This Boring Business Lesson Can Make You Millions...

It's kind of like dating. You sleep with the person further in the conversion cycle. But optimizing for number of people you sleep with is the wrong metric to optimize for.

Oftentimes, in the early phase of your business, you know too many things and you do too few things. This is especially true if you're really smart, you're studying all these things, you're learning all these ways that people are growing, but your sales aren't moving. That's the case in this coaching call today with Sean. Sean shares how he is selling a product and is getting about a sale and he just can't break through. And I tell him that he needs to adjust his process because he's optimizing for the wrong thing.

In fact, I tell him that he.

Should not be optimizing for sales, that he needs to be optimizing for something else. And by doing that, his sales are gonna go up. If you're in the early phases of your business, you're really gonna resonate with this.

And I bet that if you put.

Your attention on optimizing for what I tell Sean to optimize for, you will get more sales as well. If you want personalized advice like this, you can hang out with us on our Thursday coaching calls inside the 1%. And if you want to join them, go over to capitalism.com1 and fill out an application. We'll see if we can get you on your road to a million dollars. Let's go hang out with Sean.

I've been kind of stuck for a while in like a sale a week. And I think it's.

I.

And I had a kind of epiphany like a month, a month or two ago about it's because I'm not really behind my brand and my product. I believe, although that I'm working really hard on it. I had a Facebook campaign and I got like 49 add to carts, but then I didn't get any sales from it. And I was like, okay, this is so close. And then I was thinking about the page. I was thinking about optimizing the page better. And then I kind of realized I need to just completely change the brand. And my idea was I was going to change. I was going to have a podcast, I sell tea and. But I've decided to rename the brand after the name of the podcast and I just kind of want to get your kind of feedback. The podcast name is going to be the T Tapes. And so now that the brand is going to be called the T T Tapes and The T tapes is kind of like an experiment in journalism and product. So we're a media company that sells a product, tea. And our vision is to awaken the planet through tea, both literally with the tea products and metaphorically through the media we produce. You can kind of think of the company as what something would look like if a journalist were to open an e commerce store, brand company. And the, the customer I'm reaching out to with this first product, who I've.

I know how to talk to.

They're kind of like a personality within the T tapes. And so the, the, the first, first product is. It's like the people's tea. This avatar is like the everyday working man or woman that cares about current events, world affairs and social justice. So I used to be a journalist. This is why I'm, I have a passion behind this.

So Sean, I'm enjoying where you're going.

With all of this.

Okay.

I can tell you put a lot of thought into this and part of my job is going to help you simplify this great into, into something that is a little bit clearer because it's a little complicated at the moment. So before we go there, tell me about this sale a day, how you're getting it, where the customers are coming from. Like tell me about what is. Right now.

They're mainly coming from an email list that's like 120 people.

And then I have like a Instagram, it's like a hundred followers. When I started I, I sold tea at like pop ups. And so some of those sales are coming from in person transactions that I had done at one point.

And where are people buying from you online right now when you're doing that sale a day? Where is that coming from?

Oh, not a sale a day, a sale a week. That's worse.

Okay, so the traffic that like where does, where would somebody buy your tea right now?

They buy it at my website.

Okay, so they buy, they buy it on your website. Are you on Amazon right now?

I'm not on Amazon.

Okay, Is there a reason why you're doing it all on your website and not on Amazon? I, I'm. It's fine whichever way you want to go. But tell me your rationale.

Amazon was confusing to me at first and I was trying to control it all. I don't have, I don't care if you, if you tell me, hey Sean, you need on Amazon, I'm gonna figure it out how to do it tomorrow. And that's one of my questions, actually. Should I be on Amazon after? I just Heard Gold Mamas. They were like, we just put it on Amazon, and then a month later, we didn't have any product. I was like, shit, yes.

Yes, you should be on Amazon. I'm fine with someone taking sales off of Amazon if they have an audience, marketing experience, an agency that they're working with to build up funnels. But if you don't have any of that, you need to make it as simple AF for people to buy from you.

Okay?

