We are in the midst of transitional times, we are in the midst of an unstable economy and I want to talk about this today and I want to talk about how your business can grow and thrive in this season. Welcome to the Legacy Creator podcast, a show dedicated to giving you the tools you need to build a profitable, purposeful, and powerful business that lasts. I'm your host, Ashton Smith, a sixth-generation entrepreneur who is passionate about helping you think bigger so that you can actualize your goals and build your legacy.
Let's dive in.
Hello and welcome back to the Legacy Creator podcast. I'm so excited to be with you all today. I even have my AC off just to ensure prime sound quality for you all, so here we are. I hope that you're doing well. I hope that you are having an incredible day.
It comes as no surprise when I say that we are in the midst of transitional times. We are in the midst of an unstable economy, and I want to talk about this today and how your business can grow and thrive in this season. The first thing I want to lead with and the question I want to ask you as we get started is: where are you putting your focus? Where are you putting your energy? I ask this because right now there is going to be a lot of noise in the online space and in the news that instills a lot of fear. When we feel fear and we operate from a place of fear, that doesn't serve anyone. So again, where are you putting your focus? Where are you putting your energy? And how are you protecting that in this season?
You know, it never fails that when you turn on the news, it's going to be all the things that are going wrong. It's going to be all the things that are negative, but that's really heightened during this time, during seasons like this. So how can you protect your energy? How can you protect your focus? Because it all starts there, right? It all starts with where your focus is at, where your energy is at. And my intention for this episode is to, number one, leave you feeling more equipped, more powerful, and more optimistic than when you got here. And of course, number two, I want to leave you with some tactical, actual tips and information that you can take, that you can apply in your business so that it can thrive in this season.
You know, I think that we have all heard this time and time again, but it is true: a lot of the biggest companies started in the midst of a recession. Go look it up. Go Google it. Go see the list. There's a lot of big-name, thriving companies that started in the midst of a recession. How did that happen? How did they thrive? I think part of that is because when we're in a season like this, where things feel unstable, you have a large percentage of people that they feel that fear, and they operate from that fear. So quite often they hunker down, they slow down, and that creates an incredible environment for people that are putting themselves out there, that are staying consistent, that are taking risks. It kind of pulls away from the noise that's usually always there, and there's just more room, there's more room, there's more opportunity.
So as we start this conversation, number one, I want you to really consider where you're putting your focus and energy. Let's reset that, okay? And number two, I want to begin by talking about a few things that are not working in this season so we can steer clear of those, we can avoid those. And then I'm going to dive into five recommendations of things that I have for you so that your business can thrive in this season.
What is not working right now?
This is always true, but especially in this season, you don't want to put all your eggs in one basket. What do I mean by that? This can be taken through the lens of your marketing. Where are you promoting your services? Where are you promoting your business? If you can only list off one particular platform, we may want to diversify a little bit. You can also think about this from a sales perspective. You can also think about this from a revenue perspective. We don't want to have all of your eggs in one basket.
And what I really want to hone in on here are those three areas: your marketing, your sales, and your revenue. So when it comes to your marketing, assess, number one, what does your current marketing strategy look like? And number two, what is your bandwidth? Because I'd much rather you prioritize excellence with a couple of platforms than feel like you have to come out of the gates and prioritize five, six, seven. There's power in diversification, but only if you also prioritize depth. I'm a big believer of that. We started this business. I predominantly used Instagram and a little bit of email marketing to build our initial foundation, our initial client base, our initial revenue. So we started small because I was a one-woman show, and the reality of it is if you see people in your space that are pulling off a large omni-channel marketing plan and they're doing it well, they probably have a team of people behind them. So I want you to assess your current marketing plan and number two, what is your bandwidth? What is your capacity? With that, you can also consider, with what you're already doing, how effective is it? Because we may want to shake things up a little bit as well. So take a look at your marketing, see how we can expand and diversify there a little bit.
Secondly, let's look at your sales. Where are your sales coming from? And a lot of times for an online business, this comes back to your marketing. Those platforms that you are on, how are people finding you? And then more specifically, how are they entering into a sales process? So if you are a startup, you may be prioritizing one-on-one sales. Right? So we're selling people one-on-one for a high-ticket container. So for example, we may be looking to book sales calls. If you are a more established company, you may have a lot of opportunity to diversify here through passive income sources, setting up email funnels, having upsell processes, having retention processes. And then of course, we may have things that are higher touch, like sales calls for a higher-ticket container. But where are your sales coming from? How are you selling people into your programs?
