One of the things it is important to look at is the small, subtle ways nerves or tension or doubt show up for you.

I’m talking about low-grade nerves here, not big expressions of it where it is obvious and can’t be ignored. These are your “tells,” signs or signals you’re just a tiny bit nervous.

When you get in touch with these small ways your body is telling you something is up inside of you, it will skyrocket your self awareness and let you start really managing your energy or mood.

As an example, years ago I noticed that I will very slowly and softly wring my hands. Nothing big, and certainly not frantic hand wringing we may be used to seeing that indicates extreme anxiety.

I remember about 10 years ago noticing I was doing it on a conference call where I was just a tiny bit concerned that a team member of mine would derail the meeting as she had before.

It was so minor, I almost dismissed it but instead I asked myself, “what is worrying you? what do you need?”

I’ve since noticed whenever I catch myself doing it and it’s most definitely one of my “tells” or signs.

I realized in that moment that it was a way my body was letting me know what was going on inside and I’ve learned to listen to it and use it as a sign to rebalance myself.

This is NINJA level personal transformation here, y’all and the key to start REALLY being in touch with the ways your body may be showing you your feelings.

So what are your TELLS and SIGNS?

If you don’t have an immediate answer, I encourage you to start paying attention to tension in your body or physical habits you may have and check in with yourself and see if anything is worrying you or making you anxious.

<3

Beware of the Frankenstein Business, or Your Marketing + Sales Must Fit Together + Work Together or it’s Not Going to Work

There are so many really, really specific cookie cutter trainings and step by step systems out there. Like SO many.

You know the one for your funnel, the one for your signature talk, your signature program, the one for your Facebook group.

The one to learn to network, the one to learn to speak, the one to learn to lead a workshop.

And on and on.

Generally these programs are really, really great information but if you don’t understand how to USE the information and tailor it TO YOU AND YOUR PERSONALITY, it’s not going to work.

It is a bunch of disjointed and half-baked strategies that only SORTA works at BEST.

I call this the Frankenstein Business because it’s a mix and match of pieces parts that don’t fit together strategically and in clear, over-arching way.

Your opt-ins MUST point to your offer,

Your signature talk has to speak to the problem your program solves

Your intro and posts must speak to the needs of your Ideal Client who’s buying Your program

Your conversations must speak to the needs / results you get clients

and on and on and on.

It ALL has to fit together, related and make sense as a whole, otherwise it’s a frankenstein of pieces of this strategy and parts of this other strategy.

With a Frankenstein Business you’re not most out of every.single.thing you are doing in your sales and marketing.

To have a business work in this day and age you must be maximizing everything you do or it’s not going to work (or it’s going to suck).

Online and offline, for different reasons, if you have a Frankenstein Business you’re going to run around a lot and be really busy but still won’t be making money or impact you want.

Do you have a Frankenstein business? What are your pieces parts?

<3

There isn’t always a 1 to 1 corollary between inspired marketing and where the money comes from.

You know how when you’re doing your marketing and it doesn’t seem like it’s working, so you stop?

I do. Partly because as a marketer from long ago, we should always be looking at our marketing activities and making sure they’re actually working.

We can waste a LOT of time doing stuff that isn’t turning into clients and money.

Also partly because I get discouraged. I’m sure you’ve been there too.

Here’s the thing I noticed last year.

I’d do a bunch of outreach emails and calls and get zero response but then in the next few days, new potential clients would pop up – seemingly out of no where.

But it wasn’t out of no where. Even though all that marketing action was in that specific direction, the Universe saw the buckets of inspired action I took and sent me the clients and money I wanted.

Saying there isn’t a 1 to 1 corollary between inspired marketing and money is just a super geeky way to say that the Universe rewards aligned action, even if the evidence isn’t 100% obvious.

Get out there and do what you said you would and notice what shows up and don’t worry about whether it lined up perfectly.

Ask the Question NO ONE Has Ever Asked – Trust Yourself!

Key to your conversations and selling – and feeling good while you’re doing it – is to be listening on several levels.

Listening from a place of deep curiosity so you can really get into and understand exactly where they are at in that moment.  

