Episode 36: Marketing Funnels 101 with Copywriter Brittany McBean

Molly Cahill
Hello, my lovely listeners. Thanks for letting me be in your ear today. What are you doing? Seriously? Like, send me a DM? Are you unloading the dishwasher? Taking a walk in the carpool line? Tell me. I'm like, I'm super curious. This is why lifestyle personal content does well on Instagram stories because people are inherently nosy. Hey, before I get into this intro, could you do me a really quick favor? If you have not yet left me a review? Could you please pretty please pretty please do so I would say I was going to enter you in to win some type of gift card or drawing but I just came off of a really big holistic marketing hub launch and my brain is tired. And I just don't have the bandwidth to to organize something like that right now to be completely honest with you. And I don't want to throw anything else on my lovely online business manager Carolyn. So today's guest is Brittany McBain and she is a launch strategist and conversion copywriter. I don't know, it was hard for me to say. She's really cool because she specializes in anti sleazy audience focused high converting copy for online entrepreneurs and educators. So she's worked with a lot of really quote big names in the industry. And she really knows her stuff. I liked our conversation because there are a lot of misconceptions out there about you know, online courses and quote, passive income. And anyway, we just kind of dive into all the things. And I can't wait for you to hear this interview. Welcome to holistic marketing simplified a podcast for health and wellness professionals looking to simplify their marketing. I'm your host, Molly Cahill. And this podcast is brought to you by my marketing roadmap, which is a five episode private audio training that's kind of like this podcast, but not exactly because it's not available to the general public when you search on your podcast feed. So the great thing about consuming free content like this for me or on my Instagram or my blogs, or whatever is that yes, you will learn a lot but you kind of have to go searching for what it is exactly you're looking for this five episode private podcast is broken down in a logical step by step order. That's why it's called a roadmap. If you're ready to get started on your Instagram marketing journey, or if you already are started and you're just feel like you're kind of like overwhelmed with all of the different free information. This is a super clear roadmap with lots of tangible step by step action items that will get you from point A to point B for just $27. So all you have to do is head to Molly cahill.com/private. Training. And based on the reviews I've had so far, I know you won't be disappointed. I'm really proud of this training. And I know personally, I've bought 2737 $17 products before and felt like I really didn't get that much out of it. I guarantee you you will learn something from this five episode, private audio feed. So again, it's just Molly K hill that comm slash private training, and it'll also be linked below in the show notes. I cannot wait to hear what you think.

Molly Cahill
Britney, welcome to the show. I know we've had to family things and we've had to reschedule what like three times. That's exciting. I'm so excited that we finally were able to make this happen. I'm so excited. You're here.

Brittany McBean
I'm so excited to be here. This be really fun conversation because the thing that you're so good in is the thing that I'm not good at all. So it's been really fun.

Molly Cahill
Well, and we just chatted for so long before we even hit record. So I'm just like, I really am like really jazzed up to have this conversation with you. So I already did your intro you know about what it is that you do but kind of give us like the speed dating version of kind of how you got here. Yeah,

Brittany McBean
so I'm a launch strategist and conversion copywriter. It's something I fell into I think a lot of copywriters either have a very nonlinear like loopy path or they're like I went to school, studied communications, went to an agency and then went freelance. So it's either one of those two paths and I have a very like nonlinear live TV, but my background is in musical theater, which just means I love attention. And that works very well for online business and personal branding. But no I say I have a degree and kicking my face and singing a high C which is not the most marketable or like Highest Paid skill. But I did that professionally for a long time and then yeah, what were you at Tell me a lot a lot of things I mean, like the very I was as a dancer and a singer a lot of times you either get those like the very like ingenue lead roles or just like the like lead dancer kind of ensemble roles so a lot of those like either very heavy dance or like tap show so like anything goes or Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Like all of all of like those those kinds of shows nothing like actually interesting And you're edgy or subversive or

Molly Cahill
wanted to do in another life. Like I got to play Lily and Annie in eighth grade and I like loved it and never like pursued it, but

Brittany McBean
I was in great shape like doing like eight shows a week and six days as you know, my 20 That was in great shape.

Molly Cahill
I bet Okay, sorry. I just had to ask because I was like, Oh my gosh, I would love to do musical theater.

Brittany McBean
Maybe in my next life. It's the other day my daughter have a five year old and she just found out that I can tap so she was like, and she said that was what she was like, do you still have tap shoes? I was like I do. So she made me put them on. Yes, we put about like asking your tap and I was like, oh gosh, this is this is wrestling. It was It was rough. It was rough. I had done that in quite some time. But yeah, so I when I wanted to kind of settle down which isn't impossible to do in that world, but I kind of felt myself burning out a little bit i i settled where I live now in Richmond, Virginia, and I was working in theater full time for a while just in like admin and education and then also not very lucrative and started nannying. I mean it was just one of those like I didn't feel like I had any hard skill or any thing marketable or anything that I that really signaled any, any I guess for lack of better words like intelligence, nothing that in this like capitalistic world that people value, right? Like, the thing that we write six figure paychecks for.

Molly Cahill
I valued my nanny very much so but I see what you're saying. Yeah, nothing that

