Ep. 94 Covid 19 Landed My Daughter In The Hospital

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Hey everyone, this is Julie and today’s podcast episode is going to be personal. It’s been a while since I’ve done podcast, but for those of you guys who follow me on this feed, you know that I am the most inconsistent podcaster ever. So it’s been kind of a crazy couple of weeks, I had my digital Insider’s mastermind at the end of May. And that was the first time really getting together with a group of people post COVID. And, of course, I got sick with a cold afterwards.

And then what seemed to happen is I don’t know if mercury went into retrograde or what but I had a string of sort of medical emergencies in my family for the next several weeks. You know, obviously, me getting sick wasn’t a big deal. It was just annoying. But then my husband hurt his back and ended up in the hospital, my daughter had an ATV accident. We had an ambulance at our house twice in one week, which was really fun. Then, my son graduated high school, he got really sick because it was the first time he had hung out with a bunch of people. Then we went to Disney World, Eden got sick, William got sick, and then Ellie came down with COVID.

And for those of you who have been following me for a while, I spent an entire year really following a lot of the top scientists and epidemiologists on the COVID pandemic, and even running a Facebook group giving daily takeaways as it was going. And I have to say that I really had kind of run out of words to say about it, I had run out of worry, you know, I had gotten vaccinated. And I just told myself, it was time for me to kind of move on, you know, when I stopped posting takeaways, and I stopped following the scientists, and I really wanted my children to get vaccinated, but I am divorced and couldn’t get my ex husband to agree. And so they weren’t vaccinated. So when Ellie came down with COVID, all of it kind of came screaming back.

And so I’ll just tell you my story. This is my this is my running with COVID, you know, and on Friday evening, July 2, Ellie was laying on the couch and said, Mom, I’m cold. She had no symptoms other than just feeling cold. And so I took her temperature and it was over 101 degrees. And I said, Okay, get a mask on, go get in your bed. We had company over we had my sister and her husband and her three unvaccinated kids. There’s a lot of people in the house. We isolated her immediately. And on Saturday, she had a low grade fever. She had Tylenol and Advil, so it wasn’t a big deal. She had no symptoms other than this fever. In fact, I started to think maybe this was an ear infection, a UTI, possibly Lyme. You know, we live in the woods. And so on Sunday morning, I went to go wake her up and she was crying in her bed, her fever was back up over 101. And she was coughing, and said, Mom, it hurts to even move my fingers.

So I don’t know, what prompted me to just all of a sudden decide maybe this is COVID. But that was my first thought, even though I’d sort of kind of put it out of my mind. And I ran to CVS, and I purchased one of those at home kits that binocs now it’s the Abbott at home kit, I would encourage you to get a couple that wasn’t that hard. You just read the instructions that are really isn’t that hard. And it was positive within I don’t know, minutes, they say don’t read the test for at least 15 minutes between 15 and 30. And within five it was just blaring pink. Obviously, this was sort of my nightmare coming true because I had spent basically 18 months in some modified or extreme quarantine I had, you know, taken my kids out of school. And even still, I could not protect Ellie.

And I knew that she would probably be okay. But still it was like okay, not only does my child now have a serious virus, but I am her primary caregiver. Her dad is not vaccinated, I’m going to have to continually come face to face with what was one of my greatest anxieties. And in full transparency when the pandemic first started back in March of 2020. I was a wreck. And I struggle with anxiety. I have an anxiety disorder. And now here I was like, basically like hey COVID Nice to meet you. So and not to mention the fact I had other kids to protect but you know I didn’t react the way I thought I would I was actually quite calm, which was funny, because in the anticipation of it for the last year, I was freaking out. So I think that this sort of lesson that keeps coming back to me over and over and over again is that anxiety tells you you’re not going to be okay. It creates this agitation or this fear of what it’s going to feel like when that nightmare scenario comes true. But then when that nightmare scenario does come true, the grace and the strength that you need is there, the adrenaline is there and you’re able to navigate it way better in reality than you are when you’re anticipating it. And it’s just another sort of reminder of how worthless anxiety actually is.