Listening like this is paying attention to the exact words coming out of their mouth, their individual phrasing and way of putting things AND

Intuitively listening and feeling into what they are say. This is why I say selling takes Listening on 5 Levels:

• What they’re saying
• What they’re NOT saying / what’s behind what they’re saying
  
• What do they need
  
• What are they afraid of
• What do they need to hear or be asked
  

What happens when you’re listening on many levels is you will get ideas and intuitive hits about what needs to be said or asked.

GO THERE.

Even if it feels a little “out there” or tricky, or potentially triggering or like you’re level jumping and asking a very personal or revealing question before you’re connected enough.

GO THERE.

I’ve found when I do, it ends up being the question NO ONE has ever asked them and pivotal to their shifting or popping through something.

Trust yourself when you hear those nudges and GO THERE.

One thing I’ve done in especially tricky moments (inside my head worrying about “going there), is tell on myself as I like to call it.

Something like “I’m seeing something I’d like to ask you (or say) that feels a bit too soon given we’ve only known each other for 2.5 seconds…”

So trust yourself, tell on yourself if need be and GO THERE.

When you do, you’ll a) help someone break through something they need to and b) set yourself apart from ALL the others because NO ONE has ever asked them that.

You’ll get more clients that way too, and even those who don’t sign up, they’ll remember you as the one who asked them the question they needed to be asked.

<3

If you’re like many people I talk to, you’re tired of the hype-y, slimey Sales Conversation tactics that leave you feeling like you have to pressure or convince potential clients to work with you.

It feels gross — you know it, they know it. You’ve been pressured or shamed, I’ve been pressured or shamed. 

What that creates though when you’re out there talking about your work and selling is an inclination to OVERCORRECT. 

You’re so afraid of making people feel like that, you go light in your sales conversations, not asking the hard questions and not really exploring what they need or their pain points.  

And you feel icky and worried the whole time about whether you’re making them feel pressured or shamed. 

I’m all about helping you END all that doubt and sell with confidence because you’ve found YOUR way to sell that feels like you. 

It’s about knowing how to deliberately navigate anything that gets said and with that, easily enrolling more clients.

Look for yourself, where do you fall on the “coming on too strong” vs. “going too light” spectrum in your sales conversations?

Understanding your relationship to pressure is key to having power without slime in your sales conversations.  <3

[Needs to Be Said]

Perhaps I’ve been to too many 3 day events, retreats, masterminds and coaching industry events, but we’ve really got to talk about the utter lack of SUBSTANCE going on in our industry. 

The Lifestyle Brand is dead, and has been for awhile.

People are sick of the slick, perfect pictures from the photoshoot in Paris. But it’s STILL going on and it’s set a tone that I see seeping into our in-person events. 

It’s all hype, flash and shimmer without the SUBSTANCE. GRAVITAS. DEPTH.

The best I can articulate it is as some sort of fashion contest. 

Who’s got the best dress? 

Who’s got the cutest outfit?

Who’s most unique?

MOST of this is subconscious behavior fueled by survival instincts that have us women ever-so-subtlety competing with each other, even while we speak of building each other up and supporting each other. 

But it’s ironic because most of us are committed to massive transformation, expansion and growth — for ourselves and our clients.

We all like to dress up and look nice but c’mom. It’s not the red carpet.  

So wear your pretty dresses and skirts and faux pantsuits (non matching pants and jacket), wear your dark jeans and beautiful blouse with cool jewelry. 

You do YOU of course but for the record:

It’s not the place for tight as hell body-conscious dresses and cage / bondage-inspired shoes. That’s for a nightclub (if that’s your style), not a networking event or industry conference. It’s not professional and seems incongruent to the environment. 

And much, MUCH more importantly, we need to make a collective decision — are we here to have dress up contests where who’s cutest wins or are we here to profoundly and irrevocably change people’s lives?  

Because the fashion contest creates the damaging comparison loop that has online coaches striving to be the next It Girl of the coaching industry. (There’s an actual brand based on this, btw.)

I don’t know about you but I have the chops, the substance and the depth, broad and extensive expertise. My work is backed up by years in business, years of training, refinement and personal growth. 

I personally don’t want to be an It Girl or to be the winner of something that seems way too much like a popularity contest. 

