We have all been guilty of this…haven’t we? 

Seeing the “next big thing to change your business” and invested money. 

Only for it to… not work. 

Don’t worry about following the next blueprint, instead take the advice from Digital Trailblazers Laeh and Todd. 

If you LOVED this episode, make sure you share this on your Instagram stories and tag us @contentqueenmariah and @digitaltrailblazer

⁠⁠⁠✨⁠⁠⁠Want to learn our signature framework to help with content strategy? Take our FREE workshop⁠⁠⁠✨⁠ ⁠⁠⁠

KEY EPISODE TAKEAWAYS 👇

• Why you need to focus on audience growth 

• How to create more impactful content and marketing

• What to do instead of buying new courses or programs

SHOW RESOURCES 👇

• Check out Leah and Todd’s Website - ⁠https://digitaltrailblazer.com/⁠   

• FOLLOW Digital Trailblazers on Instagram - ⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/digitaltrailblazer/⁠

• JOIN the Digital Trailblazers Facebook Groups - ⁠https://www.facebook.com/groups/profitablecoursecreators⁠⁠

• Check out our signature content strategy framework in our free workshop - ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sales.contentqueenmariah.com/content-strategy-workshop⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠

• Find out more about how to WORK WITH US -⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ www.contentqueenmariah.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

• Connect with us on INSTAGRAM -⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.instagram.com/contentqueenmariah⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

If you like this episode, don't forget to share it to your Instagram stories and tag me⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ @contentqueenmariah⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠!

Other than that, enjoy - chat next week 💕

ABOUT THE GUESTS

Leah Rae and Todd are the founders of DigitalTrailblazer.com, where they help experts, coaches, and entrepreneurs create, launch, and scale profitable online courses and coaching programs.

Starting out with zero marketing experience — Leah was a nurse, and Todd was a band teacher — they built a thriving multiple-six-figure business from scratch, all while raising their two young kids and prioritizing family first. After years of trial and error, they developed a proven system that combines strategic marketing with relationship-building, enabling their clients to stand out in a crowded market and scale sustainably.

Leah and Todd are known for their no-hype, integrity-driven approach to marketing and are passionate about helping others succeed without sacrificing what matters most.

PODCAST TRANSCRIPTION

This is episode  250, and I'm talking to the founders of digital trailblazers, Leah and Todd,  who are here to share with you why it's time to stop chasing the shiny objects and start building a profitable online business.  Welcome to the content queen podcast. I'm your host, Mariah entrepreneur, storyteller, digital nomad.

Creative content bootcamp and founder of Content Queen. I'm here to teach you how to share your unique story, create content and market your business with strategy through the channels that work for you. Each week I'll deliver a story to help you connect to a powerful strategy around marketing, business, and content creation.

I'll also be joined by amazing sales and entrepreneurs who are here to share their own journey along the actual steps to help you take your business to a whole new level through amazing storytelling, powerful line marketing, content strategy. Let's do it. Hello gang. All right, we have  such an aligned.

Episode. I'm so excited to share this one with you. I think you're going to absolutely love it. So we are talking to an awesome couple duo. I absolutely love it. And we're going to be talking about just like the shiny objects, the things that we see online all the time, and we put our credit card details in and they just don't work.

But we're going to talk about sustainable. Marketing and how to build from the foundations. So Leah Ray and Todd are the founders of trailblazer. com here. They help experts, coaches, and entrepreneurs create and launch scalable, profitable online courses and coaching programs.  Starting with zero marketing experience.

Leah was a nurse and Todd was a band teacher. They built a thriving multiple six figure business from scratch, all while raising their two kids and prioritizing family first. After years of trial and error, they developed a proven system that combines strategic marketing with relationship building. It enables their clients to stand out in a crowded market and scale sustainably.

Leah and Todd are known for their non hype, integrity driven approach to marketing and are passionate about helping others succeed without sacrificing what matters most.  So let's chat to Leah and Todd. I absolutely loved this conversation. Welcome Leah and Todd to the podcast. I'm very excited to have a duo on the show.

Um, Leah, can you just tell us a little bit more about who you both are and what you do? Yeah. So we are a husband, wife, um, combo, and we are the co founders of Digital Trailblazer and the Digital Trailblazer podcast. And we help, we really specialize in helping coaches, course creators, experts, consultants to refine their messaging, their offer to put in together really amazing sales systems and processes and automations and start to scale and drive traffic.

So we've been in this space for many, many years and, um, yeah, we're excited to be here today. Amazing. So I love this, um, husband, wife duo. I have a similar combo, but not as public facing. So I would love to hear your origin story and why you started in business and how did you get to where you are now?