So, for the first three days, so Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, we did everything that you’re supposed to do at home, we kept her isolated we I used to mask when I went in and out of her room, always wash my hands. When I left the room. I checked her O2 twice a day, I checked her temps, we did the Tylenol in the Advil, the vitamin C, the Mucinex, all that kind of stuff. And her O2 stayed at 98, 97, Sunday and Monday and then on Tuesday it dipped into around 96. Still, though not problematic if you’re if you know anything about O2, as long as you’re over 95 It’s fine. But there’s just this little voice in my head that said, I’m noticing a little bit of a shift. Her temp was slowly coming down each day was no longer up at 101. So a Wednesday morning when I woke up to go in. I was expecting, you know, a 99 fever I was expecting O2 to hold steady. And instead what I found was Ellie with a temp of just about 103. She was nauseous. She was feverish, she was coughing. She was having kind of a lot of gastrointestinal issues. She had a runny nose, and she was not okay. And her O2 was around 93. And I called the pediatrician and the pediatrician wouldn’t see her inside, it was like 90 degrees that day.

And so we were driving and of course, her pediatrician is still where we used to live. So it’s like a 40 minute drive. And so we’re driving the 90 degree heat she’s nauseous as all get out, and we got to the pediatrician and we’re in the parking lot. And my gas tank goes to almost empty. So now my fuel light is on. And they’re having me sit in the parking lot with the AC running in my car for like 30 minutes. And I’m like, I’m gonna run out of gas. So I had to turn the car off. And now Ellie is like, Mom, I can’t be in the heat. So here I was, I had a picnic blanket in the trunk, I grabbed the picnic blanket, set it up over underneath the tree. And Ellie was laying down and out comes the pediatrician and full PPE, gear out under the tree to give my daughter an exam in the heat to see what to do. And it was just a very, very surreal moment, I think right at that moment. I flashback to like every Facebook conversation and comment that I had ever had with any kind of COVID conspiracy theorist and anti-masker, anti-vaxxer. And I was just furious. I was so furious. And I felt like, this is exactly what I was, what I was trying to communicate to people about COVID for that year was that this is a serious virus, even if you are a healthy teenager with no pre existing conditions.

So the doctor, listen, they looked at her O2 was 93. And she looked at me and she said, this is the sickest kid we’ve seen in months. I was like, “That’s awesome, great.” And she told me that she was not quite at that cost to be admitted to the hospital because 93 is still kind of on the verge. But that now I had to check her O2 every hour and if it dipped below that we would have to go. So I brought her home. 40 minute drive home, and I started checking her every hour and by 2pm her 93 had gone down to 92.

So he went to the ER and in the ER, they hooked her up to the monitor in her the monitor at the ER was about 95 so they I thought okay, they’re not going to admit us, you know, maybe my pulse ox is a little extra trigger happy or what have you. And her fever was down because of the Motrin. And so the nurse was kind of like, I’m not sure like she’s really sick, but I’m not sure it’s enough to keep her so they came in to do an X ray. And the mental game of sitting there with Ellie with just a little surgical mask on when they’re all coming in with PPE was so stressful because I was like, oh my god like I’m just like licking COVID for fun over here and all these people are coming in all decked out. And I know why and I know the protocol and everything but there was just a lot of mental games I had to play with myself to kind of keep my To keep me in the game here.

So they came in, they did the X ray. And my hospital does like text updates. And so within 10 minutes after the X ray, I got a text that says your child has been admitted to the hospital, even though no doctor had come in yet. And so I thought, Well, okay, shit, this is, you know, they looked at her X ray, and it wasn’t good. And at that point, the doctor came in said, we’re going to do an echo, we’re going to do an ultrasound, we’re going to draw blood. And I thought, Okay, well, whatever they saw on the X ray, you know, kind of set things in motion. So sure enough, the doctor finally came in and said, she has the classic, classic COVID lungs, classic pneumonia for COVID, the glassy opacities, or whatever they say, on her X ray, you know, it’s crazy, just looking at her X ray. And then remembering all the X rays that I looked at on Twitter for the last year. And I was like, that’s exactly what they were warning me about.
So she was admitted. And they told me that I couldn’t leave. If I wanted to stay with her. I had to stay and couldn’t leave. Of course, I was not prepared for that. And I said, Well, I need to go home. I need some things. I also need to sleep. Also not sure that spending 24 hours a day, in a hotel room, or a hospital room with someone who has COVID is such a good idea. So like I was going to go home and sleep and then come back and they said, “No, you can’t.” So now we were in this sort of horrible, like, no win situation. And I talked to Ellie and I said, Honey, you know, keep you on FaceTime. Let me go home, and see if I can sneak into the hospital and break the rules.