And that. And that's Amazon.com. it's still. It's still the best option for people to be able to find you, buy from you, and have the product in their home. An acquaintance of mine, his name is Brian Lee. Brian was the founder of the Honest Company with Jessica Alba. He was also the founder of Legal Zoom. He was the founder of Art of Sport with the late Kobe Bryant. He was a founder of Shoedazzle with Kim Kardashian. And I heard him say once that a win for their company is when the product shows up in their home. That's the win. The win is how is. How is the pro is the product being received at home and displayed somewhere. So we're indifferent as to whether they buy from our website or Etsy or Amazon. We're indifferent to this. But we need. At the beginning, we need to make it as easy as possible for someone to become a customer and that, especially with something like T. That's Amazon.com so, like, step one, yes, you should be on Amazon now. Before you go and rebrand and rename the company and go in a completely different direction, could you take the same purpose of what you're trying to do, of raising awareness, raising consciousness, awakening the planet? Could you take that same purpose into the brand as it currently is today?

I could. It's also easy for me just to change the. To flip the name out.

Okay. I mean, like, follow your heart on this one. But I would discourage you from making a whole bunch of wholesale business changes this early in the process. Unless you were like, you know what? I never wanted it to be that brand. I wanted it to be this brand. It's early. I'm gonna make the decision to go in this direction. That's fine. Like, you have my blessing to do that, but don't make the changes because you're like, this isn't working. I think this will work different because the truth is, Sean, we haven't tried yet. It's too early to say we gave this a real go. We're not on Amazon. We haven't built a real audience yet. We not documenting the process yet. You haven't built your traffic triangle yet. You're not communicating in the way that you want to be communicating long term to the audience and to the customers. So we haven't made a real go at that brand yet. So are you changing because you genuinely desire this other direction more, or is it because at. This isn't working, I need to throw it out and start all over.

I think it's sort of a mix. All right.

This is a decision you'll have to make for yourself and your business. I just want you to know that I don't think you've failed on this brand yet.

I don't feel like I failed.

Right. Like, I don't think. I think the branding's wrong. I don't think that's the problem.

Yeah. I feel like it's just because I don't have passion about who I'm trying to talk to and how I'm trying to tell this story.

So could, so can. You can change that, right?

I can do what you're saying.

You can change that without changing anything else in the business.

Right.

So. So step, like, step one, yes, you should be on Amazon. Step two, communicate to that person, regardless of what the brand is called. I, I have someone I worked with very closely for years that was doing $7 million a year and then had to completely rebrand everything because of a miscommunication in the marketplace with a brand that looked a lot like theirs. And, and it was fine. New logo, new packaging, new name, new color scheme, new ads, same business. So, so it, it, it's not as hard of a pivot as we perceive it to be. And I mean, Sean, I've changed the name of my podcast, like, four times. So. So, and people are still here, so you can always make that change. I just want you to know you can start communicating to that person and get sales even if the brand doesn't change.

So when I'm doing. If I, if I go, I put my product on Amazon. So. And then I'm. And I send out an email with a link to where the product's going. Is that going to the Amazon site or should it be going to my site? Or is my site being able to buy through Amazon for, for.

So we have. You can look up YouTube videos or trainings inside the 1% for getting set up on Amazon, but for the. Until you're doing a consistent 25 sales a day, you should send all traffic to Amazon.

I'll send it there. Okay.

You should, you should and if you're. If you've got traffic coming from Instagram or an ad, you should be sending it to a place where you collect an email and then you send them to Amazon. If. Have you watched the training about the traffic triangle, Sean?

I have.

I have my traffic triangle set up.

Okay, tell me about your traffic triangle.

So my traffic triangle is going to be the podcast, and it's kind of like a newsy kind of thing. And that's one question I have. So I'm. I'm passionate about what I want to do with the, the podcast, but I'm kind of not selling tea anymore. You know, I mean, I'm doing what you're saying, though. It's like a brand rather than the, the product, but it's kind of. I, I think you referenced this once to somebody else that has a tea thing, and you were telling them, look at creatures of habit. And, And I look at that. That guy is. But he's very focused on what he's selling. He's selling this. The oats.

Yeah, yeah.

So that's the. That's like the hopper.

Slash traffic, and then Instagram and then my email.

Okay, very good, very good. So let me clean this up for you a little bit. Instagram is going to be your traffic.

Okay.

Podcast is your hopper, and your email list is your conversion source. That's your traffic triangle. So how does all of this flow? When there's a news item that you want to talk about, you do a podcast about it.

Right.

You do a daily show, a three times a week show. However you do it, that's your podcast. You're going to clip that up, and that's going to be your Instagram exposure with your opinions on what's going on from the context of awakening the planet.

Right, Right.

You're gonna talk about. Every podcast is sponsored by your tea, where you can get 20 off if you're a new customer. If you go over to awakentheplanet.comt.

