Free Video: Scaling Your Business with Content Marketing, Funnels, and Paid Advertising

Book a strategy call

Transcript for: Scaling your business with content marketing, funnels, and paid advertising

[00:00:00] Pol Cousineau: The presentation is about scaling your business with content marketing funnels and paid advertising, in a way again, that’s not going to make it overly complicated. And we’re gonna take some action items so that you can make progress. ’cause I know sometimes we get all this information, but we don’t necessarily apply at all.

[00:00:18] So the most important thing is going to be to take action. So first is like why would this actually matter? Right? How is this going to be helping with your business? Well, one of them is to have a repeatable way so that you can be found because you need to grow your audience. If you’re going to be scaling, build trust, which is going to be critical if people are going to convert, we say, in our industry, or I like to say, enroll in your programs, right?

[00:00:48] When we’re looking at more heart-centered type offer, generally that language resonates a bit more with everyone. And then you also wanna avoid being on a treadmill. I’ve had a lot of people I’ve worked with where they do all these big launches, like three, four big launches a year and then they just get tired because as soon as they stop, the whole business stops and then you’re in a catch 22. There’s not enough energy to do anything else, and that’s definitely not the position that I want all of you to be in. And then also simplifying it and making a system that you can repeat. So no matter what you’re gonna be doing with what we learn today, I want you to be able to apply those concepts for other areas of your business.

[00:01:32] Other offers, other ideas as new things come up and evolve over time. So one thing that I would like to see is, which one of these resonates with you the most? And you don’t have to tell me. You can put in the chat if you want, but this is for you. I have a few prompts here. So one of them is I’m posting or you’re sharing a lot of content, but you’re not seeing conversions.

[00:01:57] You’re not getting people enroll in your paid programs. Maybe you rely a lot on referrals, and that’s how most of your business is coming, and that means that it could be vulnerable if those referrals would stop. You might say, Hey, I’m not visible at all. Like, I’m not posting, I’m having some challenges with that visibility.

[00:02:19] Or the other one, which normally comes more towards the end is you’re getting a lot of attention, you’re getting a lot of engagement, but the sales are just not coming. And then that’s another issue, right? Because in the end, this is a business. So just take a moment and then determine which one resonates the most for you.

[00:02:36] So like I said, we’re gonna make this system simple today, and what we wanna be doing is going through these different parts of your business so that you can have a system that will scale as well. And we should be looking at those in this order. So the first component is your message. Is your promise clear?

[00:02:58] And we’ll go into more details in these in the next slides. But how, like what is the transformation you’re offering? What is the problem that you’re solving? If you’re doing some coaching, who is the ideal person for that coaching? And is it clear when you communicate that or are people a little bit confused?

[00:03:19] The second component then is the content, and this is how you build that trust, and that should be focused on the message that you have. No matter if you’re publishing videos, if you might be making social posts, you might be writing articles. Podcast appearances, everything should be centered around the core message that you have in that transformation that you’re providing and what you’re solving.

[00:03:47] So let’s say someone is providing coaching for career growth, well then all the content should gravitate around that topic. And then by sharing that freely, people are going to trust and see you as an expert. The next component is what we call the lead magnet in our industry. Basically, that’s your free offer.

[00:04:09] That’s when you’re going to get the contact details of the person. So if we go again with a career coach example, the lead magnet might be something to help build a resume. That will now go through AI, because that’s how that works now, the AI tools analyze all the resumes so that they can get a better job position, or maybe you have a dialogue sheet and examples of like a video and how they can play a little bit with having those conversations with their bosses to get those raises, to get those higher level positions.

[00:04:43] So your lead magnet would be that script that you would be giving them. Then we have the email system, which will be nurturing your audience. You wanna be always top of mind. Obviously you can use other channels like SMS or social posts, but email tends to be the one that is tried and true and that will continue building your following.

[00:05:05] So over the years, you definitely wanna have an email list that grows and you wanna be in touch with them at least a few times a month so that you’re top of mind. If we go back with the career coach example. Well, when that person is having that conversation with their boss or about to have it, that’s when you want them to open their email and think, oh yeah, I need to contact this person and get some help with this.

[00:05:29] But if you don’t email them that month, and that’s when they’re having the difficult conversation, you just missed your opportunity. And then we have the offer. Which obviously is what they’re going to be signing up for. And finally is the ads, because this will amplify what’s already working. A big mistake I see is people dumping thousands of dollars in ads, but they don’t have all of these other components in place.

[00:05:53] So it could still be profitable, but they’re gonna be leaving a lot of money on the table if they do that. So that’s the biggest mistake, is you don’t wanna go to the paid ads right away.