Brittany McBean
like I felt like I could brag about I always felt very, um, around the dinner table, nothing that I could really write home about. And I was doing some social media, marketing and kind of was like, okay at my own social media and thought I could do it for other people. And so I just, I don't know, I was getting kind of antsy. I've always been really creative. And I guess you could say entrepreneurial but but also have ADHD. So what that looked like was like, every, you know, three months, I would just go buy a bunch of supplies for a new hobby and then like think I was going to do something and then get bored after three weeks. So like, that's what that's what that looks like for me, right? It didn't look like anything real. But anyway, I I ended up doing some other local businesses, social media, thinking that like I really was gonna like really love that and I hated it. But I enjoyed being in that world ended up meaning quote, unquote, meeting online some other copywriters and like hearing about that job for the first time, like, it just wasn't something that I knew existed. And also found myself with these other businesses that I was working with, really, all I wanted to do was fix their websites, all they wanted to do is like fix their messaging, and I didn't care about growing their, their brand, I didn't care about engaging, I didn't care about hashtags. I was just like, your, your messaging is confusing. Your offers are confusing, what is why is your sales page like it? Like, it was instinctual? You know, it just it just felt natural. And then I learned what copywriting was, I learned that it was a job and I just was really, really drawn to it. And really, it felt like, like a fish learning to swim after being on land, you know, not that that's the thing, but but it just felt like I totally get what you're saying. Yeah, like this is this is this is my thing and started feeling for the first time like, Oh, I'm I'm really, really good at something, I am really smart like this, my brain does fire in this way my brain does. Like I see strategy, like I'm smelling color, you know what I mean? Like, and so I wanted to actually develop that skill and not just not just say, like, Oh, I'm naturally good at this. And so I started working on some actual like, training that was a little bit more accredited than just like your average run of the mill online course and trying to actually learn some some technique and then develop my own methodology and got really lucky by getting a big client which then led to another big client, which led to another big client, I got some really really cool opportunities, which not everyone gets, and it just kind of snowballed is Yeah, yeah, in in nine months, I had after after saying like, I'm a copywriter, I'm gonna write on my website, I'm a copywriter somehow fell into a six figure business, which is that's a weird flex. And that's a I don't think that's like the measure of success. But what happened was I had a business that I didn't know how to run or control that I had to like, learn how to how to run and learn how to like figure out what it meant like to be a CEO and run a business while actually doing this thing that I'm good at. And that's been a very yeah thing for years. Yeah,

Molly Cahill
it's a whole different skill set. I mean, it's I was telling you I work with a lot of like chiropractors or whatnot. And like, we didn't go to school to be an entrepreneur like you know, like to I learned all these techniques in these things and now I'm like, expected to also know how to run a business. Yeah, for me, like I know people struggle with like team and hiring a lot for me. That was not something that ever, that's I've been, that's not been a pain point for me because my background was as a manager, I had a team of 17. So like that I had that transferable skill. But I will say, there's just a lot of other places where I've struggled like, Wait, do I need to have a business license? Like, do I have to like, what? You know what I mean? Just like, yeah, what's book? What's an EIN? And like, what's, uh, he just like all these things that you're just like,

Unknown Speaker
Oh, yeah.

Molly Cahill
And then you know, the elusive advice of focus on your money generating activities. I'm like, What the hell are my money generating activity that

Brittany McBean
I can't stand that like, sorry, I just sometimes you just need to do the things that keep your business afloat. And like, you can't, if you can't afford outsource, you can't afford to outsource and when you can, that's great. But sometimes you just have to do the things that you need to do. Like, I would love to just sit around and be like, Oh, I'm only doing my $10,000 An hour tasks. But yeah, like if sometimes you just need to be the one to hit send on an email. That email isn't going out like, but I love that you just said like you already you already have that skill, because it is a skill and set like it's skills are learnable like talents or not, right? You don't like it. But if we're like, oh, leadership is a talent, well, then there's nothing you can do about it. But it's not like I didn't have a leadership skill. And so learning to lead a team is was really difficult and very clunky and hard. And I felt like a toddler learning how to walk. But it's a skill that you can learn. And you just got to put on your big girl pants and do it.

Molly Cahill
I was just recording a solo episode on my podcast, and there's this Do you know Suzy more? Let it be. I love her stuff. She had a quote. It's like, everything's hard before. It's easy. Yeah. And I'm like, Yes. I think sometimes we forget that. So

Brittany McBean
everything is hard. Like everything. Yes.

Molly Cahill
I mean, even just little things. Like once I discovered I could, you know, automatically link my zoom to my Calendly so when someone books a meeting with me, it generates the Zoom link automatically. You know, I was like reading like 10 Google articles. And it took me and then once it was done, I was like, Oh,

Brittany McBean
yes, yes. I I like don't really put a lot into my social media. That's just not really where I've gotten clients now that I'm really growing the more like educational and scalable side of my business. That's something I'm focusing more on and outsourcing more support with but like, I and I, I started in social media, I was really good. Like, this was like in 2019, where I like knew all this stuff. And like a couple months ago, I had to make a reel and like, couldn't do it. And I felt so old. Like, I'm 35 I'm not like I was like, okay, Boomer, what is this? Like, it was so hard. And I was like,

Molly Cahill
I'm 37 my very first reel I ever made. It was me going. I don't like this.

Brittany McBean
Like even the caption I was like shout out to the three Gen Z YouTubers who I had to watch.

Molly Cahill
You should have asked me I have a tutorial i'll send, I'll send you my tutorial to hopefully it's super simple. shouldn't be that hard, but it is. Well, I just recorded my tutorial literally a month ago because they changed the reels, like editing interface. So I'm always having to like redo it. But if if anybody wants that, if anybody's listening, you don't know how to make a reel. Just go to Molly cahill.com/reels.

Brittany McBean
You'll get to hear Molly's of the world. Yeah, I need the Molly's Well,

Molly Cahill
I mean, people asked me about it like I don't do tick tock I don't do like I don't do anything else. Like I just do the one thing because that an email because in email marketing, because it's easy for me like that's where like my, like, this feels easy. I have one client that I do some stuff on their Facebook and I'm like constantly messing it up. They'll be like, Oh, you just accidentally posted that to the this page and like I don't understand Facebook, there's too many buttons. There's too many things like so, for anyone listening to this. Hopefully that's helpful for you to hear us say these things that it's hard. You're not there's nothing wrong with you. I have a real where I'm like stop telling yourself that you're not tech savvy. Like that's just a story that you're telling yourself. No one's tech savvy until they like push buttons just push buttons. Nothing's gonna explode. You're not gonna detonate a bomb anyway.

Brittany McBean
And like, developers aren't chiropractors because developers and car makers aren't developers because they're chiropractors like,

Molly Cahill
I always tell people I'm like I was really realized I would paralyze someone okay, if I tried to do your job, so we all have our zone of genius, but Okay, let's get Chuck. I'm also ADHD so like this conversation could go everywhere. This is hilarious. Your

Brittany McBean
listeners are like, what did I sign up for?