And so I left her that evening, around 10 or 11, she fell asleep. And the next day, things sort of escalated her O2 dipped down into the 80s. They started Remdesivir they started Dexamethazone, they ended up giving her Lovenox for clots, they did a CT scan, and she spent Wednesday to Sunday in the hospital. She did need oxygen, she’d never needed a ventilator or anything like that. And she’s home now. And she’s doing better her fever has been gone for quite a while, but her cough persists. One of the interesting things is that what we think of when we think of COVID, you know, it’s a disease that affects the entire body, from you know, hair falling out to nausea, diarrhea, heartburn, to messing with your hormone cycles, you know, getting your period like completely at the wrong time. So there’s dizziness, breathlessness and all that kind of stuff.

And so I feel incredibly grateful that Ellie is okay. I feel grateful that we happened to get COVID at a time when the hospitals weren’t overflowing with COVID patients, and we were able to get the care that we needed. And none of the other six children that were in the house have shown symptoms. So I you know, I understand everyone is tired of COVID. But it’s still here, it’s still among us. It’s still dangerous. And at the timing of this recording the cases, the case counts are actually going up in the United States. And this is because we have a large swath of our country that is not vaccinated. And even though a lot of people are like, Oh, well, it’s the tale of two countries, the vaccinated and the unvaccinated, what’s really happening is the virus is continuing to mutate in the unvaccinated population.

And so this is just sort of my PSA, that number one, pay attention, it’s not over number two, your kid can get sick and can land in the hospital. And three, if you are the kind of person who struggles with anxiety, let this be a lesson that once you are in the situation you fear you have strength and that you didn’t know you had which means that anxiety is really not preparing you for the moment. It’s really just depleting you for the moment. So as always, I appreciate you all and I will talk to you soon.

Ep. 93 15 Benefits of Running an Event

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Hey everyone, this is Julie, I hope you are doing awesome. Today I kind of want to talk a little bit about behind the scenes of The Marketers Heart event. How many of you guys went to the Marketers Heart Event? Curious. And you know, its funny, the whole idea of events, and what is the value of the event. So today I just want to go through some unexpected benefits from running an event. Even if it’s virtual.

Events can feel like a lot of time and money and energy and they sometimes aren’t profitable. In fact, we were laughing because this was a virtual event, so you would think it would be profitable, but then we’re like, “I don’t think we made any money on this.” So here’s just a few things to note.

Number one, we decided from the get-go to hire a professional production company to do the virtual event, so it didn’t feel like just a regular Zoom meeting. So we had a team of 4, we had 3 camera people, we had a studio. We also made all the speakers come and speak live from their remote locations. It was actually technically quite complicated. So that was our biggest expense, hiring that team to come in and make that event. But it really did feel like an event. We had 500 people registered for the event and we had more than 50% of people attend the entire 3 days. So we think that a lot of that had to do with the fact that we had this sort of dynamic studio and multiple camera angles, and things that kept it interesting so it didn’t feel like you were just in another zoom meeting.

So what were some benefits that we saw from The Marketers Heart event? Now these, the first two I’m going to mention probably you would already think. Events build brand identity and loyalty. More than anything else, if you are trying to grow a community, you are trying to help people feel like they are a part of your brand, not just consuming it, events will create brand loyalty and identity. Whether it’s through friendships, whether it’s through swag, whether it’s through just a more intimate connection with the people that are front facing on the company, there is nothing that works better than events. And virtual events when done well can have the same impact. Obviously, in person events does it even more, but virtual events, we still saw a ton of brand loyalty and identity come out of our virtual marketers heart event.

Okay, another unexpected benefit, obviously people know, you can sell higher ticket offers, or you can sell things that might be a little bit more expensive to sell, but you have all this momentum, you have all these people there, they’re listening. So we sold for the first time, actually that’s not true, we sold Launch Gorgeous last year at the New York event, but it was a very sort of quick sell, towards the end. We didn’t really do much to promote it, whereas this time we did a full webinar. And we sold the Launch Gorgeous On Demand off of the back of the event, we did it as the last presentation of the two days. It worked very well. We were able to answer questions, and then we went right into an open cart launch the week after. Logistically it was very taxing on our team, but we had our biggest launch ever off of this event.