And now we just need to run this process for long enough until we have a little bit of an audience.

Okay.

And over after about 90 days, something's gonna happen.

I want to run ads right away and, like, kind of like prime the pump, you know, while I'm building the brand with the podcast and utilizing the traffic triangle and everything. Is there, like an average order value that I should be aiming for in order to like.

I think that's the wrong question for where you're at in the business right now. Instead of focusing on average order value, I want you to focus on cost per email.

Cost per email.

Because here's, here's what you're going to do as you're like your job right now, Sean, is to be building your audience. So what I would do if I were you is I would take the clips that got the most views and shares on social media. I would run those as ads with calls to action about what you're trying to do.

So you do, you do a news clip about the current election and your take on it and how the world needs to awaken more than ever.

Right.

One of the ways that we're doing that is by putting out content and selling tea.

So not, not ads for sales, not ads for conversion. You're trying.

This is not the metric I want you to measure right now. The metric I want you to measure is how you're getting email addresses on your conversion list.

Okay.

Is there, I can, I can tell you are a thinker, Sean. Every time I say something to you, it goes into this very full bucket where you're like, I keep it all here. How does this, how does this, how does this compute?

Right?

So okay, I want, I want you to go break some, like, go make some messy mistakes and, and run. And if you're gonna run ads, run it for exposure and measure it on. Are you getting followers and, and email addresses? We look, we, we look at it like it's kind of like, it's kind of like dating.

You sleep with the person further in the conversion cycle. But optimizing for number of people you sleep with is the wrong metric to optimize for if the goal is to be in a long term relationship. Right. So what do we optimize for quality first dates?

This is, this is what we optimize for. And so what do we need to do here? Yes, we need to have a profile that stands out. Yes, we need to have a few ideas of places we're going to take the person, but we're optimizing for quality first dates. Tiffany, I'm so glad you're in the green room. You're the only one who understands me. Thanks for laughing at my jokes. So, so Sean, that you're looking at quality first dates. So in the context of business, followers and leads, what does that look like? It means what content do we advertise that gives someone a really good experience to be like? I agree with this, I resonate with this. I want this, I want more of this. I want to see this in the world.

And then the next date is.

I've been following this dude or this company for like a month. What is this tea that they're selling? Second date, third date, they sleep with you and they buy your tea.

Okay, great. I like that.

So if you, so that's what, that's.

What we need to optimize for. I, I another way that I like to look at it is easy yeses. So if you look at my marketing, if you look at how I interact with people on social media, if you look at how I make connections with influencers, if you look at how I people get people to speak on my stage, there is sometimes a year of easy yeses first. And those easy yeses are things like, do you want to come on my podcast? Are there things like.

You know, I do things when people apply for the 1%. I sometimes do video reviews of their business, and I'm like, hey, I just, I saw this and I saw this and I saw this. Just wanted in case we never see each other again, just want to give this over to you. I know the team's in touch with you, right? And that's like, it's an easy way for me to contribute to them for they're like, geez, it's an easy yes for me to take the sales call, subscribe to the podcast, want more, right? And if it's done from a place of genuine service and contribution, like you're doing with trying to raise awareness for how, where you think the planet should go, that's when you're going to attract the type of person who wants what you have to buy.

It's just not the thing to optimize.

For at this point in the business. I've got to move on, but does that make sense?

That's great. That's really helpful. I appreciate it.

Very good. John, great to see you. Thanks for being here.

Bye.

Bye again.

In the early parts of your business, you know so many things that you could do, should do, and it feels overwhelming because you just need to get some momentum. You just need to get those first dominoes to fall. And as I tell Sean in this coaching call, optimizing for leads is sometimes better than optimizing for sales. There's a different energetic exchange that happens if publicly you're just saying, give me sales, give me money, come join my thing.

But when you're getting people to raise.

Their hand first and get into your audience, it becomes a much clearer, cleaner, easier way for you to drum up those initial sales. If you need help with your business on your road to 100 sales a day, that's what we specialize in the 1%. We help entrepreneurs get to a hundred sales a day because a hundred sales a day is just four products at 25 sales a day at a $30 price point, which is a million dollar business. That's what we do inside the 1%.

And if you'd like to hang out.

With us and be a part of.

These Thursday coaching calls, you can apply.

For a spot over@Capitalism.com 1. I'm Ryan Moran with Capitalism.

Com.

Thank you for being here and I'll see you on the next episode.