This Run Lift Mom Podcast Episode is about how to serve value to your audience as a small business, direct seller, or entrepreneur with Brenda Ster.
Show Notes
2:00 push versus pull marketing 3:00 why people use social media 6:00 abundance based mindset 7:30 on cold messaging 9:00 displaying your true self through lifestyle content 10:30 your story is not boring 12:00 3Ps defined 13:00 crafting your own story 14:30 vulnerability as a strength 16:00 3 types of stories 17:00 value of purposeful content 18:00 walking the talk of the value 20:00 create a safe space in community moderation 21:30 defining ideal client (minute 24) in the Influencer Strategy episode 22:30 progress over perfection 23:30 serve those behind you on the line 25:00 promotional content 28:00 weaving 3Ps with social psychology 30:00 predicting behavior as a marketer 33:00 rapid fire
Find Brenda on the Sassy Suite website, Facebook, and Instagram.
Download the 3 Ps of Social Content Workbook(at no cost- thank you, Brenda!)
Transcript of Episode 47: 3 Ps of Social Content with Brenda Ster of Sassy Suite
Aired originally on Sept 24, 2019
Suzy [00:00:48] All right- we’ll get rolling here. All right. Welcome to the Run Lift Mom podcast. Brenda Ster I am so happy to have you here.
Brenda [00:00:58] Hello I’m so glad to be here. Thank you so much Suzy.
Suzy [00:01:02] Well I have invited you here Brenda to talk to us about content mix because you are the gold standard. So we are gonna walk through, of course, how to provide value for our audience. OK let’s do it. So, Brenda- you have planted your flag firmly in attraction based marketing. Can you tell folks out there whether they are direct sellers or small business owners or entrepreneurs, what that means?
Brenda [00:01:29] Yes absolutely. So the whole idea of attraction based content is drawing people toward you. Pull marketing versus push marketing; push marketing is you’re pushing your content to them, you’re invading their news feed, you’re pushing your information into their inbox, you’re cold messaging private messages. And I personally believe that, yes, cold marketing has a place and there are people out there who teach it and swear by it and say it’s successful. But here’s the thing: you have to make a hundred phone calls to get one yes. You call that one yes a success? Good for you. I would bet those other ninety nine are going to hit your mindset. They’re going to make you feel like “man, I am struggling. Am I good at this? Can I do this?” Here’s the thing:
Brenda [00:02:14] There is a place for cold marketing. I’m not good at it. It affects my mindset. It makes me feel bad about myself.
Brenda [00:02:21] I feel like I’m burning my network. I feel like I’m annoying people. It is not my vibe so attraction content is where I’m putting content out there that is drawing people toward me that they like that provides them value that they’re interested in and that they want to learn more about; so that when I do get to a promotional ask, if out of 10 people I ask and 2 say yes I’m a 20 percent return versus my 1 percent on that cold marketing option.
Brenda [00:02:47] So I just prefer at the end of the day I’m not very good at sales but I’m really good at creating content and creating value. I’m not good at that sell. I’m not good at the hard ask but I’m really really good at relationship and content building and creating spark that draws people in because people come to social media for three reasons and really only three reasons: entertainment, relationships, and utility. So we think about relationships. We come because we peak at what our friends and family are doing. We want to check in with our friends.
Suzy [00:03:20] Right. Right.
Brenda [00:03:21] What they’re up to and we come for entertainment. We watch videos we share viral content. We want to zone out on Netflix. We come for entertainment value. We we all love memes right. And we come for utility. Utility is some purpose that I’m online because I have a need I’m here for training I’m here because of groups I’m a part of that are valuable to me in some way. I ask my friends questions that I specifically need an answer to. Everybody knows somebody that you have ever asked a question and said who knows somebody who sells this?” “Oh you’ve got to call my friend Suzy cause she’s amazing!”
Suzy [00:03:57] Right.