Another thing that is a great benefit is to test material. So if you have future material or material that you may want to put in a book, or put on a podcast, or in a course, you can test this material on a live audience. And we did that with some of our presentations. We tested it out just to get that initial, instantaneous feedback for how it’s resonating. So if you have any plans to put out some new content, put it in an event first.
Another benefit is that you can give attendees upcoming sneak peeks. This is part of that brand identity and brand loyalty, is that when they feel like they get to see behind the scenes of what’s going on, they get more sort of inside look, you can build that loyalty and identity, but you can also help your community understand, “Here’s your mission, here’s your vision, here’s where you are going.” It’s almost kind of like the way stockholders in a company will get like sort of a state of the union address. You can do that at an event in a different way than just sending out an email. Okay?

Another thing, networking relationships with speakers. So if there’s anybody in your sphere that you want to get to know, inviting them to speak onstage is a great way to start developing that relationship. So if you have some people in a Dream 100 and you can afford to get them on your stage, it’s an excellent way to build that rapport.

Obviously, it goes without saying that another benefit is you get replays that can be reused for bonuses, courses, workshops, summits, things like that. So that is another benefit assuming that you of course pay for an audio/visual team production company.

Another thing is that it will sell more of your existing stuff. We had some of our highest days ever in our business on those three days of the event because people were buying things that we weren’t even talking about. But there was a sense of “Oh, I’m here. It’s Funnel Gorgeous.” And you know, maybe people were mentioning things in the comments. So it will sell more of your existing offers even if you’re not actively talking about them from the stage.

Another thing that it can do is build incredible social proof and buzz on your social media profile. So whether people are in your group talking about the event or whether they’re tagging you on Instagram, it’s going to generate buzz and give you lots of material to screenshot and use for later. So for later offers, later launches, later events.

Another benefit is that you’re going to actually bond with your team more. I think we, as a team, really, I mean it was a stressful event, but we had some great bonding time, we were able to fly in one of our employees as an emcee, Cathy came to my house in Connecticut. So there’s just a chance to bond with your team in a different way when you’re putting on an event because you’re all working towards this one particular goal.
Another thing that it can do, is it can help you get awesome b-roll for social. So b-roll and photos. We had a photographer come and take pictures with us, and we had of course, the event fully photographed and video recorded. So this provides a lot of material as you’re moving forward, and Instagram and Tiktok, so you might as well, if you are on those platforms, the event provides a way for you to do all of these things and get some of that sort of by-product as well.

Another unexpected benefit that didn’t even dawn on me until I did it, was it allowed me to connect with A/V people. And I know that seems kind of random, but for any kind of like small workshop or event, or even if you want to have a local production company in your area, that you can develop a relationship with so that you have someone who is local that you don’t have to fly in, that was also a benefit as well.

And lastly, it allows you sell tickets to a future event. You can actually sell another event off of your existing one. So if you do a virtual event, or you do an event and it’s not as expensive and you want to sell tickets to a more expensive event later, an event is a great place to do it. A lot of people who have a great experience want to repeat that experience.

So those are some benefits. I hope that’s helpful for you guys if you are on the fence about doing an event. Start with a virtual event, because it’s a little simpler, and then move to an in person. But we had an incredible time at the Marketers Heart, and we really wanted to connect with our community and our customers, and we got all these extra side benefits as a result. Appreciate you all, talk to you soon. Bye.

Ep. 91 The Service Provider Formula

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Today I am doing the second formula in a series that I’ve been doing. Last week I did the coaches formula, which was a 10 step easy to explain formula to help people get started with different online business models. So today I’m back, and you guys loved the coaches consulting formula, so I am back today with the service provider formula.

A couple things about this formula, it is specifically for done for you services. So you could swap the term service provider and you could call it the social media manager formula, or the ad agency formula, or the copywriter formula, or the freelancer formula, or the funnel builder formula, or the virtual assistant formula. The idea is anything where you’re doing actual work where it takes time using your hands, not just your brain, that’s just kind of how I say it, will work for this formula.

The last one I did, the coaches/consulting is simply for people who do brain work, meaning they’re just selling their advice or their expertise. I still think that the service provider formula is the easiest way to enter the online space, especially if you don’t an expertise or a following yet. So if that’s you and you’re listening, I would definitely follow along.

Keep in mind that if you’re starting from scratch and you don’t have any online specific skills, it will take you a little bit longer because you do have to learn those skills and build out the business, but if you already have some skills that people would pay for, this can happen really fast. And unlike the coaches formula, where I suggested it would be about 18 months, you can actually get your first paying client in a service based business in as little as 30 days. You could be booked solid within 6 months. It’s a pretty fast way into the online space and doesn’t take a tremendous amount of money to get started, nor a huge audience. And you can earn anywhere from $30 to about $75,000 in that first year. That can quickly accelerate to $100k if you are choosing higher priced skills like funnels and aps.

