Secrets to Stress-Free Online Course Creation with Caitlin Bacher

Ever wondered how to turn your passion into a million-dollar course? Join me as I chat with Caitlin Batcher, CEO of Scale with Success, who spills the secrets on creating a sustainable, stress-free revenue system for course creators. From her journey as a teacher to becoming a successful business owner, Caitlin offers an inspiring look at aligning your business model with your lifestyle and leveraging evergreen revenue strategies.

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Caitlin’s Podcast - Scale with Success®

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:04

Hey there and welcome to the Girl Means Business podcast, the show where we're all about helping you feel confident both as a mom and a business owner. I'm your host, kendra Swalls, mom of two, former teacher and full-time photographer, and business coach. Each week, we'll discuss the challenges, success and secrets that make you say I can do this, because you absolutely can. So pop in those earbuds, grab your favorite snack and let's dive in, because this girl means business. Hey there and welcome back to the Girl Means Business podcast. If you are in the business of course creation or you've ever thought about creating and selling a digital course, then this is going to be an episode you absolutely want to listen to. I am chatting this week with our guest, caitlin Batcher.

Speaker 1: 0:58

Caitlin is the CEO of Scale with Success, which is a company dedicated to teaching coaches and course creators how to turn their online course into a seven-figure business without launching. That's the key here without launching. We've all seen those course creators online who do these massive launches. They push really hard for like three or four or five weeks. They launch the program, they make a bunch of money and then they close the doors and you kind of don't hear from them for a while, and while that works for a lot of people, it may not work for every single person, and I know for me personally, like that is not how I, my brain functions. I can't, I don't deal in launches. I like evergreen, I like things that are constantly building revenue in my business and that are constantly running in my business, and that is exactly what Caitlin teaches. And so in our conversation today, she is diving into all of the details of how she went from running her business in a way that felt overwhelming and stressful and time consuming and all consuming to creating a system and structure in her business that allowed her to create revenue 24 seven. She was no longer running on launches, she was running in a way that really made sense to her and her lifestyle and that created just calm and peace in her business. And I know we all want that. We all want to have a business that feels peaceful, that feels content, that feels like it's a good fit for us, and Caitlin is a perfect example of not necessarily having to follow the same model that everybody else is doing or that you see all these other big time coaches or course creators doing, and so if you have ever considered creating a course for your business, whether it is in addition to what you do as a full time business, or if creating courses and online education is the space that you are currently in as a career, as a business.

Speaker 1: 2:44

You absolutely want to listen to this interview. You are going to love it. Here is my conversation with Caitlin Batcher. Hey guys, welcome Caitlin Batcher to the Girl Means Business podcast. I'm so excited you're here, caitlin. We have a really exciting topic today. How are you?

Speaker 2: 3:01

I'm doing well and I am so grateful to be here and to speak with your audience today, so thank you for having me on.

Speaker 1: 3:08

Well, thank you for giving us your time and your expertise today. So before we get into our exciting, fun topic today, tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do and how you kind of got into the world of what it is that you do.

Speaker 2: 3:22

Yeah, sure. So right now, our company is dedicated to helping online course creators create consistent revenue in their business. That means no more launches. Now, the way that I kind of got into this business is probably how many of your listeners right now got into business.

Speaker 2: 3:44

It started out with me feeling like I wanted to have more time freedom. I had a two-year-old daughter. At the time. We weren't really in a place where I could put her financially in a way where I could put her in daycare, so she was always running around and I was basically looking for, uh, for something that I could do creatively that would also generate income, and so what I decided to do was that I would start to, um, help a few friends out with their social media.

Speaker 2: 4:20

Now, the reason why I did that is because all of my previous work experience was teaching. So I was actually I worked in the public school public schools for eight years. I taught kindergarten, I taught sixth grade, which is like both sides of the spectrum. Both are good, and so what I? But I really wanted to shift into something new, and so I was able to take a sabbatical from teaching, and so while I was doing that, I was like I want to test something out. So I didn't have any social, any real social media experience, and so I knew that, you know it was, it was so competitive to get those kinds of jobs. I was like, well, let me just try this on my own. So I had a few friends that had their own businesses and I said, let me run your social media for you, let me just like try this out, right and so, and I'll do it for free. So I was doing it for free, helping them out, cause I just kind of wanted to get my feet wet. And then after a while I was really able to, uh, you know, help them out, help them grow their audience, help them, uh, um, get more clear on what their brand was. And so then I decided, you know what, I'm going to start charging some people. So I, you know, did introduce myself to a few other businesses, started charging. I remember the very first. I mean I made every mistake in the book, so, like you can like, in terms of pricing and all of that.

Speaker 2: 5:42

But over time, after I had a few paid clients under my belt, I felt like, okay, well, now I'm doing social media management and this is great, but I still feel tied to my computer because I'm tweeting for people, I'm responding to their audience when they tweet back. You know all the different things. And so I was like I think I'd rather go into the into the consulting space. So basically I then shifted into social, social media consulting, and so then people would book calls for me and I'd help them, you know one-on-one on kind of what they, what they wanted to do with their social media marketing strategy, but they were executing it, so I didn't have to do it for them. After I did that for a while I was like you know what? I am literally saying the exact same thing on all of my calls. And if you were listening and you are a service provider, you have probably found yourself in the exact same place where, like man, I feel like I'm starting to realize that everyone's having the exact same problems.