[00:06:03] so what’s important now is to determine what is going to be the bottleneck in your business. Each of you. We’ll have a different area where you’re struggling a little bit more, and as you fix those areas, then everything will come together. Just kind of like if you have a nice car, maybe you don’t have gas or electricity.

[00:06:23] If you have an ev, well that that’s not necessarily going to work, right? So then that’s your bottleneck. It doesn’t matter if you have the best car in that situation. So what I want you to do is try to identify which one of these is the biggest challenge that you have in your business right now. Because if you’re not focusing on the right problem, it doesn’t matter how much work you’re going to be putting into that.

[00:06:48] And we have a tendency to focus on the areas that are most natural to us. Not the most challenging areas. So then if you’re noticing that, hey, you’re not visible enough, then that means we have a problem with traffic. And that could be that you don’t feel comfortable posting on social media. Maybe you’ve never thought of going as a guest on a podcast you may not have published on YouTube.

[00:07:14] That could be you, right? Or perhaps you have so much traffic, but in the end, your email list is not growing. So I see that all the time. There’s people that have Facebook groups and it’s like 20,000 people, and then you look and there’s only 2000 people in their email list. There’s a lot of value. People like their content.

[00:07:34] So what’s the problem here? Usually it’s the free offer. Whatever you’re offering in exchange for their contact information is not resonating. And then take a moment and see if that might be your situation. The next step of that is you’ve got lots of leads, but you’re not making any sales. So I’ve seen the opposite, like people have 80,000 contacts in an email list.

[00:08:00] This is someone I’ve worked with and the sales are so minimal. There’s another person I worked with, she had about 40,000 in the email list size, and she was getting less sales than someone that had an email list of about 5,000 people in there. So what that means is one of two things. Either you’re not nurturing your list, which is giving them valuable content through email, staying engaged, staying top of mind, or your offer is not resonating.

[00:08:30] Now if you know that you’re nurturing your list, then it’s probably an offer issue, and the biggest challenge in an offer that I find is, does the offer resonate and the pricing is wrong? Or the offer doesn’t resonate. So there’s an easy test to determine that. If you think you’ve got a great offer, you can always offer it a discount.

[00:08:52] Or you could have like a beta group that would be cheaper and then you would say, Hey, it’s gonna be an entry level pricing, and then I’m gonna wanna have feedback at the end. It’s always great to have that exchange in that context so that they understand why they’re getting that deal, and that allows you to get the feedback and the testimonials.

[00:09:10] You can always move your pricing up. Now if you say, Hey, but what if I can’t get more students after that? I don’t wanna start with a low pricing. Well then maybe we have a traffic or a, or a lead magnet issue, right? Because we don’t have enough of an audience here. So always go lower with the pricing if you’re not sure about your offer, and then build that up.

[00:09:30] And then if ads are not working, then that’s usually because the funnel is broken, which is basically everything I just talked about or your offer doesn’t resonate. The challenge with ads is it’s generally targeted at a cold audience. It’s people that don’t know you, so you have to complete all of these steps.

[00:09:49] With that person in a relatively short amount of time, unless you have tons of cash. So most people don’t have tons of cash, so you wanna make back your investment from those ads and somewhere between like 15, 30, or 60 days max. So again, if that’s not working, then all these other pieces are usually broken, and then you wanna go back and then fix that before you start spending more money on ads.

[00:10:15] So I want you to think. Which of these is the area that you are most stuck with in your business? And if there’s like two or three, you should still pick one. And that’s the highest one that you’ve, that you’re stuck on.

[00:10:29] So then, we’re still talking about scaling, right? And how does that work? Well, you wanna have a clear offer. And then not like five programs. So that’s another mistake that I see. You’re gonna say, okay, my audience is growing. I’m starting to get sales. Let me release a second course. Let me put a second coaching signature program.

[00:10:53] Let me build a third one. Let me add a membership on this. That’s generally not the way to scale. Now, it’s good if you wanna test your offers and you can have offers at different types of levels, that’s fine. But you should really pick one offer that you’re going to want to scale. If you want to go the paid ad route.

[00:11:14] Then it has to be something that you can make substantial money with it. So what I mean by that is if your offer is under $500, it could be very difficult to scale with ads because you’re going to have to pay to acquire those customers. Normally, there’s one offer that you have that people give you the most review.

[00:11:34] They’re the most excited. You tend to have most enrollment in that. If you have a coaching program, then there should be a name or a solution that you’re focused the most on. So you might be able to think right now, like what is working the best in your business, and then that is usually the offer you’ll want to scale.