So the first two steps of this formula are the same as the coaching and consulting formula, which is step one, set up your online presence on social media. Make sure to do it under your name. I know that some people worry, “Well what if I want to run a big agency, don’t I need an agency name?” Well, you could but I’m telling you that it’s going to be a lot harder to build out an agency with a brand that nobody knows, than it is a person. And the lovely thing is you can always change your name. You can change your business name later, or you can just add an “& Co”. A couple of examples of this are my client Katie, she runs KW Content agency, which is Katie Wight Content. And I know there was, I had a client a long time ago, her name was Miranda Nahmias, and now her business is Nahmias & Co. So you can, there’s lots of things you can do. It’s easier to set up under your name. Just trust me on this one.

So that’s step one, and step two is to go ahead and get a domain, professional email address. You can use something like Google Workspace which was GSuite.
Okay, so those are the first two steps, they’re the same first two steps as the coaches formula. It’s pretty much the same two steps for any formula. Now in step three, this is where we’re going to deviate a little bit from what I gave you in the last episode. So step three we’re going to set up a service provider website. We have in FG Funnels a five page website all ready. It’s in the styles of minimal and magic, if you sign up right now. If you’re listening to this down the road it may be a different style. But we always have a premium style and a basic style when you sign up with an FG Funnels account. That allows you to get your five page service provider website up very quickly.

So you’re going to determine your expertise or your service suite when setting up your website. There are two options. You can be a project based business, which means you’re doing something like copywriting or funnels. Or you can be retainer based, which is things like virtual assistant, online business management, social media, copywriting etc. So that’s what you’re going to do in step three, get your website set up and decide on your service suite.

Step four is really focusing in on the services page of your website. That services page should lead to a discovery call. The good news is in our pre-built templates it already does. We also have services automation in our simple collection for FG Funnels, or you can build your own. The idea is you really just need to get people on the phone. Once you’re on the phone you’re going to do one of two things, you’re going to sell a business intensive, which leads to custom project work, or you can just simple quote them retainer services and start the engagement. So again, it depends on what kind of business you’re running. Is it a project based business or is it a retainer based business. Either way you’re going to get them on the phone, and what you sell them might be slightly different.

Now if you don’t have any skills yet to market, in step four this is where we recommend getting into a training program area that you want to focus on. I know so many training programs for things like bookkeeping, virtual assistance, online business management, WordPress coding, Pinterest ads, Facebook ads, and then of course the one that I run in Funnel Gorgeous with Cathy is FG Society and I highly, highly recommend it for anyone getting into the online space, but especially if you are a service provider and you are interested in funnels, copy, or design. So you can work as you learn, and you can you know, just charge a little bit less. So that’s in step four. You’re really focusing on that service page and making sure you have the skills to actually deliver.

Now in step five we’re going to do the hardest step, the step that is the most important, the one that people resist most. And it is network and Facebook groups through podcast interviews, social content, clubhouse, and go ahead and get your first 3 to 5 clients. Now the good news is FG Society teaches this, and we also have a directory now so that all of our certified marketers go on hireamarketer.com, they’re listed on the directory. We also send out job bids, so there are lots of different types of these sites. I know there’s one for online business management, I know several virtual assistant programs that do this. So this is why it’s so important to invest in a program, depending on what you want to focus on, because you’re going to be able to tie into a network and get clients more quickly.

Alright so step six, once you have your few first clients, it’s time to create your first case study report. So use a lead magnet template for Funnel Gorgeous, use the free lead magnet funnel we give in FG Funnels. You’re gonna focus on how much easier, better, more efficient, more profitable it is to work with you. You’re going to showcase the ways in which a business could change with you there to help. You could also do a video with your pdf case study, and you’re going to make that a lead funnel. Put this on your website, your social media.

Now depending on how good the case study is, you could run traffic, but for most providers when they’re just starting, they’re just going to share it organically. It’s just a great free thing to start building an email list. You’re going to get a very, very slow trickle of leads organically. But you need to make sure to email those leads. So that’s step seven, because what we want to do is email those leads regularly with valuable content and encourage them to book a discovery call off your services page. This is incredibly important because we want to see if the case study lead funnel that you set up is actually getting the right people on your list. So that is what’s in step six and seven.