Speaker 2: 6:49

And again I kind of booked myself out where I didn't have, unless I was going to, you know, start to raise my prices, I didn't have a lot of room to grow my business revenue. And so I was like I'm going gonna package all of this into a course. And so I did that. And once I kind of started, so my very first course was all about, you know, general social media marketing, and I've created a few different courses, uh, since then, but I remember the first time that I got my very first sale and uh, with course, and I was just like, I mean, I was excited but I was also a little bit nervous, to be perfectly honest, because there's a big difference between working with someone one-on-one, having that face-to-face contact, and then, you know, putting together what you know and, of course, sending it out into the universe and just kind of, you know, hoping that whoever buys it is is pleased with the product.

Speaker 1: 7:48

Yeah, yeah Well, and I come from a teaching background as well. I taught elementary school as well, and so I can relate to that a hundred percent, because it's so hard as an educator to break that need to like be part of the learning process. You know, like I was using the example recently where I was like, you know, if I was in a classroom and I was trying to teach somebody how to do two digit multiplication, I, you know, I wouldn't stand up there and give them all these steps and then go, okay, good luck, I'll be back in 30 minutes. You know like I would go through it with them, kind of step by step, and I would be like, okay, pause here, try this now, let's make sure you haven't made any mistakes, and then move on to the next thing. And so, um, it's, it's interesting, like I think the teacher in us, like it makes for really great educators as far as course creation or working one-on-one with clients. But it is hard to break that. Some of those things that are ingrained in us of like we need to be involved in every single piece of this, otherwise we don't know that if it's actually being successful. And I come from a state where, like your teaching is tied to a state assessment at the end of the year and if your kids don't perform. So, as an educator, as someone who has moved into like the course creation, the education space, it's taken me a while to kind of separate that of like my audience's success. While I want them to find success, I cannot be responsible for everybody's success or it wears on me too much, and that's been, it's been interesting. So I, as an educator, former teacher, I totally understand that feeling. Yes for sure. Yeah, so I okay.

Speaker 1: 9:29

Before we get into kind of some of the the outlines and the key talking points we've kind of outlined for this episode, I do want to address the topic that I did an episode on recently. So if you've listened to the podcast for a while, you may have heard this episode a while back where I talk about courses and just sort of my thoughts and feelings around courses as they've evolved to where we are today. And I know when I started learning photography and my photography, business courses were the only way. I mean there was no, there were no Facebook groups, there were no membership programs. That was literally you buy a course and then you work on it on your own and good luck, and so I think that courses have evolved.

Speaker 1: 10:14

However, I do have a well, I'd like to know your thoughts, I guess, on where you see kind of the state of courses being now, because I do think that they're the audience is looking for more of that support, more of that like how can I take this and implement it? And one of the things I mentioned that thing too, is that I can see how these big overarching courses where you're like I'm going to teach you how to build a business from scratch well, that's a lot of information versus I'm going to take this little course, I'm going to teach you one or build a business from scratch well, that's a lot of information versus I'm going to take this little course, I'm going to teach you one or two very specific things where you can actually see results. So, um, I just think there's a lot of changes that have kind of come to the course industry.

Speaker 2: 10:55

So I would love to know sort of your thoughts on where we are at currently with courses in the education space so I'm so glad that you brought up that topic of kind of broader business courses and one thing that I will say is that it's a much better delivery experience for the course creator and it's a much better learning experience for the client, the student, if the course is able to be real, specific and cover a um, cover a like a very limited, teach, a specific skill. Uh, and I think that what happens for a lot of people who are new to course creation I know this certainly, I can think that this definitely happened to me when I first created my course is that we go really broad. So, like for my first course that I created, it was it pretty, it covered like Pinterest, twitter, facebook, instagram. It was like the whole thing, right, it covered branding, it covered this, that like the whole thing, right. Yeah, it covered branding, it covered this, that, the other, and, uh, and over time, my courses became more and more targeted and I think that kind of what happens for, uh, what happens for some people is that we can get into this idea as we're creating the course, that we want to put as as much as possible into it because we get, we become very focused on giving value and we're nervous that if someone enrolls in our course, they're not going to find enough enough value in it, right, yeah. And so we kind of squeeze more and more into it and then.

Speaker 2: 13:55

But then when we, if we deliver that to the student, the student can feel very overwhelmed. And I think that one of the one of the things that you know to be really intentional about when you are creating and delivering a course is what level of support are you prepared to offer with this course and how can you be transparent and communicate the level of support that will be offered throughout the delivery? And so, because the reality is offered throughout the delivery, and so, because the reality is, there are some people that are selling courses that don't come with support, and that's okay as long as that's inside of the marketing, right, as long as people understand you know what you're getting these step-by-step. It does not come with the community. There's no you know Q and A's or anything like that. It's just literally like you're doing it. And for some people like I, definitely bought courses like that because I just want to like, kind of know the nitty gritty or whatever about something.

Speaker 2: 15:04

Um, but, yeah, you know yourself best and, depending on the specific topic that you're learning about, it's really and, and that you're teaching about, it's really important that you're conscious of the, the, the bandwidth that you have to deliver on what you're saying, right, and so, like one of the one of the things that I think people kind of one of the problems that people have is that when they are first marketing their course, they're feeling like, oh my gosh, I have to, I'm going to have to, like way over, deliver here.