Brenda [00:03:58] Utility. How long do you bake a Thanksgiving turkey? Google that. Or you could ask your friends and your friends are going to tell you the funny stories about how they bake turkeys. So this is literally the reason we come to social media is for these other reasons- not for a promotion. So when we if we have a no matter what kind of business we have whether you have a boutique or a crafting business or a drug sales or network marketing business or you’re an entrepreneur in some way or you sell coaching services if you come in and you’re heavy handed pushing pushing pushing promotion it’s sort of the equivalent of people who watch TV and they stay for the commercials because they love the show but nobody it comes to TV and says I want to watch commercials all day long. Right. You tolerate the commercials because you enjoy the show. Our job as marketers is to create the show! Its to create the reason that people want to hang out with us. So when we think about well what’s my show about it comes down to the value of why would people engage you what value can I provide. So that it speaks to what I call the three P’s content mix.
Brenda [00:05:03] So this all right. Yeah. And I want to get into that, Brenda. But I want to pause here for a second just to point out not only from a numbers perspective does this put me in a position to win but then also it’s, you know, I often will say that my side business is my happy place. It’s more enjoyable for us when we are connecting with the folks that we’re serving. Like it’s more fun to do it this way.
Brenda [00:05:27] Yes- it’s more fun and a lot of people you know and, like I said, I’m not good at cold cold messaging. I feel bad when I feel like I’m annoying somebody.
Brenda [00:05:38] If I if I get blocked by somebody if they’re like” spammy direct sales girl!”- Block- right? It perpetuates the stigma. And it hurts my own mindset. Conversely, if I have something that I’m providing of value and value could be entertainment, information, community. One of the hardest things that women in our age demographic struggle with is making new friends.
Brenda [00:06:02] Right. That’s really fundamental here.
Brenda [00:06:05] How do we make friends as adult women especially adult women with children who never get out of the house.
Suzy [00:06:10] Yeah.
Brenda [00:06:11] It’s hard to do! So, if we’re talking about common values and we’re creating spaces for community we’re creating online safe spaces to be vulnerable. We’re creating connection based on something else. And here’s what I find: when I post something that gives high engagement isn’t about me. It inspires me to want to keep on providing more value. So if I know that my community loves content I want to create more of it because I want them to be happy. It’s completely in abundance based mindset philosophy versus the idea of scarcity like if I post something and people compete against me or you might steal my idea or I don’t want to share something.
Brenda [00:06:51] I’m out there saying if everybody had this abundance mindset of content and value all rising tides raise all boats that kind of philosophy. That’s how you know that’s the idea that I want to share and it’s so much gets your mindset into such a better place to say attraction marketing is a long game. It is not post and make sales today it is post, nurture, and build relationships and build trust and build familiarity and build likeability so that later on when I do get to an ask I have a better chance of conversion so I’m nurturing. I’m nurturing long range revenue versus I’m nurturing immediate revenue.
Brenda [00:07:30] Right. I’m doing both but I have this balance with I’m nurturing long range revenue toward a relationship based outcome. I have a much better chance of sustaining because I have built a relationship and I can become referrable and I’ve got repeat business and clients who then refer me because oh my gosh you have to call my friend Brenda or my friend Suzy versus one time quick sale that may have come come off that cold message.
Brenda [00:07:55] So, I mean- and I get this. I get this feedback all the time. Well Brenda my up line or my friends I’ll teach cold marketing. There is a place for that.
Brenda [00:08:04] I think there’s I think there’s a lot of struggle with how that affects somebodies mindset why it perpetuates a negative stigma of this industry because MLM and drug selling has this sort of spammy reputation. When I say I’m willing to take a stand and take my whole career on the stand. I’m willing to say that there’s enough people out there who really don’t like that method but don’t know any alternative.
Suzy [00:08:27] May I offer a personal example?
Suzy [00:08:30] So I I celebrated my year with ZYIA Active in July so I started an Instagram account from scratch. So about now I’m starting to see my memories right. You posted this this time last year. Yeah. And I actually Brenda the way that I know you is because I started going up against some brick walls about a month in of sharing stock photos from my company. And I hired a business coach- a student of yours. I hired a business coach who taught me about attraction based marketing. If anyone is on my direct sales team they know that your three P’s workbook is onboarding material.