Molly Cahill
I know. Okay, so let's kind of start by No, I told you my majority of my audience is kind of a little more beginner and you are this launch strategist and conversion copywriter. Let's just define those terms. What is a launch? You know, I I just so funny. I literally just before we got on just I was recording the cash flow and promotion classroom for holistic marketing hub, which is my program. And in the beginning, I'm like, now this is not a full on launch, like, this is not a business quote like this is just like, hey, let's run a little mini promotion. And here's how you do that on Instagram, to kind of once like the key, or is there a difference? Like how do you define a launch versus like a promotion or whatever?

Brittany McBean
Yeah, so launch strategist is just a really kind of sexy word. And it's like an SEO keyword. But the things that I specialize in the most are funnels, which is just an online marketing system that leads to sales. And so a launch would be defined like a live launch is to is a promotional period that has a true cart, open cart close. And there's usually a couple of different components. And so you'll hear people say, like, top of funnel and bottom of funnel, which means that there is a, a buying journey that people are going through where they are experiencing a couple of different touch points where they either meet you or meet the offer, or the journey at one point, like a Facebook ad, or like a webinar, and then go through an experience before they are introduced to the offer. And so you know, your live launch, somebody might meet you for the first time on a Facebook ad and get invited to a webinar and get invited to your email list or get invited to like a live challenge or something like that some sort of like launch event, and then go through a series of emails where they are introduced to your offer. And so this has a true cart opening cart close. We're not manufacturing any urgency, this is the the period of time where they can purchase this offer. And so that would be like a live launch, as opposed to an evergreen funnel, which is another buzzword. And funnel is just a sale system. Evergreen funnel is something that is running all the time in the background, we typically manufacture a period of time where somebody can either purchase or will get some benefit for purchasing during this period of time have some thoughts about manufacturing that but an evergreen funnel could look like running paid ads to your offer. And then they're going to go through the sale system where there's some advanced tech involved that will kind of prevent them from going through this system again, you know, they're going to maybe get on to a recorded webinar or a recorded email sequence or an email sequence and might have like three video trainings are just an automated email sequence being introduced to your offer, get on the sales page, and maybe only be able to purchase that offer for a period of time or only have access to a discount or a bonus for a period of time. But the cart is not only open for a period of time it's it's open all the time. And there are plenty of quote unquote evergreen funnels that do not function with paid ads, maybe it's a product or an offer or service that is open on your your website all the time. But when we're talking about a sales funnel, that is where there is a multi step process. It's not just like, like this and by we're kind of they're coming into the funnel at one point, we're taking them through a series of conversion points and messaging conversations to kind of coach them into a buying decision. And when I say buying decision, I define that as the reader confidently deciding Yes, this is for me or no this is not for me. Yeah, because I don't think that someone entering into a funnel means that they automatically need to buy or should buy we want them to know I agree with you decide yes. So to kind of

Molly Cahill
put this into perspective using examples. Holistic marketing hub has been on an evergreen funnel for a couple years because I serve such a niche market I'm like 98% referral based at this point. So my to get people onto my email list. I have not run any paid ads but I've done a lot of partner promotions. So I've partnered with a lot of like chiropractic business coaches, health coach business coaches, people like that and done like freebie swaps. So they email their lead magnet, I email their lead magnet to my list and they email my lead magnet to their list. So that way it's like a really permission based opt in obviously, and I've done like some joint webinars and how I've put like kind of manufactured the urgency is you can go to my website and enroll right now I'm actually closed because I'm actually doing a live launch at the end of September for the first time in forever because I've got like a whole curriculum update and all kinds of things but my like quote like manufactured urgent He was a discount coupon code that did truly expire. But you could still go to the website and buy anything, you just would have had to pay full price. Right? I tried other bonuses, and I never had I don't know, they never quite converted as well as like the discount. Yeah. But just to kind of like, like, for me, it looked like, once they got onto my email list, they got like a series of welcome emails, and then it went into like a sales sequence. And if they didn't buy, we used to use. If you ever heard a job shock, Hopkins has relaunch magic. So his relaunch magic is where you essentially tag people in your email system to then get automatically launched to again in three months. Now we we did we don't do that anymore. And we haven't really done that just because it was like just, I don't even remember, it's a whole long story. But hopefully that kind of helps paint the picture of like the Evergreen funnel? Because it sounds like so like fancy.

Brittany McBean
Yeah, yeah. I mean, you can get super fancy, but it also doesn't have to be at all. It's just

Molly Cahill
not fancy. I don't have different paths people can take and like all this different, it's just like, yeah, and then if they don't buy, then they get like some down sells to, like a smaller product to have. It's not available on my website. And that's it.

Brittany McBean
The more simple it is, the more data you can track. So yeah, it's a benefit.

Molly Cahill
Yeah. So when you talk about lists, that's like the launch piece. But let's talk about like the conversion part of conversion copywriter. What does that mean to you? Like, how do you define that?

Brittany McBean
Yeah, so that's, that's another buzzword that we love to throw around in the online business world. And that specific type of copywriting was created by a woman named Joanne weaved. And really, it is defined by being driven by audience research. So the conversions are driven by the messaging, which is driven by market research. So as opposed to like advertising, or kind of this madmen style marketing, where we have these people sitting in a boardroom are like, I have a great idea. Now I have a great idea, you know, and they're just sitting around brainstorming, which is, that honestly sounds like a lot of fun, I would love to sit in a room and just brainstorm ideas and see who would come up with like, the most creative idea. And what we do is, is so heavily based in the market research and based in the data. And so when I say data, yes, looking at, you know, conversion rates and analytics, and all of that, but like, that is not how I'm determining the messages that go on the page, the messages that go on the page is determined by the information that we're getting at mass from the audience, from my clients audience, being able to determine a messaging hierarchy, which means the primary things that are being expressed, not just the anecdotal things that I hear, or the first thing that I hear, or the thing that most aligns with what my client thinks, or what I think, you know, eliminating that confirmation bias, finding those messages based on very meticulous market research, and then turning around and putting those messages on the page, to increase conversions and to coach conversions by entering in the conversations that we know the readers are already having in their head.