Yeah, so it was a quite a journey. We didn't, we had no idea we were going to end up for sure. It was looking for opportunities, looking for options. So, um, about nine,  nine, 10 years ago, something like that, we were kind of in a difficult place. We had, honestly, we had Prayed for children for 10 years. We were finally adopting our very first son.

And with that, um, Todd was traveling. Um, he was traveling out Sunday nights, flying back Thursday evenings, Friday mornings, week after week. And. It was not the life that we wanted, right? We really, you know, paying for kids for 10 years. And then when they come, I was a single mom, most of the time. And dad, you know, Todd was only a dad on the weekends.

And so that was really not the lifestyle that we wanted. We, at the time we're living in rural Oklahoma, so we didn't have any local options that could really replace the kind of consulting type, uh, income that Todd was making. So we. Looked for other things. We looked for business opportunities. We ended up like a lot of people being tiptoeing our way into entrepreneurship with network marketing.

So we were, you know, not from a business mindset at all. Grew up very much job oriented, but it was a really good way to get our Heads in the right space and have the confidence to kind of do different things, but, uh, we kind of sucked at it, to be honest, we really sucked at it. And that was a hard pill to swallow after both being very successful in our corporate space and in jobs.

And so we ended up trying to figure out how to make that work. We came online, um, started learning what, how to generate leads online, got really involved in affiliate marketing. And that's where things really took off for us is with affiliate marketing. And we learned.  All the core stuff. And for anybody who doesn't know what affiliate marketing is, it's selling other people's things.

Like you're just referring people to make purchases from other people. And it's a really great space to start. If you're trying to start an online business, cause you don't have to worry about the product. You don't have to worry about delivering. You just work on selling. And so it taught us, you know, we learned copywriting.

We learned how to do funnels. We learned how to, you know, how to sell on social media and to generate leads and all of these really fundamental things. Um, And we started crushing it and we were, uh, able to retire Todd from, uh, his six figure job. Um, and we had people starting to come up to us and say, well, how are you doing this?

Like, how are you generating all these leads and making all this stuff work? So we ended up selling our own course, putting together our own course. And that's where we found our jam. We found our sweet spot and we love the whole coaching and info product, um, courses space. Um, that's where we went from sitting, you know, lower six figures a year.

To seven figures a year, very, very quickly. And we found, we got really passionate about it because we saw so many people in sort of like the whole business space who were doing the right things, like the things they were told to do to be successful and just, you know, They just, it was, they didn't have the lucky lottery number of an amazing network or, or whatever the thing was.

And, but people could lean into their own expertise and change lives and make a beautiful business out of it. And so that's really, you know, five years ago, I think that we really shifted into helping folks, um, do what we've been able to do and, um, build beautiful, amazing coaching businesses and courses.

Wow, that's amazing. And isn't it powerful how much, you know, you learn over the process and then people were like, how are you doing this? And you start to get those little nudges of like where your next, you know, business path is going to go. I absolutely love that. There's always signs getting thrown at us of where we're going to go to next.

So that is awesome. So you mentioned, um, Yeah. That there's business owners that are doing all the things that they've been told to do, and that it's not quite getting the results that they're seeing online. Because obviously we see in the social media world, all these results getting thrown at us. And some of us are like, well, why am I not getting that?

So the topic I really want to talk about is, yeah, this Business growth and scaling in online to build this profitable business because, you know, revenue's great, but we need profit. Um, so what are the challenges that you're seeing business owners face when they're building a business? And I might ask you, Todd, to answer that one.

Uh, that's so when you think about the online, uh, business space, and you think about who you're going to learn how to build an online business for, you're learning from marketing gurus. And the thing is with marketing gurus is that they're really good at selling their courses. And the thing is that what sells isn't necessarily what you need.

And so what you often get hit with is, you know,  kind of what we refer to as magic pill marketing, where it's like, Hey, this one secret strategy that you can only learn from me that I developed, uh, is, you know, if you just implement this in your business, you're going to be able to scale the seven figures in the next 30 days or, you know, or your money back, you know, blah, blah, blah, right.

They make this outrageous guarantee.  And that's what you're getting hit with over and over and over with, whether it's for, Oh, learn how to do webinars, learn how to build an email list, learn how to do messenger marketing, learn how to do Facebook ads, learn how to do YouTube ads, uh, learn how to do challenges.

I mean, there's all these different things that are constantly getting hit with that's the next magic pill. That's supposed to get you to the next seven figures.  And the thing is that there is no magic pill. There is no one secret strategy that's going to. magically take your business from zero to six figures or seven figures or anything.