Brenda [00:09:09] Yeah.
Suzy [00:09:10] So what’s neat though it’s kind of nice for me to look at. Now it’s so obvious for me to look back and say of course I wasn’t selling any leggings when I was posting some picture of a 100 pound brunette. That isn’t me. I’m no makeup and lip gloss and kids hanging from every limb. And when I started tapping into that that’s when it really started to become my happy place.
Brenda [00:09:36] Yes because then suddenly it was lifestyle. It was connection- it was real people could look at you and say, “I want to be your friend because I feel like I relate with you because it’s interesting” Because, I struggle with the same things I’m trying to find balance and I got two kids there hanging off me and I can sort of sort of get lips lip gloss on every day maybe.
Brenda [00:09:56] But you inspire me. That’s relatable. That’s lifestyle content. So the better we do at creating that lifestyle message. And so the primary message is this is who I am and my product rides along in the sidecar versus my product is driving and I write on the sidecar. We need that position. I’m the I’m the brand I’m the person that somebody wants to follow because of my own story.
Brenda [00:10:23] So when we think about the people who are successful in online business you want you follow them because of who they are not necessarily because of what they sell exactly. This challenge for anybody listening to go to say well who are the people that I for the influencers I follow. Right. I follow them because of who they are. I like their humor I like their style I like their vibe I feel like she’s relatable I feel like we could be best friends because we all have five social media best friends that don’t know that we’re best friends. We all know this right. And when we think about why we follow certain people we follow them because they provide value to us not upset beyond the product beyond- beyond whatever they’re selling.
Brenda [00:11:04] So the shift is thinking about OK well what’s my lifestyle message. How do I want to be known. And a lot of people will say this is a very big struggle for a lot of new marketers no matter what your marketing is. Everyone feels like they’re boring. I feel like I’m boring. Why would anyone want to hear about my life. I don’t go anywhere. I don’t do anything. My big road trip is to target you know those are those are real mindsets. That’s a mindset challenge more than anything else. And I believe that I’m a case study on this. I work at home. I’m a hard core homebody. I don’t go anywhere. I literally my husband does carpool morning school by morning afternoon pick up. Not even kidding. And my big outing is maybe twice a week I go to the grocery store, maybe Target. I don’t go anywhere. I love being at home. But what I do is I narrate what I narrate my life. I just narrate right. So it creates a little bit funny a little bit self-deprecating, a little bit quirky thing my eight year old said, something funny my eleven year old did. It’s just it’s just daily life but it creates this relate ability that people say Oh I kind of feel like I know her. I feel like we’re Social media best friends. Right. And that’s what I know.
Suzy [00:12:20] That’s kind of how you categorize. So going to your 3Ps you’re giving us a great example of personality. Can you define that for the listeners. I mean, I follow this and I hope that anyone that is connected with me on the socials can see what you’re describing in my own feed; but, can you define for those that might not be familiar with it?
Brenda [00:12:42] Yeah. So I break the the foundation of my content strategy my content coaching is called the 3Psof social content the 3 P’s are: personality content, purposeful content, and promotional content. Personality content is content that helps people get to know you. What are you about? What’s what’s your vibe? What’s your sense of humor? What’s your day to day? What’s your narrating your life story?
Brenda [00:13:06] And this is where we have the opportunity. And it really is an opportunity. We have the opportunity and the privilege to craft our own story so people who feel like they know me they know things that I want them to know right. I love the color pink. I work at home. I have two kids. I’m a Green Bay Packers fan I got married in Maui. These are things that I curate as my story. And I simply rinse and repeat the same things over and over over again. I don’t share things that I don’t want to be public. There certain parts of my life that are not public. And so and so I’ve drawn a very clear line there. But we have the opportunity to curate what we want our story to be. How I ended up in this business what my journey has been. That’s all public and I share it and I repeat it. And I tell it in different ways and I weave it into my social imagery. We talked about, Suzy, that I love ZYIA hot pink yoga pants or the workout pants! My daughter and I both of them; I got them as soon as they came out. Everyone knows I love pink. I love hot pink. I had like 3 people be like, “Brenda you need these!”.