Speaker 2: 15:49

So I'm going to include like one-on-one sessions and there's gonna be you know, every day where I'm gonna host like a group call inside, like all these things, and that's awesome.

Speaker 2: 15:59

But you have to, um, you have to make sure that it's something that's actually sustainable. And that's especially important if you're not going off of a launch model, because with the launch model, the course is open and closed for a limited time delivery open and closed for a limited time. But if it's, if you're doing something evergreen where you're consistently selling it, you are going to have new people coming into your uh, your course community every day, and so it's important that you really you take a step back and you really consider what is sustainable for me In an ideal world. Over time you will. The course is going to be able to do a lot of the heavy lifting for you, right? And so, uh, based on you know frequently asked questions that you see coming into the community or people emailing you or whatever, and so when you're first starting out the the course structure is very much in flux and you're going to be kind of building it out. Um, anyway, I hope that answers your question.

Speaker 2: 17:12

I feel like I kind of went on a tangent, because I can just talk and talk, and talk. I know.

Speaker 1: 17:15

I love it. I can tell you're like super passionate, obviously, about what you do and that's how I get to is like I just kind of start just going off on a little tangent. I'm like, no, someone needs to reel me back in, it's all, it is all. Good, Okay, so, um, good, okay so, um. I think we kind of agree, like this, and I love what you mentioned about the sustainability piece, because this, I feel like, goes for everything in our business.

Speaker 1: 17:36

I talk about this so much with social media, I talk about this with email marketing is you can hear these so-called experts all day long preach do this every day, do this every day, do this every day. But if that is not something you can sustain in your business, you have to figure out what you can sustainably do, because if you promise your audience something and then you can't follow through because it becomes too overwhelming for you, then that's where they start to see this disconnect and they're like, well, wait, I, I signed up for this, but you're only delivering this. So it has to be something you can sustain, which is, I think, so important. Yeah, okay. So. I know we have a lot we want to kind of talk about, but you mentioned um, we were chatting before. We recorded that there are three kind of keys to creating a million dollar course that sells on autopilot, which I want to start off by saying that I first of all, I love anything on autopilot because there's only so many hours in a day and there's only like so much we can do as business owners. So anything we can do that is kind of this like run in the background while we're doing other things in our business is so key. But I also love the idea because I think we see a lot of these bigger course creators who do these huge launches Like I think of you know, amy Porterfield porterfield and, um, you know marie forleo and these who are like okay, I'm doing, I'm launching this course for these this two-week window, and they have all these sales that come in and that seems to be like, oh, that's the way it has to be done when there's so many other options to for us to do out there.

Speaker 1: 19:08

So I want people listening to kind of just maybe put that out of their mind to go okay, there are options, you do not have to live launch your course. There are other things you can do and we're going to get into that, so I'm going to let you take over. But what are some of the keys for creating that?

Speaker 2: 19:22

um, you know, million dollar course that sells an autopilot yeah, so I'm I'm so glad you mentioned that, um, because one thing I do I just want to re um, glad you mentioned that, because one thing I do I just want to expand on is that there's always more than one right way to do something right. So if launching is working for you and you're, you just love it. And there are a lot of people out there that they love the launch process. They get like energized by it and like charged up. They're like, oh, I can't wait for my next launch, like energized by it and like charge up there, like, oh, I can't wait for my next launch. Great, like that's totally fine for you. Um, and I say the same thing with when it comes to like the types of programs people sell.

Speaker 2: 19:59

You can make a million dollars launching. You can make a million dollars selling your course on autopilot. You can make a million dollars with low ticket. You can make a million dollars high ticket, mid ticket, whatever. There's a bajillion ways to do something. It's just about finding out the right for you way. Um, one of the most important things, one of the most important things to consider when it comes to creating your course, is that you want to make sure that you are choosing a topic that you absolutely love. So, number key, number one love your topic. Now, the reason why this is important is because whatever topic you choose to make your course about.

Speaker 1: 20:45

You're going to be talking about it a lot.

Speaker 2: 20:46

You're going to be consistently talking about it, whether that's, you know, inside of your email, marketing, through social media marketing, through partnerships, whatever.

Speaker 2: 20:55

And so a lot of times I see people choose a topic because they've heard other people say, oh well, you should create a course about this, or like you should do this or you should do that, and so they may not be actually interested in doing that topic, but they feel like they should because everyone keeps telling them that's something you know what they should mean. The other end of that that I will say is that, whatever topic you choose, it's always okay to pivot and shift over time. So, yes, it's important to love your topic, but do not become so kind of obsessed with choosing a topic that you love that you know you're going to talk about for a hundred years. It doesn't have to be that. It can be a topic you know you can talk a lot about for the next year. Yeah, like I know, speaking from experience, I've, I've.

Speaker 2: 21:50

I started out with that social media marketing course. At the time. I was super, super passionate about that. I loved it. And then I noticed, hey, the only area that people seem to care about in this course is Instagram. So then I made a specific Instagram course that was only related to Instagram. As I was selling the Instagram course, I got really good at growing, uh, profitable Facebook groups, and so I was like you know what I think I'm going to? Like this is really exciting. Now I'm going to talk about, you know, growing a profitable Facebook group, and so it's so give yourself that freedom, but but really choose something that you are excited, that you're really excited about.