Um,  when you look at  the studies that they, that they've done with marketing and sales,  one of the most fundamental things that you will find that every, every experienced salesperson knows is that in order to take someone from cold prospect to paying client, you need At around seven touch points. And actually, I think the latest things, you know, when people have done the latest research with online marketing, things like that, it could be as high as 40 touch points.

And when we say a touch point, we mean something like  downloading a freebie from your website, seeing a training that you did on YouTube. getting an email from you, uh, you know, there's all sorts of things, getting a phone call or having a phone call conversation with you. Each one of those is a different touch point.

And so when you think about the magic pill marketing and they're saying things like, yeah, if you just do a challenge, a challenge is the latest thing that's going to get you from zero to seven figures and blah, blah, blah. Well, you may pay five or 10, 000. So you joined a coaching program to learn how to do a challenge, but now you're blowing five or 10, 000 on one touch point.

Right. And we know from the, you know, from decades of research in marketing sales, that we need somewhere around seven, maybe as much, as many as 40 touch points to get someone from cold prospect to paying client. So, you know, the, that whole concept of that magic pill, that's going to get you where you want to go.

What people often do is they'll, so they'll invest in that course to learn how to do a challenge. And then ultimately it doesn't work out. And then they'll look for the next shiny object. What's the next thing? Oh, it's YouTube ads. So let's go ahead and do YouTube ads. I'll run YouTube ads, no sales. And then it's like, okay, well that didn't work.

Now let's go find something else. And it's just thing after thing after thing. And eventually what you got is you've got a bunch of strategies that you've tried. Uh, you've got a lead magnet funnel over here. You've got a webinar funnel over here. You've got a challenge that you did over here. And you've got all these things that are all kind of working on their own.

They're not really working together. You don't know what you need. You don't know what you don't need. And it's, it's what we call a Frankenstein business. Right. You've got all these things that you've kind of cobbled together, um, that you've done in your business. Some of them may be functional, some of them, maybe not, uh, all varying levels of success, but it's like, you you've cobbled together this thing, this monstrosity, and it's really not producing anything for you.

And so that's typically, you know, most people's experience. When starting an online business is that they don't have that that concept of what do I need To really just take someone from cold prospect to paying client because there's a system that you need to put together With a you know, some are around seven touch points or more  That go in order from low resistance to high resistance.

That's the other thing is that you can't just Let's say, you know, one of your touch points may be, hey, you know, uh, check out my, my coaching program. It's 5, 000 or whatever, right? You have a sales page for your coaching program. Well, seeing that sales page may be a touch point, but showing that sales page to the same person seven times over.

Yeah, that's seven touch points, but that, you know, those are seven of the most high resistance touch points possible. So it's like, uh, the analogy that we often use is like with dating, right? When you, when you're looking, uh, to approach somebody for, uh, to, you know, to go on a date or maybe to marry them at some point, you don't go up and ask them to marry you seven times over and say, Hey, you know, that was seven touch points.

Why didn't they marry me on the seventh one? You know, obviously you start with, Hey, how's it going? Can I buy you? Can I buy you a drink? Can we sit down and talk, right? Use something super low resistance. That's easy, easy to say yes to. And marketing works the same way. So we want to start with an offer.

That's very low resistance. That's easy to say yes to. And then we progressively work up to the cell from there. And that's, you know, that's how you, you, uh, build out your, what we call a nurture sequence, but that's, you know, in a nutshell, right? I kind of just,  We're drinking from, from a fire hose here,  but that's, that's the big thing is that we're trying to cobble together all these different things.

And we don't know the system that really, that we really need to put together. And that's why most people are not making sales.  You speak in my language though. I love it. Um, it's so true though, right? Because, um, we're always just following what online gurus are telling us, but also,  I was talking about this the other day, you know, there's people with millions of followers, millions of follow marketers, right?

They're.  This is, but they're selling marketing.  So, you know, it's like when everyone did those Instagram Reels challenges and like buy my Instagram Reels course and sell like I do. Well, you're selling Instagram Reels on Instagram Reels. Of course you're going to make a lot of money, but I'm selling something completely different.

So how does that, you know, work for me? And I think, um, We're, we're looking at these, you know, massive, massive marketers that have great things to say, but often, as you said, that one thing that we need multiple things. So we need to look at it from a holistic standpoint. When I look at content marketing, obviously everyone wants social media, um, but we need to look at it from a holistic standpoint.

A bigger lens than just social. We need to build that, you know, that digital footprint as a digital trailblazers. That's your name's perfect. Because obviously like there's just more than one path you can go down and making them all work together. As you said, sometimes they're just one's working over here, one's working over there and it doesn't come together.

That's like when I worked in corporate, when marketing and sales didn't really talk to each other. And I'm like, Why, why are we not talking? And then we've got these little small businesses where we're  solo entrepreneurs, or maybe we've got a couple in our team and then they're not talking together.