Brenda [00:14:08] And I was like, “girl, I already have them!” You know?
Brenda [00:14:10] So my point is that when people get to know you, personality content is stuff that will they will be Target see something that reminds them of you. And then they tag you and say “Suzy I saw this thing and I thought of you!”. That’s the best connection ever because it means they’re thinking about you when they’re not with you. And we only tag people who we want to have a relationship and have a friend place connection with.
Suzy [00:14:34] I want to make something clear here. You know, my my business coach- a student of yours- often says “you can quit a product you can’t quit a person”. And that’s kind of what I hear you describing. But what you’re saying is there are things that can still be private! Like, the things that you’re weaving in about your personality- it’s not some made up fiction story you guys! It’s just what you feel comfortable sharing with the world. I like hearing you encouraging us to be vulnerable!
[00:15:01] Yes! Here’s the thing about vulnerability and this fits into that personality element. Another thing I’ve been sharing recently for like the last six months or so is I struggle with anxiety and depression. So this is something that I will tell you. It took me a while to get my head wrapped around whether I want to go public with it. And as soon as I did. People were like, “Brenda I had no idea that you’ve struggled with this”. I struggle with it since postpartum and my daughter is 11. I mean I go and ups and downs like everybody else but I had a real mindset shift on…we tend to think about- we tend to think of vulnerability as weakness but in reality the people who are in our audience view vulnerability as strength. So that’s a huge opportunity for those of us who may be in a position of influence to say, “I struggle with this! You’re not alone”. I’m willing to put myself out there and here’s my story so you don’t you don’t feel alone.
Brenda [00:16:00] Because people didn’t know I struggled with this behind the scenes and I decided to bring that as part of my story public and say, “listen you guys I’m really struggling with this and here’s how I’m struggling here’s what I’m doing about it and here’s my doctor assessment and here’s all my, you know, “are you struggling with these things? Number 1 through 5”; I put it on social media I put it out there and people were like, “Oh my gosh Brenda I feel like you’re more real now because I feel like you’re like me!”.
Suzy [00:16:25] Yeah! You know, one of the things- you know, so any market are out there will be familiar with: you can take cues from television or movies! Powerful stories: the you are not alone story, the walk away story, the redemption story.
Suzy [00:16:39] Folks that are connected with me know that I recently won a race but it was a race that I did because I missed my flight for the marathon before. It was a- so listeners if you’re wondering why in the world you felt so connected to that story-it’s because it was a redemption story! I missed the flight. I signed up for one on a fluke and won the race. It’s a redemption story.
Brenda [00:17:03] Yup exactly.
Suzy [00:17:04] So tell us a little bit about purposeful information. Because, now I’m talking about running and listeners of Run Lift Mom, Yeah yeah. So talk to me a little bit about that second. So first is personality.
Brenda [00:17:18] Personality content is content that helps people get to know you. So personality is curated by you and really you-centric. Purposeful content is content that serves your audience. Content that helps them in some way. It’s content with a purpose. So the purpose might be to inform, to inspire, to entertain, to educate, to build community, to create an emotional connection.
Brenda [00:17:44] So this is where all the value is. This is where all the value lives. So the way that I sort of say it is, personality is the spark, the sizzle, but purposeful is the steak. OK? Personality is the frosting but purposeful is the cupcake. Personality is what will get someone’s attention. Purposeful will keep someone’s attention. OK?
Brenda [00:18:06] So purposeful is where we now have the opportunity to help our community in some way. Whether it’s information community value, articles of interest, creating humor, creating conversation. It’s the reason people will stay engaged.