Now step eight, once you have five people to say yes to you, or if you’re booked solid, it’s time to raise your prices. You’re also going to want to hire an assistant to help you with things like proposals and onboarding and client management. This is also a great time to start reading the book, built to sell, it helps you productitize your agency or service based business as much as possible, so that you don’t end up with horrible, horrible {inaudible}.

So that’s step eight. Now step nine, it’s time to figure out an easy introductory service based offer. This is something you see your clients needing. It could be a fast, easy fix. Something you could do a lot of. Is it too time consuming? Things like audits, migrations, tech setups, speed optimization. For example we have providers that offer the FG Funnels set up. You wanna make sure that that introductory offer is less than $200. You want to do something that’s super concrete, painful and obvious that they can say yes to, and you’re going to build this as a simple hybrid services sales page. It’s going to be a sales page and an order form, and you are going to be able to start talking about this on social media, on email, in Facebook group, you can also attach it to the backend of your case study lead funnel, if there’s a relationship between those two, the free case study and the offer.

Now sometimes I recommend people actually demo this in a service provider webinar, which we teach, but you don’t have to do that. You can just do a sales page if you want. But this introductory offer is a great way for people to test out what it’s like to work with you.

And then finally in step ten, we’re going to start adding additional revenue to your business besides done for you work. So the easiest way to do this as a service provider, is to start building an affiliate arm of your business where you recommend tools and software that you use so you can get some recurring income without having to work for it. So software is great right. FG Funnels has a 40% recurring commission affiliate program. Hosting offers, affiliate programs, so If you are a project based service provider, this is going to be really important to kind of stabilize your revenue. If you’re a project based service provider you might also want to think of any sort of ongoing services you can offer after the project is done. If you’re retainer based, you might want to incentivize your clients to refer you to others with a referral program.

So in step ten you’re really sort of expanding out your revenue besides just your done for you services. Within 18 months you should be booked solid and really feeling the burn of an agency that’s growing quickly. You may need to hire, you may to dial in your services so that they’re even more specific and scalable. And this might be the time where you would start thinking about some digital assets that you could sell to keep your email growing while you manage your current client load.

So that is the ten step formula for service providers. I hope you guys liked that and appreciate that. If you do, please leave a review, subscribe, tag me on Instagram, tell everyone how awesome my podcast is. I do such a horrible job of promoting it, so I just try to give amazing content so you guys will share it. I think the next one I am going to do is the course creator formula. That will be coming next. Appreciate you all, talk to you soon.

Ep. 90 The Coaching Formula

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Hey everyone, how’s it going today? I want to start a new series; I actually started it last week on my email list. And I’m working on this new idea, and it’s all about easy to explain formulas for different online business models. And just because it’s easy to explain doesn’t mean it’s easy to do. But it will create a roadmap that’s pretty simple to follow.

So I’m thinking about creating these 10 step formulas for each of the different online business models, and I’m going to start today with the coaching formula.
Now you could technically swap out the word coaching and put the word consulting in there as well, but before I get started, I want to make it very clear that this particular formula is not for a done for you provider. I think in the next episode I will do a done for you provider. This is for someone who is selling their advice, their therapy, their expertise in a high touch one to one capacity. So that’s what I mean by coaching formula, or consulting formula.

So this also assumes that you have an expertise that people are willing to pay for. So if you are not an expert in anything quite yet, then you don’t want to start with the coaching formula or consulting formula. You’ll probably want to listen to my next episode when it comes out and do the done for you formula because that’s going to be a little easier entry point.

But let’s assume you have an expertise that people would pay for, this is the 10 step formula I would take you through. And this is not based on theory, this is based on actual case studies, working with clients that I came up with this. So this is going to take you about 18 months if you’re doing it part time. If you’re doing it full time you could do it much faster.

So the first step is simple. It’s going to be setting up your online presence on social media, since that’s the primary modality with which people use and advertise right now. That means get on Facebook, get on Instagram, for those two definitely. You many also want to snag YouTube, Clubhouse, Pinterest, etc. But for sure you want to make sure that you have your name and your social media presence really on brand for Facebook and Instagram. And do it under your name, don’t do it under a brand. Nobody knows you yet. Especially with coaching and consulting, you really want to focus on your name.