[00:11:53] And then you would revisit the first points that I had in the presentation so that you can fix the traffic, you can fix the lead magnet, you can optimize all of those different components. You do not want to change everything every week in your offer. By having something very specific, you’ll also be able to keep track of your analytics and then document your changes that you’re doing over time.

[00:12:19] Oh, I start publishing a weekly video and now I’m noticing that my email opens rates are increasing and I’m getting 1% more enrollment in my program. Great. You take note of that. Oh no, the videos are not working. That’s okay, right? You tested that and then you can try something else in that moment. But if you say, oh, I’m gonna move to offer B, then there’s an expression throwing the baby with the bath water.

[00:12:45] That is not how you’re going to be scaling. And what you can think about is, I put a little note here with a formula. It’s like I’m going to help one specific person achieve a very specific outcome through a method and why I have method is because it’s good normally that you have a framework or that you call your thing, you give it a name so it feels more concrete, and then without main friction, that would be one of the objections or challenges that they’re facing.

[00:13:14] Why would they not want to buy that?

[00:13:16] So then there’s three types of content that you want to be producing so that you can convert into that offer. The first type of content is problem aware. That is educating people about that problem that they’re facing. Maybe they’re not getting those raises because they don’t know how to have those conversations with their manager if you’re a career coach or if they’re trying to get a new job, maybe they haven’t updated their resume and their profiles to go through the AI filters. Funny thing aside, I have a friend and he had to do an interview and the interviewer was a full AI, like he didn’t even talk to a human. Well, if they’re unprepared for that, right, that’s a big problem.

[00:13:58] They’re not gonna get that job. So you have to educate them about the problem. The second thing is content around the solution that you’re providing. How can they do things differently? So in that instance, he could be doing different types of practices and learning how to engage in an interview with an AI, which is really weird when you think about it, but that would be a part of a solution, right?

[00:14:21] And then finally, the third one is content that helps them make the decision because most people will then compare, okay, great, I’ve got this problem, here’s the solution, here’s a path forward. But now they might have three different options. You want them to pick you and content that compares you to different types of option usually works great for that.

[00:14:42] Most people are concerned about talking about the competition, but if you don’t do it, they’re going to research it anyway. I’m sure you’ve all researched other types of alternatives for whatever you’ve bought, right? So you need to create content in these three buckets if you wanna really have a scalable system.

[00:14:58] So you just wanna get things done good enough, put it out there, and then start refining. So you can pick today, like what offer you’re going to be working on, and then you improve on that. I’ve gone on podcasts and it wasn’t the best delivery. It doesn’t matter. Get my practice reps out there, and then I start, I mean, I’m looking at some of my old social media videos from years ago.

[00:15:21] They’re horrible. Yet somehow they still got me clients and done is better than perfect. That is really, really important. And then what you wanna do is just take notes so that you can improve on what you’re doing. A mistake or an error. No, that’s just a way that you can learn, right? And I mean, the other day I did a Facebook Live.

[00:15:44] I was using a new app. It was sent on private, no one even saw it. Then I made it public. I thought, well, this was embarrassing. Doesn’t matter. Change it to public. The video’s out there, right? I mean, it’s still better. Next time I’ll use the app better. And I’ve been doing this for 10 years. So again, that’s just part of, of the process.

[00:16:05] Now, what I don’t want you to do is give up after you’ve made one of those mistakes. This is not gonna be the last Facebook Live that I’m going to be doing.

[00:16:14] Now, some of you might be wondering if this is the right time to run ads. You’re saying, Hey Pol, I’ve got all this. I’ve got the steps I can nurture.

[00:16:22] I’ve got my message right? I’ve got my offer, right? Well, is this the right time for you to be running ads? So what you want to be looking is first, is your message resonating with your existing audience? Are you able to convert them? Now I’m gonna be bringing some stats, and those are pretty low actually.

[00:16:42] So when you’re talking to a cold audience, selling to 2% of them is actually considered great. When you look at like big gurus in the field, they have about 3% conversions. That’s three out of 100 people that sign up for their free stuff. That buy their paid programs, and those are called unicorns in that instance.

[00:17:02] And a lot of businesses, they convert about 1% of that traffic. Now organic, that’s all the social content, how you’re engaging. You wanna have higher numbers in there. So once you feel good about the organic approach, then you can start running ads and you could do a budget, like $500 or a thousand dollars if you’re using a platform like meta.

[00:17:24] And then just evaluate all the data, all the stats, the open rate, are people watching your videos or the reading your emails, are they buying your offer. And then refine. And then continue spending. I have clients that spend $30,000 a month in ads, but even then when I brought them on, I’m like, no, we’re just gonna do a thousand dollars.