Brenda [00:18:23] It’s the reason they’ll keep watching. So it’s this is the core big opportunity of value. So in my business space where I talk about social media coaching and social media marketing, my personality is helping people get to know me- what’s my story and why they why they would want to follow. But my purposeful value is all about tips and education and trends and articles from the market and sharing other experts resources and saying this is what Mary Smith is talking about, and this is what these tech crunch is posting about, here’s what’s happening on Facebook, Here’s what’s happening as the video trends of the industry- that’s all purposeful content. Hundred percent.
Brenda [00:19:00] So in your business is with Run Lift Mom, you’re a lot about health and wellness and things like that. Everything here is about showcasing the lifestyle of you doing the doing the run lift mom mission, right? It’s exercising, its health, its mindset things that are inspiring. It’s walking the talk of the value you provide. That’s how we tie personality purposeful together. We walk the talk of the value. So those two pieces of content are the biggest chunk of all your social content and they’re what are going to build your nurturing funnel when you bring people in to say, “I want to get to know you before I decide if I want to buy from you” and “I want to get to know you because I want to see one if I like you and two if you’re going to help me in some way. One, do I like you because you’re perky and pink and blonde and adorable? And two are you going to help me because you’ve provided free value to me in some way and I’m willing to invest further?
Suzy [00:19:57] And can I make a point that listeners, you need not be a retired run coach and health professional to provide purposeful information. You are good at something! You are good at something!And so I would recommend, and Brenda I’d love if you can just comment on, if you can find what you can serve with- we’re serving then selling- and then learn to teach and inspire with that thing. You don’t have to be a pro.
Brenda [00:20:26] No not at all. And this is where people underestimate: a lot of purposeful value simply comes in community moderation. If you create a safe space for people to talk about what their their goals and their pain points are. That alone is value. That alone is value! If you create a safe space for people to say you know what I’m really struggling with this and other people can weigh in and say “girl, let me help you”. That’s value that’s purposeful value because people will love the community aspect. So I go back to that point of saying who’s your ideal client.
Brenda [00:21:04] And if you’re thinking about your ideal client- and you know, we didn’t talk about ideal client in depth today- but the idea of ideal client is: who’s good who is the person who is sitting across me at the table would be the perfect person for your product the perfect person for your business, or the perfect person for your service. That’s the person who I want to serve value to so I build relationship trust with her.
Suzy [00:21:27] And I will link in the show notes to a bonus episode that I did with Neena Malosky. And you guys I’ll tell you the time stamp and everything you can hear all about Becki. She’s my ideal client. And Neena and I have a really nice back and forth about how to define that person.
Brenda [00:21:41] And yes-that’s such a critical piece because as soon as you know who your ideal client is, and you know what she’s struggling with, you know her pain points are, you know with her internal motivations and fears are- then, I simply speak to them all day long. So in my case, I know that in a very specific way my ideal client is someone who is new in direct sales or Network Marketing or up to an emerging leader. She struggles with mind set fear. She struggles with the perception of being spammy. She doesn’t want to burn out her friends and family but she doesn’t know where to start. So there’s two different major pieces of value I can provide just in my public content that has nothing to do with marketing my products. One is mindset- “girl you got this. Let me show you our community who’s going to help you with this mindset because we’ve been where you are”.
Brenda [00:22:28] And the second is “here are some tactical tips on how to get started. Here’s blog posts here’s and here’s my free e-book. Here’s the pieces of tactical content that will help you get started on this particular topic you want to make progress on” So, some of it is vision casting like what do you want the dream of your business to be but a whole lot of it is tactical mindset of you got to take the first step. Got to move forward. Progress is progress no matter how slow, progress is progress as long as you go.
Brenda [00:22:55] I feel like I read a Dr. Seuss sometimes but that was actually a quote that my elite…
Suzy [00:22:59] Can you say that one more time for me?
Brenda [00:23:01] So it was actually a quote somebody in my premium coaching group created a hashtag called “snailed it” – SNAILED IT! Okay? And so we wrote a little a little poem that goes with it: progress is progress no matter how slow, progress is progress as long as you go. So it was just this tiny little, like, she she basically wrote a little brag flag. Her name is Angie Reuter and she wrote this little brag flag and she wrote SNAILED IT and we were like, “oh my gosh look at you. So amazing. You took this little progress step forward and made positive momentum in your business!”.