Speaker 2: 22:29

The second thing that I would say is to teach what you know. Now, a lot of people, a lot of people, come to me and they're like well, I don't really know what I should make a course about. And it's funny when they say that, because usually the people that say that they actually do know what they wanna make a course about, but they're nervous it's not like the right topic, right? Usually the people that say that they actually do know what they want to make it nervous it's not like the right topic, yeah, Right, um, because they're starting to kind of censor themselves. Like I know, you have a lot of photographers in your audience, and so they might be thinking you know what? I would love to create a course about photography, but I don't know if I can do that, because I'm like my social media marketing and everything is geared towards attracting photography clients. So, dah, dah, dah dah, and it's really easy to just kind of get in our head and start to censor ourselves about that.

Speaker 2: 23:18

So we do not want to do that, but really make a like brainstorm, a list of all the things that you know, um, I can give. There's one example that I love to give, which is uh, we had one client who was a uh, professional housekeeper. So that's what she did, and she learned over time that the more houses she cleaned, the more money she could make, and so she got really good at cleaning houses. I mean, she had like her own, like her own method, her own system for getting it down fast. Um, and eventually she hired some other people to help her out, and so she was able to share that. She was like okay, here's how we're going to do it, here's how we're going to get fast. So guess what?

Speaker 2: 24:00

Her first course was teaching that system. She marketed her course to busy parents who wanted an easy process. I love it, keeping a tidy home, yeah, now, it would have been very easy for her to sit there and tell herself well, I don't know if I should do this, because this is not a course that, for example, teaches people how to make money. Maybe I should, maybe I should be teaching people how to start a housekeeping business, right, but that wasn't what she was passionate about. She was passionate on teaching everyday people how to clean their house top to bottom in a timely manner, and she was.

Speaker 2: 24:41

So. She packaged what she knew, she put it into a program. It wasn't super high ticket, it was. I think it was like around 200 or $300, something like that. You know it wasn't like a uh. Know it wasn't like a uh, it wasn't like a thousand dollar program or anything. Um, and so she started there. Uh, she did that and she was able to, over time, grow her business to hundreds of thousands of dollars a year and by she did that by teaching what she knew and teaching what she was passionate about and not falling into the trap of, you know, kind of creating a course based on, um, what other people are saying that you, that you absolutely should do.

Speaker 1: 25:21

Yeah, I will say. One thing, though, that I think is important to them and interject here with, is that I think sometimes it's even hard for us to see what it is that we're really good at, because, like I use that analogy of like we can't see the forest for the trees. So I'll use the example of the lady Like you just mentioned. The lady was clean, Like if I were in her position and I, there's a lot of people who would feel this way. There's probably a lot of people who would have been like well, but that's nothing really special about this, it's just what I do, Like it's just another system, it's another way to do things, but it's not like the greatest system, it's not the.

Speaker 1: 25:56

I'm not an expert in this system, and so we kind of second guess or we doubt, or sometimes I've talked about this in the podcast is when I was teaching, I had a teacher I worked with one year on my team and she was a great teacher. But what we all really went to her for was because she had such a knack for organization, Like she could take even with like spreadsheets and different like technology pieces, but then also like systems within her classroom that were really good, but she would not have said that that was what she was really good at. She would have said she was really good at, you know, communicating with the students or building connections with the students, but we were all like no, teach us how to like create these systems. So I do think there is something to be said about like we.

Speaker 1: 28:36

While we like, it's all about teach what you know and what you you know, feel confident in and what you can talk about for a long time. But I think sometimes we also need that outside push of like no but you. This is a really cool new thing that not everybody knows how to do Like. You know how to do it, it makes sense to you, but everybody else doesn't get it. Like they don't know that that's how this should be done or that that's a great system to use. So sometimes I think that outside, that outside voice can be a voice of reason as well.

Speaker 2: 29:03

Yeah, and and I love that you said that because a lot of times, things that come easy to us whether it's something we're just naturally good at, or whether it's because we've developed a system over time things that we're naturally good at we tend to dis, or not naturally good at things that we are good at, we tend to discount the value in our head, because we just start to assume that like, oh well, everyone does it this way, or this is, this, is, this is not hard for me, and so therefore, it's not hard for anyone. So why would they, why would they want that? And so, exactly, I totally agree that with you, that getting that kind of outside perspective and being like what about this cool thing that you do? And you're like this Well, I would love to talk about that, but nobody is interested in that and you're like hello, that's all I want to know about.

Speaker 1: 29:52

Everybody is yeah, no, I agree, I agree. Yeah, no, absolutely Okay. So sorry, I didn't mean I didn't want to like derail us. I was like no. I think there's something really important there too, about making sure we kind of get out of our own way sometimes because we can discount and we can kind of talk ourselves out of those things because we're like no, it didn't Like. For me it's email marketing. Like, I love email marketing. I love setting up an entire email marketing like system in my business. It makes sense to me, it fits with, like my analytical brain and then all that stuff, and I just assume everybody else gets it. I assume everybody else understands how this works. But then I go talk to somebody and they're like but no, what, what is that? What does that mean? I'm like wait what? And so that kind of was one of those like moments for myself where I was like oh, okay, so this isn't something that everybody else just knows how to do.