There's no excuse. They need to be working together. So perfect answer. I absolutely love that. So  with all the, um, mistakes that we're seeing, um, in small business owners make, which. It's not their fault. Like, this is, you know, we've all been guilty of following something because it's been thrown in our face and we think, oh, maybe I need that.

Um, you know, it's totally normal to follow a shiny object, which I love when you say that in your podcast episode, you know, this  shiny object syndrome is really big in the online space.  How do we fix these mistakes that maybe we're going, Hmm, I make them quite often. I seem to be making those mistakes all the time.

What can we do to sort of rectify that?  Yeah. I think it's really important that we take a step back and we look at the customer journey. Right? Because a lot of times folks are they're taking. They're only looking at this silo or this little piece of the puzzle instead of taking that holistic approach.

So if you kind of take a step back and follow the entire customer journey and make sure there are no dead ends, make sure that you have you All of these multiple touch points. And with every touch point, they're invited to take another step and another step until they're invited to make a purchasing decision and to walk with them through that process.

Um, I think it's a very common trap to fall into.  Honestly, having a coach to keep you on track is wise because they will slap your hand when you start reaching for something shiny that doesn't help you. I think it's really important that people understand you need a really good foundation to the business.

You need to build out this system and process. You need this beautiful customer journey that takes them one step at a time closer and closer to where you need to making a sale. Once you have that built out, now we can add additional traffic sources. Right? A dish, you know, that's when you can say, okay, well, I'm going to focus on this kind of traffic source, maybe Facebook ads or Instagram or whatever else they want to focus on to driving traffic.

Great. Once you've got that down and that's working and you want to add another traffic source. Good. But as long as you have that foundational system, you have options, but, um, Yeah, if you're out there on your own, just trying to figure stuff out, you'll probably fall prey to shiny objects at one point or another.

So  generally speaking, it's good to have a coach to guide you through that process.  Yeah, I totally, I totally can get that. Someone that's got that like outside perspective that's like, hang on, you know, cause it's so easy when it's your business and you want it to work and you love what you do. And you also, uh, providing for a family or you have a dream, you know, like I travel full time, so I got it.

Like I want to keep this thing going so I can keep traveling. Right. And both of you having a family, like. So it's easy to hear that, you know, get that email in your inbox. It's like, this is the new thing. And if you don't try it, you'll be left for dead. And you're like,  um, and it's having someone go, well, you know, I had this experience with investing recently, um, investing personal finance.

And, um, I don't know as much as my accountant knows, but I, you know, did this free trial thing and it all seemed really great. And then. After the free trial, they offer you in to continue investing, but you've got to pay like 2, 000 for the brokerage fee in Australia to make it all legal. And I was like,  I don't know.

So I might email my accountant and he was like, Hey, try this one instead. It's like, you know, blah, blah, blah. And it's like, ah, okay. I'm so glad that I reached out. I wasn't going to, cause I was like, Oh, I can work it out myself. But having that person that, Has been in the industry, has seen it all. Like when you've been in it a long time, you see these things come back around, like challenges were probably something different, you know, but they're just packaged up to look different.

And it's like, it's, it's kind of the same thing, but we can kind of do this without you needing to spend 10, 000 on a course to work out how to do a challenge. Right. You just got to understand your audience really. Don't you? And I love what you say about foundations, because I think that sometimes when you say foundations, you're like, Oh, really?

It's like, but it's, it's, it's. It's the thing you ought to keep coming back to. And  people that have been in business over three years, you know, you start to get to that five year mark, 10 year mark and everything clicks and you go, it's because I did the foundational work, which is something I did very early in my business.

And I look back now and be like, I'm so glad I did all that because everything works. And that's why, you know, you and I have lots of channels and lots of content because But we didn't start with that, although I did and learnt hard way to cancel that. Um, but we build that up over time and we build this, you know, digital footprint that allows us to have all those traffic sources that you mentioned.

So I absolutely love that.  So, as I said before, I love in your podcast, you talk about building a business without the shiny objects, the gimmicks, the stress and the overwhelm. So you've sort of mentioned it a little bit, but what, what does that look like for anyone going like, Oh, you know, I, nothing is like, working at the moment and I feel really stressed and overwhelmed and I just need to start somewhere.

So yeah, what does this look like trying to build this business without shiny objects, gimmicks, and stress? Sounds awesome.  One of the things that we often talk about is, uh, building an audience, and the analogy that we often use is, imagine that you have, uh, like a, a McDonald's franchise.  How profitable do you think you're gonna be?