Step two, you’re going to get a domain and a professional email address. So for me it would be Julie@JulieStoian.com. You can use Google Workspace, it’s easy to get the domain and email address that’s professional. So those are the set up things that you need to do. Those are the first two foundational steps.

Now in step three, we’re actually not going to start with a website, we’re going to start with a funnel, and we’re going to set up an application funnel, of course it goes without saying that you should FG Funnels. The nice thing is we actually have a coaching consulting application funnel with the automations already built in. So it’s the actual page, it’s the calendar, it’s the emails, it’s the reminders, it’s everything. And that’s all done, all you have to do is go get an FG Funnels account.

So what you’re going to do is you’re going to sell a $3000 offer to start. It’s going to be a one to one offer and we recommend $3000 for about 12 weeks of coaching/consulting. Now that may change if you’re in an industry where that’s really high. Like if you’re teaching organizing or parenting, you may have to drop that. But if you’re in any sort of business to business, make money online, any high level expertise, whether it’s therapy, relationships, health, I would go with a $3000 one on one offer.

So you’re going to get the copy, the tech, the design, you’re going to get the application funnel launched on your domain. So that’s step three.
Step four is the hardest step, it’s the step people like to skip the most. It’s the most important of all the steps and it’s the one people resist the most, and you shall not skip it if you want to be in business. And that is to start networking through Facebook groups, through podcast interviews, social content, clubhouse, and get your first 3 to 5 clients. This will be a slog if nobody knows who you are. There will many days when you feel like it is not doing anything. I remember the first time I was, not the first time, but one of my clients it was their first time doing this step four. She messaged me and she’s like, “This is such a waste of time.” And I was like, ‘I know it feels that way, but it’s like you’re digging a hole. Eventually you’re going to hit water, but for the three days before you hit water, you’re just going to assume there’s never any water to be found.”

And I really encouraged her to set a number of conversations that she was trying to have every single day. And eventually that first client came and she’s like, “That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.” And I said, “I know, but it’ll get easier.” So step four is to network in Facebook groups, through podcast interviews, social content etc.

Now, step five. Once you have a few clients, now it’s going to be time to set up your first lead funnel. So again, you can use all the templates that we offer in Funnel Gorgeous and the free lead magnet funnel that we include in FG Funnels. You’re going to find a free offer that’s going to be something you run ads to, to start building your email list.

So once you have your lead funnel done, that’s step five, and step six you’re going to run about a thousand dollars worth of traffic, and you’re going to work to get your first 500 leads on your email list. That’s step six.

Step seven, go ahead and start emailing those leads regularly with valuable content and encourage them to book a discovery call off your application funnel. The reason why this is important is because we want to see if any of those people that you paid a thousand dollars to acquire are going to turn into one on one customers. Now if they do, that’s awesome. It means the lead magnet was good bait. If you can’t get any customers off of that email list, that could mean that the lead magnet isn’t quite the right bait for what you do. So that’s why that step is really, really important.

Okay, so in step eight, you hopefully have gotten another client or two from the method of running traffic to your leads and then emailing them. If you want to you can turn your ads back on and keep working that system to continue with lead flow.

Now step nine is sort of a little bit more advanced, but I find it works really well to go from having a base of clients to being booked solid. And that is to set up a weekly class with a limit of about 6 people and charge $50. Do something very concrete and easy to accomplish in an hour. This is going to be an introductory class where people can start to feel out what it’s like to work with you. You’re going to build this simple funnel and start talking about it on social media and email. You can also attach it to the backend of your lead magnet, once the class is ready.

And now when you’re networking, now you have several options. You have an application funnel you can send them to, you have a lead magnet you can send them to, you also have a really exciting introductory class that’s really affordable that they can come to once a week.

So step ten is to upsell people from your weekly class workshop into a discovery call for one on one coaching. And that is the ten step coaching/consulting formula. I have found that within 18 months you should be booked solid. And again, that’s with part time energy. This means about 10 paying clients, plus some leads, a few people coming to your workshop. And again, you could do it much faster if you have more time to dedicate to networking. But it’s going to work, this formula will work even if you are listening to this and you don’t even have a Facebook account yet. If you have an expertise, but you know nothing about online marketing, this will work. It is difficult to do, but it is simple to follow.

And so I think that’s really my goal for these formulas. So I hope that was helpful guys. If it’s helpful please share my podcast, tag me on Instagram, leave a review. And I will be back next time with the next simple business formula.