[00:17:43] There’s no point in wasting money. Then if that’s not working, then you just go back with your organic, you refine that, and then you do another ad test. And eventually, if you’re having really strong organic presence, then you can run both in there. Now, if you’re running ads and they’re not making money and you’ve been doing this for several months and you’re spending over a thousand dollars a month, you should be stopping those ads.

[00:18:08] There’s something wrong there.

[00:18:10] So then what does the growth system look like for scaling? The first item is like a masterclass or a webinar or something where you have more time to present what you are offering and then you can educate and then give them a small transformation. After that, you want to be sharing usually some kind of blog content, but a blog that they could still be a video blog.

[00:18:36] It does. It could be like infographics, different types of mediums like that. It’s good to have those on your website as well. And then you’re gonna be having an email series, could be like 10 emails that make your audience go through a story arc, and then you’ll be sharing that content, that blog, those videos, those types of content.

[00:18:55] I have short videos here. That’s a little trick that you can use when you’re sending out emails is every a few emails, you put a video in it, you can even see in the subject line, and then you put a thumbnail of your video and that dramatically increases the rate at which people are going to open and engage with your emails.

[00:19:11] It also builds trust. As people see you and hear you, they’re more likely to want to move forward with you. So this content is essential. And like I said, my first videos were horrible. It doesn’t actually matter. You wanna just get it out there so you can build that trust. I know how like, it can be challenging at first when we’re getting into that area.

[00:19:34] After that, we can have what’s called retargeting ads. So just showing your offer to the people that have been engaging with your emails. That would be a whole other presentation on how that works. If you’re using any of the advertising platforms, you just wanna make sure you install the pixel so that you’ll be able to retarget those audience, or you can even upload an email list in some of the advertising platforms.

[00:19:57] And then obviously you want an offer page that clearly explains the transformation that you’re providing.

[00:20:03] So then here, this is just to remind you that you need to understand the metrics for your business, and you should be having data on these stats. So how much traffic are you getting?

[00:20:15] How much of these are signing up for your free offers? That’s gonna be the lead conversion. What’s the percentage of those leads that then buy your offer? And if you’re running ads, how much is each one of those leads costing? And then you can have a small dashboard and track this on a weekly basis or monthly basis.

[00:20:33] It doesn’t have to be too complicated. I recommend that you use something like a Google sheet and then you punch in those numbers there. If you have an assistant help you, you should still be looking at those so that you’re familiar with those numbers. And then you can see what is making changes as you implement some of the strategies and tactics in your business.

[00:20:52] And then finally your 30 day action plan, because otherwise this is just information. It’s not going to help move the needle. This is very, very important. I want you to do something right. So then here, a four week plan could be something like this. So let’s say in the next week. You clarify, refine your offer, your audience, and then you identify that biggest bottleneck, what we were talking about earlier.

[00:21:17] You have access to the recording, so you can go back to that if you’re not sure what that bottleneck was. Then in the week two, focus on that free offer. Here I have like a webinar. You could have a checklist, a consultation, an application. Generally a video training series or something like this or a webinar tend to work best at that stage because they build trust.

[00:21:41] If you have a consultation you’re offering for free or an application, make it very specific and say the problem that you’re going to be solving. Don’t just say discovery call. Because people think sales call, right? That’s not a lead magnet. That would be an offer at that point. And then on the third week create an authority piece.

[00:22:02] So that could be a good video or a recording that you have. And then you can have like three small articles that go with that. Or maybe you have a checklist, you have a video, and then you have an interview discussing that. So you’ll be able to share that through the email list and building that nurture sequence that we talked about earlier so that people that get to know you and they can build that trust.

[00:22:25] And then finally make a traffic plan. So for you, it might mean talking to your referral network, to people that already know the work that you’re doing. Or maybe you’re gonna be having a series of social posts around this content that you’ve made, or you might wanna try that paid ad test. But if you do the paid ad test, don’t spend more than 500 or a thousand dollars. Most of the time, $500 is good enough to know if that resonates.

[00:22:52] So we only had a little bit of time today. I tend to be a detail guy, so I’m quite proud of my accomplishment right now. If you have follow up questions, then I’m sure that those can be relayed to me and I’ll be more than happy to answer those.

[00:23:06] If you want to learn more about what I do, I have two brands that you can check out. The first one is thedigitalnavigator.com, and then you’ll see that there’s a pricing page there and I have website, technology and marketing services. And then I have a new brand, mindofalltrades.com. We’re launching a podcast in about six weeks, give or take, and we’re taking some founding members there.

[00:23:33] This is about exploring the craft and commerce of educational businesses. In the digital age. So that’s gonna be really exciting. And then for the early founders, they’ll be working in small live group calls throughout the month as we’ll be building the membership together.