Speaker 2: 30:40

So yeah, that's a great. I love that. So we have. So number one love your topic, Uh. Number two teach what you know. And the third.

Speaker 2: 30:51

The third piece is that you want to make sure that you are connecting with your audience on an ongoing basis. Now, the reason why I say that is because a lot of times, people have in their heads that you know, oh, this creating and selling a course is like passive income, or you're going to make sales like while you sleep and all of that. And yeah, you can make sales while you sleep. But there's not really anything passive about growing an online course business. It takes a lot of, uh, intentional work and focus and energy and resources.

Speaker 2: 31:36

Um, and it's really, really important that while you are, uh, while you are creating your course, while you're selling your course, that you are staying connected with your audience and that you go into the business of selling courses with the understanding that this is not something that you're just gonna like kind of put you know, make a sales page for put it, pop it on your website and then not really market it, not promote it, not talk about it consistently, not work to improve it over time.

Speaker 2: 32:16

It's gonna, it is going to take some upfront effort to get things going Now. Over time, of course, as your business grows and you're able to hire a team to help you out and things like that, you are going to be able to, you know, kind of have more time, freedom and all of that. But I just want to be really clear about that because I see a lot of times people go into the business of selling courses with this expectation that it's just going to be like super passive and I'm just like what Cause? Sometimes I noticed that in the conversations in my DM sometimes I'll get people, you know, DMing me being like hey, so, um, you know I'm thinking of joining your program, but like I just want to make sure this is really passive because I don't have time to do anything.

Speaker 2: 33:05

Nothing is passive. Yeah, so right, I get in there right away and I'm like so the first thing I want to say is that if you're looking for something passive, do not start a business. Like, do not, don't do that. If you want something like, you can maybe think about investing in the stock market, like I don't know, but this is not it.

Speaker 1: 33:24

Yeah yeah, I feel like there needs to be a different term for it, because passive income or passive, you know, revenue streams has become kind of a hot button term. Yeah, I think that there is some a lot of misconception around that, um, and so I'm like oh, we need a different phrasing for that, because passive is definitely not passive. Yes, exactly.

Speaker 2: 33:47

Yeah, especially not when you're, when you're you know, when you're getting started, and you're in that phase where you're making a lot of mistakes and you're figuring things out and you're you're not super efficient with your time, not because you don't care, but because you're just figuring it out. You don't know what you know, you, you don't really know where the focus needs to be yet, and so, and that's okay, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 34:12

Well, okay, and so I want to kind of go in that direction.

Speaker 1: 34:15

Let's talk a little bit about this idea of making mistakes, because I think that's another misconception A lot of people have is that and again, a lot of this comes down to the fact that we see certain things happening on social media that make it look like it should be so easy, like it should be just as easy as I create this thing, I put it online and it makes a million dollars.

Speaker 1: 34:35

And the reality is that most of the time that the product you're seeing these successful business owners putting out into the world is not the first edit of that thing. It's like a book, like nobody puts out their rough draft of their book. They don't put out the, even the 10th draft. They put out the one that's been polished and refined and fit, you know all the things. And so, as business owners, we're looking at it as like, okay, I've created this course, I've created this thing, that's your rough draft. Like that's the thing that you're going to have to go in and tweak and make changes to, but that process kind of discourages people. So can we talk a little bit about like, what is it? What should we expect when we go through that kind of beginning process.

Speaker 2: 35:19

So the one thing that I that I do want to address when it comes to that is because I see a lot of people make this mistake is that sometimes they get so stuck in their heads about making the course perfect yes, they are comparing their first draft to someone else has who has been selling the exact same course for seven years, who, over time, has built out a team who can have beautiful graphics, everything's updated, dah, dah, dah.

Speaker 2: 35:50

You can't compare your first draft of your course to someone else's. The second thing I want to say about that is the only way to get better is by doing the thing is to putting it out there, and the first draft of your course is probably not going to be your best draft, but it doesn't mean you can't put it out there and start marketing it and selling it. And the reason why I say that is because when you're first getting started, the number one kind of thing that you have to trade on is your time. And so it's true that when you're that, when you put your first draft out there at the course and I don't care how pumped you are, because I know some people are like, well, my first draft is awesome and I totally. I'm sure your first draft is awesome, but let me tell you, five years from now, it's going to blow your mind how incredible it's going to look, and so it's okay to put it out there. And then, when you're first getting started, if, if you have a community, if you have some kind of, you know, live Q and a component or something like that, where you're in there helping people, they're going to get a lot of attention from you because you're still in the draft phase. So you're, you have this draft, you're putting it out there and you're consistently making it better over time. The only way you're going to make it better is by putting people through the program and doing your best to to serve them and and all of that.

Speaker 2: 37:24

But it's not going to get better on its own by keeping it hidden away and just kind of being in your head about, like, all the different ways you can. Um, you know you can make it better or whatever. It's really really important that you just get it, get it out there. And I think sometimes people have in their heads. They're like, well, I'm afraid to put it out there because, like I don't want people to think I'm a scammer and dah, dah dah. Nobody's going to think you're a scammer If you are putting a product out there and you're in the community and you're helping them out like they're going through the course.