Molly Cahill
This is kinda like, Oh, she's talking to me piece. Yeah. Like, how does she know that? How is she in my head? Okay, so you and you talked about the social media piece, and all you wanted to do is go back and fix their messaging? Well, I just recently added a new offer to my office suite, and I on my website, you have to like, I need to have a conversation with you before we go there. And literally, sometimes I wonder, I'm like, do people feel like they're even getting anything out of this place? After two? And I know they are. But it's just like, that's just like my own little internal. Like, we want to have deliverables, we want to have the sexy things, we want to have the, the, here's my post, and here's the thing, when really this two hour session with me, is what you just talked about, it's the messaging piece where like, you know, what keeps them up at night? Like what's what is, like digging down to that deep, deep, deep level of why. And it can be really frustrating to go through that exercise because you're like, well, like, it's just, it's the thing, like I have the thing and it helps them in this thing. Like it's not, you know what I mean? Like, it's not that deep, and I'm like, Well, it's, but it might be like, my questions. So are you okay, if we kind of walk through like a live? Not live but like a, like a real, like real life example for one of my clients? Yeah, selfishly I'm like, okay, so meeting with a client Friday, and we're doing actually one of these sessions in person, which is really exciting, which I've never gotten to do. And they are a fully booked functional medicine practice where they see people in person, but they have just, I don't know if they already created it, or they're in the process of creating a course that they can sell virtually to anyone about diabetes. Okay, so if you are meeting with that client, and they're like, how do I market this course? Like, how do I launch this diabetes course? Like, what would go on in Brittany's head?

Brittany McBean
Yeah. So copy is the last thing that happens? Always. Yeah, so the order of operation is audience offer copy. Okay. And that is the order of operation when you're building out a sales funnel or marketing system, when you're launching a new offer when you're optimizing something when you're trying to figure out what's wrong. That is the order of operations. And so when I say audience offer copy, you can substitute audience with list or target market, basically the people who are who are coming in the people whose eyes are on this, right? So do I have the right people in front of me? Or who is in front of me? So we cannot move forward until we have validated that we have the right people? Or until we know who we have in front of us and then go create the right offer for them? So after we have understood who was on the list, or who are the people in front of us, who are our followers, who is on our email list, who are those people, then we move on to offer? And then we say what offer do they need? As opposed to saying I want to create an offer? What offer do I want to create? And then how do I go find those people? We always have to start with the people. And then we say what offer do they need. So you look at the people, you study the people, you understand the people, and then you create the offer that they need the most. So you optimize the offer, in light of those people. Audience first study the audience, write the offer they need, you optimize the offer in terms of the features, the benefits, the delivery mechanism, the promise, the outcome, everything in light of the audience that you already have in front of you, if you don't have an audience in front of you, and go build that audience or look at the people that you're already serving. But that has to come first, then offer. And then after that copy. And so the copy comes from the messaging, and the messaging comes from the offer in the audience. So with someone creating a new offer for the first time, it's obviously hard, right? When we're like, okay, audience offer copy, but like we don't have the offer. So someone building out an online course for the first time. If it's a version of what they're already doing, then you need to really, really, really understand why what you're doing in person works, and who it works for. Because you have to understand if this is going to translate online. Why does this work? Does this work? Because you have a name and your community? That doesn't mean that it won't translate online. But how do you duplicate that? Okay, here's the hardest part about online marketing is marketing. The people who want to teach you to build a course online, because they are selling you a product that teaches you how to build the course online, it is profitable for them to tell you that the easiest part is marketing, because that makes them money. The easiest part is creating the course. The hardest part is marketing. And building a list is hard and expensive. Marketing is hard and expensive. And it can create some really incredible opportunities and can create some really incredible impact. Like, it's what I do all day every day. And I help my clients make millions and I make a living doing it. Like I love this industry. And it is hard. And I've seen people burn out because they have been sold this dream that the easiest part is marketing and it is the hardest part. So creating the offer will always be the easiest part. So you have to understand if you already have an offer that you want to turn into an an online offer, like why it works and what works about it so that you can translate that into an online offer. Yeah, so that was a monologue. So let's let's you ask questions and then we'll go from there.

Molly Cahill
No, it's okay. It's very much in line with what we were talking about before we hit record how we kind of have like roll our eyes at that misnomer of passive income. I feel like people have been sold this dream of like, oh, you're trading time for dollars in you don't want to do that anymore and your schedule is already full. So create this online course. And I'll tell you it's damn near a full time job to create and market successfully an online course I'm not saying it can't be done alongside you know, if you have like a practice or you have you know, you're seeing clients one on one virtually or whatever. I'm not saying it can't be done. I just want you to had to go into it with the mindset knowing that, yes, everything we can make it be easy, right? But I don't want you to think it's like, if I just build this course it's like, here you go now I can offer. No I can, yes, I can market to anybody who speaks English in the world. And I'm like, oh, yeah, let's take a step back because I'll use one of my clients who an essay client as in like, she did not need me she basically just used us to like, help her create some real like edit some reels, make some carousels and help her with her course, like she's genius. But Meredith man of the peachy spoon, she already had an amazing audience. And then she had a cookbook and she was seeing clients, one on one in Birmingham, Alabama, where I'm from. And now she has an online course. And I guarantee you so many of the people who bought her course, were probably local in Birmingham too. So I think I'm not saying I'm sure she sold it worldwide, just because she already has a very engaged and loyal following. I'm just saying when she started her business as a health coach, she started with a lot of the people she already knew in her network that were geographically close to her. And I think people go into this online space going anywhere that speaks English, where it's like, like, don't be afraid to start locally and then work your way out center. The only thoughts around that piece?

Unknown Speaker
Yeah, well,

Brittany McBean
I think what what people need to understand is that the average funnel like a funnel that works a funnel that is not broken. So a funnel that is validated. We know the messaging works, we know the offer works, this is an offer that people want this is an offer that people buy, this is an offer that like that is validated that has like interest, and the audience is there. A working funnel converts at 3%, one to 3%. I personally like and so that that number is a lead to sale conversion, which means the number of people that come in at the top of the funnel is like the number of people that like opt in to a webinar or a freebie compared to the number of people that buy so 3% of the people that opt in at the top will buy. Yep, one three percentage.

Molly Cahill
Yeah, just to save for people. If you get 100 people on your email list in July, then three people might buy.