So marketing, sales, and then revenue is another big one. Where does your revenue come from? Is it one predominant offer that you have, or do you have a nice, diverse, well-built out, thought-out offer suite? This is an entirely different discussion, but what are your revenue sources? If you only have one particular source of revenue, we may want to look at the ability to diversify. Again, coming from the lens of what season of business are you in and how can we prioritize depth and excellence? We never want to sacrifice on those things just to do more, but take a look at that. How can we diversify your marketing, your sales, and your revenue and not have all of your eggs in one basket? That's the first thing here.
The second thing that is not working right now is waiting for opportunities and potential sales to come your way. This is, if I'm being honest, a little pet peeve of mine, but I can't even be that frustrated about it because I used to do this. Okay? So let's be honest, let's be real, but there's this discussion and this mentality sometimes that I find in the online space where people just kind of expect that leads and sales are just always going to come their way and their inbox is going to be flooded with inquiries. And again, it depends on your season of business. Are you just starting? Do you have an established community? Do you have a warm audience? You know, all of these things are going to weigh in here, but no matter what season of business you're in, all of my clients will know because I've told all of them, you need to have a proactive sales system in place. Okay?
So I'm going to get to that here in a minute in my recommendations, but if you are waiting right now for opportunities to come your way, this can be from a sales perspective. This can also be, you know, from the perspective of collaborations or PR. Don't wait. Don't sit back and just wait for things to fall into place for you. That is just not how life works. I think that there's a balance because there's power in belief and declarations and vision and holding the space and the energy, right? But at the end of the day, you also have to take action. Action is so important. So don't wait. Do not be the person that's just waiting for a business to come your way. Consider how can you put yourself out there? How can you get in front of people? It's a harsh but true reality that as founders, we are solely responsible for the success of our companies, and if we have a team, we're responsible for their livelihood. And I don't say that to you and instill fear, but I do say this to instill responsibility. I want you to feel empowered to take responsibility and ownership over your business and the success of your business, and one thing that I feel like does not fall into that category is just waiting for things to happen. Okay?
The third and final piece that is not working is being isolated, being on your own island so to speak. I see this time and time again, and I also used to do this as I was in the startup stage and I was building my network. I I was so isolated, and I had this expectation that if I released something, if I offered something, that inquiries would flood in. That was my expectation, and how far I have come, how far I have come. And I think it's also why I'm really passionate about this piece and empowering founders to take that ownership and responsibility because it's something I really did have to learn. I have a lot of compassion for that, but do not isolate yourself. There's so much power in building out a network of people, in leveraging collaborations. This can be as simple as connecting with people one-on-one, utilizing your primary marketing platforms as that mode of communication, as that bridge to connection. But expand your network and establish relationships. It really, business is a—a lot of business, excuse me, it's about who you know. It's not always about what you know. It's about who you know, and that will open so many doors in terms of how you can support a fellow founder or they can support you. There's so many opportunities there, and I'm going to dive into that here in a moment. So those are the things that are not working right now. So if you identify with any of those things, take a moment, have have some grace and compassion, and let's kind of see how can we fill those gaps? How can we make some shifts and tweaks here?
Alright, let's talk about some recommendations for this season so that you can thrive in your business. I have five for you today. If you are sitting down and you have access to write or type, I really do recommend that you take some notes. I want you to feel empowered to apply what we're talking about today. If you're driving, come back to this, that's totally fine.
First and foremost, I want to mention that a lot of these recommendations I have are about leveraging the path of least resistance, leveraging low-hanging fruit. Why? Because in a season where a lot of people may have their guard up, where, you know, certain things that used to be really easy may feel a little bit harder, we want to leverage the path of least resistance to start. Okay, so that's kind of the inspiration here.
