see it on a grander scale, it's so rewarding. That's been one of the big things is just the rewarding aspect.
But then the flexibility has been, I mean, world changing as well. I talked about this when I was on last time, but I have two young kids. I have a six-year-old and a three-year-old right now. And a lot of the reason that I started my business to begin with was to have more flexibility. But I didn't feel like that in my business before. I mean, at all. And now I feel like I have that flexibility.
I actually, for the very first time—I'm an accountant by trade. I'm a CPA by trade. I came from corporate accounting. Never in fifteen-year career have I been able to take a vacation in January or February. I went with my husband, got a great opportunity to go on a trip with his work in February to Costa Rica. And I got to go. And I just remember sitting there in shock. It was after my launch had had been done and everything. And I couldn't believe I was on vacation in February, and I could just enjoy it and not even have to worry about anything or clients calling me or anything.
AMY: So good. When you're talking about vacation, as you know, at the time of this recording, we are in quarantine, during a pandemic. So it's like vacation. That sounds so good right now. That feels so exciting.
JAMIE: Like, before all of this.
AMY: Right. Right before all this happened, so good timing.
Let's talk real quick—total side note—but we are in quarantine right now, and you have two toddlers. So you were working from home before, so it's not like you were sent home during quarantine, but how is it going over there?
JAMIE: It's a little crazy. Part of it is self-inflicted. I mean, the great thing is hadn't planned to be selling right now anyway. I'm kind of gearing up for what my next project is going to be. I’m going to do next big launch of my Financial Fitness Formula, which is the one I launched in January, again, probably in the fall. So I was kind of going to use this time for some projects and gearing up anyway, which was good. And the thing that has been great, though, about it is I have kind of created this place, my Facebook group, which is all about financial literacy and teaching business owners and solopreneurs all types of financial concepts. So usually we're talking about profit margins or how to read your P&L or something like that.
But what happened with all of this going on right now with the quarantine is I started to see people coming in asking questions about when the stimulus kind of got passed. That was the big thing that was on everybody's mind. And obviously, nobody is really an expert in that, but I decided, you know what, this is what my audience wants to know about right now. They don't want to hear about profit margins right now. They're not making revenue. They’re businesses are closed. What can they do? So I shifted my message during that time. And I said, you know what, I'm just going to answer—I'm just going to serve. And that was something that you had talked about. I think you talked about it on one of your podcasts. You talked about it in Momentum. And I heard you in Momentum saying, how—I’m trying to remember exactly what you said, but it was something to the effect of how do you want to serve your community? How do you want to show up?
AMY: Yeah. And be remembered when all of this passes. Yeah.
JAMIE: What do you want people to say about you? Do you just want to be gone? And so I had planned to work on some different projects, and I kind of shifted and said you know what, I'm just going to show up and serve people in any way that I can. And this is a way that I can. So I just started reading through 880 pages of stimulus bills and trying to decode it for people, because that's sort of what I do is I take complicated concepts that nobody understands and try to put them into words that make sense.
And so I shifted everything in my group to that, where we were talking about stimulus and the loans and what do people need to do and navigating them through that. And in two and a half weeks, we're sitting here in April recording this, in two and a half weeks, over 6,000 people have joined my Facebook group. My email list has grown by 4,000 people. And it's like, there’s like—I just checked, there's a queue of 500 people waiting to get in right now. It's been insane. And all it is is just showing up. I mean, literally, it was your Momentum came on, that live in Momentum came on the same day that the stimulus bill, I think, came out, or maybe the day before. And it lit something in me that said, no, I'm going to serve. I'm going to use this time to serve and show up. And it has been the biggest game changer. It has basically doubled my entire email list.
AMY: Okay, Jamie. I love that. Let's give that Facebook group a shout out. Where can people find you on Facebook?
JAMIE: Yeah. So come on over. It's Financial Literacy for Women Business Owners. But I have to say, we've gotten a lot of men in there lately. I am accepting men right now, as long as they're fine with being in a community of—
AMY: Of badass women? Yeah, that's cool.
JAMIE: Exactly, exactly, exactly. Come on over. But yeah, come on over, but, yes.
AMY: So good. Okay, good. I'm glad we talked about that because you've seen some great success just by showing up, rising to the occasion, being relevant at a time when people need you most. So, so many great examples.
Okay, so let's get to that pre-sell. Give me step by step, how did you do it? And it really here's what's cool. Inside Digital Course Academy®️ for September 2020, we are adding a pre-sell component to the program. For years and years and years, I said, first, create your entire course after you validate it, and then launch, because there's some stress in selling something before it's made, because then you really put your feet to the fire and you got to get it done. But what I’ve realized is my students want to sell first. They want to pre-sell. They want to bring in some money, validate their course idea in a big way, because when people lay down money for a course before you have it made, you know they really want it.