Brittany McBean
Yeah, and so take the price of the thing that you want to sell, and multiply it by three. And that's, that's your ROI. So and I'm not here, I'm not trying to be a Debbie Downer, I want to create some really realistic expectations so that we can understand what success looks like. So in a highly successful funnel is 3%. My clients do get higher than that, because I have a very high standard for ourselves. But when you are moving towards an online model, you have to get volume, you have to get 1000s of people in at the top every time you launch or every month in order to see the numbers that people talk about when they're talking about this dream. And we're talking about like the five figure months and the six figure launches, right? We're talking about 1000s, if not 10s of 1000s of people at the top of the funnel every single time you launch it every single month.

Speaker 3
So the list has to have volume,

Brittany McBean
which is why the audience is always the most important. And so if we're if we're just starting with no audience, or no followers, or no email list, and starting with our offer, then it's a lot harder to launch, right? But if you can build that list or build that audience, and then learn who they are, and understand what they need around your offer. So So going back to the really tangible example, the client who has in his creating this course around diabetes, like my, my first advice would be okay, are you working with clients who have diabetes, like start to understand what's what's going on with them, why they're coming to you all, all of those messaging things that we know, like the pain points, anxieties, frustrations, hesitations, but they weren't all all of that stuff. And then how can you start to build that audience online? Outside of like, yes, starting locally, and expanding? How can you build that email list? Because emails are always going to convert higher than social media? I love social media. But yeah, like you do social media and you do it? Well, really well. Well use that to get people by Molly, and use that to get people on your email list and start building that list around that topic around your offer around diabetes around functional medicine around functional medicine with diabetes, building that audience, and then continue to hear them continue to study them, run surveys, capture those data points, capture those pain points, capture, and then use that information to create your offer, and then go create that offer that perfectly aligns with the audience that you have built, and then then launch to that audience. And your beta launch is going to have the highest converting numbers that you're going to see and then your conversions are going to dip after that and then it's kind of an uphill battle. As you increase and as you optimize, and as you build, and as you grow lead gen but at least then you know that you're launching an offer to the audience that you already have, and you're meeting them where they are. And not just like pulling something out of thin air and then saying, I hope you guys like this, this came out of my head, you know, yeah,

Molly Cahill
this, let me go back. This is something that I've never quite knew how to advise clients. And so maybe you'll have some insight that like, I would just like, selfishly love to know. So for the diabetes client, and then I have another client who has a course on pregnancy pain, she's the chiropractor, but she has a course called the mobile mama method, where she teaches you how to like, these are like the exercises you should be doing during pregnancy to prevent back pain, if you can't get into see your chiropractor, physical therapy, whatever. And we've marketed it to her entire patient database, right, but obviously, not the entire patient database is pregnant, right. And we also have a lead magnet that's aligned to her offer that you would only download if you were pregnant. But I'm just wondering, like, should we have them almost like, click, like, click here if you're pregnant, but then someone else might be pregnant again, it's like I've had a hard time. Because it's just like a blip in time, where it's like, if you have diabetes, you have it, you have it like, but it's like when you're pregnant. It's like a blip in time. And so I think we've had a hard time balancing, what newsletters we send to her entire email list that focus on that pregnancy piece versus parsing out? Do you see what I don't know if it's on a well formed question, but

Brittany McBean
no, it's it's funny, this kind of this comes up a lot in like the online course, specifically, like the pregnancy component, you know, especially people who like Teach live launching, and there's, like, by by people are pregnant, like, I can't just launch once a year, because why did they're not pregnant, you know, that I hear that come up a lot. And, you know, I mean, it's so interesting, the things that are like, so timely, and, you know, segmenting is so powerful. But when we segment it's like the things that are always true about someone, right, segmenting by like their like location, or their interest or their job or whatever, versus like, what is true about this person right now. So the burden is then on the business owner to build up this reputation about, I do this for people who are pregnant, so that when that person is pregnant, it's always there. And, you know, here's the thing, I'm sure your readers have heard, that it is the best, like messaging and marketing strategy to speak to one and only one person. And I'm calling BS on that. Because I think that, number one, we do not have to be homogenous in our messaging. If we are only speaking to people who look and live in love, just like us, I think that that is a problem. But that's, that's the thing, but like most of us are not. And I would hope that most of us do not want to. So there are going to be people in your world that do not share your lived experience. And so if you're only in most, most people, when they create their like their one and only avatar, it looks that that person looks just like them, and shares the live experience with them, or is someone who is like, like them, but aspirational. And that leaves out a huge part of the population. Okay, so I think it is highly ethical and interesting and nuanced to have messaging that speaks to people with multiple lived experiences. And I think that our message is stronger if we say, our methodology doesn't just work for people who only have this unique circumstance, because then it's not actually that good. It literally only works for you. If you have all of these privileges, or all of these unique circumstances. Like I think that our solutions are much better if they work, whether you have this or whether you have this or whether you have this right. That doesn't mean that we don't have a niche. And that doesn't mean that we're not speaking to people under a defined umbrella. That doesn't mean that we're speaking to everyone, I believe in a niche and I believe in defined messaging, and I believe in clear communication. But our people are also smart enough and sophisticated enough to hold more than one thing. So like in an email newsletter, I think it is totally fine to have one messaging and say if you are pregnant, or if your partner is pregnant, click here. You know what I mean? And that doesn't mean that like all of a sudden, I don't know what you do know if you're saying like I specialize in ear infections, and if you're pregnant, click here. I might be a little confused, right? But if you're like I I help people experiencing diabetes and if you're pregnant experiencing gestational diabetes, you know what I mean? Or something like that, like that's still a niche and I can still contain that in my brain that still makes sense to me.

Molly Cahill
With the erection example, I think of it as like pregnancy and babies like these are Yeah, gamut of things you would experience to me. Yeah. And I I've gotten away from teaching kind of like this, this speaking. You know, I do teach if you speak to Everyone you speak to no one I teach you absolutely mint chocolate chip ice cream or in my, in my, I hate mint chocolate chip ice cream. I think it's so gross. Don't mix it. And I'm not

Brittany McBean
a fan. I'm not gonna say no to any ice cream, and I will never pick my chocolate chip.