Speaker 2: 38:00

People it's you know, of course it's their responsibility to ask questions. If they have a question as they're going through it, and then you're helping them out like there's nothing, there's nothing wrong with that, and then over time you're be you're noticing you know what? I'm getting a lot of questions about this lesson. So now I'm going to go in and tweak this lesson. It doesn't mean that you have to put everything on hold. Stop selling you. You know, until you have it, everything perfect. It's it's okay for it. It's it's okay to uh, to make things better over time. Yeah.

Speaker 1: 38:35

And I think that is a huge piece is like and it not just with this, but just in business in general people want things or think things should be perfect before they put it out there, and sometimes done is better than perfect. I mean, I've bought into courses where, you know, six months in they're like okay, we're going to add this component or we're changing this thing up, or we've noticed, or I've noticed, that this isn't working like this, so I'm going to try it this way. It does not make me feel like I've missed out on anything. It makes me feel like oh cool, I get you know, I get to see the process. I get to like have the beginning thing and this new thing that they're putting out here, like that's pretty awesome, yeah. So my next question kind of follows suit with that.

Speaker 1: 39:17

Let's say that somebody's created a course. They're like okay, caitlyn, I hear you, I put it out there. I didn't wait till it was perfect. I just kind of went out there and started promoting it. I got a few people to purchase and then, but I feel like it failed and there could be a million reasons why they feel like it failed. Like, maybe they feel like it failed and there could be a million reasons why they feel like it failed. Like maybe they feel like it failed because they didn't make as many sales as they wanted to, or because they had people come in but people weren't actually going through the course curriculum, or they weren't engaged in the community, they weren't asking questions. So what do we do when we feel like our course has failed and how can we kind of turn it around to become a successful course?

Speaker 2: 39:55

Yeah, so there's three different, three different ways that you can go about doing that. So, first and foremost, when you are marketing your course, you want to make sure that you are attracting people who are actively experiencing the problems that your course can solve. Now it's really important that when you are marketing your program, you're speaking about problems and the problems that your course helps people solve, but you're speaking about problems that your audience is already aware of. And so let me back up a little bit, because sometimes that sounds a little complex to people. What I mean by that is that a lot of times, as experts, it's very easy for us to see someone struggle with something and we can look at those symptoms and we can skip right, go, drill down right through those symptoms into the root cause. We already know the root cause. We know that's what has to be changed in order to make these symptoms disappear.

Speaker 2: 41:05

But your audience, who is just following you on social media or getting your email newsletter list, they're only aware of symptoms, they're not list. They're only aware of symptoms. They're not. They're not aware of root cause. And so if you're trying to make your course topic about the root cause, which is something that they're not yet educated in um, then that's not going to go so well, because in your marketing you're going to be talking, talking, uh, talking about that root cause problem and but your audience is like, well, I don't care about that, I just want my symptoms to go Like, I just need someone.

Speaker 2: 42:17

So you want to talk about the symptoms, you want to use the words that your audience is using to describe the problems that they are experiencing. What you don't want to do is to kind of get latched into the way that you want to do something, as opposed to the way that would serve your audience best and that would kind of meet them where they are. So, once they get into your course, you can then take them through your process of getting that like getting the root cause problem. So they're, you know, uh, symptoms go away and all of that. But I think for for a lot of people there, it's like there's, they're kind of speaking over their audience and so their audience just doesn't, they don't get it.

Speaker 1: 43:10

Yeah, it reminds me a lot of like I've been to a lot of doctors lately cause I've been having some weird health issues going on that nobody can it mean. It fits perfectly that nobody can tell me what's actually happening with my body currently. But I will go in and I'll be like, okay, these are the symptoms I'm having. I randomly break out in hives, I have what feels like an anxiety attack. I have had to go to the ER a few times because I've passed out, like what's happening? And there these doctors will talk to you kind of over that. They'll be like well, you know, we need to be looking at X, y or Z, which again is what you're saying. They're trying to go to the root problem which I get and I totally respect that for. But sometimes I'm like, okay, great, but how can we make these symptoms stop now, so that I'm not like having to cut my day short because I passed out and ended up in the yard, like you know, or because I broke out in hives for three hours, and so that makes complete sense.

Speaker 1: 44:02

And I think that that is something that also, as business owners, we are so in our businesses, that things that make sense to us that we can see so far upstream. We have to remind ourselves that, like, yeah, even though we can see so far upstream, that doesn't mean that we need to be talking to someone upstream. We have to meet them where they're at and we have to use the language that they're using, which you mentioned, that them where they're at and we have to use the language that they're using, which you mentioned. That which is so key, you know I I hear this a lot in the photography world is photographers will use language around their camera equipment or you know they'll use abbreviations like IPS. Well, your clients don't know what IPS means. Like you have to use verbiage that they are going to understand or it's. There's going to be a disconnect and then you're not. You know it's hard to put the pieces together when it's so far disconnected.

Speaker 2: 44:52

Yeah, so true, um. And then the. The second thing to really consider when it comes to, you know, looking at your offer honestly even if this is if your offer is a service, this would still work, for that, um is that if is that if your course isn't selling the way you want it to. Of course, number one, you want to think, like speak about the problems your audience is already aware that they have and that they actively are looking to solve. But the second thing is you need to investigate why people didn't buy right? So a lot of times people think that if someone chooses not to buy their course, that's the end, like see you later. Oh man, I guess you'll never buy.