First and foremost, focus on your current clients. I feel like in some regard, I shouldn't have to mention this, but at the same time, I feel like I have to. The online space is crazy, and I'm sure that there are people listening that have bought things, that have invested in mentors, etc., where the expectation wasn't set properly, where the experience was not prioritized once you were sold that particular offer, and it's heartbreaking, it's frustrating. I have been there on multiple occasions myself, and we need to really raise the bar and we need to set a new standard for the experience that we're providing our current clients. The online space talks so much about marketing and sales and acquiring new leads, and all of that is necessary. Do not get me wrong. Do not twist my words. You you should focus on those things 100%. But where we have a problem is when we only focus on those things and we don't focus on what what happens after somebody says yes to working with you? How are you serving those clients? How are you delivering an incredible experience for them?
So I want you to focus on your current clients. I want you to consider ways that you can make their experience the best possible experience. Why? Number one, we want to operate out of integrity. I mean, you know, we want to deliver on what we promise. I think that's important, period. But number two, there's so much potential from a business perspective, from a revenue perspective, when you focus on your client experience. There is a potential for continued work together, continued value-add from you to them. You can expand the scope of your work together. You can extend their contract. You can serve them in different ways, and this is a huge thing that we work on with our current clients. Our clients in general, retention and further service for the people that have already said yes to working with you. It may sound simple, but it's something that I find a lot of people don't focus on and don't put enough effort and energy towards. So again, focus on your client experience. How can you deliver an incredible experience? Of course, delivering on what was promised, but even adding like special touches in there too that just elevate the experience and make them feel seen and empowered and served, whatever it is.
I think that's another important question you just ask here is: how do you want your clients to feel when they work with you? For me, the first thing I always say is I want them to feel seen. I think how you want your clients to feel is going to be a representation of who you are as a founder, what matters to you, and the company that you've built. So it's okay that if it's different, but to me, I want them to feel seen. I want them to feel um empowered. I want them to feel like I am compassionate towards them. I want them to feel heard. I mean, there's so many things. So let's kind of consider, how do you want your clients to feel? And then beyond that, how can you create that in the experience you're providing? Okay?
The second one is prioritize retention. Now this ties directly into your client experience. With an incredible client experience, you will have a lot of clients that want to continue their work with you. There's a lot of benefits there, of course, but with an excellent client experience, you will be able to increase your retention rates. The most important piece with this is that your offer suite needs to allow for ongoing value-add and retention. Now what is an offer suite? If you are new to the space and that's a new term for you, that is just the products and services that you currently offer through your company. There's a lot to unpack with that concept alone, but in order to prioritize retention, we either A, need to have multiple things that you offer where people can be kind of like upsold into those different tiers and containers, products, services, as they continue to build rapport and trust with you and your brand. And then option two or B—I can't remember if I said A, I think I said A—so option B here is retaining within individual offers. So if you are, you know, newer to business, you may have a less full offer suite. You may focus on the higher tiers if, you know, for example, maybe you're an agency and you help people with their social media marketing, you may have a set of top-tier packages that you serve people in. Well, we could retain your clients within those offers. What we're trying to get away from here is having a business model that is dependent upon brand new sales every single month in order to hit your revenue goals. So how can we prioritize retention? How can we structure your products and services to allow room for you to provide ongoing value for your customers? Okay?
The third recommendation here is to integrate a proactive sales system for new sales. This is so important. I talk about this a lot, and I ensure that every single one of our clients that we work with on the private coaching side do this as well. It doesn't matter what stage of business you're in, something that I am so passionate about is that you have control over your business, over your sales process. So if you are waiting for sales and leads to come to you, maybe you are posting content and you are hoping that that's going to convert someone with no additional effort, to me that is a system that you don't really have a lot of control over. Whereas if you have a proactive sales system in place that actually allows for human interaction, for you to invite people into further service with you, your brand, your community, that is something you have control over, right? Because let's kind of break down the math here. If we know that you need five new sales and we also know that you convert at a specific percentage when you pitch people to hear more about your work, then we know how many people you need to pitch in order to convert to a sales call, and then from there we take the conversion rate of your sales calls and we know how many of those are going to convert into actual sales. So we can set the goal and then we can reverse-engineer so that you know, "I need to pitch x amount of people in order to fill these particular spots." This is going to be very applicable for filling those higher-ticket containers. If you are filling a lower-ticket offer, we may be looking at something completely different. For example, one of our clients right now, we are optimizing her email funnel that sells her course. She has multiple courses, so we're looking at that data instead, making tweaks in order to improve those conversion rates. But all of that to say, you want to have a proactive sales system in place for your business that you can depend on, that you can leverage, and that I may even be able to unpack in an upcoming episode. But all of this to say, if you need new business and you aren't asking for it, go ask for it. Okay?