If, if somebody were to just hand over a fully functioning McDonald's franchise to you, most people would probably think, well, yeah, I, I, I'd make hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars for that. Well, okay, so here's the catch. Now, let's take that McDonald's franchise and let's put it in the middle of the desert where there are no roads and no people.

Now, how do you think, how profitable are you going to be? Well, obviously you're not going to make any money, right? But if you take that same McDonald's and you put it in the middle of, say, Times Square, New York, where it's, you know, upwards of 300, 000 visitors per day, Well, yeah, now you're going to be very profitable.

And in fact, you could probably swap out that McDonald's for just a no name, mom and pop, you know, burger stand, and it would still be very profitable. And so the name of the game, what's really going to determine the velocity or, or how fast you can grow is the size of your audience and your ability to, uh, to influence an audience.

So, uh, online, that's your ability to drive traffic, right? If you think about, uh, You know, an online or a local brick and mortar business. This is the equivalent of having the prime location in the, in the largest city is your ability to, to drive traffic and, and build an audience. So the very first things you want to focus on are number one, creating content for your, for your business.

So it pick one channel, you don't need to be everywhere, but pick one channel. That could be YouTube,  excuse me. That could be tick tock. That could be Instagram. That could be wherever, wherever your audience is. You know, whatever you're comfortable with, find a channel where you can create content and start, you know, attracting that audience that way.

Uh, the other thing is that you want to start building an email list right away.  One of the things that, uh, that we learned early on that has always stuck with us is that you want to take the traffic you control and Take the traffic you don't control and turn it into traffic that you own. Uh, and this, uh, this, if you've heard of Russell Brunson, he's the one that, that we learned this from.

But the traffic that you control is paid traffic. It's traffic that, traffic that you can turn on and off, uh, at, at will. You know, whenever you want more traffic, you just put some more money into paid ads and traffic comes in.  Uh, traffic you don't control is, uh, organic traffic. So if you create a YouTube channel, a TikTok account, Instagram, whatever it is, the algorithm really determines.

If your content is going to get promoted, how many people it gets promoted to, who it gets promoted to, and all those things, you don't really control that. You can put more effort into it. You may, it may or may not pay off, right? But that's, it's traffic that comes in that you don't control. You want to take those two sources of traffic and turn it into traffic that you own, which is your email list.

Okay. There's only really two things that you own online. Number one is your website. Number two is your email list. So once you take those two traffic sources, you start building the email list. Now that people are on your email list, now you can email them and you can market to them for free anytime you want, right?

And that's the name of the game. That's one of the main things that's going to make you profitable in your business. Whenever you're running paid ads, whenever you are, you know, you've got a, uh, a social media account that you're, that you're running.  If you think about, um, you know, in an online influencer who has a YouTube channel or a tech talk account or something, and they, they post a video to say YouTube, or let's say they're, they've got a Facebook group with hundreds of thousands of people in that group,  you post something in that group.

You would be lucky to get 10%. Of people in that group, seeing your content, if you were to create a YouTube video and, you know, YouTube notifies all your subscribers or, you know, a portion of your subscribers, you're lucky to get, you know, 10, 20 percent reach on that. On that new post on that new video.

Right.  But when you have an email list. Whenever you email your email list, you're going to have 97, 98 percent deliverability. Everybody's going to get that email and your open rate, you know, if you're good is probably going to be around 40%, sometimes up to  60%, depending on the size of your list, if you've got a huge list, that's, you know, hundreds of thousands or millions of people, it may only be 10 or 20%, but it's still much better than you're ever going to get.

On any social media site, but that's your way of marketing to people for free. Once you've generated that traffic the first time. So that's the number one, most fundamental thing. Once you've got that audience. Now you can approach you. Now you can promote affiliate offers to them. Now you can promote your own courses and coaching programs to them.

Now you can promote whatever you want and make money from that audience. But that is probably the number one, most fundamental thing. You want to start working on right now, even before you have an offer ready. If you don't even have an offer ready, it's still kind of kicking around ideas in your head. As long as you know who you want to market to, the audience that you want to serve,  building that audience is the very first thing that you can do that will help you to be profitable as fast as possible whenever you do have something to offer.

Oh, I love that because so many of us are waiting for things to be ready before we start posting content. Right. And I love that. I think we are so, and that just, even though, yeah, building an audience takes time and effort and all that. It's more of a simpler process than writing a challenge here. And then you don't have the energy and the time to show up.

And when you do show up, you're promoting something all the time. You're not giving value, you're not building connection. You're not sharing to entertain, to engage with your audience. And I see this a lot now, more so than ever, is there's such an energetic thing around content, if you're. Willing to show up for your audience in that space, rather than just like, Oh, I'll just chuck some stuff up and hope for the best.