Molly Cahill
I will say no. I like anything with like peanut butter in it or whatever. But my point is, Hey, Susan, how do we? How do we still narrow our messaging, but really be mindful of like that the thinking of like having an ideal client avatar, like, multiple ideal clients, or we have like,

Brittany McBean
yeah, that work? Yeah, it's hard. And so I will say like, I fully believe, like, when you speak to everyone, you speak to no one, right. And a lot of times, we want to hold on to that, like speaking to everyone to avoid alienating or like to not even alienating, like, we're afraid of losing money, right? That's like, the number one fear is like, but but then this person will come to me, we're afraid of being bold about what we believe or think that's a big, another big fear. So a lot of times, that's like what people are holding on to. And so we need to keep those things off the table, right. And then the reality is like, there are just people that you are not going to be helpful to, you are not going to work well with them, you are not going to solve their problems, like I don't care who you are. And what you do, there are people that walk into your office, walk through your doors, and you do not want to work with them. Whether it's because like you're not good at solving their problem, you don't know how to diagnose them, you are not qualified to help them or you just don't like them. Like, those things are true, and you cannot deny it. So let's go ahead and take those people off the table, right off the bat, right? And let's say we don't like, if it makes you uncomfortable, you don't have to have in your messaging, I will not work with X, Y and Z and I hate these people. But how can we have in our copy, copy that literally lets those people know that they're not right? Or like when they're reading our copy and they're on the page, they're, they're not going to be like, Oh my gosh, they're speaking to me, right? Like, let's just be intentional about that. And then just get a little more defined about who you do serve best. And there should be an umbrella, right? Like, like you said, like, babies and pregnancy, okay, that that's family, or that is people who identify as a woman, or that is people with a uterus or like, like that is still that is still an umbrella, right? Like, and then we can say that is anyone with a child or anyone with a uterus or anyone that identifies as a female, and that's going to be single mothers, and that's going to be trans women. And that's gonna like those are still a bunch of different people, or that's going to be single dads with children like that. You know what I mean? Yeah,

Molly Cahill
no, I see what you're saying that actually made it really clear for me. Like, it's like, it's not one person, but it's one it's still a niche.

Brittany McBean
Yeah, and there's so many different ways we can niche down like, for me, I, I definitely work best in this. This world of online offers with courses and coaching programs. And this is this is where like, online marketing is where I work best. And I've had like a SaaS company come in, and I'm like, I would love like your, my people, I'd love to work with you. And we do great work together. Like you're not your marketing is not limiting who you're working with. But it certainly is, is bringing in the best people and for me, like I have, I have clearly defined who I'm going to help make the best money and the most money. And I have really repelled people whose values do not align with mine, like I will not make people money, who I do not think are doing who are causing harm in the world. And my, my website is very, very clear about that. And I have used my copy very intentionally, to repel people and to be very clear about who I will not work with and who I will not support and who I will not help make money. And if you if we align on these few core values and like, we're good, you can come in the door, even if you're not like ideal, perfect, whatever. And we used to want to work together because something about me really resonates and like let's see if we can do good work together. And if I don't think I can help you if I don't think I can make you money, like we're not going to move forward. I'm going to refer you to someone else. But there's a million different ways whether it's by deliverable or service or value or personality or person, you know, but it's, you owe the person reading your copy the right to decide whether they should come in your doors or not. And it's really frustrating. As a person trying to make a buyer decision. It is really frustrating to be reading copy and not know whether you are talking to them or not to not know whether they should click that button have whether it's like inquire or make an appointment like that is a frustrating experience when you're like, I have X problem and I can't tell whether this person solves X problem or not. Like you owe that to the person reading your website or your copy.

Molly Cahill
I know I've in the IV I don't know if this is like way an oversimplification of everything you're just talking about, but I always like having a like, this is for you. If, yeah, I don't know if that's what you're like, No, that's not what I'm talking about.

Brittany McBean
No, every every sales page we write has, like this is for you. If and this is not for you if and like okay, that not for you if and can list qualifications, or it can list pain points, or can I list personality traits? It's what are the things that exclude and include you? And there are things that exclude people and it doesn't mean that you're excluding people, it means you're allowing people to make a better buying decision. Yeah,

Molly Cahill
yeah. So I, I just had this edit Instagram post, I need to repost it because it was really popular about like a little exercise that you can do, where you just look at your look at your schedule over the last couple of months, or however long a period of time. And separating everybody into three categories. Like category one, I loved seeing this person this case, like their, their problem lit me up, or their this conversation lit me up, and I got excited to see they were on my calendar, the category two, you're like, man, like, not excited, but didn't dread it just like kind of, you know, typical day, whatever. And number three was like, Oh, I really wish they'd cancel, or I really want to refer them to a colleague or something like that. And then just focus on category one, and like write out what they came to you for. Like, what about it made you excited? Like and then like, write to those? Write to that category? I don't know. I feel like yeah, simple way to think about it.

Brittany McBean
It is and because nothing is saying category two isn't going to come in the door. And you don't have to work with them. But we don't want category three to come in the door. Because there's some there's somebody else who's better suited to fit them.

Molly Cahill
Yeah, because you know what, this just gave me a really big lightbulb moment y'all are y'all are witnessing a light bulb unfolding in my brain. So when I'm thinking about a typical ideal client avatar model, and what I see a lot of my clients fill in on their branding forms when they come in to work with us. It's like, Mom, mid 30s loves health, you know, shops at places like XYZ, you know, listens to XYZ podcast, you could have that same mom in category one, two, and three. You don't I'm saying like, yes, like, Oh, I loved mom, a she was in category one. Mom b looks just like mom a, but she was in Category Two. And mom see looked like mom A and B but she's in category three. And that's kind of like those intangible. I feel like things you were talking about, like more of like the value based like personality stuff? Yeah. Which is really fascinating to think about. I don't

Brittany McBean
find demographics to be massively helpful in marketing until it is like there are certain things where like, demographics like okay, if you're a executive coach, for women over 40, then like, their job and their age is going to be important,

Molly Cahill
or like I have health coaches who focus on menopause like, yes, go with an age. Yes, exactly.