We can most definitely change lives AND look cute, too but let’s put a stop to the fashion-plate, dress up, runway show party show.

We are SO much more than that. 

Thoughts? Have you seen this too? 

<3

Let’s talk integrity and judgment and competition.

We give what we want to get.

We assume that others want the same things.

We judge them when they do something differently that we would.

We judge them when they adhere to different values than we do.

On the inside, yes all the time. On the outside, expressed sometimes too.

There are people in our industry that do not have the skills, the background or the capacity to do what they do.

There are people in our industry selling online and then disappearing and not delivering on the promised work.

There are people in our industry outright scamming their clients, their teams and their vendors.

All of this is true. The question is how much time, energy and brain space are you giving these people?

If you feel compelled to call out unscrupulous people publicly, those without integrity who are giving us all a bad name, that’s your right and prerogative.  

That’s one thing.

What I want to talk about is the rampant judgment going on in our industry.

There is a lot of looking outwards and comparing and judging others in the name of integrity, calling out certain people specifically or a type of coach.

Just because you don’t agree or like how the person got there (their experience) or the person’s perspective or vantage point.

Just because someone is doing something you don’t agree with doesn’t make what they’re doing reprehensible or wrong.

And when comparison and judgment are going on, you can be sure there is also competition going on – even if unconsciously so.

The next time you catch yourself comparing yourself to another or judging someone else’s work or business, pause for a second and check in to see if there is any competition there too. However subtle, I bet you’ll find a little tiny bit.

I know when I catch myself, I can find a little of it there and it’s humbling. But the point is, if we can name it and identify it, we have a much better chance of shifting out of it.

Check in with yourself, when was the last time you compared yourself or judged someone else?

<3

(Or, how the Fb Algorithm Messes with Your Confidence, Excitement and Money)

You’ve heard of the Facebook algorithm, and you may think you get it, but not well enough given what I see.

The algorithm means a small, small portion of people see your posts, ads, videos — even in groups!

Like a tiny, tiny percentage.

Facebook recently again has changed the algorithm and it’s even harder to get in front of an organic – UNPAID, NON ADVERTISING – audience.

Your personal page is a bit better, but in general anything you post is NOT being seen by very many people.

Or, more bluntly NOTHING you post is being seen.

The algorithm limits who receives your post in their feed, and then we have to factor in whether or not that person is on Fb in that timeframe in order to see it. Can you see how limited that is?

Part of this is managing expectations and from a marketing standpoint, we have got to assume that very few people are actually seeing what you post.

Since marketing is about numbers and eyeballs to a certain extent, if it’s that limited, which it is on Facebook, you’re going to struggle finding and getting clients if your ONLY strategy is Facebook. 

This begins a spiral of doubt and uncertainty: you judge how well your message is connecting and attracting clients or NOT.

• You start worrying no one wants what you do.
• You start spinning out.
• You start wondering why it seems to work for everyone else. (It’s not, and they’re either doing other marketing strategies or not making money).
• You start thinking there is something wrong with you.

And it’s an instant confidence killer when it doesn’t get a ton of likes. When no one says yes or signs up.

So there is the vicious cycle thing that goes on where it dings your confidence a little, or a lot, you get a little less excited and start to spiral into doubt. 

While there are some who focus primarily on Fb, and do quite well, UNTIL YOU’RE THERE, YOU’RE NOT THERE.

You’ll also often find they are also doing other strategies and have an email list of 2000 AT LEAST. 

Here’s the thing posting to Facebook is ONE of MANY strategies you could be using in your marketing and sales. It should not be the ONLY one.

I’m shining a big ole light on this because I see so many entrepreneurs whose only marketing strategy is Facebook, and not Fb Ads (which are awesome).

If you want your business to work, you should have 2-3 solid marketing strategies that are NOT ONLINE. You can focus exclusively online when you have the NUMBERS.

For now, until you have those numbers, I promise you there are strategies you’d enjoy other than Facebook and chances are you just haven’t been exposed to what those may be.

If you’re committed to only posting to Facebook, I really do wish you good luck, just keep in this in mind before you decide that your business sucks, your work sucks and you suck.

You don’t, you’re just not getting in front of enough people.

What other strategies do you do besides Facebook? <3