But if you actually generally want to connect with your audience, that's where you see the results, right? I've seen it, you know, more so than ever now. Cause this, everyone can be a content creator. Um, everyone is tick tockers. You know, blown that out of the park. You just, you get your phone. You've got a topic.

It doesn't matter if we're going to make money from it. You're going to create content and I actually don't need to sell anything. I've got a full time job. So people are probably going to watch my content because I'm just going to create stuff about anything I don't sell. Um, so I love that you say that because I think we're always just.

Yeah. So busy on all the next things that we can do that we forget that, Oh, you know, if I just connect with my audience and your audience will tell you what they want anyway, you had the exact thing happened to you guys when you started your business. People were asking questions and you go, Oh, well that's what I need to offer.

That's exactly it. Exactly. I love that. So.  Um, going back to, I guess, building an audience, deciding on your channels, all that stuff. Okay. I, all right. You've convinced me. I'm going to start a Tik TOK. I've got, I'm going to have an email list and I'm just going to start creating content. I don't know what that's going to look like.

So what advice do you give to people when they're just starting out or even if they're like, Oh, I need to take it back a step and actually just kind of refresh a little bit. I feel like I've gotten carried away with all the challenges and all the free stuff and all these offers. I just want to like strip it back.

Where do you recommend we start when we just want to build audience and connect with people? What does that look like? What types of content should we be looking to create?  So that's a really interesting question. I think you need like the where is where your audience is. Right? So we have to kind of keep this simple and look at who are you trying to connect with?

Where and where are they hanging out and how do you engage them in meaningful conversation? So when we're looking at content, I think a lot of people, especially when you're new to it, you're thinking about yourself and you're thinking about what you, how you help people and like what, what you sell. And you're coming at this from, well, I got to tell them about myself and I got to tell them what I do.

People don't care about you.  When it comes to content, you have to only think about them. Think about their experiences. Think about what, where they are in their journey. Um, because every piece of content should not be selling. It's, that's, um, very much the wrong way to go. You should be creating content that your audience that you want to work with and help can relate to.

And some of it's fun. Some of it's engaged in intriguing and thoughtful. Some of it is insightful and educating, but it's really getting into the kind of conversations are already having Having in their own head and speaking to that and putting that out on social and you can do that. Like once you understand the core principles that can take any kind of format that can be short form vertical video on TikTok that could be reels or posts and with giant descriptions like people do on on Instagram that can be on Facebook or Facebook live or like you can.

Um, and you can, you know, move this into a lot of different formats, but you have to really understand what's going on with, with your audience and who you want to serve. And so one of the first things that we generally recommend for people is actually building an, uh, like a Facebook group. So, um, it is a very effective way to, to have that community that you can have conversations and you can do polls and you can, um, go live and talk with your people.

And even the questions that you get to ask when people are entering the group.  You're getting so many wonderful, beautiful insights into what is going on in their heads. You're learning, what do they want? What do they fear? What are they seeking? What are their goals? And all of this stuff allows you not, not only to make really great content, but also to craft a beautiful offer that truly helps and serves them.

Yeah, I was also, I was going to add on to what Leo was saying there about, uh, you know, the type of content that you want to create. One of the things that we'll often tell our own clients is imagine your ideal prospect. And, you know, obviously they've got a problem that you can help them to solve.

Imagine, that they're sitting down at their keyboard and they're on Google or they're on YouTube and they're going to start typing something in to solve a problem that they have. What are the words that they're typing in  to that search bar, right? That's, that's the number one thing that you should be creating content around is those questions or those problems that they're typing in there because it's often a very different Uh, you know, thing that they're typing into the search bar versus what you help them to do.

For example, you know, we help people to create successful online businesses, digital courses, coaching programs, and things like that.  Whenever you think about someone who's starting on that journey, that's typically not what they're typing in to Google or YouTube. What they're typing in is much more of a, an immediate need.

Right. Yes, obviously they want to create a successful online business, but their immediate need is how do I generate leads online? Uh, how do I run facebook ads, right? Those are the things that they're typing in Uh how to run facebook ads for online courses, right? The more specific we can get with those things and the more top of mind concerns that we can address That's the type of content that's really going to resonate with your audience versus you know, the big overall goal that you help them with, which, you know, could be something that's much more generic and broad.

Yeah, it's so true. Cause like what they think they need versus what they actually need, but that you have to, as the guide in their hero journey, you have to take them through and show them what they actually need versus what they think, because We are the experts in that space. So I, I absolutely love that.

And I think, um, it's interesting to go through what you said, Leah, with like, you know, people don't necessarily care about you. They care about them, but how can you weave your story in so that they care, you know, eventually start to build that relationship with you and that connection. But at the beginning, they're like, well, I don't know you.