Brenda [00:23:35] Because it doesn’t matter how fast you go as long as you GO- progress over perfection. People get caught up in the mindset of like “well it isn’t perfect” or “I’m not an expert yet” or “who is going to?” “They’re going to think I’m a fraud” or “I’m an imposter” and we forget that the purposeful value of our opportunity is to turn around behind the people behind us who haven’t started yet. Who are behind us on the line. Who are behind us incompetency in some way.
Brenda [00:24:01] Yes there’s always people who are bigger experts than us- always- but there’s also people who are less experienced than us who are have more fear than us and are looking at us and saying, “wow! She did it! How did she do that? I’m inspired by her!” We tend to get caught up with worrying about what people ahead of us think instead of thinking about the privilege to serve people behind us.
Brenda [00:24:22] I love that and that goes into the abundance mindset that you were describing earlier. It really love it. The final P is something that we kind of opened up with but I just want you to touch on in terms of how much we should be doing it depending on the channel that we’re hanging on- and that is promotional, ie what you sell be it a service or a product.
Brenda [00:24:44] Yes. Now in promotional content is obviously any content that starts with an overt “shop-host-join-book”.
Suzy [00:24:51] Listen! I.e. a podcast.
Brenda [00:24:54] Well, no this is actually purposeful value! I would call this purposeful.
Suzy [00:24:57] Yeah?
Brenda [00:24:57] You’re not asking overtly for a sale right now.
Suzy [00:25:01] No- I want to serve!
Brenda [00:25:03] This is serving value. So this is not a promotional element. This is value element this is a purposeful value element. So when we’re thinking about purpose or promotional promotion was obviously the call to action to business. Now, it can be a low risk ask: “Hey follow me over to Instagram I’ve got this thing over there for you” which is building a tighter relationship connection all the way up to something that is “shop, host or join” shop-host join-book something-invest something, all the way up to a financial investment.
Brenda [00:25:33] Right.
Brenda [00:25:33] The idea of promotional content- and I have a story on this one- it’s an interesting story. It was my own mindset challenge. When you think about promotional content there’s very obvious promotion like “we’ve been talking about pink leggings all week long. And now here’s your chance to buy them”, right? There’s a clear ask.
Brenda [00:25:55] The people who, as you mature in the process of attraction, and you’re weaving value and personality into every post- people, you’re selling all the time without even realizing. Because you’re constantly creating value and you’re constantly creating funnel connections and building that lifestyle message. So about a year ago somebody said to me I was talking to her about private coaching and she said, “Brenda- why would I coach with you? You don’t sell anything!”.
Brenda [00:26:21] I was wildly offended by that I was like I don’t sell anything I’m all upset and indignant and then somebody on my team said Brenda you didn’t realize that’s like the biggest compliment ever right. And I went “oh! She doesn’t think I sell anything! That’s hilarious”. It’s like “if you don’t think I sell anything I’m doing it exactly right because I sell a lot!”
Suzy [00:26:47] Because remember what we were talking about, when we opened this up we said this is about bringing people to you as opposed to just casting a net and seeing how many numbers you can fill in that.
Brenda [00:26:59] Exactly! So then it was suddenly like, “Oh- this is literally the testimonial of doing attraction marketing because you don’t to realize I’m selling stuff!”
Suzy [00:27:08] I love it.
Brenda [00:27:09] The goal is that when we create content integration, we create a really great content plan and our purposeful our personality content hangs together toward a promotional outcome. I mean, I’m not posting cat memes independently just to drive engagement. I’m posting content that’s related to what I eventually want to sell. I’m posting content that creates an intentional content flow and leads somebody to a promotional outcome because I’ve been planting seeds and now they’re ready for harvest.