So I'm changing my tune because I've really listened to my students, and I've gotten so many success stories from them around pre-selling, including yours. So for those of you who join me in 2020 for DCA, there's a pre-sell component. We’re changing how we’re teaching it, which is really exciting. So with that, Jamie, you've been a really big inspiration for us to make that tweak. So tell us, there's a lot of different ways to pre-sell, but tell us how you did it.
JAMIE: Yeah, absolutely. And I'll tell you, I didn't plan to do it, because I'm kind of like you, in the way that I don't like to put that added stress on myself. I’m more of a I want everything done, and then I will sell the thing. But the reason I mainly did it is that I'm a finance person, and so the idea—I budget out everything that I do, and the idea that I had no idea what the revenue was going to be on the end of this, that made it hard to budget out my costs because when you're creating a course, your costs often come before the revenue comes in. You have ads, potentially, you've got software, you've got different costs, and I just didn't know how to budget that out. And that was something that I wrestled with.
And so I finally decided, actually, I know my ICA. I know my ICA is usually ones that get to December and they're looking for tax deductions because they usually haven't prepared and put aside that money for taxes, so they're trying to find any place that they can use their money. And so I was like, you know, I can use that. I can use that.
So I went ahead and started doing the pre-sell in December to kind of get an idea of, okay, is the market there? I'd done all my ICA work. I knew the need was there. The question I had in my mind, though, was my ICA essentially puts off finances. They don't want to deal with it, they're not excited about it, and so they tend to put it off. So my fear was, okay, is this going to be one of those things that they need, but are they not going to buy it? Are they going to say they need it, but then at the end of the day they don't buy it? So that's why I said, you know, I'm just going to pre-sell it to make sure that I'm on the right track with what I've got. And when I had those pre-sell numbers that I did, I knew, okay, this has some legs. This can work.
And all I had—I did do a full sales page, which took me a whole day, locking myself, a whole Saturday, my husband took the kids, I locked myself in the room and I did it. So I had that. And then I just did—in my group, I did a couple of Facebook Lives. And it was really just at the end of the normal Facebook Lives. I mentioned it. I kind of took your lead to talk about something that was related a little bit to the course or was maybe a mindset shift that people needed to hear before they would be ready to buy the course.
So I just kind of mentioned it a couple times and sent out some emails to my list and did for the first time get some unsubscribes, which was hard because I normally didn't get unsubscribes because I normally didn't sell them my list. So that was a hard thing to deal with in the beginning was seeing those numbers. But I also knew that every single time I sent an email, somebody bought. So, it was hard because I was getting in my head about sending out too many emails to people, which I think is what happens when you see, oh, my gosh, so many people unsubscribe. But at the same time, people were buying.
And then I closed the cart on the pre-sell, and I had people who were upset that they didn't get it because they didn't know it was closing. So I realized at that point that I needed to go ahead and go sell, and it was okay. So, yeah. So the pre-sell really helped me.
And the other great thing that the pre-sell did was the pre-sell helped me to see what the objections were going to be. So that was something really critical is I got to see, I got to get a little bit of a preview as to what people's objections were about buying the course.
AMY: Yes, exactly.
JAMIE: And so because of that, I was able to use that. And when I did my webinar launch, I kind of already sort of incorporated it into my webinar launch, with already having those objections. So that was kind of a nice, little preview.
AMY: So many good things. I love that.
Okay, so when you pre-sold, you told your Facebook group, you did some Facebook Lives, you emailed your list, and you learned some objections early on, which is so great. You gave $100 off to anybody who bought before. And then what did you tell them? Because the program wasn't ready yet, so what did you say to them?
JAMIE: I told them that their first module will drop February 10 and that that's when they would have it in their inbox. And it's a live course, so there is—not a live course. It's recorded. But I have a live component to it where I do Q&As in a Facebook group and all of that. So I did get the Facebook group up and running and sent people invites to that and got them kind of getting to know one another. And I'd jump in there just to say hey, from time to time.
And then I would even put out a survey in there about their businesses. So they could go in and fill out information about their specific businesses, and it gave me a little bit, even as I was creating the course, that was really useful to me to see the different types of businesses that bought and make sure that it was with that type in mind that I created the course. So that was the nice thing, also that it gave me some more insight. It helped me create the course with actual people in mind instead of nameless, faceless—I could picture a person, and I could picture the type of business they have and the struggles that they have. And that was really helpful when I actually sat down and did the recording of it all.
AMY: So they essentially had to wait a little over a month to get module one.
JAMIE: Well, they bought—a lot of them bought in the middle of December, so it was a little bit more than that, even. It was probably about six weeks. They waited a while.