Brittany McBean
Exactly. Demographics are not helpful unless they are Yeah, but like psychographics ethos, graphics, which isn't really word just like their values, like, those are the things that I find to be more helpful. And that allows you to kind of open up that umbrella a little bit more where you're able to say like, I still have my niche, right, I still like serve specific people. But I'm able to define that a little bit more like I was listening to on your podcast earlier. And you were talking about somebody who serves women who are who are stressed, and they had a really good like, I help statement but you know, I also was thinking like you could and there was more defined than that. But it just made me think like you could say I serve women who are stressed. And it could be like, Well, why are they stressed? Are they stressed? Because they have a really high powered job? Are they stressed because they're living in poverty? Are they stressed because they're trying to train for a marathon? Wow, single parenting children? Are they stressed because they're going through a divorce? Like, are they stressed? Like, what what? There are millions of reasons so like, help me understand more about what's going on in this person's world? Because all of those people might go to see a different practitioner, they may not but but if they're not if there's if they're all going to you then there still needs to be a better connecting thread that's more than just stressed require they are going to you you know,

Molly Cahill
so with that in mind, I guess my follow up question would be then how is if if we are identifying like this person's main stressor, how is that not almost identifying ideal client?

Brittany McBean
Well, then my question would be like, so for that person. So let's let's go with this. For a little bit just Yeah, either make up an answer or just go with it, I would say okay, what? What is that person that business owner? What service? Are they actually providing? What are they?

Molly Cahill
Let's say they're striking because they're running a full time practice and excited to be a full time mom.

Brittany McBean
I don't know. Sorry, the sorry, the actual like your client, the business owner who's saying I serve women who are stressed, what service are they providing? How are they solving that?

Molly Cahill
Oh, okay. Yeah, so she has a functional medicine practice, in addition to her chiropractic brick and mortar practice, where she does like hormone testing, and like nutrition and that kind of things.

Brittany McBean
Okay, so I'm assuming this is not something that like insurance covers, right? This is No. Okay, so we're gonna go ahead and eliminate people who are stressed because they are living in poverty, like they're not someone who can afford that. So that's, that's off the table, as opposed to someone who's saying like, I'm providing social justice services for people who like cannot afford this or you know, like that, that would be a different, that would be a different niche. So she so in doing like, functional medicine, is she doing like, testing? Like, what are what is this? What do her services look like? Yeah, she

Molly Cahill
does. She does hormone testing. And then like nutrition testing, and like optimization with like, if they need supplements, or lifestyle changes, or whatever.

Brittany McBean
And so then my question would be like, do you like, how long are your appointments, because if you have like four hour long appointments, you're probably not really serving the woman who's working like 80 hour workweeks, or someone who's like training fire, like a marathon, we're trying to raise three kids, right. So then I would or have you figured out how to provide this service and 30 minute appointments, where everybody else is doing it and four hour appointments? Because then you are serving these people who have 15 minutes of free time a week? Do you know what I mean? So like I would, those are the things that I would be asking. And

Molly Cahill
I love that I would have never thought to ask that. That's fascinating. I love that. They're just like, this conversation is like sparked so many ideas for me. So just be mindful of time. I want to wrap it up with one last kind of question. We talked about more of that. The market research piece. What does that look like to you? Like? What questions are you asking? Who are you asking these questions, almost to kind of like validate this offer?

Brittany McBean
Yeah. So this is, this is the answer that can feel really overwhelming. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to lay out what we do. And then I'm going to leave a disclaimer that this is unreasonable for someone who is running a business, and this is not what you should be replicating and I'm going to share what you can be doing because I do this as a full time job. Yeah.

Molly Cahill
She What if you're like someone like me, or someone another client who already has an offer created? That's been you know,

Brittany McBean
yeah, yeah. And so the reason I answered this is because I want you to understand, like, there are levels and there, there is a reason that people hire a copywriter. And there's a reason that it's never the first step. And it doesn't mean that you just sit around and do nothing until you can hire a copywriter, right. So like when I'm working with a client, like if we're writing a full funnel, that's a 12 week project. And for the first six weeks, we're doing research and strategy. And I'm, what we're doing when we're doing the research is we're sending out two surveys to their lists. We're surveying buyers and non buyers, and we're usually analyzing up to 150 responses for each. Okay, I'm running one on one interviews and interviewing up to six buyers and up to six non buyers. And then also doing cold audience data mine. And so that's your kind of typical market research that you hear people saying like go call like a Facebook group and Amazon book reviews and like competitor testimonials to get that like market research. And so the reason we're looking at all three of those is because the surveys are really going to get us that kind of like critical mass where we just get that more like quantitative data. And we can really start to see that messaging hierarchy. explicitness patterns arise through those hundreds of responses. One on one interviews is when we really start to understand where like that slice of life information and start to understand like the emotionality behind it and the nuance behind it for having one on one conversations, you can ask, you know, qualifying questions and like, you see, when people's eyes start to water when, yeah, you know,

Molly Cahill
what, let me go back to the survey, when you're talking about surveys. Is it usually like a one click or like, write out your answer survey

Brittany McBean
are about both. So never more than like, 10 questions. And okay, honestly, the closer to five, the better because we just want to Well,

Molly Cahill
the reason I ask is because I have an intake form, and it's like, what's your biggest frustration and I have like, like examples listed out and no one ever goes anywhere except for the examples and I'm like, is it because I know my audience so well, and I just picked the right examples, or is it because I'm steering them? And they're like, oh, yeah, that one? Yeah,

Brittany McBean
I want the the multiple choice questions for me is for segmenting. So I can understand like, how many people we have at this earning level or at this age group or like that kind of thing and Then the open response is for me to understand like how they're expressing it.

Molly Cahill
Okay, well, yeah, that's

Brittany McBean
helpful. Yeah, that's really helpful. Yeah. And so yeah, the one on one interviews are more to like understand like, kind of those like slice of life and like more like nuance and then the, the like internet kind of data mine that is really more like cold audience, like the people who are not in our world, like, how are they talking about it? What conversations are they having? So we can see if there's a difference between like, the people on our email list and already in our audience? Is that different than like, what people are talking about on Reddit? You know, and how would that work out? So that's a lot like, I have a team. And we do this as a full time job. And my clients pay upwards of $20,000. For us to do this for a full funnel. That's yeah, that's a lot. And so if you tried to do this for yourself, you would stop, you would have to halt your work, right? And so that's okay, if that's not, if that's not like how you can spend your time right now. And so what I think this could look like, is having a system of feedback. So exactly like Molly just said, like, is there a place where you can have an intake form, whether it's where someone, when someone's buys or signs up for the first time, where there's a couple open choice questions and a couple multiple choice questions where over a long period of time, you start to have some critical mass data, where you can say, This is who our people are, like, in what am I trying to say? Like in quantity, right? Yeah. Or you can say, oh, whoa, we just noticed a big shift, like from from 2019 to 2022. Everyone was saying this, but then, oh, my gosh, and 2023 that shifted big time, like, and that's actually what we're seeing a lot of which is really, really interesting, right? So

Unknown Speaker
like that? Yeah, like,

Brittany McBean
that's really, really interesting. Once a year, can you just set a reminder to set us to sit down and just do three one on one interviews with people and just ask like, reflective listening, non leading questions, and just like, play a therapist, tell

Unknown Speaker
me more about that.