So, you know, what may, and it's this trust factor, right? I think 2020 was very easy to create content and get traction and 2019, 2020. And now we're like  We've been, we've lost a lot of trust in the last four years. There's been a lot online, a lot of people selling stuff that they never deliver with, you know, the government, there's so many things that have been just amounting to trust issues that we've, we have.

So if you can learn to go, okay, I just need to make people trust me. And how do I do that in real life as well? Like, and how could I bring that to that online world? Obviously there's a lot more hurdles with like, you know, Capturing that attention straight away and things like that, because, you know, it's a lot more noisier than being in a room with less people and trying to capture your, uh, capture attention with your, you know, current target audience.

But it's very interesting because I think along the journey, we forget about our audience because we want to make our business work  that we then, you know, talk about ourselves and it becomes really fun. And then there's that balance between. Content creator and business owner, you know, obviously we're here to be business owners and solve a problem.

We're not just here to do a vlog of our day and, um, you know, show what our house looks like. You know, we, we have to find that balance of being engaging, but also being like, well, I'm a business owner and this is.  Down the track, what I could support you with. And that market research thing was quite interesting.

You said Leah, cause I find resistance towards market research. I find a little classic why I haven't had enough people go through my program. So like, who am I going to ask questions to? I'm like people that haven't done it. Like just go out there and talk to people. It's it's yeah, it's crazy. I'm consuming, but so worth it in the end.

Absolutely. It's, it's powerful. I mean, even the very best copy. So in our business, Todd is the copywriter. I can kind of slap something together, but I'm, it's not my thing. Right. But the, the most powerful. Powerful, most successful copy that we, that he ever puts together is when we come together because I'm doing sales calls and I'm talking to people and I'm doing interviews all, all day.

Right. And I'm having all these conversations and I'm hearing from people directly what's going on in the business. What are they looking for? What are their problems? And so when I can help. You know, share that, those insights to Todd as he's doing his copy. And, and then that's the magic. Cause they're like, I can't tell you how many sales calls I get on.

And they're like, Oh, I thought you were reading my mind. Like I went through the video before the call and it like, that's my story. I couldn't even believe it. It was, you were inside my head. I get that. Like multiple times a week from people who are just mesmerized because we've had so many conversations that we know exactly what's going on with people and we can really craft our message in a really meaningful way that it resonates with them.

Yeah, yeah, that's so true. And that's why  it can be challenging. You know, for example, I help clients with content. I'm always like, tell me what's going on. Tell me what's going on. And I've gotten them into a habit now. But in the beginning, you know, I've got a couple of new clients. I went out and saw one of them were filming content.

And she's like, Oh, yeah, this, this, this, and this. And I'm like, Oh, yeah. Thank you. I need that. I'll just take that with me. Um, but it was amazing. Cause I got to go up there and I literally had a conversation with our target audience. And she's the exact person that we're trying to target on Tik TOK. And she did the exact thing that I envisioned our target audience would do, which was gone a little road trip.

They are in like a, um, not a fish and chip shop, but yes, like, but seafood, they catch their own seafood. It's just like next level. And she's like, Oh, I live. Down the road, like, I don't know, a couple of hours, I went to a hike and then I was like, well, I'll come here for lunch. I'm like, that is my target audience.

Someone that will travel for good food. So I had a really good conversation with her and I was like, I can now take that with me. But I guess a lot of the times, especially if you're a solo entrepreneur, if you've got someone with your marketing, you're like, Oh, they probably wouldn't care about that. So I've literally got my clients into habit.

They voice note me like, even if, voice note me what you have for breakfast, don't care. I just need to know everything that's going on. Cause eventually there'll be like a little gold nugget in there that we can use. And the more you  Sit down and think about that. I literally had a podcast episode before this one called life is content, start living it.

And one of the suggestions was after a meeting with a client, after your sales call, a conversation in a DM with a potential client, write it all down because they become topics. I'm doing a workshop tonight. I'm going to try and convince my partner to join, screenshot the chat because I need, you know, all that becomes great content.

Right. So I love that you said that because that is, Awesome. And you two can do that to pull your strengths together to create something so magical. And that is awesome. And that can be the power of having a business partner, the power of outsourcing, the power of having a coach. You can bring it all together and create something really magical for your audience.

So I love that. Thank you so much. I'm going to ask you both to share a little parting piece of advice for anyone listening that's In the business, in the online business world is, you know, sick of trying everything and nothing's working. And they just want a small takeaway from today's episodes that they can go on their way and implement.