AMY: And that—so I'll tell you guys, it typically is a little bit longer than I would suggest. Jamie definitely got fortunate there, that she didn't have any problems. Sometimes people are—when they wait a little too long, they kind of lose the zest for wanting the program. And so I love kind of like a month-ish. But hey, you do what you got to do, and you made it work. So I'm not faulting you at all. I'm actually very impressed. You're an action taker, and that's one of the things I love about what you're doing here.
So with that, will you share with us, basically, some lessons learned, what worked best through launching your first course?
JAMIE: Yeah, sure. I mean, I think there were a lot of things. I think the pre-sell was a huge thing. I think just showing up and really tapping into what my ICA needed, that was really important to do. And then I think one of the things that helped me probably the most from DCA, that was one of those things that I didn't even know I needed. I mean, I started DCA because I wanted to have somebody walk me through the process of creating the course, and the technology was probably one of my biggest things that I was worried about. That turned out to be not as difficult as I thought it was going to be, especially with the tutorials in DCA to help out with that.
What I didn't know I needed as much, which ended up being just so helpful, were the walkthrough of how to sell, right? You create the thing. How do you actually sell it? Within DCA, you walk through your webinar, and that was my favorite part probably was just slide by slide, how you sell this thing and how you can kind of coach that conversion. And similarly, even with sales pages and how to write that and how to do it in a way that you can kind of coach people into saying yes as they read through it and as they identify with what you're writing. So I think for me, those were really key. And then, again, there was even a Facebook ads training. I mean, it had everything in it that I needed to be able to sell.
I didn’t have any questions in the middle to say, like, okay, there was nothing missing, no big part missing that I couldn't figure out how to do. It was all in there. And so I think for me, that was a big lesson learned, that it is about the product and you want to make the product amazing, but you also have to be able to sell it. You also have to know how to connect with people and have them want to buy it. And so I think that was really critical.
And I spent a lot of time looking through and even using the same words that my ICA was using to make sure I was connecting with them, to make sure that I was relevant to them, to make sure that they would say, yes, this is exactly what I need. You're talking to me. And that was something I learned within DCA was how important that is.
AMY: Ah, makes me so happy. So some of your biggest takeaways. I know you just shared some lessons learned, but I know you had some big takeaways. Share some of those with me as well.
JAMIE: Yeah. I mean, I think that I will make a couple of changes next time. One of the takeaways that I will do, I'll probably start running Facebook ads earlier and more often. I think that was something that I didn't—I wasn't super comfortable with that side of things, just because it was new for me. I think now I can see the power in it. I probably got about a 50 percent return on that. So for every $500 I spent on Facebook ads, I made 500 bucks, and made $1,000.
AMY: So good. That’s excellent.
JAMIE: To me, if I can take that now and just make that on a grander scale, that's probably something that I'm going to jump into. And I probably would. I got a lot of Facebook ads that were denied for weird reasons. I had never done them before, so even just little things. Next time, I'll probably start earlier because I think that I would have more success in just getting more people into the webinars.
But even the webinars. I mean, I think if I can just pack those even more full with people. I had a pretty good conversion rate. I mean, my conversion rate on my webinars, I had about 30 percent of people show up, and then of that 30 percent, about 25 percent of them bought. So if I can get them on the webinar—
AMY: Okay, so, guys, that’s huge, just for the record. Most people starting out might get 3 to 5 percent conversion on a webinar when they're new at webinars. Twenty-five percent is almost unheard of. So when I hear that, Jamie, I'm like, okay, double down on your webinars. Do more webinars, and like you said, fill them up. And when I teach Digital Course Academy®️ and when I get into the part of the program where I teach slide by slide by slide how to do a webinar, I always remind people the most important thing during a launch is filling up these webinars. If you can get people on these webinars, you can make sales. So I love that you bring that up.
JAMIE: Yeah. So I think I want to spend more time just trying to fill up those webinars and making sure that they're completely full and even spend more money on that, because I know now I can convert. I think that's always been something that's been in the back of my head, like, oh, I'm not a sales person, and I think that sometimes we have a bit of a connotation that goes along with selling that, it's like a slimy thing or we have that used-car salesman—and my husband would kill me for saying this because he is a salesperson. He's not like that—but I think that's kind of—I've always said I'm not a salesperson. But the truth is, if you create something you believe in, that you know can help people, and you connect with people and you can explain it in a way that they understand it and say, yes, I need that, too, I mean, that's selling. And there's nothing that’s bad about that. So I think for me, I got so much more comfortable—that was one of the learnings was just getting comfortable with selling, even getting comfortable with hearing objections and how to deal with that, that was kind of a lesson learned. I got a little bit of thicker skin through it. I feel more confident that I have something to offer people that is worth value, and I'm not afraid to tell people that. I'm not afraid to put it out there. And I think before, I was a little bit more timid maybe in my approach. I think next time I'll be even bolder in telling people, no, this is what you need. You need to get in here ASAP.
AMY: Oh, it's all part of the process. These learnings are so great. I love a behind-the-scenes look at a launch.