Brittany McBean
Tell me more about that. Like, you're just like, whatever is important to them, just letting them talk as people or as you're doing intake and ask people are talking to the things that are interesting, and that you notice and the patterns and the repetitions and the words that come up again, and again, write those down, don't let those live and die in the room like, right, those are the words that come up again, and again. And again, write those down. And ethically, with confidentiality, use that in your marketing, to reflect the conversation. Knowing that you have to be aware of the things that are okay for them to say, that are not okay for you to say, in the things that are too painful. For them, like should not be reflected back. And I say that for your audience, because your people are going to experience that more than most. And they will also be aware of that, like you all will know, you know your people, and you will know the things that are so hard for them to say that you should not be putting them on the page.

Molly Cahill
Yeah, yeah. No, I completely, I completely understand what you're saying. Yeah, and one thing I've started doing recently, just because I have been so busy, like, very, very, like you said, you had like, very quickly, you had a six figure business, it was like, I got such an influx of people all at once. And I was like, so how I kind of handled doing those interviews, so to speak, is I offer these 45 minute, pick my brain sessions, I charge for them, but a very low amount. 147 bucks. pick my brain, like there's no agenda. And it's great for me, because yeah, I'm not charging a lot. But I get a lot out of it too. Because then I'm like hearing what it is or wanting to pick my brain about or what they think is like, oh, Molly can just give me this, like simple solution. Like, I'm not trying to mislead anybody and say, like, I can solve problems and a 45 minute call. That's not what I'm selling it as either. It's just like, you know, sometimes you just want to pick someone's brain, you're like, let's just, it's almost like a buy me coffee. Let's chat, ya know. And so they get out of it, you know, their questions either answered or questions where they know, like, Okay, this, this is more involved than just like a 45 minute strategy session, you know, or I mean, and then I get feedback of like, okay, this is where my client is right now.

Brittany McBean
Yeah. So and we're looking for patterns, right? It's like the things that come up, because it's so easy to go in with confirmation bias. And it's so easy to look at the anecdotal and be like, Oh, this is the thing that stuck out whether it's like bad or good and it's you can't pick out that one thing. Patterns. I'm bad about that. I'm bad everyone is it's not you, everyone.

Molly Cahill
Our my our Instagram Management Agency stays fully booked with like, very little promotion. And what I want is for more people to like, learn how to do it for themselves and not like outsource to an agency. You know what I mean? Like, learn how to do this, or train someone in your office to do it, whatever. And I go in definitely with the bias of AI I'm someone who just would outsource. And so that's just what they want. They don't want to learn how to do it themselves. They don't have time. They're overwhelmed. Do you know what I mean? And so that those are the words that listen for because I'm like, Well, I know my people. Yeah, you've given me a lot to think about.

Brittany McBean
Yeah, it's hard. It's not easy.

Molly Cahill
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for this. This is so helpful. How can people find you? And I know you talked about obviously, like the higher ticket way of working with you. But is there kind of like another way? Or what's the best way to connect with you?

Unknown Speaker
Yeah, I,

Brittany McBean
I love, love, love to give away as much as possible for free on YouTube. So I have a YouTube channel. And I don't like to get keep. So I give away as much as I possibly can. And if I can, I have like a market research freebie that we can share in the show notes here. And I share like my exact process, and I have a spreadsheet that you can use to like organize all of your market research. So if that's if that's helpful, sorry, I should have asked if I can share that. Of course you can. Yes, of course. Yeah. So YouTube, I will I will answer DMS on Instagram, because I'm bad at posting. So you can hop on over there and say hi. But yeah, those are those are probably the two best places to connect.

Molly Cahill
Okay, we will link your YouTube and your free download and your Instagram below. And I appreciate you taking the time to be on here. And letting me just kind of like ask you a bunch of questions and pick your brain because I love it.

Unknown Speaker
Yeah, love it. Alright. Thanks, Brittany. Thanks for having me.

Molly Cahill
Thank you for listening to holistic marketing simplified. This podcast is brought to you by my marketing roadmap, which is a five episode private audio training that's kind of like this podcast, but not exactly because it's not available to the general public when you search on your podcast feed. So the great thing about consuming free content like this for me or on my Instagram or my blogs, or whatever is that yes, you will learn a lot, but you kind of have to go searching for what it is exactly you're looking for this five episode private podcast is broken down in a logical step by step order. That's why it's called a roadmap. So you're ready to get started on your Instagram marketing journey. Or if you already are started and you're just feel like you're kind of like overwhelmed with all of the different free information. This is a super clear roadmap with lots of tangible step by step action items that will get you from point A to point B for just $27. So all you have to do is head to Molly cahill.com/private training. And based on the reviews I've had so far, I know you won't be disappointed. I'm really proud of this training. And I know personally, I've bought 2737 $17 products before and felt like I really didn't get that much out of it. I guarantee you, you will learn something from this five episode, private audio feed. So again, it's just Molly K hill.com/private training. And it'll also be linked below in the show notes. I cannot wait to hear what you think. And hey, you know, every podcast or at the very end of their episode asks you to rate and review their podcast. Well, that's because it's super important. These podcasts take a lot of time and heart an effort to produce to bring you free information. So in order for me to be able to continue doing that we need more people to find out about the show. So if you could please just take like two minutes out of your very busy day to leave me a rating and share this on your Instagram stories and tag at Molly a Cahill. That's c h i ll I would greatly greatly appreciate your support. I truly appreciate you so much. I know your time is valuable and I can't wait to see you in the next episode.

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