Suzy [00:27:36] So do you find a lot of direct sellers- you know you mentioned that you work with a lot of folks that are new or are trying to find their voice- do you find that a lot of folks don’t think about their content strategically? Like, they’re just posting things willy nilly? Because you’re talking about weaving these things in.
Brenda [00:27:54] Yes, this is sort of an advanced marketing strategy.
Brenda [00:27:55] Now at the beginning, the very very first step? I have a success path of literally what I call my coaching arc. And at the very very first step, I assume that people don’t know how to do advanced marketing. Obviously people who come in or they don’t have a marketing background or have not done this type of business before. Why would you have this background?
Brenda [00:28:13] But the very first thing we teach is: what is personality? What is purposeful? And what is promotional? So you can at least recognize them and create each independent type of content post. So when you post personality, here’s what you should expect- when you post purposeful, here’s why you should expect- if you post promotional with no context, it’s going to get it’s going to drop like a stone it will get no engagement- and let me tell you strategically why. So when I coach I really try to put two major halves together. I talk about the strategy of not just I don’t want to hand you a post and say, “Hey Suzy go post this. This is this is a great engagement post” without telling you WHY it’s a good engagement post. What should you expect to happen? If it doesn’t happen, what should you do in response? How can you recreate this?
Brenda [00:29:00] There is strategy behind every element of content and so much of it is driven by social psychology. Anyone who’s had a psych class who might be listening going “Oh this all psychology, I love this!” I was a psych minor in college and I have a master’s degree in communication. This is all this is- it’s understanding human dynamics and social psychology. Group psychology is very predictable- very predictable.
Brenda [00:29:26] When we join a Facebook group, for example, most people do not typically dive into the deep end and become an immediate rising star engaging person. They check the friends list. They lurk around the edges. They watch for safety and security and who’s being vulnerable here. Can I be vulnerable here? Who else is being vulnerable? They watch. All psychology. We all look for group dynamics- is this a safe space for me to be? Before I’m willing to commit and put myself out there. So as as moderators as leaders, and that’s what we are we’re community leaders especially if we have an online presence we are community leaders- we have the opportunity to create those safe spaces. Create those communities.
Brenda [00:30:09] And by virtue of creating those communities that’s where we’re building the know like and trust. We’re extending things toward a promotional outcome because in the most in the most truest sense, any promotional outcome should be the extension of value of what you’ve ALREADY been talking about. If I’ve already been talking all about Instagram and Instagram tips and Instagram ideas and creating Instagram chatter in Instagram community and then I say, “you guys- I’m launching a new course and we’re gonna go deep into stories” and they’re like “well I need that because I’ve been working on Instagram for a week!” Right?
Brenda [00:30:44] So a natural extension of value in talking about the promotional is talking about the natural extension of whatever you’ve been talking about that helps continue to meet your ideal client’s goal or solve the pain point. The most basic level of, you know, ideal client definition or any marketer’s goal is to increase pleasure or decrease pain in someone’s life.
Suzy [00:31:05] Yeah. Yeah.
Brenda [00:31:06] What is pain? I want to save someone time. I want to save someone effort. I want to save someone money, increase pleasure, I want to give someone more free time, I want to make them feel better about themselves in some way. I want to have them spend more time with their family or kids, I want to increase their financial position, I want to increase pleasure or decrease pain. Every marketer should be seeking about those two goals and how they can serve their audience; if you can think with those two things in mind and your content hangs against those those outcomes and we mix the personality-purposeful-promotional, we have a much better chance of building our community becoming referrable and building the tractions where people are like “wow, I want to follow you because you’re so interesting and helpful!”.
Suzy [00:31:49] Right.
Brenda [00:31:49] I might sell stuff around the edges but it’s not my primary motive. 20 percent of your content is promotional 80 percent is everything else. It’s all the other stuff.
Suzy [00:31:58] Do you guys hear that? So what I hear you saying is, I mean, roughly right? That 20/80. But it’s all connected. And I love how you’re talking about serve then sell and serve is address that pain point, solve the problem, help them…and then also you might happen to sell something.