Yes. So  stick with it. Number one, it is way worth it. Um, we have, you know, we kind of said the beginning of the story, we adopted our first son and there was all this travel. We have now our seven year old, um, and he's never had parents working outside of the home.  It's where it's, is it easy? No, but it's worth it.

And so stick with it. Number one, but, um,  I would say. Work on the foundations. If what you're doing right now, and you're trying all this fancy stuff, if it's not working, we need to kind of back this train up and get your foundation laid, really hone in on your marketing message. That is the foundation for everything that you're doing.

And 99. 7 percent of the clients that we bring into our program,  We have to help them refine that even if they have something yet, making it sharp, making it powerful will allow any of the strategies to work, right? So really working, get back to the foundations, um, work on that marketing message, making sure people understand the value you bring and that it's really worth them paying for it, that they're willing to take out that credit card.

And if people hear your message and they don't feel like, Hey, I got to get this now.  That's a problem. And you need to go back and rework that message to make sure it resonates.  I love that.  Yeah. I would, I would say that's another very fundamental thing is that marketing message, differentiating yourself from the competition out there, because I think what a lot of people don't realize is that when it comes to online courses and coaching programs and things like that, people are much more discerning with how they spend their money versus, for example, let's say  You've got a 50 online course that you're selling.

50 in the grand scheme of things is really not a lot of money, but still people are going to hesitate. They're going to have all these questions, all these objections, and, and they're really going to want to research whether that's the best thing for them if they want to, you know, buy and join and invest.

But you could take that same 50 and,  you know, that person could take a family of four out to McDonald's and probably spend all 50 and they wouldn't give it a second thought.  Selling online courses and coaching programs is a much more complicated process. It's much more profitable, but it's much more complicated.

And the number one thing that that's fundamental to your business is that message. How do you not just convince people that what you have is valuable, that it works, uh, and that's, uh, that you're effective at what you do, but also how is it different and better than the competition? And that's the part where most people miss, uh, that.

that they just, they don't put together a very convincing argument. And so what happens is that when somebody sees your marketing, and they go through your webinar, or your challenge, or whatever it is, and they hear your message,  if they think to themselves, well that's the exact same thing this other person said.

Right. It's very similar to this other program. I tried  at that point. Now they've got a choice to make, they've got a decision to make in a, between two things that are equal.  Typically the next thing they look for is, okay, well, what's the price? So now you're just competing on price and it's a race to the bottom.

And the thing is, you're never going to win a race to the bottom. There's no point in being second cheapest. So you need to find a way to differentiate yourself so that you don't have to keep lowering your price in order to get clients. Uh, the second part is that. When you can effectively do this, like I said, it just becomes much, much more profitable.

And you can, instead of lowering your price, you can raise your price. Uh, and, and it, and people start signing up immediately. Your conversion rates go up and everything else because people start to see your, your program is, The very best thing for them to get to where they want to go that's going to solve their problems that's going to succeed where the other things have failed because most people who are coming into your program, they've probably tried other things in the past, they probably failed with other things in the past.

So the person that can.  Most articulately describe for them why they failed in the past kind of diagnose the situation and then tell them why what they're doing is going to fill in that gap that the other, that the other methods missed the person that can make that argument the best as the one that's going to get the sale.

Oh, I love that. That is great parting words, everyone. So thank you so much for coming on. How can people find you and connect with you and work with you or see how that they can work with you and just consume your awesome content. Yes. Well, thank you so much for having us on. People can definitely check us out at the digital trailblazer podcast.

If you're enjoying these conversations, you will absolutely love the podcast. We dive into all things to help you to build your businesses online. Um, and head to digital trailblazer. com. We've got some, uh, we've got a free course. There are zero to 20 K, um, course that we can get you access to all kinds of good things.

You can check us out, but digital trailblazer, um, you can find us everywhere. Amazing. Well, I've put those links in the show notes. Everyone can check you out. Thank you so much for joining me. This has been a really great conversation. We appreciate you. Thank you. Oh my gosh. What did you think? I love it. I love again, always having the aligned people on the pod, but foundations guys start there, build your audience.

Create an email list and, you know, choose a channel where your audience is really going to connect with you and you're going to connect with them.  So I hope you loved that episode as much as I love interviewing them. Thank you for joining me today.  Be a content queen or king and remember that developing a strategy and story develops your business.

Thank you so much for joining me today. And please don't forget to share this with all your business and entrepreneurial friends. You can do this by adding it to your Insta stories. and tagging me at contentqueenmariah, or just tell them about it. If you do rate and review on whatever platform you're listening to this on, it does help me get this podcast out there.

Share my message. Follow me on TikTok, connect with me on Insta, and I would love to know what topics you want to hear about in the future. And I'll talk to you soon. Bye!