Speaker 2: 45:35

And one of the things that I am always telling my clients is if someone doesn't buy, that can actually be great, a great opportunity to improve your marketing If you reach out, connect with them and ask them a few questions to better understand why they didn't buy. Now, when I say to reach out to people, a lot of times they're like well then, am I like hard selling them? No, you're not doing it to try to sell them or to change their mind. It's strictly curiosity, it's strictly research.

Speaker 2: 46:11

Yeah, just research, investigating, discovering and what you, what you want to. What you really want to do again is not think of this as like a passive thing where you're just putting it out there. Nobody's buying. Well, I guess that means I should change my niche. I guess that means I should change my entire course topic. I guess that means I should redo my entire webinar.

Speaker 2: 46:32

Well, before you do any of that, why don't you get on the phone with a few people and figure out why they aren't buying? Because if people are telling you, well, the reason why I didn't buy was it's just, you know, it's just kind of out of my budget right now. For some people, that's absolutely true and it's out of their budget and that's okay. But there's also a section of people that they just don't want to get into the details with you. They're kind of saying, like, well, it's just outside of my budget right now. They're trying to, they're trying to be nice and so they're letting you down easy. Or they might say, well, the timing's just not right. For some people, maybe the timing isn't right, but if they're taking time out of their day to sign up for like a one hour master free masterclass or something like they have a problem and they're actively looking for solutions, right? And so one of the things that I tell people is that the reason a lot of times, the reason why people aren't buying, is not because they don't think your method works. They think it's not going to work for them, right? So they're like you know what? That sounds awesome, that sounds great, and like I see that all these great testimonials that's awesome, but it's not. But I don't think it's going to work for me, because X, y or Z.

Speaker 2: 47:53

As the business owner, it's your job to figure out what. What is the X, y or Z? Because more often than not, their X, y or Z is something that's actually included in your program, but they don't know it, or or you haven't made that clear enough to them. And so when you're having these conversations, you know you want to ask them questions like um, well, of course, at the beginning you know you're building rapport and all of that, but, but you want to ask them questions like you know uh, so why? Why do you think this wouldn't? So why, why do you think this wouldn't? You know why do you think this wouldn't work for you, right? And if they're telling you so, what? And then you can say well, what, what are you going to do next? Right, what's the next plan? Because you want to know what they're planning on doing next. Well, have what have you tried in the past that hasn't worked? Why do you think that thing that in the past that you tried didn't work, like, why do you believe that didn't work?

Speaker 2: 48:47

And so, through that process, you're collecting words and phrasing that your ideal customer is using to describe the problems they're actively experiencing, which you can then put into your marketing materials, into your sales materials. Then put into your marketing materials, into your sales materials, um, and it helps you increase that connection with your audience and it makes your like, if you kind of think of, uh, think of your business like a lighthouse, right, so it's like the you know, rocky internet sees people are out there trying to solve their problems and your business is a lighthouse and you want to make that light as strong and clear as possible. And you're not able to do that unless you really do that active like, uh, one-on-one-on-one conversations with people, and and I get it like sometimes people will say, well, oh yeah, I did that once, you know, and it's like, okay, we've got to do it more than once. Yeah, it needs to be an ongoing part of your routine, whether it's once per quarter, you do like a thing where you're like you know what, the next couple days I'm just going to be getting on the phone with people that it up because the market shifts and changes, and so the what one thing that I've noticed is for people, including myself, who have had a course that they've successfully sold for over five years, is that the needs of the market are always shifting and changing, and so it doesn't mean you have to change your method, it doesn't mean you have to change your course, but you have to change the way you talk about it to effectively meet the needs of the people.

Speaker 2: 50:27

Right, and and and, because the world is always changing, like you have to be abreast of that. And sometimes people think, oh, you know what, people just don't want my course anymore, like it's been so successful for you know two or three years, and now I guess people just aren't interested and I'm like has your marketing changed? Well, no, I'm just doing what worked before. It's like, all right, well, good luck.

Speaker 1: 50:49

I need to shift it up.

Speaker 1: 50:50

No I always use the analogy of it's like still advertising in the phone book Once the internet came along. Like you have to. You know you have to adjust, you have to shift, okay.

Speaker 1: 50:59

So quick question on the collecting kind of the information with these conversations, for anyone who's listening, who is like, oh my gosh, the idea of getting on a phone call with these people and the idea of like even just let's say, you have your people coming into your sales funnel, they're on your email list and you've kind of segmented them out of like who purchased, who didn't purchase. So now you're going to be like cold emailing, not cold, but you're emailing these people saying, well, you set up an appointment with me, yeah, so do you think that that can? It can be? Uh, I don't want to say as effective, because the actual conversations are going to be top notch, yeah, do you think sending out like a survey to those people could be as beneficial for someone who's like I don't know that I'm, I'm wanting to just get on these phone calls with people. I don't know how honest they're going to be, how forthcoming they're going to be.

Speaker 2: 51:52

Can a survey work. Yeah, so here's what I would say about that. Here's how a survey, here's how we use surveys to fit into that process. Okay, so you know how, when you do a sales call with someone and so you have them fill out an application first before you get on the sales call with them, so it's the same kind of thing. You want to have them complete a survey first before you get on the phone with them, so the survey pieces can be automated.