Brenda [00:32:16] And you might happen to sell something- yeah. It’s it’s really a mindset shift because you can’t you can’t go in…there are some predictable statistics like X percent of people will open your emails and x percent will be part of your conversion and all those kinds of numbers. There will be predictable conversion rates on any campaign; and a campaign is simply an 80 20 content mix. OK I’m going to do a heavy focus on promotional and teaching and value and education and community and I to get as many people into the funnel as I can to provide that value because of X percent are going to convert in my ask. Those numbers are predictable.
Brenda [00:32:52] They’re very reliable and the goal is to provide isn’t enough top funnel value. I want to bring as many people in to give them as much as I can because then I have a better chance of promotional at the back end. But what’s my whole goal?My whole goal is to grow top funnel value. That’s my that’s my intention not to build the perfect promotional post! Promotional post doesn’t matter if I don’t have anybody to help provide value to that might convert on.
Suzy [00:33:22] Absolutely. Absolutely. People buy from folks they know like and trust and we can quit a product- it is hard to quit a person.
Brenda [00:33:30] Exactly.
Suzy [00:33:32] I love this. And you know what? It occurs to me we could go deep deep deep. I can nerd out on this because I have a health behavior background but what we’re going to do for listeners of this show: guys I’ve got it in the show notes I’m going to blast it all over my socials. Brenda, you’ve been kind enough to set us up with the 3 Ps workbook. Then folks can get that for free! You guys, this was the first line of business that my own business coach had me go through. And so. Wow what a blessing to be able to speak with you right now, Brenda.
Suzy [00:34:04] Can I do a couple of rapid fires for you before I let you go? All right. I would love to know what your first concert ever was (these clearly are not related to the 3 Ps)
Brenda [00:34:14] That’s OK. My first concert was the Beach Boys in Wisconsin at Wisconsin State Fair and I went with I was like a junior in high school and I went with a guy named Joelwinkleman.
Suzy [00:34:28] Joel Winkleman, if you are listening…
Brenda [00:34:30] It was in high school at about 1987.
Suzy [00:34:33] I love it. Hot pink leggings for Joel, I don’t know. How about your favorite book to gifts.
Brenda [00:34:40] My favorite book to gift? Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert.
Suzy [00:34:43] Love it. Love it.
Brenda [00:34:44] I gift it to everybody. I love that book.
Suzy [00:34:49] Listeners of this show if you heard the Core 4 author Steph Gaudreau, she was also the author of the stupid easy paleo website, that was hers as well. Brenda you’re in good company.
Suzy [00:35:00] And then finally what would your advice for your let’s say early direct selling self be?
Brenda [00:35:08] I was so worried about what other people would think about me. I didn’t take action as effectively as I could. I spammed everybody. I spammed everybody. I didn’t know what I was doing. I was afraid that- I just want to get sales out there, you know? I was afraid of what people would think if I did something that my company wasn’t endorsing.
Brenda [00:35:27] So my advice would be “Brenda do what’s authentic to you. If it feels spammy and you feel like you’re hurting your own mindset then don’t do those things. Do them differently- do them better. Do what’s authentic to you and feels valuable to you and sustains your relationships”.
Brenda [00:35:42] Because every single person who blocks us every friend who rolls their eyes and they’re “ugh, you started a new, ugh ugh”. That’s one person your warm network that you’ve potentially burned out and you’re going to hit your wall in a couple of months and have no one to sell to. So unless you’re focusing on really value centric messaging, value centric content, you’re going to run out of people to sell to eventually if you’re not continuing to build your nurturing your nurturing funnel and that nurturing funnel is 100 percent value-centric. Has to be.
Suzy [00:36:12] I love that advice. Thank you so much. Again if listeners are interested in playing the long game, getting a strategy around what they’re doing, I’m going to encourage them to look at the show notes and to check you and the Sassy Suite out, Brenda.
Brenda [00:36:24] Thank you very much, Suzy. I love it. Thank you everybody. I hope we hope we can connect and I really really appreciate the opportunity.