The fourth recommendation here is to infuse story and history into your marketing. Why do I mention this? A lot of times we think that everyone buys based on the same exact thing. You know, they buy based on the deliverables and what they're going to get access to, the pricing, you know, of course, how much they trust you, etc. But something that can help you and your company stand out is by sharing the history of your company, by sharing story-driven content, by pulling back the curtains of yourself as the founder or your team. How can we create content and promote or integrate more story into your marketing so that we can form deeper connections with your community? That's the ultimate goal here.
People remember fun facts, and they remember stories. One fun fact I share all the time is that I have a birthmark in my left eye, and I will have people message me about that, or I share all the time when I make my little cup of espresso and I have it in this little espresso cup that I bought when I was in Italy, and people will message me about that as well. So like, fun little quirks, but also, you know, stories of like your journey and your process in business as an entrepreneur. People are very, very in tune with and aware of my story and my failures, and those are things that we connect over. Those are things that we bond over. Even when we invite people into the deeper meaning behind what we do, behind why we do what we do, that allows us to connect on a deeper level with people, and people remember those things. People begin to develop more trust with you when they learn more and they're provided more depth to who you are, to who your company is. So consider integrating more story-driven content, sharing more of your like history and business, really opening up to your community through your marketing.
The fifth piece here, the final recommendation: get scrappy and leverage your network. So there's so many ways that you can leverage your network. Could you form any partnerships within your industry? This is I find a very often untapped opportunity. But is there anyone that you're connected to that you could partner with, where you guys both refer business to each other and maybe there's a payout for each of you when you refer business to each other? Could you integrate a referral program to leverage the people that already like, know and trust you and get some word-of-mouth marketing going for you? And of course, can you prioritize any collaborations in order to get in front of new audiences? It kind of depends on what your most immediate goal is. If it is visibility, that could be an incredible option. If it is needing a couple of higher-ticket sales, maybe we'd go with that first option of more of that proactive partnership with someone in your industry. But how can you leverage the people that you're already connected to right now? How can you see how you can also be of service for them? How can it be mutually beneficial? You could aim to book some coffee chats to just connect with people that are in your sphere and see how you can serve them, how they can serve you. But get scrappy here, right? If we need additional visibility, if we need and want new sales, what are some ways that you can do that and have control over that process?
Ultimately, as we close out, I just I want you to use this season as a massive opportunity. When everyone else goes left, I want you to go right. When others pull back, press on. When others hunker down, put yourself out there. There's so much growth to be had in this season. There's so much opportunity to be had in this season. Be so protective of where you put your energy and your focus, tying back to how we open this episode. Be so protective of what you're focusing on and where your energy is going. Focus on the fact that there is opportunity to be had in this season. There are people that need your services, support, products. There are people that need that. And if there's anyone listening that is under the impression that people don't buy during times like this, please know that that is so far from the truth. People still have needs, they still have desires, they still have goals, and you have the solution to some of those things. That doesn't go away just because we're in an unstable economy, okay? So there's so much opportunity, and there are people that actually need what you bring to the table. Okay?
So lean into that, lean into the service side of that, lean into knowing that it's not even just about you and your company and your bottom line. It's about how can I be of service to my community in this season? And that doesn't even just have to be from a paid perspective. What are some fun, scrappy, unique ways that you can serve your community in this season? Maybe in a way that's free? Maybe we put on a class for people? Maybe we share a discount code with people? What can we do to serve the community? What can we do to think bigger and beyond ourselves and our businesses and lean into the service side and the service element of being a founder of running a business? Know that there is goodness and breakthrough and abundance an opportunity to be found in this season.
My belief in you, as always, is boundless. If you wouldn't mind, I would so appreciate it if you would leave a review for the podcast on whatever platform you are listening on. That just helps us to know what is resonating with you, what to share in the future. And if you feel led, go ahead and share this episode to your social. Tag us @myawakeningco so we can get this message out to more people.
I'll catch you in the next episode.