Speaker 2: 52:16

So whoever goes through you know, uh, your series of emails and does not buy, then then, after things close, then you send them the survey and say and just ask them like two or three questions. One question is like hey, you know, aside from, uh, aside from money and time, you know, uh, what prevented you from enrolling in this, uh, in this program for now? Right, and they'll enter whatever. It's usually like, they'll put like one word. Usually then they're just like money or time, or they have like one sentence right, yeah, that's fine. And then this, uh. The second question is like you know, if I could wave a magic wand and change anything about this offer to make it a complete no-brainer for you, what would it be? You know, and and sometimes they'll be like honestly nothing, like it sounds really good, timing's just not, timing's just not right, or or they might be like well, I think I'm actually looking for someone to do this for me.

Speaker 1: 53:10

I don't want to do it myself, right.

Speaker 2: 53:12

Whatever it is. So it's like okay. And then the third question is like would it be okay if I reached out to you for more like for more information, right? Um, if yes, then can you list your, your email down below, and so you're only reaching out to people who have already said like, hey, I'm open to further conversation, and so then you can email those people like, hey, like, I totally appreciate you filling out my survey, even if they just left one word responses, that's fine. Um, you know, I totally appreciate you filling that out. Would would, I'm doing some, you know, market research.

Speaker 2: 53:46

Would you mind getting on the phone with me for, you know, a five or six minute conversation where I'm just asked, like asking you a few more questions and whether it's phone or zoom or whatever it is that you want to do, um, it like a lot of people will be like sure, because they like to give their opinion, and sometimes we think, oh, oh well, do I have to offer them a gift certificate and exchange or a free this or free that? No, you don't have to do any of that, you're just asking. Like a lot of times people will be like yeah, because they want they people like to be helpful yeah, they like to have their their voices heard and their input.

Speaker 1: 54:21

have you seen, um, through doing this? I really love this, this strategy that you have here and that you know, the having that sort of pre-qualifying little questionnaire is super helpful, because then you don't feel like you're kind of just pushing and they also know too, you're not doing this to try to get them to convert into a buyer.

Speaker 2: 54:37

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 54:37

Have you seen any kind of like rates, of like the people who get on the calls with you, who do ultimately become buyers?

Speaker 2: 54:48

That's a good question and I have no clue I have had. I have had some clients report back to me and say, caitlyn, I know you said this wasn't a sales call, but they ended up buying, like, at the end of the call they were like, well, maybe I do need this. Yeah, you know. So it's true that some people do end up buying, um, but, but really the point of it is to go.

Speaker 2: 55:09

But I wouldn't approach it with that intention, yeah, that expectation, and instead think about it as what information am am I going to glean from these, uh, from these interviews, and how can I put it in my sales and marketing to attract a hundred new customers, right? So, so, not so much fixated on them, but I will say that a lot of times you know, when you're creating especially whether a lot of times like short form social media content, those conversations are a great resource to create short form content because all of the individual specific things that they bring up in those calls, then you can. It's kind of like you're making a response video. You're not saying it's a response video in the short form content that you're making, but it but it is for you, cause you're thinking, you're in your head are thinking that you're talking to that one specific person, knowing that there's millions of people that share those exact same, exact same things. Yeah, yeah absolutely.

Speaker 1: 56:12

Oh my gosh. So so much good information here. Is there anything else you want to touch on? Or that kind of cover most of the things that we want to.

Speaker 2: 56:20

I mean, I know we covered a lot, I know. So I think for now this is good. Overwhelm anyone.

Speaker 1: 56:26

I was like we went through a lot, but I think it was I mean, even for me like it was good to kind of hear. Um, you know, I feel like I've been doing courses and programs and memberships for a while now and I've had some that have been really good. I have some that have flopped. I have some that like I wish I had stuck with a little bit longer. I wish I'd met you, you know, six years ago and I could have been like, okay, I don't need to throw the baby out with the bath water, like it. Just because I didn't get a million people buying doesn't mean that the course was a bad course. So I think this has been incredibly helpful for everybody. Listening, um, before we go, tell everybody where they can find you or learn more about you or, if they want, want to work with you, how can they get ahold of you?

Speaker 2: 57:07

Oh, so the? So the best thing to do would be to check out my website, caitlinbatchercom. Uh, you can sign up for my free masterclass there, which is all about how to generate launch size revenue without launching. You can find, uh, my podcast there on my website and the but if you want to, you know, send me a personal question or something like that.

Speaker 2: 57:32

you can definitely do that through Instagram, so please do not send me a message through Facebook. My Facebook messenger is real chaotic. I don't really go in there. However, instagram DMs that's the best way to kind of chat with me one-on-one.

Speaker 1: 57:46

I agree, facebook messenger is a hot mess. I will take Instagram DMs any day. Well, caitlin, thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for all of your expertise. I know there's a lot of people listening. They're going to like either jotting down notes as quickly as they can or saving this to come back to, to listen to again and again, for more notes. So we really, really appreciate it and I look forward to chatting with you again soon, thank you. Thank you so much for tuning in this week. If you enjoyed this episode, I would love for you to take a screenshot, share it to social media and don't forget to tag. Girl means business and, as always, we greatly appreciate any reviews you leave for this podcast. Thank you so much for being here and we'll see you next week.