So tell me this. Final question. What advice would you give to someone who wants to go from corporate to where you are, setting your schedule, making a great income, making an impact and really doing what you love, and to me, what you were meant to do? Like, you are in your lane, girl. You are doing what you're meant to do. You're on fire. I see you on social. I see you making your videos. You're just out there, making things happen, showing up. So what would you say to someone that really wants to do that, but they feel stuck or scared or just like, I don't know if I have it in me?
JAMIE: It is 100 percent “do it anyway.” That for me, when I finally just said, “You know what, what's the worst that can happen?” and I think we're so afraid to put ourselves out there. I'm a perfectionist. I want everything to be completely buttoned up. But when I finally just started showing up all the time, every single week, I would show up in my Facebook group, I just started being there and listening to people, just start doing. I just think it's so, so important. Even if it's not perfect, it's not going to be perfect, you just have to start somewhere. So even if that's starting to build a list, starting to do some content on the side while you build that list while you're still in corporate and kind of building that up and getting that experience and the momentum. I look back at even just the Lives that I started last July, and I kind of laugh because they're kind of terrible.
AMY PORTERFIELD: We all do that. We look back, and we're like, ooh, yikes.
JAMIE: I know. But I still, I keep them up there, and I still even share them sometimes when somebody asks a question that I'll go back and share an old Live of mine. But just doing, I got so much better, and I got so much more confident. And nobody was sitting there, criticizing me. Nobody—I mean, and the people that did, who cares, right? Who cares what the people, who you're friends with on Facebook from high school think. Think about the person that you want to connect with, that you can help, and just focus on them, and don't worry about the rest, and just do it. Just start. Just start.
AMY: Amen to that. Just start. Just start. I love that message, and I continue to remind my students of that over and over again.
Jamie, congratulations on your success. This is only the beginning, my friend. Tell everybody where they can find you online.
JAMIE: Yeah. You can find me—easiest way is Financial Literacy for Women Business Owners Facebook group. I'm also on Instagram, just JamieTrull. And balancecfo.com is my company.
AMY: Perfect. Well, thank you so very much. And I can't wait to connect with you again.
JAMIE: You, too. I have one more thing—
AMY: Oh, what?
JAMIE: —I want to throw in here. And feel free to cut this if you want to. I hope you don’t. But I wanted to kind of say thank you to you in a couple of different ways.
So the first thing that I wanted to do was say thank you, just by gifting you or somebody in your company with my course. So when I launch Financial Fitness Formula in the fall, I would love to have somebody take part in it if they want to, with all finances.
AMY: Oh, thank you. For sure.
JAMIE: I just wanted to at least gift that to you.
And the second thing that I wanted to do is I feel like you and DCA, I can't even—people ask me about it, and I can't even tell them enough how much that course, and you specifically, and all of your advice has changed my world. I mean, I can't even—I wish that I could tell you that in a way that it was—I just can't even fully explain it in a way that really can get it fully across in the way that I want to. But I do believe in kind of giving back, and I do believe in paying it forward. And this made such a big impact on me, so I want to make impacts on others. So I made a donation in your name to Village Impact—
AMY: Jamie!
JAMIE: —because I know that’s close to your heart—the charity. And I did it for the full sticker price of DCA because I think that course is worth it a million times over. Anybody that's worried about the investment in it, I am a person that's really gun shy. I'm typically not a person that invests in myself. I maybe wouldn't have even have had done the course had it not been for actually talking to you and getting that push. And I'm so glad I did. It's made all the difference. I think, like I said before, I think it's kind of this divine-intervention thing. I think it was meant to be. I think it set me on a path for what I'm supposed to be doing. So that is my gift to sort of pay it forward what you've done for me.
AMY: Thank you so much. I’m such a fan of Village Impact. The fact that you made a donation in my name gives me all the feels. So thank you so much.
And just literally watching you do what you do and seeing you have the success you have is why I do what I do. So thank you. That's a gift to me. So thank you for showing up, being an action taker, and just going for it no matter what. So I love you dearly, and I'm so, so happy that our paths crossed. So thanks again for being on the show.
JAMIE: Of course, of course.
AMY: All right. Bye, girl.
JAMIE: Bye.
AMY: So there you have it. I am just blown away by my students. I love them so much, and I love to hear their stories. I hope you really enjoyed hearing Jamie's story and following along on her journey of her very first launch.
So here's the thing. I want to hear from you. You know I've got a Facebook group called the Online Marketing Made Easy Facebook group. Easy enough to find, right? And I want to have a conversation with you about what you're going to take away from Jamie's experience into your own. There's so many lessons learned here, so many ways to get inspired, let's talk about it inside of my Facebook group. I'll meet you over there.
And in the meantime, I'll see you back here same time, same place next week. Bye for now.
